A Nothing to Fight Over

As the light from the lone candle faded, Jimmy was aware of someone standing with him. He glanced over his shoulder, half expecting the voice from the journal to greet him. To his surprise, it was Natalia. He sat there, unsure what to say to his wife. "How did you know to find me here?" Finally his voice broke the awkward silence.

The tall woman walked forward laying a hand on his shoulder to comfort him. "I'm your wife and your partner; I always know where you go."  She smiled.  “I called BJ and she told me you were here.”  She glanced over the room and then back to him.  "It has been many years since I came here." She looked up seeing ghosts that weren't there.  "Why did you come here, Jimmy?"

"I was checking on a stolen car when I stumbled across this house.  I also found out an officer on the force had a case dealing with this place, so I decided to check it out.  But, somehow, I get the impression you already know the case, and you know what happened to everyone who lived here." Jimmy sighed hard, closing the cover.  He moved his rough tanned hand up through his gray hair before looking his wife in the eye.

"Come on Jimmy, it's late, and what I have to tell you will not be so easy." Natalia set her hand on the journal, touching it as though it kept some great secret she did not want to escape.

"In the ten years we have been married, I have never heard you say those words.  It must have been quite big if it is hard to talk about."

"Come on, we can talk at home, in silence, just as easily as here, except, the home has lights and food."

"Fine but give me a clue about what happened to these people."

His wife didn’t know where to begin.  She didn’t know how much he knew about the pack that lived in the house, or what happened all those years ago.  So, she simply started from the beginning.  "Do you remember that street kid that went by the name Nothing?" Natalia asked as they climbed the steps.  "Yada was her real name," she waved her hand as she asked.

"Nothing? Yada Olsen-Myers?  Natalia that was twenty years ago, what does she have to do with all of this?"

Natalia closed the door behind them, leaving only their footprints in the dust behind. "I'll tell you all about it when we get home. It's going to be a long night."

Jimmy nodded as he slipped into the front seat of his car. He watched his wife getting into her truck, and his hand patted the journal and fumbled back to the page where he had left off.  He was tempted to read a little more before the drive home but decided his wife would beat him if he didn’t follow her.

September 10

It takes all types of people to make the world go around.  I know and understand this, but I am here to tell anyone who will listen that there are some on the island who just have no clue about life.  I meet a street rat today, she said her name was 'Nothing,' can you believe it, Nothing of all names.  I think I felt pity for her at first, but I do not feel it anymore.  She ripped me off fifty bucks. A life lesson I guess, never feel sorry for street rats, they can handle their own.

I guess in some ways living on the streets must have its own rules.  Live or be killed, steal or starve, and I'm sure there are more.  I never really noticed before how many kids live on the streets here.  I have always just overlooked them in the past.  Now that I think about it, she was a nothing.

She was interesting to talk to.  She sounded like she was educated, or at one time was educated.  She was pretty, and I don't mean pretty in a cosmetic way.  She had no make-up on, and still, she was remarkable.  She had long black hair with a purple streak in the front.  I wouldn't have noticed her, but she was running from someone and almost knocked me over.  I watched some man run past and when he was gone, I told her it was safe to come out from behind the door.

The man didn't look like a cop or a local. I figure she ripped him off as well.  After she thanked me, I offered to buy her some lunch.  I felt a strong connection to her.  The type of connection you just must know more about someone.  We talked for hours and when I left, I knew less about her than I did when we started talking.

