On the Edge of Wakefulness, Part 2

Chapter 15

"Welcome to Llantano County Juvenile Detention Center, Mr. Chant. My name's Charles Eldridge an' I will be your attendin' counselor, your watchdog, your mama an' yo' papa, all rolled up in 275 pounds of my beautiful Black self. Any questions so far?"

Eldridge had a thick Southern accent and, like he said, had some serious heft going. No doubt he could break through walls, steamroll over the little people behind said walls, and hang their stuffed heads on his own wall. Jed glanced at the bit of sky he could see through the window before he said, "No questions." Head down, arms hanging limply to the side, he wished he was back on his bike, headed out on a long road...

He sighed tiredly as Eldridge wrote notes on a file. Glancing around the intake room, he noticed an officer behind a window studying a computer screen, numerous camera monitors flickering grey and black images at her. He looked down at his bare body in his skivvies only, eying the blue rubber mat he stood on. Thought of Todd in prison… and how he got there…

"Good. Now, let's go over da rules o'da house – unbreakable rules. First, you will follow all instructions given to you. Second, you will never talk disrespectfully to me or any person in command over you. Third, you will comply with our schedule without pro-test. Startin' tomorrow, you will be awakened at 6:30 in the a.m. You will shower, have a healthy breakfast in the cafeteria, then you will be walked to a classroom to take standardized tests so we may determine what year you will be placed in for formal education. You will be given lunch at noontime an' then you will promptly return to the classroom for further testin' of your intelligence which I strongly suspect will be very limited considering that you in our custody in the first place."

Jedediah looked down, Eldridge hammering out more rules and regs of juvie. Too loud, too mean-sounding. He'd already had such a fuckin' day. Started with the long walk of shame down the jail corridor, disgusting things yelled his way by other inmates. Once in the police unit, cuffed and shackled like he was a mass murderer, he then had to hear all the gory details about Todd's crimes by the transferring cop. Details he didn't previously know.

For his own good, he was told.

The guy talked about the condition of Marty Saybrooke following her rape, described the violence of the assault, working his way through the various bruises and markings on her body, conjecturing how those injuries must have gotten there. He expounded on the fact that Todd wasn't the only one to have raped Marty that night.

"Picture it, boy. Young girl on the bed, all torn up from what you did… then you make your buddies get on that... two more times at his order. Think he got off on that? Think he still gets off in it?"

Fucking Satan, Jed thought, who I betrayed by giving away his location. Beautiful.

Then there was the killing of Suede Pruitt, the stalking, torture, and attack on his own lawyer. And more: the kidnapping of an innocent missionary, his dramatic capture and imprisonment, and most recently, a very "insane" hostage-taking incident, the last infused with plenty morsels of violence there, too.

Betrayal sometimes is a form of love, right?

As a final punctuation, as a closing encore with the detention center looming on the horizon, the cop then had looked into the rear-view mirror at Jed, and said coolly, "Good luck, Mr. Manning, Jr. May you fare well with his sins running through you."

Do you love me ... Daddy? Am I bad enough for you? Empty enough? Why do I even care if Satan loves me?

"Did you not hear me, Mr. Chant?! Or are you already defyin' my authority over you?!"

Jedediah looked up and said a soft, "No," reaching for clothes being handed to him by another officer, another massive guy who looked like his name could be Running Hawk or Buffalo Man of Few Words or Kiss The Cement Floor As I Step On The Back Of Your Sorry White Head. It was hard now, fighting the sadness, fighting an intense sense of loneliness again, wanting to be home wherever that was.

A couple of tears finally slipped out as he stepped into the grey sweat pants and pulled on the white tee-shirt. Red letters, LCJDC, ran down the right pant leg of the sweatpants and were emblazoned on the back of the tee-shirt. He sniffled gently as he slid his feet into rubber-soled grey canvas-type sneakers with no shoelaces.

Letting those worn tears run down his face, now dressed in that clearly marked clothing for easy identification if he were to escape, Jedediah stood tall with his head held up and glared at Mister Eldridge.

"You don't scare me," Jed said. "And you don't need to talk to me like I'm some criminal because I'm not one."

Eldridge's face slowly drew into a scowl at the indignation and he moved too close to Jedediah, leaning into him and speaking in a low but deadly serious voice, Jedediah not flinching. "Mr. Chant, so long as you are in my custody, you are a first-rate HOODlum. YOU are charged with the transportation OF, the possession OF, hero-IN which is a felonious charge meanin' you could end up with prison time of five years or more. WHICH MEANS that after two years with us you will be sent to Statesville to finish out the remainder of your sentence. In my opinion THEREFORE, you are a criminal until proven innocent OR until you earn the right NOT to be considered one. THEREFORE, you WILL listen to however I choose to speak to you and you will follow instructions LIKE everyone else here. DO YOU UNDERSTAND ME, MR. CHANT?!"

At that declaration, Jedediah did something he sort of regretted later. But the thing was, he'd spent about forty minutes listening to real crimes committed by a real criminal so Eldridge's words just hit him wrong and Jedediah knew one thing for sure, Todd was way over the line, way over the edge of criminality, a place absolutely, indisputably, untouched by Jed.

So in light of those things, Jed coughed and spat wetly and productively into the face of Eldridge and he had good aim 'cause the ooze hit him directly in the eye. In seconds, Jed found himself on his belly, face squashed on the blue mat, 250 pounds of weight on his back at which point, Jed yelled, "GET OFF'A ME, YOU BIG BLACK FUCK!"

