by Rick Jones
When Kimball left the house he did so with the feeling that he would never see Connor again.
And Kimball would be right.
He never would see Connor Deveraux alive again.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
The pain was incredible and the funds almost nonexistent for Becki and Dennis as nightfall descended over the city of Malden. The streetlights outside their windows winked on, the sodium-vapor lamps tossing out cones of feeble illumination. Across the street ran the train station. And right now the platform was empty.
Becki sat by the window with her arms enfolding herself. The cramps were getting worse. Beads of sweat coursed lazily down her cheeks and brow. Her hair was in greasy strands. And the glow of the streetlamps coming through the paned window cast eerie shadows along her face, giving her a deeply haunted look.
Dennis was no different.
Their systems were yearning for another fix. Their bodies crying out in agony.
“Dennis--” Becki couldn’t finish as a wave of nausea swept over her, causing her to gag up a glob of bile. After spitting out the last of the sickness to the floor, she turned to Dennis with her eyes saying it all. I need Smack.
Dennis began to pace the room while driving his fingers through his hair. “We got no money, babe. We’re tapped out.”
“Dennis . . . please.”
He turned on her and shouted. “What the hell do you want me to do? Squeeze blood from a rock?”
Becki started to cry, hard.
As soon as she did, Dennis raised his hands and started to pat the air. “All right,” he said. “I’ll figure something out.” But Dennis didn’t know where to begin. All he knew was that his craving was becoming just as biting and painful as Becki’s, though not as extreme. “I’ll be back,” he said.
She didn’t bother to look up. She continued to sit by the window rocking back and forth in the chair cradling herself.
After leaving the residence, Dennis wandered through the Oak Grove section debating on whether or not to sell his soul to the devil. Of course it wasn’t even a contest since his needs outweighed his sense of morality. So he ventured to the Bellrock section, which was a good forty-minute walk, knowing that everything in life had a price with some costs graver than others.
In the alleyway behind a section of small shops, Dennis saw Jesse sitting on the milk crates, while the other guy practiced the opening and closing of his butterfly knife, his actions graceful and smooth.
When Dennis walked from the shadows and into the glow of an overhead lamp, Billy-the-Blade stopped swinging the knife. And Jesse simply watched his approach.
It was obvious that Dennis was sick. His clothes hung on him like drapery; his face was pale, even beneath the light; and he smelled badly of a man who hadn’t seen the inside of a shower for quite some time.
“What do you need, Dennis?” asked Jesse.
“You know what I need, man.”
“How much?”
“Look, Jess, I have a little problem.”
“First of all my name’s Jesse, not Jess. Secondly, I don’t care about your problem, OK? All I care about is making a transaction. So what do you want, Dennis?”
“Smack,” he answered.
Billy-the-Blade started to swing his knife again, showing off his skill with perfect sweeps by opening and closing the weapon with surgical precision---open, close, open, close, open, close. Billy-the-Blade smiled proudly with the ease of his efforts.
“How much?” asked Jesse.
“See, Jesse, here’s the thing--” Dennis cut himself short.
“What?”
“I ain’t got no money.”
Jesse looked at Billy-the-Blade. Billy-the-Blade looked at Jesse. Two seconds later they were both laughing as if what Dennis said was the funniest thing they’ve heard in quite some time.
Then Jesse faced off with Dennis. “Then I guess you’re SOL, my friend. Time to piss off.” Jesse pointed to the direction from which Dennis came.
“Jesse, please,” Dennis started to gesticulate wildly with his arms and hands, the man pleading. “Just because I don’t have money now doesn’t mean I can’t get it later. I can.”
“You come walking into this alleyway with empty pockets telling me that you can get the money? Just not now. But you can get it later?”
“Yes.”
Jesse turned back to Billy-the-Blade, Billy-the-Blade turned to Jesse, and then they started laughing again. And hard.
“You’re funny,” Jesse said, chortling. “Do you have any idea how many people come up to me asking for a fix with the promise to pay me back later, but never do? Any idea at all? You think you’re the first person, Dennis, to come slinking out of the shadows asking me for a taste? This is business. Not a handout.”
“I can get the money,” he lied.
Jesse appeared to consider this for a moment. Then: “People have given me the same promise only to break them time and time again. They think they’re smart, Dennis. They think they can take and not pay, so they try to run. But they don’t get far. Not far at all. You wouldn’t try to run out on me, Dennis, would you?”
“Of course not. I know better.”
“I hope not,” Jesse said. “Because I’ll find you.” He pointed to Billy-the-Blade. “He’ll find you. And Cooch will definitely find you. And I promise you this: if you run, I guarantee you’ll never take another breath again. Business is business.”
“I understand.”
“And the price isn’t cheap, not when money is owed.”
Dennis could feel the pain blossoming inside his gut. Just give me the damn stuff, will you?
Jesse held up a small baggie of white powder, a tiny amount that would get Dennis and Becki through the night. Said amount usually cost $25 per bag. But Dennis was sure that the price would be escalated.
“Two-fifty,” said Jesse. “That’s a doable price you can pay back within three days, yes?”
“That’s ten times the amount.”
“Hey, look. I’m the one taking the risk here.”
