The Castaway Hotel: Next Generation - 50. A Bump In the Road.

On Wednesday morning, I got the boys up and saw them off to school. After they left, I got busy making phone calls and finalizing the arrangements for our weekend trip. First, I called Andrew, to make certain he didn’t have other plans for either Saturday or Sunday. Once he agreed that he didn’t, I told him we’d be arriving Friday night, so we could spend a little extra time together. It would also allow us to spend all of Saturday celebrating his birthday with him and then we’d stick around for part of Sunday too.

Andrew seemed pleased we were coming, but he was even happier when I informed him that Jake and I were bringing the boys with us as well. Suddenly, he was not only thrilled that we’d be there, but he was also pleased that he’d be able to spend time with Jesse and see Elliot again. On top of that, he also admitted that he was looking forward to meeting Noah as well.

After I finished speaking with him, I called and reserved two rooms at a motel where we had stayed before, and then I began packing the things Jake and I would need for this trip. When I’d finished and felt that everything had been taken care of, I started going about my normal weekday tasks. What I wasn’t aware of yet, was that today was not a normal day.

Unbeknownst to me, the divers finished their practice early, due to a problem with the platform, so Elliot told Hayden that he was going to walk over to the middle school and meet up with Noah. He said he’d wait for me to pick him up there and then they’d come over to the high school to get him. Once he finished explaining all of this, he left the pool area and went to change.

A short time later, when Elliot was approaching the middle school, he spotted Noah sitting in front of the building with some of the other soccer players. Obviously, his team had finished practice earlier than normal too, so they were all waiting in front of the building for their parents to pick them up.

As he got closer, Elliot noticed there was a bigger kid standing next to Noah and quickly assumed he must be one of Noah’s teammate’s older brothers. As he focused in on them, Elliot started to become concerned. It appeared the larger boy was picking on his brother and Noah looked as if he was on the verge of tears. Elliot quickened his pace and then broke into a full sprint when he saw the larger boy reach out and shove Noah.

Elliot was slightly taken aback as he approached his little brother. The bully was not only nearly twice Noah’s size, but he was also larger and heavier than Elliot as well. Despite this disadvantage, Elliot raced up and shoved the other boy away.

“Don’t push my brother, you jerk. He’s not even half your size,” Elliot admonished, before leaning down to check on Noah.

“Noah are you okay?” he asked.

“Yes. Can we please just go home?” he wondered, without looking up to meet his brother’s gaze.

Hearing this, Elliot quickly grabbed Noah’s arm and helped him up. Once Noah was on his feet, Elliot put his arm around Noah’s shoulder and they began to walk away. Elliot thought it might be wiser if he took Noah over to the high school now and wait for me to arrive there. It also meant this minor incident would have ended then and there, except the bully had to open his big mouth and stir things up again.

“That’s right, just take you’re little boyfriend and run away,” he taunted. “Go back to your Pride meeting with the rest of the Currie queers.”

Elliot stopped dead in his tracks after he heard the boy say this. After a momentary pause, he leaned down and whispered in Noah’s ear.

“You go stand by the building and stay where I can see you,” Elliot urged him. “Just wait there and don’t get involved in whatever happens next. Do you understand?”

“But…” Noah began to protest in response.

Since Elliot didn’t want to argue this point, he hushed his brother by putting a finger over Noah’s lips. Once Noah got the hint, Elliot sent him on his way. When he was sure Noah was where he’d directed him to go and was going to follow his instructions, Elliot turned and walked back to face the bully again.

“Would you mind repeating that for me, because I don’t think you have the balls to say it to my face?” he challenged.

Hearing Elliot’s retort, the bully let loose with a barrage of insults about Noah, Elliot and our family in general, but Elliot simply stood there and let the bully rant on. During this time, Elliot allowed the slurs to bounce off of him, like raindrops off a slicker on a stormy day, but at the same time a subtle change in his demeanor began to occur. Although it didn’t appear that anyone else even noticed this new development, Elliot’s jaw, neck and arms started to tense up, indicating at least some of these insults were beginning to get to him. Slowly, any of the previous indications that had once showed he might be feeling a shred of kindness toward the aggressor now seemed to drain from Elliot’s face and eyes. Instead, he began to stare at the bully with a steely, cold determination.

