Meaner Things

by David Anderson

  I was tempted to continue the same way down the next short flight but I knew there was a security guard somewhere on the fourth floor and, even with the alarm, he might hear me if I made too much noise. Slowing down, I edged past the door to the fourth floor, then speeded up again and quickly worked my way down. The continuous movement gave me less time to dwell on the throbbing pain in my ankle.

  On the ground floor I had a decision to make. Front or back? The front was where the main staircase came down, near the glass-panelled booth in the foyer in which the security guards normally sat. The second guard would be stalking around there somewhere, shouting into his walkie-talkie to keep in contact with his mate on the higher floors. In my present condition, my chances of getting past the guard in the foyer were slim to zero.

  Even if I could get past him, the front doors led out on to a busy main street. There probably wouldn’t be any pedestrians around at this time of night, but there would be plenty of automobile traffic. The back exit opened on to a much quieter side street. It was my best hope.

  I waddled down the back hallway and peered out of a small window next to the big roll-up door. There was one more guard on the premises, an outside one who patrolled the back yard area where trucks came to make deliveries. As far as I knew, he never came into the building, his hut being out near the yard gate. I couldn’t see any sign of him.

  I hadn’t time for niceties, I had to get out. The cops might be slow finishing their coffee and donuts but they wouldn’t take forever. There was a side-door next to the roll-up and a big fire extinguisher set into an alcove in the wall near to it. I pulled out the extinguisher and pounded it against the door lock. It gave way immediately and the door burst open. I thanked my lucky stars that the alarm was still drowning out the racket I was making.

  Ignoring my busted ankle, I charged out into the yard and made for the back gate. When I got to the security hut its door opened and a grim face under a peaked cap looked out. Instinctively I reached out to push him away from me. My fingers must have poked into his eyes as his hands shot up to his face and he ducked back inside.

  Depending on what the guard did next, I reckoned I had five or ten seconds to get away. I took another step forward, grabbed the wire mesh gate and pulled.

  It was chained and padlocked.

  *

  I felt like a balloon that had just been pricked with a pin. My ankle was screaming at me for attention, but all I could do was stand still and take the weight off it. Any second now the guard would reappear with God-knows-what weapon in his eager hands. I imagined a baseball bat cracking my skull. To get so far and now be beaten by a locked gate . . .

  Physically I was numbed, but my mind was still in overdrive. Big blue recycle bins at least a metre tall stood right next to the guard’s hut. I grabbed one with both arms and yanked it across the door of the hut, pushing it tight against it. I could barely move the thing but sheer terror gave me the strength of the damned.

  I seized hold of another bin – bizarrely my brain had time to register the ‘Flattened Cardboard Only’ sign on the front of it – and hauled it over to the gate. Now I somehow had to get on top of it. I managed to get my good foot into the long horizontal slot three quarters of the way up, grabbed a handle at the top edge, and swung myself onto the lid.

  The gate was still about a foot higher but fortunately the top of it was not barb-wired. I stood up, shaky and weak, and was about to jump over when a hand grabbed my leg and I crashed back down onto the top of the bin. As I came down my foot shot out behind me and made contact with what felt like someone’s face. In two seconds I was up again and jumped over the gate without giving myself time to think about it.

  I landed on my good foot, which promptly slipped from under me, but I fell on my pain-free side and was able to get up quickly. I was far from safe yet. A streetlight almost directly above me illuminated the whole area I was standing in. To get away from it I hobbled across the road toward the relative darkness on the other side.

  A police car, its red and blue strobe light flashing, pulled up at the end of the street.

  *

  If they saw me, I was finished. I got across the street and hobbled as quickly as I could in the opposite direction to the police car, not daring to look back. I still had to pass several more buildings before I’d reach the end of the block. Worse still, there was another streetlight up ahead that I had to pass directly under. I’d never make it.

