Bojangles Posted December 10, 2007 Author Share Posted December 10, 2007 just waiting until tomorrow's chapter! Ah yes...Tomorrow brings the story of going to Job Corps and almost getting beaten to death I believe. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Raw fish Posted December 10, 2007 Share Posted December 10, 2007 looking forward to the next chapter, feel free to post more than one a day... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tails0nE Posted December 10, 2007 Share Posted December 10, 2007 to be honest, when i first clicked this thread i wasnt intersted... im not neccisarily a big fan of reading at all, but i just read all of chapter 9 and im really feelin this... i would buy this book no doubt about it.... im now looking forward to chapter 10... dope shit Bojangles... props... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bojangles Posted December 10, 2007 Author Share Posted December 10, 2007 Chapter 10 I took the bus Downtown and thought about my fate the whole way. As I rode, I took a long look at everything I passed. This would be the last time I'd see any of these places for quite some time. While I was on the bus I read a pamphlet about Job Corps and tried to make the best of it in my mind. They had a lot of vocations to choose from once I got there and the pictures made it look like the friendliest place on Earth. Smiling faces and open fields dotted the brochure. As I read on, I actually started to get excited about this place, maybe this was meant to be. I read on about vocational training. “Maybe I'll take up carpentry” I thought as I read more. I got off the bus Downtown and took a deep breath in, no more sulfury city air for me after today. I hiked down the street towards the Greyhound terminal a few blocks away from my stop. On the way I got harassed for money by panhandlers and I thought about the photo on the pamphlet. “No more of these kinds of nuisances soon!” My ride was all set to go, I had ticket in hand and boarded the bus quickly. I took my seat near the back and tried my best to keep to myself. I really didn't want to have a mindless conversation with someone all the way there. As I waited I couldn't help but think back to the last time I was on one of these things. It had been awhile and I'd grown up quite a bit but my life wasn't that much different. I set forth on my voyage shortly after I got situated. The brakes squeaked and the bus jerked into motion. I stared out the window as we left the city quickly via freeway. I had a six or seven hour trip ahead of me, I better get comfortable. Skyscrapers faded into the distance, crowded urban expanses gave way to rural settings and finally level corn fields as far as the eye could see. I was now in the heartland of Ohio, the part of the state that people from other states think of when you say “Ohio”. I didn't mind though, it was a nice change of scenery. Just as boredom overtook me, we made a stop to pick up more passengers in some out of the way town I had never heard of. A woman in her forties sat down next to me, she looked me up and down and smiled. I smiled back and continued my staring into the distant fields. About a half hour into the rest of our ride she decided to make verbal contact with me. The usual small talk sparked, I told her about Job Corps and how I was going there to better my life. She was heading to Dayton as well but was very vague about her trip. “How old are you?” she asked. I told her I was almost fifteen, she smiled. She continued with a barrage of questions about my life back home and about me as a person. I shied away from the questions, I didn't want some stranger to know too much about me. Finally, I got curious and asked her about her occupation. Again with the smiles she answered “I help people.” I jokingly thought to myself “I wonder how much that pays?” In a few hours we pulled into the Dayton terminal. As we got off she stopped to hand me a business card. It had her name, number and address but no job title. “Call me if things don't work out there and you need to work.” she said. I shrugged it off and pocketed the card. I don't know what kind of job she had for me but I don't think I wanted it. I walked away and waited by the front door of the station, a van was scheduled to pick me up along with a few other new kids. I was surprised by the look of Dayton, this wasn't farm country at all, it's a city that rivaled Cleveland. Where are all the rolling hills the picture promised me? They must be a few blocks away. As I waited, another kid as scraggly as me walked up. He almost mirrored me except for the long pony tail he wore. He looked like he was waiting for someone too. “Job Corps?” I asked. He looked surprised and said “Y-yeah.” in a meek tone. I told him that I was heading there as well, a look of ease came over his face. He introduced himself and told me that he had come from some hole in the wall town in Michigan. “Well at least this kid looks like one of the people in the photo.” I thought. A few minutes later a white van pulled up, out jumped a muscular black man that looked like a Drill Sergeant. “You here for Job Corps?” he yelled over to us. We nodded back. “Well get in, time to go!” I was hoping the rest of the staff would be a little more personable. Neither me or the pony tailed kid talked much on our ride, we listened as the “Sarge” spouted of rules and facts to us about the place. As I listened, I felt like I hadn't heard the whole story about this place. He was talking to us like we were last resort criminals rather than kids trying to make a change. As we drove I kept a look out past the abandoned buildings and dirty streets for those open meadows I had been promised. No sign of them yet, maybe they're right past this rusty bridge coming up. A few minutes later we pulled into an area with a large brick building in the background. “We're here” said Sergeant personality. Pony tail looked at me out of the corner as we drove closer to the building. It wasn't a big deal at first, but I noticed the racial scales were a bit tipped as we got closer. In fact, the only white kids I had seen so far were me and homeboy next to me. The general population was gigantic, gangster looking black dudes that looked like they were fresh from prison. Most of them had gang tattoos that I recognized instantly. I felt bad for dude next to me, I was used to these kinds if things...he clearly wasn't. My guess is he was from some one horse town on the edge of nowhere where he lived his life as a pothead slacker plucking his guitar in a farmhouse. Terror took over his face as we stepped out of the van. “Follow me, we'll get you signed in.” Sarge said. As we walked in I heard “What's up whiteboys!” being catcalled from one hallway, “Fresh meat!” from around the corner. Still no rolling hills though. We hit the sign-in office and were given our room assignments and blankets. Pony tail asked if he could room with me as I walked away. “No room for both of you in one room.” I heard as I kept walking. He was probably shaking in his boots by now. I was trying to take it all in stride. As I walked, the torment continued. Guys three times my size looked at me and laughed evilly. Girls just stared and shook their heads. I had now counted five white kids including myself and pony tail since I got here, the other three were ghetto ass hoodrat girls. I made it into my room and met my roommate, a Puerto Rican kid nicknamed “Fast.” He was the first friendly face I had come across since I got out of the van. “Ey, wassup Bro!” He said as he extended his hand to me. I was relieved. Pony tail ended up down the hall a few doors down, I don't think he got as lucky as me. I could hear laughter as he traveled, it was like a homing beacon on him. “Yo, I gotta' tell you...They pick on white dudes big time here.” said Fast. “Just try and make friends and watch your back.” “Good advice” I thought as I unpacked my meager belongings in my new home. Fast offered to show me around once I was done. Within a few minutes we were heading downstairs to the rec center. I couldn't help but wonder how pony tail was doing at this point. I figured I'd be alright with Fast by my side for now. A few minutes later we ended up in the basement recreation room, it actually was the nicest part of the place. They had a few pool tables, ping pong, the usual stuff. This almost resembled something from the brochure. Fast gave a nod to somebody sitting down, he came over and introduced himself. “What up man, they call me Pain.” he said. I was a little hesitant about his nickname until I asked “Why do they call you that?” He responded with an answer I wasn't expecting “Cuz' I look like the dude from House of Pain!” which was a hiphop group with a white rapper in the lead. I could see the resemblance. I couldn't tell if Pain was white, Puerto Rican or Italian. He was dark complected with a shaved head and rugged features. He was a white guy by comparison to general population but it looked like he got respect here. Seeing that put me at ease a little bit. Maybe I was just getting messed with earlier because I was with a country boy looking dude. I made up my mind to stick close to these guys instead. “What are you cats up to tonight?” I asked. “Dunno, probably go kick it outside and chill with some girls.” Sounded good to me. I asked if I could come along and they had no problem with it. I was getting ready to go back to my room when Pain stopped me. “Ey, listen.” He whispered. “Be careful, they're probably gonna' try and catch you in your room alone tonight and give you a blanket party.” The “they” he was referring to were the black students in neighboring rooms. “Whats a blanket party?” I asked. I wasn't sure if I wanted the answer. “They take bars of soap, put em in a sock as their weapon, then they wrap you in your blanket and beat you with them!” said Pain. My jaw dropped. He looked around and continued. “I know they're coming for you and the new whiteboy tonight, I overheard it. Don't answer your door for anyone.” Damn...this was not good news. I had to stick close to my new found friends until bed time. I prayed that this wouldn't happen the way Pain said it would. That night I met up with the guys outside as planned but I felt paranoid the whole time. I wondered how they were going to pull this off if Fast was in the room? Would he just look the other way while it happened? Did he know about these plans already and was in on it? The night went on and I hung out and met some new people. We traded stories about where we were from and it turned out a lot of these kids had it as bad as me. I tried to make as many friends as quickly as I could. Maybe if the word got to the right people tonight that I was alright, I wouldn't get attacked. It was quickly getting late and I was tired, plus I still had a few things to do to get ready for class tomorrow. I kept trying to stall and wait for Fast but he was in no hurry to move. Finally I went inside alone. The halls were quieter than before, only a few people roamed them now. I went into my room and got my things ready for the next morning. I made sure to lock my room door as soon as I entered though. The only person that was getting through here tonight was Fast and even then he better be able to prove that he's alone. A few minutes later I heard feet stomping down the hall and muffled voices. My doorknob jiggled, then someone knocked. I stood there petrified. I knew it wasn't Fast, he would've said it was him. Someone said “This is your floor monitor, let me in.” I could tell it was a lie, this was the disguised voice of a teenager. The feet continued on down the hall. I held the doorknob with my hand tightly. And pressed my ear to the door. A few doors down the same performance was being carried out at Pony Tail's door. He was naïve enough to open the door, I winced for him as I heard crashing around for a second and then his door slam shut. They had gotten him, I was sure of it. A few minutes went by and I heard whines come from his room, he had probably caught the worst and possibly only beating of his life. I still refused to open my door even to go see if he was okay. Fast was nowhere to be found yet. I wondered if he was told to be scarce from our room for awhile while this all went down. They hadn't gotten me tonight and I was grateful. What lied in store for me tomorrow though? I woke up the next morning with one thing on my mind, LEAVING THIS PLACE. I started packing as soon as my eyes opened. Fast woke up and asked me what I was doing. “I'm outta' here. I was safer back home on the streets.” I said hastily as I jammed clothes in my bags. I marched down to the offices and explained to them about the proceedings from the night before. They refused to believe me at first until I broke down and cried as I said “Either you give me a bus ticket home today or I start hitchhiking right now!” The man in the office looked at me sadly and said “It's gonna' take me at least three days to get you a ticket home. Why don't you just try us out for this week?” I replied “You get me that damn ticket as quick as you can, if one person touches a hair on me I'll sue this whole God damned place!” I don't think he had ever heard defiance like that before from one of his students. He nodded silently and I stomped out of the office. As I walked back to my room to continue getting ready I ran into Pain again. “Yooo...they got that other white dude last night, ya' heard?” I just shook my head and said “I'm not sticking around for mine.” Pain tried to stop me but I just kept walking. I packed up shop and made phone calls back to Cleveland frantically. I called everyone I could think of who could possibly help me. The problem was we were all kids, no one could come get me on their own...except for Roland! I didn't have his number on me so I called Dan and told him to run to Roland's and get him on the phone. In a few minutes I got a call back on the hallway phone at Job Corps. Dan and Roland were both on the line. I was thankful to hear his voice. “Roland, I need help.” He asked me what was wrong, so I explained. “Okay, Dan and I are coming to get you but I can't leave today it will have to be in a few days. It wasn't the best answer but it was better than no help at all. “Okay, I'll see you guys then.” I hung up and locked myself up in my room right after. There was no way and no sense in me going to class. I just stayed in my room unless I had to leave for food or the bathroom. Word must've gotten out about the incident with the other guy because a few days later I had my bus ticket back to Cleveland in hand before Roland could make it down. I heard through the grapevine that “Pony Tail” left the morning after we got there, no doubt because of what had happened. I guess they figured it was best to get me out of there if I wanted to go before I made some big stink about the whole ordeal. I ran to the phone and called Dan. “Tell Roland thanks, but no thanks! I'm coming home tonight!” I hung up and ran to the van waiting to take me to the bus station. In no time I was on my Greyhound ready for takeoff. While we traveled I counted the minutes until I'd be back home. I didn't care if I had to live under a bridge once I got there, I'd at least be in familiar territory. I made it back into Cleveland and called good ol' reliable Safespace. They said they had room for me so I headed there. I stayed there for about a week or so then transferred to West Haven. I liked it there better, it was closer to “home.” I was determined one way or another to live back in my neighborhood so I didn't want to be too far from it. I had now been in town for almost two weeks and still hadn't seen my friends yet. I had to put priorities first though and keep a roof over my head. West Haven had now moved to a bigger residence up the street. It was no longer in an old house, but a building very similar to Safespace (Without all the gangster kids though.) Once I settled in, I told them of my mother's disappearing act a few weeks earlier and