“I just had to pick it up” I mulled regretfully
“I should have just left it alone”
“Then maybe none of this would have happened”
“And maybe” I thought my heart sinking as the gun pressed deeper into my skull “I might
have lived just a bit longer”
…………………………………………………………………………………………
People always say how the smallest of things can just spiral out of control but I never
knew how true that statement was until Friday, October 5, 2012.
It was 4 pm and I was at the downtown bus park waiting on a 21 jutc bus to take me
home. The sun was high in the sky, the heat smoldering and according to the JUTC
officer manning the out of control line, another bus wasn’t due for about an hour because of some sort of traffic jam or road block. Luckily for me, I was content with spending the time staring at a girl positioned not too far from me. I had seen her on my way to the bus park. It had only been a passing glance as the bus taking me to the center speed by her on the street. But it had been more than enough time for me to analyze her slender figure, flowing raven hair and sapphire blue eyes. And decide that I was in love with her. So when I had glanced her standing just a stones throw away from me I thought it was God’s way of telling me to go for it, if only I had known it was just the devil setting me up for a fall.
I could have just spoken to her then but according to my friends I couldn’t just go up to a girl out of the blue and say “Hi,” no first I needed a good excuse to go and talk to her. Unfortunately for me I couldn’t come up with one and I probably would have just stood there until my bus came without saying a word, if it had not been for a stroke of what I saw back then as luck.
She had looked at her watch and seemingly decided she had time to walk around before her bus would arrive. And she began moving away. I was watching her go thinking my opportunity was gone, when something sparkly caught my eye. Right where she had been standing was a gold heart shaped key chain.
“It must have fallen off her bag” I’d thought. And I had felt so overjoyed as I realized that this was just the ice breaker I needed. So I picked up the keychain, stuffed it in my pocket and went after her.
Looking at the situation that I’m currently in I’d like to blame it all on the cruelty of life. However to be honest the reason I was in this predicament is partially my fault. Why? Because even with the perfect excuse to walk up to her I just didn’t have the nerve to do it. I’d been following her around for about ten minutes running over in my mind what to say, how to say it and most importantly how to get her number. There had been a dozen opportunity’s to walk up to her and return the chain but I kept chickening out.
Truth fully I shouldn’t have even been following her, because I really didn’t know the lay out of the area, which combined with how nervous and distracted I was resulted in me becoming lost. The worst thing about it though was that not only was I lost but I’d also lost track of her. And when I looked around all I could see where dirty building empty roads and the red eyed glare of brutish people littering the side walk.
I was scared out of my wits, I tried finding my way back but it was all in vain. And I was too frightened of the people to ask for directions. The sun was going down and I was cold, hungry, tired and frustrated. So it should be perfectly understandable why I chased after the guy who picked my pocket.
I had just been slowly trudging aimlessly when someone in rags came up behind me, snatched my wallet and ran. Now in retrospect I only had about a hundred dollars in there and my bus card was in my other pocket so I could still get home. Plus I was lost enough as it was. But something {maybe the frustration, maybe anger, I don’t know what} made me run after him. My heart was racing as I ran and my bag felt heavy on my shoulders, but yet I kept chasing him. And for a while it looked like I would catch up {though I had no idea what I would do when I did}, but he unlike I knew the area and he soon lost me in an ally way.
Slumping against a wall to catch my breath I’d begun to wonder if things could get any worse. When a man dressed in jeans and a sweater suddenly jumped out of no where, pulled out a knife and asked me for my money. He had a blue cap on his head and there was a scar on the right side of his face, his eyes were red and his breath smelled of alcohol. “I don’t have any money” I told the man truthfully. But evidently he didn’t believe me because he was still waving the knife around.
“I said gimme your money” the man yelled again. But now he was moving the knife closer to my throat and in a move of desperation I grabbed a steel bar that was on the ground and before he could act I smashed it across his face and ran.
If there’s one thing I learned from all this is that adrenaline is one heck of an amazing thing. One minute I’m dead beat tired the next I’m running at full throttle. I ran and ran my heart beating wildly and my lungs on fire, I didn’t even look where I was going I just wanted to get away from well everything. While running I got splashed twice and pelted with rice by some lady screaming “Where you going sonny, Where you going?”
But I didn’t stop running until I looked up and saw that finally I recognized where I was. That’s when I stopped and took a moment to calm down and then started walking towards where the bus stop was supposed to be. It took about ten minutes but I finally reached and saw to my relief that my bus was there. I was about to get on and finally end this nightmare, when I heard the sound of police sirens behind me. And an arm clasp around my throat shouting
“Stay back I’ve got a hostage.”
In about ten seconds everyone was hiding and about five officers had guns trained on the criminal who as my amazing luck might have it was the same man who I’d hit before, only now instead of a knife had a dangerous gun. Hence we come to our present situation, a man jamming a gun into my head and me regretting my life’s choices.
Luckily for me though the man wasn’t exactly sober, so it wasn’t all that hard to grab his gun long enough for the police to tackle and subdue him. As they cuffed him and put him in the police car I breathed a sigh of relief, I could finally go home and get this day over with. I felt in my pocket for my bus card but my hand came out holding a gold keychain, the cause of all my problems. I would have thrown it away and left if only I hadn’t happen to see the girl to whom it belonged step out of a store a little way from me.
I made up in my mind that after all of this craziness the least I deserved was to get to hook up with the girl. So I marched over to her and held out the key chain and said
“I think you dropped this” she touched the chain then looked up at me and smiled. Finally things were going my way; I was going to talk to my dream girl. Then she said in such a melodic voice
“Sorry but this isn’t mine” then she walked past me, boarded her bus and never looked back.
