Listen

27

Damien arrived home a little before 9 p.m. Kay, Hunter, and Jenna sat crowded on the couch in front of the big screen. Movie credits rolled.

Damien kissed the top of Kay’s head and clapped his kids on their shoulders. “What are you doing?”

“Just a little movie and hang time.” Kay stood and turned to him. “We saved you some pizza.”

“Nice of you.” He grinned. He looked at Jenna, who was still seated, staring at the TV. “You okay?”

She rose, taking her plate off the coffee table. “Just tired. I’m going to shower and go to bed, okay, Mom?”

Kay took her plate and embraced her. “Sure, baby. Whatever you want.”

“I gotta do my homework,” Hunter said, leaving his plate and bounding upstairs.

Damien retrieved the plate off the coffee table and followed Kay to the kitchen. “When is that kid going to learn to put his dishes up?”

Kay smiled as she rinsed Jenna’s in the sink. She glanced up the stairs, then turned off the water and faced Damien. “Reverend Caldwell wanted to see how we were doing.”

“Did he show up?”

“Show up? No, he called. Why?”

“Nothing.”

“What’s the latest on Mike Toledo?”

“Wanted a lawyer, wouldn’t talk. They’re getting a warrant to search his house. That’s the last I heard. Lou called me and said they’re confident this is their guy. Now they just have to prove it.”

Kay sighed, fiddling with the edge of the dishcloth. “Does Jenna seem all right to you?”

“Why?”

“She seems sad to me.”

“She’s been through a lot.”

“Yeah, but she bounced back, was doing great. Lately she seems very mellow.”

“Have you talked to her about it?”

“I’ve dropped a few hints, but she always says she’s fine.” Kay threw the dishcloth on the counter. “Will you try?”

“You know me. I never know what to say-”

“Just try. Please. I want her to know she can talk to us.”

“All right. I’ll see what I can do.”

Kay hugged him, pressing her cheek against his. “How are you?”

“I’m okay. If it turns out to be Mike Toledo, I don’t know what I’m going to do.”

Kay stepped back. “It will mean justice, and that’s what Frank would’ve wanted. He would also want you to continue living your life.”

Damien couldn’t stop the tears.

Kay wiped them with her hands. “I know how much you miss him,” she whispered.

Damien pressed his wrists to each eye. “Yeah. I do.” He took a deep breath. “I’ll go upstairs, talk to her.”

“Thank you.”

Damien headed up the stairs and turned toward the kids’ rooms. He was just about to knock on Jenna’s door when he heard the shower running in the bathroom. He forgot. With every year that went by, ten minutes was added to the shower time. She was up to an hour now. It could be a while.

He decided to chat with Hunter while waiting. He tapped on the door and turned the knob.

As it cracked open, he saw a familiar sight… Hunter scrambling toward his desk, nearly knocking over his chair, practically diving for the mouse. Within seconds, he stood upright, working hard at mustering up a casual expression. “Hey, um, Dad.”

Damien felt flustered, yet deep inside there was some resolve building, something that told him it was time to confront the situation. Frank was no more, and even with Frank’s assurances that he’d talked to Hunter, Damien realized in that instant that there was nobody who could talk to Hunter except him. He was the father, and no matter how uncomfortable it got, he had to do it. He should do it.

Damien held his son’s gaze, which soon dropped to the carpet and one untied sneaker. “What’s going on?”

“What do you mean?”

Damien’s courage quavered. He took a moment to compose himself. “There’s something on that computer you don’t want me to see, isn’t there?”

“No…” Hunter’s attention shifted to his computer. He stepped forward as if he were guarding a small animal.

“Look, I’m not mad. Disappointed, yes. But not mad. The truth is that I should’ve talked to you about this myself. Much earlier. I was afraid I wouldn’t know what to say. How to handle it well. And though Frank was always like an uncle to you, I should’ve talked to you myself.”

Hunter’s eyes widened with each word. He stood completely still, barely even blinking.

“You should be able to talk to me about these things. And I’m sorry I’ve come across as a father you can’t talk to.”

“Am I in trouble?”

That was all he wanted to know, whether or not he was in trouble? Damien crossed his arms. “Do you think you should be in trouble?”

“Um… I think… I’d like to explain.”

Damien tried not to smirk. This ought to be good. “Fine.”

“I know the rules, and I know I’m not supposed to be doing this. But you don’t understand what I’ve been going through and how helpless I feel against everything.”

Damien bit his lip. How to spin this? Spin it? No. This was real life, with a real kid. It was time Damien connected on a deeper level. He walked over to Hunter’s bed and sat down, patting the empty space next to him. “Come sit down with me.”

Hunter obliged, sitting next to his father with a slouch that made osteoporosis look healthy.

“Here’s the deal. I do know what you’re going through.”

“You do?”

“Sure. What you’re feeling is not unnatural. Every guy goes through this, and in and of itself, it’s healthy. But when you take these urges and allow them to get out of control, by taking them places you know you shouldn’t go, then you’ve got a problem.”

“I’m not sure I’m following.”

Oh, brother. How specific was he going to have to get? He glanced at Hunter, who was staring at him. He offered a small smile. “Okay, see, every guy is tempted with this. And with the Internet, it’s so much easier to get. Back in my day, we had to actually have the nerve to go into the gas station and buy a copy. And then you had to try to hide it so your mother wouldn’t find out.”

