Archive of Our Own

A Stranger to Sorrow

 

You were a stranger to sorrow: therefore

           Fate

has cursed you.  – Euripides

 

 

Prologue

Jensen Ackles reached for perfection, the day before his sixteenth birthday.

Against the Texas Rangers ballpark the sky was a break heart blue, showing off the freshly minted nostalgia in each of its clear hard lines.  Jensen stood tall on the mound, pitchers mitt and ball ready. His feet raised a small cloud of dust with each movement, testament to the summer’s grip, but his heart soared above everything, touching Matt and Lucas in the stands, swooping over Lottie and Karin and his father, finding his mother standing to one side of the dugout and her family. She was conspicuous in her beauty, as she always needed to be.

Perfect. Almost perfect. Niels wasn’t here; Niels couldn’t make it, tied as he was to his duties as platoon leader  at Fort Bliss. His brother Niels was his lodestar, the brightest and best in Jensen’s personal firmament, and his absence was only consoled by the fact that he had volunteered to serve his country and was even now demonstrating the noblest way to live a life. But Jensen would remember everything – the scent of sweet grease, and dust, and grass, the way the stands towered above him but somehow raised him up, too, the somewhere murmur of the crowd, so that he could send it all to Niels and bring his brother with him to this moment. His father, with that quizzical, careful affection as he looked at his son; the announcer, telling the fans that the throw out today would be by Jensen Ackles, state high school champion, with an ERA of 1.97 ; the sound of that voice echoing across the field and rebounding, so that Jensen felt as if the world was a bell ringing out his glory.

In front of him, Kevin Day, first up pitcher of the Rangers, shaking his hand and then coming to stand behind him. It was all dreamlike, and yet the most real thing Jensen had ever experienced.

“It’s just the same as junior league, Jensen,” Kevin was saying, his voice in Jensen’s ear. “Same pitch, same ball, same mitt to aim at.”

Jensen grinned, twisting a little to face him. “No, it’s not.”

Kevin laughed. “Well, ‘long as your arm thinks it is, that’s all that matters. Forget about the crowd, just send ‘er in there. Get her done.”

Jensen turned back, facing the catcher. Dave Challender had given him a pat and a wink before, told him to go easy on a poor aging catcher; now he squatted down, mitt in readiness, sending confidence out to him where his body fizzed and settled on the mound.

A heavy hand came down onto his shoulder. It felt like stone, and Jensen was briefly dismayed by the thought that pro-baseballers were so much more substantial than he, in his adolescent wiriness.  It felt like the weight of the earth was on him. The voice was back in his ear.

“Tell me, Jensen Ackles,” the voice said. “Would you rather have good fortune in your youth or your old age?”

It was a bizarre, bewildering question, and Jensen twisted to look back at Kevin again; but the sun flared around the Ranger’s cap, and it seemed as though he were looking at a tall, hooded shadow, with no features to be seen in the penumbra.

Off-putting, certainly, both question and brief shadow; but then Jensen grinned again. He had good fortune already, and it was as sure and solid as the mound beneath his feet. Good friends in the stands, a family full of love by the dugout, and a lifelong dream unfolding about him. It occurred to him that this was part of the initiation into baseball’s paradise, a hazing of the apprentice.

“Old age,” he said. “I’mma win the Series all by myself first.”

Hooded Kevin nodded, and the hand left Jensen’s shoulder. A little shiver ran down his arm.

“Put it right over the plate, kid,” Kevin said, and was his voice different now? Jensen couldn’t tell. Kevin stepped away, and Jensen was on his own, the announcer winding up the crowd with his trademark cheer, and the crowd responded with the good-natured applause reserved for children and amateurs.

Jensen squinted up into the stands, saw Matt and Lucas stamping and hollering. Then he left them, put them out of his mind, because to the side and directly down from them the plate was gleaming, and it looked six yards wide.  Jensen spun the ball, lifted it to his chin, mitt brushing his face. His body coiled, shifting his weight up and back, eyes on nothing but Dave Challender’s mitt, hanging there above the plate like a harvest moon come to play.

He pivoted forward, his arm a slingshot, his whole body existing for nothing else but to send that small white ball in a spinning fast curve straight into Dave’s hand.

The sound of the ball hitting the glove ricocheted into the stands. A collective gasp; and then the crowd roared. They were seeing their future, and they approved. Col Parry, the Ranger’s coach, was on his feet; Dave Challender was standing up, ostentatiously shaking out his hand then pointing at Jensen. Somebody was running onto the diamond, and Jensen realized it was Kevin, his hand stuck out, shaking Jensen’s in front of thirty thousand people. Perfection sizzled, and then slid away. The thought of Niels in Fort Bliss took it.

Dazed, his smile hurting his face, Jensen found his way to the side of the field. There were cameras, and a family snap with Kevin, and Col Parry was talking to him, reined excitement in his voice, in the way he pumped first Jensen’s hand then his father’s. Col didn’t reach for Ulrike – she was not a woman who submitted herself to common hugs. But he gave her a half-bow, anyway, and she seemed amused.

Lotte and Karin were swung into the air, and for the first time since that strange moment on the mound Jensen could understand what people were saying.

“Keep pitching them like that, son, and we’ll be seeing you in the colors before you graduate, y’hear me? Not seen a fast curve on a youngster like that since Goose Gossage. Beautiful, son. Just beautiful. You got a champ there, Mister Ackles.”

“Well, we’ll see,” Conrad Ackles said, and it was slow and warm, but the dizzy heights settled back into perspective for Jensen. Because his father was looking at him with pleasure and pride, but there was also a message there in that quirked smile. ‘Don’t go getting too big for your britches, now’. Jensen nodded, message understood, because these two had read each other all their lives, and Conrad’s smile widened as much as his son had ever seen it.

Matt and Lucas came bounding down the stairs, Matt’s glasses slipping off his nose, Lucas’ red hair blazing in the brightness that seemed to be everywhere. They leaned over the railing, like fans reaching for a fly-ball, and Jensen slapped their palms.

“Jensen! Jeeeeeensen!”

Jensen laughed, hugged Lotte first, then consented to piggy-back Karin down into the shade beneath the stand where the family could join his friends. They would watch the game, guests of the Texas Rangers baseball team, then crowd into the stretch limousine Conrad hired for the day and head on in to Dallas for a meal in Deep Ellum. It would be the pinnacle, the day from which Jensen Ackles could stand and see his glorious future stretching out around him. It would be the beginning of the life appointed to him, second son of the wealthiest man and most beautiful woman in Titchville, baseball champion, A grade student, youth leader and charity worker and beloved big brother.

The next day, Niels Ackles took his perfectly cleaned and assembled M4 carbine and shot all ten of the Titchville men who had volunteered with him a year before. His journal would show he was convinced they were secret agents of terror.  He only needed one bullet for each of the friends he killed. It took fifteen bullets to bring him down.

Chapter 1

Niels’ father, Conrad Ackles, took the call in the kitchen of their 100 year old home. It wasn’t a part of the house he frequented often, but when Patrizia was cooking rellenos he could generally be found there, stealing peppers.

Jensen was close behind him.

“It’s so cool, Dad!” He waved the new Canon camera he’d been given for his birthday. “It’s got x zoom, and auto focus, and you can take shots with a panoramic lens on that lets you get the whole horizon. It’s just super-cool!”

“Super-cool, right. Just a minute, Jens.” Conrad turned back to the phone. “Yes, this is he.”

“Hey, Patrizia, smile!” Their cook, and Jensen’s friend since he was old enough to climb onto the kitchen stools to watch her bake, gave him a scowl and shooed at him.

“Oh, yes, I will be a super model for you, sure.”

Jensen hooted with laughter at the thought of Patrizia, Super Model. Niels had photographic evidence of supermodels in the form of Linda Evangelista all over his bedroom walls.

Conrad was saying, “That’s not possible. That’s…”

“Come on, Patty, you’re beautiful.” Jensen framed the rellenos. “Your food is beautiful.”

“And you’re sure… But that- that doesn’t make sense…”

Patrizia growled at him. “Go on, out of my kitchen, take your father with you.”

Jensen turned and followed the line of late afternoon sun across his father’s shoulders, out through the patio and onto the summer-scorched lawn. He lifted the camera and lined up a shot, trying to adjust for the brightness of the garden’s sun against the relative darkness of the kitchen’s edge. Patrizia hadn’t put the lights on yet.

“I see. Yes, I understand. You – yes. Yes. Of course. Thank you for the call.”

Conrad stood, facing the wall where he’d replaced the phone in its cradle, and turned with the slowness of an unberthed tanker caught in an ebb tide. On instinct, Jensen caught his father’s face in the viewfinder and pressed the button.

Months later, he would label the photo ‘Death’, and not know which one he meant.

“Jensen, we – “ Conrad suddenly seemed aware of Patrizia and, to Jensen’s surprise, gave her a look of fear. “Come here.” He gripped Jensen’s shoulder, painfully hard, and took him out of the kitchen, even as Jensen gave Patrizia a comical “what the?’ face as he dragged behind. Her own expression was troubled, and Jensen felt an odd turn in his stomach.

“It’s Niels. Jensen, it’s Niels.”

He gave his attention solely to his father. That was a name that would always claim him.

“Is he coming home?”

“He’s not… he didn’t…”

His father never struggled for words. Jensen pulled away, suddenly cold, suddenly afraid.

“Dad?”

“He’s such a good shot.” Conrad shook his head, slowly, bewildered. “It doesn’t make sense.” Making sense was the pact Conrad Ackles had with the world, and it had never failed him before.

“Go and find your mother. No!” Conrad gave a violent start, gripped Jensen tight again. “No, not her. God, Jensen, what are we going to do? What am I going to do?”

So Jensen learned of his brother’s death not through any direct words but through the way his father’s knees folded beneath him, and Conrad started weeping without sound, a fist pushed into his mouth.

“Dad?” It was a choked, high pitched sound, and Jensen would have been ashamed of it any other day. But it didn’t matter, now. Nothing mattered now.

He heard Lotte and Karin squabbling outside. They were visible through the French windows, snatching at each other, each one so visually alike that people often mistook them for twins. But Jensen knew that Lotte would give in to Karin, fulfilling the unwritten script the whole family stuck to that dictated they would spoil the youngest one rotten. They wouldn’t be able to shelter her from this, though, and the enormity of it, the impossibility, suddenly punched down upon him like the wrath of a spiteful god.

He didn’t want to know how it happened. He wanted to know how they could stop it. How that phone call could become unanswered, how the world could shudder backwards in its tracks. How they could keep it from Lotte and Karin and Ulrike. The whole county would be wasted in their grief, because this was Niels, their brilliant boy, everybody’s friend, everybody’s hero.

“It doesn’t make sense,” Conrad said again. Jensen had never heard his father so lost. “Son?”

“Dad?” Perhaps he should be kneeling beside his father, not looking down on him in his moment of destruction. But something kept Jensen on his feet, ready for the blow to come.

“He – he shot them. All those boys. All the ones from town, the ones he took with him.”

And he had taken them, hadn’t he? It wasn’t a question of leadership, or suggestion. Niels had stood up there at his graduation, the valedictorian speech in his hand, and announced he was joining the army. Oklahoma’s April dust was not yet settled, 168 innocent lives taken, and Niels Ackles was going to give his all to make sure it didn’t happen again.

“This country was built on freedom, but nothing stays free unless we give ourselves to that cause, and gladly.” Everybody cheered, even Conrad, even as the offer of a football scholarship to UT withered and died, because Niels was standing there, tall and strong and effortlessly handsome, offering himself as a hostage to their safety. There were tears in Principal Corcoran’s eyes.

It was almost inevitable that ten other graduates would declare themselves alongside him. He was Niels Ackles, not so much a flame to their moths as the rock they clung to, that they grounded themselves upon. They took the adventure with him; Miguel, Domingo and Patrizia’s son, who grew up with the Ackles children and was Jensen’s second brother. Calvin Padalecki, son of Conrad’s fiercest rival, Jurek. Principal Corcoran’s boy, Philip. Doctor Nuentes’ son, Felix. Rory McConachie. Ian Besmer. Jason Brice. Owen Chick. Toby Minicozzi. Tony Esposito.

And now – ten of Titchville’s sons were dead, were shot down by Niels? The thought was an obscenity.

“They made a mistake. Maybe they made a mistake?”

“That was their colonel!” For Conrad, no one in such a position of authority could be doubted. “Niels shot them. He – he said they were terrorists. That he was saving the rest of the base.”

“Maybe he was right?”

“Jensen. All those boys?”  His father shook his head, slowly. “He left a note.”

“What kind of...” It was all so wrong, so absurd. “Was he – did he..?”

Conrad understood him. Conrad always understood Jensen.

“They killed him. They shot him.”

Like a rabid dog. As if he wasn’t loved, wasn’t special.

Jensen felt such an utter disconnection between that realization, and this early evening of bright sun and cool shadow that breath and thought were lost to him. He let the camera slip from his fingers. It slapped against his leg, suspended by the wrist strap.

From far away he heard a telephone ringing and the murmur of an answering voice. Then a shriek, horrible, inevitable, as Jensen thought oh, of course, they’ve rung to tell Patrizia about Miguel. That was another jolt sideways into a dimension of grief and denial. The girls on the lawn froze in their tangling, heads up, mouths open in shock and awareness of some unimaginable threat. As one they turned to the house, their eyes searching through glass to find Jensen. He needed to move forward into the light, let them claim his attention and concern as he always did but something kept him rooted to the shadow. Maybe none of it could find him there.

“How can I tell her?” Conrad whispered. Never before had Jensen wanted so badly to have an answer for his father, the man who had them all to hand. Father and son heard her footsteps on the stairs – polished oak, smoothed by generations of Ackles and their servants, so shined and hard that a simple sandal sounded like a military boot. Together, they flinched.

“Conrad, what’s going on? Why is Patrizia so upset?” Ulrike stepped into their darkness. “Why are you on the ground?”

As beautiful and brittle as a hummingbird in ice, and Jensen could not shield her, could not help her, as the words tumbled out and she shattered across the cold-shined floor.

 

Chapter 2

Jensen began saving people when he was seven years old.

It was simple enough. In his second grade class he sat beside a large child called Tyson Morrison, a boy who lacked much in social graces but who understood and dealt in mutual kindness. Jensen absorbed his company, in the unquestioning way children will. He found no fault in Tyson’s untidiness, or chronic asthma, or inability to remember notes from home. He shared his lunch with him, when the need arose. At recess he and Matt and Lucas would allow Tyson to come with them, or not, as Tyson felt. It was an uncomplicated existence, under an autocratic teacher with strong views on keeping boys in their place.

Until the day that Jensen left his seat and came to stand at the front of the teacher’s desk.

“Miss Torrens?”

Loretta Torrens raised a sharp eye to him. Small boys did not approach her during quiet work time with any kind of impunity.

“What is it, Jensen? You should be working.”

“I know, Miss Torrens, but it’s Tyson.”

Miss Torrens craned her head past Jensen to where Tyson sat, scowling, his book upside down in front of him.

“Tyson Morrison! Get on with your work!”

Tyson frowned harder, and slid a little further down into his chair.

Jensen pursed his lips. “That’s just it, Miss Torrens. He can’t do it. He can’t read.”

“Of course he can. He is not completing his reading task now, and he’ll be staying in at recess at this rate, but Tyson can read quite capably when he chooses to.”

“No, Miss Torrens.” Jensen shook his head, patiently. “He really can’t read. He needs help.”

Loretta Torrens felt a swell of irritation at this small boy in front of her. “I think I know somewhat better than you what the children in this class can or cannot do, Mister Ackles. I suggest you stop poking your nose into Tyson’s business and concentrate on your own.”

Niels Ackles could have told her that when Jensen lowered his chin in that way, the odds of him obeying any consequent command were slim to none.

“Miss Torrens, you should help him. He’s getting left behind. That’s not fair.”

It was quite enough. Miss Torrens slammed a book down onto her desk.

“That will do. Jensen Ackles, you will march yourself straight to the principal’s office and tell her that you have been rude and insubordinate. I expect you will find detention a surefire tonic for impertinence and rudeness!”

Jensen looked at her, in a measuring way that made her want to fetch the switch that hung beside the cupboard. Then he turned on his heel and left.

He was far from vanquished. He did go to the principal’s office; but rather than offer himself up for punishment, he laid bare his grievance about Tyson and Miss Torren’s neglect. As it happened, the principal was a just woman, who had long deplored Loretta Torrens’ teaching style but who found a board ruled by nostalgia for the days when Loretta had taught them, many years before, and who insisted it had ‘done them no harm’. All her efforts to have Miss Torrens sanctioned or dismissed had come to nothing.

And she liked Jensen. He looked her straight in the eye, and his complaint was not, she could tell at once, one designed to avoid punishment for himself. Some children were born with a strong sense of natural justice, and Jensen Ackles was one of them. She had worked with children long enough to recognize the strength of character that stood before her, albeit in the body of a small, blond-haired boy.

So Jensen received detention, but Mrs. Minicozzi, the principal, made enquiries. She checked workbooks, and spoke to both Tyson and his Gawley Park parents. The upshot was that Tyson received special reading instruction, and Loretta Torrens received an early retirement offer.

It taught Jensen to back his own judgment in a way that became a fundamental part of him. There was no windmill too large or too crooked for him to tilt at. Occasionally, he over-reached, and sometimes he got it wrong; but Conrad was there to remind him that everyone made mistakes, and what mattered was generosity of intent – although perhaps next time, he’d think things through a little more before galloping off on his white charger. ‘Pick your battles carefully’ was his counsel; and Jensen took heed, even if his lance was always ready, close to hand for a just cause.

It was how he came to start the Titchville Volunteer Life Guard.

Titchville had one municipal pool, an ugly creation of fifties hubris, when Titchville was a ‘town going places’, as it stated on the city limits sign. The essential absurdity in the notion of a town with hat on head, suitcase in hand, heading off to seek its fortune never failed to crack Niels and Jensen up.

“Going places,” Niels would solemnly intone to Jensen as they passed each other in the junior high hallways, and Jensen would give a crisp, one-fingered salute.

The same governing genius who designed the go-ahead posters around town also instigated the mall, the new post office and the gymnasium that abutted the pool. Each of them had a fifties space age feel, complete with rocket-fin style projections, so consequently each of them looked dated within ten years. It didn’t stop the good people of Titchville thinking that they lived in a modern town embracing the nuclear age. Even the board of Parcae College voted to pull down their faux-Gothic gatehouse and erect something Buck Rogers would have welcomed in its place.

But then the Gawley proposal to build a plastics factory in the town employing 400 local folk was beaten by a consortium from Baylor, Dallas, and grand gestures towards the future no longer seemed quite so well-conceived.

The morning Jensen started the TVLG was melting molasses hot, which meant that every child of school age in the county who could walk, ride or hitch a lift to the pool was crammed in and around it. Leighton Polk, who designed the complex, had an unusual aesthetic sense and chose brown tiles for the pool itself, which resulted in the water generally looking green. In the fifties, it was a point of difference and some pride for the Titchville folk. It had long since degenerated into being known as the P – Pool, and the ‘P’ didn’t stand for ‘Polk’.

Jensen, fourteen years old and just beginning to broaden across the shoulders, swam with Matt and Lucas until he was pleasantly cold. He sat down on his towel, surreptitiously checking the size of the bulge in his swim trunks and wishing it was bigger. While he was at it, he also wished that this was the summer when all his freckles would join together and give him a permanent tan. By the kids’ pool Niels sat on the edge, legs swinging in the water, watching Lotte and Karin. It would be Jensen’s turn in half an hour to swap babysitting duties.

Jensen gave up hoping for extra inches and an all-over Malibu glow and instead found himself watching Troy and Terry Padalecki. He couldn’t help it. Visiting a zoo it is always the dangerous animals that capture the most fearful attention, and Troy and Terry were the unlovely lords of middle school bullying at Titchville Junior High. Now, Jensen saw, they were teasing a younger boy, ducking him with monotonous invariability whenever he rose to the surface. As he watched, the boy was pushed down again, and he sighed.

“Whatcha doing, Jizzhead?”

Lucas dropped clumsily to his towel beside Jensen, the only other boy who could challenge him in the raw-lobster look after a day in the sun. Jensen flicked his hair at him.

“The Padaleckis are killing some kid.”

“Huh. Must be Tuesday.” It was sympathetic; they’d both been there. But it was also said with an understanding that rescue would not help; you put up with the bullying, resisted it in whatever way seemed best to you, and some day you would reach the point where the Padaleckis could no longer terrorize you. Jensen, Lucas and Matt had passed through the furnace, and now allowed their lips to curl in contempt whenever they met the Padaleckis in open confrontation.

“Hayley’s said I can come to Niels’ birthday.” Lucas shuffled until his towel was more comfortable beneath him.

Jensen poked him. “Yeah, she’s awesome like that. She even invited Kit Polk.”

“Shut up.” Lucas grinned, and laid back to lean on his elbows, watching the shrieking mass of children in front of him. “Kit’s in the can again.”

“No shit?” Kit Polk was the town drunk, and a source of amused fascination for the boys. “What’d he do this time?”

“Peed all over the sheriff’s car. Wrote his name in the dirt on the back door.”

“Huh.” Jensen joined Lucas in leaning back, rejoicing in the warmth of a late Texas summer. “Bet he spelled it wrong.”

“So you think Hayley’s gonna invite Kirsten?”

“Oh, you got it bad, boy.” Jensen didn’t even have to look to know that whatever part of Lucas’ face wasn’t red from the sun was red now with blushing. He figured it was deserved when Lucas punched him in the ribs.

“At least Kirsten came to my place to watch my video.”

“You and that VCR, Lukey. Dating heaven.  What did you tape for her? Charmed? Oh, wait, I know, I know – Seventh Heaven.”

“I’m too chilled out to kick your ass, Jizzhead, but as a matter of fact, it was Beavis and Butthead.”

“I’m impressed. I’m more than impressed. I’m comatose with impressedness.”

“So is she coming?”

Jensen sighed dramatically, and squinted over at his friend, who wasn’t even trying for neutrality.

“I’ll ask Niels. Who’ll ask Hayley. Who’ll say yes, because she has some weird kinda disease that makes her do nice things for dorks like you.”

“Cool. Coolness.” Lucas squinted over at him. “Are you asking anyone?”

“Your mom.”

Lucas sighed and shook his head.

“She keeps telling you, boy, you’re too undeveloped. Come back when your balls have dropped.”

It was Jensen’s turn to half-heartedly smack at Lucas. The conversation was typical; insults, mixed with plotting, mixed with physical attacks that did all they would ever do to display their affection for each other.

For another long minute he was content to swallow the sunshine and let his gaze roam around the pool deck. At the first pass he thought Steve Esposito was there, with his brother Tony and the rest of Niels’ friends, and any thought of Steve was one he had to be careful of while wearing swim briefs. It was alarming, and exciting, what happened to him when Steve was around; and it was okay, ever since a typically short but precise and compassionate talk with Conrad one night a year ago. He didn’t know if he was gay or just hormonally whirlpooled, but he knew he was safe in his dad’s affections, regardless.

His eyes were drawn back to the Padalecki boys, and something tightened in his stomach. He could see Terry and Troy, laughing together, and Troy seemed to be suspended in the water as he stood at the side of the pool, half a shoulder higher than his twin. He’d been standing there like that for several minutes.

The reason came to him with such sudden violence that Jensen was on his feet and at the water’s edge before he’d even considered what to do. Somehow, he just knew that the last time he’d seen the kid shoved under was the last time the boy had been above the surface, and it had been far too long.

“Out of the way!” He jumped in, pushing bodies aside, and there was enough command in his voice that unreflecting children shifted automatically to allow him passage. He reached Troy so quickly that he hadn’t even formed a plan of attack; but this close, through the choppy green surface, he could see a pale figure on the bottom of the pool, with Troy’s feet anchoring him there.

He didn’t need to think. Troy had only just turned around, sneer ready, smart remark beginning to form, when Jensen’s fist caught his nose. Instead of snark there was a wail through the instant gush of blood, and Jensen was ignoring him to duck-dive to the boy, lying still as a lost statue on a seabed, fingers splayed in silent appeal.

Jensen gripped him beneath the shoulders and wrenched him upward to the surface. The boy didn’t respond. The moment Jensen realized it everything inside him, the terrible driving urgency, the fear, calmed. Knowledge came to him, as clear as if it was being dictated in his ear. He shoved the boy out onto the pool’s edge, and onto his back, then pulled himself out to kneel beside him and tilt his head back, checking the airway.

The boy’s lips were blue. But as Jensen listened for breathing and felt for a heartbeat, the kid gave a violent start and snorted water and snot all over him. A terrible, clawing breath and then a half gasp, half scream, and the boy was grabbing at Jensen, terror thick between them.

“It’s okay, you’re okay now.” Jensen hugged him briefly then rolled the shaking, crying child over to his side, where he drew his knees up in foetal defence.

“You fugging asshole, Aggles! You broke my fugging dose.”

Jensen glanced up, and the look in his eyes stopped Troy’s outraged advance upon him.

“You shitsuck, you nearly drowned him.”

Terry crowded behind Troy, peering down at the boy on the poolside deck.

“He’s alright. He’s just a crybaby.” He looked to Troy for confirmation, who was vainly cupping his hand beneath his nose to catch his own blood. “We were gonna let him up.”

“Yeah, and I’mma kick both your asses.” It was Niel’s growl, and Jensen let the warm feeling of safety he felt whenever he heard his brother’s voice settle his pounding heart.

“Your brother did this!” Troy shook a blood-covered finger at Jensen. Niels looked at Troy’s face critically.

“Did he? Hey, Terry, you want me to break your nose too, so you two needledicks can look like twins again?”

“Come on.” Terry, always the smarter of the two, pulled at Troy’s elbow. “We’ll tell Dad. Guess we’ll see how funny you are when our lawyers have finished figuring out what to charge you with.”

“Jeez.” Niels rolled his eyes. “No, seriously, your dad musta married his sister, right? ‘Cos you can’t get quality dumb like that just by luck. Hey, Terry – one? Lawyers don’t charge people and two? Considerin’ our dad could buy and sell yours with change left over for the popcorn, he’ll be talking to Sheriff Dwayne Boule, who’ll be talking to this kid, who’ll be thinking about if he wants to press charges for attempted murder.”

Still muttering, but now looking a little green, the Padalecki brothers backed away, and Jensen felt Niels’ hand on his shoulder.

“Cool, bro.”

He nodded, Niels nodded back, and that was all that was needed between them.

The kid had managed to sit up, and after checking he was alright, Jensen patted him a little awkwardly and got to his feet. The etiquette of post-rescue was beyond him; all he felt now was a vague kind of embarrassment. So he said some kind of goodbye to the boy and hurried away. But he had an idea – and as Conrad often said, once Jensen Had An Idea, it would take the Lord and Randy White to hold him back.

Cassius Polk was nominated as the permanent on duty lifeguard, and Cassius Polk was almost never to be seen. Within two weeks Jensen had managed to sign up thirty boys and girls from Niels’ class down to his own into the Titchville Volunteer LifeGuard. They took it on a rostered basis, two hour shifts apiece, and it was as much testament to Jensen’s strength of will as it was to the Ackles family owning the largest stock and feed store in the county that they stuck to it. The Padaleckis and their friends were notable non-volunteers.

Principal Corcoran heard of it on her return from vacation, and she called by the Ackles home one late summer afternoon. She caught Conrad out by his beloved rose bushes, and got straight to business, as usual.

“Word tells me Jensen has started another community initiative. That’s three, isn’t it? So with the baseball, and the grades, and the community work – well, I’d say that boy of yours has got the 97 Parcae Prize sewn up, Con, and he’s three years away from it yet.”

“Moira, I have no idea how you conjure up these points, but Jensen won’t need the Prize. I can afford to pay his way.”

Moira Corcoran looked at him shrewdly. “I think you know to the nth degree how this is done, Con. I know another control freak when I meet one. So when I say that Jensen will be the first Junior to reach those 500 points, and the next closest in his year and above is almost 200 points adrift, well, I’d guess you’ll have a very good idea of how well he’s doing.”

Conrad frowned. “I’d appreciate it if you didn’t say anything of that in front of Jensen. I don’t want him to stop doing his best.”

Moira Corcoran smiled at him. “Con, don’t you know your boy yet? He’s one of those people who were born to shine. He’ll do his best, no matter what, can’t help it. The gods smile on folks like him. Did you know his grades went up when he travelled on that baseball trip? You don’t need to push that kid. You just need to stand back and let him run.”

Chapter 3   

It was two months before Niels’ body was returned to his family from the army, and the funeral could be held. Twenty eight people came to an event that should have seen the best part of the county crowded around the church. Rob Tolliver, Conrad’s lifelong friend, and his wife;  Uncle Carey and his family; Walter Surillo, who ran the funeral home; thirteen journalists and photographers. The ‘Terror of Titchville’ had some media juice left in it yet. One lurker at the far edge of the cemetery, come to gloat or simply bear witness.

And Jurek Padalecki without Terry and Troy, his surviving boys. He hadn’t come to mourn.

The day the news from Fort Bliss arrived saw Patrizia and Domingo leave the Ackles household. They had lived there for 13 years, but no one argued with them to stay with the family of their son’s murderer. In that grotesque absence that followed the calls, it was left to Jensen to get the girls out of bed, bathed, dressed, and fed breakfast. He was the one who cuddled them when the silence stalked them to terrified stillness. Ulrike stayed in her room. Conrad went out to the summerhouse and sat there, unreachable. It was Jensen who picked up the egg-lifter from off the floor, where it had fallen from Patrizia’s hand; he was the one who scraped the burnt rellenos into the bin, and set about learning where everything was kept in the kitchen. He was a poor cleaner, and a worse cook, but it was him or no-one, and he knew it was what Niels would expect of him.

On the morning of the funeral, Jensen found his mother dressed in powder blue, determinedly putting her hair up with trembling fingers.

“Niels hated me to wear black,” she said. Jensen just nodded, but she glanced at him sharply as if he’d argued the point.

“There’ll be so many people there.” She slid one pin into the mass of blonde hair, watched as it held for  a moment then sagged to the side.  She gathered it up again. “We have to support your father. It’s important. He’s important. Everyone will be there.”

But they weren’t, of course. In the muggy heat of late summer, the lilies she’d ordered outnumbered the people ten to one. They were fit for a prince’s passing, but the kingdom was lost. They wilted, unnoticed, as Ulrike searched the near-empty church for all the love that was her due.

Cameras clicked and whirred, and a journalist “From the Dallas Morning Herald, ma’am”, just wanted to know if their son had any ties with the Unabomber, and when did they know he was unstable?

