Frank

November 18, 2016

The hairs on the back of my neck had been perpetually raised all day. I knew two people were stalking me.

My number of classes had grown to three over the years. It might never go up to four, as the college saved a significant chunk of change by keeping me part-time. And so, every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, I taught a 1:00, 2:00, and 3:00 class, and then had one office hour before walking home at 5:00.

It was currently 4:55 on a Friday. Thanksgiving Break was just around the corner, after a couple of days of classes next week. One of my stalkers had just walked into my office and crossed her legs, asking for feedback on her rough draft essay regarding Criminology as a Social Science. I knew she'd chosen the time deliberately.

The chair Heather was sitting in was directly in front of the window. It was snowing outside, as always. The last rays of sunlight combined with the soft glow of my desk lamp to perfectly complement the sparkle in her eyes and the gloss of her perfectly straight, black hair.

I turned on the bright overhead lights. She covered her eyes, startled.

"Sorry," I said with a tight smile. "I needed more light to be able to read your paper."

I skimmed it. It was excellent.

I looked up at Heather. Her eyebrows were slightly raised as she hoped (or expected) praise. This was a very smart girl who was used to getting what she wanted.

"This is terrific," I said honestly. "You're not on my list of declared majors. Have you considered a career in law?"

She flushed with pleasure. "I'm thinking about it."

"No pressure. I'm sure you could excel at any number of careers." I put her paper in my briefcase. "I'll provide more detailed comments about the strengths of this essay, and then hand it back to you. You've earned an A. No corrections are needed."

Heather hesitated just a fraction of a second, betraying the fact that she'd wanted an A plus. "Thanks, Professor Campbell. Your opinion means a lot."

"You do excellent work," I said, turning my chair back to face my desk.

She stood up and took a step forward. "A bunch of us are going to the dining hall now. Professors eat with students all the time. I could use one of my meal tickets on you."

I turned sharply back to look up at her, and my facial expression must have been harsher than I'd intended. She stepped back, uncertain and embarrassed.

I softened. "Thank you for the invite. But no, thank you, Heather. I don't eat in the dining hall. I'll see you in class on Monday." I didn't need to open my office door for her; I always kept it open when I was alone with one female.

"Thank you," Heather mumbled, and left. I glanced at the clock: 5:09. I was only thirty-seven, but my habits had become as rigid as a much older man's.

I gathered the other documents I needed into my briefcase and shut and locked my office door. Nodding in respect to the other professors locking up, as well as the few who kept office hours until 10:00 at night, I put on my heavy coat and hat and exited the building. Soon I had turned right and was risking my life walking up the very steep, icy hill. I'd never bought a car; I couldn't afford it, for one thing, and there was also little need in this small community. Marie and I took her husband's car to the store ten minutes away when we needed groceries.

Reaching the apex, I could see my home in sight. It certainly wasn't where any other active professor lived. This was the retirement community, and I still lived with the older couple who had taken me in during the worst time of my life.

Dread and excitement mingled inside me, settling in my gut. I ignored my feelings and pulled out my house key from my coat pocket. The porch light was directly in front of me. Fifty feet…forty feet…

And then the silhouette appeared, just on the edge of the porch light. My adrenaline surged, along with the accompanying increased heart rate. Nevertheless I opened the door, turned on the light, dropped my briefcase and made sure the door was firmly closed behind us before I pulled my brother in for a tight hug. "Joe," I breathed in relief, blinking back my emotion before he could see it and provide commentary.

I heard his laughter. "Hi, honey, I'm home."

"And about to get scolded, too." I pulled away and punched his shoulder. His laughing eyes and sardonic expression lifted my spirits even more. "Don't I always tell you only to come at full dark? And not loiter around the porch so that the entire universe can see our reunion?"

"I'm getting brazen in my old age, Elder Brother." Joe shrugged out of his coat. "Looks like I picked the perfect day for my bi-annual visit, too. You're a better man than I am, dismissing that young scholar so abruptly."

"What, did you teleport up here? I made a promise to the president of this college that there would never be a whiff of a rumor about me. I'm as used to the aching hell of celibacy as any healthy man can be." I shrugged and held out my hand, palm up. "She's a Christian kid anyway. She probably just wanted an emotional affair, a notch on her belt."

Joe looked at me pointedly. I knew he was stuck on my second sentence: He'd never quite trusted President Taylor since he'd found out the man had a distant friendship with my WITSEC agent. He punished me by making me wait another few seconds before handing me his phone.

