OK, just shut it and listen. I don’t write well and feelings don’t come out easy for me, but I got a story to tell. No… a truth to tell. And right now, this is just between me and you.


So me and the Gang just hangn’ by the school, waiting for our rides to come; No one rides the bus no more. So we just hangn’ and givn’ ol’ Freddie McCormick some good advice.
“Why you such a nerd?”
“You dress like my Grandma!”
“Watch out! Fats’o is in Town!”
“What you cryn’ ‘bout? You’re A- in Math?”
OK. More like slapping that good advice right across his ugly mug. How was we to know he’d go and step in front of that train?
Linda Osborn saw the whole thing. And she and Freddie close. They was like first cousins once removed of somethn’ like that. As I said. The two close - family close.
Linda come stormn’ up to us the next day like somebody’s business screemn’ bloody murder right there at school.
“Bastard!” She screemn’ for the world to hear, “You killed him! You killed Freddie!” The hallway got so still, you could hear a heartbeat. Our panicked heartbeats.
Al tried to play it cool “Who you say?” He tried to look uninterested but his index finger twitchn’. Sure sign somethn’ bothering him.
“Freddie!” Linda sure was loud, but now she got quiet, sentimental. “The poor kid. Came home crying after school. Don’t even stop to have snack. Just throw down his bags and run right out the back door with Grams calling after him and everything! He never ignored Grams like that before. Ma sent me after him to see what was wrong. I was always the faster of the two of us, but I wasn’t fast enough.” Behind her thick glasses, tears pooled and fell. “I got there and saw him. I called out. He don’t even look back. He just step out onto them tracks like the train weren’t even there. I looked away. When the train passed, I didn’t recognize the bloody mass as Freddie anymore. He didn’t look like anything anymore.” And she broke down sobbing, right there, shaking uncontrollably. The Gang took off. No need to stay longer than necessary.


But it shook up the Gang, shook us up real good. Al was all for calling it quits and hitch a ride outta here, but Bernie say we gotta face it and get what we deserve. Al just don’t wanna get pulled into the station again. Al been in for all sorts o’ stuff. Been in Juvenile few times too. He don’t even care he killed someone. Someone he went to school with every day. Who’s family was in the same town, cryn’ over him. I used to idolize Al, but not anymore, really.


The gang split up. Not in two, but each man for himself. That left me all alone. All of us were alone. Didn’t have much of a family to talk about. Dad left us three weeks ago, Ma work full-time job to pay the mortgage, my older sisters pushn’ me ‘round... I started to have dreams where I was at a funeral and I wouldn’t want them to open the coffin, but they always did and in it was always someone different. Ma, Al, Bernie, my sisters, other members of the gang... Or I see someone from school in the distance, a train headed toward them and I scream at them to run, but they don’t hear me and just stand there waving and smiling at me. And the train hits them.
I couldn’t face anyone in school. I wouldn’t know what to say. Linda especially. She wasn’t mad no more, she was just... quiet. Not sayn’ anything. Just gettn’ good grades and listening to her broken heart cryn’. And that’s worse than haven’ her screemn’ at us.
Finally, one night, I broke. I just start cryn’ silent tears and blindly stumble ‘round town, avoidn’ the streets with street lights. I found myself in front of Freddie’s house. The Gang and me have followed him from school; taunting him often enough to know it was his place. It was real late and I could hear someone crying. It was just a soft, barely audible cry, but it stung me in the heart. I felt numb as I walked up the front porch. I was drawn to the sound. I just wanted to look through the window and see who it was. In the Kitchen window, a woman sat there, her hands gripped tightly around a mug of somethn’ and tears pourn’ down her face. She looked familiar in some way, but I didn’t know anyone that gorgeous. She got up, to wash her mug I guess, but she saw me there, in the window. I ducked and began to run when she rushed to the door and called out to me:
“Wait!”
I stopped dead in my tracks and turned around.
She came up to me real slow like. “Do I know you? Who are you?” Her voice sounded foggy, like she was in a dream.
“I just wanna say sorry...about Freddie and all. I’m real sorry.” I didn’t know where this was gon’ and wanted out of here. I was ready for her to recognize me and beat me bloody or scream at me.
Then she pulled me in and hugged me close.
“Thank you.” She whispers soft “You were the first person to say that.” She sighs and looks at the stars “Losing a son isn’t easy.”
I realized where I had recognized her. She look so much like Freddie, I don’t know how I missed the connection.
“Ya.” I said like I knew all about what she gon’ through “My Da left me and my Ma. Kinda like he died, seen’ how he don’t come see me no more.”
“You poor thing. At least your Mom has you. It probably does her a world of good.”
“Probably.” I say then make my exit. Ain’t nothn’ more to say, and the Gang and me, never in the habit of stayn’ longer than necessary.