Step On A Crack

Chapter V

George made his way down the sidewalk, wiping the blood from his nose onto his shirt sleeve. He carried the maimed loaf of bread in his left hand and had begun noticing people were no longer smiling at him, but staring at him in disgust and horror. "What the hell are you looking at fucktards?" he shouted as the strangers passed.

Up ahead he could see several construction workers working on the outside of the old Matinee Theatre. The vintage building was only a couple blocks away from his mother's house and had been in the process of renovation. George actually looked forward to its grand opening.

One of the workers moved a 20' tall A-frame ladder into the middle of the sidewalk directly in front of George, placing it next to the theater's large antique marquee. A stack of crates blocked George's path on one side and scaffolding made it impossible to pass on the right. The only way to go was directly beneath the ladder.

"Fuck." George impatiently passed between the object's legs and continued to walk. He turned upon hearing a large metallic boom from behind him and found that one of the workers had dropped a heavy metallic toolbox on the ground. The worker was attempting to carry the box up the ladder.

"Hey! Watch out!!!"

George spun his head to look forward once again, but, it was too late. He plowed face first into a large mirror. The glass didn't break, however the two men carrying it lost their grip on the reflective pane and the sheet of glass fell, exploding as it hit the concrete.

The trio of men all turned their heads away to shield their faces from the shattering glass.

"Are you fucking blind!?!!" one of workers shouted at George. The construction worker strode over and poked a finger in George's chest. "Do you have any idea how much that damn mirror cost?"

"No."

"Well, you are about to find out, buddy. You are gonna pay for not payin' attention. You didn't see that sign back there that said, 'caution, construction in progress'?"

"Don't you have insurance to cover this sort of stuff, moron?" George shot back and leaned his face forward with an eyebrow raised over his blackened eye.

"What the fuck did you just say?" The construction worker threw off his hardhat and grabbed George by the neck. He drew a fist back.

"I...uh," George stuttered only to stop as he watched his assailant's eyes change to large round saucers filled with fear.

"Move!" the man shouted, grabbing George by the shoulders and yanking him to his left.

George and the construction worker fell backwards as the large A-frame George passed under only moments before loomed over them. George assumed the man on the ladder must have slipped and fell off the side of it, pulling the object off balance. As the worker fell, his leg became wedged between the rungs and he screamed as he rode it down. His head slammed violently onto the hard concrete sidewalk and blood erupted from his face, splattering George as he lay on the ground only a meter or two away.

"Son of a bitch!" George yelled as he recognized the heavy tool box from earlier tumble over the edge of the Marquee. The worker evidently managed to get the box up the ladder somehow. Tools rained down from above. George covered his face with a hand as a screwdriver fell from the sky. The tool embedded itself in his hand, stopping only an inch from his eye. He screeched in pain as a hammer slammed down onto his left leg.

George howled as he extracted the screwdriver from his hand. With tears in his eyes, he glanced over to thank the man who saved his life only to find he was staring into one lonely eyeball lying on the dirty concrete. The muscles and blood vessels attached to the orb trailed back toward his savior's crushed skull buried beneath the toolbox. The lower half of the man's head was still intact, his tongue extended from an open mouth and several teeth lie scattered through the dark pool of blood and pink flesh that oozed outward from the impact's epicenter.

George wretched and slipped into darkness.