Sammy Keyes and the Kiss Goodbye

  “Billy?” Dot asked with a concerned quiver in her voice. But then she turned to look where Billy (and now everybody else) was staring.

  “Uh-oh,” Casey said as a group of students parted to let a man approach. He was obviously angry and had (at least) a three-day stubble.

  “Who is that?” Heather whispered.

  Casey (being the only one besides Billy who knew) answered. “That’s Billy’s dad.”

  When Mr. Pratt was within striking distance of his son, he growled, “I told you what you were in for if you ditched again.” And Billy (who was stuck between mortified and terrified) tried to explain. “My friend was—”

  “Don’t start that crap with me!” Mr. Pratt shouted as he grabbed his son by the arm. “Get home! Now!”

  Billy’s father was not particularly tall. Or particularly large. But he had an ominous presence, and as he manhandled his son forward, Billy’s friends gave them wide berth.

  For Mr. Pratt, however, it wasn’t wide enough. “What are you kids starin’ at?” he shouted. “Mind your own damn business!”

  The little hints Billy had dropped about his father suddenly congealed into what seemed like a monster rearing up from a dark, bubbling pool. And as the stunned teens watched Billy get dragged away, no one seemed to know what to do, or how to help.

  Dot gasped, “Billy shouldn’t be in trouble for caring.”

  “There’s no talking to his dad when he’s like this,” Casey said. “It just makes things worse.”

  “It looks pretty bad right now!” Marissa cried.

  Dot turned to Casey. “Does Billy’s dad hit him? Because it sure looks like that’s what he’s planning to do.”

  Casey (who’d been sworn to secrecy by Billy) looked away.

  “We can’t just let him beat Billy up!” Dot cried. “We have to do something!” Then she looked around and said, “Sammy wouldn’t let him beat Billy up!”

  “That’s right,” Marissa said. “She’d clonk him over the head with her skateboard!”

  “Or cement him in a wheelbarrow!”

  “Or run him down with a motor home!”

  Heather frowned. “Don’t you guys ever just call 911?”

  “And say what?” Casey asked. “ ‘My friend’s dad hauled him home for ditching school’?”

  “That’s right,” someone in the crowd volunteered. “They won’t do anything until after he’s beat up.”

  Casey nodded. “And Billy’s never gonna cop to it.”

  “He’ll just take his lickin’ and keep on tickin’!” another guy called.

  “This is not funny!” Dot cried. “We need to do something!” She turned to Casey. “Where does he live? We have to go over there and do something.”

  Casey frowned. He’d seen Billy’s dad in a rage before, but he’d never actually seen him hit Billy. And he’d always gone along with Billy’s insistence that “Ma pappy’s just a hurricane running its course. You hold on, and then it’s over.”

  Billy never talked about the damage.

  Or the things that were impossible to repair.

  But for all the hiding and covering up Billy did, Casey knew Dot was right—if Sammy were there, she would do something. It would likely get them into trouble, or danger (and this was definitely a sidetrack from what they’d set out to do), but Sammy wouldn’t just sit around the mall wondering what was happening to her friend.

  So he eyed Dot and said, “You think we should storm the castle, huh?”

  “Yes!” she cried.

  “Uh-oh,” Marissa said, because she knew exactly what that meant.

  “You guys are nuts,” Heather grumbled, but she was the first one to swing on her backpack.

  In all, only six of the teens went to “storm the castle”—the original five plus Cricket. And on the way over, Cricket (keeping her voice low because she, too, was uncertain about the New Heather) told Dot, “Thank you so much for calling me. I’m really, really glad I’m here.” Then she gave Dot a shy look and said, “I always want to do stuff with you guys, but … it’s usually over before I hear about it.”

  Dot nodded. “I feel that way sometimes.” She smiled at Cricket. “I’m not usually the one who wants to storm the castle.” And then, because she had a pretty good idea what Cricket was feeling, she added, “Sammy really likes you, Cricket. She still talks about that camping trip you guys took.”

