Sins of the Fathers

by S Gepp

  "Yeah, huzzah," Brandon echoed as he sat heavily.

  "But I, I mean, we, but we thought you wanted to write and…" Francis blustered.

  "Journalism was my second option," Brandon muttered. "Pre-law was what I wanted, but my grades…" He looked at Francis. "Really wanted," he added grimly.

  Randolph then stood. "That's what I wanted as well," he stated but then fell silent.

  "Well?" Julian urged.

  "My last choice, the one grandpa wanted me to do." He sneered then as he spat, "Accounting."

  "At least I won't be alone," Sean muttered.

  "Huzzah." This clearly was not going the way they had planned or hoped at all.

  Troy was last. He looked at all of them with a smile on his face. "I got the one all private school students get offered if they actually pass their final year, and I only just passed: Liberal Arts. I guess I'll see what subjects I can pick, then see what sort of dead-end job I can get at the end of it all." He held up his bottle. "Huz-fucking-zah."

  No-one bothered to respond. He had refused to tell anyone his results, so they knew it had been bad, but now they knew he at least hadn't failed. Still, how could the Round Table have fallen so hard?

  Then:

  "English Literature." They all turned suddenly, and Francis almost jumped to his feet.

  "Chelsea!" he cried. "What brings you here?" His broad smile grew even wider as she grabbed him tight and kissed him loudly.

  "I did it!" she squealed happily. "I made it into uni, what I wanted, and it's all because of you!" She then looked around the table at the others, keeping a firm hold on Francis's hand. "So, I guess we'll all be at the same school again.

  "Huzzah!" Troy said with a partially forced smile.

  "Huzzah!" the others echoed, and the tone of the gathering changed markedly. False fronts were plastered onto each of them, trying to make this seem like a celebration and not the wake it had threatened to become. Glories of the future—what university might bring, what could happen beyond formal education—were not what they focused on; instead, talk drifted to high school reminiscences, of times when they had influence and success. They did not let a hint of their concern about the sudden and dramatic lack of power they all felt, especially with so many of them not living up to their personal expectations show; not the fact their lives were no longer in their control; not even that sudden feeling of helplessness—even within those who had achieved what they wanted thus far—sat incredibly uneasily on them all. They were about to go from the top of one of the best schools to bare beginners in a tertiary institution, many having, in their eyes, failed already. This terrified them.

  And all Chelsea's presence did was keep that fear bottled up and festering…

  Chapter Eighteen

  2012

  "Dad, are you going to tell me what the fuck is going on?" Nathan demanded.

  Francis just continued to drive, his hands clenching the steering wheel so tight his knuckles were white, not even telling his son off for swearing.

  Nathan shook his head and stared out the window, watching the cityscape slowly turn into suburbia. "This isn't the way home," he stated through a tight jaw. "You at least going to tell me where you're taking me?"

  Francis did not relax. "Yeah, you're staying at the Archer place for a few days."

  "What?" Nathan shook his head. "What about school? What about my friends? It's bad enough I can't play football, and you're all paranoid about everyone who's not one of your old mates, but I'm the school Captain, and I've already missed too much class time, and exams are…"

  "I know, I know!" Francis yelled suddenly, slapping his palms against the top of the wheel, jerking the car sideways. "I know," he repeated, "but we just want to keep all you kids together, just until we can work out what's going on." He paused briefly, debating with himself what he should say next, and decided that anything but honesty was going to catch him out. "The others really want you there. The way you've helped Chantelle, especially keeping your cool when that nurse… Look, you're probably the most 'with it' of the lot of them, and they all trust you."

  "But Chantelle's older. She's already at uni, and I'm just…"

  "Chantelle wants you there as well," Francis said quietly. "She's scared, mate, really scared."

  Nathan fell silent again. He didn't have an answer to that; he could not let Chantelle down. His body tensed up. Where had that thought come from? Yet, he had to admit, the idea of spending more time with Chantelle was quite pleasant. "So, me and Chantelle," he mused.