Which got Jedediah placed in juvenile hall's version of solitary confinement for the night, called "the isolation unit." They did leave him his shorts.

No wonder the cop called this place, Juvie Hell.

Téa sat in the middle of Todd's motel room on the floor with her arms wrapped around her knees, head down, waiting for Tim to arrive. She stayed after Todd left, stunned, surrounded by the life Todd chose to lead. She didn't know if "choose" was the right word. It was more like bleeding out this life, vomiting it up, having some garbage truck dump this life onto him.

No, Peter Manning forced this life on Todd.

Raising her head and looking out the open door, she saw the lights of Tim's car. Staring at the mess hadn't revealed any more than she had already seen. What was the point of her being here? Todd wanted to be dead so why help him anymore? Why fight something he wants so desperately?

After it was obvious that she had lost Brandy and Todd to the city, she called Tim first, then Viki, and told each of them in brilliant detail what had happened. She then told them with a certain plainness that Todd had handed himself over to his mental illness and drug abuse and that basically she was finished. But in response to Viki's voice, in response to that motherly way about her, Téa then broke down on the telephone, saying that she just didn't have the devotion within her to see this through.

Téa explained, "Every time he uses heroin, he hopes it will be his last. Except he's not talking the last as in quitting but rather as in death and even though he believes death isn't the worst thing that can happen, I still think it is, and I can't deal with losing him. I'm done!"

Viki had tried to encourage Téa, but she herself understood the position too well to really argue.

I couldn't do it, Todd. I couldn't make that walk, that exchange of pain for your soul. I'm sorry, amor. I'm so sorry.

Tim knocked on the door and Téa looked up at him with familiar desolation that tore into him; he knew that look. He had seen the same expressions on the faces of many family members of patients who had given up.

"No, Téa," he said firmly, shutting the door behind him, shaking his head before she could even speak. "Don't throw in the towel now. This is exactly what he expects you to do, and it's also what he doesn't want."

Téa snorted, "Oh Tim ... maybe I need to repeat some of the more ... colorful ... phrases of the evening if I can remember them in all their perfection. Let's see, how about, 'You taste so good for being such a cunt.' Yes, that one particularly sticks out in my mind."

Tim kneeled down and gave Téa too heartening an expression, causing her to turn away. "Sounds right. Sounds just like Todd."

"No! Screwing around with a whore is NOT what Todd does! Shooting himself up with drugs is NOT what he does! Wanting to die at every moment is not him!"

Rocking back and plopping onto his butt, Tim nodded and studied his fingernails, looking up at Téa when she calmed. "Yes, it is him, whether we want to accept that or not. This is him ... NOW. This is who he is."

"Then if that's the case, I have a problem. I've found myself loving someone who doesn't want to be loved. Who lives in a world of misery, suffering, pain, self-punishment and self-denial ... and who rejects me at every turn. Rejects everyone! Yet I still make my way to him, I still get on my knees and BEG HIM to love me back, to love himself, to just live! Why? Why do I do that? Why should I care about someone who DOESN'T WANT IT?! LET HIM DIE!"

Tim smiled at her, squinting one eye at her wildness, instantly diffusing Téa's near-hysteria. She took a breath and bowed her head to him sharply, like it was his turn to talk.

"You will love my response," he said.

"Really?"

"Really. I've spent years trying to figure this out ... for just this moment." She nodded a willingness to hear him out. "Téa, you do what you do because love is ... illogical. If you read the Bible, we're told that God loves us no matter what. This is what we learn as children. Boundless love is what supposedly makes us – internally, soulfully – wake up each morning. This love is what basically drives us to take another breath. God's kind of love is absolute acceptance. Are you following me?"

Téa sighed, raising an eyebrow, motioning for him to hurry up and get to the point.

"Well, our personal, human view of love mirrors this kind of absolute and total acceptance. The result however is behavior that defies logic such as loving someone who by all accounts appears to hate us. We will love a child who constantly runs away from home. We love a parent who might very well abuse us, or neglect us. And we do this because we forgive everything ultimately. We love without sense, without logic. We love according to instinct. If there was logic in love, if there was only common sense, our world would not be as populated as it is; if at all."

"I hate your response. It makes no sense." Téa put her head back down on her knees, shutting her eyes tightly, wishing for different things, different instincts.

"It's not supposed to," Tim answered. "Look, you're a lawyer, you're used to things ... making sense. A plus B equals C which leads to D being the only possible reward, i.e. damages, jail-time, retribution or apology. Love doesn't work that way. Love is ... A plus B might equal C but it could also equal X which is quite out of the realm of A-B-C'ness and IS most certainly proof of insanity and most certainly calls for ... damages, orgasms, jail-time, grey hair, weekends away, retribution, crashing vases, flowers IN vases, and always ... always apology."

He smiled weakly, shrugging.

Téa stared for a few moments and then said, "You oughta be arrested for that line of logic."

Tim chuckled even though there were tears in Téa's eyes and she was twisting that wedding ring and shaking her head at him. He moved next to her and wrapped his arm around her, at which point she cried softly into him.

"It sucks," he said. "And I'm sorry."

"What do you have to be sorry for?" she asked tearfully.

