Back in the middle of the last century, New Yorkers decided to trim somebody’s budget by shutting down mental institutions, and that dandy idea turned a whole lot of head cases loose in the streets. At least two ended up in Manhattan. This crazy guy and this even crazier lady.
Both looked nuts, especially in the eyes, but were conditioned like world class athletes, and covered ground with impressive pace, at a walk but easily two or three times faster than anyone else in town. And they never stopped. Not for anything except red lights. Somehow both knew about red lights and always, always obeyed them.
The crazy guy had this little toy duck on wheels, and he towed it along behind him on a string, and it went “Quack, Quack, Quack, Quack, Quack“, and rather boisterously too, and he was great at this because, speedy as the crazy guy was, the little toy duck on wheels never tipped over, bounding up and down curbs, or over manhole covers or shiny pedestrian shoes sometimes, but skirting anything seriously in its path like hot dog vendors or the pretzel wagon, though skidding big time when the crazy guy put it through hairy turns, which he did a lot.
“Quack, Quack, Quack, Quack, Quack” terrorized lower Manhattan the whole time The Kid worked his summer job there, and The Kid looked for the crazy guy and his pet toy duck on wheels every lunch hour except Fridays, when the guys took him along for pizza and beer, and the toy duck on wheels was happy and almost radiant with these wonderful whites and silvers and blues and ruby red toenails and a great big medium yellow beak that dipped up and down, and the wheels made something inside go “Quack, Quack, Quack, Quack, Quack” as the great big medium yellow beak dipped along, looking for all the world like the thing was actually talking, though in a delightful cartoon kind of way, but when you peered into the crazy guy’s eyes you could see there was absolutely nobody at home in there.
Sidewalks cleared when the crazy guy hustled by, and no matter how crowded the Wall Street area was, within maybe ten yards of the two of them, and on all sides, the crazy guy and his toy duck on wheels had the whole town to themselves in what was a really, really strange kind of way.
The Kid watched the two board the Staten Island Ferry once, and jumped on after them, and the crazy guy hustled up and down the decks there too, and his pet toy duck on wheels went “Quack, Quack, Quack, Quack, Quack” right behind him, and a vessel totally filled with passengers was empty to the two of them as people shoved each other up against cabin walls like it was a subway instead of the ferry just to get away from the outrageous pair, and the crazy guy took the ferry back to Manhattan, and The Kid did too, and the crazy guy never slowed down once the entire time The Kid was following him, world-class athlete that this whacko happened to be.
The crazy lady stalked pedestrians in midtown Manhattan, storming up and down Third Avenue a lot. She’d target someone on the other side of the street and charge her prey, screaming unintelligibly in the poor victim’s face when she got a few feet away, then veering back to the side she’d started on while people freaked out. Totally freaked out. Most stopped dead in their tracks, a few ran, but nobody, absolutely nobody, ever, ever went after her.
You should’ve seen the crazy lady’s face.
That woman was beyond nuts.
Over the years, and directly because of these encounters, whenever The Kid ran across an animal, any kind of animal, he’d always stare deep into the creature’s eyes, trying to see who was in there. Sharks are stone cold killers, gorillas and them could be living in the house next door, and probably were that year The Kid sublet in Alexandria. Birds are the most frightening, and a remarkable number of mammals simply look coy and you end up thinking you deserve whatever‘s coming next because you‘re so not in on stuff compared to them. But none of the animals ever came anywhere near scaring The Kid out of his mind like the crazy lady did. Not even that eighteen footer in the Seminole alligator farm a few miles outside Pahokee who singled The Kid out for lunch and followed him with his eyes everywhere The Kid went inside the Seminole alligator farm a few miles outside Pahokee, which had probably been designed to make this happen to big meals like The Kid dumb enough to start something by staring into a Goddam alligator's eyes, for Chrissakes.
Crazy lady was the only one ever got The Kid hotfooting away, and he took off every time he spotted her. Crazy lady was beyond terrifying. Kid lived off Third Avenue at the time, and got the hell out of there as soon as the lease set him free.
Anyway, whenever some psycho shoots a place up, people focus on the gun, but we remember way back when all these loonies were dumped into society, and why. Caring for them had been deemed too expensive. Now that more people have gotten themselves shot in another senseless massacre, it’s long past time to acknowledge these kinds of casualties as collateral damage to wrong thinking.
And do what’s right. For everybody, including the whack jobs. Spend the damn money and care for these people properly. We need to put them away. Always have. Especially that horrible witch stalking midtown Manhattan back in the day.
God, we hope the creature is dead. It’s an awful thing to say, but we do. We truly do.
You should’ve seen the crazy lady’s face.
That woman was beyond nuts.
