Victor took a step closer to Brad. The boy squeezed his eyes shut, bracing for the impact that he knew was coming. But the impact never came. Instead, Victor just leaned on his cane looking down at the terrified kid. “You think the world is a playground?” Victor said softly. The gravel in his voice was thick, worn smooth by time. “You think you can take whatever you want because you have youth, because you have speed. You think a camera makes you a ghost. It doesn’t.” Brad slowly opened his eyes looking at the tip of the leather cane resting inches from his sneakers. “There are men in this world who have lived entirely inside the violence you play at,” Victor continued, his slate-gray eyes locked onto Brad’s face. “Men who carry graveyards in their hands. You don’t know who you are standing next to in the grocery store. You don’t know who is sitting on a park bench. You don’t know what it costs a man to keep his hands in his pockets.” Kyle groaned loudly trying to push himself up on one elbow. He failed, his arm giving out and his head slumped back against the concrete. “Get your friends,” Victor ordered. Brad scrambled to his feet. He rushed over to Jace grabbing the heavier boy by the shoulder of his black hoodie. “Come on, Jay. Get up. We got to go.” Jace groaned shaking his head. “Can’t. I can’t breathe.” “You can breathe,” Victor said from a few feet away. “I bruised your spleen and shocked your diaphragm. It feels like dying, but you will live. Stand up.” The cold authority in the old man’s voice overrode Jace’s panic. With Brad pulling on his hoodie, Jace managed to stagger to his feet. He stood hunched over, his face pale and slick with a cold clammy sweat, completely unable to stand up straight.
They shuffled over to Kyle. Brad hooked his arms under Kyle’s armpits pulling him up into a sitting position. Kyle’s eyes were glassy, unfocused. He looked around the park completely devoid of his former arrogance. He didn’t seem to understand where he was or how he had gotten onto the ground. “Come on, Kyle,” Brad pleaded, his voice thin and reedy with fear. “Stand up, man. We’re leaving.” Between the two of them, they managed to haul Kyle to his feet. Kyle leaned heavily on Jace, his head lolling to the side, his legs moving like rubber. They didn’t look back at Victor. They didn’t offer any parting insults. The ecosystem of their bravado had been thoroughly and violently dismantled. They just wanted to be as far away from the old man on the bench as the laws of physics would allow. They limped down the concrete path, a slow, pathetic, three-legged race heading back toward the east entrance of the park. Victor watched them go. He didn’t move until they had rounded the corner of a brick apartment building and vanished entirely from sight. When they were finally gone, the tension in Victor’s shoulders completely collapsed. He let out a long, ragged exhale. The adrenaline had fully evaporated now, leaving him feeling hollowed out and incredibly frail. He carefully turned around and lowered himself back onto the wooden bench. He felt every single one of his seventy-two years settling deeply into his bones. His right shoulder throbbed with a relentless, sickening rhythm. His knuckles were bruised, the skin scraped slightly from the friction against Kyle’s jaw. He leaned his cane against his knee and rested his head back against the hard wooden slats. He tipped his flat cap down over his eyes, shielding them from the bright morning sun. He reached into his pocket, his hand trembling slightly, and pulled out the empty plastic bag that had once held his sourdough bread. He stared at it for a moment, listening to the distant, rhythmic rumble of the city traffic. “Survival,” Victor whispered into the quiet air, speaking to the empty park. “It’s just taking the hits and standing back up.” He closed his eyes. He wanted to be left alone. That was all he had asked of the world. But he knew with the deep cynical certainty of a man who had seen too much that the world rarely listened to quiet men.