Wet weather adventurer

Ball was caught in the rain as he took home a man in his 40s on his motorbike.

I met the older guy half an hour earlier, as he sat with Mum, her son and a few others outside the slum, drinking.

He was growing outspoken and touchy-feely as he knocked back the beers, but the others did their best to ignore him.

He decided he couldn’t find his own way back home, so prevailed on Mr Ball.

'Can you take me home?' he slurred.

Eager to be rid of him, the rest of the group agreed it was time for this guy to go, and urged Ball to oblige.

Ball’s first instinct was to pass on the burden to his younger brother Beer, the go-for of the household, but Mr B made some excuse, so Ball was left with the job.

Touchy-feely lived only five minutes away, but it started to pour while they were away.

Mum's friend Noi was concerned, and didn't think Ball should have been dragged into ferrying touchy-feely home.

‘If he found his way here, he can find his way back. The roads are slippery in the wet, and Ball could have an accident.’

She frets about me too.

Earlier, when Ball dropped in to his place to talk to his brother, she looked at me and said: ‘Don’t worry, he’ll be back in a moment.’

Ball pulled up on his motorcycle, and touchy feely clambered on the back.

He was away 10 minutes. Noi, peering eagerly through the rain, was the first to call his waterlogged return.

'Here he comes,' she said, as she pointed down the road at an approaching motorcycle.

Ball, displaying a keen sense of direction which normally eludes him, had found his way to touchy-feely's place, and dropped him off.

As the rain started, he managed to take off his watch, a possession he treasures perhaps more than any other. He handed it to his mother for safekeeping.

He parked his bike, as I pulled from my bag a towel, which I gave him to dry off.

Another member of the gathering, a grizzled guy in his 50s who sells dry squid on a cart, gave me the thumbs up. ‘Good on you!’ he said.

Ball took the towel, wiped himself down briskly, and handed it back. If he had held on to it any longer, it might have looked as if we were close.

‘Ball, you have a cold. Please dry yourself properly,’ I said, giving it back to him.

He put it through his hair, and handed it back a second time. I held on to it for a moment, and tried again.

‘Put it over your shoulders to keep warm,’ I said.

He took it, and let it lie there limply as if he would rather stand there soaked.

I like to think Ball has a gay angel sitting on one shoulder, a straight angel on the other.

A minute later, with his shoulders still swathed in the towel I had given him, his straight angel starting giving him grief.

‘What will they think? Quick, hand it back!’ it chattered in his ear.

Ball surrendered the towel a third time, and I gave up my fight.

I enjoyed seeing him soaked to the skin. His skin looked clearer, his boyish face more open and pronounced, as his wet hair was plastered to his little head.

Ten minutes later, we made our way back home.

Ball headed straight for his girlfriend, and started talking in that impenetrable teenage-style, boyfriend/girlfriend way they have.

Realising my chance to make a difference had passed (I am slipping back!) I said goodnight and left them to it.