by Nye, Laine
They all laughed as the tension in the room began to evaporate. "Did Sherry act the same way that her father just did" Kate asked Brad.
Brad nodded, tipping his head to the right. "Yeah...Seems pretty much the same to me,” he answered thoughtfully. "She was just as belligerent as he is."
"Well then, I just lost whatever sympathy I was having for her when I told you about betraying her," she stated.
Suddenly a loud crashing at the door brought their eyes back to the door. The door was slammed into a second time. Steve went back to the door to look through the peephole and saw Mack on the porch slamming his shoulder and hip into the door. The door frame was beginning to give under his strength and weight. Every two seconds, the door was slammed again. The door was warping momentarily from each blow, and the bolt lock was started to get pushed out of the frame.
At the two second mark, Steve unbolted and jerked the door open. Mack's headlong assault threw him into the room with his feet tripping on the threshold. He hit the floor hard face down and before he could roll over, Steve was on him and had him in a choke hold.
“Now, listen good you overgrown snot nosed wimp!” Steve said through gritted teeth. “You can leave my house unconscious or you can just get up and leave. But things are about to get rough for you if you don't get off my property! What's it going to be?”
“I'll leave. But this isn't over,” Mack said through a partially closed throat.
“Well, if it's not over, then I might as well finish it right now!” Steve retorted. “Mack you can't win! Just let it go. Brad will stay as far away from your daughter as humanly possible but you need to let it go.”
Mack started to slowly get off the floor in a non-threatening manner, and Steve let go of him. He stood back ready for anything. But Mack backed out of the door and began shutting it while he spoke. “It's not over Shaw. I'll leave but it is a long way from over!”
The door slammed shut. The house was quiet as the effects of the second attempted assault against them weighed heavily upon them.
“Stay away from her Brad.” His father warned, “I mean it!”
“I will dad.” He said emphatically, “After what I have seen from her and her father tonight, I don't want anything else to do with her.”
“And don't tell anyone else about your abilities,” Kate told her son.
“I won't Mom. I promise.”
A few minutes later, there was a knock at their door again.
“You know. It's getting real late for us to keep having visitors. Who is it this time? Avon?” Steve complained.
He looked through the peephole and saw a man dressed in a policeman’s uniform on his porch. He opened the door and there stood Officer Sherman Greene with a hateful expression on his face.
“Good evening Steve. It's been a long time since we've met.”
“Did you think it has been too long?” asked a now very perturbed Steve. “I didn't think it was nearly long enough.”
“Well, I wouldn't have come by to bother you at this time of night except for the little matter of an assault charge against you. I'm going to have to take you in Shaw.”
He was already pulling his cuffs off his belt when he said this. Steve looked down at the cuffs and back up at Greene. “They won't fit me,” he said.
“And why not?” Asked the officer.
“Because you will never get them on my wrists. I won't allow it. Instead, we need to talk about what really happened tonight.”
“Turn around Mister Shaw. I'm going to frisk you.”
“No thanks Sherm, I'm not feeling frisky tonight.”
“Listen, Steve. I have a man outside on your lawn who is ready to press full charges against you. You will allow me to search and cuff you.”
“You get that man off my property!” Steve yelled. “He is not welcome here. Get him out of here now!”
“Turn around Steve and put your hands against the wall over your head,” Greene ordered.
“No Shermy, I don't think so. You come over here and look at my door jamb where that brute out there tried to break down my door. Come look Shermy and see what the idiot did. Don't tell me I don't have a right to defend myself and my family.”
“He's right Officer Greene.” Kate said as she came into the entryway with a dead serious expression. Mr. Rowley came here and forced his way into our house twice. My husband merely defended family and property.”
Sherman Greene looked at her. Then without responding to her, he looked back at Steve. Did you call an officer of the law a disrespectful name? Shermy?”
“Not at all. It was all the respect I could muster at the time,” Steve retorted. “Officer Sherman, look at this door and you can see the obvious damage that was done until I stopped Mack!”
