Day CLXlX

The Jackass

     “Hey…Charley is det you?” I asked.

     He looked at me for a long time, then said:

     “Yea…whatcha doing down hea?”

     “I gotta customa ova hea on Wall.”

     “Really!”

     “Yea…I thought ya wents ta Nam.”

     “I spent twelve months in the bush ova da, stopped using too. You just can’t stay high in a place like that, man…and expect to stay alive man. I learned to appreciate life ova da too man, and when I got back I went to night school. Got my sheepskin, man!”

     “Dat’s way cool, man. Hey did ya eva find out what happened to Henry…ya na da perfessor.”

     “I didn’t know that anything happened to him. When I came back, my folks had moved out of the area, and I never went back da. So what happened to him?”

     “After you left Henry cleaned up ina government program, when he came out, Ted hired him to take your place. I don’t know how you stayed there as long as you did. Nobody ever stayed on too long. Anyway, Henry was there for a few months, and everything was cool, then one nite he robbed the place. Took the payroll, and disappeared. They found him about a week later, overdosed in a flop house. I always wondered how he got into the safe, how did he get into the place.”

     “That jackass used to come by all the time, beg for change on paydays. He knew everybody had money, and we all gave him some, you know. We knew what he was going to do with it, but we felt sorry for him, and gave him something anyway.”