Excited, I sat down, still clad in hat and coat, and surfed through the last six months of pictures. My wife in her detective uniform. My wife on a canoe trip, laughing as she splashed an unsuspecting kid. Her hair straightener had been no match for the humidity that day. I smiled fondly, tracing my finger along her frizzy curls in an automatic effort to smooth them. I flipped to the next picture. My son, looking decidedly unhappy as he was forced to submit to a first-day-of-school picture in his senior year.

I whistled. "Is that kid ever going to stop growing? He passed me a long time ago, and he's almost caught up with you. And what's with that haircut? Nancy didn't allow him to go to the barber shop with you unsupervised, did she?"

"Har, har," Joe said. He stood up and thrust his hands in his pockets, slowly circling the room while I savored my time with the rest of the pictures. "Still happy here, bro?"

"Yes, by and large," I answered distractedly. "The people are good here. The simple life has its advantages. Where are Paul and Marie, by the way?"

"I came here a few hours ago, and they forced me to eat a sandwich and take a nap after that drive. Conveniently, they said that they were going out to eat and then to Wednesday night choir practice." Joe grinned.

"Those two. Always thinking of everyone else."

"They accepted money so I could pay for their night out."

"Oh…" I felt a wave of guilt as I found a picture of my mother. "Before I forget." I walked down to the basement to my room and took a package from under my bed. I returned to Joe and handed it to him. "For Mom and Dad. One letter for every week." They burned the letters after they read them.

"It'll get there."

"Please tell Mom…" I sighed and gave him a pleading look. "Please tell her again that this is a temporary situation? This will all work out sometime soon. I'll see her again and we'll make up for lost time."

"Maybe sooner than you think," Joe said, wholly unexpected.

I gawked at him. "What? What happened?"

Joe gazed at our surroundings, suddenly uncertain.

I placed Joe's cell phone on the coffee table. "What happened, tell me right now, Joe."

He took a deep breath. "Nancy told Aaron that you're still alive."

The room spun suddenly, symbolic of my carefully formed world upended with that simple statement. "What? Why? Why now?"

"Aaron and Nancy got in a fight, started arguing about everything being kept secret from him all the time. Nancy decided that she didn't want Aaron to think that he lives in a family of secrets any more."

The story obviously had a lot more details to it than that, but for now I was focused on the implications of this statement. This was the moment I'd been waiting for, and I knew it was coming up soon, but now that it had abruptly arrived I felt downright scared.

"How did he react?" I began to pace. "He must be disgusted with me. To go from a father who died heroically to a father who's been hiding out all these years."

"Actually, trust me, it's me and Nancy that he's furious with." Joe ran a hand through his already-spiked blond hair.

"Did she tell him everything?" I hissed.

"No," he said quickly. "No, nothing like that. Just that you have valuable information that people want, and you have to wait to come back until the situation blows over. Information that we can't tell him or else he becomes another pawn in this game. He wants to see you, Frank."

I shook my head. "It won't be safe. Let's at least let him have his last normal year of high school. Nancy can't approve of this. I want to see him so badly…but, wow, to go from having a twelve-year-old to having an eighteen-year-old…"

"Stop, Frank," Joe said, his hands up. "Do you hear yourself? Ask yourself what your opinion would be if you were sure that you still had your son's respect."

That statement changed my thinking immediately. "I'd be concerned for his safety, but very, very happy to be back in his life," I said, calming down. I sat down, shaking slightly.

"Exactly. And let me tell you, yes, you do still have your son's respect." Joe still stood, looking down at me and waiting.

"I know your interrogation techniques," I said, rubbing my forehand tiredly with one hand. "There's something else. Get it all out, Joe."

Joe walked to the coffee table, picking up his phone hesitatingly like it were an explosive. "I have two more items of news. Both good news." He didn't sound entirely convincing. Joe opened a different photo album. He showed me a close-up photo of a redheaded child, grinning at something humorous that must have been happening to the photographer's left.

I needed air. "What's the punchline, Joe?"

He lowered the phone. "That child is Nancy's son. Born eight and a half months after you left."

I had no recollection of leaving the house. I found myself sprinting across the plains in my business suit, bounding over the moors. I knew all the soft spots, all the rocks. I'd spent months here when I'd first arrived, earning myself the nickname the "Hound of the Baskervilles," and my demons had plagued me in the wilderness as I'd escaped here with my thoughts. My shoes were ruined, my pants splattered with muddy snow. The wilderness behind Houghton retirement housing had held me in a fragile stasis during a personal hell, an existence which had a rock bottom of even lower depths than I had imagined.

