HDA - Living in Darkness Trilogy - Pt 2 - The Search

Joe sighed as he leaned back in his seat and looked up at the large house that his mother rented a few days before. Unfamiliar, not the home in his mind that he wanted to see again, Joe felt lost and lonely – bereft. The young man got out of the rental van and waited on the sidewalk as his mom fished in her purse for her keychain, and followed her listlessly to the front door, waiting for the door to open so he could find a place to disappear.

I want to disappear, Joe thought again. I need to…get away from them.

He didn’t want anyone watching him, didn’t want people looking at him, not even his own family. As Laura got the front door of the strange house open Joe sprang inside and was about to head upstairs to his room when he stopped.

Not only did he not know which room was his, but there was no familiar set of stairs located just on the other side of a familiar living room. There was, instead, a room he had never seen before.

Joe took a deep breath and tried to keep from falling apart right then and there. He forced himself to get his bearings, to look around the unfamiliar room. It was an entry way, not a living room. There were four doors leading out of the room, all of them closed. He turned to his mom.

“Where’s my room?” he demanded. He really needed to get out of here. He hoped they could see that.

“There’s three bedrooms down the hallway off the room through that door,” Laura pointed to the doorway located on the far right side of the entry way. “This house is all one story, no stairs. Pick one of those rooms, two of them share a bathroom, the third has its own.”

That was familiar, at least. He and Frank had shared a bathroom for quite a long time. He and Frank would probably be sharing a bathroom again, as long as Frank could get in and out of it okay.

Joe went through the door his mom indicated and into a room that looked to be the dining room. He saw the hallway his mom talked about, located on the far right corner of the room and he went down, finding one of the bedrooms that shared the bathroom and slid the door shut.

With a shuddering sigh he leaned back against the door for a moment and squeezed his eyes shut. He was safe now. Nobody watching.

I can be alone. For once, I can be alone.

Joe walked the few steps to the double bed situated under a window and he threw himself across it, pulling one of the pillows over his head. He thought he might cry but he didn’t, he did nothing but lie quietly, trying to fight back a large variety of emotions, ones that were beating inside of his head.

Loss, anger, rage, hate – and self-loathing; they whirled around in his head. He couldn’t fight them off and, if he was completely honest with himself, he didn’t want to.

“I love you, Joe,” the words whispered in his head, haunting him. Joe blanched and tried to fight back the flashback. He felt hands ghosting over his body though and felt… he felt Andrew…

Andrew kissing him. Touching him. Inside…

Shuddering, Joe curled up, trying to escape the memories. Suddenly he flew out of his bed and into the bathroom. He threw up everything he had eaten that day and sat, leaned over, hands propped on the seat as he shook. He shook as he reached up to slide off his shirt and the rest of this clothing and, after taking a towel from the linen closet, he hopped into a shower set as hot as he could make it. The blonde-haired boy scrubbed and scrubbed, the urgent desire to be clean threatening to eat him alive. He had to get clean. He had to get everything off of him! He continued to scrub, long after his skin hurt, the bar of soap he found in the shower growing smaller and smaller.

Finally, Joe collapsed in the shower, sobbing. He buried his face in his hands and curled up, the hot water falling all around him as he sobbed.

“He’s still in the shower.” Mandy sat down on the sofa in the family room of the new house, her blue eyes fierce as she looked up at her parents. “I knocked on the door once but he didn’t answer and he has both doors locked so I couldn’t go in to check on him. Are you sure we should leave him in there by himself?”

Mandy didn’t like the new house already. Yes, it was cool. It was large, one story – Frank wouldn’t have to negotiate stairs and beautifully decorated – but Mandy hated it. It wasn’t home, the house she had grown up in most of her life. It was all strange to her, something unknown in a world of upheaval. Mandy longed to go find Andrew in whatever dark hole he was being held, and bury a fist in his stomach, before she rearranged his face for him.

Great, Mandy shook her head, berating herself. I’m become a totally immature, fractious two-year-old who lost their favorite piece of candy. Cut it out, Mandy. Right now!

“Leave him be for now,” Laura said again. “He needs some time on his own; he can’t really work things out if we’re all hovering over him all the time. I know you want to help him, Mandy, but some of this he’s going to have to help himself with, all right? If he’s in there too much longer I’ll check on him.”

Mandy sighed and turned away, curling her legs up and rocking slightly.

“I don’t like him closing himself off so much,” she muttered softly. “He goes all dark, Mom, all snowy inside. I don’t like it at all.”

