by James Green
Chapter 3
Hello again Smallville.
I didn’t do it for Sonny, I wouldn’t have done diddley-squat for Sonny. He was selfish through and through and bad news all round. I tell you I had a hard time deciding whether to do it at all. After all, are you doing someone a favour if you give them a fistful of marked bills? See what I mean? Dough is dough, but what if something bad comes with the dough?
Sonny wanted to go home and I was pretty sure his old man would want him home so agreeing to take Sonny all the way to Smallville might seem like I was doing him a big favour but what I was trying to do was something for his old man. But was it doing his old man a favour to take Sonny back to him? It was a tough call, my friend, and close, but in the end I figured Sonny’s old man would want him back even if he hadn’t changed except maybe got worse considering the shape he was in, so Sonny and I left Chicago heading West.
OK, I know what you’re going to say, why drive him, why not just put him on a bus or a train? I thought about it, I really did, a long haul in a car with Sonny for company wasn’t my idea of a good time, but how far would a weak user like Sonny get on his own? How long before he was sweating blood for a score and working out crazy ideas how to get one? How long before the police had him in the slammer or he was dead down some alley? If Sonny was going home to his old man he had to be taken and the only person around who would take him was me so I took Sonny back to my place and fixed him up as best as I could so he didn’t look like a sign to the
cops - stop me guys, I’m today’s easy bust. I made a call and picked up enough shit to keep Sonny from going cuckoo on the trip and then we were ready to roll. I figured there was no real risk in carrying, it wasn’t much, not enough to pull a dealing rap and anyway, I would plant it on Sonny if we looked like getting pulled over.
That was some bad journey, let me tell you, some very bad journey, so I’m not going to say anything about it because it was bad enough without remembering it all over again and anyway, you wouldn’t want to know because it was some bad journey, my friend, some very bad journey. Eventually we were close enough so I could phone Sonny’s old man and tell him I was bringing Sonny in. He didn’t say much and that worried me, was he glad or mad? Out of the blue someone calling and saying I’m bringing your no-good son back to you and he’s in pretty bad shape isn’t something most folks are expecting so you can’t always tell what they’re thinking about the whole thing, not over the phone anyway. But as it turned out I needn’t have worried, we were about ten miles out of town when I saw the beat-up old pick-up pulled in by the side of the highway. Sonny’s old man had driven out to meet us. I pulled in behind it and Sonny’s pop got out and came to the car, Sonny got out and maybe for a minute they just looked at each other. Then they were in each other’s arms and both crying and Sonny saying he was sorry, I mean the selfish bastard actually managed to say sorry, it was wrong what he did. And of course that squared everything with the old man because he was that kind of guy. How do guys like Sonny and Jesse draw old men like him? I mean, is it fair? Anyway, I tell you, it was like something off the TV, tears and gladness all round, a regular happy ending. Then Sonny’s old man came to the car door and said there was going to be a celebration back at the ranch, an old-style spit roast and I should follow because I was guest of honour and he and his two sons wanted me to stay a while and visit. Now that was nice, just like the old man, thinking of the other guy. He’d just got his son back but he had time to make me feel important, not just some guy in the background. But I said, no thanks, I thought it should be just a family and friends occasion, maybe tomorrow we could all get together for a beer. I’d go into town and get a room at the hotel and freshen up. It had been a long drive and I was tired. So Sonny and his dad got into the pick-up and drove off and I went into town.
Nothing in that town had changed, maybe nothing in that town would ever change or maybe things there changed so slowly you just couldn’t notice the difference. Anyway the first place I went was the bar because what I really wanted was a cold drink. It was the same and I sat at the bar with my beer ready to feel real pleased with myself that I had done Sonny’s old man a favour and maybe now the nice old guy could get a bit of happiness back into his life. He deserved it, I reckoned.
Well, the happy ending didn’t last long because I had just started my second beer when the bar door opens with a bang and in came Jesse breathing fire. He stormed up to the bar and ordered straight rye. Man, that was one mad cowboy. Now there was no-one in the bar but me and the barman and Jesse wasn’t about to talk to us about what was eating him so no-one said anything. The barman wiped glasses for something to do and I minded my own business and watched my beer. Then the door opens again and who comes in but Jesse’s old man, looking sad I thought. He walked up to Jesse slow, like it was hard work even to walk.
‘Come home, son, come on home.’
And Jesse turned on him, man I thought for a second he was going to hit the old guy. Well, he didn’t, he just ranted on about Sonny coming back after all the harm he’d done, about how come Sonny deserves a spit-roast and maybe if anybody got a spit-roast how come it wasn’t him and his friends seeing as how he was the one who stayed on the ranch and did all the work?
I felt sorry for the old man, it should have been a big day for him and there was Jesse all fired up to ruin it. I guess I hadn’t realised just how much Jesse was like Sonny, selfish I mean. You’d have thought he could have let his old man have one day’s rejoicing before he laid into him but no, he just waded in and ruined things.
The old guy tried to reason with him, told him that the ranch was his now, all of it, and couldn’t he be happy that Sonny had come home, that he was alive?
I tell you friend I didn’t want to stay and see how it turned out for the old guy because I didn’t figure it was going to turn out well so I just left my beer, left that bar, got into my car and left town. I didn’t want to stay in that place one more minute, it was just too sad a place for me to be in it longer than I had to be. I drove off to the first motel I came across, stayed the night, then headed back to Chicago.
So, my friend, there you are, that’s the story of Sonny’s comeback. As I said, I don’t know how it ended so I can’t tell you but it seems to me that some people just don’t get to be happy no matter how good they are and I guess Sonny’s old man was one of those people. But some good came out of it, an undeserving no-account got something out of it, because when I left Smallville and came to Chicago and changed my name thanks to the kindness of Sonny’s old man I decided to change my way of living. Now it was true what I said, that all I knew about was bad ways, drugs and dealing and street stuff like that, but with the Lord’s help even a sinner like me can find salvation because the Lord sent me the pastor of the Church in the neighbourhood where I had just naturally fitted in and was looking round to see what I might do. I told him all about myself and how I wanted to make a new start but I didn’t see as how I was fitted to make any sort of start that wouldn’t take me back straight to where I had come from in the first place. But he knew better and he got me a job in their drug rehabilitation outreach. Man, I was so qualified for that job I just had to be a success and I was so here I am mixing with the likes of you instead of you crossing the street and ready to call the cops like you would have done before I met Sonny’s old man. You know thinking about Sonny and Jesse and their old man makes me wonder how the good Lord lets the dice fall the way they do, I mean, a sinner like me ends up with the roses and a good man like Sonny’s pop gets the blackjack and gets it all the way, I mean, shouldn’t the Lord load the dice a little, in favour of the good guys, after all they’re his dice? Still, I suppose the good Lord knows that even if you mean well it’s wrong to bring loaded dice to the table so he knows what he’s doing I suppose. At least I hope he does because, man, it sure is a mystery to me.
