Paths

It was nearing the end of another minute, another hour, another day and another week tracing undeniably bland paths through monotonous doldrums, without purpose. Trying to impress, but feeling rather empty. Reaching for something, yet left lonely. Last call had already happened. A night had been lost to vain attempts to infuse novelty into the corners of a city strewn with old brick walls and gutters of refuse left unswept. It was drizzling slightly. In the small puddles the capillary waves of the gentle raindrops scintillated in the rays of warm yellow street light diffracted through the faint mist. Walking the alleys on the way to retreat to a familiar place to sleep, colored disco lights could be seen in a room several stories above, with an iconic saxophone solo fading away into lyrics whispering to me as I walked away; “Share it fairly but don’t take a slice of my pie.” Staring at the ground a small black book suddenly presented itself before my feet. It looked rather freshly arrived. Not particularly dirty and not particularly wet. So conspicuous and dapper why not open it? The first few pages had an odd little ledger of some sort of address followed by a number and what was probably an alias.

3T54y1FpXz712NmQviEGr4yiJd65PjW8Ly……..5.36………Mr. Chuckles.

It enticed such curiosity that after a few paces, protruding along the ground from behind a row of trashcans, the ghostly pale shape of a human hand exacted attention long after it could have been noticed. The air seemed to become heavy with foreboding. The night suddenly seemed to become both silent and loud. A piece of gravel under the sneakers sounded like the roar of a tree erupting in flames. There was a sudden and overwhelming fear of being watched that crashed down like a mighty wave. Behind from whence I came it seemed the shadows in the street grew long. Deer died in the headlights. Pressing forward I was seemingly pulled into a narrative that enveloped the essence of what I was by a force indifferent towards whatever outcome thereof would inevitably become interwoven with my fate. Slumped along the ground behind the waste bins was the body of a man staring unblinkingly at the dark sky, a single bullet hole on his forehead serving as the headwaters for a weakly flowing pool of blood on the pavement. The night grew louder. Quieter. An electric impulse tingled up my spine behind the skull. What were most likely the quaint vocalizations of rodents rummaging through a dumpster half a block away echoed down the alley like a piccolo commandeering a chaotic treble over the orchestra. There was fear. I pressed forward in the direction that would bring me closer to the familiar. Closer to home. Furtively I rushed, stuffing the little piece of evidence I found into my pocket. Looking everywhere and seeing nothing; yet feeling as if the eventuality of the possibilities before me were being written by an omniscience that watched me as I went. As I came to the perpendicular alley bisecting my path there was suddenly the awareness of rushing footsteps; the heart palpitations easing when the knowledge they were rushing away from me came with the receding strength of the echo and the silhouette of a man in a wide brim hat running down the perpendicular alley. At such speed he must not have been able to hear much. Down the other sides of each alley I saw nothing. I followed as quickly and quietly as possible. I became captive to the intrigue of the running man.

At speed he crossed into the street lights; the black coat now visible, waving with him as he ran. But as he did quite suddenly and unexpectedly the roar of a large engine ricocheted down the alley ahead of the sight of a speeding car hitting the man towards its front passenger side. He was thrown forward out of sight and as he did so an item seemed to be flung from his coat back towards the alley. Simultaneously as it happened red and blue light began strobing and siren’s wailing. The recognition of police insignia on the car stimulated a feeling of cotton balls in the mouth and an inclination to swallow. Why was the car not heard sooner, either by me or apparently him? Why weren’t the headlights seen? Did the wash of the streetlights obscure them? The coincidence with the sirens initiating as the man was hit? Was he simply not seen?

The questions grew amid an escalating sense of confrontation. The night seemed frozen with red and blue light strewn into the opening of the alley ahead; there was a palpable anticipation of contact with a police officer who may have just inadvertently committed vehicular manslaughter. Time stretched into countless partitions awaiting a seemingly inevitable outcome. But the moment never came. The blue and red light washing into the visible cubicle of Chesnut Street at 3:14 Am faded and disappeared. All lights were off in the buildings above. Perhaps the image was a trick of the lighting? That the man had passed behind the car? Had dove sideways behind an obstacle to avoid being seen? Perhaps that he was imagined altogether? Perhaps the whole thing was a dream. Regardless of whether or not it was a dream there were questions to be answered.

