Saturday, 2:AM

When one is walking through Lincoln's Near South neighborhood at 2Am on a Saturday night, it is assumed that one is looking for something. We have no dangerous neighborhoods mind you, we simply have neighborhoods where people go to get things.

I had been drinking since seven, first at the state fair and than playing cards. I lost, bought back in, avoided the biggest dick-waving bets, and ended up making a five-dollar profit. It came in quarters mostly, and that's okay.

The woman emerged about half a block behind me, on E between 13th and 14th. She asked me for a cigarette. I dealt with her the same way I deal with every stranger who asks for change or a cigarette from half, a block away, I half-turned, mumbled "sorry" turned back and kept walking.

She followed me around the corner, than around the next corner and the next corner and the next corner.

I turned north on 16th, she apparently didn't want to face the traffic and finally turned to go another way. "You son of a bitch, you should have given me a cigarette!"

Or else what? What now then?

A few months earlier I was walking up 14th between C and D, four blocks shy of the governor's mansion. A man walked out of his apartment house and into the middle of the street where I was. It was four in the morning and was still only mid-spring.It was chilly. He asked me for a cigarette and I gave him one. He asked me what I was doing out there and I said I was just returning home from a party. He put his hand on my shoulder and I told him it was nice to meet him and I needed to get going.

After the woman walked away my path was blocked by a cop that had stopped in the 16th street crosswalk across G. He was staring at me of course. I was drunk, and people come here to get things. If I was in a bad mood I would have walked in front of his car to emphasize his illegal blocking of the crosswalk. But I was in a generally good mood, tempered a bit by unease, and I thought it best to avoid him completely. I turned back into the neighborhood and made my way into downtown via 14th.

When I returned to T-Town the parties were still in full swing all along R street. I don't remember if I went to any or not.