Deja Vu-and Not in the Good Way

My parents hardly ever went to this McDonald's because of it's appearance. The bricks looked as if it had been an old Taco Bell, and they had converted it to a McDonald's sometime in the 70's. It should have been closed down years and years ago. It looked as if it doubled as a homeless shelter at night; dirt on the floor, which was always sticky, and sometimes sleeping bags tucked behind tables.

Mom told me to go find us a table while she waited for our food. I was six or seven, old enough to be able to take care of myself at a table. As soon as I was out of my mother's sight, I felt a grubby, rough hand grab my upper arm. It spun me around and I was face to face with what must have been a homeless man. His breath was a mix between alcohol and what smelt like grassy mud. Dirt was creased into his wrinkles, much like a Shar Pei when he has never been washed. His skin was poc-marked, and his eyes were a mystery. They were a dull glossed over brown, but they were trying to be vibrant.

He spoke to me, almost in tounges; He described everything you'd ever not want to know about the world; He told me my parents were going to die and leave me someday, that I would die too, and that no one would care about me. He talked about many other things, and I was frozen to the spot. I was afraid of what he would do if I tried to break free of him. He almost had me locked to him with his eyes, somehow I couldn't move even if I wanted to.

Finally another patron told him to leave me alone. He released his grip on me, and I felt the scrape of dirt that fell from his hands. I looked down at my arm and saw that he had left a dirty print of his hand. I never forgot how scary that was, being held captive. But I never told my mom, and she never asked why I kept brushing dirt off my arm the whole meal.

Around seven or eight years later, we came back to that same McDonald's. We were shopping in the area, and it was the only place that my sister would eat at. I tried to talk her into something else, since I had never wanted to go back to that McDonalds. My sister was the same age I had been when we last went there, and I had the encounter with the homeless man.

My sister had a terrible habit of running off, which she did as soon as we got to the counter. I went to go get her from my mom, but I took my time getting to the area where she had run off to. I rounded the corner and saw her; her arm was being held the same way, by the same man. At first I couldn't believe my eyes, but I would have recongized that man anywhere. He had changed his speech to more profanity than I remembered, but there he was. This time he had an eye patch over one eye. A skateboard was tucked under the table. Although I was as terrified as if it had happned to me all over again, I called out my sister's name and told her to "get over here NOW." Once again the man loosened his grip and Amanda wasted no time getting away from him. We never talked about it, and I never mentioned that the same thing had happened to me, just before she was born. He was even in the same booth.

This homeless man started popping up everywhere. He rode the skateboard around town and screamed obsenities. He never made sense, and I swear he followed me everywhere I had a job. When I worked at Hollywood Video, he would hide in the bushes and scream at me when I went outside to check the dropbox. He walked the mall where I was selling calendars for Waldenbooks. He was everywhere. Until one day, he disappeared. I never saw him again.

That McDonalds was closed a few years later, a nicer one built a block away. It only took them a few months to get the floor permently sticky though.

Me at 3 months old

Pictures by Paige