The Cultmaster

Chapter 11: Mothers

Traffic on 95 going north was horrendous even now, despite the fact that the sun had almost completely set. Jacob watched the highway signs pointing to Washingtonian suburbs, and took note of all the cars heading in that direction. Grantham was blasting the entire album 'Sports' by Huey Lewis through his stereo at full volume, but Jacob ignored and simply listened to something on his Walkman. The drive was already ruined before it even began by Grantham's gross maltreatment of Burt, and Jacob began to regret not doing more to stop it. Any of it, even at dinner. It was clear that everyone was afraid of the man, yet revered him simply for his high position. Jacob's young mind could neither fathom nor understand it, even if it seemed he was one if them. He was still wiping tears away from his face while trying to maintain his composure around such an influential man.
"The traffic never ends here," said Grantham, looking in the back seat at Jacob. It took him a moment to process that he was being spoken to.
"What?" Jacob responded, removing his Walkman, which caused Huey Lewis and Bon Jovi to mix in an unpleasant cacophony.
"I said, 'the traffic never ends here."
"Oh, cool," Jacob said, uninterested. But then a thought came spontaneously to his mind.
"Joe, can I ask you a personal question?"
"What's up, Jacob?"
"Why do you treat people the way you do?" Grantham almost began to break out in intense laughter in what he viewed as a stupid question. He searched for the perfect answer for a while.
"Because," he responded with an air of seriousness, "I can. I have been placed in my position by the powers above, and I don't intend to relinquish any of it. In this business, you have to be mean, and tough, and harsh. In other words, you have to be an asshole to get by. I didn't get here by being nice. Nobody ever did in the history of the world." Jacob knew that this was not true. He could cite at least ten historical examples off the top of his head where a people group was subdued peacefully by their conqueror, yet they still respected the conqueror, not knowing the harm he was actually interring upon them, unbeknownst to them. Also, he had known for quite a long time that the Divine Right to Power was complete bullshit. As he stared out his window, he noticed a long row of beautiful colonial style row houses amidst a backdrop of taller buildings closer to downtown.
"What's that?" Jacob asked, pointing to the neighborhood.
"Oh, that," Grantham responded, "that's Georgetown. I've got an apartment there. In fact, I've got five apartments in the DC area alone. Do you want to see my apartments?" Jacob was shocked, once again, by the scale of this man's wealth. He told Grantham politely that he did not want to see the apartments, before being aggressively interrupted.
"Move your fucking shit!" the man suddenly yelled to the Virginia plate in front of him, startling Jacob. Grantham was like Jacob's own brother with the road rage, and Jacob could already tell he would be dreading this drive more than he thought he would. Grantham switched lanes without a signal afterwards, and began driving ten over the speed limit, but no cops were around. Jacob figured that Grantham did this because he felt that 'he could'.
"I want to take you to one of my favorite spots. It's this park near the banks of the Potomac overlooking the river," said Grantham. So they drove for a while, eventually reaching a dark, trash infested alleyway that had to be passed in order to reach the park. Jacob began to feel uneasy.
"Is this the only way?" he asked, with a tremble in his voice.
"Unfortunately, yes. But don't ever think about getting out here. The criminals that hang out here, making drug deals, they'll pop you like that," Grantham responded, making a shooting gun motion with his fingers. Grantham was going noticeably fast, and reasonably so, considering that nobody wanted to spend too much time lingering in this neighborhood. Jacob suddenly felt himself jerk forward as Grantham slammed on the brakes.
"What's this bitch doing now?" Jacob sat forward to see what was going on. In the headlights, he could make out the figure of an adult dog, probably a female, mangled and dirty, carrying a puppy in her mouth across the road. The puppy was squirming and whimpering as the poor mother tried to console it. After bringing one puppy to the other side of the road, she would risk her own life to retrieve the rest who were waiting for her on the other side. Jacob looked around the alleyway intently to see if there was a father present, but he could not find one. Meanwhile, Grantham was laying furiously on the horn as Jacob was formulating a plan for how to deal with the situation.
"She's not going to go faster just because you're doing that," Jacob said.
Grantham attempted to make light of the situation in response.
