Let your mind go, let yourself be free (pt11)
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~*~
Monday morning begins with a terribly stiff neck, no coffee and a best friend who's just as grumpy as Jensen is himself. Instead of battling the sophisticated coffee-machine that Goldi keeps behind the bar, they make their way up to their room, originally planning for a shower and fresh clothes. They are sidelined, though, by the incredibly comfortable looking bed and gravity, not strong enough to withstand the lure of more oblivion.
They wake again at two in the afternoon, reeking like a locker-room filled with old socks, the scent nicely accentuated by the tingling odor of already-digested dog-food.
While Jared is in the shower, Jensen stuffs his friend's pants into a garbage-bag, knots it and deposits it outside the room so they can throw it away later. He's scrutinizing his shirt and one-sleeved jacket when Jay returns and has to admit that there is no rescuing those. The shirt is dotted with sprays of paint, happy, tiny dots but still too many and too obvious to walk around with, not to mention wear to a meeting with his parole officer which is due on Tuesday morning. His teeth start aching with the sheer reminder of that jolly experience.
Today, though, there is nothing on their schedule. They'll have to check for e-mail later, to see where and when the ceremony will be held and the car's still waiting for them on the other side of the city. Or, at least he's hoping that it's still waiting. They'll need money to pay the bus, or the train because there is no way in Hell that Jensen is doing any more walking that strictly necessary. His feet are two lumps of hurt and the way Jared is walking like he's stepping on eggshells leads to the conclusion that his friend isn't much better off.
“Your turn.”
“Yeah.” Jensen would love nothing more than to take a nice, relaxing shower. Nothing, except avoid putting weight on his weary legs.
“What, you want me to carry you?”
“Would you?” he looks up, mock-hopeful expression on his face bat Jared just laughs and drops on the bed, sitting for a second before stretching out with a satisfied groan. For a minute, Jensen tries to tell himself that he doesn't actually smell this bad, but his bladder is urging him to reconsider that possibility.
With a heavy sigh, he shuffles off into the bathroom.
~*~*~*~
They retrieve the car, and it's a little bit insulting that nobody even tried to break into it to steal the radio.
“It's because she looks like a police-car, my pretty girl.” Jared coos, but Jensen isn't convinced. They fill her up and drive around, trying to spot some of the competition's pieces. They didn't have time the week before, but now that they do, it's obvious that it's going to be a tough decision for the judges.
The new pieces look amazing, some so bright and colorful they hurt the eye, some dark and brooding, some happy and some sad. They're scattered all over the city, and when they check on their neighboring districts, places where Jared and he seldom hang out, two or three murals catch Jensen's eye that make him doubt.
He isn't used to that. He still loves their pieces, the moments in time they froze into walls and there is no doubt they are amazing. But will they be enough to convince a jury? Would that guy who's maybe offering a contract think it's enough? Are they maybe too personal to him and Jared to capture people, to keep them interested in what they have to say?
He doesn't notice that he started gnawing on his thumbnail until Jared bats his hand away. “Dude, stop fretting. We did the most awesome things this last week. These? Are fucking good, but ours are fucking amazing, and you know that. There is no way these here will win.”
Jensen nods, but can't help that puddle of tar-black uncertainty in his belly. It tastes like ash.
~*~*~*~
While Jensen is trying to charm Mr Whicker, a crisp new shirt that they... uh, liberated from WallMart underneath a sweater he borrowed from Willie that makes him look like he's a drowned kitten - Jared's words, not his, the e-mail arrives with date and location. That was fast, he thinks when Jared holds the printed sheet out to him as he steps back into their room. He couldn't say if that's a bad sign or a good one.
“So, what did Whicker-Basket say?”
“I'm a bad person and I should have stayed in prison, I need a job and I'll have a mark in my file for not reporting my change of address.”
Jared scowls, looking like he would love nothing more than tear that man's throat out. It's good to see someone caring so much, Jensen admits, though in the office, he hadn't cared one bit about that information. It's a minor thing and petty bullying, but he's used to that. He's dealt with bullies all his life, usually for Jay's benefit.
