The Good Son - 14. Chapter 14: Memory Lane

Seeing so many people dressed in black made Daniel’s gut uneasy. It made Geil uncomfortable; especially the people crying.

Johnathon stood beside Shelly’s mother, who held the couple’s one month old daughter, Elizabeth. He looked like he were mad for being sad, clutching a single rose in his hand tightly at the stem. Standing next to Arty and Jack, Daniel didn’t know where to concentrate: Jack was looking around for someone, Henry just arrived and stood next to Johnathon, putting a hand on the man’s shoulder, Arty was holding Geil’s hand and looking at the white casket, and the priest was saying some things for Shelly. Then he said, “Let us pray,” and bowed his head. Daniel decided to bow his own and concentrate on the quiet.

“Our Father in heaven,” the priest spoke, “we thank you that, through Jesus Christ, you have given us the gift of eternal life. Keep us firm in the faith, that nothing can separate us from your love. When we lose someone who is dear to us, help us to receive your comfort and to share it with one another. We thank you for what you have given us through Elspeth...”

Daniel opened his eyes. Elspeth?

Standing in the small crowd of family and friends, the casket in front of them all was brown instead of white. The priest was overly aged, like he should have retired years ago. Daniel looked to his left and saw his father, Leslie Douglas Scott, standing beside him and staring stone-faced at the casket.

The priest was speaking the eulogy and it was wet outside from the fresh rain that had fallen not too long ago; Daniel’s twelve year old friend, Adam, still held his umbrella open above him. He looked at Daniel with his green eyes and, although not smiling, whispered, “It’s alright.” Daniel blinked a few times, his dark eyes glazing over.

“Adie?” he whispered, his best friend watching him. Before he could say anything more, Leslie clasped a firm hand over Daniel’s shoulder, looking down at him through stern eyes.

“Be quiet! Have respect for your mother,” he whispered sharply, with enough snap to make an attendee glance over. The priest spoke up.

“We must now part with this beautiful mother, wife, sister, daughter, and friend, Elspeth, and say Amen.”

“Amen,” everyone said. Daniel whispered the word, looking back at his mother’s casket. He drew in a shaky breath.

“Daniel,” Arty said, tapping the teen’s shoulder. Daniel looked at him, blinking a few times as he came to. He furrowed his eyebrows and looked around.

They were still attending Shelly’s funeral.

He looked back at Arty, confused at his own self. Arty offered the teen a smile and pointed off to the casket. “We’re putting our flowers in,” he said. Daniel gave a light nod, glancing down at his hands, where he held a few roses. Arty reached out to take them, patting Daniel’s hand. “I’ll take them, you look worn out.”

Daniel nodded again, watching Arty as the man walked to the open grave and casket with the flowers.

He looked around at the dispersing crowd to see what all had happened while he were in his daze, and his attention was drawn to Johnathon, Jack, and Henry.

Johnathon was hugging Henry, his uncle patting his back. “Thanks for coming, Uncle Henry,” Johnathon said quietly, holding in his emotions until he were in his family’s hands. Henry shook his head.

“It’s okay, you’ll get through it.”

Jack seemed to be waiting to talk to Johnathon, because once he and Henry parted, the man walked over to his son.

“Johnathon,” he said, his son looking at him through red, irritated eyes. “Where’s Lawrence? He should have been here.”

Johnathon scoffed. “Lawrence? When was the last time anyone saw him? He’s been gone just as long as you have,” he spat bitterly and tried to turn away, but Jack grabbed him by the arm.

“Don’t walk away-”

“Don’t touch me!” Johnathon pulled his arm away before shoving Jack back. “Mom isn’t here, and Lawrence isn’t here, because you’re here! The only time you ever decide to show up, and it’s Shelly’s funeral? Leave!”

“Johnathon-”

“You were supposed to help us! You were never there! You were supposed to help me with Shelly!”

“It should have been you,” Leslie said, his breath reeking of alcohol. Daniel took in sharp, gasping breaths of terror as he touched a hand to his mouth, his fingers coming away with blood from his lip being cut against his teeth. He looked back at his father, dark eyes wide as he tried to process what had happened.

He had been punched. He had really been hit- struck in the face.

“Dad-”

“Shut up!” His father grabbed him around the throat with both hands, holding him tightly to cut his airway. Daniel choked and started scratching his father’s hands to get him off, terrified and crying.

“Dad-” Daniel shut his eyes tight, the loss of oxygen and the strength around his throat painful and traumatizing. But then, as if it hadn’t happened, he was let go.

