Lost & Found Ch. 04

She emphasised each word with a prod in my chest, and I realised she was furious, her eyes flashing like emeralds in firelight, and I was suddenly just a little afraid of her. She sensed this, and patted my knee, drawing herself closer so she could rest her head on my shoulder.

"Frankie, what happened to Sally? Was it what I think? Did someone hurt her...you know...like that?"

I looked at her, unable to bring myself to say it, to tell my kid sister what I knew, why I'd done what I'd done. I saw tears gather in her eyes, concern and horror, anger, fear and outrage all flitting across her face.

"No, Frankie, no, please say no, not...not Sally, oh God, who? Who could have done that to her? Why? She never hurt anyone..." she whispered.

Two big tears rolled down her cheeks, compassion for her big sister flooding out of her. Suddenly she looked up at me, her eyes sharp and accusatory.

"You know who did it, don't you? That's what this is about, isn't it?" she demanded, holding up my bandaged hand, "You know who did that to my sister, don't you?"

My look told her everything she needed to know, and she turned away, her shoulders shaking. I put my arm around her, and she collapsed against me, crying as though her little heart was breaking. I tended to forget that for all her sharp wits and smart mouth, Kat was still only 13, still just a little kid, and this was too much for her to try and deal with. I let her cry until she'd cried herself out, doing my best to mop her tears, finally letting her blow her nose and calm herself down again. When she'd finished she looked closely at me.

"Did you hurt him bad?" she asked, and I hedged, not wanting to admit anything to her, but she asked me again.

"I said, did you hurt him bad? Answer me, Frankie, and you better say 'yes'!"

I mumbled something about giving him a beating but he walked away, but Kat wouldn't let it go.

"Who was it, Frankie? Who would do something like that to Sally?"

She pinned me with her eyes, and I caved in, just like I always did when it came to Kat, and I told her, seeing the shock and outrage and disgust grow in her eyes, and wishing I'd kept my big mouth shut. I made her promise, on my life, that she'd never let Sarah know that we knew, making sure she understood that Sarah felt soiled and ashamed enough, even though it wasn't her fault, without having to know that we knew as well.

Kat promised solemnly to keep it secret and between us to her dying day, and as Kat had never broken a promise to me in her life, I was content she'd do the same this time too. As she stood up to clear away the dressings and gauze, she kissed me on top of the head.

I looked at her in surprise.

"What was that for baby? And she smiled back at me.

"For being Sally's knight in shining armour and avenging her honor! She can't thank you, so I will! Thank you Frankie, I'm so proud of you, it was an honor to fix up your hands for you!"

I had to grin; my baby sister was so funny sometimes!

Next day the whole town was buzzing about how Steven Dolan, the richest kid in town, had been jumped by 5 guys who'd tried to mug him, but he'd bravely beaten them off, getting a little knocked about in the process, but he'd handed them all a beating and run them off. He was a hero, a genuine example to the town, with battle-scars to prove it; there was even talk of the college making a presentation to him, and how the Mayor was going to give him a special Citizenship Award...

Now you know what kind of town I grew up in.

*

A few weeks after all this, mom called Kat and me into the sitting room and asked us to sit down; she had something she wanted to tell us. We were both mystified; mom looked solemn, and angry, and sad, a welter of emotions flitting across her face. I had a sudden premonition what this was all about, and hoped it wasn't true.

Mom dithered for a while, clearly looking for a way to begin, so I helped her a little.

"Mom, what's wrong? Is this to do with Sally, with whatever it was that happened last month?"

Mom looked ready to cry, spooking Caitlin, who huddled closer to me, her knuckles white with the way she was clutching my hand.

She looked at me half gratefully and half in anger that I'd broached the subject, but she nodded and turned away to look out the window.

"Kids, Sally...your big sister Sarah is...she's...Sarah is going to have a baby in the spring. We know who the...father is, your father is going to speak to him and find out what he's going...his plans...if he's going to accept responsibility for his child, this baby Sarah's having...in the spring..." she trailed off, looking off into the distance, her voice barely more than a whisper.

Kat looked at me in incomprehension, then suddenly she realised how this must have come about, her eyes popping as she almost burst with the effort of not blurting it out. I slipped my hand over her mouth to quiet her, but mom never even noticed, still staring vaguely off into the distance. I pulled Kat away, signalling that we should go talk somewhere, and as we left the room, mom spoke.

