The Diseased Stranger

I used to think that I have had bad days before. Getting fired, fender benders, losing my wallet. These used to all seem travesties in my peanut mind. I don't think that way anymore. Not after what happened last year.

The whole thing is still fresh in my mind. A beautiful spring Friday. The outside air brisk, but no too chilly. Birds sang sweet and lazy, perfecting their forgotten summer song.

Looking out the window at the park across the street, I could see the grass. It was emerald green silently bending from the dew. Lying and waiting. Ready to attack some little kids sneakers, that would undoubtedly go sloshing through, damning his laces to be wet until noon. The sun had been up for awhile now, but it was still friendly. I leaned into the window, letting the light coat my skin with the warm glow that only a May morning could provide.

I spent the entire morning at my job as usual--screwing off. I was in the back pretending to fold pizza boxes, when I overheard my boss, Alfredo, the don of pizza, talking about leaving early. Alfredo was fifty five going on a hundred, A bald headed and big bellied man. Years of stress, drinking, and pizza eating were etched into his face and body. He was a living monument of unhealthy. I couldn't really knock him though. He was a good guy to work for.

I heard him say something about his clubs. Golf! I loved how much of my boss' time this sport occupied. I did feel sorry for the golf carts, however. Three hundred fifty pounds of man and probably another forty pounds in clubs. Quite the load for those little electric engines.

He'd be gone in an hour and wouldn't be back for the rest of the day. I spread the news to Tony and Maria. They were pumped.

As soon as the boss left, Tony our long haired hippy shift manager grabbed some Budweiser's from the take-out fridge. He handed us each a twenty four ounce can and went into the back to make a phone call. Today was going to be slow anyway.

Me and Maria cracked our beers and started talking. Maria was a pretty girl. Five foot five, copper skin, thick frame, with curves everywhere. She always wore tight tank tops that let just a little bit of fat hang out of the bottom left and right sides. The love handles. I always found this slightly irresistible. Tony thought it was gross. He was pretty critical for a hippy. I thought they were supposed to be nice?

Maria was mostly quiet, but she was sweet. She never had a mean thing to say about anybody.

She pretty much only ever talked about her boyfriend though. He was locked up for selling/stealing drugs or something. Doing five to seven years, I think. Although her love for him was truer than true, She tried to kiss me last year after the Cinco de Mayo party. Being a faithful man, I gently held her back and said that I couldn't. But, being a man I'd have to admit that I had liked the way her body rubbed against mine as it happened. I guess that might be why I was a little hot for her love handles.

Tony asked us if we wanted to smoke a joint. I usually didn't care to, but having consumed most of a 24 oz Budweiser I was feeling a pretty courageous.

Having tapped out early I was the first one back into the shop. Coming in through the delivery door, I got a whiff of something awful. For a second I thought we were being invaded by an army of old shoes.

Some dirty, ragged looking guy was standing by the sliding glass soda fridge. He was one of those guys that seemed to be having the worst day of his life, everyday of his life. Our boss usually kicked people like this out on sight. I never had to heart to do that. Especially when I was alone in the shop.

"How can I help you?", I said.

"I'd like a bottle of water please?", He said

"Uh, the water is over there," I said, while pointing at the other sliding glass fridge, "Go ahead, it's on me."

The man studied me with these electric blue eyes, gazing into mine as if he was trying to silently thank me. Getting a better look at him, I'd have to say--he wasn't a bad looking guy. I giggled inside as I imagined that I was meeting the most handsome homeless man in the world.

He took two bottles. He drank one right there, and put the other one in his pocket.

I grabbed the air freshener out of the bathroom and sprayed it around the shop. The guy had left but his essence was still among me. I chucked a couple of slices of meatball pizza in the oven and my mind drifted over to my girlfriend.

Today was our five year anniversary and I was thinking about asking my girlfriend to marry me. The trouble was, no one was tipping the pizza man with a diamond rings. Honestly, I was pretty broke. Sure I had an apartment and a car, clothes and a guitar, but not much other than that. I started thinking about how I would propose.

Maybe we'd be sitting in a dimly lit room. I'd be feeding her mind some of her favorite slow jams. Dinner in the oven, wine and flowers on the table. Shit, as funky as I was feeling now, I might take all of the blankets, pillows, and candles that we owned and construct some sort of Persian love den in the living room.

Fantasies aside, I didn't really know if I was ready to marry her. The thought of being with someone everyday for the rest of my life was a bit daunting. Plus, I'd never get to fondle Maria's love handles. I know it's wrong, but damn.

Tony let me out early. It was really slow and we weren't getting any calls for deliveries. As tight as my bank account was, I still couldn't be mad about getting to leave work early on a beautiful spring afternoon. Still feeling stoned and slightly drunk, I walked outside into the bright blue day.

