CHAPTER SONG - Dark night Warren Zeiders

"Mateo, I swear.."

"Mateo. Mateo." I mocked, "Swear what Joel? Swear to tell my daddy on me? Ohh, I'm so fucken scared you got me pissing my pants. Honestly Joel how pathetic, you already called him."

"I can tell your mother."

I paused mid climbing and shot a cold stare over my shoulder. I knew it would punch him like a motherfucker.

Beside him, Maddox was watching me, trying not to laugh at this conversation, or maybe it was the tiny, and I mean spec of fear in my eyes that only he could ever find. Okay, maybe it wasn't all that tiny because if my mom found out I was climbing another cell tower I think she might just make good on her promise and kill me.

No, she loves me too much, right? Hopefully or I'm what do they call it? Kicked the bucket? Croaked? Met the maker? Went to the place in the sky? The last once's kind of ironic considering I'm climbing up to the sky right now.

"You wouldn't dare.." I replied, loud enough for him to hear below me. But he raised his brow at me, telling me he would totally dare do that. I sighed, turning to look back up at the tower. Fuck, I really wanted to keep going. I was almost to the top. Just thirty more feet and I would be so damn high that even the air would change.

The oxygen is always far better in higher places, crisper and rawer. It clears my mind, eases it to the point that I can inhale so calmly that It's almost like I am stepping out of this darkness clouding my soul. This darkness I was raised in, and the same one that I live in. This darkness that pulses with anger, tugs with iciness and splinter's into consuming void. Not that I minded it, oddly enough it feels good to live here, sometimes. It was like I had two souls, one consumed by the darkness and one pleading for a taste of fresh air. The darkness was the safe place, that soul was the guardian, and he knew it was a necessity in my life to know how to weld itself with brutal coldness.

But sometimes...well sometimes my other soul pleads loud enough. Begging on his knees. Chocking and suffocating. Tear filled eyes and lung's full of smoke. Until I finally answer it. Finally climb a cell tower like a damn monkey to give it the one thing it asks for. Finally lift it above the cloud it's withering away under.

Like tonight. So fuck Joel, I'm going up.

I pushed up, grabbing onto the tower. "Madds, get up here!" I yelled and kept going, not giving one fuck about Joel already calling my mom. Maddox started climbing below me, catching up quickly. "I'm going to tell your mother too Maddox!" Joel yelled out.

Let's make it clear that Joel is not at all bad. Actually, quite a good dude, but his job was clear. Mateo is to stay alive, under all circumstances. Sometimes his job consists of threatening me with calling my parents on me, even though that really wasn't going to do much. But I give brownie point to the guy. His job is not easy by any means and he answer to my dad so I get why he takes it so fucken seriously. I would be afraid of the man too if he wasn't my dad.

"My mother doesn't scare me." Madds called back, just a little lower than me. And I had slowed at this point, leaning back and releasing the tower with one hand so that I could dangle back a little. The wind circled around me, already getting me excited about how prestige it was going to be up there.

"What about your father?"

We both froze mid breath. My mother was one thing, my dad another, but threatening us with Uncle Jonny was a whole new level of punishment. "That's low, even for you Joel." Madds shook his head but continued to climb after a second. I mean he is your dad Maddox but come on the dude is scary.

After the accident we had about a year ago that ended with a broken arm and a nice concussion, we got the talk. It started with both of us being sat down and talking to like adults. At least that's what our mom's called it. It clearly didn't work, so that escalated to threats about grounding us. When that obviously didn't work, Uncle Jonny looked us dead in the eyes and said, and I promise I'm quoting this, "If I find out either of you climbed anything but the damn fucken stairs in your house I will personally make your lives a living hell."

Even though that threat is partly weak because what is he really going to do? It something about the way he said that made it feel like it was that bad. Like his threat was life or death and his words were a nail in the head. Clearly, we didn't listen, but that didn't mean Joel had to be such a buzz kill. And I was still thinking about it when Madd's stopped right below me, looking up at me with his ghostly grey eyes. So grey that they turn almost icy clear sometimes. His dirty blond hair that was more brown then even blond, waved in the wind "You going up or what? Don't be suck a fucken quack Mateo." he smirked.

