Deep Spring

[Repugnant Abomination]

Sweat rolled down his taut face. He shifted, unsure if the cracking was splintered wood or his aching back. Women with Prada bags and high heels walked by, wine colored lips pursed thin with contempt. Men too, in sports jackets and ties, jaws tight, eyes stern.
He had been in the stocks since he could remember–it was part of life, like gravity–he didn’t understand it, but there it was. He never complained. Their barely contained disgust was all the conviction needed. Whatever he did to deserve such a lot must be warranted. Discolored rags caked with stench hung from his emaciated form. His teeth were rotten, gums cracked and bleeding, badly chapped lips. Children who strayed from their mothers hem paid no attention to him, as if gifted with some innate knowledge to stay away.
Wind whipped debris and car exhaust into his sticky grimacing face. Grime mingled with sweat trickled down from the smoldering heat. Every breath burned, every exhale coughed dust. Smokey brown eyes saw a couple, legs crossed, laughing and sharing ice cream while pigeons bobbed their heads and picked bread by their feet. He pictured the fowl honey glazed and roasting over a pit. He thought of this while the bird fed.

During day he existed by the curling of their lips, but when embers pierced holes through the black sky he felt abandoned, a ghost. Boney knees rattled and joints creaked like a rocking chair. The wind caressed his skeleton. A cold sweat, frigid, rags blowing against his skin. His mouth opened and closed like a gaping fish. But day always ushered night away and took its turn, no respite.
He never slept, always red-eyed and deprived. Lunacy pervaded his space like a toxic cloud. Those who got too near placed a handkerchief over their face. Dawdling children were scolded. The old man didn’t understand. He lacked perspicacity. A waggish woman stopped in front of him, chin high and hip cocked haughtily. Eyes stared down the barrel of her nose with disdain. The attention jarred him. Shrunken eyes rose; feet shifting and hands waving in a kind of excited dance. She sneered and shook the stocks. The wood rattled. She left.
Weeks passed mundanely. Brittle bones threatened to break. The sun scorched the sidewalk and made everything dizzy white hot. Feet blistered and callused. A group of men wearing blue overalls and carrying toolboxes approached begrudgingly. They were all business reinforcing the stocks. Onlookers shook their head as if witnessing some morally appalling event.
“Why?” the old man asked haggardly. It was a strange sound. The men hammered with their eyes down, but one with red hair faltered. Their eyes locked until one of the others barked. In that moment the old man tasted humanity for the first time-a deep spring of compassion capable of quenching every thirst. He stared imploringly to will him to look back up but he didn’t. They hammered the last nail and tested its strength then left.
The old man thought about the eyes and what he saw. It stirred a whirlpool inside him. He looked at the mass of people and cars. He was alone. Twilight painted the backdrop a pinkish hue and drifting white speckled across the canvas like some painters brush. The beauty was soured. If God came and apologized he would not accept. He vomited.

[Orgazmo]

Is the man Michael Vick?