they helped track her down a few days later for me by calling around to local adult shelters. They said she had been making her way through the homeless circuit around town. As of right then she was spending her nights at a place called Catholic Charities, a women and children's shelter on Lorain Avenue. I was confused by this, she was receiving money from the State still...was she choosing to be homeless? I had to get to her soon and find out what was going on. I used West Haven as a place to stay for a few weeks while I recovered, got back into school and made contact with my mom. I told her how awful Job Corps was and explained thats the reason I was back. She sounded like she could care less as I spoke. I told her that I would come see her soon, again there was very little emotion. I got off the phone and thought to myself “She's given up on everything. That's not even my mother anymore.” At least I knew where she was. West Tech was right down the street from West Haven so it was easy to get that back on track with school at least. I had disappeared from there weeks ago and just like that I appeared again. That was no rarity at that institution though. When I made my reappearance I could tell that people were talking about my situation, I had not only up and vanished but I came back looking rough and worn out. To make matters worse, the shelter makes you prove you were in school by having your teachers do a sign-in sheet you carry with you. This made the students gossip even more. I never gave them details about my circumstances, I was far too embarrassed. Later I heard that most thought I was in juvenile detention or something. I let them continue to believe that, it was far cooler than the truth. I ended up staying at West Haven for a few weeks and finally decided it was time to go. I hadn't seen my friends in forever. Besides my friends though, I had to see my mother. I called Lil' Roy and asked if I could spend the weekend there. Pap and Gram agreed but strictly enforced “The weekend only.” Good enough for me. I'd figure out a plan by Sunday night. That's sad, I was known as the guy who showed up and never left at this point. I made it over there and hung out with all the guys and couldn't be happier despite my current status. We never once talked about my situation until I brought it up. I decided to talk a little bit about it over the weekend as we partied and goofed off. Everybody sat and listened as I spoke, everyone knew what I was going through but this was the first time they heard details right from my mouth and my feelings about it. Dan had a look on his face almost of anger the whole time. When I was done speaking Dan stood up and said “I'm gonna' get you to stay at my house...for good!” out of nowhere. We all sat there quiet afterward for a minute. I thought long and hard about the statement he just made. Could he pull it off? Do they have room for me? “I'm going to talk to my mother right now.” Dan said as he left Roy's. I stayed behind, I was too embarrassed to go along and hear all of this go down. Who knows what Dorothy might say to such an outrageous request from her son. Dan pitched his speech that night and Dorothy listened. Dan came back about an hour later and re-joined our group. We were all just sitting around playing video games as usual. He had an ear to ear grin on as he said “Welcome home, you move in tonight if you want!” All eyes were on me, the ball was in my court and I was in shock. I graciously accepted but told Dan that I would stay at Lil' Roy's for the rest of the weekend and move in Monday. Dan looked a little let down but was okay with it. He ended up crashing over at Roy's that night as well. “Wow!” I thought as I fell asleep that night “I have a place to call home again.” I made the “big move” that Sunday, which consisted of me carrying my backpack and an overnight bag into Dan's bedroom. Dan's room was big enough to eventually fit two small beds into. That would be the plan as time went on but for now I made a bed on the floor. Anything was better than the shelter or Job Corps. I never talked to Pain or Fast after I left Dayton but I did keep in touch with Cecil from Safespace over the coming months. He left the shelter soon after and got back into the gang life and was hustling drugs as well. He'd call me up once in awhile with a “big thing I had to get in on” and I'd politely turn it down. Over time the calls between us lessened. I hope he got out of that lifestyle before it ate him alive, something tells me he didn't though. Speaking of which, I was back in Royal Mafia territory. I had to take care of that problem soon as well, if those guys caught me walking around here who knows what would take place? I had deserted them weeks ago. I was sure they were hot around the collar by now. Up and leaving a gang is a huge sign of disrespect, I had a feeling I wasn't going to be able to just plead my case and walk away from it all. That time would come soon, all I could do now was try and get on with my life. Things were crowded but overall good the first day or so at Dan's. We contacted my mother and told her about the living situation, she was happy for me and even offered Dorothy money from her Social Security in return for the favor. As soon as I got settled in I used my time wisely an went to the place where my mother was staying. I had to find out why my mom was still on the streets and not in Hospice Care. I had no bus money left and no one was around to borrow it from so I walked. I walked for almost two hours, all the way across town to the lower West Side. When I got there and saw my mom, she looked like a zombie version of herself. Her eyes had no soul left in them and her words would just fall out of her mouth most of the time. I couldn't bear to look at her like this. I told the shelter she was at about my plans and made sure they knew how to contact me. I had to make sure I stayed in touch with my mom so she could sign over guardianship of me before the State found me and took me away to wherever. When I was younger I used to pray that Child Services or somebody would come and find my life the way it was and take me. Now I was so close to being where I wanted permanently that I had to stay below their radar and get everything right on paper quickly. Everyone at Dan's house was treating me great but when it really came down to it, there wasn't enough room for me there. Dan and I were both entering our teen years and Dorothy had her younger daughter, Dana there as well. It was a lot of people to be in a three bedroom apartment. I told my grievances to Lil' Roy who in turn told Pap and Gram. I'm not sure if the money my mom was offering out sweetened the pot or if they just downright felt bad for me but they offered me a place to live under their roof a few days later. I never pictured that scenario, usually I was the stray cat being chased away from their garbage cans at night. I told Roy I had to think it over, Dan had put his neck out there for me, I couldn't just walk away like that. Over the next few days I was torn. Dan was a closer friend and I loved his family like my own but Roy's house was more suitable to accommodate me. The decision would manifest itself soon enough though. I was out on my own one day doing whatever, when I came across some of the guys hanging out on 107th. I saw Big Roy and he looked a little leery when he saw me turn the corner. I came up and asked what everyone was up to. Suddenly my eyes flew open all the way, they were fixated straight at Big Roy. He was wearing one of my shirts that should be in my dresser space back at Dan's house. One of my last good shirts from my shopping excursion last year! I had next to nothing to my name so my clothes were my identity and he was stealing that from me. I went into a rage at the thought of him going through my stuff and wearing it and pushed him as hard as I could. He fell down and I screamed at him at the top of my lungs. “You think you can go into my things and just take what you want!!!” I know it sounds a bit overboard but when you barely own anything, you really value what little you do have. I made him take the shirt off and turned to walk away with it. Suddenly anger overtook me again, I spun around and kicked him in the ribs as hard as I could out of nowhere while he was still on the ground. Everyone that was standing around me tackled me to the ground right after. I felt a few kicks from the guys as they yelled at me about how messed up that was. They were right but I was infuriated. I felt like Dan had disrespected me and my belongings by letting him take my shirt like that. I began to think as I got up that if I stayed there, things like that or worse would continue to happen. This sealed the deal for me. I made my way to Dan's house, packed up and left that night. Dan had no clue I was leaving and when he found out later he pleaded with me angrily to stay. He knew he was fighting a losing battle with the condition I was in. He probably thought I'd calm down and come back the next day but he was wrong. I went to Roy's in the middle of the night and told him of my decision. He looked happy about it despite the circumstances, I just hoped Pap and Gram would feel the same way when I saw them in the morning. Roy's Room already had two twin beds in it so I was good to go. As soon as I hit his room I fell asleep soundly, this was the first real bed I had slept on in ages. I woke up the next morning feeling refreshed. I also had feelings of embarrassment and regret for the way I left Dan's house the night before. We had been friends for too long, I knew once I'd see him again we could talk it through. I came downstairs and Pap was sitting right where he always was, in his recliner. That was a sight for sore eyes. I liked Roy's house, for once this place felt right for me, it felt like home. I told Pap my decision and he was fine with it. He contacted my mother soon after and made sure the paper work was taken care of quickly so there would be no legal problems down the road for us. I ended up seeing Dan a few days later and apologized to him and his family and thanked them for all they had done. He was hurt at first but things went back to normal in no time. I felt good, now all I had to do was make sure my mom ended up somewhere stable. Over the coming weeks I really got to get my head together. I saw the changes in myself, physical and mental. I could go to sleep at night and know I'd be doing it here again tomorrow. I knew if I was hungry, there was food to eat. This allowed me to focus once again on my art and schooling rather than survival. School was no problem at all to catch back up on, the curriculum in inner city schools was easy beyond belief for me. It was only a matter of time before I had surpassed the grades I was getting before all the chaos started. Being back around here also gave me the opportunity to start learning more about graffiti art as well. After about two weeks or so, my mother took care of the paperwork for Pap and Gram. When they came home and told me the news I nearly jumped out of my skin, I was finally no longer hers! Honestly, I was all about living life for me these days. I didn't want anything awful to happen to her but I could care less where she threw her life away at now. She had her chances and ruined them all. This was truly a rebirth for me. Besides becoming mentally stable again, I felt a personality change as well, my self-confidence shot through the roof over the coming months as I got back on my feet. I got descent clothes with the money from the state, I could get regular haircuts and could keep up on my overall appearance again. People saw the change everywhere, in no time I was making friends left and right in school, I was showing off my art proudly and I even had a few girls checkin' me out again. Truly a whole new Bob Peck. My mother on the other hand didn't fare as well. After signing off on me, she fell apart completely. I was her last shred of a real life and she wrote me off. She left the shelter and was wandering the streets, staying in church basements turned makeshift mass bedrooms at night and eating in free food lines. I was appalled to hear about this but what could I do? I had been trying to help her for years. I watched her walk this road to total degeneration, now she was at her goal. I made sure to keep tabs on her and caught up with her a few weeks later. She was sitting in a City Mission type place in the middle of the day, piled in with homeless men and women. I found her there drinking the free coffee and eating the stale donuts. Next to her was all her belongings in one plastic shopping bag. The people here looked like they had been out here for far longer than her but she was wearing their same beaten facial features. As I talked to my mother, one of the homeless guys yelled “Hey Marky Mark!” in my direction. Most of the homeless here were black, so it was funny for them to see this fresh faced whiteboy wearing urban clothes. I walked over to him quickly and told him to “Shut his fuckin' mouth, before I did it for him.” His friends laughed and pointed at him. These days I was afraid of no man, especially someone like him. I returned to talking to my mom like nothing had happened. She never once looked me in the eye the whole time we spoke, she just continued her gaze at the wall. I couldn't tell if she was delusional or ashamed, maybe a mix of the two. She was still aware of what she needed to do though. She knew she had to talk to her social worker about getting back into Hospice Care as soon as possible. I was glad for that at least. If she could keep that one simple program in her mind and follow it, she'd be okay. I wished her well and left soon after. I kept my composure as I left but on my walk to the bus stop I felt a flood of emotions set in. Sadness first hit but it was swallowed up by anger soon after. At least fear wasn't hanging over me anymore. I had to get all this out of my head before it dragged me down again. As soon as I got home I spent the afternoon working on my art. This was becoming my therapy, the only thing that could make all the feelings suppress. When I wasn't working on fine-tuning my abilities, I was getting back into the swing of doing all the normal teenager stuff. Going to the mall, playing video games and whispering sweet nothings to the ladies. The majority of us were now beginning to outgrow our passion for Dungeons & Dragons. We still played once in awhile but not everyday like we used to. You get a bunch of teenage guys sitting in a circle talking about elves and fairies for too long and you're bound to hear some jokes cracked. Besides me changing, the neighborhood was changing as well. A development company was beginning to come around and buy up all the abandoned and run down properties in the area. This was common in most major cities, watch a neighborhood fall apart completely and then buy it dirt cheap. Rebuild over the ashes and ship in the yuppies. God bless corporate America. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spitfire15 Posted December 10, 2007 Share Posted December 10, 2007 full metal jacket beatdown with the bars of soap. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RELAPSER Posted December 11, 2007 Share Posted December 11, 2007 ^^^ ha, thats exactly what i was thinking. