The Punch
He looked like a normal guy.
It was cold. I was walking on a pedestrian bridge over the river, and because it was so cold, no one else was around.
He was loitering at the point where the bridge ended, wandering around in no particular pattern, as I walked toward him. In his late 20s, I'd guess. Black puffer jacket and knit cap. White jeans, which are unusual in any season up here. Boots.
It was his walking around aimlessly that seemed a little odd, and I made a note of it, but I walked past him with no incident. I had on earbuds and was listening to the new Kendrick Lamar album.
After I passed him, I heard a shout behind me. "Do you want to go back to the U.K.?" he asked. I didn't know why he asked it at the time, but I was wearing my Oxford knit cap and it has a U.K. flag on the front. I didn't take out my earbuds, because I really didn't want to engage, but I said, "No, but I wouldn't mind going to Canada."
He kept talking, his volume rising steadily, but I didn't quite understand him. Then he assumed an aggressive poster and I realized I was in a situation.
He shouted a few more questions I didn't understand, then walked forward, wound up, and punched me in the stomach. Hard.
I didn't fall over, even though I was shocked. "What are you doing?" I shouted back.
"You're a fucking Trumper! I know it!" Oh, the irony.
He was wound up, ready to go again. I looked at him and said, "Are you kidding me? I'm not a Trumper. I hate Trump. I'm stick about the election."
"Oh, no," he said. "I'm so sorry. You looked like a Trumper." He walked up to me and actually shook my hand and kept apologizing. And talking.
At this point, it was easy to tell that he had some kind of mental illness. He'd start sentences but not finished them, shifting midstream into other topics. He was amped up: his walk, his gestures, his words.
My stomach hurt, but it didn't feel serious. I just wanted to keep him as calm as I could until I could get away from him, so I started talking back, asking him questions. I told him it was a bad idea to punch strangers, because he was going to run into someone who was either armed or tougher than he was."
"I don't give a fuck," he said.
He kept talking, telling me about his life in the Upper Peninsula before he came down to Grand Rapids (less than a week ago, he said). He moved here to get away from Trumpers, but it seemed they were everywhere here, too. He was calm, telling me this, but angry at the same time.
This conversation kept going for almost twenty minutes as he continued to follow me. Most of the time, he had his phone in front of him, ostensibly filming himself, although I doubt his phone was even on.
For some reason, I kept to my original route, which passed right by a grocery store. When we got to the intersection, we crossed against the light, and a white SUV honked at us.
He stopped in the middle of the street and started screaming at the SUV, and when it stopped in front of him, he ran around to the driver's side and punched the window as hard as he could. "Everyone in a white SUV is a Trumper!" he shouted.
I kept walking. I was almost to the grocery store when he caught up to me. "Are you going to go to the police?" he asked.
"No," I said. "I just need to sit down, because my stomach hurts."
"What's your name?" he asked.
"Bill," I said. "What's yours?"
"Andrew," he said, shaking my hand again. We went into the grocery store, where he was distracted by the displays and started wandering around, and I walked out.
He didn't follow me this time.
Tomorrow: what I did wrong (per Eli 23.4, which could have been a critical error).
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