Almost every weekday, Charles ran through the county park to get to work on the other side. He and his wife Cheryl lived in what they had expected to be a starter home near the river, but which they had gradually come to realize would be their home for life, ends always hard to meet. It was a saltbox in a good neighborhood with basketball hoops in the driveways and bikes left out on the lawns during the day but locked away at night. Here three sons made do with a single bedroom, and there were always lacrosse sticks in the living room and never any counter space in the kitchen. Charles ran up the river and through the woods. His destination was an office park near an ugly tangle of local roads and interstates that should have been a fifteen-minute drive but could easily be triple that at the wrong time of day. He was crazy enough to run both ways. 

Charles was a senior distribution manager. It was his job to make sure his division’s products—a line of paper goods that needed to be moved out of the mills quickly and were expensive to warehouse—flowed efficiently and steadily onto the store shelves. He spent a lot of time worrying about logistics and figuring out workarounds when storms stymied interstates or even just an individual truck broke down. If there was a shortage of toilet paper, he took the blame. 

He delighted in the problem-solving aspect of his job. He recoiled at the stress, the bugbear that was always either hovering right behind him or sitting on his shoulder, or totally possessing him in the gut. Its effects on him were behind his reputation for being gruff, which he didn’t think was really him. Only running kept this demon at bay. 

It was the easiest thing he did all day, just keep those legs moving. He wanted to be a deer. He’d be happy if he could just live in the woods. 

He ran even in winter, when a road through the woods was plowed and he needed to have his miner’s light on for much of the way. These winter runs gave him more than relief from stress, they gave him a distinct sense of confidence and power. Who else at the conference table had just run seven miles, stopping only for a crap in the bushes, where he had wiped his ass with snow? Who else was wearing clothes they had carried with them? These would be stiff when he put them on, still frozen from their journey, even though he’d have lingered in the hot shower in the basement at work.

Indeed, he considered the cold his friend. It emptied the woods. It brought a particular clarity to the sounds and a sharpness to the smells. Gravel popped under foot. A titmouse sang like a church bell. He picked up the pleasant wet cornflakes smell of a local brewery. 

His runs were daily vest-pocket adventures. He once stopped to watch a coyote hunting in a meadow, body low, head up, stalking like a lion. He once surprised a coven of vultures in a clearing as they flounced the body of a deer, ancient heads nodding and sneering and looking at him sideways. Their wings made a sound like a bedsheet being shaken out when the giant birds flapped off. 

Oddest was the goat head he found nailed to a tree, horns and shaggy beard intact, but the brown eyes opaque and a little wafer of hard, black tongue sticking out just beyond the recessed lips. Below was a soggy white cake and an open, half-full bottle of rum. Intellectually he knew it was some sort of Santeria thing, an offering to some local wood nymph. Emotionally, it scared the living crap out of him. 

He knew he was never completely alone in the park. Across the railroad tracks were hills with limestone in them that people had mined for cement-making long ago, leaving deep caves. The Kilns, they were called. People were known to camp in the Kilns. Sometimes in the early mornings he saw dark-gray little curls over the treetops from their fires, smelled wood smoke, heard scraps of voices. But these people were safely on the other side of the tracks—there were only two bridges across the rail cut in the entire park. A few times he had picked up his pace when he heard popping sounds, which he could only believe were gunfire. Probably hunters in tracts of woods adjacent to the park, getting an early start in the deer season—nothing to worry about. But his emotions shouted take no chances and it was easy to run fast. 

Then one evening the police found a man in front of the Kilns roasting a swan over an open fire. The local Audubon people were appalled. That corner of the park also had a ballfield and a running track and lawns with grills for people to barbecue. Stories came out about men exposing themselves to teenage girls, of rocks being thrown to keep people out. There were calls to “clean up the Kilns,” to evict the homeless from the caves. 

