Embarcadero, Summer 1993
It's before noon but still an unusually slow day at the plaza when three rollerbladers suddenly appear and start doing whatever it is rollerbladers do. They're not coming close to where a few heads are gathered and sitting around on the little 3, but also aren't shying away from doing their thing where people are skating. A few insults are hurled in their direction from the people sitting down, but nothing that really gets their attention. I skate by the little 3 and get the sense that the hostility from the few EMB guys sitting there is starting to get serious, and it's pretty clear that while the rollerbladers have no doubt taken shit off skaters elsewhere, they aren't aware of how badly their day might go here if they don't move along.
I approach the oldest of the 3, who has a couple years on me. Tell him as diplomatically as possible that this is the kind of place where if people want you to leave, you'd be wise to do so, and that right now, people want him and his friends (younger brothers, it turns out) to leave. All I get is attitude. "Psh. I'm not fuckin' leaving" and he rolls away. As I watch him do so, it occurs to me that they really do look fucking stupid. Fine.
A few minutes pass with nothing really happening when the oldest one suddenly pulls a candle out of his backpack and, as rollerbladers tend(ed) to do, proceeds trying to pile on a thick layer of wax on the really blunted C-block (the one opposite the little 3 that a lot of people also did manual stuff on). Couple things about that:
- As anyone who skated there knows, the Embarcadero blocks had probably been waxed at some point, but nobody waxed them now. It wasn't done. Certainly not by bridge and tunnel dorks like my friends and me, and definitely not by rollerbladers. They didn't really need to be waxed anyway, but I don't think most people outside the EMB crew would squawk if someone were to run a candle over them once.
- Excluding obvious world ass famous landmarks like the Great Wall of China or whatever, this dude couldn't have known that he was fouling up what at that time may have been the most famous, stupid ledge in the world.
All hell breaks loose and what seemed like a relatively slow day at Embarcadero is now bearing witness to every kid in the place rushing these rollerbladers. Just like that, the 3 are surrounded by probably 12 dudes. I'm standing off to the side with some other people who don't want to get involved, and I can see from the oldest rollerblader's face that he has definitely lost his fuck you attitude now. He's getting shoved in every direction before a fist is thrown and his head jolts back and back up with blood running out of his nose. He looks fucking terrified.
This is straight out of some stupid melodramatic script, but it's true that just at that moment, Kelch shows up. He doesn't have a board but he's bleeding from the elbow. His shirt is filthy and his pants look like the ass has fallen out. His eyes are sunken and his hair is a rat's nest. Dude looks like he hasn't slept a wink for the past week but he's cool as a cucumber sauntering down the little 3 toward the fracas.
"What the fuck's going on? What the fuck's going on? Watch out padna. Watch out."
He's holding a cigarette in one hand and in the other, inexplicably, a roll of duct tape, and the blood running down his forearm has dribbled a little onto it. I can't be the only one wondering just what the fuck is going to go down here.
Kelch makes his way through the little mob and gets up into the oldest rollerblader's face, sort of looks him up and down and breaks the tension by telling him he looks like he just got his ass beat. People laugh. The rollerbladers don't laugh. Kelch tells him he's probably about to get his ass beat if he doesn't leave and stay gone. One of the skaters wants blood and says so. Kelch says something about fighting a dude with wheels on his feet a pussy move. The rollerbladers leave. So Kelch 86'd some dudes but also saved their asses in the process.
TL;DR: Kelch shows up to Embarcadero looking like the white version of Bubbles from the Wire and saves the lives of a trio of rollerbladers.
Topic: Weird Stories About Pros (Read 76167 times)