“Trav, keep walking, the cops are on to us,” I told him.
“How do you know?” he said, turning to look back.
I grabbed his arm.
“Don’t look, don’t let him know we’ve seen him. That guy, I’ve seen him a few times today. I’m sure he’s been following us,” I said.
“You sure it’s the cops? Wouldn’t they have picked us up by now?” he asked.
It was a good point but I wasn’t taking the chance either way. We carried on, the alleyway opened out onto an avenue running parallel and when we were clear of the corner we ran. I decided not to go to our drop off and not to return to Joe’s either. I didn’t want to lead anyone to either place. We hid out for a while in a local cafe, eating a pizza until I thought the coast was clear, then headed off to the gym.
“Ted, can you get a message to Joe?” I asked, as we entered.
“Sure kid, what’s up?”
“I think we were being followed today, maybe the cops, I’m not sure, so I didn’t make the drop. I didn’t want to lead him back to Joe’s, so I still have the package. Can you tell him that?” I asked.
He taped up our hands before he went off to make the call and Travis and I changed. Mack was working out with the heavy bag and once he saw us, he signalled for us to join him. He held the heavy bag and Travis went first, throwing a couple of punches. Mack would move the bag about making him move with it, sometimes lurching it forwards towards him.
When it was my time I squared up to it as I had been shown, my fists raised to my chin in defence and I hit that bag. When my fist connected, flashes of images would fire through my brain of every beating I took. I hit that bag as if I was defending myself back then. Nothing mattered to me than to punch and hurt. Every slap across the back with that belt, every minute of being preached to, every hour of chores, warranted a volley of punches to the bag in front of me. Sweat dripped from my forehead into my eyes, stinging and blurring my vision but still I carried on, hitting the bag with as much force as I could muster.
“Whoa kid, steady up,” I heard.
I slowed the pace and Ted grabbed my wrists, inspecting my hands. Although he had put tape across them, blood seeped through from the grazes I had sustained to my knuckles. I looked down at them, in wonder. When had that happened? I felt no pain but an immense sense of release. Something triggered in my brain. I could hit out and it felt good, a small amount of years of pent up aggression was being set loose. Joe arrived at the gym and immediately called Travis and I over.
“What happened today kid?” he asked, while inspecting my fists.
I repeated what I had told Ted, about the man in the blue jacket and jeans, I was able to describe him well. I told Joe that I didn’t think it wise to make the drop or return in case we brought whoever it was back to the office.
“You did good kid,” was all he said. I handed him the package, grateful to be rid of it.
****
The days and weeks that followed were much the same. Instead of just running errands, we went to the gym as well. Travis and I were evenly matched on speed but I was stronger. All those years of sweeping and cutting logs meant I had muscular shoulders, a powerful punch for someone of my age. Soon enough we were able to get into the ring and spar, with each other and with Mack. Occasionally some of the other guys would challenge us, mocking and trying to rile us because of our age. Travis always bit, I just shook my head and out boxed them. We had fun, we learnt to fight and I learnt that I had found something I was very good at.
It took until my fifteenth birthday though, for me to be good enough to finally put Mack on the floor.
We had been sparring, Travis watching as I went a couple of rounds with Mack. We had gloves on and by now proper boots and shorts, bought with some of the money I had saved for us. Joe was watching, ringside with Ted. I could see them chatting, heads together and Ted shaking his at whatever Joe was saying.
For some reason that day I was pissed. I was getting restless with running errands, picking up laundry and shopping. I wanted to do something more challenging. I had been pestering Joe for a little while for Travis and I to do something else. I knew we were young but I thought we could handle a little more. Joe had said no, he wanted to keep us where we were. At the time I didn’t understand his reasoning, we might have been fifteen but were much older in the head, more street wise than some of the older guys he had working for him.
I guess I wasn’t concentrating when Mack threw a punch and it hit me square in the face. I felt my nose crack and a trickle of blood run down to my lips. I tasted it and something exploded in my head. I was immediately taken back to the days in Sterling. I did the total opposite to what was expected of me, I lowered my hands and I looked hard at Mack. Many years later, Mack would tell me that as my eyes got darker, the hairs on the back of his neck stood on end.
As he approached, I let out one punch, straight through his guard, square on his jaw and I watched in slow motion as he sailed backwards and landed with a thud on the mat. Ted jumped in the ring and grabbed my arms from behind. He was nowhere near strong enough to restrain me but somewhere in my angry brain I registered his voice and it stilled me.
“Kid, calm it down,” I heard him say.
I tugged the string with my teeth to loosen my gloves, pulling them off and throwing them to the floor. I felt bad for Mack, he had been kind to me, we were only sparring and I had knocked him out cold. I walked over to where he lay and crouched down. I was expecting him to be angry, seriously angry with me. Instead, as he came round and was helped to his feet, still groggy, he gave me a soft punch to the head, a smile and I knew we were all right.
“Kid, you got anger issues,” he said with a slur as Ted helped him out of the ring.
