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Wasted Youth
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"They say I'm in need of some radical discipline
They Say I gotta face the Truth
That I'm just another case of Arrested Development
And just another Wasted Youth."
-Jim Steinman
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The sound of his mother crying was the ultimate factor. The sound of his mother, sobbing in another room, unknowing what would happen. Unknowing that today her life would change. Unknowing that she had a cancer in her that would kill her before May of 2001 would come ot a close. Unknowing here on this day in 1983, this cold October afternoon, as the sun slowly closed its lights and went to bed, her son, the eight year old Thomas Aaron Levi would kill his father.
The plan had been in his mind for some time. For years maybe. He always knew one day, one day when he was big and grown, he would stop Him from hurting her. One day, he would stand up and make Him stop. One day was today.
He wasn't grown by any stretch. Not even really four feet tall yet, his growth spurt would be soon after, now. His black hair was matted to his head as he rolled out of bed. He always went to his room before they began to fight. He always came back here and held the picture, the only one he had, still in its cheap plastic gold colored frame of him and his mother, Rosetta Marie Levi. But today, he didn't feel like just holding the picture anymore. He wanted to say something. Anything. Or do something.
He opened the door of his room slowly, looking back at his bed longingly. It was an image that would stay with him for many years, an image he wished he could turn back to. And make another decision, just to go back to bed, holding that picture. But he didn't. He turned around and headed out. His first instinct was to go to his mother, to cuddle up in her arms and kiss her cheek and tell her its okay. One day when hes big enough, he will stop the Bad Man. But not today.
That Man had once told him "Son, if you wanna be a man, you gotta learn when to STAND THE FUCK UP! When someone hits you, when someone touches somethin' thats yours, you FUCK THEM UP, you hear me? You beat thier ass till its blue, then you spit on thier fuckin faces, cause, shit, fuckin Siccilians, they may be no good shits, but they will at least step up. If your a REAL Italian, and that shit in your mama's side of the family, that Duncan shit, if that aint big in you, you'll know boy, you'll know how to stand up."
Stand Up.
It was time to Stand Up.
As Thomas came around the corner to the living room, he heard the television, still rambling on. No sign of Him. The couch, old and musty, like most everything in this home, was empty. The sounds of South City Chicago grew louder as sirens blared, coming down the street, chasing after someone that Levi neither wanted to or cared to know. Oddly enough, those same officers would be the first to arrive just twenty minutes later.
Thomas turned to his left, examining the hall again before looking in the kitchen. His breathing hitched and then stopped completly as he surveyed the scene. His Father, sprawled on the floor, beer bottle beside him, empty of course. The kitchen tile in most places bending upwards from the lack of care. The entire kitchen floor was on a slope, a fact that would prove deadly soon.
Thomas stepped forward, walking hestitantly, very lightly, yet with speed, across the kitchen. He heard the snores coming from his Fathers head and knew he would never see it coming. The plan that he never thought would ammount to anything suddenly began unfolding. He quietly reached up and pulled open the silverware drawer. His heart beat in his throat as he reached inside. Nothing. He panicked. Then he felt it, something cold, smooth and mettalic. He seized it and pulled it out only to find it was a spoon. A large table spoon with fancy writing and design on it. It read of a name that he couldn't quite make out at the time. Though he would know it very soon. Very soon indeed.
He reached up towards the sink, hoping, praying for what he knew of prayer to find something, anything sharp. A knife, even a fork, SOMETHING.
Yet nothing. He wasn't tall enough and if he moved a chair it would run the risk of waking Him. The spoon wasn't enough though, and he knew it. He began to cry. Tears came down his face as he realized that he wouldn't be able to do it. He wouldn't be able to stop the crying. He wouldn't be able to Stand Up. He wouldn't be able to be A Man.
Then he saw it. The refrigorator. An old, fifties style Fridgidare, oval top shaped and green. Yet, this old Fridge was showing its age. The bottom was not able to hold up on its own on the rotting, sloping floor. It was held up by a cinderblock under one side and a dictionary on the other. If the door was opened too hard it would
fall...
His mind raced as he tried to measure the refridgorator from his Fathers head. Would it hit? Would it land on him? As a matter of fact it looked like it would. Dead Center. Bullseye.
He walked to it, staring at it, rubbing a hand across it, feeling how cold and smooth it was. Then he reached to the top of his head, feeling the horseshoe shaped scar. His Father had made that, on yet another drunken rampage, this time after spending a few months at home, not working because of an arm injury caused by, what else, the falling refidgerator.
He had to. There was no other choice. It was the only way to stop the crying. To stop the fighting. To
BE A MAN, DAMMIT!