I was cutting through the alley behind my apartment complex when I saw him. It was the same ragged man from the pizza place sitting slumped forward with his back against the brick wall of the laundromat. His knees were tucked into his chest, His wild beard compressed against his knees. He was clutching a piece of paper and crying. It was strange to see a bum cry. I've honestly never seen that before.

I hesitated before approaching and asked him if he was alright. Keeping his gaze down, he shot his arm up, displaying his hand signaling that he wanted some help standing up. And I'm not particularly afraid of germs, but this was guy was asking a bit much from me. This guys fingernails weren't dirty. They were black.

The idea that this guy might be a veteran popped into my head. He was the perfect age. He was thin, but not too skinny. He could have been muscular, but it was hard to tell given the layers of clothing that this man had on. He was dressed like he was ready to shovel snow all day. Given that the temperature was in the high seventies, I found his garb a little odd.

He grabbed a plastic water bottle off of the ground next to him and feebly took a sip. A small stream split off from the corner of his mouth and ran down his chin. He wiped his face and it made mud.

I pitied him.

This poor guy had been chewed up and spit out by Uncle Sam. Joined the military to pay for a college he couldn't afford that he was now too fucked up to attend. The least I could do was help him stand up. Besides, my apartment was right there, and I could always just wash my hands.

I stretched down and helped him to his feet. As I let his hand go the man's posture changed immediately. He stood erect. Shoulders back. Ready to take on the world. He looked me in the eye for a solid five seconds. More than enough time to completely freak me out.

He took the piece of paper he was holding and folded it up into a tiny ball. He leaned forward and dropped it into the breast pocket of my t-shirt. Before turning the corner, he turned around and gave me a feeble salute.

The good feeling of helping my fellow man was replaced by a sort of cold dizziness as I walked into my apartment. My girlfriend, Katie, had just moved in with me this month. Today was her day off and she had been putting in a rather serious shift on the couch.

On the television were a bunch of housewives, berating one of the ladies at the table for acting like she was wealthy, when the fact was that she was only rich. The shrill voices coming from the television made my head hurt.

Of course they were all drunk and not any sense, but who cares? The fact that they all lived in mansions and drove nice cars seemed to be captivating enough for them to be all over television promoting their half ass products. I swear these shows are just one long commercial, with make believe fights thrown in--just to keep the dummies drooling.

Katie jumped off the couch and hopped onto me, clinging like a barnacle. Being that she didn't weigh all that much, I never had any trouble holding her up for a few. My legs wobbled from her weight and we both went crashing down on the couch. She searched my face with look of anxious concern.

"What's wrong honey", she said, as she stole my hands with her little fingers, "Am I really getting that fat?"

"No. I'm just feeling off", I said. She disappeared into the kitchen to get me glass of water.

I reached into my pocket for my cell phone and felt the piece of paper. Being so freaked out by the whole ordeal in the alley had made me forget that it was even there. I unfolded it. It was a note

"If you are reading this you already have the disease. It is wildly contagious, but easily cured. It is spread through hand-on-hand contact, but it is also cured by hand on hand contact. Once you touch someone it leaves your body and goes into theirs.

Depending on your immune system you have three to five hours before it kills you.

Sorry."

My girlfriend came out holding two glasses of water. She set them on the table and held the back of her hand to her forehead. "I don't feel well either", she said.

She wasn't lying, either. She looked like she had just swallowed a scoop of used kitty litter. Her face was sweaty and flushed. Her skin almost grey. She shuffled towards me, and I grabbed her hands.

I felt like motor oil had been poured into my brain. Katie looked like a clay-animation character and the world looked like jello. The ladies on television were still fighting, and looked uglier than ever. Everything went black.

My buddy Nick told me about lucid dreaming, where you realize that your dreaming in the middle of a dream. He said it happened to him once before. He flew around his bedroom and then up into the sky. He told me he loved every second of it. I began thinking that I was having a dream too. But, why was everything so dark?

I woke up.

The smell of vomit slapped me in the face, bringing on a bull of a head ache. God, I was thirsty! I grabbed the glass of water on the table above me and chugged it down. My bones ached. I felt sick and was sweating all over. I pushed myself up off of the ground and grabbed a sweat shirt out of the closet.

Katie sat in the corner looking back and forth between me and the note. The cordless phone lay by her feet and the television was off. Thank God.

I shot across the kitchen and threw up in the sink. Meatball pizza, and Budweiser. Fantastic. I sucked water from the tap and wiped my mouth.

Katie was talking on the phone. She had called 911. I know she was just looking out for me, but the thought of dying in a sterile white hospital bed surrounded by a bunch puzzled doctors did not suit me in the least.

