Justice is Served?

My daughter was killed by two kids. A kid who can't even speak, Ray Harris, and his stupid little friend, Johnny O'Shea, chased Katie, beat her with a hockey stick, and shot her through the head.  God knows why they did it.  Maybe Silent Ray wanted to keep Brendan from moving to Vegas.  Maybe Brendan was the only person he cared about.  Or maybe they were just two kids being idiots and my poor daughter was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.  Aside from all of this confusion and raw anger flowing through my head, I always found my way back to one fact. A single, undeniable fact that I would have to face at some point.

I killed the wrong man.

Dave knelt before me and begged me to believe that he killed a child molester, not my daughter.  But I allowed my hand to slice the knife through his stomach anyways. 

After the fact, as I was walking on Gannon Street, I pondered the level of my guilt.  So I killed the wrong guy.  But just because he didn't kill Katie doesn't mean he was an innocent man.  He still killed that child molester.  So, in a twisted sense, Dave still deserved to die.  And that idea helped me to ease some of my culpability.  

Later, Sean walked up and told me that they'd found the culprits, a couple of kids, and that Dave Boyle was missing.  Then, after just a glance, he knew.  He saw right through me like a freaking window.  I repressed my panic with the knowledge that there was never going to be anything to link me to that murder, just like there was nothing to link me to the murder of Just Ray Harris.  So, at that point, I still had the freedom to make a choice.  My Katie is gone.  Rather than living with the weighty regret of a premature murder, I am going to live every moment in loving memory of her.  I will enjoy the time I have with Annabeth, Nadine, and Sarah, creating new memories, while remembering every precious moment I had with Katie.

Jimmy Marcus

Seeing Red

I stood over him, begging him to give me a reason not to kill him where he knelt.

I thought to seeing Celeste on the step through a fog of red, confessing her suspicions to me.  Again, I felt the weight of certainty make my heart sink in knowing who took my daughter's life.  Dave killed Katie. Dave, who had never been the same since the day he got into that car.  Dave, who had never forgiven me for not getting in it with him.  Dave, who now had to pay for what he did.

No Dave, I don't believe your BS story about killing a child molester outside of the bar, just like the ones who abused you.

Yes Dave, I want to hear you say why you killed my Katie.  I'll spare your pathetic life if you just tell my why.

Sorry Dave, I lied.  This is a matter of principle.  An eye for an eye, you know?

After it was done, I was drawn to the place that changed my, Dave's, and Sean's lives forever.  Gannon Street was deserted, and I could picture the three of us as kids, planning our attempt to jack a neighbor's car.  I then thought about fate.  How one thing can lead to another.  What if it had been cold that day, and we were playing inside instead of on the street?  Or if our dads had been sitting outside on the porch, watching us?  Would things have been different?  Would I be walking down this street with my daughter, rather than all alone?

Jimmy Marcus

A Heart Twice Broken

Gone.
Stolen.
My sweet, innocent little girl, taken from me.
The moment I heard those sirens from the church, distracting me from my angel Nadine, I knew.  I felt it so deeply in my chest that I hardly recognized it.  It was a feeling of knowing, past proof and physical evidence, just knowing in a divine sense that something had gone terribly wrong.  Maybe you don't understand what I'm saying.  Maybe it comes with being a father.  All I'm saying is, I didn't need to wait to see the look on Sean Devine's face to know that my Katie was dead.
Right after, after I had broken through the police barriers with Chuck Savage and gone to where my daughter was, I couldn't stop thinking about who could have possibly done it.  Who could have had enough against my girl to take her life away?  For christ's sake, she was only nineteen, she had so much life left.  I racked my brain for who I'd have to hunt down, who would have to pay for what they did.
Until I saw her.  Beneath her was a cold, unforgiving table.  Above her, a sterile, crisp sheet.  Her perfect face was distorted by the purple bruises left by the fiend that attacked her.  At that point, my brain lost all function.  But in my heart, I could feel it setting: the hole that would have to be avenged.

Jimmy Marcus

Band of Horses - The Funeral [OFFICIAL VIDEO]

Reaching Enlightenment

My childhood was spent seeking out boundaries and finding the most exhilarating ways to cross them.  As a kid from the Flats, my dad didn't have the money to buy me a fancy bike or an expensive basketball hoop, so it was my job to come up with my own forms of entertainment.  So my friends Dave and Sean followed - Dave like an over-excited puppy and Sean unable to keep from checking over his shoulder - as I made trouble, jumping into subway tracks and attempting to steal cars.  Even after Dave, Sean and I went our separate ways, I found a crew to help me find the thrill I sought after.  For a while, that was enough to satisfy me, the rush.  Then, all of a sudden, it wasn't.

I remember the day very clearly.  It was a day when everything simultaneous clicked into and fell out of place.  I stood in my kitchen two years after I was thrown in Deer Island and two months after my sweet Marita died.  My daughter Katie looked up at me with the innocent eyes of a five-year-old but with the expectation and skepticism of one more mature.  It hit me then that the girl before me was trusting me, however reluctantly, to take care of her.  There was no way she could survive if I went back to prison.  In that moment, I decided to devote my life not to thrills and adrenaline rushes, but to my daughter.  I pushed aside my old life, got a job, cleaned up my act, became the father I needed to be.  From then on, Katie was the companion I meant to keep, and I would do anything not to jeopardize that.  Anything for Katie.

Jimmy Marcus