ILLUSIONS
by
AUTHOR D
Chapter 10
The Chapters
Frank settled in the chair across from Fenton and although his eyes held more than a little guilt, when they met Fenton’s gaze they never wavered. It was Frank’s unspoken way of saying “I’m ready to take my punishment.” Inwardly, Fenton couldn’t help but smile at the striking difference in his sons’ personalities. Had Joe been the one in that chair, he’d already be talking a mile a minute, cracking jokes and using every diversionary tactic he could to put off the inevitable. While Joe would always admit his mistakes and readily accept responsibility for his actions, he’d do just about anything to avoid the inescapable ‘lecture and punishment’ phase.
Refocusing his attention on Frank, Fenton looked at his oldest son and spread his hands helplessly. “What were you thinking, Frank?” he asked. “We asked you to keep an eye on your brother, to stay with him all night and you gave us your word that you would,” Fenton said. “That is the only reason we agreed to this outing and you knew that. And yet you still let Joe and Vanessa go off by themselves. Compounding that, you convinced me not to bring Joe home by giving me your word – again – that you’d drop the girls off and come straight home. Then you turned around and went right back to Frightland to investigate. Your mother and I trusted you, Frank, and you broke that trust - twice.” Fenton exhaled forcefully, running a hand through his hair. Somehow these conversations were so much harder with Frank. ‘Maybe because they’re so few and far between,’ he thought dryly and continued.
“I realize that the situation changed somewhat and I understand that might happen sometimes. But when it does, I expect you to call me, especially when it concerns your brother’s welfare. Yes, technically, Joe is an adult but in this particular situation… with what’s happened the past two months… your mother and I are still legally responsible for him. And we will be until he’s completely cleared by the doctors, which hasn’t happened yet. And last night we trusted you with that responsibility.” Fenton stopped for a moment, aggravated at the situation more so than Frank.
“Yes, sir.” Frank’s voice was steady and sure, but his eyes reflected remorse… and shame.
Fenton ventured a guess that it had more to do with Frank feeling he’d let his parents down, disappointed them, than the fact that he returned to Frightland to investigate. He also knew it had something to do with Frank’s innate need to be there for his younger brother, no matter what. Wanting confirmation, and to satisfy his own curiosity, he asked “Can I ask why you went back even after you gave me your word you’d come straight home? Even you have to admit that’s very out of character for you, Frank.”
Frank shifted in the chair, looking more like he was trying to organize his thoughts than nervous or hesitant. “After we dropped Vanessa off I did start to head home, but then I asked Joe why he was so sure that this girl was real.” He stopped then and his brow creased.
“What did he say?”
Frank wrinkled his nose, again trying to find the right words. “It wasn’t really what he said, but the way he said it. He said it was different this time. Whenever he had a hallucination, he always knew afterwards that they weren’t real, remember?” Frank stared at Fenton and waited for a nod of agreement. “Dad, he was so sure, absolutely certain that this time was different. There wasn’t a shred of doubt for him – he knew she was real.” Frank lifted his shoulders and let them drop.
“And that was it? That was all it took to convince you?”
Frank tilted his head and looked off into the distance for a moment. “I’m not sure ‘convinced’ is the right word… I guess I thought what would it hurt to give him the benefit of the doubt? And it had been two weeks since Joe’d had any hallucinations-”
“Yes,” Fenton interrupted him. “It had been only two weeks. Given the two months prior to that, two weeks is barely a drop in the bucket.”
Frank shrugged, standing firm on his decision to give Joe the benefit of the doubt. “Still, I didn’t disbelieve him enough to risk some kid’s life on it. So I turned around and we went back.”
Fenton sat back and rubbed his chin, digesting what Frank had said and finding himself torn. He and Laura had always been thankful for the close relationship their sons shared. And despite knowing Frank was simply doing what he’d always done, this time the circumstances were different.
