Flash Fiction: My Wall

 My newest hobby has been throwing stuff at my wall. Any stuff really. 

It’s a white wall on the outside of my house with a window that looked into nowhere in particular. I’ve thrown everything I’ve had at it. 

 

Empty beer bottles. Old ceramics I got tired of. Food I don’t feel eating. Apples from a tree that’s been here longer than me. Extra plates. Colored glass. I even throw myself at it, on days when I really want to feel something. 

 

One time, after a grocery run, I decided to make a fruit salad and it eventually got mixed with some stucco. It was delicious. 

 

I thought about throwing paint, but reasoned I was never an “artistic” type, even with a preponderance of free time. Don’t have the patience for it. These days, I’ve proven myself to be more of a “throwing random crap at the wall” type of guy. Besides, it wasn’t the color of the wall that kept training my throwing arm. 

 

Every time the trash needs taking out or when the lawn needs trimming, I have to look at that wall, unchanged in the twenty-five years this house has stood. This house has under my name for eight years. I’m still paying off the mortgage, one month at a time. With a new lease on life, everything inside the house got changed up. The old furniture was thrown out and replaced with heavenly leather cushions and finely cut coffee tables. All the walls got repainted and an entire room was renovated into my new home office. The big wooden desk is my most prized possession. My constant rock in daily life, before isolation.  

 

Moving in can be a chaotic time for a new homeowner, but I assured myself to make the most of it. 

 

After all of the changes, I was happy to say I took pride in my home. What’s the point of living life in one place if you couldn’t say that? 

 

My current problem is that I’m stuck in it. And I changed everything about this house except the outside. 

 

The leather furniture has grown uncomfortable with constant use. My prized work desk feels more like a tether than a sanctuary. It’s torture going to the garage and into my car since there is nowhere to go and nothing worth getting, besides groceries and a rented movie. 

 

So seeing that wall, unchanging for all these years… It makes a guy want to experiment. Seeing crap break is also very cathartic. 

 

Is this healthy? No. 

 

Is it helping me better understand my current situation and what I can or cannot control? Of course not. 

 

But it is something to do, and as long as no one is here to judge me for it, I will keep doing it. The neighbors don’t talk to each other. There are no social engagements in the future. I still got books in case this new hobby gets stale. 

 

Doubtful that will happen though. 

 

Thank God I live alone.

Flash Fiction: An Ink Mess

  

“This… looks like a mess.” 

 

That’s what a mother, here named Andrea Parker, said to her son when he proudly showed off his latest ink drawing. Let’s call this son… Neil. 

 

Neil Orlando Parker. 

 

Now, Neil is a thirteen-year-old kid just starting high school. He’s at that age of opportunity where any kind of club or group would welcome him with open arms. During the Involvement Fair, he found a nice group of kids called the Inkers Club. It is an art club that focuses on teaching students about sketching and drawing with ink pens and practicing calligraphy. While unfamiliar to Neil, the idea of putting shapes to paper really appealed to him. So, he signed up for their newsletter. 

 

Meetings took place every Wednesday during lunch hour at a special recreation room on the east end of the school campus. Thirty students in total made up the club. The student leader Michael was assisted by a beginning art teacher Ms. Willingham, and after all of the members’ introductions, the first creative exercise began. Everyone took a blank piece of paper, a metal tip pen, and a jar of black ink. The directive: to take whatever they could imagine and put it to the page. No restrictions. No critique. Complete freedom. Complete support. 

 

Out of everything high school offered, it was the freedom that most excited Neil. The chance to let his mind run wild on a wide-open plain of white pulp with black trails of ink became such a wonderful thing. The chaotic thoughts of the mind found their home on the page to create a full illustration. 

 

It wasn’t bad, for a beginner. The main visual theme of the piece was spirals. The continuous line showed a variety of line thickness and depth, starting thick and dark black on the outside but growing thinner and lighter once the spiral reaches the center. 

 

For his first art piece, Neil chose the title “Ebony Gyres.” He found both words in a dictionary lying around the recreation room. They sounded super cool say. 

 

His fellow students were impressed. Ms. Willingham said it revealed the creative and experimental mind Neil had. The compliments got Neil buzzing. He ran home with the drawing safely tucked into his backpack, just so excited to show his mom he had a great day at school. He may have found what he wanted to do as a career. He looked forward to what his mother, his supporter in all things would say. 

 

When Andrea held “Ebony Gyres” in her hands, the reaction was not at all what he expected or what he hoped for. 

 

“This… looks like a mess.” His own mother said that. She may not have meant the way it sounded, but the effect it had on Neil is just the same. She did not understand the art, but it still hurt. 

 

The hurt won’t stop him. He does need to get better, but it’ll be for just himself. He’ll need to reread that dictionary. 

Short Story: The Empty Grave

 

It was an odd sized casket, too small for a man, too big for a child. A flag was draped over it, a smallish one. It was carried by four men in uniform, though it was hard to tell for sure from a distance what uniform it was, or even if they were all men. There wasn't room for the usual six pallbearers due to the small size of the casket since it would have made for a comical service to have all six jammed together, shoulder-to-shoulder, crowding around an under-sized coffin. So the extra pallbearers were in the ranks of many others in uniform standing beside a small open grave. The officiant wore a robe instead of a uniform and must have said something because there was a long silence, then a burst of laughter. 

Bastards. They couldn’t even pretend to hold a proper funeral for me. If I had to guess, I’d say the officiant, a religious weasel of a man named High Father Ashton, recited the usual burial rites from the Book of Royals; but, when he got to the part of my spirit deserving a place spirits in heaven, everyone, even the men carrying that empty coffin, just lost it. All priests needed to say these words during an event like this. They also needed to act respectfully while doing so, but Ashton turned out to be as horrid a priest as he is a man. 

