by Steven Novak
No matter what these angry, simple-minded oafs threw at him, they were not going to hurt him. They could not hurt him, because he was not going to allow it – not anymore.
The moment the burly thug threw another punch, Tommy ducked underneath it and wrapped his arms around the boy’s legs, tackling him to the ground. Like a snarling, angry dog, Tommy sat on the fallen boy’s chest, dropping punches to his arms, shoulders, and face. Nathan wrapped his arms around Tommy’s neck, pulling the manic boy off his teary-eyed cohort.
“Huh!? You think you’re some kind of tough guy weirdo!? Huh?! Is that what you think!? I’ll show you, loser! I’ll show you who’s tough!” Nathan screamed wildly, tightening the chokehold he had around Tommy’s neck.
Tommy tried to squirm free, but Nathan’s choke was deep, pressing against his throat. The burly-tough oaf had better positioning so no matter what attempts Tommy made to work his way out, he could not get free. A wet gurgle escaped Tommy’s mouth, a wad of frothy spit seeping from his lips. He was having trouble breathing, and struggling seemed to only make the choke tighter.
As his vision started to blur, just as his arms began to weaken, Nathan unexpectedly released his grip. Freed from the boy’s vice-like arms, Tommy’s legs gave way and he tumbled onto his hands and knees, trying to fill his lungs with much-needed air. As he regained control over his breathing he glanced over his shoulder, fully expecting to see Nathan laughing at his misfortune. What he saw was not the burly bully with the blond mop-top though – well, not entirely. This was something unexpected, quite different. Nathan was sitting in the grass, leaning back on one hand, rubbing the side of his obviously sore face with other. Looming like a great dark mountain over him, hands pulled into two massive fists, was Donald Rondage.
In a deep voice Donald growled, “Get the hell out of here before I tell your new buddies how you wet your bed until you were eight, Nathan.”
The comment obviously conjured up a deep embarrassment hidden somewhere inside Nathan’s belly. Nathan glanced at his cohorts to see if they had heard the comment. Furious at what Donald had just said, and more than a little frightened by the much larger brute, Nathan crawled to his feet, leaped onto his bicycle and sped away with his thugs following close behind.
“Thanks” Tommy said between coughs, pulling himself up.
“Whatever…that was as much for me as it was for you, loser. A guy’s out of town for a week and suddenly every idiot thinks they run the place. I needed to remind him who’s the boss, plain and simple.”
Turning away, Donald walked toward his bicycle, lying a few feet away in the grass. “I know that I’ve told you this before, but don’t go thinking that this means anything, weirdo…because it doesn’t. As far as I’m concerned that handshake never happened. It’s just like they say about Vegas…what happens in Fillagrou stays in Fillagrou, am I right?”
Moments later Donald was pedaling down the street in the opposite direction. Before turning the corner and heading out of sight, he yelled back once more. “You’re still a weirdo, Tommy!”
*
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CHAPTER 63
NEW BEGINNINGS
*
“Nicholas? Nicholas, you up there, buddy?” Ed Williamson called out from the foot of the stairs.
Getting no response, he sighed deeply and reluctantly made his way up the creaky stairwell, one hand sliding across the loose railing. The stairwell needed fixing. In fact the house in general needed work – needed a lot of work. Ed found that getting the things done that needed to get done simply was not as easy as it once was. Silently he wished that Nicky had answered him. It would have saved him a trip up the stairs which would, in turn, have saved him a series of painful knee aches later in the day. Over the last few years simply making his way upstairs felt more like scaling Mount Everest. Age was a funny thing that way – the more able you become to deal with life’s challenges, the fewer opportunities you are given to be a part of them.
“Nicholas? Where are you, pal?” he asked again as he reached the peak of the mountain.
Leaning on a windowsill, looking out across the Williamsons’ heavily wooded backyard, sat Nicky Jarvis. For over thirty minutes Nicky had remained in this position, completely lost in thought. The outside world had ceased to exist, long ago faded into a blurry softness both real and unreal. Foremost on his young mind had been the whereabouts of his older brother. When would Tommy arrive home? His detention had been over for some time. He should be back by now. Nicky worried about his brother a lot these days. The Williamsons were treating them good for the most part. Their life here was much simpler, much slower and vastly more stress-free. Despite the drastic change in their day-to-day lives, very little had changed about Tommy’s general demeanor and Nicky could not figure out why.
Behind him, the door to his bedroom opened and Mr. Williamson poked his head inside. “Hey, pal…did you not hear me calling?”
Awakened from his trance, Nicky turned to Ed, shaking his head gently. “No, sorry,” he answered quietly.
“No problem, bud. Hey, do you know if your brother is home yet?”
Again Nicky shook his head no.
Ed Williamson breathed deeply, removing his hat to wipe the sweat off his head which had accumulated after working an hour or so in the yard. Neither he nor Edna had been able to break through the older Jarvis’ boy’s armor. Nicky seemed to be transitioning to his life with them fairly easily - as well as could be expected, anyway. Tommy, though, proved stubborn, unwilling and possibly even incapable. Edna had often reminded him that it would take time, if it ever even happened at all. The boy had been through things that most children were lucky enough to avoid. The way Chris Jarvis had treated him - the things he did to him – were moments not easily forgotten. Some lives were harder to put behind than others. To ask either child to openly accept him and his wife without hesitation was asking a lot. In his heart Ed knew this, but the fact remained that he simply wanted to help.
