RSL -- Day Nine

October 20 -- Day Nine, Sunday

I get up, and nothing gets me down
You got it tough / I've seen the toughest around
And I know, baby, just how you feel
You've got to roll with the punches to get to what's real

Oh can't you see me standing here
I've got my back against the record machine
I ain't the worst that you've seen
Oh can't you see what I mean?

Might as well jump / Jump
Might as well jump
Go ahead, and jump / Jump
Go ahead, and jump
         -- Van Halen


Get Out And Hang
Ray left his room a little early. He was going to take the Caravan up to the garage where they left the Porsche but after he heard the weather forecast; “we’ve got another Indian summer day in store for us today, high fifties now and we’ll be reaching the mid seventies by late afternoon,” he decided it would be a better idea to walk up to the old garage thus leaving his van in the relatively safer, highly visible location he parked it in last night. The air was a little crisp but there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. ‘Perfect weather for a jump,’ he thought to himself on his way up to Junilla Street.

He pushed open the garage door and the silver beauty was still sitting there just like they left it. Ray climbed in, started it up and took off to Robin’s place.

He knocked on apartment 214’s door at 8:00 A.M. just as they had arranged the night before after Robin performed her full-body massage (with extras) treatment on him. She answered the door, let him in, offered him some juice and quickly took care of some last minute morning details.

Robin persuaded Ray to let her drive. The ride to Bouquet Airport in Greensburg went quickly being that it was Sunday morning and the traffic was light. They stopped on the way at a gas station / convenience store, filled up the Porsche and picked up two large cups of coffee.

When they got to the airport, the jump instructor a tall, thin man with a military-like presence about him welcomed them. There were a few others standing outside the small trailer that would serve as their classroom for the morning. They were just standing around and not saying much. It was obvious that everyone was nervous being that this would be his or her first jump.

The class got started at 9:00 sharp. After having everyone, all six of them, file into the trailer, sign the release form (something to the effect of: ‘if you’re stupid enough to jump out a perfectly good airplane, then we aren’t going to be held responsible if things should go bad’), and pay their $130.00 first time jump fee, class got started.

“Hello everyone and welcome to the Bouquet Jump School. I’m Jack Hawkins. For obvious reasons, everyone calls me Hawk. I’ll be your jumpmaster for the day.” The instructor spoke in a clear and pleasant yet authoritative tone as he went over his credentials before continuing on with what it feels like to skydive. “When you’re up there you’ll know exactly why the birds sing.” He told a few stories about jumps that he’s been on -- what it’s like to be 10,000 feet up in the air and free fall three fourths of the way down.

He moved on to what they were to expect out of the day. “With this being your first jump we’ll have you attached to a thirty foot static line. Jason, who you’ll meet later, will be up in the plane with you as your coach. You’ll listen to everything he says and he’ll guide you out of the airplane.

”When he opens the door, the wind is going to kick up inside the cabin. It gets noisy up there and he’s going to have to shout. He’ll wait until the pilot guides the plane in position over the jump zone then he’ll instruct you to get in place with the command ‘put your feet out’. When you hear that, you’ll maneuver yourself so that you’ve got your hands on either sides of the door, and I guarantee that you’ll be gripping the sides of that door with all you’ve got. Your feet will be hanging out the door on this two-inch wide step.

”His next command will be ‘get out and hang’. There’s a brace that runs from the body of the plane to the underside of the wing. We’ve put two strips of red tape on that brace. You’re going to step out on the step while the plane is going seventy miles an hour and reach out and grab hold of that brace between the two strips of red tape and step off of the step.

”Yes, you’ll be hanging 3,000 feet above ground going seventy miles an hour. When Jason gives you the thumbs up, you’re going to smile – because Jason gets upset if you don’t smile – and you’ll let go of the brace.

”You’ll more than likely experience a barber pole, and we’ll get into that in the second portion of this briefing, the section on emergency procedures. You’ll kick your feet to get out of the barber pole. Then you’ll reach up and grab your risers, pulling them down, then guiding them back up to inflate your chute. I will give the rest of your commands. You’ll hear them on the one-way radio that’ll be fastened to the straps of your chute.”

