Chapter Five

Chapter Five

The next day Christina woke up to find her father sprawled out on the couch nursing a massive hangover. All the lights in the living room were turned off and the shades were pulled down. The TV was on, but muted, early morning cartoon characters flickering frantically across the screen. She got the feeling it was going to be a bad day.

Tiredly, she grabbed a bowl of Fruit Loops and ate them slowly at the kitchen table. Last night at a quarter 'til three, she heard Paul stumble in from Mike's -- the late hour enough to tell her that he wasn't going to be able to make it in for work that day. Quietly, she dialed Principal Dalton and informed him that her father was sick with the flu that morning and wouldn't be able to come in. Principal Dalton's "Alright then, thank you, Christina" was a little all too understanding.

She took a shower and let her hair air dry. Packing her backpack with too many books, she snuck out of the house, careful to close the back door quietly behind her. The early morning sun caused her to blink rapidly after the unnatural darkness of the house.

The day passed relatively normally until lunchtime. Something seemed off with Jamie, who was shunning her with boy-like insensitivity. They sat next to each other in the cafeteria as always, but he answered all of her questions with simple yeses and noes, refusing to elaborate on anything.

"Jamie," she asked him shyly, fiddling with her apple, "are you alright?" He hadn't touched his brown bag lunch and the loudness and raucous of the cafeteria seemed to irritate him. 

"I'm fine," he replied in a distinctly not-fine voice.

At that moment, however, a huge wad of school-cooked mashed potatoes flew across the room and landed right smack dab on the back of his head. "Hey Hendrick," Huey Liter's voice immediately called out, "I like your new hat!" The few laughs the dumb joke managed to earn sent Jamie to his feet, flushing wildly. 

"Jamie," said Christina, simultaneously reaching out for his arm and her napkin, "let me help!" She could feel everybody's eyes on her and there was that panicky butterfly feeling in her stomach she got whenever she had to do a presentation in Speech class. Jamie eluded her grasp and walked ahead of her, determinedly making his way to the double doors at the end of the room.

"Jamie -- wait!" The sound of her voice was too pleading and it annoyed even her. She caught up to him, grabbing his arm firmly this time, but he wrenched away from her with a violence so sudden it sent her tripping to the floor. Embarrassingly, tears started to well in her eyes, more from the humiliation than the actual pain. As one, the whole watching student body went "Ooooooooohhhhhh…" 

"Leave me alone, Christina," said Jamie, giving her a look that snapped her self-esteem in two. He exited through the slab metal doors, which slammed so hard behind him she winced. Even though Jamie was the one hit by the mashed potatoes, Christina felt like the true loser. I can't believe I have five more years of this to look forward to, she thought despairingly, getting up to face her staring and cackling peers.

***

Jamie skipped the rest of the day. After cleaning himself up in the boys' bathroom, he hid out in the cemetery around his brother's grave. The day was hot and muggy and his stomach rumbled angrily for its lunch. He lay out on the grass underneath the full strength of the sun, feeling dizzy and slightly faint. He knew he treated Christina like crap. She didn't deserve it -- she had been only trying to help. He wallowed in the guilt for a moment before making an effort to clear his mind. The lack of sleep, the unproductive conversation with his mother the night before, and his continuous downward spiral at school -- in both popularity and grades -- all formed a kind of angst-filled black hole he could slowly feel himself getting sucked into. 

Catalina Middle had become a sort of prison for him. Before last Christmas he was just one of a hundred students, surfing along on a comfortable average. He was -- let's face it now -- a nobody. He blended in well and attracted no more attention than could've been helped. But after Christmas, things changed. He gained an identity, and not a good one at that. He became Jamie Hendrick, "that kid with the murdered brother." People recognized him now, but instead of saying "hello" or "what's up?" they averted their eyes or, even worse, gave him looks of pity. Even the teachers did it too, the mandatory meeting he had with the school counselor nothing more than a low-budget therapy session filled with questions asked with false concern. 

So now Jamie was sure rumors were flying around the school about how he had just attacked Christina Marks in the cafeteria in a kind of grief-stricken rage. People -- people who now knew his face -- would remember this, and his reputation would be ruined for the rest of the school year and maybe even beyond.

