No Free Lunch

 It was beginning to turn overcast as I pulled into the drugstore parking lot.  I was hot, tired, running late and anxious to get home before the rain and I didn’t notice the crazy man right off.  When I looked up, he was half-standing, half-crouching in front of the car’s hood, hands raised to the level of his ears, fingers curled claw-like.  It made me think of a scrawny bear in attack mode with a flat top haircut - a ridiculous image - but there was no mistaking the menace in his twisted features and contorted body.  He was alternately leering and shouting. I was about to turn the key in the ignition when he suddenly shambled off and approached a pick up truck three rows down and began pounding his fists on the passenger side window.

Hongry!  I could hear him yelling, I'm hongry!

The headlines being what they are these days, I might've just said the hell with it and gone on to a different store but it would've been troublesome and he was three rows down so feeling relatively safe, I left the car and made my way to the store.  He continued to roam the parking lot in his dirty green work pants and grease-stained yellow tee shirt, shaking his fists at the empty cars and shouting incoherently. Not your everyday homeless panhandler but surely not actually dangerous, at least so I hoped.  Once inside the drugstore, I could still hear him ranting and cursing.  More than one customer suggested that someone summon the police but the manager shrugged.

I bought my cigarettes and was about to leave when what's left of my liberal conscience kicked in.  

Never give money to an addict, I could hear the voices of a half dozen aftercare counselors saying, Buy his lunch, pay his rent,  get him some clean clothes and a haircut but never give him money.

I turned around and picked up a ham and cheese pre-packaged sandwich, a carton of milk, and a chocolate bar.  It wasn't much and I wasn't at all certain I wouldn't regret it but the 60's me still speaks up every now and again and the voice is hard to ignore.

Hongry!  I could hear him shouting to the gray sky, I'm hongry!

I approached him cautiously, offered him the plastic bag, tried to smile.  He glared at me with dark, angry eyes and for a moment it hurt my heart to see a human being so beaten down and lost.  Then he snatched at the plastic bag, peered inside it, flung the contents onto the ground and defiantly stomped them to smithereens.  When he was done, he held out both hands in a gimme gesture.

Money!  he growled at me.

I shook my head and began to back away just as a police cruiser slowly pulled in behind him.

Ma'm!  the crazy man snarled, Money!

The police officer - young, muscled up, fresh-faced but deadly serious - stepped smoothly between us and asked if I was alright.  I assured him I was fine.

Sir, he said quietly to the crazy man, Ya'll need to move along now.

Hongry!  the crooked little man protested but it was hollow now and his shoulders were pitifully slumped.   There was no fight left in him.

The officer glanced at the remains of the sandwich and milk, the smeared chocolate and the torn plastic bag.  He sighed.

Ya'll need to move along now, he repeated,  Can't have you litterin' and scaring the customers.

The little man looked from him to me and back again.  I silently cursed for listening to that damn 60's voice.

Don't make me arrest you, the officer warned.

But it wasn't to be.  The little man stubbornly stood his ground and the misting rain began to come down harder.  By the time the officer handcuffed him and put him in the back of the cruiser, his sad yellow shirt was sticking to his thin chest and his green pants were damp with rain.

The cruiser pulled out with its passenger and the rain washed the parking lot clean.