I light a cigarette and lean against my bike.
I’m not stupid. I knew things were rough. News travels, even when you’re stationed in Kabul. I knew about the drugs. Knewthe cops stopped responding to half the calls around here. I knew the vets, the ones who wore the same boots as me, were sleeping under bridges with nothing but trauma and dog tags to their names.
But seeing it and feeling it? It isn’t just rough. It’s broken.
Broken crown, broken city, broken people.
And I am not about to just stand here and watch it rot.
Isaiah’s still young, ten, maybe eleven. Smart kid. Quiet like me, but has fire in him. I see it when he watches the world like he’s already judging it. I can’t let him grow up thinking this is all life has to offer.
I don’t know if they’ll be willing, or if I’m still the kind of man they’d follow.
But I’ve seen what happens when good men sit still too long.
So, I ride.
I ride until the road dead-ends at the old junkyard on the edge of town. The same place where we used to race dirt bikes, scrape our knees, and swear we’d become legends one day.
I find Rico “Saint” Mendoza first. He’s outside a dented camper that’s seen better centuries, surrounded by beer bottles and busted lawn chairs. He’s barefoot, shirtless, and holding a half-lit cigarette with the kind of ease that comes from not giving a damn.
“Shit,” he says, squinting at me like I just crawled out of a war zone. “Tama King. Thought you were either dead or a congressman.”
I grin. “Still undecided.”
He laughs once, short and bitter, and tosses the cigarette into a pile of ash that used to be hope.
Next, I find Curtis “Dog” Malloy elbow-deep in the gut of a ‘78 Trans Am. The garage reeks of oil and regret. There’s a cooling fan humming, but the heat still clings to everything.
Dog looks up, wiping sweat from his brow with a stained rag. Grease tattoos his forearms like war paint. “Tama?” he says, blinking like he’s seen a ghost. “You look like shit.”
“Still prettier than you,” I shoot back.
He snorts and keeps working. “Not hard.”
Then, I find Talon “Bookie” Hart behind the shop, stuffing a wad of cash into his sock like the world’s worst magician. He jerks when he sees me, almost falls backward into a trash can.
“Jesus, man. Don’t sneak up on a guy who owes half the town.”
“Still running from things, huh?”
He shrugs, standing to his full lanky height. “Some of us run. Some of us ride back into town like a damn cavalry charge.”
“Guess I’m both.”
He grins, but his eyes scan the street like trouble’s always ten seconds behind.
Men like me. Worn but not done. Still breathing. Still hungry. Still angry.
I came to rebuild something real. But first, I had to see if the fire in their eyes hadn’t gone out.
It hasn’t.
We meet one night, on the roof of Saint’s camper, passing a bottle of Jack and watching the moon like it owes us answers. I say the words that change everything.
“What if we build something that can’t be bought off or broken down?
What if we stop waiting for justice and become it?”
