Puzzling Pieces

Updates Weekly: Chapter 20

“I once found it an attractive trait of yours: uncovering the blindness of the unwise who miss the details - until I realized that you have no empathy.”

“That’s no true” –

“You never tried to fight for my feelings. Not once, even when I told you how much I cared about you. I had to constantly be sharing a room with your stone-cold persona that didn’t know the meaning of the word. And you know what … all this time, I still wonder why you went for me when I’m clearly not your type at all?”

“Anisha, I’m not here to go over the past and your insecurities.”

“I have none. I get hit on every day of my life by both girls and guys … what’s there to be insecure about?”

“Then be happy with that s**t and let me just work out Y.O.M. in peace.” I was always jealous of the attention Anisha got from having such an open personality and treating everybody the same. It’s what bugs me in my memory bank when I looked past the good looks and rare smile when she would let me see it.

Anisha was the one who I could’ve loved when I sat there that whole evening reading through word after word on what they included in Nate’s special paper: always having a break to watch her sleep.

Anisha was catching some zzzzzzzz with me having to switch on the side-lamp to find what I needed. I was searching for whatever would pop-my-cherry and break the virgin within. Nate’s specialty was … needless to say … gbh: grievously bodily harm. He also wasn’t afraid to carry a firearm just for the sake of having it on him in case he was jumped for the chemically altered m*******a that he hovered around with unseen. It was Haden’s batch: supplied kindly from the one and only, Henry.

Anisha grumbles, “switch off the light and go home.” She turns over to her side and pulls the duvet over her head grumpily.

“I’ll be gone soon.” I quietly whisper: not knowing if she’s alive or with Luther. No idea who Luther is but it came to me. Maybe her guardian pimp? Who knows. But I was sure that Nate’s association with guns would come in handy for them and explained their harassment and constant need to get him over to New York.

Anisha pops-out from under the duvet; “I need you to go. I have work in a few hours. Which is a normal working job … not one that is done in my spare time.”

“Lucky I don’t have balls because you know how the Italians like to talk about them being busted.”

“I’m half-Italian … and I told you that.”

“Anything else you want to tell me?

“For the sake of my sanity and being able to fully heal from you … I ask that you do not come back here anymore. Unless it’s for reasons other than talking about your dangerous hobbies.”

“Somebody has to do it.”

“No. Sia chooses to do it. Nobody tells her to.

…

Nate figured we should split the bill: four each, with the hope that Haden, Sidney, and Simian don’t join in the bashing that was commencing right before me. No quips about the whole guy not being able to hit a female thing … they went in for me like equal rights were issued and gender didn’t matter.

I found that this to be the scrappiest street fight as soon as a fist came flying to my cheek and missed: bumping into another that I had to duck-rise-duck-and rise again because these boys were coming at all angles with a rainfall of knuckles that eventually would be hard to dodge.

I assumed Nate was having it worse because more ruffled pants and swings were heard than my opponents as they tussled him to the ground and tried to keep him down to issue some heel jabs into Nate’s stomach. I tried to prevent that … but I became entrapped in a circle and felt that in any given time ... they would go for both my ankles to bend my knees awkwardly forward: that’s what they did - then came from the side and bash my cheek-in ... they did that too.

And then the wrath of a trainer’s sole arrived: stamping my back until I almost spit out yesterday’s dinner but twist to stop him from turning around and trying to grab that sole … but of course, I’m outnumbered, so I have no chance when a barrel of punches patter-cake me all over my body and I curled up into a ball to prevent any breaking bone and severe bruising.

But that was useless because I felt some pain in both kidneys where they kept targeting. My head was starting to make music with the small green patch as they continuously came for me. I hear Nate call out in a labored; “yo,” but it’s met with bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam- and then I don’t hear Nate again.

 I started to zone out from the audio of my own whooped-ass recipe. It was such a basic beating that I shouldn’t have succumbed so much to a seabed of misery that was screeching from every bone, muscle, and working blood vessel that hadn’t been popped. I concealed my head with my hands like a helmet, but they stopped 2 – minutes later. And I felt able to recover and regain some consciousness in my anatomy that I couldn’t move. I would need a doctor this time. They had done a number on me and even my legs.

Nate was receiving the same treatment. It was no movie here … we didn’t expect to be able to beat them with our street-credible moves. We weren’t karate choppers or kung-fu nutcrackers, it was expected for me to lose. I was meant to come with Nate that day. We were meant to get a beating, and then to have Simian come over to me and say, “you took that like a man. No doubt, I’ll put in a good word for you.”

