Fear Has a Name: A Novel (The Crittendon Files)

by Creston Mapes

  It was the Devil knocking, see? He was right there. He was always right there. He was in Granger’s head. Granger could only do what was right for so long, and then …

  Hurry. Get going. Return the stuff before it’s too late. Before you change your mind. Before you start thinking and planning and dwelling on how to take her.

  There’d been a plan.

  It will be messy at first. I’ll have to take her by force. But she’ll get used to me. She’ll see I’m not going to hurt her. Then she’ll come around. She’ll love me again.

  He made his mind go blank; then he stood, folded the letter, walked it to the box, and slipped it inside. He taped the box shut and fetched his leather bag.

  “The spirit’s willing,” Mother would say, “but the flesh is weak.”

  Keep moving.

  Get your stuff in the bag.

  Get the box to Pam. Don’t think about her. Just deliver it and get away.

  Far away.

  Before you change your mind.

  16

  A calming breeze blew down on Pamela from the ceiling fan, and the smell of fresh-baked cookies drifted into the family room from the kitchen. The girls, in their oversized flowered aprons, had helped her bake several batches of oatmeal–chocolate chip cookies and were enjoying their bounty on the screened porch. They sat across from each other at a small table, sipping tea and, of course, wearing their long dresses, bonnets, and plastic high heels. She didn’t know how they could stand the heat, but they seemed content, gabbing like young marrieds.

  The girls were so enthralled in their conversation, Pamela didn’t think they even noticed when she meandered out and latched both screen doors. She was still in hyper-security mode and probably would be for a long time. At that moment, she hoped Granger’s apartment had been raided and he was in custody—above all, for the girls’ sake. How it would play out from there—if there would be a trial, whether Pamela would need to testify—was anybody’s guess.

  As usual on Sunday afternoons, Jack had fallen asleep long-ways at the foot of their king-size bed upstairs. They had made up sweetly and enjoyed some peace and quiet together before he drifted off. He’d listened as she explained everything there was to know about her history with Granger. She had a feeling, however, that Jack was a lot more understanding than he would have been if the police had not been on their way to apprehend the man.

  She put her bare feet up on the ottoman and opened the Sunday Dispatch. As always, she looked first for anything with Jack’s byline. This week he had a piece about parents who had lost one or more children to death. Seventy percent of those bereaved couples ended up getting divorced, the story read.

  Pamela loved Jack’s feature articles. As opposed to hard news like crime and politics, feature stories gave him the opportunity to be creative and showcase his emotions and sensitivity. The story she’d just finished was about Compassionate Friends, a national group of volunteers comprised of parents who’d lost children through death and helped others make it through similar grief.

  Pamela couldn’t fathom losing Faye or Rebecca. It was one of those unspokens she always tried to prepare herself for in the recesses of her mind, yet couldn’t imagine actually living through. She knew if it ever happened, it would be God’s plan. She knew that in head knowledge, but losing one of them would be earth shattering. Would she have the faith to endure such an ordeal? Part of her feared she wouldn’t be able to overcome the bitterness toward God that would surely come in the days after.

  If it happened, it would be meant for a purpose.

  But, oh, the suffering it would bring.

  You would be forced to deal with it. You would cope, because you would have to.

  But the constant wishing, longing, yearning for a smile, a kiss, a hug.

  Life would never be the same. You would live waiting for heaven.

  Did other people think about such things? Or was all of her fear simply a behavior she had learned from her mom? She thought about confronting her mother in hopes of finding out why Margaret was so afraid—was it a behavior her mother had learned from her parents?

  Pamela wanted more children; she envisioned them growing up, loving and encouraging each other, from childhood to adulthood. But maybe she wanted more, too, because she was afraid; afraid of losing one of them, or two. Afraid of what God might allow for whatever reason.

  The back door opened, and Rebecca led Faye in by the hand, both holding up their dresses, ankles wobbling on pink high heels.

  “Mommy, can we each have one more cookie?” Faye asked. “That will be all.”

