Bedlam

[blood_pardon]

This is a segment from a paper I wrote in Composition 1 about the late Charles Cribb. The paper was split into 5 sections about 5 seperate incidents spanning 4 years. This is a true story.

2005

Its black when Jake Davis and I pull into the driveway of the white two story house on
Highland Street. We knock and Chris Freeman answers. He is Charles' brother.

When I walk in through the front door I see Charles in the corner on the left from the door.
He wears a blue hoody with the hood up, sunglasses, and jeans stained black with ash. He smokes a cigarette with fervency. It seems as if he doesn’t even pause to breath.

Gene walks around the corner with his hands in the air twisting his fingers in an odd way. "Hey Jake what’s up man? You gotta buck?"

When Gene Allen was seventeen he was struck by a car and his skull bounced off a curb. Charles was seventeen and was ran over at an intersection. Both have been diagnosed with schizophrenia. Gene is basically harmless, he just sits and flips wildly through the Bible without reading it. Charles is the dangerous one.

Chris leads us upstairs to his room. There is a bed, couch, and coffee table. There is a gold dot picture of a lion on the wall. He has a leather rocking chair with speakers built in that sets low to the
ground right in front of his 32 inch. There is a black Xbox laying on the floor wires from it and the
controller snaking every which way.

I move a skateboard to sit on the couch. Something bangs downstairs. There is a pause
and another loud bang, followed by another pause, then another bang. Chris swears and gets up
and hustles out of the room, I hear him yell. I follow him downstairs.

I see Charles standing in the middle of the floor. He slams a dark stone against the ceiling
causing white powder to rain down. I notice a large hole where he had hit repeatedly, causing the
plaster to break loose. Over and over again he slams the rock against the ceiling, catching it as it falls
and throwing it back up. All the while Chris is yelling at Charles.

He finally yells back, "You can't tell me what to do Christopher!"

Hours later we go back downstairs and get some pizza from the fridge. Charles strides up to us. "Hey
did yall want to see a magic trick?"

No one says anything. Charles seems to convulse he thrusts out his chest, his arms are
twisted awkwardly. He is still in that odd posture. Hands at his side and wrists bent up. He laughs, I
examine his face it looks like he is having the time of his life. Its as if he is expiriencing pleasure from
striking this odd pose. Suddenly, the radio in the corner crackles and the volume turns up. ACDC "Highway to Hell" plays. There is another crackles and it blares. Charles' body relaxes and the
volume returns to where it was.

"Howd you do that?" I ask and he busts out into a fit of laughter. He walks over to his corner and sits
Indian style smoking a cigarette like a mad man.

"How'd you do that?" I persist standing near him, but he just laughs even harder.

---

Summer 2006

For a week now I have been wondering if I have contracted the HIV virus. I look up the symptoms online and I have all of them. Diarrhea, thrush, weight loss, sinus infections, fatigue, nausea. What’s worse is my girlfriend has all these symptoms as well. I wonder if Cassie would stay with me if I gave her the dreaded human immuno-virus.

I inhale the marijuana smoke and cough loudly. I pass the joint to Chris who sits next to me on his couch. He etches something onto his drawing pad with a penicil. He takes the weed from my hand and puffs it. A giant cloud of smoke spurts out his nostrils. He leans forward and ashes on the coffee table before passing it back Charles scrambles inside and closes the door behind him. He wears sunglasses, baseball cap backwards, and a blue hooded sweatshirt with the hood up.

"Get out!" Chris yells.

"Let me get a bud." Charles begs sitting Indian style in front of us.

"No! Get out!" Chris shouts slamming his book on the table

"Christopher, let me get a pinch?" He pleads.

Chris says no.

"Christopher," Charles repeats over and over again as Chris shouts at him to leave.

I join in with Chris and start telling Charles to leave. He rounds on me. "Oh no I gave my girl firiend aids," He mocks. "You faggot!"

I sit there in stunned silence. I didn't tell anyone my fear. How did he know I was thinking that?

He just gives me a black toothed grin.

[Dotard]

Charles Cribb and Chris Freeman are brothers?

Why do they not share the same sir name?

[blood_pardon]

Charles Cribb and Chris Freeman are brothers?

Why do they not share the same sir name?