Hawk continued to describe how they’ll be instructed to guide themselves to the ground and what to expect when they land.

He concluded the first portion of his class by going over the parts and functions of the parachute before releasing the class on a ten-minute break.

Ray and Robin took their break outside.

“This looks pretty cool,” Robin spoke first. “I hope I get to be the last to jump, I want to watch everyone else, especially you, shit yourself as you ‘get out and hang’”.

“You just don’t want anyone to see you ‘shit yourself as YOU get out and hang’,” Ray replied in a taunting tone.

“Yeah, I’ll admit it, maybe you’re right. But I AM going to do this!”

The second portion of the class, emergency procedures, wasn’t nearly as comforting as the first part was. Hawkins pretty much went over anything and everything that could go wrong and what they should do if any one of those things would happen. He went over the different scenarios and how they should react if the chute should fail to open. He detailed how to cut away the first chute and rely on the reserve if the first one happens to get too tangled. He also described how to use the air pressure to slow themselves down if the chute didn’t inflate properly. Hawk even went as far as to try to assure them that even if they were to get knocked unconscious, the computerized mechanism built into their gear would automatically discharge their chutes at 12,000 feet and float them down to safety.

Ray noticed that the palms of his hands were starting to sweat. He glanced over at Robin and could tell from the expression on her face that she was starting to have second thoughts too.

“But all of these things rarely happen with our modernized equipment. We’ve had over five thousand jumpers go through this class and we’ve never had a fatality. But the one thing that almost always happens is a barber pole. They’re more of a nuisance than anything else. It’s just the nature of the static line you’re attached to. They have a tendency to encourage barber poles by their very nature.

”A barber pole is when the lines leading up to your chute twist up and resemble, well, you guessed it, a barber’s pole. When you jump, the static line releases your main and it cause the chute to discharge in a spiraling motion. Before your pull you risers, you’re going to have to untwist yourself. This is done by reaching up and pulling the lines apart as you kick your legs in the opposite direction. This kicking will cause you to spin thus untwisting your lines. It’s really nothing and we’ll practice it down in the hanger.”

Hawkins finished his emergency procedures lecture and directed them over the hill to the hanger for some simulation practice.

As Robin and Ray walked together towards the hanger he turned to her and asked, ”How you feeling about all of this now?”

“I’d be lying if I didn’t say that that last little talk of his didn’t exactly make me feel 100% confident. But hey, their safety record speaks for itself.”

“Yeah and that’s what scares me the most. With my background in statistics I just kept thinking to myself ‘God they’re more than overdue’.”

Down at the hanger they each got an opportunity to climb five steps of a ladder and get strapped into a harness that simulated the parachute that they all would soon suite up in. The instructor would tell them to step off while he removed the ladder. As they hung there, Hawk would spin them to simulate a barber pole and they each practiced kicking themselves out of it.

While they were still suspended Hawk would go over one of the emergency scenarios and each student would practice cutting the bad chute away and releasing the reserve. This hands-on practice instilled a little more confidence in each of them. After the simulation exercise was over it was now time to take a ride to the airfield.

Ray and Robin paired up with one other guy from the group, a young man in his early twenties with a pierced lip and nose ring. They managed to get on the first flight. After getting suited into their gear -- a parachute, a radio, goggles, a helmet and an altimeter (a device used to measure the distance you’re at from the ground) – they boarded the plane in reverse order of who would jump.

Ray, honoring Robin’s request to jump last, said, “Ladies first please.” The other guy with the piercing asked if he could go second. “I’d really like to watch you do it first dude.”

Ray didn’t mind this arrangement at all because he wanted to be on the ground and unsuited in time to watch Robin jump. He, being the last jumper to board the plane, took his seat with his back against the cockpit.

Jason, the other jumpmaster, boarded the plane last and got into position to coach Ray. “Here’s you static line buddy,” Jason said as he handed Ray the wound up cord, “You’re going to want to hold this close to your body so that no one can accidentally trip over it.”

Ray took the cord and clenched it next to his side. Moments later they were in the air.

