by Manuel Tiger
“Then she’s invited and that takes care of me looking for further entertainment,” Daman said with a grin.
We talked for an hour more, sharing a plate of BBQ wings and fries before Anna announced she had to leave and be up early for work the coming morning.
Daman decided it was a good time to call it a night for us as well and after bidding her goodnight and watching her drive off, we headed back toward his car when a commotion a few cars over caught my attention.
“You stupid boy! Didn’t I tell you to listen to me?”
“Henry?” Daman called as I found myself already headed over in that direction.
I arrived upon a scene of a man striking a boy no older than seventeen with one fist while with his other hand he was removing his belt.
“I’ll teach you a good lesson boy!” he snarled drunkenly as he jerked his belt free, looping it around one hand with the buckle hanging down.
“Stop!” I said already moving forward and grabbing the man’s hand as he spun around on me causing me to gasp.
For a moment his eyes seemed to blaze red in the light of the nearby light pole.
“Don’t get mixed in on business that isn’t of your concern, boy!” he said shaking my hand off, pushing me away when Daman stepped in.
“What’s going on here?” he demanded placing himself between me and the man.
“He was about to strike the boy with a belt!” I said trembling with anger, with outrage while staring at the man. “He was beating him with his fist!”
“Mind your business like I said!” the man growled back, his voice nearly animalistic. “My son didn’t listen? So he gets punished!”
“You don’t have to beat him!” I said stepping around Daman. “He’s your son!”
“And that is why I have every right to beat him!” the man retorted. “Mind your own business before I use this belt on you boy!”
“Over my dead body,” Daman growled stepping up to the man. He grabbed him by the front of his shirt and shoved him up against a car nearly rocking it. I don’t know what was said but the rage left the man and the belt dropped from his hand and Daman continued to talk to him in low tones.
I went over to the boy that cowered at the back end of the car. I squatted down in front of him as he peered up at me beneath a fringe of blond hair.
“Are you okay?” I asked softly reaching out and gently touching the bruise that was forming on his arm. There was another taking shape on his left cheek as well as that of a black eye and his bottom lip was split and becoming caked in drying blood.
Too many flashbacks were coming back to me, but I pushed them under, forced them under. Now was not the time for them.
“I’m fine,” he whispered. “I’m used to it. I shouldn’t have disobeyed him.”
“What’s going on here?”
I looked up to see a man and woman approaching us. They looked similar but there was something about them that made me uneasy. They looked at the boy and then at the man that Daman still had up against the car.
“He was beating his son and was about to use a belt on him,” I said standing up and placing myself by the boy. “We stopped him.”
“Clyde,” the woman said with a snarl that surprised me. “We’ve talked about this before with you and here you are again in a public place doing the exact same thing you were told not to do.”
“We’ll handle this,” her male companion said squatting down by the boy. “Not too bad this time, William?”
“No sir,” the boy said.
“This time?” I said shocked. “You’re aware of him having done this before?”
“We’ll handle it,” the woman said stepping up to Daman. “Mister Salvadori, take your mate and have a good evening.”
Daman looked at her and the two stared at each other for a very long moment before he nodded.
“Henry, come on,” he said holding his hand out to me.
“What? No! This man obviously has a history of beating his son! Shouldn’t the police be called? Notified of what happened here?” I said outraged.
“You’re new here aren’t you?” the man said standing up. I spun around to face him. “We’ll handle this on our own.” He looked in the direction of Daman. “It’s an internal matter.”
“I-Internal matter? This was a public beating! The police need to be informed!”
“We’ll handle it,” the man stressed and his eyes seemed to become more golden, to become for a moment what I thought resembled a wolf’s eyes. “Mister Salvadori, take your boy and go home, please. We’ll handle this.”
I stared at him and looked at the boy who was still kneeling on the ground, his head down and ears bright red.
“Henry,” Daman said again as I stepped back.
“Rot in hell you son of a bitch!” I spat toward the father. He looked coward already just by standing next to the woman who wore a stony expression on her face.
“Good evening, Mister Salvadori,” she repeated with a harder edge to her tone.
I felt Daman grab my hand and pull me away, but I continued looking back in the direction of the odd group, wondering about the boy and wondering how they were going to handle this matter.
“We should call the police,” I said once we were back at his car.
“Let them handle it in their own way, Henry.”
I looked at him, jerking my hand out of his. “What?”
“Henry, you’re new still to Heaven Falls,” he said. “Some things are best left handled to others to deal with as they see fit.”
“But he was beating that boy! His own son Daman! We can’t just let it go!”
“In this circumstance? We do.”
“Why?”
“It’s not our business.”
“That’s…that’s…,” I couldn’t form any words.
“Get in the car,” he said opening the door for me.
“No,” I said trembling, shaking all over. “I’ll just walk home.”
“That’s being silly! Get in the car Henry.”
“No!” I said spinning around and started across the parking lot. I heard the familiar growl of his car and it was soon driving slowly by me.
“Henry, get in this car. It’s getting cold and it’s supposed to rain tonight,” he said through the rolled down passenger side window.