He claps his friend on the shoulder and snatches the sheet out of his hand, dodging the attempt of retrieval and reads. It's not much, just the information that on Thursday at ten, they should be at a warehouse in the cannery-district if they want to know who's won the competition.
They should probably get some new clothes for that.
~*~*~*~
It's ten and the warehouse is stacked with people. Crazy people, ordinary people, friends he hasn't seen in ages and complete strangers. Jared nudges him when he spots Kermit and Gonzo, but the two are standing in a group with some old-school-sprayers and so they don't bother going over and wishing them luck.
Blue, Crop and Bones are somewhere in the melee and Ducky is skipping over to them now, bouncy and happy and oblivious, it seems, to the stares that are following her like the tail of a shooting star.
“Jack, Woody!” she squeals as she jumps into Jared's arms, completely certain he's gonna catch her. And who wouldn't catch that bundle of beautiful energy? Jensen smirks when he sees the jealous scowls on some of the guys around them. “I just saw the pieces you did, that's just... wow. Oh man, I so wish I could've helped, I'm sorry I didn't. I really am.”
“I know, Duckster. But that's okay. We were fine.”
“I know you were, stupid.” she steps away from Jay and gives Jensen a long, thorough hug “but that doesn't mean I don't wish to have had my hand in it as well. You did so well...”
“Where did you ssee the pieces?” Jensen inquires and Ducky stares at him, hard.
“Back-wall. They hung all of the entries in poster-size. What's wrong with your tongue, you finally got a piercing?”
Jared snickers and turns away, probably to take a look at the photographs and Jensen tries to pierce his back with an angry stare. “Bit my tongue.” He opens his mouth and shows her his stitches, satisfied when she recoils a little.
“Eww, dude, that's disgusting. Did it hurt? Oh, there's Blue, I gotta talk to her. See you, pal.” and she's off like a butterfly in a gust of wind, swirling with the airstream and weaving carnal dreams in her wake.
~*~*~*~
Jensen finds Jay in front of a huge poster showing a scene from a nightmare. It's dark and gritty, foul creatures crawling through the gray, dusty mist, seemingly reaching for the viewer. An amazing piece of work, and Jensen swallows hard when he sees the roll-call. The Good Boys, Gonzo and Kermit and someone who's possibly named Miles, or Miley? Milkey or something like that.
“Holy...”
Jared's voice is rough when he answers “Yeah.” and he points to the next piece, equally dark but with a lot more green, slimy-looking stuff. “They really are pretty good, I guess.”
“Yeah. Ah, well...” Jensen turns away, that tendril of doubt swirling in his stomach but he shoves it down with a handful of potato-chips from the nearby table. Together, they move along the walls, take in the pictures but also the names and faces of the sprayers that surround them.
It's a fucking big competition, and the bass-beats from the wall-mounted speakers rattle his teeth and stomp on his stomach.
~*~*~*~
“Dear Spray-Nozzles,” the lanky guy with the fire-red hair announces on the stage “welcome to the final hours of Paint Wars, and thank all of you who participated for participating. We love a war with a lot of participation.” The crowd, silent since the first words, chuckles. “This is a totally new thing. We've never done this, and we might never do this again. It all came to pass because this awesome fellow here,” he points at a man behind him, smart-dressed and suave “asked me while we were chatting quite nicely about the weather if I knew any good sprayers who might want to work for him. I said I knew several, and thus, they say, this event was born.”
The gathered crowd, mostly around Jared's and Jensen's age, but a few older fellows as well, clap and whistle and the man who might hand a bright future to Jensen and Jay - or to someone else who equally deserves it, Jensen is trying to convince himself - bows and grins and waves. The red-haired guy - Tony 'The Raven' Collins, former king of the kings but retired after losing his right hand in a bike-accident - continues to introduce the jury and other important people, but Jensen just lets it drift by. He's feeling a little pathetic, doubt now warring painfully with hope and his stomach signals that maybe it might want to empty itself, the potato-chips curling and growling and demanding to be let out again.