I barely heard what they said before in hushed “reverent” tones, but I could plainly hear them now, riotously howling at my demise. Like a wild pack of sick hyenas you’d find in the far continent, laughing themselves to death.  This pack contained seven men total, neatly arranged and standing straight and narrow for the performance. Three stood at the tombstone and four a few paces in front of it. The four Royal Soldiers were the ones carrying the coffin, of course. Strong men, but not bright ones despite the metallic shine of their helmets, swords and belts. Their military decorations all adorned in silver with intricate markings to denote their prestigious ranks. High Father Ashton placed himself behind my tombstone. His pretentious white robes blew in the wind as he raised his thin, rickety arms, trying to regain his composure and continue the ritual. At the left of Ashton was his toady Ascendant Morgan, a spoiled fat cat sweaty from tears of laughter, and at his right was the toady’s toady Gregory. Out of everyone there, it was the meek Gregory who kept his laughter to just a slight chuckle, not out of respect but out of his pathetic inability to offend his masters. Without them around, he’d be laughing the loudest, and they would find him incredibly annoying. 

I watch them with an older pair of binoculars, hiding in a tall, heavily foliaged tree. This tree was one of hundreds on the forest’s edge. That puts me about a few yards away from the Royal Graveyard, where all burials are held. The tree line easily rose above the gray stone walls, allowing for a clear line of sight. I couldn’t help but chuckle, seeing them break character, if only for a moment or two. Them cracking under these pretensions was a foreseeable outcome since it involved the men that mediated my assassination. Honoring me in my final moments before my arrival at the great hereafter? Honoring a boy that they despised with their entire beings? Clearly as ridiculous to them as it is to me. Honoring tradition and honoring the dead after a murder and a dishonorable seizure of power. The great two-faced absurdity of a coup d’état. 

Unfortunately for them, I survived, but just barely. They tried to poison me, and by “they” I really meant High Father Ashton. He had it out for me since I inherited the throne eight months ago. He spent decades in the kingdom’s service and believed in ideals opposite of my own. Since he decided to poison a young man of royalty, one could easily surmise how dark and cutthroat these ideals were. He considered my father, the previous king, the greatest mind and leader of his time. By comparison, it became destiny for me to become an inadequate replacement, and someone who just had to go. The poison was cooked into my afternoon soup, chicken broth with carrots. The venomous concoction took its toll, so then Ashton tasked one of the lunkhead soldiers with stuffing my fresh corpse and some jagged rocks into a burlap sack. That same lunkhead soldier then threw the sack, with my limp body inside, into the moat, which fed into a great and perilous river. By all rights, the High Father’s assassination plot should have worked, but the priest, or one of his lackeys, made one fatal flaw. 

He gave me paralysis poison instead of death poison. It turned out a quick dousing in ice-cold water made an effective cure for that particular malady. Desperate, I began to squirm my ways upwards. The river’s current violently drug me along. After getting swept twenty miles downstream, I managed to loosen the sack’s knot, quite lazily made come to think of it, and launched myself into the freezing stream, properly escaping from death. I crawled my way onto the riverbank, gasping for air. The poison and chill waters sapped whatever strength I could muster. Miles away from my castle home, I laid there in the mud, unable to reach shelter or even cover myself. Desperate prayers for survival escaped in my shuttered ramblings. 

A traveling farmer and his mule soon answered them. The oafish farmer had no idea who I was, thankfully, but that didn’t stop him from offering his hand to pull me back up. Having revealed himself as the kind sort of man, that farmer took me, a stranger, into his home and nourished me back to health. Once I halfway restored my wits and vigor, I relished the chance to take back my throne and rub this particular failure into the face of the High Father and his toadies. However, practicing my own common sense, I recognized the foolishness to approach any priest or soldier now. They are the ones who wanted me dead, and they got what they wanted. They expressly announced their mutiny and discordance against anyone who was of royal blood, and I was the last Royal still alive. So, things will fare better for me if they continue to believe I was dead. More time was needed to properly come up with a strategy though. With the farmer’s express permission, I maintained room and board and began my physical and mental training, exercising in the fields and working whatever mills that needed extra hands. I needed to sharpen my entire being for the tasks ahead, and all the while I kept up with the news and gossip coming from the castle. Months after I returned to full strength, I discovered Ashton had gained command of the entire military, putting himself at the top of the command chain. With the might of the Royal army, he pointed it at any subversive or neighboring kingdom that dared raise a complaint. No one on the continent wanted to give him an excuse to use it. 

A few more minutes pass. A migratory flock of birds made their flight across the horizon by the time the laughter subsided. Ashton coughed out orders to cease the revelry. He commanded the rest to fall silent or face a prompt execution. The soldiers, their expressions reset in stone, went upright again, raising that empty wooden coffin and ragged kingdom flag back into the air. The priests, once again, clasped their hands in insincere prayer. Ashton brought a large, leather-bound book back up to his beady eyes and turned a few pages. The Book of Royals. Returning to the burial rites, he skipped over the book’s section about my soul, as well as the accompanying gospel. Next he began to recite my name with all its royal signifiers. My name, as I realized when I first learned it during childhood, was much too long to properly memorize or write down, even for a recon report. So, I tuned out the priest’s words. It’s not a name much worth listening to anyway, considering I don’t use it anymore. 

Unmoved from my position, I keep my watch from afar. I analyze how the participants moved on with this sham of a private ceremony. By traditional kingdom law, they are required to do upon the death and burial of a royal, but anyone watching with any sense or honor would have recognized the ignoble heartlessness that defined the proceedings. As nice as it was to see the priests and those soldiers in their hysterics, finally appearing more like humans than cruel and stoic fascists, I couldn’t help but feel a twinge of pain in my heart when they began the sham anew. It’s still my death they were laughing about. Hell, they are practically celebrating it, putting the memory of the last Royal to an eternal, undistinguished rest. They tried to kill a young king, and they almost got away with it. 

Memories of childhood arose from the forgotten dark corners of my mind. Watching the drills and sparring matches between the Royal Soldiers. Attending the speeches of the High Father and his Ascendants. Foundational experiences during my youth, where I learned the value of strength in the service of others. The bedrock from which I developed the ideals of responsibility and benevolence for my destined time on the throne. I cherished the memories and those noble images from back then, before bitterness came to define my being. It hurt to imagine how such institutions, built over generations, started going so wrong. Quickly, I shake off that small pain and suppress those warm memories. With a slap across the face, I remind myself why I’m here, stuck in a tree and investigating those bastards. This was a recon mission for someone else. A task in service of my new goal and my new job. It’s a favor building toward partnership with my boss, a black-haired and broad-shouldered woman named Phillipa. This was not my personal vacation watching the stupidity of my would-be killers. It was pure luck that I managed to get this mission without scrutiny as Phillipa was another farmhand with no idea who I am or was. If she knew my origin, it was guaranteed that she’d pull her sword and kill me on the spot.

