Kruppo

For those that read Rosko, the novel I wrote and posted on here, I had promised that I would post anything new from here on. Well, here's the first chapter of the new story I'm working. It's a bit of an about-face compared to Rosko, in regards to pace. But here you go anyway: Chapter 1 of "A Finer Moral"

His head would’ve usually greeted him in a friendly way in the morning, despite the bright sun stabbing through the window, happening to end up landing on Taylor’s face. But this was no ordinary day, and Taylor’s head felt like…hell.
Like his brain had been caught in a bear trap. Call it agony in the making. The pressure discharged and unloaded itself right between the eyes, filling up the sockets, wracking the temples, and squeezing the eyes closed shut. The sun did not improve the situation; it came on right away, seizing the opportunity to piss Taylor off. The dark brown pupils could only take it for a second, and then the lids came crashing down like the waves not two hundred yards away from the house would. The light persisted, and finally, amidst his pain and cursing, Taylor finally shifted himself out of the bed, proceeding to roll until his stiff body fell out of the bed, landing on the floor with a thump.
His soft-brown hair, shoulder length and messy, covered his face as he remained on the scratched wooden floor, even as he grimaced in regret of the previous night. He managed to reach out with a tanned arm to slap around on the floor until he found a shirt, an orange tee shirt that stated in a scratchy handwriting, ‘I may be short, but you’re down-right ugly’ which he yanked on over a beer belly. He glanced around for his shorts, wondering where they could’ve gone.
The door opened, and then Taylor’s older brother, Adam, the only family Taylor had left, stood over Taylor, smirking. The older man was tanner, taller, darker of hair, and far more handsome by ways of appearance. He was also smarter. In Adam’s hand was a pair of black khaki shorts. “Lookin’ for these?”
Taylor snatched them away, and pulled them on as Adam went over to the window, yanking the curtain aside, inviting the sun in fully. Taylor winced and put a hand up over his eyes. “Do you really have to do that?”
“Not really,” Adam admitted. “But then again, I’m not the one who went and had a crazy night while I was gone. Whatever’s out there is your mess, kid. You’re pickin’ it all up.”
“That bad?” Taylor stood up, shocked.
“Yeah; that bad.” Taylor took off, pushing past Adam, only to burst through the doorway into the living room, which connected the kitchen to the stairs, both on opposite sides of the house. The couch in the living room was flipped upside down, and its pillows were strung about the stairway. Upon entering the kitchen, Taylor smelled vomit, and saw the catalyst on the plastic-white tile floor, an orangey secretion, with stringy pieces of something once edible scattered around the puke. Taylor knew immediately that he’d been the cause.
“Great.” He muttered. He couldn’t recall the details of the previous night right away, but in the meantime, he would clean up the mess.
He didn’t even want to know what the upstairs, where Adam’s bedroom and the guest bedroom were, looked like or what shape it might’ve been in. He looked around for the mop, found it leaning against the counter, and knew Adam was watching him from the doorway, leaning against it, arms folded across his chest, no longer smirking nor smiling. He was pissed.
(As he should be) Taylor thought, (this is his house, after all.)
“How much longer are you plannin’ on doing this, Taylor?” Adam asked then, as if almost reading Taylor’s mind. “You’re not in high school anymore, kid. Don’t you think maybe it’s time to grow up? To learn responsibility, and maybe learn when to say ‘no’ to temptation when it’s called for?”
Taylor didn’t answer. Adam walked over to the counter, the lightly-red-colored wooden bar, and rested his arms on it, his dark eyes still on his younger brother. “Well? Don’t just act like I’m some kind of TV you can put on mute, boy, answer me.”
Taylor glared at him for a moment, and then kept mopping. He got all of the vomit swept up, and put soap in the mop-box, swirling and swishing it to mix it with the warmed water. Then he said, “Look, it was just a little get-together. You have one every now and then. I don’t see what the big deal is-”
Adam cut him off, “The big deal, as you put it, is that when I have friends over, no one’s trashing the entire place. No one knocks things over, has pillow fights, or sleeps with girls on my bed-”
“There were no girls!” Taylor protested.
Adam continued without hearing him. “And of course, no one heaves their entire body-weight in alcohol on the floor.” His face had turned bright red, and Taylor leaned against the mop, readying himself for the tirade that was to come.
And then consequently remembered what had happened that previous night. About time.
Three friends. Two of them smokers, one of them an alcoholic. All three skinny, yet had toned bodies, tattoos, piercings, and plenty of booze. Smoke rising from the cigarettes, the ashes being dropped into a cup holding water. Taylor sat with them, playing cards, drinking, laughing, as he helped put away a twenty-four pack of Budweiser and a bottle of Captain Redbeard’s rum. Or now wait, make that TWO bottles. Two-thirds of one of the bottles had been Taylor’s. He’d consumed it so quickly, and things became funny. Like drinking water from the toilet like a dog. Or getting on the roof with a couple of Cubans and taking turns pissing off of the roof-
Adam made a fist and knocked on Taylor’s head as he was reminiscing. “Hey! You listening to me?” Taylor reluctantly brought himself back to reality. “Look, Taylor, I brought you here to live with me because I thought you’d man up. I gave you a job, and pay you well not only in cash, but I also have given you a room here without paying rent. The very least you could do for me would be to keep this place clean, and not destroy it.”
Taylor sighed. “Dude, I’m sorry!”
“Yeah, I know,” Adam put a hand to his eyes, rubbing them vigorously for a few moments. “Look; you’re my bro, and I love you. But I’m not going to let you live here anymore if you don’t pull your weight, stop trying to get out of work, and don’t clean up your act.”
“You know, if I recall right, I’m not the only one who liked to party back a few years ago,” Taylor said hotly, shoving the broom against the refrigerator. It struck the fridge violently and then clattered to the ground. If this had been meant to intimidate Adam, it failed miserably. Adam didn’t even blink.
“I did a lot of stupid stuff, man,” Adam shrugged. “And I’m not sayin’ that you’re worse than me; you’re not even close.” He came around the bar and put a hand on Taylor’s shoulder. “But now that it’s just you and me, I’m doin’ my best to make sure that you don’t go down the wrong path, kid. You’re outta control right now. This is the third time I’ve seen you hung-over in two weeks. You’re startin’ to scare me.”
“So you think you’re both Mom and Dad now? Dude, c’mon-” Taylor tried, but Adam persisted.
“Taylor, I love you man. I’m not going to let you do whatever you want, because that’s not what Mom and Dad would’ve wanted. You know that as much as I do. I do this because I love you. I want to you succeed in life, man. That’s why you’re still here, and not out on the streets.”
He finally stepped away, towards the door. “I’m going to work. You’re supposed to be in at six tonight, right?”
“That’s what it says on the schedule, doesn’t it?”
Adam smiled. “See you tonight then, kid. Later.”
Taylor just watched him go. The moment the door was shut, Taylor frantically looked around the living room. Under the overturned sofa, around the chairs, under the television, and then, behind the old leather chair Dad had once sat in four years ago, lay a third bottle of rum. Even last night, it had been virtually untouched. Taylor sighed with relief as he snatched it up.
Taking it over to the kitchen, he rummaged around in the fridge until he found a Coke, the perfect chaser. But just as he opened the soda, a sense of rationality entered his mind.
(Wait a sec. You’re still hung-over. Are you retarded? It’s eight-thirty, for Christ’s sake!) he then took the rum and put it away in a cabinet. He swallowed some of the soda, and then went and fetched the mop, determined to at least finish his job in the kitchen.