Livin' After Midnight

by Tom Nelson

  In 2009, Tom has had twelve years of sobriety. It still amazes him! He really didn’t know life without drugs and alcohol was possible until twelve years ago. All of his sober friends laugh about that. Tom has been out of prison almost seven years and has owned his new business in LA for two years. Tom is working his ass off night and day to keep his business afloat during the second year of the worst crash in stock market history. The entire nation is in a recession and has been since the end of June 2008.

  Tom still feels compelled, however, to speak at rehab and outreach centers. The three speakers make it through the hallway and into a small auditorium. There is no stage. No curtain. Just a large open room with dozens of rows of foldable chairs. It looks like a large twelve-step meeting to Tom every time he enters this room. The only difference, he guesses, is that the majority of this audience will be kids. Young people growing up in South-Central LA at the end of the crack epidemic, then going directly into an economic depression. These kids’ lives sucked! This is the time to make an impression on them though, Tom always says, because the more experience in this life they have the colder and harder to reach they will become.

  Across the room are tables with plain tablecloths, paper plates, plastic cutlery, a coffeepot, and various snacks and other refreshments. No alcohol served here, thank you very much. From where they entered the room, the three can see everything going on. A thin African American man is serving himself a snack on a paper plate and saying something with a chuckle to the person beside him.

  “Johnny!” Tom calls out. “Johnny Dollar!”

  Johnny turns around and an enormous smile splits his face. There, in the flesh, stands his old friend Tom-Tom. Johnny starts calling Tom that after hearing Biggie and King use the nickname so frequently. They are at the new outreach center that Johnny has purchased. Apparently, he managed to stash quite a bit of money during his crack years! Of course, so many buildings and properties are available now, because a lot of the businesses are unable to survive the recession. So, Johnny takes advantage of huge drops in prices by desperate property owners and purchases an extremely quaint old building in South-Central.

  “Man! Look at you! Still pumpin’ iron, I see.” Tom still maintains a very athletic physique. He was in sports during his youngest years in school and started lifting weights at age seventeen while in a South Carolina prison, so being active in some way has always been part of Tom’s life.

  Despite how horrible his lifestyle had become during his heavy crack days, Tom always managed to remain active and in pretty good shape.

  Of course, fighting is an excellent workout! And, lord knows he’s done enough of that through the years. Tom can’t count the number of fights he has been in but figures the number to be around a hundred. He can easily remember the one fight he lost. Tom is an excellent fighter. A survivor. Now though, all of his fighting is done at Wild Card Boxing Club gym, not in local parks.

  “Yeah,” Tom responds in a playfully sarcastic tone, “It’s my business these days, Johnny.”

  “I know that, fool!” Johnny says mock-defensively. The person he had been socializing with at the refreshment table has continued on to other snacks.

  “Oh, that’s right,” Tom says, “that’s because of your photostatic memory!” Tom laughs, as do Juan and Molly. They have already heard the story of Johnny’s infamous photostatic memory. They seem to enjoy that one.

  “Fuck you, Tom-Tom!” Johnny is feigning being hurt.

  “You’re not my type, Johnny,” comes Tom’s smart-ass reply. The entire group is laughing now.

  “Man,” Johnny says with a more serious tone, but the word is drawn out, “thank you, guys, for bein’ here tonight. It means a lot to me. And I know it will mean a lot to at least one of those little fuckers out there.” He nods at the group of rowdy youngsters who are piling in through doors on the opposite side of the room.

  “No sweat, Johnny,” Juan replies in his heavy East LA accent. “It’s always good to see you guys.”

  “Yeah,” Molly chimes in. “It’s good to be among friends.”

  “So, who’s goin’ first?” Johnny asks as he stands there smiling and wringing his hands. He will be doing a very brief introduction of each person to the audience, but the speakers will be the ones who draw these kids in. Johnny loves the work he is doing now. It makes him feel as though he is redeeming his soul for the crimes against humanity he committed during the crack epidemic. Besides, it sure beats the hell out of slinging crack, getting shot at, and ending up in prison!

  “Juan is starting us off tonight,” Tom says. “It’s his turn.”

  “Yeah,” Molly chimes her agreement again.

  “Okay,” Juan responds in his heavy East LA accent, “you know I got no problem with dat. Let’s do dis shit!”

  “All right,” Johnny says in an excited voice. He has finished his snack and is ready to get this show started. Johnny walks to the front of the room and begins to speak. No microphone is needed for this small venue. One of these days, Johnny thinks, I’ll buy a huge cathedral . . .

  The End?

  (Don’t count on it!)