I gathered up a collection of my short stories and poems for you to enjoy. I know everyone will enjoy it because readers have nothing but good things to say thus far.
Special Deliverance Bob D. Caterino This is a short tale of a little boy named Jackie. Now, Jackie didn’t have a short tail but this is about him so make no mistakes about it. Jackie was about ten or so when he had his first encounter with the neighborhood hoods, the wise guys, hooligans, Mob persuasion. “Hey kid, come over here” Mack said as he stood on the corner waiting for his ride. Jackie stood there wondering if the well dressed man meant him. Jackie never seen a well dressed guy like that and was amazed at how rich he must be. The man was looking at his watch as if he was late for something. “Yes you” Mack said profusely and loud. “How would you like to make yourself ten dollars?” Mack asked Jackie as he flipped his silver dollar in the air like George Raft in those old films. Jackie smiled and his eyes lit up. Mack handed Jackie the ten spot and whispered in his ear. Jackie shook his head yes and ran off. You see Jackie was a deaf mute and has been since birth and didn’t really hear what Mack had told him but he was smart as a whip. Jackie took his new found riches and gave it to his mother. She bent down and signed to Jackie to pick a three digit number. Jackie signed back to her the number 218. She then ran across the hall to Mr. Esperanto’s apartment and knocked on the door. The door opens slowly and Jackie’s mom placed the number and the ten in Mr. Esperanto’s hand. Mr. Esperanto rubbed Jackie’s head and the boy ran out the door.Mr. Esperanto was the neighborhood numbers runner. He would take advantage of peoples misfortunes and when someone did hit a number he was still well ahead of the game. In this poor neighborhood, a dollar would not get you much, but there were well over ten thousand poor people living here and it all adds up for Mr. Esperanto. The next day Jackie was sitting at the kitchen table when the knock came at his door. His mother answered it and opened the door. There was a small package lying on the floor in front of the doorway. She bent down to pick it up but it never dawned on her that her son’s number hit. The package was filled with eleven thousand three hundred and fifty dollars. She stuck her head out the door, looked back and fourth, didn’t see anyone and went back inside and placed the package on the counter not giving it a second thought. The Figaro’s kitchen window looks out towards the street. Being a nice summer day a petty two bit thief named Johnnie Lumbago happened to be passing by. He noticed the opened window and took it as an open invitation to poke his head in. He saw the package and grabbed it along with a piece of hot apple pie, and walked in a hurry, on his merry way. Johnnie was heading to his bookie to make a bet of his own. He put the still bound package down on the roof of a parked car and reached into his pocket for his cell phone. As he dialed his bookie’s number, the car that had the package on its roof drove away. Johnnie was too busy to notice and just started walking and talking. Now as the car carrying the package on its roof turns onto the expressway, the package slides off the car’s newly polished surface and over the railing it went. In a downward spiral the package sailed through the air landing on dirt pile on the back of a dump truck which was hauling the dirt to a park the city was refurbishing. The truck hits a pot hole almost two feet deep blowing out its front tire causing the package went airborne once again. Now as everyone knows, what goes up must come down, and this package was no different. Landing in Mrs. Manicotti’s baby carriage sitting outside her apartment, the force of package landing in the carriage made it move forward and it starts rolling down a slight incline on the sidewalk. Picking up speed it is stopped by a tree in its path. The package went flying up in the air about thirty feet and lands right in the lap of a homeless dude sitting on a park bench. The homeless man being curious, smells, listens and then shakes the package and starts to open it when a policeman walks over and chases him away. He drops the package in the process of running. The package lands off the streets curb. Some of the neighbor kids opened the fire hydrant up that same street to cool themselves off on this hot and summer day. The water flow takes the package down three streets. It gets caught in some leaves piled up on that corner. Jackie was walking to the store for his mother when he spotted the package. He walks over to it and picks it up and headed back home to show her what he had found. Arriving home his mom is nowhere to be found. She probably stepped into a neighbor’s house to chat for a while. He tries Mrs. Collins next door but she wasn’t there. He sees his mom coming out of the bookies apartment quarrelling with him about the money she never received. Jackie now goes to his extra special hiding place in the back of his closet where the light peeks through just enough to light up the small crawlspace. He tears open the package and sees all the money inside. He is so happy he grabs a twenty runs back to where Mack hangs out and throws the twenty into his hand. Mack yells out “Hey kid what about my pack of butts I sent you to the store for? Ahhhh I guess I have to get them myself. Hey wait kid I only gave you a ten spot before, oh well, stupid kid.” Mack goes about his business while Jackie runs off again. Jackie runs into his mom on the way and she is crying. She hugs Jackie and tells him in sign that they haven’t anything to eat because she had to pay the landlord. Jackie signs back in a panic but she doesn’t understand what he is trying to say. She starts to cry and grabs him tight. He pushes her away again and tries to sign again but he is too excited and she is confused. She grabs both hands of Jackie and yells at him to calm down. He looks at her in bewilderment and she then steps back and they both take a deep breath. She calmly signs to him and asks him to slow down. Jackie signs back to her “We will be eating mom.” She signs back “how we have no money.” Jackie smiles and takes her by the hand and pulls her back across the hall to their apartment. He walks her in their house and down the hallway to his room. He opens the door and guides her to his closet. He opens the door to his closet and crawls into the back leaving her out by the closet door. Just then Jackie reappears and he is holding the cash. His mother’s eyes opened so wide she starts to laugh. She asks him where he got all the money. He said he found it. Now Jackie and his mother both sit at the kitchen table covered with money. She is confused. She looks Jackie in the eye and asks him if he stole the money. Jackie signs “no mom honest.” Just then the phone rings and she runs over to answer it. It is Mr. Esperanto asking Mrs. Figaro if she got the package he had sent. She remembers the package and looks over to the counter but it was missing. She then realized that the money was hers to keep and they were rich for at least a while anyway. She and her son went out to eat real food that night for the first time in many years. She used most of the money to send Jackie to the doctors and they did a procedure and fitted him with a hearing aid that let him hear for the first time in his life. His mother cried tears of joy. Jackie looked at her and for the first time two miracles happened. The first was that Jackie spoke. “Don’t cry mom, I love you” he told her. She grabbed him again and he rolls his eyes. He then whispered in her ear the second thing. He said “thank you mom.” She burst into tears of joy and said “I love you so much Jackie.” She looked at him and said “You are a great kid Jackie, but you know were broke again and things will get tough around here worse then ever before”. Jackie simply replied “Mom, its only money.” Now as for the moral of this story? I have none you will have to determine this for yourself. Was it that his mother was unselfish, or Jackie was cured of his handicap? I don’t know but what ever it is they were happy and isn’t that all that matters?
Excerpt
She looked at him and said “You are a great kid Jackie, but you know were broke again and things will get tough around here worse then ever before”. Jackie simply replied “Mom, its only money.”
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