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Amos James Jr. · (01-02-2014)

That pack of Marlboros been sittin' there all day long just tauntin' me. Ain't had one since I got out a couple months back. That's one of the things Eli said I couldn't be seen takin' part of 'round here at his place. Didn't strike me so much he had a problem with me actually smokin' one here 'n' there, so much as he didn't want the rest of his people doin' it. There's a lot to be said about tellin' folks what they can and can't do.

I'm supposed to call my parole officer by 4:00 today. I already know what he's gone be askin' me about. "The warden said you'd been caught with some Percocets that weren't prescribed to you about a month before they let you out."
Well, no shit, is what I'm gonna' tell him. You try makin' it as long as I did without somethin' to get you through it. Be glad it was just the Percs. Them bastards shut down pretty much everything comin' in off the street by that point. Don't know quite what Eli'd say 'bout all that if he knew it. Imagine he wouldn't have let me stay up here in The Promised Land. Hell, wonder what he'd think if he found the cocaine stashed under the bed.

I ain't touchin' it. That ain't me no more. I'm Baron Samedi walkin' the earth. Got responsibilities I didn't have before.

Them Marlboros is laughin' at me.

I walk across the dusty wooden floor and pick up the pack. Smack it on my hand a few times to settle that tobacco and I go next to the open window.

Light it up, inhale. Relief.

That psychiatrist kept on askin' me over and over for all them years, "Why'd you kill her? Why didn't you just walk in and take what you was after and leave?"

Hard to explain somethin' like that to somebody wasn't there. I's only 18. Dropped outta' high school in 10th grade, ya' know? That ain't to say I'm stupid or nothin'...Ain't for me to say whether I is or whether I ain't. What I'm sayin' is that kids make mistakes. I feel regret for what I done, sure. Ain't a day passes I don't think about it. I walked up on that old lady's front porch, knowin' her old man done passed away a few months before. Figured she had the life insurance money and all that. Wasn't bright enough yet to even think about how long that shit takes to get or to even consider she had a bankin' account.

Poor old lady. I twisted the knob...I was figurin' it'd be locked, but it came right on open. Real late at night. This loudmouthed chihuahua comes runnin' downstairs barkin' at me. I picked him up right quick and threw him outside and he just ran away. Then I picked up her purse 'n' just started goin' through it.

Then I hear her movin' upstairs. She starts walkin' down and I swear I ain't never felt my heart beat quicker. She comes down, old black lady, in a blue nightgown. She starts yellin' for that dog.

"SUGAR! SUGAR! HERE, SUGAR! COMERE, SUGAR!"

I decided right then I's just gone take the purse and leave out the front door but she seen me right as I's turnin' around.

"Boy, what is you doin'? Ain't even nothin' in that purse!"

Didn't even know what she was sayin'. I just knew she'd seen me and I got scared. I stopped in my tracks, 'fraid of this old woman. She came up and put her hand on my wrist.

"You just put it back and we can pray together. You don't have to do none of this."

I didn't believe her. I could hear the fear comin' up from deep inside her and I knowed I's goin' to jail. I punched her hard as I could right in the nose. She felt straight down and her head hit the corner of the table on the way down. I don't remember much past that, 'cept all that blood. I'd seen blood before when I's huntin' and fights I'd been in. Not that much, though. And her eyes. I still see them all clouded over ever time I try to sleep.

But no, warden's right. I don't need them Percocets.

Now, don't hear me wrong. I ain't tryin' to say I'm a victim or nothin'. I know what I done. It does haunt me and I feel bad it had to happen to her, but I know who I am. I know why I'm on this earth. I know why I been here since the beginin'. I'm part of that natural order. Amos is there to breathe life into the little ones and he's there to take 'em out.

My cigarette ashes and burns my finger. I flick it out the window.

I got caught pretty quick. It only took 'em 'bout two days to figure out what I'd done. It'd been rain' that day and my left leg's a little bit shorter than my right one, so when I walked up through her yard it left my boot prints in the mud. Didn't take no scientist to figure it out in such a small town. Not to mention I didn't wear any damn gloves.

Hindsight's 20/20, they say. It's all a blessin' to me that it happened anyhow. I figured out who I was, and I'd have never seen Truth had it not been for all that. Ever time Eli came to talk to me, tellin' me 'bout The Almighty...Man, that shit opened my eyes. That helped me figure out who I was and what my purpose was. I'm to judge those that would do evil and help those righteous in his eyes. I became The Lord of the Rot and The Resurrection.

It's 3:00. I decide I better call Officer Cotter.

"Officer Cotter. How can I help you?"

"It's Amos James Jr. I's callin' to check in."

"Alright, Amos. You're still down there with your cousin working on his farm?"

"Yessir."

"That's good. They were giving me a little grief for letting you go out of state, but the religious nature of the work you're doing got them to agree to let you stay. So, how are you doing with the drugs and all? Staying sober?"

"Yessir."

I eye that bed hidin' that cocaine.

"That's really good. We'll need you to go to the local doctor's office in a few days for a drug test. It's mandatory. I'll call you tomorrow with the address and what time you need to be there."

"Yessir."

"Any questions or concerns about anything?"

"Nosir."

"Well, alright. Keep your head up, Amos. Keep doin' what you're doin'. You still gonna' be on TV this next week?"

"Yessir."

"I might need to get you to give me an autograph or something!"

I don't say nothin' to this.

"...Alright, Amos. I'll call you in a few days. Happy New Year."

Eli told me I probably oughta' record somethin' to send in tellin' this John Austin feller what for. So I walk down to the cabin where he's already got a camera set up for me and I turn it on. I get in front of it, feelin' sorta' natural, surprisingly. Just start sayin' what's on my heart, like I been told.

"Problem with this world these days is folks think they can just get away with doin' whatever they want to. They think the whole damn world owes 'em somethin'. I see it ever time I go into town. You got all them little kids just crawlin' all over their mommas and daddys beggin' for toys and just cryin' and cryin' and screamin' and cryin' when they don't get their way. Seems like don't get nipped in the butt no more. Then them kids grow up and they end up grown up runnin' around just like they did when they was kids.

That's what gets a boy like John Austin, not provin' himself a pinch, thinkin' he can just get away with sneakin' up on somebody greater'n himself like ol' Eli James and not get what's comin' to him.

You gone get what's comin' to you, boy. Same as the rest. See, I seen what you done, and I wasn't impressed. You, John Raide, and that whole Black Circle just a whole buncha' cowards. That's right. You cowards and you look down on folks like me and Eli. 'Dumb hillbillies.' That's what you think. See, John, I seen you tryin' to mock me at the end of Madness, and the only thing that's funny is while you sat there runnin' your mouth...I could see it, boy...I could see The Rot creepin' up your legs, threatenin' to eat you up whole.

And it's goin' to, boy.

See here, we ain't dumb like you think we is. No, no. See, ol' Amos right here ain't just some podunk, toothless hillbilly wanderin' out in the woods lookin' for what have you. Naw, boy...But it's good that you think that.

It's good, son that you think so highly of yourself and so lowly of poor ol', dumb Amos. 'Cause the higher you get fillin' your head so full of pride, the worse it's gonna' hurt you when it pops. And when it pops, you gonna' just drift back down here with us lowly folk and you gonna' sink in the mud.

Deeper...

and deeper...

and deeper.

And that's where The Rot is, son. That's where it gets ya'."

Threaded Mode \| Linear Mode Pride Goeth Before Destruction
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