I'd suspected that my wife hated me when she had run the opposite direction and told our son that I was dead. I'd known that she hated me when my brother reported that she had dropped out of WITSEC long ago, proving that the issue wasn't even about maximum safety for her and Aaron. For the kids. But this was about more than her romantic feelings toward me. If I'd known about this child, that might have been all the more reason to accept Nancy's choice, increased incentive to stay away for my family's protection. And Nancy would have known that. There must have been another reason why she would keep this from me.

The snowflakes added a chill to my wet cheeks. "It meant that much to her," I whimpered to the frigid darkness. To a God who would have to help me up once again. "It meant that much to her to never have to see me again. Not to even let me know about this kid, not to let me…decide…she thought that after all that happened, I didn't have the right to know."

"Frank!" I heard a cry, mingled with pain.

I stopped, turning around in alarm. "Joe! Oh, no," I said, making my way back. "There's no way you could have found your footing through here."

Joe sat on the ground at the edge of the moor, grimacing, holding his ankle. I knelt beside him and carefully took his foot into my hands. He supported the weight of the leg while I gently tested the range of motion.

"Seems like just a minor sprain." Joe sighed, flopping onto his back in the snow. "You've respected all of Nancy's decisions up to this point, so I made a tough call that you would want me to respect her choice about this, too. Believe me, I've never felt good about being caught between you and Nancy."

I shook my head. "I hope you can never relate to how I feel right now, Joe. And I'm not happy about you keeping this from me. But I never should have allowed you to put yourself in this situation in the first place. I want you to meet a girl, live for yourself once in a while, drop your visits down to once a year. Oh, no, is this why you moved with Nancy? To help raise the baby?"

"Partially, and don't worry about me, I've told you that before." Joe tentatively put a hand on my shoulder, then firmed his grip when I didn't resist. I felt him shiver violently from the cold. "I know you're wondering, even though you're not going to ask," he said. "When Reid was born, Dad took him and a hair from your comb and got the DNA test done. The test results arrived in the mail, and Dad has kept the envelope safe and unopened ever since. Even Mom doesn't know about it. Nancy decided that the test results will be opened if Reid has a health concern, or possibly if Reid has questions as an adult and wants to know. But of course he has been raised as your son, and he knows it."

I covered my face with both hands for a long moment. Then I stood up, offering Joe a hand so he could tentatively stand up on one leg. I put an arm around him and helped him limp back to the house. Once inside, I guided him to the sofa and helped him shrug into a bathrobe. I took off my things and hung them up. I made Joe some tea, organized some pillows so Joe could elevate his foot, and then unbuttoned my shirt.

"What's going on, bro," Joe said suspiciously from the sofa. "You're too calm."

"I never should have accepted Nancy's asinine decision about Aaron's formative years." I reached in the corner cabinet for Paul's stash of brandy. I took a swig, then walked back to Joe and added a healthy dose to his tea. He didn't object. "Seeing our son at her Carson's house between cases like we had joint custody with them. I thought about suing her for custody a few times, but kept holding out hope that she would marry me."

"Which she did."

"And now I'm expected to lie down and accept no contact for a son I didn't even know about? Making an even worse decision about the second kid than I did about the first kid?"

"And this is exactly why Nancy didn't want to tell you about Reid," Joe said vehemently. "Please sit down and keep talking to me. Don't jump straight to custody battles. Come on, sit down."

"I need a bath," I said. I sat down on a chair in the kitchen, trying to contain the mud as I carefully removed my shoes and socks. "A very long bath that might burn my skin. And by the time I come out of the bath, I will have accepted the fact that I have a toddler that my wife chose not to tell me about, it does not matter whose name is on the paternity test, and that God can help me through even this." I stood up and unbuttoned my pants. "You will be staying a few days, correct, Joe? I need you."

"Yes. I'm leaving Sunday afternoon. You have class on Monday."

"You will stay until Tuesday."

"Fine."

"You will stay until Tuesday, Joe."

"Fine. Yes, I promise that I will."

I entered the bathroom and shut the door.

Joe

November 18, 2016 (Cont'd)

I had The Big Bang Theory on in the background. I stared straight through it, comprehending nothing. I hated this show, and it seemed only appropriate to have it on right now. Frank had been in the bathroom for so extraordinarily long that I would have almost been afraid of self-harm if I hadn't heard the bathtub drain and refill with hot water so many times.

