vagrant

vagrant

fiction
edward w pritchard

I try to be kind to people, not always easy for a policeman. Boswell sits down at the Lake and stares into the water  for hours and hours. He makes the restaurant owners across Manchester Rd  nervous when he comes around, they are afraid he scares off their customers.

I met Boswell when I worked over at the Children hospital as a security guard when I was finishing my criminal justice degree. He came everyday to see the sick little girl and I came to respect him as I got to know him a little. I recognized him; he was well known locally for his cage fighting. I was interested then in martial arts and we used to talk a little. It was odd  because he stood outside in the cold and smoked cigarettes. He was very anxious over the girl's health. Her name was Megan and because of her he broke his training and smoked.

The night Megan died my supervisor at the hospital radioed me to come up to the cancer ward. Boswell Shayes was sitting out in the hall on the floor. The little girl was dead. Several of the Doctors were afraid Boswell might blow up. I walked with him outside and talked to him for twenty minutes. After, he went back in with his girlfriend, the girl's Mother.

One of the fishermen told me about the Turtle release Boswell and Megan did here at the Lake. I was talking to the fisherman when I was playing softball up at the field.

Sometimes when I am driving home from work from my duties as a policeman I stop over at the dollar burger place across the lake and buy three or four hamburgers and take them over to the lake and share them with Boswell. We eat one each and always throw the rest to the snapping turtles.
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