Well, thought Jamie, trying to look at the bright side, at least summer's coming up. His need for the break was starting to get desperate. To be away from Catalina Middle would be a big relief… He could spend days in bed, binge out on junk food, stay up late with Christina -- if she ever forgave him…

He breathed in deeply and closed his eyes. The sound of birds chirruping and the leaves rustling above him was calming and he was starting to feel a bit better after the fiasco in the cafeteria. Distantly, he heard a car drive past. He wished he could just lie there in the cemetery forever and just hide away from life and all its burdens.

He ran a hand slowly, lovingly, over the grass growing on Lucas' grave. In a way, his brother was lucky. He never had to deal with all the crap life dealt out. He had been taken young, when his biggest worry had been what he was going to get for Christmas. But Jamie scowled. He couldn't kid himself and, moreover, he couldn't disrespect Lucas' memory that way. His brother was not lucky. In fact, he was distinctly unlucky. Out of all the little boys in this Podunk town, he was the one killed. Why? Why? It was such a simple question and yet its answer seemed so out of his reach.

Was it random chance or fate that his brother was taken? Had some wandering hobo or crazy lunatic like Isaiah Grimm come across Lucas just in time for their annual bout of murderous rage? Or was his brother's death premeditated? Did someone in Catalina have the actual motive to go out and kill the six year old Hendrick boy? Had Lucas unknowingly offended someone, who on that night simply snapped? 

The not-knowing broke Jamie's brief spell of calm. Again, he was filled with an unhappy frustration. The possibility of Lucas' killer walking free on the streets of Catalina, of being a man or a woman he attended church with, a person he either "yes ma'am"-ed or "no sir"-ed was infuriating. It was unfair. It was f*****g wrong. 

***

Through the school grapevine, Mary heard what had happened to her son in the cafeteria. She also heard that he had conveniently decided to not show up for class the rest of the day. So when Jamie finally came home that evening, she was armed and ready with an angry lecture about skipping. 

"Jamie, three -- three! -- of your teachers have already requested conferences with your father and I about your grades! What am I suppose to tell them now? That you're trying the best you can? Because if you can just waltz out of class and dally the rest of the day away in the Catalina cemetery, you're obviously not giving it one hundred and ten percent!" Red-faced, Mary stood barefoot on the kitchen floor still in her nurse's uniform, Fletcher whining below her in apprehension. "For God's sake Jamie, I don't know what to do with you anymore! Do you want to repeat the seventh grade? Do you want to fall behind your friends?"

Jamie wanted to reply that "friends" should really be singular, but Mary kept steam-rolling ahead.

"I understand you're upset over your brother's death, but I'm not going to let that be your excuse for deliberately ruining the rest of your life! You're a smart boy, Jamie, use your brain. Tomorrow, I want you to go to school and apologize to all the teachers whose classes you missed. I want you to apologize to them and make up any work they assigned. I'll make sure you do it too, young man -- I'll go and see every last one of them myself. And," she added, her face truly darkening, "I want you to apologize to Christina Marks on bended knee if you have to. If what I heard today was correct, your behavior toward her was absolutely unacceptable. I didn't raise any son of mine to treat a woman that way." 

Jamie was so ashamed of himself he could only nod while his mother looked down on him in fury. Mary, usually so gentle and soft-spoken, only got angry when there was really something to get angry about -- a sign telling him that he had really crossed the line this time. 

"You better straighten up, Jamie Hendrick. If you don't, I'll have your father beat your a*s so badly you'll be making 'A's until you're seventy."

She stomped out of the kitchen, fuming, and he heard her make her way to the bedroom to change. Jamie felt upset and terrible, his life coming into brutally sharp focus after his mother's unflinching assessment. Though he should've tried to say something, or explained himself somehow, he knew from the few previous skirmishes with his mother, she always ended up the winner, shooting down his excuses with an expert hand.

Moodily, Jamie grabbed a popsicle from the freezer, his least favorite kind, grape, all that was left. He dragged himself into the living room where he found his father sitting in front of the TV, a sweating bottle of beer in front of him. A football game was on.

