First Offense

by Nancy Taylor Rosenberg

  “This is stupid,” Ann said in the kitchen some minutes later, scraping off the peanut butter and dumping the pan in the sink to soak. She’d take David for an ice cream instead.

  When she didn’t see him in the living room, she instantly panicked. Then she saw the VCR was empty. He must have walked to the comer to return the movie. She’d always allowed him to walk to the corner, but not tonight. Racing to the garage, Ann backed out the Jeep and sped down the street.

  There he was, just ambling along with a sack in his hands on his way back to the house. She slammed on the brakes. “Get in,” she yelled out the window, throwing the passenger door open. “I didn’t give you permission to leave the house.”

  “You’re not dressed. Mom,” David said, frowning as he opened the door and got into the passenger seat. Ann’s robe was open in the front, and her underwear was showing.

  Pulling the robe shut, Ann shouted, “Don’t leave the house again, you hear me?”

  David cowered in the comer. “I’m sorry. Mom,” he said. “You always let me walk to the video store. I just wanted to get another movie.”

  Ann pulled the car into the garage and just sat there, taking several deep breaths to calm her raging fear. “David,” she said, looking over at him, “someone broke into our house last night. I didn’t want to tell you, but you have to know.”

  Who?” he said, his mouth falling open in shock. “I don’t know who it was. Tommy thinks somebody’s just trying to scare me to keep me from testifying against him. It’s called intimidating a witness.”

  David’s body became rigid, and he got out of the car, slamming the door behind him. Ann followed him into the house, and they stopped in the kitchen together, facing each other. “Come here, honey,” Ann said, opening her arms.

  “No,” he said, shaking his head, his shoulders twitching and his face flushed. “I’m not a baby. I’m not scared. If anyone comes here again, I’ll beat him up. I won’t let anyone hurt you, Mom. No one’s gonna hurt you again.”

  Ann walked over and put her arms around her son, holding him tight. In a low and reassuring voice she said, “It’s okay to be afraid, David. Even I’m afraid. But everything’s going to be all right. No one’s going to hurt us.” Ann pulled back and smiled at him. “I almost killed the guy last night. I got my gun and shot at him. He was so scared, he crapped right in his pants. I mean it, right in the hall.” She paused, managing a chuckle. “Your mother’s pretty tough, you know. I’m not going to let anyone hurt us.”

  “You don’t have to say this stuff to me. I’m not afraid,” David lied, jerking away from his mother and heading to his room. “That’s why my window was broken out, right? And that’s why my book report was ruined, right? It wasn’t the tree like you said. Why don’t you just tell me the truth?”

  Ann followed her son down the hall, but he slammed his door in her face. She just stood there staring at it. Then she leaned her forehead against the wood and spoke through the door. “I’m not going to come in, okay?” she said softly. “I know you have to work this out yourself. But please believe me, David, everything is going to be all right. If things don’t get better soon, we’ll just pick up and move away somewhere.”

  A few moments later, the door opened and David looked out. “Can we really move away?”

  “I promise,” Ann said.

  “When?”

  “I don’t know exactly when, David. I’d have to get a job and find us a place to live.”

  “You’re not going to move. You’re just saying that, just like you said the tree broke the window.”

  When David got angry a vein stood out in his neck, exactly like his father. Every day her son looked and acted more like his father. When he slammed the door in her face again, Ann gave up trying to reason with him. She’d never been able to reason with her husband, so why would she think she could with his son? Walking to her room, down the same dark hall where she had been attacked, Ann felt a wave of depression she knew well by now. Just as before, someone had pulled a string, and her entire life had begun to unravel. She fell on the bed face first. Soon dark memories of the past were flooding her mind, against her will. Life hadn’t been that great with Hank. All those times he had exploded….