See, royalty was not just unpopular within Ashton’s Church. It was vehemently despised outside the palace gates throughout the farmlands and townships, for pretty clear reasons too. The king before me, my father, and the king before him, my grandfather, prided themselves as men of law and order. That meant increasing military power and spreading their political influence further across the continent. The two men even threatened to invade the territories of neighboring kingdoms if they failed to make certain agreements. My predecessors were popular in their day as everyone from the rich to the poor felt the intoxicating fervor of flag-waving. However, in a more enlightened age, they started to rightfully be viewed as warmongers, endangering the safety of the populace with the consolidation of force and the fragility of monarchical authority. Obviously, Ashton’s new control of it all would prove those views right, but before his coup, I recognized the changing winds of public opinion and sought to divest that familial legacy during my reign. A changing of the guard and the surrender of arms. Peace treaties and the distribution of wealth. Those were my first goals as king once my father had his accident and the throne got hastily passed down to me. It was those goals that drove the church and army to kill me before I gained too much trust and support from the public. Their plot occurred within the first two months of my rule. Most tragically, those traitors deposed me before I could even make a good impression upon the people with a great speech or public appearance. 

Lost and alone within a citizenry of around two million irritable but passionate souls made it perilous to venture out without protection. They still viewed me as the same kind of man my father and grandfather were, which would result in a grisly death if they ever discovered my identity. Still, I had to find my back into power somehow. That is where Phillipa and her revolutionaries came in. Once I met their agents at a backwater pub in a game of cards, my plan began to form. Phillipa Finch recognized the changing winds too, but instead sought to stoke fires of anger and rebellion within the people in order to overthrow the royal family and install a democratic government. A very admirable goal, but one that would lead to a preponderance of violence, beginning with dead citizens in the streets and ending with the rich and well-off under a guillotine. From childhood, I had the privilege of learning about war secondhand while practicing the tenants of peace and prosperity. Phillipa, being born a peasant, only learned war from my father and his soldiers. She told me it was the harshest of lessons. Phillipa lost everything due to my father’s actions, from her livelihood to even one of her eyes. The impassioned speeches she would give in protest against that injustice would gather people from all lands and trades. Those speeches turned into calls for action, which then grew into an underground rebellion army called the Rising Tide. I found the name odd, considering we are a landlocked kingdom, but it turned out the semantics didn’t matter once you became a believer and went to the gatherings. In caves and sewer tunnels, Phillipa held meetings of strategy and indulged her soldiers with fantasies of gore when they got their hands around the throats of the royalty and churchmen.

It was an army, but not a particularly organized or well thought-out one. That disorganization is part of my plan and the primary reason I now work for someone who wants to kill me as much as my religious rivals in the court did. While they did not know my secret, we shared a common enemy. High Father Ashton and his Ascendants, along with the military might of the kingdom, will be our primary antagonists in the coming conflict. The people needed to be united and properly prepared if they even hoped to have a chance against him. This recon mission will be the first step towards that. Afterwards, I’ll report that the church just buried the last royal, omitting the unprofessional behavior of the participants and the fact that the whole burial was a sham. Without a commanding royal to worry about, Phillipa will begin the rebellion in earnest, falsely believing the army to be in disarray. She’ll immediately be met with Ashton’s strategic prowess, stopping the Rising Tide in its tracks and weakening its morale. However, she will encounter a savior. A random agent. A fresh, strangely clean face. This man will just so happen to say the right things to keep her spirits high and renew her assault against the enemy. He will also happen to know the strategies and weaknesses of the castle and its inhabitants, eventually becoming the ace that will lead them down the long, hard-bitten road to victory. 

Phillipa will remember this agent from a previous recon mission, before the insurrection started. She heard that he had connections to a royal gravedigger, an elderly man tasked with digging all the graves of deceased royals. That responsibility also meant spending his entire life in the graveyard, with only intricately carved tombstones to keep him company, never leaving and never talking to anyone. Like all others in this kingdom, the royal gravedigger had great reason to hate the monarchy. So, on one fateful morning, he encountered this young agent, who recognized his struggle and wanted to free him in exchange for information. Eager to assist in the monarchy’s downfall, he promptly told the agent about a big ceremony held by High Father Ashton. Phillipa would send this same agent out for recon and he would tell her all he needed her to hear. That agent, as could be easily guessed, is me and that ceremony is my own burial, just as I knew it would be. 

Besides the strategic reasons, I wanted this recon mission so I could witness the bastards spit on my memory. I slowly notated which one of them should die first. I already decided that the High Father would be the first to go, but that would run against Phillipa’s intentions in the future. Once the Tide finally won, and with my knowledge and strategy they will, she will want to make an example of the highest man on the totem pole. That would be Ashton facing the end of Phillipa’s blade, but I wanted our encounter to be more private. A final confrontation where he is completely at my mercy, dying only to know that he failed, and I won. 

The solution to getting that is simple. Through my shrewd espionage, it shall be revealed that High Father Ashton’s second-in-command, Ascendant Morgan, really pulls the strings. The new figurehead of the kingdom is a mere puppet. So, the puppet master will receive the worst punishment. Everyone, except the executed of course, will be satisfied. The risk of pulling such a deceptive maneuver will be great, as I understand, but that bridge will be burned once I get to it. Despite the stress and betrayal inherent to this whole endeavor, I found that violent thoughts and duplicitous schemes came remarkably easy to me. Ever since I joined the Tide, my thoughts fluctuated from a virtuous desire to help the downtrodden towards the burning hunger for vengeance against those that wronged me. An unhealthy state of mind for sure, but one that has not gotten in the way of anything as of yet. For the foreseeable future, I just needed to keep my composure and hold my best cards to my chest, so to speak. With enough favors and patience, Phillipa will reward me with a position in her army and government, where my real work will begin. 