"Sally's going to need both of you to help her now, you know that don't you? She's in no condition to go back to college, and I need both of you to be patient with her, help her, just be there when she needs you. The...boy who did this is no good; your father's wasting his time, that whole family are no good, so Sally's going to be alone, and she's going to be a mother, and there'll be times when she's going to be angry for what happened, and she might snarl and snap and lash out at you; when she does, just remember she's your big sister and she loves both of you more than anything in the world, and she's only doing it you because she can't do it to the one who deserves it, okay?"

We both murmured assent, Kat doing so because I did, I think, not because she understood what mom meant, but I got it. Kat took me by the arm and towed me upstairs to my room, where she sat down on my bed while I paced around, digesting what mom had told us. I only had a vague idea of the implications of what mom had told us, the main fact, that Sarah was pregnant, beating most insistently in my brain. Now I wanted to find Steven Dolan and rip his arms and legs off, beat him into an unrecognisable mess, and show the town what their 'hero' was really made of.

Kat watched me quizzically for a while as I paced around muttering and cracking my knuckles, eventually calling out my name, and repeating it until I broke out of my reverie to look at her in surprise; I'd forgotten she was there.

"Frankie, Frankie, FRANKIE! Have you finished talking to yourself yet?" she demanded, "Talk to me!"

I sat on the floor next to the bed while she sprawled on her tummy on the bed, her head level with mine.

"Frankie, what's Sally gonna do now? She wanted to graduate, now she's gonna have to stay home and have a baby, is she having a baby because of...what happened to her, you know...?"

I leaned back, eyes closed, not really wanting to answer. Caitlin waited for a few seconds for my answer, then, growing impatient, clonked me on the back of the head with her fist.

"I said...!" she began, cocking her fist to give me another one, but I grabbed her wrist.

"If you do that again I'm going to shove your head in the toilet and flush it! Now quit that, you don't hit people! Remember what dad's always saying, Kat, and try and be a little lady once in a while!"

Kat pouted, looking cute as all get out, and I had to grin; even at that age I couldn't stay mad at her, no matter how much she deserved a good swift kick in the pants.

"Look, Kat, Sally needs us now; that piece of crap and his dirt-bag family are gonna walk away from this, because people like them don't think people like us matter. Mom's right; dad's wasting his time, Sally's never gonna get any kind of help from them. We just have to make sure we're there when she needs us; we're all she's got. I think I can safely say Joe's gonna run a million miles when he finds out about this, he's not gonna want anything to do with Sally, and I think that's gonna hurt her the most. So this is your heads-up, okay? No more talking about Joe, no more mooning over him, or blushing when his name gets mentioned, okay? Sally feels alone enough without us rubbing it in, so just leave it alone, got that?"

Kat's eyes had been getting progressively larger as I talked, and she just nodded, the seriousness of my tone getting through to her immediately. She really was too quick on the uptake sometimes, more so than I would expect from a 13 year old girl, but this was our sister, the one person in the world we adored more than any other, and all we wanted to do was make the hurt go away, or at least not let her hurt alone.

I got up and headed for the door.

"Where you going, Frankie?" she asked, and I paused to look at her.

"I need to talk to dad, and no, you can't come, just give mom some story or the other if she asks where I am, I don't care what, okay? You got that?"

Kat looked rebellious, obviously wanting to come with me, but knowing I wasn't kidding this time, so she let it drop; like I said, she was a smart kid...

*

When dad came out of the factory gates, he saw me waiting on the sidewalk, so he pulled over and wound down his window.

"Frank, what are you doing here, son? You can't catch a ride, I'm not going home yet, just go home and I'll see you later. Go on now!"

I opened the door and climbed in, turning to face him.

"I know where you're going, I'm coming with you. Sally's my family too, and I want to see what those scum Dolan's are going to do about what happened to her!"

Dad's expression changed, his face going very still.

"You...know? About Sally ...and...?

I nodded.

"Everything, everything that creep did, how he set her up, the whole story. Where do you think our 'Town Hero' got his brand-new face?"

Dad looked down, shaking his head.

"That was you? Oh Frankie, didn't I tell you enough times to think with your head and not your fists? You shouldn't have done that."

He leaned back in his seat and rubbed at his eyebrows, something he did when he was thinking.

