Super powered

My sweet Jenny I'm sinkin' down Here darlin' in Youngstown"

Chapter Thirty-One

"My sweet Jenny, I'm sinkin' down
Here darlin' in Youngstown"

Youngstown Ohio

Archie Leach was angry. It seemed he'd been angry all his life. It was an undirected anger mixed with a general alienation towards everyone and everything. He took another swig of his beer and looked around the three-room house he was renting. An eviction notice lay crumbled up on the floor next to the body of his landlord. The gun was still in Archie's hand.

Somewhere it had all gone wrong.

He remembered his old man coming home from the mill that last time. Even as young as he was then, Archie knew defeat when he saw it. At first there was talk of it just being a minor setback and then things would turn around. The old man tried going out day after day to apply for another job, but nobody was hiring. Then he gave up even trying. After a while the unemployment ran out, too.

The bills just kept coming.

They lost the house. The family moved into what they used to think of as the poor neighborhood. That's when Archie realized they were poor. Momma told Archie and his brothers that it was just temporary and the family would be back on its feet in no time.

Archie was still waiting.

The old man spent most of his days drinking. He was a mean drunk. He would rail against those that were ruining this country, foreigners, the blacks, the big corporations and mostly the government. He would take his anger out on Momma, Archie and his brothers. Archie remembered the house always being tense. You never knew what was going to set the old man off.

Momma signed them up for welfare and food stamps to make ends meet. It was Archie's first experience with shame. He saw it in both his parents' eyes. This wasn't how it was supposed to be. They'd taught Archie all about the American dream in school, but somehow that got lost in translation between the schoolyard and reality.

The old man walked out one day and just never came back. That made things even tougher at home. Momma had to go to work, but the only jobs she could find were a cashier at a second hand store and cleaning rich people's offices at night. That left Archie and his brothers on their own most of the time. He didn't blame Momma she did her best. What little extra money she had, she spent on them. He still remembered that first video game system she got at the pawnshop. Archie and his brothers would play those games for hours.

Momma was just tired all the time. The long hours just beat her down till she couldn't get up. Archie remembered her always having a far away look in her eyes, like she was trying to remember something but just couldn't think of what. Money was always short. Archie always wore hand me downs to school. It would have been worse, except everyone else did too.

Archie started skipping school. It wasn't like they missed him. With the armed guards and metal detectors at the front door, it was pretty obvious where their priorities were. It was in the warehouse they called a high school that Archie first felt the satisfaction of hitting someone. He'd been in fights before, but this was the first time he just started punching and continued punching until they pulled him off the other guy. There was blood everywhere.

Archie sat with his mother in the vice principal's office as he told Momma that Archie was a troubled teen with anger issues. He suggested perhaps Archie would be better suited for a vocational school. Momma sat there meekly and agreed with everything the old bastard said. Consoling was recommended. Twice a week, Archie had to meet with some fat old lady that used to be a gym teacher. She always wanted to know his feelings

When Archie turned sixteen he told the fat old broad what his feelings were about her and the rest of the school and then dropped out. He still laughs when he thinks of the last thing she said to him, if you drop out now you'll never get into a good college. Like that was ever going to happen.