Drove home from the Y, last night, get out of car in parking garage and a woman with few teeth comes over and apologizing, "i'm not bad," she says. i look at her, i lock the car, i say hello, she says "i'm not bad," and she takes her hat off. Her hair is grey, like snakes coming of the grey cap, the hat with the pills all over it. "My hair," she says giggling. "i don't want to scare you," she says, kind of hyper. My hair is standing straight up, just out of the pool at the Y. Haven't even brushed it. She walks over toward me in the little garage with a bouncy step. She has the air of a woman on her way to a wine tasting but her coat is a man's and she has no socks. It's raining out and we both run our hands through our wet hair. I stare at her and she smilies at me like she wants to borrow a garden hose but she doesn't live in the building.
She smiles and continues walking toward me. I am backed against my car fingering the key to the trunk. "Can you, can you?" she says. And i stare at her, "I'm not dangerous," she laughs and asks for $5 to go to Granby. I go immediately to open my trunk and stick the key in there to open it. I open the trunk and there they are, a pile of butternut squash, gleaned for the poor. I close the trunk and offer her a ride to Granby, "I have to go there anyway," I lie. Then she says it's not really Granby, it's pretty far, really really more like Belchrtown," she says. i say "Oh," and hand her a five and she tells me i look tired, "Just get off work?" she asks me. She is calm now, with her $5. I ask her, "Is it enough?" "Will someone be able to give her a ride all the way to Granby/Belchertown for $5?" I ask her. And she says yes. She got into the garage by scooting in under the automatic door after I drove in. She scooted in to get to me, not the squash, this woman who grinned as if to say, you know how it is and i thought, sure, I know exactly how it is.
She leaves through the two doors like she owned the place.
