Hardy Detective Agency featuring Hardy Boys Fan Fiction

You’re asking me? The elder Hardy thought, grateful for the red light they’d just paused at. Hard as he tried Frank could not shake the sense of disbelief that he was actually doing this, actually driving his brother to school after all that had happened. The elder Hardy knew that their friends were all concerned, eager to see Joe, to welcome him back; but they also were hoping that they could help him see the light.

“You mad or something? You’re giving me the silent treatment.”

Frank gripped the wheel with white knuckles and took a deep breath.

“I want to check in with you a lot today. And if you’re dizzy, you’ll go to the nurse, right? Have her page me, I’ll come help you.”

“Frank, for God’s sake, would you please give it a rest? Just for a day? Look, I’m going back to school, everything’s going to be fine. Just relax, okay?”

It’s not okay! Nothing’s okay!

The light changed, and Frank slowly steered the van toward the school parking lot. “You’ll meet me for lunch?” the elder Hardy asked, struggling to keep his voice casual.

“I might go and work through lunch. I’m going to be super behind.”

Of course, and then you’ll skip, just like you skipped breakfast, ignoring all of our pleas but Joe did you look at our faces? Dad, exhausted, turning into an insomniac; Mom, her eyes lightly pink as if she was only resting in between tears; Aunt Gertrude, her face taught, her ideas of what to do lost as Joe’s body disappears despite the scoldings.

And me? I don’t even know what my own face resembles anymore. Perhaps, like Joe’s, it’s waning.

“I’d feel a lot better if you met me,” Frank murmured. Joe turned and watched his brother for a moment.

“Frank, have you been sleeping? You look…kinda bad.”

“Well, I feel pretty lousy.”

“You ought to take a day off and rest or something. You look exhausted, bro.”

The elder Hardy pulled into a parking spot, braked, and blinked, hard, fighting off tears. This was the real Joe: kind, caring, looking out for his older brother. Not sick, not emaciated, not bent on self-destruction.

Not anorexic. Not bulimic. Not depressed.

“Well…you’ll meet me after school then, right? We’ll drive home together. Or maybe we can go somewhere, do something.”

“All right.”

The two boys gathered their things and locked up the van, heading toward the school; halfway there Joe paused, rested a hand on his forehead, swayed.

“Joe?”

“I’m all right,” the younger Hardy murmured. Frank slid an arm around him and pulled him close.

“I’ll help you,” he said gently, hoping Joe wouldn’t raise his eyes and see the elder Hardy’s eyes rapidly filling with tears.

Frank tried to get through the day.

He stood by as the Hardy’s friends welcomed Joe back, all the while casting wary glances at Frank as if to say what now? Can’t you see he’s still sick? What should we do?

I don’t know, I don’t know I don’t know I don’t know I don’t know…

Vanessa had pulled Frank aside and tearfully asked what the Hardy’s were going to do, if Joe was going back to the hospital or if they were sending him to a specialized place.

“We don’t know Van,” Frank had said tiredly. “There isn’t much we can do aside from committing him to an institution. Most specialized centers, like RENFREW and such, won’t take men. And what good’s it do if he won’t even try to recover?”

“But…Frank…he needs help. Fast. He’s lost weight, didn’t they do anything for him?”

The elder Hardy had looked past Vanessa to his brother, now sitting on one of the benches in the senior hallway as Chet had patted his shoulder.

“They couldn’t,” he had murmured.

The elder Hardy went about his day as he usually did. He went to his classes, took notes, handed in his assignments, kissed Callie in the hall, met his friends for lunch—and all the while felt he was breaking.

He barely recognized his brother in the hall now, knew him only by stares given by students who now realized that Joe’s absence was not due to a cold or virus, but a very severe weight problem.

Frank, who hadn’t been sleeping, or probably eating as much as he should, felt the stress of it all catching up and quietly asked to be excused.

In the hall he stood alone, trying hard to pull himself together: he drew a deep breath, startled to find it escape in a short sob. He tried again; a louder one this time, more aching. Stumbling down the hall, he made his way to the men’s room, leaned against the stall, and burst into tears.

Get a grip Hardy, you’re still in school you have classes to go to you can’t do this, not now, not here, cry at home, cry when you’re alone, what are you thinking you weak baby, huh? Joe’s the one suffering, Joe’s the one depressed, you’re just watching him fade away…

But that’s just it! I’m watching him fade away. My brother. My best friend. Fading before my eyes. Killing himself.

Dying.

Frank drew a deep breath and got slowly to his feet. He washed his face, dried it with paper towels, and made his way upstairs to the guidance office.

“I’d like to speak to a counselor,” he told the woman at the front desk.

She looked him over, frowned, and rose, disappearing into the hall of offices guarded by her desk. Frank glanced around at the many pamphlets set up on tables around the office—pamphlets on depression, pamphlets on suicide, pamphlets on body image, pamphlets on stress and peer pressure and smoking and drugs. Frank thought of health class in junior high and wondered if anyone actually touched this school-time propaganda.

“Third door on the right,” the secretary announced, re-emerging and gesturing to the rooms behind her.

Frank thanked her and walked behind her desk and on to a long hall with green tile and cream walls, a hall that reminded him suspiciously of the sixth floor of Bayport General where his brother had resided for the past two weeks.

“In here,” a voice called as Frank passed an office. The elder Hardy pushed the door open and shut it quietly behind him.

“Have a seat,” a pleasant man with glasses and a receding hairline said with a grin. “What’s your name?”

“Frank Hardy.”

“Okay. Oh, do you have a brother? On the wrestling team maybe?”

The elder Hardy bit his lip, hard, and nodded. “Yeah,” he almost whispered.

“So, Frank, what can I do for you?”

Frank swallowed hard and drew a trembling breath. “It’s…about my…my brother. Joe, his name is Joe. He has this…problem where he won’t eat. He’s anorexic, and bulimic by now, and he’s lost all this weight and I don’t—”

“Son,” the man gently interrupted.

“What?”

Frank felt his heart pounding as the counselor rubbed his eyes, hoping desperately that this man had some words of wisdom the hospitals missed, that he’d offer to call Joe in and sit him down and help him, that he would understand and—

“Boys can’t have eating disorders.”

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Disclaimer

The Hardy Boys belong to Simon and Schuster and the Stratemeyer Foundation. The Hardy Boys Fan Fiction authors of the Hardy Detective Agency have just borrowed them for an adventure or two. The authors promise to put the boys back when they are done with them. The authors do claim copyright to the original characters in this story. Please do not borrow original characters without express permission of the authors.