The Favor (11 page)

He’s at the top of the stairs when he gets caught. He didn’t know his dad was home from work that morning, so when the old man’s voice slithers out from the shadows of his dark bedroom, Gabe’s caught like a mouse snatched up by a snake.

“Come in here.”

Gabe’s feet don’t want to obey, but he makes himself go in, anyway. He’s no longer tired from being woken up last night and then being unable to fall back to sleep. Now he’s wide, wide awake.

Dad’s in bed, but not in his pajamas. His curtains are shut tight, the blind drawn. He’s propped on his pillows, on top of the blankets. The small light clipped to his headboard is on, but the rest of the room is dark. In front of him is a box full of pictures and letters.

“You’re supposed to be outside.”

“I know,” Gabe says. “I came in because—”

His father waves a hand at him. “Shut up. I don’t care. Come over here, closer.”

Gabe does, thinking he could scream if he has to. Last night and all the nights before that, there wasn’t anyone to hear him, so all he had was the ability to fight. Some night, he thinks, he’s going to be too tired to do that anymore. But today Mrs. Moser is downstairs, and surely, if he screams, if he runs, she’ll hear him. She’ll help him...won’t she?

The old man doesn’t touch him. He just looks at him. Hard, and for a very long time. No smile, nothing that looks like anything nice. He stares until Gabe starts to sweat.

“She’s the one who wanted kids, you know that? She wanted ’em, I didn’t. I said, ‘Marlena, why do we gotta go and mess up a good thing?’ We had money, we could go out to dinner whenever we wanted. Nice car. I could buy her as many pretty dresses as she wanted. But no, she wanted kids, she said. So she got ’em. And then what? She found out they were as much a pain in the ass as I’d told her.”

Gabe says nothing. It’s nothing new; he’s heard this story before. Or ones like it. The details change sometimes, but the stories are almost all the same.

“
You
made her sick. You know that?”

Gabe nods, hoping that if he agrees the old man will let him get out of here.

“She got sick, and now she’s gone.” His dad heaves a heavy sigh that turns into a choking cough.

He’s crying. Gabe looks away. He’s seen his father cry before, that’s nothing new. Grown-ups aren’t supposed to cry, he thinks. He won’t when he’s a grown-up. He won’t now, no matter what.

“This is your fault, you remember that. You just remember it, Gabriel.” Gabe’s dad looks up at him with red eyes, his nose snotty. “And you better understand something else, too. If it’s not you, it will be one of them.”

Gabe jumps as if someone punched a fist through his chest and grabbed his heart. His stomach is a stone that hits the floor. He can’t breathe or speak; he can’t even move.

“So you just remember
that,
” the old man says. “Now you get out of here before I take it into my head to give you the belting you deserve.”

Gabe does as his father says, making it only halfway down the stairs before his stomach heaves up and out of his throat, and he has to run for the bathroom to lose his breakfast. Mrs. Moser finds him there, crouched over the toilet. She doesn’t scold him. She wets a cloth and puts it on the back of his neck, and despite his every intention, Gabe can’t stop himself from crying.

It won’t be him. It won’t be him. It won’t be him.

THIRTEEN

AT FOURTEEN, JANELLE still wore her hair in a ponytail and slept with her collection of stuffed toys.

At fifteen, she pierced her nose and dyed her hair black; she bit her fingernails but painted them black, too. She pierced her ears multiple times and wore a safety pin in one.

At sixteen, she painted her eyes with thick, dark eyeliner and mascara, but left the rest of her face pale. She sneaked out with older boys to drive to Harrisburg and Lancaster to see bands she didn’t even really like. Sometimes she let those boys kiss her.

At seventeen, she smokes pot she buys from the farm boys looking to get some extra cash to fix up their muscle cars or buy steers to show at the Farm Show; she doesn’t ask and doesn’t care. She steals liquor from her stepfather’s cabinet and tattoos a small star on the webbing of her right hand between her thumb and forefinger. It takes her mother four months to notice, though Randall figures out about the vodka and bourbon a lot sooner than that. At seventeen, Janelle doesn’t have a boyfriend she secretly hopes to marry, one who gives her his class ring or his letterman’s jacket. She has a lot of boyfriends, but though everyone including her parents thinks she’s sleeping with all of them, Janelle’s still a virgin.

