The one-eyed man was buying a newspaper from a newspaper machine. He put in a few coins, opened it up and took two papers, because he could. No one else was going to read them anyway, right? And it’s not like someone was going to, what, see him do it?
The one-eyed man had a lot of extra newspapers piled up at home.
He was going to go do a little shoplifting at a convenience store when someone tugged at his sleeve.
Excuse me, sir, could you help me across the street? I am blind, you see.
Yeah, of course you’re blind, thought the one-eyed man. This is the land of the blind. Just cross the street on your own, he thought — it’s not like anyone is out driving or anything.
But old habits die hard. The one-eyed man led the blind man across the street.
The street was totally empty, except for one man a few blocks away walking in circles with his cane.
A tumbleweed blew past them while they crossed, that’s how empty the street was.
The blind person at the side of the one-eyed man had a seeing-eye dog. Most of them did. The one-eyed man didn’t understand why they always asked him for help.
Maybe because he was king.
A king has responsibilities.
The seeing-eye dog snarled at the one-eyed man. It was a golden retriever, he had never seen one of them snarl before.
Seeing-eye dog, thought the one-eyed man. I mean guide dog. Guide dog, right? he thought.
The dog stopped snarling. As soon as the one-eyed man turned his back on it, though, it nipped him in the calf.
Hey, WTF? he shouted. Your dog bit me.
The blind person apologized, but it was hard to understand because he was already walking away and the wind had picked up.
The one-eyed man went home. His apartment was messy, but he never got visitors, so who cares? He made himself a bowl of instant noodles.
In the street below, a bunch of blind people were huddled together, staring up at his window with their blind eyes.
He couldn’t figure it out.
The one-eyed man had imagined this king stuff differently.
