Thanksgiving Food Stamps

One day he met an old, brown-skinned man.

His head had charcoal-colored eyebrows, silver-colored hair, and a white, scruffy beard. A half-smoked cigar smoldered in one hand and he held a shot of tequila in the other.

A red, blue, and green shawl wrapped over his shoulders.

"Hola, señor, my name is Jesus," he welcomed the young man into his little office. Jesus kicked his feet up on a desk, and offered, "Care for a drink, amigo?"

"Thanks but I'm looking for a place to stay. I read you were renting out a bus?" He said.

"Sí, señor, I have a bus that no longer runs. But, once it ran for many years across the border when I carried workers back and forth. I named it Up North because that's where it went.

When I wasn't driving the bus, I ran a junkyard. My father owned a junkyard, and before him, his father too.

As far as I can remember there was always a junkyard in my family's history. What is another gringo's trash is another man's treasure." He gulped a shot and refilled the glass.

"I followed my gringo wife to America. She is gone but, now, I have another junkyard." The end of his cigar glowed. The shot glass emptied again. He let out a long sigh.

"Can I see the bus?" He looked out the office window.

"Sí, follow me," he replied. The old chair squeaked as he got up.

The young man followed him through his junkyard of dead cars and parts.

"This is it," he pointed to an earlier 1960s model Harvester school bus.

Up North rested on rims.

Without its tires, the angle of the bus was so precarious that he had to sit on the side facing the doors or he'd slide off the driver's seat.

Once filled with the sound of Mexican workers, it was now a motionless heap of rusted metal. All that remained were empty booze bottles. Fast food bags, torn clothes, a broken nylon-stringed guitar, and a ratty sleeping bag. Most seats were torn out and converted into a living space.

"I'll take it," he smiled. His cat jumped on his lap and meowed. "How much do you want?"

"It does get cold at night, señor," he pulled his shawl tight around his neck.

It was the night before Christmas Eve and the young man tried to imagine the darker part of winter. As long as he had propane in the camping stove it heated the bus and food.

He thought of ways to fix up the bus like insulating the window cracks with electrical tape.

"I charge $30 per month," he said, scratching his chin stubble.

"I will return tomorrow with the money," he told him. "Is it okay if I stay here tonight?"

"Sí, I don't mind. I lock the gate at night. I will leave you a key," Jesus agreed. "The cats," he added, pointing beneath the bus seat, "keep them junkyard rats away."

Jesus left the young man to settle in.

The only light came from a hurricane-styled oil lamp. A moth was hungry to land on the beam of light. Trapped inside, now pecking at the glass, refusing to die, and looking for a way out.

Below the back windows where it read emergency exit, he saw a flashing, snowplow light illuminate his footprints in the early evening snow.

He tried to curl up next to the cooking stove for warmth. His soul wandered the bus frame.

He blew into his hands for more warmth and tried to play the left-behind guitar.

He turned off the pretend bus motor and crawled back into his sleeping bag. Tomorrow was an early start if he wanted to get a low number at the Emergency Services office."

In the morning, he made his way to the state office building. It was downtown near the courthouse. Inside a gothic-styled building above an iron gate, a sign read: County Department of Welfare.

Above a pigeon-infested exterior, the great cosmic on/off switch was on and ticking: 7:30 a.m.

"Damn it, I hope I'm not too late," he said to a person at the end of the line.

The courthouse clock gave up seven bongs. The sound of an unchangeable past made on the ever-moving present.

The door at the front of the line opened. It was a steel door with no glass, a brick-framed job with bars in front.

The line was one block long and made up of society's downtrodden.

He noticed young and old, half-dead, sick, some with kids, camped out along the sidewalk like a ball of used paint rags.

On one side of the line, spiritual recruiters handed out time-share condo deals for the afterlife. Lured by food and the promise of a better life some of the destitute reached out with a forgotten hand.

Over 100 souls pushed and shoved their way into a filthy, matchbox-sized room. Under headache-inducing fluorescent lights, the unventilated, graffiti-covered space had 20 metal folding chairs.

The chairs were taken, so he stood for a while and then sat on the floor, and waited his turn. There was one bathroom and no water. The social workers called it the "processing area."

One social worker explained, "It's a deterrent so you'll want to go right out and get a job!"

Everyone was assigned a case number, on a first-come, first-served basis. He received the number 89. Wow, he could wait all day. He should have camped in line overnight.

A radioactive cloud of cigarette smoke boiled above his head.

His papers arrived several hours later. Fill them out wrong and it was back to the end of the line. He didn't know his social security number and didn't have an address, so he invented them.

