Justice in Our World and That of Others

            Jack Robinson isn’t interesting because of his name. He’s not interesting because of his life or his accomplishments. But his death makes those things somewhat more interesting. Jack was the wild child of a no name public school in Detroit; a city that had to fight its way back from the market collapse. It was a city that had to be proud of itself, not its heritage.  

 

            Jack didn’t fall into the wrong crowd; he avoided the “right” one. He hated the way kids his age had an ignorant fear of the upperclassmen, instilled by their parents no doubt. They were told to fear growing up, but Jack wasn’t that stupid, he was really smart, in fact. Tests proved it. He couldn’t be fooled so after class he and the seniors, the ones that smoked cigarettes at lunch, would leave the school parking lot to smoke pot in other Detroit parking lots.

 

            Jack learned about sex through his older friends. They showed him that some girls liked to pop pills and cling to their drug dealers, so Jack became a drug dealer. He only sold to two of his friends, underclassmen. They became his sidekicks and called him, “Jack Rabbit.” He claimed that selling weed and Adderall got him “tons of wild kitty.” His older friends knew the truth, and he was constantly at ends to impress them, so when they asked him to man up he didn’t hesitate to take key bumps (dipping car keys into a baggie of coke and snorting it) on the way to heavier drops. Soon Jack had decided against school. When he looked in the mirror he saw his body and face become lean and sharp and he liked the way he had an edge that people with more city cred respected.

 

            After high school most of Jack’s older friends had been arrested, but he still looked up to the ones that went away, as well as the ones out making real money in auto-shops, still selling on the side. Jack’s two younger friends called themselves “white-hounds,” because they too had a healthy appreciation for coke. So at 22, with a loyal crew, he drove to the lower numbered streets, between abandoned office buildings and used car factories.

 

            “Tonight, we cut out the middleman,” Jack said, thinking they would get straight from the source, where it was cheapest. They drove into the city that gets orange at night. That’s what happens when lights only hit grey buildings. From a stop light they eyed Crime. That was the drug dealer who had distributed to his previous dealer, Shammy-Sham. He was waiting for them in an adjacent parking lot. All they had to do was impress Crime by exaggerating how much they could push in a week.

 

            Unfortunately a black beat up truck pulled up beside them and two men drew guns.

            “Get the f**k out!” One gunman yelled, but the other didn’t wait. While Rabbit and the white-hounds reached for their gun they took shots to the chest and legs each. The gunmen ripped them from the whip and sped off with their gat, while the three Detroit Crack-City Cats moaned in the street and the light turned green. Crime and his squad fled before the cops could come. As an ambulance drove Jack to his deathbed all he could think of was what a p***y Crime was for running away. 

            At the hospital a surgeon who had never done cocaine tried to remove three bullets from his chest, but only succeeded in removing two. She had to leave one for the mortician. The surgeon’s name was Sarah. When she was done work, she showered and got in her car to drive home, extra attentive at each stop light. She hated how scared she had to feel all the time, but her boyfriend helped her feel safe. She would marry him, she thought that night.

            “Jack,” she said, opening the door to her loft, emotionally exhausted “You’ll never believe what happened at work.”

            “Oh yeah?” Jack said, “After hearing all your stories there’s nothing I wouldn’t believe.” He leaned in to kiss her neck as she pulled her hair up to undo it.

            “There was a boy today. A man, I mean, who got shot just for stopping at a street light.” Jack laughed in a way that annoyed her a little.

            “I think I’ve heard this story before,” he said.

            “No. But he had your name. His name was Jack Robinson. It could’ve been you, Jack.”

            “No. It couldn’t have,” He said. He kissed her for a long time and when he let her go she said,

            “No, I guess it couldn’t have,” but she didn’t know if she believed that. 

Author's Note

i think the ending makes this piece. Maybe it needs more. Let me know what you think.

Reviews

[Debbie_Philly]

Wow that certainly caught my attention....the end was an amazing twist... will there be a series to this story ? Really great write :)

[Deuces]

Wow. Do you write novels? I would gladly read one. This kept my attention and was very interesting. It's funny, I shot an indie film in college entitled, "Intersection" and it comes from the same premise - that we are all in some weird, parallel way... interconnected. The movie "Crash" draws on this as well. This was extremely exciting, deep and entertaining. Please send more read requests like this. Thanks.

[Epipsychologist]

Thanks Cyntax. I was thinking of crash when I wrote this, although I wasn't trying to do the same thing that I think that movie was. I was just thinking about, like you said, how we are all connected, and how our lives intersect. We live in a world were there are killers, thieves, and drug dealers, but there are also normal people and doctors. And there's a weird connection in terms of justice through which all our lives intersect. Jack Rabit gets shot for no real reason. It could happen to anyone. But he also brought on through his entire life leading up to that point.

[Marie]

I think Jack got exactly what he deserved. Crime and his people didn't, but they will.
And that is all the story means to me.

[Epipsychologist]

Hey Marie. I somehow clipped off the original ending, which was what I liked about this anyway. If you'll give this another read, I'd be delighted because I think it changes the point of the story.
I agree for the most part about Jack, though. He's just kind of pathetic to me, which is why all he can think about are cultural values (pride) for his last thoughts. He could never get around romanticizing gangsterism, which makes him an ignorant person.

[Marie]

I do't know that this hanges the meaning of the story any. There's "them" and there's "us". Neither of us aspires to the other's level.

[Epipsychologist]

Right, but what I was trying to do when I wrote this was show that in every personal world there are people in worlds entirely dissociated, but there's still the possibility of an intersection. They have different vocabularies and different values, which partly predict their fates. One might marry a beautiful surgeon, the other gets gunned down, but either way, they have to be careful when they find themselves at dangerous intersections.
Thanks for rereading and re-commenting Marie.

[Marie]

I believe I understand what you're trying to say.