1. First Blood
"Oh, Jesus! Help! I’m burning!"
"What?"
"I’m on fire, Lenny! It hurts! God!"
"Quit yer playin’, Frank," Lenny hoarsely chuckled as he took another sip of rotgut whiskey and wrapped himself tighter in the newspapers he and Frank would use to keep warm in the trash-filled back alleys of Chicago’s Magnificent Mile.
"Lenny, please," Frank coughed as he rolled out of the abandoned refrigerator box they called home and into a nearby puddle of muddy water. A smoldering emerald refer joint clung to his trembling lower lip despite his attempts to spit it out. The veins in Frank’s neck bulged and pulsed violently. He began to wail and growl like a bobcat snared in a hunter’s trap.
"Frank, you ok, buddy? What’s the matter?" Lenny asked, his voice rising with the fear that began to overtake him.
"God!" Frank screamed at the top of his lungs as the agony grew unbearable.
"This ain’t funny, Frank," Lenny muttered as he inched closer to his friend. "What’s the matter with you?"
Frank didn’t answer. He curled himself up into a ball and grabbed the sides of his head, writhing back and forth along the ground and howling like a madman.
That’s when Lenny saw it.
Faint at first, but growing brighter by the second, a river of green liquid flames poured from Frank’s mouth and spilled onto his quivering lips and chin.
"Water! Water!" Frank cried in a shrill, high-pitched voice that sounded more like a twelve year old girl than a gruff two hundred sixty pound Vietnam war veteran.
"Water! Water! Water!" Frank cried over and over again in his tormented mantra.
The emerald flames suddenly set his goatee on fire and caused the flesh on his chin to bubble and boil. His lips quickly dissolved into two fatty lumps of red and yellow flesh. Lenny forced himself to swallow the vomit that crept up his throat. He desperately searched the alley for anything to help douse the flames, but finding only discarded whiskey bottles, Lenny bolted for the street.
"I’m going for help, Frank!" Lenny shouted. "Just hang on, buddy!"
At that moment a few blocks away, Lauryn Jefferson, a beautiful caramel-skinned woman in her late twenties with long woolly black hair that flowed down her back, was strolling hand in hand with her college sweetheart and soon-to-be husband, Will Harris, a rather imposing man of West Indian descent whose no-nonsense attitude, swaggered walk and permanent frown suggested that he was the type of guy who just couldn’t sleep well at night if he hadn’t beaten up at least one person during the day.
As they leisurely made their way down Michigan Avenue, enjoying the cool summer breeze blowing off the lake, Lauryn felt a peace she hadn’t known for months. Her final year at Northwestern’s medical school had almost proved to be more stressful and demanding than she could handle. But with graduation behind her and an internship at Mercy Hospital set to begin in the fall, Lauryn had finally arrived.
"Thank you for such a wonderful evening, Will," Lauryn said as she snuggled close to her man and pulled him in for a passionate kiss. Normally Lauryn wasn’t big on public displays of affection, but the two glasses of Zinfindel she had on their dinner cruise of the lake still had her feeling a little tipsy.
It was their sixth year together and that night was their anniversary.
Caught off guard by Lauryn’s amorous advance, Will managed to crack a smile and warm his icy facade. "Anything for you, sweet."
He loved Lauryn dearly. She could see right through his tough-guy act and touch his heart like no one ever could. As a private investigator for one of the city’s top law firms, he regularly encountered the worst that human nature could conjure. The love and stability Lauryn provided helped Will endure a life filled with crooks, conmen and murderers.
But that was all about to change...
