Sunday, May 9, 2021

Hey! You! Get Out of My Way! Leaving Home Part 12

Two weeks later, Tom and Alex have brought a joint into the shelter. Everything has seemed to be heading in a direction to put me on “a path” in life. I would finish up my time at Equinox, move to Saratoga to live in a group home, and then go off to college. Tom and Alex stand at the top of the stairs and wait to hear Laroy’s snoring before they open my door. “Come across the hall,” whispers Alex, motioning with his hand. “We are going to smoke some weed.” Silently we cross the hallway and enter Alex’s room.

I had been in Alex’s room before but now he was living alone. His roommate recently worked out his problems with his parents and moved back home. Against one wall of Alex’
s room is a pile of mattresses that are kept there as storage. Our job in the morning is to move them to a storage room on the upper floor of the building. People are always donating things to the shelter, and since our numbers are always growing, the donations come in handy.

We get the idea to block the door with the mattresses so that no one can get in and surprise us. Alex reaches in the front pocket of his jeans and pulls out a joint, he then places it in his mouth. Pausing to smile, he takes a lighter out of his pocket and lights up.

The smoke curls around Alex’s head as he inhales deeply and holds the smoke in his lungs. Tom reaches out and takes the joint from Alex holding it between two fingers. “Smells like skunk,” says Tom with a laugh. Alex gives him the thumbs up.

We sit on the fire escape for about twenty
 minutes, talking about what our dreams are when we get out of here. Tom and Alex want to see the world and travel across the country. I want to move to New York City and become a dancer.

We finish the joint and while we’re climbing back in through the window, it sounds like someone is pounding on the bedroom door. “Open this door now!” screams the person on the other side of the door. It is
 Laroy. “I know you’re smoking weed!” he screams. Alex and Tom run across the room and lie against the mattresses, trying to block Laroy from coming in. Laroy, tired of asking us to open the door, begins to kick it down. The crunching and splintering sound created by the door as it crashes in is deafening.

Once through the door, Laroy butts the mattresses and sends Tom and Alex flying across the room. I stand there with my mouth hanging wide open, completely in shock. “The police are on their way,” screams
 Laroy, as he takes the mattresses and tosses them as if they weighed nothing.

The Albany police, ever none too subtle, pull up in front of the building with their lights flashing. Laroy grabs at the air as we try to dive past him. Somehow this tiny little ex-Hells Angel kicks
 in a door, throws mattresses around, and grabs three boys as they jump out of his way.

Laroy drags us down the stairs and into the office. We can see the police at the front door. Laroy throws each of us into a chair and pointing, screams, “Don’t anyone move!” Running to the front door, he opens it and in a calm voice says, “Gentlemen, to what do I owe the pleasure of your visit?” The cops laugh and walk into the office. You can hear their walkie-talkies going off, as one of the officers pushes his hat back off his head. “You got any more on you?” he asks, scanning the three of us.

“No……no…
no sir,” Alex stammers. “Well, you’d better not,” he responds. Speaking into his radio, one of the cops walks back out of the room. The one who stays begins to give us a lecture on the evils of smoking marijuana. While he is talking, his partner re-enters the room and begins to go through our pockets.

 

Thank God they never found anything. When he was done with his speech, he tipped his hat to Laroy and he and his partner walked back out into the night. “Tonight is your last night,” said Laroy. “Go back to your rooms. In the morning you have to leave.”

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