Zain's Murder

Corvus Brachyrhychos or the American Crow has fascinated me for many years now. It is a magnificent bird; they’re highly intelligent and adaptive, I also like their appearance. For centuries now, people revered the taxonomic crow family, some cultures have also feared it; I guess it’s all because the members of this family have no problem eating corpses of various kinds. Speaking of which, one such lovely bird is sitting on my porch as I’m writing this. I’ve named him Zain, after my childhood best friend, Zain, he used to love these birds too.

First and foremost, I am originally from a small town in southern Poland, I’ve moved to Texas twelve years ago when my dad decided it would be a good idea to leave Eastern Europe and move The States live a better life. Now, being a common Polish person, I’ve been brought up in a rather tight Catholic family, nothing too serious though. As long as I was a good Christian boy who said his prayers, ate his vitamins and obeyed his parents everything was easy and lovely. I was a good kid, never causing trouble or questioning my folks, they are good people too, aside from the religious indoctrination part.

Anyhow, originally we settled in Eureka, a small rural community because this was pretty much the only place we could afford. There were a little over three hundred people when we moved in so it wasn’t hard to get to know people. A couple weeks in town and I’ve managed to make myself some friends. It was a small gang of four boys my age; Trevor Jagodicz nicknamed “Red” for his shot temper and ginger hair, Michael “Mikey” Philips, a skinny little kid, even for a twelve year old, Theodore “Teddy” Jackson and their so called leader, Roy Reznik better known as “Double R”. This kid was nuts from the get-go and I should’ve noticed it, but as tends to be, I missed the huge signs on the wall when I first saw him flaunting around his huge golden crucifix necklace. I mean he was spewing priest-levels of religious rumblings once I introduced myself to the gang in an attempt to join their game of soccer. I’d never be able to forget how I am of course welcome to join their game because I appeared due to “god’s guiding hand” in their lives, mind you it was a fucking twelve year old.

One soccer game later and we became a united group, I was one of them, I wasn’t the new kid anymore, I’ve come to be a local kid. We did everything together from going to school, to going to the arcade together to even going to church together. Back then, it seemed like the best time I could have in my life and that went on for a couple of years, life was bloody perfect for me.

Two years after I moved to Eureka, I came across a new kid at the first day of my Eighth grade school year. I had never seen him before, and he did seem kind of weird staring at the crows that were flying above the school yard, so me being the nice kid I was, I’ve decided to approach him and make small talk. Man, that went on great, we became instant buddies, he told me about he admires the fact that birds can actually fly using their own bodies, which at that point, seemed like granted for me. This new kid even told me about how he wants to study the birds and later, when he would grow up to build flight machines and such. That is how I met my soon to be best friend, Zain.

Over the following days and weeks, I’ve slowly distanced myself from Double R’s gang and started hanging with Zain more and more frequently. We would do all sorts of stuff, from talking about the girls in our classes to going to the movies to playing video games together. In a sense, we were a couple average teenage guys, but there was another side, a more mature side to our friendship, mostly brought up by Zain’s dreams and the way he chased them. His passion with Corvids in particular and flight in general had often caused to stray around town for hours in search of a good observation spot to stare at birds. The other boys did not like my close friendship with Zain.

I learned pretty quickly that Zain was a Syrian kid whose parents immigrated to America during the nineties, I found his parent’s rather secular approach to Islam to be fascinating. Guess that was caused by the stark contrast between his parents and mine on the matter of religion.

There were virtually no other Arabs in town, let alone Muslims, and back then, the memory of 9/11 was still rather fresh in the minds of the public. You can imagine how Double R reacted to seeing me around Zain after he figured out that Zain wasn’t exactly a “White Christian boy”, ironically though, Zain had a skin completion slightly lighter than mine.

So I wasn’t really surprised when my former gang pulled me aside one day and tried warning me about my best friend being a possible terrorist and what not, I brushed them off, stating the guy was born on American soil to parents who weren’t in any way, shape or form related to terror organizations and what not. I didn’t even take the time to listen to a counter argument, I just left, and the gang, well they stared at me like I had murdered a person.

All was fine and dandy, until one weekend Zain and I were hanging at this large open field staring at the sky, we virtually spent the whole afternoon laying on the grass looking at the birds come and go, it was a really nice and quiet pass time. So we’re laying down there on the grass and Zain looks at me grinning from ear to ear, I looked at him dumbfounded and he goes, “Fun fact, a group of Crows is called a Murder”

I chuckled with surprise and went, “Seriously, dude?! That’s sick!” and we laughed off our ass about this weird little fact. We stayed in that field until the sun started setting on us, that’s when we got up and started leaving into the direction of Eureka. Just outside the field, my old gang was waiting on us.

