Delivery

The New American Landscape. Endless rows of gleaming autos crawling the arterials of golden commerce. Leave behind the tired and the poor, escape the huddled masses, find a place where you can breathe free. Unseen in the rearview, in the parking lot of a dying mall, waits a dying man.

The man has been bruised, beaten, broken, his lifeblood spills onto the concrete. The car he waits by is no better off, their dripping fluids mingle before draining into the sewer. They both wait for the car's owner to finish her shift and appear. The man waits because she is a nurse and his sister, she may be able to save his pathetic life, as she has done many times before. The car waits because today is payday, and perhaps this time there will be enough to fix the leak in the transmission. The car is named Charlie. The man is named “George, stay the hell away from me, I mean it this time.”

A woman is approaching, sensible shoes on her feet, slightly soiled lavender scrubs on her torso, a sensible can of pepper spray at the top of her easily reachable purse. She is no stranger to stranger danger or the hazards of living alone in the city. The late afternoon sun gleams off the shiny fluids leaking from under her car, she pauses to retrieve her spray. She works the clinic in the dying mall, and knows the sight of blood, even if it is mixed with transmission fluid. She takes a wide arc around the car, pepper spray at the ready, only to see her stupid dumbass brother George, lying up against the wheel.

“George, what the hell are you doing here?”

He jerks his head up, not having heard her approach. His face is a swollen mass of darkening bruises.

“Help me Anni. Please?” His pathetic swollen lips can barely make out the words.

“No way George. You need help? You call an ambulance. I ain’t getting involved in any more of your drug dealing bullshit”

George struggles to reach into his pocket. His left arm is clearly broken, and he can’t reach into his pocket while sitting down anyways.

“Please Annie” he blubbers “I’m not a dealer any more, I swear. I’m a corer,,, currer,, “ His swollen and cracked lips won’t make the word come out, “I’m a delivery boy.”

“I don’t care George. Whatever you are into, whatever caused, THIS,” gesturing to his injuries “I want no part of it. You hurt me too many times George. I can’t help you any more”

The man gives up trying to reach his pocket, and instead struggles to stand, disappointment and pain searing across his face. He bumps his left arm, a flash of pain collapses him back to the ground, all progress towards standing lost.

“Sit still dumbass, I will call the ambulance for you.” Says Annie, her voice a little softer, but not soft enough she would tend him any direct medical aid.

She puts away her pepper spray to retrieve her phone. She looks around the massive parking lot, identifying landmarks to direct the ambulance. As the operator answers her call, she hears a scraping noise. Whirling around, heart racing, she sees George limping away, cradling his left arm. There are blood smears on her door, bloody handprints as well.

“What is the nature of your emergency?” Asks the neutral sounding operator.

“Sorry to bother you,” says Annie “ I thought I saw something, but it was just a dead rat in the road.”

She waits until he disappears from sight around the corner of the mall before relaxing her grip on the phone. Pulling a pack of wipes from her purse, she hopes there are enough to clean off the blood. The neighborhood she lives in is full of sharks.

#

Drought had long since struck the land of opportunity. The East side, once home to bistros and bodegas, now held pawn shops and bail bonds. Towering above the street, its mighty facade slumping in the sun, a once proud apartment block creaks under the weight of humanity's bottom rung.

On the second floor a door is open to a studio apartment, exit blocked with a broken down baby gate. Inside, in the heat, in his thoughts, a man sits on the couch which is also the bed.

Another day, another rejection. “The position is no longer open, your resume will remain on file for 6 months” said the form letter. Duncan knew it was an auto response. He should not take it personally, yet it was hard not to. Six months he had been applying to every logistics job he was qualified for, and not one interview, not even one response from an actual human.

Oh, there were plenty of jobs available, lots of work for those who were willing. But as a single parent, he needed more. Minimum wage would barely pay for daycare, leaving nearly nothing for food, rent, clothes, medicine, crayons, soap, toilet paper, an ice tray, baby shampoo… His mind had wandered again, thinking of all the things money could buy, and all the money he didn’t have. Unemployment only went so far, and his late wife's life insurance had run out long ago. Once he had prayed for everything to return to normal. Now he just prays for deliverance.

Duncan took off his glasses, setting them down next to his barely functional laptop on the one table. He looked at his daughter, gleefully eating her store brand Loop Oh’s. That was the last box of cereal they had. He wondered what was in stock today at the food bank. He rose from the table to make ready for the journey. As he packed the travel bag for Shara, he lingered with the stuffed frog. It was the last gift his late wife had purchased for their daughter. Wife and Daughter had gone to the grocery one day, and then there was a truck, and thank goodness Shara was safely strapped into her car seat. But his wife? Duncan was crying again. That was two years ago. He still cries nearly every day.

But here was Shara hugging his leg. Duncan dried his tears.

“Ok girl, time to put your shoes on.”

