Chapter 53

Sunday after church was a quiet day, but then I was reminded that I’d yet to inform Grandfather on the date of the fight. So, after dinner, I sat down to make the call.

It surprised me that the phone wasn’t answered in the usual 3 rings. If there was one thing my grandparents were adamant about as we were growing up was that you answered the phone in 3 rings with a proper greeting.

“Hello.”

“That’s not the proper way to answer the phone you dumb Polack.”

“So, what do you want jackass?”

“Guess I’ll just have to inform grandmother how you’re answering the phone now.”

“Which will result in you getting your ass kicked.”

“You mean like I did at Christmas?”

“Fuck you! What do you want?”

“To talk to Grandfather.”

“Well, he’s out. They went to dinner at Smakosz. I don’t know when they’ll be back.”

-”You know it’ll be a while; Grandfather always ends up drinking vodka and shooting the shit. Next time I visit I need to grab dinner there, just about as good as home made.”_

“They have some great Polish dishes Grandfather doesn’t make anymore. You want to leave him a message?”

“Can you let him know my fight is the 12th of November, and I’d appreciate it if he could give me a call tomorrow night.”

“Yeah, no problem.”

“Thanks.”

“Alright, gotta go.”

“Bye.”

School was its normal boring time, and it was a little hard to concentrate. My classes in the vocational wing and weightlifting were the only bright spots of my day, though on this day chemistry provided me with a glimmer of hope.

We were going to have to do a science project and report; there were just so many wondrous ideas popping into my head. That enthusiasm was tempered when Ms. Pascal asked to speak to me after class.

“Mr. Badzinski, I had a conversation with Mr. Ficarra yesterday.” Mr. Ficarra had been my biology teacher Sophomore year. I wondered what this had to do with me.

“He’s my teaching advisor, and he warned me about you. Did you really dissect a baby pig and a live bullfrog?”

“Yep. Though Mr. Ficarra insisted that he was the one to pith the frog.”

“I was surprised that you came up with that as a science project. A lot of college students don’t even do that.”

“I will say that it was interesting to see its heart beating as well as the lungs trying to work. To be honest it was also a bit creepy.”

“I’ll agree with that. Mr. Ficarra said you will most likely come up with something that most people wouldn’t normally come up with.”

“Sounds about right. I’ll be looking for something that seems perfect.” She looked at me, and I could only figure she was trying to guess what I’d come up with.

“Here’s that deal Mr. Badzinski. Any type of actual experiment you want to do, it will have to be approved by me.”

“OK.”

We had a decent diner of the almighty Hamburger Helper, and afterwards, I told mom that I was going to need some extra money for my chemistry project. It went better than I expected, and the money would be available when I needed it.

I was perusing the Encyclopedia Britannica to see what might be interesting for my project. I was reading when Mom let me know that Grandfather was on the phone for me.

“How are you going Grandfather?”

“Fine. JJ told me you called last night.”

“Yeah, so everything has been finalized for my fight. I just wanted to give you the pertinent info.”

We talked for a few minutes about it. He then started talking in generalities that left me wondering.

“So, Grandmother and I will be down on the 9th, and we’ll have a couple of surprises we’re bringing with us.”

“What are you talking about?”

-”If I told you then it wouldn’t be a surprise now, would it?”_

“No, it wouldn’t.”

Tuesday was a normal school day; I’d be glad when I would be done with it. Kickboxing was more working on what I needed to do for the fight.

I got home and was surprised when Mom wanted to have a conversation on how my day went. The sudden shift was abnormal, usually she’d fight tooth and nail even if she was wrong. I’d have to keep an eye on this, I couldn’t tell if it was real, or some sort of game being played.

The next day, I had a conversation with Ms. Pascal in Chemistry. She shot down all my first ideas for the project. Seems that there was too much of a risk of an explosion. I needed to go back to the drawing board and try again.

It was a quick trip home to change before the meeting. I had just enough time to grab a snack before I made my way over to the DA’s office.

