Living in Quiet Rage

by Michael English Bierwiler

  “Be careful not to let her get away,” he cautioned as he poured the furry prop into Rachel’s eager hands. The little puppy squirmed insistently. “Don’t squeeze her too tightly or you’ll hurt her,” the man prodded. Rachel loosened her grip. “You have to be very gentle with little puppies or they can’t breathe,” the man continued while pulling Rachel’s little fingers away from her hold.

  Suddenly, the frightened animal bolted from Rachel’s arms and ran to the alley. Doc tripped over the man’s outstretched calf as the puppy clawed past him and disappeared outside the umbrella of porch light.

  “Now look what you have done!” the stranger accused. Rachel and Doc were shocked and frightened. The puppy was gone and it seemed to be all Rachel’s fault for not keeping a good hold on her. Rachel immediately started crying while Doc followed his first reaction and got up to pursue the wayward canine to keep his sister out of trouble.

  The snow was still fresh enough in the dirt alley to track the puppy to the end of the street, but at that point the tracks ended where the traveled portion of the pavement and sidewalk began. Doc quickly decided to run to the right so he could have a clear look both ways down the larger residential street. There were still children out trick-or-treating, but no sign of the dog.

  Doc doubled back past the alley to the residential street at the other end of the block, but met with the same results. He was very frightened as he shuffled back up the alley to tell the man that the dog was gone. He was hoping the man would not be too angry at Rachel, and especially hoping that he would not tell Anna that her children were responsible for losing the pet for which the man had spent so much time searching that day. There was the possibility that the man would make them pay for the loss of his pet.

  Doc turned into the yard of the triplex near apartment B, but realized that he was in the wrong yard because Rachel and the man were not there. Doc walked up to the next triplex and was confused because the porch light was off and no one was there. Doc checked the next triplex but remembered that there was a screen door on the apartment he and Rachel were in front of when they met the man with the dog. Doc returned to the first triplex where he noted that the tub of cheap candy was still sitting in the light of the porch. His candy bag was not on the porch where he left it, but this had to be the right place after all which meant that the man and Rachel must have gone to look for the dog elsewhere.

  Doc felt a shiver up his spine that was independent of the chilly night. He was feeling very alone and frightened as he really wasn’t sure where he was in relation to home. In fact, he had no idea how to get home. His only thought was to find Rachel so the man could help them find Rose and Patty, or maybe even help them find their house if Rose and Patty had already gone home.

  Doc walked between the houses to the main street and looked both ways. Straggling children were still hitting the last houses for decadent goodies, but most had given in to the increasingly chilly weather and gone home to feast. He went back to the lighted porch and tub of cheap, hard candy to regroup. A piece of chocolate from his candy bag would have gone a long way in making him feel better, if only his candy bag was where he left it. Hopefully, Rachel remembered to pick up his bag, too.

  If only Rose and Patty and Rachel would suddenly appear from around the corner of the building so they could all go home and eat themselves sick on Halloween treats. Doc didn’t even mind if his loot had been lost because the girls would certainly share.

  Doc sloshed up the alley in the other direction, but discovered only tall dark wooden gates and fences until the alley opened up on the sidewalk and pavement. He had to decide whether to return to the porch or make a proactive search for the man and Rachel or Rose and Patty. He turned around to go back, but the dark alley with the tall dark fences seemed especially foreboding. Besides, this was Halloween and who knows what evil lurked?

  Doc walked to the streetlight on the corner and waited for a couple minutes before crossing the street. He called softly, “Rachel? Rose? Patty?” as he walked. At each intersection he waited a few seconds less before crossing, and his pace picked up to a run until he ran out of breath. He began chanting, “Rachel, Rose, Patty” to keep pace with his footsteps. The chanting grew louder to compete with his thumping heart until he came to the end of his six year old world.

