Unwritten Rules
G.L. Snodgrass
Copyright 2014 Gary Snodgrass
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book, or portions thereof in any form. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means. This is a work of fiction. Names and characters are the product of the author's imagination and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Purple Herb Publishing.
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Other Stories by G.L. Snodgrass
Worth Saving
Nothing So Quiet
Certain Rules
A Demon's Nightmare
Short Stories
Prom Date
The One That Got Away
The First
Dragon's Skin
For my Mom
Shirley Baker
Chapter One
Austin
My stomach clenched as I ducked behind the dumpster to let the cop car go by. That was the last thing I needed right now. Shuddering at the thought of being hassled I pulled my jacket collar up to avoid the biting wind.
It was supposed to get colder than a church ladies ass tonight. Hardcore cases like Billy needed to forget about their pride and head for a shelter even if that meant I had to drag him there kicking and screaming.
A quick scan of 2nd avenue and no Billy. You’d think that an old crippled bum, drunk off his butt wouldn’t move very far. You’d think wrong. Billy knew every hiding hole and short cut in the downtown area. Nobody knew more about disappearing when they wanted to than Billy.
He must of scored pretty good and didn’t want to share. I didn’t want any part of his cheap ass hooch, he knew that. I wanted to make sure he was okay and know where he was in case I had to get him inside for the night.
I pushed the hair out of my eyes and stepped into the rushing throng of people fighting their way along the sidewalk. They immediately parted around me like a stream around a rock. Each particle independent yet still a part of the whole.
My shoulders hunched as their negative wave of anger washed over me. Things had changed. It used to be a quick smile of guilt or a softening of their brow in pity when people saw a young boy like me living on the street. Now, three years and twelve inches later it was anger and fear. Woman clutched their purses tighter and pulled their children close. Men gripped their briefcases and glared from under furrowed brows as if asking why didn’t I have a job like a real man?
I ignored them, once cataloged they were easily forgotten. Tourists, Marks, Prey, we had a hundred names for them. It came down to ‘Not Us’, not from the street, not important except as a resource. Billy, in one of his more lucent moments had told me that we street people were the last group for which discrimination was socially acceptable.
“A KKK Grand Wizard would rather be stuck in a room with an African American Black Panther than stand on the corner next to a street person,” Billy used to say. “The most liberal college professor would prefer to have dinner with a Republican businessman than share an elevator with one of us.” Of course I might have cleaned up the language a little. Billy cussed like the bowery bum he was.
I hopped up on a street light foundation and hung from the pole with one hand as I scanned the street for Billy. When I couldn’t find him I jumped down and head up hill checking his usual spots. My stomach lurched a little when I couldn’t find him. He wasn’t in Chang’s doorway. Not on the stairs leading up to the back of the old glove factory. He wasn’t even parked behind the 102 Club’s dumpster. One of his favorite places because he could see the water from there while tuning out the street noise.
“Why is this my problem?” I mumbled to myself as I continued my search.
Because you owe him, that’s why. A thirteen year old kid didn’t last long down here without someone showing him the lay of the land. Billy had been that guy for me three years earlier. We’d sort of kept an eye out for each other ever since.
Some jerk honked his horn as I ran across the street. As if they thought I might learn a lesson and never do it again. Shaking my head at the total idiocy of some people I headed up to 3rd to continue my search.
“Hey Austin, you looking for Billy?” Someone called from behind me. I turned and saw Jimmy the Crip leaning on his crutch.
He held the proverbial tin cup and a cardboard sign hung around his neck on green yarn. The sign read “VETERAN, EVERY LITLE BIT HELPS. God Bless.” That was Jimmy, short and to the point. I was tempted to tell him about the spelling error, but knowing him, it was on purpose. Probably some theory about how it made people feel superior or some kind of crap.
“Yeah, you seen him?” I answered as I walked up.
“Yeah man, I saw him on fourth a couple of hours ago.” Jimmy said as he continued to watch the people passing by for any potential contributors. Trying to hold eye contact long enough to make them feel guilty about their 2.5 car garage and summers at the time share. “He was acting strange, you know, pretending not to see me and stuff.”
I nodded in understanding. Billy could get weird at times, feisty and mean. Yelling about some guy named Charlie crawling through the bushes to get him. I learned to leave him alone when he got like that. My world was filled with enough craziness.
“Where on fourth?” I said.
“Over by the Art Museum,” he said as he held his cup out for someone to drop a couple of quarters. They tanged as they hit the bottom. “Thank you, God Bless,” he said to the woman as she continued on her way, never really seeing him. Like I said, invisible.
"Thanks Jimmy," I yelled over my shoulder as I headed to Fourth. The least I could do would be to locate Billy and make sure he was alright.
As I walked I instinctively looked for easy marks. A loose wallet in a back pocket, an open purse that wasn’t being thought off.
I didn’t do that stuff much anymore; only when I got desperate. People didn’t let young men my size get into their personal space. We set off way too many alarms. It’d been a lot easier when I was younger. Nobody ever paid attention to a short thirteen year old.
