King
For the first and only time since I’d known Rossi, I was grateful for something he’d done. Even though it was completely under duress, Rossi had still told me where to find my old crew, and, without him, I would still be aimlessly searching for them.
The address that I’d arrived at, an old and partially dilapidated house on the outskirts of town, was a place that I wouldn’t have found on my own, even though, now that I arrived, I immediately recognized it as someplace my old friends would likely occupy. It was a general rule of the crew to only ever occupy places that didn’t look like much on the outside and that were uninviting enough that they wouldn’t draw any attention, apart from pitiful looks and the casual comment every so often as someone walked by. It was in the perfect location, too. It was not suspiciously isolated, but not crowded enough that someone might start to pay too much attention.
It worried me that I could still fall so easily back into the mindset of my crew, but, then again, I used to be one of them.
Though I’d been preparing for this moment since I had learned that they had betrayed me, I hadn’t specifically planned out what I would actually do once I found them. I felt a little like Christy, impulsively making plans without arranging all the details. Standing outside the old house, I let my anger build inside me and act as a motivator to go in. I finally stepped inside, completely set on getting vengeance, though still not entirely sure how.
I wasn’t sure why the inside of the house shocked me as much as it did. From the outside of the house, I should have been able to predict what I would see inside, but I hadn’t. It had nothing to do with the house, either, and everything to do with the people in it.
It was definitely my old crew in the house, that much was for certain. The moment I stepped past the threshold, I spotted a sleeping or unconscious Sammy to the right of me. A few more steps in, and there was Joseph, sitting absently in a chair and seeming totally transfixed by the blank wall in front of him. Further in, there was Danny, Ryan, and Tim, all in various stages of unconsciousness. I wasn’t unfamiliar with the use of drugs from my past, but never like this. A strong odor lingered in the air and seemed to hand heavily over them all.
It was amazing how quickly the bulk of my anger began to dissipate at the sight of them, as I kept walking through the house. At the end of the room, sitting on the bottom step of the staircase, was Dane. I approached him carefully, wondering if he was asleep, unconscious, resting, or the last option that I couldn’t even imagine.
“Dane?” I asked, placing a hand on his shoulder and giving him a light shake.
“King?” he called out uncertainly. “Hey, man! Good to see you!” I didn’t know how he could sound so cheerful and look so depleted.
“Don, what’s going on?” I didn’t want to waste time, when any idiot could see that there was something really wrong with the situation that I had stepped into.
“What do you mean? I’m so glad to see you. Hey, everyone! It’s King!”
Though there was no response, Don acted as if a large cheer had sounded out and was grinning goofily up at me. He reminded me of a child seeking approval from an adult, but the worst part was that I was meant to be the adult in the situation. How had Done ended up like this?
I felt my entire viewpoint shift as I stared down at the shell of a human being before me. I’d never seen any of my friends as bad off as they were now. It was hard to believe that they were all hooked on drugs, every single one of them. How did I not notice that the last time I saw them? They looked completely different, from their skin to their eyes. I should’ve noticed something was wrong. Maybe I would have, if I hadn’t felt so monumentally betrayed.
Don pushed himself off the stairs shakily and wobbled a little on his feet, but managed to lean forward and place his mouth at my ear. I almost drew back at the vile odor coming off of him, but I held my ground, wanting to hear the apology that I was sure was coming.
“King. King. I know you can help us. Do you have a little money you wanna throw our way?” He gave me a wide smile that I thought he intended to be convincing, but I just stared back in disgust and disbelief.
So, this was what my friends’ lives had come to. They were hooked on an arsenal of drugs and desperate for money. I didn’t know how to react, or how to process. All I’d come here for was to get even for their betrayal, but I might not even be able to do that; not when any revenge I got would either not be worth it or be too extreme.
“Don, you and the crew betrayed me. I’m not helping you,” I said angrily. That much I was sure of. There was no way I was fueling their problem. Not when it was so obviously already out of hand.
“Oh, man! That’s not fair. We feel bad about it. We really do! But the money, man. It was so much.”
I realized, in that moment, that the man standing before me wasn’t the Dane I knew. He was a shell of the man that had once been my friend. Selling me out for more money for drugs? That wasn’t something I could ever forgive. But, strangely, all desire for revenge had completely left me, and so I was just able to stand there in shock and disappointment.
I’d never said or felt it before, but I was incredibly glad I wasn’t part of the crew anymore, now that I’d taken a good, long look at them. Why would I be part of a bunch of drugged up criminals, a group of people who would willingly betray one of their own, if it meant they could get money to further their drug habit. No, I was glad I was on the outs, even if I never thought I would see the day when I was.
How could I even think about revenge on them, being as they were? Would I even get any satisfaction out of it? Half of them barely realized I was there, and the rest probably wouldn’t even notice after I’d come and gone. After searching for so long, waiting so long for answers, and trying my hardest to control the overwhelming sense of betrayal that had been hanging heavily over my head for quite some time, I felt a strange sense of freedom wash over me. Not because I had finally found them, or because I finally understood how they could’ve done something like that. I felt freedom because I knew there was nothing to get revenge on. I could just walk away and feel confident in the fact that they had already punished themselves enough. In a way, they were their own worst enemies.
“Do you want to come meet everyone again?” Dane asked, not waiting for a response before walking away and speaking with a person lying face down on the floor. The man lying there didn’t even attempt to respond, but Dane continued carrying on a conversation anyway, most of it sounding like nothing more than incoherent gabble.
I was getting sick of this now. This wasn’t how it was meant to turn out. I’d expected, no, I’d hoped, for some semblance of my old friends. They would apologize for betraying me and give me a reason that I could understand. Finding out it was just for the money for more drugs was a low blow that would be hard to recover from.
“Don, I know who everyone is,” I interrupted tiredly.
“But I wanted everyone to be awake when I told you that we wanted to give you a job in the crew again!” he called out in a huff.
I froze at his words.
“Wouldn’t that be fun, huh? If you came back. It’d be just like old times.”
I stood shocked into stillness as I processed his words. Come back to the crew? Really?
For a moment, I considered it. I really, truly considered it, and I saw my whole life flash in front of my eyes.
They were my family. Sitting all around the room, regardless of their states of awareness, were my brothers and sisters. No matter how dysfunctional they were, they were my whole life at one point. We didn’t grow up with proper homes, proper lives, or parents who loved and cared for us. No, we grew up with nobody but each other. We made a name for ourselves, taught each other what we knew, and fought for the chance to make something out of ourselves. We grew up on the wrong side of the law and stayed that way. The story wasn’t uncommon, and we weren’t special. But we stayed together, through thick and thin. Or we had.
But I had something better now. I had something to hold on to. When my so-called ‘family’ had left me behind and moved on without a backward glance, I found myself in a better situation than I had ever dreamed. I found myself with Christy.
I never understood, really, when people described someone as a game changer. I never understood how one person could change your entire outlook on life and make you want to think better, do better, and be better. How could one person be responsible for all of that?
But then I met Christy, and I understood.
She was the one bright point in my life, through all the darkness. She was the one who would keep me going through everything I had endured. She was the one who I needed to back to at the end of the night in order to be content with the world.
Yes, I thought about Don’s offer. But families came in all shapes and sizes, and, honestly, Christy was enough for me.
“I’m not coming back, Don. But I need your help.”