no feelings for her anymore,” she asks. I hear gunshots and Joey Fontane and his gang as they shoot and kill everyone in their way as they march through the sand coming toward us. Fontane comes up to my beach towel and grabs me. I see Victoria on the opposite side being grabbed by one of Fontane’s men. I look back at Kayla as she gets grabbed by another one of Fontane’s men. Fontane pushes me forcefully into the middle of them. The wind begins to blow the sand violently in different directions. The clouds begin to get dark. The sounds of thunder could be heard in the distance.
“We’re going to play a little game. It’s called pick one and the other one gets a fucking bullet in their head. Pick nobody then all three of you will die. To your left the very lovely Victoria, your first true love, and to your right, proving that first love is so overrated is the very beautiful Kayla,” Joey Fontane shouts into my ear over the sound of the wind. “You have 10 seconds to choose the one who you want to live,” he shouts again. I look at Victoria, then at Kayla. “3 seconds,” Fontane shouts. I don’t know who to choose. “1 second,” Fontane shouts. “Victoria,” I shout over the wind. I feel light rain against my bare skin as I fall to my knees. I turn to my right and watch as Kayla’s lifeless body collapses onto the sand. The thunder roars loudly and then suddenly my eyes are open once again.
23
I’m sitting at a table across from Fontane and two armed men standing at his sides in a dim lighted room. Fontane and the two men at his sides wear black suits. “My associates inform me you were unarmed. Why,” Fontane asks. “I give up, this all needs to stop,” I say. “Give up?” “Yes, go back to the way things were before I was here.” “The foreign and transfer students go back to me,” Fontane demands.
“This is just pathetic. Look at you, no fight at all.” He places a combat knife on the table between us. “Why don’t I just kill you now,” he asks. “You could and to be honest I don’t think I would care, or I could be the symbol of a guy who wanted nothing but to bring you down then gave up because he realized he would never win,” I say. Fontane studies me but probably see’s a man so defeated that he agrees with my argument. “We return the transfers immediately,” he says.
I walk with Fontane and members of his gang as they go from classroom to classroom taking hostage the foreign and transfer students. I see them look at me with defeated and disappointed eyes while I watch the brutally inflicted upon them. “This is fucking bullshit, you’re no better than them,” one of the transfer students shouts directly at me. Fontane takes the end of his rifle and violently smashes it into the transfers face. Blood rushes from his nose. His nose cartilage is now crooked to the left from the impact. He falls onto the hallway floor, and holds his hand against his nose to stop the bleeding. Fontane with full force kicks the transfer student in the nose harder and harder and harder as he cries out in pain. Fontane picks him up by collar of his shirt and pushes him forward as him and his gang continues to gather up more transfer students.
Fontane has his men planted throughout the school to show the student body just in case they didn’t already know, the school belongs to him. It’s the last day before summer break and I hope to forget my first year of high school. I sit on the ledge of the school roof with my legs hanging down. I look at the rural campus surrounded by forest and empty land. The land surrounding the school is plentiful and in a world of its own. I hear the door slam shut behind me. I turn around to Victoria walking in my direction.
“What a year,” she says. I ignore her and continue to stare straight ahead. She takes a seat on my right on the ledge of the roof with me. “I’m sorry what happened to Kayla,” she says. I turn to look at her. “You haven’t talked to me all year.”
“I was scared Matt,” she says. “Of what?” “That I would be missing out on the high school experience if I was with you. We had a great thing going. My whole family asks about you because they knew it too. The only thing I missed out on was being without you for the whole year, possibly longer,” she says. “Why didn’t you ever say anything to me this whole year Victoria,” I ask. “You seemed content. You had a new group of friends. I don’t know you just seemed like you were making your own way, and moved on from me. Then you started dating Kayla,” she says. “I’m not a hero Victoria. I don’t even know who I am anymore,” I say lifting myself up from the ledge of the roof heading for the exit door. I close the door behind me leaving Victoria in silence.