“Leave her the hell alone!” growled Rob Tolliver, but Jensen’s father said nothing.  He gripped Ulrike’s arm and guided her to the waiting cars, as the organist played a hymn it took Jensen too long to realize was ‘There is a fountain filled with blood’.

Afterwards, at their home, when Jensen looked at the tables covered in food – all professionally catered, nothing from caring friends, murmuring neighbors – he made a decision and closed off the living room doors.

“Bring everyone in there,” he said to Lotte, and he and she brought two plates apiece in to the drawing room. If he could spare his mother the silent offence of so much unwanted food, he would.

No one had thought to draw the blinds, so the sun streamed in through the leaded windows, lightening what was a sometimes dark space with its Victorian paneling and wallpaper. Jensen put the sandwiches on the bureau and opened the doors into the hallway, ushering the handful of guests into the smaller room. Lotte left one plate of cakes on a table then stood with the other in her hands, clenched in front of her as if it were a salver holding human hearts. A sacrifice to the gods of mayhem and grief. Rob Tolliver and Darcey-Anne  wandered in. Uncle Carey dutifully entered, miserably wiping his mouth with his handkerchief, followed by his wife Claudie, who looked about her with an appraising eye.

“Would you like to sit?” Jensen gestured to the large armchair that dominated one corner.

“Why thank you, no.” Claudie dipped her eyes demurely. “Those long services always do play aitch- ee- ell with my veins. I think I’ll stand here and admire your garden.”

That was a shot across the bows; the garden had been abandoned to its own devices since Domingo left, and a hot, wet summer had given nature free rein with what had not long before been owned and orderly.

“Dammit, Claudie,” Uncle Carey muttered. “Not today.”

“Can I get anyone some refreshment?” Jensen glanced at the doors to the living room, wondering how he’d manage to get drinks from the bar there without letting the guests see the evidence of the Ackles family’s ridiculous failure to acknowledge the new truth of their local standing.

“Jensen, what are you doing?” Ulrike came in ahead of Conrad, who carried Karin. “I told you we were set up in the living room.”

“Mutti, it’s better in here.”

“Do as your mother says, Jensen,” Conrad said. He sounded distant, a radio-signal too far and too faded to make proper sense through the ether. “Just – whatever she says.”

Lotte shot Jensen an alarmed look. Nine years old, and she could read the room as well as he. 

“Daddy, please.” But Conrad moved past her, unnoticing, to reach one-handed for the door handles.

“Thank you, Con. Your brother deserves better from you, Jensen. As if we’d be in this poky room. For Niels. For my son.” As Conrad opened the door she swept through, to where table after table had been set up with forty plates of vol-au-vents and finger sandwiches, cookies and cakes, all catered for the memory of how it once was, how it should have been.

 “There’s plenty for everyone. We have plenty. Plenty.” She sounded almost bright, as she swooped onto a tray of food and offered it to Darcey-Anne.

She’s right, he thought. Niels deserved so much better than this. He was so much better than this.

“Here, Claudia, have some punch. You’re looking peaky. I know what it is; the heat is just awful, isn’t it?”

 Jensen watched in silent misery as the guests looked slowly about them. There was something grotesque about the mismatch of quantity between guests and food, something obscene, and he didn’t really understand what it was until he realized that his mother was oblivious to it. The food was Ulrike’s tribute to her child, and it was therefore unstinting and impossible in scale.

Later, when the few guests had gone and Ulrike went upstairs to rest, Conrad stood with his children and surveyed the food left untouched. He said nothing, and when Jensen saw his face he knew his father had no words to lay on this pyre. With a nod to Lotte, Jensen went to the kitchen and gathered plastic wrap, containers, anything to attempt some kind of salvage job, however ephemeral the effect. Conrad left them to it, moving in a daze to the front door where his hand rested on the doorknob, lacking the will to turn it, to make it to the garden. The hundred year old stained glass window by the door that showed Fortuna with her horn and rudder sent streams of amber and red around his head and that was where he stood, stopped as utterly as fifteen bullets had stopped his son.

 

Chapter 4

In the two months since the unimaginable had happened, the Ackles Stock, Feed and Hardware store went from being the biggest in the county outside metropolitan Dallas to an echoing warehouse.  A handful of folk stayed loyal; but most had lost a son, a nephew, a friend, and somehow the charisma that had been Niels’ greatest gift became sinister, a curse, a compulsion he laid on their unsuspecting boys. He was not there to take the blame, so the county turned against Conrad. And their children turned against Jensen.

It began on the first day he returned to school. It didn’t occur to him to be wary. The struggle of caring for his family and putting one foot ahead of the next on a daily basis kept him from looking too far inward, too far ahead. He didn’t expect to be accosted, and at first, he wasn’t. Instead, it was a violence of averted eyes and tight-tucked bodies, one that Jensen had not foreseen but immediately understood.

As he entered that day the first thing he saw was a board featuring the graduation photos of ten of the eleven Titchville volunteers. Each was bordered in black; above them, carefully draped American and Texan flags stood at half-mast. In neat, red writing, the words ‘For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son’ ran up one side of the board and down the other.  Beneath and alongside the board stood posies, some store-bought, some obviously picked from home gardens. Some had the dusty petals of roadside wild-flowers.

Niels’ absence from the board was such an acute wound that Jensen rounded his shoulders, as if he’d been punched in the chest. There were other students standing there, paying their unspoken respects, and they moved as unconsciously as a shoal of fish away from Jensen’s intrusion. Echoing calls and the sounds of running feet, screams and laughter from outside, the PA announcing changes to the room for Mr. Suerte’s Spanish class, the banging of lockers, all of these built the cacophony that identified school for Jensen; and yet, that morning, in front of that grim memorial board, he felt utterly alone in a sea of silence.

When he did finally drag himself into class, a ripple of sharp attention and then instant avoidance fluttered around the room. He dropped into a seat. He was aware of Matt and Lucas two seats over, but he couldn’t bring himself to look at them. If they didn’t want to know him, making eye contact would unwillingly drag them into this ugliness with him; if they did, the fact of that might break the resolve that had kept him dry-eyed and focused ever since the moment of that phone-call, in the kitchen, eight weeks and a million miles ago.

Mrs. Besmer, the economics teacher, came into the classroom slowly. Her nephew Ian had been one of the ten. She put her books and notes down onto the table as if placing an enormous weight, and straightened up to begin.

“Welcome to your Junior year at Titchville High. It’s good to see you all back here – “ Her voice wobbled, and she drew  in a  breath, but kept going. “I know all too well you won’t have done your summer reading until last weekend, so it will all be fresh in your mind. If you’ll begin by opening Woolmer to page thirty-eight, and we’ll take the first three – “ She stopped as her gaze caught Jensen. For a long moment they stared at each other, caught in a mutual misery that they nonetheless could not share. Mrs. Besmer raised a hand and brushed vaguely at her face, as if pushing away whatever it was she was thinking, before resuming in a voice that was cracked and hoarse. “We’ll take the first three exercises and complete them in pairs. Find your study partner from last year. This is combined work but it’s still quiet work, people. Watch the noise level.”

Tyson Morrison, Jensen’s study partner, grimaced but shifted his chair slightly to get closer to him. He gestured with his chin to the book by Jensen’s hand.

“You gonna open that?”

“Yeah, sure.” Jensen realized he was grateful that Tyson had spoken to him at all. Quickly he found the right page, then scribbled down the parameters of the first problem. “So, do you want to work out the interest first, or should we look at the model overall?”

Tyson fiddled with his pen, his head averted.

“Don’t care. Do whatever you want.”

Jensen bit his lip, then nodded. Pick your battles, son, Conrad would say. Today was not the day to push for fairness.

He worked alone with Tyson sitting beside him, pointedly not helping, until the bell went and the class dispersed with unusual swiftness. By the time Jensen had gathered up his books and stood up, the room was empty – except for two people standing behind him. Jensen didn’t look around. He knew exactly who they were. What he could not know was what they would bring to him now, and the fact that he was afraid of it, of them, made his hands tremble as he straightened his shoulders.

“Hey, Jense?”

Lucas shuffled up beside him.

“Hey, Lucas. Hey, Matt.”

“Jense, uh – y’know, we’re real sorry about … you know, everything.”

“Yeah.” Matt came to stand by Jensen, too. “Sorry about the funeral. Mom was worried there might be some trouble.”

“Really?” The thought hadn’t occurred to Jensen. Matt looked embarrassed. No, not embarrassed, Jensen realized; ashamed.

“There was some talk, some of the older guys, from that year. Were gonna mess it up.”

“What happened?”

Matt shrugged. “Dunno. Guess it was all talk. But it got real ugly, and Mom didn’t want me anywhere near in case.”

You could have phoned, Jensen thought. You could have let me know I wasn’t in this alone. But as true as it was, he couldn’t bring himself to place blame. There was too much of that in his world already.

“You got science next?” Lucas shifted from foot to foot, as ungainly as ever, and the familiarity of that washed over Jensen, realigned something that had been badly knocked askew.

“No, got AP English with Somerville.”

“Ugh. You know Cathy D’Oliveira said he cracked a boner watching the girls’ swim team train last week.”

“Huh.” Jensen grasped at the gossipy lifeline Matt threw him. “I thought he was gay.”

“Well, der. Of course he’s gay. He’s an English teacher, ain’t he?”

“So how could he - ?”

“I dunno. Full moon, maybe.”

“Yeah, right. You are so full of shit.” Jensen did a laborious double take. “And why were the swim team training before term started?”

“Oh.” Lucas and Jensen each gave a laugh at the expression on Matt’s face.  It was tentative laughter, but it was a start. “I never thought of that.”

“You never thought of that. Jeez.” Jensen led the way out of the classroom, into the thrumming hallway. “I gotta go. See you at lunch?”

“Sure thing.” Defiantly, Matt slapped at Jensen’s shoulder, his glare catching the students who were determinedly not looking their way. “See you then.”

Matt and Lucas headed off towards the science wing, as Jensen let the first internal warmth he’d felt in two months suffuse him. The thought of doubting his two best friends seemed ludicrous now. And with them as anchors, the challenge of the next days and weeks didn’t seem quite so mountainous.

He wasn’t exactly smiling as he threaded his way through the students towards AP English, but he managed to almost ignore the obvious shrinking away from him. Until he met the only students who didn’t give him a leper’s space, who deliberately blocked his path as he went to swing around into the final hallway; until Troy Padalecki swung his fist hard and fast straight into his unprotected belly, dropping him, gasping, to the ground.

“Welcome back, asshole.”

And that was the true beginning of the story of this term.

It continued that afternoon, at the first football training session of the year. Coach Caselli was a man given to plain speaking, made the fact his trademark, so it was peculiarly awful to watch the way he danced about his message to Jensen.

“You see, son, I can’t ask them to walk that walk. What’s happened, n’all. Can’t ask Brett and Troy and Terry to go with you. You c’n see that, now, can’t you?”

“So I’m not quarterback anymore.” He said it leadenly, and was vaguely surprised to realize he didn’t care.

“Still on the team, still my go to. And when it’s baseball season, well, those scouts are coming, you better believe it.”

“Sure, coach.”

Coach looked at him with pity, and Jensen turned away, remembering the way coach had looked at him last term, when they won the baseball championship under his command. Youngest captain in the history of Titchville High, a boy wonder who brought home the cup. Now he was that Ackles, the brother of the crazy guy, the one tainted with madness and murder and misery. No one would want that person helming a team, he knew. It was going to be hard enough to stand alone on the mound and feel his own teammate’s enmity enveloping him.

Thoughts of getting the scholarship to Parcae College seemed caught in his mind, as if trapped in some golden past, an amber made by different people in a different time. But as distant as it was, it remained the only goal he could see. Baseball was a season away, and right now that felt like a lifetime. His great grandfather had started the College – there was a beacon there, surely, some kind of message he could fathom as the days grew colder and everything he thought he once knew and belonged to were swept away with the first winds of October.

 

Chapter 5

The colonel from Fort Bliss arrived a week after the funeral. The kindness in the man’s eyes ambushed Jensen: he was prepared for official indifference, not sympathy, and the catch in his breath at the sight caught him unawares.

“My condolences,” Colonel Radford said, Southern charm muted to gravity. Ulrike received his hand in silent acknowledgment. “I want you to know, ma’am, sir, that everyone at Fort Bliss shares your sorrow. Niels Ackles was as fine a young man as has ever come through our training. There wasn’t a body on our base that didn’t think well of him. It’s unaccountable, it is, what happened to him.”

Jensen could see that bewilderment was not something this army man was used to carrying. It fit him poorly, in an otherwise assured life.

Conrad cleared his throat. “So you’ve – you’ve not found anything that would explain..?”

“No sir, no.” The colonel shifted in the overstuffed chair. “There was the journal – I believe you knew about that? It is unremarkable, except as a record of a committed professional, always thinking how to improve his work. There’s nothing but training plans, and good thoughts for his comrades and his country and his family in there. Until that last morning. And that’s the first sign that there’s anything remotely wrong. The base psychiatric staff have gone over it carefully, sir, ma’am, and there’s no warning. Until that final day, he was a model of a sound mind in a sound body.”

Ulrike drew her arms in closer to her sides. “There is nothing sound in a mind that decides the boys he’s known since childhood were enemies of the state. Somebody missed something. “

Colonel Radford gave a slight shake of his head. “I spoke with his supervising officer directly, ma’am. He’d just been assessed a week before, passed every milestone and marker the army could come up with, and passed them well, too.”

“What did the last entry say?” Jensen said.

The colonel shot him a quick glance. “You’re his brother, Jensen?” Jensen nodded. “Well, son, it seems your brother was convinced that the men he attacked were going to bomb the new ballpark at Arlington. Something about you being there, and that he had to protect you?”

“That was the day before,” Jensen protested, but his voice was so small he doubted the man could hear him. The colonel nodded anyway.

“Son, the chief psychiatric officer told me that a break like this, a break from reality, can happen for any number of reasons. And once it does, I doubt if he knew what day it was, leastways what constituted a reasonable course of action.”

“The army is investigating?” Conrad’s voice sounded like gravel dredged beneath water.

“There’s a full investigation being conducted, sir, and we’ll keep you informed of the outcome. You must know that the US Army takes its responsibility for its men very seriously, and there are other families here that are looking for answers. I’m very much afraid we won’t have anything to offer that will provide comfort at this time; sometimes, these kinds of breakdowns occur for no reason that anyone can tell.”

“It’s the Lord’s doing, then?” Jensen knew Ulrike’s question was contemptuous, but Colonel Radford nodded.

“Guess it is at that. If you’d like the chaplain to come and visit with you, or any of the psychiatric support staff, I’d be happy to arrange that.”

“No, thank you,” Ulrike said, with simple coolness. “Thank you for coming to speak to us, Colonel. I appreciate you coming all this way to tell us so little.”

The colonel frowned, but thought better of replying. He got to his feet. “The US Army looks after its own, ma’am, and Niels Ackles is still one of us. If there’s anything we can do, don’t hesitate to call.” He looked at each of them in turn, then gestured with his head. “Thank you for your hospitality. I’ll show myself out.” 

No one said anything as the colonel left, until Ulrike gave an angry snort.

“Nothing to see here. Does he think we’re all fools? The army destroyed our boy, and then tells us he’s one of their own? Pah.”

Conrad made a small motion towards her, as if asking her to desist, but she twisted away from him.

“They tell us there was nothing to notice, that all their specialists and support people and supervisors didn’t see that he was in hell. That is what they do there, that is what they do to bright young boys, good boys. They have to make them monsters in order to make them fight.”

“Ulla, please.”

“And you let him go!” Her voice grew in volume, feeding on its own mindless despair. “You were so proud of my son, you sent him on his way, you said he was doing the right thing. At the graduation, when you could have said no, you could have said go to college, no, you wanted him to be a hero, you wanted the glory for yourself. Didn’t you?”

Jensen’s father’s face was gray, and frozen in helpless listening.

“The town turns against us, all our friends, the papers all talk about a crazy monster, and no one is mourning my son. No one is mourning my beautiful boy.”

“Do you think,” Conrad choked out, “do you think for a second I don’t mourn my son?”

Jensen flinched, feeling small and sick, wishing that everything would stop, please stop.

“I think,” Ulrike said, very deliberately, “that you mourn your position in this town. I think you are sorry that your business is failing, that people don’t pay their respects to you everywhere you go like they used to.  I think you wish your boy had died a hero’s death, not gunned down like a dog by the army that now comes and tells us he’s one of their own. I think you care about yourself more than you’ll ever care for your children.”

“My god, Ulla.” Conrad sounded as insubstantial as a ghost. “You don’t know me at all. After all these years, and you don’t know me at all.”

Ulrike’s face contorted. “You let him go!”

“I couldn’t stop him!” Conrad stood up. “He was a grown man, Ulla. He made his own choice!”

“He was a child!”

Conrad ‘s shoulders, raised in defence, began to lower in defeat. “Ulla. Please. Ulla. I  - I can’t…”

“No, I can’t!” Ulrike stood too, and Jensen got to his feet, afraid, useless, unable to stop this little tragedy grinding on. “I cannot and I will not stay here to listen to the apologies, the excuses, the lies. I am taking the children and going out. You do what you want.”

Jensen knew ‘the children’ meant Lotte and Karin. It didn’t include him.

“Ulla,” Conrad whispered, but she was gone, and Jensen heard him make a sound like the groaning of a tree in a high wind.

“Dad? Hey, Dad?” Jensen reached for him, but Conrad turned away, towards his study. “Dad, come on. You know how Mutti gets. She’s – everyone’s upset. We’re all upset.”

Conrad didn’t answer. He shut the door of his study as gently as a caress.

Jensen was left standing in the living room, alone. He heard the dull thud of the car door being slammed, and then the car pulled out, past the bow window, with Lotte and Karin in the backseat, their heads still bobbing as they adjusted hasty seatbelts. For a full minute he remained where he was, with no direction in his mind as to what he should, or could, do.

At last, he pressed the heels of his hands to his eyes until all he could see was an orange haze. Staring at the swirls and patterns of light let him drift, unloosed from any kind of mooring, almost mesmerized by his own ineffectuality. He would stand and hide like this, a child’s answer, and somehow that would be good enough for Niels’ memory. Good enough for his mother’s grief, his father’s despair. He thought of the pitcher’s mound, and that bright blue sky, and the boy with the mitt was only a dream, lost to the rushing of blood in his palms.

So intent was he on obscuring the world that the next sound he heard took more than a minute to penetrate the void. He pulled his hands away and blinked, repeatedly, to clear his vision. There’d been two sounds, he realized. A sharp one, then a dull one. From the study. From his father’s study.

And even though he moved towards it quickly, his mind a roaring blank, it seemed to take an hour before he opened the door and looked in to see what his father had done.

Chapter 6

He buried his father on a Tuesday. The Friday before had seen Conrad greeting the colonel, shaking his hand, wounded by his wife’s fury, and by the following Tuesday he was in the ground. The time between seemed to Jensen like a series of shutter snaps: one, and it was the day after, and he was struggling to work the washing machine to clean the drapes from the study (the red splatter so artfully hidden amongst the posies of the pattern); two, and it was Saturday evening, and Karin was watching a Scooby Doo cartoon. Shaggy was saying, “Yowzer! The Day of the Dead is, like, muy bizarro, Scoob!” as Karin watched, stone faced. Three, and it was Sunday, lunchtime, Karin calling him a poo-head for not cutting her crusts the way Patty did, and when was Patty coming back, because Jensen’s cooking sucked? Four, and he was shaking hands with Walter Surillo, the funeral director, as he saw him to the door. The funeral was simple to arrange; they still had the card tucked on the refrigerator door. There was food in the freezer from the last one.

Five: Father Simmonds was standing by the open grave, and Jensen felt as if it was an eye-blink ago that he stood there on a sunnier day, with Conrad by his side, a different name on the temporary headstone. Another blink and he was leading Lotte and Karin back to the car, to where Ulrike already sat, her chin high, her face tight and fixed in some emotion Jensen couldn’t begin to read.

“Lotte, you want me to ring Daisy, get her to come stay tonight?”

Lotte shook her head. She was saying nothing of what crossed her mind; Karin was sharing everything.

“Jensen! I want B and J on the way home.”

“Not now, Kitty-Kar. Mutti’s too sad for ice cream. She needs to get home, get some rest.”

Ulrike heard the exchange.

“Oh, don’t be so mean, Jensen.” Ulrike reached for Karin, and stroked her hair as she wriggled in to sit beside her. “We could all use a treat. This miserable weather.” She looked out at the overcast skies, trapping the turgid heat against the ground.

“Sure, Mutti.” Jensen was grateful to hear his mother’s voice; she’d been so silent since Friday, leaving everything to him. “You like some too, Lottsie?”

Lotte shook her head, hunching down between her shoulders as if she might find shelter in her own skin.

“I suppose that woman is coming home with us?”

“They’re all we’ve got of family now, Mutti.”

Pursed lips and a fixed glare out the car window told Jensen that his mother did not regard the fact of Conrad’s family as something to be encouraged.

The car trip home seemed quicker somehow than the one done only weeks ago, despite the stop off for ice cream. Carey and Claudie’s car pulled in behind them, too close to the garden bed so that the gardenias were bruised against the hubcaps. Jensen heard his mother’s clicked disgust as she disappeared into the house, leaving him to nod his uncle and aunt in to the study. There was no question of a larger room this time.

“I’m going upstairs, “ Ulrike announced as they gathered. “I have a headache. Jensen, you can see to our guests, can’t you.”

“I – “ But she was gone, not quite flouncing from the room, and Jensen was left smiling a weak apology at his uncle.

“Probably for the best,” Carey said. Claudie subsided into the large chair, every inch the Southern belle as she unfolded into a pose that was somehow both elegant and aggressive. Carey remained standing; as Jensen watched, he pulled out a handkerchief and wiped at the sweat at the back of his neck before letting his gaze wander the room as if cataloguing every item there. “But I really must speak with her. Or then again –“ he looked at Jensen as if he were the sudden answer to a hasty prayer. “I suppose you’re an adult now, eh? Close enough, close enough.”

“Can I get you something, Uncle Carey?”

“Well now, a whiskey would do me good, I believe. Claudie?”

She waved away the offer in a manner that made it clear Jensen couldn’t possibly have anything that would interest her.

“Sure.” Jensen hesitated at the bar, then reached up to the niche above and pulled down one of Conrad’s finest single malts. It gave him such a stab of sorrow that he almost dropped it as he opened it; the thought that his dad would never again tell Jensen of its origins, never again measure out a careful glass whenever there was a celebration in the house. Hell, he could pour the whole thing on the floor, and no one would care. And only he was available to clean it up.

“Thanks, Jensen. You’re a good boy. Doing a good job here.” But Carey was shifting about, barely looking at the drink before swallowing it in one. His nervousness would have made Jensen uneasy had he anything but grief and despair in his head. Now, he numbly wondered why Carey looked like a long tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs.

“You’ll be alright, Jensen, won’t you?”

He nodded, dully. What was he supposed to say to that?

“You’re a good boy. A good boy.”

Carey’s oddness was penetrating even Jensen’s fog.

“What’s wrong, Uncle?”

“Nothing! Nothing, boy.” The heartiness of it was false enough, and so woefully amiss at a wake, that Jensen blinked into sharp awareness. “No, no, nothing’s wrong. In fact, I have just done something that will look after your interests for some time to come. And the girls of course, your mother.”

Jensen frowned. “What are you talking about?”

“Well, “ and Carey looked about him for somewhere to place the glass, making a fuss of it so that he was facing way from him, “you know the store was in trouble, and the offer I got was so good, I made the decision to sell up the business. There’s a hundred grand coming your family’s way, and that’s a pretty darn good deal, if I say so myself. Hundred thousand will keep your mother in style for many years to come, son.”

“A hundred thousand?” Jensen found his throat tightening up. “What are you talking about? The warehouse is worth three times that. Then there’s the stock, the fittings. The trucks.”

“Now, now, Jensen, don’t take that tone.”

“Tone? I’m not taking a tone, Uncle, I’m –“

“I split it fifty fifty, right down the line. You suggesting I’d cheat my own brother’s children?”

Jensen shook his head, a little dazed.

“I’m not suggesting anything. But a hundred thousand is not half of what the company’s worth, not even close.”

“Don’t pretend you know more than me about business, boy!”

“I know enough!” The anger he felt was shocking in its unexpectedness. “Well, you can’t sell off the land. You’d need Dad’s signature for that. So at least you can’t steal that.”

The look on Carey’s face made his stomach churn. He’d never known that someone could look angry and guilty at the same time.

“I’m not stealing anything! You don’t know anything about the business. I got us a good deal.”

“I’m sure as shit you got someone a good deal. You sold the land, too? All of it?” Carey’s bluster answered him. “And all we got was one hundred thousand dollars? How’s that going to keep Mutti for the rest of her life? How’s that going to pay for college for the three of us?”

“Well, you won’t need it, will you?” Carey swung around, making the statement an accusation. “You’re winning that goddamned Parcae Prize.”

“Conrad never did shut up about that.” Claudie, clearly enjoying herself, threw in from the chair. “As I understand it, you’ve already got the points. Don’t know why you’re fussin’ about college, Jensen.”

The violence that surged through him was so alien to him that he couldn’t recognise it. His fists ached to punch his father’s brother in the face, in his fat gut, slap his wife onto the ground. It made him sick, as much as the betrayal.

“Get out. Get the fuck out of my house.”

“Mind if I take this?” Claudie uncurled like a snake on the chair and lifted up the vase that Conrad inherited from his grandmother. “A memento of dear Connie?”

Jensen was on her, instantly, and she actually jumped back a little.

“Put that down, and get out.”

“Come on, honey. No use tryin’ to talk to the boy. He’s clearly out of his mind with grief.”

Jensen trembled with the urge to strike him.

“Not so out of my mind that I won’t get Mitch O’Connell to go over this deal of yours. Don’t think you’re going to do this to us. Just because Dad’s  - because Dad’s  -not here to –“ He gasped, the words catching in his chest, so painful and sharp they were slicing the words away from him.

Carey and Claudie left. He heard the car but didn’t watch for them to go. Instead he turned for the stairs and found himself running up them, so full of feeling he couldn’t think of anything but finding his mother. People didn’t understand he and Ulrike together, thought her hard on him, he knew that; but now he sought her as he’d done as a little boy, and he knew she’d be there for him, in her strange, demanding way, as she’d always been. The earth had shifted so fast and so far in the last week that he needed her to anchor him upright.

She was sitting on the bed, facing the window. This was remarkable enough. ‘Head high, shoulders back’ could have been Ulrike’s call-sign, and yet now her body was rounded, one hand supporting her lean to the left, fingers gripping the bedspread so that it rucked like a wound beneath her.  Curtains were pulled across the window but incompletely, leaving a thin strip of blazing light catching her shoulder, the side of her hair.

He hesitated. The air was thick with wrongness, palpable with it. He needed to go to her, badly. Needed one of her rare but surprisingly warm and gentle hugs. But the pillar of blue and gold he expected her to be was gone; the slumped silhouette she made against the light of the window was a sign as bare as a shriek that she needed his strength, his support now.

For one treacherous minute he stood in the doorway, clinging to his childhood.

“Jensen, is that you?” She sounded no worse than tired.

Backing away was still an option, and the thought came to him quick as a stab – and left him. He spread his fingers wide then relaxed them, as he did before each turn on the mound, so that his hands were loose and ready at his sides. He took the step into the room.

“Oh, it’s all too silly. No, it really is. I told him so.”

“Told who, Mutti?”

She sighed, her head only half-turning towards him.

“Get me my pills, would you? They’re in the cabinet.”

“Which ones?”

“Headache. The ones Niels bought me that time.”

He crossed the room, through the slice of brightness that pinned her to the bed like a dead butterfly, over to the small ensuite Conrad had installed to surprise her on their wedding day. The cabinet was small and not particularly full, and a quick rummage failed to find the pills.

“They’re not here, Mutti. Maybe downstairs?”

“No.” A quick dismissive gesture. “Your father will have taken them.”

“They’re in the study?”

“No, Jensen, don’t be obtuse.” With all the flounce she would ever allow herself she brought her legs slowly up onto the bed and lay back.

“I’m sorry, Mutti, but I don’t know what you mean.” Jensen went to her bedside, aching to hug her and help her. It was the spell she cast over all her men, this beauty that was both imperious and fragile, the fortress made of spun glass.

One hand on her forehead, one on her stomach. Neither ready for holding.

“They’ll be in his car. You know he gets headaches when he has to drive into the sun too long.”

“Do you want me to go look?”

“Where?”

“In the car?”

She made a soft, exasperated noise.

“What is wrong with you?”

Jensen frowned, growing uneasy.

“What do you mean?”

“He won’t be back for a week, Jensen. How can you possibly check in the car?”

He blinked, and mentally stumbled, repeating her words.

“He won’t be back..?”

“These long trips always make him so tired. I told him to get Carey to do it. God knows he does little else. But you know what your father is like about the supply contracts. Jensen, can you please get me some water? It’s so dry in here, I can feel my skin cracking. By the time he gets home, I’ll be an old, old woman.”

Niels’ voice. Christmas, three years ago. Mutti, you make the worst jokes ever. Man, is it a Danish thing? And Mutti: Oh, do not be so sure, little American boy. You never met my father. His jokes were much worse. And then laughing, all of them, except Karin, who wanted her daddy to open his present.

“Mutti?” He stood by her, covered the hand on her stomach with his own. “Mutti, that’s not funny.”

She frowned, a rare indulgence.

“What are you talking about?”

“Daddy.” And why, oh why did that name he hadn’t used in years come out of his mouth now?

“Jensen?”

“It’s his funeral today, Mutti. You know what happened. You know.”

Her fingers turned under his and gripped, tight.

“Don’t say such things. That’s a wicked thing to say.”

“Mutti-“

“No!” She flung his hand away. “You can go to your room. I will not have horrible jokes in here.”

He couldn’t breathe.

“Mutti! Please, please don’t – please, just think, just don’t – don’t…”

“Go away, Jensen, and when your father gets home he’ll have a word with you. You’re too old for such foolishness. You know he depends on you and Niels to look after me when he’s away. I don’t understand why you’re doing this.” It was as close to querulous as Ulrike Christensen had ever been in her life, and the trembling in her voice scared him as much as the words.

“Alright. Alright, Mutti, alright. You rest. I’ll let you rest.”

“And my water, please.”

“Sure. Okay. You’ll feel better soon.”

He heard the door to Karin’s room closing, the sound echoing through his empty body.

“Jensen?” Karin stood in the doorway where he had, an era ago.

“Ssh. Come on.” He led her out. “Mutti needs her rest now.”

“Jensen, I don’t like today. It’s not a good day.”

He wrapped his arms around her.

“No, baby girl.”