Jack Hendrick was a handsome man. Tall, with a full head of hair the color of Jamie's, his blue eyes stared at the screen intently as if the outcome of the game was life or death. The room was filled with a kind of freezing tension; they hadn't had a full conversation in months. Still, feeling too tired and frustrated to care, Jamie plopped down on the armchair across from his father, licking his melting popsicle morosely and staring at the game, unseeing.

"Overheard the argument with your mother in there," Jack grunted, not taking his eyes away from the TV.

"Yeah," Jamie said, not sure what to say to this. Hearing his father's speak after such a great stretch of silence was disconcerting.

"She's right," said Jack, still refusing to make eye contact with his son. "I don't like the road you're travelling Jamie." His father's rough, gravelly voice had the effect of making everything he said sound deeply meaningful. That, combined with the fact that Jack didn't talk much to begin with, made even this simple metaphor sound like a damnation from God.

For what seemed like the gazillionth time that day, Jamie felt a rush of self-loathing. In an attempt to raise his father's esteem of him, Jamie hesitantly explained the news he'd been sitting on for the last day and a half.

"Dad," he said, trying to keep his voice steady -- confident -- "Mrs. Fisk, my art teacher, um, she's holding an art show at the school Friday evening, and my piece has been one of the ones picked to be showcased. Mine and Christina's, we have the only seventh grade pieces in the show…" He stopped.

Jack didn't respond. He didn't even blink. Instead, he continued to stare at the screen.

"Would -- would you like to come to the show?" asked Jamie. 

And then suddenly, stupidly, he was praying that his dad would come. Say yes, Jamie recklessly pleaded to himself, say "Of course I'll come, son, because that's an achievement to be proud of!"

But Jack didn't say any of that and he didn't take his eyes off the screen. He made Jamie wait a whole five seconds before responding. "I'll think about it," he said finally and took a long sip of his beer.

An overwhelming roar filled Jamie's ears like a great tidal wave rising up out of the ocean. Suddenly, the TV screen in front of them was covered by the gushy remains of his purple popsicle, inconveniently blotting out the last of the fourth quarter. It took Jamie a minute to process that he had hurled the popsicle at the screen, his astonished mind having to catch up to the action.

"Boy -- !" started Jack, staring at him now, eyes blazing.

But Jamie jumped up out of his armchair, cutting off whatever his father had to say to him.

"No!" he screamed. "Don't you get mad at me! You shouldn't even call yourself my dad! You don't talk to me, you don't do anything for me! I bet you never even cared about me!" Tears were streaming down his cheeks and he wasn't even sure where all this resentment was coming from. "I hate you! All you do is sit around and watch TV! You care more about a stupid football game than me! You don't care about me and you didn't give a damn about Lucas!" 

Then he took the plunge, feeling hurt and reckless, feeling that for the first time in many months he had finally gotten his father's attention. 

"You didn't even cry at his funeral! I watched you the whole time! It was like it was nothing to you! And -- and -- " here his voice broke "you never even did anything about his murder because his killer's still out there!" He took a final deep breath before unearthing the horrid thought. "It's because you're the killer, aren't you? You killed Lucas!"

In a flash, Jack was on his feet. He loomed over Jamie like a giant, his palm reaching out and gathering momentum before hitting Jamie's face with an overwhelming blossom of pain. Under the force, Jamie fell to the ground, crying wildly because of this and because of the general horror of the whole day -- whole year. But then everything was okay again because his father was on the ground beside him hugging him harder than he'd ever been hugged in his life. In amazement, Jamie saw tears running down Jack's face too. 

"I didn't kill your brother," he whispered into Jamie's ear. "I loved him and I love you, and don't you ever doubt it again."

***

That night Christina locked herself in her room and cried and cried. She lay on her bed and clutched her pink pillow tightly to her chest hating everything about herself. She came home that afternoon to find her father still sprawled out on the couch exactly where she had left him early that morning. Everything was the same except for the cartoons, which had been replaced by a dull infomercial on diet pills. She didn't even bother to say hello to Paul, too disappointed in him to acknowledge him.

