The Way I Died I really loved him, and I cared about him more than I cared about all the problems he had, or the problems he put me into. I still think he loved me as much as I did. He was this tall, skinny guy with brown baggy pants that fell every, like, ten steps he took, he looked so cute pulling them up making sure that no one was watching. I remember the colors his T-shirt; they where full of really bright colors that no one could forget. The hat he wore every day, the bee hat, as I called it that because it had yellow and black strips. It covered his entire head and his forehead, but even though I never actually recognized his face, I will never forget it. I was still a girl when I met my boyfriend, a happy, cute little girl. I really liked being around him, because he was very nice with me and he respected me. I felt secure and loved around him, but one horrible day we both fell in this huge deep hole. It is called drugs, and it was hell for me. Drugs surrounded our lives; they went every where with us. This was the only thing that ruined our beautiful relationship. I could easily tell he was much more into drugs that I was. I knew than I could come out of the hole, and I wanted to, but I felt scared of leaving the one I loved alone in this. Every once a week, or so, my boyfriend came to me with a different object. It was what we exchange for drugs. This time he came to me with a letter in his hand, it was in a conavi´s envelope. -“Look at what I have” He told me with such happiness in his voice and in his face. He expected me to be happy too, so I pretended to be happy when I really was not. I looked at him trying to smile. I stood up, he held my hand and we started walking. I knew were we were going, well we went there very often. It was a small wooden cabin with a big window in it. There was a young man sitting on a chair looking out the window. We stood on the back of the line that led to the window. It was a long line and I wasn’t feeling very well. My boyfriend had the letter on one hand and I was holding the other. He looked pretty happy, and I could also see he was very anxious to get to the end of the line. I looked at him and tried to smile back but I just couldn’t. I didn’t wanted to be there, I wanted to leave and go home. But some big and powerful thing pushed me to stay there. It was a very strange feeling standing there in that line. I wanted to leave that place but it was wired because I also wanted to get to the end of what it used to look like an endless line. But I didn’t want to get there either. I wasn’t sure of what I felt, but I did know that I didn’t liked filling like that. The line went fast and I wanted to stop it but definitely my boyfriend didn’t. Then we were second. There was a very young little boy the one that stood on front of us; he was about ten years old. He stared with lots of attention at the man in the window while he looked at the money the boy had given him. Then the man handed the money back at the boy. He looked at us, I could tell he was going to cry. He faced the floor and walked away. I started worrying that our letter would not be exchanged, that the same thing that happened to that little boy would happed to us too. My boyfriend hand the letter in to the man, the man took one look at it and put it a side in his desk. Then he very fast reached his hand into a box that he had in the floor. He took out a small lunch bag raped in masking tape and not even looking at us he handed in to me very fast. I didn’t want to hold it so I very quickly handed to my boyfriend while he smiled. We walked away from that place and went to the old house near by, where we used to go to after getting the drugs. It was a very small empty wooden house. It had a small table on the outsides of the house. It wasn’t normal to see anyone around that place but I felt someone was there because there were half full bottles of “Quatro” on the porch table. My boyfriend didn’t cared about that until the police came to ask us something. I got scared, but my boyfriend looked very calm. “What are you doing here?” they asked looking at my boyfriend. He didn’t answered he just looked at me and said, “ Lets go behind the house.” “ You know what, we should leave this for another day” I said to him. I could tell he didn’t like the idea but he agreed with me. He held my arm and pulled me away. The next day I came out of my house sure that I would tell him my decision. The whole night I stayed up thinking on what my life has been since I started using drugs, and I had made my decision. I walked to the park thinking that his reaction will be when I tell him. I was pretty sure that he was going to get mad at me but I had to do it. Then I saw him. I stopped for a minute to look at him. He was sitting alone in a picnic table drinking a “Quatro” that was just started. He looked so cute sitting there, at that moment I felt sorry for him, I was going to leave him alone in this, and I didn’t wanted to. I walked up to him, and sat right next to him: “ Hey baby” I said He looked at me and smiled. At that moment I thought how quiet he has always been and how cute his smile was. “I thought about something last night.” I started saying “ and I have decided to quit drugs.” “ I think that’s a great idea.” He said for my surprise. “Really?” I asked full of joy. He smiled again, but I could see in his eyes that he wasn’t very happy about the news he had just heard. “ I love you.” I told him while I stood up to leave. He grabbed my hand really hard and kissed me. “ I love you.” I repeated and left. He looked down the table. I was walking back to my small house and I stopped to look around. Colors looked brighter, people looked happier, every thing looked better. I felt free having made that decision and have talked to my boyfriend. Then I felt sorry and sad for him. I knew it was almost impossible to make him think about quitting. But I was going to do everything I could to help him get out of this. I saw my house on the other side of the street so I ran to it. Next door of my house three was a purse shop. There were all sizes and colors of purses. I stooped to look at them but I realized I didn’t had any money so I just entered my house. It was about six in the afternoon and it was getting dark. When it was already dark I went to turn the living rooms light on when I heard very loud noises coming from the back yard. It sounded like people running. I went to see out my window. When I got there I saw people hiding in the table and the chairs I had back there. It was my boyfriend and some of my friends. They were very scared. They got under the table and started screaming. Then I saw three big guys dressed in black following them. They got to my back yard and pointed to the table and to the house with the big guns they carried. “SHOOT!” one of the men, shouted. I ran as fast as possible to the wall away from the window. While I ran I could see my self when I exploded in to little pieces while something shoot me. Different parts of my body landed in different places of what used to be my clean house. Everything was black. “ On today’s news, a teenager was murder by a drug dealer. We have found the plans that her boyfriend and this drug dealer had made to kill her. Her boyfriend and some of her friends made her believe that there were three men following them, trying to kill them. Then one of them will shout shoot. She will run to away from the window while the drug dealer will come from behind the curtains of the window and will shoot her.”
Copyright © 2000 Juanita Grillo Diez |