Sociopath? (29 page)

*

Rafe was surprised to be summonsed to Renny’s
study. Usually Renny had a reason to call him in and there was no
reason he could think of that his father would want to talk to
him.

“So, Rafe, how’s it going at school so far
this year?”

“Good, Dad. Being in the apartment is like
being in heaven after the the dorm.”

“I’m glad it’s working out for you so well.
And school itself, that’s all right too? Your classes are
okay?”

“Yes, my classes are going fine.”

“And football?”

“Yes, fine too.” He was becoming cautious
now. Something must be up. Renny wasn’t usually one for wasting
time on small talk.

Renny sensed the guard coming down although
there was no perceptible change in his son’s posture.

“Well, Rafe, I’ve been given a homework
assignment too. I was asked to feel you out about something but I
guess I’d just as soon ask you directly and I expect an honest
answer.”

“What’s this about, Dad?”

“The business about you and Professor Barnes
and whatever happened between you.”

Jesus, how did Renny know about that? He was
silent, trying to decide how to respond.

“Don’t be figuring how to con me, Rafe,”
Renny said sharply, “just tell it to me straight.”

“I’m not trying to con you, I was just trying
to think where to start.”

“The beginning usually works the best,” Renny
responded dryly.

Rafe took a deep breath. “She called me to
her office at the start of last year. She had no reason to do that
because I wasn’t taking any of her classes. She didn’t even know me
except what some of her students had told her. She was especially
upset about some of the girls calling themselves Rafe’s Riders
because sometimes when I went out in the car, I took a woman with
me and we stayed at a hotel overnight. But, Dad, that wasn’t my
idea. I’ve never told anyone the name of any girl I’ve ever had sex
with, ever. If anyone talks about it, it’s them, and I can’t
control that. Anyway, she told me I was a sexual predator. It
pissed me off because it isn’t true. I don’t deny sleeping with
lots of girls but they are always free and willing and I don’t
pretend I’m going to marry them or anything. She fucked with me,
Dad, and I decided I was going to fuck back with her.”

“And how did you do that?”

“I found out she had a girlfriend who was bi.
I joined the gym where she worked in order to meet her. We started
having an affair. Ms Barnes caught us in bed together.”

“You set that up on purpose?”

Black eyes held black eyes.

“Yes.”

“That was pretty cold, Rafe.”

“I was just going along minding my own
business, not bothering her at all. She’s the one who decided to
jump into my life. If she’s paying a price for it now, it’s her own
fault.”

“I gather she’s paying a rather steep price.
I hear she’s leaving Women’s Studies altogether.”

The smile was there and then it was gone.
“She was a hypocrite. Lots of posters on her wall glorifying
choice, but treating her girls like innocent maidens taken
advantage of by an evil male. It was bullshit.” The tone of his
voice was unyielding. “She should have thought twice before she
tried to screw me over, Dad.”

“Yes, it sounds like she didn’t know what she
was dealing with, but then, I doubt very many people know what
they’re dealing with when it comes to you, Rafe.“

“But you do, Dad?”

“Yes, Rafe, I do.”

They stared each other down. Rafe’s eyes
dropped first.

“Dad, I…..”

“That’s all I wanted to know, Rafe. You can
go now.”

*

“So, Gil, that’s the story.”

“Wow, I hope Rafe never decides to turn to
criminal activities or we’re probably all in trouble. I can
understand him being angry and maybe striking out in some way but
such a calculated cruelty is sort of breathtaking. He homed right
in on Helene’s biggest vulnerability.”

“I don’t think Rafe is one for striking out
impulsively. Anything he does will always be carefully
planned.”

“Scary, Ren, because he’s so fucking
brilliant. Poor Helene. She really loves that girl. What she did
was stupid but I don’t think she deserved to be punished so
severely.”

“He’s always been the way he is, Gil, even
when he was a little boy. I doubt he’s going to change. So, I just
wanted to share the information with you, like I said I would.”

“Okay, Ren, thanks.”