"Okay, what's done is done, but next time you want to pound someone, walk away and count to fifty, then, if you still need to do it, do it, but at least you've taken the time to think why you're doing it; spur-of-the-moment revenge is a poor excuse for rearranging someone's face!"

He started the car again and looked at me, at my expression.

"Okay Frankie, you know where we're going, just two things; keep your mouth shut while we're there, and I mean that, and you're going to hear some stuff you will never, ever repeat to anyone, you hear me?"

I was more than a little intimidated by his manner; he'd never enjoined that kind of silence from me before, believing as he did in openness and honesty, and I nodded, wary of him for the first time in my life. He looked at my face for a little longer, then reached out and ruffled my hair lightly.

"Good man, I knew I could rely on you; you're just like your father, there's more of Martin in you than you know. Now, let's get this over with and go home!"

We drove to the suburb the Dolan's lived in, owned, really, pretentiously named 'Beverley Hills', no doubt another boost for their already bloated ego's and overwhelming sense of their own importance. Jerry Dolan and his family lived in a moderately palatial ranch-style home surrounded by a high wall and imposing gates, the gateposts adorned with crowned lions; obviously they thought of themselves as the leaders of the pack around here. Dad grinned and pointed with his chin at them, and I had to grin back. He pressed the call-button and spoke to someone inside, and the gates slowly swung open, closing again after we drove through. When we got out of the car, there was Jerry, looking his usual puffy, pouchy self, his drink-ravaged features bleary and indistinct, and his face glowing with large areas of broken veins, making him look red-faced, bruised, and unhealthy. As he stood up he swayed, and I realised he was drunk, not even 6 o'clock and he'd obviously been communing steadily with the bottle long before we set out to see him.

He lurched to the front of the porch, leaning on the upright to support himself.

"What d'you wan' here, Moran?" he slurred, his eyes piggy and hostile, and as I looked at him I realised I was looking at his son 30 years down the road; the same meaty features, the same thick-lipped, self-indulgent sneer, the same air of entitlement. Like his son, Jerry Dolan believed he walked three spans above the earth.

Dad looked at him with barely concealed contempt.

"You know why I'm here, Dolan, and I want to know what you're going to do about your pissant little son. I know you think you can do anything, well, not this time, not to my daughter, so I'll repeat myself; what are you going to do?"

Jerry swayed so much I really thought he was going to collapse.

"I don't have to do anything, Moran! If your slut daughter wants to open her legs..."

He got no further before dad's huge hand grabbed him around the throat and yanked him close like he weighed nothing.

"Be careful what you say about my girl, Dolan, you may be someone in this town, but right now you feel like nothing to me. Watch your mouth!"

With a contemptuous surge of his shoulder, dad flung him to the ground by his throat, where he bounced once and lay still. I thought he'd actually killed him, he'd hit the ground so hard, then came a loud snore. Dad looked at me and grinned.

"He's too drunk to notice, but don't worry, in the morning he's going to hurt good, believe me!"

I looked up, to spot Steve Dolan fading inside the house, a look of sick fear on his face as he realised his protector-daddy was out cold and there was nothing stopping my dad going in there, dragging him out, and beating seven types of shit out of him.

There was a clapping sound, and someone moved up out of the shadows into the early evening sunlight, and I gasped; it was a woman, and she looked exactly like Kat, or how Kat would probably look in 25 years time.

"Hello Mikey, how are you?" she said in a soft contralto, and dad grinned at her.

"Rosie, damn you look more like mom every time I see you! It's been too long, baby-girl, you're looking good!"

The woman smiled again, looking exactly like Kat, even the slight tilt in her eyebrow when she smiled, and gave a little curtsey, and I couldn't help but gawp. Dad looked at me and smiled.

"Frankie, let me introduce my sister; Roisian Shelagh Caitlin Moran...Dolan. Rosie, my stepson, Frank, but you knew that!"

She stepped down from the porch to take my hand, and look closely at me, her fingertips gently brushing my cheek for an instant.

"He looks so much like poor Martin, doesn't he? I know Sarah does. How about little Caitlin, does she know?"

Dad shook his head.

"I don't think that would be such a good idea, especially now, after all this...mess."

Roisian grimaced.