Finally, Greene stepped over to the door and saw the damage.
“Don't come to my home trying to arrest me for stopping this creep from attacking me and my family. I had every right to protect us! Now you see the evidence and you have three of us who will tell you the same story about Mack's home invasion, twice! And it leaves you with little reason to be threatening me with cuffs. No matter how much you hate me, you cannot win this in court. I will pursue you for false arrest charges.”
Officer Greene wasn't as comfortable or confident as he had initially been. He had thought he could finally get revenge on his high school nemesis by using the law against him, but it wasn't looking like a good idea now. He said, “If you two get into it again, I'll have you both arrested, no matter what.”
“Yes, sir,” Steve said saluting him. “No more trouble from this end, I promise. Now get him off my property and tell him he can never return or he'll be arrested for trespassing.”
Sherman stared long and hard at Steve before starting to leave the doorway. “He says you used martial arts on him,” Sherman Greene said to Steve. “I'd sure like to see you try that on me.”
“No. You wouldn't,” Steve responded. Then he shut the door. Turning to his family he said, “We'll all have to be really careful of our surroundings now and watch who is around. We don't know where or how or who could give us trouble.”
“I'm sorry Dad. I had no idea how much trouble I could bring down on us,” Brad told them dejectedly.
“You are young Brad, and prone to do things that are not well thought out at times. We all had that curse when we were your age. We don't like what you have done, but we understand.” His father counseled him. “You still have school in the morning, so go get some sleep if you can.”
“Good night Mom. Goodnight Dad,” Brad said and went to his bedroom.
Outside, Officer Sherman Greene and Mack Rowley were talking quietly in the street. “Why didn't you arrest him?” Mack asked.
“Because you left evidence showing that you were trying to break into the home, you are the one I should arrest,” Greene told him. “There is nothing I would have liked more than to run him in tonight, but your actions made it impossible. If you had called before you tore up his door, I could have taken him in.”
“Officer, I know you are having a hard time believing what I told you about his kid with my daughter, but my son Jeff, who is Brad's good friend, backed her story a hundred percent. I called Jeff at home on my way over here. You have got to do something about this kid. He hurt my daughter in a reckless manner. He is dangerous for his friends to be around.”
“Maybe so. We'll keep an eye on him, and if he pulls something like you said again, we'll nail him for reckless endangerment.” Greene assured him.
“Nail him now!”
“Look, your daughter has no proof of what she said happened. If I go interview the kid, and what you say is true, do you think that kid will tell me the truth? No. he would deny it. I want to hand Steve's head to you along with the kid, but I cannot do it.”
“Why is there bad blood between you and his father anyway?” Asked Mack. “How long have you known him?”
“He once cold cocked me in high school when I wasn't looking.
>
The coward deserved to be arrested, but you blew it for me.”
Well, he knows how to fight. No doubt of that. If Brad messes with my kids again, I want you ready to arrest him!” Mack demanded.
“Don't worry about that. I am on your side. Even if I do find your daughter's claims to be a little outrageous, I will still help you all I can.” Greene assured him.
“Well I believe her. If my oldest son Dan gets a hold of Shaw's kid, he will make him regret having survived birth,” Mack told him.
“He can hogtie him hanging from a tree and beat him with a 2 by 4 for all I care. Just make sure Dan is at least 50 feet outside my jurisdiction when he does it, so I won't have to arrest him. Remember, I'm on your side. Alright?”
Mack nodded without speaking. They shook hands, and Mack took one last hateful look at the Shaw's home then got in his car and left. Greene followed shortly thereafter.
Officer Sherman Greene was seething. Mack Rowley had provided what was supposed to be the best opportunity that Greene could have to put Steve Shaw in cuffs. At this point, he had to admit that he wouldn't mind if it were Brad or Steve, but he definitely wanted his revenge on Steve and either one of their arrests would be hard on the father. He wasn't worried about how Steve’s wife would feel. It was her own fault for marrying someone like Steve. Sherman thought that he should have looked up Steve after high school long before either of them were married. He could have kicked Steve's butt then and set things right. He knew that Steve got a lucky shot when he had downed Sherman. That's all it was.
