Chapter Forty-Three Self-Taught 2 page

His name was Tom, and he was unlike most people I had been coming into contact with. They had sunken faces with swollen eyes and worried glares, stiff upper lips or water-logged sympathies. This guy was just like a teenager, but older and brandishing a law degree. He swore a lot, something my mother didn’t exactly approve of, but she wasn’t around a lot of the time. He would ask her to leave occasionally, just because he knew he could get more out of me when she was gone. She had stayed for our first normal meeting for the boring and drudging paperwork and whatnot. I had zoned out countless times during that meeting, looking at all the degrees on the wall, and the small artwork hidden amongst diplomas and prestige. It was a print of a piece done by some obscure artist I didn’t know. Probably local talent, but I highly doubted that anything talented came out of Jersey. It was a simple picture will rolling hills and blue sky. It wasn’t the best thing I had seen, but it reinforced my trust in Tom even more. He had art in his office; he must have had some kind of sympathy.

As it turned out, he did. Nearing the end of that first meeting, he turned to me suddenly, and called me by name.

“Frank. How are you?”

His question had been something I was not familiar with. Even the shrink had not asked me how I was in that very moment in time. She had asked how I had been that week, that month, in regards to my family, in regards to my friends, and Gerard. She was not asking in the general sense because she could, it was because she had to. Bonnie had asked that too, but she was a doctor. She almost had to as well; she was just more sympathetic than most people had been.

I looked at Tom, and he nodded. He actually wanted to know how I was doing. He was supposed to be dealing with law, not feelings. This was a change.

“I’m okay. Kind of tired.”

“Do you know who looks really tired?” he pondered out loud, and I noticed his Jersey accent, just not as thick as the stereotypes that bled into real life. He didn’t give me much time to answer before motioning to the vacant body beside me. “Your mom looks exhausted. How about she goes to take a break while you and I figure out the rest of this stuff, okay?”

The lawyer’s words had startled both of us into gaped mouths. We looked at each other, then back at him, trying to see if he was serious. He was. When my mother had regained some kind of composure, she had not wanted to leave. She tried to shoo Tom’s offer away, blinking and rubbing the sleep out of her eyes. It was when Tom mentioned it that I really noticed how tired she was. There were bags and dark circles under her sallow skin, and her hands were trembling slightly. Her voice faltered as she talked, especially when she mentioned my name. I didn’t know I had hurt her this much.

Tom stepped in, trying to fix the mess I had created.

“Nah, don’t worry about Frank, Mrs. Iero. He looks pretty fine to me. Go get a coffee and he’ll meet you by your car. I only need him for a little while.”

When she opened her mouth again and tried to argue, Tom flung some change on the table from his pocket for that coffee, and really, my mother couldn’t argue anymore.

I felt comfortable around him just from the way he treated my mom and I as a unit, but when left alone, I could feel my blood thickening. I wasn’t sure how this would turn out. I should have never have doubted him, because just like his first question to me, his inquiry into how I actually was, he talked to me first. We actually had a conversation before the legal shit was brought to the surface again. We discussed favorite bands and some of his I had actually heard of, same with some of mine. The majority of our conversation was reminiscing about our first concerts before he finally got out to the nitty-gritty of things.

“Like I said, I know it’s fucked,” he started, waving his hands in the air and looking over his paperwork in a half-assed attempt to be professional. “But did Gerard do anything inappropriate to you, other than give you alcohol?” His eyes rolled around in his head as he asked, trying to add a comic light to the situation.

When I had answered my standard no, this time with my voice as strong as ever, he only asked me one other time if I was sure. And then he moved onto my other charges, like drinking and driving.

“You’re a good kid,” he stated, clucking his tongue as he looked over some statements and other legal jargon I couldn’t understand. He brought his eyes to meet with my own, scratching his beard with his long fingers. “I can probably get you community service. You just made one mistake, and hopefully you won’t do it again?”

