Skid Row

Monolithic buildings rose far above and before me, tall in the way you imagine mountains. Their magnificent height put the squat, ergonomic shacks of my upbringing to shame. They rose so tall, they nearly blocked out the light of the mid-afternoon sun and each one was shrouded in a fiery orange halo. I stretched my back before striding out onto the street, hefting my bag and, like so many travelers had before me, descending into the streets of San Francisco.

I thought about the money in my bag, a few hundred at best. I had never bothered to count it, and in that moment I felt myself wondering just how important that number would become in the long journey I had to come. But I soon forgot, because I was in Frisco, alone and free. Even as the iridescent halos of the concrete gods faded, the day's heat radiated from the concrete keeping me warm against the stiff, salty breeze.

I wandered through the streets at a brisk pace, taking in the sights and sounds of the bustling city. My legs strained as I mounted the side of each hill and screamed in release as I practically ran down the other. I would love to drop the names of every street I crossed, like the Beat Generation greats, but in those first moments of freedom, I couldn't have cared less. I weaved, wildly from one street to the next, brushing my fingers against ancient red brick and beaten wood fences, smiled to myself as I passed each liberated-twentieth-century couple, necking in a back alley.

For the first time in years, I felt like dancing. Through an alley and out into the next street and across the road and down the block, straight through traffic every time. But I just grinned broadly, in the fading light, beneath neon signs. When my legs finally grew tired, I forced myself into the throng of the late night commuters jamming themselves into crimson and gold San Francisco trams. I pulled myself into the very back of the tram's last car, hunkering among businessmen's and barista's feet, finger's crossed that I wouldn't be discovered.

As it turned out, the meter-maids on the tram were the least of my worries. As our cart jostled up the hill, each leg I bumped into returned with a sharp kick. Not a malicious sort of kick, but a harsh reminder that I was in their world, not mine.

Following one especially harsh kick, I tilted my head back, groaning involuntarily, first of many mistakes I would make along the way.

Her sharp cry ground my groan into the dirt, as she wildly leveled her eyes on me. "You were looking up my skirt, weren't you? You sick f**k!" The first thing I noticed, as her sharp black high heel lashed out at my chest, was how unlikely it was that I even would have been able to stare up her form fitting gray skirt. But far be it from me to tell her that. You see people see what they want to see, it doesn't particularly matter what's actually there, perception in nine tenths...

That was about the point where the wedged front of her high heel caught me squarely in the ribs, knocking my train of thought from its tracks and killing all the passengers. I'll never know what that shrew of a woman saw, but as soon as she spoke, everyone in the back of that tram saw me through her vicious blue-gray eyes.

From that point on, I kept my head hunkered down. For a cross city tram, we seemed to roll for eons, each second lengthened by the glares I felt boring into my back as I curled fetally around my bag. I stared as hard as I could into the black rubber floor mats of the cart, not daring to look up, for fear that the dull ache she had left in my chest would be multiplied. What, two days on the road? But I was laying face down in a tram-cart, praying that I wasn't about to be thrown out while it was moving. I wonder sometimes what would have happened if I had just packed in my bags then.

___________________________________________

By the time I left the tram, swept out by the thinning of the crowd and my fear of getting caught, the sun had set and the temperature dropped so that I found myself shivering involuntarily. As I pulled the my sweater down over my head, I spotted a street sign and realized where I had gotten off. I was smack dab in the center of skid row.

I wandered down the block, staring at the vagrants an winos, hunkered down in stoops, pulling at brown papered forties. I imagined each one's story, how they got to those stoops, wishing I could talk to each and every one of them. I just kept walking, looking for a cheap hotel.

Three blocks on I spotted a seedy looking motel advertising rooms for six bucks a night. I wove my way through the parking lot towards the office, blushing and grimacing at the solicitations of painted up red light w****s. It became very obvious to me why the sign said “one night only.”

The clerk at the window was tall and weaselly, dark slicked back hair framing high cheekbones and a thin, sharp nose. His voice was even oilier than his hair.

I mumbled something along the lines of “Hey, can I get one of the uh, six dollars, room?”

“You bringing any 'friend?'” he raised his eyebrows in the direction of the girls traipsing around the lot.

“No.”

“Six bucks for the room. Fifteen buck security deposit, it's optional.” He leaned in closer to the window glass. I slid six dollars I had palmed earlier under the glass. He squinted at me for a second before sliding a key back.

“Have a lovely night.” He smirked. You could've spread his voice on toast.

Exhausted and sore, but excited for the next day I pulled myself up the stairs and opened the door to my room, A6.

The smell hit me immediately, like piss and half cooked onions. I had never imagined that even a sex hotel could smell this foul. I flipped on the single, unshaded bulb that hung from the ceiling. The wallpaper, a sickly floral memory peeling from the walls, perfectly matched the stained yellow sheets that lay wrinkled on the bed.

I didn't bother looking at the bathroom, or even undressing. I locked the door then passed out, face down on the bed.