Falling to the floor and choking on air, the young teen placed a hand over his throat to feel the damage of the wound while he cried. He could hear his dad leave the room, his boots thudding against the wooden floor. He took a deep, ragged breath and lay there, trying to work up the energy to get up.

He evened his breathing, breathing slow and trying to calm himself down. Once he got that under control, he pushed himself up to his hands and knees and crawled to the side table of the sofa, where the home telephone was. Then he picked it up from the receiver and dialed 999.

“This is the police department, can I ask your state of emergency?” a woman’s voice sounded from the other side of the phone. Daniel exhaled deeply to calm his nerves.

“Hello, my father is drunk- he’s hurting me,” he spoke in reply, his voice scratchy and hoarse. The woman gave a light “Alright. Are you home?”

“Yes.”

“Is he still in the home with you?”

“Yes, he’s left to the kitchen. Please come, m’am, I’m scared.”

“Okay, it’s alright. Can you tell me your place of address? And where has he hurt you?”

“It’s down Rose Street, 421. He’s hit me in the face and choked me- are you coming yet?”

“Yes, I’ve given some police your home and they’re on their way. Can you tell me your name, laddie? And your age?”

“I’m Daniel, and I’m twelve. Can you-” Daniel could hear his father coming back, so he quickly slid the phone underneath the sofa to hide it. Turning his head, he saw Leslie approaching him.

“Can’t you just lay still?” Leslie grabbed Daniel by his hair, pulling the curly locks roughly and forcing the boy to fall onto his back with a loud cry.

“Daddy, stop!” Daniel cried as his father dragged him away from the sofa by his hair, his tailbone scraping along the floor’s wooden planks. “You’re hurting me!”

“Your mother was hurting!” Leslie yelled loudly at Daniel, throwing the boy roughly against the floor, his head hitting the wood and making him cry. “Only girls get to cry- you think this hurts? You think you’re in pain? I’ll show you what pain is!” He stood in a slumped stature from his drinking and stamped a foot heavily over Daniel’s torso, knocking his air from him and making him dizzy. His boots were heavy with steel in the toe for his work, and it hurt Daniel to the point that he were close to pass out. Then Leslie paused for a break, panting and wiping his face with a dirty shirt sleeve. Daniel, winded, couldn’t even roll to his side to get away, his vision doubled and waning. Leslie dropped down to his knees beside him.

“Help,” Daniel breathed inaudibly, his head spinning. Leslie brought a knife Daniel hadn’t noticed before up over him, and then he slammed it down into his son’s body, his drunken mind messing with his aim to the point that the knife missed Daniel’s stomach or chest and rather, struck his hip. The blade slid in through his skin, slipping in like a knife to butter, making Daniel cry and writhe on the floor. Then his dad pulled the blade out and slammed it back in, the knife catching on Daniel’s hip bone and stopping it a quarter of an inch inside. It could have stopped there, but Leslie used enough force to drive the blade through his bone with a sick sound, the kitchen knife breaking into the bone and exiting underneath, slicing into the meat and tendons that lie beneath.

Though he couldn’t get up the air to scream or call for help, Daniel could still sob loudly in pain. He could hear the operator’s voice on the phone, quiet and muffled, but she were speaking. He could feel himself crying, his tears escaping his confused eyes and slipping down his face. He twisted his body to get away, but it just caused the trapped blade to send painful tremors through his bones.

Leslie tried to pull the knife out but couldn’t- it had gotten trapped in the bone. He gave a loud exclamation of anger and stood back up, stumbling on his drunk feet, before he continued stomping over Daniel’s body, his boot hitting the handle of the knife and making immense pain strike up his son’s body, the boy choking on a sob of terror.

Then the house’s door burst open.

“Get off the boy!”

“Back away! Put your hands up!”

“Get off him!” officers yelled, but Leslie didn’t mind them, finishing his beating. Until a gunshot took him down, followed by two more of the same gun. Daniel was in the midst of unconscious when an officer came to his aid, the other two checking on Leslie to see if he were alive.

“Hey, boy, you’re okay,” the officer said to him, picking him up. “It’s alright.”

“Guys, stop it! Please,” a woman stood between Jack and Johnathon, probably one of the latter’s friends. Daniel turned away from the scene, leaving the group of watching bystanders and stepping off to a neighboring building that stood at the end of the grave’s lot, for some type of storage, probably. He pulled his cell phone from his suit pocket and called Joe.

The phone rang a few times before being answered, with Joe panting heavily into the phone like he were out of breath.

