NINE YEARS AGO
Officer John Christian had met some scum bags in his life. He had also met some excellent examples of what humanity should strive for. Unlike many of his fellow officers, Officer Christian kept in mind that the latter outnumbered the former. In fact, he had sworn to protect them and found that they were all around him if he kept an eye out for them. Sometimes it seemed like half the town was on drugs though. Sometimes he had trouble holding on to what his criminology professor called, ‘the idea of humanity.’ This was one of those days. He felt like self-destructing into a case of beer. Christmas was in a few days. It tended to bring out the worst in people.
He received a call for a domestic disturbance at 6 pm. What he found sucked. It didn’t suck because the guy was a scum bag who was beating his wife. A part of him would have preferred that. He liked playing hero. That’s why he was a soldier. That’s why he was a cop. No, it sucked because he had to play bad guy. He had to back the Grinch.
The Grinch was a heroin addict named Phil Murphy. His wife had called the police because he was trying to take their children’s Christmas presents to return for drug money. Phil was sick from withdrawal and not thinking straight. He hadn’t been thinking straight for a long time. Phil came from a family of abusive alcoholics. At 17 he’d begun shooting up. Everyone has their damage. John didn’t know Phil’s history outside his previous possession arrest records. He didn’t tend to care for excuses anywahttps://www.amazon.comy, but he did understand sickness. He believed that was just the biology behind evil, whether it was esoteric or not didn’t matter much. He didn’t care for philosophers or theologians, though he was glad to see Officer Al Hendrix take the call with him. Hendrix was the type of guy who had his back—mildly preachy, but he worked with at risk youth on his off time. He was one of the good guys. Unfortunately not all cops were, and today it was his turn to be a bad guy. He hated being the bad guy.
As Officer Christian pulled up to the house, he could hear the hysterical screaming of the woman and children crying. Al was already there and talking to Phil the heroin addict. He radioed in and Al looked back. Al was glad to see ‘s John’s arrival. He thought the situation was insane. The woman kept screaming that he was taking the presents to buy drugs. All figured this was probably true, but there wasn’t much he could do about it. Officer Christianson told officer Henderson he was going to go talk to the woman.
“Are there drugs in the house right now,” officer Christian asked the angry wife and mother, Betty.
“No, he’s out. I threw his junk away. That’s why he’s taking our kids’ stuff. He’s sick. He’s fucking sick, the bastard.” Christian noticed an air of alcohol on the woman’s breath. Nothing illegal, but he wondered if this would end up becoming a CPS case. So far not. They won’t take a case unless the children are in danger or neglected, and psychological abuse generally wasn’t enough. Officer Christian listened to the woman’s story, and wrote down her information. The couple had separated the day before, and she had disposed of his drugs in a fit of anger. He was now getting back at her with the kids. It was fairly typical for an abusive man to punish the kids to punish the woman, but at the same time, he was just looking for a fix. It was all sick, and he was glad most of the time to have never gotten caught up in a relationship or drugs. Sometimes he got drunk and bitched about women, but it wasn’t very often and he didn’t mean it, other than the pain they caused him. Officer Christian hated men who were assholes though. The more she described him, the more he sounded like an asshole. Then again, he was the Grinch.
“Look ma’am, it doesn’t sound like there is much we can do about it. Legally, the stuff is just as much his as yours and this is for a civil court to settle. Of course, it will be too late then, but I’m sorry… there just isn’t much I can do. Let me go talk to officer Hendrix and see how he’s coming along.” He went over to officer Hendrix, and hoped he had convinced him to do the right thing. Officer Hendrix wasn’t able to. Addiction was more powerful than the conscious of a good cop.
“.They’re spoiled brats, I tell you. I’m just trying to stop her from ruining them,” Christian heard the man say as he approached them. Officer Henderson had tried to reason with him. He denied the heroin allegations, and said that the woman was a drunk and coddling her children too much. “I can’t be doing heroin. I’m on probation. She’s the one with a drug problem. She’s going to ruin those kids.” Officer Henderson had given up. There was no arguing with heroin addiction sometimes and this guy was in denial.
“Look, I can’t stop you from taking the Christmas presents. It’s your choice. Just remember this; someday you’ll regret this. Hurry up and get them. This turns my stomach. Have a merry Christmas,” officer Hendrix said bitterly. He didn’t swear. He normally didn’t swear, but God bless him, he was really tempted to tell the guy to ‘fuck off’ at that moment. That would be wrong though, because he wouldn’t let trash like him bring him down. The police officers waited on the man, and then apologized to his wife again. It was time for them to go. It was a busy time of the year. Not as bad as summer, but bad. On their way back to the car he could hear the kids crying. Officer Hendrix turned to officer Christian. “That was a load of crap. That guy will get what’s coming to him in the end.” Actually he would kill himself about 10 years later from guilt, depression and loneliness. His by-then teenagers would be distraught. Officer Henderson had no way of knowing this though; only that it would come back to haunt him.
Officer Christian was pissed. “This would never happen to Batman,” he thought. He expressed his anger to Al in swear words laced machismo and retribution, Al wouldn’t have chosen, but that Al empathized with at the moment. Al told him that it would all work out.
On Christmas Eve the Kalamazoo Department of Public Safety Explorer Post Al was in charge of helped deliver what would probably be the poor family’s best Christmas for years to come. The public safety department had organized a collection for the kids and something special for the wife. Crystal would talk about that Christmas for years to come. It touched her deeply. She was six. The presents filled the porch, and the skinny, awkward teenage explorers in their para-boy scout uniforms were like elves helping a remote Santa. This Christmas truly was magic.
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This was one of the many stories of Crystal. Greg didn’t know it, and she didn’t tell him on that drive home a decade later or ever. She kept it buried. He would know that she had a lot of pain inside. He would sense a longing for love and a heart capable of it. Unfortunately she would be rarely shown it. Her mom was twisted herself. She would put Crystal in many more bad situations out of sickness and mental illness, and it takes some emotional stability to have the capacity to truly love someone. James would have it, but she would come to hurt and repeatedly cheat on him. Her mother would never understand her role in Crystal’s problems. Her mother would remember some of the things she did wrong, but she would justify them and rationalize them. We do strange things for love, but when we don’t love ourselves we turn to, and on, others. We shouldn’t, but life isn’t fair, and love is often only requited as dependence, lust and/or infatuation.
Joker's Wild 