“I guess step four is haul ass to Wal-Mart.” Marky Mark said.
“No. We are stopping somewhere much closer. Did you two notice the storage building on the left of State of Franklin as we made our way in; the one that looked like it hadn’t taken any damage at all to its fence?”
“Yes. I made a note of it.” Amanda said.
“That is where we are going for tonight. We won’t be pressing on until morning.” I said.
“Why?” Marky Mark asked.
“Because it’s way too dangerous to travel at night, even with Big Lou. Also, staying there is part of the plan.”
“Yeah right. You’se ain’t got no plan.” Marky Mark said.
“Unless, turn and run, has become an acceptable plan I feel I must agree with Mark. You’re winging this whole thing.” Amanda said with a smile.
“Ye of little faith. I’m thinking five moves ahead.”
“Yeah, five moves ahead, that’s the part where we run, right?” Marky Mark said.
“Yes. That is the part where we run, as slowly as humanly possible.” I said in all seriousness.
TEN
When I was in the eighth grade I had a friend named Adam. To look at us, we had to seem like the odd couple. He was prissy and preppy and his family was VERY well off. If you had grown up in this area, all I would have to say is “he lived on the lake” for you to get a picture of him almost immediately. As much as I hate stereotypes the image that would enter your head upon hearing those words would have been one hundred percent correct. Me, on the other hand, I was relaxation in human form. I didn’t dress to impress, I dressed for comfort. Jeans, rips were optional, my t-shirt and, over that the unbuttoned button up shirt as was my fashion. You have to remember that I was dressing like this years before Nirvana and grunge came along to make it cool. I was also wearing my Converse All-Stars which I had begun wearing WAY before it was cool to do so as well. Back then they only made Chuck Taylors six months out of the year. If my shoes blew out in the time of year that they weren’t making them, I had to wait months to get a pair. That is if the local shoe store was out of my size, they were always out of my size. The longest wait I ever made was four months if I remember correctly. Getting a picture of the two of us walking down the hall at school together? Bullies couldn’t figure out what insults to hurl at us because we offered such a wide spectrum of options. They were unsure which ones we would take personally. Add in the fact that I really didn’t take anything personally made me a constant source of infuriation to these examples of the baser aspects of our species.
To be honest, I seldom had to worry about bullies. I decided early on that the best way to avoid conflict would be to sneak around the edge of it. I would find ways to be useful to these bullies or just outright befriend them thus putting me on the safe side of the punching line. This plan didn’t always work, but it was successful at least eight out of ten times, and having eight bullies as friends was a really good bartering chip to convince the other two that you were simply not worth the trouble.
Adam, however, never really had a chance. I attempted to talk to some of my “friends” and get them to leave him alone through bargaining and diplomatic efforts, but some just wouldn’t budge. The way Adam dressed and acted didn’t help either. It was like holding a red flag up in front of a bull. Everything they despised, hated, feared, and knew they could never be was what Adam represented day in and day out.
Then the day came when I discovered that one of my very close friends, a person I had known for years, was revealed to be the worse bully there was in the school when it came to who was picking on Adam. Will had never given me any reason to think he bullied kids. He grew up four streets over from me. I had slept over at his house and he had spent entire summers swimming in our pool. When I was confronted with him verbally attacking my other friend I was so shell shocked that I was unable to do anything but stand there with my mouth hanging open.
The day it happened was supposed to be a fun class free day at school. It was a day set aside as a celebration at the end of our Tennessee anniversary week. We had spent the last four days learning about Tennessee history and now it was time to have fun. I was with Adam walking from one event to another. I had been pulled aside by another friend and Adam had gotten a few steps in front of me. Before I could catch up Will had jumped. He was ripping into Adam about being a little princess and how he just had to be gay to dress that way when I caught up. I could hear what was going on as I walked up and that’s when I had my mouth falling open moment. I didn’t know what to do. Two people who I was very close with were at odds; I didn’t know who I should back up. Will lived near me; if I sided against him, all hell would break loose in the neighborhood. At home, drama would ensue, friendships would end like a small scale civil war. I’m not being dramatic here. I had seen such things happen before. I had been a part of such things. If I sided against Adam, then I would be turning my back on the best friend I had in my grade and all my classes. Life at school would be infected with that drama instead of life at home. My two worlds had collided, and I had to choose which one to completely destroy.