  Cricket gave her a grateful smile and nodded. “That trip was crazy.” Then she added, “We ran into Billy out in the wilderness. He was so funny.”

  “Yeah?”

  “He had this huge rattlesnake.”

  “Billy did?”

  Cricket nodded. “It was dead and he was carrying it like a jump rope and being so crazy with it that I told him he should chop the head off before he injected himself with venom. So he laughed and told the snake, ‘Time for the guillotine, serpentine!’ ”

  “That is so Billy,” Dot laughed.

  “Isn’t it?” Cricket said, then shook her head a little and sighed, “I just love Billy.”

  “Me, too,” Dot said with a sigh of her own.

  Then both girls (suddenly realizing the real emotion behind what the other had said) looked at each other with wide eyes and, without a word, put up pinky fingers, linked them silently together, and smiled.

  “What are you two doing?” Marissa asked.

  Cricket and Dot (both recalling how Marissa had insanely dumped Billy for the lying, cheating Danny Urbanski) chimed, “Nothing.”

  Marissa might have pressed them, but just then Casey turned onto an apartment-complex walkway, and the pinky swear she’d witnessed completely vanished from her mind. “He lives here?” she gasped as they walked along, because the buildings weren’t just badly maintained, they had an ominous shadowiness to them. Like the sun was not welcome and any respectable breeze would think twice before blowing in.

  “You never visited him?” Cricket asked Marissa. “You know, when you were going out?”

  Marissa shook her head. “He always wanted to meet somewhere.” Her voice was low, almost a whisper. “Now I understand why.”

  Casey led the group along the walkway toward a back corner of the complex. As they approached, it became clear which apartment was Billy’s, not from a sign on the door announcing PRATT FAMILY, but from the sounds coming through it.

  “Oh, no!” Marissa cried, because both the volume and the language were extreme, and they weren’t even at the apartment yet. And after hearing what Mr. Pratt was yelling at his son, Dot’s eyes welled with tears and she asked, “How can he say those things to him?”

  “That is definitely abuse,” Holly said. “I wish we had a recorder!”

  “We do,” Heather said, and took out her phone.

  Cricket gasped, “That is a great idea!” and Heather gave her a quick, grateful smile.

  Casey had approached the apartment window, which was past the front door and in the shadows. The curtain was not drawn, and after getting a look inside, Casey signaled his sister to get over to him fast.

  Heather had a reputation for being sneaky, calculating, and vindictive. She was also known for being gutsy and brash—someone who could pull off stunts others wouldn’t dream of trying. So sneaking up to a window to record what was going on inside was nothing compared to other things she’d done, and yet her hands wouldn’t stay steady as she videoed the scene inside the apartment. And after only ten seconds she could no longer put gathering proof above stopping Billy’s dad from beating up his son. “Stop it!” she screamed, knocking on the window. “Stop hitting him!”

  The apartment fell quiet.

  The curtain flew closed.

  And then the six teens stood terrified, sure that the door was about to fly open and the Monster would turn his rage on them.

  But it did not.

  And he did not.

  And as the silence continued, Heather (with shaky hands and a pounding heart) showed the others the footage she’d managed to capture on her phone
.

  “He’s just going to hit him harder after we leave,” Holly whispered.

  Dot nodded. “What’s to stop him?”

  “Us,” Marissa said, then looked right at Heather. “You were right.”

  “I was?” Heather said.

  Marissa nodded. “We need to call 911.”

  16—BLACKMAIL

  It had taken longer than expected to get the Nightie-Napper tucked safely away in jail, and Gil Borsch had just finished documenting the Garnucci Incident when something in the quiet radio traffic at his side caught his attention.

  Recognizing the address being relayed, he turned up the volume, and when the apartment number was specified and he heard the description of a “frantic group of teens,” he was up in a flash, certain that the teens were Sammy’s troupe (with the absence, of course, of their fearless ringleader).

  So although a unit had already responded to the call, Gil Borsch bolted from the station, jumped into his squad car, and tore out of the parking lot (taking the turn onto the street on two wheels).