“Sup, boys” called out Zain at the sight of the gang.

They didn’t respond, so we kept on walking and they got in our way, I asked, “what’s this about?”

“So what this Muj is what you traded us for, man, really?” called out Mikey, mockingly.

“The fuck?” I asked, staring him dead in the eyes.

“Yo what is this about, I haven’t had any issues with you, people” called out Zain.

Teddy shoved Zain and said, “We’ve an issue with you trying to make our little pal here into a terrorist like yourself”

Zain was about to punch him in the face for that remark and before I could react I felt sharp pain in my shoulder, I’ve been struck by a telescopic bat from behind by Red. I screamed out in pain as he hit me again and again screaming at me that I wouldn’t be a so concerned with “him”, referring to Zain, unless I had a thing for him. I cursed back at him and in response; he kept beating on me with his bat.

The pain was unimaginable, I felt as I was being crushed by a truck and then, boom, one unlucky blow for the bastard and I was out, bleeding from my head, everything became muffled and I could hear this loud beeping sound before everything faded to black.

I woke up around a day later at the local hospital, my whole body bandaged up, not remembering a shit of what happened. Turns out that even with a chance to lose the use of my arms I was the lucky one.

Zain was dead.

Me suffering partial amnesia, I was informed that the gang had found me and Zain lying in a pulp on the side of the road next to the field we were at. Officially, even today, over a decade after the incident, it is assumed that we were the victims of a Hit-and-Run accident.

I felt like shit when I woke up, from all of my injuries, and the idea that I might have a useless limb, but when I heard my best friend had died, I completely lost my shit. It’s like a part of me dying in that instant. I wanted to cry, but I couldn’t, nothing came out. Like a part of my soul had died. I was depressed for a while and a few weeks after the incident we moved to Houston so I could get better medical attention.

Made a full recovery, my doctors deemed me a miracle, my arm was obliterated and the wound in my head did not seem to cause much internal damage, if at all, unlike what was expected. Today I practice Kickboxing and Judo and I even considered joining the military, but eventually I gave up the idea due to my psychological trauma. You see, I kept suffering from these nightmare in which I would get beaten shitless by a group of shadows in this huge gray grass field, it felt so real, so painful, apparently my PTSD kicked in kind of late. Hence, the reason I even took up martial arts in my mid teens in the first place – to channel my newfound aggression somewhere positive.

Fast forward to a few days ago and I made a trip to Eureka to meet old faces and see old places, I needed this, I guess, or maybe it was by an act of fate or whatever, not that I believe in this stuff anymore. Here’s to the many magical properties of modern medicine! So, I come here and the first person I meet is this girl, Darcy, who used to go to school with me, and wow, this girl, she had blossomed into a one heck of a woman, after some catching up she offered me to stay at her place for the duration of my visit. I immediately agreed, I am just a man after all, and if you could see her, I promise you’d fall in love too. She’s freaking gorgeous now!

I digress though, me and Miss Castiliagno had a nice afternoon together and then she said she had to leave for work, telling me to feel at home at her place, and I did, for a couple of hours. Being the fucked up, restless guy I am, I quickly got bored and went out for a stroll in town.

Just as I left her apartment, I saw a crow land on the cable line a few feet ahead of me, it looked at me, called and flew further before stopping once more and staring at me again. No idea why, but I felt like it tried to make me follow it’s trail of flight.

This thing continued until I reached the town’s bar; the crow would fly a bit, look at me and wait for me to catch up then fly again some more, stop again, look, and repeat the cycle. The crow ended up landing on the roof of the bar building, it set down and stared. I stared back at it for a moment and then I was snapped back to reality by a familiar voice, it was Red’s, it hadn’t changed a bit, still hoarse and half broken after all those years.

I heard him say something along the lines of, “I can’t handle this anymore… It’s torturing me!”

And then another voice said, “Come on, it’s not that bad, we could suffer an eternity in Hell, you know”

More religious mambo-jambo, these guys hadn’t changed at all, I guess.

“Dude, it’s been like twelve years since we’ve fucked up this guy” a third voice said

What were they talking about, it sounded oddly familiar, yet not exactly

I heard Red go again, “Yeah, you’re right, Father Raynolds said everything will be forgiven, we did repent after all”

The previous voice snapped in response, “Fuck forgiveness! This Zain fuck is torturing us, punishing us for murdering his ass”

It all sank down then and there, the memories blew right through my brain, it all became clear. I could feel my blood beginning to boil, but I had to remain calm, I couldn’t do anything stupid, otherwise I’d end up no better than them

The second voice from earlier caught my line of thought short, “Chill out, Roy, we’re in a public place, let’s go and have a nice drink to relax…”

That’s when my opportunity presented itself, but I didn’t have a plan yet, I thought I could come up with something along the way, but first I had to come into the bar and make sure they don’t suspect anything.

