The Confession

“well then Alex” Vinney said as he laid a large handgun on the table beside him, “I think it’s time for your confession”. Vinney’s eyes were fixed on the young man who was sitting on the opposite couch in front of him. Alex could almost see his reflection in them. Small and beady in the center of a large, bald face. Alex looked away at the bloody-beaten face of his friend, who was sitting hunched down on a large sofa at the back of the room, caught between two large unpleasant men, barely conscious. Well then, thought Alex, a confession is what he’s gonna get. He took a deep breath and started talking.

“well then, I actually have two confessions. I’ll start with the first. When I was eleven, I stole a pack of cigarettes from Mr. Yelzits’s shop”.

“…what?” Vinney replied, “are you dumb or something? Did you come here just to waste my time?”.

“relax” Alex answered, “I’m getting there. I just need a few minutes”.

“okay, I’m gonna give you that” Vinney said, “But depending on what you say, Dylan over there might not be getting out of here”. Alex knew that. Dylan’s face, which usually made him angry, has now only brought up sadness in him. He took out a cigarette from the pack in his pocket and lit it like he was unaware of the situation he was in.

“where should I start? Let me think. yesterday I was at the studio, recording with Benny Hendrickson. On stage he goes by the name Hendrixson. You know, like Jimi Hendrix. perhaps you’ve heard of him, he recently got a few of his songs playing on the radio, got close to the top of some charts. I knew him from around, used to be the warm-up for a couple of his gigs around town, so now I join him for a session from time to time. We finished recording and went to lay back on the couch. While I roll us a joint, He tells me about the tour he’s about to go on tomorrow. something big, all over Europe, finally he’s leaving this god-forsaken town. And just a day before the trip, his guitarist breaks his hand in a car accident, so he asks me to join him. he says I’d have to put around ten grand up front, since he can’t finance me, but once we get the money from the shows I’d get it all back and then some. Now Vinney, believe me that I just wanted to scream at him yes, that I’d go, but that isn’t the kind of my I carry. He needs an answer by tonight, and I tell him I’d think about it as I started making my way back home.

“I often think about how the city changed a lot since I was a kid. Or maybe it was I who changed. The more I grew, the more I could see the ugliness of it. And let me tell you, I would see some awful sites, and hear some awful sounds. As a kid I remember not being bothered by any of it, for me it was just the world. But now it’s like I can only remember the bad things.

“once I got home, I saw my mother was there, sitting in our crammed kitchen taking her shot at the paper’s daily crossword. You know, whenever I look at her, I always see this sadness. like a cold that she can’t shake off. I think she never got over my dad’s leaving, even though it happened a long time ago. round the time I was five. Not that I blame him, by the way. I mean, who would choose a life like this? To live in this shithole? If I were him, I would’ve run away too. But on the other hand, it’s always harder to be the one left behind, so I can’t blame her too.

“She gets up and we talk about how my day is going, usual things, And all the while I try working up the courage to ask her for the money to join the tour. I know that if I ask, she would give it to me. This woman, who probably doesn’t have more than five hundred bucks in her bank account, would find a way to get me that ten Grand. But tell me, how can I break her heart and ask her to let me leave like that? When I’m the only thing she’s got? I just couldn’t bring myself to do it. I end up going to my room, hoping I’ll get the muse to write a song. I write them in this little black notebook that I took from my dad on the last night he was still with us. I then get a text from our Dylan asking me to come over to his place later. Since I didn’t have anything else better to do, I agree.

“Dylan lives alone since he doesn’t get along with his parents. Especially his dad. Even as kids the two of them would always get into these awful fights, which is why he would always be outside. following me around until late hours. At the time I never got why he’d do it, and I couldn’t stand seeing his loyal brainless puppy face all the time, it made me so angry. I think the only reason why I bothered being with him at all was that we both understood each other. We both had this need to run away.