I narrowed my eyes at him. "It's your damn father. You decide." I muttered. I wasn't afraid of him per say, but maybe a little worried about what living hell meant. Now I kind of wish I had asked for clarification. But Maddox rolled his eyes and sighed, "Mateo, just keep climbing. We both need it after tonight."

He was right, we did need it. So I swung forward, catching the railing and pushed up. Tonight was mentally draining. Tonight required us to not only live in the darkness but to weld it, and welding was always harder than just being consumed by it. We didn't just have to weld it easily, no, we had to dive headfirst with it and not that I was not use to the darkness, or the violence, or the brutality of my life because I was. I grew up in it, I was trained in it, and I would end my days in it. I don't fear it. I don't think I even fear death really.

My mom fears my death. She thinks I play with my life to often. But the truth is, it didn't matter if I died. I had someone waiting for me on the other side. My life here was good, my life there would be good. It's not a win, lose situation. At least for me.

So, if by some chance my finger's slip and I go flying through the air. If by that chance, I land on my back and creak my skull open then so be it. Someone bring a cupcake to my funeral and eat it for me.

Joke's aside, sometimes the life I was brought up in gets too much. Even for me. I know my dad says it's how it is, its who we are but even I see how much it drags him sometimes. How much it drain's all of the humanity out of his eyes and replaces it with such a void that it numbs your skin and insides. It turns us into empty shell's. Into monsters.

Who my dad is outside the home, and who is he inside the home are different people. As am I. It comes with the life we live. His too proud to admit it, or in his words to strong but I see it every time my mom hugs him. It's like he falls apart in her arms, like he knows that only she can hold up everything he carries. It's like he only trust's her to give himself too.

I don't have that person. I have Maddox, and my siblings but it's not the same. I wasn't raised to let someone care my burden, even if sometimes it's too heavy for me. I was raised to be strong, head high, shoulders back, chin out, eyes cold. That's how I was raised. But sometimes I wish I had someone like dad has mom. Someone I can trust to the point of falling apart in their arms.

I climbed the last few railings and swung myself up onto the top before crawled to the ledge and hanging my legs over. I leaned back on my arms and dropping my head backwards before inhaling so deeply that my lungs burned, and my pleading soul cried out with happiness. Fuck, I was right. This air is more than perfect. No earth words as my mother liked to put it.

Maddox dropped beside me, resting back on his arms too. His life wasn't different from mine. Sadly, because I kind of wish a different life for him. A more selfish part of me is fucken thankful for him. That his here. That he knows the glowing eye's of the demons. That he knew the world we walk in.

I wish I could say the selfish part wasn't at big as the genuine side of me, but I can't. I know he deserves better than this, then me, but deep down I'm fucken glad his next to me. He was raised to be strong, clever, and fierce. He turned out to be just that, a sly fox. Charming, bloodthirsty, and sleek. Golden brown hair, eye's sharper then needles, and villainously cunning. A smile full of hard pressed charm that could turn warlike, and savage in seconds.

He was raised to stand beside me no matter what, and to put my life ahead of his. He was raised to take a bullet for me, and he has. He played it off like it wasn't a big deal, but it was. I hate knowing that he was raised as if his life mattered less than mine. It wasn't true. Maddox is equal to me. He was my best friend, my brother, and my soon to be right hand. Where I went, Maddox went. Where Maddox went, I went. It was a bond built on thick blood. And I promised myself I would never let him raise his first-born son to think he is any less then equal too mine.

"How pissed is your dad going to be?" I asked, keeping my eyes closed tightly as I enjoyed this rare peaceful second. Maddox chucked, a sound that's almost rougher up here and said, "Mad enough to take my car, not mad enough to do anything else, chill."

I smirked, "Can't take my car thought."

He nudged me but flinched back. "If you think that you're even a little bit right you forgot who my father is. Shall we go back in time and talk about the last time you said those exact words?"

