A Death On The Wolf (23 page)

I can only imagine what a sight we were, Frankie barefoot, holding on to me looking like death warmed over with fresh vomit on his chin. Judging from the look on Daddy’s face, it wasn’t a pretty picture. As soon as Frankie could focus and saw my father sitting there, he started retching again.

Daddy jumped up from the table and said, “Take him to the bathroom.” I set the bag with the gun in it on the counter and Daddy helped me half carry Frankie down the hall to the bathroom. We just did make it in time for Frankie to get to the toilet and let go with another round of dry heaving. When he was done, we sat him on the edge of the bathtub and Daddy was already running warm water in the sink. Frankie’s face was drenched in sweat and he was shaking. Daddy took a wash cloth, wet it, and wiped Frankie’s face, cleaning off the disgusting vomit that reeked of beer and whiskey. He got another clean wash cloth, wet it, and sponged Frankie’s face. He handed me the cloth and then took Frankie’s face in both his hands. He forced open Frankie’s eyes with his thumbs. “He’s had way too much to drink,” Daddy said grimly. He looked over at me. “How much did he throw up outside?”

“
Tons.”

“
Good. What the hell happened?”

“
Did the phone wake you up?” I asked him.

“
No, your car did when you left out of here. Where’d you go?”

“
To get him. He called about ten o’clock and asked me to come pick him up.”

Daddy pursed his brow and looked back at Frankie. “Did you get into your daddy’s liquor, son?”

“
He wasn’t at home,” I said.

Daddy looked at me. “Where was he?”

“
Nelson,” Frankie said. His eyes narrowed on me as he shook his head no.

I had never lied to my father and I wasn’t going to start now. “He was with Peter Bong,” I finally said.

Frankie closed his eyes and started sobbing. I closed the toilet lid and sat down. How much worse could this day get?

“
That jackass with the ponytail from yesterday?” Daddy asked.

“
Yeah,” I said, looking up.

Daddy motioned for me to hand him the wash cloth, which I did. He wiped Frankie’s face again and then put the cloth in Frankie’s hand. “Where were they?” he asked me.

“
At that motel out on 49 like you’re going to Gulfport.”

“
Did you see Bong?”

“
No, he was already gone when Frankie called me to come get him. Daddy, he took all of Frankie’s clothes, even his underwear and shoes. Why would he do that?”

“
Probably to make sure he could be long gone before Frankie would get up the nerve to call the police.”

Frankie had stopped crying and was nodding his head. “That’s what scared him off, I think. I told him I was gonna call the cops.”

“
Did he do something to you?” Daddy asked. “Is that why you told him you were going to call the police?”

Frankie nodded and then looked down, clearly embarrassed.

Daddy sighed. “So he kidnapped you, took you to the motel, got you drunk, and then tried to force you to do things?”

Frankie looked at me. “Tell him the truth,” I said.

Frankie’s eyes were filling with tears again. He looked at my father and shook his head. “He didn’t kidnap me,” he said.

Daddy took the wash cloth from Frankie and put it back in the sink. He then traced the long red cut on Frankie’s neck with his finger and asked, “What’s this?”

Frankie reached up and touched the cut on his neck. “He put a knife to my throat and told me he’d kill me if I ever told anyone.”

“
Did he choke you?”

Frankie hesitated. He seemed surprised by my father’s question. “How’d you know that?” he asked.

Daddy put his hand to Frankie’s chin and lifted it up. “You’ve got finger marks around your throat, son.”

“
Yeah, he choked me.”

Daddy had been kneeling in front of Frankie this whole time and now he stood up. “Do you still feel sick?” he asked Frankie.

“
Yeah,” Frankie said, “but I don’t think I’m gonna puke anymore.”

“
Okay, let’s go in the living room,” Daddy said.

Frankie stood up and he was a little unsteady at first but he made it down the hall without any help from me or Daddy. He sat on the sofa and I sat beside him. Daddy sat in his recliner. I looked at the clock on the wall. It was quarter past eleven.

Daddy looked at Frankie. “Tell me how you wound up in a motel room with that man if he didn’t kidnap you.”

Frankie leaned forward and put his face in hands and shook his head over and over. It didn’t look as though he was going to offer an answer, so I told Daddy about going to the Colonel Dixie and Frankie leaving there on the back of Peter Bong’s motorcycle.

“
What time was that?” Daddy asked me.

“
I don’t know—around three o’clock I think.”

“
So he hasn’t been home since before three this afternoon?” He pointed to Frankie.

“
I don’t know,” I said.

“
I called Mom from the motel when we got there and told her I was spending the night here,” Frankie said.

“
Frankie,” Daddy said, “are you telling me you went to that motel room willingly?”

Frankie nodded but didn’t say anything.

“
Damn, son,” Daddy said, shaking his head. “What in the world were you thinking?” Frankie was silent. He was embarrassed and I was embarrassed for him. Daddy stood up and scratched his brow. “I need to call the sheriff…and your father, Frankie.”

Frankie looked up at Daddy with pleading eyes. “Mr. Lem, please don’t do that. Dad said—” Frankie stopped.

Daddy sat back on the edge of his recliner and looked long at Frankie. “Your dad said what?” Frankie didn’t respond; he just looked down. “Your father already knows about this, doesn’t he?” Daddy said.

Frankie nodded without looking up.

“
Did you call him first?” Daddy asked. “I mean before you called here?”

“
Yes, sir,” he said. And then he started crying like his heart was broken. I reached over and put my arm around his shoulders and he leaned into me and cried and cried. Daddy went to the kitchen and got a clean dish towel and handed it to him. Frankie wiped his eyes with it.

