A Portion for Foxes Read online

  Dad did, walking on the balls of his feet, controlled and balanced, with a small fake yawn, and I knew he was close to snapping. He only looked that way when he was about to put someone through a wall. The only question was whether he would pick me or Eades.

  “Have a seat, sir,” Eades said. "Complaints about the Stanglers are nothing new. Every cop in the county knows their faces for one reason or another. Little stuff mostly. DUI. Assault. Accusations of much more but no proof. The one time we've had enough on them for a warrant, they came out squeaky clean. A lot of hours and money got thrown away on nothing—money the county simply doesn't have. I know the feds are interested too, because word came down from the DA this morning that the Stangler brothers are strictly off-limits unless we catch them red-handed for something serious. They’re supposedly building a case, but they won’t pounce till they’re sure.”

  "You wouldn't call rape and murder something serious?" Dad asked.

  "Of course I would. For what it's worth, I believe Sam saw something, and I’m not going to let it lie, but we got zip for evidence. Between the fire, the storm, and according to the lab boys, at least a gallon of gas being poured on and around that firepit, we got nothing, not even a fingerprint off a beer can. The girl hasn't turned up at a clinic or the ER. If she does, you'll be the second call I make. Right after I call my boss and the feds. My advice to you and Sam is to go home and keep this little story to yourself. The only thing we can prove happened at that campsite was two teenage boys went fishing, and Mick lit out after, a kid with a history of running away. There's just no evidence anyone else was there."

  "Mike," I said. "His name is Mike."

  Eades looked at me with more annoyance than interest. "Yeah. Mike. That's what I said."

  #########

  I skipped school the next day. From Sunday afternoon until the alarm went off Tuesday morning, I barely left my room. I couldn't stop throwing up. When I tried to sleep, all I could see was Mike with that hole in his throat and Richard Stangler’s face, cold and calm as he wiped the blade clean on Mike’s shirt. All the things I could have done, should have done, kept running through my mind. I knew it was dumb to think that way, that I couldn't have known, couldn't have stopped it, but if we'd just left the way Mike wanted to, he'd still be alive and joking. Instead, he was gone forever. And I was left with my guilt and cowardice.

  Dad called Mike's house Tuesday morning before leaving for work. His father was off welding on a rig someplace in West Texas and couldn’t be reached. Since Mike hated his stepmom and had a habit of disappearing from home for days or even weeks at a time when his father was gone, she didn’t even seem surprised, much less concerned he hadn’t come home. Dad didn't mention my story. He said she was pretty pissed off at him for waking her. I'd rarely seen her without a tall glass of something she called tea in her hand, and Mike hinted more than once she was a fan of weed and pills too. Chances were she forgot the call five minutes later.

  Mom tried to talk to me about it, but she was confused. Dad and I agreed we shouldn’t tell her anything. She took medicine for anxiety and depression. Sometimes, when times were hard or for no reason anyone could see but her, she retreated to her room for two or three days. A couple of times when I was little, she had to go to the hospital for a while. Dad never said that, of course. He told me she was visiting her sister in Kansas. My brother, Will, told me the truth.

  Mom had breakdowns every few years and ended up in Shady Pines, a "mental health center" in Ardmore. “Going in-patient” they called it. That only lasted a few days the first time, but the second trip lasted two weeks. Four years had passed since her last visit, and she rarely took the meds anymore. I knew because I checked the prescriptions once when I was home from school, sick, and they were all six months old and half empty. Sometimes, when she seemed down, I opened the bottles and counted the little white and green pills. She kept them hidden behind Dad's supply of Campho-Phenique and vitamin C in their medicine cabinet. I took one of the green ones once, just to see what would happen, and spent most of that Saturday staring at the TV. I couldn't even tell you what was on. I just stared until I fell asleep. Now, I wanted to take them all.

  At school, everyone went on with their lives of sports, grades, and hair spray as if all was right with the world. Other than teachers marking Mike absent in their grade books, not one person asked about him. When they called on me in class, I didn’t respond. I just sat, staring out the window. Grades, girls, cars, where the party was this weekend, all the things that used to fill my day—suddenly meant nothing.