The local newspaper talked to the man who roasted the swan. He gave his name as Diogenes Smith. He apologized for causing a ruckus. None of this would have happened, he said, if he had simply roasted a duck. 

“Swan was King Henry VIII’s favorite dish. I’m the king of the Kilns. I should be allowed to eat swan, too,” he was quoted as saying. 

It all meant very little to Charles until one dark morning when he was running through the park he came across a person standing under one of the few streetlights along the way. It was on, and the dark blue light over the emergency phone box on the streetlight was also on. Charles thought it was a tall woman—a hooker who had strayed from the small tenderloin by a truck stop at the interstate cloverleafs, perhaps. The person had on a blond Marylin Monroe wig, and a coat of black synthetic fur that came down to the knees. As Charles approached, not breaking stride, the person looked and smiled at him, then lifted their right hand. It held a pistol. It had an extra-long barrel, maybe it was a Magnum. The person raised it and swiveled their wrist to point the gun directly at the side of their head. 

“Stop or I’ll shoot myself,” a man’s voice said. 

Charles stopped. 

“I knew that would get your attention. You don’t happen to have a light, do you brother?”

Charles couldn’t make his mouth work. He shook his head no.

“Then perhaps you would like to make a small donation in support of my little experiment in what I call inter-natural living. Like that Thoreau guy.”

He said Thoo-roo.

Charles had pockets in his running tights. He always ran with a few dollars. He gave these to the man. 

“Thank you, brother. What’s your name? I see you running through here all the time.”

“Charles,” Charles said.

“I’m Diogenes Smith. You’ve probably been reading about me in the papers. Professional solitary. I should have been born one of those rent-a-hermits English aristocrats used to have for the little grottos they built in the back of their big houses. A kept recluse. I should have been born a lot of things other than a Black man in the United States—I’d done better being born a white man’s dog in the United States; better health care. That’s why they want to close the Kilns. Put cages over the entrances. So it’s safer for the white man’s dogs when they’re out loose off their leashes and running everywhere, like they’re not ’posed to.” 

Charles had trouble not staring at the wig. Diogenes poked it with the tip of his gun. 

“This here is what we call a little wish fulfillment. My Goldilocks. She’s warmer than a hat. I’d never be caught without my Goldilocks.”

Diogenes finally lowered his arm. Charles realized he might be expected to hold out his hand to shake at this point. But he didn’t. He kept his distance. 

“You got blond hair, don’t you?”

It was mostly gray now, but Charles nodded. He did not, however, take off his watch cap to prove it. 

“I know you got this jogging thing. I suppose you got some freedom hang-ups, too. Maybe you and me should switch places. So what about it?”

Charles said nothing.

“So what you ’bout?” Diogenes asked. 

Charles said he worked in the office park by the interstate. He wasn’t saying where he lived. He explained he was an executive for a paper products company. He oversaw distribution.

Diogenes picked up on it quickly.

“Oh, you mean you make sure everybody in the United States gets to squeeze their Charmin.”

That was another company, but so what.

“So pleased to meet you Mr. Charmin. Charmin’ Mr. Charmin. I got to go find me a rabbit that has my name on it—and shoot it dead.”

He raised his gun just slightly. There was something comical about it—it had a reflective finish—perhaps it was fake, a theater piece that shot nothing more than a flag that said “BANG!” But instinctually, at the slight movement, Charles froze, which Diogenes noticed. He winked, then he turned and stepped out of the light. 

“I do accept donations,” he said not looking back as he walked deeper into the shadows. “Butane lighters. Warm clothes. Delicacies such as canned escargot. Smokes. Just place them on the picnic table furthest from parking lot at the Kilns. That’s the one closest to my hidey-hole. No toilet paper. Please. No Charmin. I’m a hard ass just like you. I use leaves or snow, according to the season. At least when the Gents next to the track is closed or the boys inside are busy pleasuring themselves. I like to do it when it’s light out so when you grab a bunch of leaves to wipe you can make sure nothing’s crawling on ’em. Otherwise, you might really—literally—get a bug up your ass.” 

