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The City of Rossford

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ChrisGibson

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THE CITY
OF ROSSFORD

THE FOURTH ROSSFORD
BOOK

CHRIS LEWIS GIBSON


In memory of Lizzy Seeberg, Sean Valero and other young people who were compelled to take a long journey from which they cannot return.




PART ONE

SUNSET


ONE



THE CITY OF ROSSFORD



THE NIGHT OF THE GANG RAPE, Chay got the call, and all the days around that time people would shake their heads and say, “Things like this don’t happen in Rossford. Things like this never happen.” But even when Chay ran out of the store and climbed into a car that wasn’t his to drive toward Rossford High School, he knew that was a lie. Things like this happened everywhere and to anyone if you were in the wrong place, if you didn’t look behind you. And now they were happening to Robin. They had happened to Robin.
“Sheridan, wherever you are, get here now!” Chay shouted into his phone.
In front of Rossford High, the sirens blinked and rolled around spilling lurid red and blue light over the streets. It made everything look like a crime show, and Chay could hear his father saying, “I should never have let you go there. I went to public school. You should have gone to Saint Barbara’s.”
Behind him, Chay could hear feet pounding Mirrin Street, and it didn’t look anything like the quiet neighborhood north of Edgefield where happy children went to high school.
“Hey, Chay, did you hear?”
Mathan was panting as he ran toward him. He went hands to knees.
“Yeah, I just came,” Chay decided to push through the crowd, but Mathan caught his wrist.
“You can’t do that, man.”
“But she’s my friend.”
“But she’s in police custody. They’re going to take her to the hospital.”
“What the fuck happened?” Chay demanded.
Mathan threw his hands up in the air and shrugged.
“We had a basketball game tonight—which you never come to.”
“I had to work.”
“Well,” Mathan said, “I was coming out of the gym, and that’s when I saw the sirens. And that’s when I called you. And… Where the fuck did you get that car from?”
Chay took a cigarette from his jacket pocket and reached into his trousers for a lighter.
“I stole it.”

“She was naked,” Meredith told the detective, pushing her hair out of her face. “I was coming out of the game. She was supposed to come with me.”
Meredith’s face was blue and then red as the lights swept over her. “But she said she couldn’t. And then I was coming out with Marlee and there she was, just bleeding. Just… all of her clothes... God! What happened to her? Oh, my God!” Meredith stood up and interrupted herself. “Those are my friends over there. Those are her friends. We’re her friends. Let me get them.”
“Ma’am,” the cop said, and Meredith thought it was strange that this grown man was calling her ma’am, “not just yet. We’ve got a few more things to ask you.”
“That’s all I know,” Meredith said, frantically, shaking as if she could cast something off. They were lifting Robin onto a stretcher and into the ambulance. The ambulance light was twirling. As it left, the siren was whirring.
“I need to get my friends. And we need to go to the hospital.”
“Ma’am—”
“Why are you calling me ma’am if you’re not even going to let me go?”
“We are going to let you go. Only, ma’am, we may have to call you again.”
“Yes,” Meredith said. “Sure. Here’s my number.” She took her phone out and read off her number.
“Call me anytime. Please. But… not right now.”
Meredith held up her hand before the cop could say anything else, and she trotted across the crowded seen toward Chay and Mathan.
“Where the hell is Sheridan?”
Chay shrugged, but before he could say anything, Meredith hugged him quickly, and then hugged Mathan.
“I’ve been dialing him since Mathan called me,” Chay said. “Still no answer.”
Meredith took the phone from Chay, dialed a number and then bellowed, “This is Meredith. Everything’s fucked up around here. Get your ass to the hospital as soon as possible. We really need you.”
She shut the phone savagely and handed it back to her friend.
“If that doesn’t do it,” Meredith said, “I don’t know what will.”


The old priest sat in his room, hardfaced. There had always been something steely about him. His face was eagle like and his hair was a deep, steel blue. Into the room came a young, brunette man, swarthy, with features like the priest, and the priest pointed to the television.
“Just look at that, Sean.”
Sean put down the popcorn and sat down beside his uncle. Above the television was a plain wooden crucifix with an almost invisible brass Jesus.
“Tonight at Rossford Public High School, tragedy has struck. Junior, Robin Netteson—”
Flash to a bad picture of a plump girl, in a cheerleading costume—
“Was found semi-conscious, beaten bleeding and naked outside of the gymnasium.”