24
On the Saturday morning of my high school graduation parents and other family members file into the football stadium eager to watch their loved one walk down the aisle with diploma in hand. I stand on the outside of the football stadium fence watching as the seniors walk in line heading to their seats. I imagine Kayla in her cap and gown sitting with the rest of her class she grew up with, turning around in her chair smiling at me.
“My son never told me you had beard when describing you,” a man who looks to be in his 40s tells me leaning his hand against the fence looking out toward the football stadium at the soon to be graduates. He has a clean, neat, professional appearance, dressed up for the occasion, while I stand wearing cargo shorts and a blue t-shirt. “Sorry do I know you,” I ask. “My name is Alex. Leo’s dad,” he tells me extending his hand. Upon hearing the words Leo’s dad, I turn in his direction giving him my attention. “Your son died saving the school, doing everything to keep it out of the hands of Joey Fontane, only for me to give it back a few months later. You don’t want to talk to me,” I say turning my attention back to the graduation ceremony. “You’re going through a tough time right now. I understand. However, if I told you could get revenge for everyone you lost by taking down Fontane and the rest of the Pyramid organization, would you agree to it,” Alex asks. “Pyramid Organization,” I repeat perplexed. “Take this card and call me if you want answers.” I take the card he holds out in his hand in front of me. I examine the plain white card with his cell phone number printed on it then place it in the pocket of my cargo shorts.
Kayla’s parents walk down the aisle to a standing ovation as they accept the diploma on behalf of their daughter. When they arrive back to their seats I leave the scene behind me.
Two weeks pass since the high school graduation. I dry myself with a towel as I come out of the shower and walk to the mirror to look at my reflection. I decide to shave my beard which has been getting increasingly thicker. I begin to put on my cargo shorts when I notice something in my pocket fall onto the floor. It’s the card which I took from Leo’s dad at the graduation ceremony. I unfold the card, now wet from being in the washer machine. I make out the number printed on it and decide to call it. Alex answers on the second ring. “Hello, its Matt we met at the graduation ceremony two week ago.” “Yes, I remember. How are you,” he asks. “Better,” I answer. “I was hoping I could answer your question you asked me. Yes, I want revenge and to take down Fontane,” I say.
I sit at a nearby park, watching a physical pickup game of basketball. A limousine pulls into the parking lot in front me, and when I see Alex open the door wearing a black suite I walk in his direction. “Hey,” he says holding the limousine door open for me. I sit on the black leather seats opposite of Alex in the back as the limousine pulls out of the park parking lot. “I don’t have the best experience with limousines,” I comment. “We won’t be in it long. Any bad experiences with private jets,” he asks.
“Pyramid is the name of the company that supplies my and other school districts with food. One of the drivers was caught smuggling Fontane’s drugs in and out of the school by your son,” I say. “Matt, it’s bigger than that one isolated incident at your school. The Pyramid Company is major drug operation that uses the school delivery business as a front for their other illegal business,” he says. “The company is headquartered in Miami, Florida and run by Fontane’s dad. There are more people like Joey Fontane at a number of high schools throughout the country and their operation is only getting larger,” he finishes. “Fontane’s parents are dead. Joe
y was adapted because no one else would take him in,” I say with certainly.
“Not true. Fontane’s parents staged a car accident, and they left their son to start their illegal operation. No one in the family took Joey in because no one in their families associated themselves with his parents, so no one knew they were dead, nor did they care if they were. Leo befriended Fontane in school. He would come over the house, then I got assigned to look into the Pyramid Company in Miami, and I discovered his parents alive. I made the mistake telling him that his parents were alive, trying to convince him that he shouldn’t feel abandoned by people who would leave him behind to do what they were doing, and that his family didn’t know he existed and that’s why no one came for him. But the news pushed him away and he joined with his parents,” Alex says. So many questions race through my mind, that I don’t know which to ask first.
“We’re here,” Alex says. I open the limousine door to a private jet parked a thousand feet away on pavement in what appeared to be in the middle of nowhere surrounded by dried out grass. I step onto the jet and take a seat on