ALL BOXED UP PART FOUR chapter one

I want to run, I am on overload, but I stay stuck, to listen to more. Willie steps closer to me and I wait for more of his telling secrets. He begins to talk again. 1

"Sis, I remember,looking up and there was Jake, holding the guy in a choke hold, his thick muscled arm around the guy's neck". 2

Willie sighs, and looks as if he is still there, living it again.3

and speaks.4

"Before I could even blink, Jake lifted the guy's arm up,the gun still in the crazies hand and more shots went off. Shattering glass and plaster. I jump up from the bed, stepping on some glass with my bare feet. When I looked down I saw my own blood dripping' on the floor from some other part of me. I stayed still, staring at Jake, just in time to see him pistil whip the guys head in with the gun. I watched his other arm bulged and tightening his grip on the shuttering guys neck, until the guy went down with a thud."5

"Sis, Jake kicked that guy until he was a silent ball of fat bloody flesh at Jake's feet". 6

"Annie "? "Sis "? ...."Jake, why he just looked over at me while he leaned back against the door frame." 7

"He pulled out a cigarette from his shirt pocket and without even lookin' down at the guy, Jake rolled him off of his shoe with one final kick. The only sound after that was the click of Jake's lighter". 8

"I stood stone still, waiting for what he would do next, then, Jake says to me.... (kid,it's time you left)... and he took a deep drag on the cigarette and looked around at the mess in the room, looked at everything, but the guy on the floor at his feet". 9

" Annie" Willie says. I pray this is the end of this story 10

"Annie...That's when Jake's eyes came back to land on me and 11

says... 12

(your a liability to me now, can't afford to have a run-away around here any more. Kid your listed) 13

"Then, Jake gave me the same look that he had on the first day I'd met him. The look of a teacher adding' up my score, but this time I knew the score too". 14

"I jumped over the guy slumped on the floor and tripped my way down the steps hoping Jake didn't take offence at my clumsiness and that there weren't anymore bullets in that gun he was still holding' in his hand."15

"Everyone had stopped work in the kitchen. All of them staring' at me running through the maze of pots and plate just missing' the hot stove". 16

"I leaped out the back kitchen door, smack into the dumpster where I'd been standin' over three months before, but this time I was lookin 'at my own blood not the food. I gulped the air into my lungs and I ran out of that alley as fast as my legs would let me". 17

I watched Willie's eyes moving, as if watching a movie that is built inside his head, that does not stop, does not leave his mind to become, just a memory. He is not here, he is there completely, except to take me back with him to re-live it again, with me, he is pulling me into his frightening fear. But with out my understanding. I listen, and now know his horror, but only can guess at the meaning of his pain. I am with him and sharing in his story, my fear has put my mind on hold and I simply watch and listen feeling all of his emotions flooding me.Willie speaks on...18

"I stopped about ten feet out into the street , realizing I didn't have any shoes on and that I was drawing quite a crowd, with all the commotion. Cars breaking', horns honking' people staring. That's when this cop grabbed me, I knew him from the Jazz Club I'd given' him packages many a time, but he didn't have that old smile on his face now". 19

"He caged my bloodied hands behind my back and cuffed me. I don't know, I don't think I'll ever admit this to anyone again, but Sis, I ah, Annie."20

Willy looks around the shed with a kind of crazed look himself and bows his head towards me whispering in my ear. 21

"peed my pants,I did, when two more cops showed up and said (lets get this idiot off the streets)". 22

Willy straightened up a bit and I tried to allow my mind to take it all in, to sift this information into some kind of sensible shape.... 23

"So back into Jake's place I go, kinda carried this time or at least walkin' with my feet off the ground. Jake was sitin' at a table,24

in the back, off the kitchen. He was eating a bowl of chili, and he glances up at me, calm as could be says to me",25

(kid) "takin' a swig of beer from a long neck bottle" 26

(somebody has got to pay for that mess) 27

"Well since I had three cops holding me, while I was standing there bleeding and barefooted with nothing on but a ripped up tee shirt and wet pants , I figured Jake meant me. I think I had turned a shade of green by then and they all knew that my eyes and every other part of me stank of fear". 28

"The cop from the Jazz Club the one that used to smile, he let go of my arm and uncuffed my hands". 29

"Then says to me"30

(look kid, your listed at the station as a runaway, they got you posted now. No hard feelings, but between you and that mess upstairs we got to clean up, well, it's a real problem. Now we been working on it and decided about $2000. will cover the cost)31

the cops all looked from me to Jake".32

"Jake took another bite of chili and with his mouth half full told me to go clean myself up in the toilet and one of my Mexican guys will bring me some clothes."33

"Well Sis, I sat in that washroom on the toilet barf-in' in a can and when nothin' more came out of me in any direction, I just shivered, farted and hiccuped all at the same time I was trying to get the glass out of my feet and hands. I could hear the kitchen goin' back to its business". 34

"I pushed the glass out of the way with some paper towels and stood up to use the sink. Splashing running water over my face before I dare to take a look. After the shock of me looking at myself I realize I hadn't got shot, that it was just the glass, that had shattered me."35

"I stood there, tall,skinny and naked except for the bloody cuts that covered me. I tried to pull the slivers of glass out of my back. If it hadn't hurt so much, I would have laughed. I could have made it into a side show, as a naked contortionist".36

Willie tried not to show the pain, but the memory still had hold of him, and now of me.... " I realized I wasn't alone Sis", 37

"Jose was standing in a corner. Kindly lookin at the wall, so as not to interrupt my fear. He was holdin' out a bottle of booze, I shook my head no, I knew I couldn't keep it down. But Jose brought the bottle over and set it down in front of me. He smiled gently, shaking his head in sympathy". 38

" Then he carefully got the glass out of my back. When he had done his best, he got close to my face saying "shush" putting a finger to his mouth". 39

"I just stared at him, not knowing who was nuts,him or me". Jose opened the bottle of booze, picked it up and poured it on my cuts, dabbing' me dry with paper towels. It stung like a million bees, but I stood still takin' it with no sound, at least none that others, except Jose and I could hear. I took the clothes that Jose handed me sayin' nothin',lookin' down". 40

"God Sis, I didn't say even thanks. I just turned away embarrassed".41

" When I finished gettin' dressed and came out of the toilet, no one looked up in the kitchen, it was as if, I was invisible. I looked around for Jake or the cops, they were all gone". 42

"Jose was washing dishes, but he stopped when he saw I wasn't movin' and came over to me. 43

"Pointin' to the alley door and says to me, (Amigo, go, comprehena? Amigo, vamoose...OK?) He tilted his head toward the back door". 44

"I went out, with my shoes on this time. Walkin' slowly and quietly, shivering. I don't remember much more until the police found me sittin' on a park bench with newspaper covering me, trying to get warm. I had put newspaper in my pants, under my shirt, and the paper under my pants was frozen to the seat of my pants and the damn bench."45

Willie's voice cracked in an odd sound. I think he was trying to laugh but cried instead. 46

"Sis" ? 47

"I think those dumb cops thought I was resisting arrest when I had trouble standin' up. I guess if I'd peed in my pants again I could'a broke the ice. What ya think squirt?