Shiny, and Not in a Good Way

You may have already heard, or you may just have seen it, but for those who don't know what I'm talking about, I'm sporting a brand new shiner today. That's right, I've got a black eye -- though strictly speaking there's nothing all that black about it. It's more of a purplish red, and it's not so much a whole "eye" as it's a long ugly line under my left eye accompanying a scratch on my nose and a swollen temple and jaw.

Now, in an effort to save myself from the long list of repetitive Q&A sessions, I'm just going to recount it all here. In fact, if you ask me about in person, I'll just redirect you here or even make up a more exotic story since I'm already tired of re-telling the whole thing.

Now, to begin: Langley is a shithole. Yep, that's an excellent start to all of this.

So after work on Friday, I headed out to the aforementioned shithole by way of SkyTrain and then the 502 bus from Surrey Central to Langley Centre. As I approached the heavily fogged-in bus loop, I called Chris to let him know that I'd be there in five and then hopped off when we pulled in.

Not seeing Chris yet (turns out, he was in the parking lot, wondering where I was), I walked out toward the street corner where I was passed by a couple of really hyper, giggly girls running toward the bus. One of them chucked an empty chip bag into the air and I (in a friendly way) slowed them down with "hey there, you just tossed your garbage in the street". "I don't care!" she yelled and continued down the street with her friend. I leaned down, picked up the bag and tossed it into the can (3ft away) and in a similarly friendly tone yelled "fuck you too!" -- I felt it only appropriate, but clearly, not the smartest move in a near deserted bus stop in a shithole town swallowed by fog.

I then continued onto the corner where I waited a few minutes and was soon re-approached by the same coked-out girls. The litterbug was irate with my choice of language, despite her own consistent use of it. She began slapping, kicking, the typical flailing coked-out girl stuff. Then she grabbed my $300 glasses, bending them and yelling at me so I grabbed them back. No, I didn't hit her, but in her messed up little head, my pushing her away and grabbing my glasses constituted as such. She and her friend then started yelling about how I'd hit her etc.

Enter the equally coked-out roid-monkey boyfriends. "Fucking Langley" I mumbled to myself. Much punching ensued, no amount of reasoning on my part was working, not that expected it to. For my part, I didn't fight back and instead opted to spend most of my time trying to block and insist that I'd not hit anyone. My thinking being that presently, they were taking turns punching me in the face, but if I landed even one good punch I'd be facing both of them, along with whatever other fabulous new joys awaited me in the fog.

Chris had decided to start driving around in the soup looking for me as he couldn't find me in the parking lot, and pulled up just in time to see them leaving -- they'd decided that they'd done enough damage. Thankfully, Chris hadn't seen the whole incident (or the blood on my face due to the dark in the car) or he'd most likely have wanted to go back and return the favour. Instead, I had to ask him if he had anything with which to clean myself up in his car as I was dripping on my jacket, and at that point, too much time had passed to be able to find them again.

At the time, I chose not to call the police because, as messed up as it may sound, I didn't want the run the risk that they'd believe the crazy chick when she insists that I hit her. With the kinds of things I want to do with my life, a record for assault and battery didn't seem like a good idea. Looking back on it all now though, I regret not calling them at the time because it's likely that I was not their last target for the evening. It's too late now though, I couldn't describe them any better than "coked out fuckers" if I wanted to.

In retrospect, I keep going over the whole incident in my mind thinking about what I could have done differently. Like one of those Choose Your Own Adventure novels, I see myself asking for the return of my glasses, or punching out one of the guys, or more importantly, not yelling (even nicely) at the girls int he first place. I honestly don't see how it could have gone any differently though. Sure, it's possible that had I said nothing, I would have avoided all of this mess, and that probably would have been the better option, but it's just as likely that these kids, fuct out of their trees as they were, would have attacked me for any other reason. However in future, while I won't stop yelling at people who litter, I will be more discerning with my selection of who is worthy of a good bitch-out.

For the rest of my stay in Shithole, Chris and Trish were really kind. They ordered pizza and Chris even endured Mama Mia for my sake (sorry Mom, not as good as I'd hoped). They helped patch me up and drove me to King George station in the morning. So yeah. Langley is a horrible, horrible place, but the friends I have there are awesome.