  I passed another structure, an old brownstone office building, saw an alleyway to my left and ducked into it. High walls rose up on both sides and the darkness here was nearly total. I was sweating like a pig and yearned to be able to sit down, stretch out the leg, rest and recover. But I pushed myself on, deep into the alley, my shoes squelching through mud or God knows what.

  I tripped on something that felt like a brick, stumbled forward and, through sheer exhaustion, lost my balance completely. My forehead thumped against a metal railing and I dropped like a stone.

  I lay there for several minutes, stunned and groggy, my forehead thrumming like an engine. When my head cleared a bit I got on my knees, leaned to one side and vomited. I put a grubby hand to my forehead and winced; when I took the hand away it was wet and sticky with blood that looked black in the dim light.

  The blare of the warehouse alarm had diminished as I’d got further away from it and now it stopped completely. The silence was stunning after so much noise and I almost thought I’d lost my hearing. Then a car engine started up and grew steadily louder.

  The police vehicle slowed and stopped in front of the alleyway entrance. I could make out ‘POL’ in big blue letters on the side. The red and blue lights on top were now switched off. Two cops got out.

  I could barely walk and had no idea what lay further down the alley or even if it was a dead end. If I tried to get away I would blunder into more obstacles and the racket would attract these cops like flies to a turd. I had to find a hiding place. Real fast.

  I hauled myself to my feet and felt around me with my arms. They bashed against the metal railing I’d head-butted and I discovered it was a handrail for a set of concrete steps leading up to the back entrance of a building. I checked the door and found it was locked. No surprise there.

  A glance back told me that the two cops now had flashlights and were walking across the sidewalk to the alley. I moved to the right, out of the way of the handrail, and felt my way along the opposite wall. My hand brushed against an old-style round garbage bin and I almost knocked its lid off, but grabbed it just in time before it clattered to the ground.

  I kept going and found a big rectangular bin, the sort with a hinged lid on top. The cops were at the front of the alley and were training their flashlights into it. I felt around the lid of the bin, discovered it wasn’t padlocked, and raised it a little. A revolting stench of rotten vegetables and used cat litter made me gag. Either some of the garbage bags had burst or a lot of lose stuff had been tossed in on top of them.

  My two pursuers were in the alley now, each with a flashlight in one hand, the other resting on the butt of his side-arm. In a minute or two they’d be onto me. I desperately needed a hiding place and had no time to be fussy.

  The lid of the bin was plastic, not metal. Lightweight and silent to open. I raised it as high as I could and swung myself up and in. Fortunately it was three-quarters full and I didn’t have far to fall. Instead, I flopped quietly down into a squelchy mass of garbage and eased the lid back down so that it made no noise.

  I clenched my mouth tight shut and breathed through my nose. The putrid stench was almost unbearable and I could feel small, hard things in gritty gravel under my hands. My head seemed to be near something only slightly less repulsive – the rotting vegetables my nose had detected earlier.

  It was foul, but it was preferable to the alternative. I sank a little deeper, tried to reduce my breathing to absolute minimum, and prayed that the cops wouldn’t open the bin and look inside it.

  *
>
  I couldn’t hear much with the lid closed tight and didn’t dare raise it even a fraction, in case one of the cops happened to be directing his flashlight in my direction. For the first time I realised how utterly helpless I now was. My fate was out of my hands. I’d made my stinking bed and had to lie in it.

  Minutes dragged on and I still heard nothing. I desperately wanted to get out of the filthy garbage but fought back the urge and made myself stay put.

  It was the right decision.

  One of them started whistling. I took this as a good sign, indicating that they’d looked around the alley and decided there was no-one there. They were more relaxed now, might even have taken their hands off their weapons. So I imagined it.

  Then the round lid I’d almost knocked over earlier tumbled off its bin and fell on the ground, making a ‘cymbals clashing’ sound. One of the cops hadn’t been as careful as me. That meant he was very close, and probably looking straight at the big bin I was lying in right now.

  My heart stood still and I prayed to whoever might be listening that the cop wouldn’t lift the lid and look in. That would really be game over.