"I'm sorry ... that you hurt. I'm sorry that you made such an interesting choice in men ... and such a bad one, too. I'm sorry you've given up ... I'm sorry that I couldn't have done more for him while he was at the hospital. I'm sorry that his son really got in his way this time. I'm sorry mostly for him, that he had parents like his, and that he went through all he did. I'm sorry he learned about heroin. And I'm sorry he thinks there are no options."

Téa bit her lip and stubborn tears started to come again, "God ... Tim ... what are we going to do?"

"What we're doing. Sending the cops for him, hoping they'll find him before it's too late."

"Tim, don't say, 'hoping' ... I want to hear they'll find him."

"So you don't want him to die, then? There's still a shred of hope within you?" He looked at her directly, seriously.

"I don't know what I feel right now, damn it. I'm so tired of fighting his will." She then glanced back at Tim. "I screwed up, though. I think ... I'm afraid ... we won't find him because of me."

Tim looked away a moment, "Téa, I've never been one to sugar-coat anything. The truth is he's going to hide. Fat chance we'll see him marching into the Penthouse to check in with you. Fat chance he'll go kindly with a police officer when they realize they're looking at Todd Manning and not just some homeless guy on the streets. No way. He's going to hide and he's going to hide good. Which ... is bad. But it's not your fault."

"I shouldn't have threatened him with the police. Or told him about Jed being in juvie." She looked at Tim and felt like a little girl telling her father or teacher about the fact that she stole something at the supermarket.

Shaking his head, he said, "No, he has to know the effects of his drug use, the consequences. I know you're terrified of pushing him over the edge, like what you say will really make a difference in that regard. Like you ... really have control over him. That's a lie though - you don't have control."

Téa nodded, wiping away her tears with a tad of frustration. "Oh God ... I do want control. I'd like to think that what I say will make all the difference to him, that my 'I love you,' my kiss, my assurances ... will make him come home, that it will make him see, that he'll listen to me, you know?"

"I surely do know. But it always comes down to this: he has to want to come home. He has to want to change and ask for help. Even once we get him to the hospital through a court order, Todd's still going to have to be willing to get off drugs, to take medication, to attend group therapy, to attend one-on-one ... to work."

"Why does that seem like such a distant thing?"

"Because it is. The drugs are very important to him right now, and I think ... like you told me, that it feels so good to him, he believes it's the answer to everything; a very difficult thing for us to fight. In sum ... THIS is why he needs to know about Jed. He needs to understand that heroin takes in more than one person as a mate; she takes in everyone around the user, not just the user."

The room grew quiet at that and Téa pictured Todd sitting in the bathroom, heard him pleading with her to let him just "feel" what he was feeling, that it was all fading fast. This seemed an impossible battle at the moment. "So what are we dealing with here?"

Tim sighed, "I don't think he's technically suicidal. Yes, he might describe his using in suicidal terms, BUT ... there are so many other ways to kill yourself and he's not taking advantage of those ways. He wants to live, but he wants to be free of his problems. On the other hand, the next time we see him may not exactly be in the way we'd like."

"You're saying ... we might find him ... no ... I don't want to think that," Téa said, knowing what Tim was saying, knowing that Todd was walking this edge, gambling with his life, not caring about the result. "I'll die right along with him. My heart will stop right along with his ..."

"No, it won't," he said reflectively, speaking from his own experiences, from his own losses. "If something happens, if he steps beyond our help, you'll live with the special things he gave to you. You'll remember his sense of humor, his love for you, his arrogance, his independence. All the extraordinary things you shared with him. You're so strong, Téa ..."

"You don't understand, you don't understand anything," she cried, tears streaming down her face.

Tim hugged her again, quieting her, "I do understand. Losing someone is probably the most difficult thing that can happen to a person, BUT ... we're not standing by, right? We haven't given up on him, right?"

She shook her head, "No ... I'm not just standing by." Téa sniffled, sitting up again, pulling away from Tim.

He smiled at her, shrugging, "Hey, I care about him, too, you know. Perhaps more than I should." He looked away, glancing at the messed up bed, a whole slew of concerns flashing in front of him. Too many to think about independently of the other.

Téa crinkled her eyebrows, looking questionably at him. "More than you should?"

"Oh no, no, not in that way. I mean… I've found myself ... um ..." He looked over at her, slightly scrunching up his face, thinking of the right way to say the truth. "I care about him, like family. From one professional to another, I care too much and is one reason I've been consulting with other experts in the field, to make sure I don't lose judgment."

"Tim ..."

"It happens to all doctors at some point in their career. Todd's one of them. I think it's because ... he tried so hard. He opened up so much to me and there were these moments when he would shine through – he'd reveal his true self. Then there were these other times he had this terrible surprise that the world could be so horrible. He'd look at me, 'why' on his face, and I had no answers. Then for him to walk away, to shut down the way he did. God ... he got to me. And I think ... I'm sorry for that." Tim's voice had softened, trailed off.

"Tim—"

"You can report me – ask for me to be taken off the case – I probably—"

"Tim! Stop!"

"What?"

She scooted close to him, studying his blond, crazy curls, his thick layer of freckles alongside blue, blue eyes, looked at that burliness she found so sweet, and mostly, she looked at the honesty on his face, an honesty Todd needed.

"My God," she said, smiling slightly. "How wonderful that he has someone else to add to his list of people who love him. I think he needs his doctor to be a little biased, a little askew, operating from a 'place of illogical love' rather than from a text-book, or for a research paper." With tears in her eyes, she said softly, touching his arm, "I'm glad he got to you."

