The
Journal of Secrets
By Ian De Shils
(Ernest Shields)
Chapter 3
REUNION
Lonnie walked in and dropped an old beat up suitcase on the floor.
"Hi, Dad." he said in a nervous voice.
I must have paced the house a thousand times that day, checking out
the window every few minutes and yet I never heard him coming up the walk.
He startled me. I hadn't seen him in six years, not since he was thirteen;
yet, I would have recognized him anywhere. He looked exactly like me, or
at least how I remembered myself at his age. It left me speechless. He
stood before me a young man, shy and nervous, blue eyed, strongly built
and handsome,--- all the time I'd been expecting to see my little boy.
None of it was Lonnie's fault of course, but still there came an
urge to shake him,--- slap him for all the pain I'd suffered, for not
telling me, and most of all, for growing up without me,--- but all I could
do was cry and hug him. For almost all of those six years I thought him
dead, the victim of some crazed killer. I didn't learn the truth until
Carla became bed ridden. I took a leave of absence to care for her and
while puttering about the house one day I found a postcard with a picture
of a clear, sparkling mountain stream that belied the threat scribbled on
the back.
"You crazy bitch, what the hell are you up to? Lonnie doesn't need
this kind of shit. You leave him alone! If you ever try to contact him
again, I'll come see you up close and personal and that's a promise!" It
was signed with a scrawled `C,' but the postmark was dated only two years
before.
I read it over and over until the meaning finally sunk in. Lonnie
was alive! Not only that, Carla had known all along, she even knew where
he was! His kidnapping had been a hoax, a bald faced lie! I think at that
moment I might have killed her had she not all ready been so close to dying.
I knew Carla long before meeting Sara, so it never occurred to me she might
have somehow gone insane. I lay her quirkiness, her interest in the occult,
to simple rebellion against her bible pounding father. With Carla I learned
the ecstasy of sex. I thought I loved her, that I couldn't live without
her, until her father broke us up.
Two years later I met Sara. We were both eighteen when she got pregnant,
high school sweethearts of the hot pants variety. We thought we were
in love, but if love was lacking, lust made up the difference. They say
a love that's slow to bloom is finer than the instant kind, and I know
that's true. We married before Lonnie was born and our fascination with
the baby kept us together while we learned to care for one another. Somewhere
along the way, like and lust turned into a love and caring so profoundly
deep it made me want to cry for joy. Lonnie was a part of it of course, a
part of us, a part of everything that mattered, but that knowledge somehow
escaped me when Sara died.
He was only four when Sara lost her life in one of those senseless
freeway shootings in LA. Suddenly I was alone. Shock and grief followed
me for months and I couldn't seem to cope with even simple things. Lonnie
needed more than I could give him and Carla came back into my life ready
to provide it. Why didn't I see the evil in her? Why didn't I feel the
hate? She ripped away his childhood and all because she hated me. For
eight long years I left Lonnie in her care, never questioning her decisions,
never inquiring very deeply into why my son seemed so withdrawn. It was
just a phase, she said, and I accepted it! I was inured to Carla's strangeness,
busy with a job that took me away for months at a time,--- neither reason
can mitigate my guilt. Lonnie thought I didn't care what Carla did to him.
One bright November day he vanished. Carla claimed she'd seen him
talking to a man just minutes before he disappeared. The police assumed
a kidnapping, but no ransom note arrived, no clues, no body, no description
of the man except the vague one Carla gave, and no resolution of any kind.
As the days dragged into months and years I simply gave up hope. The bitch
had known where he was all along and when I confronted her with the postcard
she laughed in my face.
"I hope you like your little bastard, I'm sure he'll be a credit
to your whole family."