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bojangles Posted December 11, 2007 Author Share Posted December 11, 2007 (Writer's note: Here's where it starts to get Graffitified.) Chapter 11 Almost overnight, the old abandoned storefronts were having new life breathed into them by businesses that had been given good deals on space while being spoon fed the new ideals the development corporations we selling. While walking to the store one day, one place caught my eye in particular. One of the renovated stores now had merchandise in the window. As I got closer I rejoiced at the site of graffiti covered airbrushed clothing! A shirt hung in the front window, on it was a portrait of a man. Clipped to it was his actual photo for comparison. Next to it were a pair of jeans doused in graffiti lettering down the leg. The styles were so complex that I couldn't even read it. This work was surpassing anything I had ever seen to this day. I stood there for at least ten minutes staring at these articles of clothing like they were ancient artifacts behind museum glass. When I snapped out of it I asked the Deli owner named “Ibe” what was going in there. He told me that some guy had rented it from him to use it as as an airbrush shop. He hadn't moved in yet but should be there in a few days. I left the store blown away by what I had seen, I had to meet this guy. I stalked that store for the coming days like the FBI on a international drug sting. Finally the day arrived, the blinds were pulled open! Inside was a guy behind the counter working on a mural of a screaming face on the walls. First I walked up and watched him through the window for a minute. His characters looked like they could jump right out at you as he sprayed the colors into their faces. It was like watching a magic show for me. Finally I gathered up enough nerve to make my entrance. As I opened the door and walked in he got up from his crouched position and turned to look at me. He was a big guy, his stature easily dwarfed mine and intimidated me at first. He looked sort of like a bouncer for a club or a bodyguard type. On his head he wore a baseball cap with a metal plate on it that said “Intensity.” I stared at him for a minute and he shot the same look back with a “Well, what do you want?” look in his eyes. “I like your store” fell out of my mouth clumsily. “Thanks” he said as he continued his work on the wall. “Theres a portfolio on the counter you can look through if you're interested.” he said without looking back. I opened it up and leafed through. I was blown away at first sight. The work was amazing, all the colors and angles almost seemed alien to me. His work was so complicated and detailed compared to anything anyone could do around here. I had to learn his secrets. While thumbing through I mindlessly spilled out the words “I do graffiti too.” this got his attention. “Oh yeah?” he said, he came over and leaned on the counter. Oh crap, I had to prove myself now. I had just put myself in a pissing contest and hadn't had a drink in days. “Yeah I learned from Pepsi...and I know some of those 113 guys!” the man looked at me with a raised eyebrow. “What do you go by?” He asked. “They call me Presto.” he said. In truth I didn't even have a cool nickname yet, I told him I used the name “Suspicious.” It was a word I had played around with a handful of times while drawing. “That's way too long he said, you need something shorter.” I completely blew off his last remark in my art induced daze and said “Let me run home and get some of my drawings to show you!” Before Presto could answer, I was on my way. I did run home literally, every step of the way until my chest hurt. I slammed into the house and up into me and Roy's room. With drawings in hand I raced back down the street and only stopped running when I hit the corner so I'd have a few seconds to catch my breath and not look like a complete psycho. To me this was like finding an alien spaceship or a real Leprechaun. If I didn't act now the opportunity to learn some of his skill might slip away. I walked back in cool, calm and collected. I set down my sketchbook and he paged through it. Inside my book were awful, scratchy drawings of lopsided characters and letters. Symbols like money signs and crooked stars adorned the pages. His work was flowing and impressive, almost organic...mine was not. I wasn't paying attention to see what he thought but once we had our work side by side mine paled in comparison. I wondered how long he had been doing graffiti for, he couldn't have just started like me. This guy must've been doing it for years. He didn't look that old though, I was guessing he was just a few years older than me at best. I stuck around for about an hour after he looked at my work, he seemed to warm up to me a bit after he saw my drawings. I must've asked Presto a million dumb questions that day, he was patient with me though. I'm guessing he had probably met some of the other kids my age from around here and figured I was the best of the lot. After a while he told me he was leaving for the day. I asked him if he lived around here and he answered with a vague “kinda'.” He told me before he was going home that he was stopping to see Rox1. I couldn't believe it, this guy knew Rox! I had only seen that name tagged around, never met the guy myself but he was a hero in my eyes. Bravely, I asked if I could come along. He looked at me like he couldn't believe I asked such a thing. Looking back though he handled it well, some scrawny kid who could barely draw that he just met an hour ago was trying to latch onto him and shadow him for the day. Most people would've told me to get lost, he politely said “Not this time, come back in a few days with some new drawings and we'll see.” I went home feeling like I had won the lottery that day. I dedicated the rest of the week to coming up with a whole body of new work. The whole time I looked at his work I took mental snapshots and was ready to try and hang with it. Over the coming days I went back but wasn't ready to show him the new pieces yet. Instead, I brought in some of the guys every time I came. I was showing Presto off like he was a trained monkey. Some friends showed more interest than others, Dan took a liking to Presto's work right away. I told Presto about how Dan and I played D&D with some of the other guys in the area and this got his attention. He told us that he used to play but hadn't in awhile. I invited him to one of our games and surprisingly he accepted and said he'd meet up with us soon. Something told me Presto would become a long standing fixture in my life from that first day, I could just feel it. Now I just had to wait and see. It was definitely a year for change. New places and people, a new home for me. Some old faces came back as well. Mark and Danny moved back from Parma into Lakewood. This was cool because it was much easier to get to their house again. Different house, same environment though. You could still go there and party your life away just about any day, any hour. When their dad wasn't Downtown upholding the law at the Court House, he was at home in his flip flops playing cards and guzzling cold ones like the old days. Mark and Danny liked their life but I couldn't help but feel sorry for them sometimes. Sure they got a twenty dollar bill whenever they asked for it and there was always a laugh around the corner but there was very little sense of family. I wondered what home life was like when they went to visit their mom. As of right then, she was living in Washington, DC because of work. Mark and Danny would go see her several times a year usually. I had never met her yet but from what I heard, she was raking in the big bucks doing whatever it was she did. Well, who am I to talk about families anyway? Mark's house was fun but with my new setup on 107th I couldn't spend every day over there like I used to. Besides, his house was right on the outskirts of Madison Park. Home to Royal Mafia and in their eyes I was a deserter. Months had passed since I had seen them but I heard they were always trying to find me. I also heard that their numbers and notoriety had grown as well. They were truly becoming a threat in the eyes of the law and the community alike. Their actions became more violent as they grew, reports of stabbings and robberies circulated the area. These guys were trying to earn street cred and I wanted nothing to do with it. The problem was I couldn't just walk up and ask for a discharge. Every time I went to Mark's house I had to tiptoe my way in and out of Lakewood. It was nerve wracking and I knew I couldn't live like this forever. Finally, I met a few kids on Mark's street who knew those guys. I asked them to relay a message back to the gang. “Tell them I want out. I have a dying mother that I have to take care of.” The message got back to them that day, unfortunately they must've threatened to play “kill the messenger” and he ratted out my location at Mark's place. Mark had gone off somewhere and left me at the house for awhile so I was sitting around playing Super Nintendo or something when all of a sudden I heard feet come flying up the stairs. It was one of Mark's friends from down the street. “Dude! I was just at the park. They're coming for you...right now!” I stood there like a statue, no time to panic. “How many?” I asked. “Lots, I dunno' ...all of them?” This wasn't good. They were going to storm the house, beat me down or worse and leave all in a matter of minutes. Mark's friend and I locked all the windows and doors and waited. I don't know why he didn't take off and save himself but he didn't. It was like something out of Nazi Germany, I had all the curtains pulled, lights off, doors barricaded. Now all I could do was wait for the madness to begin. Soon enough I heard yelling outside from them. I cracked a curtain and looked out but couldn't see them, they were too close to the house down below. I could hear their voices from all sides now. They were starting to surround all the doors. I hoped that one of the neighbors would see or hear what was going on and call the Police but sadly I realized most of them were probably at work. It was fight or flee time. No way I could take all of them. I looked at Mark's mountain bike laying in the corner and grabbed it. Before I knew what I was doing I made a mad dash with it down the back stairs. They weren't in the backyard yet from what I could tell. I burst open the door with the bike and threw it over the fence to the neighbor's yard. Mark's friend followed me for a few houses as I hopped fences while throwing the bike along with me. Finally we stopped for a quick breather once we got to a safe distance. We were now a few yards down and I could hear the yelling coming towards us. I sent him on his own path away, no sense in dragging him down with me if they caught up. I cut through the neighboring backyards as fast as I could until I got a few side streets away. I managed to lose them for the time being it seemed. I took a few seconds to catch my breath and rationalize my situation. I now had an angry mob looking for me every time I'd come into Lakewood from this point on. Something told me I wasn't talking my way out of this one. I hopped on the mountain bike and rode back to Cleveland watching behind me the whole way. I made it back to Roy's house and stashed the bike in the backyard for safekeeping. I was pretty sure they didn't know that I stayed here, I just had to make sure it stayed that way. I had just settled in here, I think Pap and Gram would be a little angry if a gang came through and ransacked the house looking for me. Speaking of which, I hoped they had left Mark's house alone. Hopefully they were smart enough to realize I wasn't there and just left. I played it super low key the next few days and barely left the house. Every waking minute I felt like I was going to hear them outside again. Even walking in my own neighborhood I kept an eagle eye out for them. They never came around here but I didn't want any firsts. A few weeks went by of running but I knew my time of reckoning would come. I was walking down West 110th with some of the guys about a month or so later and I was starting to think I was in the clear finally. I was wrong. Everyone else went towards 107th, for whatever reason I went my own way down West 110th. A car came flying by me with tinted windows blasting rap music, in my neighborhood these kinda' cars were always potential threats. Only wannabe thugs, dealers and kids trying to look hard would roll around like this. I kept an eye on it as it passed, my heart raced a little. It hit the corner and I felt better. Suddenly, it kicked into reverse and came flying backwards up the street. This was never a good sign around these parts either. I froze up and waited. I didn't recognize the car at all. It slammed into park in the street right next to me and just sat there. My heart was racing again. Slowly the tinted window lowered, the driver was not who I wanted to see. It was indeed one of the members of the Royal Mafia. I couldn't see who else or how many others were in the car yet but I knew they rarely traveled alone. He signaled to me to come over but I refused. Suddenly both doors opened up and out poured five guys, all members of the gang. Fear took over instantly, I scrambled to try and think of ways to talk my way out of this. Thousands of words raced through my head as they walked towards me. Worst of all I was on a nearly deserted portion of the street. All I could think about was someone being able to find my body after they did whatever they had in mind. The leader of the gang walked over “Where you been?” he asked in a cold, stern tone. I tried looking him in the eye as I answered but was twitching in fear to badly. I did my best to explain my situation. “Look...My mom, she's dying and I have to take care of her now...” I didn't think he was listening as he stared at me. One of the guys walked over as I spoke and took my hat right of my head and put it on. “I'll take that.” he said. They knew they had me and could get away with anything. I looked at the leaders hand as I watched him palm something shiny and silver from one of his guys. It was at this moment that I came to terms with the fact that I might be saying my final words. I was sure I was about to get shot or stabbed. Nonetheless, I continued my speech “...And I just got back around here, I've been homeless...” blah, blah, blah. I could tell them that I traveled through time to fight dinosaurs and the outcome would still be the same. Right as I thought that, I saw a flinch and a white flash. I fell to the ground. What happened? I didn't make a noise. I was lucky, it was only a hit to the face with whatever the metal object was. “Get up.” said the leader. As I stood, I spit out a piece of a tooth and some blood, a few of the guys laughed at me. Crack! I caught another one right in the jaw. I felt another tooth crack into pieces in my mouth. I just stood there silently and took my punishment. A few more guys came up and hit me in various places, I never flinched. The leader looked at me disgusted and said “You're out, don't ever come around.” I nodded silently and walked home. They took off back on their route. I lost a hat and a few molars that day but it was better than my life. I went back home and cleaned up. Never did an ass kicking feel so good. It was truly over now. I could go on with my life. One more obstacle out of the way. With everything beginning to fall into place, I devoted my time between my friends and my art. When I wasn't catching up on all the good times I had missed over the last year I was buried in one of my sketchbooks almost religiously. My friends were always really supportive of my art and most of the time while we were sitting around they would throw out ideas for me to draw. Life truly couldn't get much better than this. Presto, the guy from the airbrush shop was now coming around regularly and taking me under his wing with graffiti. At first I was just creating lopsided copies of his work and awful looking characters of people from my neighborhood. Presto sat me down one day and gave me a pearl of wisdom. “If you want me to teach you, you're going to have to forget everything you think you know and wipe the slate clean.” I've now passed this gem on to generations of graffiti writers under me. The problem with graffiti art is that when everybody first starts, they want to be as good as the stuff they saw that impressed them. What happens then is people take everything they saw and try and cram it into every piece that they do. This usually results in a God awful mess of color and crammed up, overdone design. I took