chapter 1 - Philly streets

Adrian

I wandered my way out of the alley and onto the streets of philadelphia. I had to get somewhere warm. fast. The house was about 2 miles away. I know that because I just passed the music store across from the fire house. I kept walking ,or at least I kept moving. I couldn't tell since my legs lost all their feeling. It kinda felt like I was floating along the sidewalk. I was trying my best to think. To think of how to get warm. To think of if I'd be safe when I got home. But there was a fog in my brain that left me in a state where thinking just didn't make any sense. Or at least it seemed that way. Like instead of looking at the world with questions and answers there were only statements and actions.

I accidentally bumped into a tall man and quickly murmured a sorry. He huffed and kept walking. Just then I realized the fire house and music store were about 3 blocks back. And I also realized that every person I passed stared at me and my attire.

Apparently they thought it was unusual to see a 13 year old boy dressed in a t-shirt and shorts walking around philadelphia in the middle of december. But those were the only clothes I had. And they also happened to be the ones I was wearing when I heard dans poker buddies storming our front door with liquor to spare. Everytime they came over I had to leave. Not just because Dan would have enough booze in his system to finally kill me but because his friends would too. And those aren't good odds for a malnourished straight D student.

I passed the Starbucks I had gone to with my mom when I was little. Every time she parked the car there in the morning she would tell me that we would make a deal. If I was patient and sat there while she drank her coffee, she would get me a cake pop on the way out the door. Usually thinking of my mom was exhausting and painful ,but this time it felt more warm and innocent. I pushed all the other thoughts of her away as guilt threatened its crushing grip.

I passed the liquor store on 34th street (which was a block away from home) and stared down at my shoes hoping that no one inside would see my face. About two years ago I got caught by the cashier trying to steal a bottle of bourbon. It wasn't for me. It was for Dan. sometimes i'd come from school and he'd be sitting on the couch lacking a dangerously high BAC. which of course needed to be remedied. So he'd scream at me the minute I walked into the door. I didn't have any money and of course he didn't give me any. So I stole it. I hate myself and I know I'm gonna burn in hell. But I stole it. And It worked for a couple months but one day I got caught. And I can still remember the car ride home. There was tension so thick a chainsaw couldn't break it. The thought of what happened that night when we got home sent shivers down my spine.

I arrived in front of the place I've been calling my home for the past 9 years. It was a small wooden house with a decently sized yard. The front yard's grass was up to my elbows since it hadn't been mowed in almost 5 years. I walked on the cracked concrete path that led up to the house. I walked up the small row of steps that had remnants of glass (from beer bottles) sprinkled on them. I found myself at the screen door. The door that was the border between the world and the hell of home.

I carefully walked into the house and quietly clicked the screen door closed. I looked around as the familiarity crept up my spine. To the right of me is a 40 inch TV sitting on top of a cabinet that wasn't filled with much more than a few dvds I had as a kid. To the left there was a leather couch (with plenty of rips and of course cigarette burns on it.) and right in front of the couch was a small wooden table. When I walked closer to it the light from a floor lamp shined on the table and revealed countless condensation rings on its surface.

I looked forward and carefully tiptoed towards the kitchen. In Front of me a swinging door (like you might see at a bar in an old western film) partially hid the innards of the kitchen. I looked under it and sighed in relief when I saw no legs occupying the room. I carefully walked through the doors and looked to my right where the kitchen table still had an unfinished poker game and empty beer bottles lying on its surface. I turned back and pushed through the still swinging doors.

I wandered back into the living room and turned up the wooden set of stairs. The stairs creaked under my light weight as I thought of how they screamed under Dan's 240 pound beer belly physique. I chuckled to myself lightly but my tone quickly darkened once my eyes met the dent in the wall to my left. I kept walking up the stairs as my mind remembered a time when that dent was caked in dried blood.

I reached the top and walked down a narrow hallway. I stopped. A partially opened door at the very end of the hallway taunted me. I ignored it. I turned to face another door (the door to my 'bedroom'). I walked into the room and was greeted with the pile of blankets that I slept on (at least I did when I felt it was safe to fall asleep) . The only other thing in the room is a beach towel with dried blood in the center of it (I had set it aside from the rest just in case I needed to stop any bleeding).

I walked out of the room and carefully closed the door. I looked further down the hallway where the partially opened door resided. I creeped down the hallway towards the room as my mind threw memories at me just as fast as I could knock them away.

I stood in front of the door with fear poisoning my movements. I gathered myself and cracked the door open just enough to see inside. I peered through the opening and to my relief nothing but a sheetless beer stained bed was in the room. I returned the door to its original partially opened state and sighed to myself. But just then a knock came at the door. It was a firm knock that didn't sound anything like the knock that Dan made when he came home drunk in the morning and forgot his keys.  

I walked down the stairs and through the living room as another firm knock hit the door. I found myself at the doorway as I began to peer through the peephole as I saw a police officer standing in the doorway. I stepped back and opened the door. The officer seemed to be caught by surprise at my presence and the more he observed me the more confused he became. "Uhh hello I'm Officer Rennman with the Philadelphia Police Department and I'm looking for Adrian Angoscia." he said with a tone that i had never heard before, a tone that felt kind but at the same time insulting. "Um..uh y-ya that's me" I said, tripping over my words. My mind raced with questions that had an intense desire to be answered but everything that was circulating in my head stopped and died as the officer spoke. "Uh..we regret to inform you that your step father Daniel Angoscia has passed away."