With a great force, High Father Ashton slams the Book of Royals shut. Even I felt how hard he closed it, despite my distance. A portentous omen maybe, but more of a sign that Ashton wanted to get this done as much as I did. I appreciate his forwardness. He pointed to the soldiers who slowly put my coffin on the funeral grounds. Strapped to their backs were instruments with ivory grips, finely cut wooden handles and gold rectangular blades. The royal shovels. Everything about my family and my life had to be so damn royal. The golden blades made their first cuts into verdant grass and royal earth. The priests began a song-like prayer of gibberish. It was now time to dig my grave. 

From there, the ceremony went at a snail’s crawl. Hours passed as the soldiers halfheartedly threw up dirt, the four separate piles growing taller with each successive heave. Instead of the gravedigging, I keep my line of sight directed at Ashton, Morgan and Gregory. I memorized every crack in their wrinkled faces and every industry they could control. I plotted on the exploitation of their weaknesses and the details of their executions. If there has been one valuable thing to develop while working within Rising Tide, it is the acceptance and hope for bloodlust. I found myself eager to put my new skills to practice in the coming uprising. I imagined myself plunging a blade into the hearts of the wicked. The Rising Tide celebrates me as I do so. Then I remember I’m still royalty, raised to be better than some mindless beast. The immediate shame gnaws at my mind. The lessons and virtues I’ve learned grip my heart. Memories of youth shine brighter; despite the ghostly pain they bring. I need to be better than that if I hope to bring peace. 

Hours pass. Evening begins and the sun starts its descent. Now unsatisfied with my placid position, I slide down my recon tree and make my way towards the graveyard walls. I wanted to secure a closer look. Not for the mission but for me. Well-camouflaged and safe within the shade of the coming twilight, I climb over the graveyard walls into the royal burial ground. In the final moments of the ceremony, as much of a sham as it is, I needed to see my empty casket laid to rest. It was my funeral after all. Crouching behind gravestones and darting from shadow to shadow, I keep my distance and stay out of sight from any watchful gazes. The closest I can get is about a half-dozen meters away. An old mausoleum, probably a great uncle’s or a great-great grandfather’s, provides an adequate hiding place. Away from prying eyes, kneeling in one last show of deference to the kingdom I used to believe in, I watch the coffin and start to pray for my future. 

The grave wasn’t ready until sunset, so the whole event was rushed and disorganized, except for the very last part.  The grave was a massive affair, more of a crater than a grave, and it took until dark to roll the casket down to the bottom. If any prayers were said, they couldn’t be heard over the dull thudding of the clods raining down on the casket far below. It was an odd sized casket, too big for a man, too small for a dream, but just right for a dynasty.  

Short Story: The Kid and the Killer

        

         The violent world kept on speeding by outside of the Angel’s Diner windows, and you could probably feel the owner’s perverse pleasure in keeping everything inside a vacuum-sealed time capsule. The decor suggested an atmosphere of optimistic prosperity that no one else could really feel, and 1950s teenybopper music jammed through the jukebox, adding to the ambience. The poppy music also blocked out any of the noises in the city, and all of the customers knew that was by design. For most of the customers, sunken into their red leather booths, this diner was a bubble, a sanctuary, of good times past and away from the troubles going on in the more modern world. Add a menu with wonderful pies and undercooked burgers into the mix, and you had the physical manifestation of the American Dream. That’s the way these people like it, visiting every now and then to marinate in the vibes after having to survive Zio City for a few days.

            However, for David, this would be his twenty-seventh day straight of having to sit in this diner, waiting for any orders, and he was one more bad cup of coffee away from rampaging to the kitchen and demanding some fresh cream and a decent amount of sugar for once. The waitress on duty immediately defused the situation when she brought the cup with ten packets of sugar and five French vanilla creamers on the small plate holding it all. David liked his drinks sweet, never bitter, but his gut twisted, and he shuffled in his seat. He was not used to having his kind of needs so graciously attended to. 

            What was even more surprising was the waitress dropping down onto the opposite chair, unbothered and inattentive toward everyone else except the well-dressed mystery man in front of her. 

            “So, what’s your story, guy,” she asked, leaning in with beaming curiosity. The white diner uniform she wore stood out from the red chairs but seemed droopy and stained, betraying the happy-go-lucky attitude servers were meant to portray. 

            David carefully pulled the coffee towards him. He made sure to avoid the girl’s line of sight, but she did not look in the mood to be ignored, especially when she threw her uniform hat onto the table. This must have been how she wanted to spend her break.

            “I’m sorry, miss, but I’m not sure what you mean by that. Thanks for the coffee and all the sugar,” he said. He then started tearing the packs and pouring them into the cup like a machine. Any sensible server would see his distaste for the waitress’s presence and go back to the counter. 

            She laughed at this poor attempt of deflection right off. 

            “Nice try, but my break goes on for the next half hour, so you got to deal with me until then,” she said. 

            “And why should I have to deal with you,” he said with a degree of annoyance. 

            “Because I see you every day in the same booth with the same coffee and additives. No one here notices things like that but I do, and when I do, I get curious and even sit with them. Like now.”

            David shifted uncomfortably in his seat. 

            “Besides, you looked real pissed coming in today and real pissed sitting down. It looked like you were going to blow up and yell at the coffee guy.”

            He took another deep, bitter sip.

            “Might as well tell me about yourself.”

            He sighed and shook his mug, a whirlpool of caffeine, milk and sugar helping him contemplate on how to go forward. He was usually a nice guy outside of the motel, so he would be a nice guy. 

            “I may have been a bit upset this morning and a little disgruntled when I came in,” he gracefully explained. “I apologize for disturbing you.”

            Another sip. The girl pursed her lips. 

            “Nope. Frustrated would be the better word for it.”

            “Oh, so you can see the nuance of a guy ‘looking pretty pissed’ huh?”

            “It’s a gift,” she sarcastically flourished, “Like I said, I notice the things other people don’t. If I had your look during a morning shift, my boss would fire me on the spot.”

            “That bad, huh?”