“I don’t feel safe.”

“Shhh. It’s okay.” He kissed the top of her head, wondering at the lies. “You’re safe here. As long as we’re together in this house, Kitty-Kar, we’re all safe.”

 

Chapter 7

“Mutti, please.”

“I won’t discuss this with you.”

“Mutti, we have to pay these. We have to. I don’t have access. You’re co-signatory, you could just write some checks –“

She slapped the mail down onto the kitchen bench – so shiny and clear in Patrizia’s time, now smeared and cluttered with Jensen’s inability to be all things required.

“And how would I explain myself to your father when gets home? You don’t understand, Jensen, you’re just a child. But a man must feel in charge in his own home. He has enough to worry about with the business. Really, you’re being very mean lately. I don’t like to see it in you.”

Jensen spread his hands on the bench, holding himself there like a rock for her storm. He saw it brewing, the clouds banked on her new horizon, the one over which Conrad had merely sailed and would return in time.

“It’s November. It’s getting cold.”

“I don’t see – “

“The heating is costing us already, Mutti. When winter comes we’ll be cut off and the girls and you – it will be so cold in this old place.”

“By then Con will be back. He’ll see to it.” She sniffed at him, and he lost his kindness in the whirl of frustration dragging him down each day.

“No he won’t!”

Ulrike’s gray eyes hardened. “What do you know? Why do you say that? Has he rung you?”

“No, Mutti, Christ!”

Without a blink, she reached over and slapped him.

“You do not blaspheme in this house, Jensen Ross Ackles. You wouldn’t dare do it if your father was home.”

“He’s not coming home!”

She drew back then, alarmed, and Jensen’s stomach was in freefall. Her bottom lip quivered.

“Please, Mutti, please –“

“Of course he’s coming home! He loves me. You don’t understand, you think it’s the end of the world that we had a fight. Con will come home to me, very soon. It’s just business. The store, there’s been some problems.”

“It’s not the store. Mutti, don’t you remember?” He did not have the courage for this. Niels would have known and done so much better.

Now her hand trembled as she lifted it to her mouth.

“I don’t remember anything. There is nothing to remember. You’re being so hateful. A hateful child.”

It was a long, slow progress towards disaster, but he knew that he had to get through.

“Dad’s not coming back, Mutti. He couldn’t handle the – anything. It was too much for him.”

“He’s away on business. He does this sometimes.”

“We were at the cemetery. F-f-for Dad. We went for Dad.”

She drew her shoulders back, lifted her chin. She’d trembled for a moment beneath a hurricane that would blow her away, but now the Valkyrie had returned.  Valkyries rode storms, high above them.

“I buried my son. My beautiful boy. You’re confused.”

“I’m not confused, you’re-“

“Enough! Holde! Enough of your bad manners. Go and do your homework. Your father will speak to you when he gets home.”

The moment had come and passed, and he’d lacked the skill to make it bring anything like clarity. Ulrike swept from the room, imperious once more, sure again in what she knew, leaving him more dreadfully alone than ever.

He opened the fifth envelope. Gas account from Davey’s Pump n Go. It joined the energy bill, the grocery bill, the phone bill. The fourth envelope held a reminder for license registration. Two of the bills had fluorescent colored stickers on them. Overdue. Thirty days late. Pay Now or Die.

He flicked each one in a skimming circle across the breakfast bar and into the bin. They couldn’t stay there- it would only be so long before the consequences became more dire than a malignant sticker, and he wasn’t stupid. But there was a febrile satisfaction in pretending they were as inconsequential as his bank balance.

His dad opened the account for him on Jensen’s thirteenth birthday. Over the years he’d banked summer jobs and birthday cash. Just before the day at Arlington there was $2800 in the balance column, intended to buy his first car. An ugly inheritance had wiped away that need; he drove Conrad’s car, now, and every time he put his hands on the wheel each day he felt a rolling wave of nausea.

He was astonished to watch the money go. Only four of them in the house, and they spent a hundred a week on groceries, even buying the cheapest alternative brands. He’d quickly learned to save the old packaging where he could – they’d had one disastrous day when Ulrike had opened the pantry door and gasped at the rows of home brand products. A Christensen never ate generic brands. Now he explained the different taste as a reflection on his own poor cooking, and Ulrike had grudgingly accepted that.

“Though why Patrizia and Domingo left us so suddenly I do not know. It was very wrong of them. They were part of us.” She eyed him as if he’d done something to send them packing. “When your father gets back, I’ll send him to talk to them. They’ll come around. But we need a new housekeeper, Jensen.”

The pell-mell draining of cash continued with the energy bills, and this was in the milder weather of mid-Fall. He would have saved gas by riding his bike the twelve miles to school each day, but six year old Karin couldn’t yet ride a bike, let alone make that distance twice a day to kindergarten class. So he drove them all, and bit his lip as he watched the odometer tick over.

“Jensen? What’s wrong with Mutti?”

Lotte stood, foursquare and resolute, in the doorway. He looked at her, and knew this was a conversation he could no longer avoid.

“She’s confused.”

“Like Miss Haversham?”

Jensen frowned. “You’ve read Great Expectations?”

“No.” Lotte came into the kitchen. “Saw the TV series at Shelley’s place. Martin Harvey’s cute.”

“Okay. Right. No, not like Miss Haversham.”

“She thinks Daddy isn’t dead.”

“Yeah.”

“Why don’t we ask someone for help?”

She’d cut straight to it, of course. Lotte was nothing if not practical. He swallowed, wretched.

“Lottza, if they find her like this, if anyone ever finds out that she’s not – they won’t let us stay.”

“Here?”

He shook his head. “Together. I’m not old enough to look after you, that’s what they’ll say. They’ll take you and Karin and put you in foster homes.”

Tears blinked into her eyes. “What will happen to Mutti?”

Even now, her concern was not for herself. He felt a surge of love for her, a need to protect that was almost crippling.

“They’d put her in a place where she’d get help. But we wouldn’t see her, not for a while, I don’t think. I don’t know. Lottsie, if we can hang on, if we can get through for a year or so, I’ll be eighteen. Then I can ask to be your guardian, and we can all live together here.”

“But how can we do that?”

“I’ll think of something.” He bit his lip, looking at the bills in the bin. “Dad would want us to try. Wouldn’t he?”

Lotte wiped her eyes, leant on the bench top, close to him.

“We should stay here. We can’t be a family all over the place, it’s ridiculous.”

Jensen gave her a weak smile.

“You’re ridiculous.”

She nudged him. “You are.”

“No, you.”

“No, you.”

She shoved him hard, and he fell away, a real laugh coming from him.

“We’ll sell everything. Live on mangoes.” He knew how much she loved them, and he saw her eyes light up at the thought, laughing with him. He refused to let the laughter be hollow.

He needed a job.

And he had a sudden inspiration as to where he might go.

*%$#%$&^&*&

“Boy, I saved your ass again.” Matt plumped down half on him where he sat outside, not eating lunch. “Dad’s cool. Says he needs someone to do the first shift.”

“Really? That’s awesome!”

Matt snorted. “Yeah, not so much. I did it over summer, ‘n it sucks. Y’have to start at two. In the morning, dude.”

“Don’t care, I’ll do it.” Jensen punched him in the arm by way of thanks. “When can I start?”

“Dad says come by this afternoon, he’ll show you the ropes, and then he’ll be there tonight. But after that, you’ll be the one opening up, getting the ovens started, warming the yeast. Which stinks, by the way.”

“Man, that’s – “ The relief that swamped him was so great for a moment he couldn’t think of anything to say or do. Matt grinned at him.

“Yeah, you’re welcome. Oh, and here.” He threw a paper bag at Jensen that smacked him in the face.

“Ow. Shithead.”

“Again, not so much. Lunch.”

Jensen rummaged in the bag and found buns and two loaves of bread.

“What are -?”

“Well, we usually throw them to Grady Harrison’s pigs, but I told Dad I knew another pig who could use fattening, so…” At Jensen’s confused face, Matt nudged him. “Leftovers from the bakery, man. And don’t tell me you’re dieting to keep your girly figure. I don’t know what’s going on with you and eating, but you haven’t had lunch for at least two weeks because there’s actually some left over for the rest of the school, so I noticed.”

Jensen swallowed, then dug out one of the buns.

“Thanks.” The need to cram it into his mouth whole was only barely resistable. Matt watched him.

“So.” He looked away, over to the fields where several students were lazily tossing a football back and forth. “What’s going on with you, anyway? How come you need a job all of a sudden?”

Jensen pointed to his full mouth, then opened it to show half-chewed bread and gave a manic grin.

“Ugh. Fucker.” Matt shifted against him. “It can’t be money, ‘cos you Ackles are richer than God. So what’s going on?”

Jensen shrugged.

“Okay. Just make sure you turn up this afternoon, okay? I told Dad you’d be a real good little bake boy.”

“Promise. I’ll be there. And thanks, man.”

“De nada. But hey-  can you stash me some of those cinnamon loaves? Dad never lets me steal them.”

 “All you can eat. I’ll smuggle them past the guards.”  Jensen couldn’t stop grinning. “Seriously, this is awesome.”

“Oh, and could you pass me the answers in trig this afternoon? That midterm is gonna suck.”

Jensen reached for the next bun, as he heard the school bell signal the end of the lunch break. “Usual code?”

“Sure. He hasn’t worked it out yet, may as well keep doing it.” Matt stood up, slapped Jensen’s shoulder hard so that the bun jagged away from his open mouth. “See you in there. Gotta catch up with Frannie.”

Jensen waved the remains of the bread in farewell, and began to stand himself, when suddenly a steam of warm liquid splashed down onto his shoulders.

He had a second to register shock, and then its stink, and the fact it had penetrated at the back of his collar to soak down through his shirts.

“Ugh! What the fuck?” He jumped back, arms raised away from his body, holding the already wet bag up and clear, but it was too late. He reeked.

There was a giggle from the balcony above, then muffled laughter and words he couldn’t catch but whose sound he recognized. Troy Padalecki.

“Dude!” Matt was back, aghast. “What happened?”

“Some – some shithead pissed on me!” Jensen lowered and shook his head, flapped his jacket as if that would help.

“Oh, god, man, you stink.” Matt grimaced as he came closer.

“Yeah, you think? Shit, Matt, the test’s on in five minutes.”

“I know, I know!” Matt ran his hands through his hair, evidence of his panic. Matt took styling very seriously. “Wait! Okay, showers, locker room.”

Jensen shook his head. “No time. Too far. I can – I can rinse out in the bathroom.”

Matt groaned. “You’re kidding! Jense, you really, really reek.”

“I know!” Jensen took off towards the main building, discarding the urine soaked bag in the bin as he went . “It’s all I can do – he won’t let me do the test if I’m not there at the start, you know what a dick he is!”

“Shit. Shit, shit, shit, shit,” muttered Matt, as he raced alongside him. “Here- give me your jacket.”

Jensen extricated himself as they ran, handing it over to Matt who held it gingerly between two fingers.

“Eww, gross. Padalecki piss. It’s gonna burn holes in it.”

“Shut up! Here – “ Jensen banged the door open, reached for the nearest faucet and turned it on as hard as it would go. Matt shoved the jacket beneath the water for a moment, then Jensen stuck his head under, shouting at the cold but vigorously rubbing his hair and neck.

“Ah, God, it still stinks.” Matt wrung the jacket as hard as he could while Jensen twisted and turned to get under as much of the water as possible. “Use the soap dispenser.”

“That smells as bad.”

“No, it doesn’t. It really doesn’t. Goddamn that Padalecki asshole.”

“Done.” Jensen pulled back, shook his head wildly to displace the water.

“No, you’re not. Jense – “

“I can’t help it, Matt, we gotta run.” He scrambled out of the door and ran down the almost deserted corridor, Matt swearing and thumping along behind him. The two of them swerved around the corner almost together – straight into Principal Corcoran.

“Stop right there, gentlemen.” Her voice would freeze dry ice. “Why are you running – and wet - in the hallway? Could you possibly be late for class?”

Matt gasped for breath.

“We – we – we – “

“All the way home, I’m sure. Thank you, Mister Tolliver, very helpful. Well?” She turned to Jensen. “You’re soaking.”

Jensen straightened, acutely conscious of the shirts sticking to his back and chest, his hair dripping down the back of his neck, his sodden jacket.

“I know, I’m sorry, Mrs. Corcoran. I just – something spilled on me. And we’ve got Mr. Alvarez for trig, but I had to rinse off.”

“Dear God, is that urine I smell?” Mrs. Corcoran waved her hand under her nose as she stepped back. “That is truly disgusting. Just what were you two doing?”

“Nothing, I swear, Mrs. Corcoran.”

“It wasn’t our fault, honest.” Matt’s indignation grew. “We were just having lunch and some assho – um, jerks threw it on him.”

“Out of the goodness of their hearts? Just why do you suppose they did that, Jensen?”

Jensen looked at her, and thought of Philip Corcoran, and knew there would be no justice for him today.

“Both of you, late notes. Mr. Tolliver,  go to Mr. Alvarez’ class.” Matt left, hesitant, looking back at Jensen, who surreptitiously urged him onward. “Mr. Ackles? Detention, after school. I do not know, nor do I care to enquire, as to the reasons why you would think it appropriate to wander the halls of this school smelling like a urinal. But I can assure you that however many points you may hitherto have accumulated towards the Prize, they can as quickly be removed for delinquent behaviour. Are we very clear on this?”

“Yes ma’am.” The sting of the urine on his back matched the humiliation he felt as Principal Corcoran leaned back again.

“You are not fit for a classroom in this condition. Go to the gym, shower properly, and change into sports gear. I will not have other students discomfited by your filthy play habits.”

“Ma’am, I have a trig test – “

“Which you will clearly sacrifice on the altar of personal hygiene. Now, I suggest you go quickly, young man, before anyone else sees or smells you in this condition.” She swept away, and Jensen felt a surge of anger that made him tremble, made him want to take something precious and destroy it, carelessly, crazily, oh so very publicly. He breathed hard, imagining nothing but violence, until the trembling lessened and he began his miserable walk to the gym.

Consolations existed. He had a job. And that was a huge thing, a possibility that lightened the weight that had been smothering him for months. He knew the hours would challenge him, but he was young, and fit, and his family needed this. A job meant he could start having lunch again, could maybe keep the heat on a bit longer at home. A job meant Christmas.

And Troy Padalecki? There would come a day, and Jensen could see it, hear it with exquisite detail, when he would walk past Troy Padalecki onto the stage and accept the Parcae Prize. The Padaleckis might own the Ackles stores and land now, but the Prize could not be bought, and it was already his. On that sweet day in June, Jensen would be the first Ackles to win the prize since 1970, when his father claimed it, and maybe, maybe Ulrike would be well enough by then to see it happen. Maybe Karin and Lotte would be there – such a different family, now, from the one that day at Arlington but still together, still out of care and being what mattered to each other most in the world. And they’d look up at Jensen and know that things were turning around, they were finding their way back. The Ackles had always been lucky. Everyone said so.

But first, he had to get rid of the stench of Troy Padalecki’s piss.

*^%&^%$##$#$###$%$%%$^^^

Fog.

Everything, every day, felt like it was being lived through fog.

It began at 1.00am every weekday morning, when the alarm by his head went off and dragged him, heavy eyed and heavy-limbed, from the warm nest of his bed. Through his window, past the pine tree planted on his parents’ wedding day, Jensen would pause and look out at the features of the nightscape as if assessing the troops of an opposing army. He was about to face them all – sometimes a Blue Norther, sweeping all the way down from Nebraska, carrying the spite of distant, snowy plains; sometimes, a frost, crackling and deadly; sometimes the kind of rain that blinded and battered him, left him shivering as he fumbled for the bakery key. And often, the fog, making the yard look like an alien place of shifting shapes and black, leering malice.

Coffee, quick and quiet, then finding his bike and beginning to cycle the lonely night road to Tolliver’s Bakery. There weren’t even farmhouse lights to cheer him.  On Parcae Road, the Ackles house was the first past the town limits, and that was 12 miles’ worth of East Texas empty. So he rode head down, bleary eyes on the white light leading him, scarf tight against the cold and the creeping sense of being watched in the thick copses of elm and cottonwood.

Titchville was different too, in the first hours of the morning. Jensen used to like meeting Lucas and Matt in the town square, sometimes doing nothing but drinking cokes in the sun and waiting for people they knew to come by as inevitably as driftwood in an eddy. Now, a trip to buy groceries meant keeping his head down, his eyes at a mid-distance to avoid contact and conflict. The only time he got to look around freely now was in darkness. The buildings and trees that were solid and unassuming in the daylight loomed large in the pale glow of the streetlights.

Jensen felt like he was the only person awake in the whole of the USA.

Once in to the bakery he put all the lights on at once, then started the ovens, looking forward to the gathering warmth. He loved preparing the dough, loved the organic magic of it, watching it rise in the warmth then punching it down to see it rise again. Rob left him the basic loaves, rolls and buns to prepare, while he took the fancier breads and baked goods.

Rob Tolliver came in at 3.30. He said little – a brief smile, genuine but not effusive, a slap on the back, and then he got about his work, leaving Jensen to do the same. They both paused for coffee at five, then Jensen helped Frannie set up for the early morning coffee run before finishing his shift at seven.

Cycling home was, in some ways, even harder than riding in. The weariness that fogged his brain and body crept onto him as he headed back. Five hours’ work lay behind him, but rather than a break, an acknowledgment, a largely thankless full day of school and looking after his mother and sisters lay before him.

In the fog, everything was hard to make out. Teachers asked questions that seemed to get lost in its white coils; spiteful jokes were made, insults offered, and the barbs were muffled. He blinked, head aching, and teammates came and went, enemies jeered, all of them unrecognized. There was football practice some nights (practicing to ride the pine bench). But mostly he was picking up the girls and driving home to play with them, feed them, oversee the bedtime rituals and listen to Ulrike’s vague complaints before beginning his study at nine. His grades were disappearing into the fog, too, the As fading away to Bs, solid Cs. Some nights, he sat with his books open before him and was unable to see anything on the pages but a swirling white. It crept into his mind, a kriegslight trained on him with pitiless intent, highlighting every failing, every mis-step. He would sit there, transfixed, a traveler snowbound in a blasted interior, until the alarm sent him out into the night again.

Fog was everywhere, and the only light in his life illuminated nothing.

 

Chapter 8

On the night before Christmas Day, as the tired tinsel of Titchville danced in December gusts, Jensen felt bone deep doubt for the first time in his life.

He realized it as he maneuvered their tree into its customary position. This year he’d stolen one from Mamie Harwood’s farm, three miles down the road. Mamie let the pines grow unchecked in her top field, and the poor of Titchville were always welcome to take one as they needed. Mamie was a kind soul, and a careless one, with 300 parking tickets unpaid. She strung them up on paper chains to decorate her front porch every Fourth of July.

She and the Ackles family had conspired in past years to take food baskets out to Gawley Park, where folks lived in flannelled fragility. Wasn’t an ounce of mean in Mamie, and Jensen loved her, even if she looked and smelled like a long haul truck driver in June. Poor folk were close to Jesus, Mamie said, and when she saw a need she’d tap Conrad Ackles with an air of certain expectation.  Alderton Cooper needs new glasses for Christmas. Tiffany Pasquale wants a flute. Jaime Numez has asthma. And Conrad, lips pursed, eyes kind, would write the check as Niels and Jensen grinned at her where she stood on the porch, resisting all invitations to step inside.

“No better than you should be, Con,” she’d sniff. “But you’re on the Lord’s path.”

“And I thank you for that, Mamie Harwood. Care for a refresher?”

“You know I don’t hold with strong drink, Conrad.”

“Patrizia’s punch is purely medicinal, Mamie.”

This annual ritual observed, Mamie would step over to the porch swing as elegantly as if she were taking a seat at the Governor’s Ball, where she’d accept a glass of Patrizia’s Punch (main ingredient;  corn whisky) and Con and the boys would join her to hear her talk of the farm, and the folk of Titchville, and what would become of them all in the New Year. Every year Mamie would appear with her wishlist in hand, and every year Ulrike would stay well away from their chat. But to Jensen, it was as essential a part of Christmas as putting up stockings or the reindeer light on the roof.

This year, Mamie Harwood stayed away.

It didn’t matter that Jensen’s job at the bakery barely left him enough money to buy a tinned ham and a box of mince pies for Christmas dinner.  It didn’t matter that his efforts to make something of Christmas staggered between pathetic and risible. Mamie’s non-appearance, more than the bills and the struggling make-do, brought home to Jensen that the Ackles were no longer the dispensers of charity. They were amongst the families that stole a tree. They were the needy.

He didn’t ask Mamie for the tree. She wouldn’t mind that he took it. She never did mind if those that had none came to her for what grew freely in her own soil. But it was the thought that he would have to go to her and see her face as he told her that their annual trip to Dallas to buy the biggest and best tree to be found – the trip when Ulrike would singlehandedly keep afloat a dozen gift-shops, when Niels and Jensen would take Lotte and Karin for eggnog at Marcus Neiman before enjoying the Christmas lights of the city – wasn’t happening this year. He didn’t know if he feared pity or platitudes, but either from Mamie Harwood would break his heart.

Lotte was aware. Her face had taken an inward look. When Jensen brought the box of decorations down from the attic, and said, “Come on, Lottz, let’s  get the tree looking beautiful,” she sat quietly for a moment, watching him untangling the lights, before getting up and walking into the den.

“It’s warmer in here.”

The den was smaller, the fireplace better; Conrad had often remarked on its snugness. But their usual Christmas had needed the size of the living-room to accommodate the abundance of their gifts.

This year, the purloined pine sagged in the living room corner as a silent testament to Jensen’s inability to provide. There would be precious few gifts under it, and its drooping branches looked sad in the gracious expanse of the room. Jensen considered it, considered Lotte standing watching him, mutely; then sighed and bent to heft the tree into the smaller room.

Lotte didn’t help him decorate it. Christmas Eve, Decoration Day, had been her favorite part of Christmas. Daddy was the one who lifted her high up to place the angel on the topmost bough. She could reach the top of this little tree without help. Lotte was steadfast, and warm, and smart; but she couldn’t face this day with just Jensen.

Ulrike joined them when Jensen had almost finished. She stood back and appraised the tree critically.

“Is that the best you could find in Dallas?”

Jensen swallowed, hid his head as he busied himself with packing away stray baubles.

“Yes, Mutti.”

“Hmmm.” She tilted her head. “I hope you don’t plan on putting that angel up yet. You know Daddy always does that.”

“Yes, Mutti, I know. But Dad – he might be late back home this time. Maybe I could - ?”

“Don’t be silly, Jensen.” She looked about her, then settled on the easy chair facing the French windows. “I know you think you’re very grown up all of a sudden, but there are still things your father and brother can do somewhat better than you can. Don’t go getting ahead of yourself. You’re still a child.”

He swallowed again, as if doing so could take away the illness that caught in his throat whenever she talked like this.

“Do you want your sherry?’

“Sherry? Yes, I suppose so.” She closed her eyes, and shivered a little. “Get Patrizia to turn up the heat a little, will you? It’s been so much colder this winter. I don’t know why.”

Jensen knew, and felt the guilt trip him again. Turning the thermostat down ten degrees had helped to keep the power bill from becoming unmanageable. But every time he saw Lotte rubbing her arms, every time Karin pulled two sweaters on before burrowing under a rug on the sofa, it came home to him how poorly he was taking up the task left to him. He was sixteen. He should do better.

“I’ll get your wrap,” he said to Ulrike, and headed upstairs, to where the chill of winter crept under the eaves and into their bedrooms. Through the century old windows he could see the garden, bare and black against the early evening sky. There had always been an element of delight in looking out on the season’s desolation, when the view was beheld from inside warmth and light and laughter. Now it seemed to echo the bleakness within.

For a moment, as he looked out at the garden, he thought he saw a hooded figure moving under the trees, a deeper umbra in the darkness. A blink and it was gone, nothing but branches twisting in the wind, tricking his eyes to see another soul where none existed.

Karin was sitting on her bed, dolls arranged before her in a semi-circle for admonition.

“Naughty Baby Born! And you’re naughty too, Calico Kate. You never, ever, ever, ever go outside with bare bottoms on. You need a smack.” And his sister, who to his certain knowledge had never been smacked in her life, picked up the nearest doll and began to hit it savagely. For a moment, Jensen just watched, stunned. Mostly, the sound of her hand hitting the doll’s bottom again and again shocked him; but somewhere in his mind came an equal response, and the thought of just hitting, and hitting, at anything and everything, met a need he couldn’t acknowledge he had.

“Hey, hey, baby girl. Hey, don’t do that,” he said, as gently as he could. He caught her arm, and she flailed at him.

“They’re naughty! So are you!”

“No, baby girl, come on.” He grabbed her other arm and held her tight, as she wriggled and growled against him. “Hey, why don’t you bring them downstairs? The tree is up.”

She stilled at once. “The Christmas tree?”  Karin shuffled forward, and he let her escape. “Let’s go. Come on, Jensen. The Christmas tree!”

“Okay,” he laughed. “Sure. I’ve just got to grab something for Mutti.” He watched her run from her room and down the stairs, shoes clattering on the polished wood. Without her, the room seemed indescribably empty; even as the mattress rose back to its former plumpness where she’d been sitting, it felt as though she and everyone else in the house had left it long ago. There was no one else on this second floor; no Niels, no Dad, no Miguel or Domingo. As the wind picked up and caught the tree branches to tap and scratch against the window, Jensen stood and bowed his head, feeling the emptiness, like the branches, tapping at his soul.

He found his mother’s pashmina and began to bring it back down when suddenly a new idea came to him. He’d turned off the upstairs heating; what if the girls camped down in the den, next to the tree? They’d asked to do it last year and been met with refusal, but this year, in this time of such coldness, maybe it was a good solution. Maybe, under the lights, with the angel soft above their heads, they’d sleep a little warmer, a little safer? The thought brought urgency back to his step; he bounced down the stairs and swung around into the den.

He expected to find both his sisters there, but only Lotte sat in the easy chair, resolutely staring at her book. Giving Ulrike her wrap, he moved toward the living room only to meet Karin coming towards him, indignant.

“You said the tree was here!” She glared at him, arms fisted on her hips. “You’re a liar, Jensen Ackles.”

“It’s here.” He stood aside, revealing the tiny pine that was all he could manage to carry home on his back. Karin frowned at it, and then him, uncomprehending.

“That’s not a Christmas tree!”

“Sure it is. Look. I’ve got the lights on. And there’s the ball you made last year, the one with ‘K’ for Karin on it.

“It’s a stupid tree.”

Jensen bit his lip. The urge to snap back at his little sister was strong. But he knew he’d had nothing of this turmoil and grief at six years of age; how well would he have behaved if everything was torn away from him, as it had been from her? He gritted out a smile.

“I’ve got a plan, Kitty-Kar.” He reckoned her closer, and the invitation to a secret was as irresistible to Karin as it was to any child. “How’s about we bring the beds down, camp in the den?”

“With the Christmas lights?”

“You bet.” Another sudden transformation. She gave a skip, and raced back to the stairs.

“Come on, Lotte! We’re camping!”

Slowly, Lotte came to stand in the doorway. “We are?”

“Sure. Everyone’s coming downstairs. We’ll put on the little heater, snuggle in. What do you think?”

She nodded. “It’s a good idea. Mutti too?”

Uncertainly, Jensen looked past her to where Ulrike sat, back straight, desolately beautiful, in the armchair. She looked like an exiled princess, cold and alone.

“Yeah, Mutti too. Come and help me with her bed, okay?”

“Okay.” Lotte came to him, and patted him on the shoulder. “You’re thinking up good things, Jay-Jay. We’re going to be alright.”

A lump came to his throat, but all he said was, “You bet. Come on, let’s chase Karin!”

As the words left his mouth they heard a loud bang. Karin’s feigned shriek became a real one, as the power cut out in a spectacularly complete fashion.

Lotte’s fingers gripped his arm.

“Jensen?”

“It’s alright, Lotte. Karin – it’s okay, honey, it’s okay.”

Karin wailed as if it were her job, until Jensen reached for her and pulled her close.

“That’s enough! Karin, stop it!” His tone surprised her into a compromise of hiccups and muffled sobs. “Lotte, look after her, okay?”

“Jensen?” Her voice trembled, but he squeezed reassurance.

“I’m going to get the lamp lit, we’ll be fine. Probably the fuse box. No big deal.”

“What on earth is going on, Jensen?” A regal irritation from the den, and Jensen almost rolled his eyes.

“Just the fuses, Mutti. Getting on it.” He thrust Karin into Lotte’s arms and felt his way to the sideboard in the hallway, home to a hundred year old paraffin lamp Conrad once loved to light up on special occasions. There were matches in the drawer beneath, and after a fumbling minute or so, Jensen had the lamp glowing. He lifted it up to see his sisters clutching one another at the foot of the stairs, their faces white and strained. He grinned at them.

“Come on. This is cool. Got the special lamp on. You want to go in with Mutti while I check on the fuses?”

“I want to stay with you,” Karin said firmly. Jensen glanced around, uncertain, then nodded.

“Okay, but stay close. And get your coats on.”

For one moment, as he held the wavering light before him, he looked back into the barely lit darkness at the foot of the stairs and had a sudden sense of time past. This was what it would have been like a hundred years ago, he thought, and felt a coldness, a fear, shoot down his spine, shocking in its lack of cause. He loved the history in his home, loved the feeling of stepping where his grandfather and great grandfather once stepped. Stupid. He blinked hard, dispelling the ghosts, and took Karin’s hand.

Wrapped and close, the three of them ventured down the hallway to the kitchen and the back door beyond. The wind battered at the door so hard that when he pushed it open it slammed from him to lie back against the wall, and Karin gave a little squeal.

“You sure you want to come with me?” he asked, and both girls nodded fervently.

“I know how horror movies work,” Lotte said. “We’re staying with you.”

“Ha.” Jensen grinned at her. “You’re so smart.”

They moved in an awkward testudo towards the fuse box, the lamp light warm and sure, Jensen trying to project the same to his little sisters. Despite the wind, despite the cold, a scent came to him that was strong enough to resist both and so incongruous he struggled to place it.

“Jay? Have we got fireworks?”

“No, Kitty-Kar,” he said absently, but even as he did so he knew it wasn’t quite the truth.

Because swirling in the wind, jammed in the cover, scattered across the porch boards were the wrappers of blast mines, a dozen or more, that had clearly been stuffed into the fuse box to destroy their power on Christmas Eve.

The hatred in the act, the sheer malice, was so much it made him gasp.

“Are there going to be fireworks, Jensen?”

“No, baby girl, no,” and the words almost choked him, because there would be nothing joyous this year, nothing exciting, nothing warm or bright but what he could conjure without power or heat or money.

