Chapter 8: Deer Lake

My uncle Dick was always nice to me, but he wasn’t always moral. His first wife took a temporary position out of town, and Dick started sleeping with another woman. Despite having two boys with his first wife, he left her when his girlfriend got pregnant. In my first life, he left his current wife in a few years, so that he could be a pimp for his new girlfriend.

I know, I said he was always good to me. That doesn’t mean I didn’t notice that he treated the rest of the family like shit. I never did figure out why he treated me with respect. I always tried to treat him that way, but it was difficult. Every time I saw him, I couldn’t stop thinking of all the shit he pulled with the rest of the family.

His current wife, Holly, spends most of her time taking care of Dick’s dad, my Grandfather. Don’t think she is a saint just because she married an immoral prick that turned her into a slave. She is a gold-digging home wrecker, and my cousins’ home wasn’t the first or last home she would wreck. She also has a temper as bad as my mom’s. She would be the key to my escape plan. I am willing to give living here a try. My escape plan involves ruining her life, and I don’t want to do that unless she fucks with me.

The house is packed. Dick had his two sons, 17 and 18 years old. Holly has her daughter, 17 years old, and they have a son, 9 years old. Then there is grandpa. I am forced to sleep on the couch, in the games room downstairs. I have no privacy and Holly makes it clear, I am not wanted. In exchange, whenever nobody can see or hear, I do things to deliberately piss her off. She can never prove I am doing anything. The first couple times, Dick believes her, but when she keeps punishing me for things nobody else sees, Dick starts getting mad at her.

School in Deer Lake is fun. The teachers are informed about me, and what I did in Fort Grand, but are required by law to keep their mouths shut. It is like anything else. If a large group of people know a secret, it isn’t a secret. On the first day, some kids hear the teachers talking about me. By lunch, everybody wants to be my friend.

Deer Lake is a northern community. They have many of the same problems as Fort Grand. The difference is, the police and school district try to deal with issues as they come up, instead of sweeping them under the rug. Deer Lake is nowhere near as bad as Fort Grand.

The dynamics of a northern High School are also a lot different than a school in the south. There is no such thing as a cheerleading squad, so all the best-looking girls are not automatically paired up with jocks. In fact, it is more likely the best-looking girls don’t realize how good looking they are because they rarely get asked out. The guys are too intimidated and expect the pretty girls to say no. Most boys don’t even try. If a girl is popular, it usually isn’t because she is pretty or a good person. It is generally because she is a slut, and the guys know she is a sure thing.

My first lunch break in my new school, word has already gotten around about what I had done in Fort Grand. Everybody wants to be my friend. I wait until the cafeteria is mostly full before I go for lunch. As I am getting my food, I looked around. I am looking for a particular kind of girl. My life in the military taught me never to expect something to happen unless it already has. I may have plans to leave Deer Lake, but I am willing to give this place a try, and that includes finding a girlfriend. My time in Fort Grand showed me that being alone isn’t what I want. I need some companionship.

It doesn’t take me long to find what I am looking for. I want a girl with an athletic build. If we end up together for years to come, I want her to have a tight body decades from now. She can’t be a jock. As soon as they finish school, they tend to drop sports and get fat. Most of all, she has to be somebody I could read. I don’t want to waste time, having to try different things to attract her.

She is sitting with a small group of girls. Judging from the other girls, it is the brainy crowd. Even amongst them, she is shy. I can tell she has ‘the princess being swept off her feet by prince charming’ fantasy. Given her attire, I guess she is a virgin. The only question is, how closely does she guard it?

Thankfully, the chair in front of her is unoccupied. She sits there, talking to her friend that sits beside her. By social convention, it would have been more appropriate to ask her friend sitting kitty-corner to her if the seat was taken, but I want her attention. I walk up to the vacant chair, ignoring her friends. When she looks up at me, I say, “Standing in the meal lineup I noticed those beautiful emerald eyes of yours and I would never forgive myself if I didn’t come over here to see if this chair was vacant, so I could sit down and become lost in your eyes.”

To her, it is incredibly embarrassing. Thankfully, her face didn’t turn too red, or this wouldn’t have worked. Her friend answers for her, “No, it is free.”

I place my food down and sit, continuing to ignore her friends. I hold out my hand to greet her, “My name is Trent.”

She tries to place her hand in mine to shake it and says, “Shelly.” I move my hand slightly, so I only just catch her fingers. Then I lean over and pull her hand to my mouth, kissing her hand.

“I’m pleased to meet you, Shelly.”

You could see her friends’ hearts melt. For a moment, I think I overdid it. Her friends all greet me, and I shake their hands, sending a clear message that their friendship is welcome, but I am here for Shelly. Of course, one of the first things they ask me is if the stories were true and if I was the kid that started everything in Fort Grand. I admit to my part and give credit where it was due.

