My Night of Raving and Impending Death

Did I seal his fate?

*Places and names withheld*

Early 2000’s, coming back from a hardcore rave. Guys in gorilla masks and commie T-shirts drinking something funny from tiny Flügel bottles. 200 BPM interwoven with amen breaks, samples of 80’s soap operas and Schlager. Girls with angel wings. A guy managing to sleep in the corner despite the staccato stream of 90+ dB blasts. The same guy 2 hours later with a beer can on his head.

I find myself face to face with a pillhead that encloses me in a spontaneous embrace. I think he’s not even capable of remembering his own name anymore. Every part of his face looks like it’s going in another direction. He reminds me of Opie from Family Guy.

My head is pounding. Some air and some silence is what I need. Let’s call it a night.

Shit, my train home is in 3 hours and it’s raining.

3 AM on a autumn night is a hell of a time for a stroll in the city. The patrol car slows down besides me, a maglite shines into my face. They don’t recognize me as a Person Of Interest so off they go.

I find a bar that’s closing down where I’m allowed one quick beer, surrounded by an indifferent audience of upturned stools. Then I go stare at the clock in a 24H sandwich shop. Smartphones didn’t exist yet.

I walk down the street, hoping to find something else that’s open and not too sketchy.

“Excuse me.”

Even if it had been a nun I wouldn’t have been less startled.

Early twenties. Not significantly taller or stronger than I am, as my fight-or-flight logic decides.

“No, it’s OK I’m not gonna do anything.”

“I live in a caravan in a meadow in [Redacted]”

He names a specific town on the outskirts of this city.

“…and it’s getting cold. Do you have two euros for a gas bottle?”

Not taking any risks here, and I might actually be helping someone in need. I grab a handful of pocket change out of my wallet and carefully place it on a bluestone windowsill while keeping the distance and not losing eye contact for a second.

A taxi creeps by to assess the situation.

Our interaction ends and I walk on to the station, my senses sharpened fivefold. The taxi, my guardian angel, carries on his lonely shift.

This walk is not among my wisest choices.

Not two weeks later I browse the paper. Second section, regional news.

Young man dies in trailer fire in meadow in …[Redacted]

Oh no. No no no. Poor kid. Whatever sensation I had left in my pale face sinks down into my stomach.

Not long before, a friend’s mobilhome burned down because he kept the gas stove on as heating despite my warning. I knew it had to be that.

Not even 3 lines. Hardly a footnote for a kid that fell through the cracks.

My handful of change, his obol to cross the Styx before his time.

May your soul find rest.