Tales From Xavon/Tale 1: The Jacket/Book I: Earth
Chapter 1: More of a Warning
My name is Elijah Tanner, or at least that was my name at the time. My former hometown was a peaceful one. It was a suburban area in South Boston, Massachusetts. The domesticated dogs knew when to sleep and stop barking. The grass in a striped pattern due to it being recently mowed. The homes, all were at least two floors and looked exactly the same, inside and out.
November 2nd, 2011. I awoke to the blaring of my digital alarm clock. I quickly stood up and slapped the snooze button. Yawns came out of my mouth as I searched through my closet for clothes to wear at school. As I yanked my black, long-sleeved shirt off its hanger, the door to my room opens. I turned around to see that the visitor of my room was none other than my legal guardian, Darrel Centeio.
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Over 3 years ago, Darrel was an employee at my father's repair shop at Dorchester, one of the worst towns in Boston... Darrel proved to be a strong member of the workplace, after his third week on the job as he continued to work without slacking off or taking breaks through his 9 hours of work, soon he became my father's right hand man. Eventually, Darrel made multiple visits to our household, sometimes it was to assist my father in looking for tools and extra parts, and sometimes it was so that Darrel babysits me while mom and dad were away. The first words I had said to Darrel was, "What are you watching?"
"It's football..." He answered with a yawn.
The term "football" had never been in my vocabulary at the time, so I asked "What's football?" As that was said by my 10-year-old mouth, a look came across Darrel's stubble face. He then turned to me and rose an eyebrow in disbelief.
"What's football," repeated Darrel, "What's football? Football, my young lad, is the most greatest sport in the entire freakin' planet!" I dropped my jaw when the word "freakin'" was uttered, the language on this teenager's mouth had shocked me, did he kiss his mother with that foul mouth?
"Kid, what's your name?" Darrel asked, he had never learned my name due to the fact that I had avoided him multiple times because he was "scary".
"E-E-Elijah..." I stuttered nervously.
"Eli, eh?" He said as he shifted over to make room for me, "Sit..." He said, patting the couch.
I stepped towards the seat slowly, if he was like the teenagers I saw on TV, then I was in for a world of pain and swirlies. I sat down, and to my surprise I was not being pounded or gurgling toilet water, but he pointed at the TV screen. He was pointing at a man in a jersey with the number 12 being labeled on the front, back and around the shoulders.
"That man right there, throwing the ball, he's Tom Brady. He has a hot ass wife..." Said Darrel. A small gasp came from me, I could try to deal with the word "Freakin'" but "ass" was a completely horrible word.
"Hey... sorry about that. I thought you were one of those bratty kids who constantly swore at their mothers if not at themselves." Retorted Darrel, taking notice in my shock. "Don't tell your mom, eh? I don't want my ass to be fired by your father... oh damn..." I cringed as Darrel continued to swear and began to introduce another swear word to me.
"Meh, swears are stupid anyway, mommy said that she'd chop my tongue off if I swore." I stated with a neutral expression on my face.
"Well, if that was the case for me, my tonsils would've been ripped out." Said Darrel, who seemed to be zoned out. My interest in Darrel and his swearing was now peaked.
"You swear that much?" Asked a curious me.
"Yup! Got myself big ol' red marks on my cheeks, just from saying the B-word"
"C-can you tell me some swears?"
"You're 10, why do you need to learn swears, at least wait until you're my age. Then you can swear like a sailor for all I care."
"I... just... want to be cool... like those other kids..."
He had laughed at me, which pissed me off.
"H-hey!" I sputtered, "Shut up or I'll hit you!"
He didn't flinch or even react to my threat, he only continued to laugh. When he finally did stop laughing, he only had this to say...
"You don't need to swear to be cool, you just need to be yourself. It's either that or don't give two cr- eh, poops about those losers..."
All of this came from a bad-mouthed teenager, it convinced me that he was a good guy.
"My name is Elijah Tanner! What's yours?" Asked my young self as I held my hand out to shake the teenager's hand...