“To the park?” She asked, eyes hopeful.

“Sorry baby, not today. We need some food. We are going on the bus.”

Shara thumped her almost three year old rump into the floor, disappointment crawling across her face. She didn’t cry though, she hardly ever cried. That was something daddy did.

Near the bus stop the pair waited in the sun. Shara in her pink shoes that were almost too small, stuffed frog held tightly in one hand. Her other was wrapped around Duncans fingers. They waited here, 10 yards from the bus stop, because it was currently being lived in by a person of indeterminate gender who was shouting bible verses at what appeared to be a fashion doll.

Shara released his fingers. Duncan looked down in concern, she had dropped her frog and was fiddling with her shoes.

“Whats the matter girl” He said, as he squatted down.

“Hot feet” she said, plopping down on her rump on the cracked sidewalk.

Duncan pulled off her left shoe and saw how her toes were curled up inside the sock. He helped her uncurl her toes, and held the shoe up against the sole of her foot. It was clearly too small. Putting on a brave face, which seemed to be his only face besides despair, he said

“Ok baby, I’ll carry you”

He took off the other shoe, stowed both in his bag. Duncan picked up Shara, and lifted her up onto his shoulders, just in time to hear the bus drive by behind them.

The next bus to this stop wasn’t for another hour. They used to come more often, but public transit never seemed to get enough money any more. Not like the new stadium or convention center. Not that anyone from this part of town would ever visit those places. This neighborhood, this apartment building, this was the last stop before homelessness. He looked at the person in the bus stop, still preaching to the doll. He wouldn't end up like that, he couldn’t. Not just for himself, but for Shara also.

The resolve of fathership straightened him up a little taller. There were things that needed doing, even if he had not found a job today. He needed to make it to the food bank, and just maybe they had some shoes for Shara also.

Duncan knew of a transfer station about a mile away. He figured that was better than going back home, even if it did mean carrying Shara on his shoulders. It's not like there were any more shoes for her there anyways. Part way there was an old shopping mall. It had been a happening place once, full of joyous teens, pretentious stores, and endless noise. Now it was a few box stores, a gym, and a clinic. Not even a food court.

Duncan cut diagonally through the parking lot towards the transfer station. It brought the pair near the truck loading docks, but it saved a lot of time over walking all the way around the gigantic and mostly useless parking lot. They rounded a corner, and had a brief bit of shade. The sudden transition out of brightness caused Duncan to miss the wet spot on the concrete, his foot slipped, and the pair nearly tumbled.

Shara let out a shriek, Duncan a rare curse, as they recovered. Heart pounding, Duncan peered at what he had stepped in. It was dark and wet and also sticky. His brain flopped over as he realized it was not oil, it looked like blood. And not like what he saw on TV. This was far more real, and there seemed to be a trail of drops. His eyes naturally followed them to a pile of trash at the bottom of a loading ramp. No, not trash, that was a person.

Duncan looked around for help, but this was a vacant corner in a dying mall. No help would come. Shifting his arms to hold both Sharas legs with his left, he pulled out his phone and bumbled it until he started recording. Regretting the choice even as he made it, he walked them down the ramp towards the person, taking care not to step in any more blood drops. As he got closer it was clear this was a person who was lying on a pile of trash. A man, pale and bruised, vacant eyes staring upwards, left arm unnaturally bent. Flies were crawling on the mans face.

Duncan stopped recording and called the emergency number, all hope of making it to the food bank today had been lost. He was desperate, but he was still human. Shara was fussing, she was hungry and tired. Duncan tried to calm her, but he couldn’t put her down, at the same time he described to the operator what he saw and where he was. The loading ramp was far too dirty to put Shara down, he continued to carry her, but after the phone call, they went back to the top of the ramp to wait for the police. Then he saw, near the top of the ramp, a leather zipper pouch. The kind used for bank deposits. It was right near the large splotch he had slipped in. It looked old and dirty, but not like it had been lying here for years, this was recently dropped.

Duncan stared at the pouch. It probably had been dropped by the dead man, he must have stumbled here before going to the end of the ramp. The police would want to know about this. It was old, nobody used zipper pouches to deposit money any more. Yet he remembered the bus stop resident. An image flashed in his mind of Shara reciting bible verses to her stuffed frog while wearing rags. Shaking his head clear, Duncan looked around and not yet seeing the police, he carefully knelt and picked up the pouch, then quickly took several steps away. Away from the blood, away from the body, away from the guilt of picking up what was probably evidence.

Duncan found a relatively clean spot of parking lot and set Shara down. He risked a quick look into the zipper pouch before stuffing it into his bag. A squad car was now approaching. Duncan had never been in trouble with police before, but he hoped he would not have to stay too long answering questions. Based on what he had seen in the pouch, Shara would be getting new shoes. As many pairs as she wanted.

#