There has never been a time that I haven’t known Charles. His first outing as a baby was as a 7 day old crammed in the back of a station wagon accompanied by his family to head to the hospital and watch me be born. It was 1956, and to wear out a phrase, we’ve been thick as thieves since. That’s not to say there hasn’t been an occasional row betwixt us, of course there have. Too many to count even if either of us were keen to arithmetic. Even amidst these skirmishes the love lost between us was fleeting. As boys it was over when one of us (the bigger “man” in the scenario would show up to the others house with a ball and mit and suggest a catch. When we aged, it became settled over the purchase of a pint at the nearest hole in the wall.

During all that time, I’d never kept a secret from Charles, nor he I. Matter of fact, that virtue was the cause of many of the fisticuffs betweenst us. So how now could I look this man in the face - my best friend of nearly 40 years and tell him “hey. You know that masked vigilante you’ve been tasked with down at the station of apprehending? Yeah. Thats me. Your old pal Warren.”

I’m of two minds about it. On the one hand, in his off duty conversations with not only me but anyone (not in uniform) who would listen, he’d praised the efforts of the one they called The Woodsman (I’d never cared for the name, but seeing as how I take down criminal activity in the hollers of North Georgia I guess it’s as good a name as any) he’d even gone so far as to say that aside from the additional paper work, I made his job a hell of a lot easier and his wife Betty sure did sleep better at night knowing that a bullet coming my way was one that wouldn’t meet Charles.

But on the other hand, it would mean that for 5 years I’ve outright lied to his face. Not just about my secret identity, but about all the birthdays I missed. All the bruises I came up with excuses for. All the jobs I’d lost because I couldn’t keep the hours. I had to pretend to be a drunk at one point just to sell it, cause he knows I don’t lack the work ethic. Went to meetings and everything. Worked the program like a regular junkie even though I hadn’t had a sip of booze since I first donned the mask. How could I? It’s hard enough to keep your wits about you when you’re half blind in one eye from a BB Gun shot gone wrong. And yeah you guessed it, I got Charles to thank for that too.

I know it’s time he knew. I can’t run from it any longer. I’ve got him at work chasing down leads he ain’t ever gonna close, cause let’s face it: I’m too good. The question is not if I tell him, it’s how. But the question that haunts me even more is: where do we go from here?

The thought of losing Charles as a friend is as profound a dread as I can imagine. I might not even be alive if it weren’t for him. One night back in 75 when we were just teenagers. Before Skynyrds plane went down and took away what we thought was everything we had, we were at the county-line bar having a couple Miller Pony’s and watching some half assed boxing match on Mrs Rhonda’s (she was the owner ever since her husband died. We all think she killed him but he had it coming.) black and white tiny box tv. I over heard a man say “if that nigger in the red shorts goes down in the 5th drinks are on me!”

It’s possible he meant no ill will by it. This was the south and it was the 70’s. That word was as common as “Kleenex”. But it hit me wrong that night. My Aunt had just given birth to two twin girls. Black ones. That event would be referred to by my family for years to come as “Aunt Linda’s mistake”. Aunt Linda was my favorite Aunt, see. Used to cut my hair as a boy and kept me in lollipops when I didn’t have the spare change to get my own. I’d heard the way people around town had talked about her and her pregnancy. There was talk (mostly from Papaw Clem) about sending her away during the ordeal so she could come back a year later and no one be the wiser. Fat camp I believe was mentioned. Reckon they didn’t think that one through cause what Linda lacked in a loving and understanding family she more than made up for in an hour glass figure that would make Sophia Loren look like Bruce Vilance in comparison.

So maybe on another night I’d let that man slipping that word loose go. Lord knows I’d done it before and I’m ashamed to say I’ve done it sense. Perhaps the holier-than-thou Yankees might look at me with disgust, but down here you just try to avoid a fight when you can, and as I think the phrase goes “when you wrestle a pig you both get muddy but it’s still a pig” or something like that. But tonight was not that night.

I swung around from my bar stool so quick that it’s a wonder some of the washers holdin’ it together didn’t spring loose and bore a hole in the door. In my best attempt at a Clint Eastwood impression I uttered “which one of you said that?” The man who had called the boxer the N word knew exactly what I was talking about, yet had the gall to stand there in his worn out skoal ring equipped jeans, dirty white shirt and leather vest and say “who said what, boy?”

Now I wasn’t sure what I was madder about. Him unknowingly insulting my new baby cousins, or him calling me “boy”. Charles sat there looking straight ahead for the time being watching the fight. Probably hoping that the Black feller did not indeed go down in the 5th. That’s Charles. He’s not oblivious to impending trouble, he just don’t make any rash moves. Where most people would be shaking, you could balance a glass of whiskey on his head and it would stay level and plumb all while he was gettin berated. He was Cool Hand Luke and I, unfortunately, was Travis Bickle (Taxi Driver wouldn’t come out for another year, but it quickly became my nickname from Charles every time I got wound up)

“I’m not gonna repeat it. But you know what I’m gettin at”. I could feel my face flush. The tingle you get when you know you’ve just started something that ain’t gonna end well but you got no choice but to accept the consequences whatever they may be. I’ve heard it written about my alter ego “The Woodsman” that he fears no man. That’s not true. Quite the opposite. I fear almost every man because I know what we are capable of. It just doesn’t stop me from doing what I think is right. Fear isn’t a bad thing. It’s an evolutionary mechanism to make us fit for survival. But harnested correctly it can be quite the tool for shoving a man’s head through a wall. This was before I was The Woodsman. But perhaps it was the spark.

The man grinned and said “what are you one of them hippie types? I said if that nigger goes down in

The…” that was all he could get out before I lunged his way. No sooner than anyone at the bar knew we were about to redecorate on spec, he pulled a knife the size of my forearm out of that tattered leather vest. Quicker than that though, Charles had him in a full-Nelson against the wall and beat his head into a dart board until he dropped the knife. Charles kicked it towards me and said “take it and go start the jeep”

As I sat there in the CJ-5 that Charles’ daddy had damn near resurrected from scratch, I searched high and low to find my breath. A few moments later, Charles jumped in the drivers seat and casually drove off. I started to get out the words “how did you..” and Charles cut me off “while you were busy huffing and puffing I noticed that knife reflect off the bar mirror. I got up slow and headed to the bathroom so I could double back on him. I couldn’t have taken him in a straight fight. I don’t know if either of us could. So cowardly as it will sound when he lies about the story to his buddies down at the VFW tomorrow, I figured the element of surprise was bout the only option”

“Well” I said, still breathing like I’d jumped rope in the Rocky Mountains “thank you”.

“Don’t mention it” he said. “Let’s go home. Beer there is just as cold”

That night taught me some valuable lessons: never let your emotions get the better of you, always be aware of your surroundings, and never under any circumstances lose Charles as a friend. Because he was the difference in us watching that Black man eventually win by TKO in the final round on a comfortable couch with a belly full of beer, and me lying on a sticky bar room in a pool of my own blood