“I came outside… and she was naked. She was supposed to come with me tonight, but she said she couldn’t. I’ve been calling all of our friends,” a girl said, stammering over her words as she tried to keep herself together.
“I know her,” Sean said, his brows knitting. “That’s Meredith. I know her.”
“Do you know the girl?” his uncle asked, meaning the girl who had been raped.
“I’ve seen her,” Sean answered, sitting down and frowning. “I’ve seen her. But I don’t really know her.”
“Things like this just don’t happen in Rossford,” a slightly round girl said, with hair the priest judged to be too long and too untidy.
“Oh, yes they do, girlie,” the old man’s fingers unconsciously went to the little cross around his neck. “They happen every day. Everywhere.”
“What’s the world coming to?” Sean wondered.
The priest looked at his nephew, skeptically.
“Now you sound just like that girl,” he said.
“She was supposed to be coming with us….” Meredith said over and over again on the television.


“I know you always looked after her, I know you did,” Mr. Netteson was saying when he and Robin’s mother came into the lobby. “I know all of you guys did.”
“She’s fine,” Mathan said to them. “I mean,” he revised, “she’ll be okay, we’ll make sure she’s okay.”
“I know you will.” Mr. Netteson said. “We all will.”
Eileen Nettison seemed incapable of speech and Chay came up and touched her lightly on the wrist.
She looked at him.
He kissed her quickly.
“Everything’ll work out,” he said.
She looked at him, and seemed to be seeing him for the first time.
“Yes, Chay,” she said. “Thank you, Chay.”
“Where is Sheridan?” Meredith shut her phone again.
“I can’t find him,” she reported. “I’ve been dialing all night.”
Mathan put a hand over hers.
“You’re almost as frantic as them,” he whispered.
“You just think I sound like some dumb white girl.”
Mathan grinned and said, “Not yet.”
Meredith pushed her hair back, and cleared her throat.
“Then I’ll try not to go there.”
“Everything’ll be alright,” Mathan said.
“Not for Robin.”
“Yes for Robin. Even for Robin,” Mathan looked up at Robin’s parents who were fretting, twisting their hands as they walked back and forth in the lobby.
“If Sheridan was any kind of friend…”
“Then his phone would be on all the time? Stop that. You know it’s not right.”
Chay sat down with them.
Meredith and Mathan looked to him. Meredith placed her hand over his.
“How are you?”
Chay shook his head.
“Now I’m worried about Sheridan.”
“Nothing’s happened to him,” Meredith dismissed this.
“We thought nothing had happened to Robin,” Chay said. “We let her out of our sight one minute…” he shrugged. “I thought I was such a bad ass. I can’t even watch my friend. Oh, by the way, you’d better call your Dad.”
“Shit!” Meredith remembered.
As Meredith dialed home she muttered, “I guess that means I used to be rich, too. Oh, well… Yeah, Dad. I’m at the hospital. No, I’m fine. No. Don’t send her. Don’t send anyone. Yeah. You’ve seen the news? Yeah. Yeah… We’re just waiting for word….” Meredith looked around the lobby, fretting before repeating, “Just… waiting for a word.”

The phone rang and Sean picked it up even though his uncle had signaled for him to ignore it.
“Hello, Saint Agatha’s rectory. Yes. Yes… It’s Sean. Hold on. He’s not asleep yet. I’ll ask him.”
“They know damn well,” Father Frank said, “that after ten o’clock I do not exist.”
“It was Mark Dance from the church board.”
“Oh, God!”
“He thought that it would be a good idea to open the church up tonight. In light of what’s happened. So people can come together. You know? Pray. Light candles.”
The old man looked at his nephew steadily.
“You think it’s a good idea, don’t you?”
“I think it doesn’t hurt.”
“It doesn’t help either,” Frank got up from his battered old armchair. “People always get God the same time they get sentimental. If they got God before hand then we wouldn’t have to have midnight vigils in the church.”
“He’s still on the phone,” Sean reminded his uncle.
“Oh, hell. Tell him yes.”
“Good,” Sean decided. “You know, Saint Barbara’s never locks its doors.”
“Saint Barbara’s isn’t in the middle of downtown Rossford with junkies and cokeheads sitting on its steps,” Frank returned, shuffling into his coat.
 
A great start with heaps going on. I wonder who raped that girl? I guess I will have to wait and see. I feel so sorry for her, such a horrible thing to happen. Excellent writing and I look forward to more!
 