Janelle’s mother tells her she has two choices—reform school or rehab. It’s Nan who steps up to offer the third choice, to come and live with her. It sure isn’t something Janelle’s mom would’ve come up with on her own, and she’s not happy about the idea. How on earth will Nan make sure Janelle behaves herself, when her own mother can’t?

Maybe Nan understands that the booze and drugs, the makeup and clothes, are only things Janelle
does.
They aren’t who she
is.
Maybe raising five boys makes Nan feel she can handle one wayward teenage girl.

Whatever it is, that’s how Janelle finds herself unpacking her bags in Nan’s upstairs bedroom the August before her senior year of high school. The last time she stayed here, two of her uncles were still in this room. She shared the small one across the hall with her dad, who was “taking a break” from the “grind of working” in order to focus on his music. The closet in that room is still full of his things. Boxes from his apartment, packed up and never opened. His leather jacket. A pair of boots. Nan said Janelle could have the small room if she wanted it, but Janelle doesn’t want to be that close to all her dad’s stuff.

The counselor at school told Janelle’s mom it was normal for her to act out after her mom’s remarriage. After the birth of her brother. After this. After that. The counselor and her mom both needed reasons and excuses. Janelle misses her dad, but she’s not, as her stepdad says, trying to
be
her dad. It’s ballsy of Randall to have an opinion about her at all, but Janelle understands that he needs reasons and excuses, too.

The truth is, it’s all about power. Get a boy on his knees, begging for just a touch, a taste, a stroking hand, and that’s gaining power. Take a drink, smoke a joint, let your head get swimmy and the world go spinny—that’s about giving it up. Give and take, high and low, up and down. Janelle hasn’t decided yet which she likes best. Maybe there is no best. Maybe the world is one long and constant rise and fall.

Now she’s here in Nan’s house, sweating in the summer heat. Her shirt sticks to her skin. Sweat tangles her hair. When she runs her tongue along her upper lip, she tastes salt. She can smell herself, the tangy scent of her perfume and body odor, the lingering tinge of smoke from her clothes. Her mom confiscated all the cigarettes before Janelle left. She ran her hands inside the linings of Janelle’s suitcases, in her pockets, searching for pot or pills. She found the stash easily enough; Janelle hadn’t hidden it very well. She let her find it so her mom could go away satisfied she’d done everything she could. There’d always be more weed. It’s all about power, and by giving her mom the illusion of it, Janelle keeps most of it for herself.

Opening the window might let in some cool air, but someone’s painted the sill shut. It will take a screwdriver to pry it up. Muttering a curse, Janelle grips the painted wood. Her black nail polish is chipping, and she doesn’t remember if she packed the bottle.

When her dad was working, he saw her once every few months for a weekend or a couple days. A week or so in the summer. Sometimes she came and spent a few weeks with Nan while her dad traveled. Janelle has many fond childhood memories of her time spent in St. Marys, but none of those visits have prepared her for what it’s like to actually live here. One small movie theater. No mall. Still, even a town nestled so deep in the mountains it was like its own world had to be better than rehab or reform school.

And...hello. The brick house next door. That’s where those Tierney boys live. Gabriel is her age, and the twins, Andrew and Michael, four years younger. She used to hang out with Gabe sometimes when they were little kids, but she hasn’t seen him in years.

Now she does.

A movement behind the curtains in the room directly across from hers alerts her, but with the light on in her room, it’s hard to see. Janelle reaches for the lamp, turns it off. Blinking, she steps to one side to tug the curtain just enough for her to peer out.

Gabe Tierney went and growed himself up, Janelle thinks. He has the long, lean build of a swimmer, but his body is liberally sprinkled with hair. Something catches in her throat at the sight of his arms, abs and pecs as he turns from the dresser, where he must be searching for something to put on. She’s been with boys before, but Gabe...he’s a man.

Something strangled and low comes from her throat when he drops the towel. He’s not facing her, but the back view is as nice as the front had been. More hair furs his thighs and a small dark patch at the base of his spine. She’d have thought a hairy butt would be gross, but all at once everything about him is so masculine she can’t imagine how she ever thought smooth chests and bodies were attractive.