"Man, how many little bitches does this bitch have? She's really getting around with those boy bitches, isn't she?" Grantham elbowed Jacob as a joke, but Jacob was angry that Grantham was not taking the situation seriously, and also that he had interrupted Jacob's train of thought.
"She needs our help," he said. As he watched the female dog carry the puppies across the road, all by herself, he was reminded of his own mother and how she had struggled to care for him and his siblings after his father was murdered. How she worked so many jobs, became so stressed out, cried every night, how he cried because she cried, all so that little Jacob could have a good life. It shook him to his core to watch the dog care for her babies all on her own.
"No, she doesn't," Grantham responded harshly, breaking Jacob's train of thought, "it's the natural order. It's not our place. God, I ought to just run this bitch over, end this bullshit right now."
"NO!" Jacob responded in fear.
"What, no? You want to sit here and wait for this to end? I thought the traffic was bad enough, this is even worse!"
"No, I'm getting out." Jacob opened the door and stepped out to Grantham's disbelief.
"Why would you help them?" Grantham yelled from the window.
"Because my mother did the same damn thing!" Jacob yelled, angrily. Also, it was a good thing to do.
"They probably have rabies!"
"That's a risk I'm willing to take," said Jacob.
"Fine," Grantham responded angrily," you'd rather waste your time doing this than living it up in a nice apartment with me. Don't come crying when you get jumped."
"I would rather do this," Jacob said, as Grantham cut around him and out of the alley. "Whatever", said Grantham as he passed Jacob. As Jacob stood there and waited for the dog to return from the other side of the road, he thought of his own family life, as well as his childhood dog, Rocky, whom he had found under similar circumstances. Rocky had been dead for three years now and had been with Jacob ever since the young boy had discovered him as a puppy in a box in an alleyway in Newark. Rocky was Jacob's best friend since he lacked many in real life due to his inept social skills, and when he finally died, Jacob lost a part of his own being. He became much colder and reserved as a result of the dog's death, which compounded with Anthony's drug problems, only served to tear the family further apart. Despite this, Anthony was always the first person Jacob went to to discuss his internal problems because Anthony was the only one who truly understood, considering that he was a man too. The absence of a father in Jacob's life, to whom he would have gone to discuss his problems instead, was a role filled by Chester, and in a way, he had always seen Chester's standing in as a silver lining to his otherwise messy childhood. He was snapped out of his deep musings by the sound of aggressive growling behind him.
"Whoa, girl. Calm down now. I'm...I'm friendly. I'm a friendly human," he said, as he showed her his palms to indicate he was not a threat. But she only took it as a threat and began barking at him. Jacob had never dealt with strays before, and hearing the dog bark at him while she bared her sharp fangs made him fear for his life as he stood back up against the wall of a building. Strays were almost like wild animals. Their trust had to be earned in order for them to be tamed, so Jacob slowly walked over to the nearby garbage can and pulled out a piece of bread, which the dog ate hungrily. Then, she came up to him and began licking his face. Now that trust had been established, the dog lead Jacob through an intersecting alleyway until they arrived at an area dotted by smoke and water pipes. On the ground there were eight small puppies, whimpering, blind, not knowing where they were going or what was happening. The mother pierced Jacob's eyes as she began to whine. He quickly ran to find something, a box, perhaps, to scoop up the remaining puppies as the mother waited on the other side with the other five. As Jacob scooped up the first puppy, it began to whimper and cry that it was being held by a human stranger instead of its mother. He consoled the little animal, holding it close to his chest, as he began to cry with it, sorry for their circumstance. His heart was broken at the sight of this circumstance. After he had gathered each puppy and held it close to him for consolation, the mother was much happier. She laid down on the ground for a belly rub, which Jacob obliged, and the entire party strolled around town to find a shelter. When Jacob finally found an animal shelter, he bid farewell to the family as the mother gave him a final lick on the face out of gratitude, and he left, flooded with an immense sense of satisfaction. But he could also not help but wonder why some people would not have lent a helping hand. The common good was out there, waiting to be reached. But what if Grantham was right? What if the common good was only subjective, merely trivial writing in the mind of the consciousness, an overly optimistic, unrealistic end?