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The Homeless man’s eyes, searching the blue sky.
The streets of the city.
People, hustling by in the 99-degree heat. Walking down
the sidewalk. A man, a woman, a child. A little lad, with a
red balloon! The Homeless man’s eyes
connect to the young lad. A memory, from a former life.
The young lad tugs on his father’s shirt.
"Papa, papa, why is that guy sitting on the curb?"
The man kneels, looks the child in the eyes then looks
over to the homeless man who wreaks of stink from
the street. Just smiles
"Sometimes, son, life can be very CRUEL."
Looking his son in the eyes, the man reaches into his pocket
pulling out some change. Placing the change in the
young lad’s hands
"Here, go give this to the man."
The boy, vex, yet courageous!
Walks over to the homeless man.
The young lad’s shadow, casting over
The homeless man looking up.
Sweat profusely with dirt dripping off his brow. The lad’s
eyes a spellbinding blue.
The lad, wanting to speak.
Fear, gripping his tongue!
Hand shaking. Lifting his arm, releases the coins. Homeless
Man’s eyes are still locked to the young lad’s.
Coins bouncing off the concrete.
Echoing, Homeless man’s mind in a still frame. What
seems like eternity, his head, rotating downward. Eyes, watch
In amazement! Coins going to and fro!
Hands not moving. The lad, bolting back to the man,
back to the woman, back to love. It’s a mom and dad!
Homeless man’s hands move, grabbing up the money.
Like a chicken, plucking its food, gathers up the
Coins while looking up. The boy with the red balloon,
walking away. The boy’s head turns slowly, his mesmerizing
blue eyes, looking back at the homeless man
The lad bumping into someone, lets loose the red balloon!
Homeless man watches its ascent!
The lad vanishes into the mass.
Eyes follow the balloon as his mind goes into a dream
while a familiar voice echoes in his heart.
"Ronin, RONIN? Where are you Ronin?
I need your help in Troy's room."
Ronin’s eyes glued to a computer screen. Glued to something
Deemed at the time, important. Yet he miraculously responds
"On my way, I'm finishing an email to my client!"
Ronin closes his laptop then heads through the foyer, runs
up the stairs into Troy's room. The outline of his wife, her
blond hair, her figure, races through his mind.
"Ronin, can you please hang this red balloon mobile up
here over Troy's bed."
Ronin frowning. "Why on earth are we hanging a red balloon
mobile over his bed? Why not something cool, like jet
fighters or spaceships?"
She doesn’t even think about it
"Because, that is what Troy has picked out of the magazine."
Ronin climbs on the bed screwing the eye hook into the
Ceiling, then, she hands him the red balloon mobile. He hangs
the mobile, as they watch the red life-like balloons spin.
Suddenly the memory is broken to the sounds of a deep voice
"Scumbag trash, move on; you can't be here!"
The balloon vanishing into the sun, Ronin's head moves slow.
A slave to the system, enforcer of policy, jolly Ol’Police
officer is trying to communicate
"Shit for brains, you deaf?”
The Officer getting annoyed relatively
quick kicks Ronin in the arm.
“I am not going to ask again, now move it!”
Ronin looking at the officer, gets on his knees, grasping the
ragged cup while gathering his tattered jacket, stands and
walks away.
Walking, Ronin gazes upward, trying to find the red balloon
in the sky, a sky so vast, so empty, yet with no avail.
Walking down the street,
half dehydrated from the heat, cuts down an alley. A familiar
area. Taking the change out of his ragged cup, placing the
coins into his left pocket. The only pocket he has with no
holes. Lifting his cup up under an air conditioner.
Catching the water that drips off.
Down the alley is the back of the Chinese restaurant.
Ronin filling the cup halfway drinks the warm water.
Walking down to the back of the Chinese restaurant looks
around. It’s a crime to take food from a dumpster.
Lifts on the locked dumpster just enough to get his hand
to slide in. Pulling out a hand-full of day old noodles mixed
with a hardened white rice. He places the filth in his mouth
and begins to chew.