his advice, if starting from scratch could make me as good as him, then I'm all in. Nowadays you can go onto countless sites on the Internet and stare for hours on end at pictures and videos of graffiti art, back then it wasn't so simple. The only way you were going to truly learn in those days was by picking up a mentor, a real person not a computer monitor. That person would teach you the history, the techniques and introduce you to your peers. I was lucky enough to have Presto volunteer in this daunting task. Just like I saw something in him and knew he'd become a lasting friend, I think he saw the same thing in me. Even though I was a pesky kid and he was in his mid-twenties, there was a bond. He saw the determination in me. I'm sure that he knew that if he didn't tutor me, I'd still be in his hair everyday at his shop anyways. Soon enough I was spending my evenings in 113 alley with the older guys. Rox 1, Presto, Ivan, Mist, Pepsi, they were all there. It was like a ghetto red carpet even to me. They'd be painting away, drinking 40's and smoking joints. If I started to ask too many questions they'd hand me a beer and say “You wanna' learn? Sit there quietly and watch what we do.” and I did. I was a loyal apprentice, soaking up everything. I'd mimic their hand movements as they glided the spray can across the wall, I'd listen to the lingo. Words like toy (a new on the scene writer), biter (someone who copies someone else's style), and burner (a really good graffiti piece) would all become part of my daily vocabulary. I was now all in, I lived and breathed graffiti from those days on. The only problem was I had never painted any graffiti yet. All I had ever done was little sketches in my books. I was never gonna' get respect like this. I had to start getting my name out onto the streets. Problem number two, I didn't even have a name to tag around yet. My moment in the limelight would be cast upon me a few nights later in the alley. Presto and Rox had met up to do a wall right at the entrance. This was a prime spot to paint because you could see it from the street. I was excited out of my mind to watch these guys get down. They made it known that it had to be a “burner” or better than average graffiti for this wall. I sat quietly and watched them get started as I took swigs off of a beer that was being passed around. This was the life, it was a beautiful Summer night, I had all my heroes right in front of me, nothing could top it. Then halfway through the piece Presto and Rox talked about what should go in the middle spot on the wall. Rox had done an alien character on the left and Presto was working on a chromed out spray can in the bottom right corner. This left the middle section barren. “We need a 113 right there.” Presto said as he pointed to the spot. Rox agreed and said “I don't feel like painting it though.” Presto looked over to me and said “You wanna' do it?” “ME?” I said in shock. I stood up and took in what was just said. They wanted me to paint on their wall with them. “I...I don't have any paint.” I said. “We've got plenty.” Rox replied. I walked over nervously, what if I screwed up their wall? Besides us three being there, there was a small audience of people from the neighboring streets watching it all go down. Presto handed me a can of black and ran me through the motions “Hold the can like this, move it fast or you'll get drips.” I nodded. “Just think about what the line will look like one the wall before you make it.” I stared at the wall and did a mental projection onto the wall. I pictured a “113” in my head and I pictured a character that I had been working on in my books. It was a cartoony version of myself that I had been dying to try and paint. Before I knew what happened I pressed down on the nozzle and let the paint flow. At first I was getting discouraged, lots of drips and fuzzy lines. Rox and Presto guided me through the whole process though, every time I made a mistake they made me try again and fix my errors. In no time at all I was creating the numbers and character I had imagined. Crude by my abilities and standards today but on that night it was the most amazing piece of art I had ever created. When it was all said and done Presto and Rox complimented my work which was like winning the Nobel Prize to me. It was nowhere near as good as what they had done but they were nice enough to give me that first shot right next to them. I felt like a million bucks. I wanted to paint every day and night from that moment on. I went home and told everyone about what I had painted and we all possed up and walked down the street to look at it. My friends all thought it was awesome and continued to tell me how much they liked it. Big Roy sparked up a joint and we all stood in front of the freshly painted wall and smoked it. Every few seconds one of the guys would take a second long look at the wall again as he toked on the J. I liked this feeling, I felt like I was appreciated for the first time in my life. I felt like I had created something for more than just myself, this was for the people. I had a huge buzz from all of this...wait maybe it was the joint? Nope. I felt good from the graffiti first! I still had no graffiti name to tag or write so at first I just used my first name, “Bob”. Not a good idea, soon enough I had store owners chasing me down and yelling at me to stop writing my name on their properties at every corner. I needed an alias. I needed something cool. Suddenly I remember one night on Lil' Roy's porch he yelled over to me “Hey B!...Hey B, man come here!” Trying to get my attention. Hmmm...B-Man, this could work. It had a nice ring to it! Now all I needed was some practice. The weeks flew by as I began to spend a majority of my free time in 113 alley. Sometimes I would cut school just to sit there all day and meet some of the graffiti writers that were still unknowns to me. I took my lunch money and bought cheap dollar store spray paint whenever I had the chance. I was stockpiling it up for my first solo graffiti piece. Dan always had a thing for art as well as music and I finally convinced him to try and draw some graffiti one day. Because Presto was one of our few influences, it came out looking like one of his pieces, good enough though, I had a potential partner in crime. I kept pushing Dan to come out with me to do a piece but I could tell he was nervous about it at first. Dan and I were both pretty straight laced kids for the most part, the idea of us sneaking out at night and trespassing was a pretty hardcore idea to us at that age. One night though, I showed up at Dan's with a bag of paint and a sketch. The graffiti piece said “10-7 Uptown” a shoutout to West 107th street and our neighborhood. Around the piece were all of our names. This got Dan pumped to go when he saw his name on the roster. Much like myself and my new found alter ego “B-man” Dan had one now too, “Kid 3”. I gave Dan this name because he was the third Daniel in his family. It was corny but it worked. This would be the night the world (or at least Franklin Avenue) would meet B-Man and Kid 3. That night we played it cool and I hung out at Dan's house pretending I was spending the night. I snuck in my bag of paint and hid it in his room as it got later in the evening. As we waited for the cover of darkness Dan was starting to get uneasy about the idea and started to try and back out. I countered this with reassurances and tales I had heard about painting out in the streets. I had to keep him psyched long enough for his mother to go to bed so we could sneak out and get this done. Eleven o' clock finally rolled around and Dorothy was off to dreamland. Dan looked unsure still but I was ready. We hit the door silently and crept down the old wooden stairs. Once we hit the street we both felt at ease and started our walk to our destination. I had scouted out the perfect wall for us. A bright yellow wall on the edge of a parking lot to a factory. This wall was ideal. Visible from the street in the daytime, secluded at night. We walked along through our deserted neighborhood for a few minutes until we got to the spot a few blocks away. There it stood in all it's glory. It was like a monolith to me, calling out for a layer of paint produced by my hands. I walked up to it eagerly with Dan dragging behind. As I looked back with one hand inches from the wall, I could tell the nervousness was finally beginning to wear off from him now that he was here. I got up to the wall and slid one hand across it. “This is it!” I whispered with a grin on my face. I looked around before we got started, all was clear except for one thing. The factory to which this parking lot belonged to had a slow moving camera panning the lot. This meant about every six minutes the camera would hit the wall. I was pretty sure that no one was monitoring it at night, there wasn't one car in the lot. My bright idea was to just keep the paint out of sight around the corner and hide whenever the camera hit. Dan agreed to the plan and we got started. I sprayed the black outline of the letters onto the wall a few seconds later. My nerves were making it hard to control the paint at first but by the time I was ready to start adding colors I had developed a steadier hand. Just like clockwork, every six minutes or so we stopped what we were doing and ran around the corner. This was a great plan except for one thing. If somebody was watching the lot, they never saw us per se but they did get to watch a graffiti piece magically appear on the wall over time like it was stop-motion photography. I never factored that into the equation at the time. We kept working away with little worry, we must've had beginner's luck on our side that night. We had to of been out there for almost two hours, clanking cans around and being noisy as hell. We never had one problem though as we filed in the thick black outline with the sweet rainbow fill I had come up with. At the end it was time to put all of our friends names around the piece. Everyone had nicknames so we used those instead of their first names. I could only imagine the ass kicking Frankie would've gotten if his dad would've drove by the next day and saw his son's name graffitied on a wall. Mission accomplished. We packed up and jogged home with a “nothing suspicious here” look about us. The next morning we gathered the troops and took them all up to the wall to see it. Dan and I stood proudly as everyone gathered for a picture around it. There was that feeling again. The ability to bring people together, all from a can of paint. I was now full-on addicted. When I wasn't hanging in the alley, I was over at Presto's house these days. He eventually got an apartment right above his shop. Unfortunately due to airbrushing going out with the times and finances in general, his shop closed down soon after. It was the end of an era for airbrushed clothes, right place wrong time. Presto had many talents when it came to art so he wasn't too worried once the initial let down faded. He was still making money doing freelance jobs and he held down a part-time job to make ends meet. I used to love going over to his place, he had every single art supply you could imagine. It was like a mad scientist's lab to me. I didn't even know how to use half off the stuff he had in his possession but I knew I liked it. I'd go over there and me and Presto would sit there and draw together for hours sometimes. I'd grab his expensive markers and brutalize the tips from pressing too hard on them, he'd yell at me, I'd get nervous and knock something over. One might say it was a symbiotic relationship from the get-go. With me having no family, Presto soon became the closest thing to a big brother that I ever had. We even gave each other sibling rivalry. In no time at all I was wisecracking on him and he was tossing me around with his super karate moves. Sometimes we'd just sit around and just talk about life when we weren't doing the graffiti thing, it was refreshing, I never had this kind of relationship with someone before. The thing I liked is that he saw me for what I had in my head and heart, not as some dumb teenage kid from the 'hood. Besides the art, Presto was helping me learn about life and the world around us. He helped fill in the blanks I had in my life while I was on my way to becoming a young adult. I can honestly say that if it wasn't for his intervention into my world, I don't think I'd be where I'm at today. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bojangles Posted December 11, 2007 Author Share Posted December 11, 2007 Morning bump. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Raw fish Posted December 11, 2007 Share Posted December 11, 2007 excelllent Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
T ReXXX Posted December 11, 2007 Share Posted December 11, 2007 I am thoroughly enjoying it so far. Thank you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mauler5150 Posted December 11, 2007 Share Posted December 11, 2007 Great stuff. I just had to catch up on like 5 chapters, but it is awesome. I would buy it if i had a damned credit card, ahaha. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bojangles Posted December 11, 2007 Author Share Posted December 11, 2007 Great stuff. I just had to catch up on like 5 chapters, but it is awesome. I would buy it if i had a damned credit card, ahaha. Steal a friend's. Steal your grandma's. Steal your Grandma's friend's. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spitfire15 Posted December 12, 2007 Share Posted December 12, 2007 bring on the morning update plz! MOAR! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bojangles Posted December 12, 2007 Author Share Posted December 12, 2007 Chapter 12 With everything going as well as it was, my self confidence was going through the roof. My quest for coolness that I had started in Junior high was almost fulfilled. I had descent clothes, I was learning the graffiti game and most importantly, I had a roof over my head. Even mom had finally settled into her Hospice Care for good. Definitely a bittersweet scenario on her end. Seemed like I had almost everything, now all I needed was a girl in my life. We were all getting to that age where women were becoming priority one. A few months ago that was next to impossible due to my circumstances but now I no longer had to be embarrassed to talk to girls about my life. “Want to come hang out at my house?” was no longer a situation I had to swerve around. Because the girls were so ghetto in our neck of the woods, we had to look to other areas for the ladies. Parma was still one of our gold mines for that. Even though Mark had moved back to our part of town we had made enough connections out there to keep visiting regularly. I made the rounds out there but none of the girls out there had anything in common with me. After a while I was beginning to lose hope. After all, the last girlfriend I had was Angie and that was in Junior High. Then one night it happened, we had a party at our house for some reason. I don't remember the occasion, all I remember was being too tired and going up to my room to go to bed. I woke up in the morning and there was a girl lying next to me. Don't go thinking any dirty thoughts, nothing too crazy happened that night...I think. The worst part was waking up and her remembering my name as I stared at her in silent shock wondering who she was and why she was in my bed. I handled it well and in a few minutes found out her name was Nicky, she had come to our party with some mutual friends from Lakewood. She too got tired and found my room to come crash out in some time after I did. She stumbled in through the darkness and fell asleep next to me. She seemed cool enough so we hung out the rest of the day and got acquainted. The thing I liked about her was she was more mature than most girls I had met up until now and we basically dated from that day on. Just like that I had a girlfriend. Nicky was a quiet girl by my standards, one of those “go with