Never Say Never
MATURE ADULTS ONLY
Please be advised some people may be DISTURBED OR OFFENDED by the following chapter. Alludes to Sookie's experience with her 'Funny Uncle'.
YOU CAN CLICK THE - X - AT ANY TIME. NOBODY WILL MAKE YOU READ 'TIL THE END.
Chapter 1
Stackhouse property Bon Temps
16 years before Vampires make themselves known.
"Oh… We must have gone to sleep Mindy." The tiny girl says to her dolly as she wakes up under a pile of old blankets in the corner of her daddy's tool shed.
"It's dark now but we're not scayered ares we.? Do you like the nest we made forwer us? Nobody gonna find us heayer Baby girl… Member we came in the secret way." That had been a good find while she was playing mud pies with Mindy last weekend. While leaning on the shed scraping some dirt to mix in the old saucepan Gran had given her when two of the planks of wood moved apart making just enough room for her and Mindy to squeeze through. They spent the rest of the weekend making their hidey hole, bringing a couple of old blankets for comfort and a few of Jason's action figures for lookouts. It was the perfect hideout. Nobody would look in there for them because Daddy always locked the tool shed.
"I think I still have some crackers and water left if y'all are hungry?" The little girl holds the raggedy cabbage patch doll up to her ear and listens carefully.
"Are ya sure…? It's bad manners to eat in front of others, my Gran says so." Holding the doll up to her little ear again she nods her head. "Well if you insist, I am kind'a hungry. Do you want me to save you some? OK… Thanks Mindy." Carefully so as not to make any noise she opens the plastic lunchbox. Inside are a handful of TV snacks and a few sips of water in her plastic drink bottle left over from her school lunch.
Heavy footfalls outside in the dark make her still and start to shake so she takes tighter hold of Mindy for comfort. Mindy is her only friend besides Gran and Grandpa. She has yellow hair the same colour as the little girl but the wooly dolls hair is going frizzy and coming out of it original ties. Gran says she'll fix it when she visits next. Because of all the cuddling and kissing she gets, Mindy's face is very dirty and badly stained from giving comfort when the little girl is sad – which is pretty often, Sookie loved her Mindy.
She called her dolly Mindy after her favorite TV character, Mindy, out of 'Mork and Mindy'. She loved how Mindy was friends with Mork even though he was different and wished she was her friend too. So when her Daddy gave her the dolly for her fourth birthday there was no question what she would call her.
"I've looked everywhere Uncle but I can't find Sookie anywhere. Mommy and Daddy are sure gonna be mad when they find out she didn't come home from school. Maybe we should call Gran and Grandpa and see if she's over t'their house."
"Now how would a little girl of five walk all those miles across town Jason? Use ya head ya dumb shit." Slap
"Ouch… Why'd ya do that for Uncle? I ain't the one that's run off." Slap "Ouch!" Sookie and Mindy couldn't help but giggle some. Jason was as dumb as a box a rocks… Well that's what Momma said.
"Shut up dumb-ass… Did ya' hear that?" Sookie covered her mouth with Mindy, covered Mindy's mouth with her hands and they both held their breath. All was quiet. The only sounds she could hear was her blood pumping in her ears and the heavy breathing and shuffling feet of the two outside but there was something else she was picking up on, 'cause Sookie has a disability. That's what made her different and she was sure that just like Mork she came from another world and she would have to learn to pretend the rest of her life so she could fit in too. This is what she struggled with day to day. She hated her curse (that's what her Momma called it 'cause she didn't know she was from another planet) because Sookie could hear what her Uncle Bartlet was thinking. Uncle Bartlet is a 'Funny Uncle' and unfortunately for the little girl that doesn't mean he's a joker. It means he is not right in the head and takes pleasure from doing bad things to little girls. That is why her Daddy's sister, Aunt Linda moved to New Orleans with her daughter Hadley after Hadley's Daddy left with 'no 'count trailer- trash whore' – well that's Momma calls her.
Sookie wasn't so lucky. Bartlet had been interfering with her since at least two birthdays gone that she could remember. At first she thought things he did were on accident. His hands would slip and touch Sookie in places no one but her Momma or Gran did when they were bathing her. Sometimes he'd bounce her on his lap and she would feel something like a long sort of hard tube underneath her and after a while he'd press her down hard on it knowing nobody was looking and his thoughts… so scary for a little girl and he makes muffled grunting noises into the back of her hair. Sookie's most happiest when he stops, he always lets Sookie go when he stops. He goes straight to the john and she makes a B-line to her Daddy but last week Daddy pushed her off of his lap saying she must have sat in somethin' at school 'cause she had some paste or somethin'on her behind and to go to her room and change. While she was still in her room after changing her clothes, Uncle came in and grabbed up Mindy and said-
"If'n you tell about that…" and he pointed to her messed cloths and got right up in Sookie's face his long lank hair hanging in his eyes. "I will rip… this here… stupid cunt of a doll… to ribbons. D'ya hear?" Sookie didn't go back out the family. Scared and crying, her and Mindy hid under the covers of her bed all night. His words were real mean but in his head, was real scary. Sookie never ever wanted to be alone with him again. He'd slapped her and touched her before but he was thinking she was old enough for somethin' new. Nobody had ever put their fingers in there before. He was going to hurt her and he was going to like it.
"Maybe we should go inside and call your Gran. If your Pa's home from work he's a better swimmer than me and we may need to check the pond." Sookie could hear her brother and Uncle climb the steps of the front porch. Relaxing she forgot about her lunch box and knocked it enough that the plastic drink bottle rattled in the box. That would have been OK because no one had heard but when she moved quickly to try and recover it, Sookie little foot hit the loose boards on the side of the shed and the movement caught Bartlet's eye.
"You go on and phone ya Gran. Ya Daddy asked me to check and see if he has gas in the gerry can in the tool shed so he can mow on the weekend. You stay here incase Sook comes in." Bart softly says to Sookie's brother.
"OK Uncle Bart."
"Good boy Jason. Y'all can put on the TV and watch a while if ya like."
"Thanks Uncle Bart."
Sookie was so panicked about making the noise with her lunch box she didn't realize she had knocked the palings on the shed and she didn't hear the man-sized foot falls coming towards the shed or hear the broadcast from the predators mind or the unlocking of the padlock as she and Mindy prayed to Jesus to keep them safe and wish for her Daddy, her Granpa, her Gran (Not Momma… No not her Momma. She'd told her Momma about Uncle Bartlet and got a whoopin') to come home and keep the nasty man away from her – for eva and eva Ay Men.
It wasn't until he was pulling away the tarp and blankets that hid their little nest from around her that Sookie realized – He'd found them.
Grabbing the child by her hair because that was the easiest thing to get purchase on, he dragged her out from the corner under the work bench, never saying a word as he did it, pulling her little body over boxes and tools not caring if she was injured. She wasn't going to live past tonight anyways.
Once he got a grip on Sookie's waiflike arm his thoughts bombarded her mind. In a panic the little warrior started hitting Bartlet with Mindy but the soft doll just annoyed the sadist and he ripped it out of the wriggling child's hand and threw it into the dirt.
Realizing she'd lost Mindy, Sookie started to scream for her friend. Bartlet snapped and slapped the child unconscious and carried her tiny limp body out into the woods.