He narrowed his eyes at me, but in a comical way so I didn’t feel like he was looking down on me. Everyone else around me had been doing that, even my own mother on some instances. It felt so good for a person in power to actually treat me like a person, an adult – instead of this child who didn’t know what they were talking about. I did know what I was talking about, and fuck, Tom believed me. He was going to fight for me, not against me, even when my parents spoke up.

On our second meeting, my mother and I had made the foolish mistake in letting my father come too. We didn’t really have much say in the matter actually; his death glare had shut me up, and my mother was too much of a silent shell to say anything at all against him. The moment we set foot in the door, things started to go bad. Before Tom could even shake my father’s hand he was running off at the mouth about Gerard, and just what should be happening to him.

“I want him arrested. No fucking trial - just put him jail. He’s not going to touch another kid again. Sick pedophile.”

Tom placed his extended hand at his side, forgoing the greeting. His face was surprisingly calm, while I closed my eyes for impact.

“Well, first of all, if he’s charged with anything, it won’t be pedophilia,” Tom started with stealth, using knowledge like bullets. “Pedophilia only pertains to people who are interested in prepubescent children, and as much as we hate to say it, Frank’s not thirteen anymore. He’s almost an adult, but still very far away at the same time. He’s capable of taking for himself, believe it or not, and he’s told me in the company of your wife, and in private, that nothing inappropriate has happened.”

I could see my dad’s skin toughen upon impact of those words. I could have sworn I saw red bloom beneath his tanned skin, but it could have been the light, or the vexation in his system.

“If Gerard is charged with anything, it will be pederasty. But,” Tom quipped quickly, moving on. “I am not Gerard’s lawyer so I cannot predict anything at this point in time. I am Frank’s lawyer, and how about we talk about his case, Mr. Iero?”

Both Tom and my father swallowed their pride, while my mother and I tried to remain visible in the crowded room. Tom began to explain some details to us, looking in each of our eyes as he talked, but my dad still required his full attention. He would constantly cut in, trying to find errors in what he was saying, and each time, Tom would bounce back. He was extremely professional, though I could tell the constant scrutiny was getting to him by the way he gritted his teeth. I knew it was only a matter of time before he snapped, my father snapped, and everything went downhill again. It happened as I began to talk to Tom and explain a few things that involved Gerard when my dad’s deep booming voice looming high in the air tried to intercept every word I said and change it around. Tom finally called my father out, telling him by his first name to please leave the room. My dad refused to go, saying he wasn’t breaking any law, but when Tom turned around got out a thick text book from behind his desk (that I had thought were for display purposes only) and started to read him a passage about coercion, my father left in a huff.

He didn’t come back again. It was around that time where he began to seclude himself more and more from the family, but I tried to not let it bother me. Tom was listening to me, my mom was getting better, and Gerard wasn’t going to get charged. Tom had confided to me during one of our alone sessions that things just weren’t holding up like they needed to. It had taken so long for things to finally come down from hiding up in the air, but when it rained, it fucking poured. Gerard just had to deal with the charge of giving alcohol to a minor, something that could be settled out of court. I had no idea who his lawyer was, but Tom knew him briefly from law school and said he was a good guy. Gerard merely got a fine and some community service of his own like me. My proceedings were still in the process of being worked out, but Tom assured me that community service, even if it was an insane amount of hours, would probably be the only thing I got. But I didn’t care what I got anymore; Gerard was fine.

“What about his bail conditions?” I asked the last time I had seen Tom. “Is Gerard allowed to be outside and around minors now?”

Tom had sighed, scratching his beard again; a nervous habit I noticed he had. His face was serious and there was another emotion hidden behind that thick mane of hair. “Yes, but it’s not a good idea to see him.”

My head fell into my hands that I had draped over my lap. My mother was outside; it was another quick visit where Tom had kicked her out, just to talk to me privately for a while. I was glad she wasn’t in the room so see how fucking disappointed I was in his statement. Tom saw it though, and quickly corrected himself.

