After dinner, while everyone else had gathered in the media room to watch Shrek the Third on DVD, I managed to slip away to the kitchen where I grabbed the cordless phone and hid myself away in the pantry. I knew that with the time difference between Maine and California, I would have a really good chance of catching Gary at work. At least that was my sincere hope!
Amazingly, my call to California went through and someone picked up on the first ring.
“Thank you for calling The Shack. How might I help you?” Came the unfamiliar voice of some young sounding lady.
After recovering from the shock of not hearing Gary answer the phone, I asked, “Uh, is Gary there?”
“May I ask who is calling?” the lady politely asked.
“Tell him it is Alvin!” I said.
“Alvin who?” she asked and my heart sank a bit.
“Alvin Holloway.” I said.
“You mean Alvin Holloway the Junior Surfing Champion?” she asked.
“Yeah that’s the one.” I said feeling slightly annoyed now.
“I am sorry, but I think Alvin Holloway moved away or something like that. Besides, I don’t think he ever really worked here. He just sort of hung around maybe.” She said.
“No! I am Alvin! I am trying to call my friend Gary who owns and runs THE SHACK!” I said virtually snarling.
“Oh!” she said and for a full second I thought that was all she was going to say, but then she said something that totally blew me away.
“Um… yeah… Gary doesn’t work here anymore. I’m not sure, but I think I remember Becky telling David that Cindy said, that Gary met this one lady and they ran off to Mexico to get married or some junk like that.”
“WHAT? MARRIED?” I shouted into the phone.
“Like oh my gawd! You like totally yelled in my ear!” she whined and I wanted to reach through the phone and strangle her.
“But-but-but, did he leave a number or an address where he could be reached?” I pleaded.
“No, sorry! Hey I got to go now! Thanks for calling. Bubye!” she said and hung up just like that.
I sat, stunned with the phone still to my ear. I couldn’t believe what I had just heard. At first I was so exceedingly mad that she had hung up on me the way she did. I then wondered if maybe someone was playing a dirty trick on me.
The phone started making that really annoying beeping sound indicating that it was still off the hook. I quickly yanked the phone from my ear and turned it off, but I didn’t climb out of the pantry. Instead, I sat down on a large overturned cooking pot and stared down at the lifeless phone in my hands. I had no idea I had been in there as long as I had until Jacquelyn opened the pantry door and said to me.
“There you are! You’ve missed half the movie already! What are you doing in here anyway?”
“Gary is getting married.” I mumbled.
“You mean that old surfing guy you told me about?” she asked.
I simply nodded my head, stood up, handed the phone to her and drug myself all the way to my room. I was probably in my room all of five minutes before Jacquelyn came in.
“You okay?” she asked in a very sweet sort of way.
When she had come in I had been inside my armoire getting out my pajamas. I shook my head to indicate that I wasn’t okay. She then did something I hadn’t expected.
She walked up to me, took my pajamas and things away from me, laid them on the bed then returned and gave me the biggest hug. I hated that I did it, but I started to cry there in her arms.
“He sold The Shack and everything.” I mumbled not really to her, but just sort of thinking aloud, “I can’t believe he sold it. And he didn’t write to me or call or anything to tell me he was getting married. And what’s he doing getting married? He’s too old to get married!”
“I know it is shocking news and more so that you had to hear it from a stranger.” She started saying though I don’t know how she knew I had heard it from a stranger.
I don’t know why I am so lucky to have a girlfriend like Jacquelyn. I mean, how many girls out there would not care that their boyfriend wets his pants and bed?
The two of us sat on the floor leaning against the wall. We didn’t really talk; we only sat quietly while holding onto one another. She softly kissed my cheek and rubbed my chest through my shirt until I stopped crying.
After a while I said, “I’m sorry.”
“What for?” She asked almost in a whisper.
I shrugged, “For everything.”
“What do you mean?”
“You came up here to visit but everything here sucks right now. I wish everything wasn’t so sucky!”
She placed her hand on my right cheek and pulled my face around so that we were looking into each other’s eyes.
“Alvin,” she began, “I came up here because everything is so sucky right now. I wanted to be able to help you.”
I think I might have smiled back at that.
She leaned in closer, never closing her eyes. I leaned in to. Our lips touched and we began to kiss; at first soft but soon it had developed into passionate kissing. Unlike before when we had been making out down in the basement by the Lap Pool, this time we both seemed a lot more comfortable with what we were doing.
Jacquelyn’s hand, which had been rubbing my chest through my shirt started to move lower. Her fingers found the hem of my shirt and slipped underneath. They felt warm and soft as they slid across my belly; stopping momentarily to trace a circle around my bellybutton. Suddenly, realizing what she was doing she stopped and pulled away. But I took hold of Jacquelyn’s hand and placed it back on my stomach. That was all the prodding she needed to keep going. We kissed again, only longer and more passionately than before.
I wanted so desperately to touch her but feared she might not like me to. You know, it is funny how you can be thinking about something like that while at the same time be thinking about how wonderful all of it felt. I decided to try touching her. While still kissing I slowly lifted my right hand and soft as I could, I allowed it to come to rest on her left thigh. Unbelievably she moaned her approval. I began to slide it up and down; each time moving my hand further and further up her hip, then her side until my hand came to rest beside her small breast.
I had been so focused on getting my hand to her breast that I hadn’t noticed she had been working her fingers under the waistband of my pants. She nearly had her whole hand inside when I had finally got up the nerve to cup my hand over her left breast. At that same moment she had pushed her hand into my shorts and squeezed the front of my diaper directly above my rigid penis. We were both breathing hard through our noses, as our tongues wrestled together. She continued to squeeze and massage the front of my diaper while my hand explored her wonderful chest through her shirt. I was just starting to build up my courage to try to put my hand under her shirt when she suddenly pushed me away so forcefully that we both slid across the wooden floor a couple inches.
