RUNNING SCARED # 10


I stopped by a shabby-looking bed and breakfast and talked with the owner. I told her I was looking for a room for a couple of weeks – just a room, no breakfast. She showed me a spacious room with a double bed and quoted a price outside my budget. “Have you got something smaller?” I asked. Finally she showed me a tiny room with a single bed and a bath down the hall. It was barely adequate but I was able to negotiate a rent I thought I could afford. I paid her for a week, got a set of keys, and dropped my heavy backpack off.

Back at the tavern I didn’t see the woman I’d spoken to before. “I’m looking for Steve,” I told the woman behind the bar. She was a Sharon Gless look-a-like from the Cagney and Lacey days – short blonde hair, turtleneck sweater and jeans on a trim figure.

“I’m Steve,” she said, “what can I do for you?” I noticed her taking in my damaged face. I mentally revised my story for a female-friendly audience, briefly explained my circumstances, and asked to trade kitchen work for meals – nothing fancy.

She laughed. “Fancy sure don’t live here,” she said, and agreed to my working there Friday and Saturday nights. “I’m mostly busy those nights. We’ll see how things work out from there.”

I readily agreed, thanked her, and decided to wait to ask about poker games. I’d have a chance to observe for myself what sort of place it was, and if there was any action where I might fit in.

As I walked around the area the next few days I found myself thinking back to my life with Paul. We had been too young, and hadn’t had it easy, but we eventually had learned to fight fair – to respect both each other’s bodies and each other’s psyches. Nothing had prepared me for Vern’s violent nature. Having married so young I had ended up short on life experience, and, once thrust into the world by widowhood, both naïve and too trusting.

Ironically, I realized that it was that same naivety that enabled me to travel around living by my wits. In many circumstances I simply didn’t know better -- didn’t understand how many things could go wrong, and if I could keep my fear in check, I could handle almost everything. And, despite the fact that I had trusted Aaron from the beginning, I no longer was quite so trusting in general.

By the time Friday came I had established a routine at the café. Sarge was both cook and owner. I found out he was a Vietnam vet, homeless at one time, now just content to eke out a small living from the business he had inherited from an uncle. He lived in the tiny apartment upstairs.

I usually worked from seven to eight-thirty, had my breakfast, and then killed time. I’d scouted out the paperback bookstore and was working on a barter approach to the guy who ran it. I was hard up for reading material. I could sometimes scrounge a newspaper or two from the café, but needed more. My spartan room didn’t even have a TV; there was one available in the parlor, but I didn’t want to answer any more questions from the gossipy proprietor.

On Thursday I took the bus to a nearby area with a library where I could e-mail Katherine. I needed to let her know I’d moved and why; I told her I’d continue to check in with her once a week. I also phoned Aaron. Lucky to catch him, he told me that someone new with a better photo of who I used to be had been asking around Murietta for me. Aaron said he was glad that I’d left when I did. Said he’d been thinking about me. I told him I’d keep in touch. I didn’t tell either of them where I was.

Back in Madrona I showed up at The Tav at five-thirty on Friday. Jenny, the main bartender, showed me where everything was and explained what was expected of me; I’d work from six to eight-thirty Friday and Saturday evenings mostly doing some prep work in the back room, then clean up as needed. I could have a sandwich and coffee four nights a week in exchange. No alcohol. Suited me fine.

I asked about the name of the place. Jenny said it was called The Tav because half of the neon sign had burned out years ago and, by the time there had been extra money the locals had adopted the shortened name and voted against fixing it.

Working that first Friday night I overheard enough to know that there was a small stakes poker game on Wednesday nights, and another larger stakes game on Saturday. I hoped I’d be able to check out the Saturday players the following night.

Steve came in around eight, and asked how I was doing. “Fine,” I said, and encouraged her to let me know any way I could improve my performance. She just smiled. “Any problem with my sitting in on the Wednesday night poker game?” I asked.

She shot me a quizzical look. “No problem if you don’t mind losing money.“

“I won’t know about that unless I try,” I said. “Right?”

“You can sit in if we have an extra place. Wednesdays are usually slow.”

When I showed up on Wednesday evening to have a sandwich and to check out the poker players, I was wondering if it was a totally different set of people; I recognized only two of those I’d seen on Saturday; four others were new to me. Only two were women.

I began by playing conservatively, but ended the evening doing as well as I usually did in Murietta – a little ahead money-wise. I stopped in the ladies room and returned my major stash of cash to my money belt before walking the four blocks back to the bed and breakfast. I zipped up my coat, pulled my hood over my head, and stepped outside.

I got only a few steps from the tavern before I was suddenly jerked off my feet. I fell to the ground hard, my face slamming into the dirt; as I lay there slightly dazed my mostly-empty daypack was grabbed off my shoulder.

“Let’s get out of here,” I heard someone say as I shakily struggled to my feet. I heard several people running away. Damn, I thought, probably kids. I couldn’t call the police, I couldn’t even tell anyone lest they call the police. I hadn’t seen enough to identify anyone anyway.

I didn’t seem to be badly injured, just a split lip. My poor face, I thought. Once again I felt how precarious my situation was. Reality triumphing over naivety. My feelings of well-being had fled. Just random violence, I told myself, but it didn’t reassure me at all. Violence of any kind still frightened me. And fear was still my most formidable enemy.