“Just yet,” he added, cocking his head to the side. I nearly leaped out of my seat, my eyes bulging and wanting more details, like when and where, but that was not what I got. I got sympathy, but in the best for possible.

“You shouldn’t see him so soon because it could mean a lot of trouble for both of you.” He looked at me with an austere face. “It’s just starting to blow over now. People are starting to forget, and with that double homicide up the street from your place, I think people are going to have better things to talk about.”

We laughed at the black humor in the situation. I vaguely recalled glancing at the headlines and hearing something about a domestic squabble gone very badly. Honestly, I had just been searching headlines for anything about Gerard that morning at breakfast, and barely paid attention to anything else.

“If you see Gerard while it’s still somewhat fresh in people’s minds, you’ll remind them why they think they need to be afraid.”

I sighed, nodded. Just because Tom was able to disprove to the police force and my mother that there was nothing to hide from, that didn’t transcend to everyone else around us. There were still people like my father would chose to believe the worse, and sadly, people like him were far too common.

“I can understand why you want to see him, though,” Tom started, still scratching, but a smile emerging. “I met with him once in the station for awhile, and privately. He seems like a good guy. A little fruity, but a good guy. I’d want to hang out with him too.”

He looked up at me, his eyes whole and serious – for the first time since I had met him. I hadn’t known him long in calendar days, but we had spent so many hours together over paperwork and testimonies, hours I should have been at school, hours I should have been with Gerard and taking pictures, but I had been with him instead. You got to know people in crisis situations and when a lot depends on them. I depended on Tom, and he delivered, with more real sympathy than I had ever seen in my life. Sympathy that made me feel human, instead of broken. And he was only my lawyer.

“Thank you,” I stated earnestly, getting up as he did from his seat to guide me out of the room. I didn’t know what else I could say, what else I could do. I just wanted to let him know how much I appreciated everything.

“Hey, no problem,” he insisted waving his hand in the air as the other one reached for the doorknob. “It’s what I’m paid the big bucks for,” he joked, tapping his chest mockingly. I laughed, realizing that money and my simple thank you was probably enough. Especially the money part.

As I met up with my mother, smile still planted on our face from the most recent (but not last I knew, at least not for awhile) meeting with Tom, I heard the lawyer add yet another thing to his statement.

“Just stay out of trouble, okay, Frank?” His voice still resonated the serious tone as before, his thick bushy eyebrows meeting in the middle and sinking down.

I knew he chose to believe that Gerard and I were a teacher-student relationship, and probably he thought that was all that was there, but he still didn’t want either of us to get in anymore trouble. His brow displayed his worried features, knowing that I would probably see Gerard sooner than society needed me too.

“I will,” I assured him, then walked out the door.

***

Days passed a lot faster, but I still felt like I was missing something. I had done all the legal things I could have done for then, but I was still trapped at home. I was determined to keep Tom’s word, and though it would be hard, I knew I could. I had gone to a shrink and I had mended things with Jasmine. Fixing anything with Gerard I knew had to wait, and though I was okay with that, something was still missing inside me. Gone. I couldn’t figure out what it was at first, and it plagued me to no end. I started to become paranoid that one of my lies had fallen through, or I didn’t cover them up properly enough. I stared at the phone for one entire afternoon, thinking that they were going to call and tell me some horrible news. When my mother called me for dinner, and nothing had happened, I realized what I had been missing. There had been no phone calls from the lab, other than for my blood work. Any closure of the rape kit had not been had, though its name and presence still buzzed within us all. My dad’s obsession with it beforehand had make me discount it entirely, but now that my dad had been a mere mute the past few days, I began to pick up the slack.

The rape kit was something that I figured and hoped would be done as soon as it could be, even before my dad’s little out burst. I knew the results deep down inside, and ever so slowly, my mother was starting to believe them without any official word just yet. I needed evidence though, solid, factual, and tactful evidence if I ever wanted to be completely free of myself and my worries and doubts. That was what I was missing inside, why I didn’t feel right in my own skin. I needed the lab to call me, and soon because time was running out as much as it was passing by slowly.

