Behind The Scenes

Loud rap music erupted from the silver Cadillac as it rolled down the street. SJ just kept walking. The car stopped at the corner of the street and all four of the doors opened. Uh oh. SJ broke off running in the opposite direction but all of a sudden he was standing at a grave site. He looked at the headstone. DaSean Johnson. A lump formed in his throat. The four gangbangers who had gotten out of the car ran up behind him. He recognized all of their faces. DaSean's killers. One of them raised a gun and aimed it right at SJ's forehead.

"NO!" SJ screamed. He sat up in his bed and looked over at where his brother, Aaron was stirring. Aaron rubbed at his eyes and looked at SJ. "Bad dream?" he asked. SJ nodded even though he felt stupid admitting this to his little brother. Aaron was only 10 but he seemed to understand. He nodded and went back to sleep. SJ sighed and crept out into the hallway. His uncle who was only four years older than him, was laying on the couch snoring softly. SJ walked into the kitchen and opened one of the cabinets. He grabbed a small bottle of pills, opened it, and popped two in his mouth. It was supposed to help him sleep. He had some weird disease that kept him up at night. The doctors had a name for everything that was wrong with him. ADHD, bipolar... the sound of footsteps snapped SJ out of his thoughts. He turned to look at his mother. She walked towards him and looked at the bottle he was holding. "Couldn't sleep again?" she asked wearily. SJ nodded. His mother was beautiful, even when she was half asleep. She had thick red hair and bright green eyes that were copied into SJ's face. His mother russled his golden brown hair and smiled. "The medicine will start working soon," she said reassuringly. SJ nodded and said, "Okay, Momma," even though he didn't believe it. His mother went back to her room. SJ sighed and decided to mess with his uncle Dave. He grabbed a glass and filled it with warm water. Slowly, he picked up his uncle's hand and moved it toward the glass. But then his uncle grabbed SJ's hand, smiled, and said "Better luck next time kid." SJ smiled as his uncle opened his eyes and sat up. "Couldn't sleep," Dave guessed. SJ nodded. Dave sighed and said, "Well since I'm up, how 'bout we take a walk." SJ knew that his uncle didn't want to walk, he wanted to talk. And SJ knew no matter how much he didn't want to, he couldn't refuse his uncle. So within five minutes, SJ and Dave were out the door.

They walked in silence for a few minutes. SJ noticed that he was almost as tall as his uncle who was 6'1. That made him stand up a little straighter. Finally, Dave spoke. "I don't think it's just this condition that's been keeping you up at night," he said, "Is everything okay at school?" SJ felt the anger boil in the pit of his stomach. He felt like punching his uncle. "Of course," SJ said sarcastically, "Because everyone's just so eager to hang out with some bipolar kid with ADHD who killed off his best friend." SJ didn't know where the words had come from, but there it was and he couldn't stop. "And on top of all of that, I'm the only white kid in the whole freakin' school. But you know, that doesn't matter, 'cause when they call me names like crackerjack and wonder bread, I know they just wanna be my friend." He fumed and Dave didn't speak. He had seen his nephew like that many times before and knew that it was best to just let him be angry for a little while. SJ's anger slowly subsided and Dave felt it was safe to speak. "You know it's not your fault that DaSean died. You didn't do anything wrong. Those thugs killed him, not you." SJ knew that, but still a small part of him felt that he was responsible. He could have saved his friend, but he didn't because he had been afraid. And now, he hated himself for his cowardice.