I grabbed the phone, careful not to touch her hand and threw it against the wall. Panicked, I ran out of the door. Katie shouted a bunch of stuff that I didn't even try to understand. All I knew was I had to give this to someone else. Someone who didn't deserve to live.

Images of my mom's ex boyfriend flickered in my mind. Just picturing his face ensured my decision even further. Coming on six or seven billion people strong, I’m sure the world would be just fine without another guy who hits women. Or, a little kid for that matter.

The memories that I had fought for years to repress came boiling over. I could see everything. Glenn walking in drunk. Staggering through the kitchen. Singing songs that he had to have made up. I can remember as an eight year old thinking how dumb they sounded, which is pretty pathetic. But, Glenn was a pathetic asshole and my venomous hatred of him was probably the only thing that kept my mind off of the pounding headache that had only gotten worse.

My mother would tell me to go to my room. And I always listened. Glenn came home drunk. I went to my room. I'd lean against the door and tune in to what I could. What started as whispers usually ended in loud thumps and yells. Sometimes the loud noises seemed to be good. They made me feel weirder than weird, but I could deal with that. It was the crying that set me off.

Fresh off of a tenth birthday, I remember feeling like I was now a bigger person. Dammit, my age was in double digits! I remember instead of getting all of the little candles scattered around my cake, I had a big wax figure of the number "10". It sparkled and everything. It was definitely my mom's idea. Glenn couldn't think of stuff like that. He was too drunk and too dumb.
Anyway, later that night I had heard some yells.

I was in my room wearing my new jeans, as well as my blue and white striped t-shirt that I had just gotten that night, along with my new white Ked's. My mom had lied and told me that Michael Jordan makes them. I believed it.

My plan was to sleep in all my new clothes, shoes and all, so I could wake up, eat breakfast and jump onto my bike showing off my new outfit to the neighborhood. But it was hard to fall asleep when you heard your mother crying. Besides, I was ten now. My age was now double digits. I had to see what was going on.

The image of my mom sitting in the kitchen with her shirt half torn off, bruised eye and a swollen lip stung my mind. It brought that long forgotten headache back on. The pain was brilliant. My sight went white as I puked up the water that had been sitting in my gut. I grabbed the back of a bench and sat down. The mental drama un-paused itself and played out in my head.

My mom was lying on the ground yelling at me to go to my room. My fists were balled. Glenn yelled at both of us about how hard he worked to pay the bills. How he can't have peace of mind in his own house. And then threw a cookbook at my mom. Luckily he was drunk because he missed. I swung at Glenn, hitting him directly in the balls. He backhanded me, sending me into the kitchen table, my head bleeding from the fall. Blood leaking onto my brand new t-shirt.

My mother cleaned me up and slept with me in my room that night. She rocked me back and forth and told me she was sorry. I really was going to kill this motherfucker.

I tried to stand up from the bench, but the world went black.

I had passed out in the afternoon and awoken to the night. My eyes were overcome by a brilliant white light. I heard a voice. All of the stories of people seeing the white light were true! I had died and was going to heaven. Just as I came to peace with the fact that I was leaving my physical body, I felt a sharp kick to my side.

A police officer stood over me shining a flashlight in my face.

"I'll give you ten seconds to get out of here, before throwing your ass in the back of my car", he said, in the condescending tone that police officers seemed to have perfected through the years.

I stood up feeling both better and worse from my little nap. The head ache was gone, but I felt weak and ached all over. My temperature had to be around a hundred and five. I mumbled that I was sorry. The cop listened to some garbled message over his radio and turned it down.

He said, "Why don't you go be sorry somewhere else. I've got more important things to do."

The classic small town cop lie. They never had "more important" things to do. Ever. At that moment I thought about reaching out and grabbing his hand. I'd give this guy the disease and run for it. Being in and out of trouble in my youth, I had never exactly grown to love cops anyway. I could see him get uneasy as I stared at him. He gripped his pistol.

A car pulled up. My car to be exact. My girlfriend was driving with some clean shaven, long haired guy. As sick as I was, I can remember feeling pissed about this. Sick for three hours and this girl already replaced me? Life was getting pretty old at this point.

Katie and the guy hopped out of the car and ran towards us. Katie was holding a blanket. The guy opened his wallet and pulled his out his marine card. He spoke in a slow southern drawl. "Sorry officer, my buddy here just came home. Having a pretty tough time." The cop looked at me, and then back at the guy who was with my girlfriend. He released his pistol and nodded his head. "I understand". I was glad that I hadn't grabbed the officer's hand. Turns out he wasn't a total asshole.

The long haired guy slid the card back into his wallet. He was a handsome guy, good build, and had the electric blue--My mind accelerated into a brick wall. Emotion surged through me, coming out as angry tears. I lunged for him and fell over. I couldn't get up. So I yelled from the ground.