the flow” kinda' people. It wasn't bad though, she'd sit around quietly and snuggle up to me while me and the guys acted like assholes. What more could I ask for? As time went on and our feelings for each other grew, I told her about all the craziness that had just passed in my life. She was the first person I ever really opened up to about all the mess. She just took it all in and never said much in return about it.. I wasn't sure if it was just her nature or if she just didn't know what to say about all of it due to lack of experience. It was kind of nice though just being able to spill it out without interruption, kind of like a therapy visit. Another Winter and another birthday were approaching fast. I was on the verge of sixteen and now in the tenth grade. This was a great year for school as well. Some of the guys were now going to school with me at West Tech this year! It was now me, Bert, Big Roy and Lil' Roy all under one roof. Bert didn't hang out with us too often inside the school walls but he walked with us everyday. Being there the year before I had already established myself in the school, all the other guys had to do was show up and I showed them the ropes. Even though “the Roys” as they were now known as, were in a lower grade than me we still shared quite a few classes. One of those classes was “O.W.E.” or Occupational Work Experience, essentially a vocational class geared for screw ups like us. This was my second year in the program. It worked like this: Go to homeroom, from there go to the O.W.E. pick up your in-school work assignment like cleaning halls, etc. and then disappear for half the day. When you were done with your job. You “clocked out” of that class and continued your day in regular classes. In all realness it was a class to prep you for pushing a broom for the rest of your life. I knew that wasn't destined to be my path so I didn't care. Most of the time me and the Roys would go get our supplies, wave good-bye, throw all the crap in our lockers and go to Big Roy's house right down the street. We'd sit around and get stoned while we watched game shows and ate cake frosting right from the container. When our shift was up we'd stroll back to school and go to our Algebra class together. This was always a laugh riot, our teacher Mr. Adams knew we were a bunch of stoners and we didn't do much to hide the fact. If we weren't coming from Roy's house all baked, we were out by the bleachers smoking with ghetto East Side kids right before his class. Weed was everywhere in that school. I know all High Schools have drug problems wherever you go but this school's was outta' control. On more than one occasion I was cutting class in the basement halls and some kid would walk by smoking a joint or a blunt, the bell would ring for class and random kid would just yell out “Who wants the rest?” More often than not I was there to receive. I'd just sit in a corner and smoke it up and show up fashionably late for my class. But I digress. By the time we'd get to Mr. Adams class our eyes were bloodshot and sleepy. We were slumped over as we strolled in five or ten minutes late on average. One time I went for my seat and missed completely and ended up landing on the floor. At first he used to get furious and throw us out of class but eventually he warmed up to us when he saw we were harmless. Compare us the the herds of Crips and Bloods that feud in his room everyday and we were comedy relief. This was the year where the three of us would single handedly begin taking over West Tech as well. We got word that the school would be closing down in a year or so and decided this would be the year that we'd let it all hang out. I had been through so much lately that I felt I deserved a solid school year's worth of being a slacker with my life. The news also meant the teachers cared even less about the place now and the already lackadaisical rule system barely stood a chance against a thousand kids from the 'hood all with the same mentality. Think about that for a minute. Around a thousand street kids all piled into one crumbling building that was on it's way to being condemned. All bets were now officially off. As soon as the word became official, chaos consumed the school. Reports of sex in empty classes was an everyday thing. Gangs ran wild and turned the school into a major drug hub for the remaining time. I'd be willing to bet that at any time in that place there was at least five pounds of weed or more and mass amounts of cocaine and other hard drugs. Guns were commonplace as well. It wasn't out of the ordinary to see kids showing off weapons from their duffel bags in gym class. One kid topped everyone one day though when he pulled out a “street sweeper”, a fully automatic machine gun with an extended ammo clip. That's right, a teenage kid with a machine gun. God bless public schools. The drugs got so bad the first few weeks after the news that they had to do “hall sweeps”. The guards would randomly lock down a hall with the riot gates and trap everybody who was in that section of hall. Regardless of sex or color your pockets were getting searched. When this would happen you would see kids scramble to jam packets under lockers with their feet or folders. Some kids were so desperate that they would eat what they had on them, plastic and all. I even saw a few kids run head on at guards, push them out of the way and make it over the fence and squeeze through the small space between the top of the fence and the ceiling. This brought on a whole new meaning to “higher learning.” Me and the Roys could care less about all that mess, we were at school to chill out and party. We were friends with all the gangsters and dealers but only because we had to be. If you weren't their friend, you were their enemy. We came to be known as “those crazy whiteboys” of the school. With all the chaos ensuing the place, it was easy to get away with countless pranks and schemes. First we started a racket to make money, we collected up breakfast cards for the free breakfasts that kids got based on their income. Most kids hated the breakfast there and would just throw out or give away these cards. Why did we want them? Because they looked just like the lunch cards for free lunches except they had a green stripe printed across the top. A little love with an eraser and some scotch tape and you've got a stack of lunch cards for sale. We'd off them for a buck or two a piece and kids could eat for the whole month. I won't say how much we made but we did alright. Once we were established for that we had a little street cred in the school. This meant we could walk the deserted, gang filled back halls of the school safely. Besides our lunch hustle, I had been hooking up all these kids with art of quite some time now. We'd even be able to go to school on the most feared day of the year in those days “May Day”, the first day of May. In Public schools back then (and possibly now) this was the day that all the black kids would gang up and rob all the white kids. Most white kids didn't come to school that day, the ones that did usually went home with half of the things they came with. Not us though, we walked through unscathed. We were now a fixture of the school. Going to class became such a hassle that we spent more time in the halls after O.W.E. My schedule now was down to going to Algebra, English and History twice a week most of the time. To make things even more sweet, Big Roy scored the job of hall monitor as his new gig! This meant Roy could accept bribes from kids for safe passage during class times, which he did. This also meant me and Lil' Roy could roam freely unless we ran into the real guards. Even they became less of a threat in little time. Because of O.W.E. and my quick wits, I'd often come up with elaborate lies as to why we were in the halls all day. In no time we were even walking to the store during class and coming back with bags of goodies to share with friends and the guards. Again, these guys were used to having to body slam thug ass kids twice their size on average. We were about as dangerous as mice in their eyes. It started to get boring just hanging out in the halls for forty minutes at a time, so sometimes I'd bring a marker with me and place my name in clever little spots all over the halls. B-man could be seen on the handles for the water fountains, the exit signs and random lockers on every floor. When I wasn't establishing my name, I'd come up with more practical jokes to pull off. Sometimes we'd pick a floor and go ring all the bells at the same time with our broom handles and run around the corner. After about thirty seconds you would see all the doors open slowly and kids pour out into the halls confused. The teachers would try and control the situation but it was too late, they were already wandering away. Anarchy at it's best. As the school year trudged on we got more creative with it and became sort of underground celebrities for our stunts. My favorite one was the time I brought some dog food to school with me. What ghetto school would be complete without packs of stray dogs living outside of it? I took out the dog food and threw a handful to the pack, this got their attention as they gobbled it up instantly. The next handful got thrown by the side door of the school. See where this is going yet? I'd knock on the door and one of the Roys would open it from the inside, in goes handfuls of dog food thrown around the halls. Before you knew it you would have a circus of crazed, hungry dogs patrolling the halls! Ah, what fun. Then there was always the good time of stealing a wood cart from the workshops in the basement, throwing it onto the freight elevator and taking it up to the third floor to ride like a giant skateboard. The only problem with this was they have caster wheels and don't steer to well. Me and the Roys learned this one day as we flew down the hall screaming and crashed straight through a classroom wall. We hit the wall full speed and that cart took out a gaping chunk of the exterior wall. We all stood there in shock for a second then ran like hell, leaving the cart right where it hit. Needless to say, we didn't stick around in school for the rest of the day. The next day we all went to homeroom and weren't in there for five minutes when the guards came to pull us three out and take us to the office. We walked calmly together, quietly planning our alibis. We got to the office and the Principal looked at us and without saying a word and turned on a monitor. It showed an angled shot of the hallway empty at first. Next thing you know, you see Big Roy and Lil' Roy surfing the cart as I pushed it by the handle while running down the hall. Then, the infamous wipeout and escape. We had nothing to say. We had seen the cameras before but were sure they didn't work based on all the other happenings in the school. I could tell the guard still in the office wanted to laugh at what he had just watched and it made me want to laugh with him. This turned out to be no laughing matter though, we got threatened with everything from expulsion to court cases. Surprisingly, nothing ever came from it after that day. The story shot around the school like wildfire, upping our “crazy whiteboys” status even further. In that school the crazier you were known as, the better. People stayed out of your way. We laid off the pranks for awhile and decided to go to our classes a little more after that mess. The only class I really looked forward to in tenth grade was Art and I didn't even have it as a real class on my schedule. I had asked for Art the year before but it was full so I got Industrial Arts instead, which was a glorified name for wood shop. It wasn't bad but it wasn't art. So when tenth grade came along, I went right to the Principal and asked for art again. What did I get? Industrial Arts 2. I guess art class was full again this year. This was Kinda' feeling like when you'd ask for a cd player for Christmas and you'd end up with a cassette deck. Finally, I took it into my own hands and started skipping study hall and just showing up in Art class. Full? It wasn't full, there were plenty of seats so one day I walked in and I took one. The teacher looked puzzled the first day I pulled this stunt. “Can I help you?” asked the art teacher who looked like an ex Black Panther from the 60's. “Oh... I just transferred in!” I replied. He shuffled through his papers looking for my info. “You probably don't have it yet, they should have it up here soon.” I told him. He looked confused but let me stay. The first day I excelled past every student in there, immediately gaining his attention. I showed up every day from that day on. As the weeks passed I did every assignment thrown at me and did it perfectly. He brought up my schedule a few times but I always had a quick excuse and over time the questioning finally stopped. I couldn't help but wonder if he just forgot about my name not being in his attendance or just didn't care? Finally towards the end of the semester I brought it up to him just to make myself look legit. “Did you ever get my scheduling straightened out?” I asked. He looked around and spoke quietly to me “You were never supposed to be in here in the first place. I'm not stupid. I checked in on you, you're skipping Study Hall to be here.” I looked stunned and tried to think of a cover up. “Look, if you want to be in here that bad, I'll help you get in here for real. At least then you can earn a grade for your time.” A smile grew across my face. Sure enough, within a week I was an honorary student of his class. Good bye Industrial Arts, hello real art. Even if I skipped every other class that day, I made sure I went to his class. Sometimes I would come to school right in time for his class then leave and go home again. I saw him years later and thanked him for everything and was proud to tell him about about my career as an artist. He looked pleased as we walked on to our own destinations. Outside of school life was moving right along and feeling better to me by the day. We were all teenagers looking for fun times and the easy way of doing everything. I was dividing my time still between graffiti, being a slacker and my girlfriend. ...In that order. Every night now I was leaving the house to go write my name around the area. So much in fact, that I finally got the attention of none other than Bert and Josh's older brother Tim -aka- “Pepsi”. He caught me out wandering one day and asked me if I wanted to go up onto the rapid line with him and some of his crew, which completely caught me off guard. Wow, Pepsi had just asked me to go out onto our subway line with him to do graffiti. I didn't know how to answer at first, I was a little worried that he was still mad at me for goin' into his room while he was locked up. What if this was some clever plan to get me out there and jump me? I had never even been out on the rapid line to paint yet, I had only seen all the great graffiti pieces from inside the train while cruising along the tracks from the safety of the train. At first I declined but Tim has a way of making people do what he wants. We stood around on the corner and smoked a joint while him and his boys talked me into coming along. I began to feel like they really did want me to come for graffiti, not to pound me into dust. They were talking about all the places they had seen my name and soon we were gossiping the way Rox and Presto did with each other. The mood felt light and it seemed that this invite was genuine so off we went, down 110th street a few minutes later. It was just about dusk as we got to a steep grass incline and Tim looked around for traffic before climbing up it. At the top was a factory that was still up and running right next to the tracks. My heart pounded from the thought of going out there. To me it was like entering another dimension or stepping onto an alien planet. We got to the top and Tim walked out into the open area that the tracks ran along and took a look around. The gravel crunched under our