To whom might very well have been Vivian. And what indicated that for me was his arrival for when the murder of that girl with the engagement ring business was trying to unfold. I had lied to Vivian about not seeing him. I knew the date of when he was arriving via the help of Nate: who had gone to New York after he had been discharged from the hospital.

It was either that or become a body bag for us both. My budding friendship with Nate was worrying more than just Henry and Sidney, it was alerting their precious Y.O.M. buddies who came along with Viv for the ride: the corporate looking trend-setters who think dressing casually will hide their stink. Yeah, Viv was not alone that day. But his eyes were fixated on me. And when I ran into him for the first time that we met, he confirmed that Simian had told him all about me.

How else would this old man know I’m always running? That reference could only be from the time Simian had heard about me being run-down by a bunch of haters who couldn’t take me beating them in an arm-wrestle. But Viv’s angle had come from knowing that I had no father and my mother being absent paternally in the flesh.

It no doubt worked. And straight after I had spoken to Viv, I ran into Nate with his crutches as they had managed to break a few of his toes. I had recovered quicker than he did. But I was still unable to eat properly for a while as my lungs, trachea, and chest were nearly clogged with inflammation and blood. I had to have a tube inserted via my windpipe to apparently to clear it all. I was lucky to be alive, the hip-hop doctor said.

I deliberately passed this way to get a glimpse of Nate who often smoked in a section behind a fenced baseball field where fifteen-year-old kids practiced on the weekends. Nate was relaxing on the bike railings with a cigarette placed on his lips but not smoking. He kept taking it out; flickering thumb down on the lighter to bring up that spark and then stopping to go back to his thoughts.

“What’s on your mind?” Nate’s crutches are forming a capital-a without the middle line that completes the letter on the grass.

“Damn, you sure do like to show up when I be moody. Never when I’m down to sell a few more bags.”

“Ran into an old man who suggests I’m always running.”

“You must be talking about that Viv guy? Simian must’ve told him that joke.?”

“But Viv interpreted it the wrong way and must’ve taken it into the context that I truly am running from everything man.”

“Weird as f**k! I doubt anybody could misinterpret a story about out-running thugs who want to kill you. Viv might like you, Sia?”

I didn’t need that to be the case. But Vivian was going to come at me as a grandad would with his special granddaughter. “He only likes me because I might crack a loop-hole in a very dense state of affairs, Nate. You know, I actually think he’s a nice guy.”

“Well open your eyes to the real uncanny. You’re tough as old boots Sia, but don’t allow that old man to have you feeling remorse or some s**t. He picked his devil may cry, and I ain’t no savior myself but I know that Y.O.M isn’t for me.”

I was about to move on to the poisoned ring in my pocket, but Nate was now handing me the lighter to help him out with his cigarette. “Something got you nervous?” I’m trying to light that b***h up for him. It takes a couple of tries until he’s inhaling that fire and able to puff out the tobacco smoke. It sincerely brings him back to the ignorant Nate that I know.

“Y.O.M. had me …” he takes another puff, with me joining him on that railing.

“Make some room?”

Nate does, “I saw something Sia, and it puts some people in Y.O.M right in the deep end. And what’s worse … I think … I might know a thing or two that includes you.” 

“Save it for when it’s needed. Right now, this is only a new beginning for Y.O.M. trying to get back on its feet.”

“You did your research?”

“I don’t need to. All I know is my peace of mind will come when justice is served, Nate.”

“I sure as hell hope it’s served with me around. I’m going back to New York in a few days and I don’t feel safe at all. I’m going to need your smarts to make sure that I’m ok. And you know what, the thing that always irked me with fighting the hoodlums, is that they’re so damn similar to me.”

“Bone breaks, but they also heal.”

“I know that, Sia. But it doesn’t change that nuff of those boys are thinking that clinging to Henry will get them pocket money. I haven’t seen one of them who beat us up since! Where the hell are they all going to?”

“You never did get that newspaper, did you?”

“What newspaper?”

“Doesn’t matter. I think if you did, you’d be an entirely different person.”

“How comes?”

“They pay a decent wage. If they can get an intelligent man like Viv on that roster of success, then they must’ve found more willing participants in the past?”

“About that …”

I was sure then that Nate had seen what I didn’t want to hear just yet. But I wanted to get closer to Vivian for the sake of needing that closure and finding the key to my missing equation. Where was I then on that puzzling board? I’d say closer to leaving Nate who I never got to see the next day. He was on borrowed time. As was I. As was anybody who didn’t follow the oath of Henry who silently gave himself the leading role more and more … but seemed astonished that Viv was truly back.

That also wasn’t hard to work out when I left that reunion with no idea that I was claiming an oath without having to site it. But it was at this reunion, that I learned who was involved in the murder I was trying to solve.