Page 7 of Right in Front of You

CARTER, AGE 15

I wasat the fire station with my father when he received the call for extra muscle. It was urgent that he come to the local pub right away. My father, also known as Captain Clark at the fire station, wasn't working that day, and he took me with him to show me the new fire truck they’d bought for the town.

We walked two streets down to where the sheriff’s cruiser was parked in front of the pub, its lights flashing red and blue. My father’s pace was quick and uneasy, and dust spun from underneath his soles. Grateful for the growth spurt last summer, for the first time ever I was able to keep up with his long strides. The day was a hot one, like most during the summer in Hope Bay, but that didn’t stop my father from speed-walking.

“You stay here, son.” My father pointed to the porch, and I nodded. I flinched at the sound of shattering glasses from within the pub. Voices rose higher, and the loud swearing I’d heard in the two minutes since my father had gone inside should have burned my ears right off. I had the urge to use my hands to cover them – and I was a teenager, so that was saying something.

A soft cry around the corner of the porch drew my attention, and I got up to see who was pulling in the long sniffles. As soon as I saw the brown curls, my heart jumped.

“Molly? What are you doing here?”

She lifted her head. Her eyes were puffed up, her cheeks swollen, and her nose running. She pulled her bare arm underneath her nose, wiped the snot off, and then dried it on her dress, which appeared disheveled. Fresh tears sprung from her eyes.

“Hey, what’s the matter?” I crouched beside her and took her into my arms. “Don’t cry. Everything’s going to be okay.” She was trembling so hard that I couldn’t stop it, no matter how hard I squeezed, no matter how much I smoothed my hand over her arms or tried to whisper a soothing Shhhhh into her ear. “What happened?”

“My father. He’s drunk again. He told me to help him with groceries, but we came here instead and… well, he had a lot to drink. I wanted to go home, but he said he never got a proper gift for his birthday and that he deserves one from me, and I…” She pulled in another sniffle along with a longer, desperate breath of air. “I fell.”

“You fell?”

“Yes. I scraped my knees.”

I tried to see her scraped knees, but she was holding on so tight it was difficult, and so I smoothed my hand over her back before securing it there to comfort her.

“Well, that’s okay. Everybody falls. Your knees will heal.”

She broke out into another heaving cry.

“Will you let me have a look at them?” I asked.

She nodded, gently lifting her skirt higher. Her dress was torn at the side – I assumed from the fall. I had a closer look at her knees. The wounds weren’t as deep as I’d thought they would be; they didn’t match the level of her distress.

“This blood came from your knees?” I pointed to the thicker drops on the patio, catching sight of smeared blood over her inner leg as well. It wasn’t a lot, but still, it didn't look like that much blood could have oozed out of the wounds on her knees, and definitely wouldn’t have traveled up her leg. There was a painful nagging in the back of my mind, but Molly distracted me when she pulled in another sniffle.

“Why don’t you come with me to Doctor Burke’s office, and we’ll get you checked out? Look, his lights are still on.” I pointed down the street to where the only doctor’s office in town was still open.

“I… I don’t know. My father—”

“Let me talk to my dad. He’ll make sure your father’s okay with it. All right?” Then I remembered an incident with Doctor Burke, right on this porch a few a few days earlier, and I added, “And if he’s not, we’ll sneak away. He won’t even know it.”

She nodded.

I quickly went inside. Chaos was spread across the floor in the form of broken glass, splintered wood that used to be part of a chair, and spilled beer. The culprit of it all, Molly’s father, stood smack in the middle of the mess. He was surrounded by eight brawny men, including the sheriff and my father, and was holding a gun, pointing it to his own head.

Shit!

“Carter, get out of here.” My father’s voice, deliberately stern, was like any father’s would have been if their child came into a room where a madman was holding a gun.

“Molly scraped her knees. I’m going to help her clean them off.” There was no way I would mention Doctor Burke in front of Mr. Fowler, especially when he was holding a gun.

“That’s fine, son. Walk her home and go tell your mother that I won’t be home until dark.”

“Sure thing.”

I backed out of the pub, wary of the way Mr. Fowler was giving me the side eye. I was afraid that if the door hadn’t been close enough, he would have turned the gun on me. With fear crawling over me, as soon as I stepped outside, I exhaled; and avoiding the window, I crawled on all fours to Molly.

“What’s going on in there?” she asked.

“Nothing. They’re just trying to get your father to have some water. He had a few too many drinks.”

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