As they ascended, Jason carried on some small talk with Ray trying to get him to relax. “Everyone’s first jump is the one they’ll talk about for the rest of their lives. You know it brings on a whole new meaning to the old Van Halen song, ‘Might as well jump, Go ahead and jump.’“

This brought a smile to Ray’s face.

“We’ve reach 3,000 feet now. Here, give me your static line. I need to get it attached.” Jason fastened the one end to a hook on the floor and clipped the other end onto Rays chute.

Not long afterwards the jumpmaster slid the side door open allowing a rush of wind and engine noise to enter the cabin area. “ALL RIGHT BUDDY,” he said in a loud commanding voice, “PUT YOUR FEET OUT.”

Ray slid himself slowly and cautiously towards the open door. Hawk’s prediction was right on the money when he said that they would be gripping the sides of the door with all they had. Ray’s grip was so tight his knuckles were turning white. His stomach was full of butterflies as he looked down to find the two-inch wide step he would tread off of. The butterflies didn’t go away when he looked over at the wing brace with the two strips of red tape – it looked to be much further away while up in the air than it did on the ground.

“GET OUT AND HANG.”

Ray hesitated, thinking for only a moment that this had to be the most unnatural act he’d ever been told to do. He then stepped off and reached for the brace. It was cold to the touch but Ray’s hands clutched it just as firmly as he clutched the door only seconds before.

He looked over at Jason and Jason put his fingers up to the corners of his lips as if to say, ”I’m waiting for my smile.” Ray forced a smile and Jason gave him the thumbs up.

Ray released his grip and arched his body back into an ‘X’ formation as he sped towards the earth. He soon felt a quick jerk as his static line released the chute and the cords twisted into the anticipated barber pole. Pulling and kicking Ray undid the barber pole, grabbed the risers and tugged firmly down. The chute inflated as he guided the risers back to their original position at head level.

“Good job Ray!” a voice came from the one-way radio, “Now listen, I want you to give me a little right.”

Ray pulled the right riser halfway down to mid-waist level and started flying in the same direction.

“All right, you’re doing real good. Now let her up slowly and let me see a hard left.”

He slowly returned the right riser up to its head level position and pulled the left riser all the way down to his thigh. This quickly turned his direction and Ray started flying in counter clockwise circles.

“You’re doing super Ray, now let her up slowly, we’re going to straighten you out now.”

As Ray listened to the instructions over the radio, Hawk flew him around the sky for a good five minutes before guiding him down towards the landing strip.

When Ray would look straight down his butterflies would return, but looking up over the horizon was simply breath taking. ‘This is like no other experience in the world,’ he thought to himself. ‘Yeah that guy was right when he said, “When you’re up there you’ll know exactly why the birds sing.”’

Halfway through his flight he took an inventory of his gear and just briefly thought about what would happen if his harness would break. But he didn’t allow that thought to linger and spoil the otherwise fantastic experience of open-air flight.

As Ray started to approach the ground he could see the trees coming quickly up at him. He had a quick flashback to a day when he was only five years old and his dad took him to see Batman and Robin, the so popular at the time caped-crusaders, do an exhibition landing in a field not far from where they lived. He remembered that Robin landed perfectly in the bull’s-eye that was painted on the ground but the emergency crew had to untangle Batman who was stuck in the trees.

As the treetops got closer Ray began to panic and thought to himself, ‘If they don’t give me a hard left soon, I’m going to take it myself.’

“All right, looking good. Lets see a quick hard left about now.”

Relieved that he finally got the command he was waiting for, he pulled his left riser down quick and hard to make the turn.

Ray flew twenty feet over the last treetop and glided towards the runway.

When he was about fifteen feet above ground, he heard, “Break now Ray, Break now!”

Ray pulled both risers quickly down to his thighs. This action floated him gracefully down to the runway. He stumbled a little as he hit the ground at about seven miles an hour but quickly regained his composure and walked off the landing. The ground crew rushed over to retrieve the now dragging chute and wrapped it up. They did this so that it wouldn’t get ruined or get caught in a sudden gust of wind and whisk Raymond away.

He was next instructed by Hawk to unsnap himself from the harness and clear the runway.