I mentioned her to Quinn.  He made a strange face before calling Noah.  Noah is another character around here.  He comes and goes as though he owns the place.  When I first met him, I thought he was a street rat as well.  He was scruffy and dirty, and smelt like yesterday’s trash.  I learned a lesson about not judging people or wolfin though.  Just when you think you have them figured out, they go and change all the rules.

~~~

"Come on Chad, it's my turn." The young woman said, leaning over the boy before fighting him for the joint.  She had placed it in her mouth and inhaled deep letting the burning smoke fill her lungs and clouded her mind. "Where did you get this?  It's good, not like that crap Jack had last week.”

"Some kid on the boardwalk," Chad said, leaning his head to the sideboard of her bed.

"I told you to get it from Cliff."  Yada made a funny face.  The buzz was already taking hold, clouding her mind.  "You will have to show me who he is the next time we are there.”  She paused, glancing sideways at him.  “You were careful coming back here, right?"

"Yeah," he growled.

Yada hated when Chad answered in a one-word response, it normally meant he was hiding something. "Look at me, Chad.  You weren't followed back here, were you?"

"No," he growled again.

"Chad, are you sure?  I mean I can't have trouble here.  My dad is in the US and my step monster is just looking for a reason to kick me out."  Yada sounded urgent.

Chad sat up and was about to speak when the bedroom door suddenly burst open. Yada jumped up startled by the number of people flooding into her room. She was caught; there was no sense in fighting it.

"Yada!" the voice greeted matter-of-factly.  "You go by 'Nothing' on the street, right?" The female cop said before yanking her to her feet.

"It looks like you already know who I am,” she turned to Chad who had set her up with the cops.  “I want my lawyer," was Yada's only answer.  She cringed when the officer doubled her arm behind her back.

"Yeah and I want drug dealers off the street," the woman officer said, pushing Yada into the hall.  She seemed to enjoy the pain she inflicted as she shoved the teen forward.

Sandra Olsen-Myers, Yada’s stepmother, stood a few feet from Yada with a smug look.  "I kept telling her that I wouldn't allow her to do this in my house.  I was only glad I caught her this time."  Sandra regaled another officer about Yada's activities.

"Thanks, mom," Yada sneered as she was escorted from the house.  Yada didn't resist, they had caught her, why fight it?  But the officer forcing her in the backseat didn’t show as much restraint and hit the young woman’s head on the side of the door as she was shoved face first into the back seat.  Her eye twitched a little as a few drops of blood flooded it.  Yada glared at the house for nearly an hour as the officers came and went.  Finally, they took her in.

Yada was taken into a small room and left to sit alone for what seemed an eternity.  A woman with shoulder-length red hair walked in setting a file on the table along with a pencil.   Yada watched as she sat across from her, "Miss Olsen-Myers,” the officer nodded reading a report.  “Yada, do you know why you are here?"

"You have nothing on me other than possession," Yada said with an irritated look.

"Possession," the woman said sternly, taking a seat across from the girl.  “You think that is all I have on you?”

"I know the laws, lady; I also know you did not find anything in my room."

"You were caught with marijuana, Miss Olsen-Myers.  We take that quite seriously."

"You have to prove that it was mine, and I do not foresee you doing that.  I want my lawyer."

"Yada, you go by, Nothing, right?  Do you mind if I call you Nothing?  Nothing, although, you had a small amount and I am sure given who your dad is you will be free in an hour it is not you, I am after.  I'm after the one selling this shit to you."

"You think you know me?  You think because I get high from time to time you think you will just put pressure on me, and I will just crack like some baby." Yada laughed once.  "As if you're going to get me to say anything.  Ask the kid who was there with me.”  She looked in the mirror knowing others were there.  “You think I don't know my rights?  I’m sixteen, you can’t talk to me unless my guardian is present or my lawyer.  I am not saying another word until one or the other gets here.”

"Tell me about the person you bought your dope from."  She slammed her hand on the table.  The force blew a few sheets of paper across the table.

"Touchy aren't you?  I told you I don't know what you are talking about.  Now as I see this you can charge me, and we wait for my lawyer."  Yada grinned.  "Or you can detain me for questioning and we wait for my lawyer.  It is up to you.  But," she paused.  "Since I am a minor shouldn't you be calling my father and telling him you have detained me here."

"You think you are so smart, Nothing, you think you have us figured out?  I'll make you a deal," she straightened her collar and sleeves.  "You give me the dealer's name, and I will forget this meeting ever happened."

"I'll make you a deal lady you let me go, and I promise you will have your job tomorrow.  Now get me a phone either so I may make my one call or get my lawyer or dad in here.  We are through talking."  Yada folded her arms over her chest and stared at the woman.

The woman stood up and knocked on the door once.  The door opened slowly, and a tall thin man walked in.  "Phil, get this nothing a phone."

Nothing just smiled.