The couple had lost their own son Jacob to cancer at such a young age – Tommy so resembled Jacob.
“Hey, I have to head into town to pick up a replacement part for the mower…wanna tag along?” Ed offered, quickly changing the subject.
Nicky turned his head to the window again. Still no sign of Tommy. His brother had recently taken to staying out late, sometimes not getting in until long after the sun had set. Nicky wondered if Tommy was visiting the tree fort. If he was, why had he not been invited to go along?
The boys barely spoke of the fort, or the stream, or anything that had happened in Tipoloo since returning. Despite an urge to sneak out of the house, dive into the stream, and visit his friends once again, Nicky had not gone back. Tommy had made him promise not to return, telling him that it was too dangerous and that King Walcott, Pleebo, Fellow and the others could handle things just fine without him. Nicky had grudgingly promised his brother that he would stay away; despite his urges, he was going to keep that promise.
“Well pal, what do you say? We’ve got to get going if we want to get back before dinner. Maybe we’ll spot your brother on the way…bring him home with us.”
Home – it sounded so strange. This was not his home. As nice as the Williamsons had been to him, as much as they tried to make him feel welcome, they were not his family, even if a part of him wished that they were.
“Sure.” Nicky answered with a slight smile, “What’s Edna making for dinner tonight anyway?”
“Heck if I know bud…I’ve been married to her for thirty-eight years now and I don’t think I’ve eaten the same thing twice. Whatever it is, I’m sure it’ll be delicious. You like Edna’s cooking, don’t you?”
Nicky paused for a moment, trying to come up with an appropriate response, “Umm…ya, sure…it’s great…it’s interesting.”
Ed’s voice cracked struggling to hold back his laughter, “Interesting…ya, you know what, that’s the perfect word for it…interesting.” After ruffling Nicky’s hair he added, “Head
down to the truck, bud…I’ll meet you there after I wash up.”
Making his way down the stairs and stepping into the crisp mid-afternoon air, Nicky reminded himself once again that these people were not his family and that this place was not his home and never would be. None of that mattered to him, though. The fact that it might be gone tomorrow was all the more reason to enjoy it while it lasted.
*
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CHAPTER 64
ACCEPTANCE, PUNISHMENT, AND CHANGE
*
Chris Jarvis had barely moved since his children were taken away from him a little over a month ago. It had been some time since he had been into work. He stopped answering the phone, stopped shaving and showering, and stopped doing anything that resembled living. Every time he stepped outside, he could feel the eyes of the neighborhood on him – furrowing into his soul and judging him. Eventually he had decided that it was simply less painful to stay inside, away from the steely cold stare of prying eyes and the achingly hot sting of judgmental thoughts. The bills were piling up, the electricity had been shut off for two days and he had probably been fired from his job. None of that mattered anymore.
In fact, very little mattered to Chris these days.
He had been ordered by the State to attend classes for abusive parents, as well as attending a separate class for alcoholism. Alcoholism. What a stupid word –so pompous, so finite – as if it could ever fully explain everything that had happened to him.
He failed to last in either class after the first meeting. This fact was probably going to result in the permanent removal of his children. They would never be allowed to come home. He would never see them again. Maybe it was better this way – certainly better for Tommy and Nicky – maybe even for him. Without Megan at his side, he had proven himself incapable of being a father.
From the mantle across the room, her photo sometimes spoke to him, “You’re no good to anyone.”
It was all she ever said. Over, and over, and over again – it was all she ever said.
The first two weeks after the boys had been taken away seemed a blur to Chris. His memories were whitewashed, smeared with a hazy, smoky film erasing the details, leaving only an uncomfortable fuzziness in its wake. There was no telling just how many bottoms of how many bottles he had reached in those fourteen days. He knew it was enough because puking his guts out three to four times a day was the routine rather than the exception. He had failed in nearly every way a person could fail and his failure had been put on display for all to see. This was shame at its most potent, a shame so bright it was displayed with a million neon lights on top of the tallest building in the world. Branded forever, with no idea of what to do next, Chris returned to the only thing he knew, and it, too, had beaten him.
At some point, the bottle had stopped working. A tolerance to its wonderful numbing agent had been built. Over the course of a day Chris went from feeling too much to feeling nothing at all. The drastic whiplash of emotions left him useless and mentally bloodied, like the victim of a car wreck. Left alone, unable to feel, or move –only to think – was Chris Jarvis’ ultimate nightmare. The days faded away, morphing into a single long, unending night. Shame and regret swallowed him entirely, shrouding his reality in something deep and black, extending to a point in the distance where time lost meaning. Sprawled out across his living room floor, in the dirt and grime that had accumulated over the past month, Chris Jarvis was a broken shell of the man he used to be.
