Secrets of Innocence

by V.

  The bartender nodded.

  As they waited, Alexander tapped Danny on the shoulder to the beat of the music. The boy turned toward him and smiled.

  When the drinks arrived, Alexander handed the bartender a fifty. “Get us a table, pal.”

  The bartender’s broad smile revealed a gap where his four front teeth used to be. He nodded, ducked out from behind the counter, and headed toward one of the tables in front of the stage. He argued briefly with the two men sitting there, snatched up their drinks, and returned to the bar with the men close behind, protesting and waving their arms in the air. The barkeep signaled toward the door, and the huge bouncer headed his way. As the bouncer approached, the two men made conciliatory gestures and settled onto two empty barstools.

  When the bartender nodded toward the table, Alexander steered Danny over and slammed his drink down on the now-empty table. He shoved the boy onto a rickety chair and then spun his own chair around and straddled it, resting his chest against the back. He toasted with Danny and after a big gulp clamped a hand onto Danny’s shirt and pulled him closer.

  “Did you notice the bartender?” he yelled.

  Danny nodded.

  “That’s a man who lives life and doesn’t settle for an imitation. I love the bastard.” Smiling, he released Danny and glanced at the bartender who gave him a thumbs-up.

  A waitress in a faded-pink baby-doll negligee, bent very close to them with the clear intention of using her breasts to encourage a better order. Alexander examined her with glee.

  “I’m Lola. What’ll it be, gents?”

  “Oh momma. You’re all right. How about a couple of double whiskeys and a little suck?”

  Lola smiled at Alexander. “That’s extra, sweetie, and you can get it right through that door there when you’re ready.”

  She licked her lips lasciviously and nodded toward a curtain off to one side of the stage. Alexander reached over and squeezed her breasts.

  Lola pulled away, slapping his hand. “Hey. No free samples.”

  Alexander handed her a folded bill. She examined it and smiled at him with great satisfaction. “I’ll make an exception for you, honey.”

  The dancer on stage paraded about in a half-hearted attempt to follow the music while Lola headed to the bar for their drinks.

  Alexander yelled, “Yeah, momma. Shake it, baby, shake it.”

  Embarrassed, but unable to avert his eyes, Danny slumped into his chair and turned toward the dancer as she sauntered up to a man waving a dollar bill. She leaned toward him as he placed the bill between her breasts. She squeezed them tightly together to capture his hand.

  Lola set the drinks on the table, and Alexander slipped her another bill. “Two more, darling,” he ordered as he slapped her bottom and gulped down his drink.

  “You’re going to be sick, drinking like this. Why don’t we go home?” Danny implored.

  Alexander gulped down Danny’s drink and said, “C’mon, don’t tell me you’re not having fun, boys your age dream of this shit. Oh, I’m sorry. I forgot you’re past this small-time stuff. After all, you’re banging your hot Mrs. Fo—” “Shut up.”

  Alexander clamped his hand over his mouth in mock horror, holding his breath until his face turned crimson, and expelled all the air in his lung with one explosive puff. “Whoa, what a buzz.” He turned toward the dancer and yelled, “Hey! Baby! Come over and shake it right here.”

  He pulled a few bills from his pocket and slammed them on the stage. Danny retrieved the money and stuffed it back in Alexander’s pocket. “Don’t be stupid, you’re going to get robbed.”

  “Fuck you.” He put two fingers in his mouth and whistled.

  The dancer glided over to Alexander and squatted with her legs spread before him. Laughing with exaggerated enthusiasm, Alexander handed her a bill. She smiled at him, sat back and spread her legs, shaking them up in the air. Alexander grabbed Danny by the scruff of the neck and pulled him up close to her.

  “Whose is better? Hers or Mrs. Foster’s?

  Danny shook himself loose and glared angrily at Alexander, who guffawed at the boy’s reaction and shoved him back onto his chair.

  “Fuck. Relax man. We’re having fun.”

  Alexander stood up, jumped on stage, and pounced on the dancer.

