Today’s Portland Press Herald
headlines; “Tear gas, arrest end six-hour standoff. Brian Kelley, 48, is charged
after a woman is shot in the chest.”
Surprising… only 48. I would have guessed 60.Then again, gauging a
person’s age on the waterfront is hit or miss at best.
Brian was always drunk when
the crew gathered at the bait shop each morning at 4:00 AM. He would stumble
down the stinking, dark, cobble stoned Custom House Wharf, always on foot. He had permanently lost his license to drive,
served 5 years in the State Prison in Thomaston as a Habitual Offender. If it
was raining heavily, he would sometimes accepted a ride in my little red pickup
truck. He smelled strongly of booze,
cigarettes and fish, a familiar… and strangely comforting aroma.
I liked him. Over the two
years we worked together on the dock, we always greeted each other cordially
each morning. It might go like this;
“Mornin, Glen.”
“Mornin, Brian.”
“Wet one, huh?”
“Yes-suh. Stay dry”
“Ayhuh…”
He would retreat to his
barrels, dumping and hosing the fish slime and blood from the blue and white
plastic 55 gallon drums, stacking them 2 high , preparing for another day of
filling them with salt and fish that the lobstermen used to bait their traps. I
would head for the wharf to take the orders from the fishermen and winch the barrels
down to waiting boats. The crew wouldn’t let Brian run the winch or the fork
trucks. He was too dangerous.
When the Porthole coffee shop
opened at 6 o’clock, I would often bring him a steaming cup of the bitter, black brew. He drank it with 2
creamers and 5 sugars speeding the decay of his already rotting, black teeth.
When the work flow allowed, we would sit on the dock, smoke hand rolled cigarettes
and watch the sun rise out of the ocean. Sometimes we would talk.
He told me about earning his
living as a younger man diving for urchins… before his scuba gear was stolen,
before his strength was wasted by injuries and abuse. He talked about life in
prison and how he couldn’t trust anyone inside the walls. He spoke bitterly
about how he had been falsely labeled as a “skinner”, a child abuser, in jail
and how he had confronted and beaten the liar to clear his name. On his forearm
was a prison tattoo that he bought for $5 from an inmate who used needles and
an ink pen to draw a map of the state of Maine behind bars.
On day he was raging about
another guy on the crew who had disrespected him. “He better back off. I can get
real angry I’ll hurt that son of a whore.” he growled.
All day long, he would work
under the fish conveyor, covered in fish guts and salt dust, filling barrels.
His eyes were red and irritated. I brought him a pair of safety glasses which
he wore until they were stolen. When the fishing season slowed down in December,
Brian was laid off and signed up for unemployment compensation.
The newspaper article
reported that he had allegedly shot a woman in the chest with a pellet gun. The
pellet had not broken the skin, but the Portland police had dispatched swat
teams and snipers to bring him to justice. After a 6 hour standoff, the police had
tear gassed his 3rd floor slum apartment and taken him into custody.
My friend Brian is in a world
of shit today. I’m sure there is more to the story, but it’s unlikely he will
beat this rap. It’s far more likely he will spend more years behind bars. It’s
tragic all around.
The only good news is he’s
already got the tattoo.