            “Very bad.”

            The waitress started playing with her dress’s collar, a knowing expression traveled across the table into the man’s ego. 

            “Have you ever thought of minding your own business?” David asked.

            “Absolutely not,” the waitress replied. He couldn’t help but chuckle a little at that. “Hey, there you are, smiling and feeling better. So why the whole sourpuss routine from before? Is it all the poor businesses leaving town? The garbage man strike? The subway strikes? All of the violence going on out there in the bad kind of streets? Newspapers this morning talked about this warehouse massacre with bodies stacked up and everything. No suspects, no leads. It’s crazy out there and if I had to deal with any of that, which I assume you do, I’d be angry when I’d come in for bad coffee too. So, what is it? You part of the night life? A police officer?”

            With each word the waitress said, David slowly brought his eyes downward until he was just staring down at his black pants and his sugary coffee. 

            “How close am I to any of that? Got an answer? A reply?” she droned on with the questions. 

            To be anywhere else, or to be facing anything other than this, even if it meant to die young, would be more pleasant than talking to her, he thought to himself. 

            “Come on now, my break time is vanishing by the second, and I want to make some more conversation. Don’t let me get in trouble with my boss.”

            She was right. He was frustrated, but not with anything she mentioned. He liked sitting in at the diner, but it was the lack of activity that gnawed at him. He had just been waiting, and he felt like the waiting had gone on for far too long. He couldn’t complain about it, though, or else he would be worse than fired by his boss. 

            David could see that this one waitress would talk back to her boss regularly, probably how she was able to get a half hour break this early. Guys like him, he thought to himself, did not have that kind of luxury, and even if he did, he would never go against his own boss, his leader, in anger or even speak to him in any rude manner. 

            Unlike this diner, where the boss gave this girl a job to fill out a staff, David’s boss took him in because he wanted to save his life. He just hadn’t gotten to work for him yet, and he knew he was ready for it. However, nothing had come yet. He was on the cusp of manhood in a city that still wanted to treat him like a boy. It had become painfully infuriating. 

            “I’m just waiting for a chance to prove myself,” he said. “The problem is that I’m beginning to think that it’s too late for that.” As he answered, his voice started to reveal a great sense of regret, a mixture of sadness and disappointment that he did not quite know how to digest. Truly a turmoil to tell a random retro diner waitress. 

            “Well if you’re feeling like that, then today is your lucky day,” a voice happily boomed from behind. The waitress immediately stiffened up to look at the tall man casually eavesdropping on the conversation. He was dressed in a black suit, exactly like David, but had a messy long mop of a haircut in contrast to David’s own short wash-and-wear hairstyle.

            “Eli?” David said wide-eyed, almost in disbelief.

            “Been awhile, right Davey?” 

            In an instant, the young man rose from his seat and embraced the gentleman. As they held onto each other, the waitress came to the conclusion that this regular customer is at his most comfortable and his most flagrantly dismissive when he’s with someone he knows. A minute later, David remembered the waitress was still sitting there 

            “Sorry, miss,” David apologized with a new happy pep in his voice. “This is my brother, Eli.” He gestured toward the tall, lanky man, who he still disturbingly dressed exactly like. The waitress still thought that was strange.

            However, unlike David, Eli had a much more rugged appearance. He didn’t have the soft features that made David so approachable. Everything about his face was messy and worn out, with an abundance of acne scars being the most distracting thing on his face. The two of them even had different skin tones. He looked like he’d been through a lot, and based on what David told her, it sounded like he wanted to go through the same kind of thing. Why? For him? Besides their clothes, they looked nothing alike. 

            “You’re brothers?” The waitress held an apprehensive distance toward the two men. 

            “By a common upbringing,” Eli playfully answered. “I know it doesn’t look like it, with me being more handsome and all, but I like to think family is more than blood and appearances.”

            “That’s…” she paused to find an appropriate descriptive. “Very true. I believe the same thing, honestly.” 

            “Look at that bro, she gets it. I like you!”

            “Sure, she does.” His attention quickly turned back to Eli. “What are you doing here, bro?”

            “I’m here for you, Davey. I know you’ve been waiting, and it’s time that patience was rewarded. Come out with me. We need to take a walk.”

            “Of course,” David downed the rest of his drink in one go and threw down a generous wad of cash from his pocket. Turning back to the waitress, he offered a short goodbye. “Thank you again for your time, miss.” 

            “Wait.” She put out her hand. “My name is Beth. Nice talking to you.”

            Out of politeness, he grasped her hand. “David. Nice to meet you.”

            “Think I’ll be seeing you again?”

            When David had to wait for this moment, for the call, he planned to never see this diner again. But when it came to where he was going, what he was going to become, it would be useful to have connections with someone so talkative, informed, and snoopy in the city. He'd remember the name and see how she could help him. 

            “After this, I hope so,” he slyly replied, “Let’s pray the job doesn’t take up too much of my time.” 

            The two of them laughed and then shook on it. David went out the door with Eli, leaving everything in that diner behind. 

            “I’m disappointed in you, bro,” Eli commented in a cruel tone of voice. “That had to be the least smooth operating I had to ever see. You know our brothers expect more than that from you. How do you expect to be like one of us if you are just so bad with the ladies?” 

            There was the Eli that David knew and loved. “Sorry for caring more about getting the call than getting it on with a relationship that’ll probably go nowhere. Besides, she’s a six at best. She’s nosy, talks too much, and is stuck at a dead-end job. Also, when have you ever known me to hook up with blondes? Being with her wouldn’t be any fun.”

            “I agree on that. There are definitely better girls out here.” 

            The both of them walked around the street corner to a curb where a large black car, something close to a limousine, sat. The engine still rumbled. It was the kind of car anyone could be intimidated by, but the way Eli smirked at David showed that whatever, or whoever, sat in that car was very good news for him. 

            David squinted, and managed to see the silhouette of a large, heavy-sat man through the car windows. Once he made out the shadow’s shape, he stopped, grabbing Eli by the sleeve. He wasn’t intimidated; he was fearful, but at the same time strangely hopeful. Shaking, David mawkishly gestured towards the car, about a few feet away. 