  Immediately, a couple of bouncers went after him, pulled him off the dancer, and knocked him out cold. When Danny tried to intervene, one of them simply pushed him unceremoniously back onto his chair.

  The bouncers hoisted Alexander up effortlessly and carried him out of the tent where they dumped him face down in the dirt next to an overflowing trashcan.

  Danny stood there for a few seconds, stunned. His idol, the writer he had most admired, lay unconscious and covered in filth.

  Danny knelt beside him and shook him back to consciousness. He helped him to his feet and together they stumbled off down the dirt path.

  “Can we go home now?” Danny insisted.

  “I just wanted a little taste. They didn’t have to get so upset.” Alexander pushed away from him. “You’re not very good at promises.” He staggered down the path.

  Danny hurried to catch up with him. “Where are we going now?” he asked, exasperated.

  “To get fucked.” And with that, he shoved Danny into a tent to his right.

  The boy pulled up just shy of an older woman wearing something that resembled an old curtain more than a dress. “Careful, boy,” she warned in a husky voice.

  Alexander stumbled in behind and chuckled. “You can do better than that.”

  “How can I help you gentlemen?” Husky Voice inquired.

  “Show us the best you got,” Alexander replied.

  The woman yelled toward the back of the tent, “Get out here. We got business.”

  Seconds later, three girls emerged through a curtain with big smiles on their faces. They varied in age between their late teens and late twenties as far as Danny could guess. He tried to flee but Alexander blocked his way and pushed him toward them.

  Alexander chuckled as he seized one of the girls by the wrist, handed her to Danny and then pushed the two of them through the curtain. “Show her what you got, boy.”

  Parked in her idling car on a roadside lookout point, Sarah yelled, “My God, Alexander, you’re a piece of work!” By now she had grown to expect the silence and took it as a sign that more would come.

  She glanced around and realized where she was. “At least I had the good sense to pull off the road.”

  “What are you after?” She took a deep breath and screamed, “Answer me!”

  As usual there was only silence. The movie had played and she knew nothing more would be disclosed until the next installment.

  “Listen to me, you revolting bastard, I’m on my way to Williams’s office, so now would be a very good time to show me if there’s anything I need to be aware of before I get there?”

  Silence.

  “Have it your way. But it’ll take that much longer to work it all out, and that’s on you.” She tightened her grip on the steering wheel. “You broke his heart. For what?”

  Silence.

  “Whatever your reasons, you’ve achieved your goal. I’m repulsed. No wonder you were afraid to reach out to me.”

  She put the car in gear and merged onto the highway.

  “I realize horrible memories like these would need to be forgotten, but it all happened so long ago, why do this now?”

  The hum of the road was the only response.

  “You’re one cruel and exasperating man.”

  CHAPTER 18

  Sarah reached the outskirts of town and proceeded toward the Sheriff’s Office, trying all the time to steady her nerves.

  She parked the car, grabbed the tart, and shut the car door. She was about to lock it when Williams tapped her on the shoulder. She spun around in alarm. “You startled me!”

  “Really. If you’re psychic how come you didn’t see me coming?”

  Sarah took a dee
p breath and forced herself to remain calm. “That’s not how it works.”

  A sardonic smile crossed his lips. “Why are you here, Mrs. Thompson?” “Well, I came by to speak with you, and brought you a pie I made. I hoped to find out if you’ve made any progress in figuring out who attacked Daniel, and ask if I could be of any help.”

  “No, to all of that. You can go back home. I don’t eat pie.”

  “Technically, it isn’t a pie. It’s a strawberry chocolate tart.” She shoved it at him, leaving him no option but to take it.

  She smiled at him. “Has a famous writer ever lived around these parts?” The unexpected question obviously intrigued Williams who cocked his head. “Writer?”

  “Yes, writer.”

  “What kind of writer?”

  “As in books. He also painted portraits.”

  “What does that have to do with you or Daniel?”

  “I have a feeling that he might be connected. That’s how this ‘psychic thing’—as you call it—happens with me. So I propose that we work together in case I get more such feelings.”

