CHAPTER TEN
A few days after my surveillance rounds, I started hitting homes. I was still taking jewelry and cash from the homes, but now one out of every ten I was also stealing a car from them.
My vehicles of choice were those that were the easiest to sell; pickup trucks, foreign cars, and SUV’s, all newer models less than a year old. Some of them I got directly off of the new car lot and had less than ten miles on the odometer.
Some of the higher end vehicles had GPS trackers on them, which I would disable. One of my many new talents learned from my job at Tony’s.
Most of the vehicles I took from the houses were easy. The keys were usually hanging on some kind of hook or in a container like a bowl close to the door leading into the garage. My routine was quick and to the point: I would go into the garage first, change the plates, then go in the house and get what I could find, bring it all into the garage, load it into the vehicle, start it up, open the garage door, turn on the headlights, then drive out, closing the garage door behind me, as if I was leaving my own home.
Through the years of my thievery, I had met some people who were helpful in getting rid of my stolen merchandise.
They were called fences.
One of those fences was a guy named Steve-O. If I remember correctly, the ‘O’ stood for Olvedo. He was a Latino, and it turns out that he knew Julio. Small world, huh?
So, Steve-O told me what kinds of vehicles he wanted and how much money he would pay. Surprisingly, it was much more than what I had heard.
Payment was made upon delivery and he started me out with just one car per week, which was just fine with me. I needed to get my feet wet, so to speak, and get comfortable with my new vocation.
Vocation? How could something so fun be a job? Ah man, I loved it, but you know, it almost came to a halt before it even got started.
It was the night I got my first car. It was raining fairly hard and visibility was low, just like I liked it. The car was a black Lexus Sedan, worth about 50K off the lot. I would be getting about five thousand for it.
I got the car out of the garage with no problem, drove down the driveway and followed the streets to get out of the neighborhood. As I made a left turn to go to the highway that led to town, I glanced in the mirror and saw a cop car coming up behind me, lights flashing and moving fast.
I believe if I would have had time to panic, to respond, I probably would have punched the gas pedal, but before I could do anything at all, the car moved over into the lane to my right and passed me. I looked at it and shook my head. It wasn’t a cop. It was a security company car. A rent-a-cop. They were paid to patrol specific sub-divisions and businesses, supplementing the overworked police force. The guy in the car that passed me was probably some fat slob who had just realized it was time for his break. Man, did he have me spooked for a few seconds. I thought I was caught for sure.
That was the closest I ever came to having an encounter with the law the entire time I was a thief.
And speaking of encounters with the law, that reminds me of the first encounter I’d ever had with the police.
It happened only a few months before I’d stolen the Lexus.
I was helping my mom and dad clean out their garage. I say their garage because there was absolutely nothing in it that belonged to me.
It was trash day that day; our trash pickup was in the evening, and were a little bit late because of all the work we’d been doing in the garage. We were trying to hurry to get everything to the curb because the trash truck was at the end of the street.
As I made my last trip back to the garage to get the last load, the trash truck passed our house and the driver turned the truck around when he got to the end of the street. Apparently, they started on that end, then, picked the trash up on the way out of our neighborhood.
The truck pulled up in front of our house as I was dragging the load toward the curb. I passed one of the trash men who was sliding a box of half broken fluorescent bulbs back to the side of our house. I noticed that he had a nervous look on his face and he said sorry as he put the box down. I shrugged and looked toward the curb. A cop had just driven up to the entrance of our driveway and gotten out of the car. He was standing by the front door and speaking to my father.
When I got within hearing range, the cop asked if the house belonged to my dad. Dad answered yes, then, the cop pulled out a notepad and started writing in it.
After about a minute, he finished writing, tore a ticket out of the notepad and handed it to dad. He then said that he was writing him a citation for not properly securing the broken light bulbs. He explained that an animal or child could have been seriously hurt due to his negligence and that in the future my dad needed to be more responsible when disposing of any dangerous or hazardous materials. He also said the one-hundred dollar fine was nothing compared to the lawsuit that could have been filed against him if a child or someone’s pet had gotten hurt.
During the whole explanation, my father said absolutely nothing. I watched the whole thing, then as the cop started to leave, I spoke, asking the cop to hold up. When he stopped and looked at me, I went into an explanation about how the trash guy had picked up the box of broken bulbs from the side of our house, that we had not placed them on the side of the curb. I also told the cop that our gate to the side of the house had been closed and that the city employee had no right to open our gate and trespass onto our property. My voice had gotten louder as I spoke. By the time I was done, I was almost shouting.
