Waking up at the start of the end of the world,
But it's feeling just like every other morning before.
Now I wonder what my life is going to mean if it's gone.
The cars are moving like a half a mile an hour.
And I started staring at the passengers who're waving goodbye.
Can you tell me what was ever really special about me all this time?
I believe the world is burning to the ground.
Matchbox Twenty12
Chapter 4 3
My Freshman year in high school lasted about three months culminating in one of the biggest riots in the school's history, but I'll get to that later. At this time, we were branching out. There is a little place between Albia and where I lived that we called Residential. It was directly across from Griswold Heights.
My friends and I started hanging there because of the girls. Unlike where we grew up, they seemed to out number the boys. There was a game room where all the kids hung out. I was standing on an old cracked road that was unusable which led to the Heights, smoking pot with two other guys, when two girls walked by. One of them caught my attention. "Sweetheart, it took you long enough. I’ve been waiting here for you.” I said to her as she passed me. To my surprise, she turned and said hi to the two guys, Chap and Danny, I was with, and then held out her hand and took the joint still ignoring me. 4
Donna or Rhea, which was her nickname, stood so close that when I moved I would have to bump her and did, and still she ignored me. She had feathered back long blond hair that fell to the middle of her jean jacket and two small patches of freckles on both sides of her cheeks. Her jeans looked painted on right down to her cowboy boots her pants were tucked into. After about three minutes of bullshitting with my friends, she turned to me and said, “So, Richie, you gonna walk me up the hill or just stand there and breath on me?" Catching me off guard only for a second, I smiled, took her arm and started up the hill towards Residential answering, “Only if I can breathe on you as we walk." She laughed and we talked all the way. We got to know each other pretty well. We actually became better friends then anything else. 5
Rhea actually had a boyfriend, which at the time they were on the outs, but he was quite older and hung in my sister’s crowd, so Rhea hung with him in the older crowd. Mo was his name and he was a bad ass. And as you can guess, he came to not like me at all, but even he knew not to fuck around when we were in packs. He always tried to find me when I was alone, which was rare. He used to tell my sister he was going kick my ass, and she would threaten him to stay away from her little brother or she would get someone to kick his ass, and she would always add that her little brother was a crazy fuck. My sister would tell me, "Listen, that big asshole has a bad left knee. Kick him and punch him in the knee. Hell, if you have to, bite him in the knee and he will drop like a sack of shit. 6
So the band Boston was coming to town and I was taking Rhea. The rest of the gang was either sneaking in or had tickets. We were all standing at the back of the building smoking and drinking and getting ready to deploy. Rhea and I began to head in when I stopped her, pressed her up against the wall and kissed her.
There was no resistance so I started thinking this could turn out to be a very good night when someone grabbed me by the back of my head yanking me back then shoving me forward past Rhea and right into the wall. 7
“YOU LITTLE MOTHER FUCKER! DIDN’T I TELL YOU TO STAY AWAY FROM HER?” I heard Mo’s unmistakable voice as he slammed me once, twice and three times into the wall. I remember falling to my knees and immediately rolling to the ground coving my face as I rolled away from him as he kicked and spit on me. I could hear Donna screaming for him to stop and as in Gimmie Three Steps by Lynard Skynard that was the break I was looking for. I jumped up and ran between two parked cars trying to get anything between him and me. Blood was running down into my eyes and I felt like I was going to throw up, but I kept moving hearing only him spurring me on. He was yelling how he was going kill me. How I’m not so fucking tough now, just shit like that. I didn’t cry, in fact, I didn't make a sound. I was too busy trying to get away from him.
After awhile Donna succeeded in getting some people to contain Mo and she followed after me. She was crying and hugging me as my blood was getting all over her. We ended up back at her house where she bandaged me up. Needless to say, we missed the concert. Shit! I was going kill that mother fucker. I knew she still had feelings for him because she begged and pleaded for me to just let it go. She even went as far as to offer herself to me, but my anger and hate was way into overdrive now. When I felt good enough, I left. Yes, without taking her up on her offer.
I looked like I tangled with a bull! My face was swollen and I had a black eye and a fat lip. I couldn’t spit without drooling on myself. I thought to myself, first round goes to you, but I’m going to win this fucking war! In any case, it was over between Donna and me. 8
Mary lived in the Heights and, let me tell you, she was beautiful! She actually looked like a young Nicole Kidman before there was a Nicole Kidman. I met Mary Ellen by accident. My buddy Harvey liked her and had met her several times before. A bunch of us had headed up to Residential to pick up Gabe, one of our friends who had moved up there. We saw there was a party going on when we arrived, so we decided to hang out since there were girls everywhere. Harvey already had his license and his parents had let him take their car that night.