Tim sort of smiled at her, a sad one, looking emotional himself.

"You know what he told me?" she asked. "He wanted you to know that he sometimes hears you ... he hears you call him 'kiddo'. You got to him, too."

Tim closed his eyes and dropped his head, his whole body seeming to sink, so overcome he was with a sorrow he'd been fighting. He cleared his throat and pinched the bridge of his nose like he always did. "Aww shit," he croaked.

Téa wrapped her arms around him. "Thank you, Tim," she whispered. "Thank you for your weirdness and your illogic and especially for your ... devotion."

A breeze of cold air whipped up, the closed door to the motel room shuddering in its frame. Thoughts of Todd and where he could be, how he could be, swirled within the minds of Téa and Tim. They were so limited with their options now. All they had really was the grace of God, the grace of bureaucracy, and a few salvaged beads of hope.

I love you. I will always love you.

No matter what.

Phillip Manning rubbed his hand through his butchered, bleached hair. Fingered his pierced ear. Seven studs he had. Gotta complete the full look, you know? He shook his head like a wet dog and continued to suck on a cigarette as he listened to the police scanner. He sat casually on one of many benches in Llanview's park, enjoying the iciness of the night air, enjoying the sounds of stupid cops and stupid dispatchers and stupid ... stupid static. He sat there with legs crossed and watched the one or two people hustling home.

Ya' better run, brother. Better run.

You know, he thought, it would be really shitty if some poor kid died in the coming snow, tied up, face down, harboring a couple of bullets in his abdomen. Oh yeah, that would be shitty because it would be a slow and painful death. Bleeding and freezing he'd be. But hey, only the best for the Devil's Spawn. Phillip took another drag off his cigarette, leaning his head back to blow out the smoke.

He had heard earlier on one of the scanner frequencies that Jedediah Chant had been transferred to the juvenile detention center. There was attention and fuss because he was the son of someone with a long, juicy, nasty criminal record. Like father, like son. Sure Phillip could have gotten rid of Chant a month ago, but it was fun playing cat and mouse. Fun taunting the little shit with the idea of Michelle being alive. Oh God, what he would give to have had a video camera to capture that miserable, heart-wrenching desire on Jedediah's face to see his mommy. Oh yeah ... it was breath-taking, fucking delicious. Reminded him of Todd. In the days following the rape of Georgie Phillips-then-Calhoun, he would corner the little faggot at school and talk about Michelle, how hot she was, how tight she was. Todd would just stare back at him on the verge of tears. Oh ... so sad ... so fucking sad that he'd lost his trampy, slutty bitch girlfriend.

Scamper away, little one, scamper beneath the rock, into the brush ... you can't escape me. I will always be here.

If only he'd known that Uncle Peter had raped Todd. The harassment would have been sumptuous to the nth degree. Like the creamiest crème brulée, like the cheesiest cheesecake, like ... like ... whatever it was, he wished Uncle Peter had told him. Phillip licked his lips like a cat, tasting how wonderful it would be to torment Todd personally, some more. More ... because really, there couldn't possibly be enough torture of that fuck.

So yeah, he could have gotten rid of Jedediah Chant a while ago. But he liked the chase and he also liked the idea of using hit-men. It was cool Mafioso and he loved being the boss, he did. There was something orgasmic in making someone else do your dirty work. And he could have gotten tens of people on the job, but ... his people ... they fled like fucking rats on a sinking ship. Rats infected with disease and doomed, yet still they jumped, doomed to drown. Doomed to die anyway so why jump?! WHY JUMP, the fucking bastards?!

That's what he wanted to know.

You can't run from me. I am in your dreams, your nightmares, and your visions. I carry His legacy in my breath, in my words, in my body that is host to Satan himself, to Peter, my Savior, and my Master. My God.

He took a long, slow draw off his unfiltered. The scanner clicked and he heard one of the female dispatchers quip, "We got an emergency warrant for a psych-pick-up of Todd Manning..."

Phillip's heart jumped. Holy shit…the man himself is roaming the streets again. At that, he stood up and stuck the scanner into the pocket of his long black coat. Stretched his legs, his arms, then breathed out, "Alright ... mousy ... come to Papa. Meow."

Todd sniffed back a runny nose and rolled a kid's marble away from him, watching it bump along the uneven asphalt of the alley until it disappeared into a pile of trash. He had found several marbles where he sat and had kept them. Played with them beneath a wintry moon and then started sending them off into the urban wilderness, joking that he was "losing his marbles." He chuckled to himself emptily and looked about for Brandy, stopping his search when he saw her some yards away hunched awkwardly against a man, her body sort of moving strangely, clearly working for her keep. He had no idea how many men she'd done this way.

He didn't think much about what she did because really, he wasn't feeling much of anything and the great thing was that he wasn't even high.

Looking away, it just didn't occur to him that he was in a complete state of shock over Jedediah's incarceration. He thought he was being cool about the whole thing. After he had panicked back at the hotel room, he felt this odd calm wash over him, making everything and everyone seem far away, including his core self. He remembered vomiting after his little stress-attack, remembered that disgusting incident up close, but then after that, it was all ... fuzzy. Dreamy. Really, really far away, like when you look at stuff through binoculars the wrong way. He barely remembered getting to this very spot.