By the expression on Hunter’s face, Damien thought he was maybe saying too much. But what else could he say? He couldn’t dismiss this or turn to anger. What good would that do? “All I’m trying to say is that it’s normal to… It’s just not okay to get involved in. Not in our house. Son, once you look at those images, you can never take them back. They’re in you forever.” Damien paused to take a deep breath and look at Hunter, whose face was still frozen with shock. “What? Am I being too forthright here?”

“What are you talking about?” Hunter asked.

“Pornography. What were you talking about?”

“The MySpace page I opened. I know I’m not supposed to have one, but I needed one.”

Damien jumped to his feet, holding his stomach and his mouth at the same time. “That’s what you were talking about?”

Hunter’s eyes turned worried. “Can’t I explain? Please?”

“Yes, of course.” Damien tried not to sound as relieved as he felt. So the kid opened a MySpace page? Damien wanted to run around the room and do a little dance. But he had disobeyed, so Damien tried to look as stern as possible.

Hunter slid off the bed and slowly moved to his computer, watching Damien closely as if he was afraid of a sudden move or a possible lecture on the female anatomy.

Damien stood near Hunter as the kid typed something into the address bar. A page appeared.

“That’s not you,” Damien said. “And that’s not your name.”

“I just pulled a pic off the Web and made up a name.”

“Why?”

More typing, then a new page came up. Hunter pointed to a block of writing. “Read this.”

Damien scanned it. Something about a bratty girl. The language was inundated with a lot of profanity and lewd comments. “What is this?”

Hunter turned in his chair, a serious expression on his face. “It’s about Jenna.”

“What?”

“They’re talking about Jenna.”

“Jenna isn’t named.”

“I know. You have to read more on this page to know it’s her. But they’re talking about her. All over the place. Smearing her name.”

Damien looked at Hunter, then back at the screen.

“It’s just a few girls,” Hunter said. “I know who they are. They’re the ones that hung out with the two that were arrested.”

“So they’re targeting Jenna because…”

“She told. They know she’s the one that told the police where to find Gabby.”

Damien stood upright, gasped. “How?”

“I’m not sure. I think it was mostly just a lucky guess. Jenna stopped hanging around them, and they decided she was the one that went to the police.”

Damien shook his head, staring at the screen.

“But look what I’ve been doing.” Hunter beckoned him closer. “It’s like a cyber blast. I’m working to control the first page that appears on Google when Jenna’s name is entered. So I’ve started blogs and a MySpace page and have linked up with any positive mention of her name, which is easy to do with alerts. Anytime her name is mentioned on the Web, I’m alerted. Then I sort of manipulate the information so that only positive remarks show up on the first page of Google. It’s kind of a way to manage your online reputation. And I think it’s working. Over the past few days, there has been way less activity. A lot of the people who were talking about her before are losing interest. But I’m not stopping until this thing dies down completely.”

Damien quit staring at the screen. He couldn’t take his eyes off his son. Emotions welled up as he watched him talk.

Hunter glanced at him. “What’s wrong?”

His voice cracked. “I’m just proud of you. You’re amazing.”

Hunter looked away. “It’s no big deal.”

“It’s a very big deal. Does Jenna know?”

“Yeah, I’m sure she does. It’s hard to hide from this kind of thing.”

“No, I mean, does she know what you’re doing for her?”

“Please don’t tell her. She’d freak out and get all emotional and stuff. And who wants a little brother handling your bullies, you know?”

Damien nodded. “I see what you mean.”

“So this stays here?”

“I promise.”

“Thanks. Oh, and I promise I won’t tell anyone about your porn problem.”

“What? No! No, there’s no porn problem. It was just an example. Those magazines, that was a long time ago, like when I was younger, way younger.” Damien took a breath. He was rambling.

An awkward moment passed. Hunter looked at Damien with a worried expression, indicating he thought there still might be some repercussions or perhaps new confessions.

“Finish up your homework,” Damien said, then walked out, closing the door behind him. He leaned against the wall for a moment, catching his breath and chuckling a little. Well, at least he got the pornography discussion out of the way.

He listened for the shower. It had stopped. He walked the length of the hallway to find the bathroom vacant. Jenna’s bedroom door was closed. He tapped lightly. “Jenna?”

No answer.

He hesitated before opening the door. He wasn’t sure he could go another round of “It’s pornography-wait, no, a MySpace page” again.

He nudged the door, cracking it open slightly, just enough to see the lights were off and Jenna was in her bed. She didn’t even stir.

“Jenna?” he whispered.

She didn’t respond. Her breathing was slow, peaceful.

He crept across the wood floor to the edge of her bed. He stared at her for a long time, remembering how he watched her sleep when she was a little girl, curled tightly around a giant panda he’d given her when she was four. He’d liked to watch her sleep, brush her tangled hair off her face, rub her cheek with the back of his hand.

He imagined, though, that now she was not quite the deep sleeper of her childhood.

Instead, he knelt down on the small, fluffy circle rug by her bed. As he clasped his hands together, the feeling of helplessness that caught him up in constant fear melted away. He knew he had no control over this situation, and there was nothing worse to feel than helplessness over a child.

But in the darkness of her room he was reminded that helplessness was often a portal to God, because rarely did the fragile, self-serving human pray for things in his complete control. He knew he’d been brought to his knees, and he willingly stayed there, his forehead laid against the side of her mattress. He prayed boldly, calling on the God he’d rarely thought about in the last few years. His small attempt at churchgoing was hardly enough to reconcile himself to his God. Yet he knew without a doubt, despite his absence, God would not be absent and that He was waiting even now to help.

“God help her,” Damien whispered. “God help me. Help us. Help Marlo.”