            “Oh god... Eli, is that really him?” David stuttered. 

            “You know it. Asked for you personally,” Eli put his hand on David’s shoulder, tightening his grip. “I need you to know that this is an important job, David. Really important. I need to know if you are ready.”

            “I’ve been ready since he made me a part of the family. Let me in.”

            Eli grinned toward David like a teacher would a precocious toddler about to do something stupid. Then the older brother walked up and opened the black limo door, leading his younger brother into a shadowed room with black seats. Now it was time to be a mobster. 

……………….

            Boss Saul was a weathered man with enough power and prestige to have one side of this luxurious limousine too himself. He boasted a small mustache and an air of tantalizing confidence. Even with his weight, Saul looked elegant. 

He wore a fancy black suit and a white shirt underneath. What made him different was an ancient family crest pinned to his lapel. On this pin, a golden jackal head stared forward, strong and unshakeable. This is uniform for everyone in his family and these pins a symbol of status for the heirs, the commanders, and those who rose to the ranks. They grew into these suits and would eventually be buried in them. The pins went to those they trusted most in life. Trust went to the most responsible or the most brutal. 

Both Eli and David faced him. David looked straight into the boss’s sunken eyes. He leaned forward, intense. Eli just laid back and spread his arms out. A deeply disrespectful display, David thought. He should be at the ready to hear whatever words or orders Saul will give. That was how David always understood it. 

            He tried to think back to when he last laid eyes on the boss, the man who saved his life, but could not recall anything significant enough from the recent past. Their last meeting definitely happened during his early teenage years. He was twenty-four now, so Boss Saul must not completely recognize him, despite being the one he wanted to share a car ride with. 

David figured he should reintroduce himself.

            “Mr. Saul,” David began, struggling to keep his voice from stuttering. “It is an honor to see you again. I am…”

            “I know who you are, boy,” Saul raised his hand dismissively. “I know everyone in this family, from veterans to rookies. And you’re all my brothers and my sons. Don’t feel the need to get all formal. You are with your father, and your brother.” He beckoned towards Eli. 

            “Of course, sir,” David apologized. The boss remembered him. He felt blessed.

            “I am sure that, as any good son of ours would, you keep up with the goings on in the Jakkal Family’s business. Even when we don’t make headlines.”

            “Yes. I pore over the Zio Gazette every morning sir. I read the story about the warehouse and the violence that occurred. I hope I can be a part of mourning those brothers in the near future.”

             “Good. Good. It is because of that unfortunate event that we brought you here.”

            Here comes the job. How would he prove himself? How could he go above and beyond the expectations about to be set for him? 

            “Tell him, Eli,” Saul nodded to the relaxed enforcer. “Tell your brother his… mission.”

            A mission. This must have been a task of even greater importance than he first thought. 

            “Yes, father.” Eli dutifully bowed his head and faced his younger brother, noting the shine in his eyes. He wondered how much of that light would be left by the time David knew what had to be done. 

            “The Jakkals have been the dominant family in this city ever since it was a port town, and while you’d think that would warrant respect from anyone who lives or visits in this city, the latest thorn in our side disagrees. This thorn was annoying at first, but now, they’ve become a bigger pain than we’ve thought possible.”

            “The Gaths.” David made sure to heighten the venom in his voice speaking the name. 

            “Yep. Those useless gangster layabouts that apparently can be a force to be reckoned with. Recently, they’ve stumbled into the favor of a few local businessmen, tired of the way this family has been running things.” 

            “Selfish bastards.” He heard rumors of people like a small-time hotelier acting flippant towards his brother, as well as talk of bashing that hotelier’s knees in. 

            “Right. We thought it would be no problem for us, we’re the Jakkals. We’ve crushed worse. We’ve faced worse. Turns out, Gaths outnumber us fifteen to one. Their strength in numbers turned the tide against us. Even worse, thanks to their new resources, they have an ace. A goddamn mercenary.”

            “Just one?”

            “Not just anyone. They call him the Goliath. Huge dude from Eastern Europe. Worked as a soldier, a bounty hunter, and now a gun-for-hire. He was the one responsible for that warehouse massacre.”

            “By himself?”

            “Would I ever lie to you?”

            “No.” David carefully chose his next words. “Am I being brought on in the war against the Gaths? Against this Goliath? I’m well connected throughout the entire city. I know Gath hangouts and with a team I can find their hiding holes and burn ‘em out like the rats they are. Whatever it is, I’m ready.”

            “You won’t need a team for this,” Boss Saul intoned. “This is something only one man can do, and based on your record, your commitment to this family, you are that man.”

            Eli put a hand on David’s shoulder, gripping it to communicate the seriousness of his position. 

            “We’re sending you to kill the Goliath himself.”

            “My agents have been able to track his movements,” said Saul. “His patterns while he is living in the city. We don’t want to kill him out in the open where there’s a chance of anyone in the family getting caught.”

            “He also travels with a Gath entourage when he’s out and about,” Eli continued. “So there normally wouldn’t be a safe place for a hit, but there is one time he’s alone and one time he’s vulnerable. An old apartment building on Hale Street.”

            David knew the street. It’s part of Zio City’s abandoned slum. Decades ago, it was home to immigrants and refugees, but poor living conditions and better work outside the city drove everyone out, until the place was only known for bums, bum fights, and crumbling buildings. 

            His brother went on. “When he’s there, he brings no weapons and no company. Completely defenseless. A bullet to the head should take him out. Use two to be safe.”

            With that, Eli handed a pistol to his younger brother, fully loaded. It would be difficult to hide, but with what he heard about Goliath, hiding wasn’t what David needed. All he needed was a few seconds to make a quick shot to the head. He began considering the best way to hold it, the best way to aim it. He’s practiced with a gun plenty of times before, and depending on how tall this Goliath was, probably just above six feet, he’d be able to finish him in one smooth quickdraw. However, he’d never taken a life or aimed any sort of weapon at another person. That sounded like something one meditates and prepares for. 

            “Will you take this mission, brother?” Eli asked, the weight of expectations in his voice. 

            “Of course. I want to kill the Goliath. I want to help the family,” David answered. 

