Kaleidoscope Eyes Pt. 01

"Leave him here. That way, the next semi-truck that comes around the bend, there, will run him over and at least ruin his legs, if it doesn't kill him," I heard Boyd say.

Were these guys serious? They were willing to let me be maimed or killed by a setup highway incident? Over pussy?

But, then I thought of my precious Ruthanne ... yes, I now thought of her as 'mine', regardless of the strange circumstances ... and I could not relegate her to such a vulgar reference simply as 'pussy'.

I could hardly move, I was so exhausted, sick, and in pain from my beatings. I looked up to see Boyd and Dennis and Hamp getting into a huge shiny king-cab Ford F-250. They pulled a slumped and crying Ruthanne in with them. Try as I might, I just did not have the energy to do or say anything to help her as they started the truck and pulled away, barely missing my legs as they drove by me.

I lay there in the quiet for at least five minutes, not hearing anything. Finally, I heard the approach of another vehicle, and I tried to scoot out of the roadway but I just did not have the energy to move more than a few inches.

When the vehicle stopped before hitting me, I prayed that this was a Good Samaritan, sent to help me. I watched in horror as Sam Chaves, one of the 'Amigos', got out of his pickup, and approached, entering the glare of his headlights where I recognized him.

"Well, this is it," I said to myself; figuring that Boyd must have dispatched Sam to ensure my demise.

I did not get any farther along with that thought, as I passed out from the pain and exhaustion shortly after feeling Sam turn me over on my back, put his hands under my arms, and start to lift me.

I drifted in and out of consciousness for... I don't know how long. I just knew that I felt the sense of motion; as if I were in a vehicle. After a while, I became aware that I actually was in a vehicle... a pickup truck driven by Sam Chaves. He saw that I was awake and looking at him with no small amount of alarm, and he began talking to me calmly.

"Relax. I am taking you to a hospital about an hour away; Halifax Works Healthcare Express, just across the North Carolina line in Roanoke Rapids."

I managed to croak out, "Why?"

Sam sighed and said, "Because I didn't want your death, or serious injury or... what happened to Ruthanne... to be on my conscience," he said. Then he snorted, "For all the good that does me. Just relax now. We are only about twenty minutes out."

"They raped her, man," I croaked. "They just took turns at her as if she were some common street slut." I tried to say more, but I was overcome by a coughing spasm that caused my ribs to explode in agony. Once that subsided and my vision cleared, I went on.

"Cops..."

"No!" replied Sam, cutting me off. "Boyd's daddy owns the Sheriffs of all three of the neighboring counties in these parts. All you will do is stir up a lot of trouble, and for nothing. I've seen it before with... other incidents." At that, he shut up and would not engage me in any other conversation, despite by attempts and even pleas for his calling someone... to do something!

He remained silent until we reached the clinic at Roanoke Rapids. That is where he left me... well, on a bench right outside the clinic, anyway. Before he left me for good, he said one last thing to me.

"Just get yourself well and forget about what happened tonight. Forget me, Boyd, Ruthanne, the others; what all happened. Just go home... and stay the hell away from Simonton." He got in his still-running truck and left me sitting there on that bench... to wait until someone from inside the clinic came out for a smoke break and found me. It didn't take but a few minutes for that to happen.

I was there at the clinic for about two hours before being transferred over to Halifax Regional Medical Center, about half a mile away, and put on a ward. I had bruised ribs and kidneys, swollen testicles, and a minor concussion. I asked someone from the staff to call my dad and he came and got me; transferring me by private ambulance to Sentara Williamsburg Regional Medical Center near home the next morning. He had contacted the Staff Duty Officer at the 160th at Fort Campbell at my request, letting him know that I might need to extend my leave. It's a good thing he did, because if took all of my two-week leave, plus another five days, before I before I arrived at my new duty station of Fort Campbell.

I had told my dad about what had happened and I asked him to help me get this all reported so that something could be done. I hoped that, as a prominent politician, Dad could get something moving through legal channels. He made a couple of calls, but came back to me with his estimate that he did not have the political pull at the moment to get the powers that be to act on his, or my, behalf.

