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Can’t say I’m sure of how the day I’m gone will play out. Can’t say if it’ll even come, which might be a laughable admittance from a man who likes to think there’s some sort of fate in things. If I had a fate, it’s without a doubt screwed to all hell—I don't know many who cheat death, you know, have an exact moment where everything and everyone aligned just right in the perfect circumstance to ensure that I was completely zeroed out. No way I should’ve made it out. But I did, and now I feel like I got some sort of ache to set things straight. I got this son of a bitch, greasy-haired, bullet-belted asshole rewiring my brain like it's his own personal playground–and there's that very real possibility that all the shit I've done, all the people I’ve met, all the things I’ve been through will just be useless… and lost. And, I think maybe that’s kind of unsettling. Scary, maybe. Heartwrenching, actually.
I’ve let a lot of people down, had a tough layer of skin, and far too many things left unsaid in the amount of time I’ve had. I can’t say what I need to say to the people that it matters to anymore, they’re long gone. And maybe it’s more terrifying to think that the memories I have of them will be gone too, finally just canceled out of existence. All the sleepless nights I spent pacing Jackie’s room, I’m the only one left with that memory. Those nights exist only in my mind now. I really, really don’t want to lose that. Those memories were once Jack’s, now they’re for me to hold, and I ain’t letting go easy. If there’s one thing I need to prove, it’s that I’m trying to be a man who puts up a fight. I can take care of any bullshit thrown my way with my own two hands–or at least try to. If I have data spilling through my head, vivid images, sounds, smells, tastes, feelings–in the same potency as I see Johnny’s– I gotta capture it somewhere. Being remembered is so stupidly human, being put in place in someone’s untouchable mind and making an organic, genuine home. Not a place to occupy for gain, for power–but to sit and listen in as the world passes by. I like that, I think I may want that. Time has flown by where it is written on paper or etched on a stone, you know, the image of all that Vincent Estavilla was and all he loved. And maybe the ways that Vincent himself was loved, or made some sort of imprint. Instead of parchment or stone, I’ll think. I’ll think and have it recorded. When my brain is too busy to rest or there’s something of me that’s too loud, it can go home somewhere.
Home was a painfully confusing word as I grew up. Hell, some may even say I’m still some sort of kid, like the gonks I pass that used to see the youth in my eyes and think tryin’ me would be in their best interest–maybe that’s why I got them ripped out. The eyes, not the gonks–in this case. Had to show I don’t pace around blocks with any sort of naivete, I know Heywood as home, and I know it damn well–well enough to not be treated as some kid. Just lil’ ‘Vinnie’ as my dad used to say. He always had a knack for butchering anything of meaning or charm–like my name, or our house, or my mom.
I got a lot of love for my nook of Heywood. Or, I hold a lot of love for it. Holding it like an infant in front of a fire station, while it is crying and weeping for you to not put it down. So you don’t, you don’t place him in the dumpster and walk off. You rock him in your arms and trudge back home, even though there ain’t much waiting for you back there. A little on the nose, maybe… But that’s the story my Ma used to tell me. The story of my first hours of life, she said she never regretted keeping me held. Before I left, I used to think that story was so fucking gonk. Just something she used to tell me so I’d be more grateful for when dinner ended up at the table and I didn’t have to go out beggin’ by the plaza. But, when I left, I was so fucking sick of the idea of that whiny baby. I had no want or desire to take care of it or hold it in my arms, so I didn’t. I set Heywood down and left.