Charles stayed put until he saw nothing and heard nothing. He didn’t know if he had just been shaken down or had made a new friend. Then he thought about the hard-ass remark—he had been watched—and he wanted to get out of the park as quickly as possible and run fast, without looking back. 

If he had been brave and civic minded, he would not have run off at all. He would have waited until the coast was clear, then picked up the emergency telephone and said there was a mentally unstable man loose in the park brandishing a weapon. Or called the cops on his cell phone as soon as he was safely out of the park. The gun was not acceptable behavior. The gun was not okay. But the mentally unstable part he was pretty sure sold Diogenes short—Diogenes clearly knew what he was about, what he was up to—even if what that was exactly wasn’t clear to Charles.

***

As soon as he had showered, changed, and got settled at his desk (with toasted bagel and orange juice bought at the company commissary), Charles googled Diogenes Smith. He had been a street performer up in Albany, used to give foraging tours in a local park. Charles found an article from the 1999 Albany Times Union art section about how a SUNY Albany production of King Lear was canceled because its street performer star—Diogenes Smith—had bowed out. Mr. Smith stated that he was forced to cancel because “God has ordered me never to memorize lines.” There was, also, in the 2000s, jail time for armed robbery. 

Charles did not tell anyone about his being stopped in the morning nor would he tell anyone what he did after work that day. He went to a supermarket and bought a jar of instant coffee, a can of salted peanuts, a bar of soap. Running home, he crossed the tracks and stopped at the picnic table closest to the Kilns. He waited in the dark for several minutes. He took off the knapsack, took out his gifts. 

The next day was Saturday and he waited until it was fully light out to go running. He ran back to the table. The paper bag his items had come in was on top of the picnic table, held in place by a rock. A note written on it said “Thank you brother for your thoughtful offerings. But please don’t squeeze the Shaman. What I need you to get me now is as many boxes as possible of 9mm bullets. A man got to eat and I’m running low.”

***

On Monday morning Diogenes was standing under the light. The gun was nowhere to be seen, but Charles decided it was not a good idea to just nod and continue running, so he stopped.

“Hello Prince Charmin. I got some ’splaining to do.” 

Diogenes reached under his coat and pulled out the gun. But he pointed it down. 

“Man’s best friend when he’s hungry. Best was when I went down to the river and shot me a beaver all fat under its winter coat. Woodchuck not shabby eating, neither. Nothing really left to eat if I blast a squirrel. Only two-legged creature this peacemaker ever killed was a turkey I got right through the throat. Had a small snake in its gizzard and I ate that, too. Oh, and there was that swan. I bet you heard about the swan. I could use a shotgun but I realize that’s too big an ask.” 

Charles said he’d see what he could do. He didn’t know anything about firearms, he said. Had never shot one, much less owned one. 

“I’m a big believer in my second amendment rights,” Diogenes said. “But don’t worry. They say if you shoot someone you become that person just a little bit. I have no desire to become any part of you. Can you imagine if I woke up and was you? Had your heart burn? Farted your farts? It would be horrible. And the weird thing is if I really woke up and was you, I’d also have all your memories, and I wouldn’t have no memories of me. It’s weird shit, this being alive business. Maybe I am you sometimes and you are me sometimes—we go back and forth—but when I’m me I have no memory of being you and when I’m you I have no memory of being me.” 

He raised the gun up and glanced at it.

“What I’m saying is we all should have compassion for our fellow man. Help him out. You never know what might come ’round to you.”

Diogenes was now smiling at him, gun held up in no particular direction. Charles muttered he was late and started running. Then he stopped and looked back. He knew he shouldn’t look back, but he did. Looking back showed fear.

Diogenes was still under the light, his arm raised so the gun pointed upwards, as if he were about to start a race. 