The doorbell rang. My brother was in good hands. The people he lived with, Paul and Marie Johnson, were ringing the doorbell to their own house to make sure they weren't interrupting any male bonding.

"Hello, Joe," Marie said pleasantly after I'd answered the door. "Some choir members wanted to get coffee and dessert after practice. Decaf, of course." She stifled a yawn and looked at the clock on the kitchen stove. 9:37.

"You didn't have to stay out for us," I said. I sat back down but didn't elevate my foot so I wouldn't have to answer any questions.

Something in my tone caused Paul to give me more attention than I wanted. "What happened?" he asked sharply. He handed his coat and hat to his wife to hang up, revealing a shock of sporadically-spaced white hair.

I knew that Frank held nothing back from his "mentors," as he called them, and objected heartily whenever I suggested that he should consider doing so. "You might want to sit down," I said.

Paul used his cane to hobble to the couch, his body deteriorating with age while his mind did not. After a few words of pleasantry and my repeated insistence that I didn't need anything, Marie headed to the bedroom.

"You can stay," I said to her, but she shook her head and closed the door.

Paul focused a steel, penetrating gaze on me. Like a protective mother bear, I thought. Anything for Frank. "I had three items on the agenda to discuss with Frank," I explained. "I have only been able to discuss the first two. He has locked himself in the bathroom ever since."

Paul's forehead wrinkles deepened in a concerned scowl. "Which are?"

"His wife informed their son that Frank is alive. Aaron wants to visit him."

I caught a glimpse of a very unexpected emotion in Paul: fear. He was afraid of losing Frank. Paul nodded. "What's the second item of news?"

I put the TV on mute. Paul wasn't going to be happy with me. "Since Aaron can't possibly be expected to keep a secret of this magnitude from Frank, Nancy has finally given me approval...to tell Frank about her child who was born eight months and two weeks after Frank left."

"What?" Paul's face contorted in surprise and anger. "How could you keep this from your brother? A man has a right to know. And another right to make decisions based on all the facts."

"This was Nancy's choice, not mine," I retorted, prickling in self defense.

"No. The mother does not have more say than the father."

Our gazes locked in a passionate intensity. Guilt settled in my stomach, and I swallowed.

Paul retrieved in his cane, then shuffled to the bathroom and knocked on the door. "Come on, Frank, you're cooking in there," he said gruffly. "Come out here so we can talk to your brother together."

I could just barely hear his submissive response. "Okay." I heard the sound of water sloshing, and I felt a quick stab of jealousy. Frank considered Paul's words to be golden, and to be obeyed immediately and without question.

Frank emerged in his bathrobe just as Paul finished pouring the three of us shots of brandy. Frank sat on the couch next to me and all three of us downed them immediately. I saw the anxiety on Paul's face, and I echoed the sentiment. Frank had a demeanor of shock and horror that reminded us both of how he looked when this entire ordeal had begun.

Frank turned toward Paul. "Paul…my wife…"

"I heard the whole thing. Congratulations, Frank, and I'm sorry you're hearing about this so late. There are many possible interpretations for your wife's decisions, as we've discussed many times. Just as there are many possible interpretations for why you still haven't told anyone who killed that Italian man, of which I still harbor certain suspicions. In the meantime, put these feelings to the side for the moment-" Paul laid a firm hand on Frank's shoulder—"and listen. Joe has something else to tell us."

"I hadn't forgotten." Frank turned toward me, wary but with an undercurrent of hope. "I'm as ready as I'm going to be. What's your last item of good news, Joe?"

I leaned forward to grip his knee. "This news is fresh at least, from just a few days ago. The last man who had a price on your head? He passed away, Frank. As far as we know, he was the only person still after you."

Frank eyes widened, unfocused, as the implications of this information sank in.

I noticed a sudden, jerky movement from Paul, and realized that the man was desperately trying to hide a profound misery. I spoke again. "But we have to take this one step at a time. We know that the mafia denounced what that man did to Nancy, and as far as we know, they consider the matter closed because of it. Your silence regarding who killed Esposito should be respected because Nancy already…in a sense, paid for it. Earned it."

"I understand," Frank said curtly.

"If our sources are correct, then you are safe to leave Houghton. If our sources are correct, Wakefield has no power over you because the price on your head is zero. If our sources are correct, your risk is at an all-time low if you leave the Witness Protection Program." I raised my eyebrows.

"Low but not zero, you're saying," Paul said. There was a tremor in his voice.

Frank put a hand on Paul's arm, but continued looking at me. With a more peaceful expression than I'd seen in years. "I'm happy here, Joe."

