This is a story about gay love between teenage boys. If that offends you or if it is not permissible for you to read such things where you live or if you are under 18, please leave now. The story is fiction, entirely.
Feel free to write to me at sanansaattaja2003@yahoo.com
Sam, chapter 6
Mack and Sharon and Sam were eating when Jenna called, but as soon as Mack hung up the phone, he said, "Quick, grab your coats! That was Jay's sister. Something's happened and Jay's in trouble. He needs help. We gotta go."
Shocked, but without saying a word, the two ladies jumped up from the table, not giving another thought to their half-eaten supper. In just moments the three of them were in the car and Mack was tearing down the street. Luckily there was little traffic, and even more fortunate, no police car happened by, since Mack was speeding. He normally didn't do that, but this was an emergency. Or at least it had seemed like it. He kept replaying Jenna's cryptic phone conversation over and over in his mind and repeated it for his wife and Sam while he drove. He had just driven to Jay's home within the last hour, with Jay, so he knew all the right turns to make, and in just under ten minutes from the time Jenna had called they were pulling up to the curb in front of the Evans house.
Mack noticed that the garage door was open and that there was no car inside, so he wondered what that might mean but didn't stop to think about it. They all three ran up the walk to the front door and Mack rang the doorbell. Almost before the chime sounded, however, the door swung open and an obviously distraught Jenna ushered them into the entryway where they found Jay, still sprawled half sitting on the floor.
Immediately, Sam cried out, "Jay!" and ran to kneel down beside him.
"Thank God he's awake again!" Jenna said, and then added, "And thank God you've come!" Then she burst into tears and began sobbing almost hysterically.
Sharon wrapped her arms around the weeping girl, trying to comfort her, while Mack ran over to kneel beside Sam in front of Jay. "Oh my God," he thought to himself, seeing his battered face with its big purple bruise and the one eye black and swollen shut. The sickening smell of vomit made his stomach lurch, but the sight of Jay's face was even more sickening to him. Whatever could have happened? Who could have done this to this beautiful boy?
Just then, having realized that other people were in the house, Jay's mother came from the kitchen, still weeping, and looking bewildered and disheveled. "Who are you?" she said to them.
Mack stood up and replied, "I'm Mack McMillan. My daughter Sam here is Jay's school friend, and that's my wife Sharon. You're Jay's mother, I assume?"
"Yes. Irene Evans."
"Mrs. Evans, I think we need to get Jay to a doctor. It's best we take him to the emergency room, don't you think?" Mack said to her.
"NO... please! Please just help me carry him up to his room, sir. Surely he'll be alright. I can look after him. Please, sir, we needn't..." She pleaded with Mack, getting more and more distraught.
But Mack interrupted her, "No way, Mrs. Evans. I'm sorry, but I must insist we get him to a doctor. It looks like he is hurt very badly and he's in shock. See, he's shaking like a leaf."
And he was. Sam was talking to him, softly, and patting his face and his hands, but he was not responding to her. He was awake, more or less, and staring at her with his one eye, but there was just a blank expression in it, like his mind was not really processing the information that was reaching it. And his slight body was shivering violently.
"Please get me a blanket, Mrs. Evans," Mack instructed, and robot-like she turned to obey, returning presently with a woolen blanket.
Mack put the blanket over Jay, and then stooped down and picked him up in his arms. "Are you going to come with us, Mrs. Evans?" he asked, but she hesitated, seeming unsure, unable to make a decision.
"Well, I don't... What if...? Well..." she stammered.
"We must hurry, ma'am. Please get your coat on and get your purse," Mack said then, taking charge. And she did as she was told.
"Sharon, dear, will you be all right staying with the girl?" Mack asked.
She nodded, giving him a wan smile. "Please hurry, dear, and get Jay to the hospital. Don't worry about me," Sharon urged.
"Come on, Sam. Take Jay's mother's arm and let's go," Mack said.
And then they were out the door, Mack carrying Jay, and Sam leading his mother by the arm, out to the car.
