No Way to Say Goodbye - Anna McPartlin [114]
Sam lifted the flask.
“Good.” Jack took it and poured a cup for Sam. Then he pulled a plastic mug from his pocket and poured for himself. “She makes great coffee.”
Sam drank half of his in one gulp, then balanced his cup on a rock. He looked back towards the hill, and could barely make out Mary’s car. Jack took a slug and began.
“It was the summer of 1957 and I had just turned sixteen. My father had a friend with a farm who offered to pay me half nothing to help him clear out an old stable that needed fixing. I’d been working three days before he came near me and I was exhausted from lifting and hauling. The place was in a terrible state. He brought me a lemonade drink his wife had made. Jesus, I can still taste the sugar – it was thick with it. I sat down to drink it. He sat beside me. The next thing I know his hands were in my hair. I thought maybe there was straw but then his other hand was in my crotch.”
Sam wanted to stand but his legs failed him. “I can’t,” he said. He put his hands to his ears, but Jack gently removed them.
“I tried to push him away but he was a strong man. It didn’t take much to knock me out, just one clatter of his hand and I was a goner. I wasn’t out for long, though. Only long enough for him to have my pants off.”
Suddenly Sam was crying, tears streaming down his face. He was shaking the way he did when the anger took over.
“I understand that kind of hate,” said Jack. “I know how it can infect your entire being. I know how it can destroy a soul. I know how you feel, son.”
Sam was sobbing and Jack stayed quiet. He focused on the tide turning and the birds calling until Sam had collected himself enough to speak.
Mary sat in the car. It had become clear now – she had seen it all. She saw him rehearsing above an old launderette. She watched him say goodbye to the others and turn onto a street marked 7th. She saw him pass those boys. They were calling out, Loser, hey, loser, where ya going, loser? He gave them the fingers. They started running. He started running with everything he had in him. Again she felt the concrete under his feet and heard the steam emitting from a grating. She could hear the car screeching to a halt and the horn beeping. She could feel the steel bumper against his thigh as he brushed past it. She could hear them coming and the thud of eight feet moving closer and closer. She could feel his chest tighten and his breath shorten. They were closer now, the hairs on the back of his neck standing to attention, warning him of danger. He tried to speed up but his legs weighed heavily. He slowed by a fraction but it was enough.
Seconds later they had caught up. The kicking and punching started. He was on the ground, his hood pulled tight around his face and his hands attempting to protect himself from their blows. There was the big guy Topher, the one they called Bear. He was standing there with a bottle in one hand. He was jumping up and down and laughing.
“Topher’s excited. Give Topher a go! Go on, Bear, give it to him! Give it to him!”
Sitting in that car she was lost, lost in another time when a boy was about to be raped. “Do it! Do it! Do it!” The words resonated in her head. She closed her eyes but she heard Topher release his buckle and unzip while two of the others held the boy down. She heard them tearing at his jeans. She felt one unzip him, then the cold air strike him, as though he’d sat on ice.
“Do it! Do it! Do it!” the boys chanted.
“Get him on all fours!” their twisted leader called, but he was barely audible.
She saw them pulling him to his knees. He wanted to call out but his voice was gone. He wanted to kick and punch and make them all bleed, but he couldn’t. He just wanted to run. It felt like he was tearing inside. It felt like he was burning and every invasion burned deeper and deeper until time meant nothing. The moment froze. Then, suddenly, he was alone, covered with blood, shit and piss, and still he couldn’t scream, so instead the rage simmered until it infected