Many walls and boundaries limit the open roads of life;
mine is no exception. Of course, I might be dramatic with all of the climates
in my life with a broken down father and a death-by-cancer mother. Life wasn’t
all that bad before this one.
My father Allen was a Speed-Racer for the Sunset-Gang
since he was sixteen years old and won numerous races in the 80s but became a
race fanatic when he was ten at his Uncle Jay back lot of a junk-yard, which
was by some rail-yard; where he and his friends would race in old junkies on a
two-mile of flat, but dirt road just miles outside of Oakland.
Things became serious for Dad when he married Mom in 1986
due to me coming into the world and decided to go Pro at age 25 in the year of
1990. From his first winnings, dad bought a house in Orange County and
everything that Mom or I wanted. Within
ten-years dad became a big name by winning championship titles for the tenth straight
year in the Orange County Derby. He would also race in other tournaments in
Southern California. Five years later, he began going to other places in the
East coast and also in other countries from the London Drag-Race to the
Australian Super Speedway, winning titles as he went. Life was good and it looked as if we were on
top of the world.
Unfortunately, things took a hard turn for the worst when
mom was diagnosed with Lymphoma in 2009 and lost the battle to cancer two-years
later in January. In the months after Mom’s passing, life began to shut-down
for Dad and we were evicted out from our home in Orange County due to large
debts that Dad had accumulated from betting on races and owing much to investors.
In the Summer of 2011, we moved from our home in Orange
County to the streets of Long Beach where Uncle Jay, now at the age of 75, has
resided for the past 30-years in his auto shop. Smack dab downtown on Long
Beach Boulevard and 6th Street. I had only heard of Long Beach from
friends that come here to watch drag races on Friday nights and I never heard
about Uncle Jay until we moved in.
We lived in a newer, remodeled Forgotty’s
Broadway-Apartment on Broadway and Loma Avenue in Belmont Heights. Dad became a
manager for the apartments two-months after we moved in, because dad knew the
owner Rick Forgotty of the old Sunset Gang in the early 80s. Although many of
dad’s friends were either dead or behind bars, Rick became smart and used the
money from his old man’s will to better his life and for his wife and three
boys.
One Friday morning in early June, finally settled in, I
was just waking up to get ready for the day. I felt different in this place
that I never been before. I felt alone. Felt that all this was just a dream
that I couldn’t escape. Just being in a new room that I knew wasn’t mine to
begin with made it all that much more difficult to adjust.
After I showered and got ready, I went downstairs just in
time to see my dad taking off for work, which was in the central building of
the complex. Ever since Dad and I had moved here; even since the funeral, we hadn’t
spoken or spent real time together like we use to. Nowadays it’s like I’m alone
in this world and no one out there for me to call on or even call family. I surely
miss my mother more than ever!
After breakfast, I decided to clean up around the
apartment. I unpacked a few leftover boxes and tidied up my room just to waste
time. On my way outside I decided to stop and enter my Dad’s room. It was dark;
no light was coming in from the humongous windows. In the far corner of the
room I saw boxes full of our family albums and beside it was a nightstand covered
in half-empty bottles of vodka, 40s, 50s, and even a few left overs of Dad’s
favorite drink of Jack Daniels! I decided to clean up the room as if I were mom
because she would have done the same. I looked inside the boxes and found our
family albums and decided to look through them and remember a time that family
meant something long forgotten. I never want to forget my mother’s smile, the
smell of her perfume, and especially her personality. After what seemed to be
hours, I left to explore the rest of the apartment.
I had the chance to meet Rick & Polean as I passed
their building. Polean invited me in for something to eat, and boy did they
have some nice gigs here! They had a large six-bedroom apartment and allowed me
in although I was still new to the area. Luke was the first to introduce
himself to me. He was a pretty-boy, who stood at 6’3” with an athletic body to
match, and a great head of blond hair and blue eyes with a face that looked
like porcelain. All of this looked like a match made in heaven to his girl
named Mary-Ann. Mary-Ann looked gorgeous in her own right, standing at a 5-8
with a humble personality and a face that’ll melt any guy’s heart every time
she looked at you with her hazel eyes, wavy brunet five-feet long hair every
time she walks towards you…To me, it was like an angel was walking out of
heaven.
The Forgotty boys too, were loaded with some cool whips
and out-of-this-world cars, trucks, and SUVs.