The girls keep asking me questions, and I answer honestly. Every so often, I bring the conversation back to Shelly and ask her questions about herself. I don’t do it enough to be creepy, but I do it enough that everybody knows my attention isn’t going to be pulled from her.

By the time lunch is over, I think I have done reasonably well. Shelly is flustered and can’t hide that she is thinking about me. More importantly, her friends love me. They will do the heavy lifting for me when they encourage her to accept my advances. If you want a relationship to work, then have her friends work for you.

The next day at lunch, I am glad to see my plan working. As I am getting my lunch, Shelly sits between two friends. When I approach her table, one of the friends sitting next to her gets up so I can take her seat. This time the conversation is more balanced. I don’t have to field many questions. What pleases me is by the end of lunch, Shelly is getting talkative. Through lunch, I often put my hand on her arm or her upper back as we talk.

Day 3 of school is Wednesday, and it is the day I ask Shelly out. First thing in the morning, I track her down. I don’t want to embarrass her, so I am not going to do it at lunch, in front of all her friends. She has just arrived at school and is heading to her locker. There are few people around because it is early. I jog to catch up with her and get her attention by saying, “Shelly, wait up.”

She slows down for me to catch up and gives a mousy, “Morning.”. I think it is cute that she is still shy around me.

When I catch up, I ask, “A movie just came out with my favourite actor in it. I was wondering if you would like to come with me to see it on Friday?”

She blushes, but smiles. You can see she wants to say yes but is trying not to sound too eager. She replies, “What’s the movie?”

“You will love it. It’s called Rain Man. It’s a drama. Dustin Hoffman is the greatest. He plays an autistic idiot savant. I know he is going to kill the role. I’m willing to bet the movie will clean house at the Academy Awards.”

My enthusiasm has her curious. She asks, “What is it about?”

“Tom Cruise’s character starts as a slimeball. His father dies, and in the aftermath, he discovers he has an older brother, Dustin Hoffman, in a mental institution. The movie progresses, and Tom starts to connect with his brother, becoming a better person. Trust me, my description doesn’t do it justice. You will love it.”

“It sounds like you already love it enough for both of us.”

“I will take that as a yes and I will even throw in a supper. How does 5 o’clock sound?”

By now, we have reached her locker, and she is putting her stuff away. She pulls out a sheet of paper from a binder and gives me her address. “It sounds fine.”

My heart almost skips a beat when I take it from her hand, “How about Mr. Mike’s. I know a steakhouse isn’t the best restaurant to take a girl to, but there isn’t much selection in this town.”

“Mr. Mike’s is fine.”

I lean in and steal a kiss from her cheek. Pulling away, I say, “Mr. Mike’s it is. I can’t wait.” I then take off towards my locker, leaving her there thinking of me.

That day at lunch, I am deliberately a few minutes late to the cafeteria. When I walk into the cafeteria, I can see she has her book bag on the chair beside her, reserving the seat. As I approach, she has a big smile on her face. She places the bag under her seat, and pushes the empty seat out a bit, indicating I should sit there. I deliberately made sure my lunch today was all finger food, so my eating isn’t hindered when I put my arm around her.

When I do place my arm on her far shoulder, she looks at me with loving eyes. We hardly know each other, but when I first saw her, I knew we would quickly form a connection and grow close.

Thursday, she doesn’t have to reserve my seat. Everybody knows my place is next to hers. We have progressed into hugging to say hello and goodby. I am saving our first kiss for our first date, or I would be working on progressing our greeting.

I can see, if things work out here, I could be happy. Even if things don’t work out with Shelly, the rest of the girls are enamoured with both my reputation and how quickly I am making Shelly fall in love with me. The fact that she is one of the smartest and best-looking girls in the school adds to that.

Friday comes, and I am sitting at lunch with my arm around Shelly when the PA chimes and I am called to the office. I’m used to that call always being a bad news. In the little time that we have known each other, Shelly and I have become somewhat in tune with each other. She notices my feeling there is something wrong. She excuses herself and comes with me.

I climb the stairs to the ground floor in front of the office to get. As I am climbing the last flight of stairs, I see Rachel. We are both excited and end up running into each other’s arms. We hug for a while, and when we part, she kisses me on the cheek, proclaiming, “I missed you.”

I admit, “My heart broke when they sent me away before I could see anybody. They didn’t even let me know how Grace was doing. What happened with her mom? Who was that guy, and is he in jail?”