“Look, Frank, I appreciate that you were trying to support your brother and yes, the two of you have gone off on your own hundreds of times to follow a lead or a hunch without calling first, but the situation was different this time and you knew that. Add in the fact that you didn’t come home, you didn’t call to tell me you weren’t coming home, you didn’t answer your phone when I called…” Fenton looked at his son intently. “If you were me, what would you have thought? By the time I got that phone call from the emergency room I’d already convinced myself Joe had had another violent hallucination and killed both of you. I was only praying he hadn’t killed anyone else. I don’t ever want to go through that again.” Resting his elbows on his knees, he leaned forward holding Frank’s steady gaze. “I need to know that when I ask you to do something, even if you don’t agree with me, you’ll do it. I need to be able to trust you, Frank.”
Frank swallowed hard, looking distressed and remorseful to the point Fenton almost felt sorry for him. Frank took the responsibilities his parents entrusted him with, and their trust in him, very seriously. To know his actions caused that trust to be damaged was devastating. Finally he nodded and asked quietly, “So… what’s my punishment?”
Fenton stared at Frank and wondered if anything he could come up with would be worse than the self-flagellation Frank was indulging in at the moment. “Let me get back to you on that.”
Frank nodded again and stood up nervously. “I can go now?”
“Yes, you can… but would you send Joe in, please?” Fenton requested.
Frank stopped and turned, looking at Fenton questioningly.
“I want to apologize to him,” Fenton began, then his mouth quirked up in the hint of a smile. “And I think since we’ve all established the fact that he wasn’t hallucinating and was, in fact, lucid and rational and knew exactly what was going on… I think that qualifies him to take his share of the responsibility for what happened last night. Unless of course you want to shoulder all the blame yourself?” he asked, unable to fully hide his amusement.
A slow smile spread across Frank’s face and Fenton got the impression he was reliving an inside joke. “Joe did say last night that Mom always said we should share…” he stopped and gave his father a full blown grin. “But I’m not sure this is the best time to talk to him, Dad. He took a painkiller as soon as he got up so he’s probably in rare form by now. Your talk might not be very effective if he’s telling you how much he loves you every few seconds.”
Fenton chuckled and scratched his head. “Yeah, I think you’ve got a point there. I’ll wait a few hours until he’s more… coherent.”
Frank headed for the door, stopping in the doorway. Hesitating a moment, he turned around. “Dad, I really am sorry. If I had it to do over again, I can’t say I’d come straight home but… I definitely wouldn’t leave you hanging all night. You’d know where we were and what we were doing the whole time.”
Fenton wasn’t sure if he should be annoyed that Frank freely admitted he still would have disobeyed Fenton or proud that he would defy anyone, his father included, if he truly thought it was in the best interests of his brother. Instead he simply settled on a nod of acknowledgment.
*****
Several hours later, Fenton was sitting in the same seat, this time gazing at a fidgeting Joe, his younger son not sure why he’d been summoned and clearly nervous. “How’s your wrist?” Fenton asked, glancing at the cast.
“Broken,” Joe cracked, then smiled and shrugged. “It’s okay, I guess.”
“Good…” Fenton leaned forward and looked his son directly in the eye. “Joe, I want to apologize to you. I made an error in judgment last night. Hindsight being twenty/twenty, I now realize there were signs I should have picked up on; things that should have at least prompted me to give you the benefit of the doubt. I didn’t do that and I am truly sorry.”
Joe gave him a strained smile, but his eyes held a trace of hurt at not being believed. “Thanks.”
“While I’m still not happy about being kept in the dark all night, I am proud of you and your brother. If you two hadn’t found that girl when you did, there’s no telling what might have happened to her.”
Joe sat up a little straighter, beaming at the praise. “Thanks!” he repeated, this time with much more enthusiasm. He then started to rise, apparently assuming their discussion was over.
“Which brings me to the other thing I wanted to talk to you about,” Fenton continued. Joe stopped midway to his feet and looked at Fenton nervously
“Other thing?” he asked, as Fenton gestured for him to sit down again. “What other thing?”
“Let’s see… we can start with not coming straight home after you dropped the girls off.”
“Frank was driving!” Joe cried out. “He’s the one who decided not to come straight home, not me! I was at his mercy. Practically a prisoner! What was I supposed to do, jump out of a moving vehicle?” he finished dramatically.