What an actress she was. All those years I never realized she actually
detested me. Oh, God, how could I have been so blind? The only way I
could get a straight answer from her was by withholding morphine and
even then I was never sure she told the truth. Once she claimed it was
she, herself, who killed Sara, then in the next breath denied it. Carla
hated me all those years because I'd chosen Sara over her, but at the
time I first knew Carla we were only kids, sixteen at the most. How she
could plot and spend all those years ruining Lonnie's life over something
he had no part in, was beyond my understanding. It was she who chose the
abortion, I never knew about the pregnancy until years after, but in her
twisted way of thinking it was I who carried the blame for her later barrenness,
not that back hills abortionist her father sent her to.
All those years I thought him dead, Lonnie had been living on a ranch
in Colorado. In Carla's desk I finally found the address for 'C.'
Charles St. Pierre, Craig Colorado. I wrote at least a dozen letters to
the post office box in Craig before Lonnie finally called, but when I told
him I was coming to bring him home he refused. He said the old man who took
him in was ill and he couldn't leave right then. We talked for hours. Lonnie
told me a little of what Carla had done and said he received a letter from
her stating I knew where he was and I never wanted to see him again, I was
glad he was gone. I couldn't believe he'd think I would say those things.
I always thought he knew I loved him.
The next day I put Carla in a hospital and made arrangements for
her funeral when she died. It was the last time I ever saw her. Whether
or not she killed Sara, I never knew, but without a doubt, Carla earned
and deserved the pain the cancer gave her. She inflicted cruelties unimaginable
on my son and I hope with all my heart her final suffering matched his.
* * * * * * *
Notes:
Dan's last icy words were hard to reconcile with the warm, jovial
man I met, but then, how would I react if someone lied to me like that?
Probably the same. That time in Hawaii when we nearly lost our children
left me perfectly capable of killing the bastard responsible. It's all reaction
and I think Dan was totally honest in describing how he felt. Thoughts
of murder have entered my mind at least twice in my life. It seems longer
now, but it was just three years ago when I turned the whole of GSI into
a juggernaut intent on destroying those who wounded Jake before knowing
the extent of the damaged done. Like Dan Harris, I cannot be forgiving to
those who injure people I care about. Be it from insanity or sane intent,
it is an eye for an eye and nothing less is near enough.
I now add Lonnie's side of those events and find it poetic that the
woman's final act of hatred is the one that ultimately saves him.
* * * * * * *
NOW I LAY ME DOWN TO SLEEP
I was really scared because this time she didn't care if it showed.
My eye was swollen nearly shut and I had bruises everywhere. She phoned
the school telling them I had a bike accident, but I hadn't been off the
chain for three days now, not since she caught me trying to run away. I
was hungry but didn't dare ask for anything. She told me to be quiet and
I was. She still acted like she gets just before a punishment. I
wish dad would come home, just once walk in without calling first, maybe
then she'd stop. I started to cry again, but quit when the steps creaked.
She might hear. I learned a long time ago not to cry, it makes her mad and
then it gets awful,--- awful. The next thing I knew it was morning and she
was sitting on my bed shaking me.
"Come on, baby boy, let mama see it!"
"I'm not a baby, and you're not my mama!" I cried, trying to pull
the covers tighter.
"Oh, yes, I am, Lonnie, the only mama you'll ever know. Now be good,
or Mama Carla might cut it off."
It was the same threat she used since I was five and it still scared
me. Someday I knew she would. She told me when the signs were right,
she'd cut it off and burn it on the alter, along with my 'cute little
balls.' Carla was a witch. Not like the hags the kid dressed up to be
on Halloween, but a real one. The kind that could make you hurt and wish
you were dead. She lay the knife on the shelf where I couldn't reach
it, then the other four came in, their faces all covered up with black
hoods. I knew what was going to happen, they'd done this before. They'd
hold me down and Carla would get the knife. Once, I tried to get away
and she cut so deep I think it scared her because afterwards she left
me alone for almost a month.
When I was little, Carla would do it by herself and just for the
blood, now these last few weeks they wanted something else. What Carla
used to do didn't work anymore, it hadn't for a long time, I hated her
so much just the thought of her made me limp. They crowded around doing
things with their hands and even though I didn't want to, it came up hard.