“Now, ladies and delinquents, here finally comes what you've been waiting for. The jury has decided, and that decision was hard. Really hard, let me tell you. You all did well, did amazing, if I may say so, but like Connor McLeod once said: There can only be one. So please gather closer,” he waits for a minute as the crowd obeys “and we'll reveal now who gets to take not only the price-money home with them, but also a talk,” he winks “with my good friend over there, who might have something in store for your future.”
It's amazing how a group as individual as this one can be so silent. The jury takes the stage, and one woman, dressed smarter than anyone else in the big, graffiti-covered hall steps forward and grabs the microphone.
“I can't really add anything to Tony's speech, it really was a hard choice. We had three crews in the final pile, the Happy Hamsters,” she grins at the name and smiles when a group of excited teens whoops in joy “the Good Boys.” Jensen tries to see their rivals, spots them on the other side of the room where they smile and nod at each other “and, of course, The Killer Bees.”
Strangely, it's not a surprise that they name them. He never doubted to get close, it's just the win-part he's not so sure anymore. A little sure, but not entirely. Jared, though, is beaming already, bouncing on his toes, eager to go up and get their price because that's how certain he is of winning. Some people snickered at the name, but Jay had insisted. It had been his favorite sketch, seen in a recorded episode of Saturday Night Live, from 1920 or something. The nuns had allowed them to watch it, the ratty TV and VCR-system nearly drowning the sound with its constant scratchy noise. But Jared, seven or eight years old, had loved that silly piece of shit, and it was either Killer Bees or Toy Story as a name and everyone had agreed that there was a limit, and Toy Story would have crossed that.
“It was really hard to decide.” the woman continues ”All of these murals show incredible skill and creativity, and if it were just the pictures we see, it wouldn't be possible to judge any of them better than the others.”
Another jury-member steps forward and takes over. “And this is why we had the rules installed. We judged by creativity, style, execution, yes. But we also looked at the placement, the overall visibility and the blending of the art with the surrounding.” It's completely quiet, the only thing audible the drizzle on the roof and the occasional cough from the audience. “And if we take that into account, there is one crew that went beyond any of our expectations. It is with great pride that I announce the winner of this crazy, funny, highly dangerous competition. Which are... The Killer Bees!”
With a flourish, someone uncovers a huge poster, a medley of all their pieces on one large canvas that's been hanging from the ceiling, covered by a white cloth that apparently nobody paid attention to. It looks gorgeous, a great compilation, every thing that they've worked for photographed in daylight.
Jensen is staring at their pieces, their art, their achievements from the last week, lost in a world of amazement over how good they look like this, how wonderful his favorite piece looks now that the Myer-scaffold has apparently been taken down. He's shaken from his reverie when Blue squeals in his ear and Jared grabs him, nearly squishes the air from Jensen's lungs with his Chewbacca-strength and the crowd around them claps and cheers.
They make their way up to the stage and Jensen still cannot help watch the pictures while his mind overlays them with distant memories.
Jared is beaming like a beacon, glowing in joy and pride and happiness and while Jay really is a happy person, it's not often he's seen him happy like that, all-out smiling like the world is his playground. There have been earlier occasions, though.
And they painted every one of them, in large, colorful murals all over the city:
Two boys on a tree which is bristling with life. Bugs, butterflies, spiders and moss, birds and not to mention a freaky squirrel and hidden deep in the branches is a toy-car dangling from a cord. The boys are comic-figures, but if you know what to look for, you recognize the floppy hair and the thin legs and arms that distinguished Jay during his childhood, and you might see the hint of freckles on the other boy's face - which thankfully have paled a bit while Jensen grew up. If you look closely, you see the edge of the sign of Bob's Coffee Bunker in the corner.
On the second mural, the same two boys sit on a wall, older, lanky, smiling and happy, clothes dotted with spray-paint. The taller kid has red stripes in his floppy hair, the older boy green spikes. But it's the wall that draws the eye. It's large and bursting with color, graffiti sprayed all over it, a huge wildstyle, unreadable, a celebration of life and color and light, filled with shades and angles and references only a true sprayer would get. It's their biggest piece, spread along the train-track for about half a mile, though the quality of the graffiti-graffiti - Jensen is still confused how to call it - is lessening towards the sides. It looks like there is one great piece on a wall of mediocre crap, and the kings throne above the toys - or at least their work.
