"Take one step closer and I will end you, motherfucker" - the frog squeaked like an abandoned rubber toy putting all it's resentment and anger in last resort menacing cry.
"Listen I am not around here" - I tried to reason with the amphibian, doing my best to hold a smile, knowing full well the creature was serious. "I didn't mean to make fun of your friends, we cool, right"?
I felt a sickeningly cold liquid drop on the back of my neck; was it the wind licking me in anticipation of a inter-species fight? Why so damp? How can it reach all the way from the swamps? Why did it choose me to follow to the city?
All other toys were mocking me; any sort of upper hand I might have had by being 5'9'' was immediately lost when the frog established it's dominance.
I unpeeled my face from a shop window, shaking bad thoughts off like a day dream that went too far, that got personal, turned against me and got too creative with it's associations.
"You are a figment of your own imagination" - frog said, feeling bad for me now, realizing I was nothing more than a man well over his head who got a little cocky with his presumed place in this world.
I did not reply this time, shuffling off meekly, leaving yet another peeled off skin right there in the streets of the New Orleans. My head was foggy, my stomach full of tightening knots, feet sprightly moving in the direction only known to a growing orb of warmness deep inside my chest.
When I snapped out of it the cold breeze felt like a novelty, but the spreading smile on my face reminded me of being here many times before.
"Is it gonna be right this time? Is it going to be golden?" - I chuckled, shaking off the last remains of self-pity.