  One that was seared into her mind had happened when David was four months old and Ann was still employed at the police department as an officer. Walking out of the station late one night with her partner, she had been laughing at a joke the young officer had made when she suddenly saw something out of the corner of her eye. “Quick, Bobby,” she said, pulling the other officer behind a parked patrol unit. “Look,” she whispered, reaching for her gun as they crouched behind the car. “Someone’s hiding over there in the bushes.”

  “Shit,” the officer said, removing his own weapon from his holster as he dropped to his knees. “It’s a man. I can see his legs. He must have been waiting to ambush us.”

  Ann scooted over next to him. “Come out,” she yelled as loud as she could. “Come out or we’ll fire. If you have a weapon, throw it down on the ground. Keep your hands where we can see them.”

  When the man stepped out of the bushes, his arms over his head, Ann was flabbergasted. She was pointing her gun at her husband.

  Sending her bewildered partner on his way, she lit into Hank. “What in the hell were you doing? I almost shot you, for God’s sake. And Bobby thinks you’re nuts now, hiding in the bushes like an idiot.”

  Hank seized her roughly by the arms, practically lifting her off the ground. “You’re screwing him,” he growled like a rabid dog. “I won’t have my wife screwing some damn rookie.”

  Ann twisted away from him, appalled by the accusation. “I am not,” she screamed back. “What’s wrong with you? Bobby has a girlfriend. He’s my partner, Hank.”

  “I want you to quit the department,” he said, still panting. “I don’t want my wife working nights with strange men.”

  “Where’s David?” she asked, suddenly alarmed. You didn’t leave him home alone, did you?”

  He’s with the sitter,” Hank said, glaring at her. He would never neglect his child.

  Relieved, Ann looked around the parking lot and sighed. At least David was all right, she thought, and as far as she knew, no one had seen them. Most of the evening watch had already left for the night, and the graveyard watch was already on the street. Ann had stayed late with her partner to finish a report in the squad room, probably one of the reasons Hank had gone crazy. He insisted that she be home ten minutes after her shift ended—just enough time to drive to the house. Ann had let the time get away from her, and had forgotten to call.

  “I’m going home,” she said, turning to walk to her car.

  “I mean it, Ann,” Hank said, following behind her. “I don’t want you to work anymore. I want you to stay home where you belong. David needs you.”

  “I have to work,” Ann said flatly, still annoyed at his behavior. “You don’t make enough money to support us.”

  She saw the explosion coming, but there was nothing she could do to stop it. She hadn’t meant to say that to him. She was angry, and it had just slipped out. His face got inflamed, his mouth tightened. Then the arm went back. The next thing she knew, his eyes had rolled so far back in his head that all she could see was the white. She kept her eyes focused on him, refusing to duck, refusing to look away. There, Ann thought. It was almost over. The arm was whipping through the air. She braced herself for the impact.

  With a loud, sickening smack. Hank slapped her right across the face.

  “I dare you to say I don’t earn enough money to support my family!” For a moment his face went blank, as he realized what he had just done. Then the tirade continued. Pacing back and forth in front of Ann, he spat words at her like bullets, flailing his arms around. “I work night and day at that lousy fucking job. People spit on me, puke on me, and that’s not counting those that want to blow my frigging head off.” He stopped and caught his breath, then continued ranting. “Maybe I�
�ll just throw in the towel, walk away from the whole thing.”

  The longer Hank raged, the more agitated and out of control he got. “You can support me, huh? We already live in your father’s house. Why don’t you just support me, huh? You gonna support me, huh?”

  Ann was silent, her hand cupped over her mouth. It made her ill to see her husband this way. But she wouldn’t cry. She refused to cry. They had been down this road before, even gone to a family counselor. All day long on her job, Ann dealt with domestic violence, but at home she was still the victim.

  People didn’t understand, and she certainly couldn’t confide in their friends, since most of them were police officers. They all thought Ann and Hank were a perfect couple. They didn’t know the pressure her husband was under, how he hated the job, hated the hours, even claimed he hated half the highway patrolmen he worked with. He simply wasn’t meant for the profession. What he needed was a job without stress, a position that didn’t require him to deal with other people’s suffering.