  Now, perhaps it was the determination with which he hit the streets. Or perhaps it was that he knew exactly where he was going. Or maybe it was just the number of right-of-way laws he broke getting there. Whatever the contributing factors, Gil Borsch may not have been the first to respond, but he was the first to arrive on the scene.

  “Officer Borsch!” Marissa cried when she saw him. “Over here!”

  The lawman hustled toward the apartment, asking, “Is Billy all right?”

  “No!” Dot cried. “His dad was beating him!”

  “He’s mad at Billy for ditching school,” Casey explained.

  A flash of doubt crossed Sergeant Borsch’s face. He knew Mr. Pratt and his son didn’t get along, but maybe the kids were exaggerating. What parent wouldn’t be mad to learn their son had ditched school?

  And corporal punishment was not against the law.

  But then Casey brought the whole situation home. “He wouldn’t listen to why Billy didn’t go to school today.” He turned to Heather. “Show him the video.”

  So Heather did, and after Sergeant Borsch watched the segment several times, he handed back the phone and pounded on the apartment door. “Mr. Pratt! Police! Open up!”

  Two other police officers approached along the walkway, a male and a female. “Sergeant,” the male said. “Didn’t know you were responding. You got this?”

  Sergeant Borsch glanced over, and to his relief the responding officers were not the partners Sammy had dubbed Squeaky and the Chick. These were useful officers. And in domestic-violence situations—whether you knew the perps or not—it was nice to have competent backup.

  It also flashed through his mind that he’d gone completely rogue, breaking with procedure without even thinking about it. (And the without-even-thinking-about-it part definitely troubled him.)

  Fortunately, he outranked both responding officers. “Stick around,” he told them, then instructed Heather to show them the clip. And while she complied, he pounded on the apartment door again. “Open up, Leon! We’re not going away!”

  Moments later, the door opened and a surly Leon Pratt snarled, “This is my kid, my business.”

  “I want to see Billy,” Sergeant Borsch told him.

  “Well, goodie for you. He’s not your kid.” He glared at the teens on the walkway and added, “Instead of knockin’ on my door, you should be out askin’ these kids’ parents what they’re gonna do about their kids hangin’ out at the mall instead of goin’ to school! My kid told me they all ditched!”

  Sergeant Borsch locked eyes with Leon Pratt. “Get Billy out here and let me see that he’s okay, or what I’m going to do, Mr. Pratt, is show a video of you beating your kid to the district attorney and see if he wants to file charges against you.”

  Mr. Pratt’s eyebrows stretched up ever so slightly. “What video?”

  Heather handed her phone to Sergeant Borsch, and after the lawman had played the scene for Billy’s dad, Mr. Pratt grew red in the face and shouted, “That is illegal!” He turned on Heather. “You had no right!”

  Gil Borsch handed the phone back to Heather. “I’m sure the courts would have their own opinion.” He again locked eyes with Billy’s dad. “So it’s your choice. You can go that route, or you can bring your son out here.”

  Mr. Pratt’s defiant stare held for a tense fifteen seconds before it finally faltered. And as quickly as his face had turned red, it now went pale.

  Reality, it appeared, had sunk in.

  “Wait here,” he instructed, and a full five minutes later, he finally reappeared with Billy.

  “What’s up?” Billy asked as he approached the doorway.

  From outside the apartment, the teens stared at him. It was as though nothing had happened. He wasn’t bleeding. He wasn’t broken. He was just … Billy.

  “Dude,” Casey said quietly. “Let us help you.”

  “I’m fine,” Billy said. “I shouldn’t have ditched school.”

  Casey looked right at Billy’s dad. “One of our friends is in a coma in the hospital. That’s why we weren’t at school today. Some of the teachers even left school. We were at the mall because we were hungry and the nurses in the ICU were sick of us taking up the waiting room.”

  The elder Pratt stared at Casey a minute, then frowned at Billy. “Why didn’t you say so?”

  Dot popped forward and cried, “He tried to!” then immediately backed down.