Mandy took a deep breath as Laura sat down beside her and hugged her. “I know you want to help him,” Laura said softly. “I know you want to be near him but…you have to wait. You need to wait for him to ask for that help. You need to wait for him to take the steps. You’ll know when he wants you close.”

Reluctantly, the blonde-haired girl nodded and leaned into her mother’s embrace. Laura patted her hair and Mandy smiled, wiping a tear that had finally fallen down her cheek.

“You know me, Mom,” Mandy tried to laugh a little. “I always have to try to help, even if people don’t ask for it. I hate just sitting here doing nothing.”

“Well, I do have something you could help with if you want to be doing instead of sitting,” Laura said slowly.

“As long as you aren’t about to say ‘do the dishes’ what is it?” Mandy asked cautiously. She hated doing the dishes!

“We need linens for the beds,” Laura said. “I managed to get some towels but we need more of those too. You want to head to the mall and see what you can find?”

“You want me to buy linens for everyone?” Mandy’s mouth nearly fell open at the very idea. “Comforters too?”

Her mother nodded. “All of it,” Laura agreed. “Maybe Samantha can go with you so you have someone to help you carry. You can work on it together.”

“Well…” Mandy frowned then nodded, the frown turning to a smile. “Okay.”

I can’t help Joe, maybe I can help Mom, Mandy thought. I have to do something beside sit here or I’ll make everyone crazy, including Joe!

Mandy went to find Samantha, who was sitting on the bed in Frank’s room. Frank was leaning against the headboard, his bad leg stretched out in front of him, talking quietly with his girlfriend. Samantha was holding his hand and they had been laughing softly about something when Mandy came into the room.

The shower was off in the bathroom connected to Frank’s room, and Mandy sighed with relief that Joe was finally, at least, finished with impersonating a fish in need of water. Mandy wanted, badly, to knock on the door to his room but she went back to her task at hand.

“Sam,” she said to her friend. “Mom wants me to head to the mall to go linen shopping. Do you want to come give me a hand?”

Samantha raised an eyebrow. “Sure,” she said. “If it’s all right with Frank.”

“Fine with me,” Frank said. “I figure I’ll be awake for another ten minutes anyway, stupid drugs.”

Samantha laughed and leaned forward, giving him a thorough kiss.

“I’d bring Connor but he went and got Chet so they could go rescue his SUV from Cambridge ,” Mandy said. “And you have a better eye than he does.”

Samantha laughed. “I remember the last comforter he bought.”

“Ugh, so do I!” Frank exclaimed. “That thing was hideous!”

“Quit dissing the boyfriend, big brother,” Mandy warned him. “Or I’ll get you something just like it.”

Frank managed a mock-look of horror and Mandy laughed again. She tugged on Samantha’s hand and they left to head to the mall in Mandy’s mother’s car.

“So what should we get for Joe? Something sporty?” Samantha asked a while later as they stood before the vast selection of comforter sets in a local linen store.

“Nope,” Mandy said. “He likes plain or geometrics – very modern. His last one was like psychedelic swirls – no way am I getting something that hideous again. Yuck.”

Samantha laughed as she looked over the list of bed sizes.

“This one,” Mandy pointed to a nearly solid blue bedspread. Along the edges were boxy brown, green and red squares that broke up the blue color nicely. “This is great for Joe. Solid but with a little geometric shape to it. And it’s all cotton, feel that. Very soft. He’ll love it.”

Mandy grinned as she put it into the basket, found the matching sheets, pillow shams and curtains.

“I like this for Frank,” Samantha had found another comforter set and set it on top of the basket. It was a masculine striped pattern that looked pretty cool. “I mean, he can’t see it, but…”

“Yeah,” Mandy sighed. “We can describe this to him easy enough though.”

Mandy found one she liked, in purples, pinks and reds with a few flowers embroidered in, then she got one that was similar to what her parents had before, for them.

“More towels and we’re on our way,” Mandy commented a little later. “Sheesh, this is harder than I thought.”

Both girls were pushing carts now and, after picking up a couple dozen towels, hand towels and washcloths, they brought the carts to the checkout lane.

When they got home they found Mandy’s parents on the front porch, looking a little alarmed.

“Mom, Dad, what’s wrong?” Mandy asked.

“We were in cooking when we heard the front door slam,” Fenton said to his daughter. “Joe’s gone again!”

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Disclaimer

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.