Street Fight

Yesterday I was in a street fight.

Actually, more like an appetizer after which you hope to avoid the meal.

It went down like this:

I work in the studio all day Tuesday until 5:30 AM Wednesday morning, before bicycling home to get an hour of sleep before my 8am physics lab. Just as I am leaving, I obsessively check my e-mail and find a note that my term bill payment bounced; unknown account problems. So I make a mental note to go to the bank and billing/payment services in the morning.

8:50 am. Wake up 50 minutes late for lab, jump on the bike, pedal hard...flat tire on Telegraph. Now I'm 90 minutes late.

I have to make up the lab in the next session, so my day just went from starting errands at 10 to starting at noon. And I'm walking, so it all will take even longer.

I decide to not fight it; enjoy the walk, down through campus, and down center street across into town. I am always in a rush on my bike, and never here at this time of day. It is lunch time, and everyone is out on the street; college kids, high schoolers, suits and punks and beggars, guys who wear socks with their sandals, enjoying the sun. I am hungry and eating an apple as I walk.

On the south side of the street, in front of the burrito place, by top dog, a group of guys is hanging out; youngish, probably highschool, dressed in baggy pants, FUBU gear, caps on sideways; racially mixed but darker than not. They're just kickin' it, talking low, throwing jokes. I think to myself that they seem overdressed in the hoodies, day like this.

Just after I pass them, two break away from the group and brush past me, one saying 'yo yo, there he is...'; start dodging through the crowd, not running, but moving quick, as if to catch up with someone but maintain surprise.

I follow suit.

There is a feeling they give me, that their intentions aren't good; I pick up the pace and am soon almost behind them where they have slowed down, pushing up hard on two other kids, white dudes, thinner, bookish. Maybe I identify? They are talking, harrassing; the two guys in front seem to slow down, as if to not show fear by running away; neither do they turn around to confront the situation. I am trying to see what is going to happen, if they are going for a wallet, or what...

I am three steps behind and gaining when time shears. The black kid in front of me, on the right, drops down fast and wraps his arms around the legs of the kid in front of him, tripping the kid and throwing him down on the ground. I think I hear the hit, a smack of skin on pavement. My momentum carries me toward the four of them and my left hand goes out to grab the tripper, pull him back; in the same instant he is rising up to turn and run, smiling, laughing. My hand on his shoulder and his rotation merge; together we turn first into each other as I step back, absorb his flight; then together around my pivot, chest to chest, until he is falling backwards toward the storefronts, my left arm then entire body following him down as I come to a kneeling position, left foot grounded, right knee bent, shin pinning down over his thighs.

His look is of complete disbelief.

We hang there, suspended for a second, two, three; he regains his breath enough to sputter 'wha tha f***!...hey..!'. His friend has already run up the street; the two kids that were in front must be somewhere behind me, the tripped kid back on his feet.

I stare at his face, into his eyes, mixed with anger, fear, embarrassment; and say 'you alright, then?' - a retorical question; not about whether he is unhurt, but a command, imperative that he get all right, corrected, clear on how his position has changed. He is moving under me, perhaps trying to take a swing; I hold, above his squirming, a moment, then rise up and stand back.

He scrambles to his feet and takes off up the street, a bouncing sideways run through the opening that has formed in the crowd; but he is still looking back at me, gauging. He turns and comes back at me from 20 feet off, like a boxer, bouncing and light on his feet; my left arm is still extended, full but not locked, open hand. We connect.

I don't move. At least not much. A shift of the feet, rebalance, open angle; palm against his chest. He is saying something that means he will hurt me; I know that what it really means is that he is embarrassed. He is throwing his weight forward, shoulders, arms, hands, but not quite throwing punches. I say something that means, 'Well?'

His friends call him back; 'yo, let's get outta here!', and he hesitates, steps back, forward, and then slips away up the street; turns, and from a distance of thirty feet stops again to hurl more words.

I stand with my arms open, hanging low. 'My name's David Gregory. Who are you, huh?' More words from him, them; then I ask, 'alright then?': is it over or is there more they want to add?

Holding my position, I watch them disappear into the crowd, before turning to continue on my errand. The two kids who were being harrassed are there, walk with me a moment; the tripped kid thanks me, says something about 'what did they think, I can't kick back from there?'; he is wearing what seem to be new shoes, but nothing I would consider hot commodities. Was that what this was about?

I ask if they knew those kids, and they mutter a no, which seems to say yes but not too well; in any case they don't want to say. I tell them to be careful, and they murmur another thanks, turn the corner and continue down the block. I stop to wait for the light before crossing, notice the apple, still held between the thumb and forefinger of my right hand.

I take a bite.