  "And Karyn Worthington and Allan Cornelius." Francis turned a corner carefully. "You need to keep a good eye on Allan. He's in a bad way. They're still not sure if Kristina's going to pull through."

  "So, why isn't he still in the hospital?" Nathan couldn't help but ask. "Didn't he shatter his pelvis or something?"

  "Broken, cracked, yeah, and he's all bandaged. They decided against a full cast. But, seriously, after what happened to Chantelle…" He let his voice drift off. "Nath, I'm really proud of you," he said, his voice cracking a little. "You didn't panic…" The younger man opened his mouth to protest. "Chantelle said you didn't panic," Francis corrected. "You just did what had to be done." He swallowed a sour, heavy lump rising in his throat. "I just wish I'd been like that when I was your age." He struggled to keep his emotions in check. "Then maybe none of this would be happening."

  "So, what's going on, dad? Tell me, please," Nathan begged suddenly, exasperation evident in his tone.

  "I wish I could." Francis sniffed back the tears that had finally broken free. "I really wish I could…"

  1991

  Francis could not bring himself to stand up.

  Chelsea was lying still in front of him, and all his friends were staring at him, and all he felt like doing was crawling into the earth and disappearing.

  This was not something he had ever, ever imagined facing. His future, everything he had worked so hard to achieve in his life, everything his family had wanted for him, it was all as dead as the girl before him.

  He finally risked casting a glance at his comrades. None could return his glare. None except Troy.

  The absolute fury on his face was unconcealed.

  Francis's own anger rose in response. "We've killed her," he hissed.

  "And all for nothing," Troy returned evenly.

  "What? Is that all you've got to say? It was for nothing? What does that even fucking mean? She's real, a person, not a…a…" He struggled for the right word, but it didn't come. "…a fucking thing!"

  "You don't understand." Troy's demeanor remained gruff and full of bile.

  "No. No, I fuckin don't." He stroked the girl's forehead, the skin cold and clammy. "Why did I…"

  "Hnuuh!"

  Chelsea's eyes shot open, and she inhaled a deep, throaty breath. She swallowed hard and tried to sit up but instead collapsed onto her back again, panting heavily.

  The worried expressions on the teenaged boys around her actually grew a little more concerned.

  Troy pulled out the book once more and surreptitiously opened it to a pre-marked page.

  But all the others could do was continue to stare with a mixture of relief and sheer, absolute terror.

  Chapter Nineteen

  2012

  Nathan was finding it rather difficult to concentrate as he typed the name into Google on the unfamiliar PC. Chantelle was sitting beside him, somehow sharing his chair while still sitting on her own, her head resting on his shoulder, her hair hanging down across the top of his chest, her hand gently cradling her aching stomach. He could feel her breath as a pleasant zephyr against his cheek and struggled to control his body, especially when her other hand came to rest on his upper thigh.

  The search results flashed up, diverting his attention. Almost a million hits. He wouldn't have thought "Chelsea Hartog" was that common a name.

  He took note of the very first one and started. It was a link to a Facebook page titled "20 Years Ago—Remembering Chelsea H
artog." He clicked on it, and both of them read the opening spiel: "20 years ago, on September 16th, 1991, my older sister Chelsea disappeared. No trace of her has ever been found. If you remember & still love Chelsea, please share this page." Almost a year had passed since the page had been created, they noted, but with over fifteen thousand "likes" and the latest comment coming only two days earlier, it was certainly not a dead page.

  On a whim, Nathan scrolled down the comments section, right to the bottom of the history, then slowly worked his way up. It took about five minutes, but he found what he had been sure—and yet fearful—that he would find: "September 16, 2011, 11:56 p.m: Francis Coulter. Still in our hearts. I'll never forget her. ☹' This was followed by an indication of sixty-three "likes" of what had been typed.

  The comment underneath, in response, was also telling: "September 17, 2011, 6:14 a.m.: Jasmine Desiderato. She really liked you, Franky. You were so good for her." Twelve "likes."

