Burning Gardens

By Nathan Prince

By coincidence or not? It was a long-running argument between them. Everything happens for a reason, Sophie used to say. But not necessarily, Mitchell would counter and extrapolate.
Mitchell Fischer cant seem to get it right. With a group of riotous friends and a hostile environment, Mitchell is determined to make something of himself. But the odds are against him. Will he find a meaningful place in the world or succumb to the inherent difficulty of his situation?
Burning Gardens is a riveting story about love lost and love found. There is a price for everything, but what will it cost?

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Mar 30, 2016
• ISBN: 9781504982252

Nathan Prince

Nathan Prince has studied writing all over Illinois. He lives and works near Chicago. He finds inspiration in family, a tremendous source of strength to him, and friends. Creative work has appeared in Subtle Fiction, Permafrost, Euphony, and Eunoia Review. He was the featured poet for Contemporary American Voices in July 2012. He believes in the unfathomable possibilities of creativity. This is his first novel. Visit his website at nathamprince.com.

Book preview

© 2016 Nathan Prince. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 04/14/2016

ISBN: 978-1-5049-8226-9 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5049-8225-2 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2016904108

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Contents

PART 1

Chapter 1 Sisters

Chapter 2 The Crew

Chapter 3 Brothers

Chapter 4 Huntdown

Chapter 5 High Life

PART 2

Chapter 1 Vegas, Baby!

Chapter 2 City

Chapter 3 The Complex

Chapter 4 The Shop

Chapter 5 The Hunt

Chapter 6 The Road

Chapter 7 Death Sentence

PART 3

Chapter 1 Soldiering

Chapter 2 A Brief History of Insanity

Chapter 3 Fires

Chapter 4 Falling, Flying

Chapter 5 Business

Chapter 6 We Are All Savages

Acknowledgments

About the Author

For Ana, a brilliant stream of light through darkness

         el mundo cambia

si dos se miran y se reconocen…

         …mejor el crimen,

los amantes suicidas, el incest

de los hermanos como dos espejos

enamorados de su semejanza

         Octavio Paz, Sunstone

PART 1

Chapter 1

Sisters

Sophie Baraqat and Maria Lopez got into it over something or other at school and met up on Marion Drive to squash it. A group of us formed a circle around the two. Sophie could scrap. She was a brawler, a no-nonsense fighter. We shouted and wailed as the two girls slugged it out.

Maria’s older brother came out and broke it up. The crowd dispersed. The excitement over, two friends, Mitchell Fischer and Daniel Cavolini, headed home. Hector, Maria’s older brother, snuck up behind them and smashed their heads together like cantaloupes. Daniel pissed himself and Mitchell recoiled in horror. Hector was a Saint, an untouchable. The friends cowered before him.

Stay away from here, Hector said, and walked on.

Lying in the grass, Mitchell and Daniel held their heads and moaned sheepishly. Then they collected themselves and continued home.

Later that week, Mitchell passed by Ana Sharon’s. Ana lived on Daniel’s block directly behind Mitchell. They all grew up together. Ana was sitting on the steps with Sophie and another girl who looked like Sophie’s twin. Mitchell waved hello to them, and Sophie asked him what he was looking at and insulted his mother. Mitchell laughed.

Do I know you, he asked.

No, Sophie yelled, but you should!

Mitchell had seen her around but didn’t know her name. Seeing the two look-alikes together confused him. He thought they were one and the same. He shook his head at the thought. Sophie swore at him. Then Mitchell cursed her. She jumped up from the steps like a tiger to hit him. He ducked and dodged her blows. They were powerful and accurate. He couldn’t help but laugh. Ana and Sophie’s sister, Zoey (a nickname she gave herself), intervened and pulled Sophie away. Ana apologized and pleaded forgiveness. She said that Sophie was upset. Mitchell told Ana not to worry, that it was nothing. Then he told her to keep her new friend on a leash, and Sophie broke free and slapped him something fierce. Ana and Zoey bowled over in laughter pulling Sophie away. Although the blow hurt terribly and left a solid red welt on his face for the better part of the afternoon, Mitchell had to laugh it off to avoid embarrassment. Sophie spit at him as he walked away, and Ana again chastised Sophie.

Sophie and Zoey were, in fact, twins. But not to one another. They were only sisters. Zoey was twins with her brother Lee while Sophie was twins with another brother, Nas, about a year-and-a-half younger. Nevertheless, Sophie and Zoey were hard to tell apart. Later on, when Mitchell got to know the sisters, he still sometimes confused them. He would tell one something he meant to confide in the other, but they usually didn’t know what he was talking about anyway and so it made no difference. To them Mitchell was a strange duck.