Line one on the questionnaire summarized: is there any reason to prevent you from working today?

At least that's the way it was until Mr. Vape entered the picture. Mr. Vape (he pronounced it vaw-pee) was his caseworker.

"Number 89," announced a voice over the intercom.

"That's me," he called out, waving his number like it was a winning bingo game.

"Mr. Vape is straight ahead past the green partition." An armed guard at the entrance told him, pointing to a maze of cubicles decorated with holiday ornaments. "Straight past the red and green partitions, turn left at the Santa."

The long hallway leads to bright red, green, and gold partitions zigzagging in a crazy maze.

With large files on their desks and blank absent-minded expressions on their pasty indoor complexions the case workers looked dead.

No one paid attention to the young man in orange Day-Glo sneakers, bellbottom pants, buckskin jacket, and shoulder-length hair.

He found a cubicle with the nameplate Mr. Vape. Department of Welfare and sat down.

Vape raised his voice like a train was running through.

"Hey, everyone… look. The rock star is back!" he said with a chuckle.

The room was filled with fake coughing. Without looking up from his desk Vape licked his waving finger.

Weighing his case file with both hands, he gave him a sneer, and let it drop upon his desk with a loud thud.

Vape's long nose turned upward. "Looking for another free ride, I presume?" Vape scowled, meaning to intimidate. "I have news for you." He trumpeted. "You're to report for work next Monday morning - 7 a.m., Room C at the courthouse… basement level."

He took off his tennis shoes and rubbed his cold toes. "How can I do that? He questioned. "I am not old enough to work. I turn 16 in a couple of months."

Infuriated, Vape pulled at his blonde poodle-like toupee. Wondering what to do, he angrily lifted the black receiver of his phone.

"Hello… is this Becky's Cafeteria?" He spoke into the receiver, staring at the young man in disgust. "Yes, I'd like to speak with Becky. Becky…Yes. This is Mr. Vape at HCW. Yes, I'm sorry, I know you're busy. I have a new dishwasher for you. Yes, I know you're a high-class restaurant. Um, no, he hasn't gone through dishwashing training. What difference does that make? Hello, Becky. Are you there?"

Vape set the receiver down in silence. From his shiny, white forehead down to his pointy chin, all was rocket thrust.

"The opening was filled," he grumbled, and like a deck of cards - he gathered up his files and shuffled them off his desk.

"You know, Vape," he cleared his throat. "I wouldn't mind going to school."

Vape swiveled in his chair; an eye popped out. "And what type of school, pray to tell, do you suggest?" He spewed, "I read your file. It said music school. That's completely out of the question. We build future taxpayers, not vanity trips."

Vape held his head, laughing more, and teased. "Can you carry a gun?" Then he hurled Army enlistment papers at his chest, adding. "Don't shoot your foot off."

"But I'm not old enough to be in the military either," he argued.

Vape went through his case file again. "Where are your parents anyway?" he asked, with more disgust on his face. "Are they dead?"

He answered with the first idea that popped into his head. "My family moved away."

"Why didn't you go with them?" he probed.

"Well, they didn't ask me…" he explained.

"What are your plans then? You can't keep coming here the rest of your life for rent credit, food stamps, and bus tokens," he closed his file.

He knew deep inside he was right. Begging for a handful of dimes was a dead end.

He could have used a break, a role model, even his parents - anything except the hard knock. Feeling vulnerable, he acted defensively and shouted. "Someday, I will be a success. You'll see!"

"Listen to the rock star. Someday you're going to wake up and find out life's a bitch and then you die. No one cares about you or your stupid guitar," he laughed more.

He stood up and pointed at him like a bad joke, the nearby cubicles had another belly laugh.

"Take your monthly emergency services packet and hit the bricks. I don't want to see you back here again," he growled, handing him the packet.

"Life's a bitch and then you die. That's it?" he repeated, stunned.

"I've heard enough out of you. Beat it, rock star," he raised his voice again, motioning toward the door.

On his way out the door, he noticed a young woman with a child. She was panhandling. The young man approached and she held the child with one arm and extended her brown hand with the other.

In a Spanish accent said, "Por favor, señor, my baby is hungry. Can you spare any help?"

He gave her half his food stamp ration. "It's all I have, I'm sorry."

"Mucho gracias, señor. Feliz Navidad," she blessed him.

"Merry Christmas to you too," he hugged the family with all his might. "Do you have a place to stay?"

"No," she shook her head.

They stared at each other.

As the daylight disappeared under a freckled-white downpour of frozen rain, their silhouette turned into gray slush.

He placed her backpack over his shoulders. "Follow me. I have a bus and it's not far."