I blinked my eyes open, glancing over at Maddox who unlike me was staring straight into night as if he was trying to battle it, trying to win whatever it was he fought in his own head. I sighed, "Yeah your right, my car is gone now too. Fuck."

His lips barely lifted. "Good thing we have Joel down there who can drive us around, since his the one who couldn't keep his mouth shut."

I snorted, swinging forward. "You hear that Joel? Your fucken babbling just got you a week of chauffeuring us around." I yelled, and Maddox's grabbed my shoulder, gripping it tightly. Joel muttered something, but we were too high to hear, or really to even care. I leaned back, and Maddox relaxed again beside me.

We sat there for a while, not talking about anything because I think we both needed it to just be fucken quite for a second. No one screaming and begging. No one looking at you with eyes of sour regret. For a second, we turn off our brains and stop being ten steps ahead of everyone. Don't get me wrong, we were good at doing all that. How can you not when that was all you were thought, but sometimes, we need to just not have to do that. No one realizing how fucken tiring it becomes.

In school I see all my classmates and it truly amazes me how unaware they are. How fucken clueless they are to the life going on around them. They study among murders, and future Cartel leaders. They see our limos, guards and think we are just rich, not that we aren't but we are also dangerous. Far more dangerous than their innocent little minds understand.

Sometimes, I'm jealous of their blindness to the cruelty of this world. I wouldn't admit to that, not to even Maddox. I know that made me weak, but sometimes I just wished I didn't know how to kill someone in more than a hundred different ways. And sometimes I wish I didn't wake up to my dad's nightmares echoing the house, and then hunting my own dreams.

I sighed, feeling my chest extra heavy tonight. It really was a long night. "You think one day this gets easier?" I asked, listening to Maddox breath. He inhaled every breath sharply, like it's never enough.

Maybe because his weight wasn't any lighter, no matter how much he pretended it is. "I think it was supposed to be easier a long time ago." he answered.

"So what? We feel like this forever?" I asked, hating that I was even saying this. But Maddox shrugged, "We learn to live with it."

Even his words sounded like they came out rehearsed and meaningless.

Those innocent blind classmates of mine would say just change your life if you don't like it and I would laugh in their face. There was no changing this, there was no doing something else. This was my life. This was it. One day, if I get lucky, I would be as strong as my dad, as my biological father. I was named after him, and in my mind that made me want to strive to be just as powerful as he was. My parents never hid him from me, no, they told me stories after stories about him. How strong he was, how smart and powerful he was. How much of a good man he was, and how in control he lived of his own mind. I crave that control they always talk about. I love my dad, Angelo, but he always reminded me that he wasn't my only father.

And even thought I never met him, somehow, I want to make him proud. One day I will. One day I'll be as strong as he was. When I meet him, he'll be proud.

Maddox phone rung, the obnoxious ringtone singing louder now that we were so high from any of the noises that never stopped flowing on the ground. He pulled it out of his pocket and moved the phone in my direction so that I could see. "Great." I muttered, seeing his mom's name and a photo of her feeding a baby goat.

I grew up with his mom, she is basically my second mom. Growing up I remember her always being there. I remember her kindness, sweetness, and oddness. The lady had roasters and chickens in her backyard for fucks sack. I might be a little petty about the rooster part, but I will never forget the fucken thing chasing my ass down the driveway when I was ten. At least she makes the best hot chocolate, and I mean like heavenly.

Maddox answered the phone, putting it on speaker. "Was the broken arm not enough for you?" his mom asked, the guilt tripping voice clicking on and making Madd's cringe.

I rolled my eyes, titling my head back and shut my eyes again. Maddox has a thing about disappointing his mom. I understood it, Aunt Nora has a way of making you feel bad just by the way her voice softened. "Or the concussion, Mateo."

Now I cringed.

"Mom we already up here." Maddox sigh, "And don't put any more of those bad vibes back into the world."

She gasped. "Do you hear those children?" she asked, most likely talking to someone in the background, before talking to us again, "And now you have to get down. Lord save us all from the stupidity of those two boys."