  Sometimes Pamela was certain Rebecca put Faye up to such stunts, thinking Mommy would more readily say yes to the littler of the two. Sometimes Rebecca was right.

  “Por favor, señora?” Rebecca added in her most sophisticated tone.

  Pamela sat up, trying not to smile. “Two more, that’s it.”

  She began organizing various sections of newspaper, sorting out the ads and classifieds. She glanced at a front-page story about a thirty-seven-year-old family man who’d been beaten almost to death by two thugs the night before at a convenience store. He was clinging to life, and what kind of life he would have if he lived was yet to be seen.

  There were bad people out there. So many. All around.

  Granger Meade had become one of them.

  How Pamela wished she could turn back the hands of time and share with him the only thing that made her any different from him, or even different from her mother, for that matter, who was afraid to walk out her front door in the morning. It was the only thing that made anyone safe or unafraid or sane or somewhat stable in that chaotic world: a relationship with Jesus. Pamela was going in, in, in. Deeper inside the High Tower than she’d ever been. He was the creator of the universe. The one who gave the seas their boundaries, kept the snow in its storehouses, and told the lightning where to strike.

  She was safe with that kind of God.

  How could anything harm her in that place?

  But what if it did?

  What if he allowed it?

  She recalled the words of a song Jack loved. On the road marked with suffering, though there’s pain in the offering, blessed be your name.

  Could Pamela bless his name if tragedy struck?

  Bad things did happen, yes, to good people and bad. Scripture said that God caused the sun to rise on the evil and the good; he sent rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. In Proverbs it even said God made everything for its own purpose, even the wicked for the day of evil.

  Such mysteries were terribly difficult to reconcile. The innocent guy in the paper who’d been beaten—what about his wife, his children, his job, their future? What if he was brain-dead? What could possibly be the good in it? Was there good? The thousands of bereaved parents, all this stuff with Granger, why did any of it have to happen? How did people cope? What happened to their faith, or lack of it?

  Truly awful things did happen. People were shaken to the core. There was suffering. It was bizarre madness. How could one endure such trials?

  When I am weak, then I am made strong.

  That was the whole point; she couldn’t endure anything on her own. God wanted Pamela to purify herself of any hint of reliance upon herself. She’d come to think of it as an indelible knowing that God was in control—and she could trust him completely.

  A wellspring of emotion came up from her insides to her eyes and spilled over. She slid to her knees, swept the newspapers from the ottoman, and leaned on it, burying her face in her folded arms.

  “Lord, thank you,” she whispered. “Thank you so much. Blessed be your name.”

  Silence fell.

  Be still.

  The house was quiet.

  Then, there it was, out of nowhere.

  Pray for Granger.

  God had been doing things like that since she’d begun fasting—just bringing things into her mind.

  “You are so radical,” she whispered. “Your love was
so radical. So many hated you, but you gave your life. The least I can do is love Granger.”

  The word came like a hard, refreshing rain.

  Yes.

  “Then I lift him up to you. Have your way in Granger’s life. I’m not in charge, you are. This isn’t up to me … Your will be done. Draw him to you, Lord.”

  Perhaps God’s plan would be to save his soul in prison.

  “What you want, I want to want. Help me, Father. Help your desires become my desires.”

  A thump at the front door startled her.

  She stood and walked toward the door.

  There was something leaning at an angle against the vertical window beside the door. A package.

  It was a brown cardboard box the size of a shoe box.

  She got closer, thinking she would see the FedEx man or UPS lady heading back to the delivery truck, but then realized it was Sunday—no delivery.

  She stopped five feet from the door.

  Heading away from the house, almost to the street, was a large man, wearing black. He looked both ways, a bounce in his stride, wearing black. He quick-stepped around the back of a … brown car.

  “Jaaaack!” All of her energy and breath and strength drained from her with the scream. “It’s him!”

