It’s just a part of my everyday life, helping people. I don’t need recognition; I’m not looking for a medal. It’s just what keeps me going, and maybe that’s different, but that doesn’t bother me. I’d been shouted at outside my Church by a drunk teenager and had to see the police to report the incident. I’d ended up working late and I finally finished up and walked home. It was cold, at least approaching zero degrees if not below. Everything seemed fairly normal for a Friday night—the girls were out with far too much skin showing than could realistically be good for them, the lads were singing football songs in the street.
I came round a dark corner into a walking street, by day one of the busiest in the country, and people were still wandering up and down, getting their taxi fare from the hole-in-the-wall or carrying each other to the bus. It had already gone midnight and I couldn’t help wondering what each of these people did when they weren’t out drinking.
My attention was drawn to one side, slowing the quick gait that was all I had to keep me warm. There sat a man, his head to one side, slumped in a bench with the contents of his stomach sat next to him. He looked almost peaceful in slumber. I stopped and looked around me. No-one so much as batted an eyelid, or if they did, it was to glance and move on. He could have been any old drunk, a homeless vagrant getting his forty winks for the night, but something made me want to know more. I couldn’t even be sure he was just ‘sleeping’.
As I approached I saw red liquid dripping from his nose. I still couldn’t be sure what had happened; it was dark and the glow of a street light and some neon shop signs were all I had to illuminate the scene. I just hoped he was still breathing as I reached for his shoulder. He was, and it was okay, or at least it was better than it could have been.
“Hello?” I said. He grumbled and began to turn his head. I asked his name and if he knew where he was. Some more incomprehensible grumbling later, I at least knew that he was conscious. Helping him clean himself up, I didn’t even think of how I was going to help him, what he would need, or even who he was. He told me where he had to get to and I thought it would be as simple as calling him a taxi. But not living in the city for very long and with a dead battery on my mobile phone, I wasn’t much use in the taxi numbers department.
I stopped several people as they walked by, oblivious to the circumstances surrounding me and “John”. No-one could help, and they just kept going. One man said there was a police vehicle round the corner and suggested asking their help. I carried him down the street to a bus stop where an armed police unit guarded a money van emptying cash machines at a city centre bank. Even they weren’t much help, suggesting only that I flag down a black cab for my new friend.
People continued to walk by and I wondered what they must be thinking. Perhaps they’re torn between the mystery of wanting to know what was happening and the propaganda they see in the news each day about rapists, serial killers and paedophiles. Maybe they were scared that John, who sat with his stomach in one hand and his head in another, occasionally coughing up some more red liquid, would be a threat to them. And so they went, groups of revellers, young professionals, hen parties, all the usual Friday-night suspects. But no black cabs for hire.
Another police van approached, and I asked for their help. I told them I didn’t know the guy, I just found him in a bad way and wanted to help. Now it looked like he was coughing up blood and I was worried he wouldn’t make it home. “We can’t help because we’re carrying firearms,” said the officer. Another armed patrol? He said I could call an ambulance, “if you want to be the good Samaritan,” he added.
He just needed to get back home, but I asked him for his phone and I started dialling 999. I wasn’t sure about the blood he was coughing up, or how much of it was actually blood. The operator asked me questions about how old he was, what he’d been drinking, whether he had any heart or lung condition, and so on. I’d already explained twice that I didn’t know him but she thought I must have been out with him anyway. I explained that I had just passed him in the street and decided he needed help. She was so taken aback, she hardly knew what to say. An ambulance was dispatched and I just had to keep an eye on him. As more and more people walked by, only one of them stopped to ask if John was alright. By this time of course, an ambulance was on its way.
He wasn’t getting any better, so I decided I would get him to open his eyes and look at his environment more. As a Scientologist I’ve learned a lot of tools for day-to-day living, and one of them was a procedure to help sober someone up. I just pointed out some features on the street and had him look at them, letting him know when I saw he’d done it. He started to relax and wasn’t holding his stomach so steadfastly. I just took care to listen to what he said, no matter how nonsensical it sounded, and to let him know I got it and I was there to help him. After almost half an hour, the paramedics arrived.
The same questions came again, how old is he, how much has he drunk and what—we had to go over the whole thing again. I didn’t know him, I’d never seen him before in my life, and here I am sitting with him for over an hour trying to make sure he stays alive. “Really? You just… found him?” Even the paramedics couldn’t deal with it. I found it so hard to believe that what I had done was that incredible. I’ve given people advice that has prevented much worse circumstances before they even got to a dangerous stage, and yet it was so strange that I would stop and help a man who obviously needed medical attention.
The ambulance couldn’t take John to hospital, and he had already improved, so they had to just leave him there again. They cleaned him up and checked him out, but we were back to square zero. After a few minutes I squinted at the side of passsing taxi and wrote the number on my hand. I had to use John’s phone again to call them up, and I ordered a taxi, earliest twenty minutes. More waiting.
But I stuck it out, because I knew if I’d just left him he would have gotten worse, could have been robbed, might never have made it. He managed to tell me he was from out of town and as he sat there writhing, he held his phone up and said “call speed dial number two, it’s my ex. Tell her I’m in a bad way.” I told him it was gone 2am and asked if he was sure. In the end I called her, not knowing what to expect. And here was another who couldn’t understand what I had done. “And you really never met him ever before?” she asked me. She was so grateful despite me having woken her in the middle of the night. I don’t even remember her name.
The taxi finally arrived and I thought my troubles were over. I got him to pull round closer to where John and I had been sitting on a cold bus stop seat. He’d been complaining of the cold and I began to fear he could become hypothermic. But I’d gotten him a taxi after two hours of freezing myself silly, talking to a man who recited the address of his hotel every few minutes, and explaining away my actions to the emergency services, and I wasn’t about to give up now. The cab driver took a look at John as he stumbled into the back of the car and he told me he wouldn’t take him. I just used what I knew about communication and I knew he would have to better understand what was going on before he’d risk having a drunk on his valeted interior.
As I explained to the cab driver I realised what I had done. “He’s not from round here, he’s alone, and he’s just been checked out by paramedics. I don’t even know him and I’ve been sat with him for over two hours, twenty minutes of which have been waiting for you. Now you need to take him home, and he’s going to pay you.” I realised it was probably quite a feat, but he looked like he was changing his mind. I quickly grabbed the sick bowl John had been given in the ambulance and handed it to him through the cab window. The driver was sold, or rather, he was bought, as John handed him a wad of cash surely exceeding the fare. Before he went I handed John my card, hoping he might call and ask what happened. But that’s not important. What’s important is that I helped him.
But why should I be so different? Scientology has taught me to be responsible, to look for the good in people, and to help myself and others to lead better lives. But you don’t have to be a Scientologist to help someone. You just have to get over thinking it’s socially unacceptable to do a good thing. If there’s one thing I learned from L. Ron Hubbard’s books, it’s that man is basically good. So everyone has that good streak, they’re just not all doing a good job of showing it.
The next day I went to my Church after a well-deserved lie-in, and I found people stood outside singing and dancing like lunatics, waving signs critical of my religion. I wonder though, what were they doing at 2am? Perhaps they need to do a better job of showing that ‘good streak’ I just mentioned. But it’s just today’s youth, right? They’ll attack anything if it gets them out of the house. Well, I’m only 21 myself. Maybe I’m different, but at least I’m not just walking on by.