CLASH

Luc

He knows that his struggle will be useless against the four heavy-set bodyguards escorting him out of the stadium….

He is not going to do anything stupid but…

Thud!

“Aaaaggghhhh!” The man shouted when one of the bodyguards kicked him in his back, making him throw to the asphalt….

He could only curl himself on the asphalt as those four bodyguards assaulted him…. They punched his face, kicked his ribs and stomach, that made him throw up…

Ptui!

One of the guards’ spit on him as the four of them left the man lying on the asphalt….

He tried to get up and slumped back to the ground…

He grabbed his teeth, and once again forced himself to get up, and started to walk wobbly towards his parked truck….

Every step was excruciating, from the kick to his ribs that he could hear a cracking sound coming from them, that he had to stop and even sit on the road for a couple of times, coughing and spitting blood on the asphalt below him, before he finally managed to open the door of his truck, sit and then breathing laboriously for a while….

The reddish aura figure looked at the truck that was driving away from the place…

I had to get ready for the next plan… he thought as he vanished from sight….

****

The drive back home was more painful for the man…. Not only because of the distance that he had to cover, but the pain all over his body from the beating made his effort get even harder….

But he was relentless, he kept on pushing himself, ignoring all the pain, he kept on driving….

“Are you okay…?’ Said the man at the gas station when he had a quick stop to refuel…

“Just having some misunderstanding…” He forced a smile, before he packed a microwaved sandwich, a cup of coffee, forced himself to fill his belly, and then continue his drive….

Along the way he was worried…. The phone next to him was silent all the time…. It was never like that…. There is always a call at least every twenty minutes since his departure…. And now there was none….

He speeded up his truck, he needed to be back home as soon as possible….

For the last couple of years, after all their savings dried up, and his mother's illness getting worse, where they have to sell the house, they have been living for years, they move down to the trailer park….

His heart raced as he saw the trailer they used to live in, which was crowded with their neighbours….

Quickly the man ran towards his house….

“Where’s Ma…?” He asked, toward one old lady who frequently visited their house.

The old lady said nothing but cried, and one man took him to the bedroom where her mother was lying…

“I’m sorry, son….” He said, placing one hand on the man’s shoulder…. “Your mother had just passed away….”

The man feels like his world is crumbling down….

He sat next to the small chair he used to use when he was taking care of his mother, looking at the lifeless body of his mother, didn’t even care for the people trying to comfort him and started to call for the funeral to arrange a proper burial for his mother….

****

“Two Timothy four verse seven says I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith…. And our dearly departed have now come to her finish line, and she will now come to the warm embrace of our father in heaven….”

The man barely heard what the preacher said, his eyes were hollow, even when his gaze was fixated on the casket where his mother was placed….

His heart was torn…. Anger builds within him….

He was angry with his mother….

Why didn’t you get angry, Ma….?! Why did you keep on praying for him….?! He thought in his heart, looking at his mother's faith, saying that his father would at one time repent and come back to them….

He hated her faith, because for him, his mother’s faith brought only misery for her…. And for him….

But at the very bottom of his heart, he knew that he had his anger and knew his father the most….

You cause this…. You have all the money in the world, and you don’t even want to share a dime with us…?! He thought in disgust towards his father, and their last encounter that left him with wounds in his face that were still visible during the funeral….

The funeral was only him, the old lady and the man that were his neighbours at the RV park, and the preacher from the local community church….

And it was a brief sermon, that in the end only him and the undertaker kept looking at their watches, waiting for the man to give them the sign to fill the grave, which finally they do it anyway because they can’t wait for more, ignoring the man that still sitting, seems unaware that the grave finally filled with the ground and the undertaker already left….

The cold breeze at the graveyard forced the man to finally leave the site, not even looking at the fresh grave that had now become the final resting place of his mother…

****

Not even removing his black suit, he entered the bar. He became one of the regulars, frequently visiting the place, went straight to the bar, ordered himself shots of strong vodka, and started gulping the liquor down his throat….

“Whiskey, straight, please….” Said a man sitting on the stool next to him…

“Hey…. Aren’t you the family of the deceased…?” Said the man that made him turn his head and saw that the preacher giving the rite at the funeral sitting next to him, in his black hem, black trousers, with his white preacher’s collar still around his neck….

The preacher has a handsome face, with wavy tussled hair that makes his face more handsome, with thick eyebrows, strong cheeks, natural reddish lips…

“I’m her son…” He said, before gulping another round of the vodka shots, where the preacher followed with his whiskey….

“I thought your kind couldn’t drink alcohol…” He said sarcastically.

“Hmmm…. Does it state inside the ten commandments? Or did it say so at the Law of Love?” The preacher said calmly….

The man snorted and then gulped another round, before paying his bill at the table, and then left the bar….

“Preach somewhere else, Man…” he said.

For a moment, they were focusing on their drinks when the preacher started the conversation once again…

“I would like to see the other guy…” The preacher said, his index finger, which was holding his tumbler, made a circular motion over the man’s bruised face…

The man feels annoyed, yet somehow, he still answers the preacher….

“They were in much better shape than I am….” He said, remembering how they beat him mercilessly in the parking lot outside the empty stadium….

The preacher gulped his whiskey away, gestured to the bartender to refill his tumbler and said…

“Come…. You need to release your tension” he said, paying his bill, after gulping his last tumbler….

“Nah, man…. You bark at the wrong tree….” he replied, scooting a little, away from the preacher who laughed and said…

“Heck no…. Come…. You… You need to release your tension…. Come….” The preacher said with an easy tone, yet it was the shooting that shot the man, a little wobbly, took out his cash and paid his bill before he followed the preacher out of the bar…

“Come…” the preacher said, asking the man to follow him to a black sedan…

The preacher started the engine and said to the man….

“Where’s my manners…. I’m Luc….” He said, revving the engine a little.

The man looked at that strange preacher and replied,

“Bryan….”

The preacher nods and drives the sedan out of the bar….