I made it there before Bob did. Parking between 2 big vans, I went inside to sit and wait. About 2 minutes past time, Bob walked into the lobby.

“Where have you been?”

“Right here.”

“I’ve been in the parking lot waiting for you, and I never saw you come in.”

“Well, I’ve been sitting here for about 10 minutes or so.”

“Don’t do that again. Let’s go.”

I got up and we headed to Mr. Roth’s office. We were called in as we made it in front of the doorway. There were the usual greetings, and as we took our seats, Mr. Roth was looking through a folder.

“So, the investigation into the alleged assault on Mr. Lindquist has been concluded. The detectives found insufficient evidence to support filing charges. It seems that the evidence and the conflicts of interest make this an unwinnable case.”

That was great news, the weight that was lifted felt excellent. This would allow me to move forward without the looming cloud of possible incarceration looming.

I had a question though, and it was probably me being a vindictive prick, though honestly, being thought of as a vindictive prick was OK with me.

“So, Mr. Roth, are there going to be charges filed for falsely reporting a crime and a making a false statement to the police:”

Both Bob and Mr. Roth sighed at almost the same time. I could see Bob shaking his head in my peripheral vision. It was Mr. Roth that responded first.

“Really?”

“Yep.”

“So, I find this quite interesting. You were willing to show lines and compassion to Ellie. Now you want me to throw the book at Mr. Lindquist.”

I knew what was going through my mind, it took a minute to get the wording right. I looked at Mr. Roth directly.

“Two totally separate incidents. Ellie’s part was personal; she broke my trust, the only thing that saved her from my normal reaction is that she is female. That it turns out she has mental issues made my choice even more appropriate. Then again anything that bleeds for 4 to 5 days a month and lives can’t be sane.”

A snort came from Bob and a chuckle from Mr. Roth. After the appropriate pause I continued.

“The issue with Mr. Lindquist is many fold. First, he stuck his hand in my cookie jar. I refrained from physically teaching him a lesson and let him do it to himself. Then the prick tried to get me put in jail. He’s lucky I have plans or I’d have some retribution to dish out.”

Mr. Roth leaned forward onto his desk and looked back at me. I could see that he wanted to ask something, and I could guess what it was.

“So Barnim, from all of our meetings you seem to be a levelheaded young man. That doesn’t match the things that you’re saying today.”

“Mr. Roth, I’m generally one of the nicest people you’ll meet, however, when provoked or screwed over, I’m not really someone you want to deal with. Now I was raised Catholic, though I’m not personally an overly religious person. That being said, I’m an Old Testament guy. Fire and brimstone, eye for an eye and such.”

Both Bob and Mr. Roth were staring at me like I’d grown two heads. I had to glance at Bob to see his expression.

“I get that it’s not a well-received point of view to take. If it comes to it, I believe that I’ll do whatever it takes to protect me and mine. Heaven help the individual or individuals that caused me to get to that state.”

Bob turned his chair so he was better able to look directly at me.

“Barnim, I’d be lying if I didn’t say that the whole thing you just said seriously concerns me. Though you are more mature than I would have thought, you’re still only 17.”

“I get that Bob. It’s that maturity that you see which allowed me to handle Lindquist without touching him. I’m not somebody looking to get into a bunch of physical altercations. It just seems to find me. All I really want to do is to be left alone, finish out school and enlist.”

Mr. Roth looked kind of surprised at the last part. I decided to end this line of talk.

“So, I’ll let everything go, I only ask one thing. Let Lindquist or his lawyer know that I’ll push for him to be charged if they come after me. Now on to a completely different topic. I have a question to ask of both of you. Though at this point I’d like it to stay between us.”

They both nodded.

“So, I need to find a reputable stock broker for when I turn 18. I’d like to have someone in place before then so I can hit the ground running.”

I could see that this had caught them off guard and it took a minute for them to respond. Mr. Roth responded first.

“So. What do you need a stock broker for?” I didn’t have a chance to answer before Bob cut in.

“Barnim got a sizeable settlement.” He then looked back at me.

