Prologue
The thing about people with fucked up names is that they all think their name is the worst. I suppose that’s human nature to be a little self-centered, but it’s irritating. Yes, I know some people do have fucked up names. I got nothing but sympathy for Dick Butkus and Tim Allen (his real last name is Dick), not to mention all the people with names that rhyme with words that make grade school hell. I know I don’t have a significantly fucked up name, but that’s part of the problem, it’s subtle. My full name is John Smith. No middle name. Really. Nobody understands how fucked up it is because nobody believes that’s my real name. And that’s what makes it fucked up. At least in grade school, nobody knew there was anything wrong with it. Took ‘em a while to realize that. High school was different. So was the Army. But the worst place to have a fucked up name is prison. Guess what? Yes, I’ve been to prison.
I joined the Army right out of high school. I was in for 8 years but never got deployed. I met Kate, married her, and we had our first kid before I got out. We had Karen three years after Brian. Four years later, I was living a typical Middle American life. One day, I decided I was going to walk my son home from school. I had the day off and wanted to spend some time with my kids. I’d spent the morning with my daughter, so I decided to even it out with my son. What can I say, I was having one of those days where the world kicks ass. If I’d known how the day would end, my mood would’ve been different. That day started the events that destroyed the life I knew.
My son’s school sits on a slow rise of a hill, so there’s a cinderblock wall about four or five feet high with a chain link fence on top of it between the street and the parking lot. I was walking down the sidewalk, almost to the parking lot entrance when I saw my son talking with three other boys, a couple years older than him, next to some cars parallel parked on the street. I couldn’t tell what they were talking about and I didn’t think anything of it ‘til I saw the one in the middle push him. I paused mid-step, surprised at what I realized I was seeing, and having flashbacks to grade school myself. The two little dipshits on the left and right also started to push him, but only got one or two in each before my son nails Dipshit #1 in the mouth. Hard enough to make him have to catch himself before he fell on his ass. I was so proud. But, just when he was about to do the same to Dipshit #3, Dipshit #2 kicked him in the balls. What a little pussy. Even when they outnumber him and all 3 are bigger, this little bitch had no other move than a nut shot. I was on the move again. Dipshit #1 got up and got in my son’s face while #2 and #3 held his arms. After a bit of verbal abuse that I couldn’t hear, he punched him in the stomach, then pushed him hard enough to send my son between two parked cars into the street. With a car coming his way. I was almost there now, so I sprinted between the parked cars to my son, pulled him back on his feet and in between the parked cars before the oncoming car could hit him. Actually, before it was even close to him. It probably wouldn’t have hit him even if I hadn’t been there. There was more distance between them than I noticed at the time. With my son out of the way of the car, I turned to the 3 Little Dipshits, grabbed the left arm of #3, the right of #2, and squeezed them together.
“Don’t even think about moving.” Then I turned back to my son. “Are you ok?” I asked him as I checked him over to make sure he wasn’t missing any parts.
“Yeah, I’m fine.” Was my son’s reply. Still a little out of breath. He looked a bit embarrassed. I’m not sure if that was ‘cause he’d just been pushed into traffic or ‘cause his dad pulled him out of it. I turned back to the Dipshits.
They started up before I turned around. “We didn’t do nothing!”, “He deserved it!”, “Leave us alone!”, “He started it!”, “We’re the 3 Little Dipshits alright!” Ok, that last one was a paraphrase. I grabbed the left sleeve of #3 with the right sleeve of #1 and the right sleeve of #2 with the left sleeve of #1, and pulled ‘em closer to me as I hunched over.
“Do you dipshits know how much trouble you’re in right now? Probably not, ‘cause if you did, you’d be pissin’ yourselves.” Then I pushed them. A bit harder than I intended. Dipshit #2 mostly just turned and stumbled a bit. Dipshit #3 turned a little and bumped against the wall, scuffing up the shoulder of his jacket. Dipshit #1, however, hit the wall square and bumped his head hard enough to break the skin. Probably hit a rough spot on the wall. That was all the damage, but it was enough. I didn’t know any of this at the time. As they ran like the 3 Little Dipshits they were, I put my arm around my son’s shoulders, and we walked home.
Unfortunately, what I didn’t see during all this was the little girl with the Iphone who recorded all this. Sorry, most of this. From her viewpoint, she couldn’t see in between the parked cars or the street. And she didn’t start it in time to see the 3 Little Dipshits push my son into traffic. What she recorded was me running between the parked cars, then coming back and pushing three kids against a wall. When I saw it on YouTube, it didn’t look good. And the district attorney used it as evidence against me.
Turns out the 3 Little Dipshits were younger than they looked. I thought they were a few years older than my son, but they were only one year older. In the same grade, though, and preparing themselves to uphold a fine, poor white trash tradition of being stupid jocks with blue collar jobs who would never leave the town they grew up in. The reason they were friends was because their fathers were friends from high school. All on the football team. Never went to college (they weren’t that good on the football team). Married their high school sweethearts and had kids when they were 19. Yeah, I know it’s clichéd. There’s a reason clichés become clichés. It’s a good thing I’m paranoid enough to keep my phone number and address unlisted, or the 3 Big Dipshits might have come knocking at our door some night when they were wasted.