“I don’t care,” I said fighting against tears, embracing myself.
“Henry.”
I didn’t stop and began walking faster, scenes from when I was fifteen, even younger, replaying through my head. I felt again the fisted strikes, the feel of hard leather against my face and upon my back, the names, the slurs rained down on me and that of the hard kick to my side that robbed me of breath as I pleaded for him to stop, as I pleaded for my father to stop beating me.
“Henry?”
Daman was standing before me, his hands on my arms as I trembled and shook, crying and not knowing I was crying. It was loud body shaking sobs coming out of me.
“Henry, what’s wrong?” he asked pulling me into his embrace. “What’s wrong?” he whispered clutching me tightly in his arms. “Tell me, please,” he said and I could hear the fear in his tone.
“N-Not here, not here,” I whispered against his chest. I felt him nod and guide me back to the car. He helped me inside, closed the door then hurried around and climbed in. He reached out and pulled me to him, driving with one hand while I pressed my face into his chest, shaking like a leaf in a storm.
I was only dimly aware that we had passed by River Haven when I caught a flash of the plaque on the stone column. Some part of me wondered, but it wasn’t a concern as I felt Daman hold me closer and I just pressed my face firmer into his chest.
Soon I sensed the road going up, curving at turns and by the time I looked I realized we were in the mountains and turning down an old road that was covered in pine needles and leaves while to either side of us rose up trees that created a tunnel, the headlights of the car chasing the darkness into retreat before us
before dropping back into place behind us. When we finally stopped I looked out the window to see we had arrived at a fenced in parking area.
I could see the lights of the town through a break in the trees, and it all looked a million miles away like some child’s toy set.
“Come on,” Daman softly whispered as he led me out of the car. While he went to retrieve something from the trunk I stood there wiping at my eyes, feeling so pathetic and stupid for reacting as I had. “This way,” Daman said taking my hand, a blanket draped over his shoulder. He led me to a nearly hidden path to the left of the parking area that sloped downward.
“I’m fine now, Daman,” I whispered yet my voice was shaky, wavering as he turned to look back at me.
“No you’re not,” he said in a voice full of concern. “You’re shaking and trembling still,” he drew me to him and rested his chin atop my head as I clutched at him. “I want my Henry back and I want you to tell me why what we saw affected you as much as it did.”
“If I do? You may not want me anymore as your Henry.”
He leaned back and stared at me. “Don’t speak fucking nonsense,” he said cupping my chin and tilting my head up. “Nothing could ever make me not want you, nothing!”
I said nothing and looked away as he sighed softly and continued down the path which turned and twisted. Then I heard the roar of falling water and at a slight rise that became a hill, where a break in the trees and bushes appeared, was framed that of a roaring waterfall that poured out of the side of the mountain. I watched as the water fell in a single spill, glittering like diamonds beneath the moon overhead.
“This way,” Daman said leading us to the left and along another twisting path which ended at a small rock cave that looked like some giant had smashed their fist into it to create it for there was also an overhang. “I used to come here when I needed to think,” he said leading me to a small depression in the ground where old burnt wood resided, sticking out like grasping black claws of some creature emerging from the earth. Around it resided smooth flat stones. He took the blanket and laid it down on the ground by the depression and guided me onto it, joining me.
For a long moment neither one of us spoke. He just held me to him as I rested my head on his chest, listening to the falling water that seemed further away now.
“Will you tell me now, Henry?” he asked softly while rubbing my arm gently.
“Build a fire,” I replied, my lips suddenly dry. “It’s a bit cold.”
He nodded and got up and went about gathering up fallen tree limbs. He impressed me that he could find so many as dark as it was here even with the moon offering light. Once he gathered enough he started a fire with his lighter and soon there was a blazing fire.
For the longest moment we sat together again with me staring into the flames.
“Henry?” he asked softly.
“I was kicked out of my home at fifteen when my father found out I was gay,” I said in a rush of breath, staring forward, feeling numb, not even sure I was speaking or wishing my tongue wouldn’t work. But once started I didn’t stop. “He, um, beat me when he found out,” I said looking down at my hands when Daman’s appeared and he took hold of one of them lacing our fingers together. “I came home that day to tell him something else when he was already standing in the entrance hall waiting for me. I didn’t even see the first blow coming. It just came out of nowhere.
“I clearly remember the sound of his fist striking my face followed by my head hitting the floor, bouncing off of it. He then he jerked me up and dragged me by the collar of my shirt into his office which was off to the left of the front door. He threw me on the floor and my mother was there, seated and seemed as shocked as I was.”
“Did she do anything to stop him?”
I laughed and felt the tears coming freely now. “She calmly got up, smoothed out her skirt and left the room,” I said looking away. “Even as I was pleading for her to help me she ignored me and closed the door behind her leaving me alone with him.”
“Fucking bitch,” he whispered, tightening our hands together.
“My father threw me about his office, condemning me, calling me a worthless fag, a cocksucker. He didn’t hold back at all and all the while he was beating me, all the while he was pummeling me or hitting me with anything handy? I just prayed that he would hurry up and leave me alone.