  Ann saw her husband’s head lower as he rushed toward her again, the same look on his face as before, but this time he was moving fast, almost charging her, about to butt into her like a bull on a rampage.

  “Don’t hit me again. Hank,” Ann screamed, stepping sideways and ducking. “I won’t allow it. I’ll leave you…file for divorce.”

  He stopped and stood perfectly still.

  “Did you hear me. Hank?” Ann said. “If you ever hit me again, I’ll file for divorce.”

  “Divorce me,” Hank said, yelling back at her. “Just leave me. Go on and leave me. Everyone else in my life always leaves me.”

  Ann sat up in bed, her head pounding, her body damp with perspiration. Why had she let this memory surface? She wanted only the good memories. The bad times she had simply erased as if they had never occurred.

  After the first time her husband hit her, Ann had insisted they go to a family counselor. The therapist had told Ann her husband had unresolved conflicts, and the terrible truth had finally come out.

  When Hank was only a chubby little four-year-old, his parents, drifters and alcoholics, had been residing in South Dakota. For reasons Hank never uncovered, they had driven him out to a spot on the interstate in the dead of winter, told him to get out of the car, and then ordered him to hold on to the fence until they came back to get him. The temperature was below freezing. By the time the authorities rescued him. Hank’s fingers had frozen to the metal fence. For the first day or so, it was touch and go whether the child’s fingers would have to be amputated. But Hank had recovered from the physical injuries and was placed in foster care. He had been shuttled from one place to the other, never having a real home of his own. Finally, when he was in his teens, he was adopted by an elderly couple. They weren’t well off, but they tried to give Hank a decent home and love. It just wasn’t enough. They never located his parents, and Hank grew into a bitter and confused young man. According to the therapist, he had so much suppressed rage that he was a walking time bomb.

  In therapy. Hank was sullen and closed, refusing to deal with his tragic past. Finally he stopped going, and there was nothing Ann could do but try to understand and love him. With enough love, she told herself, Hank’s anger would one day subside.

  In his favor, the one thing Hank Carlisle had never stooped to, the one thing he knew Ann would simply not allow, was venting his anger on his son. It was one of the reasons Ann tolerated as much as she did. Whatever else Hank Carlisle was, he was an excellent father to David.

  How many times had Hank hit her? More times than she could remember. The incident in the house, the one he had wanted to buy her, had been a particularly brutal one. When she’d told him they couldn’t afford it, he’d knocked her to the ground. His attacks had gone on for a few years, until the night he threw a plate at her, cutting her forehead so badly she required seven stitches. That was the last. After that Ann had hit back. And when that didn’t stop him, she attacked. One night she struck her husband in the legs with a baseball bat when it looked like he was going to slug her. That had put an end to the outbursts.

  But ending the outbursts hadn’t ended the fear. Every day she had lived with it, never knowing when he would explode. By this time Tommy Reed had entered the picture. After one blowup he had spotted Ann with a black eye and had come unglued. Ann had covered for Hank—she told the detective she had walked into the bathroom door during the night. Tommy Reed, however, was an astute man. He knew Ann was lying. He also knew Hank had a vile and explosive temper, because he had seen it on numerous occasions with his own eyes. Several times Reed even tried to talk Ann into leaving. Other than the one instance when she had threatened to file for divorce, however, Ann had never seriously considered leaving her husband. How could she leave a man who had already suffered the ultimate injustice, rejection by his own parents? Underneath the tough-cop facade he presented to the world, her husband was still that little child on the freeway, still clinging desperately to the fence.

  Things improved for three or four years before Hank set his sights on getting promoted to lieutenant. If he could just get promoted, he kept telling Ann, then they would have enough money to move to a bigger house, maybe buy some new furniture or take a much-needed vacation. He studied and studied, sitting at the dining-room table far into the night, eventually scoring one of the highest grades ever on the lieutenant’s exam. Hank was certain he would make it.