Without his father.

Without Niels.

Chapter 9

The last week of February saw the start of baseball training, and the fog lifted with every sharp crack of ball and bat, every thump of ball and glove.

“Jizzhead! Go long!” and Lucas sent a ball skying into a sharp February blue that Jensen could almost fly into.

He laughed, for the sudden joy of it, when he reached up and gathered the ball, sent it spearing back to Lucas. Matt grinned and clapped lazily from the stands.

“Let’s see some hustle! Ackles, Watts, get your asses in here. I want you on the mound, Ackles. Padalecki, you’re up. Come on, come on,” Coach Caselli yelled, and Jensen didn’t need the urging, already up there, tossing his glove to Lucas for the hell of it as he trotted past, catching it on the return.

This was where the fog lifted completely, where his body felt tight and strong, and his fingers tingled.

“Hey, Ackles. I’m callin’ it.” Troy lifted his bat, pointed at him. “Gonna drill it right through your pretty little face.”

“Ah, shut your yap, Troy. No one wants to hear it.” Coach stood halfway to third on the baseline. “Just show me some clean hits. You hit as good as you talk, we’ll win the pennant by May.”

Troy gave him a wavering smirk, then shaped up in his batting stance, bat twirling high.

“Oh, for love of- bring it in clean, Padalecki. You’re not takin’ it to the Prom!”

The twirling stopped, but Jensen didn’t mind either way. He spun the ball in his hand, owning the weight of it, the smoothness, the ridged stitches that would catch the air in a wicked curve when he asked them to.

“Yeah, whenever you’re ready, Sackles.”

He smiled. Taunts and threats in the hallways were ugly, but out here, on the field? They were spice in the sweetness.

Coiling his body felt like claiming an old, familiar skin. Everything in him gathered together, tension made perfect by purpose. He rocked back, whipped forward, released.

Troy had no clue.

“That’s a strike, Padalecki.” Coach rocked on his heels, and the look on his face told Jensen that Caselli’s doubts about his pitcher’s path through the valley of last summer and winter were gone.

Those doubts vanished altogether as the season sped forward. The coldest April on record, they said, crawling down from the Great Lakes and collecting misery as it went. Some days the baseball games were played in an atmosphere so damp it jeweled the cameras in the stands, making the players and the lights look haloed and saintly. But the weather didn’t deter the scouts. It became a kind of game in itself, spotting the lone figures high in the stands with their notebooks, guessing which team, which university, which savior it was, each one coming to watch the boy who’d won the pennant the year before, each one stopping by to talk to Coach Caselli after the game, leaving cards, numbers, ghostly futures in the ether.

Because baseball was the one thing that hadn’t deserted Jensen. The gift lay in his palm, still, in his wide, straight shoulders, his balance, the thighs that gathered the strength and anchored it. The eyes that saw the path and sent the ball down it, every time. Titchville High and Jensen Ackles broke every record for shut-outs in the history of the Texas State High School championship, and it was nothing but easy for him, when everything else stayed so hard.

One a.m. was his enemy. A blare from the alarm, and the hand that once automatically slapped out to stop it simply curled tighter to his chest, clinging to sleep. Three hours of it was the average, though he wasn’t keeping track. But sleep had become something he daydreamed about where once he fantasized about baseball and shadowy bodies up against his own.

Karin’s birthday fell on the 17^th of April. Jensen bought her the bike she wanted, a girlie extravaganza with fake roses and streamers on the handles. Her face when she saw it hit his weariness so hard his eyes watered, but his heart lifted, and when he thought of the Ansel Adams signed print he sold (for a piratically low price) he felt no guilt, no regret. Ulrike wouldn’t notice, and Conrad wasn’t here.

Lotte grew more and more quiet. He found her crying when she realized she no longer fit into her best dress. She understood, without being told, that new dresses would not be coming from Dallas, or even the dress shop on the town square. She would be wearing whatever they could find at the Goodwill store, and he knew, without being told, that this would open her to a wealth of cold-shoulderings, a whole spectrum of social excisions beyond his boy’s imagining.

And Ulrike dwelt as she had since the day of his father’s funeral, in a world of complaint and confusion and cavernous denial.

He didn’t expect any of them to come to the pennant play-off, and in the end, no-one did. Ulrike left it to Conrad and Niels to represent the family, as they had always done. Lotte wanted to come, but in Jensen’s view she was too young to stay alone in the stands – not when dead cows were deposited in their front yard in the middle of the night, or the stained glass window beside the front door was smashed one day while all three children were at school. Jensen had begun to see threats in each face, each car, each passerby, and baseball began to seem as though it were his hostage against his family’s annihilation. While the town waited on back-to-back championships, they wouldn’t hurt their star pitcher.  That was his reasoning, and the mantra he repeated to himself each night as he cycled through the darkness to the Tolliver Bakery.

The day of the play-off was overcast, a kind of milkiness to the sky that whispered of swing and curve on the ball. Coach Caselli called him in to his office thirty minutes before play began.

“Hey, Ackles. Y’all set?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Good, that’s good.” Coach Caselli frowned at him. Jensen had worked with him long enough to know that there was nothing meant by it. Coach frowned whenever he was thinking. Ungenerous souls suggested it was to ease the strain. “So you know the Mustangs’ got one hell of a batter in Delgado. He’s a southpaw, gotta watch your line with him.”

Jensen shifted in his seat. He wasn’t nervous; a tingle of excitement in his belly, but no fear. Through the window he heard the sound of balls being hit into the outfield, and he wished he was out there with his team mates, no matter how distant they could be. Loved or loathed, it was where he belonged.

“Alrighty. So.” Coach cleared his throat, wrapped his fingers into a fist on the desk. “Been a tough year.”

Jensen wondered if he really expected a response to that.

“Now, I know you’ve been doin’ it hard. Not much gets by me. You been workin’ at Matt’s bakery, keepin’ up the grades. Helpin’ your mama look after your sisters, ‘m I right?’

For whatever reason, Jensen felt hot embarrassment flush through his body.

“Yes, Coach.”

“Yes, indeed. Yes, indeed.” Coach nodded to himself. “And you got your name etched on that prize. Had that dog chained since last year. Figure you’ve got every right to be proud of how you handled that. Given the givens.”

“I guess.”

“Well, I’ll tell you something. You might not want to put all your eggs in that basket just yet. Got Jake Macquarie comin’ over from the Rangers this afternoon, third time he’s swung by just to watch you lay ‘em out. And a little bird’s tellin’ me he’s got a contract sittin’ in that briefcase.”

A thump of excitement in his chest, his stomach.

“What are you saying, Coach?”

“I’m sayin’ that the Rangers might wanna recruit you straight from high school. What do you think of that?”

A contract to a major league club? The first idea of it swept through him with such force that he almost gasped with it. It surged into every secret place in his heart, lit them with a light so blinding he could barely see. It took him almost a full minute to realize the coach had stopped talking, and his own mouth was hanging open.

“I – that would – I would..”

Coach Caselli chuckled. “Now, it ain’t locked in yet, son, but I hear he’s talkin’ six figure high. You get your signature on that and your future’s secure. And I’ll tell you, I’d be right happy to see it. Never had a boy through my program that I thought higher of. Told your daddy that last year. Glad I did.”

“Are you – are you sure? That there’s a contract?”

The coach’s eyes were kind.

“I’m sure. Six figure high. So when you go out today and wipe the floor with those Chisum boys – and I know you’re gonna do that – I want you to know that you’re doin’ more than winning us another championship. You’re setting yourself up, lookin’ after your family. Just wanted you to know that before you went out there.”

Somehow, Jensen thanked the coach and got out of his office. The pale sunlight seemed bright after the coach’s office, but he squinted automatically, all of his mind taken with the sudden prospect of a rescue more glorious than any he’d allowed himself to hope. A future of struggle through college, saving every cent, spreading himself between the heartbreak of home and the burden of college disappeared in a vision so enticing he felt a desperate urge to bury his face in his hands and yell his joy.

Because it solved almost everything. For that kind of money he could hire a nurse/caretaker – for his mother, for his sisters. They could live at home under her protection while he made a career for himself in the show and supported them all. Hell, he could hire a cook, too, maybe one like Patrizia who did housework as well.

“Hey.” Lucas ran up to him, already red in the face from the warm-up drills they’d been doing. “What’d Coach want?’

Jensen shook his head, slowly. Too much to talk about just now. Lucas accepted the brush off with an easy shrug.

“Matty’s gone to meet his dad for something. You feelin’ good?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I’m good.” Oh, God, so far beyond good! But Jensen blinked, tried to focus, bring himself back to the kind of readiness he’d need.

“Hey, Matt’s callin’ ‘em the Jizzum Bustangs. Pretty good, huh?”

Jensen raised an eyebrow. Lucas shrugged again.

“I thought it was funny.”

“It’s hi-larious. Are the Padaleckis here yet?”

“Yeah. Troy’s complainin’ about his shoulder again.”

That was serious. For all his hatred of the guy, Jensen knew Troy was their most consistent hitter.

“Really? How bad is it?”

“Pfft. He’s such a diva. Ain’t nothing. I think he just hates the fact that you’re gonna be the hero of the hour when we win that ever-loving, motherfuckin’ pennant. Hoo-roar!”

Jensen laughed, suddenly realizing his heart was somewhere officially known as over the moon.

“Come on, dude. This is ours, bitch!” He ran for the dugout, Lucas gleefully scrambling behind him with a “Yeehaw!”

The rest of the team was gathered there, nervous and excited and juggling on the kind of cliff-edge made by end of season sport. Troy was there, getting his shoulder taped; he glanced at Jensen, gave him a nod. On this particular precipice, old enmities were put aside, however briefly.

“You know what I just heard?” Gavin Porter said.

“Rangers scout,” the team replied, sing-song.

“Shit and amen. Ya think it’s true?”

“Coach would say. Wouldn’t he?” Troy asked the room, but his eyes came to rest on Jensen.

“Guess he would,” Jensen said.

“So?” Gavin jiggled like a terrier with a bladder problem. “He say anything?”

Jensen paused, relishing the sudden stillness as everyone looked towards him.

“Guess he did.”

“Hoooooly shit,” breathed Lucas. “For real?”

“For real.”

“Oh, mama. He’s comin’ for me, I feel it in my waters,” Caleb Harris said.

“Shoot, Harris, you couldn’t catch the clap in a whorehouse.”

Outside the PA changed in tone from the running list of local businesses sponsoring the day to announcing the team lineups. Jensen watched as the rest of the team dropped items into their bags as if they couldn’t hold them anymore, or licked their lips, shook out their hands, gave strangled little laughs. Three of them rushed for the bathroom. But he felt none of that. For the first time in almost a year, a kind of peace was in his veins, a sense that all things would find their balance. They were better than Chisum, so they’d win. He was the best junior player in the state, maybe the country, so he would be offered a contract. Luck, fate, chance – none had sovereignty here. Only the physics and beauty of baseball, and the fairness of just due for his bereaved family.

And even as he stood on the mound once more, as he heard the chanting, saw the waving, as Xavier Delgado stared him down above the plate, that sense of calmness held him in its grip. He struck out Delgado in each of his turns at bat, and Lucas managed to bring home Caleb on a baseline hit in the seventh that left them at the start of the ninth inning with a score line of 1-0 in their favor.

Top of the ninth, and Troy managed to get a hit that got Gavin home for a 2-0 lead. The Titchville Tees (Tease to the seniors) went into their fits of rehearsed enthusiasm and Jensen ran onto the field feeling nothing but rightness. They were going to win. Even the Mustangs looked as if they knew it.

Jensen took his place on the mound again, spinning the ball a little, opening and closing his hand. Delgado took his own stance, and Coach Caselli gripped his arms tight across his chest, unwilling to let anything go yet.

Delgado liked them low and away, so Jensen sent the first pitch in high and tight.

“Strike one!”

A second pitch, curving in, cramping him for room. A second strike and it was easy, this, natural. Foretold. The PA burbled in the background, and the cheers from the crowd in the stands, a seething beast of colour and movement, joined to make a kind of chaotic aural backdrop for the inevitability that lay in his hand.

Jensen received the ball back from Jesse Flores the catcher, shook his head at Jesse’s first two hand signaled suggestions, nodded to the third. Fastball, hard and straight. It was clear to him, the path he had to send the ball on, almost as if it were channeled into the air.

“Now it’s just a matter of fortune in youth or old age, wouldn’t you say, Grayson?”

“What?” Jensen dropped the ball in his shock as the PA echoed on.

“Looks tough for Chisum now, Pete, that’s for sure.”

“What did they just say?” Jensen asked Lucas, fielding in close. Lucas frowned.

“Tough for Chisum? What’s wrong with you, Jizz?’

“Didn’t you hear the – didn’t he just say something about fortune?”

“Said Chisum would need a whole lot of luck to save it. Jense? You okay?”

“Yeah.” Jensen shook his head, shook out his shoulders. “Yeah, sure.” But his hand was trembling, and when he looked back at Delgado, glowering at the waste of time, the path was gone.

 There was nothing between him and the plate but air.

“Come on, Ackles! Send it in!” Caleb, from third base, and a flutter of panic began in Jensen’s belly because he was looking at Delgado and there was no certainty at all. A few claps from his team mates, and Lucas, still frowning, but nodding encouragement.

Jensen swallowed hard, then drew back, searching for the line, bringing it all tight and ready then letting it all go.

Low and away.

The sound of the bat connecting with the ball was as crisp and clear as the snapping of bone.

There was a collective groan from the stands as if a mortal wound had opened in two hundred bellies. Faint cheers struggled out from Chisum’s cheer squad stationed at the end of the stands.

“Shit.” Jesse ran out to the mound. “What happened to ‘fast ball’?”

“Sorry. I’m sorry. I don’t know.” Jensen stepped away, working the sudden tension out of his shoulders. He waved back the coach. It wasn’t as if there was anything anyone could say to him, and only he knew how much was riding on success here. The score line was now 2-1, no outs, bottom of the ninth. Chisum could still win. Delgado’s delight as he ran past his team mates, high fiving, told him as much.

No. This would not happen. Jensen closed his eyes, his head bowed, and breathed in the scent of the crowd, the late May sweetness, the new summer’s promise of heat. Already there was dust in the air, lingering from last year and a hundred summers before that. He heard his dad, that slow, deep voice, telling him to pick the spot and put it there, but telling him it was all a game, just a game.

He opened his eyes, blinked at the odd glare of that bronze and opal sky, and looked right through the next batter. There, clear and simple, was the path, just waiting for him like it always did.

He struck out the next three batters so ruthlessly that the game was over before anyone had time to call it.

Lucas swung him off the mound, screaming, “You sonofabitch, give me a heart attack, you bastard!” Troy was whooping, the rest of his team mates jumping and hugging and hollering. Coach Caselli was shaking Jake Macquarie’s hand, a look of supreme satisfaction on his face, and the Titchville Tees were giving themselves group hernias to express their general satisfaction and willingness to put out for the new champions.

Afterwards, after Jensen and Jake had a long talk in the cramped little office off the dugout and he signed a first option contract with the Texas Rangers Baseball Club, after the rest of his team shared showers and congratulations, Jensen sat alone in the locker room. Troy watched the way Jake put his hand on Jensen’s shoulder, the handing over of the papers, and sent Jensen a look so full of loathing it should have scorched the happiness that armored him for the first time in twelve months. It couldn’t. Jensen just smiled, nodded, tapped his heels to an inaudible tune that sang of home and help and heroes to come.

He heard the slamming of car doors, cheers and yells. In his hand the contract felt heavy. It was his future, he guessed. A life raft should have some heft to it.

At last, weary with relief, with months of struggle and doubt, he got up and stepped outside into the muted sunshine. His car was the last in the parking bays. Celebrations had claimed everyone else. It didn’t hurt. Nothing could hurt more than his own family’s tragedy, and nothing could heal more than the thought he might yet pull them through to a better someday.

So fast it startled Jensen, a car came rattling onto the car park dirt, skidding wildly to a stop. He recognized the old blue Chevy as Rob Tolliver’s.  What he didn’t recognize were the expressions on Rob and Matt’s face as they burst from it.

“You fucking little shit!”

Jensen gaped, truly without any kind of comprehension, as Rob stormed over to him.

“What is –“

Before he could say anything more, Rob punched him so hard in the face that Jensen was dropped back onto the gravel, falling in a graceless sprawl.

“What the fuck is your problem? Huh? Didn’t I give you a job? No one else in town would look twice at you, but I gave you a fucking job!” Rob picked Jensen up and punched him again, splitting open his eyebrow. Jensen staggered back against his own car door, too bewildered to resist.

“Rob – Matty – how –“

“Shut up, Jensen! Jesus!” Matt looked like he’d been crying, his face ugly with the effort not to twist into more tears.

“Don’t you stand there and deny it, you little prick.” Rob shook him. “I’ve spent the day at the hospital, waiting to see Charlie Johnson’s mouth get stitched up. You see this?” He shook a piece of amber and red glass in Jensen’s face. “You recognize this? You think this is funny?”

“Your window, asshole.” Matt was almost choking in his distress. “We drove out to your place to check. It’s your front window, the one that’s all boarded up. You think I haven’t seen that stained glass window a hundred times? ‘Fortuna’? Think I wouldn’t know it?”

Rob spat to the side. “I found six loaves with these in them. Not until Charlie’s mouth got ripped open, of course. Christ all-fucking-mighty, you could cost me my business!”

“But – I didn’t do anything.” Jensen’s heart was hammering so hard he could barely speak.

“This some kind of prank, Jensen? You and Lucas cook this up?”

“God, no, Rob, I’d never –“

Rob slammed him against the car again, his anger and grief so bright it hurt to look at him.

“Your glass. Your loaves. I could lose my licence. Do you have any idea what you’ve done?”

Tears formed in Jensen’s eyes.

“I wouldn’t, Rob. I couldn’t. Matt – Matty, please…”

But Matt turned away in disgust. Rob leaned in closer.

“I’m not telling Sheriff Boule. I owe your father a whole hell of a lot, and this is what I’ll do for you. I’ve lost a day’s takings. I’ll pay for Charlie’s medical expenses, and I’ll pray that’s all it’ll cost me. You better pray too, because if she sues I’m hangin’ you out to dry, you hear me, you smartass little prick?”

With one final shove Rob left him, grinding back to his car with Matt at his side. For one moment, his best friend looked back at him, and Jensen would always wish he hadn’t. The look on his face drained what strength Jensen still had left and he slid down against his car, dazed with hurt and horror.

He heard footsteps on the gravel behind him and, wincing, raised himself on one elbow to carefully turn his head. For a second, clear against the darkening sky, he saw him. Then faster than he could process the thought, a bat was swinging down towards his head, and in a move made of instinct and panic he threw his elbow up to meet it.

And everything shattered.

Agony, pure, endless. No time, no self, no place existed. The gravel beneath him, the wheel beside him, the heat and the glory and the look of betrayal – all was lost in a whirlpool of pain born of bones and nerves smashed into pulp.

When he came back he realized he was screaming and his boots were kicking, gouging tracks in the dirt. Somehow, he knew he needed to stop, that writhing was making the pain worse, but his body was not his own and he kept crying out, kept trying to crawl away from his own existence. Until at last it was exhaustion, not will, that slowed him, and he managed to open his eyes.

He heard a deep voice above him and he looked for the source, for Dad. It took him much too long to realize it was only the distant thunder. There was no one with him. Not even his attacker.

Thought crawled back in. An ambulance. Did he have insurance? No way of knowing, disastrous if he didn’t. A phone booth. Call for help. There, over by the entrance. But who could he call? Mutti couldn’t be exposed to this. Rob? Carey? Matt?

Lucas! But Lucas would be with the rest of the team, and he had no idea where they celebrated these days.

After so much unhinged movement, now he wanted to stay very, very still. Even his breathing – wide mouthed, shallow – even that became monstrous with movement. Carefully, he tried to look about himself, to find an unlikely rescuer. There was no car but his own, no breath but his own and that of the dull breeze, bringing the rain.

Another, stronger gust of wind skittered across the car park, kicking dust into his face. It stuck to the sweat that was clammy on his cheeks, and muddied the blood in his eyes. He blinked past it and tried to look at his arm. He saw that his forearm was hanging off his elbow at an angle that left his hand turned away from his own body. It looked like it belonged to someone else. Like it was begging.

His elbow was already three times its usual size, already blackened. And yet somewhere in his mind he saw that arm as it moved to sign the contract, as it reached to hand over the papers, as it pulled in and stretched back to release another fire bolt past the last of the Chisum Mustangs to win the pennant.

He maneuvered his body until his shoulders were against the car door and he could use his legs to drive himself half upright, to the point where he could reach around with his left hand and open the door. The car was an automatic; all he had to do was get it started and then steer. He lowered himself slowly, slowly into the driver’s seat, breathing through his mouth, focusing on nothing but sparing contact with his shattered arm.

And it didn’t work. The moment his butt reached the seat his useless hand knocked the hand brake, and for a long time all he knew was a roaring sound, like a crowd cheering in his head so loudly it hurt, became screams.

There were tears through the dust now, and the panted breaths were sobs, too, but he found the key and the ignition and the car started first time. Dad was always so punctilious about getting it serviced. Dad knew the best roads to the hospital, too, and Jensen would ask him, soon as he stopped feeling sick, soon as the sky grew light again and the pain let go, just a little bit.

Everything was sliding away. The whole world was tilting and falling and he was kinda grateful that the car door stopped him. Because for a minute, a very long minute, Jensen really thought he might just be sliding off its edge.

 

Chapter 10

Jensen trembled. As he brushed his teeth, as he gathered up his clothes, zipped up jeans, attempted to corral his hair. It was a fine tremor that was annoying as all hell, but that he couldn’t stop, no matter how fiercely he concentrated, how hard he clenched and released his fists.

No one should begin their seventeenth birthday with so many bands of iron around their chest, their head, their stomach, but Jensen figured the universe knew how big the day was for him and that somehow these were the bindings that would make the release even sweeter. That release – that moment of glory and relief and pure hallelujah- would come when Principal Corcoran stepped forward to the microphone on the graduates’ stage and announced the winner of the Parcae College Prize for 1997 as Jensen Ross Ackles. Luck was a bitter word to him now, so ugly he spat to think it, and he couldn’t trust it for as many hours as lay between him and that moment. But he could trust the points that were irrefutable, that set him more than 160 ahead of anyone else in the school. The prize was his.

“Happy birthday, Jensen!” Lotte gave him a present as he came downstairs. It was wrapped in home made paper, coloured with scraps torn from magazines, and looked like a hedgehog with a fashionista complex, bits and pieces of brightness sticking out at all angles.

“Whoa! Hey, thanks, Lottsie.”

“Don’t try guessing. It’ll explode your brain.”

Karin came scurrying to join them at the foot of the stairs. “Ooh, what is it? Who’s it for?”

“Me,” said Jensen, snatching it up and away with exaggerated fierceness. Karin giggled.

“Open it, open it!”

“I will. Yeesh. Just gimme a sec.” He led them into the kitchen, where he was surprised to see his mother sitting at the bench, staring at a bowl of oatmeal. Lotte tugged at his good arm.

“I made breakfast. I got up early. Figured you could have someone look after you today.”

The smile he gave her was full of affection. Jensen didn’t shield much these days; too much had been lost to deny any of his family the love they needed.

“That’s awesome. Thanks.”

“Well?” demanded Karin.

“Okay, okay.” Gingerly, unsure where to begin, he peeled back the riotous paper from the spherical object in his hands. It soon became clear it was made from matchsticks and cardboard, carefully painted in the blue and gold colors of Parcae College.

“So? Can you guess?” Lotte leaned in to him, looking from the present to Jensen’s face, searching for his happiness.

And he could. It made him draw in a sharp breath, but he managed to make it sound gratified, not fearful.

“It’s for the Prize,” he said.

“It’s for the Prize.” She affirmed it with such pride that for a moment Jensen thought he would commit the unforgivable sin of tearing up. “See? You sort of put it in there and then it can stand up on your desk. Do you like it?”

He cleared his throat.

“Yeah. ‘Course I do. It’s brilliant, Lotts.”

She grinned and gave a little skip away from him, before assuming a motherly air. “Good. Now sit down and I’ll give you breakfast. I made pancakes and oatmeal.”

“Pancakes and oatmeal? Wow.”

“I know. Well, it’s a very special day for you, young man, you need a big breakfast.”

“Birthdays are always special.” Karin said this with the conviction of a seven year old for whom birthdays were the natural peak of any year.

“But Jensen’s wining a prize, too,” said Lotte, and she scooped out remarkably smooth looking oatmeal in their bowls.

“Are you?’ Karin swung fascinated eyes onto Jensen. “What for? I won the hand writing prize in my grade.”

“I know, I saw.” Jensen stared down at the oatmeal, lacking any kind of appetite. Luck, fate, any sportsman knew you didn’t invite attention before a big game. Bitch goddess Fortune was waiting to slap the prize away from him, he just knew it; but he could keep his head down, he could avoid claiming it out loud, he could keep to the rules and deny her the pleasure of his pain. “I might win something. Eat up, Kitten.”

“I want the pancakes!”

“Yeah, well, you have to wait.” Lotte rested on her folded arms. “Mutti, you finished?”

Ulrike looked up, vague and irritated.

“I suppose. Jensen, don’t play with your food.”

He nodded, stirred the oatmeal into sluggish waves.

“What prize is she talking about?” Her voice grew sharper, and wouldn’t this morning be one of those when she joined them in more than body alone?

“The Parcae Prize, Mutti. The scholarship to the college.”

“Pfft. You don’t need that. We can afford a better college than Parcae.” Ulrike sniffed, beyond arguing. “I’ll speak to your father. He’ll see to it.”

Jensen swallowed. “He might like me to go, though. It’s kind of our college, and he went there.”

“I suppose.” She suddenly twisted in her seat to face him. “We never went through the pine arch when we married. I planted a tree, but it’s not the same. Do you think we’ll have bad luck because of it?”

“B-bad luck? No, Mutti. I’m sure it will be fine.”

“Well, I do not know. My father said we should, and I agreed, but that old Harwood woman wouldn’t let us cut any branches from her old pine. Said it would ruin the playground. I ask you!” She shook her head, decisively. “She’s always disliked me. I think she’s a witch. What do you think, Kitten? Is she a witch?” And suddenly she clawed her hands and lunged at Karin, who screamed with delighted fear.

Jensen stood up, abruptly, a swirl of nausea in his belly. The ceremony began at 1pm, and it was still too far away for comfort and too close for avoidance.

“Thanks, Lotte. That was great. I’m going to go and…” he had no excuses at hand, but Lotte’s eyes gave him one, and he nodded his gratitude.

“It’s going to look super cool on your desk, Jense,” she said.

“Can I have your pancakes?” Karin finished the last of her oatmeal and held up the bowl in proof.

“Jensen! If you’re going in to town today, don’t forget to pick up the fertilizer for the roses. You’re always forgetting something.”

“Yes, yes, and I’ll remember the horseshit, Mutti.”

“Just don’t disappoint your father again.”

He said nothing, gave a wave, and sprinted back to his room to grab his bag.

He had just heard he last words his mother would ever say to him.

^&*^^%$%$^&%$%^$%^$%^$^&%$%*&%(^(&*^*(&^(*&^(&(

If his mind had been able to stop from trembling in time with his body’s betrayal, Jensen might have wondered at his ability to feel utterly alone in the sea of so many students and teachers and parents. The susurration of conversation, the rustle and clatter and shuffling, the choked off whispers of humor and nerves and excitement, all swirled together into something liquid and distant. He was as solitary as an anchorite on a rock, while around him the connections and expectations of years flowed together.

He sensed, rather than saw, when Matt and Lucas slid past him to take their seats further down the row. There was no particular order to the juniors’ seating, and Lucas made his allegiance clear long before this day. Whatever tenacious hold on friendship had kept him by Jensen’s side through the long summer of Jensen’s alienation and abuse was gone with the sabotage at Tolliver’s Bakery. Rob Tolliver had kept his word, and kept silent on what he thought had happened. Charlie Johnson didn’t sue (“Shoot, Robbie, ain’t nothin’ but a stitch or two.”) But Matt couldn’t help but tell Lucas, and the threesome that had been unbreakable through 12 years of schooling was dissolved. No, not dissolved; shattered, with jagged edges remaining, ready to cut.

His mind jittered and jumped; forward to the moment of the Prize, backward to the look on Lucas’ face when he told him he didn’t want to have anything to do with him anymore. To Rob Tolliver punching him over and over, to Jake Macquarie saying, “You’ll do us proud at Arlington, son.” To the doctor at the hospital in McKinney, frowning at the swollen, bloody mess that was his elbow, ordering x-rays and analgesics and, at some point when everything was too much, restraints.

Sheriff Boule asking what happened.

Troy Padalecki, taking his swing.

Jensen shook himself, gripped his arms hard, harder, trying not to rock as the speeches went on, as prize winners in the senior year swept up and down the steps. Then the presentation of the senior year in all their glory, and their seating on the stage, black gowned row on row. More speeches, and Jensen could barely breathe, felt sick and cold in the heat of an east Texas June day. The mayor, crisp and collected as usual, saying she wished them all the best for their lives beyond their hometown. Principal Corcoran taking the microphone.

“And now, just before we ask the valedictorian, Luisa Calambaro, to give the valedictory speech, it is my pleasure, as it is every year, to announce the winner of the prestigious scholarship to Parcae College.” Did she look at him when she said that? She did, he would swear to it, but she looked away so quickly and he swallowed, over and over. “The Parcae Prize was inaugurated by Artemis Ackles back in 1911, and has been presented ever since to the most outstanding member of the student body, according to a system of points awarded for academic achievement, sporting endeavor, and the demonstration of exceptional civic virtues and community service. I am pleased and delighted to announce that this year, the recipient of the Parcae Prize for Excellence, and the scholarship to Parcae College itself, goes to…”

He leant forward, hands dropping to grip the sides of his seat.

“Troy Padalecki.”

There was a gasp, a kind of sucked in noise that swept up and down the aisles; then, slowly but inevitably, dutiful clapping. Somebody cheered wildly from the midsection of the seating. Terry stood up and whooped.

Troy bounded up the steps to the stage. And Jensen followed him.

“No.” His voice was astonishingly firm but far away, echoing in his own mind even as he spoke. “That’s not right.”

“Hey, fuck off, loser,” Troy hissed.

“Jensen,” Principal Corcoran was definitely looking at him now. “Leave the stage immediately.”

“No.” Jensen returned her look. “It’s mine. It belongs to me.”

“Get off this stage right now, young man. You are embarrassing yourself and ruining the ceremony.” Her voice was pitched low but hard, a delivery drilled into his heart.