They played with me until I came, then they all nodded their heads as Carla
spoke some words in Latin, or some strange language.
"I'm getting tired of this shit, Carla," one man growled, "when do
I get the boy? You promised me a week, and now it's only four days before
high mass!"
"Shut up, Charlie, can't you see I'm busy?"
The knife's duel points made two tiny stab wounds like a snake bite
and she caught the blood in a silver cup. The face Carla always presented
to neighbors was as serene as the statue of the Madonna at Saint Paul's,
now it was twisted and ugly as she chanted her incantations. Finishing the
words, her face changed back again and like a cloud uncovering the sun,
she smiled sweetly at the man.
"My, how time flies. This is Friday, isn't it? Dan will be
coming home tonight!"
She looked at me, humming and smiling to herself as though she had
some great secret to tell dad.
"Why, Charlie dear, I think it's time! I see no reason you can't
take him now. I can hardly wait to tell Dan all about it."
Patting my face she said,
"Lonnie, baby, I guess this is 'goodby,' but then you never loved
Mama Carla anyway. No matter how hard I tried to teach you, you've always
been a rotten little bastard! Now don't give Charlie any trouble and maybe
he'll keep you around for a few days. And when it hurts, Baby, just remember
your uncle Phil and think how much quicker this will be for you than it
was for him." Jumping to her feet she left the room laughing, white teeth
like a shark's glittering in the morning light.
The man was huge with muscles that stood out even through the heavy
shirt he wore. He was the only one in Carla's coven I'd never seen without
a hood and when he slipped it off it startled me. He didn't look at all
like a killer, but then Carla didn't look like a witch either.
"Get dressed, Lonnie," he said, as he unlocked the chain around my
ankle. "You and I have things to do."
Then he smiled at me with large white teeth and suddenly I was as
cold as ice. I tried to hide back in the covers only it didn't do any good.
He pulled them away and dressed me, and his eyes gleamed just like Carla's
when he looked at the bruises. Cold. My body turned to solid ice, my teeth
chattered and my mind seemed frozen. All I could think of was, this isn't
real, this isn't happening and I couldn't move a muscle. That didn't matter
either. He just carried me to a pickup and we drove out of Bakersfield heading
east.
The man kept saying he wasn't going to hurt me, but I heard words
like that from Carla all my life and they only led to pain. He was one
of Carla's witches, so why bother to lie? I knew the truth, I knew it the
moment Carla stopped worrying about the bruises showing. The 'Right Time'
she always talked about was now, so why keep saying that? Over and over
he told me,
"No one will ever hurt you again, Lonnie." but I knew he was
lying.
He bought some pop and stuff at a gas station, but I couldn't eat.
I felt like throwing up all the time. I kept waiting for it to start,
but he just drove farther and farther away from Bakersfield and after
awhile I felt so sick I just didn't care anymore. I couldn't stop what
he was going to do to me anymore than I could stop Carla, so like always,
I just closed my eyes and went to sleep.
Instead of ending up dead, I ended up in Colorado on an old ranch
so far from nowhere that it might as well have been the moon. Charlie wasn't
anything like Carla. Instead of slaps, he showed me kindness, instead
of terror he gave me peace. He said hate would never come to me again
and as the days stretched imto weeks I slowly began believing it. Charlie
was a quiet man who never raised his voice or lost his temper and I soon
found my favorite place was curled up beside him on the sofa. We might
read, or talk or listen to the radio and it was as though I belonged there,
as if I finally found my way home. Charlie taught me to play chess and
lots of different card games and when the snow came deep, we built snow
forts and row upon row of snowmen. Sometimes we'd go sledding until dark,
then light a fire, watch the stars come out and if the mountain lions
howled or the coyotes yapped, he'd slip an arm around me and I was safe.
