The Second Doublewide on the Right (part eight)

I’m Fixin’ To present part eight of The Second Doublewide on the Right:

Jimmy Ray Hurd had been on the wrong side of the law since he was 15 years old. It was 10 years ago when he had been in the ninth grade, about a year after his daddy had gone to prison for running a chop-shop, when he had been busted for shoplifting.

The Law put him on probation and his momma had to pay a lot of fines, but he had stolen a tremendous amount of goods and materials at various establishments before he got caught.

He gave up enough of his stash to pacify the law, but with what he had held out he was able to peddle stolen loot all summer before it was all gone. The money he had made had helped him momma with paying the fines and also provided pocket money for him and his little sister.

Jimmy Ray knew his daddy wasn’t coming back because his last conviction was his third one, and that meant he was going away for good. His momma had a good enough job to support them and the three of them managed to get by living in a small, rundown rented frame house out in the county.

After he had served out his year of probation and turned 16 years old, Jimmy Ray had said to heck with school, dropped out and got himself a part-time job at Scooter’s Tire and Lube Shop. It was a dirty work, but he learned how to service, repair and maintain truck and car engines. Plus it made his momma happy after he began to bring home a few honest dollars to help pay the rent, and it made him feel good when he slipped his little sister a few extra bucks.

Scooter’s was a fairly big operation with five work bays, and did a brisk business. After Jimmy Ray had been there for six months and was working full time he had saved up enough to buy a beat up 1971 Ford Pickup. It was in rough shape, but afterwards he didn’t have to walk or bum rides back and forth to work. He scavenged used tires and used parts until he had his truck running as smooth as a sewing machine, and with some tread on the tires.

After almost a year at Scooter’s, Jimmy Ray was finally over the shock and pain of his arrest and probation, consequently he began to casually leave items outside the shop during the day and sneak back at night to retrieve them. He was very patient and would lie in the darkness for hours sometimes before he would make his move, because he didn’t ever intend to get caught again. Then in the darkness of late night he would take the stolen items across the street and through a strip of woods to a small dirt road where he had left his truck.

At first it was just a tire or a tool, but as time went on Jimmy Ray became bolder and began to steal valuable sets of tools and electronic devices of great value. He always made his heists very late on Saturday nights so that nothing would be missed until the following Monday morning. By then he had already disposed of the stolen goods to some people he knew who had taken up where his daddy had left off.

In the disorganized bedlam of brisk business at Scooter’s, at first folks thought things were just being misplaced and would turn up, but soon it became obvious that things were actually disappearing.

Scooter was a real person, and as soon as he realized he was being robbed blind, he ran a criminal background check on all his employees. It turned up nothing. Of course Jimmy Ray’s record was protected since he had been a juvenile when he had been arrested.

The attitude around the shop became tense after motion cameras were installed, and Jimmy Ray knew it was time to move on. So after two weeks of making no attempts to steal anything, he left one Friday with his paycheck and never went back.

He also never went back to work at a real job, but rather became a master thief, and like his neighbor, Quantavious, he kept his work away from his home in the Shady Grove Trailer Park.

Jimmy Ray had been putting the final touches to a valve job on his prize truck when his neighbor had driven by in his purple ride about noon. He knew Quantavious had something to do with dope dealing, but he hadn’t been able to figure out how he was doing it. Back in high school, before he had quit, he remembered how everybody knew he was dealing. Son-of-a-gun wore hundred dollar shoes while he had to wear those old ragged ones from the Dollar Store.

He didn’t know how or when yet, but he was watching Quantavious, and he intended to rob him blind sooner or later. He thought about starting with those expensive wheel covers on his ride, and how easy they would be to sell.

But, no, that would be too dangerous because he knew that his neighbor would be watching his ride like a hawk would be fixing to watch a chicken.