After a little while, Harvey said he was going for a ride to check something out. I was bored so I went with him, still nursing my wounds from Mo. The swelling had gone down and there was just a tint of color to my bruises. 9
Harvey drove up into the Heights acting as if he was looking for someone when we came across five girls standing in a circle talking on the backstreets. Before we even got out of the car I spotted Mary Ellen. She stood out in the crowd with her light brown hair hanging past her shoulders in a pony tail and her skin white as porcelain. Harvey knew the girls and moved right in talking to them. I guess his target was Mary, but I didn’t know it. After a couple of minutes of boring small talk, I walked around behind Mary Ellen and spying her brush sticking out of her pocket I took it. She whirled around smiling asking me to give it back, but I was already getting in the car waving for Harvey to come on, telling Mary if she wanted it back she would have to come to the party at Residential and get it. She was pleading now as Harvey got in the car and we drove off. 15 minutes later she showed up looking for me. She told me she couldn’t stay because her parents were going out and she had to baby sit her little brother and could she please have her brush back. I told her I would bring it to her after her parents left if she told me where she lived. She eyed me curiously then said ok. Tony said he knew where she lived and then turned and walked away. I smiled watching her as I cracked a beer. 10
Well, I never made it to her house that night. Instead I opted for some hits of acid and ripped the beverage center off. The beverage center was on the corner of Madison and 3rd. The house next door was abandoned and that was our ticket in. We broke into the hallway, pried the stairs up, dropped down between them, and ended up in the cellar of the store. Mudstone and I were the ones elected to squeeze through because we were the thinnest. We loaded up on beer and taking everything we could; 38 cases of Bud, 25 cases of Michelob and every tap in the place. We figured we would rent the taps ourselves to anyone that was having a keg party. We only stopped when Mud tried to get the cash from the register as it set off every alarm in the place. As we tried to get back out, we realized those fuckers had bolted on us as soon as the alarm went off. Shit!
Now we had to jump for the hole in the stairs and pull ourselves up because the cops were already pulling up in front of the building. Mud and I put fire to our feet and climbed up until we reached the roof, then sped across the rooftops until we got to where we could jump to a telephone pole and climbed down. Then we walked back and stood in the crowd watching the excitement and acting as shocked as everyone else. When we finally hooked up with Phil and the others, they told us they had secured a spot for the beer and taps, but right now Phil had his sister's car and they had lined the trunk with plastic loading it with ice and about 15 cases of beer. It was time for a road trip!11
Comments
1 - 11 of 11
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It just keeps getting interesting... Did you get a chance to have a rematch with Mo?....
Good job, really enjoyed it...
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Yeah Mo and I went at it again only this time over Mary Ellen, but that is later.
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oh ok...... I had a feeling you guys must have had a rematch..Cant wait to read it.....
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Excellent This just keeps getting better. I love your reflections on the wild times of your youth. Must have quite the exciting childhood.
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Yeah i guess it was but you know at the time, your just living and i really didn't know it was different until i moved on and listened to othe people talk about their childhood.
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Yeah, man!
beginning: 5, language: 5, plot: 5, ending: 5, dialog: 5, characters: 5.
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Ah! Excitement!
...And as yet another cliff hanger! You sure do enjoy making your readers twitch. Haha...
Your gonna hit that bad knee I suspect. -
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Oh you have know idea! Ha ha
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You're back...yipeeeeeeeee!!!!!
I'm glad you're back! OMG I can't believe you took on the big bully by yourself! Can you get back to the mushy love scenes? I'm sure you have many tales to tell and you tell them SO well! I thought there was going to be one before the concert, but it was a bloody ending!
beginning: 5, language: 5, plot: 5, ending: 5, dialog: 5, characters: 5.
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Thanks
Again though in hindsight i guess it is tragic, but at the time we just thought it was normal, well for us anyway. -
So tragic!!!
It's so tragic for such a young boy to live and breathe so much violence. You had such a hard life from the beginning and it's amazing you survived on your own through it all. Life is so unfair sometimes. Excellent writing as always.
beginning: 5, language: 5, plot: 5, ending: 5, dialog: 5, characters: 5.
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