  There were several other comments about the apparent strong relationship that had existed between this missing girl and his father, then Chantelle stopped his hand. "That's dad," she stated, pointing at the screen.

  "Luke Bowman?"

  "He's a teacher, remember?" she explained. "He doesn't want any of his students to find him, troll him. Get him into trouble, whatever. So, you know—Archer, Bowman." She laughed, a musical sound that tingled pleasantly down Nathan's spine. "He thinks it's clever."

  "Parents, huh?" Nathan rolled his eyes, and this time, they both laughed and pressed their cheeks together. They parted slowly, in silence, and looked at one another, neither really smiling, their eyes fixed on the other's.

  Chantelle bridged the gap with the lightest of kisses on his mouth with her amazingly soft lips. When she drew back, her grin was wide but coy, and she settled her hand once more on his leg. It took him a few seconds to compose himself before he could even begin to refocus on the computer monitor. He found himself wondering at her timing more than the emotion behind the kiss and decided that it was most likely a coping mechanism. He found that thought actually a little upsetting; he guessed a part of him wanted to believe it was more than that.

  He shook his head clear; now was definitely not the time.

  He read on:

  "September 19, 2011, 8:01 p.m.: Luke Bowman. She was the best, mate. I just wish things could have worked out differently."

  "September 19, 2011, 9:41 p.m.: Jasmine Desiderato. Here here!"

  "September 19, 2011, 11:12 p.m.: Sophia Cuccitone. agree!"

  "Wow," Chantelle murmured. "This looks like she and your dad really had something special."

  "It does, doesn't it." Nathan suddenly felt he was prying into areas he shouldn't, but he couldn't help himself and could not stop.

  "Does it actually say what happened?" Chantelle asked, placing her hand over his on the mouse and closing the page down to once more bring up the Google search results. She quickly scrolled down, then went to the second page. "There," she said.

  Nathan nodded and opened up the year-old archived news article. "20 Years Later and Still No Closure for the Hartog Family," the headline read. The article featured a picture of a woman who looked very old, a man who could have been a contemporary of their fathers and who it took Nathan a few moments to realize was a teacher from his school, and an image they immediately recognized from the final year high school yearbook they had been shown. Both skimmed the article, then sat back, Chantelle pulling away so she could see Nathan's face.

  "Disappeared without a trace?" she whispered.

  "That's what it says." Nathan looked at the screen again. "Last seen walking through a park on her way home from university, no sign of her since." He went back to Google and clicked on the next news-looking link, this one from 2008. "Holy shit," he whispered.

  "What?" Chantelle was right against him again, but even the smell of her hair and feel of her skin did nothing for him as he highlighted a paragraph halfway down with the cursor. Chantelle read it out loud: "'The last persons known to have seen her alive were her close friend Francis Coulter and a classmate, Troy Washington. Even though Coulter admitted Washington and Chelsea argued, they were never seen as potential suspects according to police records.' Your dad was one of the last ones to see her alive?"

  "So it would seem." Nathan closed his eyes and controlled his breathing until Chantelle rested her hand over his, entwined their fingers. "You don't think dad was involved, do you?" he asked, his emotions bubbling so very close to the surface.

  "But she isn't missing, is she?" Chantelle looked at the photo on the screen, that gorgeous eighteen-year-old from so long ago. "I mean, we've seen her, haven't we?"

  "Yeah, we sure have." They stared at one another. That was true… they supposed. Wasn't it?

  Wasn't it?

  Nathan shook his head. Chantelle took both his hands. They did not understand what all of this meant. It went against everything they both accepted as reality, but…

  But it was there. Right there. Staring at them from a computer screen.

  What in the hell was going on?

  1991

  Francis walked into the half-full university tavern, bought a beer, downed most of it, and then joined the other members of the so-called Round Table in a corner booth. He sat heavily and looked around. "Where's Luke and Randolph?" he asked.

  "Randolph failed an essay and has until six this evening to resubmit," Sean said.