From the mantle his wife still stared at him as she had for more hours than he wished to count. Many times he wanted to flip the picture frame over, smash it against the wall, or throw it into the fire. Despite the overwhelming urge, he never did. In his heart he knew that he needed her to see him, to watch him sink deeper, to tell him what a worthless nothing he had become. He needed her to stare at him, eyes overflowing with contempt and disgust. He had let her down – let his children down – let everyone down.
“You’re no good to anyone, you bum, you lowlife.”
She was right, every single word.
“You’re no good to anyone and you’ll never be again.”
She had always been his moral center, his guiding light.
“How could you do it? You’re no man at all; you’re a child, Chris…a child.”
She had always been there to pick him up, to dust him off and convince him to move forward.
“You have to make this right, Chris.”
So strong – she had always been so strong.
“Make this right, Chris…fix it. Make this better, or I swear I’ll never forgive you.”
God he missed her.
Awkwardly stumbling to his feet, his gangly, malnourished body resembling something out of a horror film, Chris dragged himself to the picture window on the opposite end of the room. Breathing heavily, a disgusting sheen of sweat dripping down his filthy face, he slowly opened the blinds. The light from the afternoon sun peeked through, hitting him in the eyes, making him squint. It patiently melted over him, seeping into every pore, warming his chilled flesh. Soon the entire living room was covered in its all-encompassing glow, bringing light once again to a home that had soaked in darkness for too many years. For the first time in his life, Chris Jarvis was truly ready to be judged. For the first time in a long time, he was ready to change.
*
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CHAPTER 65
FRIENDSHIP
*
Instead of returning to the Williamsons, Tommy walked across town, making the long trek to the tree fort. The entire trip took him almost thirty minutes but he did not care. It had been weeks since he was here, and maybe not so strangely, the lonely tree fort felt more like home than the Williamsons’ house ever would. By the time he arrived, the sun was beginning to set off in the distance. A beautiful mix of orange and red hues lit the sky, giving it a bizarre otherworldly feel. Were it not for the absence of two extra suns, Tommy could swear he was looking at a Fillagrou sky rather than his own. Scaling the rickety wooden ladder, he pulled himself into the fort and lay sprawled across the creaky floor, breathing deeply. The air was crisp with the slightly salty freshness that comes just before the onset of night. Outside the fort he could hear the slow, controlled chaos of the patiently moving stream. The soft rustle of the autumn leaves tumbling to the ground joined with the sound of moving water, creating a wonderfully rhythmic hum that lulled him to sleep.
The police had confiscated most of the drawings but Tommy had drawn more, taping them on the wall the last time he had been at the fort. The two new ones softly flapped in the breeze. Their corners were already beginning to curl due to the moisture in the air. Winter was approaching. Soon the snow would fall, blanketing everything in a blindingly clean white. Tommy was looking forward to winter.
Closing his eyes and clearing his mind, Tommy tried to enjoy the silence. He wanted it to soak into his skin, to slip through the tiny pockets in his muscles and meld forever with the bone underneath.
A soft, girlish voice sliced through the comfortable nothingness, waking him unexpectedly and dragging him back to reality. “Tommy?”
Sitting up, he looked around wearily, spotting Staci’s head sticking awkwardly through the hole in the floor. Her hair was pulled back tightly into a ponytail, her cheeks ever so slightly red from the night chill. The moment he saw her, Tommy smiled. It was not intentional, nor for any reason in particular – it just sort of happened.
“I knew I’d find you here sooner or later,” she said, pulling herself through the floor. “I’ve been sneaking down here every night for over a week hoping to find you. My mom would blow a major gasket if she knew where I was. You’re public enemy number one around the house these days…off limits, with threat of grounding.”
“And just why did you want to see me so badly?” Tommy responded with a bit of a chuckle and a sly smile.
Instantly catching on to what he was implying, Staci’s face turned a shade of deep red. Embarrassed, she rolled her eyes an
d a soft giggle escaped her mouth. She responded simply, “Shut up, Tommy Jarvis…”
Biting her lower lip, she turned away from him, making her way to the window “I just wanted to see you is all…you’re my friend, you big dork.”
Tommy stood and leisurely walked toward the window. Stepping beside her, he rested his elbows on the edge. Outside the sun was still visible over the distant row of trees
“So how are things with Old Lady Williamson?” Staci asked while leaning out the window, their shoulders just inches apart.
“It’s alright, I guess. Nicky likes her, I think…Mr. Williamson, too. The house has a weird smell, though.”
Staci chuckled, “Weird smell?”
“Ya, you know…old people smell. Like socks filled with cottage cheese or something.”
Staci’s chuckle changed into laughter and Tommy followed suit.
The giggling slowly faded away, as Staci playfully bumped into him. “You’re a weirdo sometimes, Tommy.”
“You’re the second person to tell me that today.”
Turning her gaze away from the setting sun, Staci glanced at the stream below. One could watch the movement of the water, with all its tiny variations, for hours and never once see it repeat itself. Beyond the dark murky water lay a whole other world. Despite having been there, despite having seen and felt its reality firsthand, the very idea that such a thing could exist still seemed unbelievable to her.