by Gary Sapp
been struck right then. Pandora would have crushed a House in Chains 30 years ago.” Serena’s tone almost became apologetic. “I won’t repeat his mistake here. There is so much more at stake now. There is so much more than you will ever realize. I don’t want have to summon up the Whirlwind.
Louis gave up his argument…for now. “As you’ve said before, I’ve passed every test so far. And as I’ve said before, I won’t fail you.”
“You’ve succeeded on so many levels, already, Louis. Look at this place: We’ve engineered this compound based on the specifications of models and designs of your ideas. You chose the location. It’s a brilliant sanctuary.” Serena said. “You should remain undisturbed from outside forces while you continue your work here. No one will find this location.”
“That is why Moses role is so critical. The others must not attempt to escape. It’s at least ten miles in any direction towards civilization once you leave this compound. Death awaits them outside these grounds. I need them to remain safe and secluded long after your people leave us after this Whirlwind of yours takes hold. That is why Moses is so important. I don’t care what they think about me if they trust Moses, it improves their chances of survival.”
Serena smiled at him.
And just as suddenly he began to tear up before the smile faded…possibly forever. Serena flashed him a look of mild concern. He began to feel a trembling in his shoulders…and when she reached for him, he shied away from her touch. We are so weak and pathetic.
“What is it, Louis?” She asked him. “What’s wrong?”
Louis got himself together and said: “For a moment, when you smiled, your facial expression reminded me of my mother.”
“Really,” Serena’s new expression showed that she was trapped somewhere between fascination and annoyance. No woman in her 40’s, no matter how hard, wants to be compared to nearly 60 year old man’s mother. “Why do you say this?”
“It’s just a look, a facial expression.” Louis said again. “My mother loved me, Serena, of this I have no doubt, but her approval was often difficult to come by. Yet, every so often I would complete a task that pleased her.”
Serena took a step closer. She was the leader of Pandora which meant that she knew all of Louis Keaton’s dirty little secrets. If she didn’t know every detail she had to be aware of the overtures of his life.
“Louis,” She said, “Why did you mother allow her brother to molest you?”
So the Dragon Woman does not see and know all. Yet, it was a straightforward enough question. It was one that he knew that this woman and her methodical nature would bring up time and again so why not answer her now. Leave us alone, bitch. Hugh fought reliving this tale again. It was his tale for the most part after all, Louis only had a secondary role…and it came a little later.
“I don’t have a simple explanation for it. I’m sure you studied Dr. Angel Hicks-Dupree’s notes.”
“I have at that. Her notes inform me of how your situation concluded. I’ve never understood how your life evolved before that point. But this isn’t mere curiosity on my part. I want to compete all the work that all of your past doctors, including Angel, who treated you. I want to help you.”
No…you want to manipulate us into completing you bidding, you bitch.
“My mother and I were very poor. She had me when she was 15.We traveled from place to place around western Tennessee, Missouri and Arkansas never staying in one residence or place for very long. Mom was a border line alcoholic. Either the booze, or showing up late because of the boozing, or not having adequate transportation cost her job after job.” Louis was amazed at how it still broke his heart to tell this tale of yesterday. “After many struggles my mother took to shacking up with anyone who would take us in. Like I said, Serena, we were very poor. She didn’t have much to offer anyone who we lived with.”
“So your mother sold her sex to these men to keep a roof over both of your heads.” Serena looked as if she would be ill.
“Yes.”
“Go on, Louis, tell me the rest.”
Louis exhaled deeply. “A few of the men were pleasant enough. I remember that one or two of them actually treated me with some kindness. They’d take me hunting or fishing or would play baseball with me during the summer months.”
“Did any of them touch you?”
“No.” Louis said and thought that his revelation surprised her. “It wasn’t like that at all…and my mother satisfied their needs well enough.”
“What went wrong?”