  “And even if you didn’t know,” Casey told Mr. Pratt, “it’s no reason to beat up your kid!” He turned to Billy. “We saw, okay? And Heather’s got enough on video for proof. So stop pretending everything’s okay.”

  “Come on, Billy,” Holly coaxed. “You don’t have to put up with this.”

  Regardless of what the other kids said to try to convince Billy, Sergeant Borsch had seen enough domestic-violence cases to know that the boy was not going to file a complaint against his father. And since the abuse had not crossed over into Billy needing medical attention, there was nothing he could legally do to intervene. So instead he switched to an unapproved (and questionably lawful) tactic:

  Blackmail.

  “Here’s the deal, Leon,” he said quietly to Mr. Pratt. “We’ve got some very damning evidence against you. I’m going to keep this clip on file. I’m going to document everything that happened here. And I’m going to alert the school to watch out for signs of physical trauma where your son is concerned. I can’t be here twenty-four-seven, but these kids are good friends and they’re not about to let this continue. So if you don’t want to wind up in jail, if you don’t want social services to remove your kid from your home, you will change your ways. Are we clear?”

  Leon Pratt stood in the wide-open doorway, visibly feeling cornered. And knowing that a cornered man is a desperate (and often violent) man, Sergeant Borsch gave him an out. “You want to be a good dad, right? You don’t want to have this kind of relationship with your kid, right? And Billy doesn’t want it either. Look how he covered for you! So get some help figuring it out. The county has people who can help. It won’t cost you anything but a little time.”

  Mr. Pratt looked down, and a long silence ensued before he heaved a sigh. And then (in a moment of unexpected candor) he said, “His mom’s been tellin’ me the same thing.”

  “Does she live here?” Sergeant Borsch asked.

  Leon Pratt nodded. “She’ll be home shortly.”

  “So talk it over with her tonight,” Sergeant Borsch said.

  “And just to give you and your son a little space and time, what do you think about Billy spending the night with one of his friends?”

  “He can stay with me,” Casey offered.

  Mr. Pratt nodded again, then looked at Billy. “That’d be all right.”

  Very quietly Billy told his dad, “Sorry I snuck out this morning. Sorry I ditched school. Sorry my phone was off. Sorry I didn’t tell you about Sammy.”

  Mr. Pratt perked up. “Sammy?
??s the one in a coma?”

  Billy nodded.

  Leon Pratt stared at his son a moment. “I know how much you like her.” Then he let out a heavy sigh and said, “I’m sorry about … everything. Get your things and go be with your friends. We’ll talk more tomorrow. Just please leave your phone on, okay?”

  Billy nodded, and while he was scurrying around the apartment, stuffing overnight things (including his favorite blanket) into a pillowcase, Sergeant Borsch quietly handed Leon Pratt a social-services business card, pointing out a number he could call for family counseling.

  When the door was closed again and the entourage of teens and cops was headed back toward the street, one of the backup officers walked beside Sergeant Borsch and said, “I’ve been out on a lot of domestic-dispute calls, sir, but I have never seen one resolved like that.” He looked at the Borschman with awe. “That was incredible.”

  Gil Borsch frowned. “Not entirely by the book …”

  “Maybe not,” the other officer said, “but it’s exactly what was needed.”

  Which (aside from the satisfaction of a job well done) was, for the Borschman, payday enough. He hadn’t always had the respect of his colleagues. There was a time (like when he’d been dumped by his horse in the Christmas Parade) that’d he’d been the station’s bona fide laughingstock. During this same time, minor infractions (like, oh, jaywalking or spitting on the sidewalk) had seemed justifiably cite-worthy.

  So what had transformed him from a citation-happy, horse-bucked, blustery cop into one who could defuse a domestic dispute?

  Not that there was any guarantee that Leon Pratt would follow through, but still.

  How had he become a cop who commanded the awe of officers coming up the ranks?

  In his heart of hearts Gil Borsch knew that it wasn’t just another season on the force, and it wasn’t merely the passing of time. It was learning how to listen. Finally learning how to listen. (Something both his ex-wives had begged him repeatedly to do.)

  And the person who had taught him to listen?