chapter 4
on a tuesday night

Another Tuesday night of misspent malt liquor youth found Sherry, Elizabeth, Phrank and Julio driving around East Hill at a time Phrank's dad would say kids could only do things that would get them in trouble. Trouble is what we they were into that night.

Pensacola had recently provided its God-fearing citizens with large black trash cans to be scooped up every Wednsday by an arm attached to a truck driven by a few remaining garbage men. These black, heavy-duty plastic receptacles had sturdy handles on the back so Mildred the old lady could easily haul her refuse from the back of her house to the curb.

It was by these handles that the kids were dragging the cans from the passenger side windows of our their Toyota Supra, accelerating up past the speed limit of roads like La Rua and Brainerd. When they got the cans up as fast as we thought they could go before the wheels flew off, they swerved by a parked car and let the big black beasts go. Then all 300 pounds of them would fly 40 miles an hour into the back of some poor hard-working Pensacola resident's Oldsmobile.

When they impacted, the tops of the cans flew open from the force and garbage sometimes shot out ten feet in the air evoking a fireworks like effect. The kids flew by on four cylanders like night witches.

Over and over again, they pulled East Hill’s garbage cans around its streets and launched them into parked Saabs and Jettas under the influence of Eight Ball, Saint Ides and Mickeys. One night they slammed on the brakes for no apparent reason and all four exited and began dancing around Strong street, fueld by whatever angry music they were hearing at the time. Right when the music seemed most maniacal, Phrank, the oldest, silenced them all by throwing his full quart of Blue Bull through the drivers side window of a parked Saturn.

The glass shattered and so did the moment.

For three seconds they just stood there in awe of a rage they never saw before.

Phrank sulked off and climbed in the Supra. The rest quickly followed. It seemed to them that he was angrier than they would ever be. They were wrong. He was pointing the way.

They obediently followed.