Their third piece is less colorful. If they didn't know how hair-rising it was to paint it where it is, it would look like their tamest placement. It shows a hallway, white walls and dark, closed doors to the left and right, shady and silent. In the middle of the gloomy corridor, though, are the two boys again, running towards a corner from where natural light is spilling into the darkness, unseen but still there and very real. It's a smart painting, Blue and Crop created the play of the light on the black-and-white checkered floor-tiles. They even managed to hint at dust-particles dancing in the sun's rays.
The slightly bigger boy is closer to the viewer, seen from behind. His shoes seem to pound the floor and even though you only see the back of his head, you know that he's smiling. Or maybe it's only Jensen who knows, since he remembers the moment like he remembers all the others they eternized this last week. The boy in front, is turning slightly, his shoulder and head twisted towards the older kid and therefor to the viewer. His face is open, he's grinning in delight and his body-language practically screams at his friend to catch up, to catch him if he can.
Both kids draw the eye, bring a burst of color into the gloominess and even though it's just a picture at the back of a dead-end alley, it seems like you can hear the delighted laughter bubbling through the earnest building, the two running right through the wall, right on into whatever bright future might be waiting around the bend
Jensen can still hear the giggles and he remembers the joy he felt when chasing after his friend. He caught him, he knows, tackled him right at the corner and tickled him until Jared peed his pants.
They'd still been giggling when the nuns shoved them into the cold shower. That day, nothing could stop them, and Jensen had felt free.
On the Myer-Building, finally stripped from its ugly scaffold, is their darkest piece, Jensen's favorite. A huge, menacing house with evil-looking windows, seen from the frog's perspective. The viewer is set right behind the small figure of a small boy who is looking up gigantic-seeming stairs that lead to a huge, dark wooden door, with evilly grinning crucifixes. One side of the door is open and the interior of the house is pitch-black. It's a scary image, the whole scene so dark and forbidding that it sends shivers over Jensen's skin even from here.
But there is a point of light. It's set a bit left of center, so the watcher doesn't spot it right away. A small child, probably a boy, stands on those steps, looking down to the first kid with such a beaming face, so much light in his eyes and a hint of a glow around his form so the character bursts from the shadowy surroundings like a fire in the night. It's not even much color in the boy, he's wearing some dark uniform, but the way his face is painted, his hair and his eyes, he is set apart from the dark and gloomy theme and stands out like a beacon.
It was that small, sparkly boy that gave Jensen the courage to step into the house that would be his … home, for lack of a better word until he turned eighteen. It was that small, sparkly boy that really was his home in every sense of the word, that still is the only home he needs and wants.
With a bright smile, Jensen finally steps on the stage where the rest of his crew has already gathered, Jared already shaking hands with Tony 'Raven' and the suave business-guy. He walks over to greet them, to thank them, to take his price but he hasn't managed three steps when a loud, snarly voice disrupts the joyous celebration.
“This is the Police. Stay where you are, you all are under arrest!”
~*~*~*~
Later, much later, Jensen will think about this night and shake his head about the stupidity of that police-man. Telling a bunch of delinquents to stay where they are to let someone arrest you is more than moronic, and the chaos that ensued should have been predictable.
~*~*~*~
The warehouse explodes in motion and sound, people screaming in shock and anger and some even in pain when they are shoved into a table by other fleeing sprayers. The stages is surrounded, probably was before they even announced the winners, cops in plain-clothes climbing up, trying to get at least those that admitted to committing property-damage by stepping up when called. Jared shoves Bones to the back, then runs fast, Jensen right on his heels. They don't have time to make sure the crew is safe, right now it's everyone to his or her own.
They jump over the cops, landing perfectly with knees bent in less than ninety degrees, forward-momentum unhindered and they take off towards the exit, or anything else that might lead out. People are running like mice in a barn, they have to dodge and weave and use shoulders to roll themselves over the policemen that try to grab them.
