Begging Man

BEGGING MAN

by

KOSSIWA KIESE LOGAN

The begging man's hair was a dull red to his narrow shoulders. He was barely aware of the traffic at a standstill that he held a small cardboard sign to and the traffic whooshing by, stirring cool winds with their speed.

And his blue eyes, Kate Jimson noticed, didn't sparkle with—not greed or want, but possibility. He didn't look like he'd just been shopping with Kate Jimson's paycheck or he'd just opened presents that she spent her hourly salary on, though no one, especially her parents, agreed with her spending habits. His eyes would sparkle no matter what he was looking at, but now, they just. Except when he'd go inside himself. He'd go still in the middle of a conversation, even if he was in the one talking. What did they see? Sometimes he'd rock, but it always seemed his choice to come back to reality, to come back to Kate.

The traffic began moving, with caution as if expecting a car to ignore the rules of the traffic light and speed in front of them causing everyone to suddenly stop into some degree of a collision.

The wind blew soft, a mere breeze as they crawled and then sped up a little as their light turned from green to yellow and to red. A seemingly short amount of time between each of the lights. Even fall was hot as they approached summer. Kids' hormones and anticipation turning up Florida's heat like a volcano waiting to burst.

Kate was still too far back to read his sign, or for him to recognize her, even as she stuck her head out of her newly purchased white SUV. She could yell his name, Jacob or Jacoby as she called him. But, she remembered his mom's response to her letter to Jacob.

"Letters only," Jacoby had said when they were at their favorite, upscale burger place. He had convinced her to accept the scholarship for a university in Virginia, though he never offered hope for the future. He wrote her and she called him and emailed him all throughout her undergraduate years. She was unpacking for graduate school, where she'd study business when she realized that she hadn't heard from Jacoby. She decided that she failed to give him her new address and she tried not to make anything of it, until his mother's letter.

I'm sorry to write this to you instead of my son, but. Jacob woke one morning, nearly a month ago, and left like it was a normal day, only, he didn't come back. He never had anywhere to go. His mind was gone by them. I'm sure you remember his episodes. He finally stayed stuck in his mind.

It was like I had to revive him, and I couldn't, Kate thought as she remembered the letter. Short and lonely.

We looked for him, his father and I and when we found him. (Kate imagined her shaking her head, tears wetting the paper as she struggled to write each word, each letter.) He wasn't Jacob. He wasn't Jacoby. I don't know who he was.

Horns honked. She pressed on the gas, but was quickly stopped by the light and the slowpoke traffic. Seemingly scared of their own shadow.

Kate rolled down her window and leaned out as far as she could and yelled his name. She kept her head out of the window, even as the traffic rolled forward. She could finally see the stubble on, what she called, his porcelain face. He had always been giddy as an angel, if angels could be giddy. His body a fine paleness, like a sculptor come to life. Her mom would shake her head at her and her daddy would ask her why she felt the need to support him all the time, but they didn't understand, and she couldn't explain it to them. Not even her friends.

"Jacoby!" The name and voice echoed all the way to a past where they didn't know each other.