Quenchable Revenge
As told by Police Officer Janis Johnson, NYPD Retired.
His twenty years as a cop was over.
Never did he commit perjury, take or solicit a bribe. He did not use excessive force to make an arrest or perform any other dishonest behavior. No shades of grey, that is the truth. Anyone who knew him (cops and perps) could attest to this fact.
His integrity was never compromised.
This duality cop thing was never a problem for him. He had plenty of “iffy” opportunities, but he did not succumb to temptation. He was no goody two shoes God fearing Christian, he was just himself.
He really took this cop shit seriously.
There was ONLY one exception: People who abuse children and perps involved in sexual abuse. Street Justice was always out of the question, but these situations tested his convictions.
All cops despise those people, as did he.
Street Justice, in case you don’t know: tune the mother fucker up. A swift kick in the ass. A hard whack with a night stick, or just a knee to the balls. Anything that insures some asshole whose probably going to get away with a heinous crime gets some punishment. And the victim gets some justice, albeit small.
After seeing a despicable act, he would get quiet. His face had an erie look like he was teetering to the edge. But it would always dissipate. His moral challenge was met and overcome. Control. But there was probably an underlying dissatisfaction that never would disappear.
Where he got the ability to control himself, I’ll never know. To be sure, he had never, ever, under any condition, administered street justice. But those were the categories of policing that had tried and tempted his integrity.
But again, he never broke.
That kind of control probably comes with an emotional cost. Who knows?
We are both retired now and we keep in touch. One day he opens up to me about what it means to be retired and how he has experienced what he calls “Quenchable Revenge, Finally!”
This is his story:
He landed some innocuous job just to keep himself busy. Of course, sooner or later everyone found out he was once a cop. One day he was approached by a coworker. She was a beautiful American born Ghanian with dark soft swarthy skin and long black hair. She had a sultry voice, an infectious laugh and smiled with her eyes. They began a conversation that turned into a friendship over a short period of time.
She had two young daughters and they all lived with her boyfriend who was a musician supposedly working out of town. He suspected this guy was probably upstate doing time. It turns out he was right. She was embarrassed about it, so he let on like he didn’t know.
No, he was not popping her. They were just friends. Anyway she smoked, and he does not do broads that smoke.
Months passed and one day over lunch, she confides a story.
First, she cops that her old man is in the can for drug conspiracy. But that’s not her real problem. It seems that when she was a young girl, some older guy she knew in her neighborhood dragged her into an abandoned building and viscously raped her. Out of embarrassment and fearing the wrath of her foreign born immigrant family, she never told anyone or reported it to the cops.
Fast forward to last week. That creep is now back in the neighborhood. She found out he actually did time in jail for something else after he left the ‘hood years ago.
This skell had now opened up some storefront bullshit church. He is preaching on the street corner and wants to start a youth group. Becoming very visible in the neighborhood, yes he was.
She now is in fear of walking the streets. She is pissed that this perp has gotten away with what he did to her years ago. She’s afraid he will recognize her and stalk her. She remembers his evil smile and smirk after the dirty deed. She is losing sleep.
Not a good situation, no it wasn’t.
Now you probably think he tells her he’ll take care of it and be some sort of hero. Lean on this creep and kick the skells ass.
Wrong.
He quietly listens and offers his emotional support. He tells her she should go to the cops and see what they say. Knowing nothing will come of that.
She says she can muster the strength carry on. He tells her she can do it. He suggests she seek professional counseling.
You know, the usual bull shit.
But then he quietly goes into action. He checks out her story by investigating the asshole. This creep has been locked up for assorted major crimes out of state over the past twenty years.
He decides the asshole is now going to get what he deserves. Revenge now, street justice, quenchable. It’s no longer a job. It is now just his turn to do something that means something. He is no longer a cog in the system. He is free from the system.
Fuck the system.
Now the planning begins. That poor chump. Twenty years of frustration will fall on this one asshole.
As they say on the street, “It bes like that sometimes.”
Within the month the asshole disappears from the neighborhood: His locked storefront church remains, his apartment remains, his personal belongings remain and his car remains. The asshole is gone without a trace, yes he is.
At lunch one afternoon, she tells him that the asshole disappeared last week. No one knows what happened to him. As usual, no one is talking to the cops.
Their eyes meet as he proffers a small sly smile. She returns the smile. He notices the smile has now returned to her eyes with a sigh of relief.
The weight has been removed from her shoulders.
“Ain’t that some shit?” Is his nonchalant response.
“How about some of this fresh squeezed lemonade?” he says as he raises a glass as a toast. “It’s quite refreshing, yes it is.”
“One might say it’s quenchable.” He says after a sip.
Somehow she knows she now has no worries, thanks to him.
The asshole will be a long time dead, yes he will.