Anyways, I got charged with three counts of 2nd degree assault, because the 3 Little Dipshits were so young. I did four years after time off for good behavior. I got visits from Kate and the kids when she could manage it. I hoped for more of course, but understood why she couldn’t visit every day. It was a bit of a drive, and she had to arrange it around work, school, raising two kids alone, that kind of thing. When my time was finally up, I expected the walk out the gate to be a lot more epic than it was. But it was the drive home that was epic.
As I walked out, I saw my wife and kids were waiting for me in the parking lot. The split second my kids saw me, they hauled ass to try and tackle me. When that failed, they proceeded to trying to squeeze all the air out of my lungs. Kate stayed by our car. I picked Brian and Karen up and kept walking over to her.
“Baby, I’m gonna do my damnedest to make sure that you don’t regret sticking with me all these years.” I told her before she grabbed me in what small part of me wasn’t already smothered by my kids, and kissed me very hard. That was probably the best moment of my life. Nothing mattered but that small area about 5 feet across and those few minutes. Perfect bliss.
So we got in the car, and drove off. Ready to rebuild my life and make up for the last four years to my wife and kids. Life looked very good for me. ‘Til we got T-boned by that truck.
Chapter 1
We had gone to a park so the kids could play around. Me and Kate were sitting on a bench talking while the rugrats climbed around the monkey bars. They were right in front of us so we could keep an eye on ‘em. They climbed, jumped, fell, clambered, dropped, and generally played around for about an hour before Brian came over to us and said he hurt his wrist. His last fall didn’t look any different than the previous assortment of falls, drops, or jumps. I thought he was just tired. He insisted that he hurt it, so we left and took him to the Dr just to prove he was fine. An x-ray showed he had what was called a buckle fracture in his wrist. Minor, as far as fractures go, but still a broken bone. And I didn’t believe him. I suck.
We were talking, joking, laughing, bonding, feeding my soul, all that kind of thing. Then we came up to a T intersection with a stoplight that ran alongside a ravine. We were going through the straight part and the light was green. The truck was a fully loaded semi coming up to the intersection on the perpendicular side and should‘ve stopped, but it didn’t. I’d unbuckled my seatbelt to turn around and tickle my daughter, so when the truck hit us and our car spun around, I was thrown through my open window and onto the street. My family stayed in the car as it went through the guardrail and over the edge of the drop off. They fell about 150 feet at about a 70 degree angle. So they kept hitting the side of the ravine on the way down. And they were still in the car when the truck landed on it after it followed them over the edge. The cops/coroner/whoever does that shit told me they died instantly. At least they didn’t suffer. Suffering was my job.
The weeks after that were pretty hazy in my memory. It seemed like I was living someone else’s life. Everything seemed distant and detached. Nothing seemed real. I’d lined up a job before I was released from prison, and they understood that I needed time off to take care of things. I got the funeral home to arrange their services, and I cleaned up Kate and the kids’ clothes and stuff and got it down to Good Will. Even the funeral was detached. Plenty of friends and family showed up, sorry, plenty of my wife’s friends and family showed up. I’m an only child, my parents are both dead, and I don’t know any of my aunts, uncles, or cousins, so none of my family was there. My friends all live far away, and none of ‘em knew my wife very good, so it was all hers that gave condolences. And I did time for assaulting children, so I got the obligatory ‘sorry’s and that was it.
I sort of settled into a routine of work and tv to cope with life. Or what passes for life when you’re dead but your heart still beats. The only thing I can see as a success at that time was that I kept my drinking under control. Probably ‘cause I couldn’t really enjoy that, either. After a couple months of this, I came home to see I had a visitor on my porch.
“Mr. Smith?” was the indication I got that he was here on purpose. Something about that guy was off. It was hard to place what it was, though. He had no distinguishing characteristics. He was just average. Really average. Average height. Average build. Average features. Dark brown hair. Couldn’t even tell his ethnicity. The only thing about him that stood out was his suit. But not the cut, or the design. It was a fairly good looking suit, not too good, or expensive, or anything like that. It was the color. Once again, not flashy, it was black. But not just black. It was a really deep, dark, black. Like it was more black than black. Weird.
“What?” was my reply.
“My name is Alexander. I have an opportunity to offer you. May I come in and have a word with you?”
“Yeah, I guess.” So we go inside and sit at the kitchen table.
“Mr. Smith, I represent an agency that would like to utilize your abilities. The pay and benefits are exceptional, and the work can be quite rewarding.”
“Really. Sounds oh so believable. You want to hire a widower with a criminal record for assaulting children?”
“My organization isn’t concerned with your criminal record, Mr. Smith. What we are concerned with is your particular skillset.”