She is the whole impetus of the story and based on a real person. I knew I wanted to write about this situation, but I didn't know if would manifest itself in a Rossford book and be the centural part of it. More to come tomorrow night. Thank you for reading.
 
CHAPTER ONE, THE CITY OF ROSSFORD
PART TWO


“Oh, my God! Oh, my God! That’s it! You don’t—shit! You don’t fucking get tired, do you, high school boy! Oh, shit! Oh, fuck me! Hell, yeah.”
“You like it?” he demanded. “You like it? You like what this kid can do?”
Her face was flushed underneath him. She clapped a hand over his mouth while, red faced, the edges of his face turning white, he fucked her. There was another bed in the dorm room, but no roommate because Shelley Latham hadn’t minded paying the additional fee to live alone. She wasn’t very sentimental, and so the pennant on the wall that read LORETTO COLLEGE was one of the dorm room’s only decorations. It seemed to rock back and forth as they both came, and the boy, firmly between her legs, back streaming with sweat, gave a strangled and surprised shout while she playfully put her fingers to his mouth.
He jerked off the condom and put it in the waste can beside the bed and then lay beside her, breathing heavily. Neither one of them said anything for a moment. She was dark haired and dark eyed, swarthy and exotic. She was the type of girl who, if you saw her in public, you would assume would have loud sex in her dorm room late at night. He was long and thin, almost slight, with short brownish hair plastered to his scalp and sweet blue eyes. He was the kind of boy you’d assume was all innocence and sugar cookies, which was why she liked him.
“You really did the job, Sheridan,” Shelley said.
He made a clicking noise and fired an imaginary gun, “This high school boy knows what he’s doing, doesn’t he?”
“It’s late,” she said.
“That’s my cue to leave,” Sheridan sat up.
“No,” Shelley said. “It’s your cue to turn on the television and see what time it is, since you’ve got school and your cell phone clock is wrong.”
Sheridan shrugged and sat up. As he reached for the remote control, Shelley looked sentimentally at his back, at his small, soft bottom. The first time she had seen him she had thought about sleeping with him, but he was too young. Even a year younger, when a boy was still in high school, was too young.
“You know you’re not going to corrupt me,” he’d said to her. “I’ve been fucking since I was fourteen.”
With an admission like that, and he’d been in his tracksuit with his ball cap turned back, she’d said to hell with it. After that first time she realized he wasn’t lying. The boy knew what he was about.
The television blared.


“Tonight at Rossford Public High School, tragedy has struck. Junior, Robin Netteson was found semi-conscious, beaten, bleeding and naked outside of the gymnasium…”
“Oh, my God!” Sheridan muttered.
“Oh, my God!” he kept saying while the clip with Meredith speaking ran on. “Oh, God!”
He stumbled out of bed and hurriedly put his clothes on, the whole time reaching into his schoolbag for his phone. Shelley held out her hand for it so he could dress, and she flipped it open.
“It says you’ve got like seven messages.”
“Play them?” he asked her, as he put on his jacket, and trembling, tried to get into his shoes.

“SHERIDAN! WHERE ARE YOU?” Meredith was shouting. “I’VE BEEN CALLING YOU FOR THE LAST TWO HOURS. EVERYONE’S WORRIED. WHERE THE HELL ARE YOU???”

“Sher?” Shelley looked at him.
He was fragile looking, shaking. He wasn’t just the fun guy fucking her.
“Sheridan,” she said again.
“I gotta get to the hospital.”
“I know. I’ll drive you.”
“You don’t…” Sheridan was trembling and walking around the room, looking blindly for his coat.
Shelley was already half dressed. She crossed the room, picked Sheridan’s peacoat off of the chair, but extracted his keys before handing it to him.
“Let me get ready. I’ll drive you. You’re not getting behind the wheel of any car tonight.”