I don't know when it was Charlie became my universe. I only know
after awhile I was following him everywhere, afraid he'd disappear. I
crept into his bed one night, just wanting to be near him, he held me
close and all the hurt and fear I had always known fell away. After that,
we never slept apart. Later on that winter, I learned how loving he could
be, how his hands could arouse me to pleasure without the fear of pain
and by spring I wanted to stay with him forever. Throughout that long,
cold winter and all the years that followed, Charlie never raised his voice
at me in anger nor showed displeasure with any sort of violence, yet he could
be loud at times. If I worked extra hard or he was pleased with how I did
some ranch chore he might chase me down and knuckle my hair, laughing and
shouting all the while. It was the kind of praise only Charlie would give
and I worked all the harder to earn it. Yes, Charlie was a kind and gentle
man, thoughtful and giving, but he had his dark side, too.
Charlie was hooked on steroids. He started taking them, I think to
please his friend Steven, only he didn't stop when Steve left. He told
me he took them now because they kept his pecker hard, yet that was an
excuse even I could see through. Charlie was too scared of AIDS to sleep
around and I know his continued use came not from choice, but from some
sort of addiction to the damn things. Steroids were not Charlie's only
blind spot. I think he half believed the shit Carla was into because he
read tarot cards and looked for mystical signs in everything he saw. He
said the cards led him to Bakersfield to find me and I guess that was one
point I couldn't argue with.
Charlie told me there had been only two other lovers in his life.
Carl, his first, was killed by a rock slide on the mountain not far from
here, then a few years later he met Steve. He never talked about the problems
he had with Steve, only they argued and Steve moved on. Three years later
he went to Bakersfield because that's where the cards told him he would meet
his final lover, the one who would remain with him all his life.
Charlie's mother had been a healer, he called her a white witch,
a person who used their powers for good. She had friends throughout the
mountain states and California and as a boy he traveled with her everywhere.
They lived in Bakersfield when he was young and people there still wrote
to him years after she died. Charlie was lonely and I always thought it
was those letters that brought him back to California, not the cards, but
I never said it.
He despised the black arts, yet said he had a nose for them and could
sniff them out wherever he went. He'd gotten involved with Carla's coven
when he heard they had a young virgin boy giving sacrament. (that's what
Carla called her blood letting). To Charlie it was a chance of finding
someone 'clean,' someone to share his life with and he planned it all very
carefully. He worked his way into Carla's favor by presenting her with the
entrails of mother's milk fed infants for the unholy days, (actually they
were the guts from slaughtered lambs, but Carla never knew the difference).
Charlie made everyone in the coven believe he was a bad ass, a sadist who
tortured and murdered children, because he'd found out what Carla had in
store for me. She was waiting until I reached puberty, then on the holiest
of unholy days she planned to mutilate my body for the offering.
That was her crazy plan, Charlie had his own. He convinced her the
Great One wanted him to test the boy, to make sure I was fit for such
an honor, of course the things needed for the service would remain intact
while he went about the testing. Carla liked the idea of having me slowly
tortured by a someone who knew the ways of pain so she promised Charlie
a week alone with me if he would present her with the offering.
I'll always be grateful to Charlie for saving my life. If not for
him, my balls would have been chestnuts roasting by the fire and he reminded
me of that from time to time as we played around, but he was only teasing.
Actually he didn't have a mean bone in his body, only sometimes the steroids
got the upper hand. When they did, he'd get temperamental and rough and
as big as he was, only a fool would argue with him. Oh, he never hurt me,
I didn't even mind what we did, it's just for a time he'd be so aroused
sex was all he thought of but that really wasn't Charlie. I'd just do whatever
he wanted, no matter what it was and in a few days he'd snap out of it.
Suddenly he'd realize how crazy he was acting, then start crying
like a baby and pleading for my forgiveness. He'd beg me not to leave
and promise never to do it again. I'd act plenty mad at him, of course,
and he'd lay off the drugs for awhile, but it never lasted. After a week
or so he'd think his pecker wasn't stiff enough, or his hair was falling
out, or one of a hundred other excuses, and he'd be back on the shit. I
tried to reason with him, I had heard about steroids and knew how dangerous
they were, but he wouldn't listen.
