Nineteen
____________
Life's Reality
A loud noise awoke Jenny from
her nap as abruptly as a spray of cold water from a garden hose on a hot summer
day.
Must be the boys! Jenny nudged her door open quietly and proceeded to
the top of the staircase to take a peek.
“Yo, gangsta dude,” one boy
jested.
“If I be the gangsta,” the
second youth stepped back slightly, “then you gots Victim written all over your
ugly face, punk.”
As the second youth attempted to
run, the first boy grabbed him and the two fell to the floor wrestling and
laughing.
“Boys,” Cynthia shouted,
“Please, not in the house.”
The two quickly stood and
replied, “Yes, Miss Lafferty, we’re sorry.”
She looked at the two and
smiling replied, “No you’re not, don’t try and kid me.”
The boys broke into laughter
again.
“Did both of you have a good
day?” Miss Lafferty inquired.
“Marvelous,” Nash answered.
El Pino responded, “Yes, ma’am!”
“We have a new resident, boys.
Her assigned room is on the upper floor and,” Cynthia took a breath and adapted
a stern look, “I don’t need to remind you two of the rules, do I?”
“No, Miss Lafferty,” the two
affirmed.
Looking up toward the top of the
staircase, the group saw Jenny peering down.
Cynthia invited her to join them
and meet two of the three fellow residents of the Chandler Mansion. Jenny
walked slowly down the stairs to join them in the entry.
“The name’s Nash, but my real
name is Barry King,” he reached out his hand, but Jenny only nodded a reply.
“I’m El Pino and my real name is
Paco Gonzales.”
“I’m Jenny,” she almost smiled,
“and my beyond real name is Jenny Philips.”
The boys broke into laughter
again.
Nash responded, “Beyond real… I
like you already.”
“Jenny is here on an early
release program from the new teen women’s prison. Just so you know, boys,” Cynthia
informed the two.
“Y-MAX-Women’s Prison?”
questioned an excited El Pino.
Cynthia confirmed, “One and the
same.”
“Cool, I guess,” commented Nash.
“Not so cool if you had to live
there,” Jenny replied.
“I guess not, sorry,” Nash
repented.
Miss Lafferty departed, leaving
the three youths to enjoy a more private and open atmosphere for conversation.
“Well… Paco and Barry--”
“Low blow, ha, ha,” Barry
moaned, “usin’ our real names.”
“Just messin’ with ya.” Jenny
continued her conversation with the two boys in the large entry area room she
had observed upon her arrival. The three youths sat down on a very grand
looking sofa.
“What you been in prison for?”
inquired Barry, aka Nash.
“Let’s wait a while on that one.
I’d rather not say just yet… you know, until we all get to know one another
better,” responded Jenny.
“You ain’t no serial killer, are
you?” questioned El Pino, half joking, half serious.
“Nope, not yet. We’ll have to
see what the future holds.”
The three laughed.
“What about you guys? What got
you here?”
El Pino explained his background
in Los Angeles gang activity, car thefts, burglaries and a robbery. He was a
small youth with a three inch
scar on his neck obtained
courtesy of a knife fight when he was only twelve.
Nash did not want to talk about
his life.
“Where’d you get the name… El
Pino?” Jenny asked Paco.
Looking proud, he replied, “I
was raised in East LA in the neighborhood of the famous El Pino tree. My mom
gave me that nickname when I was little. She’d say ‘You’ll grow up big and
strong like that tree one day, Paco, so I’m gonna call you El Pino.’”
“Tree… mendous,” responded
Jenny.
“What about you, Nash?”
“My name?”
“Yeah, it’s cool soundin’”
encouraged Jenny, seeing the boy’s reluctance to reply.
“Well,” he stood and removed his
shirt to reveal his back.”
“Nash, you’ll get in trouble,” a
nervous El Pino whispered.
Nash’s back was covered with
ornate tattoos that appeared to be fading in color. Some Jenny recognized, but
others appeared as mysterious as a secret code in a spy movie.
Nash quickly replaced his shirt
and while buttoning it up informed, “I was about six years old when my junkie
dad dosed me with some type of drug and tattooed my back with
international gang symbols, Russian Mafia, the 893 of the Yakuza, some Chinese
stuff… so, the term Nash come from the inter-Nash-ional aspect of it all.”
“Whoa,” Jenny gasped.
“Ain’t no thing now,” Nash
sighed. “I’ve been in foster homes and group homes ever since they took me away
from the jerk. This home is the best yet. Never knew my mom… at least I
think I didn’t. I sort of remember a blonde lady in a kitchen, but I can’t be
sure.”
Changing the subject quickly,
Jenny said, “When I was in that Y-MAX prison I asked one of the officers why
she had a rifle. She told me it was in case she ever needed to take out
the trash.”
The three laughed before they
realized the sarcasm of the officer’s words, then silence blanketed the room.
“Enough of this talk,” stated El
Pino.
“I agree,” Jenny confirmed.
“What about the other kid who lives here, where’s he?”
“Amir,” responded Nash, “he’s
out doin’ community service work today. He should be home any time now. They
only work six hours.”
“Community service?” questioned
Jenny.
Nash continued, “Yeah, it’s part
of his sentence… so many hours of work detail, like cuttin’ trees, grinding up
branches in a chipper machine, clearing hiking trails… that kinda stuff.”
“Has he also got a r-e-a-l
name?” Jenny inquired.
“Just... Amir Rostami,” answered
El Pino. “His family is from Kurdistan in Iran, so he says. They got run out of
Iran, went to Iraq and run out of there, then off to Turkey and forced to
leave there, denied asylum in France, granted asylum in Norway, then moved here
on some special government program, or somethin’… I ain’t quite sure about
all the details. You can ask him someday if you want to.”
“He’s seen folks lined up, shot,
and bulldozed into mass graves in Iraq, even some of his own family!” exclaimed
Nash. “No little kid should be seein’ that kinda stuff.”
El Pino added, “When they lived
in Iraq, his father drove a taxi. One day after comin’ home from work and they
was all sleepin’, some type of Iraqi soldiers pulled them outta bed, drug
them outside, then blasted their house to the ground with a bazooka or LAZ
rocket of some type. Now that’s cold.”
“And I be thinkin’ I had it bad
as a kid,” Jenny responded, and then thought to herself, I did!
Not wishing to press the issue
of Jenny’s background, the boys decided to take her on a tour of the house and
grounds. Brass door handles, expensive looking wood trim, chandeliers, and
even small ivory sculptures in a glass case all reflected the grandeur
of the For His Glory Youth Home.
“This mansion is… a mansion.”
Jenny commented as she realized how large the home actually was.
The kitchen looked like
something out of a television chef competition show.
“I’ve never seen a kitchen so
huge in real life,” Jenny admired.
As the trio exited through the
large kitchen’s back door, they noticed Amir sitting under a tree in the shade.
“Amir!”
Next Chapter: I Scream for Ice Cream
No comments:
Post a Comment