Gravity pulls a piece of rice off his lip. It slowly falls to
the ground as Ronin's mind fades away to the memory of a
different day. A day to be like no other day
"Hey, dad, is that my Chinese noodles?"
Ronin, walking through the door at the hospital room looks at
his Son!
"Yes, it is, had Chou's make it just the way you wanted
with no vegetables, got you plenty of soy sauce!"
Sitting on the bed, Ronin pulls out the food. Troy trying to
sit up.
"Dad, that smells great!"
Ronin, looking up sees the green colored fluid flowing out of
the IV and into his son's arm. Smiles to hide a pain
"You’re my brave little man!"
Just then, the phone rings!
Ronin reaches over and picks it up
"Hello."
It’s a voice he knows well, though her tone is distressed!
"Ronin, I just got off the phone with the Doctor!”
She Pauses. Ronin picks up the pieces
"Honey, what is it?"
Ronin’s wife slows to respond!
"Is Troy by you?"
Ronin grabbing the phone walks over to the window looking
at Troy trying to eat the food
"Not exactly, why?"
She lets out a sigh!
"We have a meeting with the Doctor, I'm heading over to
his office now from work!"
Ronin, looking at Troy now has an emptiness in his voice
"What's going on?"
She can barely muster the words somehow though they
protrude!
"Ronin, the blood results came back, they are not good!"
She pauses to hold back the tears that don’t stop
"The Doctor will explain everything to us, this stuff
still confuses me, can you meet me there, please?"
Ronin looking out the window in disbelief
"I'm heading there now, babe.... I love you!"
She doesn’t respond, how can she
Though, she is wishing that Ronin for once would tell her
that everything will be OK.
Ronin listening the phone goes dead, hanging up the phone,
looks over to Troy
"Hey kiddo, your mom and I have to go see Doctor."
Leaning over he kisses his son’s bald head.
"I love you."
Troy looks up to his dad with a smile on his face
"I love you too!"
Ronin begins to leave; Troy calls out to his father
"Dad?"
Ronin turns and looks at Troy
"Yes."
Troy looks at his dad with a strong face
"Everything will be OK, don't be afraid, dad,
I'm tired, my chest hurts; I'm going to rest."
Ronin smiles at Troy, then turns and walks out of the room.
Heading over to the elevator. His mind Flashes!
Thoughts race through his mind of the birth of his son.
His curly blond hair, those beautiful blue eyes’. Another
elevator ride ten floors down, seems like an eternal descent
One that's been done a thousand times already,
only this time it’s different.
The mind focuses on Troy's first steps, his
first tooth.
All the things taken for granted come flushing in.
Exiting the elevator, his mind just places one-foot forward
heading over to meet with his wife
The office has a pale blue paint scheme with pictures of all
the children that suffered from cancer! A wall size bulletin
board of the ones who lived, as well as the ones who died!
A memorial, of the courageous little warriors.
A squeaky voice from behind a piece of glass
"Good afternoon, Ronin."
Ronin looks and a wide-eyed nurse whom he knows on a first
name basis is staring at him in the doorway. A nurse, he met,
three years prior.
"Oh, hello, the wife and I have an appointment with the
Doctor."
The Nurse looking at Ronin.
"Yes, I know. Just have a seat, he'll be with you shortly."
Ronin turns to sit as a voice echoes in
"Ronin?"
Turning he looks to see his wife walking through the door
They greet each other with a long-standing hug, almost like
Strangers that just met.
"Don't worry!"
Is uttered out of Ronin's mouth. Tears pouring out of his
wife's eyes, like a flood. Her nails digging into skin
“I can’t not worry, I can’t!
As Ronin and his wife are talking. The good Doctor walks
through the doorway.
"Oh, hi guys, please, come down to my office!"
The Doctor looking at the Nurse
"Would you call the Psychologist down here please."
The Nurse looking at Ronin and his wife with a disheartened
frown for she knows what this call really means
"Yes Doctor."