“
Tell me what happened when your dad got there,” Daddy said. “Is he still drinking?”

“
Yes, sir,” Frankie replied matter-of-factly. I was dumfounded. Drinking? I didn’t know Frankie’s father drank.

“
Was he drunk when he got there?”

Frankie nodded. “He was drunk. He started cussin’ and slappin’ me around.”

“
Has he hit you before when he’s been drinking?”

“
Sometimes.”

“
What about your brother?”

“
No, he doesn’t hit Mark. He likes him.”

“
So what happened after your dad got there and started cussing?”

Frankie’s eyes filled with tears again, but he remained calm. “He yelled at me and called me a faggot. Then he threw me down on the bed and started choking me. He choked me so hard I passed out. When I woke up, he was gone.”

“
Your dad choked you? It wasn’t Bong?” my father said angrily, showing emotion for the first time since Frankie started spilling his story.

“
It was my dad.”

“
Son of a bitch,” Daddy said under his breath. It wasn’t often when I saw my father on the verge of losing his temper, but he was clearly struggling to hold it in check now. “Is your stomach burning yet?” he asked Frankie.

Frankie blinked at the sudden change in subject. “Yes, sir,” he said.

Daddy got up and headed into the kitchen. I could see him in there getting something out of the ice box.

“
Is he going to call my dad?” Frankie asked me.

“
I don’t think so.”

Daddy came back with a glass of iced milk and handed it to Frankie. “Drink this,” he said, “it’ll make you feel better.”

Frankie took a couple of tentative sips and when it appeared he wasn’t going to throw it up, he downed the rest of the glass in three big gulps leaving nothing behind but four ice cubes. He set the glass on the end table.

“
Frankie,” Daddy said, “I have to call your parents. Your dad’s probably passed out drunk by now, but your mother needs to know you’re okay and will be staying here tonight. And tomorrow, I’ve got to call the sheriff. You understand why, don’t you?”

“
I guess so,” Frankie said, resigned to the inevitable. “Are you gonna tell him what my dad did to me?”

“
I think we have to, son. If we don’t put a stop to this now, it’s just going to get worse. Your dad needs help. Drunk or sober, no man should hit his kids.”

“
Don’t you know the sheriff?” I asked Daddy. Joe Posey was the sheriff of Harrison County and he lived in Bells Ferry.

“
I know him,” Daddy said. “He’s a member of the Lodge.”

Frankie and I sat there in silence as Daddy went to the kitchen to use the phone. I was more or less in a mild state of shock. How could I not have known all this about the boy I called my best friend? The times I’d slept over at Frankie’s, and every other time I’d been around his dad, things seemed fine. Frankie had never said much about his father one way or the other. I suppose I’d naively assumed Frankie enjoyed the same sort of relationship with his father that I had with mine. I was finding out in short order how wrong I’d been. Frankie’s dad was not only a drunk, he was abusive, and it had been happening right under my nose. I reached out and put my arm around Frankie and hugged him to me. “How come you never told me about your dad drinking and hitting you?”

Frankie rested his head on my shoulder. “I don’t know. It was just easier to pretend it didn’t happen. You don’t know how lucky you are.”

“
What do you mean?”

“
To have a dad like that,” Frankie said, pointing to my father standing over in the kitchen talking on the phone.

Daddy was keeping his voice low so we could not hear what he was saying, but his animated hand gestures showed how upset he was getting. When he hung up, he slammed the phone down so hard it made the bell inside ding.

“
What did Mom say?” Frankie asked when Daddy came back in the living room and sat down.

“
That was your dad,” he said.

“
What’d you tell him?” Frankie asked.

Daddy sighed. “I told him you were okay, and I’d let you spend the night here. I also told him if he ever laid a hand on you again he’d have to deal with me.” He ran his fingers through his hair and leaned back in the recliner.

“
What’d he say?” Frankie asked.

I could tell Daddy didn’t want to answer. “He told me I better get used to you staying here because you’d never set foot in his house again.”

Frankie took that declaration stoically. “That’s what he told me back at the motel,” he said quietly.

“
Don’t worry about it tonight, son,” Daddy said. “You boys need to get to bed,” he added.

“
Are you going too?” I asked.

“
In a bit. I need to cool off. You two go on.”

Frankie and I stood up and told Daddy goodnight then headed to the bathroom. I brushed my teeth while Frankie stood over the toilet and peed. Just as he was finishing up, I was examining my face for that pre-zit that had appeared on my birthday. It was gone, thankfully.

“
You don’t have an extra toothbrush, do you?” Frankie asked. “My mouth tastes like crap.” I had just opened the medicine cabinet to look when Frankie said, “Ouch! Damn!”

I closed the cabinet door and looked at him in the mirror. He was fumbling with the zipper on my shorts he was wearing. “What’d you do?” I asked.

“
I pinched my dick in the zipper. I forgot I didn’t have any underwear on.”

I laughed at him and then rinsed my mouth and my toothbrush. I held it out to him. “We don’t have any extra toothbrushes. You can use mine if you want.”

Frankie took the brush from my hand. “You don’t mind?”

“
Not if you don’t. Flush the toilet,” I said and left him to finish up.

I was already in bed when Frankie came in the bedroom and closed the door behind him. He pulled off the tee shirt. “You got some PJs I can sleep in?” he asked.

I pointed to my dresser. “Second drawer on the left.”

Frankie took my Bermuda shorts off and laid them over the chair and then slipped my spare pajama bottoms on. He came over to the bed, crawled over me, and got settled. I reached over and turned out the light.