Who killed the first man? The cacophony of the silence became an asset. I felt like a moth surveying the casualties of a quiet Sudetenland. Approaching the end of the alley the shadow and shape of an object could be seen on the ground. It appeared to be a manila envelope. It presented itself perfectly in the patch of light immediately before the alley, begging to be inspected. Reaching down for it and glancing sideways the crumpled body of a man, wrapped in the dirty, wet, black coat, could be seen laying motionless on the edge of the street. There was no deceit of the light. No mistake. Nothing could be seen down the street in either direction. The impulse to help could not be quieted and whether or not someone saw him sneaking in the night became of lesser importance. Approaching him blood could be seen draining from his ear. There was no pulse. Despite it was only the second ever encountered, the static countenance of the dead had become familiar. Retreating back to the safe dark entrance of the alley the manila envelope was grabbed with a magnetic protuberance of the inquisitive. A sense of safety in the darkness grew simultaneously with an existential dysphoria. The foundations of what was assumed of the world had been eroded into a hollow husk devoid of the trust which had been assumed to exist. If 911 was called the first officer to show up, just a few blocks away, would almost certainly be the one culpable in this man’s death; thereby making whoever made the call, me, the only witness to his crimes. I could become a suspect in another death. Framed? What had previously been a ray of hope in an emergency had become a forbidden labyrinth of jeopardy.

Before the envelope was opened it almost seemed obvious what could be expected inside. There seemed a limited number of items that could sew together this dysphoria into any sensible series of cause and effect. Striding in the darkness and reaching inside the envelope revealed two vacuum sealed bags containing small stacks of hundred dollar bills. Two men just died because of this. To put it more accurately at least one was killed because of this. The letters surrounding the meticulous water marks and anti-forgery foils read “IN GOD WE TRUST” above the print of Independence Hall. Numerous little Benjamin Franklin’s stared silently outwards with an expression that seemed to betray an unease and disappointment at suffocating beneath the tight plastic. Indeed if the bags were cut open he would certainly still have the same expression, suffocating under the display of some sort of moral dilemma that grew out of this creation of which he was a part. How many deaths around the globe are the result of the tortured situations that result from its existence? Was it my obligation to care? There were ten little stacks overlaying each other in each bag. In each stack there were certainly multiple bills. When looking sideways each little stack seemed to contain considerably more than five bills, but it is difficult counting stacked paper. It appeared ten bills was the most reasonable expectation; which meant each of the two bags contained ten thousand dollars each. Twenty thousand dollars. What could be done with twenty thousand dollars? Did this money find it’s way to me for a purpose? Can I turn it into authorities without somehow jeopardizing things I take for granted in my own life? Is it wrong to keep it? Can I donate it? Could I actually trust someone to use it in a constructive way and not just for themselves? Could I even donate it while remaining anonymous and not implicating myself in some plot in which I was never involved? Are my finger prints on the bag? Am I still being followed by someone…..?

Rushing down the alley the shadows seemed to grow and ebb, threatening doubts and insecurities and fear as they did. The questions pounded inside with each passing foot step. Was my curiosity about what was inside the envelope indeed what caused, or in the least allowed the set of circumstances initially possible for, the deaths of those two men? Am I guilty for the suffering and deaths of people the world over simply because my mind has accepted the premises which make it possible? As the quaint rain drops coalesced on the fibers of my clothes the images of the man slumped behind the trashcans, the man getting hit by the car, the red and blue lights fading against the walls lining the street, the curious black book and the envelope of cash now tucked under my jacket sequenced through my mind. An unsettling sensation of being “placed” in this situation crept in. The shadows behind and forward became ominous. Mr. Chuckles. The macabre irony of the alias as it pertained to the context in which it was discovered were seemingly raining down. What is my life worth? What is the worth of any life? There was the sensation of something grotesque, unsettling, and sick subsuming me that needed to be purged from the soul lest it was too late. As the corner was turned on a familiar home stretch the eye was greeted by something which would have been surprising if not for the instant understanding that it was “meant” to be there. In a desperate attempt to alleviate the anxiety carried by the withering onus of questions the envelope was withdrawn from the jacket and tossed into a burning trash can fire, aside which huddled an old homeless man. His white eyebrows and beard curled around his wrinkled face like the unfurling fronds of a fern. As the envelope began to burn open revealing it’s contents, immense guilt and shame were felt knowing the penniless man would see vast sums of money burning before him. I opened my mouth to speak, to apologize, but as would a pastor trying to damp an enthusiastic confession of petty transgressions from the innocent the old man raised his hand and finger as if to demand silence. He said “If it were not for money there would be no rich people or poor people…….only people.” As I stared into the fire countless little images of Benjamin Franklin’s face peeled away one after the other in little tornadoes of embers that danced and swirled high into the air, carrying my eyes into a universe of stars that had become revealed by the easing mist.