I collect characters: Jimmy-Bear

couldn't get a ride home.
apartment about five miles away
along the interstate.
it was either wait for four hours
or start hoofin' it for two.
walking along I-35, under the Rundberg bridge
I see a man lighting a refry
just under the over-pass.

he has a large, curly, blonde
fro-mane, like a great,
thick picture frame
showing only his eyes and nose.
his jacket and BDU pants
were the worn nodescript
color of fading- red? brown? blue?
It was cold
almost ten at night, and i had nothing
to do after i finally got home
until my roomie got home from work
at the bar.  and I would've gone home
that night, just walked by, but
we looked at eachother,
our eyes wondered
eachothers questions.
and then-
nothing

just nothing. 
he turns his face back to the traffic
and I pause-
there's a convenience store
by the light, a Shell.
I head in and grab a six-pack
of high-life tall boys
and a bottle of shiraz.
at the register I ask
for a pack of camels, wide.
outside, the traffic stil held
the attention of the old man
(or at least his gaze).
I start packing the sticks
on my wrist, walking
non-chalantly to the over-pass.
he turns to see who's approaching
seeing only the guy he's been seeing
walking down the interstate already.

I flip the smokes open just before 
I walk up on him
and clear my throat,
a universal and non-threatening
strangers greeting.
I offer the pack forward
and his eyebrows raise considerably,
hiding more of his forehead.
"Hey!  Thanks, brother!"
he says in a jovial beer-drunk tone
and takes a smoke.
I pull out a tall-boy and hand it out to him,
bottom facing down and away from me
like a scalpel to a skilled doctor
"Mind if I sit for a minute?" I ask.
He takes the beer
"Hell, sit all you want!! I don't
own this bridge yet!"  I pull
out my own tall-boy and
plop down beside him.

he tells me
"hey, brother!  thanks alot for all this.
you really know how to help a guy out!
Ain't no nation like
a donation, brother!"
"True, true." I say lamely,
and take a good pull.
his is almost empty already.
he lights the first smoke i gave him
and slowly, smiling,
hisses it in.  I don't
believe i've ever experienced
anything
pleasure or terror,
with as much intensity
as he did on that
thick wisp.

"So, what's your' story, brother?
You get kicked out?" he asks me.
"Nope. just trying to get
back home.
nothing to do tonight, really."
he tosses his can in what seems
like a post-hole
just on the outside of the bridge.
I wonder how full it is. the hole.
I grab him another out of the bag
quick, and ask-
"So what's yout name? 
If you don't mind me asking?"
he stares at me.
"Im Jimmy!  most call me Jimmy-Bear!"
and, by god, he gave the absolute
funniest tilted -head confused look.
I almost fell over laughing
and rolled into the unforgiving traffic.
he swigs a good bit
as I recuperate, wiping
my eyes.
"So who are you? And what
brings you here, brother?" he asks me
his face energetic,
eyes looking to my bag.
I pull out another high-life
and hand it over.
"My name is Matt," I say
and pull out two more smokes,
"and I collect characters.  Tell me
what makes you you?
and why are you here?"

his demeanor is suddenly quieter
as he pauses
with his
fingernail under the tab of
an unopened beer.
he sets it
unopened
betweeen his legs.
takes a smoke and
lights one, staring at traffic.
he sighs, opens his beer
takes a swig, takes a drag
"you really want to know?"
"it's what i do."
and Jimmy says--

"I made a mistake and married
at nine-teen.  my 'high-school
sweet-heart' (Hah!), she liked me
'cause it pissed her daddy off, see?
he wanted a good investment
and she wanted some attention, brother!"
"so what happened?"
"Oh!" long huff on the stick-
"First! First, she gets preg-o! y'know!
you do everyting to avoid it,
but as soon as they think they want one?
BAM!!!!"
"damn..."
"that was right after graduation,"
he goes on,  "And i'm trying to do the right thing!"
"uh-huh."
"I try to marry her, take
responsibility, right?!
but the dad!!
her dad hates me!!
sees me as a bum!!" he yells.
I nod.  sip...
"So the baby comes 'round and
here's this girl with a bastard kid
and a dad- reviling her
with her crimes to the
'good family name'!!
so to piss him off,
she moves in with me
and my room-mate"

"Was it a boy or a girl?" I ask.
"What?"
"You're kid.  was it a boy
or a girl?"
"Girl.  we called her stephanie-"
at this point a large rig
drove by drowning out
all sound for a second.
i hate asking people to
repeat themselves-
'-moved in with my roommie,
had the second bedroom,
Really cramped, y'know?"
he said at the end of the ruckus.
"Hard  times are how you
find who you are, though!"
i said, feeling stupid for it much later.
"you are who you're fucking!
and you usually hate yourself for it!"
I took that to heart.
I wasn't fucking anybody!

"I think i got what I came for."
I tell him, standing up.
"Don't you want to know how i got here?"
he asks, bewildered
looking at my shopping bag.
I take out the bottle of shiraz
and tuck it under my arm,
then hand him the bag with
the last two beers.
he takes the bag.
"Ain't no doubt like a hand-out!"
he quips, then looks right into my eyes.
again. sad and desolate-
"you got another smoke, brother?"
I laugh!
"I don't even smoke, man!"
i say as I toss him
the rest of the camels hard-pack
and start walking again
towards home,
with my bottle of wine.