  “Shit, I’m getting out of here, Mack,” one of them shouted, right next to the bin. “I just slipped in somebody’s puke.”

  I held my breath and waited for what seemed like an eternity. Mercifully, the bin lid stayed closed. Eventually I started counting seconds: “Mississippi one, Mississippi two, Mississippi three . . .” When I reached five minutes I forced myself to count five more.

  By now my body was stiff as a board, and every muscle protested as I slowly flexed my arms and legs to get the blood flowing again. I was facing the wrong way to look back down the alley to where the cop car had parked. I’d have to take my chances anyway, as I wasn’t staying here all night.

  I raised the lid and peeped out. The alley was pitch black again and I could hear no sounds of boots or conversation. Cautiously, I raised the lid a bit further and craned my neck around so that I could look behind me, back up the alley. The cop car was gone.

  I would have cried with joy if my ankle hadn’t been hurting so much.

  I got over the side of the bin, landed successfully on my good foot, and began to brush myself down. My hands made contact with sticky hard things all down my front. I could guess what they were and tried not to look. Bits of slimy lettuce had stuck to my shoulders and I had to peel them off. I was a disgusting mess.

  But, a free disgusting mess.

  I forced myself to continue down the alley and eventually came out at a side street that looked deserted. For a long time I peered up and down until I was sure it was safe. I hobbled down it, trying to figure out what I was going to do next. The ankle was getting worse the more I tried to use it and I had to stop more and more frequently. I kept glancing behind me, fearful that another cop car would appear.

  At last I admitted the truth to myself. There was no way that I was going to make it back to my student digs, far out on the university endowment lands, on one good foot only.

  I didn’t seem to have any options left. There were no taxis in this part of the city at this time of night. Even if I could find one, I didn’t have a penny to pay for the ride. In my present state I looked more like a homeless person than a bona fide student, so it was unlikely that any taxi driver would take the risk of letting me into their cab for a long trip to the university campus.

  I didn’t even have a quarter to make a phone call. Not that there were any pay phones around here either.

  It was hopeless. I collapsed in a heap on the sidewalk and quietly wept.

  *

  The bawling made me feel a little better. Somehow or other I had to get help. But I had little energy left to do anything. I forced myself to get up one more time and shuffled to the end of the block. As I approached the intersection I heard sounds of something going on, involving several people, and these increased as I got closer. At the corner I peeped around and saw what it was.

  I couldn’t believe my eyes. A big old school bus was sitting in a parking lot on the far side of the street in front of a concrete wall. It had been painted bright red and converted into a mobile soup kitchen. People were milling around it, most of them with hot dogs or steaming Styrofoam cups in their hands. Though their clothes were a lot cleaner than mine currently were, none of them looked like the cream of society either. Several had shopping carts stuffed with garbage bags; others were wearing backpacks that had seen better days.

  A couple of workers on the bus were pulling down a flexible metal shutter above a high, narrow counter. I hoofed it across the street, pushed my way through the crowd and banged on the metal slats with my fist.

  For a moment I thought they weren’t going to open up. Then the shutter rattled, a gap appeared, and someone peeped out. I could see him eyeing me. I must have looked pretty bad because the shutter immediately slid all the way back up.

  “You look like you need help.” The guy was about my age, wearing a baseball cap, a t-shirt with a little dove emblem or some such on it, and a white apron over his pants.

  I wet my lips. It seemed like a year since I’d last spoken. I made up a story fast.

  “Some bastards mugged me, stole my wallet and tossed me in a dumpster,” I said. “They beat me up real bad. I think my ankle’s broke.”

  The guy gave me another long appraisal. “You need to go to hospital,” he said. “Come round behind here and I’ll drive you.”

  I did my hop-along act around the side of the bus and met him coming out the back. Turns out he had his car, an old model Honda, parked nearby. He went and fetched it and picked me up a couple of minutes later.

  We drove along for a while, my ankle aching even worse in the cramped passenger seat. I must have stunk pretty bad as he wound the window halfway down on his side.

