It feels like a minute since I've had the opportunity to share a good story, so let's make the first post-restoration entry about one of the more unusual things to happen to me since being away. 

In 2021, I spent a week in my hometown, Fort Collins, Colorado. Midway through the week, I had to switch to a new Airbnb spot, so I found myself in a new neighborhood. I quickly noticed it was near a local and long-standing restaurant I've always wanted to try, the Moot House. So, after getting settled into my new place, I made the leisurely walk to dinner.

After ordering I read my book and stole glances at the other people dining around me. I quickly ate, squared up with my waiter and started the walk back to my house. As I re-entered the neighborhood, I heard a girl talking loudly on her phone. In glancing up we were walking directly towards one another, though hers was more of a drunken stumble than a walk. Not wanting to disrupt my evening's peace, I started crossing the street to give her (and me) space. 

She was grousing shrilly about some fella who upset her. As we drew even, I glanced at her and she was a wreck. Literally. Her clothes were torn. She was bleeding. And what I previously took for a drunken stumble, I now see as more of an injured weaving. I exclaimed aloud in surprise, "Oh my god, are you alright?" She looked at me then turned away, continuing to talk and walk. I turned back and intercepted her path. 

When I describe her injuries, I would first say it looks like she fell off one of those motorized scooters while moving at a decent speed. I've seen a few of those accidents, given my home's proximity to a university. Her clothes were torn, and she had abrasions on her skin that would support this. But then she also had some deeper cuts that were actively bleeding, one on her forehead and others on her thigh and forearm. These made it look like something totally different, or in addition, had happened. 

TROY
Are you ok?

BLOODY GIRL (to the person on the phone and then me)
Wait, wait, what?

TROY
Are you ok? 

BLOODY GIRL (exasperated)
Yes, I'm ok. 

TROY
But you're all cut up and bleeding.

BLOODY GIRL (looks down and takes it in as if she's noticing it for the first time).
Oh.

TROY
What happened?

BLOODY GIRL
I don't know. Do you know?

TROY (astonished)
No I don't know. You really don't know what happened?

BLOODY GIRL (continues to scan her injuries)
Do you think it looks bad?

TROY
Yes, I think it looks quite bad. You have a bunch of cuts all over. You really don't know what happened?

BLOODY GIRL
No. I can't remember. 

Her phone rings and she answers it. I hear a guy's voice and she starts yelling at him telling him to stop calling her and she doesn't want to talk to him again. Then she hangs up the phone.

TROY
I think we might want to call an ambulance.

BLOODY GIRL
NO! No. Don't do that. I will get in trouble. 

Before I could ask another question, her phone rang again, and she answered it. This time it is a girl and the girl I'm talking with starts her drunken raving about how Paul keeps calling her and upsetting her more. I interrupt her conversation. 

TROY
Excuse me. Why would you get in trouble if we called an ambulance? You have some pretty bad cuts. 

BLOODY GIRL
Because I don't have any insurance. 

TROY
I think they will still look at you. I think you need to be looked at.

She looks at her injuries again. I point out some of the nastier-looking ones. The person on the phone is talking, but the girl is holding it away from her and doesn't seem to hear. As we studied one together, she asked with genuine and innocent curiosity if I didn't think she could clean that one up herself at home. I told her I guess she maybe could, but if it were me, given the number and variety of cuts, I'd want someone to look things over and get them properly dressed.

I suggested she sit down and she did so in the front lawn of the house we were in front of. I again recommended calling an ambulance, but she refused. She was now talking both to the girl on the phone and me. She was complaining to the girl and discussing her various cuts with me. She got another call and upon hearing the voice, started yelling at them to stop calling her and that they were making her more angry. She hung up on him and complained more to the other caller.

I asked her where she was going and she said home. I asked where home was and she said got turned around and wasn't sure where she was. I asked if she had a friend who could pick her up. After thinking on this a moment she handed her phone to me. 

I asked the girl on the phone if she could come pick her friend up. She said she could not, but her brother could. After a moment, a new voice came on the line, which I would describe as kind but annoyed. He asked where we were. I described our location. I asked how long he would be. Twenty minutes. 

The girl's voice came back on the line. As I handed the phone back to the girl in the grass, I told her someone would be here in twenty minutes to take her home. I'm not sure if she heard me as she was now engrossed for the first time in studying her various injuries. As she took her phone, she asked me again if I knew what happened to her. I told her I did not. Her friend was talking, but the girl wasn't listening. Then the other line rang again. This got her attention, and she answered it. 

BLOODY GIRL
I told you to stop calling me. Stop talking! Stop. I don't care. You're upsetting me. If you keep talking I'm going to run away. Stop! Stop talking! I swear if you don't stop, I'm running away. 

While she's yelling at the phone, I set a timer on my own phone. I'm also assessing how reliable the young man coming to get her sounded. I put it at fifty-fifty. My reflection was interrupted by the girl yelling louder and starting to stand up, "That's it, I'm leaving. See what you've done. Now I'm running away." 

I stepped forward telling her to stay sitting but she was up and turning away from me before I could take the few steps towards her. And she never stopped moving. She broke into a crooked run that looked like she was trying to avoid getting shot by a sniper. She ran through the front yard, then into the street, across the street, into the next yard, then disappeared around the corner. 

As she first started running, I took a few steps after her but then stopped dead and watched her go. I could imagine how it would look to have a fifty-year-old visitor in town chasing a bloodied twenty-year-old local girl through a quiet neighborhood. Forget that this girl had zero idea of how she got in this state. So I stood and watched her drunken escape into the quiet weeknight neighborhood. 

I spent the next forty seconds assessing my options. The only thing I knew for certain was chasing this girl was not one of them. So I wished her luck on this evening (and in life) and resumed my own less exciting walk home, which at the start followed the girl's path. As I was crossing the street, a car pulled up beside me and another young woman, this one not bloodied asked, "So what was all of that?"

Part 2 is here

Photo credit: Dutch Engelbrecht who always fancies spotting the moon in a daytime sky. If you need a refresher on who Dutch is, this may help.