“He-”

“When are you going to kill him?” Daniel asked bitterly into the phone, trying to keep his anger to a minimum. Joe swallowed roughly before panting again, having been on a run.

“What?”

“Kaiden! Get rid of him!”

“W-what did he do now?”

“Goddammit, Joe!” Daniel slapped his phone shut and put it away, leaving Joe looking at his own phone and speaking into it. “Hello? Daniel? ...He hung up on me?”

Seeing Daniel head off, Arty followed after him, everyone at the funeral dispersing and Jack taking Geil to the car after he and his oldest son… tried to get over their differences.

Arty was going to call out to Daniel and tell him they were leaving, but he was struck by sudden surprise when he saw the teen punch the white painted brick wall of the spare building. He furrowed his eyebrows, heading over. He had most definitely heard a crack from one of Daniel’s knuckles.

Approaching the teen, Arty put a hand on his shoulder, lightly, making Daniel look at him. The teen looked angry, but he quickly turned away to hide his emotion. Arty sighed and pulled him into a hug.

“It’s okay,” he said while hugging the teen, hearing his breath coming out harsh in frustration. He put a hand to the back of Daniel’s head and held him tighter, sighing into his hair. He could feel Daniel, after a moment, put his arms around him and hug him tightly in return, closing his dark eyes and burying his face into the man’s shoulder.

After the funeral, when everyone went home, Henry took Jack out to a bar, which upset Arty a good amount, because apparently, once you got Jack drinking, he didn’t stop; until he passed out, of course.

That left Arty home with Daniel and Geil, and they had resorted to watching A Nightmare on Christmas because Geil wanted them to.

Sitting on the couch with the kids, Arty’s phone started going off in his pocket and he glanced at Daniel to see if he was awake. He wasn’t, but he had fallen asleep against Arty’s shoulder, virtually keeping him there, or he was at risk of waking the worn teen. Arty sighed and pulled his phone out to answer it.

“Hello?” he asked quietly, Geil looking at him before looking back to the television. There was no reply on the phone. “...Hello?”

“Hey,” said a familiar voice, softly. Arty furrowed his eyebrows and pulled his phone from his ear to look at the caller ID. It was Johnathon.

Putting the phone back to his ear, Arty spoke again. “Hey, Johnathon, what’s up? You okay?”

Johnathon was silent for a long time before clearing his throat and speaking. “...I need to tell you something.”

“...Alright. But, are you okay?”

“I really don’t want to talk about me.”

“Okay, I… won’t. What’s wrong?”

Johnathon took a deep breath on the other side of the phone. “It’s about Shelly, I-” he paused, mustering up his words. Arty waited, not really sure of where the conversation was headed. Soon enough, Johnathon continued. “I killed her.”

“What?” His voice came out a little louder than he meant, and Daniel stirred on his shoulder. Arty cleared his throat, lowering his voice again. “What?” he whispered.

“I didn’t want to, Arty. She… she made me,” Johnathon said softly. Wherever he was was quiet, because there was no echo of his voice, and there were no surrounding sounds. “She didn’t want the treatments or anything, she just… left some things for Elizabeth and said she was ready...”

“Okay. It’s okay, Johnathon.”

“It was the morphine- she told me to kill her; she made me give her too much.”

“I know, it’s okay. Hey, where are you, by the way? Johnathon?”

Johnathon sighed into the phone. “I’m just… at home. I’m not gonna kill myself, if you’re worried. Shelly made me promise. You know we keep our promises.”

“Yeah, I know.” Hearing that was a lift off of Arty’s shoulders- he thought this was a goodbye call.

“I just… needed to tell someone. I couldn’t keep it to myself. Will you… keep it a secret?”

“Yeah, I promise. Just, um… come by sometimes, okay? So we can help you out, and stuff.”

“Yeah.” There was a silence before Johnathon said a, “Bye” and hung up. Arty sighed heavily, dropping his phone into his lap. He shook his head lightly and ran a hand through his hair.

“...God,” he mumbled to himself, laying his head back against the couch and closing his eyes. Geil looked at him.

“What’s wrong?” he asked. Arty shook his head again, peeking at him.

“It’s nothing.” He reached out to pat the child’s head. “Your brother Johnathon is gonna come by with the baby sometimes.”

Geil grinned. “Yay!”

“Shh, don’t wake up Daniel.”

“Hey, what’s that song?” Geil asked lightly, leaning against Arty’s other side. Arty quirked an eyebrow at him.

“Did “brother Johnathon” make you think of “Brother John”?”

Geil laughed. “Yeah..”