As I was saying this, I saw my mother approach me from the front of the house. She tried to gently persuade me to quiet down, but I didn’t pay her any attention. In fact, I kind of moved her aside with my body as I moved closer to the cop and to point out the sign on our gate that said no trespassing, and that there were dogs in the yard.
I told him that if anyone had a right to sue, it would be us, because the city employee’s carelessness and trespassing could have let our dogs out of the yard and they might have bitten someone, or gone out into the street in front of a car and caused an accident.
Man, the cop was pissed, and you know the whole time, my dad said nothing. He just kept looking down with an angry expression on his face. I guess he was afraid to say anything to the cop.
The cop turned to my father then and told him that he needed to get control of me. I then told the cop that no, he didn’t need to get control of me, that I was over eighteen and accountable for my own actions.
I also told him that I would be suing him and the city if he didn’t take his bogus ticket back.
His face turned red and I could tell he was furious, but then again so was I. I glanced over the cop’s shoulder and could see that the trash guys were nervous. I could see to my side that my mother looked worried too. She was probably worried that the cop was going to do something to me, maybe even arrest me or maybe she was worried about my dad, or what the neighbors would think of all the commotion.
Either way, I wasn’t backing down. The cop must have seen this and realized that he was wrong, so he backed down. Of course he was reluctant to do so, and he made a weak attempt to save face by getting onto the trash guys for entering our property. He also tried to tell me how lucky I was not to be going to jail. I stood there for a moment, then, when he was done speaking I asked him if he was through. His face got red again and he started to say something then thought the better of it. He turned away, walked to his car and drove off in a hurry, spinning his back tires a little as he exited our driveway.
After the cop made it to the end of the street and turned and was out of sight, my dad looked at me, shook his head, then, walked into the house.
My mother and I watched him go, then she turned to me and tried to tell me why arguing with the police was dangerous and senseless.
I was angry and young, and I was not going to be persuaded about anything at that moment. I believed that truth was worth fighting for, even dying for. She kept pleading with me, holding my face in her hands and trying to calm me down. She told me that she was only telling me this because she loved me.
Of course, I didn’t listen to her. I shook my head and pushed her aside, then walked to my car and drove away.
I didn’t realize that two months later, she would be gone forever.
She died two weeks before my nineteenth birthday. Lung cancer. We didn’t have a clue. Mom kept it to herself. Never visited a doctor or anything. The pain she must have endured. It just amazed me that she could have gone through that and never showed us a sign of it at all. I shake my head in wonder every time I think about it.
I also think about my dad. He smoked as much or more than my mother and had no health problems at all. A few weeks before she died, he went to the doctor for a check- up, to find out if he had cancer or any other diseases, (apparently she told him to go to the doctor) but the doctor told him he was fine. That’s what verified to me that there was really no justice in the world.
I kept thinking about how I could have helped her, if only she had said anything to me. The gold dust would have probably enhanced her immune system. It tears me up every time I think of it.
It was June and raining heavily the day of her funeral. Why does it always rain at funerals? I thought it was strange, because I don’t ever remember seeing it rain in June before then. It was appropriate though, because I was gloomy too.
Not very many people came to the funeral or the wake; her sister; her uncle Bunkie, who I’d only met a few times before; her cousins, who I never really knew at all. Dad didn’t come. Some of his family members were there and they said words to me. I’m sure they were words of condolence, but didn’t really hear them.
It’s strange the things we remember, especially during trying times.
When the priest was talking over mom’s grave, I remember mother telling me something she’d thought when we were at grandma Rose’s funeral. This was about a year before mom died.
I was working that morning and was late. I had missed the service and everyone was at the cemetery when I got there.
Mom told me later that when she saw me at the top of the hill, dressed all in black and making my way down to the burial site that she thought for a moment or two that I was Death, the Grim Reaper, coming to collect Rose’s soul.
At that time, when she told me that, I thought wow, I must have looked really cool.
I thought about how idiotic and self-centered that thought had been as they lowered mom into the ground.
After the funeral, I stayed after everyone left. I walked from under the temporary awning that was set up to protect everyone from the rain and kneeled by the hole in the ground. The drops of water soon drenched me, but I ignored them. My heart was completely broken.
I cursed and cried. I sobbed so hard and thought my lungs were going to collapse. I cried until there was nothing left, then walked to my car and sat there. All I felt was emptiness. I sat there for hours. The day darkened to night and the tears and rainwater dried from my face and clothes. By the time I looked up and realized my surroundings, my heart had turned to stone. I was now dead inside—all of the joy and happiness I’d ever experienced was gone, turned now to anger and rage.