Withdrawal

The lives of the infamous Wrecking Crew

Moderators: Ticallion Carter, Myria Graziano, Ria Graziano, Maria Graziano

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Capistrano
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Wolf Like Me

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Location: 409 Cardew Road, a Brownstone in New Haven

Withdrawal

Post by Capistrano »

February 19, 2015

Through the windows and walls of Jay’s apartment, he could hear the wind whipping through tree branches, beating itself to death on the glass. Mixed in with the howling weather were the isolated shouts of his fellow students -- drunk, most likely. Or maybe the basketball team had won their game tonight? It was hard to tell. The wind swallowed the words, swallowed their meaning, until they were nothing more than the whispers of ghosts.

The air was thick with snow -- so much that there was nearly as much white in the night skies as there was black. The brave few still outside darted down sidewalks, across streets, disappearing in blinding gusts, in gaps where streetlights had burnt out, and as they turned corners and rounded buildings. They clutched their coats tightly around their bodies, scarves and balaclavas obscuring their faces. Sometimes, they had to throw themselves against lamp posts, lest they be blown over into the snow -- or off the edge of the world.

Jay looked outside, the winter weather building another white wall to match the other three in his bedroom. Clothes piled up in three of the corners, and his bed sat in the fourth. Nothing hung on the walls except for ribbons of peeling paint. T-shirts, thermal henleys, and jeans poked out of an overstuffed dresser with scuffed drawers, while a thin layer of dust sat on a desk full of folders and textbooks. A plate, a bowl, and a six pack’s worth of Badsider bottles crowded the alarm clock on his night stand. Five of them had varying amounts of beer still left in them, while the sixth was a quarter full of cigarette butts and ash.

Very few people were willing to go out in the blizzard raging throughout the city -- even those who thumbed their nose at what passed for authority here mostly paid heed to the warnings about the weather. But even if had been 80 degrees and sunny outside, Jay wouldn’t have bothered to leave.

His depression hadn’t fallen on him all at once. There wasn’t one event he could point to and say, That’s why I haven’t left my apartment in two days. That’s why I haven’t been to class in a month. Rather, it came upon him drip by drip, a slow water torture of disappointment building on disappointment. Sami dumping him and then disappearing. Finding out that the college baseball team wouldn’t take him because he was a werewolf. Struggling with migraines and vertigo. Wrestling with classes on calculus, Dwarvish, and RhyDin history. While there were ways to ease the pain, to compromise, to work through those issues, they seemed to get harder and harder to go through every day. Dating freshmen girls a decade younger than him grew less and less effective at handling his loneliness. Pitching and catching with the team couldn’t quite slake his thirst for competition. The drugs stopped working as well, and he found himself skipping more and more classes. The extra hours of studying, the Adderall, even the tutors couldn’t help him catch up.

And then there was the Wolf. He got a day a month to run wild and free through Battlefield Park, and 29 other days where He wanted more. The battle was harder than it had ever been before. Sami was no longer there to help, and he had drifted away from the Crew, from the Grazianos. His friendships with his classmates were fleeting, waxing and waning with the seasons and semesters, changing from class to class. He reached across his body towards the dresser on his nightstand, pulling it open and retrieving his cell phone, lighter, and a pack of cigarettes. He flipped the pack open and pulled one out, lips pinching around the filter. He let the pack fall on his stomach as he swapped the lighter and phone between his hands, before flicking flame to his cigarette and breathing in deep. The lighter joined his smokes as he began flipping through his phone’s contact list.

There was no one there he could call -- no one he felt comfortable calling this late, this drunk. Pangs of recognition made his stomach swim and his nerves sing, but he didn’t dare bridge the gap or hope against hope that old friends might answer. He scrolled down from A to Z and into the pound sign, and then scrolled back, taking the occasional drag off of his cigarette. As he made his way through the D’s and into the C’s, he stopped on an old, familiar “name”: Crew HQ. Ash fell on his fingers and onto his shirt as he stared at the words and numbers.