            “Good,” said the boss. “Because we are here now.”

            The black car stopped at the curb of a tall brick building, with walls chipped away and various windows broken and smashed. Not a place someone dressed in a nice black suit would or should find himself in, if they had no sinister intentions at play. Eli opened the door, and, with gun in hand, David emerged with a swell of pride in his mission. This would not only prove himself but bring him closer to Boss Saul’s inner circle than any grunt work ever could. The longer he stood, the lighter the pistol felt.

            “May you have God’s aim, David,” said Saul. 

David was sure he could hear the compassion and worry in his voice, even if his face could not show it. He was certain. 

Saul invoked a holy phrase. “For the glory of the family.”

            “For the glory of the family,” David repeated, a dutiful son. He faced the building, this dungeon, this eventual battlefield, and walked through its rusted doors. 

……………….

            Not only was the building dilapidated, it was abandoned too, unless you could count whatever was hiding under a collection of makeshift tents and blankets as proper residents or even people, which David definitely didn’t. 

            There was nothing in the lobby. A wooden desk, probably belonging to the long-gone manager of this building was smashed to pieces. The mailboxes in the walls were open and probably looted. The lights flickered on and off. The leather furniture that once looked regal and comfortable in the building’s heyday were strewn about the lobby, despoiled and peeled away. The walls were splattered with gaudy graffiti in barely legible phrases. This building once held royalty from lands far away. Future titans of industry stayed here with their families, hoping to create a better life in a new city, a new country. Now, through abandonment and ignorance, only the worst of the vagrants were to be found. A hotbed for the undesirable. 

David found the stairs. He checked to make sure they weren’t rotten like everything around him. They were still stable, so he started to climb. 

            He couldn’t find anything on the second floor. He kept on climbing.

            The third and fourth floors were similarly empty. 

            He heard a couple screaming at each other on the fifth floor. It sounded like it was about to get violent. Nothing about it was important. It was unrelated to his mission. If he was off the clock, maybe he would make the effort to stop a domestic dispute. Then again, those were strangers. So, why bother?

David kept on climbing. 

            A group of vagrants was gathered at the sixth floor. There was a corpse on the seventh floor. A fresh one, but it had its face caved in to be unrecognizable. Looked to have died from a drug overdose, based on the bent cooking spoon on the floor and the needle still in its arm. Whoever bashed his face in must have taken the lighter. Whoever the dope fiend was, David doubted it was someone a mercenary would kill. 

The target must’ve still been higher up. 

            Then David reached the eighth floor. He found who he was looking for. At the first sight of him, he had the first instinct to hide and cower.

            The Goliath stood in front of a shut green door, arms to his side, unmoving. The top of his head almost touched the ceiling. Bundles of facial hair and heavy locs obscured his face. His mane reached down to his waist. The giant cloaked himself in a tattered green wool coat. The baggy denim pants he wore were torn apart at the cuffs. The flickering light of the hallway revealed dried stains of dark red scattered about his poor outfit. 

If David didn’t know any better, he would’ve mistaken him for an abnormally large homeless man, similar to the people he found in the lobby. One who was overgrown and ate too much probably but a dirty vagrant, nonetheless. Despite appearances though, this was the mercenary that murdered rows of his brothers, the one who made Boss Saul himself call upon him. His boss, his family, relied on his skills and his resolve to kill this giant. This was the man he was tasked to kill in order to rise through the family ranks. If he just remembered how great that future would be, he would see this through. He resolved to pass this test with flying colors. 

            David put his hand on the pistol, formulating a way to sneak around the mercenary and shoot him point blank. All the giant did was stare at the door, seemingly unaware of the world around him. The Goliath would probably never expect his assassin to appear in this building, his apparent sanctuary. 

The fate of the family rested on David’s shoulders. He stepped forward and the creaking floorboards betrayed his position. However, the giant stood still. Silence blanketed the scene. Then he spoke.  

            “You’re from the Jakkals,” said the Goliath, still staring at the door. That deep sullen voice suddenly brought a heavy sense of darkness down into the hall.

            Shocked, David immediately pulled out the pistol. His arm straightened, and his grip tightened. He managed to aim the barrel directly at the giant’s right cheek, the only part of skin not covered by all that massive hair. He prepared to pull the trigger, but then the Goliath spoke again, paralyzing his digits in place. Something about his voice stilled him. It made him want to hear him out. The giant’s voice brought about the same kind of feeling Boss Saul gave him, but he held no respect for this man. He was ordered to kill him, without hesitation or mercy. So, why couldn’t he pull the trigger?

            “Before you shoot me, before we have to fight, will you listen to a story of mine?”

           David felt no respect. There was only a sense of fear. How could a violent mercenary sound so eloquent? The Goliath sounded more like a philosopher than some meathead or hired gun. 

            “Go ahead,” David answered, stuttering. “Freak.”

            Still staring at the door, the giant huffed. 

“A long time ago, back home in my country, I had the chance to leave and come to this city with my mother. We did not have the best life in the motherland, but for me and my father, it was enough. While my father and I could only know peace with what little we had, it was my mother who was unrelentingly restless. She believed there was more meant for us in this world. She always looked for any opportunity that would bring us up from the filth and poverty. Finally, she secured a voyage for the three of us to the promised land of America. She had plotted out every course and every conflict it would take to get there. My mother was a brilliant woman.”

            The giant sighed. David never knew his parents or tried to find them. The orphanage was his only home as a child. It was a broken home he hated, until the Boss Saul saved him. After that he had his own family, one with no mothers and fathers. Only one unquestionable leader and a band of brothers. He bonded with those who were similarly rescued by Saul. Eli was among his group. 

            “The journey would be a new, better life for the both of us,” the Goliath continued. “We would live in a city where we could change our names, learn the language, and fit in. We would not need to toil and struggle under an oppressive rule. We could have chosen our own destiny instead of having it thrust upon us. In this country and in this city, we would have started a legacy of invention and industry. The thought of this new world brought me excitement as a wee child.”

            Why have I not launched a bullet into this tall, hairy freak’s neck yet, David thought to himself. Why am I still listening? This is the Goliath. My brother and my boss, my father, told me to kill this man, this beast. I’m on a mission. Pull the trigger, damn you. 