“Like I’ve told you, I was treated well for the most part by all these different men.” He felt his teeth chattering. “Mom wasn’t so fortunate. Several of these men slapped her around pretty good. One man in particular was brutal to her. Every three or four days I would walk home from school and see fresh bruises on her face or arms or on her back. She was a strong woman who rarely showed emotion, even during those difficult times. But there were a couple times that I saw her emotionally break down. I would get angry enough to launch myself at these men and fight them. But I was always too little…to weak and pathetic.”
“And this Uncle of yours,” Serena wanted to get to the desert without eating the entire meal first. “What finally led you to her brother’s place?”
Louis swallowed hard. “We moved in with him just before school started when things went very badly at our previous place. My mom spent three weeks in a county hospital after our last landlord split her head open with a wrench over his dinner being burned.”
“Bless the Dragon’s flames.”
“My Uncle reluctantly took us in. Mom was so happy to be back in her childhood home of Memphis, Tennessee however. And she had learned her lessons about the boozing. She quit drinking and found a job…a good job a few weeks later. The jobsite was actually within walking distance of my Uncle’s place. Life was good for a while. I even made a friend. Up into that point, he was the most important person ever to come into my life.”
“And then,”
“My Uncle learned what Mom was making down at the factory. He kept raising the cost of our rent until he nearly broke her.” Louis said with bitterness. “Mom finally told him that she had nothing else to offer him but he disagreed. He kept gawking at me with a wide grin on his grill when he said this.”
Serena wrinkled her nose. “He asked for you as payment.”
“That’s what he told her. That’s what he demanded.”
“And your mother just…gave you to him.” Serena’s disgusted tone had returned in full glory. “She gave you up just like that.”
Waterfalls of tears fell from the ocean blues of Louis Keaton’s eyes. “Don’t you judge her.” He pointed his finger at her as he did when he learned actual children of color were in the Andrew Young Center when he detonated the bomb that took so many lives weeks ago now. He did not retract it this time however. “What other choice did she have? She was making good money, but not enough to afford the high priced housing near the plant. Her earlier boozing had cost her any chance of being issued a license to drive ever again. This job was a good one. And she was trying to save for a place of our own, but my Uncle’s pillaging of her wages spoiled that—“
“What kind of woman willingly gives her child to a pedophile?”
And so Louis grabbed Serena.
He had her throat in his grip before his conscious mind realized it. He slammed her head against the wall and heard her men enter the area locking their weapons on him. We told you your time was coming bitch. We told you. He’d made such a terrible mistake, but there was no way of backing out of this now. He’d let himself down. But more importantly, he let those two boys down…especially Moses Jackson. Right after Serena’s men disposed of him; they would kill both of those boys before his body even cooled.
Serena tried to unhand his fierce grip on her long neck and throat with one hand, while waving her men…away with the other.
“Stand down,” She somehow managed. “Everything…is…under control, isn’t it, Louis?
”
Louis peered back and forward from Serena Tennyson in his grip, to the four semi-automatic weapons trained at his skull, to the room where the two boys were being secured.
He loosened his grip on her neck and said, “My mom had taken care of the two of us long enough, Serena.” He continued his story as if it had never been interrupted. “It was simply my turn is all. She could keep her job at the plant. I could stay in a school that I liked. And I could keep my special friend.”
He released Serena completely and waited on her men to kill him where he stood. Again, Serena waved them off while she coughed and struggled to catch her breath again. She seemed to get her equilibrium under her at last. Still, Louis began to countdown how many second he had left in his life. He had always heard that people saw flashes of light before they died.
Louis was seeing numbers.
“What did your mother do…while…this payment went on?” Serena said returning to full height. She straightened out her suit. “What did she do when you Uncle molested you?”
Louis Keaton’s tears fell readily now. “She made him do it when she was home. I don’t know, maybe she felt as if she could monitor it somehow. We never talked about it.” Louis paused for a long time and wiped his tears away. “But I do remember that between my uncle’s bouts of heavy breathing and grunting that I could hear my Mom’s cries that were so loud that it would often drown out my