Thicker Than Water

I had been waiting outside the gate for a long, unsettling time. I had a lot of thinking to do out there in the oppressive, midmorning sun. I looked to the left and the right. I saw nothing but the large guard tower. There was a strange sound overhead in the powerlines, the sound of static electricity. There was a fly, one pesky little bugger, who kept buzzing around my face. "Shoo," I said, trying to scare it away. But the former little maggot persisted, landing on the tip of my right-side ear and then under my left nostril. So, this is what freedom feels like, I thought. So far so good. It most certainly beat spending 30 years behind bars. Let me tell you.

I looked to the left and the right, holding my avocado green Hartmann suitcase. Salvatore, my brother, he was late. I laughed at the irony. He was always late. Even on my first day as a free man. That was my little brother, I thought, smiling to myself ironically. I was always looking out for him. Even ever since we were young boys. Salvatore was always running off at the mouth, getting into trouble at Corcoran High with students bigger, stronger than he was, and I was always there by his side, breaking up the mess, until I graduated a year later.

Just then I saw what appeared to be a car of unknown make and model, sailing up King Avenue, here in Corcoran California. I squinted my eyes in the brutal and oppressive sunlight. Finally, I was able to make it out: A cherry-apple red Ford Fusion. Ford hadn't released Fusions till 2006. I was still sleeping in a cot at the time, sleeping with the bedbugs, intermingling with serial killers, gang members, and rapists. I had never heard of such a ride, but Salvatore filled me in about it on the phone last week. "I'll be coming up in a Ford Fusion to pick you up," he said. "Keep an eye out for me." And then I said, "A what?" He laughed. "Forget about it, Tommy. The ride is cherry-apple color. You will know me when you see me."

The car rumbled outside of the Corcoran prison gate. And there, behind the seat, sat my brother, Salvatore DeLuna. He was a handsome looking specimen. Dressed, oddly enough, in Hawaiian shirt, with wraparound Gucci sunglasses, Salvatore was the picture of eccentricity. His hair was immaculately and close-crop cut. He wore that familiar goofy smile I always remembered from Middle School onwards. Only a year apart, we were, but I felt so much love and affection for this specimen. It was almost like he was my son and not my kid brother. Our bond was, and still is, so very close.

Salvatore exited the car, walked briskly over to me, and embraced me in a suffocating bear hug. "Tommy, Tommy," he said. This was the first time we had embraced in thirty years.

"It's so good to have you back home, brother," he said in amazement, once we were both inside the Ford Fusion and traveling down the road, en route to Salvatore's apartment, on Sherman Street, in Corcoran, California, population: 22,156. "It's good to be back, brother," I said, graciously. I looked outside the window at all the miles and miles of nothingness, of farmland, of telephone poles. I looked ahead at cracked road, at asphalt that had not changed since before my incarceration, when I used to speed my very own Porsche down these roads, working full time as a busboy at the Blueberry Cafe diner, spending my entire check on the beautiful ride, always someone sitting beside me, sometimes Salvatore, other times Judy Collins, my girlfriend. I had traveled this road often, and I had always looked over at the prison, wondering how anyone could ever do anything so stupid as to be incarcerated and knowing, deep inside my bones, I never would commit any such heinous crimes. No, in those days, the worst crime I would commit was speeding, but that crime came with age; it seemed so harmless -- and natural -- at the time.

"Mom can't wait to see you," Salvatore said, pulling a cigarette from the pack on the dashboard. He lit up. "She's getting all dolled up for you now, at Debbie's Salon."

I smiled to myself. Debbie's Salon. I remembered Debbie. She was a beautiful woman. About forty years old, high cheekbones, long and flowing black hair. She looked amazing. I had always had a crush on her. She had known mom since before my incarceration. They had been friends a long time. Now I smiled, I laughed, to know they were still associating even all this time later. It was funny, but I had never once mentioned Debbie, nor asked about Debbie, since they threw me into the big house. But I asked about her today. "She is still working, after all these years, huh?" I laughed, trying to ward off the terrible smell of Marlboro 100's with my hands. Salvatore saw my frustration and promptly pressed the window button, letting in the warm air, working against the air conditioner. But at least the stench was not so suffocating, so overwhelming now. "Yes, she is still working," Salvatore chuckled. "And still offering mom her 10 percent discount for bleach jobs."

We both laughed together. Corcoran, California was an interesting town. It had a way of stopping time altogether. Friendships always lasted forever in Corcoran. Every day was pretty much joyfully, blissfully the same. Salvatore fidgeted nervously in his seat a little while, and then he said, "They would pray for you a lot at church."

"Who would pray a lot for me?" I asked. "Debbie and mom?"

"Yes," Salvatore said, staring ahead blankly at the road. We were now passing a few gas stations here and there, many ramshackle houses interspersed with more modern and socially acceptable ones. Corcoran had changed cosmetically, somewhat, with the addition of a new gas station here and there. A new store. There was a Rite Aid, something that was never here when I was outside. Some pizza parlors I had never seen before. A jewelry store. But essentially, the town felt the same as it had before I left.

"But others at the church would pray for you too," Salvatore said, as he made a sharp U-turn onto Sherman Avenue, a public bus driver honking his horn angrily at us. "Henry and Elizabeth Cox, prayed for you a lot. Father Abraham and his wife Denise, they would come to the house and pray for you. I prayed for you a lot too, brother," Salvatore said, his voice choked with emotion. "You know what's funny," he said, with a twinge of sadness in his voice, finally as we approached the tiny little tenement building that read Valley Village. "What's that, brother?" I asked, genuinely wanting to hear what came next." "The McHenry family would even pray for you, Mr. and Mrs. McHenry. Till the day he died and then later she, they would pray for you, for all of us. For...forgiveness."