She was angry at Jamie Hendrick. What right had he to push her around like that in front of the entire school? She'd had bad days before, but she'd never put their friendship in such jeopardy. Stupid Jamie, stupid, idiotic boys… but she hated herself all the more because she knew that what she was thinking wasn't true. She loved Jamie. 

The feeling had crept up on her -- not swept her off her feet -- but wrapped itself around her slowly, comforting, familiar, and cherished. That was what Jamie Hendrick meant to her… but after treating her like that, giving her that look, and saying those things, she didn't know what to feel anymore.

She got up off the bed and grabbed a tissue from her vanity. She stopped, studying herself critically in the mirror. The crying had turned her pale and her nose had gone all red and runny. The tears in her eyes were magnified ten times by her glasses and her hair was a mess. No guy would ever like you, she thought in despair. She would end her days as a nun or a librarian, holed up away where no one would have to be inflicted with her ugly face. She would start collecting cats and then slowly go completely insane.

She let out another sob. She wished she had someone to talk to. Her diary, though dear to her, wasn't enough. Its silent pages could only listen, not comfort her. She missed her mom.

Christina crept out of her room. Looking out the window, she saw the sun had set and the sky had turned a rich shade of midnight blue. She stepped into her father's bedroom which smelt heavily of sweat, dirty socks, and what could've once been the low undertone of her mother's perfume. The bed was unmade and she was sure the sheets hadn't been changed in months. She sensed the loneliness upon the air.

Quietly, she crossed the hardwood floor to the old chest of drawers. Second drawer to the bottom: the sock drawer.

She opened it, the ancient wood resisting a little. At first glance, it all seemed innocent enough, pairs and pairs of rolled-up white socks all jumbled upon one another. But she swept them off to one side of the drawer, finding the old photograph hidden beneath them like buried treasure.

The photograph was smudged by her fingerprints from the many times she had run her hand over her mother's face. Sitting out on the front porch in a light summer dress, Abigail Marks looked back at her daughter, her smile wide and spontaneous. Her long black hair was swept back over her shoulders and her uncovered arms were ropy and tanned by the sun. She looked beautiful and young, completely untouched by the cancer that would soon take her life.

Christina released a deep, cleansing breath. The ache inside her had dulled. "Laugh with me" the photo seemed to say, and Christina could almost imagine what had happened after Paul had put the camera down. He would've walked over to his wife, sat down beside her and perhaps put a lazy arm around her shoulders. Together they would've watched the sun set and their young daughter play around in the yard.

Christina often came up with these kinds of false memories. In a way, they were her first made-up stories. What could have happened… or what could have been. Gently, she bent down and kissed the photograph, careful to keep it dry of her tears.

"I love you," she said to the silent room. 

She put the photograph back and was about to shut the drawer when she saw a hint of orange nestled in the midst of the uniform white socks. Curious, she reached out and grabbed the mysterious object, her puzzlement only increasing when it was fully uncovered. She turned it over in her hands, studying it, mystified as to why it would be in her father's sock drawer.

She froze. Carefully, she looked down, examining it. Something was falling into place, the cogs in her head turning in comprehension, the gears clicking in fateful purpose. A truth -- a truth that might have been there all along -- was revealed to her. 

***

Jamie's eyes snapped open. His room was dark, and according to his alarm clock he had been asleep for approximately two hours. After the confrontation with his father, they had both gone into the kitchen to get a drink of water. Jack told his son that he could make it to the art show on Friday, making Jamie so happy he had to go and hug him again. 

That night Jamie decided to do his homework -- at least all the homework he'd been assigned that day in classes he'd attended. He sat down at the kitchen table with a sandwich and a glass of milk and worked through twenty questions of algebra and completed a rough draft for an English essay. Afterwards, he felt very accomplished.

The temperature of Jamie's room felt off and it took him a moment to realize why. The window was halfway open and the cool night breeze had billowed in. For a second, Jamie simply lay in bed, nonplussed.

Okay…

And then slowly from the shadows he saw a figure come towards him, its wild head of hair silhouetted against the full moon. Jamie couldn't breathe he was so scared, felt his oncoming death rushing towards him like an unstoppable train.

"Paul," the man said hoarsely. "His name was Paul."