*

The drawing was delivered while he was still
in Maryland. He’d done it mostly at the art building on campus
since he couldn’t hide it from them in the carriage house. It was
the size of a poster, a collage of them in various activities - Vic
standing over the stove tasting from a big spoon, Chas arranging a
vase of flowers, Vic opening the door of his Jaguar, Chas at the
piano, both of them kissing with their arms around one another. At
the very bottom, he’d written - “thank God for family, Rafe”.

Vic had tears in his eyes. “Oh, my God, Chas,
isn’t it marvelous? Did you have any idea he could do this?”

The individual illustrations were so
intricately detailed- each key of the piano, the pan on the stove,
the trim on the Jag, the petals of the flowers - and they
themselves were so unstudied, not in the least like they were
posing, but just them unselfconsciously being Chas and Vic.

“No, no clue, Vic. Our Rafe is a boy of many
talents.”

It was matted and framed in walnut. They gave
it the place of honor in the foyer.

Everyone who saw it wanted to hire him to do
one for them but drawing was only something he did for fun. He had
no desire to turn it into a job.

* *

“Rafe!” Chas’ voice was verging on
hysterical.

“What’s the matter, Chas?”

“It’s Vic. He’s in the hospital. He got
beaten up. They’re taking him into surgery. I’m so worried, Rafe,
I’m just wrecked. Can you come?”

“I’m heading for the garage now. Hang on,
Chas. I’ll be there in a few minutes.”

He sped even more than usual getting to the
hospital. He found Chas in the small waiting room outside surgery,
holding a paper cup of coffee with shaking hands.

“God, I’m glad to see you, Rafe. I stayed
with him in E.R. until they brought him here. He looks like a
villain in a horror movie. His face is swollen like a black
balloon. His nose and, they think, his cheekbone is broken, some
teeth gone. The doc also suspects he has some broken ribs and his
hand is fractured. The cops said it looked like his attacker hit
him over and over in the face and then, after he fell, kicked him
in the side and stepped on his hand, grinding it into the
concrete.

“Was he conscious?” Rafe asked.

“Barely. The officers tried to take a
preliminary report but he wasn’t able to tell them much. They said
they’d come back later when he was more coherent.”

Rafe kept Chas company until Vic was taken to
the recovery room.

“I’m going to leave now, Chas. I don’t want
to be here when the cops come back because I don’t want them to
associate me with Vic. But Chas, I want to know every detail. If
they know who did it and who it was and any other information
they’ll give you about him. If you don’t think you can remember,
write it down so you can tell me later. Call me when you’re ready
to come home and I’ll come and get you. You’re not in any shape to
drive. Tell Vic when he wakes up, I’ll be back after the police
have gone.”

“Why don’t you want to be here, Rafe? You’d
be more likely to ask sensible questions than me right now.”

“I’ve got my reasons. Trust me, Chas. It’s
better this way.”

“You’re not in any trouble with the law
yourself are you?”

A smile flickered across Rafe’s face, “no,
and I don’t plan to be.”

*

Chas called him later and he went back to the
hospital. Vic was awake by then but groaning with pain.

“I talked to the officers, Rafe,” Chas told
him. “There was a witness and they arrested the guy. His name is
Bob Bolover. They charged him with Battery but they said he’s
probably bonded out by now. They would only say he’s from around
the neighborhood. They said he came out of Granger’s Bar. That a
few blocks down from Vic’s office.”

“He just kept saying he hated fucking
faggots, Rafe,” Vic mumbled through his broken mouth. “Every time
he hit me he said it was for being a faggot queer.”

Rafe’s eyes got colder and blacker as they
talked.

*

Rafe slipped into one of the back benches of
the courtroom when Bob Bolover was arraigned. He pleaded not
guilty, of course. His attorney was with him. Battery, if it caused
bodily injury, was a Class A misdemeanor, with the maximum penalty
being a year and/or a $5,000 fine but, realistically, a plea
bargain would probably result in the A being knocked down to a B
which carried 180 days in jail and up to a $1,000 but Bob Bolover
was a first offender so he likely wouldn’t even get any jail time,
just a pre-trial diversion or probation. They could have made it
harder on him if they’d charged him with a hate crime, since he’d
obviously beaten up Vic for no other reason than that he was
homosexual, but the prosecutor chose not to file those charges, too
much of a hassle to prove.

