Robert Vickers: Mom on the make

The bruise appeared almost instantly. But Eddie was in a towering rage. The minor pain was nothing to him. A blood rage rose and blanketed, out everything else. He would fix his old man once and for all. This would be the last time Lee King ever had the chance to beat up on either Ann or Joanne.

Eddie would see to that.

As drunk as Lee was, he still had the reflexes he had built up in Korea and numerous fights. He managed to swing again and hit Eddie a glancing blow on the cheek. The teenager's head snapped back and rattled his teeth.

Eddie was no longer hot he was polar cold. He had lost any nervousness he'd once had. As if all of his nerve endings had died, Eddie felt like a machine. A killing machine. And the one purpose was to eliminate this miserable specimen of humanity.

Eddie danced forward, launched a savage kick at his father's knee cap and missed. But his father had to dodge and was off balance. Eddie's right fist rocketed out and slammed with a meaty thud into his father's midsection. What had once been muscle had long since turned to fat. Eddie's fist disappeared up to the wrist.

As his father doubled over, everything seemed to move in slow motion. Eddie marveled at being a detached observer. It was as if someone else brought their knee up into Lee's face to break the nose. A slow-motion geyser of blood spewed out in a small arc to splatter on the clean kitchen floor.

But Lee wasn't finished. For all his potbelly and fat, there was still a toughness in him that couldn't be denied. He straightened up and swung again at Eddie's face. Eddie moved a fraction of an inch and let the blow drift by.

With all the force he could summon, the teenager swung for the broken nose dribbling blood. Eddie was big, strong and at his peak. When he connected with Lee's already mangled face, there was a dull crunch! And Eddie's father was knocked from his feet.

Lee lay for a moment on his back, then struggled to his feet. As he attempted to stand, however, his foot slipped in some of the blood that had spilled from his gushing nose. He fell heavily and hit his head on the corner of the kitchen table.

A sudden snap echoed throughout the tiny room. Lee crumpled to the floor and didn't stir.

Eddie was breathing heavily as he went to his mother and put his hand around her. "I don't think he's going to hurt you any more. Not tonight. You and Ann are safe."

"Is… is he dead?" Joanne asked, her voice quavering in fright at everything that had occurred that night.

"I doubt it. Hit his head. To break a solid block of granite like that would take more than just a kitchen table." Eddie began to have his doubts, though.

He made sure his mother was sitting down and quiet, then tried to comfort Ann the best he could. She had been unconscious most of the fight but had seen the last round.

She patted him reassuringly on the shoulder and whispered in his ear, "Don't worry, Eddie. Everything will be okay."

Eddie was thinking that he should be telling the young girl that, but his more immediate concern was his father.

A quick examination confirmed his suspicions. He said in a low voice, "He's barely breathing. I think we'd batter get him to the hospital. It looks pretty bad, too."

Eddie went to the telephone and quickly dialed the operator. A few terse words and he was told that an ambulance would be sent on its way immediately. Eddie replaced the phone in its cradle without any feeling of triumph.

His father lay before him on the kitchen floor. Naked and unmoving, it was hard to imagine that the man had been responsible for the hideous torture of Joanne and Ann.

Eddie told Ann, "The ambulance will be here in a few minutes. Why don't you take Mom into the bedroom. I don't think it would be too smart to have them see her – or you – like this."

Ann simply nodded and led her hysterical mother to the back of the house. Eddie could take care of the questions now. Later, they could get their stories together. It wouldn't do for this family scandal to become public. Corinth wasn't the biggest city in the world, and, like all small towns; a scandal spread like wildfire.

In a few days, everyone in town would know that Lee King had been torturing his wife and daughter. That his son had almost killed him when he found out.

Eddie wanted to avoid any possible publicity. His mother had been through enough already. Further publicity in this wouldn't be to anyone's advantage except the news-hungry vultures in town.

Eddie composed himself just in time to answer the doorbell. The ambulance crew had come.

"Come on in. My father's in the kitchen. Hit his head on the table."

Two bored-looking attendants hurried to the kitchen while the policeman accompanying them pulled out his notebook.

"Mind telling me what happened? Got to file a report every time the ambulance is called out, you know."

"Uh, sure, officer. Not a whole lot to tell. My father's been, uh, well, hitting the bottle pretty hard lately. He must have gotten really smashed tonight. He stumbled and hit his head on the table. I guess that's about it."

The policeman had been carefully making notes as he went. He looked up when Eddie stopped. "Who found your old man?"

"I did. I'd just come in from a date. My mother and sister were… sleeping. Guess they didn't hear anything. Mother's pretty bad off. Hysterical over this. I hope you won't have to talk with her. She's been doped up with with tranquilizers to calm her down."

"Naw, won't have to bother her. This kind of thing happens all the time. Tell you the truth, I was sort of waiting for it to happen to Lee. Been getting into fights down at Tyrone Reese's bar. Ty's been real nice about it. Just tosses Lee out, but Ty warned me about something bad in the wind."

Eddie swallowed hard as the policeman snapped the notebook shut with a flick of his wrist. "Is… is there anything else, officer? I'd like to stay here with my mother and after she gets calmed down, take her on down to the hospital."

The officer shrugged. "Fine with me. I'm going to file an accident report, nothing else." The officer dispassionately watched as the two ambulance attendants hauled Lee King outside on the stretcher.

"I won't even mention he slipped in a pool of his own blood."

Eddie looked up, surprised. The policeman continued, "Heard how he's been bad mouthin' your ma. Don't like that. Seems to rue he got what he deserved, you know?"

As the cop turned to leave Eddie quietly asked, "How'd you know what happened? Really?"

The officer smiled faintly. "Nobody hits his head and ends up with blood on the soles of his feet. Had to have slipped in it before he hit his noggin. Dig?" With that, the cop left.

Eddie felt weak inside. It seemed that Corinth's finest was on his side, that there was some mercy with justice. The ambulance roared off into the night in the direction of the city's only hospital. The neighbors poked their heads out of their curtained windows at the sight of the red flashing lights, but few came out to investigate.

The teenager made his way down the hallway to his parents' bedroom. He hesitated before opening the door. He didn't want to face his mother. Not after what had been done to her tonight.

Eddie straightened his shoulders and pushed into the room. On the bed, sleeping, was his mother. Standing beside her was Ann.

His sister put a finger to her lips to make sure Eddie kept quiet. Ann whispered in his ear, "I've given her some of those sleeping pills Dr. Montgomery prescribed for her last month. She'll probably sleep for at least ten hours."

Eddie put his arm around Ann's quaking shoulder. His sister had been through just as much as his mother. He marveled at how well Ann had endured the ordeal. It couldn't have been easy for her to see Joanne tied up, then raped herself.