I think Charlie knew I'd never leave him no matter what he did. I
owed him my life, of course, but more importantly, I had become completly
smitten with him and after that nothing really mattered to me except Charlie.
Sure, he got a little crazy at times, but mostly he was kind and tender,
gentle, fun, caring and a hundred other things I can't even name. Even at
his worst I always felt safe with him. Wrapped up in those big arms, snuggled
tight against him was a place without fear, a nest of pure warm contentment,
far from Carla and her pain.
I know he wouldn't have stopped me if I really wanted to leave, but
I never considered it. There was just no place for me to go except back
to Bakersfield and the only reason I'd go there would be to murder Carla.
I dreamed about that sometimes, taking an ax and giving her a whack for
each time she'd hurt me, for every time she stabbed me in the dick. Besides,
I knew by then I was just like uncle Phil, and even if dad did care a little
bit about me, I didn't know if he could handle that news. For that matter,
I didn't know if I could handle it anywhere but with Charlie. Uncle Phil
died of AIDS, and I was just as scared of that disease as Charlie.
Carla hated me. Dad never seemed to care what she did, though I'm
not certain he knew what really went on. He'd come home for a few days,
ask me how things were going, then tell me to mind Carla and be good. So
many times I wanted to tell him, but she said she'd kill me if I upset daddy.
He worked so hard and wanted things nice and peaceful at home. There was
nothing ever peaceful there, but I'm pretty sure she would have killed me
had I told him. I was always scared of her, right from the very first minute
I saw her.
When daddy was away she looked at me like I was something the cat
did on the floor, but when he was home, she was pretty Mama Carla, all
concerned, always on the move, never leaving me alone with daddy for a
minute. No, I don't think he ever knew, but then I guess he really didn't
care that much about me. He left me with her while he went away to build
roads and bridges and only came home when he felt like it. If he really cared
wouldn't he have stayed home and made her stop?
Charlie loved me, at least I've always thought so, I know for sure
he loved sex. When I was sixteen, he wanted me to try the steroids. He
said I'd be able to keep up with him, but he never forced the issue. I
do think he slipped something in the food from time to time, because I
put on muscle faster than I should have just tending sheep. That's what
we did, chased sheep across the ranch under contract every summer. The
herders would bring them up by truck or drive them in and we'd help by
hauling supplies and such. Up the mountain in the summer, down in the valleys
in the spring and fall, it's a nice life if you like the out of doors. Charlie
had an income of a few hundred a month from somewhere back east and he told
me the ranch made a profit, but we lived pretty simply. Lots of books and
magazines, a radio, plenty to eat and sex whenever the mood hit us. It was
what Charlie wanted and I never found any fault with it.
In the summer we went into town each week for supplies. The first
three years, everyone knew me as Charlie's nephew from California, just
here for the summer to help with the sheep. After that we said my mother
died and I moved here permanently. I don't think anyone ever suspected the
truth, but if they did no one ever spoke of it. In the fall we'd go hunting
for awhile, then drive over to Denver so Charlie could take care of the ranch
business. I never liked Denver much, it was just too damn big and busy, moreover,
it was there Charlie always dragged me to the dentist for my yearly checkup.
I went, but I didn't like it. All that poking around and scraping reminded
me of Carla.
Winter was the lazy time. We always made it back before the first
big storm because we both loved the feeling of being snowbound. We could
lie in bed 'til noon and read, or get around and cook each other special
meals. Charlie would fire up his homemade sauna and we'd broil ourselves
awhile then flop down in the snow, savoring the sudden chill. Winter was
for all those special things we denied ourselves when others were around,
like holding hands, or sneaking up and nuzzling each other's ear.
Snow was freedom, we became two souls marooned in an ocean of white
with no one to look askance at what we did. The ranch house was little
more than a shack built half buried in a hillside cave, yet it was warm
and cozy and it was home. In the early spring before the work began, we'd
take a few weeks vacation and just ramble around. Once we even went to Mexico.