For their part, Noah’s teammates were just as shocked by what they were witnessing. They were all fairly good kids, so most of them had never seen or heard anything like this before. Even the bully’s brother looked embarrassed by the scene unfolding before him.

After a couple of minutes of carrying on this way, the bully finally grew tired of Elliot’s lack of response and made his next move. Unfortunately for him, this turned out to be a huge mistake. Frustrated, the aggressor stepped forward and took a swing at Elliot. This, however, was something Elliot had been anticipating and played right into his hands. In fact, it was precisely the opening he’d been waiting for.

Elliot easily blocked the larger boys right hook with his left arm then followed through by bringing the palm of his right hand into contact with his opponent’s nose. He followed this with a rapid succession of blows from his right elbow, which smashed into the side of the bully’s face. Now that the larger boy was totally disoriented and bleeding rather badly from his nostrils, Elliot reached up, grabbed him by the shirt, near his shoulders, and drew him closer. As soon as the boy was in range, Elliot lifted his knee and buried it in the larger boy’s groin. This dropped the bully to the ground, in a pathetic heap.

What had just transpired wasn’t elegant – in fact it was rather brutal, but it had been effective and was over in a matter of seconds. The bully’s face was now a mass of blood and tears, as Elliot bent down and whispered in his ear.

“The next time you have something to say about the Currie queers, I want you to think about this and ask yourself if it’s worth getting your ass kicked again.”

This was all too much for Noah! While watching the confrontation, he had been scared to death that Elliot was going to get hurt, so the second he saw the fight had ended, he raced over to his protector. Without caring what anyone else thought, he wrapped his arms tightly around Elliot’s waist. He was crying as he did this, but his tears were quickly absorbed by his big brother’s shirt.

As Elliot looked around at Noah’s teammates, he noticed their quivering lips and teary eyes. This made him begin to feel badly. He had definitely lost his cool in front of these little boys and managed to scare them half to death. As the anger began to ebb out of his body, he started to look at his former opponent with pity. This caused him to kneel down and reach into his gym bag, in search of something. When the bully’s little brother saw Elliot make this sudden and unexpected move, he hurriedly spoke up, in a soft, yet raspy, voice.

“Please don’t hurt my brother anymore,” he pleaded. “I know he shouldn’t have been picking on Noah or said that stuff about you guys, and he shouldn’t have tried to hit you either, but please just leave him alone.”

This comment struck Elliot like a knife in the gut and caused him to feel ashamed about what he’d just done. Yes, the other boy had started it, but Elliot began to feel that he’d overreacted and responded inappropriately. He’d reacted with devastating force and that was probably more than what the situation had called for. Slowly, he pulled a tee shirt out of his bag and handed it to his vanquished opponent.

“Here, use this to clean your face,” he suggested. “I’m sorry I kept hitting you like that.”

Elliot then offered his hand to the larger boy, to help him up. The bully looked reluctantly at it for a moment, but after a brief delay he took Elliot’s hand and pulled himself back to his feet.

“I’m sorry too. I apologize for what I said to you and your brother,” he stated, in a whispered breath.

As this was happening, I pulled up in the Suburban. Since I didn’t expect to find Elliot here and because it looked as if something was terribly wrong, I started to grow a bit apprehensive. I noticed one boy was bleeding, and apparently crying too, yet I had no indication as to what had transpired. When I saw Noah’s face was tear-streaked as well, I got out of the driver’s seat and walked directly toward Elliot. I hoped he could tell me if there was a problem.

“What’s going on?” I wanted to know.

Elliot looked at me and I could immediately tell he had been involved in this somehow. The expression on his face indicated he was definitely ashamed about something, but I still had no idea what.

“I’m sorry. I overreacted when this guy started picking on Noah and saying crap about our family,” Elliot confessed. “I hit him a few times and then I kneed him in the balls. I feel bad that I did it now, but he made me really mad and I just reacted.”

