Circumstances

By Terrence Arlyn

Jackson Brooks realizes at a young age that he was alone in a cold, harsh world. After he loses both parents and spends time in prison, he immerses himself in hard work, putting himself ahead of everyone else. By the time he is thirty-one, Jackson has cars, money, and a prestigious job with one of the largest art dealers on the East Coast. As Jackson focuses on attaining wealth, power, and respect, fate places the wrong circumstances at the right time in his life, changing everything in an instant.

When Jacksons careless actions and love for women leads him to contract AIDS, he becomes suicidal and blinded with rage. After he is overcome with the desire to hurt someoneanyone, without a care in the world he inserts a clip into his gun and before he even leaves his apartment building, initiates a ruthless killing spree that will take him across the city in search of the one who gave him a death sentence. Unfortunately for everyone in Philadelphia, the more Jackson kills, the more he likes it.

Circumstances is the gripping tale of one mans quest for success and then for vengeance after he is diagnosed with AIDS.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Jan 15, 2016
• ISBN: 9781491785553

Book preview

CIRCUMSTANCES

TERRENCE ARLYN

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CIRCUMSTANCES

Copyright © 2016 Terrence Arlyn.

Editor: Shelli Marie/Teruka B

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, names, incidents, organizations, and dialogue in this novel are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

iUniverse

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Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

ISBN: 978-1-4917-8554-6 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4917-8555-3 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2016900421

iUniverse rev. date: 04/25/2016

Contents

Acknowledgements

Part 1

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

DEDICATION

For Keishon & Zyion

My legacies; our future

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I am forever indebted to the following people for their love, help and support!

First and foremost to God for giving me the will and the gift to be inspired to chase my dreams.

To my mother, for the path you chose that helped round out my life, no path is easy but some are necessary and I love you for that. To my friend Derrick Webster, for believing in me and my talent, I will never forget what you said to me and I thank you! To Kenesia, for being my spine, never letting me down and always keeping me on my toes. You showed me the true meaning of the word friend and I love you for that.

PART 1

Chapter 1

T hey say everything happens for a reason. ‘Bullshit,’ some ask the question Why me? I simply look at life like a challenge and may the best man win.

By the time I was thirty-one, I had already won. I had cars, money, and anything else my heart desired, and I worked hard for all of it.

The only problem with that was that money could not change who you really are or what is inside of you. Given the wrong circumstances at the right time, watch how a life can change!

‘It changed mine!’

I was born and raised in Camden New Jersey, but after high school I moved across the bridge to Philadelphia Pennsylvania for college. I went to Temple University and double majored in Fine Arts and Economics. I even took a few courses in business & international trades to help better prepare me for the art broker business.

I knew if I stayed out of trouble and worked hard in school, I would have a shot in this industry.

I lived alone on campus. I never had a roommate and never wanted one. I was cool living alone, plus I didn’t have to worry about anyone else’s dirt or drama.

The last couple of years, there were these two guys, Jeff and Julian that, for some reason seemed to have some type of vendetta towards me.

I could never wrap my mind around why they had issues with me, but I really did not care.

Jeff was a white guy, the skateboarder type. He had blonde shoulder length hair that he wore pulled back in a ponytail and had a bad case of acne. He was the type that would have a V-neck white t-shirt on and a flannel shirt tied around his waist with blue jeans and old combat boots. His friend Julian was a lame ass black dude trying to hang with the ‘in’ crowd.

The night of my graduation, a few of my friends and I met up at a party. It was a mixed crowd and around 60 of my classmates attended. I didn’t think much of them that night, we were having a ball.

We met a few young ladies who invited us to go back to their room. We left the party early and walked together towards the parking lot. We stood outside of one of the girl’s car talking and laughing. We were about to get in the car when I felt someone coming up behind me.

I could see a shadow out the corner of my eye. I turned around quickly only to see Jeff and Julian. Jeff rolled up on his skateboard with a snarky look on his face. Julian was not too far behind.

Where you bitches going? Jeff asked.

I didn’t answer him at first but I knew he was talking to me because he was looking me dead in the face.

He walked up aggressively with a smirk on his face, for some apparent reason he must have thought I feared him or something, he was about to find out the hard way. Julian came across like his side kick, laughing at everything Jeff would say.

‘These assholes are both fucking clowns,’ I thought.

He continued to talk shit about where we were going with these bitches, as he called them. He was way out of line, and I knew he was drunk but if he kept disrespecting these girls it was not going to end well for either of them.

I contemplated different scenarios of how this would play out and none of them looked good. Damn… why tonight of all nights, then again with this jealous prick it could have been any night. So here he is with his fucking crony still talking shit.

Where y’all gay ass dudes taking these fucking bitches? he asked again once he realized no one was paying him no mind, he began to get more irate.

Every time Jeff said something Julian would chuckle in the background.

Everyone was pissed off by the way he was talking but no one did or said anything. He kept trying to provoke me, and by this point I was getting quite agitated with him. He bumped pass me, reached out and grabbed one of the girls by her hair pulling her toward him.

Enough was enough, I didn’t care anymore. I lunged towards him thinking, "I’m ready to fuck this guy up, but before I could do anything he pulled out a gun pointing it into my face.

He began laughing as if there was nothing I could do. I threw up my hands in mock surrender taking a couple steps back as he continued to walk towards me.

Look at him now he’s scared. Big tough guy huh? Jeff said turning to Julian.

Not at all, I replied shaking my head from side to side watching and waiting for the right moment.

Jeff continued to walk up to me closer and closer with his gun inches away from my face. He turned and looked at Julian smiling.

Look at this scared bitch, he taunted. Julian starts laughing at Jeff.

While Jeff’s head was turned, I stepped out from in front of the gun. I grabbed the barrel and Jeff’s wrist; twisting his wrist outward releasing the gun from his hand. I took a step back and pointed the gun in Jeff’s direction.

Now who’s laughing bitch? I barked. Jeff lunged at me taking hold of the barrel of the gun, we wrestled for the gun and then the gun went off. There was a moment of silence and then Jeff looked at me with worry in his eyes, with no warning his body dropped. He lied there on that cold pavement gasping for air. When the gun went off it hit Jeff in the stomach.

Just at that moment, a campus cop pulled up, I looked over at him knowing that I was up shits creek without a paddle.

He jumped from his car, drawing his gun at the same time.

Freeze, drop your weapon! he yelled.

Damn, I muttered to myself thinking there was no easy way of getting out of this.

I slowly put the gun down; hoping that our story would be enough to keep me out of trouble but it wasn’t.

Jeff survived so I was prosecuted and sentenced to 2 years for assault with a deadly weapon. I realized then no one had my back. It was just me.

Chapter 2

T wo years flew by in no time. I was fresh out of prison and it was just after my 24 th birthday. The only communication I received while in prison was from my aunt advising me my father had died in a home invasion over drugs.

The letter also stated I had inherited his life insurance money. It wasn’t much, a little under $20k, but it was enough to get me on my feet.

My father wasn’t shit. He struggled to take care of me so I could not imagine him with other kids. He was worthless, the one thing that he did that made sense was take out a life insurance policy.

I don’t think I ever spent more than twenty minutes with that man alone. He was