This Won't Be Easy

Chapter 4

     "Where do you think you're going, little boy?" The voice issued out of the end of a dark alley. Snickers could be heard after it. Javier froze. His mind, a second before muddled and occupied, was now focused, razor sharp at the task at hand. He quivered a little, and asked "what do you want?" Before him slowly emerged half a dozen of New York City's most disappointing youth. They were all big and ugly, but one was the biggest and the ugliest, so he was obviosly the leader of the outfit. "Got any change, boy?" Said the leader. He looked like a troll, and smelled like one, too.
     "No, Sir. "He said." He looked around. He noticed all the boys were white. That was worse for him. That means that their parents all probably moved their in 2008, when the stock market crashed. They lived the good life, then got sent crashing into poverty. Now, a lot of them took out their anger on local guys like him, guys who they thought belonged there.
     His mom was from Mexico. She came here as a girl, with her parents, illegally. She grew up here working even more than he did, but she was still poor, and didn't even have a green card, much less citizenship. She had always in poverty, but was slowly beginning to clime back out. He used to ask his grandmother what Mexico was like. "Ambrasador" She always replied. Hot. His father, though only his mother knew him, was Hispanic as well. Over all, he was small, and as thin as a twig. It appeared that these boys intended to snap him like one.
     "C'mon, guys" he said nervously. He knew what he was supposed to do. He just didn't know if he had the guts to. "Oh, sure. No change?" Said the ugly boy, looking around at his comrades and nodding. "Well, then. You know what happens to guys who walk through our neighborhood and don't pay da toll? They get it! Grab him Bobby!" He shouted. Quick as a flash, Javier pulled about his most trusted possession, a six inch switch blade. No sooner had he pulled it out, however, than the guys on his left and right also pulled out their, much longer knives. However, he was more concerned about the leader, troll. From his waistband he pulled a Glock 22 9 mm Handgun. He saw me staring. "Yeah. New prize. Stole it from a drunk striper." That's what the gangs called cops.
     He managed to distract me for long enough. I felt something heavy, maybe a rock or a bat, hit me right in the temple. I crumpled. By the time I hit the ground, I had already felt consciousness slip away from me.