and there's this dude outside, standing in the middle of the street, just staring. some people yell at him to get out of the street, so he does, and i go inside for some smokes and a red bull. time i get to the head of the line, dude's at the opposite wall, staring a hole through the cashier. understandably, the cashier is unsettled, says "what the fuck are you doing?"

"what am i doing?" the guy says back, quietly.

"buy something or get out!" they yell, so he leaves

i buy my shit and go outside, and this dude, lanky, buzzcut, piercing blue eyes, is just planted in the intersection like he's daring a car to come through and hit him. now it's closer to two, and this is a quieter corner on a narrow street in the quarter, so thankfully no one was.

i look around and now it's just him and me out here. so with a heavy sigh, i figure this guy's my problem now. so i talk him into coming over and having a smoke with me, on the sidewalk

"what does this mean to you?" he says, gravely, holding up a plastic fleur-de-lis in mardi gras, on a string of beads.

i start rattling off the meaning of the fleur-de-lis w/r/t the history of new orleans and he stops me. he takes off all his beads and holds them up. "what does all of this, mean, to you?"

"it's carnival time, dude, mardi gras. parades and shit. harmless fun."

"fun," he says, his jaw tight, his eyes welling. we talk a little more and turns out his unit's on leave, they all went to some strip clubs, they tried to buy him a dance, he's got a girl at home, it didn't feel right so he left and got separated, drunk and existential. shit happens, right? most of us don't end up in a crosswalk eyeing up the road like we're daring it to throw us a right hook

so i figure, shit, this kid's lucky i got no way to go home quick, i might as well see this situation through. i offer to call him a cab but of course he don't have the street number or the name of the joint, just "it's somewhere that way." guess we're hoofin it.

so we talk on the way, and he's in a whole contemplative mood about what is truth, and we live in a society did you notice? and i've got enough comparative religion and philosophy to bs him enough to trust me

i get him to the lobby and he asks me am i coming up? and something tells me if i don't, i'm gonna see him in the morning paper doing the face-down float in the hotel pool. so i come up to his room, not sure if he wants to convert me, fuck me or choke me to death.

i pour us some glasses of water and i tell him that all his shit about how his buddies are impure is gonna look better in the morning. he asks me to pray with him, so i do

anyway i tuck him into bed real sweet, talkin about just wait till you get leave to see your girl again, won't that be nice, she sure would want you to get some rest right now. he seems like he's about to pass out, so i sneak off. i'm halfway to the elevators when i see him out of his room walking for the staircase and i feel like this motherfucker, after all that shit he's still looking for a high place with a short ledge. well mama didn't order pancakes today dammit

so this time i get him back in bed and i think his body had finally had enough, this time it was lights out.

i thought about sticking around longer to make sure, maybe trying to call the military and get someone to check on him. but i was wore out and i still had to walk my bike a mile home. so i booked it.

hope he's ok now. i hope it was just some kinda jerusalem syndrome thing. this town does weird things to people's minds who aren't ready for it

anyway that's the second time i maybe saved someone's life. never did it definitively enough to chalk it up under my name but hey, i got some stories

@burgin good-ass story triz!!!!

@byttyrs aww thanks mads!

@burgin this is a great story friend, you did a really great thing that night

@Aleums eh maybe? never saw the dude again, hope he's doing better these days

@burgin i love your stories a lot 💕

@mood aww thanks! always glad to entertain