Here Comes the Meat Truck

Last night, while waiting for E. to get home from work, I heard a strange sound outside my door, like the bodies of small dead creatures being dragged up my stoop. (It is the Halloween season after all, and my thinking gets darker with the waning daylight.) As the sound grew closer I determined that it sounded more metallic, like someone on a pogo-stick, or impossibly high heels, no, wait...crutches! Then, this someone knocked on my door. Now, for a moment I entertained a terrible notion out of a story like "the Monkey Claw" that something had happened to my beloved, his cell phone had died, he couldn't contact me and had to drag himself home, bloody and beaten.

The knocker pounded louder. I knew that whomever, or whatever, was on my porch was not a visitor I wanted to invite inside, but I admit, I was curious (no, my parents did not teach me not to open doors to strangers at night when I am alone, obviously!).

So at last, I opened the door a crack. What stood before me was indeed a man, supported by two cheap, silver crutches. What was most distinct about him was the unique sanguine pallor that only the newly drunk possess and the heady perfume of booze fumes. He swayed back and forth, back and forth. Those crutches weren't doing a very good job of holding him up.

Ah, I thought, he's broken down, needs my jumper cables and then he's going to try to mug me. I had my old self-defense tricks already in mind (Eyes, eyes, eyes!)

"Yes?" I asked.

"Do you... guys....eat food in your house?"

"Well, we've been known to," I said, or something like it.

"Meat? Chicken, fish, steak, shrimp?"

My suspicions more than piqued, I was already thinking, you try to show me your meat and I will use your crutches against you in the worst way possible. (Get him on the ground, then pound your fists into his groin)

"We only eat chicken. Chicken for every meal," I answered, or something like it.

"Well I sell meat to your neighbors, can I show you my selection?" (When in doubt, just start screaming and flailing your arms)

*Let me point out that there was a definitive slur to his words, matched in time to the rhythm of his swaying.

"No thank you. We buy our meat at the store and we're very happy with it that way."

"Yeah but if there were no stores then I could, like call the police, cuz then, cuz then they could come and arrest you for negligence, you know, for going on a hunger strike!" he managed.

I was THIS close to saying "You crazy fuck, get off my doorstep" when he laughed and said, "That was supposed to be a joke."

I got the distinct impression that he'd forgotten how to tell that joke.

"Oh," I said. "we're content with our meat."

"Are you sure you don't want to let your guard down so I can show you the meat products I have to--"

"Oh yes, I'm quite sure. I'm going inside now," I said.

I shut and locked the door and then went upstairs to my bird's-eye vantage of the street where there was, in fact, a meat truck, its hazard lights blinking, parked in the middle of my street.