Oh, what the hell? What’s there to lose? He punched the call button and after a single ring, the Crew’s after hours voice message picked up. When the spiel finished, and after a beep sounded, Jay left his message, punctuated with pauses and slight slurring.

“Hey, it’s me. Jay. I’m, uh...I’m gonna flunk out of school and I’m probably gonna run out of money after that so...I dunno if there’s a space left for me back on the Crew, but...yeah, I’d like to come back. Uh...I guess call me in the morning?”

Jay hung up, immediately realizing it was a mistake to call while he was drunk, and shut his phone off. He brushed ash off of his fingers, then off of his shirt, and deposited what was left of his cigarette in a bottle. After that, he headed for the bedroom door. He needed more beer.
I'll play a new part; I'll make a new start
All I was we'll burn it up in effigy
It's such a long war, but what I want more is you and me
The rest can burn in effigy
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Ria Graziano
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Post by Ria Graziano »

February 20, 2015

Every member of Crew – active or no – had two levels of babysitter (or handler, if you’re being generous): a public relations executive who helped clean any myriad messes the Crew family got themselves into, and … Ria. She served as the internal connection between the corporate entity known as Wrecking Crew Enterprises and the Grazianos and their friends; her unofficial title was “Crew Wrangler” (another generously nice moniker from the charitable).

Ria’s current duties were simple, but numerous. She listened to the complaints from her family about the embarrassing public appearances the PR execs sent them on, and helped said execs find events to send them all on (both embarrassing and not). She drove the getaway car when they needed a fast escape. She played pranks on the babysitters and joked about it with their charges, getting a childish type of revenge for the aforementioned embarrassing appearances. She managed and monitored the generous trust accounts each Crew member had set in his or her name for emergencies (because at one point or another most of them had or would eventually find themselves down on their luck). Most didn’t know just how deep the accounts ran; they just knew Ria would be able to take care of them when they really needed it. As well, she quietly arranged donations and service from the Crew to various charities based on his or her time and interest; such activities weren’t for public spectacle and needed a special family touch.

Finally, though, and perhaps most significantly, Ria was the guardian of the private Crew “hotline.” It was the phone number that all Crew members received upon joining, a line just for them when they needed that help or had to impart some other information to corporate. As the intermediary between corporate and family, she soothed and cajoled both sides to coexist together and that phone number was the vehicle for communications from family to business.

That was the phone number Jay Capistrano had called and left a message at the evening before. The lack of a passcode’s input sent his message to the voicemail recorder rather than forwarded directly to Ria (because they did have to have a way to reach her urgently, of course).

The Graziano sister-in-law strolled into her office and dropped her messenger bag on the floor next to her desk, sparing a cursory glance at the phone’s console. Her brows furrowed as she recognized a blinking light that symbolized a waiting message, hazel eyes shifting from one point to another as she mentally catalogued the recent activities of the family.

“Wha tha? Who called?”

Quickly leaning across the desk, she punched the button that started the replay.

“Hey, it’s me. Jay. I’m, uh...I’m gonna flunk out of school and I’m probably gonna run out of money after that so...I dunno if there’s a space left for me back on the Crew, but...yeah, I’d like to come back. Uh...I guess call me in the morning?”

Eyes widened, rounding, and she stared at the thing that delivered this surprise. “Holy hell,” she muttered, following a few seconds later with a few more pungent words. A sudden grin split her lips, short-lived as she comprehended the meat of his words. Flunking out of school. Running out of money. Sounding a bit drunk and maybe a little desperate. Worry swiftly replaced elation, and she dropped gracelessly into her chair. She brought the receiver up to her ear while simultaneously shuffling through her contact Rolodex. A moment later, she found and entered the number to return his call. No answer came, so she left a message of her own.

“Yo, Cappy, it’s Ria! ‘Course there’s a space, man. Once Crew, ya always Crew ‘less ya tell us’ta screw off an’ be an’ asshole ‘bout it. Ya family, dude, an’ we’ll be seriously ecstatic ta see ya ‘gain. Come by when ya get this an’ pick up ya passes an’ crap; we suspended an’ changed ‘em cuz we hadda lotta attempts’a press sneakin’ in wit’ fake ones.”