Published 11/18/15 The Thought Catalogue
Copyright 2015
As told by Police Officer Janis Johnson, NYPD Retired.
His twenty years as a cop was over.
Never did he commit perjury, take or solicit a bribe. He did not use excessive force to make an arrest or perform any other dishonest behavior. No shades of grey, that is the truth. Anyone who knew him (cops and perps) could attest to this fact.
His integrity was never compromised.
This duality cop thing was never a problem for him. He had plenty of “iffy” opportunities, but he did not succumb to temptation. He was no goody two shoes God fearing Christian, he was just himself.
He really took this cop shit seriously.
There was ONLY one exception: People who abuse children and perps involved in sexual abuse. Street Justice was always out of the question, but these situations tested his convictions.
All cops despise those people, as did he.
Street Justice, in case you don’t know: tune the mother fucker up. A swift kick in the ass. A hard whack with a night stick, or just a knee to the balls. Anything that insures some asshole whose probably going to get away with a heinous crime gets some punishment. And the victim gets some justice, albeit small.
After seeing a despicable act, he would get quiet. His face had an erie look like he was teetering to the edge. But it would always dissipate. His moral challenge was met and overcome. Control. But there was probably an underlying dissatisfaction that never would disappear.
Where he got the ability to control himself, I’ll never know. To be sure, he had never, ever, under any condition, administered street justice. But those were the categories of policing that had tried and tempted his integrity.
But again, he never broke.
That kind of control probably comes with an emotional cost. Who knows?
We are both retired now and we keep in touch. One day he opens up to me about what it means to be retired and how he has experienced what he calls “Quenchable Revenge, Finally!”
This is his story:
He landed some innocuous job just to keep himself busy. Of course, sooner or later everyone found out he was once a cop. One day he was approached by a coworker. She was a beautiful American born Ghanian with dark soft swarthy skin and long black hair. She had a sultry voice, an infectious laugh and smiled with her eyes. They began a conversation that turned into a friendship over a short period of time.
She had two young daughters and they all lived with her boyfriend who was a musician supposedly working out of town. He suspected this guy was probably upstate doing time. It turns out he was right. She was embarrassed about it, so he let on like he didn’t know.
No, he was not popping her. They were just friends. Anyway she smoked, and he does not do broads that smoke.
Months passed and one day over lunch, she confides a story.
First, she cops that her old man is in the can for drug conspiracy. But that’s not her real problem. It seems that when she was a young girl, some older guy she knew in her neighborhood dragged her into an abandoned building and viscously raped her. Out of embarrassment and fearing the wrath of her foreign born immigrant family, she never told anyone or reported it to the cops.
Fast forward to last week. That creep is now back in the neighborhood. She found out he actually did time in jail for something else after he left the ‘hood years ago.
This skell had now opened up some storefront bullshit church. He is preaching on the street corner and wants to start a youth group. Becoming very visible in the neighborhood, yes he was.
She now is in fear of walking the streets. She is pissed that this perp has gotten away with what he did to her years ago. She’s afraid he will recognize her and stalk her. She remembers his evil smile and smirk after the dirty deed. She is losing sleep.
Not a good situation, no it wasn’t.
Now you probably think he tells her he’ll take care of it and be some sort of hero. Lean on this creep and kick the skells ass.
Wrong.
He quietly listens and offers his emotional support. He tells her she should go to the cops and see what they say. Knowing nothing will come of that.
She says she can muster the strength carry on. He tells her she can do it. He suggests she seek professional counseling.
You know, the usual bull shit.
But then he quietly goes into action. He checks out her story by investigating the asshole. This creep has been locked up for assorted major crimes out of state over the past twenty years.
He decides the asshole is now going to get what he deserves. Revenge now, street justice, quenchable. It’s no longer a job. It is now just his turn to do something that means something. He is no longer a cog in the system. He is free from the system.
Fuck the system.
Now the planning begins. That poor chump. Twenty years of frustration will fall on this one asshole.
As they say on the street, “It bes like that sometimes.”
Within the month the asshole disappears from the neighborhood: His locked storefront church remains, his apartment remains, his personal belongings remain and his car remains. The asshole is gone without a trace, yes he is.
At lunch one afternoon, she tells him that the asshole disappeared last week. No one knows what happened to him. As usual, no one is talking to the cops.
Their eyes meet as he proffers a small sly smile. She returns the smile. He notices the smile has now returned to her eyes with a sigh of relief.
The weight has been removed from her shoulders.
“Ain’t that some shit?” Is his nonchalant response.
“How about some of this fresh squeezed lemonade?” he says as he raises a glass as a toast. “It’s quite refreshing, yes it is.”
“One might say it’s quenchable.” He says after a sip.
Somehow she knows she now has no worries, thanks to him.
The asshole will be a long time dead, yes he will.
Published 11/18/15 The Thought Catalogue
Copyright 2015