My shoulders slumped in relief when I spotted Billy passed out inside an alley off Fourth. He leaned against the brick building with his head to one side, mouth open, snoring like a chain saw. His brown leather jacket torn at the elbow and ripped jeans couldn’t hide the old man inside. He had a short grey beard with stringy grey hair peeking out from under a black wool watch cap. Street grime was permanently imbedded in each wind burnt wrinkle like some pacific island tattoo.
My heart started beating and my breath final began to return to normal. Thank god, I didn’t know what I would do if anything happened to this old idiot. Squatting down next to him I gently shook his shoulder. An empty bottle of Jack Daniels lay next to him. Where had he gotten the money for that and why had he wasted it on the good stuff?
He was way too far gone for me to wake up. I’d have to let him sleep it off and get him later. I pulled his jacket tight around him and zipped it up.
The hiss of airbrakes from the street made me glance over my shoulder. A big yellow school bus was stopped in traffic. Rich brats from the suburbs. Come down here to the art museum to soak up a little culture.
I watched a boy flick the ear of the kid in front of him who turned around and punched him in the shoulder while grinning. Two girls, obviously in high school had their heads together giggling about something.
My stomach clenched tighter than a preachers wallet and my hands instinctively shaped themselves into fists.
I despised these kids with a pure burning hate, with all their fresh clean cloths, their full stomachs and easy laughter. Anger coursed through me as my muscles bunched up in tense knots. Most of all I hated that they’d be going back to nice warm homes with happy moms and loving dads. Like I said, brats. Each and every one of them.
My eyes roamed over the windows drifting across their fresh scrubbed faces until I came to a goddess dressed in green. My heart stopped beating and dropped into my guts as I sucked in a breath of air before forgetting how to breathe.
She was gorgeous, long strait blond hair and blue eyes that reminded me of the harbor on a winter’s morning. You know that blue that’s deeper than a color has a right to be. High cheekbones and lips begging to be kissed.
Our eyes locked for a moment in recognition. We were the only two people in each other’s world. Her eyebrows raised and her lips turned up in a small smile that made me want to storm the bus and rescue her from the evil dragon.
Okay, it was only a smile from a girl on a bus, but it could change a guy’s life. Suddenly living down here didn’t seem like enough. Suddenly there was something pure and good in the world worth working for.
The air brakes released in a hiss of air and her smile dropped as she realized they were moving on. A quick look of fear crossed her eyes and then she shrugged, smiled again, and raised a hand, pressing it against the window.
We watched each other as the bus moved on down the street. Tearing us apart. Her to some happy future full of trusted friends, the college quarterback and a large house on a hill. me back to the streets and another day of scrambling for enough to survive. It felt like someone had gutted me with a fish knife. A thousand thoughts of what could have been, what should have been passed through me like rain water down a drain. Five or six years from now she’ll be marrying her college sweetheart while I’m ether in prison, dead, or still on these streets and I honestly didn’t know which would be worse.
Chapter Two
Casey
I watched a business man in a gray suit step around a homeless lady wearing twelve layers of trash bags like T-shirts. She was talking to herself as she pushed a beat up shopping cart jammed pack with all of her worldly possessions. The man didn’t really see her, all he saw was an object to get around.
The city was so different, so extreme. It smelled like truck exhaust and brick dust, a dry, gritty smell scratched the back of my throat. The tall buildings fought to keep the sun away and hid the shadows in the darker gray corners. My heart beat a little faster and my eyesight became sharper.
“You’re not in Kansas anymore Dorothy,” I mumbled to myself.
“What?” Stephanie my seat mate and 2nd best friend asked. She’d grown quiet as we entered the city. Her normally chatterbox attitude had been diminished significantly. She was probably thinking like me about our friend Jean and wondering if this was where she came when she ran away from home.
I still got angry every time I thought about it. Your bestest best friend was not supposed to run away from home without giving you a chance to talk her out of it. Even if it was partially your fault.
How did people live like this? What kind of country were we when we left these people behind, I wondered. How would Jean survive?
Like every girl I knew, I’d been told repeatedly about the evil lurking down here. Ghost stories about runaway girls being found dead in some abandoned lot or sold into prostitution in some overseas brothel. I'd always treated them as if they were scare tactics to get us to mind our mothers. Sort of like fairy tales told to little kids to get them to eat their porridge.
My stomach turned over as I thought that maybe there might have been some truth in those stories. This wasn’t like home. There, I knew the people. I knew the places. I lived in a safe suburb surrounded by safe homes laid out in a meandering grid with perfectly mown yards and kids on bikes all wearing helmets. The kind of place you knew was safe. Sure there was the occasional wife beater and abused child. But that was always behind closed doors. People we didn’t know. This was different, here everything was out in the open. All of it mixed up together.
A safe place. That was the difference.
