Hamilton Rising (part one)

Hamilton Rising

Chapter 1: The old lady on Satan Street

It was the middle of the night, and the air was warm and fragrant with the smells of fried food and gas. It didn’t take much to make you hungry, with the aroma of French fries and KFC on every corner, but it was certainly much more of a problem to get that food, especially in this city of all places. The stars were non-existent in the gray-black sky, disrupted by light pollution, and in similar fashion the car horns and police sirens filled the not-quite-so-dark darkness. But hey, what else do you expect in a place called Smogvilleford City.

There weren’t all that many people outside, save the few loitering hoodlums and gangsta-crack heads looking tough and beating each other up. Most nice people didn’t live here, most nice people had homes, and most of all most nice people had better things to be doing on a Sunday night then hanging around this neighborhood. But it is good news for all of us to here that there was at least one semi-decent being walking down 4th street in that fried-air metropolis. His name was Hamilton Josepha William Hearington IV Smith, and he had a dream.

Hamilton Josepha walked happily down the street, carefully leaping over the passed some wasted bums lying prostrate on the cracked sidewalk. HJ didn’t really seem to notice, or care for that matter. He had much better things to do then look at these so called bums. Actually he really didn’t know what he was going to do tonight, he just felt like taking a nice little walk around the city, carrying his trusty cardboard box as he went. Today the box was especially heavy, since it wasn’t just his house, it had to have his personal items in it. Right now it was holding a pair of socks, a coupon for twenty percent off a Big Mac (valid until Hell freezes over, or until those damn fries rot), and of course his social studies project due the next day.

Crossing the street, the teenage tired, bum-hat and Abercrombie clad boy stopped to look at the address on the doorway next to him. The brass numbers seemed to glow ominously in the street light reading the numbers 666. He looked curiously at the street sign, apparently this is where 4th street mysteriously turns into Satan Street for a two or three blocks, and then turns back. HJ smiled, this street was like the Bermuda Triangle of this urban ocean, or so said all the other hobo’s in Smogvilleford City. But the point was, the Bermuda Triangle was tropical, so what bad things could happen?

HJ stood there for a moment, fixing the box in his hands and getting a better grip. He grinned and knocked hard on the door. He waited for a minute. Nothing happened. Searching in the streetlight he found the doorbell and rung it. Seconds later he heard footsteps from inside the house, coming down a set of stairs. Good thing it wasn’t deserted, he didn’t know how much longer he could carry his box, since he had stayed up late last night too, and he needed a place to sleep.

The door opened a crack, and a kindly old lady appeared in the small shaft of light. The door was still chained.

“Hello ma’am!” HJ said brightly, his freckled face lighting up with glee. “Would you mind me coming into your house, eating your food, and if you have a cat, washing it. I’ll be glad to make pancakes in the morning, and I’ll be out early, since I need to get to school, because only with my education can I accomplish my dream of becoming a magical hobo.”

“Dear, child,” the old lady smiled kindly. “I’ll be sure to take you in for the night, but why aren’t you home with your parents?”

HJ laughed. “Silly old lady, parents are for not-hobos. Ya see, I’m in training to be a magical hobo, but first I gotta become a regular one. I’ve been training for three years now, and I’ll tell you it’s great! So do you mind me bunking here for the night?”

“Sure young man,” she replied, “but you’ll have to stay on the couch, since the cats have the other bed.”

The old lady unlocked the door with a little bit of elbow grease, freeing the stuck chain, and a bit of a creak from those old hinges, probably needing a different kind of grease.

“Yay,” HJ said, grinning extatically. “Do you take credit cards or cash?”