"You know I'd do something if I could; I have no illusions about my son, I know what he did, and what he's capable of; in so many ways he's his father's son. I suppose I have you to thank for handing him his ass?" she asked me, and I could only nod a little apprehensively.

"It's alright, Frank, it was a long time coming, and I thought it might teach him a lesson, but his father sees it differently. This family abounds with lies and secrets, one more lie to make the Dolan myth even more powerful is just another brick in the wall they've built around themselves. I'm truly sorry about what he did to Sarah; she was such a pretty, happy little girl, and Martin adored her, as did I."

She smiled wistfully.

"Your father was in my class in school, Mikey and he used to hang out together, they were best friends, and I used to tag along, hoping he'd notice me; fat chance!"

She grinned at me, looking younger and even more like my little sister.

"To my bad luck, he only ever had eyes for Colleen Hennessy, but we remained friends. Then Jerry came on the scene, and I married him when I finally realised Martin was never going to look twice at me; Jerry was already a drinker then, but he was a sweet guy too, and I foolishly thought I could turn him off he booze. When your father died I was heartbroken, and yes, I know the stories about that, and I also think there was more to it than a simple hit-and-run, but I can't prove anything. I still miss him terribly, though; he was such a sweet boy in school, such a gentle man, as well as a true gentleman, and so young when he was killed, such a tragic waste! If things had been different, I might even have been your mom! Every time I see you in town, my heart skips a beat, you're so much like your father, and I do miss him so!"

Dad reached out and stroked her hair.

"Poor little Rosie! You could leave him, you know; there's nothing left here for you, and I have room in my home for one more family member, it's your home too, if you want it!"

Roisian grimaced.

"Thank you, big brother, but this is the bed I made, I did it with my eyes wide open, so I'll have to lie in it a while longer; Jerry would never give me a divorce, but I think it won't be too long now; his cirrhosis is becoming critical, but he won't stop drinking, so he's going to solve my problem for me, one way or another! Once an alcoholic, always an alcoholic, and it's killed him, he just doesn't know it yet."

Dad put his hand on my shoulder, time for us to leave. He looked one last time at Roisian.

"Do you need a hand getting him back...?" and she shook her head.

"Leave him there; he's used to it! He'll wake up in a few hours and go find a bottle of bourbon to clear his head, and he won't even remember this tomorrow. I'm sorry I can't do anything for Sarah, if only for Martin's sake, I know what my son's capable of, and I don't believe a word of his story; lying comes as easy to him a breathing, a trait he inherited in full from his father. I'm sorry, Mikey; please hug Sarah and Caitlin for me, just don't tell her about me, she doesn't need to know, not yet."

Dad hugged his sister, and she hugged me, and all I could do was feel sorry for this beautiful, sad lady, my sister's aunt, who looked so much like her.

We drove home in silence, dad only saying one thing to me.

"Remember, Frank, Caitlin can't know that the man who hurt her sister like that is her own first cousin; my sister made me promise I'd never tell her, and I want the same promise from you; Caitlin's going to have enough to deal with without dealing with that as well."

Of course I promised; I didn't want Sally finding out that Steve Dolan was her kid sister's cousin either, that was something she really didn't need to know.

As the days passed, I gradually found it easier to put it from my mind. It wasn't such a deep, dark secret to keep, merely an unpleasant one, and if I didn't think about it, it didn't affect me, or so I thought; what I hadn't counted on was just how perceptive and smart Caitlin really was. She began to suspect that there was something up almost from the outset, as the knowledge I had gained imperceptibly colored my interaction with her; imperceptible to me, perhaps, but glaringly obvious to her.

It all came to a head about a week later. Joe Anderson had found out about Sarah' condition, and, instead of lighting out of town at a dead run, had asked Sarah to marry him, surprising nearly everyone, including his own family, who wanted nothing to do with it, nor did they want Joe bringing-up someone else's child, but he was over 21, in love with Sarah, and, best of all, he was one of the honest to God good guys, a true White Hat, the guy who rode into town and saved the day. Mom was nearly fainting with relief, dad was walking around with a grin like a pumpkin, and Joe looked like he'd just scored the jackpot on 'Jeopardy', while Sarah was living in a dream world, plotting and planning her dream life with Joe. In the middle of this, early one morning, there was a knock on my bedroom door. I looked at my watch and it was seven o'clock; far too early for visitors, so I ignored it and rolled over to go back to sleep.