Lifting his head to the starry sky, he saw thick clouds heading towards Llanview – it was probably going to snow again, being it was so damn cold. He rubbed his nose and fumbled around for tissue Brandy had given him. When he finally found the little cluster, he peeled one off and wiped his nose. He felt sort of sick – just the slightest discomfort. He rubbed his hair back, sticking the tissue back into his pocket and mumbled aloud, "I wanna go. Come on Brandy, hurry it up."

Johnny boy. She your whore? She ain't nothin' but a little girl lost. Don't touch her anymore, you're hurting her, can't you see that? Can't you see? You're a one and she's a zero and zeroes get sucked up into ones and disappear because one plus zero equals one. The zero loses ... the two zeroes lose.

Todd had no idea how long he'd been sitting there, but when he stood, his leg muscles cramped so he figured it must have been for quite a while. He now fully couldn't remember getting here. He remembered Téa … remembered driving in a borrowed car? No, a man had picked them up. Someone had driven them, dropped them off. Then … things were ... fuzzy. Leaning against the graffiti-stained wall of the building behind him, he rubbed his stomach, feeling nauseous. Somewhere inside of him, he heard Brandy saying he was hooked. Hooked on the dope. He shook it off, reasoning that the sickness was just the after-effect of weeks and weeks of bingeing on heroin. What did Brandy once say? Oh yeah, his body hated it but his mind loved it.

In fact, some more would help right now. That's what he wanted. That's what he craved as a perfect way to help him out with this Jedediah stuff, with this illness, but he didn't have any right now. Paulie hadn't been around, didn't answer his cell phone nor his page, which was strange. Brandy had offered to pick up some more from a chick she knew on the streets, but Todd had said, no, going against his dying need. He decided he wasn't that hard up to risk street heroin from people he didn't know. That he'd wait, that it was probably good to take a break. Of course, he wasn't sure all that happened, but at least his brain told him it happened that way. Again, binoculars turned the wrong way.

Brandy soon shuffled up to Todd and smiled at him, going through some bills and then sticking them beneath the wide band of one of her thigh-high stockings for the moment. "You okay, baby?" she asked, adjusting herself, her clothes, her hair, looking around for potentials.

Sister, look at yourself. Look at what they did to you. It ain't fair – it ain't fair.

He gazed back at her and shrugged his shoulders, "Can we go now?"

"You havin' a hard time, baby?" She asked, her voice gentle, completely devoid of the reality of what they were doing in this alley, in one of the worst sections of Llanview. Brandy was wearing this fake fur, hip length jacket to help keep some of the cold out. Inside the pockets there were condoms and dental dams. She prided herself in the fact that she was so good at what she did that the tricks didn't care there was latex on them. Todd looked at her up and down and felt so sad. Twin whores – a matched set. Two lost marbles knocked out of the circle – far, far away.

Was I bad, Téa? Do you hate me now like I so want you to? Do I disgust you now? Johnny-boy, Johnny-girl ... tasting the Hell. Do you still love me?

"Baby? You don't look so hot – you dope-sick already."

He stared for a while at her, not sure what she meant, then said softly, "I just don't feel good. Did too much shit all these weeks. Not so smart your first time out, you know?"

"I can get you more stuff. Next block—" Brandy stopped abruptly and pulled Todd's arm close to her, starting to walk. "Gotta move, baby ... there's a cop lookin' at us."

They walked casually away, strolling down the alley as if they were in a park, looking at the sights.

"Hey! Hey! Take a breather, you two!" they heard behind them.

Todd wanted to run, that was his instinct, it was always his instinct, but Brandy gripped his arm tightly, whispering, "No, baby … I know him. And it ain't no problem 'cause he's a bad cop."

A tall, dark-haired officer with a solid build walked up to them, shining a flashlight at them, "What're you doing out here? It's sort of late, don't you think? Should be inside, outta the cold."

"We just on our way home, officer," Brandy sighed. "Me and my man."

The officer shined the light right in Todd's face and he turned away at that. Brandy stepped up close to the cop, interfering with his examination of Todd. "Hey, Donny, baby," she murmured. "It's my face you really know."

The cop shined the light at Brandy, causing her to squint, tilt her head coquettishly. "Yeah ... I know you, girl," he said in a low voice. "Brandy… good as candy."

"You got it, big daddy ... you just didn't reco'nize me with my coverin'." She took the jacket off slowly, letting it drag on the ground, showing herself off to the cop.

He chuckled, "Yeah, I remember you alright."

Todd knew what was going to happen and tried to intervene, saying, "Hey, man, you got us on anything 'cause I wanna get outta here. It's cold."

Brandy turned to Todd with a slight shake of her head. Eyes wide but it was too late. The cop shined the light in Todd's face again, "You know ... cavorting with a hooker is illegal. You want me to take you in?"

"Oh baby, don't you pay my friend no mind. He ain't a customer or nothin'. He just walkin' me home. Hey, baby… remember what we did? In the back of your car?" She slunk her thin body close to him, purring, "I liked it. You was big and tasty and slow. I think a lot about you."

She rubbed her head against his chest and carefully touched his arm, peering up at the cop's face.

Todd huffed, choking down a massive rock of nerves. Téa had to have called his name in. They had to get the hell outta here. He dipped his head down, avoiding the cop's gaze… but he couldn't stand still. He realized he was bouncing on his feet, grinding his teeth. "Brandy…," he hissed without thinking.

That got the cop to look at Todd again. "If I were you, buddy," he said, "I would shut my mouth. You have an opportunity to go your way with your whacked-out self if you just shut...up... Todd Manning."