  Granger must’ve heard Pamela’s terror-ridden scream. He stopped, hand on the driver’s door handle, staring back at the house, back at the front door—as if peering into the depths of her soul.

  Can he see me?

  She wanted to step back, out of sight, but was frozen there in the foyer. She wanted to look at the box. Was it a bomb? A dead animal? What had he left? But she mustn’t take her eyes off of him.

  From upstairs she heard the blinds rip up, then the boom of Jack’s footsteps coming toward the top of the stairs. “Coming!”

  Outside, still at his car, Granger looked up at the master bedroom window where Jack had opened the blinds, then back at the front door. His big hands went up in the air, palms to the sky, and he shook his head and frowned.

  “Where’re the girls?” Jack barely hit a step as he plummeted down the staircase.

  “Back porch,” she managed.

  He fumbled with the big locks on the front door. “Get ’em inside. Lock it. Call the police.”

  “Jack, don’t go out there!” Pamela screamed, still seemingly stuck in concrete. “I’ll call DeVry. Come back.”

  The door banged open and swung back. Jack was tearing so fast toward the brown car, Pamela thought he might bulldoze the whole thing if it was still there by the time he made it to the end of the driveway.

  She locked the door, turned, and made for the back porch. The girls played on cluelessly, music blaring from a small boom box. Pamela stopped hard at the back door. They would be so scared if she rushed them in and locked the doors, exposing them to the fact that the “bad man” had returned.

  Maybe she should leave them out there, so they wouldn’t have to know.

  She changed course and went back toward the front door.

  Jack was on top of Granger, his knees pinning the large man down like a vise. Pamela’s whole body flushed as she saw a blur of white knuckles grasping, tearing, bashing; taut necks and faces; blood splattering and glistening in the sun.

  The girls would have to be okay where they were. She snatched the phone from the kitchen, grabbed Officer DeVry’s business card from the side of the refrigerator, and punched his number as she headed for the front door.

  17

  Jack cut loose punches to Granger’s stomach and face before he was lashed with a surprise left backhand that felt like a two-by-four. The blow laid Jack on the street, and before he had a chance to rebound, Granger’s damp body smothered him. His large fists twisted Jack’s collar until he was locked down.

  Jack maneuvered one of his arms around the creep’s enormous elbows and skimmed his forehead with a punch, but it didn’t faze him.

  “I don’t want to hurt you.” Granger was out of breath, pushing painfully harder on Jack’s chest and arms. Blood trickled down Granger’s puffy face from a gash beneath his eye. “I returned your stuff. I’m leaving—for good.”

  No, that wouldn’t do. He couldn’t let Granger haunt them anymore. Jack was the gatekeeper of the home sixty feet away, and his girls were in there. He arched and kicked and butted. They were both breathing like worn-out dogs. Suddenly Granger seemed to hoist an extra forty pounds he had been hiding onto Jack’s stomach and shoulders.

  “Just let me go,” Granger grunted from clenched teeth. “You’ll never see me again. I promise you.”

  “You’re gonna pay.” With all of the fury churning inside him, Jack loosened an elbow and jacked it toward Granger’s face. It cracked his nose, and his assailant’s eyes closed. He shook his head, conveying the oddest look of, what, humiliation? Blood dripped from his hooked nose, over his lip, onto Jack’s chest.

  “Don’t make me tie you up.” Granger twisted his knobby fists tighter, and Jack’s collar cut into his neck, making it difficult to breathe.

  “Leave him alone!” Pamela’s scream came from the front of the house. “Get out of here. The police are coming!”

  Granger’s posture straightened, his neck seemed to telescope three inches, and his wide head turned toward Pam’s voice. His mouth opened. His eyes enlarged. He drank her in.

  “We know who you are,” Pam called. “You won’t get away. Leave him alone.”

  “Those are your things.” Granger panted, nodding past Pam toward a box at the front door. “Everything’s there, Pamela.”

  Jack’s stomach soured when he heard his wife’s name come from the freak’s mouth.

  “Get out of here, now!” Pam said.