Dennis swallowed. “Do you have something . . . bigger? More?”
“You want more junk at my expense?”
“I can pay it.”
“I can give you a second bag for the same price: two-fifty, making the total five hundred due in three days. Agreed?”
Dennis nodded his head. Agreed. He had sold his soul for fifty dollars of heroin wholesale, five hundred retail. Either way, the cost was basement-bargain cheap.
Jesse held the two small baggies out to him. “Three days,” he said. “You came through for me last time, which is why I’m doing this. But if you screw me over, Dennis, if you try to run, so help me I’ll track you down . . . And I will find you. But it’s not me you have to worry about, understand?”
Dennis nodded. I do.
“Trust me, running out on me is running out on Cooch. And I don’t think you want that to happen, do you?”
Another nod. No.
Jesse handed the bags over to Dennis, who snatched them out of the air like a magician’s trick and scurried towards the shadows away from the light like a cockroach.
“Three days,” he heard Jesse cry out.
But in three days he and Becki would be gone.
He would run from Jesse.
He would run from Cooch.
Only to learn that their reach was longer than he thought.
He went home to Becki.
#
That night they used. They cooked the heroin in the spoon, tied themselves off at the arm, injected the Smack into their veins, and suddenly life offered them a blissful moment that would soon be snatched away.
They lay against the couch with gentle and peaceful looks, the world once again wonderful. They still had a baggie left, which would be used on the following day. After that---well, their only agenda at the moment was to run as far as they could from Vinny Cuchinata and his followers. From people like Jesse and Billy-the-Blade.
“We’ll go south,” sai
d Dennis. “Where the weather’s nice. We could go to the beach. Someplace nice.”
Becki smiled. It was nice to dream. It was even better to follow through and pursue those dreams.
Yes, everything was wonderful.
Everything was grand.
She dreamed of beautiful seascapes with shorelines lined with sand that was as fine as talcum powder that would roll between the gaps of her toes. The sun would be bright and warm, the day filled with a uniform blue sky without a renegade cloud to be seen. And the ocean would be as tepid as bath water against her skin.
Becki smiled.
Life was going to be wonderful, she considered. Dennis had promised her this. Dennis always made promises to her.
Yeah, Becki. Beautiful beaches. Margaritas beneath palm trees. Swims in the ocean. It’s out there waiting for us.
She dreamed.
He spoke.
But soon those promises would turn empty and the dreams would disappear like commas of smoke in the wind. The all-consuming pain would return and devour their guts like acid, hot and burning. Every nerve-ending would become a matchhead aflame. Nausea would come in waves, causing the abdominal muscles to spasm frequently to drive bile from their bellies and to the basin inside the commode.
Life would take a turn. It would be dark and real and filled with the sickness of personal demons. They would be surrounded by the discarded trash and the stench of an unkempt apartment, not the sandy beaches that held the canopy of a sunlit sky.
Life was funny that way.
It sometimes kept you in the dark no matter how dreams offered the light of hope for something different and better. For some dreams were just that: dreams.
And Dennis was not the light of her life, but an impenetrable darkness that had eclipsed her completely.
For him there would be no savior.
But in Becki’s life there was. Her savior had both the power of Darkness and the power of Light. Though from Darkness he would come, he would carry her toward the Light of Salvation, and then fall back into the shadows where he felt most comfortable.
And there he would stay for years if not a lifetime, searching for his better self.
Becki continued to feel a false sense of peace and serenity, while Dennis mumbled on about beaches and a blue sky he would never see.
At least not in his lifetime.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Due to the severity of the injury to Johnnie Deveraux’s hand, the hospital decided to keep him overnight for observation to make sure that an infection didn’t take hold and fester.
When Connor’s mother returned home she appeared tired and listless, the woman completely drained emotionally. She didn’t even check on Connor or see if he had prepared himself a meal. She simply went to her bedroom, closed the door softly behind her, and wept, the sound muted in the hallway as Connor stood listening.
His father had failed them---had dug a metaphorical hole too deep to climb out of. But outside, somewhere, he was sure that Cooch was digging a real hole, though shallow, that would be one his father would never return from.
Returning to his room, Connor lifted the corner of his mattress and grabbed the pellet gun. His heart was racing. His temples throbbed. And his stomach began to churn into a slick fist.
He tucked the faux weapon at the small of his back within the waistband of his pants, drew the tail of his shirt to cover the pistol, took in a deep breath, and released it with an equally long sigh.
It did little to calm his nerves.
Quietly, Connor walked the length of the hallway. At one point a loose board protested against a footfall. So he stood and waited, half expecting his mother to be drawn out of her room by mere curiosity. But when she never materialized he moved on, taking subtle steps to the downstairs level.
Going out the front door and closing it softly behind him, Connor made his way down to Main Street. He acted out the scenario over and over in his head---of what he was about to do until his actions played out fluidly in his mind’s eye.
His courage didn’t wax. But it didn’t wane, either.
For forty minutes he paced Main Street with his target of choice in view. It was a liquor store at the corner of Winter and Main. The building was small and aged and appeared unkempt. But the volume of business was always high with people running in and out most hours of the day. Right now, being late, it was down time.