Busted. Todd breathed out hard through his nose, and shook his head, eyes firmly on the cop. "I got no idea who that is."

The cop laughed, "It took me a moment, but you can't fuckin' fool me. You a little scruffy, you lookin' a little tired… but that scar on your cheek is a dead-give-away. Every time a sex crime's committed, you and your scar come up smack in the middle of roll call. And ... you do know there's a warrant out for you, right? We're to pick you up on a psych-eval."

Todd stared up at the sky. "Binoculars" was all he could think. Far away. Téa loved him, always would… so much she called the fuckin' cops just like she said she would.

Beautiful you… beautiful woman… always see the right side of things.

Brandy purred again to the cop, touching his crotch. "Say, baby," she said. "How that feel, huh? I know you want me to do you right, like before." Todd swallowed down a sudden rush of bile which he didn't understand. He had watched her all night, yeah? Something about this ... well, it was upsetting. It was the choking kind of upsetting, the arm around your throat upsetting, the throwing yourself at your doctor kind of upsetting. He stared spacily at the two and knew he was frozen for a moment… he couldn't move… couldn't breathe...

If I do this, will you help me out? If I let you abuse me, will you cut me a break, just for tonight?

Daddy if you ignore the bad grades, I'll be really quiet tonight. I won't say anything…will you love me ... just a little?

Nothing but a whore.

Todd watched the cop pulling Brandy easily behind a dumpster. He was looking around and then unzipped his pants. Todd watched as Brandy squatted down and began doing what she was born to do. Right away, the cop immediately grabbed her by the hair, knocking her slightly off-balance for a second, and began doing all the movement. His sister-nothing was being fucked in the mouth to save their mutual asses and Todd rubbed his chest because the breathing had come back but it was cutting him to pieces.

Oh baby girl, oh baby girl, don't ... don't do that ... no.

He stumbled backwards against the wall and looked around for something to distract him, to distract his eyes and heart and ears and soul and brain. But he kept going back to them, kept seeing Brandy's hair shift in the hands of the cop, her head moving back with each thrust, seeing those pointy spiked heels. Instinct was to race over to the cop and bash his head against the fuckin' wall. She didn't have to do that – get done that way for nothing – give a blow-job to save Todd's ass. What's wrong with her? No, what ... what was wrong with HIM to not go over there? See, he just stood there, cement-shoed. Letting his sister take the abuse for him, for them. Why?

Because ...because ... because the Princess was next to him, whispering in his ear, "If you go over there, Angel Dear, you won't get any more of me. You won't be allowed to not breathe with me. I'm your true Lover, angel dear, the Heroin Princess of Worldly Perfection and Pure Innocence. The state of being you dream about. I am your Mother, your Lover, and your god. You will not stop that officer because you belong to me."

He groaned and turned away from Brandy, walking away.

Oh ... hate me ... hate me, my Chemical Savior. Roll over me with your Prettiness and your Sweetness and inject me with your Innocence and Precious Blood. Kill me with your Love. Yeah ... you do that.

He was sweating, taking his jacket off and dragging it behind him, trying to breathe without pain. "You don't gotta do that for us, baby girl," he kept saying, trying to ignore the dreamy whispers of his drug need. You don't gotta do that. I'll go to jail ... it's okay. Téa wants me there, and she does it because she loves me.

The Princess then answered, "But I love you more."

He banged his head hard against the bricks, a soft groan coming from deep in his throat. He scratched at the wall, scraped his fingers on the cutting stone.

Yeah ... yeah you do. People-love hurts, and it's hard on your soul and makes you fragile but you...oh you! Fuck, yeah. Love me the way only you know how. Please ... love me and I will die with you, I will not breathe with you.

He made it to the sidewalk and began walking down the street, passing life's biggest losers, the hustlers, the whores, the addicts, the homeless, the mentally deranged people who were talking to themselves and smoking cigarettes like the sticks offered oxygen. Someone bumped up against Todd and asked for money and he searched his jeans pockets out of habit, but he didn't have any. Shook his head and kept walking, trying to breathe easily, but he just couldn't. Breathing was so much work which made him want the junk even more because when he was really gone, when he did himself up that far, he found that he didn't have to breathe.

Let's not breathe together, Princess. I'll not breathe with you and my sister won't breathe either because she has a dick in her mouth, shoved down her fuckin' throat.

God, god ... not breathing was wonderful. He'd be lying on his back on the bed or leaning against the tub or lying out on the kitchen floor and just know it wasn't necessary to breathe. The air would go out of him and he knew he could stay that way. No air inside of him and not needing it. You know how when you were little and would play those hold-your-breath games? That after thirty seconds or so you would suck in air all crazy for it 'cause your body just couldn't take it? Well with the Princess, he wouldn't do that. His next breath was slow and easy… no desperation, it just happened… and it was a damn shame is what it was. One more milligram of dope and he knew he wouldn't need that other breath. He knew he wouldn't take it.

Bliss ... perfect bliss.

Todd looked behind him because he thought he heard someone talking to him. When he turned back to the front, though, he bumped right into a brick-like, fat older man. Just standing there. He meant for Todd to bump into him that way. The man was smiling at Todd with perfect teeth that looked false, with a black toupee, with a thick down coat over wool pants and thick black shoes. Todd could smell stale sweat on the guy and his sour breath.

Todd sort of leaned back at the closeness of the guy, growling, "The fuck do you want?"

