The Wanderer

The wind blew across my face as I sat there on the curb, watching scores of people pass by on the sidewalks, paying no mind to anyone around them during their evening hustle. Rich people, working people, scurrying on towards their destinations like mobs of army ants after a particularly tasty-looking target. Only one element separated them from the insect horde, and that's when I found the answer I'd been looking for. As the people flowed on ceaselessly in their paths, showing off their money with items like Armani suits and Prada handbags, I saw the missing attribute that made the ants in the street seem more human than the Americans surging over them.

It came to me when I noticed the man slouching against the wall of the building opposite me. He gazed up at the city folk as they strode past him, paying him no mind, as though he were naught but one of the myriad insects that they would step on without a second thought. His eyes were a deep blue, pools of that black bile melancholia, with despair reflecting off the surface. Short, silver hairs erupted from his scalp in erratic shapes as though he'd been sleeping all day, and he wore a tattered denim jacket, with a hole in the chest. His jeans were torn and fraying at the bottoms around his grimy boots, covered with the accumulated filth of years of wandering the city's alleyways. He didn't speak, except for the rare occasion of a person making eye contact with him.

If, perchance, someone looked into his eyes, he'd beg them, "Please spare some change sir, winter is here and I don't have any warm clothing," or he'd beseech, "Madame, I'm starving, anything would help and I'd be eternally grateful." This was when it really hit me. Not a single one answered his plight. Not a single person gave him anything more than a contemptuous gaze. This was the difference between the people and the ants.

I had only enough money for the train fare to get home and some dinner, but that didn't matter. I walked over to the man and extended my hand, and the depths of his eyes lit like the sun's reflection upon a pond. He rose and I told him that I was going to buy him dinner. We walked into the convention centre I had been inside of hours earlier and went to the food court. Not two seconds after he took a bite of the cheese-steak I bought him, tears cascaded down his face, flowing as forcefully as the Rhine. He told me that I was the only person to treat him like this in the past week, and the lines at soup kitchens were like the tentacles of a large octopus; twisting and turning, with the threats of suckers present at every centimeter. I saw the Danube in his visage, where there was previously only despair and agony; there now existed a glimpse of strength, of resilience in the face of unforgiving circumstances.

I asked him what his name was, and he replied in the same manner as Ulysses to the Cyclops, answering only "Nobody." Nobody taught me what it meant to be truly considerate. Nobody was strong. I said my goodbyes to Nobody and borrowed money from a friend to get back home. Nobody was human.