  At football practice, I couldn’t concentrate on the plays or the snap count.

  “Start running, Gunther, and don’t stop till I get tired!” Coach Jones roared.

  I ran laps around the practice field for the next half hour in full pads, helmet, and cleats, tears streaming down my face. When he finally called me back over for tackling drills, I took out all my fear, all my rage and frustration, all my despair and guilt on whoever they put across from me. At first, the coaches loved it.

  “Look at Sam Gunther! That’s the kind of intensity I want to see out of every one of you every play, whether it’s practice or a game. One hundred ten percent every damn time!”

  We switched from one-on-one hitting drills to Bull in the Ring. We made a huge circle, and somebody stood in the middle, running in place. One at a time, without warning, someone rushed him. They were supposed to hit each other as hard as they could. Not tackling, just hitting and getting ready for the next one.

  My turn in the center came, and it went on for five minutes, then ten, with me roaring until my voice was gone, slamming my facemask and shoulder pads into anything that came close. Eventually, no one would come at me, so I charged the circle. Coach Bond finally realized something was wrong, grabbed me, and sent everyone else off with Coach Parkhill for “conditioning,” which was just a fancy word for running wind sprints until at least three people puked.

  “Calm down, son. What’s going on with you? Where is Riddell, anyway? I’m counting on him at fullback Friday night.”

  I lost it. He was the first person to even mention Mike’s name to me, and all he cared about was that week's game. He was a good guy and a good coach, but at the time, I wanted to kill him. He could see it in my eyes. Whatever he’d been about to say died on his lips, and instead, he hugged me. I fought it at first, struggling to get free. To his credit, he didn’t say a word. He just held me tighter until I stopped fighting then led me to the field house.

  As I pulled off my shoulder pads, Coach Bond said, “Hit the shower. I’ll be in the office if you want to talk.”

  I soaped up and rinsed off as quickly as I could in the cinder block shower. After dressing quickly, I slipped out the back before he could corner me with questions. All I could think of was getting out of there before the rest of the team came in. I couldn’t face them, not with my eyes full of agony.

  I jumped in my old Dodge and turned the key as my phone started vibrating on the seat. It was Lauren—again. She’d called three times the night before and texted twice. We’d been dating for a couple of months, though her father definitely didn’t approve of the phone calls stretching into the early-morning hours. I suspected he just didn’t approve of some farm kid dating his daughter. Lauren made straight A’s and seemed destined for some ivy-covered university up north, while I was more likely to wind up in a state college and live at home. I was smart enough in class but never quite cared about subjects that didn’t grab my attention. My grades often took a backseat to football and chores. The idea of leaving home completely and starting a whole new life someplace else was baffling to me. I didn’t want to leave everyone I cared about for a maybe.

  Lauren was a year younger than me, sixteen and a sophomore, so I didn’t share any classes with her and had avoided her all day by refusing to go to my locker. I just carried the books I needed in my backpack and hid in the bathroom at breaks until seconds before the tardy bell. I knew she�
�d give up and go to class if she didn’t see me. I couldn’t talk to her. I couldn’t imagine what I would say. All I could think was, The less she knows the better. That was stupid, I guess. I knew she was probably freaking out, but she would be worse off if I told her I’d seen a stranger raped and Mike murdered. I wanted to grab her and hold on until I woke up and everything went back to normal, but I had a feeling my life would never be normal again. She deserved better than that.

  A minute later, the phone buzzed again, this time a text: “R U BREAKING UP WITH ME?!!!”

  I still didn’t answer. I figured the lost-phone excuse was my best bet. For two days, I kept thinking I would wake up, and everything would’ve been a bad dream. Mike would still be alive, and I could stop hearing that girl’s screams.

  When I finally pulled into the driveway, I couldn’t remember anything since leaving school. The fifteen-mile drive home wasn’t much more than a blur of colors and vague impressions. I fed the Hereford calf we were fattening for slaughter, the chickens, and the two Yorkshire pigs I was supposed to walk in the livestock shows later that month. As usual, the pigs were in such a hurry to get to the trough that they almost knocked me down. Without conscious thought, I raised my legs out of the way, first one then the other as they flashed past. The previous week, it would have been funny. Now, I couldn’t even find a smile for their antics. They grunted, fighting over the feed as I closed the gate and stumbled back to the house.