Fenton looked at him sternly, all the while smiling inside. Joe was nothing if not entertaining in his efforts to get himself out of trouble. “Okay, then when you did realize you weren’t coming straight home because Frank was holding you prisoner, you could’ve called and told me.”
“My cell phone battery was dead!” Joe blurted out.
“You could’ve answered Frank’s phone when I called him.”
“He told me not to!” Joe exclaimed.
Fenton arched one eyebrow, his voice thick with sarcasm. “And we know you always do what you’re told…”
Joe opened his mouth to speak, then snapped it shut and slunk down in the chair, the first sign he knew he was waging a losing battle.
“I was wrong last night. You weren’t hallucinating. You were clear and lucid and you knew exactly what was going on. And given that, I think you can take your fair share of the responsibility for what happened.” Fenton looked at him steadily. “You did the right thing but you went about it in the wrong way.”
“Maybe,” Joe replied. “But if I had answered Frank’s phone would you have even listened?” he challenged. “Or would you have just gone ballistic because we disobeyed you and insisted we come right home?”
Fenton bristled but only for a moment, admitting to himself that’s probably exactly what he would have done. “At that point yes, I very well might have.”
Joe lifted his head triumphantly, thinking he’d won until Fenton continued undeterred. “But then you found that scrap of fabric and the trap door. You had physical evidence – tangible and solid – and a lead to follow. And you should have called me immediately. You had solid proof then, Joe; enough to convince me and the police who could have mounted a search.”
“Frank and I did the search…” Joe cut in, a touch of defiance in his voice. “And the rescue.”
Fenton sighed inwardly. Unlike with Frank, he knew this wasn’t going to be easy. Joe never went down without a fight. “Yes, you did and for that I am proud of you. But you had no idea what you were walking into, yet you walked right into it anyway with no backup!” Fenton held his hand up, ticking off points on his fingers. “You didn’t know what was on the other end of that tunnel, if the girl was even there, if she was being held against her will, if so by how many people, if they were armed and with what… What if instead of two men sleeping on the couch oblivious to your presence, there had been an organized gang, armed to the teeth with guards on the tunnel, the girl… everywhere?! What if that had been the case?
“You and Frank could have been killed in the blink of an eye and dumped in the tunnel. It could have been days, weeks… months before your bodies were found. IF they were ever found! And while you were off doing your search and rescue last night, that is what I was going through.” Fenton sighed, and ran a hand through his hair, suddenly drained. Scrubbing a hand across his face, he closed his eyes for a moment trying to regain control. Leaning forward, he stared at Joe intently. “I trained both of you better than that – better than to walk into a dangerous situation blind, with no backup, no one even knowing where you are… and you know that.”
Joe squirmed uncomfortably under the weight of the truth.
“Joe…” he waited until Joe made, and held, eye contact with him. “I have all the faith in the world in you and your brother and your investigative abilities. You’re both so far ahead of me when I was your age it’s embarrassing. But with that ability comes responsibility. I need to know that you will act responsibly whether you’re looking for a missing girl, a mass murderer or a lost dog.”
Joe slouched even further down in the chair, barely holding Fenton’s gaze. “Yes, sir.”
‘Finally!’ Fenton thought. “So we understand each other?”
Joe let out a frustrated exhale and sat up, looking at Fenton earnestly. “Yeah, we do. I’ll remember everything you taught me, I’ll be mature and responsible when I’m investigating anything and from now on you’ll believe everything I say.”
Fenton opened his mouth, ready to agree, when Joe’s final words registered. His eyebrows shot up and he looked at Joe questioningly only to be met with the familiar spark of mischief in those vivid blue eyes. Shaking his head, Fenton chuckled softly, the tension between them suddenly gone. “I promise to listen with an open mind and give you the benefit of the doubt whenever possible, how’s that?”
“Deal,” Joe grinned.
“Good… Listen Ava’s parents called earlier while you were taking a nap. They wanted to thank you and Frank for what you did. Mr. Parker said they looked for you at the hospital this morning, but we’d already left. So… are you up for a drive to Kirkland?” Fenton asked, knowing full well what Joe’s response would be.