After Elliot told me this, I quickly asked who this other boy was. Before Elliot could answer, the boy’s brother spoke up and filled me in about their names and also went on to give me his perspective about what had happened. Once I heard his version of the events, he also informed me they were waiting for their mother to pick them up. When I learned this, I decided we would wait for her to arrive as well, so we could clear this matter up.

The boys’ mother pulled up a couple of minutes later, and when she saw her older son, she got out of her car and rushed over to him. Before I could say anything to the woman, her younger son began blurting out the story about what had happened again.

“Bobby started picking on one of the boys on my team and said some really mean things about him and his family, so his brother ended up kicking Bobby’s butt,” the little brother began. “Bobby totally asked for it too, and he even tried to hit the other boy first, so you can’t be mad at him for what he did to Bobby.”

His mother seemed to freeze in place when she heard this news. Then, she looked at her older son, before glancing over at Elliot and me. I quickly confirmed what she’d been told and apologized for what Elliot had done. I then had Elliot apologize to both her and her son too, but she seemed preoccupied, as if she had something else on her mind. Instead of reacting to what we’d said, she asked her younger son to tell her exactly what his brother had said and he eagerly repeated everything he could remember.

“No, we should be apologizing to you for what he did,” she stated. “He knows better than to spout that kind of garbage or to do anything that would start trouble. I’m very ashamed of him. He not only deserved the beating your son gave him, but he’ll probably get another from his father, when my husband gets home from work.”

After I corrected her and explained that Elliot and Noah were my grandsons, I tried to tell her that I didn’t feel any further punishment would be necessary. I felt that what Elliot had done to him should serve as a sufficient deterrent, but she didn’t agree. She was adamant that her older son would be dealt with again, since he knew very well that her husband and she didn’t allow or tolerate that kind of behavior. I didn’t argue with her further, because I was certain Elliot would be having a similar conversation with his dads when they got home from work. The only difference was, I knew Elliot wouldn’t be getting a beating for what he did.

Before I forgot, I hurriedly called Trey on his cell phone next. Luckily, he was still grading papers at school, so I asked if he’d run over to the pool before he left. He quickly agreed he would pick Hayden up and then drop him off at home, so I herded Noah and Elliot into the Suburban. Neither boy said anything on the drive home, not to me or to each other. However, I was mildly surprised by what happened when we reached the house. The second Noah got out of his seat he rushed up to Elliot and wrapped his arms around his waist. In fact, he was hugging Eliot so tightly that I thought he might squeeze his big brother to death.

“Thanks for saving me. I was really scared and don’t know what I would have done if you hadn’t showed up,” Noah stated, sincerely.

“I’m glad I did and I won’t ever let anyone hurt you,” Elliot croaked out. His voice was a little shaky, because he was overcome by Noah’s emotional outburst.

I was touched by the sentiment between the two brothers, but I knew Elliot would still have to be punished for what he’d done. Fighting was just not an acceptable way to solve your problems. It might have been different if he’d handled this solely as a defensive confrontation and merely blocked the other boy’s attack while protecting Noah. We might have even been willing to overlook him landing a blow or two, as he sought to stop the aggressor, but Elliot didn’t end it there. In fact, he really did a number on this kid and was very fortunate he hadn’t done more permanent damage to him.

Realizing he was in trouble, Elliot slunk past me and went up to his room. He knew he’d done something wrong and looked like a condemned man waiting for his dads to come home and pass sentence.

The house was pretty quiet until dinnertime. Once we were all sitting down at the table though, things began to get interesting. None of us had said anything to Danny or Brandon about what had happened earlier, but I’m positive they could tell something was wrong just from the looks on Elliot and Noah’s faces.

“So how did your days go?” Brandon asked.

Neither boy answered right away and looked sheepishly at their fathers. After a few moments, Elliot swallowed hard and began to speak.

“I screwed up big time today,” he admitted. “I beat the crap out of another kid when I went over to meet Noah after practice.”

“He only did it because the boy was picking on me,” Noah blurted out. “Elliot was just trying to make him stop.”

“Hold on a second,” Danny urged. “I think we need to slow down and back up a bit.”

Danny and Brandon now looked between the two boys and studied their faces.

