In my wallet, I never keep a condom but a couple of Ben Franklins—a number of contingencies far more likely than that for which one hopes—and some foreign currency, a plastic bill adorned by Queen Elizabeth for a homeless man to come.
The muggers never get my wallet, a tattered curvilinear fold of black leather, fraying at the edges, a part of my body. Steel, aluminum, plastic, something taps the back of my head, demanding that other part of me and now there are four faces, to which I assign names. One’s fat. His name is House. One wears a yellow and black rag on his head: Mosque. The other two I name Dudley and Leroy; don’t ask why, it just pops—rote—into my mind and I turn to run.
You might zigzag but I don’t. Fear mixes with anger and I see House from the back of my head, staring and pointing.
Shoot me.
**
This blogger does not have AIDS.
Tags: Adams Morgan, Washington, D.C.
