A Waste

Ed put Knut Hamsun’s book Hunger in his bag and got up from the bench in Kennedy Plaza and walked a few blocks down Westminster St. In front of the big Baptist Church, its spire pointing higher than most mortals dare to dream, a man was lying on the pavement next to a wooden bench. Ed crossed the street and walked over him. The man was bleeding from his head and a pool of dark blood formed a dread halo around his dome. The man moaned and turned on his side, struggling to get up. Two guys stood a few feet away.

“What happened?” Ed said.

“He fell off the bench.” One guy said.

“Man is he fucked up.” The other guy said.

“I told him to get home. But he didn’t want to go.” The first guy said.

“How far would he get anyway? Look at him.” The other guy said.

The bell in the church tower rang, a doleful, strange tolling at a time like this. The man on the ground, like a beetle trapped on its back, struggled to get up. He lifted his head just inches from the brick pavement. Thick blood oozed down his face and hung there, dripping from a few strands of hair.

Ed crouched down next to him.

“Ok, man,” he said, “stay lying down. You’re head is badly wounded.”

The man opened his eyes revealing two black orbs. What did he see? What could he see through the obscurity of pain and drunkenness and whatever else he might be on? He opened his mouth and made a horrific noise. It was a primal sound, a sound of extreme exertion. But this man’s Will was drunk and asleep in a corner in his soul, Ed thought. There were scratches and blood on his arms, and a bluish bruise above his right temple. The pool of dark red spread out slowly forming an abstract shape. The man lost all strength and his head hit the bricks hard. He closed his eyes and his nostrils were filled with a yellow mucus that made breathing difficult.

“Did somebody call the paramedics?” Ed said. The two guys stood there like monkeys. They shrugged as if on cue.

In the span of a few minutes a few hundred people have walked by, it being Providence and Providence being a city and it being lunch hour on a weekday. Crouched next to the fallen man Ed did not notice the blatant stares of the passersby, their expressions of fascination and fear, and the quick automatic, inner denial that city dwellers must exercise to be able to exist amongst such daily suffering and pain.

A woman stopped and crouched down next to Ed and started to speak to the injured man.

“I’m a nurse,” she said, and getting no response, she looked at Ed.

“How long has he been like this?”

“I just got here a minute ago,” Ed said. The nurse looked up at the two monkeys.

“How long has he been like this?” she said. The one guy says, “Man, I dunno, 5 minutes; he’s been on the bottle and he fell off the top of the bench.” He pointed to the bench proudly. She looked at the man on the ground. He sensed her, but could not see her and he reached out a thin arm in desperation.

“You cannot touch me,” she said, in a firm authoritative tone. “You must stay lying down. You are seriously hurt.” The man somehow managed to grab her wrist. She struggled to get out of his grip as his eyes opened suddenly and he lifted his head a few inches off the ground and let out another primal scream. Ed saw the tendons bulging in his neck and spit sliding out of his mouth and down his cheek. “You cannot touch me!” The nurse said loudly, and twisted out of his grip as his head fell to the brick pavement and its pillow of blood.

An ambulance pulled up and two EMT’s got out slowly. The nurse stood up and looked at the man with a strange expression of pity and resignation. She is a nurse, Ed thought. She deals with this kind of tragedy every day. She walked away without a word, probably already late to work, disappearing into the unceasing crowd.

There was a small group now gathered around the man. Nothing attracts people more than the red and blue flashing lights, urban colors of tragedy and misery, what people love best to watch.

One EMT walked towards the man putting rubber gloves on his hands.

“Oh, it’s him.” He said, over his shoulder. “What the fuck. Hey, Jerome, it’s this guy again.”

The two monkeys were still standing there, where else did they have to go?

“I told him to go home.” The one guy said.

“He’s always getting too fucked up.” The other guy said.

The man on the ground woke up again. He struggled with his arms, waving them around feebly and he again raised his wounded head from the bricks. Spit is stuck to his lips, blood is dripping from his head, and mucus and snot are running out of his nose. He opened his mouth and instead of a scream out came only a weak and raspy whimper that dissolves instantly into raspy breathing, silence and air. 

The EMT’s unload the stretcher.

“What a fuckin waste.” The first EMT said.

“Yeah, you’re right.” The other EMT said, “a fucking waste of our time.”

Ed watched as they lifted the man’s wracked form onto the stretcher.  His arms strained as they strapped him down but his strength was nearly gone. The crowd broke up. “Show’s over, assholes!” Ed felt like yelling. He looked at the odd shaped pool of dark blood on the brick pavement. The ambulance pulled away from the curb with lights still flashing. Ed saw an ant crawling towards the pool of blood. It stopped at the edge with its little antennae twitching, turned around quickly and hurried away.