I walked up to the two of them and said, “Sup?” They both looked towards me. Will's look was surprised confusion. The look of a man asking, “What are you doing here?” Adams look was that of relief and concern. “Thank god you’re here.” Alongside, “Get out of here or you’ll get it too.” That’s all I needed to make my decision.
“This guy a friend of yours?” Will asked.
“Yeah. What’s up?” I asked.
“You’re friends with this fairy?” He asked. I looked from Adam to him and back. “What fairy?” I asked. Will raised his eyebrows. He was stronger than I was, and he was trying to use his size and facial expressions to convince me to walk away from this. At least he was trying to get me out of harm’s way. I guess I can give him that much credit; he didn’t want to have to attack me. The bad news was he was either going to walk away or he was going to have to attack me and face the fallout. The danger of him attacking me was, I knew where almost every one of his secrets were hidden and I could announce them to the world. I was a fight he really didn’t want.
“Let’s just get out of here Charlie.” Adam said and began to try to walk away.
“Yeah, I’d expect you to run away princess.” Will said.
Adam didn’t stop walking or turn around. I didn’t have that kind of discipline. I stopped and looked back at Will. “What is your problem?” I asked.
“He’s gay. He shouldn’t be allowed out here with the rest of us.”
For the second time I was at a loss for words. I’m the kind of guy that takes each person at face value. Race, religion or sexual orientation never really matters to me. If you are cool by me then you are a good person and in return I’ll be cool by you. If you were a douche, then I was douche right back. Taking that into consideration it never occurred to me to tell Will that Adam wasn’t gay. I had been there the night at the school dance when he kissed Jannie Teeter for the first time. I had seen what posters were hanging on the walls of his bed room. He had half naked women where I had poster upon poster of Iron Maiden’s mascot Eddie, the undead metal head. Instead of defending my friend with the facts all I could think to say to Will was, “Are you stupid?” This was received about as well as you can imagine. An angry voice said “What?” It was loud. It was violent. It was a voice that my friend from down the road had never used. I found myself wondering who this person was. Had I ever really known? At a very early age I found myself asking questions and analyzing people’s behavior. I began looking into the core, the soul, of people and attempting to figure out if they were a good person or a bad person. As you can imagine it is not an exact science, but it is fascinating. The person that people project is so rarely the person they are. I had known this boy for over ten years of my life. I thought we were as close as brothers. But, as it turns out, I didn’t really know him at all. I knew the him he wanted me to know, not the him that
existed in the dark of night, when he was all alone with just his thoughts, his insecurities, and his resentments. This opened my world up to a whole new way of looking at people. People are mean, envious, vindictive bullies. We are still the warlike brutes that our cave dwelling ancestors had to be to stay alive. In our heart, we are barbaric. It’s one hell of a realization to have in eighth grade when you’re supposed to be having an easy, fun day at school.
I chose sides. I really didn’t have a choice. Will became an enemy that day. I never really spoke to him or saw him again. It was an unspoken separation of friendship. He saw my eyes say “son of a bitch” and I saw his eyes say, “it is what it is, get over it or get out”. I turned my back to him and got out. That was the first bridge I burned and even though the fire made no noise, it did its work just the same. By the time I had graduated High School I had burned so many bridges I should have majored in it at college. Adam was gone as well at that point. Another victim of the arsonist inside my head.
