Written in Anger

~ 15

James was just Joe's business partner at first. At least that's what he was supposed to be. There came a time when Joe owed James a little money, but Joe didn't have any just sitting around for him to have so that's when Joe started using all of us for his own good. When I was fourteen, Mike was thirteen, and that's when he killed a person for the first time, not because he wanted to either. Joe had a plan to make us into real men, but Michael was not happy about the fact that he killed someone, which you might think is crazy, but as soon as he pulled the trigger, he started running.

He ran away as far as possible, and we still don't know where he went that night, he never told us. All we know is that he came home at two o'clock in the morning, and Joe was waiting for him. Joe was livid that night because after Michael ditched us, we didn't get what we were looking for, and we knew that Joe would be in trouble with James. We were happy though. We didn't have to commit a crime with Joe. That was the good thing about it.

After a week, Michael hadn't said a word to any of us at all. He completely isolated himself from us, but we didn't know why. He was just there. One night, we heard him scream though. He started to cuss someone out, but we didn't know who, but we didn't want to move to go and see what happened because there was no telling what would happen to us.

Our mother started screaming at the top of her lungs, and she kept telling Michael to stop whatever he was doing, but none us moved. I wanted to get out of bed to help him, but then there was a gunshot, and my mother screamed one last time before someone left the house."

I could feel my heart beating faster and faster by the minute. I felt like I was actually there, experiencing this like Marlon had, but I wasn't, luckily.

"Soon, there were ambulances outside our house, and we watched the men take James on a gurney to the ambulance, then it drove off before we could ask any questions. I snuck into the living room that night, and my mother was sitting in the couch crying while she was covered in a bed sheet, and Joe was screaming at her. Before I could object, he slapped her a couple of times before dragging her down the hall into their bathroom on the opposite side of the house, and the screaming continued.

Eventually Rebbie and La Toya came out of their room, and they saw me, crying, and they asked me what was happening, and I told them. That's when I noticed that Mother's screaming stopped, and Rebbie ran into the bathroom, and she started to scream before Joe came out the bathroom, telling her to shut up before he did the same to her, but she continued to scream louder and louder, but I didn't know why. Joe started asking for Michael, but he wasn't back yet, but we didn't think he would come back, considering what he did earlIer that night, then he walked in the house.

Joe started screaming at Michael, but Michael wasn't listening, and I was really scared because he wasn't being himself anymore. Joe kept trying to get Michael to pay attention to him, but it was no use. Rebbie began screaming that Mother was dead, and that's when I saw Michael at his worst. He started flipping things in the house and yelling at Joe. He started screaming at us, and he was out of control. Eventually, he sat down and started to cry. He was so mad with himself and Joe that he didn't even have the strength to fight back anymore. I felt so bad for my brother, but that night he didn't leave. He slept in the middle of the hallway in front of the door to the bathroom. He wouldn't let any of us touch him, and Joe was even staying away from him. We were all too scared at that point.

Michael spent a good five years grieving over our mother. He spent those years being a mass murderer, and he would rob the people that he killed because he needed the money. I could say Joe was proud of him, but he wasn't because Michael was doing it for himself, not Joe. Joe hadn't been around in a long time, and Michael was putting food on the table for us, but we didn't think it was fair for him to be the only one working to feed us. That was when we became... this," he tells while gesturing towards himself and the house, "We were unstoppable all together, and if one of us had an issue, we all had an issue. Joe heard about us when we were on the news because we were wanted with the FBI. He called us, asking us if we wanted to join forces with him. Of course we said no, and he wasn't happy about it.