“No.” He shook his head, lost and stubborn and certain. “I know I won.”

“Hey! Asshole. Get off!” And Troy pushed him, as murmurs and consternation rose from the assembled crowd before them. Catcalls came into Jensen’s hearing, boos and cries to “Get off!” He swayed under both assaults, but kept staring straight at Principal Corcoran, helpless to look away – until at last he saw it, the quick downward flicker, the faint blush high on her cheek.

“What did you do?” he said, almost calm in the face of this last betrayal. It was Troy who answered, so low that only Jensen and Principal Corcoran could hear.

“My old man’s running this place now, Ackles. Guess there’s nothing that money can’t buy.”

Jensen nodded, twice. The cries to get off were insistent now, unending, and he gave Principal Corcoran one last long look before turning to Troy.

“Fuck you.”

Coiling his body felt like claiming an old, familiar skin. Everything in him gathered together, tension made perfect by purpose. He rocked back, whipped forward, released.

Troy Padalecki staggered backwards, his nose flattened against his cheek, his mouth open in outrage and protest. His whole body was suspended briefly above the earth, all limbs splayed, blood already flying from his face in a fine arc over the crowd seated below. His head rocked backwards, towards the dais set on the stage, and at the last second his eyes found Jensen’s and kindled with rage.

Then his head met the edge and his neck snapped like a celery stalk.

The world was nothing but a buzz to Jensen as he stood there, numb with his own grief. Above him, as if boiling water had been tipped into an ants’ nest, a flurry of black gowned arms and legs descended on him, tossed him aside and then pulled him back in again, until somebody gave a shriek and someone else grabbed him around the shoulders.

“Come on.” He was being hustled off the stage, as people yelled and screamed and a girl directly in front of him began sobbing hysterically. Elsie Clarence, he thought, calmly. She always does like to be in the drama.

The person manhandling him from the stage pulled him headlong down the stairs and towards the school office, barely giving him time to register what was happening to him. It was only as they pushed through the front doors that he realized where he was, and began to struggle.

“ I need to go back,” he began, but the person pushing him – Steve, it was Steve Esposito – didn’t listen, just kept barreling him into the sick bay where he was deposited unceremoniously on one of the hard plastic chairs that lined the walls.

“You need to stay here. Do you – “ and Steve’s voice, Jensen noticed, was shaking. He’d never seen unflappable, unshakeable, (beautiful) Steve behaving like this. “Do you know what’s happened? Do you know what you’ve done?”

Jensen wondered why the fact that he, Jensen, had been swindled out of the prize affected Steve so much. “I’m not going to let him take the Prize. It’s too important to us, Steve.”

Steve ran his hands through his hair, stepping back from Jensen as though from a threat, or an abomination.

“If the Padaleckis find you here, they’ll kill you, man. Do you get that?”

“I punched Troy. He deserved it, Steve.”

“Jesus.” There was real despair in Steve’s voice. “Jesus.”

Loud voices outside. One of them was recognizably Sheriff Boule’s, and Steve sprang to the door as though to block it before pulling himself up short.

“Okay, okay. Just listen, Jensen, okay? I loved Niels, man. He was a great guy, and you’re a good kid too, so you gotta be cool now. Just be cool. I’m gonna get the sheriff, he’s gonna want to talk to you, okay? Just stay there, stay down, be cool.”

“Sure. Okay, Steve.” It was clear that Steve was severely agitated about something, but in his dazed world of buzzing nothingness, Jensen couldn’t quite figure out what it was. But being cool was something he could do. They’d sort out this prize business, and all would be fine. It would be. Unless –

“Steve?”

Steve paused at the door. “Yeah, Jense?”

“Do you think they’ll expel me?”

Steve groaned, as if in pain, then left, calling for Sheriff Boule. Jensen sat, bemused, as he looked down through his lolling feet to where the linoleum shone under the fluorescent lights. A sense of sickness stirred inside him, a kind of vertigo. It seemed as though he were looking at an endless drop as he stared into the shiny whiteness beneath him.

The door opened again and Sheriff Boule came in with Steve. The sheriff’s face was grave, but his eyes held a kind of gentle sadness Jensen had never seen in them before.

“Hello, Jensen. Glad you stopped here.”

“I brought him, Sheriff.” Steve’s voice wasn’t trembling anymore. “He didn’t run. He wouldn’t run.”

“No. I know that. That was real good thinking, Steve.” Sheriff Boule waved Jensen back down as he began to rise. “No, stay there. Let’s just have us a talk, here. You want to tell me what happened back there, Jensen?”

Jensen nodded. “Troy Padalecki. He – well, his dad – they bought the Prize, Sheriff. I won it and they paid Principal Corcoran for it.”

“Uh-huh.” Sheriff Boule sat down alongside him. “What happened then?”

“Well, I guess I lost my temper. I know my dad would have  - he would have been disappointed in me, but he was shoving it in my face, and I just – I punched him.”

“You got quite an arm on you, haven’t you, Jensen?”

“S’not my good arm.” Jensen gestured towards his right, where his arm was still encased in plaster. “But I figure he’ll have a black eye at the hearing.”

“The hearing?”

“About the Prize.”

Sheriff Boule folded his hands together, quiet and natural, his eyes never leaving Jensen’s face. “How old are you, son?”

“It’s my birthday today.” Jensen looked up at Steve, who couldn’t meet his gaze, then at the Sheriff. “I’m seventeen.”

He saw the Sheriff give the slightest of winces. In a man of such granite-like expressions, it was like a rockfall. “Well now, that’s a problem, Jensen. Seventeen, huh. Well now.”

Jensen became aware that his entire body was shaking, deep subterranean tremors through his belly, down his arms and legs, making his throat tight, his breath hurt. “I don’t understand. Why is that a problem?”

“Jensen, I’m going to have to take you with me to the station, now. I’m going to put you under arrest, and I’m gonna have to charge you as an adult. Because you’re seventeen. You understand that, son?”

He tried to speak, but the words were lost, just dust in his throat.

“Jensen Ackles, I’m arresting you for the murder of Troy Padalecki.”

“He’s dead?” That was Steve, over by the door, and Jensen thought, but I just punched him, that’s all, and I saw him, alive and hating me, flying through the air.

Sheriff Boule stood. His voice was as gentle as his eyes. “Come on now, Jensen. You want me to go get your mom?”

“No!” That would be disastrous. No one could see her, not as she was now. “Please, don’t. She’ll just worry. She’s had a real hard year.”

Sheriff Boule nodded. “I know it.”

But it was inevitable. A deputy left for the Ackles place less than twenty minutes later. By the end of the day, Jensen was in the county jail, next to Kit Polk, and Ulrike Ackles was in the psychiatric unit at McKinney General Hospital. Lotte and Karin were spending their first bewildered night with a foster family outside of Beynton.

In August they sentenced Jensen Ackles to twenty years for the second degree murder of Troy Carson Padalecki. He was sent to Cole prison. With good behaviour and parole, he would be out in fifteen years.

Terry Padalecki accepted the Parcae Prize on behalf of his dead brother.

 

 

 

 

 

PART TWO

 

 

 

Chapter 11

There were very few things that Jurek Padalecki timed well in his life. He’d opened his store six months after Conrad Ackles had successfully started a similar business; he’d insisted on having more children after his marriage was already beyond repair; he chose to invest in Enron stocks two months before they crashed into ignominious ruin. But he knew when to move on the Ackles holdings when they faltered, and he timed his death in a way that suited Jared Padalecki perfectly.

Jared’s job at the San Augustin Sun had begun with dreams of Watergate-level glory, that had slowly but inevitably swirled lower and lower until he’d come to be grateful for a day that didn’t require him to write up the cattle-yard report. When news came of his uncle Jurek’s passing,  along with a plea from his cousin Terry to come and help sort out the family’s finances,  Jared took it as a sign that his growing determination to become a freelance writer doing independent articles should be pursued. There was no logic to this decision, but any amount of relief as he dropped off the key to his badly furnished flat and headed west towards Dallas. He’d needed a sign from the gods, he told himself, and Jurek’s asthma attack became the beacon to a brighter future.

It would sound cold-blooded to anyone else, so Jared didn’t mention his train of thought.  His memories of Titchville weren’t happy ones, and he’d disliked his cousins sincerely, so he couldn’t feel anything but the briefest of shock and regret for Jurek. The man had been avuncular when strictly necessary, and then for the most part ignored Jared completely. Jared, like most children, would have been grateful for his uncle’s avoidance if it hadn’t meant spending more time alone with Troy and Terry.

It was odd to think of coming back to Titchville and not seeing that ubiquitous smirk of Troy’s. Jared had tried not to think too much about Troy’s death, so many years ago; the little boy who wished so sincerely for his cousin to disappear off the face of the earth found that wishes granted could be bitter indeed , and ever since he’d heard the news of it, he’d struggled with vague feelings of guilt and remorse.  So when he drew in beside the Padalecki home on Decatur Road and saw Terry stand there, alone, folded down and aged in a way he never expected, he didn’t need to feign his somber mood.

 “Hey.” Jared stepped out of the car and suddenly realized he was a foot taller than his cousin. It wasn’t an unusual occurrence.  He moved to wrap Terry in an awkward embrace, and then gave a startled “Oof!” as Terry gripped him hard, a drowning man in the rapids.

“Jared. Jare.” Terry’s voice was muffled against his shoulder. “Thanks so much for coming, man.”

“Hey, no problem. No problem. Um – I was, you know, sorry to hear of your loss.”

Terry pulled back, gave his shoulder a pat, and grinned briefly. “You mean Dad? Yeah. It was sudden. Kind of took everyone by surprise, you know?”

“Sure.” Jared stooped to pull his bag out of the back seat. “Um, listen, I haven’t booked a place yet, but I can  –“

“No, no, Jared, come on. You’re staying here, with me. Us. Stacey and I.”

“You sure? I mean, I could just go and –“

“No. Please.” Terry gripped his arm again. “I really need you to stay.”

“Okay.” It was odd, Terry’s insistence, and vaguely unsettling, but Jared was nothing if not easy-going. “Thanks. I didn’t want to be a burden.”

“You kidding? You’re a godsend.” Terry turned and led the way in to the house, a grandiose construction that aimed for Spanish opulence via molded fiberglass columns. There was something almost noble in its self-delusion of grandeur.

“Kellie’s at school, she’ll be home in a while.” Jared breathed a quickly-concealed sigh of relief; Kellie had been a demanding two year old when last he’d met her, and the return engagement held little appeal.

“So – a godsend, huh?” He kept his tone light, but the observation skills he was sure would one day make him a great writer allowed him to notice how bowed Terry’s shoulders were, how much older than his thirty one years he looked.

Terry paused, then shrugged. “It hasn’t been easy, you know? Just- everything. For a while. And Dad has left such a mess in his papers, I just needed someone else to help me attack them.”

“Sure.” Observation and distance, the outsider’s eye, that’s what would take him to the top in journalism. “You know, I couldn’t help but notice the town as we came through. Changed a bit since I was here last time.”

“Last time? Yeah. That was – how long ago now?”

“I don’t know – six years? Seven?” Jared slung his bag onto the kitchen floor and leaned into a stool. “Lots of businesses closed down since then.”

“Well, sure.” Terry opened the fridge door, grabbed two beers without asking, and slid one across to Jared. “The college has closed.”

“Parcae? No shit!” That was a shock, and an unpleasant one; Parcae College had been part of the town since the early 1900s. “What happened?”

Terry settled onto a stool, looked down at his beer. “Surprised you didn’t hear. Couple of scandals – master and boys, you know. And – and financial.”

“Financial?” And there it was, the one thing that held him back every time. How could he ever be a world-class journalist when compassion trumped distance as easy as breathing whenever Jared spent time around people, finding the story. “Terry – did Jurek – was he mixed up in it?”

Terry didn’t look at him, but nodded silently.

“Well, shit.” His cousin’s desperation made sense to him now. “And you think we’ll find evidence of that in his papers?”

“I don’t know.” A world of weariness in that admission. “Dad had so many things going on. They cleared him at the time. But then, they didn’t look too hard. After the sex scandal the year before, malfeasance in the books just finished the college off. Four hundred teachers and students gone from the area, and that’s only the half of it. Jared,” and Terry’s voice shook a little, “if I didn’t know better, I’d say we were cursed. The whole damned town.”

Jared shifted, embarrassed. “Ah, come on, Terry. You don’t –“

“I mean it.” Terry looked up at him, suddenly mulish. “I mean it, Jare. It’s just all gone wrong, ever since Troy. Just one thing after another. We had the drought, eight years of it, when every other county got rain and plenty of it.  We had the bus crash of ’01, fifty-three people just wiped away like they were flies. The college closing, the businesses going broke, Gorsham’s bank going under. Just one thing after another, and it’s got so no-one believes in luck any more. We’re all just waiting for the next hammer to come down.”

It was dangerous ground, because Jared was many things, but not a hypocrite. “I guess… you and Troy were so close. It must feel like everything went wrong after he died.”

“You hated him.”

Jared took a deeper breath. “Hey, Terry, come on, man. We were kids. Kids can be cruel, without even realizing it. We all grow up, we all get past that.”

“Not all of us.” Terry took a swig of beer. “Troy never got the chance to.”

“I know, man, and I’m sorry for that.”

“Are you?” Terry looked at him shrewdly for a moment, then the effort left him and he shrunk back down again. “You know Jensen Ackles is out?”

Jared blinked. “Jensen Ackles?”

“Yeah. Jensen fucking Ackles. The guy that killed him. Troy’s in the ground fifteen years, and Jensen Ackles can just come back home to that big old house and take up where he left off. Doesn’t seem fair to me. Seem fair to you?”

“I don’t know,” Jared said. “I wasn’t here when all that happened, Terry.”

“What difference does that make?”

“I guess – it’s just I didn’t know him much, you know? And he must have done his time, right?”

“Right. Done his time. Right.” Terry finished off his beer. “We’re all doing time in Titchville. Sounds like a song, doesn’t it? ‘Doing time in Titchville’. That’s how it is now, Jare.”

Jared frowned, embarrassed and unsure what to say.

“I’ll show you.” Terry lumbered off the stool, and dug about in the kitchen dresser beside the fridge. He pulled out a scrapbook, carefully strapped together, and undid the binding to open it at the front page. With a grim little flourish, he pushed it across the counter to Jared.

Jared found himself looking down at a newspaper front page from June, 1997. A scene from a graduation, with black gowns caught in the whirl of sudden drama. Principal Corcoran standing to the side, hand across her mouth, was the only figure clearly identifiable; the others were a maelstrom of distress, gathered about someone lying on the stage. Inset into a corner of the photo was another one, obviously taken from the yearbook shoot; Jensen Ackles. Straight, poorly cut fair hair; huge eyes, ineffably sad; generous mouth, curved into a shadowed smile, one that was clearly forced. Incongruous freckles. It was an innocent’s face, demanding a stranger’s comforting hug. The thought of that face in Cole Prison, Fannin County, only weeks after this photo was taken, was almost unimaginable.

Terry tapped at it with his knuckle.

“Yeah, Jensen Ackles. You know little Macey Besmer’s missing? Those poor folk, lost their son to that crazy sonofabitch Niels, and now their little girl’s gone. Sheriff’s got nothing, town’s got nothing. Five days gone. I look at my Kellie and I think, if anyone touched a hair of her head, I’d kill them, sure as shooting. What that poor family must be going through.”

“That’s awful.”

“Well, she went out for a ride on her bike five days ago and never came home. Then I ran into Tim Minicozzi, and his boy Clay didn’t come back from a day by the river yesterday. Poor sonofabitch, looks like he’s aged a year in one day. So what’s going on, Jared? How much shit can one town take?” Terry swung around on his stool and reached for another beer, offering Jared one and accepting his head shake with a shrug. “And how long before folk just take matters into their own hands, huh?”

Jared tilted his head. “Well, I don’t know what folks could do, beside leave.”

“Oh, yeah, right, right. You think this is a coincidence? Jensen fucking Ackles comes back, and kids start disappearing? You don’t think hey, maybe, this asshole’s looking to get some payback on the people who didn’t let him get away with murdering Troy?”

“Whoa.” Jared raised his hands. “Come on, man, that’s a leap.” But Terry leaned forward, eyes hard.

“I’m thinking that the sheriff will be paying a visit to the Ackles place, and I’m thinking that I wouldn’t mind tagging along.”

“Okay. Terry?” Jared breathed in, deliberately slowing his alarm. “You’ve got other responsibilities here, man. You got Jurek’s papers to sort out, you got Kellie and Stacey to see to. If kids are disappearing, you gotta protect your little girl. Not by going vigilante on Ackles, come on. Leave that to the sheriff. You know he’s good at what he does. You can’t help your own people if you’re in jail for taking a shot at the guy.”

But Jared could see the hatred, simmering, in Terry’s eyes. It never failed to startle him, this capacity for malice that lurked inside people he otherwise knew to be decent, loving human beings. It was shocking, seeing it across Terry’s kitchen counter, framed by children’s drawings and T-ball announcements and PTA notices on the chipboard behind his head.

“Alright, Terry, how’s about this? How’s about I drive out there tomorrow, check out what this Jensen Ackles dude is up to?” At Terry’s initial dismissal, Jared pressed on. “Come on, man, I’m a journalist. I’m trained to observe things, right? Let me go out there, do a little digging. See what’s what.”

Terry stared moodily at his beer, scratching at the label with his thumb. When Jared leant forward to get into his line of sight, looking for a response, he let out a sigh.

“You don’t know what he’s like. He – “ Terry stopped abruptly, then shivered, as though ridding himself of something across his shoulders. “There’s something about that guy. You’d have to be careful.” He looked up at Jared. “Promise me you’ll stay sharp, huh?”

“You know it. You know me.” Jared held up his empty bottle in a toast. “Sharp as a sack full of wet mice.”

Later, that night, as he lay in bed following his reunion with Terry’s wife and child, a bland meal, and more family photo albums than he cared to remember, Jared tried to recall everything he knew about Jensen Ackles. It wasn’t much. The seeds of a story were beginning to germinate in his mind; the story of a town slowly subsiding into the East Texas river mud, and the tragedy that began the decline. Jensen Ackles’ return looked like a hook to hang it all on , but that would depend on what he found when he headed out the next day, down Parcae Road, to the old Ackles’ place. A meeting with a murderer, against a backdrop of child abductions and financial scandal. Jared the journalist had come back to his childhood, and it looked as if he was staring down the path to his future.

It all depended on Jensen.

 

Chapter 12

 

The moment the engine died, Jared noticed the silence that hung heavy as broadcloth over the old Ackles place. The sky seemed close, squatting on its haunches to press down on the house in an intimacy more claustrophobic than comforting. Trees sagged alongside the balcony railings, the grey and white painted boards as crazy as old man’s teeth. Everything spoke of abandonment. The window sash, askew and hanging; leaves from a long-gone fall tossed up against the door; gaps in the wall boards, the porch, the steps. Grotesque in its blank sweetness, a doll lay almost completely entangled in bindweed.

A lone bird sounded. Dead and gone, dead and gone, dead and gone. Each phrase ended on an upward inflection, an ironic enquiry.

Jared closed the car door carefully, as if the silence was a personal one he was loathe to break. There were the remnants of a path around the side of the house, and as he craned his head he could see a yard that surely must have been a gracious space, marked as it was by long-dry fountains and overwhelmed trellises. Now it held pigweed and purslane, with clumps of Dallisgrass dotted about between pavers. He could see the beauty in the bones of the house, even as it slumped beneath the onslaughts of nature and time.

“Hello? Anyone here?”

His call sounded presumptuous in this forsaken place. He stepped carefully through the grass, onto the steps, the porch, his boots echoing on the dried old timber. The door was gone; heavy black plastic was nailed to the lintel and weighted down with rocks, blocking entry. He lifted it aside, disturbing a flurry of spiders, and stepped through.

Inside, the ruin was less picturesque. It was clear that a night at the Ackles house had become at some point an initiation rite for local teens. Bottles, broken and whole, covered the floor. Painted profanities mocked the peeling remains of delicate, Victorian style wallpaper. A fire had been lit in one corner.

“Hello?”

If Jensen Ackles was really back, there was no sign in this front hall and parlor. Jared crunched across the glass, noticing how brown the sky outside seemed through the dirt-covered windows that were still intact. The others were boarded over, making the interior light murky.

Fifteen years, Terry had said. A part of Jared marveled at the transience of it all. One and a half decades didn’t seem that long for what had clearly been a beautiful home to degenerate so drastically. He wondered what had happened first; nosy townsfolk coming to strip away the furnishing with uncaring impunity? Then the parties, the transients, windows broken and weather unleashed. One and a half decades, and though the walls seemed solid, everything else that was fine and welcoming about the house was gone.

There was a shuffling sound overhead.

Jared’s heart thumped in his throat. An animal, he thought. Raccoon. Feral cat. And for all that he’d thought he’d come here to find him, he suddenly knew he really didn’t want to see Jensen Ackles. He didn’t want to see if vicious time had done to the beautiful boy in the newspaper what it had done to the house itself.

The shuffle came again, and Jared couldn’t ignore it. He’d never been a coward. So he pulled his shoulders back and, gingerly, began to climb the stairs.

As he came to the first floor landing he noticed signs of habitation. A sleeping bag was spread out against the far wall, alongside a cheap canvas bag and hurricane lantern. A pair of jeans was tossed across the foot of the bag. A pallet of bottled water made a kind of table for the lantern. There was a strong smell of paint and kerosene.

Jared peered about nervously. Stupidly, for the first time it occurred to him that his own name was unlikely to be a welcome one. Knowing his own good intentions was not, he suddenly realized, something that could reasonably be expected to find easy expression if Ackles decided to attack him.

Through a wide arch he could see newly painted walls, a deep lilac with white trim. Wood shavings piled against a carpenter’s horse. And the end of one leg, encased in work worn boot, twitching.

“Hell – hello?” His voice cracked it, and he cleared it. “Is anyone there?”

The leg stilled. Another shuffle, then a deep voice answered.

“Who is it? What do you want?”

It sounded so scratchy and raw and buried earth deep, it seemed to Jared as if the house itself was challenging him.

 “I’m Jared. I just – I’m looking for Jensen Ackles.”

The leg pulled back, out of sight.

“What do you want?”

“Just to talk. I heard you were back. It is you, isn’t it?” As he spoke he came slowly forward, moving around the doorjamb to see further into the room. Two more steps and he was in.

The man before him was lying against the wall as if he’d been dropped there against his will. The first thing Jared noticed was the arm held across his stomach. It was swollen, mottled red, and looked so painful he grimaced in automatic sympathy.

Then he followed the arm up to the broad shoulders, bare in the sickening heat, to find the face, where he was met with an expression of flat defiance. It was with a  distinct sense of relief that Jared recognized two things; he’d found Jensen Ackles, and the man who was gazing up at him, so awkwardly jammed into the wall, clearly still held the features of the boy he’d once been. The angles were sharper, the jaw line and cheekbones broader, but for all the dirt and sweat, for all the miles and years travelled, he was not a ruin.

At least, that was Jared’s first impression. It was a quick and specious comfort. Because the moment he locked eyes with Jensen, he saw the innocent pain of the teen had been tempered into something dark and deadly, something that promised a visitation of wrath should he linger too long or too close.

“Are you okay?”

Jensen Ackles stared at him. Jared gestured to his arm.

“This?” Jensen didn’t bother to look down at it. “Rattler. ‘Bout three days ago.”

“A rattlesnake? God, are you alright?” It ranked as one of his more vacuous questions.

Jensen gave a noise that might have once been a chuckle. It sounded like a house shifting on its foundations.

“Didn’t kill me. Figure I’ll do.” He squinted at Jared. “What do you want?”

“Yeah, right. Right. Um – do you want – I could take you into town, get that looked at?’

“Town? You’re a comedian.”

Jared’s face twisted in concern.

“You should get the doc to look at that. Might be infected.”

An eyebrow quirked at him. It seemed to take effort.

“You from around here? Know the doc’s name, Jason?” At Jared’s head shake, he answered, “Nuentes. Look it up. Then maybe you’ll know why the good doctor wouldn’t look at this arm if I paid him with all the money I got.” He shifted a little, clearly in pain. “Looks worse than it is. Be okay. Just – just hurts some.”

“I bet.” Jared swung his backpack off his shoulder – carefully, as if engaging with a wild creature. “I bought some beers, if you’re interested.”

Jensen frowned again, watching as Jared pulled two cold beers from the insulated bag.

“You came planning on a visit, huh.”

“I thought, if I could catch up with you…”

“You’d what? Hey, no offence, dude, but I don’t know you and you still haven’t explained any why you’re here. So – what? You’re the distraction while your pals get around back, burn me out? That it?”

“What? No!” Jared was scandalized enough to raise his voice. Jensen watched him closely. “No, I really, really just wanted to find you, talk to you.”

For another long moment, Jensen scrutinized him. Then at last he let his head fall back, eyes half-closed.

“Fuck off.”

“Jensen –“

“I’m not a fucking freak show, okay? Go get your rocks off someplace else.”

“I know you’re not a freak. God.” Jared ran a hand through his hair, lank with the humidity. “I just want to get your side.”

“My ‘side’? Yeah, okay. So you’re either a lawyer or a journalist. Which is it?”

He took the top off one beer and held it out. “I wanted to write about the town. Tell the story of how it has gone downhill so badly. I used to come here, when I was a kid, holidays, you know? And now I’m back, visiting family, and it seems so sad that the place is looking so poorly. I thought, maybe a story like that would get some action. But the more I thought about it, the more I thought the whole downward spiral started with – with that summer, with you and what happened.”

“Well.” Jensen eyed him with dislike. “Ain’t you the circumspect little sweetheart. ‘What happened’? Why don’t you say what you mean, Jason?”

“It’s Jared, actually. Here. Take it, please.” He waved the beer at Jensen, who, after another hesitation, reluctantly reached out for it with his good hand. But it shook so badly that Jared found himself taking it, to steer the beer into Jensen’s grasp. The hand was clammy and calloused, but he could sense the strength in it, the leashed power.

A nod of acknowledgement, and Jensen pulled back, shifting himself to sit a little more upright. His face was flushed, but whether that was with fever or heat, Jared couldn’t tell.

There were three empty water bottles bedside him, but Jensen’s position looked so uncomfortable that Jared couldn’t think he’d stayed there deliberately. It suddenly occurred to Jared that Jensen had collapsed there, and he wondered how long, exactly, it had been since the man had had anything to eat or drink.

“Can I get you some water?”

Jensen simply stared at him. Without waiting for an answer, Jared turned back to the landing and grabbed several water bottles from the pallet. By the time he returned, Jensen had pulled himself completely upright, propped against the wall, and Jared could see the way the sweat ran in rivulets down his neck and chest, cutting through wood dust.

“Here.” Jared unscrewed the cap from the bottle. “Better have this before the beer.”

He could tell Jensen was trying to keep himself back; but as he passed the water over to him, Jensen grabbed it and swallowed it so fast he choked, and had to pause before trying again.

“Jesus. You’ve been like this three days?”

“Nope.” Jensen finished the bottle and leaned back with a sigh. “Been a lot worse.”

“Why are you in here?” The tilt of the head again, and Jared waved towards the landing. “I mean, why didn’t you go onto your bed? With the water, and the lamp?”

Jensen blinked heavily several times, as if each blink dragged memory and thought from a deep well.

“Figured I’d die in the one room I finished.” His eyes, bright green against the grayness of his face, travelled around the walls and ceiling. “This is Lotte’s room. She always liked purple. Gotta get the girls’ rooms right before – before they’ll come back.”

“Your sisters, right? I remember them. I remember Lotte. I met her one summer.”

“You did?” Jensen struggled to lean forward. “Have you – do you know where she is? Have you talked to her?”

It was painful, the feverish desire in that question.

“No, man, I haven’t seen her since the last summer we had here.” Jared hated to see the way Jensen’s face, so briefly illuminated, dulled again. “I guess I was about ten? But you haven’t seen her since you – um, got back?”

Eyes closed, Jensen shook his head.

“Haven’t seen or heard from her since I was sixteen. Seventeen,” he corrected himself. “Fifteen years.” He opened his eyes again and looked at Jared, hopelessly. “I tried to get the agency to tell me, and I tracked down the foster family, first thing I did when I got out, but they wouldn’t…” He trailed off, and Jared realized there were tears forming in Jensen’s eyes, a silent testament to how consuming the despair of that search had been, and how exhausted in body and mind the man before him was.

“Maybe I could help?”

Jensen blinked again, and one forearm came up to roughly wipe away the moisture on his face.

“You? Why would you?”

“I’m a journalist. I have contacts. I could do it for you.”

The skepticism was clear on Jensen’s face, and Jared was reminded again of that innocent boy in the photo, the one utterly lost to the vagaries of fortune.

“And what would I have to do in return?”

“Talk to me? Tell me your story.”

Jensen gestured with tired disgust.

“I got no story, man. I’m an ex-con, living in the shell of my old family home. I got no-one and nothing. What would I have to say?”

Jared shrugged. “I don’t know. You haven’t told me yet.”

They looked at each other for almost a minute, silent, struggling with mutual incomprehension. At last, Jensen rolled his eyes.

“If that’s what butters your muffin, sure. Shoot, I’ll tell you my story. If you find me my sisters, I’ll tell you their story too.”

“Cool.” Jared saw Jensen mouth ‘cool’, with a sneer, but he was too delighted with his progress to care. “But first, I’mma going out to the car and getting my first aid kit. I got antiseptic wipes and anti-inflammatories. And Tylenol for that pain that’s got you lying here all helpless.”

“The hell I’m helpless!”

But Jared left him, hurrying down the stairs before Jensen had a chance to say more. At the car again he opened the trunk and pulled out the first aid kit he took with him everywhere (bought in the first flush of excitement about being a paid journalist, destined to be right there at the hot spots of his nation’s travails – somewhat ignored when the San Augustin livestock report turned out to be his twice weekly beat). As he closed the trunk, he found himself looking north, towards the low hills that eased up from the plain less than a mile away. In the bright light he could even see the shapes of the Parcae College buildings, with the tower spire cutting into the air above the pines, and it occurred to him that every subsequent generation of Ackles after Artemus was always living and dying within eyesight of that man’s legacy.

On his return he saw that Jensen had pulled his legs up so that he was sitting free of the wall.  He knew at once that Jensen’s effort was in response to that last comment. It wasn’t smart policy to look weak in jail. No doubt it was a lesson quickly learned and deeply ingrained, and Jared felt a flush of shame that his careless words had made an injured man feel the need to find a defensive posture.

“Hey. Here’s the Tylenol. Take some.”

Jensen reached up, scowling, to accept the pills.

“Bossy piece, aren’t you?”