Sheridan pushed himself through the electric sliding doors, impatient to enter the lobby. He looked lost and frightened, and Chay ran to him quickly while Sheridan cried, “Where is she? Where’s Robin? What’s going on?”
Meredith and Mathan were approaching now and Meredith was saying in a voice, half upset, half solicitious, “Sheridan, we were starting to worry about… you.”
When her voice wandered, they all followed the path of her gaze.
A dark haired girl had given a small wave and was heading out of the lobby, presumably back to her car.
“Oh, my God,” Meredith’s voice went cold.
“That’s Shelley,” Sheridan began. “She gave me—”
“Chay was worried as hell after you ignored the… what, fiftieth call? And I’m starting to wonder where you are too, and all this time, when Robin’s in the ER and we’re sitting here trembling, you’re off fucking some slut! Goddamn, Sheridan!”
“Meredith,” Mathan chided. He pulled her away from Sheridan who was biting his lower lip.
“It doesn’t matter where you were,” Mathan told him. “You’re here now.”
Sheridan dumbly ran a hand over his head and pulled at his face. Chay pulled him to the other side of the lobby where Mr. and Mrs. Nettison were.
“I just heard,” he said.
“She was unconscious,” Mrs. Netteson said.
A nurse came out and told them, “She’s awake, but she’s really bad off.”
“I have to go see her,” Mr. Netteson said.
“Alright,” the doctor nodded. “Alright. But she’s asking for someone called Sheridan?”
Sheridan looked surprised and Meredith muttered something, but Eileen Netteson touched him on the back and said, “You’d better go to her.”

Sheridan walked down the hall duckfooted and stupid with fear, checking his cell phone to make sure that there were no calls from her. If Robin had called him, if somehow she’d had time to call when this was happening, or about to happen, and he hadn’t gotten to her because he’d left the phone off and was busy trying to get laid, then he didn’t know what he would do.
The fluorescent lights were humming and they shone too brightly. His mouth tasted funny and all of the joy of tonight was gone. He felt, once again, like he always did. Unsure, ungainly, a little unstable and out of control, and now he was in the room, and here she was and she stirred from bed and he gasped and came in, pulling a chair up beside her.
“Yours eyes,” he said, weakly.
“I need to talk to you before anyone else comes in,” Robin’s voice was raspy. She had raccoon eyes from the beating, and her mouth was cut. “I need to talk to you before Meredith… Or anyone.”
“How did they…? Who did?”
“Who would want to?” Robin Netteson said. “I’m not popular. I’m not pretty. Nobody wants me. Or knows me.”
“Everybody knows you now,” Sheridan said, simply. “You’re famous right now.”
Robin lifted her head weakly, and suddenly, she began laughing. It was a harsh laugh and it went on a while and then Sheridan touched her hand.
“You gotta watch after Chay,” Robin said.
“What?”
“That’s what I wanted to tell you. You gotta watch after him. Cause he’s younger than us. And he thinks he can do anything. And he can get in trouble. You get in trouble too, but you get into it with girls. I know you love him. He’s like your little brother. You gotta protect him, Sheridan.”
“I should have been there to protect you.”
Her eyes went wide suddenly. They were so dilated there were almost no pupils. She seemed to be straining up and up toward something, and then, suddenly, she trembled and fell back a little.
“I thought they’d never stop,” she said. “How can they just keep doing that, Sheridan? Just keep doing it to a girl like they’ll never stop? Do you do it like that, Sher? Do girls like it when you do it to them?”
Sheridan’s mouth tasted bad, and he said, “How about you let me get Meredith and Mathan?”
Robin didn’t say anything.
Sheridan stood up.
“I’ll get Meredith and Mathan.”

Sheridan sat in the lobby with his hands across his lap, his legs splayed. It was only when he yawned that he realized how late it must have been. He looked through the doors and saw Chay pacing up and down outside in the concrete plaza of Saint Elizabeth’s Hospital. Sheridan got up to go to him.
As the doors slid open, Chay turned around and motioned to Sheridan with an unlit cigarette. He pulled a lighter from his pocket, lit the cigarette and as a puff of smoke went up and a lone car rolled up Edison Street, Sheridan said, “Chay, you know that’ll kill you.”
“This,” Chay said, displaying the cigarette, “is not what will kill me.”
Sheridan shook his head and stood beside his friend, watching the almost empty street. Downtown Rossford was fairly empty at this time of night.
“Meredith said you got worried about me.”
“She worried about you too,” Chay said.
Sheridan nodded.
“You just go off and do your own thing,” Chay said. “I don’t guess that’s bad. But Robin ran off to do her own thing, and look what happened.”
“Robin told me to look out for you.”
“Thanks.”
“Cause you really do go out and do stupid stuff.”
“Says the guy who got the clap last year?”
Sheridan looked at him.
“Sorry,” Chay said. “But… you can’t just… you’re calling the kettle black.”
“I’m just saying you do risky stuff. Yeah, maybe I do too. And Robin… Well, that made me think about you. And…”
“I’m sorry about that crack I made.”
“I’m sorry it happened.”
“Did your parents find out?”
“God, no. They still think I’m a virgin.”
A truck headed for Route Two roared past them, and when it was gone, Sheridan said, “You know if anything happened to you that would just… That would fuck me up.”
“Why would anything happen?”
“You work for that dirty guy.”
Chay shrugged.
“Who your dad hates,” Sheridan elaborated. “And Meredith said you stole a fucking car?”
“To get to everyone after she texted me.”
“God, Chay!”
“Sheridan, please don’t preach.”
“It’s just…”
“I know,” Chay said.
Sheridan yawned, and hugging himself marveled at the beauty of the cold night.
“It’s time for bed. Time to go home.”
“I was about to head out.”
“How?” Sheridan said.
“I was going to walk.”
“Fuck that,” Sheridan said.
“You can’t drive… That girl…”
“Shelley.”
“Yeah… she drove you.”
“Meredith will take us. Or Mate. We’ll just have to go back in. But you’re not walking.”
“Alright, Big Brother.”
Sheridan wrapped an arm around him quickly, the way he used to when they were still very young and they would just walk around arm and arm, hanging off of each other lazily.
Chay inhaled, and white smoke went out across the cobalt blue air.
“God, look at that moon,” Chay Lewis said.
“I know,” Sheridan said.
“Sometimes the world is so beautiful I could shit.”
 
