“That stuff'll kill you. I mean it, it will. It's worse than smoking, worse than alcohol. It's no way to treat a pure body!” The homeless man glowered at my Starbucks cup with all of the disdain and thunder of a disapproving priest. I took a step back. He scratched himself and opined onwards, heedless to my growing concern.
“It's the devil's drink, and harvested on the backs of the indigenous and the underpaid! It gives you a false sense of alertness, as in I mean that research has proven that it's HARDER for coffee drinkers to wake up than otherwise after growing addicted to the stuff...and did I mention how addictive it is?” He took of his hat. Something crawled away. I wished I could follow, but he was between me and my car...I think he'd urinated on it moments before this fateful meeting.
He went on, burping aggressively. I nearly wilted. “It's worse than smoking...no, I said that, it's worse than crack cocaine, and that shit's the killer of the black family and economy. Can you believe that? The brown bean is deadlier than the CIA's finest chemical concoctions? And best part, it's legal. Because it's yuppie crack, like the powder cocaine. You get caught with rich boy cocaine, you get a fine. You get caught with the rocks? Ohhh...you're goin' DOWN. Get caught with coffee? You get a goddanged SCONE. Tell me that's fair, I effin' DARE ya!” His avoidance of profanity unnerved me. Someone so foul shouldn't be so...pleasantly unreasonable.
My car was starting to smell. Or was I just now starting to notice?
“Me, I'll stick to heroin,” he told me. “At least heroin's honest. I get to fly every morning, right through my toes. And y'know what? I don't have to know what goddang venti means!” He shuffled off, indignant.
I threw my untouched latte away. He'd even been so kind as to leave a spoon and syringe on my hood. I was always a sucker for a good salesman.
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