Jenna cried out after them, "Bye, Jay!" and then began bawling inconsolably. "Oh God!" she wailed. "He's not gonna die, is he? Please tell me he's not gonna die. Jay, please come back! Please! I'll die if you don't come back." and then she began sobbing uncontrollably in Sharon's arms.
Sharon led her to the living room and pulled her down beside her on the couch, holding the nearly hysterical girl tight against her, crooning to her and rocking her back and forth. Little by little Jenna regained a little control and began to calm down, her sobs subsiding slowly. She began to relax against Sharon's side.
Finally, when Jenna was quiet, though still crying soundlessly, tears running down her cheeks, Sharon ventured to ask her what had happened to Jay.
Almost woodenly, with a cold voice, Jenna said, "Dad did it."
Those three words and the tone in which they were spoken chilled Sharon to the core, making her shiver, and her stomach lurched once, violently. She had already suspected as much, but had tried to convince herself that it couldn't be true. How could any father do something like that to his son, and especially to a son as sweet and innocent and wonderful as Jay, who had won her heart so quickly and completely when she had met him that afternoon? She didn't want to pressure Jenna beyond her ability to deal with it, but gently she asked her again, "What happened, sweetheart? Can you tell me what happened?"
Jenna began, then, in chilling detail, and seemingly without emotion, to relate to Sharon what she had seen and heard. She explained how she was upstairs in her room doing homework when she suddenly heard their dad hollering at Jay and then heard the sickening sound of him slapping him. She had sprung up at once and run down the stairs to see what was happening. When she got to the entryway, she could see Jay crumpled in a heap on the floor, moaning, and their mother was screaming at their dad. Then she saw how their dad kicked Jay before storming out of the house and driving away. She then told Sharon about her and her mother trying to get Jay to the couch, and how he couldn't walk, couldn't even stand up, and how he had vomited all over himself. She told how their mother at first talked about getting Jay to a doctor, and then seemed to change her mind, fearing what their dad would say or do when he found out, and then she explained about noticing that ID tag on the backpack Jay was carrying and about calling the phone number she had found there in hopes of getting someone to come and help Jay. He was so sick and she thought he was going to die. She had felt so panicky when Jay blacked out, fearing that he was dying and would never come back again. Having said that, she began crying again, and Sharon just held her, rocking her, for a long time, in the darkness of the living room.
Finally, she said to Jenna, "Are you hungry, sweetheart? You didn't have any supper, did you?"
Jenna just shook her head, not answering.
"Let me look in the kitchen, OK? She released Jenna and stood up and walked into the Evans kitchen, where she found the makings of their supper. There was a roast and potatoes and gravy and some cooked vegetables and a green salad all dished up and ready on the table. Everything was cold, of course. Sharon dished up a plate with a slice of meat and some potatoes and gravy and vegetable and heated it up in the microwave and then called Jenna to come into the kitchen and eat. She did so, wordlessly. She chewed and swallowed automatically, as if in a trance, and Sharon's heart went out to the poor girl. Tears welled up in her eyes and spilled down her cheeks for the thousandth time that evening, thinking of the emotional trauma that poor young girl had been subjected to, and of the scars it would certainly leave on her psyche and soul, to say nothing of the emotional and physical trauma Jay had suffered. She found herself praying over and over, silently, that both of those precious children would recover, knowing that it would take time and that they would need a lot of loving care.
Sam got in the backseat and Mack laid the still shivering, unresponsive Jay more or less on his side on the seat beside her with his head in her lap. The bruised side of his face was upward, of course, and she was repelled and saddened by the sight of it, but couldn't tear her eyes away from it. She began smoothing his hair with her hand over and over, tears trickling down her cheeks. Irene sat in the passenger seat in front, and of course Mack drove. Oddly, perhaps, they traveled in silence, each submerged in his own thoughts.
