Bloody Dollar

So let me tell you about this bloody dollar...

This dollar I carry around in my wallet is part of a tip I received a few weeks back. I don’t remember the order itself, but it must not have been much, as I was able to balance the paper bag in one broad hand as I knocked.

It must have been my first stop on that run, because the bag was still hot.

The woman who answered the door was thin. I would even be comfortable calling her malnourished. Even after I announced that I was from Chinatown, she still looked confused.

As she moved away from the door, turning back into the apartment, I became aware of the smell: over-sick, over-sweet, more harsh than anything I’ve ever drawn into my own lungs. I took two deep sniffs and couldn’t place it.

The man of the house would have answered to “thug”. He was ripped at one time, I’m sure, but whatever he was using had eaten him almost as slight as his girlfriend. Faded, indistinct tattoos marked his back and shoulders, and the contours of his frame were highlighted with the same red that peeked at the corner of his eyes.

Judging from their squinting, I’m sure the opening door was the first time light had greeted them for some time.

He found my money amidst the couch cushions, enough for the food and a tip. (Not a bad tipper, for the record.) He even attempted to count them out, a handful of blood-smeared ones and fives that would have alarmed me if not for that over-sweet stench.

As I walked away from that stinking apartment, my head buzzing even from the faint contact I’d had from that enclosed apartment, I realized that despite his appearance, that man was probably making more money than I would ever see in my time as a delivery boy. Sure, the cost was greater, for though his frail form was nowhere near the leprous skeletons that have become the poster-children for meth here in Montana, he had certainly left the better part of his health behind him.

This was my glancing blow with the drug-cooking underground of Kalispell. Two malnourished bodies, a handful of tattoos, eyes lost and confused as abused children, and a handful of wrinkled, bloodstained bills. Not people to be feared, hunted, or ridiculed, nor, I would say, to be pitied, for this is a lifestyle that has been chosen for its benefits, and everything must have its price.

I present them to you, as they are, not for judgment, but only for your consideration.