  “My name’s Michael,” I said to break the silence, “What’s yours?”

  He kept his eyes on the road, but smiled a little. “I’m Justin,” he replied, “Pleased to meet you, Michael.”

  “I can’t thank you enough,” I said, “What’s your organization?”

  “Glad you asked. We’re the Lifeline Gospel Mission. We do what we can for the homeless. That’s our Red Bus soup kitchen.”

  “Ah . . . that’s what was in the Styrofoam cups. Sorry I missed that.”

  “Don’t worry; we’re there every Tuesday night if you need us. We serve sandwiches, coffee, juice, sometimes even dessert.”

  “You’re making me hungry. You work late hours too.”

  “We have to. Those guys have nowhere to go. They treat it like a social event, a once a week, late-night street party. Most like to talk. Some want to pray, read the Bible, whatever.”

  “Much need for soup kitchens these days?”

  He gave me a quick look that said ‘You’ve got to be kidding’. “More every year. We get two hundred people on average. Homelessness in Vancouver is at an all-time high.”

  Despite the discomfort I was in, I was impressed by this guy and his work. But I was too tired to say any more and desperate to get to the hospital.

  He took me to Vancouver General, parked in the outrageously expensive stalls in front, and insisted he accompany me to the Emergency Department. I’d never been there before and when we walked through the automatic doors I was stunned at how busy it was, even in the wee small hours of the morning.

  The nurses here must have seen every depravity under the sun but they still looked at me with undisguised distaste. They insisted I undress myself and toss my foul rags into a transparent laundry bag, which they promptly sealed with a massive twist tie. They helped me put on a pale blue patient gown that barely met at the back and laid me out on a gurney in the hallway, all the wards being full.

  At this point my new-found friend Justin took his leave. He’d saved me from more than he could ever guess and I was profoundly grateful. I gave him my heartfelt thanks and made a mental note that if I ever had any money I’d send the Lifeline Gospel Missio
n a large donation. They’d earned it.

  I was expecting an internee or whatever it is they call trainee doctors, but eventually an old geezer with a handlebar moustache and an English accent came around and introduced himself as ‘Dr. Spurgeon.” I immediately began to think of him as Spurgeon the surgeon. He grabbed my ankle, twisted it a bit until I screamed, then let it alone, after which I didn’t have to scream anymore.

  Now that he’d broken my resistance, he gave me what he no doubt thought was a penetrating stare.

  “How the hell did you do this, man?”

  I gave him the same spiel as I’d given Justin.

  “Muggers, eh? Did they drop you from the top of a tall building or something?”

  I had to think fast. “They pushed me down some steps. Tall steps.”

  The gimlet eyes looked unconvinced. “Well, we’ll have to take X-rays, of course, once the swelling goes down, but I’m pretty sure that what you have here is a Pott’s fracture.”

  I must have looked suitably blank.

  “Do you know why it’s called a Pott’s fracture?”

  “No.” I couldn’t have cared less.

  “Pott was a surgeon whose nag threw him and when he fell one ankle got caught in the stirrup. Ever since then this type of fracture has been known in the trade as a Pott’s.”

  I nodded, praying this torture would end soon.

  “Interesting injury. Back in the old country, it’s normally found in burglars who have fallen off a drainpipe.”

  My heart suddenly stopped. This guy was more worldly wise than he looked; either that or he was clairvoyant. Then he let out a loud guffaw and I realised that he was jesting.

  “Anyway, I’ll give you a quick jab to kill the pain and an orthopaedic surgeon will see you tomorrow.” He looked me over, top to toe, poking and prodding where it hurt most until I was almost screaming again.

  At last he stopped, took a step back and stuck his bottom lip out pensively. “That shoulder of yours looks pretty nasty too; it’ll also need to be X-rayed. Assuming no bones broken there, I’ll prescribe some antibiotics for it, plus those nasty cuts in your chest and forehead.”