Needless to say, I was frustrated and pissed. I cursed and then silently vowed revenge sometime in the near future. I could not get the fact that Ruthanne and I had been set up for some sort of sick prank, and that it had turned into my finding the one woman with whom I actually felt that thunderbolt, once-in-a-lifetime attraction.

Those cretins had turned something beautiful into something sick and twisted. Not only had they beat me down. They had gang-raped sweet Ruthanne, who, up until my seduction of her... or her seduction of me... had been an innocent virgin, waiting for her special man.

At that point in my life, I sure did not feel all that special, but things actually got a bit worse from that point on, beginning with a wedding announcement.

****

Now—Simonton

Jelani, the store clerk, according to his nametag, looked directly at me for a second or two and checked to ensure that no one else was coming in. In response to my question, he said, "Well, ya live heah long enough and you find oat real quick that these folks mostly live in Gone-With-The-Wind-Ville."

I almost burst out laughing. He had said this in an accent that I would have attributed to a native Tidewater resident, grown and raised. I noted that his O-U vowel combinations sounded almost like the O-A sound that highlighted the almost-Scots-brogue intonation of Southern Virginians.

"If I spoke in my normal voice, they just would not be able to connect me with their predetermined mindset of what an Indian is suppose-ta sound like. Actually, I grew up in Franklin, a coupla towns over, and my old man owns seven of these stores around the three-county area."

He held out his hand and said, "Name's Jelani—means 'Mighty' or 'Powerful' in Hindi. But the locals just call me 'Lonnie', since it is easier for them to say and remember." I shook hands with him briefly.

I did not want to spend a lot of time there, as I still had to make it to Norfolk in time for supper with Mom, but Lonnie and I took a few minutes to talk about the nearby town, Simonton, Greensville County that surrounded it, and Virginia in general.

Having grown up just north of Williamsburg, I already knew a lot about this place, having been there that one time; and having done extensive research on it back when I had planned revenge for the events of that one fateful evening five years earlier.

Now, I was playing the role of an outsider just to get Lonnie's, well, Jelani's, take as a local. He did not fail me, given that he had the gift of gab.

"Lamar Simon's family, through the money and influence they got by moonshining and smuggling, finally gained the right to rename the town, once they got full control of all the power nodes throughout the small municipality. And they actually did rename it during the period when Virginia was rewriting its state constitution.

"Today, Lamar's son, Boyd, runs everything," Lonnie said, looking out the front window. I was glad, as I had tensed upon hearing that name, and I am sure that my body language no doubt screamed of death and destruction for a moment before I took a calming breath and fake-smiled as Jelani turned back toward me.

He grinned and then said, once again assuming his legend with the put-on sing-song, "Please to drop in again, Sir, whenever you are in the area." He smirked as he gave me my receipt.

I chuckled, grinned and gave him a two-finger salute to my forehead as I headed out the door, buckled in and started the RAV-4, paused on the way out of the lot before merging into traffic, and turned east toward Norfolk, all as I began to eat my candy bar.

I was trying to mentally absorb all the information that I had come across today in such a brief span.

I added all of Jelani's anecdotal information to my repertoire of knowledge gained by my own research into the town of Simonton five years earlier, starting just after my night of hell in that shithole town. I had even found the online recounting in the Emporia Independent-Messenger, the newspaper of record for Greensville County, Virginia, of the event that had made consideration of trying to go back to reclaim the girl whose face and manner still haunted me now just seem like so much wasted effort.

It was the announcement of the marriage between Ruthanne Madeleine Norwood and Boyd Lamar Simon. So much for pursuing charges against Boyd!

At that point back then, in my youthful naiveté, and still all bound up in my hurt pride and my disappointment, I had truly believed that Ruthanne was lost to me forever and it had taken me months to lose the all-consuming ache and the anger. Besides, with my new assignment at that time, I had needed to focus on the mission of fixing broken Special Operations helicopters for the Army.

On this day, however, I was focused on a set of multi-hued eyes in the face of a beautiful four-year-old little girl—yeah, I could narrow her age down, now. I would have to do some more thinking and internal analysis and draw some personal conclusions about possible courses of action for the near future before I spoke to my mother that night.

****

TO BE CONTINUED