Connor felt the weapon snugged tightly within his waistband.
He took another breath, waited long enough to muster the energy needed to follow through, grabbed the weapon, and crossed the street.
The interior of the store was small and tight with crates and bottles of liquor neatly stacked. Cases of beer were piled high with posted signs advertising ‘buy-three-get-one-free’ specials. A small hallway ran to the rear parking lot. And along one wall were commercial refrigerators with glass panes that perspired with cold moisture.
Connor’s gun hand shook violently.
Behind the counter the proprietor was stocking shelves with cigarettes.
Connor pressed forward, licked his lips, could feel cool sweat coursing down his brow, his cheeks, and then his body shuddered as if a chilled finger traced upward along his spine.
The proprietor turned, saw the gun, and then looked into the boy’s eyes. He raised his hands marginally in surrender. “You don’t want to do this, son,” he said cautiously.
Connor’s hand was shaking violently. The gun looked real. With a sweep of his arm he wiped away the sweat on his brow. “Give me your money,” he ordered roughly. “In a bag. All of it. I know this place. I know it does good business.”
“I’m telling you, son. You need to walk away before this turns ugly.”
“Don’t tell me what to do!” he shouted, waving his gun hand in a way to show the proprietor that he wielded the scepter of rule. “The money! Now!”
“All right, son. Just be careful with that thing. It’s not a toy.”
That’s how much you know.
The proprietor reached beneath the counter. “Just getting the bag,” he said. But when he showed his hands he wasn’t holding a bag at all, but a handgun that was very real.
Suddenly Connor’s world moved with surreal slowness as the proprietor’s gun came up over the countertop. His mind went blank and his own gun-hand suddenly went numb. The proprietor said something, his words sounding deep and slow as if an LP on a stereo turntable was moving at a terribly slow pace.
“Droooooooop the weeeeeaapooooon, son.”
Connor didn’t know what to do.
He stared at the mouth of the real weapon, saw the dark eye of the barrel.
“Droooooooop the--”
Then there was a sudden discharge, a loud report.
The round lifted Connor off his feet and into a pile of stacked cases a beer. The bullet had passed through his body and kept on going into the beer cans, causing amber ale to spill out onto the floor.
Connor laid on the surface looking at a fixed point on the ceiling. He was confused. His mind trying to understand the moment. But the pain in his chest was very real.
The proprietor stood over him with the point of his weapon directed at Connor’s face.
In Connor’s mind he thought the man kicked away the false weapon far from his grasp. And then the proprietor spoke to him with the same drawn-out voice with words that sounded off with a glacial measure. “Yooouuu shooouuuld haaavvve listeeeeended toooo meeee, suhnnnn.”
“I needed . . . money,” Connor managed.
“Yooouuu shooouuuld haaavvve listeeeeended toooo meeee, suhnnnn.”
The vision at the edges of Connor’s eyes began to close in. And he was becoming ice cold.
“I’llllllll praaaaay for yooouuu, suhnnnn. Maaaaay God haaaave meeercy onnnn yooouuur sooouuul.”
“It wasn’t suppose . . . to be . . . like this,” Connor whispered. “I was . . . supposed . . . to go to . . . college.”
“Not anyyyy moooore, suhnnnn.”
/> The peripheral edges of Connor’s sight turned a deep purple, then black, the darkness closing in on him from all points. His vision decreased with the proprietor the focal point of his sight as the scope of his vision became a pinprick dot, a mote of marginal light, and then a quasi-darkness that was deeply shadowed and foreboding.
As he seemed to fall away he heard the proprietor one last time, his voice receding to a thin whisper: I’llllllll praaaaay for yooouuu, suhnnnn. Yeeesss I Wiiilllll. Maaaaay God haaaave meeercy onnnn yooouuur sooouuul.
And like a flame snuffed from a candle’s wick, everything went dark.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
That Monday morning when Kimball heard of Connor’s death, his world started to collapse. He had never felt so crushed or wounded in his entire life. When he last saw Connor he was nervously flighty because he had placed himself in a self-imposed battle which, in the end, forced Kimball to walk away because the fight wasn’t his. Now Connor lay dead, a victim driven to his grave by sad desperation.
No one could understand what had caused Connor, who had so much going for him---like school, scholarships and a great outlook on life---to commit himself to such an extreme. Rumors surfaced and stories abounded with everyone having their own opinions, most of them contemptible and untrue. But Kimball knew the facts behind Connor’s actions, and that fear had become the true motivator behind what he did.
It was third period Philosophy class as Kimball’s mind wandered, the voice of the teacher sounding like a drone in his head, a distant buzz and whine. Yet he could hear his inner voice quite clearly, his own words telling him to forgive Connor’s digressions because he was forced into a situation not of his choosing. In between these thoughts he kept hearing the name of Vinny Cuchinata like a repeated sound skipping over a stereo.
. . . Vinny Cuchinata . . .
. . . Vinny Cuchinata . . .
. . . Vinny Cuchinata . . .
It was all like a bad dream, something that was ugly and surreal but would eventually shift back to a sound state of reality. But Connor was dead and his chair in the classroom remained empty.