The Long Nighttime Road and Failed Good Deeds

A text came in this afternoon from an acquaintance who occupies the stained fringes of society. It was a request for a kindness. I was needed to transport him from a great distance outside of town into the belly of the shadiest region of the urban hellscape so that he might join with his friend in a decadent and depressing bastardization of Thanksgiving. I convinced myself that it was a good deed worth doing, bit the bullet, and drove North. There was a certain unmentionable incentive, so the weight of any personal opposition on my part was slightly lessened.

After a great while, making my way out into the middle of almost nowhere, I finally arrived at the fellow's door. He came down from his quarters lugging several overnight bags, cursing social networking and its inherent drama. Offering me a cigarette he launched into a drawn out explanation of his recent pastimes, occasionally taking an opportunity to curse this person or that. The return journey, thanks to his deluge of babble, was incredibly tiring.

A long while passed until we eventually crossed into the neighborhood in which his friend resided. Sodium lights stained what the night failed to hide and cast a jaundiced look upon the surrounding industrial wasteland. Passing through areas of dilapidated 1960s architecture, which had been plastered over with Spanish signage, and junkyard after junkyard we eventually found the correct street. Standing before the domicile, which my passenger announced as his destination, was a haggard-looking woman whose lifestyle, apparent from her face, attire and the appearance of her home, added at least a decade to her age. She approached the vehicle and made to enter through one of the rear passenger doors. I stepped out to assist her entry, attempting some decency there amongst the shambles, and saw her smile widely at me as she made to rub her breasts against my door-holding hand as she lowered herself into the vehicle. I shuddered in spite of myself and took to the wheel yet again.

The drive continued, this time to a grocer at which the pair hoped to purchase their holiday groceries. This was an addition to the initial arrangement which was sprung upon me after I had traveled a considerable distance towards my acquaintance's home. I found that the protective layer of ignorance in which I draped myself and the constant self-reminding of an investment in good deed-doing were failing. It lasted long enough to take us to the grocer and back, though.

I tagged along through the brightly lit grocery store at near midnight, trailing behind my acquaintance and his rudely behaved lady-friend. Many store attendants were given grief by the woman, and I began to feel, as I beheld her unrepressed disrespect for others, that my good deeds, if there were truly any, were being tremendously outweighed. Thankfully we eventually left the store and set the minds of the attendants, and one badly harassed cashier, at ease with our exit.

Walking back to the car I was questioned by my incredibly tasteless acquaintance about my thoughts on the bouncing ass of his female friend who flaunted herself before us during the return trek. I shrugged off the question and watched as she made eyes back towards the both of us. I dug deeper into the bliss of ignorance and kept reminding myself that it was all almost over. I helped load up the car, experienced another physical flirtation from the woman, and then drove off back to her home to deposit all the garbage of the night which I had allowed to cling to me. On the drive back to her house she made mention of sex acts with both my acquaintance and myself, this coming after her discussion about her children and the fact that she possesses ample amounts of government food stamps from her status as a "Single mother." I shuddered violently and applied myself more fiercely to the act of accelerating back to her residence.

Whilst returning home after ridding myself of the spoiled fruits of good deeds I encountered some hostility at a local gas station. I beheld a man, typified as a "Bro" by most in the modern know, dressed in the clothes of a sloven sports fanatic married with the garb of a hobby hunter. He was photographing his over-sized pickup truck with his cell phone while his friend sat behind the wheel. I shook my head in disgust at the sight and pumped gas into my vehicle. Before I was finished I looked up to see the pair drive by, the sporty hunter hanging out the window inquiring, "What are you looking at, bitch?" I responded with "Red neck, deer-fucker," and finished pumping my gas as they drove off.

Arriving back home I took an opportunity to reflect upon my active wade through the trash of the night. I had set out to aid a person who stood to remain in solitude during a holiday and ended the night with lessons learned and ripe, blistering fury. I'm calm now, here at home with my loving wife and my familiar things. I know now why I prefer the life of a shut-in. May it never become as horrific as what I involved myself in this evening. Now to plan a use for the incentive. I guess that I am not as entirely wholesome as I believe myself to be.