“Not usually.” Jared sat down cross-legged in front of him, aiming for a reduction of height and possible threat, then reached for Jensen’s arm, antiseptic swab in his hand. It was given to him with reluctance. “So – you’re doing up the whole place, huh? Gonna sell it?”

Jensen swallowed the pills, his eyes never leaving Jared. When he wiped his mouth, he set the bottle close beside him, a man attuned to casual thievery.

“I don’t know. The girls have to have their say. It’s one third theirs too, you know. I mean, each.”

“Yeah. It’s hard, the whole dividing up things, with family. I mean, after someone dies.”

Jensen looked at him, an invitation, and Jared took a small breath. He’d made a decision as he climbed the stairs. He finished wiping down Jensen’s arm and gently replaced it across his stomach.

“My uncle just died. ‘Reason I came back. Jurek Padalecki.”

For a moment, Jared didn’t think Jensen had heard. Then a low sound escaped Jensen, like a breath dying on release.

“You’re a Padalecki.”

“Yeah. Jared Padalecki. I’m staying with my cousin Terry.”

Jensen stared at him. Jared waited for the reaction – rage, or even violence, perhaps – but there was nothing for a long minute. Then Jensen’s mouth tightened, rueful and weary.

“And I’m supposed to believe you’re not looking to sandbag me?” At Jared’s frown, he added, “Get some more payback? For Troy?”

“God, what is it with you people? First Terry – no. Jensen, you went to jail for fifteen years. I don’t even know why you hit him, but I read the transcript, few years ago. You wanted to hurt him, I get that. Hell, times were I wanted to hurt him. But I don’t for a second believe you wanted to kill him.”

A fly buzzed lazily through the air between them, fat and slow in the heat. Jensen brushed at it, his eyes never leaving Jared’s.

“Maybe I did. I hated Troy fucking Padalecki. Glad he’s dead. So what are you gonna write now, Jimmy Olsen? ‘Unrepentant Asshole Curses Town’?”

“You think there’s a curse, too?’

Letting his shoulders slump back towards the wall, Jensen sighed.

“There’s a curse. On me, anyway. Can’t say about the town, but yeah.”

Jared shook his head slightly.

“I get that there was some bad luck happened –“

“No. No, I mean it. Now, I’m not saying I’m in my right mind just now, ‘cos of the heat and all, but I mean it. Took me a long time to remember it, because so much happened straight after, but in jail you got nothing but time. At Arlington, on the mound, and Matt Day asked me, said did I want good luck now or when I was old, and I said – “ Jensen shuddered in a breath, stopping the rush of words. He narrowed his eyes at Jared.

“What’m I telling you this for?”

Jared shrugged, carefully. “S’good to talk sometimes. Helps, you know.”

 “Yeah?” Jensen said, shifting his shoulders, fretfully. Everything about him – the way his body had so quickly eased back into the wall, the way his words had begun to slow, almost slurring – spoke of his exhaustion. “Helps who?”

“I don’t know. You, maybe? You never said a word at your trial. I can’t believe you don’t have a story to tell. Everyone deserves the right to be heard.”

Thick and slow, Jensen’s voice crawled from him.

“Let ‘em down. That’s all. They deserved better. Shoulda been better.”

He’d had enough talk, Jared could see that. Awkwardly he rose to his feet, and the movement startled Jensen aware again, alert to height and closeness.

“I’ll go now. Do you need anything from town?” Jensen’s head lolled sideways, and Jared left him to go to the landing and return with the sleeping bag.

“Here.” His voice was gentle. He rolled the bag up and, without asking permission, wedged it beside Jensen’s body. “Lie on that. You’ll rest more easy than on the floor.”

The fight to stay awake was quickly beyond Jensen. He slid down and rested his head against the sleeping bag. Jared pulled his legs straight and positioned them more comfortably, careful to keep the swollen arm from being jostled through it all.

“I’ll be back tomorrow,” he said, and it was a promise.

Chapter 13

The next day, Jared woke so energized he startled Stacey when he bounced into the kitchen, brimming with confidence and intent.

“Jiminy, Jared, you gave me a fright. What all are you doing up so early?”

“Things to do, papers to dazzle. Gotta earn my living, Stace.”

“Now, you know Terry didn’t want you comin’ here and doin’ nothing but work. The papers’ll wait another day or two.”

“The papers? Oh.” He realized their minds were moving in different directions. “I meant writing. I’ve got an idea about a story and I want to do some digging today.”

Stacey Kendrick was a woman from a Gawley Park family who had shed them and 25 pounds to make her marriage and escape possible. She wasn’t given to introspection, but she had a shrewdness to her that let her know when her own interests were threatened. She stopped in the act of making the coffee.

“What kind of story? Is this about Jensen Ackles again?”

Jared grabbed an apple from the counter fruit bowl, refusing to be deflated.

“He’s an angle. Look at his story, look at the town. Good human interest.”

“Him?” It was said with such venom that Jared’s eyebrows lifted in surprise. “There’s nothing good or human about him. You know what he did to Troy, right?”

“Of course, Stacey, but I – “

“Your cousin, Jared. Kellie’s uncle. Who she’ll never know, thanks to that son of a b-i-t-c-h.”

Given that Stacey’s father was a long haul truckie and her mother a stripper at the Crossroads Club by the truckstop, the pretention inherent in spelling a swearword she’d undoubtedly used since her diaper days made Jared grimace.

“He was seventeen, for crying out loud. Just seventeen, that day, so sixteen, really. He hit him once. It was amazing bad luck, that’s all.”

“You’re not defending him! Not in this house!”

Jared spread his hands, but the attempt at placation couldn’t mask his real disgust.

“He shoulda gotten probation. A good kid, clean record, still in high school, one punch. Hell, a year at most.”

“For murder?”

“Oh, come on, Stacey. It was manslaughter, sure as shit.” He ignored the glare she gave him for the swear word, and ploughed on. “From what I remember, the guy was some kind of golden boy until this went down. He lost his cool, punched out Troy – who god knows needed punching out more often than not – and was unlucky enough to kill him.”

“What does it matter to you?” said Stacey, furiously. “Why are you taking his side?”

“Hell, you didn’t even know Troy. Why are you hating on this guy so much?”

“I hate him because –“ she drew in a hard breath. “I hate him because just the thought of him coming back here has Terry climbing the walls. He can’t sleep nights for it. Jared, Terry – Terry’s never gotten over it all, the whole mess with Troy, and now this Ackles person is back here, cool as you like, and somehow we have to deal with that? I won’t. I won’t do it.” She slammed the coffee pot back onto the stand. “What in hell does he expect from us?”

“Stacey. Hey. Hey,” and Jared reached for her, concerned at her growing distress. “Hey, it’ll be okay. He’s not – I don’t know what you and Terry think he’s going to do, but he’s just out there, trying to make his house a home again. He doesn’t want anything from this town. He sure as hell doesn’t expect anything.”

“But that’s just it, Jared. Terry is talking all kinds of stupid stuff. You’ve heard him, and he’s not the only one wantin’ to give that boy a tune up.” Stacey looked at him with honest fear. “I’m thinking he’ll get something from this town, whether he likes it or not.”

There was nothing he could say to comfort her. And the truth was, he felt unsettled himself. It may have been foolish of him, but the thought that the folk of Titchville wouldn’t be content with an over-long jail sentence as revenge on a seventeen year old had never occurred to him. He wondered if it occurred to Jensen.

After their mutual airing of feelings, he and Stacey shuffled around each other in the kitchen, unable to look the other in the eye, until Terry and Kellie came down for breakfast and he could make his excuses and head out.

A trip to the library for research was his first task, but as Jared rounded the corner to the library’s address he was confronted with an empty site surrounded by cyclone fencing and covered in cracked concrete and weeds.

His i-phone insisted this was the site, but it clearly hadn’t been for several years. A woman brushed past him, wheeling a pram; he thrust out his hand to stop her, and she startled.

“Hey, ma’am, I’m sorry. I just – “ he half-turned to wave towards the empty lot. “I was looking for the library.”

She gave a pointed look at his hand on her arm, and he hastily released her and pulled back.

“Well,” and the word was drawled to the point of incivility, “you’re a mite late for that. Burned down three years ago.”

“Damnit. I mean, sorry, ma’am.” Jared ran his hand through his hair, extravagantly. His gestures were always too big, like the rest of him. “I don’t suppose you could help me out?”

The woman squinted suspiciously at him, jiggling the pram to keep its occupant amused.

“I’m trying to research about the town. Find out its history, you know?”

She was un-mollified. “Why’d you want to do that?”

“I’m thinkin’ of writing a story?’Bout Titchville, and what it needs to get going again.”

“So why d’you need all that old stuff for, anyway?”

“Uh – background? Setting the scene. Tellin’ where she’s come from, maybe look at where she’s going.”

“Huh.” Another era, and this tough woman beside him may well have spat on the pavement. “’Can tell you where we’re going, right enough. But if you want to hear a pile of old stories, go talk to Moira Corcoran. Used to be the principal of the school. Now she does gardens and suchlike.”

“Thank you.” Jared made a show of taking out his notebook and writing in the name. “You got any idea where she’d be?”

Obviously impressed that he’d written down her answer, the woman drew herself up in a self-satisfied way. “Well, let’s see; Wednesdays, she’s usually at the Sheriff’s office. Tomorrow she’ll be by the town hall. Takes care of the gardens, something to do.”

Thanking her, Jared considered his options. Rightfully, he should chase up this lead today, see what Moira Corcoran could tell him. The name was familiar – and then he recalled the photograph from the paper, and Moira’s shocked face, hands going in horror to her mouth. Yes, he most definitely should talk to her – but he knew he wouldn’t do it just yet. All he wanted to do was head down Parcae Road again and see the lonely man working in his abandoned house. The thought of it sent a sweet ache through his body, the kind he hadn’t felt in so long he thought it only belonged with high school, and teenage desperation.

He obeyed his deeper instinct and headed out towards the Ackles house. A fine haze of dust hung across the road, the marker of a recent traveler. Only an irritant, until he thought of Terry, and Stacey’s fears; and then he sped up as much as he could, chasing red-grain phantoms down the long straight road. When he swung in to the Ackles’ house, he didn’t know if he was relieved or alarmed to see the Sheriff and a deputy standing in the front yard, hands on hips, hats hanging off the back of their heads, staring up at Jensen on the upstairs balcony.

His heart pounded, ridiculously, just to see him.

His first thought was that Jensen was wielding a yard of wood as some kind of weapon; but as he watched, Jensen knelt down and slotted it against the empty space in the railings, banging it into place with the nails he calmly retrieved from between his lips.

Sheriff Boule’s body stayed facing Jensen, but he half-swivelled to take in Jared’s arrival.

“Now, I do believe I had a word with Terry Padalecki not one hour ago, Mister Padalecki. I’m a mite disappointed to think he’s sent you on out.”

Sheriff Boule was a medium sized man with an unremarkable face and the kind of moustache that was compulsory on used car salesmen in the 70s. It was an unprepossessing look, until the newcomer noticed the eyes lost beneath the shaggy brows. They were as hard and sharp as an obsidian axe, and the people of Titchville had not once thought of replacing him for the last twenty-five years. It was likely there was no-one who would have had the balls to tell him his job was gone, anyway.

Hard man though he was, the other thing Sheriff Boule was renowned for was his fairness. He’d taught several generations of teenagers and troublemakers the value of playing within the rules simply by talking straight and keeping his word.

“Hey, Sheriff.” If he was surprised that Sheriff Boule knew precisely who he was, Jared didn’t let on. “I’m just here on a visit.”

“Well, and that’s my point. I’m not sure Mister Ackles would welcome a visit from a Padalecki just now.”

“Oh, it’s okay. I’m here to help.” At which statement Jensen’s head bobbed up from behind the top of the railing and Sheriff Boule shifted to consider Jared more carefully. Jared swung two shopping bags in the air. “I brought groceries.”

“You brought groceries.”

“Yessir.”

“Why did you bring groceries?”

Jared tipped his head to the side. It was a move guaranteed to either disarm or infuriate – he never could predict which. “I thought Jensen’s supplies looked a little low. When I was here yesterday.”

Sheriff Boule regarded him thoughtfully for several long seconds. Without taking his eyes from Jared, he called, “Would that be right, Mister Ackles? Jared here came visiting yesterday?”

Jensen stood up, putting the hammer carefully on top of the railing. Jared could see his arm better from that angle, and was relieved to see the swelling had gone down considerably overnight under the influence of the anti-inflammatories.

“Yeah.”

“And at what time were you two having this little playdate?”

Jensen shrugged. Jared hurried to help.

“Uh – I got out here about four pm. I left about five.”

“Five. Yesterday.” The Sheriff somehow managed to give the impression he was delivering a stink-eye of biblical proportions to both of them at the same time, despite the fact that Jensen was twenty feet away. “You didn’t think fit to tell me this, Mister Ackles.”

Jensen, Jared was suddenly delighted to see, looked a little discomfited.

“Didn’t think it worth mentioning. Doubted you’d believe me.”

“What can you tell me about Jensen yesterday, Mister Padalecki?”

“Please – call me Jared.” Sheriff Boule acknowledged that nicety. “Well, when I got here he was pretty much laid out with fever. And his arm was about twice the size it is today. I gave him some medication, and I think it’s helped.”

“Jared, help me out here. You’re staying with Terry, you’re a Padalecki, and you came out to the Ackles place to give Jensen here some medical assistance?”

Jared laughed, a nervous sound that had Jensen flash a glare at him.

“No, no, that’s not the way it started out. But that’s how I found him. He’d gotten bitten by a rattler.”

Sheriff Boule narrowed his eyes at Jared, and he felt as though he was being gutted. Slowly.

“And when did he say he was bitten by that rattler?”

“Hey.” Jared had a shiver of amusement; that was a definite whine in Jensen’s voice. “I’m right here.”

“Yes,” said Sheriff Boule, still keeping Jared transfixed by death-glare alone, “but unlike you, Jared here is answerin’ my questions.”

“Well, he told me it happened three days ago, and the state he was in, I’d have believed it.”

“So, in your opinion, was Mister Ackles fit to be getting around much yesterday morning? Afternoon?”

“No sir. He was pretty much laid out.”

“You say he had a fever?’

“Yes sir. I gave him some antibiotics, anti-inflammatories, painkillers.”

“That you happened to have.”

“That I keep in my car. My line of work…” Jared trailed off at Sheriff Boule’s flat, formidable stare. It seemed to endure for far longer than was reasonable, given that he’d done nothing wrong, but he began to flush with guilt as if he’d just been caught raiding someone’s apple orchard. Finally, Sheriff Boule swung back to Jensen.

“Well, now. Mister Ackles? This here is what we call an alibi. They’re particularly helpful for members of law enforcement looking to track missing children. They help us to eliminate suspects. Next time I come calling, I’d thank you to remember that the Titchville County Sheriff’s Office has better things to do than accommodate the chip on your shoulder.”

Jensen dropped his eyes, mumbled something. Jared had the feeling that had he been standing down in the yard with them, his toe would have been circling in the dust.

Boule nodded to both of them, then swept his deputy before him into the car.

As the Sheriff’s car backed out to turn towards Titchville, Jared moved closer to the porch. He gestured to the pile of boards stacked against the wall.

“You want me to bring some up?”

Jensen looked at him for a long moment, then gave an odd little shrug, as if he were dislodging something whispering in his ear.  It was a good enough invitation for Jared, and he lifted half a dozen as if they were matchwood and headed inside.

Then began a strange sort of dance –something languid, but charged, a kind of slow-motion tango. Jared brought timber and paints, nails and drawsheets, water and sandpaper, and every time he drew close to Jensen he felt the irresistible tug of something rhythmic and sweet and dangerous. He saw how Jensen would lean towards him, too, then sway away, a kind of contrapuntal echo of whatever motion and impulse Jared was following. Jared quickly discovered that a Jensen undone by fever was a different creature to one with all his defensive moves firmly in place. He tried to lure Jensen with chat, and then with direct questions, but he gained little beyond grunts and headshakes in return.

It didn’t really matter. The cicadas whirred, and the old house creaked, and Jensen banged nails and sawed boards and Jared sanded, and it made a kind of waltz-tune he would happily dance to for hours.

As the daylight began to disappear Jensen set up a lamp in the second bedroom to keep working at its mold-mapped walls. A tall wrought iron bed stood in the centre of the room, the mattress long since dragged to play its part in the teenage rites of passage enacted below. He scrubbed at the walls with a particular viciousness, and Jared moved to help him, without speaking. So it came as a surprise when Jensen finally spoke, after forty minutes of work in determined silence.

“Used to belong to my parents.”

Jared just nodded. For all that he was garrulous by nature, he’d learned the value of muteness when drawing out a story.

“Conrad and Ulrike. She was Danish. German Danish, whatever.” He threw down the sandpaper as if throwing down a gauntlet, and surveyed the freshly-reclaimed wall at the head of the bed. “Probably conceived in this room.” He tilted his head back to look at the ruined ceiling. “Just imagine.”

“Imagine what?”

“Her. Here. After he died.” He shook his head, slowly, with a kind of unguarded, tender pity that made Jared’s heart catch and thump. “Poor Mutti. She only had me to help her, and I was a dumb sixteen.” A raw kind of chuckle.  “Well. That’s a tautology.”

“Sixteen? I was arrested for draggin’ the statue of Thurston Dalliwell around the town square after playoffs.”

“Yeah.” Jensen nodded. “Sounds about right.”

“Guess you got up to all kinds of stuff too, huh?”

Jensen turned and reached for the rag to wipe down the walls. “Not so much. Not that year.”

Hell, no. Jared mentally cursed himself.

“That was the year…”

“Yeah. Niels, then Dad. I was working at the bakery. Studying every second I got. Drowning upright, basically.”

“Must have been tough,” Jared said, carefully. He saw Jensen duckbill his lips, considering the question honestly.

“I think that year took everything I knew about myself and my world and just – “ he mimed tipping something over. Then he shook his head again, and addressed the wall, swiping away the grit left behind by the sandpaper with one-armed adroitness. “But, you know. Not the only kid who’s ever lost people.”

“So I guess you felt you had to fill the gap left by your father and brother?”

“Guess so.” Whatever had prompted Jensen to start talking had obviously passed; he was ostentatiously working at the wall, with wide, quick strokes. But Jared was satisfied.  They were dancing a little closer.

He said goodnight when the shadows were thick enough to summon ghosts from the deeper corners.

“You sure you’ll be okay here?”

Jensen tipped his head, a small smile on his face.  It was the first real one Jared had seen on him.

“Think I’ll cope.”

“I’ll see you tomorrow then.”

Jensen bent to open a paint pot, deliberately not looking at him.

“Yeah?”

It was such an unsubtle move that Jared couldn’t help but give a soft laugh.

“Yeah, Jensen.”

 

Chapter 14

He was there just as the sun hit the dew on the garden wilderness, sparking everything with jewel-like colors. Steam rose where the sunlight was starting to be less kind. He found Jensen downstairs in the kitchen, manhandling piles of rubbish out the back door, a rip on his T-shirt evidence that it wasn’t his first cleaning effort of the day.

“Hey.” Jared was pleased to see that Jensen’s body remained loose as he straightened from the task, grimacing slightly, no sudden tension at his appearance.

“You’re back.”

“Guess so.” He lifted the bags. “Brought coffee and sandwiches.”

“Egg and bacon?” It sounded like wonder in Jensen’s voice, and Jared had to grin.

“Sure. It’s breakfast after all.”

“Oh, man.” Jensen took it almost reverently. “You know how long it’s been since I had one of these?’

At once, Jared was embarrassed.

“Look, Jensen, if – you know, if you’re broke, it’s not – “

Jensen was too busy biting into the sandwich to comment, but he shook his head.

“M’fine,” he managed, after a moment, then swallowed. “Got Dad’s savings, and the money my uncle gave us when he stole the business.”

“What?”

“Doesn’t matter. I’m keeping a record, because it’s not mine, of course, not all of it. The girls each get a third. Whatever I use in cleaning this place up, I’ll take out of my cut.”

Something occurred to Jared. “You’re talking different.”

A frown. “What?”

“Sorry.” Embarrassed again, Jared twirled his finger in Jensen’s general direction. “When we first met, your voice – your accent, it was much stronger.”

“Huh.” Jensen considered this. “Could be. In Cole, you know, you didn’t want to seem too high and mighty. I guess I just got used to talking the way they did, keeping my head down.”

“And now you’re remembering. How you were.”

“How I was?” Jensen shook his head and took another bite.

“So.” Jared gestured around him. “You want me to start?”

“Sure. Knock yourself out.” He gestured with his elbow. “I’m getting everything from the downstairs floor out the back. Figure I’ll have a bonfire in a day or two. Then once we’ve cleaned this crap out I can get started.”

“You know, it’s actually not that bad,” Jared said, swinging around slowly. “Mainly dirt and graffiti. Bit of scorching. But it’s pretty solid.”

“I know, right?” Jensen sounded younger today, more hopeful, and Jared couldn’t afford to wonder if that had anything to do with him. “It’s going to take a while, but this place is going to be something the girls can feel at home in once I’m done.”

Jared bent to pull up a piece of matted carpet, clogged with dirt and brick dust. “Thought you were going to sell it and split it up?”

“Mmm.” Jensen looked away, busied himself in scrunching up the bag and tossing it on the pile of rubbish before him then grabbing a large rake. “I guess. “

“You think they’d want to come back here? Live here?”

“No. ‘Course not.” But Jared saw and heard the unspoken hope there, and his heart throbbed with pity. “But, you know, I don’t know what they’re up to, so -  maybe they might want to come back home for a bit?’

“Jensen –“ Jared hesitated. He knew stubbornness when he saw it, and it was there, in every line of Jensen’s back as he bent to sweep up another pile of broken boards and glass. “Jensen, I doubt if this has been home to them in a long time.”

“Yeah. ‘Know.” Jensen kicked at a particularly lodged board until it broke and came with the rest. He said nothing else as he shoved and wrestled the rubbish into the back yard, as brutally as if he were manhandling all the doubts and fears out of his life, and Jared couldn’t find it in himself to pursue it any further.

They worked alongside each other, finding that easy rhythm again, the one that let them ease in and out of each other’s space with little said, and Jared’s mind rested in Jensen’s being even as his body worked to bring life back into the old house. It was the scent of him, as much as the sound of his breathing, his occasional muffled curse, the clump of boots on glass. It was the fact of him, as much as the sight. Jensen was something that pervaded him beyond thought or speculation or dreams. Every time Jared moved, or stopped; when he turned, suddenly, seeing something fresh in the perspective, Jensen was there. He was a new color in Jared’s spectrum, and the tint of him suffused the world he moved through.

And yet an observer would see only a casual friend helping renovate an old house.

The terrible truth, as far as Jared knew, was that he was alone in this.

It was well past eleven o’clock when Jensen finally straightened up and massaged the top of his sore arm. Sweat had darkened the T-shirt on his body, and his hair stuck to his forehead in little dark streaks, testimony to the humidity even in the shade.

“You want a break?”

Jared looked up from where he was hammering a warped skirting board back into true against the wall, surprised after so long of silent communication.

“Yeah. Sure. Um – “ He took a sniff under an armpit and grimaced. “Anywhere I could rinse off? I have to go into town in a bit.”

Jensen said nothing, but Jared saw how his face tightened briefly. With what, he couldn’t say – disappointment at Jared’s going, or fear of the townsfolk?

“Creek over there.” He turned and went out into the midday glare, and Jared followed down an overgrown, almost hidden path, through a trellis fence and a patch of wild grass to a line of cedar elms and briars. Between the trunks he could see a shallow creek, pretty with hornwort and southern naiad, dappled through the overhanging leaves.

“Wow.” He itched to jump into the water, amber where the sunlight found it, tea-brown between the tree roots. “This must have been so great, when you were a kid. Your own backyard creek.”

“Yeah. It was.” Jensen smiled, but only for a second before a memory stronger than the first, more bitter, took him. His mouth grew tight, his eyes large. “’S a good hole just there.”

“Thanks.” Without stopping to second-guess himself, Jared pulled the T-shirt over his head, then dropped to hunker by the water’s edge and dip the shirt into its coolness. “You been washing here?”

Jensen shrugged, but he kept flicking his eyes back to look at Jared’s body as if it mesmerized him. “Till they get the power back on, yeah. And when they’ll do that’s anyone’s guess. Chances are I’ll have to take a shotgun to town to get anyone to actually take the job.”

“Jesus, Jensen! Don’t even joke about that.”

Jensen snorted. “Shoot, Jared, I don’t even own a damned gun. What, you think because I’m a con I’m all redneck survivalist out here?”

“No, I – no.” His voice dropped to a mumble. “I just want you to be safe.”

Jensen stood there, above him, his face still under the moving play of light and shade from the leaves. Then, abruptly, he turned on his heel.

“See you later,” he called back, and Jared was left there, the shirt twisted and wrung out between his hands, dripping into the water like the slow bleeding of a carcass.

**&^%$%^^&*&^*&*&^%%$#^%%$

Jared found Moira Corcoran where they told him she’d be; out back of the council chambers, digging in the garden bed that stretched down to the river, wearing an old straw hat and stretch slacks that hung too loosely on her frame. She gave no sign that she heard him, even as he came over to stand behind her where she tugged ineffectually at the Dallisgrass.

“Uh – excuse me, ma’am? Need some help with that?”

She straightened, slowly.

“If you would. ‘Preciate it.” Her voice still held the authority born of staring down a thousand children and their parents, and Jared bent quickly to the task, briefly dismayed by the resistance he met to his first, casual tug. He heard her give a dry chuckle.

“They hold on hard in Titchville, don’t they?”

“Yes’m.” Gritting his teeth, he twisted his wrists and finally brought up the recalcitrant weed. Moira gestured with her head to the barrow, and he dropped it there, trying not to eye her as obviously as she assessed him. She gestured again at a second clump, and he obeyed, this time bending his back to the task immediately. When he finished, she nodded briskly.

“So who would you be, then?”

“Jared Padalecki, ma’am. Pleased to meet you.”

“Moira Corcoran. Which you knew.” Her gaze remained shrewd. “You’d be related to Calvin Padalecki?”

It surprised Jared that she named the older brother, given that Terry was the only one still alive and in town.

“Cousin. I used to come here sometimes in the holidays. My people are east of here, out Bonham way.”

“But younger,” she said, as if to herself. “So you’d know the twins better?”

“I guess. I’m staying with Terry and Stacey now.”

There was a flicker of something across her face – distaste, disgust, he couldn’t be sure – and she nodded.

“What can I do for you, Mr. Padalecki?”

“Sure. Uh – mind if we sit?” Moira looked at him as if he’d just suggested they perform cartwheels, then snorted.

“Well, there’s the back porch or the riverbank. Take your pick.”

“The porch?” He motioned towards them and she acquiesced willingly enough, giving him a chance to look at her without the benefit of that withering gaze. She looked older than he had envisaged. Principal Corcoran retired after the Padalecki Murder as it was known, at the age of 45, making her just over 60. Had he not known, he’d have guessed her age to be closer to 70.

“Okay, so. Mrs. Corcoran, I’m writing a story about Titchville – looking at the effects of the GFC on small town East Texas, you know? Coming back here after so long away, it just struck me that things have been kinda tough here, what with the factory not opening, and the college closing.”

She tilted her head at him.

“What would be your point?”

“Excuse me?”

“What would you hope to gain, Mr. Padalecki?”

Jared hesitated, then plumped for honesty. He had a feeling liars didn’t fare well at the hands of Moira Corcoran.

“A byline. But maybe some government attention, you know? Get Dallas looking at what could be done for the area.”

Moira looked away from him, down to where the river slouched through the reed-beds and willows, a brown, dull thing under the morning sun.

“You’d rescue us from our God-forsaken mess, boy?” She grimaced. “And I do mean God-forsaken. This town is dying, Mr. Padalecki. I doubt all the crusading journalists on the planet could save it. We’ve made our bed, and now we’re lying down in it, curtains drawn, ready for the reaper. What, exactly, do you think Dallas could do?”

Her bitterness surprised him.

“I don’t know. But maybe fund a new project of some sort, bring back jobs to the area? Or maybe someone could start up the college again.” She made a small disgusted noise, but he continued. “The infrastructure up there is still perfectly good. Seems to me a college ran very successfully there for a long time.”

“Yes, indeed it did. But that was before – “she stopped, jaw suddenly tight. Jared straightened a little, leant forward.

“Before?” he prompted gently.

“Before the boys were killed, Mr. Padalecki. Before my son was gunned down by someone who was supposed to be his best friend. God-forsaken I said, and God-forsaken I meant, and the GFC has got nothing to do with it.”

Jared cleared his throat, knowing he was treading on ground so fragile it could crumble into an abyss beneath him.

“I’ve heard some people blame the Ackles family for all the troubles of Titchville.”

She made a low humming noise in the back of her throat. He couldn’t tell if that was agreement or dismissal, then surprised him again.

“Did you know that the name is really Tycheville?”

“Tikeyville? T-i-k..?”

“Tyche, Mr. Padalecki, T-y-c-h-e. Greek. Pronounced Tikey. The goddess of fortune, of fate. Locals read it as Titch and it stayed, as these kinds of mistakes tend to do. But the town was named for a goddess. Rather chancy undertaking, don’t you think, naming a town after a pagan god of luck– especially one known for her capriciousness.”

Jared surreptitiously brought out his notebook, began writing.

“Who named it that?”

“Artemus Ackles, of course. The founder of the great and glorious town of Titchville, and the even more famous Parcae College. There was some story about it, that I don’t exactly recall, but he had a run of bad luck, then a run of good, after he renamed the town. Used to be called Deadwater. You can see why.” She nodded towards the unlovely river. “You should ask Mamie Harwood. She’d know. Lives out past the Ackles place.”

“So the Ackles family has been here ever since - ?”

“Since 1897. The year of the Padalecki Murder was the town’s centenary.”

“That’s – an interesting coincidence.”

“Will that be your ‘angle’, Mr. Padalecki? Here’s another you might could investigate. Did you know that two children from this town have gone missing in the last two weeks? And did you know that coincidentally just happens to be when an Ackles returned to town?”

Jared put down his notebook. “You mean Jensen? Jensen Ackles?”

Moira closed her eyes, as if the name pained her.

“Jensen Ackles.” It was almost a whisper. “The good Lord forgive me.” She opened her eyes again, revealing a bleakness that chilled him. “So much evil in this town. So much hate.”

“You blame Jensen for the disappearances?”

She huffed, a shallow, small sound. “I don’t blame that boy for one thing that has happened here. I don’t even blame him for Troy Padalecki. Oh, I know what you’ll find if you read the transcripts. You’ll find that I stood there on the stand and swore under oath that Jensen Ackles attacked your cousin without provocation and with every intent to do him deadly harm. I know that’s what it says.”