  Williams stared at Sarah.

  She pressed on. “I don’t wish to make any trouble for you, believe me, but whether you accept it or not, God gave me a gift and I mean to use it to help others.”

  Williams remained silent.

  Spotting her chance, Sarah pushed forward. “I believe this writer may have written a book called Rainbow, or at least that word is in the title, and may have lived in the area. Do you know of any such person?”

  Williams mulled it over. “If I do, what’s it to you?”

  Sarah knew she’d hit the jackpot. “Maybe we could visit him and find out if he—”

  “He’s dead.”

  “I suspected as much, but I’d hoped his heirs would’ve—”

  “No heirs. The place is locked up.”

  “Can we drive by?”

  Williams glared at her but Sarah remained firm, her eyes locked onto his. “You sure are one stubborn lady.”

  “I don’t see myself that way. I have a duty to be of help, that’s all.”

  “How the hell did you come up with this guy?”

  “Same way I saw your father die.”

  Williams tightened his jaw and glowered at Sarah.

  “Sheriff, for all we—”

  “Be quiet!” He glanced around to make sure no one had heard her. “Don’t go bringing that up. You get me?”

  “I do. But it’s important that you understand how I sense and perceive things. That’s all. I didn’t mean to upset you. I’m sorry.”

  He squinted as he considered her. After a few seconds he said. “Lock your car and follow me.”

  After Sarah did as instructed Williams opened the passenger door of his car and nodded for her to get in. He placed the tart on the floor behind his seat and got into the driver’s side. Without a word, he gunned the engine and sped out of the parking lot.

  “Where are we going?”

  “Somewhere we can’t be overheard.”

  The silence hung over them like a shadow as the car sped down the two-lane highway. A few minutes later he steered the vehicle onto a dirt road that snaked through the woods.

  A quarter mile later, he stopped the car in the middle of nowhere and got out. He walked around the car glaring at Sarah until he reached the passenger side and opened the door for her.

  “We’re here,” he announced.

  Sarah looked around apprehensively. They were in the middle of the forest. Alone.

  “Well?” Williams asked.

  “Well, what?”

  “Where did it happen?”

  “What?”

  “If you’re a psychic, you ought to be able to find it.”

  Sarah got out of the car, took a deep breath, and looked around her. “This is the forest where your father was killed, isn’t it?”

  “You tell me, Psychic Lady.”

  She looked at him and nodded. “It is. Your father was killed right over there.” She pointed to a small clearing behind a massive boulder.

  All color drained from Williams’s face.

  “I can tell you in detail what I saw. Sometimes the images are not very clear at first, but with time they come into focus and I grasp the entire picture.”

  “How?”

  “How does it happen you mean? How do the images come to me?”

  He nodded.

  Sarah shrugged. “Sometimes it’s a flash, like a photograph. Sometimes it’s a series of flashes, and others are clear stories, as if I were reading a chapter from a book or listening to the thoughts of someone who lived through the event. Other times it’s as if I’m witnessing past moments from someone’s life. It varies. When I was a child I could actually feel something that was going to happen in the future.”

  “When you were a child? How long have you been doing this?”

  “I was born with the gift, but didn’t accept it until recently, so I don’t have much experience in ‘doing this.’ You’re already familiar with Angela Thompson, my husband’s grandmother and her daughters.”

  “Angela was a special lady, so were her girls. I’m sure you caught on that I made up that stuff about folks calling them witches.”

  Sarah nodded.

  “I never bought the story that they were psychics, though. Angela was real smart, that’s all—the rest is a bunch of bull.”

  “Needless to say, I disagree with you. I’m a bit like she was, in my own way.”

  Williams turned away shaking his head and staring at the ground. At long last, he looked up. “Okay. So tell me what you saw of my father’s death.”