That was an excellent portion! I am liking these new characters, especially Sheridan. I hope they catch the guys who raped Robin. :( It will be interesting to read how the characters from the other Rossford stories fit into this one. Great writing and I look forward to more soon!
 
You will be very interested, and very surprised. I want to say more but, damn, that's would really ruin the surprises to come. Oh, and by the way, Sheridan is one of my favorite characters. What do you like about him?
 
ChrisGibson said:
You will be very interested, and very surprised. I want to say more but, damn, that's would really ruin the surprises to come. Oh, and by the way, Sheridan is one of my favorite characters. What do you like about him?
Click to expand...

Well I don't know much about him yet but I like how much he cares for the other people around him.
 
Yeah, I think that's it. He's full of love, and even while Meredith is outraged, Sheridan is full of love, and passion. It's hard to say how much I love him.
 
CHAPTER ONE CONTINUED

“Was I hard on him?” Meredith asked after they had left the hospital room and they were on their way back to the lobby.
“Ask him yourself, we’ve gotta give them a ride home,” Mathan said, adding, “unless you think they just walked home.”
“Don’t even joke. It’s too cold and… Well…”
“And Rossford seems dangerous tonight.”
“Yes,” Meredith said. Then, “Sheridan just makes me so mad sometimes.”
“Some might say that you had a crush on him.”
Meredith looked up at Mathan sharply.
“You know that’s not true. You know who the one I have a crush on is.”
Mathan grinned broadly down at her.
“You’re kind of pretty tonight, you know that, Miss?”
Meredith thumped him in the chest with the back of her hand.
“You’ll be lovely at my cousin’s wedding on Saturday.”
Meredith only smiled.
“Might even outshine the bride,” he added.
“Don’t you dare tell her that.”
Mathan grinned and shook his head. “No, not if I want to live.”
“Not if you want me to live!”
“And yes,” Mathan said, “you were a little hard on him.”
“He’s gonna get some girl knocked up one day,” Meredith said. “Why does he do that?”
“Some guys like to play around.”
“You don’t,” Meredith said.
Mathan went poker faced, and she said, “You don’t?” Then, “You better not, Mathan Alexander.”
Mathan started laughing and the hospital was filled with his laughter. Since they’d been children, Mathan’s laughter was infectious. In the lobby, Chay and Sheridan looked up.
“You’re an evil black bastard,” she told Mathan, tartly.
“And you’re a blue eyed devil.”
“Don’t you fucking forget it.”
Mathan caught her hand before they rejoined their friends.
“And Sheridan’s… got stuff. You know that. That’s why he’s the way he is.”
“I know he’s got stuff,” she said, looking back at their friends. “They’ve both got stuff. We’ve all got stuff. But I know my stuff, and we know Chay’s stuff. But Sheridan’s?”
“It’s that he closes up,” Mathan said. “It’s not that he sleeps around. It’s that he closes up about everything. Including why he does anything he does.”
“Yes!” Meredith hissed.

“Are they talking about us?” Chay said to Sheridan.
Sheridan looked back at their friends and said, “I’m pretty sure they are.”

