Chapter 4

      Finally, she must stop for a moment because she has a weak, hurtful feeling in her chest and stomach from depression. As she walked, she began crying uncontrollably. She turned down an alley off of E. Lancaster and slowly walked behind an old, abandoned warehouse. She crawled on a dock next to a dumpster and sat there, still sobbing with her face in both hands. After several minutes the sobbing began to subside.

      She catches herself and begins to refocus on getting some wine. Wine would make all the hurt stop.

      While sitting on the dock composing herself a white man in his mid-twenties, unbathed, and unshaven, wearing a shabby, thick, red plaid shirt and dirty blue jeans, walks down the alley from the opposite end that Coley came from. The man came around the dumpster and surprised her. The man was somewhat sober but still talked slow and seemed to be permanently drunk. He stood there for a few seconds looking at her. His eyes were bloodshot and lifeless. Sam just looked back at him wondering what the guy was doing. Suddenly, the guy’s right hand came out of his pocket with a small metal cylinder in it. Sam just stared at it for a second. He pushed a small button on the side and a 6 inch knife blade sprung around and locked in place. The guy put the point of the knife in Sam’s stomach with extreme prejudice. With clenched teeth he got in her face, “Gimme whatever money you got, or I’ll slice you into little pieces.”

      Sam’s adrenalin was pumping and the sickening feeling in her chest and stomach was still there but was now caused by massive fear and not depression.

      Sam quickly reached into her pocket and pulled out a dollar bill and some loose change. She timidly held the money out with one hand. The guy grabbed the money out of her trembling hand, but he wasn’t satisfied, “I know you got more money hidden, now give it to me!”

      She answers forcefully, “No, no, that was my hidden money! I’m waiting for my social security check tomorrow. I got nothing else.”

      The guy still wasn’t satisfied, “take your shoes off.”

      Sam took her shoes off. The bad guy looked in them and found nothing. He looked at Sam and put his knife to her chest, “Let me see up here. If there’s no money in there maybe you can pay me another way.”

      Sam became more uneasy if that was possible. The guy probed her chest and couldn’t find any more money. After surveying the area he said, “Now we’re going to go back into that warehouse and have fun. If you tell anybody about this, I’ll cut you completely open. Got that.” Sam nodded her head short and quick up and down, yes.      

      Sitting on the dock Sam was above him. Her right leg came up fast and kicked him square on the jaw. He reeled back and fell hard. Sam jumped up and ran into the abandoned warehouse. She looked for a weapon and found a seven-inch piece of metal pipe. She stood by the door ready to pounce if he came in. After several minutes she peeked around the corner of the door to see what he was doing. She checked the dock, nothing there. She moved outside and could see the entire area from her vantage point. She breathed a sigh of relief. He was gone.

      Sam went back to the edge of the dock and sat down. Her heart was still pounding from the traumatic incident. She looked around and began checking down her pants. It took a few minutes to get underneath all the layers of clothes. She kept her secret money there and it was still safe.

      She sat there for a second thinking about the incident. She started to wonder if maybe it would’ve been better if the guy had killed her. All her worries would be over. She began to cry again. It was time to find some wine. Today she would probably need more wine to take the extra edge off.

      Sam finally refocused and decided to move on. This part of town obviously wasn’t safe.

      She stood up on the dock checking the area again and it was still all clear. As she was checking she glanced down into the dumpster beside the dock and noticed a bright red material amongst the drab colors of tan and brown boxes and other assorted garbage. She doesn’t usually dumpster dive very much, but she wanted to see what the bright red material was.

      She got down off the dock and leaned into the dumpster from a side opening. She couldn’t quite reach the red material. She had to climb through the opening into the dumpster. It wasn’t too bad a climb. The trash was dry, mostly boxes and paper, and she waded towards the red material. She lifted the material up and it was clothing. As Sam straightened the material out it became clear that someone had thrown away a Santa Suit. It appeared clean and bright red with white fur cuffs on the sleeves and legs. She looked at the suit for a few moments and began smiling. She searched a little more and found a Santa hat and a mangled fake white beard. Sam crawled out of the dumpster with the outfit and folded it up to carry under her arm.

      She was thinking about the kids at the mission. Her mind was racing with plans to bring Santa to the mission. Brad usually brought in a Santa if there were enough kids at the shelter to make it worthwhile. If there weren’t enough at the shelter they would try and take them to a mall to see Santa. Then on Christmas day organizations would make sure there were toys for the everyone. The problem is that the kids and their parents are so transient that if they miss the one day Santa is there or miss the toys at Christmas or miss both events then they don’t get any Christmas at all. This is very common. The Christmas celebration at the shelter was mostly for adults. A restaurant comes in and caters a Christmas meal and it makes all the news casts, but the kids are forgotten.

      Sam decided she could spend several days there in the Santa suit and catch a good portion of the kids coming through the shelter. She also wanted to make sure each child got some kind of present. She began thinking about where she could get presents. Maybe Brad would be able to help with that. He had all kinds of connections when it came to charitable undertakings.

      Sam was getting upset thinking about all the possibilities. She kept going back and forth between the kids and getting her wine. The earlier robbery incident had already left her mind. It’s funny how very traumatic experiences that would envelope regular people seem to just slide off homeless people’s backs. The trauma is so frequent and normal that the homeless live with it as a part of life. 

      Sam walked out of the alley to get away from the area still thinking about how to get presents for the kids at the shelter. The battle in her mind was epic. She kept thinking about the kids but at the same time she was trying to think about getting her wine for the night. She walked aimlessly down E. Lancaster Street trying to figure out what to do.