  She stepped around him and walked slowly toward the clearing. “It felt as if I were seeing what happened through the ocular lens of a rifle scope. Through it I slowly scanned the woods. Only, I wasn’t the one holding the rifle. I could hear the breath of whoever was actually holding the weapon— a hunter. The search stopped as a deer came into focus. Through the rifle’s scope he followed the deer as it moved left. I felt the hunter tighten the grip on the rifle as well as the increased pressure on the trigger. As the deer moved, it revealed an older man at the precise moment the hunter pulled the trigger. I could see the bullet heading toward the man who stood behind the deer.” She turned back to him. “Then your face flashed before me, and it all faded away.” Williams stared at Sarah, his face pale with shock, his lower lip trembling. Sarah held his gaze.

  “I was the hunter you felt,” he said at last. “You described what I saw and what I did.” He turned away. His shoulders convulsed as the pain and weight of his regret overwhelmed him.

  Sarah didn’t move, didn’t speak, and didn’t interrupt.

  After a few moments, he wiped his face, stood erect again, and turned to face her. “I’m sorry I lost my—”

  “Please, don’t. No need. I can tell you’re in pain.”

  “Not a soul knows it was my bullet that killed him.”

  “Are you sure it was your bullet?”

  He turned and pointed. “He was right there, and I was over there.” He pointed again. “You saw what happened.”

  “Did you have the bullet tested?”

  “What are you talking about? There was no need, we were hunting, and he got shot. It was an accidental death. Only no one realized it was my bullet that killed him. There were lots of hunters out here that day. End of story.” “Maybe it wasn’t your bullet.”

  “Why would you say that? You described what happened, what I did.” Sarah walked up to him and gazed deep into his eyes. “Because I didn’t see him die from the shot you fired.”

  CHAPTER 19

  A far more courteous Sheriff Williams escorted Sarah to her car. “Thank you, this was an eye opener. I’ll see what I can find out about that writer and get back to you.”

  “I’ll look forward to hearing from you.” She unlocked her car door and he opened it.

  He held out his hand.

  Sarah smiled, and shook it. “Good-bye, Sher
iff.” She climbed into her car and headed out.

  The Jeep’s headlights momentarily illuminated the forest around the cabin until it came to a halt and the lights were switched off. Danny jumped out of the driver’s seat and ran around the car to the passenger door.

  Alexander, dirty, drunk, and soaked in the stench of sweat, slithered out and latched onto Danny.

  “Fucking body. Why won’t you obey?” Alexander pushed Danny away. “I don’t need to lean on you, boy.”

  “This way, the cabin’s over there.”

  “You go. Get the hell out of my sight. You’re a fucking fag.”

  Danny reached for Alexander’s arm, but he yanked it away and stumbled into the vehicle.

  “C’mon, Alex—”

  “Why didn’t you fuck her? ’Cause you’re a fag. That’s why. You keep telling me all these stories about your precious Mrs. Foster. But you’re a liar. A good-for-nothing fake.”

  Danny stared at his idol in disbelief. Unable to control his tears, he raised his hands to wipe his eyes, and turned away.

  Alexander stopped, suddenly aware of the boy’s pain. His face contorted as he howled and dropped to the ground, sobbing. “I’m sorry. ..I’m sorry. ..I always fuck it up. Danny, I love you.. .please, forgive me.”

  Danny knelt next to Alexander and put an arm around his shoulders.

  “You shouldn’t help me!” he said. “You shouldn’t forgive me. I’m a good-for-nothing piece of shit. I’m the fake, Danny, not you, that’s why I love you. I aspire to be you, goddammit. I hanker to be Danny.”

  “No, you’re not a fake, you’re drunk.”

  “Oh yeah? If I’m drunk, how come I can’t write?” Alexander crawled on all fours and sniffed the ground like a dog. “There’s a revolting stench around here. Can you guess what it is?”

  Danny sniffed the air. “Well, there’s—”

  “Failure.. .that’s what it is, the stench of failure.” He sat down, holding his head between his hands, and resting his elbows on his knees. “How can one repeat oneself? I can’t be what I was twenty years ago. Honest, I can’t.” He began to convulse in sobs of despair.