Before I had a chance to ask why she had done that my bedroom door swung opened and in walked Grandfather.
“Busted!” I thought.
“What are you two doing alone in here?” He asked.
Jacquelyn answered, “Alvin was upset and crying. I was keeping him company.”
He pointed out of the room and said, “You two need to get downstairs.”
Jacquelyn jumped to her feet and flew from the room but I didn’t as much as budge.
I looked at Grandfather with every fiber of my being loathing him.
What I said next was probably the meanest thing I have ever said to anyone. “I wish you had died instead of my dad!”
Grandfather was visibly stunned as though I had hit him upside the head with an aluminum baseball bat. One look into his cold eyes and I could tell I had struck a lethal blow.
Anger and raw emotions boiled out of me. I rose to my feet as if a great hand had come out of the sky and lifted me. My hands, balled up into rock solid fists, hung to my side.
With a tongue of fire I lashed out again, “I hate you! I hate you and I wish you were dead!”
As he seemed to stagger from my verbal thrashing I took a bold step toward him.
“I wish we had never come here and I wish you weren’t my grandfather! You ruined everything! You made us come here! Because of you my dad is dead and my mom almost was too!”
Fueled by rage I took another step, cocked my right arm back ready to strike out in violence.
I hadn’t seen it coming. Actually, I was on the floor holding my right cheek before I even knew he had slapped me across the face. He had hit me so hard that I had gone down with a single swing of his old wrinkled hand.
With tears flooding from my eyes I looked up into his eyes and this demonic voice came out of me.
“If I were bigger I’d kill you!”
Surprisingly, Grandfather is a lot stronger than he looks. With the same speed he’d used when hitting me, he reached down, grabbed me by my right arm near my bicep and jerked me to my feet.
“I think that is about enough from you!” Grandfather said through thin white lips and clenched teeth.
I shook my head and that same devil voice came out of me only about ten times more powerful, “Everyone would be happier if you would just die!”
Grandfather grabbed my other arm and shook me.
“That is enough!” he hissed.
I shook my head again but didn’t have a chance to say anything else because he lifted me by my upper arms and tossed me face first onto the bed. Before I knew what was happening he had pulled down my pants and tore away my diaper.
He said something but I honestly cannot remember what it had been. His left hand was pressing down on the middle of my back and he must have somehow also had my legs pinned down because I tried to kick but couldn’t.
The first blow landed square on my left butt cheek and felt as though he had struck me with red-hot metal. I screamed and struggled but it was useless. The second blow struck higher and centered. It hurt just as much as the first had.
All in all I received ten hard swats with his hand before he stopped. Well I think it was ten, I lost count after the sixth hit. I was hurting so badly that I didn’t get up right away. My hands found my burning bottom as I turned my head and with tear swollen eyes I saw him from the back only briefly as he was walking out of my room and leaving my bedroom door open.
It wasn’t until later that night, after everyone had gone to bed that I noticed my surfboard was missing from the wall across from the foot of my bed.
After Grandfather had left my room I pushed myself off the bed and staggered to the bathroom with my pants still around my ankles. My tattered diaper was still fastened around one leg and trailed behind me. I was relieved when I looked in the mirror and did not see any lasting mark despite the side of my face still feeling hot from the slap. I twisted my body so I could see my bright red backside in the mirror. My butt looked like I had sat in fresh red paint.
I washed my face with cold water and splashed water all down my front in the process. Still crying a little I pulled off my shirt and tossed it down the laundry chute. With a little frustration I finally got my shoes off and my feet freed from my bunched up pants. I didn’t really think about it at the time but I tossed everything down the laundry chute, torn diaper and all.
Without turning on the water before climbing into the shower stall. I closed the glass door and didn’t even bother with the hot water. All I was interested in was the soothing effects of cold water. The first blast of cold water hit me in the chest and it felt like someone had punched me.
By the time I came back out I was nearly blue all over. My teeth were chattering uncontrollably and my limbs struggled to obey my brains commands. I stood before the mirror once again and chuckled to myself at how small my package was after suffering from what seemed to of been a twenty minute long ice shower. Another quick inspection of my backside in the mirror showed very little signs of redness. When I was satisfied that my bottom and face no longer looked red or swollen I flipped off the light switch.
I was walking out of the bathroom when I received a small shock. Standing in the middle of my room was Mommy Beth.
She smiled, “Didn’t mean to give you a start.”
I was standing there still wet because I hadn’t dried myself. My arms were wrapped around my chest trying to get warm and my dang teeth were still chattering away.
“Alvin you look positively frozen stiff!” she exclaimed as she began rubbing and hugging me to try and warm me up.
Due to shivering and my teeth chattering so much my response came out sounding something like this, “C-c-can y-you h-help-p m-m-me g-get r-ready f-f-f-for b-b-bed?”
“Wasn’t there any hot water?” She asked but I didn’t reply.
Looking at her nearly caused me to start crying again. As it was, I couldn’t talk anymore. I gazed at her longingly.
She held out her arms and said, “Come lie down on the bed.”
I nearly tripped over my own feet as I tried to walk to the bed and fell into her waiting arms. She helped me onto the bed while saying something about never understanding why little boys are always doing silly stuff like taking a shower with no hot water or taking a bath with all their clothes on. I supposed that last part was something Joey had done before.
She quickly diapered me and then helped me into my pajamas before she put me under the covers and tucked me in good and tight. I was still very cold but my teeth had stopped chattering.
“I’m going to go get you some hot milk to help warm you up inside.” She had said but by the time she had returned I was already sound-asleep.
I guess I was really tired because I don’t even remember waking up when Joey was put into bed with me.