But I found out soon enough, from piecing together little things and observing the details that Gerard had taught me about, that nothing was going to happen. The rape kit wasn’t going to be processed, and if it was, nothing was going to come from it. After one meeting with Tom where he got too flustered to even answer any of my questions about the kit, I took to myself to figure my own answers out. All I had asked him was if people had called him, and his face had grown despondent. He told me I had a lot I needed to learn about the system, and before I could ask for any guidance, my mother had come in to get me.

I had no idea where to go or what to do after that. I needed answers, and since Tom was too far away, and Gerard was just unreachable, I dipped into my youth and used the place where I used to go to for all the answers: the library. As nerdy as it sounded, it was one of the only logical places I could get to without getting into more trouble. I walked there to busy myself one night after dinner, and soon found out that I had a lot I needed to learn. I wanted to educate myself and know what I was talking about, especially if I had to defend myself. Law went straight over my head, and so did medical jargon, but there was one clear fact that I began to comprehend completely.

Rapes were almost never charged outright. The facts horrified me at first, and fueled my constant reading. I found out that though rape kits were done, most of them ended up sitting in a freezer, and if anything was ever found, charges were hard to lay. Often times, it was only because the victim was physically injured as well, and the rape charge was tacked onto an assault arrest. Some people were even discouraged from having a rape kit because the hospital knew that the staff wouldn’t do anything about it. I read that cops often tampered with them, and lab technicians often times let their own personal biases to the surface. If the case wasn’t anything too special to let a bias through on, it was just a number, a statistic, and something that when too many were put together, they fell side by side against one another, eventually lost in the back of a lab.

This, in essence, meant good news for me (I wouldn’t have to worry about any kind of results fucking up my story because it seemed that there would be no result to do that), but it infuriated me nonetheless. The statistics I was finding out were for women mostly, but I figured it would be the same for men. In fact, the details may have even proved to be better for men because they were the source of power in society and would get taken seriously easier. I just couldn’t believe that our government, the system we had to depend on worked that way. I couldn’t believe that they would tell a prostitute to never bother getting a rape kit done, and some women would never have closure or results from theirs when something serious had happened. I was being fucking forced to get one, and nothing had happened to me. I didn’t understand, and in a way, I didn’t want to understand. I didn’t want to be a part of those individuals who judged upon looking at a victim if they were worthy enough to still be a victim. I didn’t want to be a part of a society that was based on numbers and restrictions. I wanted art, I wanted equality. I wanted every picture, every case I looked at to be beautiful and validated in some form. I wanted to be free from all of this.

I thought getting results for myself in my hands so I could brandish to the world would make me liberated. I thought it would give me some foreign sense of sovereignty that I could hold in my hands and use as my ticket out of here. But when I read about other victims, people who had gone though much worse than I could even fathom, and got nothing from this law, I changed my perspective.

I looked at this one case study in a book of this girl. Her name was Mary, but it said it was changed to protect her identify. There was no picture, just a silhouetted picture of this woman. Even in this darkened shadow of a life, I could see some distinct features. Her nose was like Gerard’s; sharp, pointed, and drawn thinly to the front. And I knew that after seeing her nose, that her name should not be Mary. It was too plain for her. It was the name of a rape victim on a file, not the name of a person. There must have been at least a million Marys in the world. There were too many of them, and by forcing this title on her, it made her a statistic.

So I changed her name before I even read her story to something far greater, far better. Her name was Minerva. Gerard had told me that she was some Roman Goddess of War or something. We had seen it in a painting, and it had stuck with me. I had to name her that so this girl – Minerva now – would stick with me. Her name fit her. She had put up a hell of a fight.