Ray left the runway and gathered himself on the side with the rest of the folks on the ground. He still had that feeling of exhilaration that comes with your first jump. His other classmates, who were waiting for their turn to get on the plane, went up and asked him how it was.

“It was just like everything Hawk described. The noise in the cab when he opened the door was loud, hanging on the wing was insane, but after the chute opened and I got out of the barber pole, it was the most peaceful experience I’ve ever had. You feel like you’re flying just like a bird.”

By the time Ray was out of his gear and off the landing zone recounting his experience, the younger member of their three-party team was in the air. Ray barely noticed his landing. He came down hard and rolled to the ground.

The plane was circling overhead and everyone noticed that it circled once, then twice, and on it’s third trip back over the jump point, Ray overheard one of the ground crew saying to the other, “After three they bring em in. I bet she doesn’t jump.”

The plane crossed the jump point and in the sky Ray saw a chute open up. “She did it! Balls on she did it!”

She only looked like a dot in the sky at first. After she made a few turns Ray ran over to Hawk and asked, “Can I say a something to her?”

Hawkins handed him the radio.

“You look great up there Robin. But we can’t hear you down here.”

Almost immediately Ray heard a faint sound from up above.

“Yeahhhhhh!”

Ray watched as she sailed through the air passing over the trees, just as he did. When she finally touched down, she did it with the most graceful walk-off of the day.

The ground crew did their job and Ray went up to help her out of her harness. “The way the plane was circling up there, we didn’t think you were going to do it!”

“Between the wind and how heavy that chute was,” she replied, “I was having a hard time making it to the door. And when I finally got there, Jason had to give me a boost out to the wing brace.”

“So what did you think of it once you were in the air?”

“Oh, that was the most fantastic thing I’ve ever experienced! It even beats a crack high!”

They got off the runway and stuck around to see the rest of their classmates jump. Before they left, Ray bought Robin a sweat jersey with the Bouquet Jump School logo on the front and the phrase, “Experience 120 MPH at 3000 Feet” embroidered on the back.


A Good Day Gone Bad
It was 3:00 when they left Greensburg; Robin was behind the wheel again. Robin’s mother was due to pick her up that evening to take her back to Bedford so that she could help her paint over the next few days.

He walked her up to the entrance of her apartment complex gave her a kiss and said, “So I’m going to ask the same question I asked last time you went up to Bedford: will I see you again?”

“That’s entirely up to you Raymond, but I sure as hell hope so. I’ll only be gone a day or two.”

He gave her another kiss before getting back into the Porsche.

As he left she called back to him, “Hey Raymond, get out and hang!”

Ray looked around. He was tempted to whip his fly down and let IT ‘get out and hang’ but thought better of it.

While driving back to the ramshackle garage on Junilla Street, Raymond was toying with the idea of spending the rest of the day driving the Porsche around. He thought, ‘Why not? It’ll be dark soon. What else is there to do on a Sunday evening?’ But after thinking it over he resolved that it would be best not to chance his luck any further. The car was without a doubt reported stolen by this time and since Porsches do tend to stand out a little more than Caravans, driving it much more would be too risky.

He decided that he would take the Porsche back to the Shadyside area the next morning and park it somewhere close to the dealership. He would leave the keys under the floor mat and lock it up. Sooner or later it would be discovered and the dealership would undoubtedly have a spare key. He thought about taking it back that evening but he was unsure if the busses would be running on a Sunday night (how was he going to get back?) and he wanted to use the crowding of the Monday morning rush hour traffic to aid in his cover.

He parked the car and closed the garage door behind him. He made the left off Junilla and walked unhurried down Wyllie Avenue. He was feeling pretty good about himself. He had a great day with Robin and after skydiving he felt as if there wasn’t anything he couldn’t conquer. He walked with an air of confidence in his step, not noticing the two young men picking up their pace behind him.

Halfway down Wyllie Ray felt a forceful push from the side. So forceful it knocked him to his hands and knees into a small alleyway between two buildings. “What the FUCK!” Ray exclaimed as he crashed hard to the ground scraping his hands against the concrete.

He quickly rolled over and was about to get up but hesitated when he saw that between him and the tall, lanky black man in dreadlocks who knocked him down was a small ‘Saturday Night Special’. Just behind him was a smaller version of the man with the gun.