In temperament and disposition, the sisters were altogether different. Sophie was fierce and stubborn, Zoey lighthearted and easygoing. Both, however, could be aggressive and mean. It was like they had something to prove. The entire family, in fact, had the same hyperactive tendencies. The Baraqats were animated and energetic. They were full of life, drama and passion. Whatever the source, every one of them, from the most distant cousin to the eldest uncle, was sure enough full of it.

We spent the summer before high school playing basketball at Paradise Park. Basketball in our neighborhood was something of a cult. In makeshift teams we played for hours on end, crossing and re-crossing the black asphalt like ants on a crumb. The game was not organized or regulated in any way. Players came and went. Fundamentals – blocking, passing, shooting, rebounding – were haphazard and subjective. There were prodigies among us, myself not included, but rarely did the skills transfer over to the real thing at school with coaches, practice, teamwork and commitment.

A natural hangout, Paradise attracted everyone from the neighborhood and beyond. There were swings, slides and bars; a wide open field with evergreen-covered hills at the end that were big enough to sled down in winter; a baseball diamond; two tennis courts; a walking path around the perimeter; and a well-maintained basketball court with a smooth surface and solid rims that could withstand the occasional dunk. Mitchell got into a scrap one day with an older kid and two of the kid’s friends jumped in. Daniel was there but didn’t intervene. Mitchell fought them off until he fell down, and the three pummeled him until Lee Baraqat broke it up and pushed the three away.

Enough, Lee yelled.

The three older kids laughed and walked away. From a distance the older kid shouted, You’re dead meat!

Thank you, Mitchell said to Lee.

Are you alright, Lee asked, helping Mitchell up from the asphalt.

Yeah, I guess. That was a good beating, Mitchell said, his throat constricted with emotion.

At least you stood up to them.

I got a few good shots in, Mitchell said.

You coldcocked the one right upside the head, Lee said.

Yeah, Daniel said, walking over to them. He cried out like a little bitch.

I’ll have to watch out for them now, Mitchell said.

Or stand up to them, Lee suggested.

Those guys are weak, Daniel said.

Those guys, Lee exclaimed. You didn’t even help your friend!

But I know those guys, Daniel said.

You could have at least said something, Lee said.

Frustrated, Daniel left. Lee and Mitchell started rapping. To Lee, Mitchell was an outsider who came and went. A skater kid, his hair was long and his clothes were rough. He was tall and lean, and his eyes were blue and gray. He was sincere, an innocent with a devilish grin.

High school started, and none of us were really ready for it. In fact, we’d been dreading it. From the outside the school looked like a jail or some type of medieval fortress. It was imposing and creepy. The place was full of gangs. I wore my White Sox jersey on the first day and someone asked, What set, punk, when I walked by. I didn’t know what a set was. I had a few older friends but that was of no consequence. The school was enormous. When I walked into the cafeteria it felt like the prison scene from the movie Colors. Most of it was segregated. I wasn’t sure where to sit. I looked around anxiously. I saw Mitchell and Lee at a table with a few others and sat down with them.

Lee was already in high school and relatively well known. A few years back, the Baraqats moved into the biggest house in the neighborhood. Lee had a reputation for fighting. He’d bested a bully, Tim Shepard, at the bus stop the previous school year. Evidently, Lee had grown tired of Tim bullying a harmless fat kid every day and so finally challenged him in front of everyone. Tim approached Lee to swing and was put down instantly with one quick strike. The crowd collectively gasped and hemmed and hawed, looking around at one another like pigeons. Tim had been such a towering figure.

At the lunch table Christopher Majinowski bragged to us about how he made quick cash with Lee stealing mail. Chris was interesting. He was into magic and always showing us some kind of trick. He had an outfit and everything. We made fun of him for this endlessly, but some of it really was impressive.

Like from mailboxes, I asked.

Like from mailboxes, Chris answered resoundingly.

What do you do with mail?

Can you believe this guy, Chris cried out loud.

Shut up, Chris, Lee said. There’s cash in birthday cards and graduation gifts. Sometimes there’s checks and other types of packages.

Seriously, I asked.

As cancer, Lee replied.