His eyes, still wet with his tears, sharpened as he gripped the doorhandle. He was small, yes, but big enough, just big enough to yank this sucker down. And so, a breath inhaled.
A tear fell across his cheek.
And he yanked the door as hard as he could.
At first it didn't seem to move. He panicked, his head screaming, crying, cursing, saying the Bad Words his Father used so much. He wanted to yell at it, as he lay on the floor, the door standing open. Then, it began to teeter forward. He saw it slowly lose its grip. He saw it begin to come downward. His mind stopped cursing.
And then, down it came. The door hit first, closing upon impact, then just one second later, the whole she-bang fell to the ground, landing directly on the face of the sleeping Father. For a second there was utter silence. Blood began to spill out, almost making a humorous picture, looking like Bozo the Clowns hair surrounding the Fridge as it lay on the ground, a body sticking from the top.
Then the screaming started.
His Father, in a high pitched wail, one Thomas had never heard before, screaming, screaming incoherantly. No words, just a blood turning scream.
He had to stop the screaming. He had to stop the crying. He had to stop it all, NOW
He had to be a MAN.
"A MAN! I GOTTA BE A MAN!"
Thomas leaped up, holding the spoon in his sweaty right hand. He ran to the Fridge, looking under one side, seeing nothing but blood as he slipped in it and fell. He lay there staring at the face, the blood matted, screaming face of his Father, whose blood was now all over Thomas. He reached the spoon back, knowing somewhere that this was it, knowing that he had to stop the screaming, the crying, He had to be a Man.
"NO MORE CRYING MOMMY! NO MORE MAKING MOMMY CRY YOU-- YOU SON OF A BITCH! FUCK- FUCKER! FUCK YOU!"
He reached the spoon back, closing his eyes.
Stab.
Stab.
Stab.
The blood was everywhere, but the screaming stopped. Thomas breathed heavily, grinding the spoon under the heavy container, grinding the spoon before stopping, pulling it out. As he pulled it out, something white rolled below it, followed by a red slithery worm it seemed. But it was no worm. It was His Fathers eye. His Fathers eye had rolled from under the Fridgedare and was no seemingly staring into the empty beer bottle, its worm like tissue behind it, nerves sticking out, flailing aimlessly in the blood.
Thomas dropped the spoon, looking at his hands, covered in his Fathers blood. His whole body was, he could smell it. That sick blood smell. It was all over him, his blue Cubs shirt, his jeans, his shoes, his socks were soaked. It covered the kitchen floor. It even brought out the mice, who, though not exploring, seemed to be investigating from a distance what had happend.
His mothers scream stopped his observation. It was a scream followed by her running from the home, leaving out the door. Thomas expected this much. He knew she wouldn't be happy he did it at first. But she would after awhile, wouldn't she? She would hug him and call him her hero, like she did when he dressed up like Superman with the towels being his cape. She would tell him he did what was right. He did the Good Thing. He acted like a Man.
But she never did.
She ran to the neighboors and called the police. She testified at the trial. She cried. She never spoke to Thomas though. Not once. Not one time.
When he was 18, he went from Juvy Prison to Minimum Security, finishing his sentance for manslaughter. He had made news all around Illinois. Child Murderer.
Killer.
Demented Devil Child.
The kids at The Yard, the Juvy Home, called him "Hacker" or "Spoonboy". One even called him "the Fridge" after the big Chicago Bears lineman Fridge Perry. That stuck and he stayed with it. He grew alot. He gained weight. He became A Man.
And when he got out, after finding a life as a bouncer, helping a prison mate he had met and getting contacts in a sport that would later define the remainder of his life, he visited his mother one last time.
He drove to her house in Charles City, just outside of Chicago. He pulled in the Driveway.
He walked to the door, his eyes brimming with tears.
He knocked.
She opened the door, seeing him.
He said one word.
"Mom?"
She shook her head. She shook her head and began to close the door.
"MOM! I love you!"
The door stopped. He thought she would open it. She would open and hug him, kiss him on the cheek and welcome him home. But instead, she just paused, then slowly closed the door again.
"I- I love you..."
He left soon after, driving as fast as he could back to Chicago. Hopping his flight to Charlotte where Ric Flair would help Ivan Koloff train him. Where he would learn from the best there ever was. Where he would decide his fate before the year 1993 began.
And thus, Tommy Levi began. And a door was closed on him, to him and for him. He never even had a chance.
Rosetta Marie Levi-Hargold passed away on May 28th 2001 of brain cancer. She never spoke to Thomas after October 23rd of 1983. To Thomas, this was the sin that she commited, and the sin that he lived with every day of his life. But, now, he was Grown. He was
A Man.
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