Scared and confused Ray started to say, “What do…”

“Shud dup honky muddafucka! Now get back around on your fours and don’t move. Don’t make me have to shoot you.” Ray did as he was told. After he was back on his hands and knees he felt his wallet being tugged out of his back pocket.

“Chit, lookit dis; we made pay dirt brudda. Looks like at least a bill and a half.”

“I want da coat too,” the other voice said weakly.

“My brudda here likes your jacket,” the taller man said.

“Yeah,” with a snicker, “I’m getting cold, I need da coat.”

Ray didn’t dare turn around or move.

“So you heard him, give it up, da jacket.”

Ray couldn’t believe what he was hearing. He thought to himself, ‘How could they know that all of my cash is in the lining of this coat? They couldn’t know. They just want the coat for some odd reason.’ He then spoke up, “Aw come on man, you’ve got my wallet, have some honor now. Let me keep my coat.”

He felt a swift, quick kick in the ribs. “I thought I told you muddafucka! Don’t make me have to shoot you.” Another swift kick in the ribs, which almost lifted Ray off the ground. “Give up da jacket now!”

Ray, while coughing up what he thought tasted like blood, reluctantly took his right arm out of it’s sleeve followed by his left arm and left the jacket lying on the ground next to him.

Seconds later he saw it snatched up away from him. “You’s one stupid honky muddafucka runnin around up here (one final kick in the ribs), but you knows that now don’t you? If you’s smart, you’ll count slowly to a hundred before getting yourself up.”

Ray softly started counting as he heard the footstep running away. He counted as high as thirty before he slowly got up. As he stood the pain in his ribs seemed to multiply -- he was hoping they were only bruised and not broken.

Once he was on his feet, he rubbed the spot where he got kicked, the same spot that used to occupy his envelope full of savings. The realization that he had just been robbed of all that he had started to settle in.

‘What am I going to do now?’ He thought as he hobbled down Wyllie. ‘I’m stuck here without any backup. I don’t even have an ATM card! All I have is a few rolls of quarters in the Caravan. Hell, if I’m lucky that might be enough to get me home. But with the way the van sucks up gas, it probably won’t even do that.

’I don’t even have anyone around here to call. What am I going to do, call the police? With my luck it will be the same two cops that I ran into the day before. They’ll wonder what I’m doing around here and if they find the Porsche I’ll really be screwed.

’I’m going to have to call my bank and report my card as stolen as soon as I can make it to the van – I’ll have to do the same with my credit cards.

’Shit, I wish I could call Robin but I’m sure she’s on her way to Bedford by now. But why even call her, what could she do? No, this is your problem Ray Reider, this is your problem and you’re in a deep mess now!’

Ray, still wincing in pain, made the turn onto Kirkpatrick Street, then back onto Center Avenue. He was getting uncomfortable glances from a gathering as he rounded the corner.

“Look what da feds brought in,” he heard in a low tone once he past the crowd.

He got almost halfway down Center Avenue when a large blue Buick came screeching to a halt in front of him.

“Yeah that’s him,” resonated a female voice from the car.

Out from the passenger door appeared a huge man. He was about six foot four, almost as wide as he was tall, very dark skinned, and he wasn’t smiling as he headed in Rays direction. Ray wished he could run, but with his ribs in their present condition, he was having a tough enough time even walking.

“You drive a minivan, dog?”

Ray didn’t say a word. He just kept walking, praying for a miracle.

“Hey boy I’m talking to you!”

Ray, still silent and walking, kept his head down.

“Hey boy, I said I was talking to you.” Ray heard the voice directly over his shoulder, “You drive a minivan? Cause if you do, my girl in there says you dissed her out of some cash, and when you be dissin her you be dissin me!”

“Yeah, that’s the dude.”

Ray sensing that he could no longer ignore the situation turned around and said, “Hey look Mister, I don’t know who you are or what you want but I just got robbed five minutes ago. Feel free to frisk me down and check my pockets. I’m flat busted broke. I used to have $150.00 in my wallet that I’d gladly give to you, but I don’t even have a wallet anymore.”