feet as we followed behind. The whole area had a yellowish glow to it from being almost eye level with the street lights that were now eye level with us. My head panned left and right, open tracks as far as the eye could see. I pulled a deep breath and just took it all in. It was so peaceful up here. No noise other than the occasional car down below passing by and some crickets off in the distance. It was almost like an urban frontier, an unexplored open plot of land for me to discover. While I was getting all National Geographic about being up here (must've been the weed) Tim was already writing his name on all the utility boxes that lined the tracks. The trains passed by these slow enough that you could read all the names on them so these were prime spaces for tagging. We walked the tracks Westward, at first I barely talked. I was more concerned with learning the etiquette for being up here. How loud should you talk, if at all? Walk in a close pack or spread out? I think I was over thinking everything that night, I just wanted to come off like I knew what was up now that I was on the graffiti radar. We walked a few miles, writing our names on all the visible flat surfaces in our path. Once in awhile we'd wake up a dog on the other side of a fence and had to hide in the shadows for a minute until the barking subsided. This freaked me out the first time but the other guys just looked at it as a cigarette and bathroom break. On our way back we heard the whistle of a freight train off in the distance, Tim told us to keep walking until we could see the light from it. A few minutes later a single white beacon rose up onto the horizon, the whistle now echoed throughout the whole area. It was time to hit the shrubbery off to the side of the tracks. We all crouched down as the Engine roared by first, only a few feet from where we were. It was an incredible feeling for me, definitely a first. The train barreled by and created a wind that hit us all in the face almost like a reprimand for being up there and so close. As it continued it's course you could hear all the hydraulics and axles pushing and pulling along a seemingly endless line of cargo. It seemed like it was almost alive as it rumbled the ground around us. I felt more alive at this very moment than I had ever felt before. That night made me feel like a film had been peeled off of my life. I looked at the world from a whole new perspective called trackside and I liked what I saw. Graffiti had taken me by storm it's true, but I made sure that I did all the “normal” things in life still too. Me and the guys still spent plenty of time playing video games and just being guys. Nicky and I were still dating and hung out when we both had time. I liked the girl but I could tell it would never be a serious relationship. It just wasn't there, whatever it was. We were all still visiting the Parma girls as well, couldn't let them slip from our grasp. I had my girl so I just went along for the ride, or should I say walk? Let me explain. One day Bert and I decided it was a great day to cut school, neither of us felt like being there that day. The problem was it was the beginning of Winter and we were already cold just on our walk towards the school. We continued our walk trying to think of somewhere to hang out at for the day. Any mall would kick us out during school hours, most places would. Suddenly Bert said “Let's go to Parma! We'll go see the girls when they get out of school.” He was referring to Jenny Stack, Melissa Evans and Sabrina Yates of course. This was truly a great idea, the only problem was we only had enough money to take the bus one way each and if we took it there right now we'd get there way too early and they'd still be in school. Bert looked at me with a crazed gleam in his eye and said “We could walk there. They'd be getting out right when we got there.” I laughed, he didn't. I don't know if he wanted girls that bad or just didn't want to go to school that day but he was serious. Somehow, after a little coaxing he talked me into the voyage. “We'll walk as far as we can, if we get too tired we'll jump on the bus and go home.” was his way of coaxing me further. I don't know why I agreed but I did. It was now late in the morning and I had no idea how long a walk like this would take. I knew by bus it took me about forty five minutes to get there. Buses move a lot faster than people walking, I knew that was a fact. We strolled down side streets to avoid being seen by Police. If they caught you out during school hours you'd get a pricey curfew ticket which neither of us could risk or afford. Once we got moving it was kinda' fun, we had long talks about absolutely nothing and some serious conversations as well. It felt like like a nature hike without the nature, just relaxing and taking in the world around is as we strolled our path. About an hour into the trip we were in the lower West side of town near the Zoo. We had gone as far West as we needed to go, now came the long trip Southward. We still had to travel through a whole other city before we got to Parma. I couldn't help but complain “This is stupid. I'm going home.” Bert convinced me to take a break on some picnic benches outside of the Zoo that he saw. “Just sit here for a few minutes you'll feel better.” Bert talked in a mellow, monotone voice and I think it had some sort of hypnotic effect over me. I sat down on the cold bench for a minute and put my head down in my arms. I closed my eyes for a few minutes and thought about how dumb of an idea this was. After a few minutes I loosened up. I made it through so many tough times and I'm whining about this? When it was all said and done at least I'd have a warm home to go to. I could do this. What else did I have better to do anyways? All of a sudden I felt refreshed! I was ready to go again. When I sat up Bert just looked at me, got up and continued walking again without a word about it. He was a man on a mission, I guess I was too now. It warmed up increasingly as the day went on and by the afternoon we were walking with our coats open. I was now having a good time. I had known Bert for quite some time but that day I really got to know him. We had time to kill and we did it with a lot of talking. A whopping three hours later we arrived in Parma. It was almost time for the girls to get out of their school, Shiloh Junior High. We walked up exhausted and waited by the main door. As soon as we showed up we got dirty looks from coming and going school faculty. We definitely didn't fit the bill of Parma students. We decided it would be a good idea to move away from the front doors and went to the edge of the property and sat down on a metal guard rail. A few minutes later Police drove by slow enough to lose a race to a snail. They made sure to glare at us the whole time, not a good sign. We still had almost a half hour before they got out of school. How far away did these people want us to wait? We did the fake walk away as the cops went down the street, when they were out of sight we took our seats again. All this for some girls. We continued our babbling until we finally heard a bell ring in the distance. Kids trickled out at first, then came a full flood. We were now safe to get near the school. We waited for a few minutes and saw Jenny appear first. We yelled her over to us. “What are you guys doing here?” She asked with a surprised but happy look about her. “Eh, we got bored and decided to come visit.” I answered. Jenny ran off to find Melissa and Sabrina and came back a few minutes later with them and a few other girls. We were now literally surrounded by girls, just me and Bert. Suddenly my legs didn't hurt so bad anymore. I don't know what we expected when we got up there but all we ended up doing was walking them home and then hopping on a bus to go home shortly after. All that for twenty minutes of hang out time. I guess it was worth it though, I hadn't seen Melissa in forever and we got to catch up and have one of our great conversations about who knows what. I went home tired but pleased. Definitely better than a day of math and social studies. I looked at Bert and told him that I was never doing that again, he agreed. We sat quietly and enjoyed the ride home. We had talked enough all the way here. Time to get some rest. Over the coming months I tried to not cut school as much, it was time to shape up again before I got too far behind. The only time I did now was to go visit my mother. She was doing really bad and I knew every visit counted. I even told some teachers about it that I trusted and they went easy on me when it came to attendance marks. She was in a home off of West 25th street. Kinda' Ironic, the neighborhood where I'd begin my life is the same that she'd finish out hers. It was depressing to go visit her there. Every room had someone that was on their way out in it. A virtual house of death. Because she had been in here for some time now and not drinking, she was a changed person again, like when she was working in Michigan. Her personality was back to the way I remembered as a young boy. She was smiling through the pain and talking in a weak, but pleasant tone. We were getting along finally, too bad it was too late. Mom sat me down on one of my visits and told me she had something to say. “Bobby listen to me, the only reason I never showed you all the love I could was because I wanted it to be easy for you when I go. I didn't want you to be too connected to me.” Those words hit me harder than her hands ever did. Without knowing, I started to cry without control. She had just told me that she had the potential to love me more the whole time but chose not to. I would've rather been hurt when she passed then live a life without love in it. I never responded to her statement, I just gathered my things and left a few minutes later. What she had said there plagued me for days to come. Her message was a double edged sword. I could've had a mother showing me affection the whole time and that killed me inside. Then there was the plain truth about the statement. She loved her son so much that she chose not to get close to him to save him the pain of loss. This was the realist thing I ever heard her say. I wish she would've been on that level of communication with me the whole time. I went back to visit her every few days and we never talked about what was said again. Most of the time she just wanted to sit there with very few words between us and just hold my hand. When she did, you could feel the death radiating off of her. I just let her go more and more, day by day. A few days later I was sitting in school and though to myself “I should go visit my mom today.” then I thought “Well, it's kinda' warm today. I should go paint, I can visit her tomorrow.” After school I packed up a bag of paint and headed out to 113. Pap and Gram were cool with me doing graffiti so I always let them know where I was going just to be safe. I walked down the street with sketch in hand. With all the stress from the last few visits with my mom, some painting will be just the relief I need. I found a nice empty spot and sprayed my outline onto the surface. It was dead quiet outside, all you could hear were short bursts of paint spraying. It was almost hypnotic. To this day whenever I paint I still get lost in the sound of it spraying. About halfway through the piece a car came down the alley from Franklin. I kicked my paint out of the way and put my back up to the wall to make room. As it got closer I noticed it was Pap's car. He must've wanted to see if I wanted to go eat with him and Roy I thought. Pap stopped the car and got out, he took a quick look at what I was painting then stared at me for a minute. “Get in. She's gone.” he said. It took me a minute to understand. Once I did, I just began picking up cans of paint and loading up. As I got into the car I sat quietly thinking about what had just happened. “We'll stop at home so you can change.” was all that Pap said the whole trip. I called Dan up to go with us, I needed someone there for whatever I was about to see. Dan took the news well and tried his best to be a positive voice in the car for the trip but it wasn't helping much. I sat quietly preparing myself to see my mother for the last time. We walked in and there were people in her room with her. They invited me in and I accepted. There she laid, hands at her side, eyes closed. It looked like she was just sleeping, I even watched to see her stomach move from breathing, no such luck. This wasn't what I pictured death to look like. She looked peaceful, I was almost happy for her. I reached out and touched her hand one last time, it was colder than anything I had ever felt. It was almost like the energy from death itself was cascading inside of her and reached out to my spirit upon touch. Instantly I fell to the floor and almost blacked out. As I rose shaking and sobbing, I fell into the arms of a stranger, her social worker who I had only seen in passing. She held me for a second as I fell apart inside. I had no intelligible thoughts or words for that moment. Only the true feeling of death around me. When I composed myself I looked at her again and to me I could feel the emptiness of her body as a vessel for life. There were six people in that room but only five souls. I went out onto the porch of the house and sat on the steps for a minute, Dan came out with me and sat quietly. Pap came out a few seconds later and said “Come on.” with a tone that reminded me that there's nothing left in that house for me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bojangles Posted December 12, 2007 Author Share Posted December 12, 2007 Only one more chapter out of 33 being posted tomorrow. Like it so far? Get the whole shiny, fancy book at http://www.lulu.com/content/1017033 Already ballin' in your hometown with it? Leave me a review at the site. I feel like I'm running a telethon. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VAJ Posted December 12, 2007 Share Posted December 12, 2007 You are. I really hope that my book is here before my plane trip to New York. Do you know about how long its been taking? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bojangles Posted December 13, 2007 Author Share Posted December 13, 2007 You are. I really hope that my book is here before my plane trip to New York. Do you know about how long its been taking? I hear about a week to two tops. I ordered one for myself and it says it shipped yesterday so I'll keep you posted. P.S. T-minus 1 and a half hours until my birthday. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spitfire15 Posted December 13, 2007 Share Posted December 13, 2007 This gives me somthing to do in the morning when I wake up. A good read. You just too ghetto fab man. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VAJ Posted December 13, 2007 Share Posted December 13, 2007 P.S. T-minus 1 and a half hours until my birthday. Aren't we in the same time zone? How do you figure? I am so confused. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
El Jefe Uno Posted December 13, 2007 Share Posted December 13, 2007 I've been reading all this constantly so far, and I don't want to stop reading haha Someone is getting this for me for Christmas, but I'm not sure I really want to wait that long So far it's a great read Nice work my dude Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bojangles Posted December 13, 2007 Author Share Posted December 13, 2007 Aren't we in the same time zone? How do you figure? I am so confused. Uhhhh....no. You're at least an hour behind me. it's 10:40 here. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NerdUnit Posted December 13, 2007 Share Posted December 13, 2007 Bojangles: I've read the chapters you posted and enjoyed it. I like how it's simple and to the point. Easy to read and leaves me wanting more. I'll be buying your book with the holiday $ for sure. Thanks for living an interesting story. And writing about it! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bojangles Posted December 13, 2007 Author Share Posted December 13, 2007 I think I might post the last chapter that I'm posting on here at midnight (my time, eastern standard. AKA 24 minutes from now.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