“He broke my arm when he pinned it behind my back and slammed my head into the top of his desk, yelling at me, screaming at me and saying I ruined the family name,” I wiped at my nose. “He began punching me in the face, in the head and then just knocked me to the floor where he continued hitting me over and over before he took off his belt.
“I just curled into a ball, my right arm hanging at my side, just flopping about with each strike of his belt. I think I may have passed out several times only to come to when he was choking me, slapping at me with his other hand and I only had one arm to push at him against, to fight against him.
“I could taste blood in my nose, in my mouth, it was just all over me,” I said breathing harder. “I woke up to find myself in the hospital where my aunt Jemma worked. She would later tell me she didn’t even know it was me that was brought into the ER until she began cleaning the blood off my face. She was horrified and had to check the chart to make sure it wasn’t me, hoping that it wasn’t.
“Apparently my father had had one of his aides deliver me to the hospital, saying I was a hit and run victim of some accident they came across.” I laughed again, the tears coursing down my cheeks. “I was in and out of consciousness for several days, my head swollen up and the doctors didn’t think I would make it, but obviously I did.” I drew in a ragged breath. “When I was in the clear I woke one afternoon to find my mother standing at the bed. She just looked down at me and said, ‘You shouldn’t have turned out this way Henry for you brought it on yourself.’ She then told me I was disowned and all my things were packed and in storage. She laid the key to the storage building on my bedside table.
“Aunt Jemma had walked in just as she said this and spun my mother around and slapped her across the face. Thankfully no one else was in the room,” I said swallowing. “My mother just stared at her and Aunt Jemma told her if she ever saw her again she would rip off that surgical enhanced face of hers and stuff it up her ass.
“My mother left the room and that would be the last time I ever saw her except for one other time when I was twenty-three.”
I took in a deep breath and released it before I continued.
“Aunt Jemma had been calling her since I came into the hospital, everyone in the family, but it was radio silence. She had even attempted to go over but was denied entry by staff and security. She told me later after I was out of the hospital that she shouldn’t have bothered even calling my mother. She had been a bitch growing up and nothing had changed in regards to her.
“And that is how I came to live with Aunt Jemma for she took me in, gave me a home. She worked double shifts to pay for my medical bills even took me to rehab for my arm for it had been fractured and broken in two places. In short? She became the mother I never had even when I had one.”
I fell silent for a moment, eyes closed.
“I’m thankful you had her then,” Daman said as he pulled me closer. “But your father and mother are pieces of shit that deserve every misfortune possible. If I ever met your father?”
I shivered. “I’m…I’m not done,” I whispered, pushing away, standing up and walking outside the light of the fire to face the darkness that I always faced alone. “I said my father had found out I was gay. It was never by me. He found out I was gay from the man that was molesting me since I was twelve. That man is his own friend, a judge too and has strong connections like my father does to politics and those in positions of power in Boston.”
“Henry,” Daman said, but I shook my head. I could hear the shock in his voice.
“I was,” I swallowed and looked at my hands. “I was in the garden behind the
house just playing in the fountain we had there and daydreaming of knights and princes for you see? I knew I was gay but I kept it hidden. Or thought I did. I had a few kisses with other boys my age but nothing beyond that. Just an innocent kiss.
“But my father’s friend must have known, suspected. He came upon me playing in the basin. I was wearing yellow swim trunks and the day was warm. He sat down on the edge of the fountain and said I was going to grow up to be a handsome young man, a beautiful boy and to come give him a hug. I always gave him hugs so I saw nothing wrong with doing this although lately his hugs had started to last longer, for his hands to go lower down my back.
“I came over and hugged him only to have him pull me out of the water and sit me on his lap. He began stroking my chest and asked for a kiss. I said no, laughing and tried to get off his lap. He wrapped his arm around me tighter and undid his slacks and stuck my hand inside. I remember feeling his cock and not wanting to touch it, but he told me all good boys did. All good boys listened and obeyed adults.
“He began kissing me and I began to push at him which must have excited him for I felt his cock growing harder and…,” I shuddered. “I…I should have screamed, yelled, fought back harder. But I was frozen with fear. My silence he took as compliance. He…he raped me behind the fountain that day, among the roses.” I laughed as I removed my glasses and wiped at them with my shirt. “It was several days before my birthday. After he was finished he told me he had made me a man now, his special man.
“And from there it all started. He would find ways to be alone with me, to be at the house when my parents weren’t home. He told me if I ever told anyone about what we were doing I would be punished, I would be taken away from my family. So I kept quiet and let him do what he wanted for I didn’t want to be taken away from my family.
“He then started taking me on little trips with him which my parents agreed to. Once it was a trip to Miami and there he whored me out to other older men with perverse tastes that beat me or…,” I closed my eyes seeing those special rooms in that seaside mansion again, the things done to me in them. “Soon he was whoring me out to his friends in Boston. Some of them were also friends of my father or people in high positions.