  The final intersection was a ‘T’ where the residential street crossed a four-lane road with a turn lane. Across the street was Tyler’s Grocery with its broad, lighted, yet deserted parking lot in front and a service alley in back. Anna had taken him there in the car for grocery shopping a hundred times, but he was always busy looking at his comic books, fighting with Rachel, or daydreaming along the way, so he had no idea where his home was from there.

  From where Doc stood he could see a man unloading a truck onto the loading dock of the closed grocery. He could hear the growling hum of the big diesel engine impatiently waiting for its driver to set it loose from the dock. He felt threatened by the darkness between the houses, the impassable four-lane frontier, and the ominous noise of the diesel. Doc knew that his mother would be furious if he crossed the four-lane without Rose or Patty, so he doubled back, taking a new turn at every intersection to cover more ground and have a better chance of meeting up with Rose or Patty.

  The cold autumn wind made his eardrums hurt and the outer ridges of his ears alternated between tingling and numbness. Most of the porch lights were out now and no one else was braving the cold. Doc stopped in his tracks when his glance caught sight of a big brown and black dog two houses down eyeing him with angry concern. When the dog uttered his first bark, Doc screamed and turned on his heels, running as fast as he could into the nearest backyard.

  There was a tool shed near the alley with the door ajar, so Doc jerked it open and hopped inside. He stepped on a rake whose handle reported loudly against Doc’s forehead leaving a smarting, surging bruise. Doc pulled the door closed and hunkered down in the corner hoping the dog was not aware of his sanctuary. There was a canvas tarp on the floor, so Doc pulled it over his head and body, mainly for protection in case the dog got in, but in short order he was folded inside of it for the warmth it provided.

  Early morning daylight streaming in the single pane window of the tool shed woke Doc up. For a moment he was disoriented as he lay warm beneath the thick tarp. He knew that he was in trouble for not showing up at home last night and dreaded facing his mother. But the largest problem seemed immediate: where was he and how was he to get home? Doc shed the tarp and cautiously wobbled to the door. He cracked the door of the tool shed and peeked out to see if the brown and black dog was still standing guard.

  Apparently the beast had grown weary and left during the night. Doc wadded up his costume from the previous night into a jumbled bundle, sneaked out the door and disappeared out of sight behind the shed while he considered his next move. He was cold and hungry, but he felt that with a bit of effort he could find home.

  After a glance from his protected corner behind the shed, he quickly hustled past the house to the front sidewalk and began walking toward the sunrise. A police car was heading toward him from a block away, so Doc hid between two parked cars. It was bad enough that his mother might be angry with him, but an angry police officer would be truly daunting. The police car passed by and Doc began walking once again.

  Soon more cars and more people started their day and Doc began to blend in with other children heading off to school. Doc searched for a familiar face and began to tag along in the general direction of the rest of the kids knowing that eventually he would reach a school. If he was lucky, it would be his own Meriwether Lewis Elementary and he could find his way home from there.

  Before he realized what was happening, a familiar red and white Chevy Blazer screeched to a stop on the street next to him. With a thunderous slam of the driver’s door, John Scott sprinted over to sweep Doc off his six-year old feet in a bear clench that never seemed to end. John had been scouting the neighborhood all night in the slight hope th
at Doc and Rachel would eventually show up while Anna kept vigil at the house.

  “Where is Rachel?” John asked with unrestrained joy as Doc reveled in the force of the hug while his legs dangled a foot off the ground, swaying from side to side with the rush of John’s emotions. The swaying slowed and came to an uncertain stop as the enthusiasm drained away like the ebb of a wave on the beach. “Where is Rachel, Doc?” John repeated in an emotionless tone so that his voice would not betray him by telegraphing his own surge of panic.

  John increased his grip on Doc as if an unseen force was pulling the little child away. “Where did you last see her, Doc?” Doc began to tell John about the man and the puppy and how Rachel had accidentally let the puppy loose.