  #########

  “Aren’t you going to eat? I even made angel food cake for dessert,” Mom said.

  I’d been pushing the chicken and mashed potatoes around my plate for some time but hadn’t actually tasted anything.

  “Sorry.” I gnawed at a drumstick and chewed some potatoes and black-eyed peas listlessly. I cut myself a piece of the spongy angel food and said, “It's good, Mom, but can I take this to my room? I’ve got homework.”

  She nodded, eyes locked on my face, wondering. My father gave me a hard look.

  I grabbed the cake and a glass of sweet tea and hurried out. I had no homework, but that was the one way I could be left alone for at least the next hour. I locked my door and stood staring around my room as if I’d never seen it before. The Fathead Dallas Cowboys helmet on the wall; the Dark Side of the Moon, Metallica, and Halo posters; the various trophies and knickknacks; and even the bookcase full of cherished novels seemed to belong to someone else. Slowly, I opened the closet and stood looking down at my guns. My old WWII Mauser, a Mossberg 12-gauge shotgun, and a couple of battered .22 rifles leaned against the back wall.

  I wished my brother would come by to visit. I could always talk to Will about anything. Will had taught me how to fight, how to talk to a girl and ask her out, and what to do if she turned out to be easy. I hadn't had a chance to try any of that yet. I wasn't even sure what some of it was or if I really wanted to do it, but Will assured me it was important, and I would need it someday. Any time something happened I couldn't talk to Dad about, I asked Will. He would usually laugh and punch me in the arm a couple of times, but he always came through when I needed him. I couldn't quite bring myself to call and ask him what to do when your best friend gets murdered by scumbags.

  My phone buzzed again. I couldn’t put Lauren off any longer but dreaded the hurt and accusation in her voice. Waiting wasn’t going to make things any easier. Dad always said, “If you have to cut off your finger, it’s better to chop it off and get it over with than saw it off slow.” His advice on women was often questionable, but that one made sense.

  "Hello?"

  “I’ve been calling and texting for two days," Lauren said. "I didn’t see you one time in the hall. Why are you avoiding me?”

  “I'm not. I just couldn’t find my phone. It fell behind the bed, and the ringer was off.” I had told more convincing lies in elementary school but couldn’t come up with anything better.

  “So you lost your phone, you didn’t come to lunch, you never once thought to come find me in the hall, but you’re not avoiding me?”

  “I’m sorry. I just had a really bad weekend.”

  “You had a bad weekend? I haven’t seen or heard from my boyfriend since Friday night. What’s her name?”

  “Who?” I asked, genuinely confused.

  “The slut I need to cut.”

  Great. She thought I was cheating. I wished it was that simple. I thought about telling her the truth but had no idea how I would start. Besides, the truth sounded even crazier than the lie about losing my phone.

  “You know I’d never cheat on you.”

  “If you do, you won’t be able to do it twice. Pick me up before school tomorrow.”

  “Whatever you want.”

  “Now you’re catching on,” she said.

  #########

  Before breakfast the next morning, I made the rounds of the animals, checking food and water troughs. I found Dad waiting for me in the front yard, red clouds lighting the sky behind him.

  “Have you told anyone else?” he asked.

  “No. I’m trying to figure out a good excuse for Lauren about where I’ve been the last two days. She’s not buying the lost-phone story.”

  “Good,” he said. “Keep it to yourself for now. We’ve got some thinking to do. Mostly, we have to think about your mom. She wouldn't take it well."

  I looked up at him, and his eyes cut away. I was pretty sure he knew I wouldn't buy the trip-to-Kansas story anymore, but neither of us really wanted to voice the truth, as if not talking about it would somehow make it untrue.

  “Yes, sir. I know, but I can’t get it out of my mind."

  “You just have to keep moving. Get so busy you can’t think, and when you finally get caught up, it won’t hurt so much. Until then, keep your mouth shut while we figure this out. Now, go eat before your mother gets suspicious about what we’re doing out here.”