---

The inside of Salvatore's apartment was a dreary little affair. It was small, compact. There was an old leather couch near the front door. There was a small refrigerator in the kitchen. An espresso machine. The air conditioner whirred to life once we both made our way inside. There was a cat, a beautiful little calico, who greeted Salvatore warmly, by snuggling and nestling up to his feet, purring like he were her best friend. Salvatore looked down, and he flashed that goofy smile again. "Ah, Butterscotch. Meet my brother Tommy. The most-best brother in the whole-wide world. He saved my life," he said, holding Butterscotch aloft. I brushed his praise off. "It was nothing any loving brother wouldn't have done," I said to Salvatore. He smiled and then once again he met me with another embrace. "Thank you so much. Thank you so, so much, Tommy, for saving my life."

We sat down. We caught up on old times. Salvatore told me of all the men and women who had died in Corcoran since my imprisonment. Some I had remembered very well; others I hadn't. Some of old age, some of natural causes and disasters. We laughed. We cried. We drank freshly made espresso. It was so sobering and liberating to finally be home -- even when home was just some mangy little rat's nest.

I smiled warmly at my brother as I watched him on the couch, talking animatedly with me. The McHenry family would pray for me, I thought, with a healthy dose of irony. I had gone away to prison for thirty years, for killing their son, over what was reportedly a drug deal gone awry, and now they were praying for me, the man convicted of blowing their sons head off. If they were not Christian in every true sense of the word, I had no idea who was. For some reason, Salvatore couldn't stop talking about them, you could tell they were always on his mind. "They even would visit dad in the hospital, every day, till the day he died. Even after he had lost all that weight. Mr. and Mr. McHenry were there that day, with a big chocolate cake." Salvatore chuckled. "Dad, he could never eat the cake. The chemo and the morphine was making him too sick, but he, and mom, never had the heart to tell them no. Mr. and Mrs. McHenry. May God Bless them," Salvatore said, gesturing the sign of the cross.

"Amen," I said.

Salvatore looked at me lovingly again. His eyes welled up in emotion and with tears. "I want to thank you," he said once again, sounding like a broken record. "Thank you for saving my life brother."

Inwardly, I cringed. I wished Salvatore would stop bringing this subject up. Today was a new day.

"Like I said, what I did for you, little brother, I did out of love."

"I know," Salvatore said, his voice overwrought with emotion and grief. "But you didn't have to take the rap for me. That was a real solid you done for me, brother."

Once again, I winced to myself. The night had been a terrible one. We had both met Joey McHenry at the park, at 12:30 AM that fateful September 13th, 1991. I did not want to tag along that night, you understand. I knew what my brother was into, that world, and how dangerous it was, and that he was using and dealing. I saw the black-and-blue marks on his arms. I knew what was going on in his universe, even if mom and dad were too ignorant of such things. I knew how Salvatore was, in many ways, a young man but still like a child, getting in way over his head, entering into a world he was too innocent and unprepared for. And I wanted to protect him. I wanted him to stop, clean up his act, and get help. And I had no other choice but to go with my little brother and, if things got messy as they tended to whenever he was feeling ornery, to pacify the situation.

Also, Joey McHenry had a reputation. Rumor had it he had once eviscerated a guy in Fresno during a quarrel, who kept refusing to pay on some debts incurred. We met McHenry in the park. I still remember seeing the flies and gnats hovering around the lampposts before we rendezvoused with the legendary horse dealer from the 559. Before we exited my Porsche, Salvatore handed me a de-seralized .38 caliber handgun, snubnosed. "Where did you get this?" asked I, mouth agape, incredulous. I had known Salvatore was teetering into a very unscrupulous lifestyle but I had no idea the seriousness and magnitude of it all until he handed me that cold little piece of metal.

"Joey sold me bad stuff, impotent stuff, now I want to get my nickel back, brother, I need you to cover me," he said, handing me the gun.

I instructed Salvatore to keep the gun himself and not use it. Big mistake.

Joey approached us minutes later, all smiles, arms outstretched, ready for the druggie embrace. He spoke groggily, merrily. You could tell he was using, too. Words were exchanged. Then pushing ensued. I got between them, I broke it up once. But it was of no use, Salvatore was fuming. He was oddly sober, too. Maybe Joey really had sold him a placebo, I don't know. But the next thing I remember is a gunshot. And Joey, dressed in large sunglasses and chains, tumbled to the sidewalk. He groaned and whimpered as he lay on the sidewalk, dying. "Salvatore, how could you?" he gurgled. Those were his last words. Immediately I heard a woman scream from one of the nearby apartment windows. And then we heard police sirens. "Quick," I instructed Salvatore. "Give me the gun." And the rest is history. I cooked up a story that the police chief and judge bought hook, line and sinker, like a famished marlin, going in for the bait.

---

Back to 2021.

As the tears geysered from his eyes, Salvatore thanked me again profusely. I kept brushing aside his gratitude and acclaim with a wave of the hands. I knew he couldn't thank me while I was in prison, for obvious reasons, and he couldn't thank me enough now, either. He had bottled up 30 years' worth of unsaid and unexpressed gratitude inside himself of thoughts, feelings, regrets, sympathies and adoration for his brother Tommy DeLuna. In my eyes, I was just an ordinary man, looking out for his kid brother. In Salvatore's eyes, I was Justin Martyr brought back into the 21st century: A walking and breathing embodiment of unselfishness. But all this adulation was making me uneasy. I wanted none of it.

So, I walked over to where Salvatore was sitting on the tattered leather couch and I patted him on the head--just as I had done when we were young boys--and I said, "Think nothing of it, little brother. Now for our own good let's get on with our lives and never speak of this incident ever again."

By Jack Bristow

From: United States

Twitter: jackbristow18