  Doc’s feet never touched the ground as John Scott buckled him into the passenger seat of the truck and peeled off toward home and Anna and Rose and Patty. All Doc knew was that the overwhelming elation of being found had collapsed, but he didn’t understand the full import of why John Scott was asking him where he had last seen Rachel. If Doc had been found, it would not be long before Rachel would turn up also.

  Doc looked over at the bouncing needles of the speedometer and tachometer as John jerked the old Blazer back home. Although he was belted in, his little body was contorted in one direction and then another as John executed his stops and turns. When John turned into the driveway, he slammed the transmission into park and yanked the keys out of the ignition, then froze.

  John was suddenly gripped by the anxiety of having to break the news to Anna that the children had separated and only one had been recovered. His mind was sharpening on the full impact of Rachel left alone with the stranger at the triplex. Only his eyes moved in Doc’s direction at first, quietly misting in fear. Then his entire head turned almost imperceptibly until his full, wet face was centered on Doc’s apprehensive stare.

  Doc was startled when he heard the click of John’s seat belt unfastening and realized that John had looked away. His own door swung open and he was in immediately locked in Anna’s embracing arms.

  “I’m sorry, Anna,” John stammered. “I’ve only got Doc.” Doc was confused. Minutes ago he was swinging in John’s exuberant hug and just as suddenly he was booted from the center of attention because Rachel was not with him. Rachel’s time to be loved and hugged would come soon enough without eclipsing his time in the spotlight Doc pouted to himself.

  It was reassuring when John came around to the passenger side of the Blazer and lifted him out. Doc began to drift off to sleep soon after John carried him in the house.

  “Doc, my name is Detective Knox. Can you wake up and talk to me?” a gentle female voice interfered. Doc was snug on John’s shoulder in the living room and didn’t want to open his eyes. John set him down gently on the tan leather recliner.

  “Doc, I need to ask you some questions about the man you and Rachel talked to.” Doc ventured opening his eyes slightly to size up the stranger. She was old enough to be his kindergarten teacher, yet quite a bit younger than Anna. Doc responded as best he could, but Detective Knox could only piece together a description of a generic male of uncertain height, weight and age. Doc was tired and scared. He cried with each succeeding question until she realized that Doc had no viable information for her case.

  “There’s not much to go on, Mrs. Scott,” Detective Knox confessed to Anna. “We’ll keep looking, we’ll get her picture out to the media, and we’ll rattle a few cages to see if anybody has heard anything on the street.” The detective knew that she sounded like a second rate television cop.

  “It’s not looking good, is it?” Anna interrupted.

  Detective Knox tried her best to look Anna in the face without betraying the truth. “We’re not giving up, Mrs. Scott. Somebody out there must know where she is. We’ll find her. I promise.”

  As soon as the words left her lips, Detective Knox regretted saying them. She knew better than to make a promise, especially one that she suspected she might never keep. The golden hour in which children were found safe was history and they were half-way through the first twenty-four hours. Detective Knox consoled herself by making a solemn silent vow that the case would never become inactive while she was on the job unless it resolved itself for better or for worse.

  Over the years Detective Knox came by to talk with Anna, bringing a picture or a sheaf of reports, but the visits became more and more infrequent and she never questioned Doc again. Anna sometimes broached the subject when she and Doc were alone, but never pressed enough to make him cry again. However, just like Bill Senior, Rachel never returned home.

  The years went by. The shadow of Rachel was always among them, but the family had an unwritten compromise in which blame was never verbally expressed. Rose barely graduated from high school and moved out with a friend. Two years later Patty dropped out in her senior year and joined them to share the apartment expenses.

  Anna loved her daughters, but the separation was in some ways a blessing. The girls had never forgiven themselves for their lapse of judgment the night Rachel disappeared, and Anna had to struggle each day to forget that it would not have happened if only...

