Naked: y’ain’t got no clothes on. Nekkid: y’ain’t got no clothes on, and you’re up to no good.

As many of you know, I work at a non-profit agency serving the homeless (and those at-risk of homelessness - basically, anyone with a low income ’round these parts). Today we had more fun than is usual for a Monday morning.

I have a little rule of thumb: if you’re in the restroom for more than ten minutes, you’re up to no good.

Around 10 AM, one of my interns, let’s call her ‘N’, came to me and said, “Um, there’s a guy who’s been in the bathroom for a long time. Me: “How long?” ‘N’: “Um, like 20 minutes? Anyway, I made ‘C’ (also an intern, male) go to the door and check on him, and he came back and said ‘the word on the street is, he’s naked’.”

Apparently, the guy in the men’s room had opened the door a little, and one of the clients saw him. The restrooms are right off the client waiting room, and luckily (at that point) there weren’t very many people in there (and they were all adults).

Well.

I immediately went to the men’s room door, knocked on it, and said in a loud, firm voice, “Sir! You’ve been in there long enough! You have to come out now!” He grunted something.

I stepped back to the front desk (about 10 feet away) and waited. After about a minute, the door slowly opened. And there he was. At first, my view was obscured by the water cooler, but sure enough … he was nekkid.

He was HOLDING his pants in one hand, though. So that’s a start. I grabbed the phone to call 9-1-1.

“Sir! Put your pants on! (to my coworkers) I’m calling 9-1-1. PUT. YOUR. PANTS. ON!”

I waited a few seconds to see if he would comply. No dice. Just stared glassy eyed.

As I was on the phone with 9-1-1: “Sir! Put your fricken pants on!”

A moment later: “Sir! Get back in the bathroom! Just get back in there!”

This time, he complied.

I had ‘C’ guard the door so he wouldn’t be able to get out, while we waited for the cops. Unfortunately, it took them about 45 minutes to come, which was particularly unfortunate for ‘C’, as we ended up with more people waiting - including kids - so he *literally* had to hold the door handle so the guy couldn’t open the door at all. Yes, Nekkid Guy was in jail in our men’s room. You see, he periodically would open the door just a little bit … then close it again. If he had locked himelf in there, it would’ve been much easier. 

When he came in, he seemed ‘normal’ enough. My guess was, he got high in our restroom and things went downhill from there. And since we didn’t know what he was on or how he might behave, we wanted to leave him alone until the cops came.

Finally, the cops DID arrive, and talked to him through the door for a minute until he let them in (by then, he had figured out how to use the door lock). Then all three officers went in to ‘help’ Nekkid Guy figure out how to put his clothes back on - took about 5 minutes, then out they all came. Nekkid Guy no longer nekkid, hands cuffed behind him, and three uniformed officers - and off he went to jail.

Turned out, he HAD smoked up in our restroom (the Sergeant said it was crank, and since I don’t know the smell of crank, I will have to trust him), and it was likely the ’skin crawlies’ that compelled him to remove his garments. Ah, the fun of recreational drugs.