Mack had a fairly good idea of where the nearest hospital was. Fortunately it was nearby and the route was quite straightforward, so they wasted no time getting there. Only six or seven minutes from the time they had left the Evans home, they were pulling up to the emergency room entrance at the rear of the hospital. Once there, Mack just gathered Jay up in his arms again and ran inside with him. Seeing that Jay was badly hurt, the medical personnel on duty took over without further ado, getting him situated on a cart and wheeling him away down a corridor, beckoning for Mack to follow. While Jay was being undressed and looked over, one of them asked Mack for a quick account of what had happened so that they would have a better idea what they were dealing with. He told them the little he knew and then they asked him to return to the waiting room, promising to get back to him as soon as they could.
Meanwhile Sam and Irene had come into the admissions area and Mack found them standing at the front desk talking to the lady working there. Once she understood that Irene was the patient's mother, she began asking her for all the pertinent data: full name, birth date, address, telephone number, next of kin, etc., typing the information into the computer in front of her. When she asked about medical insurance, Irene hesitated, unsure of what to say. She thought maybe the family had medical coverage through Gene's work, but she didn't know for sure and couldn't give any details about it.
"Um... I think my husband's employer provides medical insurance for all employees and their families," she said.
"And who is his employer, ma'am?" the lady asked.
"Um... Uh... I'm sorry, I can't remember the name of the company," Irene replied, obviously flustered.
"How long has he worked there, Mrs. Evans?" the lady inquired.
"Well, we just moved here two months ago. He works for a company that makes some kind of farm machinery," she explained.
"Thank you, Mrs. Evans. We can get that information at a later time. Please have a seat there in the waiting area," the lady said, kindly, and indicated a group of sofas and armchairs arranged in a large circle around a couple big coffee tables and some magazine racks. "There's a coffee machine over there in the corner, and paper cups. Please feel free to help yourselves," she said to the two ladies and Mack.
A number of other people were already sitting there, some of them sipping coffee, one or two leafing through a magazine, a couple watching some game show on the TV, all obviously waiting for some friend or loved one being looked after somewhere down the same corridor where they had taken Jay. One young couple was sitting together on a sofa by themselves, clinging to each other and crying. The woman was completely inconsolable, the man trying his best to comfort her and calm her down. A nervous little sparrow of a lady sitting nearby whispered to Mack as he sat down on the sofa beside her, "Those poor people, their little girl was just brought in by ambulance maybe twenty minutes ago. I heard she'd been hit by a car as she was riding her bike on the street in front of their house. I guess she must've still been alive. She was covered up, of course, when they carried her past in the corridor there on the stretcher, but I did manage to get a glimpse of her little face and her beautiful blonde curls all matted with blood. Oh God. I thought I would throw up. It's so awful. Oh God, those poor parents..." And then she didn't say any more, but just sat there staring at the unfortunate parents, sniffling and sympathizing.
Jay's mother slumped down at the end of a sofa and buried her face in her hands. Soon her shoulders began shaking and she was obviously crying, though silently. Sam sat down beside her and put her arm around her shoulder, pulling her close. They sat that way for some time, in silence, and gradually Irene's shaking subsided but she didn't raise her head.
"You must be awfully proud of Jay, Mrs. Evans," Sam said to her finally. "He's so wonderful. He's one of the sweetest boys I know."
Irene didn't respond, so Sam continued, "I haven't known him very long, you know. But already he's one of my very best friends. And my mom and dad think he's the greatest too."
Irene did lift her eyes then, and looked at Sam, seemingly seeing her for the first time. Finally she murmured sadly, "I don't know any of Jay's friends. I didn't even know he had any. He never brings them home..."
"I'd love to visit Jay at his house, Mrs. Evans. And my best friend Lee would too. He and Jay are very close also. They've been working on that history assignment together for school, you know."
"Well, Gene w-w-ou... Um, I don't... My husband wouldn't li...," Irene stammered, and then her face turned red and she buried it again in her hands, saying no more.
Sam was shocked. She couldn't imagine not bringing her close friends home, and she definitely couldn't fathom not telling her parents about them. She told her mom and dad everything, shared everything with them. Well, almost everything, that is. She had never told them about Lee being gay. After all, that was Lee's secret, and not hers to tell. And neither would she tell them about Lee and Jay being more than just best friends.
