SMILEY

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James Whitman

Thats me-Smiley, and Im a regular guy. Or anyway I try ta be. Funny thing about my nameSmiley-I never used ta be a guy that name would fit. Thats why Im tellin this story.

All my life I been livin in a big city, not the same one always, but always big. And what makes a city big is people. People, I used ta didnt like them. Funny thing, come ta find out-ya know why? Because I wasn't happy. Simple, huh?

But Im happy now-as a guy could be. Im livin over on the other side of town in a nice place-not new but its clean-with a terrific guy, name of Bert. Naturally youre way ahead of me and figured it out already-Berts the one that makes it so I can say Im happy. So my name fits me-Smiley.

So I was startin out ta tell ya about what I was like before. I was a mighty sad character back then. And with good reason. I had one main trouble-I was lonely. Course 1 could never say that before. Me? Tough Guy Smiley-lonely? Ha! Anybody say that ta me gets their block knocked off!

Yeah, I had a few fights. Seemed ta make me feel better. But I shouldnt of, and I dont no more. Just makes things worse, fightin. I remember the last poor slob pullin that on me. Thought he was a tough guy-a Marine-took him a week ta find all the pieces. There wasnt nobody in those days called me queer twice.

Anyway, like I say, thats all over. Its no good bein in fights, bein tough-not that way. When somebody tramples ya, thats different. Then fight. But theres better ways of doin' it than with your fists. Fists dont solve nothin.

So, Id go ta bars and every time Id wind up only takin a hangover home with me. I guess it sounds crazy ta say I was different, but I thought I was. But maybe not, may be I was exactly the same as all the other guys and didnt know it-didnt admit it. Yeah, that was it. Id meet somebody and theyd like me all right and want ta talk, but it wasnt right. I dont know how, but I could tell, they werent much interested in me-the guy inside, the lonely guy, and not the big fake front. I guess they thought I was a tough guy with no problems. Huh-thats a laugh!

No problems? Thats all I had. I kept goin back ta the bars and always thinkin that maybe somehow-just once-thats all it'd take, Id meet somebody. Just somebody, so I wouldnt have ta be so lonesome.

But it never happened. It just kept on gettin worse. And the harder Id look the worse it got. It was gettin to where I started ta hate everybody because there wasnt anybody there for me.

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