“Good idea, let’s have a drink, boys” finished Roy Reznik.

I waited for a few moments and then followed suit, entered the bar and pretended to randomly bump into my old gang, as far as they were concerned, I had no idea of what happened that day so they were acting as if it’s business as usual. A couple of hours later, the four of them were wasted and I was the only one sober, even Reznik who had become a fat fuck probably twice my size in girth, and I’m not exactly a small guy, was drowning in booze.

Here’s the thing, I was never a heavy drinker, it’s just a thing that I didn’t like doing.

Now that the boys were drunk beyond recognition, I came up with an interesting idea, I decided it would be nice if I took Reznik to the old abandoned Owens house, which was next to the bar, beat him half to death there and leave, of course after having him confess of murdering my best friend. I thought that having the ability to kill the guy, but show him I was above that would serve as a better lesson than simple to end his life.

“Yo, Reznik, I wanna tell you something in private, let’s step outside for a moment”

“Sure, man, le’ggo” mumbled the fat man as he struggled to get to his feet.

I helped him to his feet and started making random small talk, mostly about Darcy, to spark his interest, as I was slowly guiding him to the roof of the abandoned building, you see, the Owens family had built an emergency staircase from the ground to the roof, just in case. So, we’re climbing up the stairs and once we finally reach the roof I noticed something, a bunch of crows were circling the abandoned building.

I look at the night sky, and around the building to ensure there’s no one around and Reznik goes, “well… did’ya call me here to tell me bout de chick you’re banging? If so gratz, man, she’s sure a prize”

I directed my stare towards Reznik’s fat frame and said coldly, “I know you killed Zain Ghannam.”

He froze in his place, eyes and mouth wide agape.

Probably sobered up.

“I know you killed Zain that day, Roy…” I said once more as I stepped towards him, he took a step back.

“I dunno what you’re talking about, Adam” he answered.

“Oh come on, don’t lie… I just heard you speak with your boyfriends about the whole ordeal a couple of hours ago” I replied, a large smile forming on my face.

“I have no idea what sick joke your playing here, Gorski” said Roy Reznik in an unsure tone.

“Oh come on…” I said as I began pacing towards him, with each step that I took foreword he took one backwards.

I’m a finger tip away from him, and he slipped off the edge of the roof, lucky me I’ve quick reflexes, I managed to grab him by his huge necklace.

“Don’t let me fall, man, don’t let me fall” he started begging

“Only if you admit your crime, big boy” I said, mockingly

“Fine, fine, it’s true, I swear to God, we didn’t mean to, I’m so sorry” he began crying and whimpering.

“Now that’s a good boy, now piss yourself and pray to your impotent God to save you” I snarled at him.

“Wha?”

“Pray to your idols, you fat fuck!” I barked.

He began praying like the good Christian boy he had never been before that moment.

“Oh… oh… oh my God… Yes… Jesus… I can feel you, Oh God The Holy spirit is inside me!” I cried out, laughing at my own joke.

I could see the fear in his eyes growing, he was breathing heavily, and he did piss himself.

“Unfortunately for you” I said, “I am the devil, and I came him to my diabolical work!” The fear grew in his eyes, as they widened even more, “Tell me do you know that crows are very intelligent and are likely to seek out corpses to scavenge to spare energy?” I pointed at the sky above us with my free hand where a bunch of crows were circling the rooftop we were on top of.

“One last thing Roy, you know a group of Crows is called a Murder” and I let go of the necklace, the fat fucker fell straight on the fence, a spike went right through him. He was probably gone before he even felt anything, lucky bastard.

It was a spur of the moment thing, and honestly, didn’t make me feel any better about Zain’s death. I don’t think it was even worth the effort I put into holding that fat bucks weight.

Anyhow, I passed off my disappearance to the boys as a walk to the bathroom, said I had no idea where fat man Reznik had gone to and they bought it, being drunk off their asses, of course they bought it. I guess they found him some time later; nobody can really connect his death to me as no one really saw us leave the bar together and he was known as a bad drunk to say the least.

So, the crow, Zain, had been coming to this porch ever since that evening, every single day that’s why I even bothered naming him. Well I guess I should get ready for my upcoming date with Darcy… I wonder what is Zain’s murder are thinking about him coming to this porch every single day, these birds are that smart after all.