I chuckled before covering it up with a cough because Madds shot me a look, telling me to shut the fuck up or we would just get ourselves in more trouble. Movement in the background of the phone sounded before Lily, Maddox's younger sister spoke, "Dad knows Madds, better not come home tonight!"

Aunt Nora gasped, again, and I could hear Lily running away, laughing so hard she started chocking. "Lily! Why would you say that? Maddox Anthony Vallero, if you don't show up at home tonight, I swear—"

"Mom, I'll be home tonight." Madd's groaned, cutting off his mom, who sighed at his words. "Just get off that tower in one piece, I don't want to have to bury my first born! Your supposed to outlive me."

Maddox's said his goodbye's before turning off his phone and shoving it back in his pocket. I had homework I needed to get too, and even some stupid project I needed to finish. Which sounded so damn ridiculous in the big picture of things, but both of my parents insisted I get an education, as did Maddox's.

On top of all that, they enrolled us in public school to humble us as they liked to say. The hell they were humbling when we came home to million-dollar houses, race track's in our backyards, and enough sport car's and bikes' to fill a museum, I wasn't sure. Not that we acted like soiled rich kids, ok, maybe a little sometimes. Come on, it's there. It's available and how does my grandpa always put it? Can't take that shit to the grave. Yep. Just like that. Although, we had seen enough to know that even money can't save you when you need it. Money can actually do the exact opposite; money is the root to all evil, but money was sure fucken fun.

Maddox nudged me pulling me out of my head. "I heard Ash crash the other day. Fuck the whole neighborhood heard that shit." he said, laughing a little, and my lips turned upward.

Kid's going to kill himself, but whatever makes him happy. Ash, my second brother did in fact crash his race car on the track the other day. The kid has a thing for race cars. Not the kind you see on the roads, no those are sport cars. The kind that fascinate Ash are the kind that go two hundred miles an hour on tracks and are dangerous killing machines. He build's them, races them, crashes them, and redoes it over, and over again. At fifteen. Kid's going places, and I don't know if those places are hospitals but at least he has skill. He sure as fuck has enough talent to go pro. Formula1 is the goal.

I had two brothers, Kirsan's a year behind me. Mom always say's that only a few months after I was born did dad announce he wanted another child, to my mom's surprise. After came Ash and then Aster, my fourteen-year-old sister. Parents really didn't think it through with having so many children close in age, but they sure made life fun as hell for us. Kirsan, smart as fuck was going places too. Institute's, university's and other place's genius's attend. The kid out shines us all by a million. Let's just hope he doesn't drop off those mountains he likes to climb and creak his skull before we get to see him become a doctor or whatever he decides on.

Then there is Aster, the youngest and the quietest. I think with Ash and myself, there is enough crazy once in the family. Lucky for my parents, Aster is the sweet one. I'm sure somewhere inside her she has a little bit of wild blood because after all, she is her father's daughter but for the most part Aster is a star. She keeps to herself a lot, and most of the time the only way you know she even came into the room is when you hear the click of her camera. Photography and Aster were pretty much a hand in hand thing. She is incredible at it; I mean like fucken hell she make's even me look good on those photos.

We grew up like any other family, beside the fact that all of us have a little bit of darkness in us. My siblings don't have it to the extent that I do, and for that I'm glad. They are going places, going to do things. I for one will push and drag them out of this world with all my power. They don't deserve to feel the shadow that wraps around my throat. I will rule the family, the cartel, and the business. The dark soul in me thrived in that environment, it was its second nature, and I was just happy to see my siblings happy.

"He totaled the car."

Madd's nodded. "He will rebuild it. Fuck, watch, next week he will have it on the track again."

I laughed, sitting back further onto my arms and finally feeling a little more relaxed, recharged after the long day, and night. "Mom wasn't too happy with the crash but it's not the first, and I'm sure it won't be the last."

Maddox ran his hand through the tangled mess of a hair, the wind doing him dirty and sighed, "I can't fucken believe mom is making me choose a sport this year."