The Minnesota Candidate by Nicholas Antinozzi Read Free Book Online Page B

his cellphone from his pocket. “So,
where did you leave your car?”
    Sam made a funny face and his eyes fell to the
ground. “I ain’t got no car, Tommy,” he admitted. “I kind of made
that part up.”
    Tom nodded. He had expected as much. He liked
Sam, he had always liked Sam; everyone had always liked Sam. By all
accounts, Sam Calizzi was the kind of guy who would give you the
shirt off his own back. He was polite, funny, and had a smile that
could light up a room. The trouble with Sam was that trouble hung
over him like a shadow. He made poor decisions and he had paid for
each of those bad decisions. They had cost him nearly half of his
life. “Sam,” he said, “I want to help you, but I need to know if
you’re on the level. You’ve made some pretty crummy choices in the
past. Can we agree on that?”
    Sam removed his toothpick and he began to laugh.
“Yeah,” he said, “I think we can agree on that.”
    “Are you working?”
    Sam put the toothpick back between his teeth and
he shrugged. “Kind of,” he said.
    “Kind of? What do you mean?”
    “Well, I give blood three times a week. I’m AB
Negative. It ain’t so bad. I get cookies and juice and it pays for
my gym dues.”
    “Uh-huh,” said Tom, wondering how anyone could
survive like that. “Where do you live?”
    Sam scratched his head and studied Tom’s face.
His brown eyes grew cold. “Where the heck do you think I live? I
live under a bridge, Tommy, inside a refrigerator box. I own two
pairs of clothes and I wash them with a bar of soap, down in the
river. And you know what? I ain’t blaming anyone but myself for
where I’m at. I’ve been a fool and I like to think that I learned
my lesson. Yeah, I’ve made some crummy choices, but if you’re
thinking that you can’t trust me, you’d be dead wrong. I ain’t
never lied or stolen a dime from my family, Tommy. You can take
that to the bank.”
    “I never said that.”
    “You didn’t need to. I could see it in your
face.”
    Tom smiled sadly and nodded his head. “Can you
blame me for wanting to be careful?”
    Sam stepped outside of the garage and let his
eyes wander around the property. “Not one bit,” he said, shaking
his head.
    “I’ll do what I can to help you get on your
feet. How come you’re not working?”
    “Are you kidding me? These people take one look
at my background and my application is in the trash can. I want to
work, I really do. I just can’t catch a break.”
    “I’ll see what I can do about that. Do you have
any skills?”
    “You’re darn right. I can build anything out of
wood. I can build cabinets, houses, shoe boxes, you name it. Why,
they even let me teach some classes while I was locked up. That’s
how good I am. I want to work with wood, Tommy. That’s my
dream.”
    Tom could see that Sam was getting misty-eyed
and he walked over to inspect his mother’s new dining room table.
He thought about what Sam had said and he felt his own eyes growing
wet. He wasn’t asking for much, only a chance. Tom knew he would
have to repeat their conversation to Shari, but he was almost
certain that she would share his thoughts on the situation.
“Tomorrow,” said Tom, “we’ll drive out and pick up your things.
Then I’ll take you out and we’ll get you some tools and a good pair
of boots. All I want in return is your word. Once we find you a
job, you have to do the rest.”
    Sam nodded his head and covered his face. He
then began to sob. The biggest and arguably, the toughest, member
of the entire family stood in the garage and cried his eyes out. “I
been praying for this,” he finally managed. “I know it was God that
brought me here.”
    “I been praying for this,” mimicked one of the
movers, a huge, college-aged red-headed man in blue coveralls. He
and another man were just setting down a flowered sofa, a hideous
thing in Tom’s opinion.
    Sam wiped his eyes and marched over to where the
big man stood. “What did you say?” he