However, the lesson had been learned. Everybody lies. Everybody cheats. Everybody puts up a front. Everyone, at face value, is fake. There are NO exceptions. Sure, some people are more open than others, but we are all guarded. We are all ashamed of much that we have done in our life. We all omit the bad and give ourselves the benefit of the doubt when talking about our past, even when we know by doing so we stretch the truth almost to the breaking point.
Remembering that day and what I learned had gotten me thinking about our dear Mrs. Tabitha Baker. What was she lying about? What was she omitting? Fred had lied about a lot, but he had come clean for the most part. Taking into account everything that had, and hadn’t, been said alongside with the body language that told just as much of the story as words, I felt I knew the heart of what was going on if not the complete truth. And in knowing came the understanding of what I had to do next. I just hoped Amanda would risk her life by helping me when the time came to leave the others behind.
I heard the lock slide away and the door opened. Fred stuck his head in and gave us a look.
“If there was ever a time to run. I imagine it would be now.” He said.
“Wait.” I said as he turned to leave the room. “The proof. We can’t leave unless you have it.” Fred gave me another of his go to hell looks and handed a notebook though the door to me.
“That’s it. Everything she brought back from Food City.
That’s all I have, and we are leaving either way. You can stay here or come with us. At this point I don’t care.
He turned and followed Dewey, Samantha, and some woman who I guessed was Susie who had helped free Samantha and was now on the run with the rest of us. I looked at the notebook and flipped through some of the pages. It looked really good. I hoped it would serve its purpose. Amanda and Marky Mark were leaving the room and I followed. Fred was right; if there ever was a time to run, it was now.
ELEVEN
I cleared the stairwell that opened up onto the roof and almost broke my nose running into the back of Amanda. I looked through the crowd of escapees and saw a mountain of a man standing between us and the lift. Brentley. That was the man’s name. Brentley stood between us and our way out of this penthouse of the damned. He smiled at us.
“I thought you would try to sneak out again. I tried to convince her that Fred had a few more friends he would drag into this. How you doing Susie?” Susie shrunk from Brentley’s gaze making the man laugh.
“I’m here to escort the whole group of you back down to your cell. I suggest you come along quietly. I have no problem hurting any of you, even the ladies.” He flashed us another smile and I had to reach out and hold Amanda back.
“Marky Mark.” I said.
“Yo.” Marky said never taking his eyes off the man in front of us. His hands had slid into his pockets and I had a very good idea why.
“You still feel the need to blow off some steam?” I asked.
“I really do need ta hit something.” Marky Mark confirmed.
“He’s all yours.” I said.
Marky didn’t say anything; he separated from the group and began walking towards the muscle bound maintenance man. Brentley laughed.
“You’re serious? This is your fighter? This is who you pin your hopes of escape on?”
Marky Mark stopped a few feet from the man and looked up at him. Brentley had him by about two feet. The big man was still laughing. He held out his hand about a foot above Marky Mark’s head and said, “Sorry kid, you have to be at least this tall for this ride.”
“I could tell you'se that when ya fight, size doesn’t really matter. What matters is knowing how ta get it done with what you'se have ta work with. I could tell you'se about how I’ve been'a fighting people since I was old enough ta walk. Fight'n my old man because he would get angry when he got drunk, and he drank every night. I could tell you'se that I had to fight the kids at school because they would talk about my old man being a drunk, and whether or not that was true, it wasn’t their place ta say so. I could tell you'se all that, but it would be a lie. My old man? He worked himself to death ta give me and my sister everything we could ever need or want. I was one of the most popular guys in my school. I was one of da star players on my football team. I played linebacker, not because I liked the game, but because I like feeling the bones shutter and break in the other players when I took them down. I picked on people smaller than me because they were easy, and I picked on people bigger than me because they were a challenge. I guess what I mean ta tell you'se is, when you'se boil me down to one sentence it would read ‘likes ta hurt people’.”
At this point one of Marky Mark’s hand shot out of his pocket and struck Brentley in the stomach. The brass knuckles were on his fist just as I had expected them to be. I heard the air rush out of Brentley’s body as he took a few steps backwards. He recovered quickly and stood back up looking at Mark Spacoli with a new found respect.