He drove away from the Shaw’s neighborhood deep in thought about what he could do. He finally decided he was going to come back to the area tomorrow morning when they would be leaving for work and school. It would be after his shift was over but when either Steve or Brad left in a car, he would pull them over. He would see if he could goad one of them into provocative action so that he would have a reason to arrest them, whichever one it might be. He had to make it look good or his brother, the Chief of Police would be all over him. His brother had helped Sherman out of some tight jams in the past. Ever since he had been promoted to Chief of Police, Sherman had taken bigger chances with how he enforced the law. His brother had always protected him. Even the police brutality charges had been dropped through his brother's influence. Sherman didn't like his brother chewing him out for unprofessional behavior though. He figured that he had one way to rule the city as a cop and his brother another. If he could, he would get one of the Shaws to make a dumb enough mistake, that he could nail them to the wall, get his revenge on Steve, and still keep his brother off his back.
Steve woke Brad up before he had to leave for work. “Son, I'm not sure it's a good idea for you to go camping on Saturday. I’m concerned for your safety and the attitude your friends may have toward you after last night.”
“Dad, I think my friend's attitudes will be fine. Jeff might be a little ticked, but I think I can straighten it out with him. We've been good friends for a long time.”
“What if you are wrong Brad?” His dad asked, “What if he wants to fight you?”
“If he is hostile toward me, then I'm sure he won't bother to come with us on the camp out. He'll probably confront me at school, and I can't get out of going there. Besides Dad, this thing I can do is really all about self-preservation. It always protects me.”
His father sighed, paused, and then said, “All right son, but watch your back anyway. Okay?”
“I will Dad. I promise. You know what else? Up in the canyon, I'll be separated from anyone who is after my hide. Give them a chance to calm down.”
“Alright then. Your mom and I are going to put our heads together and try to figure out a way to plug the leaks and keep our lives normal. In the meantime, be careful with this thing you can do.”
It wasn't long before Brad was in his car driving toward school. He thought about his parents and realized that sometimes he took them for granted, but he knew he had good parents who tried hard to raise him to the best of their ability and help him to be happy. As he continued on his way, his thoughts turned to the trouble they had in their home last night and the problem he had accidentally created with Sherry.
He heard the smallest spurt of the sound of a siren and looked in his rear-view mirror to see red and blue lights flashing from the car behind him. His heart leaped, and he got butterflies in his stomach. “Not again!” He said out loud.
He pulled off the road and watched in the mirror as the police car came to a stop close behind him. He could see the face of Sherman Greene behind the wheel.
Brad knew he had done absolutely nothing wrong with his driving and that there was no reason for Greene to pull him over. His anger over the intrusions into their home the night before flared up in him and he wondered if there was anything he could do about it. Greene was busy talking into his radio before getting out of his car. That left Brad with time to think of a way to give this lousy cop a hard time without getting himself arrested.
He concentrated in a particular way that he had never done before using his gravity altering ability. This would be like a surgical strike instead of an all-out altering of gravity. He threw a concentration of gravity into the door frame of Greene's car. When the officer tried to open his door, he couldn't get it to open. He pushed and slammed his shoulder against the door and then Brad released the gravity hold and Greene nearly fell out on his side. With the door now open, Greene began to put his foot out but the door suddenly slammed back shut on him, hurting his calf muscle. Mystified, he tried to open the door again.
It opened easily for several inches and then slammed back shut again. Sherman started trying to get out once again and got the door all the way open for just a second. He put his foot out, and the door slammed on his ankle. He grimaced in pain and tried to pull his leg back into the car, but the door was pressing against his leg with so much pressure that he could not remove his foot. He used all of his strength to push against the door to free his ankle. Suddenly, the door flew open with surprising speed. Sherman fell from the car onto the ground getting the side of his uniform covered in dust and road film. Sherman jumped to his feet in a fit of rage. The door slammed shut behind him. He stormed over to Brad's car hobbling.