“Don’t worry. It’s fun scaring whitey now and then, but not worth the round when you’re running low.” 

***

One small drawback with running to and from work was that Charles didn’t have his car available at lunch. The Walmart was only about a mile away, but he couldn’t walk to it because the brief stretch of highway he’d need to go on had no sidewalks. Fortunately, his buddy Rich was taking a late lunch that day, so Charles could borrow his car. Walking into the store after parking, he realized that the last time he had been so nervous about making a purchase he had been a ridiculously optimistic, fuzz-lipped seventeen-year-old walking an extra mile to avoid the local drugstore to buy something for his wallet that he wouldn’t actually use for several years. 

It couldn’t have been easier. A hundred rounds came in a handy, ten-by-ten cardboard box. He realized no one would have flinched if he had bought two boxes, or even twenty. He was oddly pleased it had gone so well, and he did feel a bit like he had just exerted some special God-given right he never knew he had. 

He left the ammo on the bench of the picnic table, again in a plain paper bag. 

The next day he again found a note on the empty bag, which said, “Thank You Brother!” 

***

For several weeks the nerves came back whenever he approached that streetlamp in the middle of the park, and sometimes shadows in the lamplight made him jump, but Diogenes was never   waiting for him. Gradually Charles decided he now had free range of the park. He even liked going to the track, where he ran speed intervals once a week. He came to think of Diogenes as some sort of mythic spirit, a Pan figure perhaps, and since Charles had shown fealty, the spirit was now appeased, and Charles was safe. 

Unfortunately, over the summer, an incident revived calls to clear the Kilns. An off-leash German Shepherd took one in the heart. The perpetrator fled. A note appeared on a picnic table: “To whom it may concern. That dog had my leg and would have killed me. I only want peace. I know when I am not wanted. Goodbye to my home of the last seven years. I hope to go to a river where I can catch trout with my hands. Diogenes.” 

Bars were placed over the entrance to the caves. As the months passed, Charles felt relief, but he also missed him being around in some way: maybe Charles would have asked Diogenes for some advice on a few things? What to do about a son who spent a night in jail for throwing a punch in a bar. Or the fact his product line was being sold off to a private investment firm, imperiling his job. He imagined Diogenes kneeling on a rock by a clear, tumbling stream deep in the woods, watching for a jump, a flash, a rippling that was really a fish. Snapping his thin fingers forward and snagging it. Roasting the fish over a small fire.

Then Charles started hearing gunfire again, in the early mornings. 

***

It was the coldest day of the year—minus four degrees at seven in the morning. Plates of ice on the surface of the river groaned as they shifted and rubbed against older slabs piled up along the riverbank. It was too cold for birds to be making much noise, although Charles saw the flash of the white tail feathers of several juncos. A dirt path he briefly ran on had frozen to the hardness of a road. A dusting of snow stayed put. 

He decided he’d run at the track. He wanted to be in the open, at a place park crews came by regularly—if he got in trouble, they’d find him. It was one of those days—if he tripped and broke a leg, he really could die in the woods. 

It looked like some veteran of the Kilns was asleep in the infield of the track, right at the center of the oval. He was on his stomach, head tilted to the side. A sleeping bag was pulled up only to his waist. Around him was strewn the contents of several upturned shopping bags, intimate detritus that pulled at Charles’ eyes although he did not want to look: empties, coverless paperbacks, magazines, sweats, jeans, a yellow skirt, a dress with a floral pattern. The man in the middle was dark skinned and had no hair. 

Charles looked away because he didn’t want to confirm what he already knew: the man wasn’t moving. Nothing. No breath. 

Charles picked up speed. He circled lap after lap. It didn’t matter if he didn’t stop. It was too late to help.

The sun rose over the bank of bleacher seats. A piece of the man’s trash scuttled onto the track. 

He tried to keep from looking right at it. Then the wig moved into a patch of white sunlight and flashed.