Date: Tue, 01 Nov 2005 21:24:44 +0000
From: M Williams <kollegekid54321@hotmail.com>
Subject: Living with a Past - Chapter 10

- DISCLAIMER - The following story, novel, or chapter
contains homosexual themes and is not intended for anyone
under the legal viewing age - If depictions of homosexual
activities disturb you - Do Not Continue To Read This Story
- Feedback appreciated

Copyright - 2005 - Max Williams
(Kollegekid54321@hotmail.com)
******************************************************
Chapter 10
     Fredo's bike was rusty and old.  Like most of his
possessions.  The bike was also stolen.  Like most of his
possessions.  He was pedaling quickly down the stretch of
Route 5 past the old hotel and the storefronts, past the
little homes and their little yards, and about twenty
minutes later, past the factories and their flaming
smokestacks.  It was a grey, unpleasant, overcast Sunday not
surprising after the torrents and lightning the night
before.  It was also starting to get dark.  Not that the
dark frightened Fredo, but . . . well . . . he shook it off
and pedaled harder.
     His destination was a little bit farther on, in an
older section of the next worker's village on the other side
of the Ford plant.  He hadn't been there in a long time, but
now he was embroiled in a situation that required he go
back, despite the bubble of dread and vomit that was
creeping in his chest toward his mouth.  He swallowed again
and redoubled his efforts in the stinging droplets of the
freezing twilight rain, and reached down to check that his
shovel was still firmly tied to the frame of his bike.
Swallowing again and grimacing a little bit, he set his mind
to his gruesome task and finally saw the sign that he'd been
looking for since home.  Preparing himself to apologize to
his father, he skidded his bike across the wet driveway
under an arched sign reading "Wyoming County Cemetery" and
sped off into the night; shovel clinking horribly; eyes wide
and alert.

***********************************

     Jason stood in front of the floor length mirror in the
upstairs bathroom of his little house in his shorts.  His
left hand was tucked into the band of his boxers, and his
right hand pensively stroked the slab of muscle that was his
chest.  He was thinking about the weekend, as he'd thought
about all day before.  He couldn't remember Saturday night.
He didn't want to remember, he knew, but so much of his body
hurt and was really cold, and as he looked at himself now,
he thought he looked a little stronger, albeit a little
paler.  His abs were now clear cut and hard, and the little
bit of fat around his stomach that had always bothered him
was completely gone.  His entire upper body started with the
pleasantly wide bulk of his round shoulders and defined,
hard square pecs, then narrowed down either side in a
pleasant V that looked strong and supported by the newly
prevalent abs.  His meager chest hair was pleasant and
silky, and like always, was scant about his chest, but
meshed together in a thick line that traveled from his navel
down his hard stomach and disappeared under the band of his
boxers.  His warm brown complexion had mellowed slightly,
and he thought he looked more buff, but less tan.  Well,
that made sense.  He'd remembered reading that a person
could lose all kinds of weight in times of intense physical
stress.  And he had fallen into the river.
     Jason stopped, and looked at his thoughtful face in the
mirror.  Fallen?  Hmm . . . he couldn't remember.  After the
party . . . oh God, the party.  Jason's face went from
thoughtful to sad, to slightly horrified as he thought of
the looks he was going to get in gym that day.  He'd kissed
Sean.  What the fuck was he thinking?!  But Sean must have
forgiven Jason for it, or he wouldn't have pulled him back
out of the freezing water.  Or at least . . . gotten someone
to pull Jason out - Jason couldn't exactly remember how he
got out, but it must have had something to do with Sean.
Jason absentmindedly rubbed himself through his boxers,
considering that, and staring at his slightly trimmer
physique.  Hey - he suddenly thought - Meghan's gonna like
fucking this.  He flexed his bicep in the mirror, and then
flicked off the light with a smile and left.  Stray light
from outside dappled the mirror he'd just been looking at
through the mounting rain hitting the bathroom window.