Darrel grins and extends his arm, he shakes my hand and said, "Name's Darrel... Darrel Centeio! Nice to meet you Eli..."
After that encounter, me and Darrel had started to hang out more. We went to football games, I helped Darrel out at the repair shop and eventually got to learn some swear words from "The Master" himself [as long as I rarely use them...]. I never got to make any other friends...
The next year, my mother died of a heart attack and my father had given the permission of Darrel to be my legal guardian and had left to start business in New York. Ever since his left, I hated him for leaving me in a crapsack city like South Boston, sure it wasn't too bad here, but everything felt so monotonous. Children of my age were coddled and had their video games and technology to fall on. I also had games, but they were always boring when I beat them...
Darrel, who always respected his boss, agreed to adopt me, under one condition.
"You'll never refer or address me as your father," he had said with a smile on his face, although had a serious tone when he said it, "But as your older brother. I don't want women staring at me under the impression that I had a kid at the age of 6." I chuckled when Darrel said that, he was 19 when he adopted me, while I was 13...
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Darrel had grown over the two years, he had grown a full 2 inches in height, he had cut his long hair to a short and spiky hairstyle and his clean face now had a stubble on his chin.
"Well, well, well, look who didn't oversleep today." said Darrel in his usual sarcastic and joking voice. Despite the sarcasm in his voice, it was true that I had overslept in the past two days due to a long time of studying in preparation for the midterms.
"Well, I could've woken up in time, if someone actually woke me up when the clock didn't." I said as I pulled my head through the hole in the shirt, I searched for my dark blue jeans.
"You looked so peaceful," replied Darrel, "Besides, you get way too grumpy and bitchy if you don't wake up on your own terms." This was true, if I had awakened earlier or even later than the time I wanted to wake up, I would have started cursing and complained about how much rest I had left or how late I was to school.
I had found my favorite pair of dark blue jeans. They had a skull head on the back left pocket and were baggy, because of that, the pockets were deep enough to store the contents of my closet.
"Why were you studying anyway," asked Darrel, as I put one leg through a pant leg, "Midterms aren't till next month."
"I just wanted to be ahead in my studies." I replied as the second leg goes through another pant leg. Now the search for my black low-top sneakers began.
"Whatever man, just remember me when you win the freakin' Nobel Peace Prize." Darrel joked. The common misunderstanding around my neighborhood and school was that I was some kind of brainy child prodigy. Which was probably because I barely spoke to anyone at school or at the suburbs. I was just trying not to flunk out of high school, not trying to be a worldwide phenomenon.
Darrel yawns and stretches his arms, "Well, I'll go ahead and leave you alone then, I gotta get to work," Darrel starts to walk out of my room, but stops, "Oh have you seen my glove, I can't seem to find it anywhere..." I shook my head. About Darrel's right hand glove, it was a black leather glove that was knuckle-less at the time it was a mystery to why he wore that all the time, except that it might be considered fashionable to him.
"Maybe I forgot it at the bathroom..." He says as he heads towards the bathroom across the hall from his room. As I found my sneakers, I slipped my feet in as I heard Darrel yell from the bathroom, "Found it!"
I picked up my bag and headed for the front door, as did Darrel, with leather, knuckle-less glove worn. Darrel and I both walk out of the house, I lock the door as Darrel walks toward his black motorcycle. Darrel, hops onto his bike and puts his helmet on his head, the helmet and its visor matched the color of the bike, black. Darrel lifts up his visor, and yells as he turns the engine on, "Eli! Don't die, bro! Don't die!" It was what he said almost every morning since his adopting me, I assumed that it was his saying, or dare I say, catchphrase. I smiled, "Don't worry, bro! I won't!" I replied innocently. Dying was hard when no one was after you at the time. As Darrel sped away after revving up his engine, I began to walk North towards my school, South Boston High wasn't far from the suburbs, it was about a 20 minute walk over.
Nowadays, I replay Darrel's words over and over in my head... "Don't die, bro! Don't die!" In retrospect, I realized it was more of a warning than a saying and I should have heeded such a warning...