When she was sixteen, she was raped constantly by her former boyfriend. I wasn’t even sure at first how someone could be raped by someone they chose to call their boyfriend, but as I read on, I was enlightened even more. If you say no, it’s a fucking no. Just because you were dating, didn’t grant anyone full permission. Fuck, I had known that all along, but I had never seen it in such black and white terms. Gerard made sure each and every time we had sex that I wanted this; he always gave me a chance to say no. I never did. I never wanted to. This only reinforced in my mind that the police and everyone were after us for the wrong reasons.

I continued to read about Minerva, about her struggles to get people to believe her. One night, her boyfriend went too far and started to beat her. Gave her a broken and bloodied nose. In the hospital, she asked for a rape kit, and one was done, but the person committing it had been cynical at best. She judged Minerva for not being a nervous wreck when she was telling the story, informing police that she couldn’t have been serious because she spoke so calmly about such an invasive crime. Minerva’s boyfriend was charged, but never with rape. The kit had been done, but nothing was done about it. Minerva had some closure for her physical scars, but none for her emotional.

Or at least, that was what I had thought at first. I had been so angry while reading this book, I nearly swore and cursed in the library. I just couldn’t believe it. I couldn’t understand how anyone could find peace with themselves after being so violated, and then have no one do anything about it. But my eyes pushed forward through the text, and my mind kept changing and bending in ways it hadn’t done since I had left Gerard’s apartment.

“You have to find peace within yourself before you can find peace within anyone else,” Minerva had spoken in the book, explaining how she had gotten on with her life. Her rape still haunted her at the best of times, but she knew what happened and how she felt because of it. Her family and friends knew the logistics of it all, but even then, they could only imagine what had occurred. She didn’t need them to imagine. Nor did she need the cops or anyone else to tell her what had happened because, as much as it hurt, she would always know. There was a warped sense of tranquility in that, and it was what allowed her to go on with her life, and finally sleep at night without nightmares. As I closed the book, I felt that peace and serenity rush through my body too.

I was in a far better situation than Minerva. I had not actually been raped, but we had both still been clinging onto results that we couldn’t control for the sake of our happiness. We had to step back and realize that we were already in charge of it.

The event was parallel to what Gerard and Vivian had done after Ray’s death. They didn’t have to go back to doing art their old fashion way because it had made them happy then. It had only made them happy because they wanted to do it, and so they did. It wasn’t the action behind the happiness; it was the freedom in the action that triggered that bliss. Once they realized they were in possession of themselves and no one else, they could move forward. Minerva had done that too, and when this book was written, it had been ten years since her attack. She was happily married with a baby on the way. She had moved on.

I needed to do that. I had to realize first that the sovereignty I craved did not always come from answers. Sure, I knew how to ask the questions, I was doing it constantly and proving that fact by staking out a fucking library for a night, but even if I got answers, that wasn’t going to keep me completely sane. I needed to figure out how to be happy and free on my own – even when I still lacked essential pieces – and be okay with it.

As I walked home from the library I hit that fork in the road where I could either go to Gerard’s or go to my place. Staring down each road, I knew that it was going to be hard. So hard, I could feel the weight in my chest and lead in my blood, ceasing me in my deliberation. I couldn’t go to Gerard’s yet, but I could walk into my house and be content in staying there. It was my house too, regardless of what my father claimed about bills and mortgage payments. I lived there too – I just needed to feel alive while I dwelled there too.

That night, I took a lot of pictures. Jasmine had come over for a bit, but when she saw me itching at my skin and staring distantly at my camera in the background, she let me be. She promised to come around and see me extra early the next day, or something like that – I was never too sure. I was just trying to get her outside so I could do something with my hands. I took some pictures, and then dug around in the basement until I found some of my old childhood paint set, and even some crayons. I colored, I drew, I painted. It didn’t matter that I felt so juvenile for all of this, I needed to do it.