Both Sam and Mack had guessed that Jay's dad must have had something to do with Jay being hurt, and found his absence at that time very suspicious also. But neither of them had really consciously processed that thought in their minds. It was just lurking there in the back corners, showing its ugly, menacing face from time to time, making them shudder whenever it appeared, and then it would dart back into the shadows. In the foreground of their minds were only thoughts of Jay, now, and worry about him, nagging worry that made their stomachs churn, mixed with warm feelings of love for him, and a kaleidoscope of memories of him from their brief acquaintance. Memories of his sweetness and innocence and shyness, his sense of humor, his intelligence, his polite and unassuming manner. They both were amazed at how quickly he had captured their hearts. They could see only virtue in him—nothing negative—and for the life of them, they couldn't imagine anyone, anyone, intentionally doing him harm. But his own father? That possibility was too horrible to contemplate.
The waiting felt interminable. Sam found herself watching the big clock on the wall, the long hand ticking off the minutes one after the other, seemingly at a much slower rate than they normally did, as was common for hospital waiting rooms. She amused herself for a bit with the absurd thought that maybe they made special clocks to hang up in such places, clocks that ran much more slowly than regular ones. She thought about Lee and wished he were there beside her. She felt such an urge, a need, to talk to him, to tell him everything, to share with him her sickening fear and worry, to pour out to him the growing rage she felt inside her at Jay's dad, on whom she was beginning to pin the blame for Jay's injuries with more and more certainty in her own mind. Lee would want to know—-hell, he needed to know-—about Jay, of course, and would surely be upset that she hadn't let him know at once. Actually, she had had no chance to call him before now. But she thought maybe there was no point in calling him now until they found out what the doctors had to say. Hopefully then she would have good news to share—-good at least in the sense that he would soon be OK again. He would be dreadfully shocked and upset, too, of course, to find out that Jay had been hurt. It wrenched her heart to think about how Lee would feel when he learned that. She determined to wait awhile longer, in any case, before calling him. Suddenly she remembered that she had promised to go over to his house after supper. He had been waiting for her now for some time, and was no doubt worried about her. Caught up in the excitement, or rather the horror, of what was taking place, she had completely forgotten about that until now. Probably he had even tried to call her at her house and gotten no answer. That would make him worry even more. He must be getting frantic. Poor Lee. And poor Jay. And then Sam began to cry again, the tears streaming down her cheeks.
Mack found himself looking often at the clock too. And then he would look at Sam, and at Mrs. Evans, still hunched over on the sofa with her face in her hands, and then he would gaze for long minutes toward the corridor where he hoped a doctor would soon appear with good news of Jay, and then he would look back at the clock, then at Sam again, and at Mrs. Evans slumped beside her on the sofa, and then back toward the corridor, around and around in a seemingly endless circle. And then he began to think about Sharon back at the Evans house, and of Jay's sister—-what was her name again? And then, unbidden, the thought of Jay's dad popped into his mind, and then, as if shocked with an electric prod, his body jerked suddenly, "What will happen if Mr. Evans comes home and finds Sharon—-a strange woman—-there in his house with his daughter, and his wife and son gone? What is he like? Is he deranged? Is he dangerous for everyone? Did he really beat his own son, his own sweet, wonderful, beautiful son, so hard that he had to be taken to the hospital? Oh my God, I hope Sharon will be all right over there, and that innocent little girl." He made up his mind to call Sharon and tell her to take the girl and leave, to call a taxi and go home to their house where they would be safe. He got up and walked over to Mrs. Evans to ask her for her phone number so he could talk to his wife.
