The days were becoming unbearably hot with temperatures over 40 degrees celsius happening daily. I now fully understood the necessity of the siesta, being a lazy guy, I had always been fond of the afternoon nap but with this kind of heat it was the only way to not fall over dead. One day Jap comes and tells me that he is going to Amsterdam for business. Part of me wondered how he had any money to go as he had told me that he was broke and had no money for nutrients. Another part of me thought that maybe he would make some money in the Dam and be able to fund some nutrients when he returned. Either way I was going to be doing all the work for the next week. After he left I realized what a tense atmosphere he created when he was around because it was gone now. Life was very easy for that week as Anna and I took care of the farm and I kept watch over the crops like a proud papa. When Jap returned a week later he brought his and Anna’s daughter Luna with him. She was a 21-year-old Amsterdammer who was down for a few months to write a screen-play. She had never written one but thought it would be an easy way to make money. I knew nothing about it so I wished her the best and barely talked to her after that. It seems the odd qualities of her parents had rubbed off on her as well, she was a strange bird indeed, but nice enough I guess. Jap was fairly mellow for the first few days back but soon reverted to his grumpy ways and was using anger to communicate with his family. I stayed in the caravan most of the time trying to stay out of his line of fire, I was starting to get cabin fever with his behavior and the heat, hopefully I could make it through. Jap came and once again told me he was going to Amsterdam and this time he would be gone for 2 weeks. I was a bit peeved that he was leaving all the work to me again but the place was so much more peaceful with him gone that I didn’t mention it and saw him off with a smile. The time just flew by with him gone as I continued to enjoy the progress of our crops, by the time he returned I had about 75 beautiful girls as tall as me. Unfortunately, he had to return.
The first day Jap came back he was in a good mood as he told of his fun in Amsterdam. I was happy he was in a good mood but felt a bit sour as he told of tripping on ecstasy with his friends in the Dam. I thought he was there for business but it turns out he was mostly there to party. Must be nice to party in Amsterdam when you don’t have any money for nutrients, this was unacceptable, but in the interest of peace, I kept my mouth shut. The peace didn’t long as later that night I heard the tell-tale sounds of Jap screaming at someone. I went over to the house to find out what the problem was. Luna had not properly latched the dog cage and the dogs had run off again, I was starting to think that them dogs just wanted to get away from him. There was no reasoning with him as he continued to scream at Luna for the next couple of hours. She just took it without yelling back, I guess a lifetime of that had probably scarred her. Finally the volume decreased and they went to bed, probably more out of exhaustion than anything else, we would see come morning. I once again was woken up by the sounds of the family yelling out the dog’s name’s. Since I could not sleep through it, I came out to help find them. This was about the 5th or 6th time they had bolted since I had been there and each time they would either come back on their own or else Jap would find them with the truck. I thought this time would be no different, but after searching the whole morning, we had found no sign of them. Anna told me about a guy they knew who was once a friend of theirs until he ripped off their weed crop the year before. He was given a special license by the local council to kill any animals he could, all he had to do was have a tail and he got 10 euros for it. It was known that he did not care if it was a pet or not and several folks had lost their pets to him. She was worried now that he had found the dogs and shot them. I had met the guy a few times and he seemed like a real scumbag so I didn’t doubt he would kill anything. When he returned from searching in the truck, Jap picked up where he had left off the night before and started giving it to his daughter again, I retreated to the caravan to stay out of his way.
That didn’t last long, as he was returning from checking out our grow in which I had been working pretty much alone with his travelling, he told me that he was unimpressed by what we had. I felt a bit insulted as I thought they looked very good with what we had to grow it with and told him so. I said that they would be much bigger if we had the proper nutrients. He snapped to anger when he said that he had already told me that he had no money for that. I snapped back that he seemed to have plenty of money to go to Amsterdam on several occasions. He just looked at me with fire in his eyes and stormed off, hopefully this would not become a bigger problem. Wishful thinking on my part for as he was returning from a walk around looking for the dogs, he finally brought the full force of his anger my way. I was sitting in the caravan listening to some music when I hear the all to familiar sound of Jap yelling. This time something seemed different and when I turned down the music I realized why, he was yelling in English, and it was getting closer. I opened the door to see him approaching with his arms flailing and yelling out something about the fan I had plugged into the bathroom outlet. He screamed how it should not be in there as it could blow out the entire electrical system. I was quite puzzled by this as the fan was only 600 watts and the outlet was rated for 1200 watts to accommodate hair dryers and the like. When I calmly mentioned this to him he got even more angry. He told me that I don’t know what I am talking about ( even though there was a sticker on the fixture that said just that ) and that he knew his caravan better than I did. I told him that I would move it but that he should mellow out and not be so confrontational, a mistake. He went into the worst tirade I had ever seen by an adult as he screamed out insults to the point he was spitting as he screamed. I tried to stay calm and reason with him but every time I did he would cut me off with further insult. Finally he said ‘pack up your shit and get out, this deal is over’, then he turned and stormed off to the house. I stood in shock for a few moments then felt my anger start to rise to the point where I was seething. I spent the next 2 hours packing up my stuff while the anger grew. I was able to reach Gez and he said I could come to his place but he was in a bad place as his mother had just died the day before so it was not going to be for long. When I finished packing I went to the house and yelled at him that I was ready to go. He just ignored me and for the next 2 hours I sat with my shit packed and having visions of beating the shit out of this guy. Hopefully we could get through without anymore yelling, I was at the end of my rope and did not think I could listen to anymore of his vitriol without getting physical. Keeping me waiting for an extra 2 hours did not help things but if he just gave me a ride in peace, then we could make a amicable parting. I would soon find out because when I looked out the window, he was coming my way.
A Continuing Story About Life On The Run