“And what is your organization that’s so interested in me?”
“My organization has an unearned negative public opinion, and due to such shall remain anonymous for the time being. At the same time, we have only one competing organization which has an equally unearned positive public opinion. I’m afraid I’m not at liberty to divulge all the details until you make your decision whether or not you want to take advantage of this offer. And may I add that one of the benefits we can provide is the truth about the death of your family.”
It took a few moments for that one to sink in.
“What the fuck are you talking about?”
“Your family’s death was planned, Mr. Smith.”
“Are you fucking high?! My family died in an accident! ACCIDENT!! The truck driver didn’t fall asleep at the wheel, he wasn’t drunk, he wasn’t swerving to miss an old lady crossing the street, and nobody had a gun to his head! The brakes went out! The truck was getting old and it’d been a while since it had a brake job! Normal fucking wear and tear! Shitty ass fucking timing! IT! WAS! AN! ACCIDENT!!”
“That’s what you are wanted to believe by the people who orchestrated it. We can give you all the details that so far have been kept from you. And we are very anxious to enlighten you, Mr. Smith.”
I stood up. “Get the fuck out of my house before I throw you out!”
He also stood up. “Very well, Mr. Smith. I hope you’ll change your mind after you’ve had time to think this over calmly and rationally.” And he walked out the door.
I was a little pissed. I grabbed a beer out of the fridge and paced for a while, then watched some tv. Well, sat in front of the tv with it on. I didn’t really watch anything. Took me a minute to realize that the only detail about Alexander’s offer that he told me was the truth about my family’s death. No info about pay, hours, location, job description, nothing. Asshole knew that was all the info he’d need to tell me.
After four beers, when I went to the fridge for number five, I saw something on the fridge that wasn’t there when I got number four. I’d locked the door when A left, so I could only assume who put it there, but not how he did it. A business card was stuck there with a fridge magnet. It said simply “Alexander”, and under that, a phone number. Plain white card with really dark ink. Beyond black ink. Even his card had to be weird.
A couple days later, I came home to another visitor. Similar to Alexander, he was waiting on my porch when I got home from work, he had no distinguishing characteristics, also average looking, and his suit was nice, but not distinguishing. However, unlike A, his suit wasn’t black. It was grey. But a weird grey. It was hard to focus on. Sorta too grey. I had a bad feeling.
“Mr. Smith? My name is Roberts. I understand you were approached by a Mr. Alexander recently?”
“Yeah? So what about it?”
“I represent Mr. Alexander’s organization’s competition. May I have a word with you?”
I tried to tell him to fuck off, but I was curious. Damn it. “Fine, let’s get this shit over with.” Again, inside at the kitchen table.
“Mr. Smith, I am authorized to give you an offer-“
“For a very rewarding job that pays good and has excellent benefits, right?”
“Yes, that is correct.”
“And why should I give any more of a shit about your bullshit than Alexander’s”
“It’s my understanding that Mr. Alexander was not allowed to give you full disclosure of information, while I am authorized to give you any information that you want.”
“Oh, so you’ve got more bullshit than him. Ok.”
“Mr. Smith, I am willing to release to you all the information relevant to the death of your family right now.”
Now he really got my attention. “Ok, spill it.”
“Mr. Alexander’s company orchestrated the accident that killed your family, Mr. Smith.”
Damn. When he wants your attention, he don’t fuck around. “And why should I believe you over him?”
“More information he refused to give you, Mr. Smith, is that he represents Satan, and I represent God. We want you to facilitate actions that God wants to take place. To orchestrate and oversee God’s agendas. In clichéd terms, take the position of the Hand of God. They want you to take the opposing position.”
“God damn, you spread the bullshit fucking deep! You want me to be God’s shock collar? What the fuck?! Ok, that’s enough for me! Get the fuck out!”
“If that’s what you want, Mr. Smith, I’ll leave.” He stood up and put a business card on the table. “I hope we hear from you, Mr. Smith.” And walked out the door.
At least he didn’t do some Twilight Zone bullshit with his card.
I tried to stop thinking about those two dickheads. But I couldn't. It was a week or two before I decided to do something about it. I’d already looked into the accident that caused my family’s death and there just wasn’t a lot of info there. I had no idea which freak to believe. But I needed a change and a distraction from my thoughts. So, I did what any rational guy would. I put the two cards on my dartboard. One on each side. Closed my eyes, and threw a dart. It hit a card. I then picked up the phone and entered a number. It didn’t even ring, just made the clicking noise when the connection went through.
“Mr. Smith, I’m glad you called.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. What do I gotta do?”
“Just be ready. An associate will arrive tomorrow to take you to the training area, where you will be taught all you need to know and given all the equipment you need to fulfill your duties.”
“Whatever.” And I hung up.
I figured I’d be quitting my job the next day, but other than that, I did my usual routine and went to bed.
I didn’t expect to be woken up by a woman shaking my bed at the butt crack of dawn.