I nod. In the corner of my eye, I see Dale, his mouth in a thin line.
He’s staring straight at me.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Dale
My dad will never betray me. I know that as well as I know the feel of my pool stick between my fingers, as well as I know the Syrah vineyards that are my true home.
Still, as he sits chatting with Ashley, I wonder.
Will he tell her how I feel about her?
Why do I even ponder this? My father’s word is as good as gold.
And it dawns on me, as if lightning is striking my brain…
Part of me wants him to tell her.
Part of me wants her to know.
Because maybe, if she knows, she’ll return my feelings.
But I’ve been around the block enough times to know that women don’t respond to the way I’ve been treating Ashley. Women like to be cherished.
And though I do cherish her, I’ll never show it.
Sure, I can fuck the daylights out of her. I have, and I hope to again. But I’ll never tell her how I truly feel. Not only do I fear she won’t return my feelings.
I also fear that she will.
Already my emotions have bubbled to the surface, and it takes all my strength to contain them. If she shares them? I’ll erupt.
That won’t be pretty.
Sure, the good part of it will be wondrous. I’ll be in ecstasy.
Until the bad part comes out.
And it will come out.
It’s the duality of nature. Of life.
My dad understands. And now I know why. So maybe the answer lies with him.
Or maybe it lies with my mother.
My beautiful mother, whose only crime was that she wasn’t the mother I loved and missed.
The mother who left Donny and me home alone after school while she worked.
That’s how…
The masked men. The vile-smelling van where we rode, blindfolded, for days upon days upon days. Somehow we got to the island off the coast of Jamaica. I don’t remember how. On a plane? In a boat?
I still don’t know.
We were most likely drugged.
When we arrived, starving, dehydrated, and covered in our own piss and shit, I remember thinking nothing could be so horrible.
I was wrong.
“Get in there, you little fuckers.”
The man was masked, of course, and he threw Donny and me into a large shower with several other children.
“Take off those shit-stained clothes and clean yourselves.”
I looked around for a bar of soap, to no avail.
Donny was crying, tears running down his cheeks—-the round cheeks of a little boy. Mine had only just begun to slim down as puberty headed my way. I wasn’t there yet, though. Only a few hairs had sprouted in my pubic area, and they were soon shaved off by one of the minions.
I grabbed my brother and held him close to me. “Don’t cry,” I said. “Never let them see you cry.”
They were empty words, and it was a command Donny couldn’t obey.
He continued to cry.
During the next few months, he cried a lot. We were left with so little water, I often wondered how he was still able to produce tears.
We shed our dirty garments and got clean as best we could under the lukewarm water.
It was our last shower until Dad rescued us.
A few minutes later, we were hustled out of the shower, given ragged towels to dry ourselves, and then each given a large gray T-shirt. It was a man’s size, and Donny’s hung well below his knees. Mine did not. It barely covered my ass, but I had nothing else.
Donny gripped my hand tightly. “What’s happening, Dale? Where’s Mommy?”
I had no answer for my brother.
It seemed Mommy had forsaken us.
We were led to a door, where one of the kids with us was thrown into a room.
Then another door, and another of the masked minions grabbed me. “In you go,” he said, his voice eerie.
“No, Dale!” Donny cried.
“Shut the fuck up,” the minion said sharply.
“Please,” I said. “Don’t. Let him come with me.”
The masked man smiled through his ski mask. Creepy, how I could see only his lips but no cheeks and nose. It was a smile of deception, a smile like a snake hissing in a whisper, “Be careful what you wish for…”
“Fine.” He threw Donny into the room with me, my brother crying out as he landed on his knees.
Donny didn’t know at the time, but I soon figured out the reason behind the sly smile of the masked man.
This wasn’t the minion helping us.
This was the minion starting to break us.
Horror would descend, and more horrific than anything done to me would be watching it happen to my little brother.
“You going to shoot, or what?”
Brock’s voice shocks me out of my trip back in time.
I quickly scan the pool table. I’m solids this time, and only two balls remain. Brock missed his last shot, but only one striped ball is left on the table for him to sink.