“Elliot, why were you at the middle school in the first place,” Danny asked, “and what happened that made you hit another kid?”

“I got done with practice early, so I walked over to meet up with Noah,” he began. “When I got there, I saw this older boy picking on him. You know, he was saying a bunch of crap and pushing Noah around. When I saw this, I went over, stepped in and told him to keep his hands off my brother. Then I helped Noah up and we started to walk away.

“When we did,” Elliot continued, “the guy started shouting a bunch of crap at us. He said we were Currie queers and told us to run off to our Pride meeting. I didn’t hit him for that, but I did walk back and challenged him to say it to my face. When he did, I still didn’t react, not until he threw a punch at me. After I blocked his swing, I hit him in the nose and then a few more times in the head, but I didn’t stop there either. Even though he was all bloody and crying, I pulled him toward me and kneed him in the balls too.”

“The boy on my soccer team even admitted that his brother started it, not Elliot,” Noah chirped in, coming to his brother’s defense again.

“I heard his brother say that too, but Elliot knows he could have handled the situation quite differently,” I stated. “His martial arts training should have taught him that it is designed for defensive purposes, but Elliot chose to use it as an offensive weapon.”

“Yeah, but I bet the shit-head won’t say anything like that about our family again,” Jesse offered, as he slapped Elliot on the back.

Elliot seemed embarrassed by the attention he’d just gotten from Jesse and ashamed of himself for what he’d done, so he just stared down at his plate. After I’d heard Jesse’s comment, I flashed him a stern glare in response. He quickly got my message and ended his contribution to the discussion.

“Okay, we’ll talk about this in more detail after we finish our meal,” Danny advised Elliot.

I think Danny suggested this because he needed some time to think about how he should handle the situation, but I also believe he wanted us to finish our meal while it was still warm. Unfortunately, it didn’t work out as he had hoped. First of all, I think most of us had suddenly lost our appetite – that is everyone except for Jesse.

The rest of dinner seemed to drag on forever, because it now felt like we were sharing the final meal with an inmate on death row. I’m not sure how the others fared, but I was finding it difficult to chew and swallow my food, because my mouth had dried up and there was very little saliva to aid in the digestive process.

After we finally got up from the table, Danny and Brandon asked me to join them when they spoke to Elliot in the family room. The other boys wanted to go in with us, but we told them it wouldn’t be necessary and this was something we needed to do in private. I explained I was only invited because I had talked to both the boy and his mother, but then Noah began to complain that he had talked to them too. Although I agreed this was true, I explained that I could relay the information they had given us, so we wouldn’t need his input. He wasn’t happy about being left out, since he had actually also witnessed what had transpired, but he realized this was a losing battle and ended his protest.

Once we were alone, Danny, Brandon and Elliot sat on the sofa, while I chose to sit in the rocking chair. Elliot was looking down at the rug and acting as if he was facing a military tribunal.

“Elliot, do you know why we’re upset about this?” Danny asked.

“Yes sir. I shouldn’t have hit him like that,” he admitted. “Maybe once, after I blocked his punch, but I shouldn’t have finished him off like I did. I treated him like he was a mugger, when he was just a playground punk.”

“Look, we’re very pleased and even proud that you stood up for your little brother, but we don’t want you to end up becoming a bully yourself. We also don’t want you to find out you now have a target on your back that others will focus on, because they think you’re abusing others too,” Brandon told him, in a more conciliatory tone.

“I know,” Elliot agreed, without going into detail.

“You have to realize that since there are people who find being gay morally objectionable, or even repulsive, it is in our best interest that we conduct ourselves in a manner that will give them little to find fault with. Many of the most vocal groups tend to overreact concerning things we do, even if they wouldn’t say anything about others who had reacted in a similar manner. This is because they would love to derail our family’s attempts to enlighten the community about our situation,” Danny continued. “Due to their bias, many of these people either tend to misread what we do or even intentionally misinterpret it, so they can use it to their advantage. That’s why it’s so important that we don’t do anything that gives them fuel to add to their fires.”

“I didn’t think about anything like that at the time,” Elliot confessed.