  None of the family held Doc responsible since he had only been six and a half, but he was haunted by the fact that he left Rachel alone while he ran off to chase the dog. At the critical moment he made the choice which left his beloved sister in the jaws of a demon.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Doc was in junior high when Patty moved in with Rose and another friend. From that point on he felt that he had to bear the silent burden of blame alone. Doc hated the way he had grown to feel on Rachel’s birthday. She would have been fifteen that year, but Doc could never imagine her being any older than on that last Halloween night. On a certain level Doc was angry with Rachel because this awful event cast a pall on his entire life, yet he still felt an aching as if he were a twin and she had been a mirror image who dissipated into thin air.

  Although Anna and John accomplished a semblance of a normal life since Rachel’s disappearance, her birthday and Halloween always overshadowed the household. Every year Anna would hide away in the bedroom and spend the free part of her day unpacking, treasuring and repacking Rachel’s photographs, toys, books and stuffed animals along with her favorite clothes. At the end of the night the boxes went back into the recesses of the master bedroom closet until the next time.

  Anna realized how much wear and tear the emotions of these painful holidays inflicted upon her remaining family and insisted on a father and son getaway to Grizzly Ranch in the mountains outside Coeur d’Alene for the weekend coinciding with Rachel’s fifteenth birthday.

  Coeur d’Alene was a few hours east of Spokane on Interstate 90 in the string of Rocky Mountains that ran the length of Idaho. The city was a namesake of the great, cold Lake Coeur d’Alene which was arguably one of the most beautiful lakes in the world.

  Civilization had impinged on the massive green forests and majestic mountains in the form of a city by the lakeshore, but the immensity of the remaining frontier dwarfed the incursion of rugged Americans.

  Grizzly Ranch was actually a cross between a guesthouse, a dude ranch, and an old motel located just off Blackhorse Bay campground which serviced those hardy folks who could survive without television and electricity during the night. Doc’s initial enthusiasm waned a bit when he found out that the ‘ranch’ had no horses, but anything was better than spending a weekend drowning in the suffering of Rachel’s shadow at home.

  John Scott was raised in Coeur d’Alene. Although he was an only child and his parents were no longer alive to welcome him, John was feeling right at home in the safety of his lake and mountains. Over the decades nothing really changed in the grand scheme of life in Coeur d’Alene.

  By the time John and Doc drove into the compound of Grizzly Ranch, the full moon had furnished its translucent reflection on every feature of the landscape and the deep cobalt sky set the background for a riot of stars. John and Doc grabbed their rucksacks from the
back of the red and white Blazer. As John slammed the tailgate down, he became sidetracked by the heavenly program unfolding above him.

  Doc waited patiently at the side of the truck and could not help but feel the power of nature as he stared at the sea of darkness above him. As a city boy, he was only used to the pale night sky inflamed by the reflected glow of streetlights and indigenous urban illumination. This was so different – so clear and bright with the Milky Way path stretching from one mountaintop, over his head, to the mountain range on the other side of the night sky. The stars were truly without number. In Idaho one could actually compare the range of intensities of each star from the dimmest glimmer to the proudest stance of the stars framing the constellations.

  John started moving again, sauntering up to the wooden-planked porch and yanked on the heavy wooden door to the lobby.

  The old man behind the counter stuck out his weathered hand as soon as he looked up to see John. “It’s been way too long, John. So sorry to hear about your folks. They were good people. And this must be your little one.”

  Doc had a sudden flash of spending a weekend in the woods with a bunch of old fogies. Doc was five foot ten - what exactly did the old man consider the dividing line between ‘your little one’ and a full-grown man? Doc was too fatigued from the long drive to take umbrage tonight, however. John was handed the key to number four, the best room in the place.

  Doc knew that the buildup to the best room in the place meant very little when John unlocked the door and Doc discovered ‘best’ was a relative term when comparing the room to the shambles that the rest of the ranch was apparently in. Doc claimed the bed next to the window and unpacked his toothbrush, toothpaste and his shorts to sleep in. Then he looked around in confusion. There was the door to the hall, the door to the closet.