When Gene Evans left his house and began tearing like a madman down the street in his car, he didn't have any goal in mind. He had just felt everything closing in on him, crashing down on him, and that was his only way out. He had to flee, to get away from it all, and to get a hold of himself. His heart was racing out of control and his mind was racing, also out of control, and his car was racing, not yet out of control. But a little girl on a bicycle that was wobbling and swaying along the edge of the street in front of him swerved suddenly into the path of his speeding car. He managed, luckily, to jerk the steering wheel just at the last minute, enough to avoid slamming right into the bicycle full force and flattening it under his car. Instead, he just clipped the front wheel of it with the corner of his bumper and sped on past, not looking back. His heart leapt into his throat. "Shit! I gotta get slowed down," he thought. "That's all I need, to kill some poor kid on a bike. Oh hell! What more can go wrong?"
If he had looked back, or looked in the rearview mirror, he would have seen the child go flying through the air, slamming into the side of a car parked at the curb and then sliding down onto the pavement where she lay unmoving, her twisted bicycle lying on the street some feet away. But he hadn't looked and he tried to force himself not to think about the hapless kid. He should stop, he knew. That was the right thing to do, to go back and look after the kid, to own up to what he had done. Oh hell! What would happen now? Bile rose up in his throat and he thought he was going to be sick. "Damn! I gotta get a hold of myself," he said out loud. But panic set in and took over and he kept on going. After all, he tried to convince himself, he had never seen her before and would never see her again. He didn't know her and knew nothing about her. Hell, he didn't want to know anything about her, ever. Just forget about her. She never even existed. It was better that way. Maybe he could just erase the memory of her and her damned bike and the whole nightmare from his mind. He had enough worries already without compounding them by getting himself entangled with some fool strangers and their kid who didn't have enough sense to keep her bike offa the street. Hell, she couldn't even ride it in the first place. So it wasn't his fault, was it, that he had hit her? She had swerved right in front of his car, after all. Shit! Why did he always have to have all the goddamned bad luck? Strangely enough, the more he tried to force himself not to think about the victim of his hit-and-run, the more she filled his mind, until he began to wonder if he was going to go crazy.
Suddenly Gene was seized with a fit of shaking. His whole body was shaking violently, as the shock of what he had done overcame him. He couldn't control himself. "Come on, Evans, get a grip!" he said aloud to himself, as he tried to force himself to stop shaking, tried to concentrate on driving, on keeping his car headed in a straight line down the street. It felt again like he was going to throw up, and he just had to pull over. He managed to stop his car at the curb, still shaking like a leaf. He sat there staring straight ahead, but seeing nothing, and started to pound his fists repeatedly on the steering wheel. Tears gushed suddenly from his eyes then, and he buried his face in his hands against the steering wheel in front of him. Oh God! What was this? He hadn't cried, ever, not since he was a baby. Not Gene Evans. What ever was he coming to?
After a long time, the shaking stopped, the tears ceased, and Gene began to calm down a bit. "I gotta drive on," he thought to himself. "Shit! I can't let em find me sitting here like an idiot so they start askin' questions." He pulled onto the street again, cautiously at first, and drove on, more slowly now, but not with more concentration on what he was doing and where he was going. He drove as if on autopilot, not thinking about it. His mind was elsewhere, churning and churning and churning. Eventually, he began to remember why he had driven off in the first place, and that pushed thoughts of the girl on the bike to the back of his mind for awhile, giving him other grist for his mill. Jay. That damned pansy-assed, no-good, runt of a kid that was supposed to be his son. Ha! How could a jock, a man, damn it, a man like him have ended up with such a sissy of a son as Jay? What a wimp! He was a thorn in the flesh. A continual source of irritation and embarrassment for him, Gene Evans, the star of his high school football team, the guy every opposing player in the whole goddamned state had feared and dreaded. Hell yeah, the very thought of that well-earned reputation made his chest swell with pride again now, like it always did. He'd shown em! No one could stand up to him. Few had even tried, but those who did had lived to rue the day. Damned right they had. He'd flattened em. Every last one of em.