She paused briefly, then lowered her voice, a slight quivering counterpoint from the beginning of the message betraying the distress at his statement of his current situation. “Don’t worry ‘bout the money, man. We’ll talk ‘bout it. Y’all’re good. Call me, a’ight?”

She replaced the receiver on its console base and sighed, leaning back a moment. “Damnit,” she swore. A moment later, she picked up her cell phone and pressed several buttons, first calling up a contact and then shooting a quick text.

Text to My (9:18 am): Yo. Sorry I haven’t been around for ya as much as I should, grats on the Barony thing. Love ya.

Jay’s call forcibly reminded her that she hadn’t been doing the best job at keeping in the family’s life, in doing what really was at the heart of her “job” …. and what it meant to be part of a family.

Shaking her head, she sent another message from her phone – Myria had signed up for Madness … someone else from Crew had to be there with her. Even if just in spirit.
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Capistrano
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Wolf Like Me

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Joined: Tue Feb 12, 2008 8:31 pm
Location: 409 Cardew Road, a Brownstone in New Haven

Post by Capistrano »

March 29, 2015
RhyDin Arts and Sciences College


Jay waited until the weekend to make his first appearance on campus in two months. The RhyDin Arts and Sciences College had been shoehorned between a sleepy residential neighborhood and a gentrifying commercial district that still had a ways to go. The brick walls and stone arched entrance to the school were directly across the street from an iron-barred pawn shop and boarded-up, abandoned liquor store. On campus, the lawns were lush and green, and freshly turned dirt waited for flowers to bloom in the coming months. Most of the buildings, save for the tallest and most centrally located one at the college, had been built within the past decade in a similar style. All had bright red brick, tall windows, and plenty of open green space between them. Deeper into campus, away from the commercial zone and closer to the homes that surrounded it on the other three sides, practicality won out over design. The dorms were converted apartments, and many department offices were located in old houses indistinguishable from nearby residences. One of those offices was the registrar’s.

In a past life, the white three-story house must have served as a residence for one of RhyDin’s richer families. Times had changed, fortunes had been lost, and the building now resided in the hand’s of R.A.S.C.’s administration. There was little to indicate the home’s change of purpose -- the front lawn was still immaculate and green, the bushes around the property line were neatly trimmed, and the porch still had its old swing hanging and ready for use. The only immediate sign things had changed was a plaque hung near the door: “RhyDin Arts and Sciences College Office of the Registrar.” On the front door, a sign stuck to one of the glass panes indicating business hours. A little bit further down, the old mail slot waited for tuition checks to be deposited.

Jay pulled the envelope out of his pocket. It was plain and white, save for his name written in giant block letters on the back. He lifted it to his nostrils and breathed in deeply. The smell of paper and glue overwhelmed everything -- the fresh cut grass, the new coat of paint on the porch, the lingering traces of hundreds of students who had walked the quad in the past two days. Everything else faded into the background. He counted to five in his head, and exhaled, before dropping the letter in the slot. Slowly, the campus smells came rushing back. He turned around, jogged off of the porch, and broke into a run once he was on the sidewalk. He wanted to get away before he caught a whiff of anyone familiar.

***

Dear RhyDin Arts and Sciences College Administration,

I am writing to inform you that as of April 1, 2015 R.S.C., I am withdrawing from attendance.

I have informed my professors of my decision, and I am in the process of submitting formal withdrawal forms to finalize the process.

Should you require an address on file, I will be moving to 55 Greystone Court, #200, New Haven, RhyDin City on April 1.

Thank you for your support and education during the past four semesters.

Sincerely,

Jay Capistrano


((Adapted from template on http://howtowritealetter.net/letter-of-withdrawal.html))
I'll play a new part; I'll make a new start
All I was we'll burn it up in effigy
It's such a long war, but what I want more is you and me
The rest can burn in effigy
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