Luke is the same age as me (18); then there is Adam at 17, and the
youngest of the bunch, Rick Junior also known as RJ, at 16-years old. All of
the Forgotty Brothers had sweet rides. Luke with his 1975 Z25 Chevy Camaro, a
350 cubic-inch V8 engine, rated at 245 horsepower. The car itself looked great
with an orange and black paint-job and a shine of steel runs below the bottom
of the car with a front end looking like a page out of the car-magazine;
perfect in every way. All that with a classic inside that is to die for;
leather bucket seats that were made to sink into and a dashboard that was clean
from ear to ear that you would kiss like you would your girlfriend.
The guys decided on a cool June Friday night, to take me
on a ride to the streets to see a drag race between Luke and one of the members
of the Sun-Street Gang. There the Forgotty boys met up with the guys, some with
their girlfriends, at Alamitos Park.
Luke then introduce me to Mike Applegate, the
second-in-command and the biggest of the bunch. Towering at 6’8”, Mike was a
former basketball star at Long Beach Polytechnic High School until he tore his
ACL on his right leg during a pick-up game a week ago. Mike met up with us at
the starting point of the race with his kid-brother, Victor Applegate Junior,
who uses a wheelchair because of his condition at birth, cerebral palsy. Don’t
let his disability fool you; Junior stands only a few inches below his big
brother at 5’9” and is 16 years old. Junior is helped out of their slick black,
tinted windowed, 32” rimmed 2011 GMC XL Denali. Luke helps Junior out of the
massive SVU because of Mike’s bandage right-leg and puts him in his chair; he
is also a mastermind in his own right with an athletic body and big arms that
make mine look like straws of hay!
Luke then introduced me to the rest of the crew and told
me that most of the guys knew each other since they were in diapers. He also
said our fathers were in the old gang together, dead now, but relived through
each of us. Many of the guys within the gang had never heard from their fathers
or even seen them. Some whose fathers were still around got to listen to talk
about stories from those days of old.
The Sun-Street Gang was made up of six other members plus
the four of us: Applegate - second-in-command, Peter and Porter Highlander who
are twins (though Peter is older by eight-minutes), Michael Link - the computer
geek of the bunch, Andrew Steel - the shop keeper at Uncle Jay’s Car Shop, and
Layla Menz, the only girl in the gang. Layla was a mother-figure to the
Highlander twins whose mother died in a shootout involving FBI officials and their
father. Caught in an ambush in an abandoned warehouse in possession of $50,000+
worth of heroin, he is now serving a 20-years sentence after a 12-year addition
due to drug tracing back to an outside mafia source. Layla’s mother took in the
twins and gave them a home before she died a few years afterward and since then
they’ve grown to become a family.
The drag race was on Ocean Boulevard by the park, which
was in the town of Peninsula. Luke, in his 1975 Chevy Comoro and Porter, in his
1979 Ford Cobra; things were about to take off as Layla counted down with her
black and blue bandana (the gang’s colors)!! Off they went down what seemed a
two-mile stretch of roadway, to the light of Belmont Avenue. Head-to-head down
to the last second; Porter won by an inch on Luke’s Chevy.
After, the gang decided to drive-up to a burger joint
that was not too far from Belmont Ave.
Lili’s Bar & Sports Grill was the name of the place on Ocean Blvd.
and 18th PI, just along the seafront of the city beach. What a view
it was! The owner of the establishment, Pam Link, was indeed the mother of
Michael! The joint was named after Pam’s mother, who died when Mike was six
years old; Lili was 80.
Pam was surprised to see me, as I would introduce myself
to her, as the son of the great car racer, Allen Kingston. Pam knew who I was
when I walked through the door because of my father’s body figure and a
photocopy of my mother’s face. Pam also knew my Mom because they lived next
door to each other as they were growing up. Dad was a mechanic at her grandpa’s
car shop, Uncle Jay’s Car Shop! She gave me the greatest dinner that night;
their famous BBQ ribs and mashed potatoes with dark gravy, a side of fresh
homemade rolls with honey-butter, and told me it was on the house while
everyone else had to “pay”.
As we walked out the door, Pam handed out the bills. Not
the bills I was expecting. Apparently she always gave the gang $50 each, but
she gave me $50, then an extra $50 then kissed me on the forehead and told me
to keep looking like Mom - she was better looking than Dad!! As we got out of
the cafe and into the vehicles, Michael asked for $20 for this new game that he
wanted, which costs $68.99. When I told him I’d race him for it I got blank
stares from the others. After a half a minute of nothing, Porter announced the
race to be at lunchtime tomorrow.
Written by: Junior F.
Edited by: Aaron C.