This urge inside of me persisted until well into the night, until the moon reached its zenith in the sky and I had drawn it using Eggshell White crayon. The last piece I completed that night had been Minerva as the Goddess of war. Only this war was the very same one I was facing, and it was called real life. I gave her the features she was lacking in the book. I gave her a face, a body, and real tangible color outside of her shadows. I had already given her a name; I knew I had to complete the rest of task. I needed to give her a full bodied identity because I would somehow find myself in her art. I made her eyes Cornflower Blue, her hair Coal Black, and the horizon above her Tickled Pink. I painted right along side the wax of the crayons, creating an anarchic mix of mediums. Once done, proud and content, I fell asleep in my inspired fury.

Come morning, I actually awoke at a fairly decent time. I had been sleeping until noon whenever I could before, savoring the night for any attempt at creativity. Jasmine sometimes stayed late on Fridays and Saturdays, but yesterday had been a night of a completely different atmosphere. I didn’t comprehend time when I was being creative, especially since yesterday I had switched and shared mediums. I must have fallen asleep before my standard three am because when I awoke, my alarm clock numbers read that it wasn’t even nine in the morning yet. My body felt relaxed and warm wrapped up in my comforter, but I flung the sheets back and decided to face the day.

When I walked into the kitchen, I was surprised to find my mother standing at the counter. It wasn’t her presence that startled me at first, but how she carried herself, in looks and mannerisms. She had on her very long and billowy fancy mauve summer skirt and a creamy white button-up blouse. She was sipping coffee and staring off into space as I entered, and didn’t seem to notice me in my boxers and t-shirt clad body until I opened the fridge.

“Morning,” she called with her same vacant tone as usual. Though he had been getting a little better at believing what was going on around her, the supposed acts that Gerard had committed were grating on her. I was surprised she even got out of bed this early, and this dressed up.

“Morning,” I mirrored, and then vocalized my thoughts. “Why are you so dressed up?”

“I always get dressed up today,” she explained, removing her eyes from the floor and watching me as I got my cereal. I gave her a vacuous look; what was today? I had no concept of time anymore now that I was skipping school right and left.

“Church, Frank,” she corrected me sternly. “Just because you haven’t been since you were thirteen doesn’t mean you forget about it entirely, does it?”

“No,” I answered quickly, surprised at how defensive she had gotten. The air settled between us, I capped the milk and slid it back into the fridge. Pulling up a stool, I sat at the island counter in our kitchen, watching my milk devour the frosted flakes in front of me.

“Come with me,” my mother spoke suddenly. She was not looking at me as she said the words, but at the files on the floor. Her eyes didn’t need to meet my own to know she was serious. Her words bore into me, and I swallowed the mass on my tongue before I even attempted to say anything.

“I don’t know…” I began to trail off, flicking my spoon around as I talked.

I hadn’t gone to church since I was thirteen years old, and hadn’t had the urge to go much since then. It seemed too much like a waste of time and energy in my mind; I’d much rather be taking pictures, or anything really.

“This isn’t an option, Frank. Come with me.” She narrowed eyes, surprising me. My mother never usually demanded anything of me, even when I was a little kid. That had been my father’s job. I looked around the kitchen suddenly, wondering as to where his presence had disappeared to.

She seemed to read my thoughts, and sparked up quickly. “There will be no one else in the house to watch you. Your father is with his friends, getting something sorted out for work today –”

“Wait, he’s not going to church?” I asked, ignoring the fact that she thought I needed a fucking baby sitter now.

If there was be anything I could count on from my father, it would be his perseverance to sit inside that old and musty religious building. Church was a need, a compulsion, and almost a downright obsession with him. He always went. He wasn’t a huge religious fanatic or anything, but it was the principle in his mind. He went every Sunday because that was what you were supposed to do, and fuck, all be damned if my father didn’t always follow the rules. He never spoke of God or the church outside the constricting building, and to my recollection, he never looked that happy when he graced the inside, but he still went. It was probably some routine conditioning inside his mind that his old Catholic mother had placed inside on him since he was a child. Even as he aged, in some sort of devotion to her, he obeyed her orders.

Date: 2015-12-17; view: 524