They all sit down in the office awaiting the arrival of
Psychologist. Small talk is heard from Doctors office. For no
one really wants to ask a question that is already known.
The Psychologist walks in with her cup of coffee.
"Hi everyone. I would say hi to you Doctor; but we just
Conversed with each other 40 minutes ago,"
Doctor smirks at the Psychologist
"Psychologist, if you would have a seat, I'll begin."
The Doctor pulling out a binder the size of a law book
"There is no easy way to say this."
Ronin reaches and grabs his wife's hand. Grasping, a death
grip. She looks at Ronin, her eye's usually a brilliant blue.
Now, covered in a haze of red with a sea of glass from all
the tears she has shed. Ronin's eyes start to swell together
they look at the good Doctor.
"The blood results show that the cancer has spread, in the
three years of treatment the cancer started to remit
though the chemo is no longer working. It has spread
through the body at a much faster rate than anticipated."
Ronin, mustering the strength
"How much time do we have, Doctor?"
Doctor pauses a moment
"A few days or weeks, maybe a couple of months, at most."
The Psychologist interjects
"I would like to meet with you guys to help you cope with
this. Also, I have a group that gets together every
Wednesday, can I set that up for you?"
Ronin’s Wife responds through a tear soaked voice
"Yes, please do."
Psychologist with a heartfelt voice.
"OK, I will dear! If you need anything, please call,
Anytime, I’ll make myself available!"
Ronin and his wife leave the office. It's like ice all over
them. They say nothing, what can they say? The ride in the
elevator like they don't exist. No words, no comfort, just a
empty numbness. Ding, ding, ding, the doors open. Ronin
staring into the empty hall. His wife, exits the elevator.
Ronin like a baby, putting one foot in front of the other,
starts to walk. A walk that they did a thousand times before.
The ceiling tiles are painted with art work from all the
children from the tenth floor.
Walking down the hall they see emergency doors open.
Bursting forth is a medical team.
Whom they know by name. Neither
Ronin nor his wife had any utterance left to speak. They
turned the corner and were gone. Wife, frantically starts
running, as if an intuition came over her. Ronin still in a
comatose state, walking. Only to be awakened by the blood
curling screams from his wife.
Ronin, running, rounding the corner. Medical personnel in
and around Troy's room. Ronin gets to the door way peering
in. Troy's on the floor with blood pouring out of his mouth
and nurses pulling his wife away from their son.
She’s in a rage of tears, screaming, kicking.
Trying to hold onto her only child
The medical team he knew by name, was trying to jump start
Troy's heart! Ronin, the room spinning, the lifeless body of
his son on the ground. The Doctor calls the time. The words
echo in slow motion in Ronin's ears. Ronin hit's the ground.
He surely didn’t know that would have been the last time he
would’ve seen his son alive. Just note those words Ronin
“Everything will be OK Dad, don't be afraid!”
Screams, screams, screams are heard.
A foreign tongue.
Ronin, vision, coming around, laying on the ground, looking
up, through blur tear filled eyes. Reality sets in as he sees
a little oriental man shouting
"You, get out! Go, get!"
Ronin, grabbing hold of the dumpster, pulls himself up.
Ignoring the rambling from a language not his own,
Pushing past the screaming little oriental man.
Tears, pouring out of Ronin's eyes. The numbness runs wild in
his veins. The endless rage. The heart filled with
anger, pumping utter despair. Stumbles to the ground! His
face looks up to the sky. Tears, fall from his cheek like a
gentle rain as he screams the screams, to release the agony
Ronin's head falls to the ground. His hands dig and scrape
Ronin slowly picks himself up walking painfully
down the alley way. Blood drips from his fingers.
Pain nullified from the overwhelming sadness that always
remains. Walking into the sunset, his outline slowly dissipates
WHEN YOU LIVE ON THE STREET, REALITY IS A COLD, HARD, GROUND!
HARDENED HEARTS FROM THOSE AROUND...WELCOME, TO A MORAL SOCIETY IN THE BUSINESS AMERICA WE CALL PROUD