a pimp on a bike

                   if he hadnt overheard him as he crossed near the bus stop late teensearly twenties Jewfro pasty white he wouldnt ever have imagined the words that came out of his mouth

it riled him made him stop made him take a paper ticket that held a library book for him from between its pages and scribble So, man, you want to make money, or you want to spend it on sex? 

                                                                                Jewfro was asking a nondescript homeless man bundled in a military surplus khaki jacket black baseball cap yanked down over his face clutching a backpack over his right shoulder  the two about the same height fiveseven fiveeight

                                                                         neither impressive

which made the job offer or comehither appear so absurb 

after writing it down he started walking again

fingering the ticket he read it over and over again to see if he possibly misconstrued the sentence

it confirmed he read it right

he returned the ticket to the book inside the canvasbag slung over his shoulder

after the library he was heading over to the market for a few items

 

So, man, you want to make money, or you want to spend it on sex?

                                                                       maybe not a pimp maybe a solicitation maybe something else he heard it out of context given all the descriptors for genders  It's complicated.  it was complicated when it was only boys and girls heterosexuals homos-lesbians he couldnt definitively say what he overheard

when he returnedinside twenty minutes passing the bus stop he saw that the bike was chained to and behind one of three darkgreen steel benches bolt-anchored to the pavement

a creek ran through town

the bus stop wasnt fifty metres off

crossing the street approaching the bridge that creekside was undeveloped for a halfmile east a dirt shoulder two-lane road ran bedside it

it reminded him slightly of the forest preserves running to either side of the Des Plaines River when he was a kid

he did some crazy shit in those woods

 

after 1401,  Twosday,  3  8. 21

1209,  Day-between-Two-Ts,  4  8. 21