See Some ID

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See Some ID

Vern was an engineering student, without a penchant for drama, really, except that he lived for Halloween; he always had, and this year was like the rest. His life was boring, full of studying, but he relished the opportunity to get a good costume, go out, and be someone besides himself for a change. This year he’d met a policeman and got the opportunity to borrow a pretty good uniform and hat. The holster wasn’t hard to find, and he even found a gun that was pretty obviously fake to anyone who knew guns. A corner of it shone out from the holster when he wore it, though. He thought it was a great costume, and he worked hard on making the shoes a shiny black. The final thing was that he’d let his hair grow long and let his beard grow out beforehand, but then, on that night, he got a straight buzz-cut and shaved clean and unrecognizable. He had two parties to go to, one given by some engineering buddies, and another by a fraternity associated with his roommate.

Halloween in Minneapolis is always cold, and dark, and often snowing or sleeting. On this night it was clear but there was a cold frost on the grass that made it slippery and shone in the streetlights. Vern was also aware of the stud in his nose; he’d had to decide whether to remove it, try to cover it, or leave it there, a sure sign that he wasn’t truly a policeman. In the end he decided to do nothing about it. It too shone in the light; Vern was always aware of which way it would shine, and who would notice it. What he didn’t know was how many people would be tipped off that it was a costume. Real policemen don’t have nose studs, do they?

He was walking, and noticed that people had a strong reaction to him right from the start. In fact he hadn’t thought out the consequences of what he was doing very carefully, but he did enjoy making people jump, and watching people behave differently after they saw him. You would think the stud would tip them off, but they seemed to be operating more on first impressions; maybe they saw the uniform more clearly from a distance, and the stud only upon getting closer to him. There was a minor commotion as he entered the party in the first house. It was a typical student off-campus party, with lots of people, lots of noise, and rowdiness, but everyone looked at Vern as if waiting for him to tell them to keep it down, or demand a keg permit. Vern had actually thought of some of the things a policeman should say, and was almost ready to try it, but it occurred to him that he knew very few of these people; although a friend had invited him, that friend didn’t seem to be anywhere around.

The person who owned the house came up to him directly and treated him as if he were an officer; he asked if everything was ok, and Vern soon realized that this guy figured out that this was a costume. But then a woman approached him; he recognized her as Karen, from her Chemistry class. She was slightly shorter than Vern, and had long, pretty, light-colored hair, and lively eyes. But she had an off-white dress with blood on it, and smudged makeup on her face, as if she’d been crying or wiping it off. The blood seemed pretty obviously part of the costume; it wasn’t fresh, but the costume was no longer clear; perhaps she’d been a vampire? She looked like she’d been roughed up a little, and when she looked away from him her eyes were no longer twinkling, but rather glancing nervously around the house.

When she got him alone she told him she really needed to get out of this place, and she would appreciate it if he’d walk her down the street. He said that the other party he was going to was down the street, so sure, he’d take her down there whenever she was ready. She was ready. She had her purse, a little hat and a jacket that were all part of her costume, and she got ready quickly; Vern had already put down a glass of wine, but he set it down, and got ready himself. He was vaguely aware that the party was not all friendly; some people were speaking rather harshly in a nearby room. Vern and Karen said goodbye to the host and walked out the door together.

The frost shone again in the streetlights as they walked down the street; they had a little less than a mile to go to get to the other party. Karen told him she’d just broken up with her boyfriend; he was back at that party. They’d gone together for about a year.

“Why did you do it tonight?” he asked her.

“Don’t know, it was time, I guess,” she said. He got a strange feeling, being with her, and he wanted to act like a cop again. On the one hand, Halloween was his opportunity to not be himself. On the other, upon meeting a new, interesting, available woman, the proper thing to do was to be oneself. It was a dilemma.

But she didn’t mind the drama angle of it a bit. A drunken kid, a student, was walking toward them, slipping a little on the frosty sidewalk, and as he got closer she stopped in horror, pointed at him, and said to Vern, “Officer, that’s the man who did it, I’m sure of it!”

The poor student looked at him in horror. Vern got a stern look on his face and grabbed the drunk kid by the arm.

“I’m afraid I’m going to have to see some ID,” he said.

The kid blubbered a bit, and searched around in his pants. Then, suddenly, he took a big wide swing at Vern, trying to punch him in the jaw. But he was very drunk, and when Vern ducked the punch, he ended up falling face first into a frosty lawn, not hurt very badly. Vern pushed his shoulders into the grass; Karen looked on.

“Assault of a police officer, resisting arrest, being a dumb idiot,” he said. “You’re guilty. But you know what? Tonight’s your lucky night, because I’m not going to arrest you. I’ve got better things to do.” He gave the guy a small push and they went on their way.

At the second party a similar commotion started the minute he got there. Unbeknownst to him, people were flushing drugs down the toilet just out of his sight, and apparently this had happened in the previous house as well. No wonder they were getting angry! He still didn’t know this, and it somehow hadn’t occurred to him that something like this would happen.

Once again Karen approached a young man and said, to Vern, “That’s the man who did it! I’m sure of it!” This time he was a young guy with an earring, well-dressed, standing against a wall.

“I’m afraid I’m going to have to see some ID,” said Vern again, at a loss for words. He was slow on the uptake this time, not as confident in his identity as a cop.

And sure enough, this time the guy just hauled off and hit him in the jaw. The guy was quick; he didn’t give Vern a chance to duck. And when he was down, on the floor, he hit him again, and then left.

Several people took their licks at Vern; it was a sudden, unexpected opportunity to release aggression toward the image of the police, or the aggressive reaction to the feeling that someone in a police uniform could bring to a party. Vern ended up being dragged to someone’s car and taken to the emergency room, though he hadn’t broken any bones. Karen stuck with him, and maintained, in the emergency room, that he was her friend. The hospital nurses cleaned up his cuts and bruises and put him in a room to sleep it off; when he woke up, it was already afternoon of the following day. He was no longer wearing  a uniform of any kind. Karen was in the chair by his bed, sleeping, but with a cup of hospital coffee in her hand. She still had that off-white dress with blood on it, though now she’d cleaned off the make-up. She was pretty in the afternoon light, but she looked worried, perhaps thinking of that ex-boyfriend.

She denied that he would have hurt Vern; he was back at that other party, and clearly, to her, wasn’t part of the group that had just hauled off and hurt Vern. He, too, had a cheesy costume, she said, apologizing for her own. Vern, she said, had the best costume, he won the prize. But what good did it do? If he was lucky, some insurance company would pay the bill, but she had to go, because she had a Physics assignment due in an hour and a half, and of course they had that Chemistry quiz in the morning. Vern had a headache, and rolled over and slept another hour and a half, before finally stumbling out of the place at about dinnertime. He’d lost an entire day. And he’d lost the desire to ever wear another costume, of any kind.