Ray looked over at the blue Buick and his stomach sank even further when he caught a glimpse of the woman jeering out the window.

“Teach him something for me baby.“

She was wearing a florescent orange wig.

“It doesn’t look like this is your day now does it?” he said as Ray felt a backhand whap across the side of his face with enough force to make him stumble sideways, almost returning him to the concrete.

“Yeah, we’ve got us a situation here and I’m going to be forced to take some action if you don’t shit something for me here real quick.”

“You want my watch?” Ray asked.

WHAP!

Ray felt another backhand across his face, which landed him this time on the sidewalk.

“What da fuck am I goin to do with a fuckin watch!”

Slowly getting back up with his ribs still throbbing, Ray could feel the swelling start on the right side of his face.

“You could pawn it off somewhere; it’s a fuckin Rolex for Christ sake. Hey listen, you can beat me senseless here but you’re not going to get any further ahead. I told you, I’ve already been robbed and I’ve got nothing but my hide and a watch. Which one do you think you can you get more for?”

“Let me see da watch.”

Ray handed it over.

“It’s a genuine Rolex, no imitation, I’m sure you could get at least a hundred for it.”

The huge man took a quick look at the watch and shoved it in his pocket.

“Get da fuck out a here,” he said as he turned and got back in the Buick.

Ray, feeling more battered than he ever had before, continued dejectedly down the sidewalk to the Terrace Hall.

Once in his room he went into the bathroom and inspected his wounds. The right side of his face, just below his eye, was taking on a deep purplish hue.

‘So this is what a boxer must feel like after a title fight,’ he thought.

He slowly took his shirt off, wincing once again as he tried to get his arm out of the sleeve, and inspected his ribs. Pushing on his side, he felt a sharp pain but didn’t feel anything that would make him believe they were cracked.

He took a shower and let the warm water sooth his body. He stayed in the shower for about twenty minutes until the hot water began to turn cool. He got out, dried off, put on some sweat pants, foregoing the idea of a shirt and got some ice out of the freezer. He wrapped the ice around a hand towel and put it to his face.

‘This has got to be the most fucked up day of my life.’ he thought feeling sorry for himself. ‘What started out great has turned into huge fucking mess!’

He went back to the kitchen and took out one of the four Rolling Rock beers that he had left; he then turned on the TV.

The Denver Broncos were running the two-minute drill against the Rams. Ray eased himself onto the bed. He watched TV – first the end of the football game, then sixty-minutes followed by the Simpsons and King of the Hill.

He nursed the remaining four beers as he nursed his wounds, alternating the ice pack between his face and his ribs.

Ray was starting to doze off during the television world premiere of the movie Family Man. The movie centers on Jack Campbell, played by Nicolas Cage, the president of a powerful New York mergers-and-acquisitions firm. He has a penthouse apartment in the middle of Manhattan, drives a Ferrari, dates women that seem to have come right off the catwalk, and everyone around him asks 'How high?' when he tells them to jump. Even though it's Christmas Eve, and his staff has plans to spend time with their families, Jack (Nicolas Cage) is all business, ready to work through Christmas to close a multi-billion dollar merger deal.

But as the movie goes on, Jack has a run-in with a mysterious man after playing Good Samaritan to defuse what seems to be a convenience store robbery. When asked by the stranger if there is anything missing in his life, Jack claims that he is content with the way things are, and that he regrets nothing. Of course, mystery man doesn't believe him, and offers Jack a cryptic warning before disappearing into the night. Jack shrugs off the strange encounter and returns to his luxurious apartment, where he goes to bed alone.

The movie continued but Raymond fell asleep leaving the TV on. He starts to dream.

He’s dreaming of flying above Pittsburgh and swooping down on unsuspecting convenience stores robbing them with a Saturday Night Special and leaving his watch with each of the convenience store clerks. The clerks are all very big black men. He flies the money he steals from the stores back to his home in Stoudtsville and gives it to his wife. But sometimes his wife is Helena, sometimes it’s Robin and sometimes it’s the orange wigged hooker who kicks him in the ribs screaming, “you dissin me boy?” because it’s never enough for her.

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