Jason the Hitman, Apple Downtown, Instant Justice, Superfly Adams. Now there is a nickname! but what’s funny is every part of that name actually has some sort of story behind it and fits my friend Jason’s personality perfectly. But i am not going to get into those stories at this time. I am opting to tell the stories of when I would catch a ride with him to school.
As soon as we were old enough to drive we stopped riding the bus to school. Jason had procured a parking pass because he went to work during his last period of the day. A work-release program I called it. I talked him into picking me up on his way to school so I only had to ride the bus home. This gave me almost an extra hour to sleep which was awesome. But I still had to be ready in time as he let me know from the start, “When I pull in your driveway and honk my horn you have until the count of three to have your ass out the door before I take off” And he wasn’t kidding.
One day I was running just a tad behind when I heard him honk, I scrambled to grab everything i needed. In my head I started counting. “1”… shoes, socks,… “2”… backpack, money…”where’s my wallet?”…”3″…”whew!”, I found it. I ran out the door only to see him backing out of the driveway, I walked towards the car thinking he would stop and let me in. But him, being the ass that he is, just acted as if he didn’t see me and started off down the road. I began running after him, but he didnt stop. He really did leave me. I was pissed. However his tactic worked I guess as I was never late coming out of the door again.
A couple of times we hit traffic and ended up being late as we never wanted to get there too early
of course and always cut it close, so any delay screwed us. At out school, after 3 unexcused tardies the student is punished by serving detention after school. One day on our way to school on a very rainy day, Jason decided to amuse himself by driving into a field and doing fishtails with the car. It was fun, until we got stuck! And just who had to get out of the car to push? Me.
I quickly rushed out of the car and went to the back to push. Jason hit the gas lightly and the tires spun slowly, still stuck. So we started to rock it a bit, then Jason sensing we were almost free, gunned it! Mud flew everywhere! I was covered head to toe. In addition, so as to add salt to the wound, we were going to be late and it would be our third tardy.
So instead of going straight to school, I mean hell, we were already going to be late so why not do it right. We went to Hardee’s for breakfast. Actually I wanted to go back home and change, but Jason wanted his Hardee’s breakfast. If you know jason at all, you know it is of no use to try and argue with him. When he gets something set in his head, he is going to do it. So off to Hardee’s I went.
I tried to wash some mud off, but that proved futile. So now I was going to enter school extremely late and covered in mud. I don’t even know what we told the assistant principal. I just know we got detention. I was lucky though as my next class was art class which was located in the basement of the rectory. We attended a Catholic High School and the rectory is where the priests and brothers resided. One area of the basement was used as a classroom, and it was adjoining the laundry room. My art teacher was a really cool guy and didn’t even ask how it happened, he just let me use the laundry room. I changed into my gym clothes and proceeded to wash my clothes as I sat through art class.
Eventually the day ended and it was time for detention. Some days earlier Jason had gotten into a scuffle with a guy in class and he called Jason “monkey”. Not sure why, I guess Jason looked like a monkey to him, or he just knew it would piss Jason off.
Well a kid in detention with us was in the classroom at the time and for some reason thought he would mess with Jason and call him “monkey”. You could see Jason’s face get kinda red as fury built up inside him. He did say anything so as not to get into more trouble. He said it again. Jason told him with a slight psychotic tone, “Meet my over by the church after detention, I am gonna kick your ass.” the kid laughed it off.
Detention ended and Jason told him he had better meet him or he will tell everyone he backed down like a little girl. We proceeded to get our stuff from our lockers and get into Jason’s car to drive over to the church where the kid actually showed up. Jason pulled up to him and without turning off the car, he stated “This won’t take long” as got out.
Jason just walked right up to him without saying a word he just hauled off and clocked him! The kid went down to the ground instantly, and while he laid there in a daze, Jason said the now infamous phrase…”Nobody calls me monkey.”