Joe sat up excitedly. “You bet!”
*****
Forty-five minutes later, Fenton, Frank and Joe were standing in the Parkers’ living room. Seeing a family portrait over the fireplace, Joe wandered over for a closer view. He recognized Mr. and Mrs. Parker and Ava, a few years younger, and next to her a small boy. Moving closer still, Joe squinted to get a better look at the boy and sucked in a breath. Staring at the picture, his eyes widened in shock.
“Mr. Parker,” he asked, nervously. “Who’s the little boy in the picture?”
“Oh,” the man said, moving to stand next to Joe. His voice took on a note of sadness. “That was our son, Alex. He died a little over a year ago… leukemia.” Parker stared at the picture, misty-eyed. “He adored his big sister. Followed her everywhere…”
“I’m sorry,” Joe said, struggling to get the words out, unable to believe his own eyes. ‘Was I hallucinating?’ Alex was the boy he’d seen in the barn; the one who’d spoken to Joe, begged him to help Ava and led him directly to her… and who had been dead for over a year…
Joe heard a gasp of surprise, turned to see Ava racing across the room and caught her as she literally threw herself on him.
“Ava!” Mr. Parker scolded. “Be careful of his arm.”
Kneeling, Joe pulled the young girl close and held her tightly. “No harm done,” Joe said, gently stroking Ava’s hair. After a moment, he pulled back a little and looked her in the eyes. “How ya doing, Ava?” he asked softly. On the drive over, Fenton had filled him and Frank in on the search for Ava’s kidnappers.
Both men had records for petty crimes but with their last arrests for indecent exposure seemed to be working their way up to kidnapping. One of them had secured a job at Frightland, the police believed to hunt for a victim. They had done their homework, discovering the old farmhouse and the tunnel leading to the edge of the Frightland property. When Ava showed up the previous evening and got separated from her group, they quickly took advantage of the unfortunate circumstances. Thanks to their previous records, their fingerprints had been in the system and they were easily identified by prints left at the farmhouse. APB’s had been sent to police precincts in all the neighboring states and it was simply a matter of time before the two men were apprehended.
Joe had found that to be a relief but even more so was the fact that other than the trauma of being kidnapped and tied up, nothing more had happened to Ava. The men had planned to take her and flee the state in the morning, a plan that had been foiled by the actions of Frank and Joe.
Ava gave Joe a huge smile, hero worship written all over her face. “I’m good,” she glanced down at his cast. “But you hurt your arm.”
“Ah, it’ll be fine in a few weeks,” Joe waved off her concern and then leaned in conspiratorially. “And in the meantime everyone will wait on me hand and foot,” he grinned, gesturing towards Frank and Fenton.
Ava giggled, quickly having developed a crush on the youngest Hardy.
“Don’t count on it,” Frank replied, having overheard Joe’s prediction.
While Joe was thrilled to see for himself that Ava was all right and happy to chat with her parents, it had been hours since the last painkiller; less than fifteen minutes after they had arrived, his arm was starting to throb. Fenton, apparently having noticed the way Joe was shifting uncomfortably and shielding his right arm, politely declined the Parkers’ offer of coffee, soda and snacks. With a quick round of thanks and goodbyes, the Hardys were on their way back to Bayport.
By the time they arrived back home, Joe’s arm was seriously hurting and he was grateful when Laura met him with one of the small white pills, a glass of water and orders to go straight to bed. It wasn’t long before the painkiller took effect and Joe quickly fell into a deep sleep.
As he slept, a soft glow suffused the corner of his bedroom. Moving towards Joe’s bed it took shape, transparent and flickering, but now easily recognizable as a small boy. Reaching out, the boy smiled and gently laid a hand on Joe’s forehead. Joe stirred slightly at the touch but didn’t awaken.
“You helped her… Thank you…”
Alex Parker stared at Joe for a moment longer, then removed his hand, flickered once and disappeared…
THE END
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The Hardy Boys belong to Simon and Schuster and the Stratemeyer Foundation. The authors 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.