“Nice speech. Now you die.” He said.
Marky stood his ground and pulled his other hand free of his pocket. It had the brass knuckles on as well. His shoulders rose closer to his head as he raised his arms and kept his fist floating in the air in front of his face.
“Like Momma Grimm’s blue eyed baby boy likes ta say, ‘It’s clobberin’ time’.” Marky Mark said as he lunged at Brentley. The big man stepped to the side and planted his feet swinging a wide arcing punch at Marky Mark who made ducking the haymaker look easy as he took a long stride and slid in close to Brentley’s body. Fist after fist slammed into the bigger man’s ribs. The brass knuckles bending and braking bones as each hammer blow rained down. Brentley attempted to back pedal and put some space between him and the hornet’s nest he had just stepped into, but Marky Mark matched him step for step still bring blow after blow into the man’s ribs.
Brentley lashed out with his right foot catching Mark in the one spot where all men are vulnerable. He bent over out of nothing more than reflex. Brentley put both of his hands together making a big meaty club to bludgeon his opponent. He brought it down with everything he had into Marky Mark’s back. The force of the blow drove Mark to his knees. I thought he may need us to help him and I could see that Amanda was ready to jump into the fight. Then I saw Mark Spacoli’s foot pivot onto his toes and he launched himself into Brentley’s stomach. The blow landed where the brass knuckles had done their work. Brentley let out a cry of pain and Marky Mark drove him up and then slammed him back down onto the roof of the building. Mark slid up onto the man’s rib cage. He pinned Brentley’s shoulders onto the roof with his knees and blow after blow rained down upon the big man’s face.
“Think you’se so damn tough just because you’se big. Always think'n you'se can push anyone around just because you'se have some muscles. Where’s the talk now big man? I can’t hear you'se laughing anymore. Why ain’t you'se laughing big man?!” Marky Mark was saying as blow after blow landed on Brentley face. The man looked like an Acme hundred-ton anvil had been dropped on his head by Wile E. Coyote. Amanda
put her hand on Marky Mark’s shoulder.
“He’s done.” Is all she said.
He stopped swinging and looked down at the man. Brentley coughed and spit some blood up. Marky mark stood up and looked at the man.
“You'se deserve no better.” He said. He then spit on him before turning back to us. “I needed that. Let’s get outta here.”
I don’t know what I expected. Maybe I thought it would be like the movies and he would see what he had done and be horrified by it. That he would tell us he was sorry and say something like ‘I’ve never lost control like that before”. The pure honesty of him looking at his handiwork and not caring was almost scary.
“Mark, are you okay? You almost killed that guy.” I said.
Marky Mark looked back at the body of Brentley the man mountain and then shook his head no. “He was going ta kill us. He did dis ta himself. He chose ta be up here alone. He chose dis fight. He lost. End of story. I could care less if he gets better or dies out here tonight. It was him or us. I'm not going ta feel bad about winning.”
And, wow, wasn’t that really close to what I told the people from the Gray safehouse after we had killed their leader and his two right hand men. Why was I so shocked about this? Knowing what I had figured out about this whole affair, I knew we were at war. Even before we sat foot in this building we were at war and wasn’t I planning on trying to kill a far greater number of people tomorrow? Yes, I had no right judging Mark Spacoli’s actions. I walked over and put my hand on his shoulder.
“Good job.” I said.
“Thanks.” Marky Mark said. I smiled at him and added, “Just for the record, I loved the ‘it’s clobberin’ time’ reference.” Marky Mark smiled back at me.
“I thought mister east Tennessee needed to learn a little of what they teach the kids on Yancy Street.” He said.
“Are we leaving?” Fred asked. Susie, Dewey, Samantha and Fred were standing at the lift. Amanda, Marky Mark and I walked over to it.
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