&games

I don't think my wife has heard this story. Do me a favor and don't mention it to her.

I got a call to pick up at an address on Iniakuk Avenue. Iniakuk is a nondescript, gravelled street located about a mile outside the city limits. Iniakuk is just like most rural roads in the area. The forest comes right to the ditch on both sides, and most of the homes are set back from the road with a wide screen of trees. I would guess that most homes in the area are on 1 acre lots.

It was night, and dark (the midnight sun had been gone for a while). As I drove down Iniakuk I met two State Troopers, in two different cars, driving very slowly. I thought that was rather odd. Two troopers on the same residential street, driving as if they were looking for something. A few moments later, as I was wondering who they could be looking for, a guy jumped out of the bushes right in front of me and started flagging me down. He literally jumped out of the bushes just a couple yards in front of the car. He was wearing dark clothes and I had to slam on the brakes and swerve to avoid hitting him.

He jumped into the cab. My heart was in my throat. I checked my mirror. The tail lights of the troopers were getting pretty far away.

"Uhhhhh.... Did you call a cab?"

"Yeah, yeah. I called from (such and such an address)."

The address he gave me was the address I was supposed to pick up, even though that particular address was still quite far away. I moved around a little bit, just to feel if my firearms were where they were supposed to be. (I normally carry two.) As I was executing a perfect fifteen point turn on this dark, narrow street, and while he was watching me back up in his rearview mirror I managed to secretly transfer my North American Arms mini-revolver into my breast pocket for easier access.

"So where do you need to go?"

He told me, but something was not right about the way he said it. It felt as though he had called a cab without a destination in mind. It would be an understatement to say that I was feeling very uneasy at this point.

Before we got back to the main road it was clear that the guy was schizophrenic. He wasn't a scary schizophrenic, he was more of a goofy schizophrenic. We were back on the main road in a minute or two and by then my adrenalin had gone down significantly, although I was keeping a close eye on the guy.

I forget what he said, but he continually talked on various schizophrenic-conspiracy-tangents for the entire ride, including how the police were out to get him, and about some stripper who was stealing all his money. The stories were so different, but so intertwined in his mind that only another schizo could follow what he was saying. Even Dick Cheney and the FBI were involved. I would occasionally insert an "Uh huh," or "I don't know," when is seemed he was waiting for a response.

I dropped him off, he paid me, and that was it.

But there was still the matter of two State Troopers on Iniakuk who were driving as if they were looking for something. I figured I had better check to make sure the troopers weren't looking for him, so I stopped at a gas station and called.

The dispatcher denied that there had been any troopers on Iniakuk or anywhere near that area recently, much less two of them. She thought that maybe I had seen the University Police force. No, they were definitely State Troopers. She put me on hold to check.

Nope. According to the dispatcher neither the State Troopers nor the University Police had been on Iniakuk recently. But. Just. In. Case. They. Had. Been. She thought I had better give them the address where I dropped the guy off.

No dice lady. If you aren't looking for him you don't need his address. Let me just slip into the gas station bathroom to dispose of my shorts, and you can read about it on my blog.