The man leered at him and suddenly pressed himself up against Todd, his hard-on obvious. He reached around and touched Todd's ass, saying, "You want to go somewhere? I could use a little from that pretty mouth of yours, from this pretty tight ass." The man breathed in Todd's face and just grinned.

The words bounced around like those marbles Todd had had, knocking against each other, pinging inside his head. Far away ... far away. The words melted into each other, separated and then melded again. Ugly words – truthful ones. I could use a little – wanna go somewhere? Well, well – that's what whores are for after all and wasn't Todd one, too? Yeah ... yeah he was. But not to this son of a bitch – not to Peter – not to any man, right? Right?

Todd suddenly pushed the false-topped man hard, once, twice, his hands pounding against the man's chest. "Fuck you," he growled. "I ain't no faggot, bitch. I – ain't – THAT!" He pushed the man again and the man started to get really scared, his face whitening.

"Uh...uh...," was all the man could say taking Todd's powerful hits, being backed up to God knows where.

"Do I look like a faggot to you? Do I look like that, bitch?!" Todd kept at the man, pushing at him, slamming his hands against the man's barreled, soft chest.

"No...no...it's just that—" the guy sputtered out.

Todd pushed him back one last time, finally pounding him up against the wall and holding him there by his shirt. Todd wanted to kill this man. "DO I LOOK LIKE A FAGGOT TO YOU?!" he screamed into the man's face, the man turning away to avoid the heat.

"No ... no ..."

Todd wanted to hurt him bad and he lifted the man away from the wall, banging him against it, once, twice, the man groaning at the pain.

"I AIN'T NO FAGGOT!"

He wanted the man to be the cop doing Brandy, he wanted him to be Tim and Viki and Téa and the cops who picked up Jedediah, he wanted the man to be Peter and Patrick and Blair ... and ... and ... Todd reached one fist back and punched the man in the chin, then in the stomach, the man finally falling to the ground, curling up to protect himself.

Todd proceeded to kick him in the chest, in the knees, anywhere he could, once, twice, more, more, with those thick, black heavy boots of his. With the steel-toes, the parts which could do ... just so much damage.

"I ain't no faggot, you FUCKER! YOU MOTHERFUCKING BASTARD!"

Kick ... kick ... kick.

He couldn't hear Brandy calling to him, couldn't hear anyone or anything. He wanted this guy to suffer, to pay for all the things that everyone ever did to him. Oh yeah, oh yeah ... kick him until he's dead.

Out of nowhere, Todd felt himself being jumped and shoved to the ground, felt himself being restrained, felt pain, like ... like ... metal pain digging into him. In shock, he desperately tried to focus on what it was that got him down but couldn't seem to do it. The sensation of being restrained was more than he could take and he started to really fight it, trying to hit and kick and bite. But then, finally, words started to break through and he slowed his efforts … taking a rest … to makes sense …

"THAT'S ENOUGH! YOU'RE DONE! We got the message loud and clear! You ain't a fag!" Then he heard the same voice ... laughing.

Then he heard Brandy's gentle voice chiming in, saying sadly, "It's okay, baby ... you done him up good. You taught him real good."

Todd looked up, dazedly, out of breath, and he could see the cop that had been with Brandy standing over him and shaking his head, saying, "You sure are trying hard to get locked up."

"You…"

"Yeah…me. So can I let you up now? You in control now?" Todd nodded his head and the cop got to his feet, pulling Todd up with him. Catching his breath, he handed Todd his jacket. The beaten man was groaning, protesting, to which the cop snarled, "You can go to jail, too. Propositioning is as bad as doing it, asshole. You deserved what you got."

Brandy's hands were on Todd's back, petting him, soothing him. The man on the ground moaned and started to crawl away, his toupee in his hand. Todd watched him while the cop was spouting off about something and thought of a cockroach, thought of a downed rat. He then coughed up some phlegm, spitting at the man, a thick globule landing on the man's thinning hair, dropping down onto his shocked face.

"Alright, alright, let it go," the cop said, pulling Todd by the arm away from the man, Todd noticing how quiet the street had gotten. How empty.

"Bastard," he muttered, shaking off Brandy's affection, "Get the fuck away from me." Brandy wasn't sure who he was talking to but assumed he meant her.

The cop shook his head again and said, "The only reason I'm not taking you in is that this idiot has been doing that all night. 'Sides..." He glanced at Brandy salaciously, "Your ... uh ... woman did such a fine job that I just don't feel like doing the paperwork. So if you keep your shit in check, I'm gonna pretend I didn't see you. We got a deal, Manning?"

"Ain't that nice of him, baby?"

"Well?" the cop asked.

Todd shivered, nodded, and started walking, breathing deeply, calming down, looking at nothing through those backwards binoculars. Just a whore, he thought. That's what we are, nothing but used and abused. Repeatedly done that way. That man could see it in Todd and that's why he came on to him. That's why the old coot felt comfortable bumping into him like he was nothing, like he wasn't worth a polite approach. Like he didn't deserve any respect. And respect means decency and warmth and realness.

I deserve that, right? Or at least something akin to it. I mean if I'm gonna get fucked ... at least you can do it with respect, at least ... you can ask me my ... permission.

Todd felt himself starting to lose control of his emotions. He'd hurt Jedediah. He'd hurt him badly, and that precious innocence, that trust, that sleeping like a rock with his arms and legs all spread out was going to be destroyed. His innocence was going to be taken and eaten by monsters because that's what they do in prison and ... and ...