“That much is obvious, but now we have to determine an appropriate punishment for what you did,” Danny stated. “Dad, I think we should keep him from doing anything extra for a while, so how would you feel if we began by making him stay home this weekend, instead of going with you to see Andrew?”

When Elliot heard this, his eyes bulged open.

“That’s your call and I don’t want to sway your decision,” I replied. “I leave that entirely up to Brandon and you.”

“Dad Danny, can’t you punish me some other way?” Elliot pleaded. “I’m really looking forward to visiting Andrew and I’d hate to miss his birthday or mess up everyone’s plans just because I screwed up and acted like a jerk.”

“Your not being there won’t ruin Andrew’s birthday and the others will be more than able to help him celebrate it without you,” Brandon challenged. “Dad and Pop have things planned, and Jesse and Noah will be there for Andrew as well.”

“I know, but Jesse and Noah are expecting me to go with them. I don’t want to screw up the trip or cause them not to have a good time, just because I got grounded,” Elliot whined.

“Well, I doubt they will allow that to happen,” Danny challenged.

“Please,” he pleaded again. “Can’t you punish me some other way?”

Danny and Brandon looked at each other, as they considered his proposal.

“What would you suggest then?” Danny countered.

“I don’t know,” Elliot replied. “Couldn’t you just ground me or not allow me to stay at Hayden’s overnight or maybe just not let him stay here with me for a while. Anything, but please let me go with Papa this weekend. I was just getting close to Andrew before he left for college and I don’t want him to think I didn’t want to be there for his birthday when everyone else is going.”

Danny and Brandon looked at each other and then at me. Since I wasn’t about to say anything in front of Elliot, I merely shrugged my shoulders.

“I tell you what,” Danny offered. “Give us some time to talk this over a little more and then we’ll get back to you about it. This doesn’t mean we’re going to let you go on the trip, but we will consider what you’ve said, as well as think about other possible punishments.”

“Yes, sir,” Elliot replied, less than enthusiastically.

He did look somewhat relieved by their willingness to reconsider their position, but it was obvious he wasn’t totally satisfied. Reluctantly, he slunk out of the family room and shut the door behind him, as his fathers requested. Once he was gone, Brandon looked at me and spoke.

“Help us out here, Dad,” he began. “We’re new at this and could use your expertise. We know we should punish him, but we also want to be fair. After all, this only happened because he was defending his brother.”

“I know and I feel badly about disciplining him for this too,” I admitted. “The only thing is, we can’t allow him to think he can handle his problems by fighting. He’s had training the other kids haven’t and that makes him dangerous if he doesn’t learn to control his temper. This incident kind of reminded me of the fiasco in the courtroom, when he tried to attack his dad’s killers.”

“I thought about that too,” Danny confirmed. “What do you think we should do?”

“If it were up to me, I would ground Elliot for the rest of the month. That will give him nearly four weeks to think about what he did,” I suggested. “Even though I know this will kind of punish Hayden too, I think you also have to make sure the grounding includes not allowing him to sleepover at Hayden’s or permitting Hayden to stay with us either. I’ll also tell Jesse that he’s not to fool around with Elliot during this time as well, although I’m not sure they have been doing anything like that as of late. It’s because I’d already asked them to cool it for a while, so we wouldn’t risk Noah seeing or hearing anything he shouldn’t.”

“So you think that will be enough?” Brandon pressed.

“I do,” I confirmed. “You know how close Hayden and Elliot have become, so going a few weeks without being able to hang out with him, except at school, plus restricting his other activities should be a pretty sober reminder for him the next time he is about to lose his cool.”

“Okay, then that’s what we’ll tell him,” Danny agreed.

Danny and Brandon got up and left the room at that moment, so they could advise Elliot about their decision. He was happy to learn he’d be able to go visit Andrew with us this weekend, but he was totally bummed out that he was going to be grounded for nearly an entire month. Not only that, but he didn’t realize his dads were going to stop him from spending time with Hayden too. When he made his suggestion, he’d thought they’d do one of those things, not all of them, so he ended up going to bed that night with mixed emotions. He was pleased that his fathers had changed their minds, while at the same time feeling miserable about his new punishment.