It was not an option going to the local hospital, too many questions would get asked, especially about where I lived, so Paul called over his wife, Rosa. She had been a nurse and she fixed my nose but it would always be crooked. Getting back to the office, Joe was regaling the guys of how I had outboxed Mack. Jonathan and Richard were there. I liked those guys, they showed Travis and I respect and bearing in mind they were so much older, they didn’t have to do that. They treated us as one of the gang. The only person we didn’t like was Joe’s son, young Joey. He was about the same age as us but the total opposite. He was fat, weak and seemed to have a permanent sneer on his face. He was lazy. If he was sent on an errand it would take him all day, half the money spent on the way back and a fresh packet of cigarettes always in his top pocket.
****
“Come on, Joe, think about it,” I said, one afternoon.
We had been having one of our regular conversations. I had asked to do more, I wanted to spend time with each of the guys, to understand what they did, helping and learning. He was having none of it. He wanted Travis and I there, with him. I got that he thought we were too young, he was becoming protective of us to a degree but I might have been fifteen in body but way older in the head.
“Jon, you think it’s a good idea don’t you?” I asked.
“Rob, you would be bored sitting with me all day, unless you’re good with numbers,” he replied.
“Come on, Richard, you need a hand, don’t you? Joe, he can’t collect all the rents on his own,” I said.
Richard held up his hands in surrender, he wasn’t getting involved in that debate.
Travis and I were relentless, every day nagging Joe until finally, a few months later, he gave in. He decided that we should spend some time with Richard first. Joe owned some property, there were rents to collect, repairs to be organised and we spent a week following Richard, watching and learning. When he thought we had learnt enough, we were given a block to ourselves.
“Travis, I want you to start on the top floor, Rob, you start on the bottom. It’s rent day, knock on each door, collect the rent and whoever isn’t in or doesn’t pay, write it down,” Richard said as he handed us each a small ring bound book.
The problem with Travis was that he though
t he was God’s gift to women and at fifteen, he certainly looked older. I had made it three quarters of the way up before Travis had got to his fourth flat. Every pretty lady that opened the door warranted a twenty minute chat. Travis would lean up against the wall flexing his muscles, giving them his killer smile and it always worked. I was amazed at how many ladies would stop and chat to him, flirting back. Until they saw me that was. They would finish their conversation quickly and close the door.
“You are my unlucky charm,” Travis would moan, staring at the closed door of his favourite lady.
“Trav, she’s old enough to be your mother,” I replied. “And fucking ugly enough as well.”
Unbeknown to me at first, the reason I got the bottom half of the block was because that was where most of the non payers were, by coincidence rather than on purpose. Richard told me later that day that he thought I looked intimidating enough to get results and I usually did. Sometimes I would come across some old, fat drunk in a string vest with nicotine stained hands. They would laugh as they opened the door, a kid sent to collect the rent. I would stand tall and quiet, listen to their rant and wait for their money. Other times it would be the mad cat woman. I don’t think she understood that she had to pay her rent, if she wanted to live there. She always answered the door with a skinny, half eared cat in her arms, talking to it as if it could understand her.
“Mrs Wren, I’ve come to collect the rent,” I would say, slowly and deliberately.
“What did he say?” she would ask the cat.
I would tap my foot impatiently waiting for the cat to answer her. However, it did seem to work. She would raise the cat to her ear and ask me if I was there to collect the rent. I often wished Mrs Wren would be out when I knocked.
By the time we had finished the block, Travis would have pocketed a couple of phone numbers and I would have all the money. Along with collecting the rent, we would have to listen to the tenants and their problems. The hot water wasn’t hot enough, the kitchen tap wouldn’t work, moaning about the amount of money they had to pay for the shit hole that they lived in. It was on the tip on my tongue sometimes to inform them that their apartment was way better than the back of a Chinese restaurant, where Travis and I had spent a year sleeping.
However, I took note of all their complaints and made sure the supervisor got the repairs done. I reasoned with Joe, if you repair what’s broken, listen to their complaints, they seemed to pay their rent on time with no dodging us, and why shouldn’t they have a tap that worked.
Each day followed the same pattern, we would shadow Richard, collecting rents from various buildings then head off to the gym for a session with Ted. Mack would be there and sometimes he would look like he had already been ten rounds with someone, and I often wondered exactly what he did for Joe.
****
Jonathan was the next person we worked with and he was wrong in that I didn’t find what he did boring. Travis did, he was not good with numbers having never really been to school, but I soon got the idea of what was going on. The rents from the legitimate side of Joe’s business went through the books. He paid tax on those to not draw any suspicion to the other money that seemed to wing its way back into the office.
“Is this drug money?” I asked outright, pointing to the stacks of notes I had seen in the safe.
“Some, Joe does a little dealing but no hard drugs, he doesn’t like them,” Jon replied.
“What’s the difference? Drugs are drugs,” I said.
I was not interested in drugs and to be honest, not best pleased to learn Travis and I had been the ones running those little packages all over the place.
“Kid, one thing you have to understand, people will always take drugs. Joe won’t be involved in the hard stuff, just a little dope.”
It was a burden to shoulder this knowledge, and yet I was proud that the information had been shared with us. Although only still young, we were obviously trusted members now.
“So, the money that you put through as rent is listed as being higher than is collected, you can then filter in the drug money. Would that mean paying more tax?” I asked.