***********************************

     "Mud," Fredo said.  "Fucking mud!"  He was kneeling in
front of a small plaque buried in the ground, desperately
moving the earth from around and under it, although the
mounting rain was making his newly dug hole a pit of icy,
muddy water.  He could feel the sharp corners of the cheap
metal gravestone gouging his numb hands, but he had only so
much time before someone would see him, there, digging, in
the small cemetery, and that kept him working through the
pain.  Mingled thoughts of pride, shame and hatred ran
through his mind as he alternated lifting the sloppy piles
of mush from the ground and ducking out of sight of the
headlights that appeared unnervingly frequently on Route 5.
Almost . . . almost . . . he kept whispering to himself as
he slowly, slowly gained some depth under the plaque.  He
couldn't help himself from reading it as he worked, over and
over again, until the name Roberto Richiazzi was all he had
in his head.  A death date some 8 years previous highlighted
some memories in Fredo's head - things he hadn't thought
about since high school had begun.
     Things like - watching his father beat his mother and
brother senseless for years . . . things like - going into
his father's closet one weekend morning while his parents
were fighting in the living room of their little apartment,
and lifting up the cover of a shoebox he had been told never
to touch . . . things like - attending the first viewing the
next Monday.  Things like - looking down at his father,
motionless for once, but still stern looking.  Roberto had
been a proud, passionate Italian; Fredo would never forget
looking at that dark-haired, olive face in the coffin, that
was so strong and cruel . . . and then oddly silent.  And
Fredo would never forget sneaking out of that funeral parlor
. . . taking the shoebox that he'd been careful to bring and
conceal in the car . . . running down the street that hot,
hot afternoon . . . being a chubby, unhappy, curly haired
little boy that ran with a mission to the cemetery next
door, and then standing, triumphantly, in the midst of a
variety of exciting hot springtime smells like clipped grass
and fresh dirt, and throwing the box down into the newly cut
pit, and making sure to cover it completely after it landed
on the precarious ledge where the grave marker would soon
sit.  Fredo remembered that day . . . it was only two days
after the wrenching date recorded forever in bronze that sat
angrily in front of Fredo as he dug in the cold.  Eight
years.  Eight fucking ye -
     Fredo felt something.  Finally.  Something that was
neither the hard bottom of the plaque nor the forgiving dirt
of the ground.  It was soft, and wet, and felt almost
exactly like what he was looking for.
     Yes!
     A car door opened.
     Fuck!
     Fredo immediately froze and hunched down on the sodden
ground.  His one hand remained in the whole, firmly grabbing
his buried prize like a hungry child claiming a pastry they
don't want to lose.  Flashlights were beaming around now,
coming around the side of a car that looked vaguely like it
had badges on the side.
     Fuuuck.
     Fredo tugged at the squarish object and felt it not
give at all.  He pulled harder and his numb soaking fingers
slipped off the corner of the soft surface and made a
sloshing sound in the pool of water in the hole.  One of the
flashlights stopped and beamed over his way, listening.
Fredo froze.  The flashlight froze too.  There was talking
now.  Too low to make out, but Fredo had an idea of what was
going on, and slowly withdrew his hand, and began crawling
backwards, through his pile of mud, and away from his
father.  He made it about fifteen feet before he felt his
foot hit something hard, and he turned with a gasp, only to
find he'd made it to where he'd left his bike and the
shovel, and the rope that had been tying them together.  He
hunkered down for a moment.
     "Yeah, it looks like someone's been here", said one of
the state troopers as they walked the lumpy ground of the
old cemetery.
    "I think that's the neighbor's house, over there; the
neighbor that called", said the second one.
     "Could be.  Looks like the only house for miles",
replied the first.  Both of them were tired and it was
raining, and they had better things to be doing than
responding to an old woman's call that someone was in the
cemetery.  In the car they'd both been expecting it to be a