Chris The Magic Man Majinowski lived in a rundown house at the edge of the Trace, a wooded area surrounded by an open prairie of wild grasses. The Trace was a hideout for all kinds. As kids we ran, rode, played, wandered, hid and built forts in the Trace. Gangs of older kids roved its inner recesses. Drunks and vagrants slept out there. We would harass them, throw rocks at them while they slept. They would jump up frantically spitting and cursing.

Chris had a way with animals and strays. He housed a number of them – rabbits, cats, birds, a three-legged dog and a raccoon – in a makeshift shelter in his backyard. He scavenged the neighborhood incessantly for stray, young and wounded animals. He would nurse and care for them until they could be released. He caught a red-tailed hawk and wanted to train it to hunt, as with falconry, and was reading up on the subject. Later, someone doused the bird with gasoline, set fire to it and let it go. We watched it ascend up over the tree line before succumbing to the flames and spiraling down into the Trace’s cathedral of trees. Chris was devastated.

Mitchell and I went to visit Chris one day after school to see the hawk. It was a majestic, beautiful creature. We looked at all the animals and talked to Chris in the backyard. We soon learned that Chris’s house was a flophouse. They called it the Mission. All kinds of people showed up and made themselves at home in the backyard. It was a ragtag group of friends, cousins, girlfriends, passers-by, hangers-on and strangers. Then Nick, Chris’s older brother, showed up and started horsing around with a few them.

Growing up, Nick was one of the best skaters around. He was a good street skater. He built gigantic ramps for bikes and boards, and kids from all over came to skate Nick’s magnificent quarter pipe. Now it lay lifeless in the backyard, crumbling like a dinosaur fossil.

Nick made a name for himself at the age of fourteen when he ran away from home with Matt Rancik. It was some kind of wild, adventure-filled odyssey. Evading authorities, the two boys were gone for three weeks riding buses, trains, hitchhiking and skating across the country. They went to Los Angeles looking to skate an authentic pool, which they ultimately did. Eventually, they were apprehended and sent home, but their adventure bordered the mythic. We never tired of hearing of Nick and Matt’s stories, embellished a little with each telling.

Skateboarding was a big deal back then. As kids we lived and breathed it. Skating gave us an identity, a purpose, a code. The world opened up to us first through the skateboard. Some of us, like Nick, were radical and innovative and took the whole thing to inconceivable heights. The street was the arena. Older kids took the bus to parks, malls and plazas to shred. Later, they took the train downtown to explore new terrain. No one lived downtown back then. It was a ghost town on the weekends. They had the place to themselves – incredible expansive plazas, curb configurations, benches, stairs and rails. They terrorized the Loop, the Art Institute, Grant Park, Michigan Avenue and the lakefront. It was glorious.

Some of the fathers built ramps for us at one time or another, and we excelled there too. Mitchell was good on the ramp. Each skater had their own distinct style, their own unique form. Some were powerful, aggressive and reckless. Others were controlled and measured, perfecting a maneuver down to the last quarter flip. There was an infinite variety of tricks. Entire days were spent working on a trick or just an aspect of a trick: the approach, a transition, the finish. Other times everything was improvised and spontaneous. The possibilities were immeasurable. Time didn’t exist. The street was a canvas to explore without compromise, without fault. There was nothing more to it really than the board, the pavement and something of a trick. Through it we found ourselves. And we found each other.

The wild energy of punk was the soundtrack. The skate scene was all Black Flag, Dead Kennedys, Suicidal Tendencies, Naked Raygun and the Minutemen. The sloppy guitar and screaming lyrics spoke to us. Over time the older kids moved on, and the scene started to fade. The ritual among us fell apart. Mitchell was the only one I knew who still skated.

Nick was also a great fighter. He was fearless and unrivalled. He had extraordinary physical ability. Hardly anyone could stand toe to toe with Nick. Because of this he really had nothing to prove. He was good-natured and outgoing. Everyone loved Nick. He was the life of the party, but he went to school and worked full time to help his mother pay rent and rarely came around.

Then Lee showed up. Nick and Lee slapboxed in the backyard powerfully, their reflexes lightning fast. Mitchell went inside to use the bathroom. Sophie and Zoey were sitting on the couch.

What are you doing here, Sophie asked.

I came to see the hawk.

You like birds, bird brain?

Why are you so mean, Mitchell asked her.

I’m being nice, Sophie said. You don’t want to see my mean. Now run along.

Sophie was beautiful, brilliant and in control.