I stared at him in disbelief. "So…you're really going to stay?"

"I don't know," he said. "If Nancy chooses to reconcile with me, then we will make that decision together. In the meantime, my kids can come visit me here." His eyes brightened even more, and he smiled broadly. "And maybe in the future I can come to them…and sometime we'll work out the logistics for me to see Mom and Dad."

"I'm happy for you, Frank," Paul said with effort. "I hope this works out for you."

"Nancy was also presented with this same information," I continued.

Frank held his breath. My next words would define his future.

I smiled. "She agreed that the risk is small enough now that I can make arrangements for a weekend. One short weekend only, so you both are at work on Friday and Monday and Aaron is at school and no one has a whiff of anyone being absent. A couple of days for your whole family. Far, far away. Wakefield won't know anything about it and Mom and Dad insisted on footing the bill."

Frank sat stunned for another moment in disbelief. His grin slowly widened until it was downright goofy. "All four of us?"

"Five of us," I corrected. I stood up just in time to absorb Frank's bear hug. "I'll be chaperoning. Carson called in a favor to the local sheriff there, so I'm coordinating which plain clothes law enforcement I can have available. Even the law enforcement there doesn't know who anyone is, only that you need an escort, and they're not asking any questions."

Paul refilled our shot glasses. I swigged mine as Frank began pacing. The first time I had seen him pace in happiness in many years. I fervently hoped I wasn't leading his family into a trap.

"Where are we going?" Frank asked excitedly.

I arched an eyebrow. "That's for me to know and you to find out."

"Joseph," he growled, putting me in a headlock, and I laughed and automatically fought back.

"It's late, enough of this," Paul said, trying his best to share in our excitement. "This is truly excellent news. And we all need to process it in our own way. We have plenty of time tomorrow to talk about the details. Why don't you head downstairs to your room and pray about this, Frank."

"All right," Frank said distractedly. I suspected he wouldn't be able to concentrate long enough, but he certainly needed time by himself. I'd hit him with a lot of life-altering updates tonight. He hugged Paul, then me. "Walk me to the door, Joe."

I did. "That old man died of natural causes?" Frank asked in a low voice. He kept eye contact with me a moment longer than necessary.

I made the sign of the cross. "That is what the newspapers reported, and I had nothing to do with it. Nor did I send anyone to do any dirty deeds."

Frank continued staring at me. Then he gave me a squeeze on the shoulder and headed down the stairs.

He wasn't convinced, just hadn't wanted to pursue this line of questioning any further. Neither did I. I knew our father's hand was somewhere in the pot, but had no idea exactly what the nature of his involvement had been. Somehow our father knew that the autopsy had not turned up anything unusual, given the man's lifestyle choices, so there should be no return calling card back upon our family.

I came back into the living room and saw that Paul was trying to set me up on the couch. I stopped him and took my own sheets and blankets out of the closet.

"I've got it, thank you," I said. "As always, thanks so much for all you do for Frank."

"I can let him go. You know that, Joe," he said sadly. "I hope this works out for him. For all of you."

"I know that you do." Paul had refilled my brandy glass, so I swallowed it to be polite. I bent over to put the sheet on the couch, then abruptly sat down, overcome with vertigo. I suddenly realized that my ankle wasn't hurting any more. How much brandy had I had? Three shots, plus a couple cupfuls of extremely strong tea on an empty stomach?

"I think I've proven by now that I'm able to keep a secret. And I can keep secrets even from Frank and my wife. Please talk to me." Paul settled in the nearest chair.

"I'm not that drunk, Paul." I was slurring slightly. "What, did you put truth serum in the brandy? Wesleyans don't believe in giving or receiving confession."

"This Wesleyan does. Ask yourself these three questions. Do I care about Frank? Do I want what's best for him, even though it kills me? Wouldn't it be nice to be able to tell just one person, an outside observer, the entire truth that you've been concealing all these years?"

I stared at him, bewildered. Bewildered because I was actually considering it.

"You and I both know that your involvement in this goes much deeper than anyone suspects," Paul continued calmly. Soothingly. "At times you look like you're more haunted than Frank is. And I'm not the only person here who isn't entirely happy about this upcoming visitation weekend. It's impossible for a man to spend so much intimate time with a woman, raise children together, without developing some level of feelings for her. Let me share the burden with you, Joe. If there are any ethical choices to be made, we'll talk about them together. Tell me the full story."

I took another swig straight from the bottle. And began to speak.