One o' the biggest mistakes he'd ever made was fallin' for Irene. Shit. Too bad he couldn't go back and undo that; hell, he coulda had any girl in the damned school by just flickin' his finger at `em. They'd a' come runnin'. They'd a' been flocking around him, that's fer sure. They were all pantin' for him, the bitches. He'd always known it and it'd given him a continual hard-on just knowin' that every girl in the damned school wanted him. But he had stuck with Irene. The frigid prude. Fuck! She'd never even properly put out for him until they were married either. Not once. It used to drive him wild, and the fact that she was holdin' out on him had kept him pursuin' her. He refused to concede defeat. What a goddamned fool he'd been. That's the only regret he had. She'd been a classy chick back then, sure enough. And popular in school. The star cheerleader. So bein' her man, or rather, her bein' his girl, had given him even added status, elevated him even more in everyone's eyes. He could never have dumped her and made do with anyone less. That would've lowered him. But fuck! Why did he hafta be so dumb as to marry the bitch? Might as well be married to a damned rug. Hell, that's all she was anyway. She just lay down and let him walk all over her. She never stood up to him. Ever. Until today, he thought, then, with a start. When he had hit that bastard Jay, she'd come flyin' at him, screamin' like a banshee... almost startled the shit outa him. Totally outa character for her. Whatever got into her anyway?
And that damned sissy of a son of hers is just like er. Looks like er too. He hadn't got any of his, Gene's, genes, obviously. Then he laughed crazily to himself when he thought how funny that sounded: Gene's genes. HaHaHa! Didn't know he was so witty, been hidin' his talents even from himself! HaHa!
But then, suddenly, he had a flashback to the reason he had gotten so mad at Jay that afternoon. Mad enough, finally, to take a swing at him. He had never hit the bastard before. Never. Not Irene or Jenna either. But that goddamned fag, that queer, that dirty old man who'd had the gall to sit there in his car in front of his house and put his arms around his boy in broad daylight in front of the whole world. The damned bastard should be shot. The world'd be a better place without him, one less goddamned fag. Every fuckin' one of em should be rounded up and locked away, he'd always figured. But on second thought, maybe that'd be lettin' em off too easy. Someone should make em suffer. He'd gladly volunteer t' help with that! Oh yeah! That'd be a pleasure! He hated all goddamned queers more than anything. But... and oh shit! This was the part that galled him, that cut him to the quick. He'd never really thought that his boy, as wimpy and sissified as he was, coulda turned out to be one of them. It made his blood boil. It enraged him to the point of insanity, almost. Livin' right in his house, under his roof, sittin' at his table and eatin' his hard earned food, was a fag. Shit! Bearin' his name, too. A fuckin' disgrace. He didn't know if he'd ever get over it. How in the world was he gonna face the bastard again and go on seein' his damned queer pansy face day after day and rememberin' the disgustin' picture of him sittin' there with that goddamned old fag's arms around im. Whatever had he done t' deserve havin' his son turn into a damned queer? Life was so fuckin' unfair!
Gene had no idea where he was, he'd just been driving aimlessly, paying no attention to the streets or roads. He looked around, suddenly, trying to orientate himself, but it was futile. He seemed to be in a rather run-down part of the city now. Slummy. Scary, almost. Ha, that was a laugh! Nothin' scared him, Eugene William Evans. No sir. Then he noticed a bar and pulled over to the curb and parked a little ways past it. It wasn't a very imposing looking place, by any means. Decrepit. Just like the area. It fit right in. But it was a bar just the same. Just what he needed right then. If he had ever needed a drink in his life, he sure as hell needed one then. A good stiff one. Ah! He could taste it already.