El Jefe Uno Posted December 13, 2007 Share Posted December 13, 2007 Such suspense.. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bojangles Posted December 13, 2007 Author Share Posted December 13, 2007 Chapter 13 As we got to the neighborhood Pap asked me where me and Dan wanted to go. I had no clue, I just knew I shouldn't be alone. Dan told me that he left Big Roy and Dave at his house to come with me and they were probably still there. Sounded good to me. We walked in and Big Roy was sitting on the couch with his goofy grin rolling a joint. I don't know if Dan didn't tell them what happened or what, but all I remember next was Big Roy making some joke about my mom. I snapped and came at him like the freight train I had seen with Tim. I let out a roar of a scream and jumped on top of him. I blindly tried to beat on him anywhere I could find an open spot. Dan and Dave grabbed me off of him and he looked at me with a “What the hell?” expression. I was still screaming and spitting uncontrollably. They pinned me down for a second and told me to calm down. After a few minutes I did. I stood up and apologized to Roy. “No problem 'cuz!” He said as he handed me a joint to light. “Just pass that over here next and wipe off all that spit from your mouth before you hit it.” Words of wisdom from Roy himself. Once I got under control I realized that I never finished my graffiti piece. I headed back to the alley a bit later and put on the finishing touches. At the end I put up a “R.I.P. mom” next to it. Not the way I wanted to end my day. That night was bad as well. Everyone came to see me and were walking on egg shells. If someone was overly sensitive to the issue I'd scream at them to stop. If someone made jokes about me, more screaming. Nicky had work and couldn't make it down to see me but was calling me on the phone every hour. That night I drank and smoked until I couldn't walk or see straight. When it was time for bed, I sat alone and drank some more. I wasn't even a regular drinker yet or old enough to be one, but I tore through two bottles of Gin and Juice like it was cold water on a hot day. That and the handful of joints Roy gave me made me numb to everything. Suddenly I got a craving for snacks. The store would be closing soon, I had to hurry. I stumbled down the stairs and walked down the street in the snow without a coat on. I was so wrecked that my body was pretty much on auto pilot, I might as well had been sleepwalking. I made it about two thirds of the way down the street and broke into uncontrollable crying again. I went to sit on curb, but fell over on my side into a pile of snow. There I laid crying, no coat, in the snow. Fortunately one of my friends found me and helped me get to the store and back. I passed out before I could even eat what I went out for. I woke up the next morning and the world felt like a whole different place. It was late afternoon on a school day but I didn't care. I just sat there in a daze. Pap was out somewhere so I had the house to myself while I sat there figuring out what my life was going to be like now. Gram got in from work shortly after while I still sat there thinking. She looked at me and said “Don't worry. Nothings gonna' change. You can live here as long as you like. You're home now.” I already knew that but the words were refreshing. “Take a few days off of school, you'll feel better. Go back next week.” Off she went to go to sleep. Gram worked the graveyard shift at the Hospital so she slept in the afternoons. I continued sitting there quietly for a few more minutes. I knew being like this wasn't healthy for me so I used the next few days to brush up on my art. If I had free time I might as well use it wisely. Monday came along quicker than expected and I was off to school again. When I walked in it was like the whole school knew. Kids that I didn't even know were giving me “the look”. The look that's like “Damn, that's too bad.” I got to homeroom and tried to come in loud and obnoxious like I usually did but it wasn't fooling anyone. It was awkward at first, after a little bit I just embraced it. At least they cared. Every day that passed from the point that my mother died was another step towards a downward spiral that would last for years to come. On the outside I was calm and collected, inside a fire burned. I was mad at the world and ready to unleash my fury on it. I took my passion for graffiti to a whole new level that year, unfortunately it was fueled by rage, alcohol and drugs, not the positivity I first used. I would get drunk or high almost every night and think about all the horrible things that had happened in my life. As I sat dwelling, I'd sketch up graffiti pieces to paint. The art showed my emotions, everything had sharp edges and almost uncontrolled bursts of vivid color. Drawings weren't enough though, I had to let some of this aggression out in public. More and more I would sneak out at night with a bag of paint and markers. First my name appeared all over the neighborhood, then around the West Side, finally I worked my way to every corner of the city. I put my name out there so much in fact that I became the talk amongst other graffiti writers that I hadn't even met yet. I was very naïve still and thought only people in my area were the ones doing graffiti, little did I know that there were writers lurking in every nook and cranny of the city and I had gotten their attention. It was a Saturday morning around ten thirty, I was eating a bowl of cereal and recovering from a night of partying and painting. Out of nowhere was a knock at our front door. I knew we weren't expecting anyone and all of me and Roy's friends just let themselves in through the back door. I opened the door curiously. On my porch stood a tall, lanky stranger with an innocent smirk. He waved stiffly to me and asked if this was where B-man lived. I froze up instantly. Seconds went by, but felt like minutes as I fought for words to come out. Was this guy a cop? Was he a pissed off owner of a building who caught me on tape? I stared him dead in the face and all I could think of to say was “Who are you???” He looked apologetic as he said lightheartedly “Oh I'm Paul or Shrug or whatever. I was looking for a guy named B-man who's name I saw around. I wanted to meet him.” Shrug? This was shrug, the name I had seen all over the rapid line? One half of a duo known as “Optic Boom”. They were notorious for doing really edgy and sometimes political characters on the Rapid Line. They were sort of heroes to me and I had a larger than life vision of them in my head up until now. “I...I'm B-man.” I said. “Oh cool man, hey can I hang out for a sec?” Said Paul or Shrug or whatever. He was not what I expected. This guy looked like he should be at home mowing his lawn and talking to his neighbor about stock investments instead of doing graffiti. We sat down on the porch and chatted once I pulled my head back together. I couldn't help but ask how he found me and he said that he followed the tags. He started in his neighborhood and rode his bike around looking for more. Whenever he would find tags of mine closer together, he'd go in that direction. Finally they lead him to the area. From there he asked little kids if they knew an artist named B-man and they pointed him right to my house. “Thank God the cops aren't that smart” I thought as he told the story. Shrug asked me if I wanted to go paint with him and and a few other guys from the East Side that night. I was dumbfounded by all of this but said “sure!” This was a big deal to me, sort of like Earth having first contact with aliens. I had made enough noise to get noticed by a higher life form in the graffiti universe. Shortly after, Paul rode away on his bright yellow ten speed covered in tags. The very vehicle that he used to scout neighborhoods looking for me. I watched him ride away then I ran in the house to ready for nightfall. Paul told me that he would be calling me once it got dark, I wanted to be totally ready to go so I used all day to get prepared. I packed up some paint, drew up a sketch and waited eagerly for night time. Like clockwork, as soon as the sun disappeared behind the house line the phone rang. I ran to it and got it before anyone else could. “Hey is this B-man?” said a voice on the other end. “Yeah, is this Paul?” I asked. The voice said “No, this is his friend Rove. We're coming to get you now. You ready?” I told him I was and hung up. “Wow. I just talked to Rove” I thought as I waited on the front porch, gear at my side. Rove was the other half of Optic Boom and I was equally excited to meet him. These guys were years beyond me in skill. They had techniques and ideas that I couldn't even fathom. I knew I would learn a lot from painting with them that night, hopefully it wouldn't be the last time. A few minutes later a small sedan pulled up and I saw Shrug in the passenger seat, that must've been Rove driving. I hopped in and gave Rove an overly energetic handshake. I think I caught him off guard a little, he looked a little twitchy. “Where we goin?” I asked from the back seat. Besides picking up Pepsi who I had invited earlier, it was off to the East side to meet up with Sano and his crew. This day was getting more surreal by the minute! Sano was the top dog of Cleveland graffiti in those days, his name was echoed around every circle East and West. If you brought up hiphop or Graffiti, he was mentioned. I had only seen brief glimpses of his work but I knew he was dope. The whole trip I wondered what Sano and his crew would be like? My assumptions about the Optic Boom guys were totally wrong, was Sano a street thug or a book nerd? Guess I'd know soon enough. We got to Sano's house about a half hour later and when he opened the door we were greeted by the overwhelming smell of Ganja and incense. In the background some old school hiphop was playing. All the walls had graffiti art of some sort on them. Not just scribbled tags but intricate display pieces. Most of it almost had a fine art aesthetic to it. I was blown away from the front door and I hadn't even made acquaintances with Sano or his boys sitting on the couch sketching yet. I was too taken back by the mini-museum all around me. A few minutes later I snapped out of it and went around the room saying whats up to everyone. Sano looked sort of like a caricature in a way. It was like someone in his crew imagined him up and drew him. He was half Black and half Asian, tall slim and nimble. He kinda reminded me of Dan in a way. His crew were all Black kids right around my age, I could tell Sano was about Presto and Optic Boom's ages, mid twenties. The younger guys on the couch were friendly but menacing upon greeting me, they too were very animated and each full of unique personality. They went around and introduced themselves as Tace, Bias, and Days. These were their names they used when they painted but their reputation preceded any pseudonyms. These guys were famous on Cleveland's underground circuits for creating some of the most impressive graffiti art people had seen along the Rapid line and around the city. I was excited to be there with them but tried to keep cool. I sat down with them and looked through sketch books of theirs laying on the coffee table in front of them. It was mind blowing, way past what I was capable of doing, some was even better than Presto's work. “These guys needed to be on my side of town” I thought as I looked on. They asked me if I had a piecebook, or sketchbook for graffiti and I reluctantly pulled it out to show them. As they opened it I fired off excuses, Days gave me a “calm down, it's okay” look. When they got to the end they all picked a blank page in the back and did quick sketches and tags for me. I soon learned this was a tradition when first meeting other graffiti writers, kinda' like a greeting. We had been socializing long enough for my liking, I was getting antsy and ready to go. Soon enough Sano's crew “C.S.T” or Cleveland Scribe Tribe were suiting up and heading for the door. I hopped back into the car with Shrug, Rove and Pepsi and we followed Sano's car down the street to the rapid line on this side of town. I had only passed through these parts of the tracks on the train, I was excited to finally be painting over here. I felt like I was really doing something worthwhile that night. Not only was I painting with some of the top notch writers in the city but I was doing it the farthest from home yet. I felt like I was finally beginning to move up in the graffiti world. We all got out of our cars and walked about a block down the street under the freshly lit streetlights. You don't want to leave your car right by where you go in, the less people that see info about you, the better. We all walked silently, no one spoke on our way onto the tracks, all you could hear was footsteps and breathing from a pack of quick walking, closely bunched, dark clothed entities. Us suspicious? Never. We got to a spot that was accessible from the street and made our way down onto the line. One by one we trickled in, gravel crunching and bags clanking as we descended the hill. When we hit the bottom, we walked down the tracks for a little bit to where Sano and Shrug had already picked out a wall big enough for all of us. A few moments later we got to the selected wall space and as soon as we did, people all ran up to it to claim their places. No time for sightseeing on the tracks tonight, I had to make my move. I tried my best to get next to Sano but his crew beat me to it from both sides by flocking together around him. I ended up right in the middle of everyone, Sano and his boys on one side and Optic boom and Pepsi on the other, which wasn't too bad. A few seconds went by and all that was heard were the sounds of plasticy “pops” as lids from spray paint came flying off from all directions and hit the gravel. A few more seconds and it sounded like a snake pit in our vicinity, almost a dozen cans of paint all hissing out paint at once. That noise alone was making me nervous about our cover being blown, let alone I was the least experienced out here. I got myself together and pulled out my sketch, a character of myself done up b-boy style with wide eyes and exaggerated gestures. I was always a bit of a narcissist. I took a step back, looked at the space and then reached up as high as I could to let the black paint spray out for the outline. I was still shaky whenever I had to do this part and was hoping I wasn't about to embarrass myself. As the first clumsy line hit the wall, I looked around and everyone else was cruising along just fine. A few guys were already done with outlines and were adding colors to their funked out, angular lettering. These guys really were pro! I didn't let it discourage me though, I continued along at my own pace. As I worked, I thought about all the people that would be riding by my character tomorrow in full view of everyone on the train. Kids on their way to school, Businessmen and shoppers all looking out the window for something to cure their boredom. I would be that cure, even it was just for a few seconds of their commute. All of a sudden my daydreaming was halted by the sound of clanking metal somewhere off in the darkness. We all froze and dropped to our knees into the shadows instinctively. It sounded like someone from up above was opening the utility gate! We looked to our left and up on the bridge was an RTA utility truck lumbering over the bridge. Its brakes squeaked and jerked it to a crawl midway over and then the worst thing that could've happened next, did. The truck kicked on a spotlight down onto the tracks, we were being raided! I had heard of this happening before and was now trying my best to mentally prepare for it as it was happening. We