“I told you about the cigarette pack, right? I guess I should tell the hole story. Back when we were around eleven years old, we used to go Mr. Yelzits’ convenience store to get candy after school. Once when we were there, I saw this pack of cigarettes on the shelf right under the counter and I suddenly had this bad urge to take it. You know, even now I’m not sure what drove me to do it. I think it might be that I recognized the brand as the one my dad used to smoke. It’s the same one I smoke to this today. Anyway, the cigarette shelf was right under Mr. Yelzits, who was this mean old man with terrible eyesight. while he was busy trying to read the newspaper with all of what his poor eyes could do him, I snuck up quickly, grabbed the pack and walked out the store as if nothing was wrong. Honestly, even now I can’t explain how I wasn’t caught. But I guess the old man got the feeling that something was off, because the next thing I knew, Dylan was being dragged out of the store by his ear, while the old man screamed at his him ‘YOU LIAR! YOU THEIF!’ and Dylan sobbing his eyes out crying ‘it wasn’t me! I didn’t do it!’. He went off on Dylan like I’ve never seen a grown man do, to a child. He even made Dylan bring his parents over, made them pay for the pack. I still think about that, how fucked up it was”. Alex stopped and took a long drag on his burning cigarette.

“So, I get to Dylan’s place that night, and the first thing that catches my eye is the fancy whisky bottle on his stained coffee table. I ask what’s this about, and Dylan offers me to sit with his big dumb fucking smile. He pours us shots and we raise a toast. ‘this is it’, he tells me. Before I even get a chance to ask him what’s he on about, he slams the table with two large stacks of cash. That’s twenty Grand, he says. He starts telling me about this deal he made, where he borrowed some cash from you to buy drugs, which he knew someone he could sell to. How an idiot like him could arrange something like this is beyond me. All in all, he says, he made about forty Grand, and he’s using one half of it to pay you back and the other to start a new life somewhere else. I sit there all the while he’s telling me this, and I start getting mad. I don’t know why. I try not to let him see it, so we continue to drink and with every shot I take it just keeps boiling and boiling. I mean, the fucking nerve of this guy, who does he think he is? That he can just run away from this town like that?

“A bottle of whiskey and a few beers later we call it a night. He goes on to bed and tells me to close the door shut. I tell him I need to go take a piss. I go to the toilet and open my phone to see there’s a text from Hendrickson, He wants to know my final answer about the tour. I put my phone aside and start to pee. I think it might have been the longest leek I’ve ever had, it just kept pouring out, and for some reason at that moment I remembered my dad. His face gets blurrier with every day that passes. Maybe in fifteen years I wouldn’t be able to remember Dylan’s face as well. I finished, grabed my phone, and replied to Hendrickson. I tell him I’ll come.

“Dylan was already asleep in his room, and the cash was still laid on the table where he left it. I stuffed the inner pocket of my coat with the two stacks and left. I thought to myself, figuring he still has twenty Grand left, that he’d still have enough money to pay you back, and after I come back from the tour, I could repay him with maybe a little extra. And besides, fuck him. Hendrickson tells me to be tomorrow at twelve o’clock the train station. I got back home, packed a bag and went to sleep. when I woke up this morning.

I turned on my phone and saw a bunch of texts from Dylan, all asking where the money is, each more panicked than the last. I tried to call but he wouldn’t pick up. That’s when I knew I fucked up, but at first I thought to try and talk to him. Maybe I could even get him to loan me he money until I came back from the tour. I went back to Dylan’s place but he wasn’t there. I then thought to check at his parents’ place, though I don’t know why. in hindsight it, there was no reason he would be there. His mother was there and when I asked her, she told me she saw Dylan last two days ago, when he gave her money to pay for his dad’s hospital bills. The same one he hated so much. They cost twenty Grand”. Alex looked at Dylan again, and the sight caused the sadness inside him to swell. “I guess you really can never know with people.

“and the truth is, for the life of me, I can’t say what Dylan did to deserve this. He really didn’t. So, my second confession and question are these”. Alex pushed the two large stacks of money from his side of the table to Vinney’s. “here’s your money. I stole it, not Dylan. And now I’ve come to give it back. at the very least, let him go”.

Vinney laid back and rubbed his bald scalp with his hand. “ok, he can go”, He said and gestured towards the two men sitting behind him. They got up and dragged Dylan across the floor, closing the door behind them as they left the room. “you know” Alex said, finishing his cigarette, “now that I think about it, I could have just taken one of the stacks from Dylan’s table that night. One would have been enough, but I took two. Why did I do that?”.