He got out of the car and walked, swaggered, actually, into the bar. The Golden Swan'. He laughed humorlessly to himself at the name of the place. Biggest joke he ever heard. Inside, the bar was as decrepit looking and unimpressive as it was from the outside. And dark. They sure weren't spendin' much money on lights anyway, but what the hell. Who wanted to look at the other ugly fuckers sittin' in there anyway? And he sure didn't want em starin' at him while he had his drink. Just as well the place was dimly lit. Easier to hide in the shadows that way. There weren't many patrons, he noticed, as he walked up to the bar in the back. Four tough looking guys were playing cards at a table in the corner, smoking foul-smelling cigars, and every once in awhile taking a big gulp from their glass. A pathetic, wrinkle-faced, scraggly-haired woman, pushing fifty, looking like a cross between a tramp and a floozy with big bags under her eyes and more paint on her than a Picasso, sat at the bar, her skinny legs crossed at the knee, her skimpy skirt hiked way up almost to her crotch, one foot swinging back and forth lazily with its scuffed and dirty red high heeled shoe dangling from her toes. She was smoking a cigarette in a long, long holder, gazing out into the room, facing the door, as if looking for some potential john to come sauntering in, like a hapless fly into the web of a spider. Three mean looking toughs with dirty jeans and wife beater t-shirts, their heads shaved and their arms covered with tattoos, stood at the juke box in the corner, jerking and swaying to the insanely loud hard rock that came blaring out of it. They looked spaced out, nearly, and hardly more than teenagers still. What they were doing in a bar was a good question, but no one bothered or cared.
Gene sat on a stool at the far end of the bar, in the darkest corner, and surveyed the scene around him while waiting for the wizened old bartender to hobble over to him and take his order. The floozy sitting several stools away was eyeing him up and down hungrily, practically licking her lips. She rarely saw such a good looking hunk of beef come through that door, no doubt, and she was hungry! She looked like she was contemplating moving over to a stool closer to him, but he glared at her as coldly and uninvitingly as he could and she stayed where she was. But she kept glancing over in his direction anyway.
He ordered vodka, and gulped down several slugs in rapid succession, thirstily. They burned his throat, but he didn't care. He began to feel the effects quite quickly, the warmth spreading over him and through him, and the tension draining out of him. Ahhhhh! Just what he needed. He slugged down more vodka, and the bartender kept filling his glass. After awhile, Gene was feeling no pain whatsoever, and thoughts of Jay and his `sugar daddy' and of his poor spineless wife and of the girl on the bike faded further and further back into the darkest recesses of his mind. The dilapidated old bar didn't look so bad anymore either, and hell, even the whore sitting a few stools away was beginning to look better. Damn! That vodka was wonderful stuff!
He would no doubt have kept drinking until he fell off the stool and passed out cold, but amazingly enough, the bartender finally refused to give him any more, demanded payment and sent him staggering on his way. By some miracle, he managed to make his way to the door and then from the door to his car. Fishing the keys out of his pants pocket and then getting the key into the lock on the door was considerably more of a challenge, but he even managed to do that and had just sunk down onto the seat when the three toughs he had seen earlier in the bar suddenly appeared out of the darkness, standing at his side. One of them gave him a quick knock on the back of the head with a tire iron and another fished his wallet out of his pocket and they were off down the street, leaving him slumped over the steering wheel, out cold and oozing blood down into the collar of his shirt.
The door of his car was left ajar, causing the dome light to shine. Some time later two policemen cruised by on the street and noticed Gene's car parked at the curb with the inside light on, and so they stopped to investigate. As soon as they walked up to the car and got a better look at it they became very interested. An all-points bulletin had gone out on just such a car. There had been an eye witness to a hit-and-run incident on the other side of the city earlier that evening in which a little girl on a bike had been hit by a car. The witness was able to give a very accurate description of the car that had hit the bike and then sped away, and this one matched that description to a tee—-the very same make and model and color. The cops could see that the man sitting in the car wasn't going to be going anywhere soon, so they walked around to the front of the car to look for some telltale mark indicating that it had hit something recently. They found a slight dent and scrape in the right front corner of the bumper and a bigger scrape along the front fender, so they felt sure they had hit pay dirt and were immediately on their two-way, reporting their find.
Just as Mack was on his way over to ask Mrs. Evans for her phone number, a doctor appeared at the door of the waiting room and asked who was family of Jay Evans. He wasn't smiling, not at all. He had a very sober look on his face, and all three of them, Irene, Mack and Sam, felt a shiver of fear pass through them.
"I'm Jay's mother," Irene said, standing up, and Mack and Sam stood up with her.
The doctor said to the three of them, "Please come with me," and led them into a little room nearby and closed the door.