practical joke anyway.
     "You see anything", asked the second.
     "No, nothing", said the first.
     "Yeah, me either - must've been a jo - Holy cats!"
     "What?"
     "Look - someone's been digging up this grave - I almost
stepped in the hole!"  The first trooper whistled as they
both looked down at the clear destruction of the cheap old
grave.  "Well who would do that", continued the second, just
as a shovel flew out of nowhere and hit him squarely in the
back of the head.  The first trooper heard the dull thud
just in time to get out of the way of the ricocheting
instrument and see the surprised look on his partners face
as his hat was knock off and he fell.  The first trooper
pulled his gun and struck his stance, nervously brandishing
his weapon into the empty watery night.  There was no sound
or noise - no footsteps, no breathing, no nothing to give
him an idea of where that shovel had just come fr-  A noose
tightened around his neck and a hand hit his arm until he
dropped the gun.  He struggled for a minute, stretching to
claw at the hands that controlled the rope around his neck
but felt only air and emptiness behind his head as the thick
vinyl stuff cut deeper into his neck.  He dropped to his
knees, and then felt himself be let go as he doubled over,
gasping, and heard a figure run around him and get his gun,
and then feverishly began swearing and digging at the ground
somewhere to the trooper's left.  He looked up, pulling the
rope from the welt in his neck, and choked as he looked at
his partner, still motionless.  He then saw a small, frail
figure beating at the ground and tugging at something behind
the gravestone, and with a great heave and swear of triuph,
the figure fell backward, clutching something.
     "Hey - you - hey kid - get back here with that
gravestone -"  The trooper was trying valiantly to uphold
the law but all that was coming out of his mouth was a croak
and a hoarse set of vowels that did nothing more than alert
the figure to his slight recovery.  Spying the shovel, the
trooper jumped unexpectedly to his feet and ran, grabbed the
hefty tool and began approaching the figure, who sat in
terse stillness under cover of dark, on a pile of mud from a
disrupted grave.  As he approached, he thought that perhaps
the figure had realized he was caught and given up - there
was a low, even set of words coming from his shadowy mouth.
     "Hey, son."  The trooper's voice was still a croak, but
at least a vaguely audible one now.  "Hey - what are you
whispering, son?  Are you whispering Hail Mary's?  Huh?  Is
that what you're whispering?  Yeah, Ill bet you're a good
little Catholic, and you just can't wait to get out of here,
and make amends for whatever you did.  Son?  Does that sound
good?  You'd like to come with me?  Hey son - let me see
your face."
     "No!"
     A bright light blinded the trooper, lighting up the
cemetery like day, and he could clearly see the surprised
curly haired teen sitting there in the mud gaping at what
looked like a sodden rectangle of paper in his lap.

***********************************

     Miles and miles away, William awoke from his moody
sleep wide-eyed and alert, and walked to his window.
Something incredible and important had just happened, and it
felt like might have had something to do with Jeremy.  Well
hell, the whole world had to do with Jeremy.
     Naked except his long underwear, William stood,
shivering, in the bay window of his bedroom, watching the
static nothingness of the wet parking lot next door, which
was gradually getting more and more familiar, although he
still didn't understand it.  He looked after a moment out to
the water, and saw the ebb and flow of the reflection of the
moon, shattered into a thousand pieces by the pelting rain.
     A bubble of hot anxiety lethargically slimed out of his
heart and pricked all the way down his spine - scaring him,
and exciting him.  Somewhere, something was going on.

***********************************

     Miles and miles away, Jason looked up from his desk and
the quick sketch he was drawing of a 10 man offensive plan.
He had this odd feeling that something had just pulled his
heart and then dripped down his spine, prickling all the way
to his tailbone.  It was unpleasant and he shivered,
adjusted himself, and wondered what was going on with the
heavy, low-hanging moon that shone about half through the
driving rain.  He went back to sketching.