We saw movies, shopped for clothes and books and gawked at everything
that was new and wonderful. I think we enjoyed those trips more because
we lived apart from all the hubbub that went on in towns and cities. TV
or a movie was always a thing to look forward to, not just something to
use up time. Charlie told me material things should be savored, taken
in small bites so as not to dull the palate. It was the immaterial things
like love, he said, that should be reveled in, because it grew stronger when
you used it. And he was right.
We lived on the ranch for six years. I loved the life and I loved
Charlie. Then one fall as we were trucking out the last of the sheep, he
had a stroke and landed in a hospital in Utah. He was only thirty five
when the steroids finally got him. I stayed in Provo to be near him yet
there wasn't a damn thing I could do but hold his hand and watch him die
a little every day. Dad's letters caught up with me there. I figured someday
I'd tell him everything, but right then I didn't want him disturbing Charlie.
I told dad I ran away. I said I was caring for the old man who'd taken
me in and I couldn't leave right then. We talked for hours on the phone,
but when he said he was coming to get me, I told him not to, I needed
time before I could see him again. It was all lies of course, but I had
to protect Charlie. I didn't know what dad might do if he learned the truth.
Charlie wasn't getting any better. He was only conscious part of
the time, but when he was, he'd call for me. Usually I was right there
anyway, massaging his arm and leg, he just couldn't feel it. Whenever
he was awake we'd talk and I'd comb his hair like always. His words were
sometimes hard to understand but not their meaning. He kept telling me
he loved me and his right arm seemed strong as ever as he'd reach up to
brush my tears away. Three weeks later Charlie died in his sleep, his whole
circulatory system damaged beyond any hope of recovery.
DAMN YOU CHARLIE! Why wouldn't you listen to me? How did you expect
me to go on without you? We had our whole lives ahead of us and you threw
it all away!
I buried my sweet Charlie in Craig and then went back to the ranch
to get his business things in order and write to those who had to know.
Mostly I just cried. Finally I got it together enough to go see dad.
When I called, he told me Carla had died the week before. On my way to
visit him I stopped by the cemetery. I don't know why I went there. I
guess I wanted to make sure she was dead or maybe I thought seeing it for
myself would make things better. It didn't. Whatever the reason, before
I left, I pissed on her grave. For all the good it did me. I think it
did,--- I've never regreted it.
* * * * * * *
Notes to myself (Remember, don't let Jake see these notes - they
would only confuse him)
I printed it out Lonnies' harrowing story and as Jake read it he
cried. He has always had a deep well of sympathy for helpless people,
especially children. Before the shooting he spent a great deal of time
and money making young lives better and even now he retains that same
compassion. It's the one part of Jake that has stayed consistent throughout.
It wasn't until I was well into Dan's journal I begin to put two and two
together. If I'm right, the connections between Jake and the Harris' are
multiple, and I guess that includes me as well. It's almost unnerving. Strange,
we never knew about each other all these years.
Was it just an accident we finally met or is it fate? Our old friend,
Alex once joked about fate being the driving force in the world. Maybe
he was right. Carla returns to haunt us. I haven't found absolute proof yet
Carla Harris is the same Carla I knew, but I'm leaning in that direction.
There is so much in Dan's description of her that jibes with my memories.
I wish I knew her maiden name, if Jake ever mentioned it, I don't remember,
nor did she ever tell me. What I do recall of Carla was her overwhelming
beauty, her charm and especially her eyes, those gorgeous eyes. You could
get lost in her eyes. I nearly did. If this is the same Carla, then fate is
cruel indeed. Such a waste.
There are three more excerpts, all from Dan's journal I'm going to
set down for Jake. I don't know that each one is particularly relevant
to him, but all mention Carla and that alone seems important. This next
entry is about Dan's brother, Philip. It's so personal I don't know if
Dan would want us discussing it. On the other hand, he could have taken
the journal with him if he was concerned about it.