  But he didn’t. Too many instances in his personnel file of excessive force, they said. Too many citizen’s complaints. Hank was devastated. In the months before he vanished, he didn’t make love to his wife. He didn’t socialize with his friends at the department. The only person he appeared to have any interest in at all was his son.

  The phone began ringing, stirring Ann from her thoughts.

  “Ann,” the voice said.

  “Yes?” she said, the phone still several inches from her ear.

  “Ann, why don’t you go get David so we can leave?”

  She gasped and gripped the phone with both hands. “Who is this?” It was Hank’s voice again. Her heart began hammering against her ribs. “Hank, is that you? Oh, God, Hank, don’t hang up on—”

  She heard a click and then the dial tone.

  “No,” Ann cried, throwing the receiver violently against the wall. “Don’t do this to me. You can’t do this to me.” She was so distraught that she couldn’t think. Digging her fingers into her temples, she tried to bring back the sound of the voice. Had she really heard it? Was she hallucinating again, suffering from sleep deprivation? What had he said? What were his exact words? But they were gone, nothing now but an echo floating around in her head.

  The one thing she distinctly remembered the voice saying was her son’s name.

  Chapter 16

  Sally Farrar was standing on the back porch, watching her children play, when she saw a red car pull into the driveway next door. She assumed they were the new tenants and looked away, not wanting to have to introduce herself and make small talk. Since the three boys had moved away, Sally had been plunged in depression, sitting and staring for hours on end, barely saying more than three or four words all day. Dishes were piled high in the sink, and she refused to wash them.

  The voyeurism had started so innocently. When Sally and her husband had first moved to Henderson Street, they found that the former occupants had covered the kitchen window with frilly curtains. Everyone on the block, Sally soon learned, had been gossiping about the boys and complained about them speeding up and down the street where there were so many children playing. Sally didn’t allow her children out in the front yard, so she wasn’t concerned. Besides, she was not into socializing with her neighbors. All her life people had picked on her for one reason or another: her clothes were weird, she was too skinny. She’d attended special education classes and the other kids called her a retard. People were cruel and malicious. Sally had learned to keep to herself and mind her own business. If you started poking into other
people’s lives, they would start poking into yours.

  One day she removed the kitchen curtains, and that evening, as she was washing dishes, she realized she could see directly into the master bedroom of the house next door. What she saw took her breath away. She saw young naked bodies, both male and female, the most beautiful bodies she had ever seen. And the sex…Sally knew things like this went on, but seeing it with her own eyes was shocking. Sometimes two of the boys would have sex with one girl at the same time. Sometimes there were girls having sex with each other, the boys watching while rock music blasted out the window. At first Sally was disgusted. The neighbors were right, she’d thought. These were evil, wicked boys, perverts and drug users. Sally wasn’t stupid. She knew they were using drugs. She saw them sniffing stuff up their noses, smelled bitter smoke she knew wasn’t from cigarettes, saw one boy with a pipe far too small for tobacco.

  But the disgust turned to fascination. She began to look forward to washing the dishes. Sally would position herself at the kitchen window, breathing shallowly in anticipation. She would fantasize that she herself was part of the exotic scenes she saw playing out only twenty feet away. Sex with her husband, a routine she had always thought more a chore than a pleasure, Sally now looked forward to all day, just as she looked forward to spying on the people next door through the window.

  Then the entertainment had all just stopped.

  She saw other things happening in the house next door. Strange things. Things Sally didn’t understand.

  Giving up on the window now that nothing was happening in the bedroom, Sally had taken to prowling outside the house next door after her husband was asleep. Even though the rest of the windows in the house were covered with blankets, some of them were still open for air, and sometimes she could hear what the boys were saying. There were arguments. She recognized the voice of the boy with the long dark hair. He was always rough with the girls, slapping them around in the bedroom, though the girls never seemed to mind.