Jared swallowed, stunned by her words.

“But now you’re saying..?”

“Something possessed us all that year, Mr. Padalecki. The town was consumed by it. Anger. Grief. Betrayal. And we wanted someone to carry that burden for us. Take away all our sins.  Did you know, I used to love that boy? He was the sweetest, most generous thing put on this earth. Would do anything for anyone, worked so hard for the school, his family, the community. And I stood there and wanted to see him put away for the rest of his life, put somewhere to rot and suffer like we were suffering. That courtroom – I swear to you, if there’d been a rope handy, he would never have seen the inside of a jail. There wasn’t a body in that court wanted anything but revenge on that child. I wake some nights, and I think – “

Jared waited, his stomach tight with the anguish he heard in her voice.

“I think there was some kind of madness. Collective hysteria they call it, don’t they? I think the whole damn town made some kind of unconscious bargain. Make that family suffer, Lord, and we’ll pay whatever you demand from us in return. Well, I’ve had a long time to sit and watch it all unfold since, and I reckon the Lord knew what to do with that kind of hate. He let it turn back on ourselves, so now we’re paying the price and finding maybe it was the devil’s bargain to begin with.”

“So you don’t blame Jensen for the children’s disappearances?”

“Jensen?” Moira Corcoran shook her head, slowly. “I know that jail will change folk, no doubt, but that boy could no more harm a child than I could stand up in front of the judge and forgive him for the death of my boy. But so’s you know – I reckon I’m alone in that thinking. Titchville has made up its mind about Jensen Ackles before, and got it wrong. I think you’ll find we’re perfectly capable of repeating our mistakes, Mr. Padalecki. If I were that young man, I wouldn’t stay any longer than he has to. This town will go to any lengths to protect its own.” She sighed, and folded her hands across her lap, as if at the end of an onerous task. “And Jensen’s not one of our own anymore.”

 

Chapter 15

“Rosie! How goes life on the Sugarland Express?’

“Diabetic.” He heard the long, hacking cough down the line, her asthmatic greeting card. “Monty’s spittin’ chunks. What the hell, Padaloser? I go on the Brad and Angie Saviour Tour and I get back to find you’ve gone feral on us? Since when did the Sugarshack not meet your every feeble need?”

“Monty Sugar, editor in chief. You can’t make this shit up. He had a heart attack this week?”

“Naw, he blue-pencilled Stanley so bad the poor guy got carried out on a stretcher. Figure that got the stress out of his system for June. And ‘course you’re not there to raise his blood pressure every five fucking minutes.”

“Hey. Have some fucking sensitivity, Rosie. My uncle died.”

“Yeah, yeah. The uncle you couldn’t stand. So what tree you shakin’ in Titsville?”

Jared laughed. “You know, I’ve been back here for a week and it took you and all your class ten seconds to come up with that one.”

“I’m flippin’ you the bird. Just so you know.”

“Ooooh. Oooh, yeah, harder, Rosie, harder.”

She cackled. “So I miss your huge, sweaty carcass. Why’dja leave me? We had something beautiful.”

“We did. We do.” Jared nodded at a passerby who was staring at him with distrust. “Rosie, you know you’re the best steam-shovel we got…”

“Uh-oh. What do you want?”

“Track two sisters? Lotte Ulrike and Karin Anna Ackles.” He spelt the names for her. “Placed in foster care in July 1997. Foster family Corstens, in McKinney.”

“They do a dice ‘n’ dash?”

“What? No. Jeez. No, they’re missing people. Well, missing from my story, anyway. I’m thinkin’ heartrending reunion for my main angle.”

“Uh-huh. And what’s my reward for finding these Danish Pastries for you?”

“Stars tickets. Any game you want.”

He heard her sucking on her inhaler, and felt again the ever-present shiver of concern that accompanied any thought of her lungs and her 40 cigarettes a day.

“You’re on. Give me a couple.”

The phone went dead, and Jared packed his own away, pleased. He didn’t need to ask the time frame – Rosie McHendry’s ‘couple’ was hours. If the girls could be tracked, and he had every reason to believe they could, she’d find them. He clapped his hands together in satisfaction and headed off to interview whoever would give him the time of day and energy enough to complain.

When he finally drove out through the wilderness of Parcae Road, past all the empty fields, the abandoned fences, he had a notebook half-full of suspicion and resentment. Titchville was a blown-knee athlete, propped against the bar, holding reminisces up to the light as if they were proof and demand that things should be better. Mothers clutched their children’s hands tightly, their fear as clear as a statement. The men respected his height, sneered at his profession, accorded him the briefest of rights on the basis of kinship, and spoke of lost jobs, and missed prospects, and deaf’n’blind government, down south.

He was beyond glad to be pulling into the drive of Jensen’s home.

And it did something more to him to see that Jensen had come out to the front porch, wiping his hands on a rag, squinting into the afternoon light to greet him.

“I bring bear claws!” Jared swung the bag high as he got out of the car. “And beer.” Jensen grinned at him, soft, welcoming, and Jared’s heart sang.

“Reckon you can help me with a window frame first?”

“Reckon I can.”

Jensen nodded, and dropped back into the mirk of the hallway, Jared scrambling to stay close behind.

 The work always came first, and it was comfortable, calming, helping to bring something lost back into the warmth of being wanted.

They worked for an hour before Jensen called a halt.

“Yeah? Early for you.”

“Yeah. Well.” He shrugged a little. “Think this is as much as I can do with the supplies I have. Need more sugar soap for the walls, for starters.”

“Okay. So – beers and bears?”

Jensen gave a small laugh.

“Sure.”

They climbed up onto the top balcony, the one that faced north to the hills and the college in the distance, half-shaded by the old pine tree framing the house. Jared cracked off the tops and handed a bottle to Jensen; they clinked them together in harmony, and then stood leaning against the newly-repaired railing, feeling the sun seep into their bones.

“Bet you missed this,” Jared said. When Jensen looked at him quizzically, Jared felt a sudden flush of concern at the topic. “I mean – when you were inside. This. The view.”

“Mmm.” Jensen dragged his T shirt over his head and dropped it onto the boards at their feet, then re-settled his cap low over his eyes. The beer bottle sagged in one hand over the balcony as they both looked out over the wilderness garden. It was more than a minute before he spoke again.

“The things I missed… it wasn’t the big things. Baseball. Friends. Family, fuck, I didn’t miss them, not really. I buried those things, hardly thought about them at all. Those things, you can’t – “ He gestured, no words for that loss. “But little things, stupid things, I missed. Pop tarts. Wearing flipflops in summer. Friendly dogs. And choice. Choice of anything. What you got to eat, when you woke up, what TV station was on. And smells. I missed jasmine. Inside smells like…” Jensen paused again, his eyes distant. “The smell of it, that’s the first thing, every morning, when you’re still kinda asleep and the realization hasn’t hit you that you’re still in there. It’s the smell that cuts through. The minute that gets hold of you, the dream is gone.”

It was more than Jensen had said in three days. He stood with his head bowed, fingers working hard against each other as if grinding rocks to dust in each hand.

Without thinking, Jared took a step toward him, reached out with his hand to cup the back of Jensen’s head. Jensen stood still, un-tethered but caught.

“This?” Jared bent to him, kissed him on the lips, gently, mouth closed, eyes wide open and searching. “Did you miss this?”

He saw how Jensen’s mouth breathed open, how his eyes grew large and dark and so deeply, deeply desperate. Had a minute to guess at what would happen next, and then Jensen surged against him, gripping his shoulders, one arm circling around to bunch the shirt at his back.

“No,” Jensen said, “no,” but he pushed hard into Jared’s body, hipbones connecting, finding softness and hardness between. A sad little sound escaped him, and he looked away from Jared’s face, buried his own into Jared’s neck and gasped into his shoulder.

Just that sound was enough to make Jared bend and turn to find Jensen’s mouth again, to bring him up and with him, tongues and teeth and breaths so harsh they hurt, they burned.

With a lost word Jensen turned his face away, burrowed it against Jared’s neck as he gasped, and shuddered, as his body bucked into Jared’s, his hands gripping the shirt so hard it threatened to rip in two. There was nothing Jared could do but meet him there, follow his own body’s ancient demand, pulling Jensen tight.

It came to him, in that long moment of everything that floated beyond orgasm, that he would never be happy again unless Jensen was hard against him, with him. The realization was excruciating, a piercing sweetness unlike anything he’d ever known before, terrifying in its vulnerability, its openness to the infinite.

Then Jensen drew back, and he heard the words, “God, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, I never –“

“Hey. No.” Jared cupped Jensen’s head, a feeling he guessed was tenderness flooding his being. “You didn’t take this. I gave it to you.”

Jensen raised his eyes to Jared’s, and he saw the echo of his own helplessness in them.

“No. I- I don’t know what I’m doing.” Jensen pulled back completely this time, breaking contact. “Christ, Jared, this shouldn’t be happening. You don’t know me, you don’t know what’s happened.”

“I know enough.”

“Really?” Jensen looked about him, found his discarded T shirt and then dropped it. “That’s bullshit. You don’t get it, you don’t get me. They hate me, man, they want to run me out of town on a rail, and here you are – “ He gestured towards Jared as though he were a stranger, as though they hadn’t just rutted against each other, shared that sweet madness.

“Yeah. Here I am.” Not stubbornness; certainty. “With you.”

“With…” A shake of his head, and Jensen turned back into the darkness of the house, clomping down the stairs to the yard below. Jared followed him. There was nothing else he could do.

Jensen kept trudging towards the line of small trees that marked the end of the garden.

“Where are you going?”

“Creek.”

At least he’s talking to me, Jared thought. And the creek made sense. When he drew alongside, he saw that Jensen was scowling.

“You really don’t get to do this,” Jensen muttered to the ground.

“Yeah? Do what, exactly?”

“This.” A wave of his hand. “Jump into my mess.”

“Think it’s a free country. Can jump into just about anything I choose, last I looked.”

“Jared! You don’t know what could happen here.” Exasperation, despair, but it was as if that moment of surrender between them had given Jared his own personal Rosetta Stone that allowed him to read Jensen Ackles completely. Because now he heard, above all else, the need.

“You’ve never really done this before, have you?”

“What? Done what?” Jensen pushed through the low-lying bushes to stand at the creek’s edge.

“Asked for help.”

If he’d punched him, he couldn’t have shocked Jensen into such stillness. Jared pressed on.

“More than cleaning up the old house. I mean asking someone to stand up beside you.”

The creek was too sluggish to sing, but it did trickle between the roots of the nearest cedar elms. Insects hummed; a crow called, harsh and high. Somehow these sounds only served to make it feel more hushed, more strained towards silence.

At last, Jensen made an unhappy gesture.

“I know you’re smart. You do this, right, figure people out?”

“Jensen, I –“

“And you’re not doing it because it’s your job. I get that.” He looked straight at Jared for the first time since they’d gasped in each other’s arms. “I get that – you actually want to be here. Be part of this.”

“So, what? Is it because I’m a Padalecki? You don’t trust me?”

Jensen made a dismissive noise.

“I don’t know what to trust. I don’t even trust myself. Shit, Jared, I’m tryin’ to figure out everything here. What I – how I should live. What I should be. Who. I don’t know.” His tone was disgusted. “I sound like some whiny emo brat.”

“Jensen.” Jared’s stomach suddenly dropped in horror. “Jense, you are gay? Because I wouldn’t have – just now, that wasn’t..?”

 “Oh, man.” Jensen spun on his heel, his face turned away, towards the house. “I went to jail when I was still figuring out who I was. Hell, I was still figuring out what I wanted to do, to study. And once I was in Cole, once – you just, there isn’t a way to talk about that. To figure that. Things happen that just – they’re just the way things are. It’s just the way things are. And you cope. Or you don’t. And I coped.” He dropped his head, and ran a hand through his short-cropped hair. “So now you ask me if I’m gay? And I got no answer for you. I don’t – I don’t remember what that kid thought. What he wanted. I only remember what he did to get by in Cole.”

Jared stood with his mouth slowly opening.

“I didn’t mean – Jensen, I wouldn’t –“

Jensen raised a hand, still facing away.

“I know you wouldn’t, and I don’t expect you to understand. I just need you to know that when you ask me a question like that, I’m the poster boy for arrested development. I thought I was something, then I wasn’t, and now I have to work it all out again.”

A bird started piping somewhere from the yard, frenetic and startling in the quiet heat. Jared reached out, dared to grip Jensen’s shoulder.

“I can’t imagine what it’s been like for you. I mean, I can’t, man. So you got to know I’m going to keep getting it wrong. That’s a given.”

“A given, huh?” Jensen half-turned towards him, and his smile was real, if twisted. “Then that’s something solid we can work with.”

 

Chapter 16

Mamie Harwood’s house was a quarter mile down Parcae Road towards the hills and the college. From the road the house looked even older than the Ackles’, but Jared realized that was thanks in part to the marked tilt of the frame that gave it the appearance of a drunk slumped against the huge pine tree that stood at its right side. A rather beautiful path of flat river stones led straight to the front door through a wilderness of shrubs and scorched out lawn, but Jared was too busy goggling at the dolls to take much notice.

They were everywhere. Sitting in trees, bushes, trellises; hanging from the porch edge, propped around the well. Most were dressed, often outlandishly; some weren’t. Some were missing eyes, limbs, hair, some were no more than headless torsos. The effect was a silent gallery staring at him as he approached the house. It was the kind of thing that might dismay and deter someone else, but Jared found it fascinating. ‘Human beings are weird’ was, after all, his journalistic credo, and that of any other reporter he’d ever met.

He knocked on the door, almost surprised to find it sturdy, if lacking a coat or two of paint. There was no answer for a full minute, as he found himself drawn into the absurdity of a staring contest with a black doll affixed to the wall beside the door. So he tried again, only to startle when the door was opened immediately on the second knock.

“Heard you the first time.” An old, old woman, knotted and twisted like a hank of rope, stood there glaring at him.

“Sorry, sorry, I didn’t – um, hello? Ms Harwood?”

“Might be.  Might be her better lookin’ sister.”

“Um – right. Right. Which means you would be Ms Harwood too, since neither Mamie nor Ettie ever married.”

The old woman peered at him, eyes gray with age.

“Who’s to say I didn’t marry?”

Jared held up his left hand.

“No wedding ring, Mz Harwood, which frankly seems a real shame to me. Some poor fella really missed out.”

“Humph.” She came forward, peering at him, and Jared could now see that one eye was almost entirely lost to grayness. “And what if I preferred honeypots to horns, hmm?”

Jared had felt reasonably confident of his ability to charm Mamie Harwood. Sweet talking old ladies had won him meals and favors since he was a boy. But he found his footing slipping as he stared at her inscrutable face, and suddenly decided to dial down the sugar a little.

“I’m sorry. Please forgive me. My name is Jared Padalecki, and I would really value some of Mz Harwood’s time if she would care to talk with me. I’m writing a piece about Titchville, and specially Jensen Ackles. If she would allow me a chance to ask a bit about Titchville’s history, I’d sure appreciate it.”

He’d done the right thing, he knew straight away. Her expression, tight and daunting, loosened a little. After a moment, she drew her chin up and stepped away from the door.

“Well, you can come on in. Don’t know if I got much to say you’d want to hear, but what I got you’re welcome to. You can call me Mz Harwood and I’ll call you Snoop, since that’s what people like you do.”

He resisted the urge to stoop as he came inside. In startling contrast to the garden, the inside of Mamie’s house was remarkably clean and clutter-free. But the ceiling was significantly lower than any house he’d ever been in, old beams making an un-plastered, red-painted ceiling only an inch above his head.

“Y’care for some iced tea?”

“That would be great, thanks.” He looked about himself, noting the old photographs on the walls, the bright watercolors of children playing. “Do you paint, Mz Harwood?”

He heard the closing of the fridge door , the rattle of ice, and Mamie stuck her head around the door to motion him further in. He followed her, through the poky little kitchen out to a closed-in porch, hung about with plants in pots and macramé holders.

Mamie poured him a tea and pointed him to a large rattan chair that was the only thing that could possibly accommodate his size.

“You think I painted those pictures inside?” At Jared’s half-nod, half-shrug, she gave a brief cackle. “Well, I did. I hear them children playing nights, out in the old pine tree, and I get up in the morning and put ‘em all down on the canvas. Now, you knew I wasn’t married. You hear that about me, too?”

“No ma’am. I’m not sure why I asked about them. They just looked like something you might do.”

She sat back, pleased.

“Then you got a good eye, Snoop. So. What do you want to know about Titchville?”

“Okay.” He cleared his throat, hesitating, then decided to follow his instinct again. “What do you know about a curse on the Ackles family?”

If he’d hit her, she wouldn’t have looked any more taken aback. She sat back in her chair, staring at him; then suddenly she plumped her hands in her lap, with an expressive slap.

“Well. All these years and it’s a Padalecki who asks the right question. The Ackles curse, oh my, my, my. You know?” And suddenly she was conspiratorial, leaning forward so that Jared found himself leaning to meet her. “I hoped and I prayed to Jesus Lord Almighty that it wouldn’t come to pass. Nice man, Conrad Ackles, nice family. ‘Ceptin’ that Danish miss he married. She was altogether too fine for Titchville, let him know every day, poor man.”

“So, Mz Harwood –“

“Oh, you can call me Mamie, Snoop. I quite like you.”

Jared felt ridiculously pleased. His old-lady whispering was intact. Until she added, “You know why? You’re on his side, ain’t you? Nobody’s been on that boy’s side for a long time. Nice to see he’s got some company on that road.”

“You heard what happened to Jensen?”

“Mmm-mm, mmm – mm. My, my, my. Niels and Jensen, those two boys. As good as God makes ‘em, and the curse took them, like I knew it would.”

Jared reached for his notebook.

“What can you tell me about it?”

“What can I tell you? Everything, Snoop, but I need more than tea for the tellin’.“ She dropped her voice, serious. “Got some special punch in the fridge. Patty’s recipe. You go get it, Snoop – in the brown jug.”

Jared obeyed, feeling the tingle in his belly that told him he was about to hear something beyond useful. Something thrilling. It was the need for moments like this that had led him to journalism in the first place.

When they both had glasses of what smelled suspiciously like sourmash whiskey, she settled back, and her voice began the tale in the age-old singsong of the born storyteller.

“Well, now. This all goes a long way back, back before I was born. There was this fella name of Artemus Ackles, and Lord but the Devil had him by the hind legs. No matter what he’d do, no matter how hard he fought or how high he cussed, everything went wrong for that man. He had a little hut just along a’here, he and his little wife, and their baby girl. Owned the whole plain, his daddy stole it off a dead man during the war some said. Didn’t do his son any good. He planted cotton and the drought took it, planted corn and the flood took it. Animals up and died, and that man was ready to throw them all on the mercy of ever loving Jesus, ‘cos he had nothin’ left to give, ‘ceptin’ one thing only. And the story is that one night, back in summer of 1897, he got called upon by some stranger, and the next full moon he took his little baby girl, Ettie was her name, he took her out into the night and she was never seen again. And oh, his wife, she wailed and wept, but that baby wasn’t coming back, and the next thing you know, the railroad’s coming through here, and they needed to buy land for the line and build a depot for everything coming through from south Texas to the north. And that’s how the Ackles’ fortune began. Artemus had a son, name of Clay, and that boy had his daddy’s good fortune and then some.”

“So – what? You’re saying that Artemus gave his baby to someone to have good luck?” He couldn’t keep the skepticism out of his voice, but Mamie didn’t seem to mind. She nodded, and smiled, satisfied with her knowledge.

“Weren’t someone. Artemus, he’d called up the old bitch woman herself. Tyche, the one who draws the thread on us all. He gave her his baby girl and in return he and his got one hundred years of fortune. Named the town after her, named the college too. Maybe he thought she’d be pacified with that, and stay away. But here’s the thing, Snoop. All those years keeping bad luck at bay, when the tide turns, you’re gonna get more’n your feet wet. One hundred years of bad luck came down on Jensen Ackles. Nothing he will do will ever turn out right, because he’s cursed. Everything he touches will turn bad somehow, and it’s a thing to break your heart because that boy was the best of them.”

“Mz Harwood…”

“You don’t believe me, I know. You’re a modern man, you don’t need to believe in anything but what your eyes tell you and your i-patch says so.”

“I-pa - ? Never mind.” Jared blew out a breath. “Okay, suppose this were true. Are you saying there’s nothing Jensen can do?”

“Well, I’ll tell you.” Mamie looked conspiratorial again, as if someone were eavesdropping as they spoke. “When I was a girl – and that’s just after the Great War, mind – I used to play with Clay Ackles’ little brother, Quentin. Used to go in their house, and one time when we were playin’ Scalp – that’s a game we made up, with Injuns that scalped us if we got caught – well, I hid in their attic. And when I was up there, I saw something I never forgot.” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “It was an old bible, black as Satan on the outside, with two great hands on the cover, gouged in the leather, like this.” She made claws of her withered old hands. “And inside, written all fancy, was the agreement between Artemus and Tyche. Written there, in blood, back of the family bible. Now, I was only a child, so I ain’t sure of the particulars, but it seemed to me there were clauses and suchlike that a body could read and make somethin’ of, if he’d a mind to.”

It was more than he’d hoped to find, even if it stretched belief.

“Can I ask – what’s with all the dolls, Mamie? ‘Cos I noticed there aren’t any in here.”

She sat back, considering him.

“Well now, that’s a strange thing indeed. Would it help if I told you there were two more in the garden this past week?”

Blankly, Jared shook his head. Mamie smiled grimly.

“And another just ’fore you came. That’s another family grievin’ and prayin’, but it’ll do no good. She’s feeding. There’s been promises made in Titchville this past week, and when the need’s upon her she collects each one.”

A cold twist to his belly, and Jared concentrated carefully to put the drink in his suddenly shaking hand down on the table. The table had a glass stop. The tumbler rattled alarmingly as it settled there.

“You think – you think each of those dolls is – represents – a missing child?”

“Hoo! Snoop, I don’t think, I know. Hear ‘em playing in the garden all night long, up in that tree. She needs somewhere to keep ‘em, I guess. They’re always children, and they’re always playin’, and that’s their fate.”

He felt ill. He was listening to the most delusional nonsense from someone he’d begun to like – or something so chilling it scared him in a whole other way.

Mamie cocked her head.

“There you go, boy, not believin’ an old woman again. Well, I’ll tell you something. Didn’t used to own this land. Didn’t used to have this house. Just slave folk, years past. My daddy lived in a shanty down by the river. Hard times, real hard. But I tell you something I did have. A baby brother. Now I hear him night-times, out unner the big old pine.” Even now, a lifetime later, the sadness was palpable. “You see, my daddy did deals, too.”

 

Chapter 17

Leaving Mamie’s was as categorical as stepping from a carnival funhouse onto a rural back road. Golden dust replaced dolls and madness, and Jared found himself breathing out with unnecessary gusto as he grabbed the wheel of his car.

Such nonsense. All of it. Dolls that captured souls, curses that infected towns and seventeen year old children. A pagan goddess wooed to found a dynasty. It was perverse in its absurdity. This was the United States of America, and the 21^st century, and John Edward was an asshole and James Randi made all kinds of sense.

Jared sped recklessly down the half mile to Jensen’s house, as if to emphasize his rejection of Mamie’s story. The faster he fishtailed away, the more adamant the rejection. So he gunned the car, and watched the dust plume behind him with anxious satisfaction.

When he got to the Ackles house he heard hammering from downstairs. He brought bags of hardware supplies in from the car to find Jensen wrestling with an old lintel, struggling to hold it with his swollen arm while hammering with the other. The job was made more difficult by the fact that there were no power tools to help, and a burst of irritation, sown at Mamie’s , flowered there.

“Why the fuck don’t you get the power back on?”

The hammering stopped and Jensen leaned against the doorway to look back at him with quizzical surprise.

“Well,” he said, slowly, “given they won’t be hurryin’ themselves to do any such thing, there remains the small problem that the fusebox kinda got blown up one Christmas. The last one.”

Jared frowned.

“How the hell did that happen?”

For a brief moment Jensen kept looking at him, then he turned back to his work, hammering hard at the recalcitrant board.

Jared blew out his breath, noisily. Everything in him yearned to find answers, ached for it. His was a world of puzzles that interlocked with a satisfying click when sense was made, and that was his job. Nothing made him happier than finding himself on a path towards solving a mystery, but stepping onto a swirl of rapidly crumbling ice floes did not.

“I went and saw Mamie.”

Jensen didn’t pause in his hammering.

“Yeah? How was she?”

“Either real crazy or real spooky. But until the crazy part, I kinda liked her.”

“Yeah.” This time Jensen did pause, briefly. “I used to.”

“Used to?” Jared put the bags down and stepped over the hole in the floor to where Jensen was working. He saw a slight shrug.

“Mamie helped everyone in town. She didn’t help me when it would have meant…” He twisted his mouth, then started hammering again.

Jared watched as the new lintel was fixed into place, a slow cleaving of the old and new reluctantly brought together by force.

“She thinks the world of you, you know. But she’s real hung up on this curse idea.”

No response from Jensen, so Jared drew on his courage.

“She said a whole lot of stuff, man. Even about how to stop it.” That left Jensen’s hammer hanging in the air for an extra second, before he brought it down with a harder thump than the previous one. “But what if – I know you think you’re cursed, and half the town does too, I know that. Mamie’s sure on board. But what if there is no curse?”

Jensen shouldered past him to reach for more nails.

“I know your brother died. And then your dad. But that kind of thing happens, Jense. Something awful, and then the family – one of them can’t cope.” Jensen stilled now, his head bowed, nails clenched in his hand. “And then the thing with Troy – I know you didn’t mean that. It was a terrible accident. Tragic.”

Jensen blew out a breath and shook his head.

“So, what – you think it could have happened to anyone? Just dumb luck?”

Jared lowered his voice. “Yes, I do.”

Jensen nodded. “Yeah. You’re right. Thanks, Jared.”

For a moment, Jared thought he meant it.

“Okay, look, I know I don’t have all the details –“

“You don’t know squat! Okay?” The nails were flung back into the tub and Jensen turned on his heel. “Jesus! You don’t know one fucking thing.”

“So tell me!” Jared threw his arms wide. “Why do you think you’re cursed?”

“Because – “ Instead of imitating Jared’s expansiveness, Jensen pulled his arms in tight and straight by his body. It was the kind of defensive stance a child might take, when about to be caught in a game of tag. “I lost everything. You don’t know what that year was like, you can’t imagine. Jail was better, Jared, there was less misery in jail.” He swung back to face him. “I tried so hard, and I lost everything, and I could see it happening. And look at me now! Look at this place. I’m here less than a week and a rattler gets me. This is all such a fucking waste of time because this place is gonna burn. Or I’m gonna be run out of town. This is so fucking stupid,” and he tried to storm past him. But Jared reached out and gripped his good arm, stopping him.

“Yeah, a rattler came, but so did I. Right? Maybe your luck is changing. Maybe this is when it all changes.”

The anger seemed to drain from Jensen, fading away as if it lacked the will to linger.

“It’s too late. I lost my family. I lost my friends. I lost baseball. Shit. The one thing I could really do.”

Jared frowned. “Oh, yeah, right. You used to play, didn’t you.” Jensen’s eyes grew wide. Jared hurried on. “I mean, I think I read it somewhere. Maybe that cutting Terry has? You won some kind of championship?”

“Terry keeping a scrapbook, huh?” Then he gave a small laugh, as bitter as pity.”You really don’t know a thing about me, do you? Jared, man, why the fuck are you here?”

“What difference does knowing about baseball make?”

“I don’t know.” Jensen shook his head. “I guess I thought maybe you knew about that. That was your angle. Rangers offer, headed for Arlington, detour to jail. Do not pass go, do not collect $200.”

“I – there was no mention of a contract in the paper.” As if that made a difference. Jared, of all people, knew that newspapers were made as much by what they left out as by what they said, but he was aware that his belly was lurching with a sickening sense of useless grief, and he scrambled for the journalist’s tone to tamp it down. “Do you still play?”

He knew the moment he asked that the question hurt.

“Guess you couldn’t tell. Swelling and all.” Jensen lifted his right arm as though it were repugnant to him. “Day of the signing, winning the pennant, Troy Padalecki shattered my elbow with a baseball bat. Don’t know if he meant it to be – you know, ironic.”

The ugliest thought Jared Padalecki had ever had in his life flooded his being so thoroughly that he knew Jensen saw it. And laughed.

“There it is. I wondered what it would be.”

Swallowing the nausea of it, Jared croaked, “What?”

Still chuckling, Jensen jerked his arm free and picked up the hammer, again.

“It was always gonna be something.” He found another nail and went back to the last patch of the lintel.

“What? What do you mean?”

Shaking his head, smiling, Jensen reached down for a second nail.

“You’re thinking I meant to kill Troy. Right?”

Jared swallowed again, searching for denial. The second half of the lintel was hammered into place, completing the door.

“It’s okay. Glad it wasn’t something else. Least this way, leaving is your choice.”

As if Jensen was making the very door he’d use to go.

“No. Dammit, no. This is my choice.” He grabbed Jensen’s shoulders and pushed him, hard, against the new-peeled wall. Instincts were kicking in, the savage lessons of a violent life, but before Jensen could bring his fists up Jared shoved his body closer and kissed the mouth opening to curse him.

 It was different, this time. Their first kiss had been a desperation of lust and need, but this was the worst kind of betrayal, a promise made in flesh that neither one of them could ever hope to keep. Jensen met him from a place of pain and sorrow; Jared answered with faith in a future so real to him he couldn’t see the ache in its brightness as anything but clarity.

They kissed blindly, stupidly, hands grabbing and gripping at each other’s bodies. Jared groaned and babbled, nonsense words and one name, over and over. Jensen said no words, gave no sounds except for his breathing, harsh and shallow. But he told Jared everything he thought he needed to know by the way his body thrust against Jared’s, by the way his hardness met Jared’s own. This time, Jared reached between them and found their zippers, found Jensen’s cock and shivered at the touch. He stroked him as Jensen’s will fell away and he simply hung on to Jared’s strength, gasping into his neck, helpless there until his body spasmed and he arched into Jared, shaking and spurting and done.

It was so easy to follow, so natural to join him there.

It took more than a minute before Jensen straightened up and pushed Jared away – but the hand that was meshed in the shoulder of Jared’s shirt wouldn’t release, and he leaned forward, awkward and off balance. His eyes met Jared’s, and they stared at each other, knowing nothing else to do, waiting for a resolution neither could make.

Jared’s phone rang.

“Shit.” Jared blew out his breath and stepped back. “Shit, Jense. I have to take this.”