all started to whisper frantically to each other about what our plan of action should be. Grunted whispers came out from every side around me, “Should we run?!? Did they see us?!?” “Oh crap!” My nerves were deteriorating by the second. Sano advised everyone to keep low, he was pretty sure they hadn't seen us yet and that they might be just doing a routine track search for repairs. We all waited silently in the shallow ditch that ran along the wall, it provided meager but welcomed shelter from the potential threat above. The next sound we heard was a loud “clank!” as the fence up top opened and the chains that once bound it hit the ground. Everyone was getting squirmy as they waited, I glanced around at faces that looked like they were attached to bodies already in stride. I was pretty sure that we'd be face to face with disgruntled workers in a matter of seconds, raid or otherwise. I was following Sano's lead on this one to the end though, this was his area and he had the most experience down here. Others felt differently about the matter. Without warning, Rove stood up and ran East on the tracks, his nerves must have gotten the best of him and he felt it was time to go. As he ran, the light from the truck up above turned and shined on him like it was a prison watchtower. He was now the proverbial deer in the headlights that everyone else took as the distraction they were praying for. We all stood up as Rove was bathed in the light and broke into two separate groups heading in opposite directions down the tracks. It made more sense to run away from the danger but for whatever reason, I went East behind Rove even though he had just been spotted. My mind was on stand-by and my body was on auto-pilot, I ran blindly and dreamed of getting home safely without thought of logic or direction. Tace, Shrug and Pepsi followed me as Sano and his crew ran West down the tracks. After a few seconds both groups stopped to look back and see where the other group was. It was pure chaos down there, we must've looked like trapped rats to the workers looking down on us. After looking back and seeing everyone in the other group as panicked as I was, I ran East again, past the light shining onto the tracks without thinking twice. I was now in it for me and me alone. I didn't know where I was going, I just knew I was getting out of there, even if it meant running right past the opposition. The only person I saw near me now was Tace who was catching up to me quickly. We kept running past the light and away from the whole mess until we heard less and less noise behind us. I never looked back as we ran until it was as quiet as when we first went in. When we did stop to give rest to our burning chests we saw there was no one following us and we were now almost a half a mile away in darkness once again. It had seemed we had outran the situation, I hoped the others fared as well. With my heart beating so hard I could feel it in my head and my stomach about to erupt we continued our voyage down the tracks. I felt like I was having a heart attack and questioned if all of this was worth it over and over in my head. After a few minutes, I started to calm down and regain my senses and realized it was worth it and that I should be happy I got away to do it again. Just when I thought I made a clean getaway and was ready to call it a night, I slipped as we walked along the tracks and fell into some sort of giant puddle of wet, clay-like substance spilled on the tracks. It was the consistency of oatmeal and it was all over me. I stood up in shock and could feel that I was covered from head to toe in this light gray film now. After a second, I couldn't help but laugh. I'd rather this, than be clean and in handcuffs. Tace and I made it about a mile down the tracks when we disagreed on which path was safe to continue on. He wanted to cut down onto the streets but I wanted to stay on the tracks as long as possible. The clay I was covered in made me a moving target for suspicious activities. Finally after a few minutes of arguing he chose to go his own way and vanished down a hill. I was now alone out here, covered in clay, running from the law and high from the joint I had smoked earlier before we started to paint. This was not a good combo. I continued walking the tracks looking down onto streets for any familiar landmarks. No Such luck, I had only been out this way a handful of times. It was getting late, I had to get to somewhere safe and hopefully to an active bus route home soon. I continued on alone and ventured over a bridge when I saw an area down below that looked vaguely familiar to me so I decided to hop off the tracks. Before I did, I tried to scrape as much of the now dried clay substance off of me as I could to avoid any further confrontation. I made it to the street a few seconds later which was deserted with the exception of me, covered in clay and the faint glow of headlights far off in the distance. This could be good or bad for me depending on what neighborhood I was in. I walked for a few blocks staring at unfamiliar street names and menacing landscapes dotted with trash and debris. All of a sudden I realized where I was as I turned the corner. I was standing on the edge of a large cluster of project housing. A stoned, nervous looking whiteboy covered in grime should not be anywhere near the pj's in the middle of the night, or anytime for that matter. What did I have to lose at this point? I saw a few guys sitting on the front stoop of one of the buildings so I walked up cautiously and gave them a head nod. They looked at me like they were looking at an alien. Finally I spoke, I used my best “I'm down” accent “Y'all know where I could catch a bus back to the West side?” One guy snickered, the rest continued to stare. “Look” I said “I just ran all the way down those tracks from the police to here. Can you tell me where to go?” I guess they respected the part about running from the law and gave me directions. I thanked them and walked around the outside edge of the Projects with extreme caution. There was no way I was cutting through there, I had been through enough tonight. Before long, I was getting close to Sano's neighborhood again, places looked less hostile and more familiar. After about a half hour walk I made it back to Sano's in one piece and just about kissed the ground. There was a look of relief as I came through the door, everyone was now back except for Tace. I told them about me and Tace splitting up and what had happened to me. As I finished, Tace came stumbling in and everyone cheered his return. We were all back and accounted for! It was now almost early morning and the sun was beginning to peak. Me and the West Siders decided it was time to hit the road. One last thing though, all of our bags were still stashed on the tracks! We all possed up and decided since Rove ran first, he had to go down and grab them. By now the coast was clear so he had little to worry about. We stood up top as he scurried down and disappeared onto the tracks for a minute or two. After a few seconds you heard clanking and grunting as he emerged from the brush with all of our bags. Now it was time to head home. On the ride home Shrug offered me info on how to handle those kinds of situations for the future, I hoped I never had to use his advice. The sun was now coming up and I was just falling asleep in the back seat. At my stop Shrug said “Here, take these.” and handed me a handful of various spray paint caps used for graffiti. Each cap created a various thickness in the lines painted, until then I was using whatever came on the can. “Practice with these, I'll talk to you soon!” It was like a Ninja master passing down his sword to his student in my eyes. I thanked him and tucked them into my pocket securely. I stopped on the back porch and took in a thankful breath of air before sneaking into the house through the back door. All the lights were off inside and Pap was sleeping in his recliner with the T.V. on. I crept past and went into my room unnoticed. That morning I slept like a baby, I was glad to be home in one piece with my first real adventure on the Rapid line under my belt. This was a rush like no other, I had to have more soon. My addiction could've been a lot worse than graffiti, this is true. Like any addiction though, it was creating repercussions on my day to day life. Nicky broke up with me after a while because I didn't have time for her anymore and my schoolwork was seriously lacking. I didn't care at the time though, all that mattered to me was the fame from painting my name. I was beginning to see the big picture of it as the days went on, Shrug had recently informed me about graffiti magazines that highlighted artists from all over the world and after seeing his stash, I realized I had a whole new goal to work towards. This subculture was far bigger that just those around me and I wanted to join its global ranks. And to think, little ol' me thought this art form was going on in just a few major cities at first. Pictures of graffiti from every corner of the globe adorned the glossy pages of these magazines, each one like a postcard written to me. A few days later I scraped up a few bucks and went to pick up a few of the mags he had shown me. Once again, I was blown away further by seeing what was beyond my city limits. All of this was so new to me, it was like every day opened a door to a new dimension. The work I saw in these magazines was better than anything I had seen yet locally. People using graffiti to create themed murals that could've easily fit into a museum or gallery environment. Besides that, there were ads for custom pieces, clothing and all sorts of mail order resources for the trade. It was a whole underground market. I bought as many different magazines as I could afford and raced home to study each picture carefully. Presto was still guiding me but these pieces were just...wow. All that day I memorized every detail of every picture. That night I tried to create my own renditions which turned out cockeyed and scribbly at best. Oh well, practice makes perfect. Graffiti was taking me to whole new worlds and showing me new faces but it couldn't whisk me away from my learning institution turned halfway house full of crazies and convicts. West Tech was now on it's last legs and it showed. It was slated for closing in just a few months with no hope of it ever re-opening as a school. They weren't going to tear it down due to its historic nature but it was too far dilapidated to be used any time soon again for anything. Most of the kids were transferring over to another regular High School nearby but I had a better plan. I kept hearing about a school that was just for artists, musicians and dancers. With my new found art obsession blooming, I had to get in. I checked in on it and found out there were auditions being held, this sounded pretty official. The only thing you needed for West Tech was a gun permit and a living will! Besides being a better school, I heard that almost every graffiti writer has or does go there. It was now my mission to become a part of that legacy. I filled out the forms to audition and waited. I wouldn't hear back for several weeks to hear if I could even audition and then it would be several more weeks after the audition to hear if I was accepted. It was going to feel like an eternity, I could tell already. I continued to finish out my time at West Tech as things were getting worse by the day there. Kids now had zero regard for the school and were singlehandedly beginning demolitions early. It wasn't uncommon to see books and other objects getting thrown through windows, locker doors getting ripped off the hinges, you name it. One of the biggest things that had gone down recently that had all the students and some of the faculty talking was a huge drug deal gone bad inside the school walls. Due to West Tech being in complete shambles on every level, the gangs took advantage of the situation, using the shell of a once great learning facility as a massive drug hub for the whole West Side of the city and beyond. Major deals that supplied entire neighborhoods with dope were now going down in the dark corners and empty classrooms. As these transactions continued, one gang ended up owing another several thousand dollars and was not paying it back for whatever reason. Rumor shot through the school that one of the kids that was on the owing side was going to get stabbed when they were seen again. The debt would be paid with blood now. Both sides continued to come to school without concern but kept missing each other in the halls for quite some time, this only fueled the intensity of the inevitable confrontation. Both sides were ready to do whatever it took to bring this situation to and end, no matter what. Whispers of extreme violence and unspeakable assaults were being gossiped all over the school making matters worse all around. Potential victims, Assailants, and onlookers were all on high alert. Then one day it happened. Moves were being made. All you saw were a bunch of Asian kids patrolling the halls, more like soldiers than students. Wherever they stepped, people wisely moved to the side or went in the opposite direction. Most students knew what was up and what was about to go down. Later in the day the news was heard that someone had been stabbed repeatedly on the third floor. The stabbed student was rushed to the Hospital for emergency surgery, he had several lacerations including damage to his heart. No debt ever goes unpaid around here it seems. As for the assailants, they were never apprehended by authorities as far as I heard. They probably weren't even registered students. Worse than arrest though, they were soon dealt with by a majority of the West Tech Football team who were all close friends and relatives of the victim. They might not have gotten the exact person who wielded the blade but they got somebody who was close to him. No matter who originally started the whole deal gone bad, the mass of gigantic, angry, urban Black and Hispanic football players finished it. When the victim amazingly came back to school weeks later, he was escorted to every class by several of the athletes throughout the day for the rest of the year. This particular story might seem a bit vague compared to some of the previous adventures you've read so far, reason being is, I made sure to stay as far away from that situation as possible and made sure to keep my eyes and ears covered before and after. They weren't going to carry me out of there on a stretcher or in a body bag, I finally had too much to live for! That's it on here. Want more? Buy it at www.lulu.com/content/1017033 Now comment your e-asses off. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spitfire15 Posted December 13, 2007 Share Posted December 13, 2007 fuck me i need to steal a credit card or somthing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NerdUnit Posted December 13, 2007 Share Posted December 13, 2007 Oh shit I just missed your post last night. Thanks for the final installment. A fun way to get my day going. I want to go write on things now! Ha ha. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CELT Posted December 13, 2007 Share Posted December 13, 2007 fuck me i need to steal a credit card or somthing. Buy one of those pre-paid ones and order with that . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RathofGod Posted December 14, 2007 Share Posted December 14, 2007 you can order with thoughs pre paid visas online going to steal one Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vivouno Posted December 14, 2007 Share Posted December 14, 2007 I read all thirteen on my third shift on your birthday! excellent reading,I get a an awesome sense of empathy with some of the stories.I think i will be downloading the rest tonight to my phone so i can read the rest,and will certainly get the book. and Happy Birthday! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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