Soon, they have to split, Jared off to the right side of the building, Jensen more to the left. He'd like to keep an eye on the kid, but he's way too busy to stay ahead of the cops.
Three policemen block his way, two more on his left side and two coming from behind. He swirls on his toes and heads right back, uses a fallen chair to lever himself high and up and over a girl that was just standing in the sea of chaos, screaming for someone named Benny. Only one cop's close right now, and Jensen pushes up and jumps at one of the thick pillars, uses his feet to push himself away from it and turning in midair to land on a table with spilled snacks and soft-drinks, where he twirls to face the concrete-post again. The cop's no fool, jumps right on the table and Jensen can feel his breath on his face he's so close. He twists underneath his pursuer's outstretched arm, uses the cop's speed to dodge behind his back and jumps down from the table right to where they came from.
He's running again, path clear as far as he can see, but there are cops in the doorway, too many to get past or over. He's lost more than one pursuer, they probably went and caught themselves some of those annoying kids that are moving like ants on acid. Jensen just cleared one of those random concrete-blocks that lie scattered around all over the building with a jump, too much speed now to do anything but run straight out. And that's when one of those ants gets right in his path, stares wide-eyed at him and instead of fucking moving away, he crouches low on the ground. No chance to evade and while he wouldn't mind kicking the kid, he can't lose his footing here. So he does what's usually Jay's forte, throws his legs high and sideflips over the obstacle, perfect landing even though he's not been able to do that ever before in training.
Jensen ignores the exit, where he knows he won't get out. Instead, he focuses on the corner of the room, runs right at it, two baffled cops on his tail. He hits the concrete running, one step high up and from there another against the adjacent wall which he uses to gain height and reach the supporting steal-beams that spread underneath the roof. A little upper arm-activity and he's crouched on the girder, the furious cops swearing and growling underneath him like dogs having chased a squirrel into a tree.
With a deep breath, Jensen stands up and moves, balancing on his narrow path, crossing the room swiftly now that there is nothing in his way or annoying policemen chasing after him. He moves to the high windows at the south wall and has just opened it to the night and empty yard outside when he turns to take one more look and spots a familiar figure on the ground.
For a while, he observes, sees Jared do what he loves to do, loves more than Jensen loves it, watches him running, dodging, weaving. Lazy vault over a pillar, perfect cat-pass over a table with his legs tugged neatly against his chest to land on his feet and keep on running. He seems to be toying with the cops and it's fun to watch, and Jensen imagines he can hear him laugh in delight. Jared has outwitted them all, is on his way up the middle column, a thick steel-bar that provides wonderful footholds to climb up.
It looks like Jay will be getting out the same way Jensen is when suddenly, everything changes. Jay looks over his shoulder, stiffens and leaps off his pillar, running straight in the direction of the western wall. Jensen frowns. There is no door there, and even Jay can't jump high enough to reach the window, and Jensen is too far away to get there in time so he could pull him up. His friend, though, is determined, dodges a cop grabbing him and shoves another, something so startlingly strange for someone who hates violence that Jensen can't look away.
It all takes place in seconds, or milliseconds, but the events seem slowed down, stuck in a time-loop or something weird like that. It's nearly too late when he realizes Jay isn't trying to escape at all, nearly too late to dodge low, definitely too late to jump out of the window and right on time to see Jared throw himself against a policeman's back with all his weight. Jensen hears the gun go off and the sharp sound rips him from his stupor. “No!” he screams but Jared, now piled underneath three cops, just shouts at him to run. He doesn't want to, can't leave his friend there, can't abandon him, no, not here and not ever, but he won't do him any good if he's caught.
He's on probation, if they snatch him, he's neck-high in shit.
“Kid, hey kid, over here!”
The call surprises him, more than the fact that a cop was actually trying to shoot him down and he looks out the window. Mr Suave-Man's looking up, gesturing at him to come down, a big BMW right next to him. Jensen hesitates, but in the warehouse, Jared is already in cuffs and it hurts, hurts to see him like this but he can't stay, as much as it tears him apart.
He figures it's pretty close to what Jared felt when they busted Jensen, two years ago.
With a sigh, he climbs out and jumps.
~*~
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