Tears started to fall. He wanted to go running back to Téa and say how sorry he was for all the garbage he threw at her and he wanted to be with Brandy under some sheets and a blanket and share an apple or rice in a bowl and ... and ... he wanted to feel good with her again … and he didn't want to be raped anymore and he didn't want to rape others any more ... and ... and ...

"It's okay, baby ... we almost home. We almost there."

He nodded back to her, barely able to breathe again, and knowing he was crying like a stupid kid and was getting sicker by the second. Just ... dying. And ... and ... what he really needed was a hit. He knew that would take care of everything, but he didn't have any money and he didn't want Brandy to make any kind of deal with Paulie for it…because dope is what got Jedediah thrown into jail. But ... but ... he needed a hit to take it all away.

Who the hell am I? Because I sure don't know who Todd Manning is anymore.

"Brandy?"

"What is it, baby?"

"You ever sing?"

"No, silly, I'd scare away the crows."

"No, you wouldn't. Sing to me. Try."

"You embarrassin' me!"

"Please ... just a little."

It was quiet there in the dark, in Brandy's little place. They lay huddled together under the sheets and a blanket after they shared a cut-up orange and a carton of chocolate milk after Brandy had taken her customary bath, her ritualistic cleansing to wash away the things that had been done to her all night. Todd bathed, too, afterwards, and then the two nothings bundled themselves under the covers, under the protection of the wool and the cotton and the night. He was so tired, so worn and so ... guilty. He'd hurt so many people in such a short time – how was that even possible? But he did. And he knew it wasn't over. He could feel the pull to the Princess of Perfection that he had come to love, to need. It was saving him and it was killing him, and it seemed to him that the saving part made up for everything. It made up ... for the killing part.

Shhh...Angel. You rest, Little One. I'm still here. Shhh.

"Are you gonna sing or what?"

"I only know one song and it ain't nothin' ... don't you laugh."

"I would never laugh at you."

"Ok ... I used to sing this one song all the time. You know I ain't never had real parents or nothin' like that. No mama to sing to me, you know?"

"Yeah. I know."

"Anyway, one time I heard this song? And I felt so much better ... like I wasn't goin' to be lost on them streets. Like I was something special. It's a song by this guy – Joel something."

Just listening to Brandy talk to him felt good and made him sort of sleepy. He was so hurt and so scared for Jedediah. Knowing ... knowing ... that it was his fault Jed was there and there was nothing to do about it. So he listened to his sister, his mated "lost marble". She was pretty and not too dumb and she smelled like vanilla and she reminded him of the spirit he sometimes heard when he slept and it all hurt. It just hurt.

Todd reached over and hugged Brandy, burying his face in her hair and neck. Held her to him beneath those sheets and she shushed him, singing gently, "Goodnight, my angel, time to close your eyes, and save these questions for another day. I think I know what you've been askin' me, I think you know what I've been tryin' to say. I promised I would never leave you, and you should always know, wherever you may go, no matter where you are, I never will be far away."

Todd heard her sing in this soft, breathy voice and it was the voice of a child, of pure, pure innocence, the kind that he had lost so long ago. And he wondered if he had any of that kind of purity left inside of him as it was so hard to imagine, so hard to see. He could hear the spirit there in her voice and it made him cry because he hadn't been sure if the spirit was around any more. But there it was in her voice, floating through the air like an angel, like the sweetest of butterflies, colorful and hopeful among breezy yellow daisies and shining stalks of grass. Beautiful it was to him, so free and so full of everything that he wasn't.

"Sing some more," he said, his eyes wet with love and loss and emptiness. She sort of laughed, sort of didn't, and let him hold onto her, let him breathe with her.

"Goodnight, my angel, now it's time to sleep," she sang. "And still so many things I want to say. Remember all the songs you sang for me, when we went sailin' on an em'rald bay and like a boat out on the ocean, I'm rockin' you to sleep. The water's dark and deep inside this ancient heart. You'll always be a part of me."

At that, Brandy started to cry because inside she knew Todd would never be hers and she would never be his in spite of all their similarities. People like them always lose the other. Their twin-ness would be lost in that rocky ocean called life and with that, they would be lost to the other forever. She ... would be lost.

Todd could hear her and he knew what she felt, what she thought, and he rubbed his wet cheek against hers, kissed her chin and her lips, rubbed his body against hers. "You'll always be a part of me, Brandy," he whispered so sadly. "Always, whether I'm here with you, or whether I'm locked up somewhere, or dead. I will never forget you. Never."

She touched his lips with her fingers to quiet him, so she could finish her lullaby to him, finish her song, her forever goodbye, knowing that when he got saved, she wouldn't be. She would stay right where she was, right there on top of the garbage heap, broken and ruined and alone. He had people who loved him – who were fighting for him – even heroin fought for him – but she had no one, nothing.

"Goodnight, my angel," she sang tearfully, "Now it's time to dream, and dream how wonderful your life will be someday. Your child may cry and if you sing this lullaby, then in your heart, there will always be a part of me. Someday we'll all be gone, but lullabies go on and on ... they never die. That's how you and I will be..."

It was so dark in that little place of Brandy's, where the two nothings held onto each other and tried so hard to dream of something better, to dream of salvation. It was hard though because zero plus zero equals zero. And ... zeroes get swallowed up and disappear.

Are you there, spirit? Do you still love me?

To be continued...