            “However, my father disagreed. He wanted no part of this journey. He thought we were already on the brink of success. Traveling was just a show of impatience and faithlessness toward the motherland. My mother believed the motherland to be a lost cause. She put forward that my father was just stubborn. That she was the better parent to bring a better life for her child. Then, the two of them fought. They violently throughout the year and through the turning of the seasons. One night, I was abruptly awoken. It turned out my mother decided that she was taking me to America with her. Just me. My father would never know or hear where we had gone. I realized that us leaving would mean abandoning my father in the mining town we called home. I loved both of them, so I could not stand to see us separated. My mother could though. Even after all the tears left her eyes, she pushed through the raging blizzard, leaving my father and I behind. We believed her to be dead and frozen, but last I heard, she lived here. Alone…”

            David, hands slowly shaking, pulls the trigger. The gun barrel roars and the bullet screams through the air. He misses.

            “I never get to finish the story,” Goliath wistfully sighs. “Poor child. He was abandoned and found by jackals. Then they raised him to be like them. But now, the jackals leave him abandoned yet again in this Zio City ruin.” 

            He turns to the poor David, now shaking down to his knees. “I still come here to respect my mother, yet your sorry excuse of a family only seeks my destruction. Poor, poor child. They actually made you think you stood a chance. You’re the seventh man they’ve sent.”

            The Goliath charged, and David fought back against every instinct to turn and run. He foolishly began to dwell on what the giant just said. He is the seventh man? The seventh brother to be sent here against a monster? 

He almost felt relieved when his opponent’s first punch connected, straight into his abdomen. The giant’s fist managed to graze a bottom rib. Like a cannonball blast to the body, David almost thought the Goliath’s fist would go right through his stomach and burst out through his back. As it is now, it felt like some asteroid left a crater impact deep into his flesh. He spewed vomit. There went his morning coffee. 

            Staggering from the force of the punch, David tried to stand back up. He tried to raise his arm back up so he could aim again. The Goliath, moving faster than a man his size would suggest, brought his fist hard against his attacker’s skull with a strong right. A subsequent downward blow threw him to the floor, loosening the pistol from his grip and sending it flying across the hall. The giant then picked up his scrawny attacker, light as a feather, and crushed him against the wall, over and over again. Like a hammer against a nail. 

            David never felt so much pain. A masochist would find it extraordinary. His ears bled. His vision blurring and he began to feel his reality slip away. The shadows started closing in.  Over and over again, the strength of an Eastern European juggernaut left impact upon impact on David’s body. Plaster and foundation cracked and trembled. If he could still hear, after so much pummeling, he would have heard the Goliath curse under his breath. 

            “To hell with this. No longer.”

            Unbeknownst to David, the giant slung the boy over his shoulder, and he started running toward the end of the hall. He ran towards a window that led to the outside, where a building, crumbling through abandonment and old age, would be the weakest.   

            Through the walls, the two men crashed. 

            From the eighth floor, the two men fell

……………….

            From darkness, the kid called David awoke. It hurt to open his eyes. 

            Pain seared across his back from the impact of the fall. He swore he could have felt his spine, or hopefully just his coccyx, cracked a little. He tried to arch his back, regain his footing. He wanted to stand up, but every nerve flared against him. The pain kept him down. His senses came back, but they were blurred and sluggish. Despite that, he could clearly hear groaning from his right. Through the pain, he turned to face the giant. 

And lo, there was the Goliath, flat on his back. Bleeding but still alive. 

            The big man had fallen onto a rebar. It pierced his hide and sprouted from his gut. While the wound in his torso kept leaking, blood burst from the giant’s mouth with every breath. He breathed in a staccato rhythm. One would assume the blood spurts could be substituted for cursing. He refused to die, and based on his reputation, he would keep on fighting to live. 

            David could see how it would end. The Goliath would find the strength to pull himself out of this, the strength to pull the iron rod out of his side. The Goliath would get up and pulverize him, the crippled goon sent to kill him. David would die, knowing he was the seventh failed assassin to face the giant. The man would then go to a hospital, or one of the Gath hideouts David knew for sure existed and tend to his wounds. The Goliath would heal in an hour, like the superhuman he was, before continuing his onslaught against the Jakkals. The family that saw a broken child and left him to the cruelty of a beast. 

            His family would die, the Gaths will take over the city, 

            In the face of such an unavoidably obvious conclusion, what was the point in trying to get up?

            Then he remembered. He said he would see Beth again, didn’t he? 

            Through deathly pain, through memories of hardship and violence, David fought to stand. If accomplishing this mission couldn’t be for the glory of the Jakkal Family, it could at least be for the fulfillment of a promise he himself made. Eventually, that was enough for him to stand. He found more strength to pick up a rock, a large chunk of the building, uneven and jagged.

            David stood over the Goliath, the Jakkal killer, stone in hand. It was obvious to both of them what he was going to do with it. 

            David, weakened and broken, stood over him in some manner of triumph. 

            The Goliath smiled. “I hope this will be worth it, for both of us.”

            For the blows the giant dealt against David, David replied in kind. 

            As the giant’s skull caved in, as each strike led deeper and deeper, his hands grew sore and raw. David slowly came to a special realization. It is difficult to kill a man like this, like some savage. Like he was some kind of Cain and this giant was something of an Abel. Even if future opponents were weaker, he would still need to fight, still need to put his finger on the trigger. He would still need to feel the blood on his with each bullet and each punch. Inflicting death on others did not come easy. This was where the path of a mobster leads, and it appeared long and winding. 

The Goliath’s blood would only be enough for the first of many cups he’ll need to fill. This, and more, would be necessary to continue in this family business.

 Before, David would not have had it any other way. He waited for an opportunity like this, and now he had it. It was just now that he realized the cost it would bring to his body and soul. He’d need to clean up before he could see Beth again.  

The Goliath lay limp after the hundredth blow. Mission accomplished. The monster was dead. David rose from the carnage he inflicted and headed back toward the black car where Boss Saul and Eli waited. Now, it was time to report his deeds and then ask what violence needed to be done next.