Jensen cleared his throat and looked aside, before tucking himself away and straightening up.

“Sure. Yeah. Go for it.”

Nodding, Jared stepped away and lifted the phone to his ear.

“Padaloser! You owe me more than tickets, shithead.”

“Hey. Rosie.” He wanted more enthusiasm, she deserved more attention, but his body was still surfing a nervous high that kept his mind swirling in its wake. “You got any news for me?’

She coughed noisily in answer, her hello and damn yes.

“Well, got bad news all round, you wanna get these gals into your story.”

Maybe it was all the talk of curses and inevitability, but Jared found he wasn’t surprised.

“What’s the damage?”

“So – gal number one, Lotte. Got herself married four years ago, then got the fuck outta Dodge. She’s about as far away as she can get from Texas and still be on the planet. Somewhere called Echuca. Australia.  Bitin’ the heads off koalas as we speak, no doubt, or whatever the fuck those Aussies do for fun down there.”

It could have been worse, and Jared nodded at the phone, aware that there existed a glimmer of hope for some form of reconnection there for Jensen.

“And the other?’

“Whoo, the other’s a peach. She took some trackin’, since she went and changed her name to Sally Horne and wants exactly zero to do with her – and I quote here, Jarhead, ‘cos you know I’m a fuckin’ lady and words like this would never cross my mind – ‘deadshit cunt of a loser brother’. “

Jared covered the phone and hunched away, even though he knew Jensen couldn’t hear him. Behind him, the sound of hammering had recommenced.

“She actually said that?”

“Hey. I take notes. Verbatim, here.”

“But why? What did he do that made her hate him so much?”

“Your boy’s Jensen Ackles, right?” And hearing her say that, his name and the implied ownership, made Jared’s heart thump in his chest, as ridiculous as a schoolboy. “Yeah, well, dug about some on him, too. Looks to me like she blamed him for the breakup of the family. And the mother died in ’04, guess she blamed him for that, too.”

“But none of it was his fault.” He realized as he said it that he truly believed it. It wasn’t the act of sex that had swayed him; it was the moment afterwards, when he looked into his lover’s eyes and saw him, saw the truth of him, there for the taking.

“She was seven. How much sense do you make of a crazy world at seven? Alright, Jay, that’s all I got for you. Gotta run. Monty’s thinkin’ of putting a women’s page in the paper. I gotta go stop him dragging us back to 1970.”

“Sure. Sure thing, Rosie. And thanks, a lot.”

“Tickets”

“You bet. Talk to you soon.”

He clicked off his phone and sighed. Above him he saw where Jensen had mended the hole in the ceiling. He must have done that in the night, working through the lonely hours to make his home again, on the chance that his sisters were still his family. It hurt him to think of that hope, that effort against pain, being expended on these walls and ceiling and doors in a cause that had been futile for at least eight years.

He needed to do something. He was the solver of puzzles, the savior of the downtrodden.  The hammering continued, and every stroke made him want to flinch. Hammering is for coffins and barricades, he thought.

“I’m going to find that bible.”

The hammering stopped.

“The what now?”

Jared turned back to Jensen, across the room.

“Mamie said something about a family bible. In the attic. You got an attic?”

Jensen shrugged. “Sure. It’s through the cupboard in my old room, right up the northern end.” He wouldn’t look at Jared, busying himself instead in selecting the right drill bit for the floorboards.  “Old Artemus made it a secret stair. The old buzzard was crazy as a cut snake, you ask me.”

“You don’t mind if I go and poke around?”

Jensen found the bit he wanted, held it up to the light’s scrutiny.

“Knock yourself out.”

Jared pocketed his phone and picked up his notepad, suddenly determined.

“Okay then.” And what he really meant was, don’t worry.

I’m going to save you.

 

Chapter 18

 

It should have surprised Jared, but it didn’t. Somehow, as he climbed the stairs and then followed the upstairs hallway to Jensen’s room – a room as yet un-reclaimed, dusty and stinking of old urine, a tattered Green Day poster still clinging to the wall – he had discovered in himself a belief in Mamie’s words. He had seen so little of the world and understood less, and it allowed him to think of things like justice and fairness without cynicism. Jensen was the hero of this story, and for all that Jared knew tragedy was real and luck could taste sour, he could not yet accept that this time the hero might not get his true reward. Not when part of the reward was Jared himself.

So when he found the cupboard, and squeezed up the narrow nineteenth century steps into the attic, it made all kinds of sense to him that the first box he opened in its slatted gloom held the Ackles family bible. It was wrapped in an old shawl and buried beneath a pile of nineteen forties newspapers, and was just as Mamie described –a  tortured looking thing, its leather cover twisted into black shapes that might have resembled the marks made by clawed hands. He spread the shawl out and carefully opened the book, hearing the gold edges catch and release against each other with a faint creak as he riffled through it. The smell of old paper and mildew surrounded him.

Right at the back was a small, brown envelope. His stomach tightened as he picked it up and gingerly pried open the flap. It wasn’t sealed, but time and pressure had brought the paper together in an organic bond, as if to keep the contents inviolate.

The air was bad and the light worse, but rather than going downstairs something made Jared hunker down against the slope of the roof and hold the document up to the slit of dying sunlight coming in between the tiles. The sunset made the bar of light a deep rose color, bringing a glow to the paper surrounding the words in his hands.

To this most disagreeable of tasks I Artemis Callaghan Ackles now do set my hand and swere, as the Lord Almighty give me power to do so, to its veracity and that most honorable of intenshins; to wit, to declare to any of my desendants who comes after the means by which my Fortune has been made, and  our combined Fates have been sealed. I don’t reckon any reader, many years hence, will feel obliged for the knowledge. But you must trust that I did what I did to gratify the natural desires of a man to preserve that which he loves. I did not look for greater Glorie than to be the provider of your daily bread. If Fortune has indeed been kinder to me than to others, I reckon it known that She has been certain cruel to those to come. If I have condemmed my desendants to a miserie more dmeaning and destructive than that which I looked to escape, I beg your pardon. I can only plede that the needs of my small Family appered to me to be the most pressing, when set aginst the needs of those not yet born.

I will not write of that Awful night when I met her, nor of the deed which will surely see my eternal soul committed to the infernal regions on my departure from this wicked life. I will only set down that Jan Padalacki’s woman came to me in response to my askings and, being reckoned a very knowing witch full of lor which no Christian woman should ever have tell of, she directed me in the ways and means by which I came to gain my considerable Fortune.

Only this will I here record so that the Lord Almighty in his Infinte Mercy may know I have  done what I could to leave a clew for those who come after me. The woman Padalacki instructed me that the curse to be visited on my unfortunate generations could be averted if one could be found to willingly take the curse upon themselves. It seems to me a precarious hope but it is true enough that I have willingly taken the curse form her family,a nd perhaps Another can be found to do so long years hense.

If by this writing I have helped a desendant of mine, then the burden of confessing my wickedness will not be invain. I remain, damned but ye trusting in ourLords kindess and mercy,

Artemus C. Ackles.

By the time he read it through twice – looping up the faded ink to make words in his mind, editing the haphazard spelling to make sense of the grammar – the light was almost gone. In this darkening attic, with the scent of ages and the sound of a dead man’s confession in his ears, Jared could believe it all. A curse. A cure. Fortunes bought at a hideous price. A goddess on the plains of Texas, glutted from civil wars and wars of extinction against indigenous peoples, craving more as the bright new century and modernity approached.

Impatiently, he straightened up, and immediately banged his head against the roof. It jolted him back to the present, and Jensen downstairs, trapped in the coils of a lurid story. Because it could be nothing more. And yet – a story that was believed deeply enough became a kind of reality. Whatever the Ackles family and the people of Titchville believed had become their truth. When Moira Corcoran talked of a godforsaken town she was putting into words the bedrock of her existence, and that was not something to be easily put aside.

But another belief could replace it.

If Jensen could be made to believe his great-grandfather’s words… Jared gathered up the bible and the envelope with its dramatic contents and stumbled to the small doorway, bent over and carrying it as if he were carrying a child. With growing excitement he blinked into the darkness and felt his way down to Jensen’s room, from where he could see headlights in the garden below. They lit a square on Jensen’s wall that held a hand-painted Rangers pennant as mural, once precious, now almost obscured by scrawls and gouges. Jared had a moment to think of that long-lost contract – was it true? Had Jensen really been close to a life in baseball? – before he realized that headlights were not necessarily anything good.

He hurried down the hall and the stairs, slipping and stumbling, swinging around on the newel at the foot before sliding to a stop in the living room.

So excited was he by the thought of the cure, so distracted by its possibilities as placebo or panacea, that it took a ridiculously long time for him to realize that he was staring at Terry and a shotgun and Jensen kneeling on the floor with blood rilling from his lip, hands raised.

“You sick fuck!” Terry, Jared saw, was crying. The tears were pouring from him, ceaseless and unheeded.  “You sick, sick sonofabitch. Where is she? Where is she?”

Jared knew disaster the moment Jensen slowly shook his head.

“Hey, Terry. Hey, man.” Jared pitched his voice low, as much from shock as from strategy.

“You fucking bring her back. “ The shotgun was pushed into Jensen’s face, shaking violently, and Jared may as well not have spoken for all either of them acknowledged him. “You took her. You took my Kellie. Bring her back now, right now, or I’ll blow your sick fucking head off.”

Jared couldn’t see Jensen’s expression in the light of the single small hurricane lamp on the wall, but his shoulders were back, his head up.

“I don’t have her, Terry. I’m really sorry. I don’t know where she is.”

“Bullshit! Bullshit, you lying piece of crap!”

“Whoa, hey, Terry.” Jared put his hands out, low and wide. “Come on, man. This isn’t right.”

“Right? He should never have come back here. He took those kids. All the kids. He killed them. Didn’t you?” To Jensen, with a vicious jab of the gun that had Jensen ducking backwards. “You give Kellie back to me. You know where she is.”

“I swear to you, Terry, I don’t kno-“

“Terry! Wait, okay, just wait. Look at me.” Jared’s voice cracked as he tried to lower it to something soothing. “When did Kellie go missing?”

Terry kept staring at Jensen as though he could kill him with a thought.

“This afternoon. She went next door, and they sent her home at about four, they said, and she never made it. Next door, Jared!”

“It’s only been a few hours.” Jared heard only pity in Jensen’s voice. “Are you sure she’s not at a friend’s place?’

“I looked! I looked everywhere! Christ, you think I wouldn’t turn the town upside down to find her?”

Jared took a step closer. “Whoa, okay. Terry? Listen to me. Jensen couldn’t have done it, okay? I’ve been here all afternoon, and so’s he.”

“No.” Terry shook his head, the gun trembling inches from Jensen’s face. “No. It’s him. I know it’s him.”

“Oh, for – Terry, stop it.” Slowly Jensen lowered his hands, then got to his feet. The gun stayed low, now pointing at his belly. “If I could help you, man, I would. I’m real sorry that Kellie’s missing. But I haven’t taken any children, and you’d know that if you weren’t so goddam stuck on hating me.”

Terry’s jaw trembled. Then, with aching slowness, he lowered the gun tip towards the floor.

“Please. I don’t care. I don’t care anymore. Please. Just give her back.”

“Jesus Christ!” Jensen screwed his eyes shut. “Terry, I can’t.”

“Is she dead?” His voice was a wrecked thing, desolate and lost. “Did you kill her?’

Before Jensen could answer, flashlights played across his wall and they heard the sounds of voices outside. The slam of car doors. Two, three. More.

“What the hell?” Jared crossed to the window to look out across the porch. He saw nothing more than torsos in the darkness, caught against the headlights and the swirl of disturbed dust. “Terry, what’s going on?”

“They’ve come to get some justice for their children.”

As he spoke, someone yelled, “Ackles! Get your filthy coward ass out here!”

“Fuck.” It was a hitched breath of a word, as Jensen came alongside him and heard for himself the official welcome home from the people of Titchville.

“Dammit, Terry! It’s not Jensen. Don’t you get it? He’s got an alibi for today. And for when the other children went missing. Sheriff Boule’s been out here, he knows.”

Terry put the shotgun on the floor; then, as helplessly as if someone swung a hammer to his knees, he dropped down beside it.

“I’ll do anything you want, Ackles. I’ll give you everything, everything I have. My house. My car. My stocks. You can have them. Just give me my baby girl back. Please.”

“Hey, asshole! Get out here!” Something smashed against the front door. Another voice, clear only in its hatred, yelled out and a second crash came, this time against the window.

“Jared, go.” Jensen turned to him, gripped his arm. “Get out the back. They don’t know you’re here. Just go.”

“What? No!” Jared wrenched his arm away. “This is stupid.”

“Of course it’s stupid. It’s a fucking mob. Not renowned for reasoning ability. Very good at taking out innocent bystanders.”

“You’re innocent, Jensen!”

“Yeah, I don’t think they give two shits, Jare.”

“But I’m not.”

They both turned to Terry, still kneeling. His arms hugged his stomach, as if to stop a pain so deep inside him it pinned him to the ground.

“I’ll confess, alright? Is that what you’re waiting for? You want me to confess?”

“Jesus, Terry,” Jensen muttered.

“It was me who put the glass in the bread.”

“What?” That startled Jensen, Jared saw, even as they ignored another bottle smashing on the porch.

“I hated you so much. You were always so happy.  And your brother loved you. I could see that. Everyone loved you. Niels never treated you the way Calvin and Troy treated me.”

“You lost me my job? My friends?”

Terry nodded. “I waited there at the bakery for three nights before you left the room after setting the loaves.” He blinked as someone screamed an obscenity outside. “I wrecked your fusebox. And it was me who…”

“Fuck!” Jensen took a step towards him. “You did that? You fucking ruined me?”

“You thought it was Troy, I know. He was always in your face, but I was the one who urged him on.”

“Why?” Jensen was blinking, too, but it was to clear the tears that suddenly came to his eyes, fifteen years late. “Why did you hate me so much?”

“You...” So much hopelessness in his voice. “You were so …You made me…”

“What? I made you what?”

But Jared saw. He knew, now, why Terry was so intent on destroying the boy Jensen had been. He knew why his cousin couldn’t sleep when Jensen Ackles came home.

“Oh, god. Terry.”

“So you can kill me now. I don’t care. Let my baby go and you deserve to do whatever you want to me.”

“Jesus…”

“Please, I’ll do anything. I’ll beg, I’m begging.”

“Take the curse.”

Jared’s words came into a brief pause in the yelling from outside, but neither Jensen nor Terry stopped in their staring at each other.

“Jared, just go.”

“No! Listen to me, Jense. I found the bible. It’s all in there, like Mamie said. If Terry willingly takes the curse from you, you’re free.”

 “Sure. Okay.” Terry reached for Jensen’s legs. “I’ll do it. I’ll take it. Anything.”

“What? No!” Jensen backed away. “Jared – I know what Mamie thinks, okay? She peddled that stuff to us when Niels and I were just kids. It’s what made Mutti throw her out, all her talk of curses and cures.” He ran his good hand through his hair. “It scared her. She believed it all, you know, my mama did. Put up these little Scandinavian charms everywhere, hung them over the windows and doors. And it made her be strong, to protect us. She never unbent, never let herself relax, from the moment she heard it all, she was on guard for us. Christ, Jared, this stuff has been screwing with my family for as long as I can remember.” Angrily, he wiped at his eyes with the base of his palms. “And she made us be the best we could, to protect ourselves. Me and Niels, we could never slack off. If we did everything right, we would keep ourselves safe, keep our sisters safe. That was our job.”

Bewildered, Jared could only stare at him, until another bottle crashed into the house and made him jump.

“So, you – you knew about the letter?”

“Hell, yeah. Dad put the damn thing back in the attic to try and get it out of Mutti’s mind.”

There was a pounding on the front door now.

“Ackles! Get out here, you sonofabitch.” Something banged and rattled, and then there was a soft whump, and the light became orange and flickering. Smoke curled inwards through the broken glass, and the possibility Jensen had spoken of in that same afternoon became real.

They were going to burn him out.

“Jared, take Terry and go.”

“Come with us!”

“Oh, Christ. What’s the point?” Jensen spread his hands wide. “Where am I gonna go?”

Terry scrambled to his feet, swaying, lightheaded with grief.

“You’re not going. You’re giving me back my baby. Give me the curse. I don’t care.”

At once, the noise from outside seemed to grow muffled, as if it were coming through water, or from a far distant place. The air grew heavy. A massive engine was starting up overhead, and then inside the room itself, powerful throbs of mass and energy thrumming through their bones, and yet silent, diffuse, and from no visible source. Jared and Jensen looked about themselves in frightened confusion as it grew hard to breathe, to think.

“What –“

“There.”

A figure was at the window, hooded, silent; and then it was inside, and they knew they had no place near this thing. Jared knew, instantly and without argument, that whatever was in front of them was something so far beyond his understanding of the world that it became *&&^*. It was unnatural in a way that made everything else seem pallid and insubstantial, as if they were touching the universe just by breathing in its presence.

It spoke. There was no sound. The words formed themselves in Jared’s mind in the way music played in his head when he saw a sheet of music.

“Do you offer him the curse?’

The words were directed to Jensen, who stood, shaking and staring, and seeming incapable of speech. Blindly, he put out his hand, and Jared grabbed it.

The figure extended one long arm towards Jensen.

“Do you give this one the curse? He has asked it of you.”

“Will – “ His voice came out so dry it choked him, but a puzzle had clicked into place for him, and Jared would not let it go. “Will you give back the children?”

They couldn’t see features under the hood, but he felt as if it was staring at him, stripping him to sinew and bone. If a desert came alive, it would feel and sound like this. Old, and deep, and pulsing with malice for greenness lost and life abandoned.

“Those who wish to go.”

“Th-thank you.”

There was no acknowledgement. The implacable, unseen gaze never left Jensen’s face.

“Who are you talking to?” Terry looked from one to the other, bewildered.

Jensen found his voice, tight and terrified. “Did you use him?”

An inclination of the hood.

“He was an instrument.”

“And you – you’re the one who holds this curse. You’re the one who did all this.”

There was no answer, and suddenly Jensen roared.

“My family’s gone! My dad, my mom, my sisters. Niels. They’re all gone!”

A great sighing filled the shimmering air, pouring out of the walls, the floor, the ceiling. It grew to a wail of anguish that echoed in their bodies, shaking them, dropping them to their knees.

The hooded figure tilted its head back, and Jared knew it felt the shattering grief that filled the room as a kind of ecstasy. This was Jensen’s heart being sounded for all to hear, and it made a music the creature had fed on forever.

“Do you accept the bargain?”

Jared squeezed Jensen’s hand, waiting for the inevitable. Tears were drawing paths in the dirt on Jensen’s face, but they shone in the muted light from the cars outside, so that it looked as if his face were painted with lines of brightness.

“And it keeps going on? He’ll pass it on to someone else? That how it goes? Someone else gets this misery?”

“Yes, I’ll do it, whatever you want.” Terry hung on Jensen’s words, trying to make sense of them.

“I am your Fate. I am yours until death unless you free yourself by giving me to a willing other.” The creature gestured towards Terry. “Accept the offer.”

Jensen dropped Jared’s hand and stood up. For a moment, he glanced at Jared, and what Jared saw in that tremulous smile suddenly made him even more afraid.

“No.”

“Jensen, what are you doing?”

“I said no.”

Terry cried out and scrabbled for him.

“I’ll take it, I’ll take it! Give her back, please, oh god, please, please.”

“No. You listen to me, you bitch.” Jensen took an impossible step towards the creature. “I’m betting no one has passed this up before, have they? So what happens to you? You’re my Fate, you’re stuck with me. What happens if I die and I haven’t passed it on?”

The hand that pointed to Terry shook slightly.

“You will die.”

“And you’ll come with me, am I right?”

“You must take his offer. Pass this curse onwards!”

Jensen crossed his arms.

“No. If you’re my Fate, then I guess I’ll be yours, too.”

“No! Shit, Jensen, what are you saying?” Jared grabbed for him but he stepped away, never taking his eyes off the Fate that stood before him.

“You want a curse, Terry? I’ll give you one. I forgive you.” Jensen tilted his head, and gave a soft laugh. “Yeah. I forgive you. It was all stupid, childish crap that got out of hand, but it wasn’t all your doing, Terry. And you were just a dumb kid anyway. So I forgive you. Whatever bad blood existed between the Ackles and the Padaleckis, it’s not going to go on from here.”

The pulsating pressure in the room grew stronger, deeper. The words in Jared’s mind grew unbearably thick and dense in tone.

“You will suffer.”

“Yeah? Been there, done that. What the hell have you got up your sleeve that I haven’t already seen coming?”

Glass, smashing, and almost simultaneously Jensen gave a soft grunt, like the cough of a fox. Jared turned to him, but couldn’t see it at first. Then Jensen looked down at his chest, said “Oh” in a tone of quiet surprise, and sagged back slowly against the wall.

Jared screamed.

“No! Shit, oh god, Jensen!”

Jensen propped against the wall, one leg gradually giving way, already looking as utterly helpless as one of Mamie’s dolls. Jared grabbed him, held him as the strength left him and he sagged completely, falling at last into Jared’s arms.

“Hey, shh, shh, Jensen. Hey, come on now.” He didn’t know why he was crooning to him, only that this was all impossible, and the blood that looked black in the firelight and darkness was part of that other world, where deserts spoke and curses were real. They would soon leave to come home to the everyday, and Jensen would be fine, the children would come home, there would be work and family and love, so much love with this man he was holding.

“Oh. Oh, Jared.”

“I know, I know. It’s okay, Jense. It’s going to be okay.”

“What – “ Terry whirled, looked outside to where there were dark shapes against the fire and the lights, then back to where Jensen lay, trying to understand.

The desert voice, written in dust in their minds, grew louder. “You will die now, unless you release Me.”

“Jared.” Jensen’s body was rigid, one hand gripping Jared’s shirt. “Jared.”

“I’m here.”

“So sorry. So sorry. You – you’re the worst thing. Of all of it.”

Jared swallowed, found a smile, his eyes filling with terrified tears.

“I know. Me, too.”

“Shouldn’t be in this. Oh, god, Jared!” In his eyes, Jared saw a mortal fear, as he half-raised up in his arms. “Oh, shit. I don’t want to die.”

“I know.”

“Don’t let him die!” Terry shrieked. “He knows where she is! Tell me! Tell me, you sonofabitch!”

“I don’t want to die. I can’t…”

Jared gripped him tighter, holding him close, keeping Fate at bay.

“Help me.” So soft, now, so low, and Jared understood exactly what he wanted, as he’d understood him for so long. The sound of his own heart breaking would echo in these walls after today, but he would give what Jensen needed to finish.

“I’ll help, Jense. It’s okay.”  Jared glared up at the hooded figure towering above them, and said the words Jensen asked him to say.

“He said no, bitch.”

A smile, fingers closing around his shoulder, and Jensen’s heart stopped.

A roaring of sound, tremendous, cavernous, visceral as it swept into them. It was a screech of such fury and hatred that Jared gasped, hid his face in Jensen’s chest, and just held on, held on against its force. Terry was flattened. The fire on the outer wall was extinguished in a blast of air and pressure. Bodies in the yard were sent backwards, staggering into cars that rocked, horns suddenly blaring.

By a small East Texas backwater, on a moonless night in June, Tyche was taken out of this world by a simple act of love.

Jared kept his face hidden, sobbing openly, knowing the pain in his body would never heal. One part of his mind searched for something or someone to blame, but he knew even as the thought formed that it was unworthy of the legacy created in this dirty, half-finished room. All of his hopes and plans were still, now, lost in an act of sacrifice that made him love the source of it even as he bade him goodbye.

A shudder, through his body, but it hadn’t come from him.

It was Jensen, arching again, gasping and crying out. As if it was electricity, not grief, pouring into him.

“Jensen! Oh, god, man, just hold on, hold on. I’m here. I’ll help!” Jared scrambled into his jeans pocket for his phone, his mind whirling, overcome.

Even as he punched in 911 he became aware that Terry was groaning, trying to drag himself upright. There were more sounds from outside, too – no longer angry, but scared, shocked, bewildered.

And as he gave the address in a voice that was too calm to be his own, he heard something that made every hair on his body stand up with a primal chill.

Children’s voices. Calling out, through the dust and darkness, the last vestiges of smoke. Calling to parents who heard, and shrieked, and fell from terror into the deepest joy they would ever know in this life.

 

Epilogue

Sheriff Boule was a wise man. When faced with a crowd of shocked people, no longer a mob but disoriented, confused and impossibly elated to varying degrees; reports of an explosion, with no signs of a blast; an extinguished fire; seven bewildered children; and an injured, dying man, he quickly and calmly worked to assist the ambulance officers who arrived then set about making the least amount of fuss out of what threatened to become legend within an hour.

The first thing he did, after overseeing Jensen’s safe placement in an ambulance for transport to hospital at McKinney, was collect the firearms at the scene. It was clear that Ed Brice’s rifle had been fired; but given that Ed swore he didn’t even know there was a bullet in the chamber, and that Ed was as bad a liar as he was a shot, the odds of it being a deliberate effort to shoot Jensen Ackles through a window from twenty yards away, in poor light, were negligible. Sheriff Boule wrote it up as an accidental discharge of a firearm improperly secured and fined Ed fifty bucks. The explosion was due to uncovered paint tins being left on the porch, and the subsequent blast when the flames hit the kerosene tins put the fire out.

The children he sent home with their sobbing parents, too busy praising Jesus and hugging their own to notice he gave them an extra one or two to look after for the night until their own parents could be found. The FBI were called in, quite without resentment, and proved surprisingly useful. They located the homes of three of the children – in Speedville, Florida, Speedtown, Mississippi, and Speed, North Carolina. It made for one of the happiest afternoons in the timeworn senior FBI officer’s life when he got to sit in Sheriff Boule’s rackety old chair and contact three grieving families in three different states to tell them that their child, against all best guesses and hope, was coming home. All had been missing for at least three months, one of them for eight.

But the seventh child proved impossible to place in his own family. He was a small boy, perhaps four years old, and he couldn’t remember much about his home. When asked, he said a tall man with glasses was President, with a nice wife, and he listened to them on the radio with his pa some nights. He lived by a river, and he and his pa kept ducks. His name was Davey.

No database offered a clue as to the child’s origins. His face and story were publicized, with one or two other details kept from the public to weed out the false claimants – and there were some. Throughout the search he stayed with Terry, Stacey and Kellie, because he had fallen utterly in love with Kellie and followed her everywhere. She was the reason, he said, why he left the garden where he’d been playing so happily all afternoon with all the others.

Because that was the one detail that threw every detective and psychologist assigned to the case into a pool of doubt. Each of the children swore they’d only been gone a few hours. It was a beautiful day, and there were lots of other children there, playing all kinds of games, and they didn’t notice it was dark until they heard a loud noise and looked around themselves to see that night had fallen and somehow they were in Mz Harwood’s creepy doll garden. Then they had huddled together, scared and lost, until Mz Harwood came out and gathered them up, shushing their tears and promising to take them to their parents. Her phone wasn’t working, for some reason, so she told them to hold hands and walk together to the Ackles place, where it seemed like there was some kind of gathering. Young Jensen would have a phone they could borrow, she’d told them.

The children missing for months weren’t traumatized. There was an afternoon of hidden delights and laughter, from which they’d come happily home to their families – inexplicably many miles away now, but gratifyingly delirious with joy on their reunions the next day.

Apart from the reunited families, Jared was the one who gained most from the strange night at the Ackles’ house. He said the best thing was Jensen’s survival, and of course, it was. But fate had decreed that he was the first journalist on the spot, and his report of the night’s happenings, sent from Jensen’s bedside in the early hours of the morning, caused a sensation when Monty Sugar received it and promptly put it on the San Augustin Sun’s online site. The Dallas Herald picked it up, and before long it was the most re-blogged, re-tweeted, and re-hashed story of the week. Jared wrote it when he was so exhausted and scared that he wanted to weep; but somehow he remembered his training and put together a report that managed to glide over mentions of goddesses and curses and focused instead on the mysterious children, reappearing in the dark. The act of it kept him sane, as Jensen battled for life alongside him. But somehow, Jared knew that the man he loved would survive. Tyche had lost; and her Sisters probably knew that the Ackles score needed to be rebalanced.

After the initial interest some bright new wonder caught the nation’s eye, and Jared settled down to write the definitive story of the Titchville curse all through the long months of Jensen’s rehabilitation. He was the one who connected ‘speed’ with the old Anglo-Saxon word for luck, and allowed himself to ruminate on how each of the lost children’s towns came to be named that way. Its publication brought a wave of new interest to the town, and the people of Titchville found themselves greeting so many New Age seekers of the Goddess, or the Garden of Earthly Delights, that some bright member of the once defunct Chamber of Commerce suggested Parcae College be re-opened as a centre for the study of all things paranormal, occult and divine. It made for a weird marriage of philosophies in East Texas, but as usual, commerce won over any other, and the town of Titchville had a boom it hadn’t experienced since the railroad came through.

Terry and Stacey adopted Davey without much trouble. Terry remembered little of the night, but supported whatever Jared had to say about the matter, which was hardly the truth anyway.

And Jensen Ackles spent eight months in rehabilitation after the gunshot wound nearly killed him. His right ear drum was smashed in the explosion, which left him permanently deaf in that ear. He didn’t mind so much; it meant he could ignore Jared when his boyfriend had something to say he didn’t want to hear. That usually led to arguments, sometimes fights, and then to make-up sex that kept them both happy, so he didn’t complain. He didn’t complain about the unfairness of the fact that he was still largely unwelcome in Titchville, either. He’d bargained with Fate, and won; he figured walking away wounded, with his life, was as much as he’d ever ask for, and the fact that Jared was there with him was luck beyond any measure he could come up with.

There was never a day when Jared wasn’t equally grateful. And at night, when they lay together in Jensen’s room (cleaned, but still unpainted), Jared would feel Jensen’s arms wrap around him and he knew again, as he’d known for so many years, that they would always keep him safe.

*&^%%%$$$^

The boy was breathing better now, and Jensen felt a kind of embarrassment at the way the kid was looking at him.

“You okay to get home?” he said. The boy nodded, and coughed again, still spitting out pool water. “Where are you staying?”

“With them.” The voice was weak, but Jensen grinned at the venom in it. On impulse, he stuck out his hand.

“I’m Jensen. You catch any more crap off them, you let me know, okay?”

The boy nodded, long dark hair joining the scratch marks on his face to stripe it like a woebegone tiger’s. He reached up to shake Jensen’s hand.

“I’m Jared.”

“Well, okay. Uh, see you later, Jared.” Jensen gave a small wave, and turned to go with Niels. “Oh, and hey. Jared?”

“Yeah?”

“Good luck.”

 

 

The end.