  “Yes, sir. And Dad?” I trailed off, my mouth working, but I couldn’t put words to it.

  He nodded, squeezed my shoulder, and pulled me into a half hug. I clutched him like my last hope in a flood.

  “Come straight home today,” he said.

  #########

  I took Dad’s advice and got so busy I couldn’t think. Much. After a week or so, I didn’t see Mike’s face in the firelight every time I closed my eyes. I got better at fooling myself into forgetfulness, but I knew the nightmare wasn’t over, not by a damn sight.

  I found myself watching the rearview mirror, looking out the window, avoiding crowds, expecting something to happen. I almost needed something to happen.

  The next Sunday morning, I told my folks I would meet them at church. Instead, I drove up to Chalk Hills and parked where I could see Mike's house across the field below. My shotgun and the Mauser were behind the seat of my truck, whispering. As the minutes slipped past, the whispers started to make more and more sense.

  I knew Dad meant well, but sometimes the man I'd known as a little kid seemed to be gone, replaced by a guy who would rather pray and read his Bible than anything else. I’d met a few of my father’s old Army buddies and some of the guys from the VFW he used to visit with once a month before deciding they weren’t good for much besides drinking and reliving times he’d rather forget. At least, that was what he said. Some of them seemed normal, but a couple were flat-out scary. They had cold eyes even when they were laughing, and I could almost smell the death on them. Others, like my father, were different. His eyes were anything but cold. Every emotion showed, and they seemed full of regret more than menace. Maybe he’d just gotten too old to fight back anymore. I wasn’t.

  #########

  Ten miles north of Highway 199 on Grant Road, a long dirt driveway led to a ramshackle house in the trees with peeling yellow paint. A rusty propane tank sat crookedly to one side. They had a new satellite dish, though, and a huge stainless barbecue grill was leaking smoke. The pickups in the driveway had custom paint jobs. One was a fire-engine-red Chevy from the sixties with oversized tires and bumpers. The other
was a blue Chevy 4x4 with ridiculously big tires and chrome rims.

  The oaks in the yard gave good shade. So did the deep porch where Richard Stangler and an assortment of hounds and pit bulls were taking their ease in the shadows. Sprawled on the porch swing, Richard watched his brother Jesse trying to teach a black Lab to fetch. Each time Jesse threw a fake duck across the yard, the dog chased the thing then ran around in circles with his prize instead of bringing it back. Richard laughed and called out suggestions or maybe insults. I couldn’t tell which.

  I watched them for the next two hours from under the low limbs of a blue cedar, careful to keep the scope of my Mauser out of the sunlight so no stray reflection would give me away. I’d read enough Louis L’Amour to have that much sense, anyway. My hilltop hideout was maybe four hundred yards away. I lay there for a long time. I took turns centering the crosshairs of the scope on each of their chests. I knew better than to aim for the head. That was for snipers in the movies. The best chance of a kill shot was dead center. I was aiming for heart and lungs, the same as hunting deer or hogs. I knew I might get only one shot before they reacted. I told myself that was why I was waiting, that I couldn’t make up my mind who to kill first.

  The truth was I couldn’t pull the trigger. I lay there in the dirt with sweat sticking my shirt to my back and cedar needles to my front. Salty drops kept seeping into my eyes, and ants were driving me crazy. I knew what the Stanglers were and what they’d done, but movies where the good guys show up and blow everyone away without a blink hadn’t prepared me for the reality of squeezing the trigger on a real person.

  Shooting an animal for meat was one thing. I’d never really enjoyed it, but I sure liked the meat and the pride on my father’s and brother’s faces when I made a clean shot. Looking through the scope at men, even subhuman sons of whores, wasn't the same at all. I built my rage on purpose, remembering everything I could about Mike. I pictured the girl on the beach and Mike's blood sizzling in the fire. With that, I started shaking and raised the rifle again. Eenie meenie miney mo, I thought, moving the scope back and forth between them. Then the sound of a car engine and a growing cloud of dust announced the brothers had company. The car pulled to a stop in front of the porch, and the dogs went wild until Richard silenced them with a curse and a thrown beer can.