Brad looked up at Greene innocently and said, “Something wrong with your car Officer?”
Greene reached through the car window and grabbed Brad by the shirt with both hands. He began to jerk Brad through the car window only to find that Brad was firmly tucked into his seat belt. Greene continued to jerk on Brad over and over as he yelled. “Undo your seat belt Shaw. Do it now!” Nearly every word was punctuated with a jerk on Brad's clothing to wrench him from the car once the seat belt was released.
Brad was shocked at Greene's strength, his rage and his unprofessional behavior. He didn't know what to do; knowing that if he undid his seat belt, Greene would literally drag him through the window likely hurting Brad in the process. Or, Brad's instinct would take over and Greene would get hurt and Brad would be further exposed. Then, what would happen once Greene had him out in the open?
Just then, a voice could be heard next to Sherman Greene. “Do you need assistance Officer Greene?”
Greene froze, pulled his head out of Brad's car and looked to his right where another North Ogden police officer was standing. He was looking at Greene with disdain and suspicion.
“No, I'm simply trying to remove this suspect from his car.”
“Well, most of us order the suspect to step out of the car. We don't try to pull them through the window. What is it you suspect him of doing?”
Greene had no answer for that one. He frantically tried to come up with something as he let go of Brad. The best response he could give was, “Why don't you mind your own business and let me take care of mine.”
“One officer backing up another is what we do, isn't it Sherman? That is my business. Why would you want to go it alone when you are having such difficulty?”
The second
officer brushed Greene aside from Brad's door saying, “Excuse me Sherman.” He looked down at Brad and said “What’s going on here young man?”
Brad was straightening his clothes as he answered. “I didn't do anything Officer. This cop has it out for me because he knows my dad. My dad punched him out in high school, and he wants revenge. Always has!”
In a quiet voice, the officer said to Brad, “You know something? I believe you.”
Turning to Greene, he said, “I think you better let this fish go. After what I have seen here, if you decide to continue to hold him here, I will be obligated to write up a full report on what I saw here today. Your conduct does not reflect the ideals of a police officer. By the way, aren't you off duty? I came on to replace you. Why don't you go home now?”
Greene was furious and humiliated. He glared at the officer then glared at Brad. Pointing at Brad he said, “I'll be watching for you boy. I am going to take you down. The smallest mistake and your mine!”
He turned, stormed back to his car and jerked on the door handle to open the door. It would not budge. He jerked with all his weight when the door abruptly flew open dumping Greene onto the street again. He stood up, brushed himself off and while rubbing a bruised elbow got into the car and gunned it around Brad's car and the officer as he turned off his flashing lights.
The police officer wondered what was wrong with the car door. “You be careful with that man,” the officer said to Brad. “He is only on the force because of his brother. If we took a vote at the station, he would be eliminated today.”
“Thanks sir. What is your name, so I can tell my father about you?”
“I'm Rod Clayton,” he said. “Who are you?”
“Brad Shaw. I live here in North Ogden.”
“Okay Brad. You better hurry on to school before you are late. If I can be of any help, you let me know.”
Sherman Greene drove to his house still fuming. The cocky attitude of Steve Shaw the night before, the strange experience he had with his car this morning which he was beginning to believe was caused by Brad after he thought about what he had learned about him, and the intervention of Rod Clayton when he was about to get Brad out of his car; All of it was leaving him in a state of anger that would not let him sleep. That made him mad too. He felt humiliated about falling on the ground twice, about the way he was caught manhandling Brad, and the way he had struggled with the door. His anger was only compounding, not diminishing as he thought everything through. He was more determined than ever that he would get his revenge on the Shaws. Hurt one of them and he would be hurting all of them. So, since Brad was the one he had the most trouble with recently, he would go for him instead of Steve. He could take care of Steve later. Not for the first time in his life did he imagine killing both Steve, and now his little whelp also. The thoughts brought great satisfaction to him.