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If I head for one of the benches in the park to eat, I’ll have the best shot at slipping away without immediate notice. It might give me just enough time.
“The usual?” He holds up a foot long in his metal tongs.
I smile. “Yeah.”
“One for him too?” Alton nods to his left, his eyebrows raised in question.
I follow his direction to the lump of blankets on the sidewalk fifty yards away, and surprise pushes aside my escape planning for the moment. “Is that Eddie?” Has it been six months already?
“Yup. He’s been hanging around here for a few weeks now.”
“And?”
Alton shrugs. “Hasn’t scared away my customers yet. I think his eyesight’s gotten worse, though.”
Maybe Eddie’s time in prison has helped where nothing else ever has. “Give me two dogs. Please.” I always buy an extra meal when Eddie’s around. Alton has guessed that he’s someone to me, but he’s never pressed for details.
I tuck a twenty under the napkin dispenser on the counter and wave away the change, as always. I’ve lost track of the meals the kindhearted street meat vendor has given me over the years, when I was starving and couldn’t pay for them.
Gripping both in one hand while I huddle under the umbrella’s shelter, I make my way over, ignoring the horn that blares of warning from the curb. The closer I get, the more potent the stench of stale urine and body odor becomes. “Hey, Eddie.”
The man peers up from beneath his soiled quilt, squinting against the rain. Or perhaps it’s to make out what’s in front of his failing eyes. They cut his hair and beard while he was inside, so he doesn’t look nearly as straggly as he did when I last saw him, and he’s put on a few pounds. He’s lost another tooth to decay, though. “Is that you?”
A painful lump stirs in my throat. “Yeah.” At least he’s aware tonight. “How are things?”
“They won’t let me in at St. Stephen’s anymore,” he grumbles.
“That’s because you threatened to kill a volunteer there. That’s why you went to prison.” It brought me comfort, knowing he had a warm, dry place to sleep and three meals a day, even if it was courtesy of the county jail.
“He tried to poison me. I saw him do it with my own eyes.”
I bite my tongue against the urge to remind him that it was fresh parsley that the man—a schoolteacher volunteering at the soup kitchen—sprinkled over the shepherd’s pie. Forget his weakening eyesight, Eddie’s so far gone to delusion, he won’t hear any version of the truth other than his own. “Here. I brought you something.” I hold out both hotdogs for him.
His eyes narrow as he studies them, not making a move.
I sigh heavily. “Come on, Dad, it’s me, Romy. You need to eat.”
After another long moment, he accepts them with a grimy hand. Tucking one under his quilt for later, he scrapes the toppings off the other with a swipe of his dirty thumb. Sauerkraut and mustard splatters on the sidewalk beside my heel, a few yellow drops hitting my hem.
“So? Things are okay? No aches or lumps or anything that you should get checked out by a doctor?” He’s a forty-nine-year-old man who could easily pass for seventy, the decade of living on the street aging him far beyond his years.
“Watch out for the demons. Especially the ones with the twisty horns. They’re here, walking among us, wearing our skin.”
The foolish shred of hope I held coming over here evaporates. Nothing has changed.
“I will. Definitely.” It used to gut me to see this version of my father—perched on milk crates and park benches, ranting about monsters who lurk in the shadows and feed on human souls. That was back when the memories of our old life were still fresh in my mind.
Once, long ago, we lived in a two-bedroom apartment in East Orange, New Jersey. My dad was a line supervisor at a factory that made bolts and screws, and my mom was a grocery store clerk. I took swimming lessons and played soccer. We ate dinner at six p.m. sharp and would drive to a farm every fall where we would spend hours searching for the perfect pumpkins for jack-o’-lanterns.
I lost that version of my father the night he witnessed a woman’s brutal murder in the parking lot at work. He claimed a shadowy monster with wings and curly black horns was the culprit, tearing her apart with its talons, and that a witch channeling flames from her fingertips banished it back to Hell.
He was never the same after, spiraling down a tunnel of hallucinations and paranoia that no medications or doctors were able to treat or explain. He lost his job, we lost our apartment, and eventually, it became unsafe to be around him.
We tried to get him help, but we had no money, and the system for people with no money is made from safety nets riddled with holes. My dad slipped through every last one until he landed on the street where he’s been ever since.
I spent years angry and pretending he didn’t exist, and then years weighed down by guilt and attempts to help him—arranging doctor’s appointments he refused to go to, housing he wouldn’t stay in, buying clothes he’d lose.
Now, all I have left to give him is a hollow heart, a cheap meal, and a few kind words when I run into him on the street. I have my own problems to deal with.
