A couple months ago, we began to notice some strange things appearing in a small space behind our branch. There's an enclosed area that houses our air conditioning unit. Really, that's not the strange part. In fact, that's fairly normal. The strange things that appeared there were some empty boxes and some cases of beer.
From this we assumed that we had a homeless person or persons living in that space. This person never spent any daylight hours back there. For a long time, we never saw anyone. We only saw what he or she would leave behind.
That changed a few weeks ago when I started noticing a man walking back and forth behind the building. Normally I wouldn't think anything of this. While there isn't a sidewalk or a real street directly behind us, there are connections to adjacent parking lots. People do use that back driveway as a short cut from time to time. But it's rare to see the same person more than once a day almost every day of the week.
One day I saw this man walk behind some of the bushes that line the back of our property. These bushes and the brick wall behind them are what separate us from a residential neighborhood. When the man emerged from those bushes, he was wearing a different shirt than he had worn going in. The guy changed clothes.
I let the manager know that someone was obviously keeping things behind those bushes and not just next to our air conditioner. Eventually, the homeowners behind us began complaining about trash that had somehow migrated over the wall into their property. At that point it was decided that something had to be done about our resident nomad.
The police were called in to investigate and the homeless man happened to walk up just as the police were searching the bushes for his belongings. From my spot at the drive-thru, I was able to see the entire confrontation. However, there was no real confrontation. Everyone remained calm. Everything was resolved peacefully, though Ryan and I secretly hoped things would get out of hand and someone would have to be tasered.
In the end, all it took was someone from the bank telling the man that he wouldn't be able to stay here anymore. After that, if he came back, the police would have no choice but to arrest him for trespassing. Ryan had the unenviable job of giving the guy the bad news. He came back in after talking to him and said he felt horrible about it.
So we're really not sure who this man was or where he ended up going next. Hopefully he's okay and will get on his feet soon.
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