Didn’t matter anyway. Rafe was only there to
get a look at the guy. Bob had worn a suit for the occasion but it
didn’t fit him very well and he didn’t look very comfortable in it,
like wearing a suit was something he didn’t do often. It was a
little tight across his paunch. He was tall and while he’d
obviously been muscular once, he was starting to run to fat now.
His brown hair was worn in a buzzcut. Rafe was too far away to see
the color of his eyes but he’d remember the falsely humble smile
and remorseful voice Bolover had displayed for the judge’s
sake.

Afterwards, he tailed (Rafe grinned at the
word, it sounded so private eye official) Bob Bolover home to his
small two-story frame house on Maple Street. Once he knew where
Bolover lived, he rented an old white Chevy Cavalier from a
Rent-a-Wreck agency (an ice-blue Corvette not being the best for
unobtrusive surveillance) and followed him off and on until he got
a feel for Bob’s schedule. He bowled on Tuesday nights and
afterwards, he went to Granger’s. Once there, he could be relied
upon to stay until closing time.

*

“What clothes of mine do you guys think are
the gayest?”

“The gayest, Rafe?”

“Yeah, of anything I have, what would a gay
guy like best?”

“That black silk Ralph Lauren jogging suit.
I’ve only seen you wear it once.”

“Oh, yeah, I remember. My sister, Annecy, got
it for me for Christmas.”

“You should wear it more often. You look
gorgeous in it,” Chas told him.

“What’s this all about?” asked Vic, home now
but still looking considerably worse for wear.

“An eye for an eye,” said Rafe

*

That night, he put on the black jogging suit
along with black running shoes. He’d bought some make up at the
drugstore. He brushed the merest drift of blush across his
cheekbones, not enough to tell he had it on, just enough to add a
faint rosy hue to his cheeks. He applied some barely pink lip gloss
to his lips to give them the least suggestion of color. He
thickened his long black curly lashes with enough mascara to make
them appear even longer and curlier and blacker. He tousled his
hair, which gave him a disarmingly boyish look. He put the
switchblade in his pocket.

Granger’s was a typical nondescript working
man’s bar. There wasn’t anything special about it except to the
customers who hung out there. You wouldn’t associate the word
ambiance with Granger’s but people who think of a particular tavern
as their second home develop a deep affection for the comfortable
camaraderie their place offers them. Granger’s was like that. It
had plank floors and a long back bar, featuring quarts of various
kinds of cheap bar alcohol. Most of them were rarely moved from
their locations on the shelf because Granger’s regulars tended to
drink beer, especially Budweiser because Bud was the beer on tap.
There was a jukebox in one corner. Most of its offerings were
country but with a little rock and roll thrown in as well, southern
rock like the Allman Brothers and Lynyrd Skynyrd and ZZ Top. There
was a television on one wall, almost always turned to ESPN. A
couple of pool tables took up space at the back and the rest of the
room had booths along both sides (cracks in the red pseudo-leather
patched with silver duck tape) and some black metal tables in the
middle. You’d sometimes find a few women at Granger’s on Friday and
Saturday nights but on week nights, it was usually only men,
including lots of bowlers or soft ball players, depending on the
season.

*

Rafe waited until he knew Bob Bolover had had
plenty of time to settle into Granger’s with his bowling buddies
and then he drove down to the neighborhood and parked the white
Cavalier a couple of blocks away. When he entered the front door
and walked up to the bar, he added just a hint of swish to his
stride, something he’d learned by watching some of Chas and Vic’s
friends.

Bob Bolover was sitting, arms resting
comfortably on the bar, with a mug of beer in front of him. Rafe
minced over to him and ducked under one arm, snuggling his upper
body against Bob’s neck and shoulder, in a loving and intimate
way.

“What are you doin’, Daddy?” he asked in a
sweet, rather breathless tone, “are we going to be together again
tonight?” He smiled adoringly at the older man.

Bob pulled his arm back and jerked away
violently. His face grew instantly flushed.

“What the hell is going on? Who are you? I’ve
never seen you before in my life!”

“But, but,” Rafe’s voice quavered, “last
night when I was sucking your cock, you said to call you Daddy. You
called me your beautiful boy.” Tears began to trickle out of his
big, dark eyes.