“So, I’m curious, do you have a plan on what you’re looking to do.”

I laid out the broad strokes of what I was looking to do. I could see that they were both contemplating what I said. I then got some good advice. Bob started off.

“It’s good that you’re looking to build a nest egg and grow it. My first piece of advice is finding a broker that is young, someone that you can grow with. The other positive of your plan is that you’re not putting all your eggs in one basket.”

I saw the intelligence behind his idea. In going with a broker pretty much straight out of college, they would be hungry to grow the portfolio of their clients. It was also someone I could have a lifelong business relationship with. That brought up something else that I needed to think about, a CPA. It would probably be a good thing to do that in the same manner. Mr. Roth then decided to add his two cents on the matter.

“Mr. Carrigan has a good point. I’ll expand on that; I’d set up the investments into a living trust. You will be the trustee and able to direct allocation of the funds in the trust. It keeps a layer between you and the investments for legal purposes.”

Bob agreed with the statement and they both thought that my idea about the CPA had merit. They would get back to me on the whole thing after talking to their brokers and CPAs. There were a few more minutes of conversation before the meeting broke up.

As we walked out to our cars, Bob congratulated me on being free and clear. He was going to get the info for me from Mr. Roth and would call me.

I got the normal questions when I got home and spent a lot of time going over the chemistry books that I’d gotten from the library. I needed to find something quick as there was only about 3 weeks until I had to turn it in.

I decided to push the pace on my morning run again and was breathing extremely heavy when I walked back up the driveway.

Pausing on the edge of the driveway, hunched over with my hands on my knees. I was hit by something in the back and knocked over. I got up to my knees and looked over to see Randy pulling out of the driveway. The motherfucker clipped me!

I looked and he was fucking smirking at me. I yelled, cussing at the asshole Pulling up my sleeve, I could see a pretty good scrape. Walking in the kitchen, I looked at Mom getting ready to leave.

“Randy looks at me wrong, I’m going to beat the living hell out of him.”

Then I explained what happened. She was kind of skeptical about it, which wasn’t surprising. I calmly slowed her my shoulder, she played it off as an accident. That was about as much as I expected.

-”Just be warned. I won’t worry if it’s an accident or not next time.”_ Without waiting for a response, I went upstairs and got ready for school.

The rest of the day went pretty well. I had a short discussion with Ms. Pascal about my chemistry project, and after giving a brief description of what I wanted to do, she gave me approval to go forward. Giving her the list of my needed supplies, she said that she would know by Friday when the chemicals would arrive.

I got home and made a phone call to SGM Okorie, as I wanted to get his thoughts on some things. We were going to have a meeting on Halloween after school, at a Steak n’ Shake just off I-75 in Stockbridge.

I was grabbing a snack and a drink when Randy walked into the kitchen.

“So, how’s the shoulder there, buddy?”

“A little sore, but it’ll be fine, though it showed me how much of a little bitch you are. Take your supposed win, it’s the last you’ll get. Know this, you ever pull some shit like this again and I’ll fuck you up so bad that our last incident will look like a play date.”

“Oh, you’ve got me scared.”

“I know you are. I can see it in your eyes, they don’t lie. While you’re at it, don’t forget to run and tell Mom like the little bitch you are.”

Turning, I headed to my room to lay out a plan for doing my chemistry experiments and began writing the report to go along with them. I was surprised when I was called down to dinner as there was no mention of anything that happened during the day.

The next two days were fairly benign. Kickboxing followed the same formula as the last couple of weeks.

Friday after work I called and left a message for SGM Okorie to make sure that our meeting on Monday afternoon was still on.

Waking up Saturday morning, I was dreading what was coming after the shortened workday.

Taking Erin trick or treating wasn’t something I wanted to do again. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed spending time with her, it was just dressing up in a goofy costume wasn’t high on my list of things to do. I gave my word though and would suck it up.

Work has started to slow down as the weather got cooler. People were doing fall cleanups. And the store was big on selling stuff for the holidays; pumpkins and such before Halloween, trees and wreaths for Christmas.