Arty put an arm around Geil’s shoulders. “Are you sleeping, are you sleeping? Brother John, brother John? Morning bells are ringing, morning bells are ringing. Ding ding dong, ding ding dong...”

“Now sing the other one!”

Arty rolled his eyes but smiled to the child before singing, “Frère Jacques, Frère Jacques. Dormez-vous, dormez-vous. Sonnez le matines, sonnez le matines. Ding dang dong, ding dang dong...”

Daniel nuzzled further against Arty, sighing heavily in his sleep. Arty pressed his lips together, thinking. He looked at Geil.

“You want pizza for dinner?” he asked. Geil’s eyes lit up.

“Yeah!”

“Okay, there’s some money in the little table by my bed, will you get it?”

Geil hopped up from the couch and hurried off to the stairs, while Arty called a pizza place to order.

“Just, one with pepperoni, and the other with cheese. That’s all. Can you be here within the hour? Alright, thanks.” Arty made a mental note of $12.95 and hung up, leaning back and closing his eyes for some final resting time. Then he remembered about Jack and Henry and sent them each a quick text of “Don’t come home drunk, I ordered pizza”. Before he could close his eyes again, Daniel opened his own, sitting up from the slouched position that made his ribs hurt.

“Hey Daniel, I just ordered some pizza,” Arty said softly to the teen, who looked like he wasn’t ready to wake up yet. In all honesty, he actually looked like someone with real emotion, right now, instead of always being perfect. He looked at Arty through narrowed eyes of sleep.

“...Hm?”

Arty laughed some. “Uh, I ordered pizza.”

“Was I asleep?” Daniel’s voice was so laced with sleep that his accent sounded exceptionally thicker. Arty nodded, looking away from the teen.

“Yeah, you fell asleep on Tim Burton.”

“I don’t know him,” the younger brunette said with so much flat honesty it was funny. Arty shrugged with a smile, looking at the TV.

“It’s okay, I’m changing the channel anyway.” He, since Daniel wasn’t on him anymore, leaned forward on the couch to get the remote from the table and changed the channel. He put it on a channel that was showing some romance comedy, because the best thing to watch when you’re down is some stupid humor. Daniel looked around before looking at Arty.

“Is Jack still gone?”

“Yeah, I might have to go pick him up later.”

“...How long was I asleep?”

“A few hours. Still tired?” Arty glanced at him. Daniel shook his head, looking away.

Arty turned on the couch to face him. “You okay? Is there something you want to talk about?”

Daniel breathed through his nose and looked at Arty again. “...You know everything about me, right? My mother and father, what foster homes I stayed in.”

Arty gave a light nod. “I do. ...I know your mom had cancer, so I’m really sorry for what you’re going through right now.” When Daniel didn’t say anything in reply to that, Arty touched his arm softly. “...I’m sorry.”

Daniel looked down at Arty’s hand before looking at his face. “...Am I a bad person?”

“What? No, no- why would you think that?”

“...Because I really like you.”

“Well… I like you, too.” Arty smiled at Daniel looking as tired as Daniel felt. Daniel suddenly leaned forward to Arty, almost close enough to kiss, but he didn’t. Instead, he paused there, like he were waiting to see if Arty would kiss him. He didn’t, taken by full surprise and chest racing.

...What kind of situation is this?

“...Daniel,” Arty backed away, nervous and confused. Daniel stayed where he was, watching Arty through his dark eyes that looked… anticipating. “I, um...” The front door suddenly opened and Arty looked over from where he sat on the couch. It was Jack and Henry, looking like real brothers as they came in together. Arty stood up from the couch, glancing back at Daniel, who was looking at the TV like nothing had happened.

Henry looked around the room. “Where’s the pizza?”

“I-it’s not here yet,” Arty said and left to the stairs, going up them and disappearing to find Geil. Henry watched him before looking at Jack, who took off his coat to hang up.

“Arty been taking his pills?” he asked. Jack looked at him, having a buzz. He gave an honest shrug.

“Probably not. No, I don’t think so.”

“Mm.”

There was a knock on the door and Henry answered it for Jack, who was rubbing his eyes. It was the pizza man, a highschooler who probably knew Daniel, because he waved when he saw him, but Daniel was still watching the television to notice.

“Hey kid, how much?” Henry asked, pulling his wallet from his pocket. The kid blinked and looked at Henry before clearing his throat to be more professional.

“$12.95.”

Pulling out a twenty, Henry paid the kid and let him keep the change, taking the pizzas and shutting the door after the driver left happily to his car. Then Henry turned from the door.

“Pizza’s here!”