  "And Luke's been shifted to a different tute group, so he won't be here for another half hour or so," Julian added, leaning back, hands behind his head. He snorted a laugh with barely a touch of humor. "Uni's pretty different from high school, isn't it?" he sighed wistfully and sadly.

  "Different? Different? It's like two completely opposite worlds," Troy sneered. "I mean, they would never just change our classes in high school like that."

  "And since when did any of us ever fail anything?" Brandon growled. Troy looked away at that. "Hell, I got a low pass on my first writing assignment. Me!"

  "Maybe high school didn't really prepare us," Francis suggested, biting his tongue so he wouldn't make a comment about how few of them had achieved their first-choice university preferences. They had made assumptions, hadn't worked like they should have. And now he was judging his friends…

  "Or maybe we don't have enough power and influence here to help us through comfortably," Troy snarled.

  Francis groaned. "Come on, how is power and influence…" He made air quotes with his fingers over those three words. "…going to help us here? Hundreds and hundreds of students are here, and it looks to me like the only ones with any sort of power at all are the ones doing a Ph.D. or something like that." He shook his head and suppressed a wry smile. "That's just crappy high school shit that got us through high school by making sure we were left alone. Our test results, my Dux, they mean nothing. This is closer to real life. We have no real power or influence. Nothing. No under-grad does. No teenager does. No kid does…"

  "That annoying shit Jefferson Mulkahy does," Brandon growled.

  "Who?" Francis returned, the mind-numbing lecture he had just left fading into the background when faced with his complaining companions. His issues were minor; he almost laughed at himself for overreacting to one lousy, complex class.

  "A little shit doing journalism. You know, the full course, not a couple of subjects." Brandon rammed his beer into his mouth messily. "Transferred from arts after one week, got put into the tutes and stuff of his choice, got help with the first assignments, everything."

  "How'd he manage that?" Troy demanded.

  "Father is a professor or something in the med school," Brandon growled. "At least, that's what some of the other guys say."

  "So, surely there must be a way for people like us to get some sort of influence here as well," Sean mused.

  "Why?" Francis sighed.

  "We were the top students at one of the best schools in the state," Sean said incredulously, as though it was obvious.

&nbs
p; Francis again struggled to not mention the fact that most of them had bombed out in their exams and had not even featured in the top lists at the end of the year. They were really looking at things with a distorted self-view. He finally forced himself to mutter, "Yeah. So?"

  "What?" Troy's tone held anger and confusion, with distinctly more anger.

  "Why do we need influence?" Francis asked. "We are smart enough. All we need is to work hard and we'll end up where we want to be. It's that simple. A few years here being the plebs will probably do us a world of good."

  The rest fell silent, knowing he was absolutely correct, but none willing to admit it out loud, all of them missing the freedom and sort of power they felt they had been afforded in high school.

  "Can I join you guys?"

  They all looked up to be greeted by the beaming face of Chelsea. Francis slid across the seat a little so she could squeeze in beside him, draping one of her legs over his with casual abandon; his physical response was instantaneous, and she knew it. She placed a beer in front of him and her favorite gin and lemonade in front of herself. "Hi," he said, unable to hide his broad smile.

  "Hi, yourself," she returned seductively and kissed him on the cheek.

  "You seem to be in a particularly good mood." He smiled wider; the good mood was infectious, at least onto him.

  "I am." She sipped her drink and stared at him through the tops of her eyes.

  "Well?"

  "Remember that essay you helped me with, the one on the Brontë sisters?"

  "Sure, but you did most of the…"

  She shook her head so vigorously her long ponytail whipped across his shoulders, settling there like a golden scarf. "No," she stated firmly. "I could never have done it without you, not like I did."

  The others exchanged curious glances, feeling uncomfortable and excluded, but unwilling to move.

  "Okay. Fine," Francis said with an exaggerated sigh. "What about it?"

  "High distinction," she squealed and kissed him again. He slid his arm around her waist, and she let him pull her in closer.