scooter

I WAS ON MY WAY HOME when I saw the man. He was standing by the roadside in a field. He was wearing a black, button down shirt, a pair of blue jeans, his arms were folded. He looked like a young Benny Andersson of ABBA, but was clean shaven. He saw me on my scooter and waved me down. “Lost?” I asked. The stranger replied, “Hey man, could you give me a ride?”

It seemed a peculiar request. He wanted to ride on my Bolt scooter? But there was only room for one. I shook my head. “I’m going home,” I told him. “I live right around the corner.” With that, I was off. The roads around my house were elevated, but more or less followed the same pattern as Breadfruit Street, Prince Street, and Rich Bastard’s Neck Road, out in Quahog Ponds at the most eastern point of Long Island. At the end of Rich Bastard’s, there was an old manor house, and at the start of that road, there was a burial ground for African and Indian servants.

I went to make the turn onto Rich Bastard’s Neck Road, and the man stood in front of me again. He had somehow sprinted through the fields and wetlands and arrived to the spot before I got there. Who was capable of running so quickly? And without breaking a sweat? He approached me with that same Benny Andersson cool. “Hey man, could you give me a ride?”

This time, I decided to lose the man in black. I revved the scooter, zoomed up ahead to another waterfront estate. I held the scooter in one hand and came up through the terrace in front, ducking through some screened in corridors and walkways until I came out the other side, where I could see that the way home was clear. Then I boarded my scooter and cruised down Rich Bastard’s Neck Road to the old estate where I lived. It was a fine day and the sun was out. I could see the ducks and geese in the water and high reeds that lined the high road.

When I got to the house, I quickly went in and locked the door behind me. My daughters’ toys and clothes were all over the floor in the foyer, and I began to pick them up and put them away in a white cupboard. The door handle began to jiggle and I could see that someone was trying to get inside. I went over to the door and put my eye to the keyhole. I saw the man’s eye on the other side. This time, he wasn’t friendly. “I asked,” he grunted while trying to break down the door, “if you could give me a ride!” The door opened at that moment and he collapsed through the doorway. Not knowing what to do, I fell on my back. As he lunged, I kicked at the air, hoping to strike. “Get the hell out of my house,” I yelled. “Get the hell out!”