  “I’m trying.” Granger squeezed Jack’s collar. “He won’t give up.”

  “Let him leave, Jack.” Her voice was close now, within ten feet. “He won’t get far.”

  “Stay away, Pam!” Jack yelled. “Get inside!”

  “Granger, please, leave!” Pam barked.

  It made Jack boil even more that Pam addressed him by name and that she had to be the one to coax him off their property.

  “I’m sorry, Pamela.” Granger stared at her while riding Jack. “I never meant it to be like this. I … I wanted to talk to you, like we used to.”

  Pam finally came within Jack’s sight, arms crossed, clutching the cordless house phone in one hand.

  “It got out of control.” Granger’s voice broke, his face twisted, rows of lines deepened above his eyes. “Sometimes I …” His head dropped. “I would never hurt you.”

  “Good, now just go.” Pam pointed toward his car. “Jack, let him go!”

  Lying there beneath the strange, heavy body, Jack felt weak and incompetent, as if he was the outsider looking in on the love of his life and this … this stronger man who had once attracted Pam’s sympathy.

  “Okay, get outta here.” Jack allowed his body to go limp, but meanwhile alarms of rebellion screamed in his head and sent tremors throughout every fiber of his being.

  Let the pig think I’m giving up.

  Jack huffed, “We better never see you again.” He closed his eyes and inhaled deeply, feeling Granger’s grip release.

  Wait, just wait for the right moment. Be ready to explode …

  Granger grunted as he hoisted himself up and turned to face Pam. “I’m sorry for what I’ve put you through.” He wiped his sweaty, bloody face with the back of his thick wrist. “I won’t bother you anymore. Please, I hope you can forgive me.”

  With that, he repositioned one of his legs and looked as if he was going to walk toward his car. In that instant of shifting, Granger’s tree-trunk legs formed a perfect upside-down V almost directly over Jack’s right leg.

  From complete stillness to a blur, Jack thrust his right foot upward with all the adrenaline-laced venom he had been storing up since his home was invaded.

  With a dense thud, the kick landed squarely in Granger’s crotch. The air left him with a gru
nt and he bent over, his surprised face within three feet of Jack’s.

  Rolling onto his right shoulder to gain momentum, Jack exploded with a right fist to Granger’s face and nose, following through all the way to his left side. The blistering pain in the back of Jack’s hand told him the punch must have scored some damage, although Granger did not fall.

  Pam screamed and ran full out for the house.

  “You shouldn’t have done that.” Granger’s muffled voice came from behind one of his mitt-size hands that covered his bleeding nose and lip.

  Like a missile leaving earth, Jack propelled himself from the ground toward Granger, head lowered, with the intent of sticking him in the gut and driving him like a tackling sled into the side of the brown car.

  Jack made it to his target, but Granger only staggered backward a step or two. With surprising power, he bear-hugged Jack and slammed him into the parked car, bashing his lower back against the side mirror. Jack’s legs lost all strength, and he collapsed to the street, realizing that the wind had been knocked out of him. His head whirled.

  A glance at the house revealed that Pam had made it inside.

  Good.

  Rolling to his elbows and knees, Jack stopped and focused on breathing. Everything flipped to slow motion, and he saw Granger’s black boots approaching from the side.

  “Pamela.” Granger took a step toward the house. “I did not mean any harm.”

  The pain in Jack’s back was searing. He was dizzy. But he was catching his breath, trying to gather enough steam for one last burst.

  “You planned it all,” Pam yelled from the door. “How could you be so hurtful?”

  Jack realized she was trying to stall him till the cops arrived.

  “I’m messed up. I know that.” Granger’s boots moved another three steps toward her. “Sometimes I’m okay and other times … I do things I don’t want to.”

  “You need help, Granger,” Pam said. “Sit down where you are and wait for the police.”

  He laughed. “The police are going to help me?” He moved toward her again, wiping the blood from his mouth.

  “Don’t come any closer!” she screamed.