“I only got to see her while she was still in the hospital. She said you guys had a tradition that you get the guy’s wallet and money whenever you save her from a rapist. She sent me back to the house so I could search his pants. She also had me hide his car. She told me to disable it somehow, but I didn’t have a clue. All I could think of was to shove a potato into the tailpipe and sugar in the gas tank. I know she went to Child Services when the police were done with her, but none of the kids in the foster system know where she is.”

Rachel hands me a wallet and a large money roll. He must have been another oil worker.

Her words hit me hard. If Grace went missing, there is nothing I can do about it from here. Canadian law is such that a private investigator can’t do anything. If I hired one, all they would end up doing is warn whoever took her that somebody was looking for her. If that were to happen, they would either kill her to cover up their crimes or stick her someplace where she couldn’t be found. I’m not going to give up on her, but it will be a while before I am in a position to do anything about it.

Coming out of my thoughts, I notice Shelly hanging back, looking a little hurt and jealous. I wave her over, saying, “Come here, you silly girl. This is Rachel, my foster sister.” You can see her letting out the breath she was holding and relax. “Rachel this is Shelly”

Rachel greets her, “It’s nice to meet you. I’m not surprised my brother has a girlfriend already. You haven’t even been here five days.”

“Stop. You will embarrass the poor girl. Besides, we have our first date this evening. We will see if she will still have me after that.”

Rachel tells Shelly, “Hunny, I don’t know what he has told you about what happened back home, but I need my little genius for a bit. I hope you don’t mind me stealing him for lunch, so we can talk about some private things.”

Shelly acts a little possessive, “You are only his sister?”

Rachel pinches my cheeks in demonstration that she sees me as the little boy,” He is only my little brother.”

“OK, remember, 5 o’clock. Don’t be late.”

We took off for lunch, and I skipped my next class. I think it is strange when Rachel tells me our foster dad refused to get rid of her when he insisted; I be removed from his home. That is, until a little farther into our conversation.

Rachel says, “It seems my turning 18 next week will not be so bad. This morning Dad gave me an address of a home I can stay at until I can get on my feet. He also said a girl that lives there will visit for supper tonight. He wants us to get to know each other, so I will feel comfortable living there.”

I don’t have a good feeling about this and ask, “Do you know the address?”

She pulls a piece of paper from her pocket, “I have it right here.” She hands me the paper.

I look at it, and I am sure I turn pale. I feel sick to my stomach, and I want to kill the asshole. I recognize the address. I tell her, “That is not a place you want to live. That is the brothel run by the cops. Most girls would have a bad time there. You may not survive.”

She shakes her head in understanding, and her eyes start to water. You can see the hope leave her.

I try to comfort her, “How many times do I have to tell you to have faith, girl?”

She wipes the tears from her eyes, “Sorry. What can you do from here?”

“First off, you need to tell each of the reporters that your foster dad just tried to coerce you into becoming a prostitute and show them the address written in his hand as proof. You need to write everything down, so you don’t forget to tell them anything. Make sure they know that it is a child brothel, controlled by the police. After you made all that known, go around and collect the names of the child prostitutes in town. Everybody knows some, so just asking the foster kids and your friends should give you a big enough list. Then give that list to the media. It should be enough information for them to be able to uncover the story.”

I reach into my pocket for a letter I have been trying to get to the media, but my aunt keeps coming up with shit for me to do, and I haven’t found the time. I hand her the letter and say, “When you get back to town, give this to the first reporter from a major channel that you see.”

“What’s it say?”

“It is my story of abuse, starting when I was 5. It also insinuates I am still in an abusive home.”

“Oh, no. I didn’t know. I’m so sorry. Is there anything I can do?”

I laugh, “I’m not in an abusive home. Don’t worry. I need to paint the picture, but I can’t flat out state it in case things work out here. I have plans to escape this place if things don’t turn out. It means a deserving person will likely end up in jail for a crime I coerce her into. The only part I don’t like is a family will end in divorce, but they would have in a few more years anyway.”

“I swear, you like putting a girl through an emotional roller coaster. You could have led with ‘Don’t worry, I’m doing fine, but.”

“I need to keep the pretty girls off balance, so they will be more likely to fall into my arms. Then, when I give them a real kiss for the first time, they will be so used to feeling extreme emotions around me, they will not just get a little hot. They will lose all strength in the knees.”

“So, I am your conquest now?”

“So far, you are the only girl worthy. Besides, I thought I was the hero in this story. Doesn’t that mean I get the best girl?”

I can see she is getting flustered. I bet being with me is something she has thought about often but is concerned about the age. Most people don’t know; in 1988, BC’s age of sexual consent is 16, with a Cinderella clause of 4 years. Meaning a 12-year-old could legally give consent to a 16-year-old. 13-17, 14-18, meaning she and I are legal. If you think BC is bad, you should look up statutory rape laws for Saskatchewan during the same period.