Later, we went to Paradise with Lee. Lee was at odds with a group of older kids who hung out there. We kept our distance. We learned that Lee was from the city, near 79th and Lawndale; that he had been in a gang; that he’d been shot at before; that he smoked and drank alcohol. We were utterly fascinated by all of this.

Lee, it turned out, had been drinking vodka all summer long. Lee and Chris had stolen two boxes of vodka from a delivery truck behind a liquor store, which was enough to stay buzzed all summer long. Lee decided we should try to find some alcohol. Mitchell and I didn’t smoke or drink, but it was fun walking around looking for action. Lee knew a few people who could help, neighborhood characters like Frank, a blind guy who walked around the neighborhood half-drunk half the time, and Travis, always working on a car in his driveway with heavy metal rock music at full volume. We couldn’t find Frank, and Travis wasn’t home. We went to a few liquor stores on the other side of town to nose around. We walked to the expressway overpass and watched vehicles pass beneath us in serial, syncopated precision. Toward the western horizon a string of clouds turned crimson. Toward dark, we went to the Trace to smoke and clown around.

The next day at school Mitchell asked Lee about his sisters. They’re not living right, Lee said. By that he meant they were not wearing the hijab, the traditional headscarf, or conducting themselves properly. Lee’s family was Muslim. His parents came from Palestine. There was a large population of people from Palestine in the neighborhood. Most of them lived and dressed conservatively. Most of the women wore the hijab.

We’re hoping they’ll come around, Lee said. But who’s to say? It’s hard to stay on track here. Do you know Ana Sharon?

Yes, Mitchell said.

She’s fine, Lee said.

Watch out, Mitchell told him. She’s a troublemaker.

I never would have thought that, Lee said. She seems so innocent.

Chapter 2

The Crew

Coming home from Paradise, we ran into Lee on Marion Drive. It was almost dark. Lee waved us over to say hello, the aromatic kick of alcohol on his breath. Lee explained that he was standing lookout. Further down the street, silhouettes were darting in and out of a house with armloads of appliances and boxes. Lee whistled sharply when a vehicle approached.

Be cool for a minute, he said.

Activity at the house ceased. The car passed and darkness was restored. The silhouettes went back to darting in and out of the vacant home. Three shadows came struggling out of a doorway with a washing machine. We went over to help maneuver the washing machine across the street, which ran alongside the Trace. We stashed it behind some bushes at the tree line. Unseen crickets and cicadas roared. Later, I learned, someone went back with a pickup to retrieve the machine. Now the Majinowski mother, Clare, didn’t have to go to the Laundromat anymore. Clare became suspicious when she learned of the break-in and asked us about it. That was older kids, we told her. They were real troublemakers, we said, and they do that kind of thing all the time. So watch out!

Mitchell, Lee, Chris and I wound up at Paradise every day somehow. We’d either wander the neighborhood like miscreants or rap with girls in the park.

One afternoon, we came across a man sitting in a parked car watching trains pass.

Chris asked him what he was doing.

The man, obviously slow of mind, told us he was watching the trains, that he enjoyed watching trains. He held a camera in both hands. Chris insulted the man. The stranger got out of the car to confront Chris. Lee and Mitchell jumped him from behind and beat him to the ground savagely. I reached into the car to grab the camera and snatched a brown leather satchel from the passenger seat. We darted across the tracks through trains and disappeared into the prairie, a sea of high grass.

At the fire pit I fooled around with the camera. It was an old Hasselblad, a 500 C/M model. I knew nothing about it. I pilfered through the brown satchel and found a variety of lenses and film, all lovingly organized. I tinkered around with the camera and took pictures of my friends.

The following week, Mitchell and I were playing basketball at Paradise late into the night. It was way past my curfew, and my mother came to pick me. I was in trouble, so Mitchell decided to walk home alone.

He cut through the Trace, the trail pitch black. The insects were as loud as jet engines. Some old drunk stumbled out of the bushes.

Hey, boy, he mumbled.

Mitchell tried to pass. The drunk approached Mitchell and accosted him. Mitchell tried to break free from his grip. The man busted a bottle over his head. Mitchell fell down, and the drunken man dragged Mitchell off the trail. Then he pulled Mitchell’s pants down. Mitchell froze up. He tried to scream. Nothing came out. The man turned Mitchell onto his stomach and put a boot on the back of his head.

What are you doing there, old man, someone asked from the darkness.

Lee and Chris happened to be passing by. They didn’t know Mitchell was there. They didn’t know what was happening. The man didn’t expect to be discovered there in the middle of the night.