Bankrupt Heart

Jake entered his plush, masculine office in a frozen trance. He turned dazedly and automatically hung his suit coat on the rack by the door as he had so many times during the past five years.

But this night was different. For the first time Jake was distraught and wondering what had brought him to this frightful place on this dreadful night.

He crossed the eerie silent room lit only by the ferocious lightning and the frantic swirling of the flashing lights that exploded into the night in rude intrusion. The vicious storm outside was nothing compared to the raging storm he felt in his heart.

Standing with his muscular Navajo arms crossed in front of his chest, he leaned against the large plate glass window, watching the paramedics and police officers scurrying around, the torrential downpour adding to the misery of the scene. The dreadful view he wished to delete from his sight burst before him and he was powerless to turn away.

Jake was totally oblivious to the full plush carpet, the polished oak desk and the exquisite gold embossed oak nameplate resting on his desk. These things had been his all engulfing pride—before tonight.

Pressing against the window frame and allowing his forehead to rest on the humid window, he scanned the scene in fascinated horror as paramedics placed the blanket-covered body of the dead man into the waiting ambulance. With labored breathing and heart thumping against his ribs he observed the police officer place his hand protectively on the head of the woman and lower her rain drenched, handcuffed form into the police cruiser.

Dozens of shocked onlookers, thrill seekers and those who were just plain curious surveyed the scene.

Jake reached out a long leg and, without looking, hooked the leg of a stool, pulled it to the window and sat in total lethargy as he realized his long black braid had left its position down his back and had plopped onto his chest. He began to absentmindedly run his fingers over the end of the braid and dropped his eyes to the feather at the end. The sight caused his heart to be jarred and he began to remember a better, safer time.

His eyebrows furrowed as he thought back. It was only yesterday that I was about to finish college. I was doing my best to rise above the poverty and depressed economy in which my parents found themselves. Distractedly watching the spectacle unfold before him, his mind drifted into a dreamlike state—and he began to reminisce.