At home, no matter where I went I knew I could go to a safe place. My dad would have killed anyone who messed with our home. Mom was ever vigilant and always full of fun. Our house was the place the neighborhood kids preferred to hang out. Cookies and Kool-Aid were always available. Mom worked at home so she always seemed to be around. If I skinned a knee or some kid was hassling us, Mom was there.
Had Jean found a safe place I wondered? Why had she left, would I ever know for sure? It couldn’t have been just because I agreed with her mom that Tommy Ballard was a jerk. I mean she gives him her virginity and then he dumps her two days later. Tragic, I know. But run away from home. Come on. There had to be more. Something she hadn’t told me. Whatever it was we could figure it out. I needed her home, in a safe place. Please let me find her I prayed.
The bus continued to creep through the traffic, moving ten feet at a time. It was going to take forever to get to the museum. A movement in an alley drew my attention. A boy, my age, dressed in a gray hoody and jeans was crouched over a man lying on the ground. Was he robbing him, rolling a drunk I think they call it? Oh My God. Was I witnessing a crime right here in front of me? Didn’t these people have any kind of morals? Where were the police?
The boy slowly zipped the man’s jacket closed and moved something away from his side. He wasn’t robbing him, he was helping him. My face flushed as I realized how wrong I’d been. The only saving grace was that he didn’t know what I’d been thinking.
He shifted the man’s arm and then looked up. Our eyes met and locked. It was like someone shoved a needle into my heart. A surge of adrenaline flushed through my body setting every nerve ending into an electrifying tingle. He had to be about my age only his eyes were so much older. Like they had seen things I couldn’t imagine.
Maybe some Native American somewhere in his family history, black hair and high cheek bones with a strong nose that’d been broken in the past, maybe more than once. It was his eyes that held me, captured my soul and held it in gentle hands. Chocolate brown, deep with long lashes. I swear I forgot how to breathe. My mouth went dry and my heart jumped in my chest as we continued to stare at each other.
Neither of us moved. It was as if the world had fallen away and left each of us alone in our own unique space.
He was obviously a boy of the streets. From a different world. A strange and scary world. I wondered what his life was like. Did he have anyone special, someone to care for him? A brief jealous feeling flashed through me as I thought of some other girl running her hands through his hair and across his forehead in soothing comfort. I wondered about the man lying in the alley, what was he to street boy, friend, family? Why did he care about the old man?
We continued to stare into each other, communicating a thousand thoughts. I wondered about pressing my lips against his and what it would feel like. My face grew flush and warm as he smirked. The boy could probably read my mind.
I don’t know how long the moment lasted. It could have been hours or seconds. All I knew was that it had hit me deep and to my very core.
The bus lurched and my heart stopped. We were going to leave. I would never see him again, would never get to know his name or his story.
My heart raced and my vision narrowed as the bus began to move. I was going to lose him. I just found him and he would disappear back into his streets. How is this possible, how could a simple look, a connection be so powerful that I knew it would rest in my memory forever. I wondered if when I was an old person of forty I’d remember that boy I saw on the streets of the city. Somehow I knew I would.
The corner of the building broke our eye contact as a feeling of sadness washed over me. Why did everything always go wrong? Why did my life suck so badly?
Stephanie had been oblivious, lost in a conversation with Mary Ellen across the aisle. She hadn�
�t seen him, was it my imagination? Oh Casey, grow up, it’s only a boy. A boy you don’t know and have no chance of ever knowing.
I grumbled to myself as the bus pulled into the front of the Art Museum. The last thing I wanted to do was hall my butt all over the place looking at paintings. I knew I was being a bitch and had no reason to complain, but still, I was angry and didn’t even know why.
“Jeanie,” Stephanie squealed pointing out the other side of the bus. I jumped up to see what she was pointing at. A girl with flaming red hair, the same color as Jeanie, I know because I’m the one who put it in there two weeks earlier. The girl turned into the park and all I got was a quick flash of the back of her head.
“Are you sure?” I asked.
“Yes, Yes, I saw her. She’s wearing the green parka she has,” Stephanie said. “She was with some guy, sort of older, maybe in his twenties or so, greasy brown hair.” She shuddered as she provided the description.
I looked again to try and get another peak. Could it be Jean, down here on these streets? My heart lurched and my mouth dried up, would it ever stop doing that. Could I get her, find her in this place and get her home and safe. My mind flew through the different scenarios. I could imagine my parents and what they’d say if they ever learned I ditched the field trip to explore the city. But I also knew Jeanie needed me. She didn’t want to run away, not really, she couldn’t have. And even if she had, I bet she probably wanted to change her mind.
“Cover for me,” I said as I thrust my sketchpad and pen box into Stephanie’s hands. Her eyes got as big as soccer balls and her face drained of what little color it had.
“No way, Mrs. Thompas would kill me. I’ll get detention.”
“Steph, Jeanie’s safety is a little more important than if you get detention or not.” She raised her eyebrow as if she wasn’t too sure. Racing to the front of the bus I pushed the other kids back into their seat and squeezed by.
Unwritten Rules Page 1