Jonathan raised his eyebrows at me. “Smart kid, and yes it would, however what we have are many invoices and receipts to offset against any profits, bring the level of tax back down,” he answered.
I found the whole thing interesting, Travis was bored and Jonathan amazed at my level of understanding the figures. We divided up some roles. Travis was left to obtain any invoices we may need, there were a couple of construction projects that Paul was involved in and he would provide what we wanted. I would log all the receipts, I had the neater handwriting after all and I booked in all the rent collected. It was my first lesson in basic book keeping.
There were things that we were not involved in, obviously. I would notice entries made or large wads of cash that were given to Jon to put in the safe and I knew better than to ask. There was a day, however, when the safe door was ajar, Jonathan having just popped out of the office.
“Look at all that money,” Travis had said. “One day we’re going to have that much.”
“One day we will, Trav. If we work hard, save, we’ll have a shit load ourselves.”
Earning money was becoming an obsession with me. I had filled my notebook and a further five by that time. I recorded what I earned, wrote down what I spent and each month would smile at the amount I had saved. I would have Jonathan check my figures and he would smile and nod, assuring me that mine and Travis’s cash was safe, ready for when we wanted it.
****
“Rob, I’ve brought you some lunch,” I heard behind me, one day.
Evelyn had come into the office, she had a rare day off. I had known her for nearly four years then and I still felt guilty about how we had first met.
She was not a tall woman, she only came up to my shoulders. She had the same dark brown hair and brown eyes as Joe. She was in her mid twenties. I had seen her out and about with a guy and I knew that Joe was unaware of this. It must have been hard for her to have grown up without her mother. She had told me her mother died and having an over protective Joe as a father, meant skulking around with any boyfriend she had. However, she was very keen for me to understand the man I had seen her with was just a friend, she didn’t want a boyfriend and I wondered why.
“Hi, Ev, I’m done here. Why don’t we get Trav and head outside?” I suggested.
As much as she was Joe’s daughter, I knew she didn’t like to be in that place. She kept her distance from her father’s choice of work. We found Travis and made our way outside, it was a bright sunny autumn day and we headed to the local park. It was not so much of a park, more a grassed area in the middle of apartment blocks, a couple of swings and a bench. Joe had paid for those to be put there, these were his apartment blocks and he wanted somewhere for the kids to play safely. Evelyn had made us sandwiches and we sat and ate, soaking up the sun.
“Rob, I’ve never asked, but how did you get to be here?” Evelyn said.
“To DC do you mean? Well, hitched a lift, hid in the back of a pickup, that kind of thing,” I said, knowing what she meant, but evading the question.
“You know what I mean,” she scolded.
I guess it wouldn’t hurt to finally tell them the truth. I trusted them both, they were family to me.
“I was born in London, as you know, and my parents died when I was six, I think. They were shit parents, never around, left me on my own most of the time, but one day they never came home. A car crash I was told. Anyway, I ended up in a foster home for a while before my dad’s sister came over from Pittsburgh to get me. Fucking right nutter she was. Spent her whole life at the church and beating or preaching at me. She thought everything that went wrong was my fault because I had the devil inside me,” I said.
I needed to take a pause, they knew what I had just said but not what was coming.
“When I was eleven, on my birthday that no one ever remembered, I took the belt she hit me wi
th and the bibles, and set fire to them in the basement. The fire took hold and the house burnt down, with her in it. I killed her,” I said, noticing the shock registering on Evelyn’s face.
“You didn’t kill her, it was an accident wasn’t it? I doubt you could have done anything to save her, you were so young,” she said.
“No, that’s where you’re wrong. I watched that fire for a while, watched it take hold of the basement. I had plenty of chances to do something about it, but I didn’t. I had plenty of time to get her out of the house, but I didn’t. I stood at the edge of the woods and watched until there was nothing left of the house or her.”
“Man, that bitch deserved it,” Travis said. Whether he believed that or not it didn’t matter, he was always on my side.
Evelyn’s eyes were filled with pain and sadness. That was something I didn’t like to see, I didn’t want nor need pity from anyone. Brushing the crumbs from my lap, I stood.
“Anyway, it’s all history now, we need to head back,” I said.
“Did you stay around?” Evelyn asked as we made our way back towards the office.
“Only until the morning. I watched the priest and the cops kick through the embers, then I left. The rest you know,” I said, with a shrug of my shoulders.
“Do the cops think you died in the fire?” Travis asked.
“I don’t know. That’s why I don’t ever want to get picked up, Trav, but I doubt anyone is looking for me,” I said, with a little sadness.
I still found it hard that Travis had no contact with any member of his family. I understood him wanting to get away. I knew what it was like to live a life of regular beatings but he had told me he had a sister he’d got on with. I had no family left, so the thought of him not wanting to know his, upset me a little.
“You should speak to dad about it,” Evelyn said.
“Maybe, but right now, let’s just keep it between us,” I replied.
I would speak to Joe, one day, but it wasn’t something I liked to just bring up. I was worried, if he knew that about me, he might send me packing.
Robert (Fallen Angel Series Book 1) Page 6