"Katie what the fuck? This is they guy! What's going on?"

The cop asked the guy if I was okay. The long haired marine nodded and picked me up off the ground. I feebly kicked and punched him all the way to the car. He took my hand in his as he sat me down in the passenger seat.

I immediately felt better. I was still so thirsty, though. I reached into the backseat and tore open a case of bottled water. Katie rubbed my leg from the drivers seat as I chugged my bottle down to the plastic. I was already starting to love her again. The bottled water had to have been her idea. She was so good about stuff like that. Always prepared. We watched the officer get into his car and drive off.

The fact that I had milled around, going back and forth on the pros and cons of marrying her seemed ridiculous to me. Not anymore. It was a done deal. I'd just have go get a ring and talk to her parents. All of that stuff that I used to dread doing suddenly seemed wonderful. I held her hand.

Katie started the car and put it into drive. She looked like she was ready to forget that any of this had ever happened.

Out of her window I saw the soldier hunched over, staring at the ground. He stood up and gave me a feeble salute, before hobbling away.

"Kate, stop the car."

She ignored me, tapping her hands on the wheel, waiting for the line of cars to pass so she could pull out. I reached back and grabbed a couple bottles of water out of the case. I opened my door and hopped out of the car.

I could hear her yelling but I didn't care. I threw the bottles of water by the marine's feet and asked, politely as I could, "Who are you and what the fuck is going on?" He bent over and picked up the water. He took small sips as he sat on the ground.

"You don't have to do this", he said.

"Yeah, I know I don't. Actually, I'm deciding whether or not I should kick you in the head? All the bullshit you've caused me and my girlfriend today?"

"I apologize", he said, "And if you want to yell at me while I die, go right ahead" He checked his wristwatch. "I only have about thirty minutes left."

He looked up at me with those sorry blue eyes. I hate to sound redundant but damn, was this guy handsome. The long hair CIA thing probably went over well with the opposite sex. At least back before he started transmitting diseases with his hands.

Katie honked the horn and yelled something that I didn't bother to decipher. The marine finished the bottle of water and looked at me as he opened the second one. I told him to get into the car with us. I had a plan.

Katie threw a fit when we got into the car. She opened her door and stood outside of the car, looking at me like I had to make a choice between her and the soldier. I slid into the driver's seat, and peeled off. Probably not the highlight of our relationship, but I didn't want her coming with us anyway.

I grilled the marine, watching him in the rear-view mirror as he smoked a cigarette and gazed out of the window. Without looking at me he asked, "What's your plan?

He looked at his watch. "I only got about twenty seven minutes and counting." He exhaled a plume of smoke out of the window and rested his head in his hands.

I put my signal on and turned down one of the back streets. Traffic on the main road was a little congested and I didn't have much time.

"Do you mind telling me what the fuck your deal is so I can make up my mind?", I said.

The marine took a pull off of his rapidly decreasing cigarette and flicked it out the window.

"My name is Ryan Young. After returning from two tours in Iraq, one in Afghanistan, I was called to serve the CIA. A lifetime dream of mine."

I looked into the rear view, making sure that he could see my eyes, I wanted him to see that I didn't give a shit about his lifetime dreams. At least not at the moment.

"Anyway, they were developing a biological weapon that was supposed to deal with terrorists living in America. My assignment was to contract the virus, pass it to a double agent who would then pass it to the leader of one of the most dangerous terrorist cells currently operating in America today.”

He lit another cigarette and pulled hard. I looked back in my rear-view mirror waiting for the rest of the story. “Yeah, so? What happened?”

Without blinking or even looking at me he just stared out of the window and said, “I don’t know.”

I’m not going to lie. I was rather let down.

“That’s it? That’s your story?"

I made another left. The street names and businesses all started to become eerily familiar. I knew this place, but I hardly remembered it. I looked back into the rear-view and said, “You’re just some guy who was supposed to assassinate a terrorist, but got dumped by the CIA and left for dead?”

He flicked his second cigarette out of the window and threw the soft pack of Marlboro Reds on the floor of my car.

"I really don't know. I'm thinking that the operation just got shut down."

The thought of being abanodoned by the country that he had loved so dearly had apparently caused him to wretch. I rolled the windows up and cranked the heat. I remember how cold I was.

He grabbed a bottle of water out of the case and took a bird like sip. He sat hunched over, staring at the back of passenger seat's head rest. It was obvious that he didn't have much time left. Fondling the bottle in his lap he asked in the calmest, most casual way possible, “Where are we going?”

I looked up in the rear-view and said, “My mom’s ex-boyfriends house. We’re gonna kill him.”