She can’t handle the sight of his bare front, she knows she can’t, but even though heat floods her, Janelle doesn’t look away as Gabe pulls a pair of white briefs from his drawer. Turning with them in one fist, he’s fully exposed. Everything. Every part of him is as perfect as the next, and she can’t stand it. She’s been with boys before, she’s taken them in her fist and a few times even in her mouth. She’s let them touch her, though their fumblings have never come close to making her feel as good as her own hand does. It’s all about power.

And Gabe Tierney has it.

* * *

“No more,” Janelle said aloud, twitching the curtains closed, though the temptation to keep watching was like a real physical force.

All of that had been a long time ago. They’d been kids, stupid, playing with things they didn’t understand. She wasn’t that girl anymore.

Downstairs, she found Nan dozing on the couch while Bennett sat at the table with his homework. The TV was showing a movie on mute, but when she crossed to turn it off, Nan jerked and woke. She clawed weakly at the air for a second before focusing.

“Oh, Janelle. Leave that on, I’m watching it.”

“You fell asleep.” Janelle grabbed the big-button remote and brought it over. “Can I get you something?”

Nan took the device in both hands. “I want to watch that horse movie.”

Janelle had no idea what movie that might be, but didn’t argue. “Bennett, how’s the homework coming along?”

He shrugged. That wasn’t a good sign. Looking over his shoulder, Janelle saw a page of haphazardly printed math problems with scribbled, indecipherable answers.

“Think you might want to redo some of those,” she said mildly, but the sigh Bennett gave prompted one of her own. “Bennett. C’mon, buddy. We’ve talked about this. If I can’t read your work, how can you expect your teacher to bother? If you don’t put your best face forward—”

“I know, I know. How can I expect the world to take me seriously. I know.” Bennett frowned. “Well, what if I only have one face, Mom? Huh?”

She reached to ruffle his long hair, but he ducked from her touch and she withdrew. “Nobody has only one face.”

“Maybe I do.”

“If you do,” she countered, “it needs a scrubbing.”

She meant it as a joke, but Bennett didn’t take it that way. Instead, her sweet boy scowled, brows knitting and mouth turning down. A picture of his father. He turned away from her and hunched over his book again, the pencil with its worn eraser and teeth marks clutched so tight in his fist the knuckles turned white.

“Bennett.”

“Forget it, Mom.” He slapped the pencil onto the table, then slammed the book closed with a thump so loud Janelle jumped. Before she could say anything else, Bennett gathered his things and pushed past her into the kitchen. His feet thumped on the stairs moments later.

From her spot on the couch, Nan chuckled. “He’s going to do his best to devil you, Janelle.”

Janelle sat on the end of the couch near Nan’s slippered feet. “He’s a smart kid, he just doesn’t apply himself. I mean, I know he gets the material, he’s just... He just wants to rush through it to get to his video games and stuff. He doesn’t take his time. He’s not careful.”

Nan laughed again. “Sounds like someone else I know.”

Janelle’s mouth quirked. “Hey. I was a good student.”

“When you wanted to be.” Nan gently shook a finger. “But there was no keeping you in that chair to do your homework, not if you didn’t want to be there.”

Janelle had another flashback, briefer this time. Sitting on her bed, knees drawn up to cradle the book in her hands, ostensibly studying, but instead watching Gabe Tierney walk naked from the shower.

“...if he’s really having trouble,” Nan said.

“Sorry, what?”

“I said, if you think he needs help with his math classes, you should get Andrew to help him.” Nan looked concerned. “Do you feel okay? You look a little flushed.”

“I’m fine.”

Nan patted her hand. “Your hands are like ice, honey. But your cheeks are all pink. Are you sure you’re not coming down with something?”

Janelle squeezed Nan’s fingers gently. “I’m okay. Are you warm enough? I can turn up the heat.”

Nan shook her head. “No, no.”

“Nan,” Janelle said, “you know you don’t need to worry about the oil bill, right? If you’re cold, I should turn up the heat.”

Stubbornly, Nan shook her head again. “I’m fine. I can just put on a sweater or get under the blanket. Bring me that afghan.”

Janelle did, tucking the green-yellow-orange-and-brown-striped monstrosity around Nan’s hips. “Did you make this?”

“Of course I did! I made it for your dad’s high school graduation. Lordy, that was a long time ago.” Nan plucked at the yarn, peering closely. “My goodness, how ugly.”