Life With A Werewolf

Absentminded Accusations Part 1

          It was one of those exhausted, drained days. You know the kind, the ones where you feel as though you’re walking around in a thick fog of exhaustion and disappointment. As if every conversation and interaction you’re having is on a VHS tape being played back in slow motion. You really can’t write well on days like that. Your brain isn’t operating in any capacity that could be called “peak” or even “good.” Since I felt about as lively as one of the zombies that I partied with last year, I decided that perhaps some caffeine and sugar would be in order.

          This wasn’t a hangover, mind you. For those, I generally want carbs, grease, and of course, salt and liquid; all in great quantities. But I hadn’t had one of those in quite some time. Alcohol hadn’t touched my lips for weeks and to be honest, I didn’t miss it one bit.

          No, it wasn’t alcohol that had drained all the energy from me. It was a lively late night gaming session that, although felt as if it was needed at the time, as of right now just felt like someone had drained about two pints of blood out of me. No, for that particular exhaustion, caffeine and sugar was needed, and lots of it.

          Small towns can be nice for somethings. Varieties of businesses aren’t generally one of them. If you live in the standard small town in America, you have Fast-Food Row: A McDonalds, A Burger King, A Hardees or Carl’s Jr that’s perpetually dead and you wonder how they stay in business, and probably one of those dual drive through places like a Checkers or a Rally’s. There might be a tiny burger place like a White Castle or a Krystal’s. There will always be two requisite chicken places of some kind. KFC and something else like Church’s or Popeye’s.

          But we didn’t live a town big enough for a Fast-Food Row. We had a local restaurant, and that’s it. It wasn’t anything particularly special or noteworthy. Just a place that served basic American fare and grease of any shade of brown you wanted it in. What I was desiring was a coffee shop. A place where I could get a nice, tall, steaming cup of caffeinated sugar water that they called coffee and pay eight times the fair price for it. But to get to such a place would require a drive; one that was going to take me almost an hour in one direction. Not worth it for a single cup of Mochafrappinated sugar milk water. So, instead I went down to the local convenience store and bought a cup of their sugar burnt bean water. It wasn’t much. It wasn’t good. But at least it was coffee. And that’s what counted, especially in that moment.

          It was like any other chain convenience store in the Midwest. Bright lights, an isle of just candy bars, and useless overpriced gifts shoved away incase on your travels through the middle of nowhere you forgot to pick something up for that special someone. In the back was the coffee maker that I had come to see. A black and red beast that could produce sugared burnt bean water in copious amounts.

          As I brought my purchase up to the counter, one tired worker gave me a small polite smile. I recognized him immediately, and for the sake of this blog, he will be called “RJ”. Now, RJ is a nice guy, normally. We’ve talked a little. He’s told me about his kids. I’ve told him about, well, nothing really, just gave him a few funny stories from the service. And that was just about that.

          As I set my purchase down, he sighed and asked if that was all in a bored tone. I nodded, and passed over the four bills for the cup of joe. “That’s about twenty two cents in change, murderer.”

          Murderer. He denies it to this day, doesn’t remember saying it, but I distinctly remember him saying that exact word.

          “Excuse me,” I asked him, half shocked, half getting pissed. Inside my mind the old veteran was raging against the bars of his cage, raring to get out and show him what exactly a ‘murderer’ was.

          “I said that’s about twenty-two cents in change, sir,” RJ said, blinking. RJ is not a strong dude. He’s got more of a drunk dad bod than a fighter bod, with shaggy, greasy hair that said he didn’t get it cut or washed nearly enough. It would be a confrontation he’d regret is what I’m saying. He looked genuinely confused as to my reaction. “Is something wrong?”

          Now, being someone who served in the military, I had plenty of people call me plenty of different things before. These days most of what I get is “Thank you for your service,” to which my standard reply is “thank you for your support.” But, I’ve been called colorful things before. (I lost rank because of the outcome of one incident. Still don’t regret it.) However, this is the first time anyone had called me ‘murderer.’

          He lifted his forearm and casually scratched at it while I answered him. “I thought you said something different.”

          Then I grabbed my coffee and began to leave. As I opened the door, I distinctly heard him say, “Have a nice day, murderer.”

          Three things ran through my mind at that moment. A, the coffee was scalding hot and could be used for a lot of fun things. B, jail is not nice in a small town, though I’ve probably been in worse. And C, It would take Crash a few hours to wake up and bail me out. The guy behind the counter must have seen my glare, because he about jumped out of his skin and practically leaped behind the counter, pretending to search for cigarettes or something. I just clenched one fist, tried not to clench the other holding the hot coffee, got back into my car and drove home.

          That could have turned this little post into a rant about veterans and their treatment. In fact, that’s the way things seemed to be heading until two days later when I stepped outside to take the garbage can to the road. Gary was outside. Gary if you remember, is our neighbor who likes to talk about cars. He’s a gearhead who enjoys old station wagons, sedans and average style “mom mobiles” from back in the day. He doesn’t really care about fancy Lamborghinis or BMWs. He’d actually rather talk about my Mercury Topaz for instance, or his Buick Estate station wagon.

          The grin on my face hid my inner cringe as the fear of a thirty-minute conversation about door seals on Buicks burned through my mind. However, Gary just smiled sweetly, his coke bottle glasses and halo of hair giving him an almost Mr. Magoo look that evening and said, “evening murderer.”

          The shock of his statement allowed him to get by me without me even summoning a response. Me. Rendered speechless. It does seem impossible, but it can happen. Having a neighbor, someone I enjoyed their company and looked up to calling me a murderer would be enough to do it.

          As he approached the corner, I ran up to him and grabbed him by the shoulder and turned him around. “What’d you say, Gary,” I asked.

          “What,” Gary asked. “I said, ‘Evening Jason’. What did you think I said?”

          I guess it was the look on my face that gave him some alarm. Or maybe the way I grabbed him and tried to spin him like a top. “I’m not sure,” I lied. “It sounded wrong though, so I had to clarify.”

          Gary idly scratched at his forearm. I turned and as I was walking away, I distinctly heard Gary say, “he’s coming, murderer.”

          “Who’s coming,” I snapped as I turned back around. Gary looked at me as if I grew three heads.

          “Who,” he asked.

          “That’s what I want to know,” I growled.

          “You’re not making any sense. You, okay?”

          “I’m,” I began then stopped. I ran a hand through my hair as I took a deep breath and tried again. “I could have sworn you said ‘he’s coming’. In fact, I know you said that.”

          Gary shook his head and clenched a fist. “I said no such thing. I was just out on my evening walk and saw you there, and wanted to talk to you about the new parts I found for my Buick Estate. Then you had to go and get all weird. I’m going home.”

          I sighed, and shook my head, then turned to go back inside. As I walked away from my garbage can, I distinctly heard Gary say “murderer” again. Clenching a fist, I walked back inside.

          These are things that perhaps should be discussed with Crash. To tell the truth, I truly want to discuss them. However Crash has had a rough time of things as of late. Red splotches over his human skin, rough patches of fur when he shifts, like a dog ate up with mange. I’m just not certain what is causing those things in him. The hardest thing to do is to discuss something troubling like this with someone who is having far harsher troubles than yourself.

          Perhaps these are things I should just keep to myself for the moment. Afterall, it’s not like things are going to progress, is it? So, I get called a few things. Perhaps it’s just a summer blues thing? Perhaps something happened in the news and people are just taking it out on me because I served? I dunno, stranger things have happened. Hopefully things don’t get any worse. I’ll talk to Gary in a few days. I’m sure he’ll tell me what’s got him upset. That will at least give me a clue to this mystery.