Grimm

I walked out of the brewery, and I felt that the tender had it out for me. During that time, I always had a way of sizing up people. I watched from afar to make a judgment, really seeping from deep down a specific type of insecurity that screamed, “I’m not cool enough.” While I had stood at the back of a 10-person deep line, I observed as the tender flirted with some woman. He leaned in, the type of buzzed comfort that makes a person forget about the jagged edge of a counter and wonder later on “Well, how did I get these crease marks?” Soon, more people trampled in, cutting in line, and pointing at the indecipherable list of brews that were but chicken scratches in the low light. My goal to shove down my fear of showing up at the concert had been thwarted. Fate would later prove that I had enough within to push me to take a big leap.

On my way to the show, I walked that long stretch of Morgan Avenue toward Brooklyn Steel. While I walked along the avenue, I hugged the sidewalk closest to the high rises. In the shadows, I lurked in my aggressive state on alert for any sign or threat of danger. Cooper Skate Park was still filled with early evening groms attempting to get clips to put out into the multiverse. I watched a kid through the wired fence try to bring it down the pipe with his board. Then I thought about the virtues of skateboarding, an activity that I had loved but was not very good at. The cries, the groans, and the clacks of dead wood onto the pavement echoed, traveling to my inner zone and shaking me up. Given how dark it was, I had suddenly become more concerned about my safety. I was walking alone, a 5’4″ brown kid in the middle of a neighborhood that I had never been to or frequented. I fixed my eyes up at the tall apartment complexes, attempting to determine if I was indeed somewhere I wasn’t supposed to be. It would be a long stretch of sidewalk along Morgan Avenue that would eventually lead me to Richardson Street.

As I neared the end of Morgan Avenue, a man walking toward my direction signaled to me the gut horror that I had failed to shove down. The streetlight above was out, creating a monstrous shadow that would envelop me as I turned the corner. When he walked closer, I kept my hands in my pockets, staring down. I pretended I didn’t see him. From the looks of the hood pulled over his head, I imagined that I was walking past the ghost of my old life. In my 20s, I used to wander around Brooklyn, around Queens, around Manhattan, bypassing the lights in an attempt to cloak myself – both from people and the budding responsibilities of my adult life. I was terrified of whoever I had walked by because I didn’t know where they were headed or what their motivation might have been. In short – I was looking to avoid any scenario where I would get fucked up. Then my primal instincts had kicked in. Questions arose like smoke from a drag. If it had not been for that tender, waxing poetic to whatever beauty – man, woman, whoever – would I have cared about any of this at all? Would I be so deep in my drink that I would not even notice the glimpse of a man walking by? What was I trying to prove by going to this show in the first place?

I inhaled the night as I passed by the man. I took a turn for the corner. I was welcomed by the return of streetlights. The path toward the venue was clear-cut. I caught a glimpse of where I was headed for the next couple of hours. I unclenched my hidden fists in the depths of my pant pockets. I continued to dart my eyes from left to right. The coast was clear. It was time to see where all the cool kids had hung out.