“Yes!” Meredith said, leaning up and clutching Mathan’s face. “And that’s why I love you.”
Mathan laughed. “You said you love me, lady. I heard you fair and square, and you can’t take it back.”

This was not how Shelley Latham expected the night to turn out. Most of her days were spent working very hard and, admittedly, having the shallowest of friendships. Her dating life was lacking too, and over time she’d decided that waiting for Mr. Right was out of the question seeing as there just weren’t a lot of guys around smart enough or interesting enough for her. When she looked at a boy, weighing him as a potential partner, most fell woefully short. When she looked at him as a potential fun sex partner, suddenly her options blossomed. But she couldn’t run around fucking the guys on campus. Girls who did that were girls whose business went all over this incestuous little school. That left the guys at the Indiana University campus or the many tech colleges and pseudo schools that dotted the area from here to South Bend. There were always the clubs. Cornfed boys, red faced, kind of hot in a farm town way with their hair gelled, their slightly strong cologne and Abercrombie and Fitch, came up from the towns and that was always a good time to bring back to the dorm. She had a few of their numbers. Jeff and Matty she kept on speed dial. They were smart guys, guys who did a semester or so of college and always planned to better themselves, but weren’t quite sure what that meant. They hated Rummelsville or East Carmel or Peru or LaPaz where nothing ever happened, but where they weren’t discontented enough to leave. And she liked that about them too.
And then had come Sheridan. He had been walking across campus with a friend of his and he had stopped and asked her for directions. She had fallen in love with his eyes. Everything about him was pale. She wanted to say pale and soft, but he wasn’t soft. He reminded her of a cat, and she didn’t know what to do with that description. He was pale like Christmas morning was pale, that same pale color in his eyes as the sky, the same paleness to his brown hair as the too bright winter sun on the stark branches of trees. Shelley couldn’t remember where he had asked to be directed, but she knew her directions were good. He nodded. She could not help but speak to the boy whose face was half hidden by the broad brim of his cap.
“You don’t go here, do you?”
“No,” Sheridan had said. “I don’t.”
Score for her.
He was walking away with his friend. His jeans were pale too, and she could see his ass, small and cute to her. She’d wanted to stop him, to find some way to make him stay. If only she could think a little longer, she would have come up with a way.
But she kept thinking and he kept walking, and even when Sheridan—whose name she didn’t know then—had disappeared, she still hadn’t thought of a way to waylay him.

Shelley was surprised that the doors to Saint Agatha’s were open. Low golden light shown through the stainglass windows. It reminded her of Christmas, the only time that churches were open in the middle of the night. And it was cold and everything. People were coming in and out, and Shelley parked. She was too wound up right now. Wound up with the panic on Sheridan’s face, with the news of the girl who was his friend. Besides, maybe Uncle Frank would still be up. She didn’t count on it. All she knew was that she was up, and she drove to the parking lot and climbed out of the car.
If churches were open in the middle of the night all the time I’d be a much better Christian.
Saint Agatha’s was a large old church, high pillared and hung with low burning brass lanterns that gave the place a dim light from their high perches. Inside the church, the stain glass windows were only night darkened strips, and in evenly spaced grottoes saints sat, stood, stretched out compassionate hands while the votive lights flickered under them.
“Shelley?” she heard.
“Sean?” she looked down at him.
“Well,” the old priest who sat beside Sean murmured, “this is a night of miracles.”
“I was just driving… a friend,” Shelley said.
“A friend, indeed,” Sean said, making a rude noise.
Shelley Latham frowned at him.
“I was driving him to the hospital. We saw on the news that one of his friends had been attacked.”
Shelley sat down beside them.
“The Robin girl?”
“Yes, Uncle Frank.”
“That’s why everyone’s here,” Sean said. “They’re all praying for her.”
“I think,” Father Frank said, “they are all praying for themselves. Because they’re afraid.”
“Things like this just don’t happen in Rossford,” Shelley said.
Father Frank opened his mouth, but Sean said, “Our uncle has already pontificated on that.”
Shelley said, “I don’t want to pontificate if it’s alright with you. I want to go up and… light a candle. And be with my family.”
Shelley got up and disappeared into the shadows while Frank said, “Well, my nephew and my niece—”
“Great-niece.”
“Don’t correct me, boy.”
“I just think Shelley likes to forget I’m her uncle,” Sean said.
“Well, I’m both of your uncles, and it’s good to have my family here.”
“I almost think we should wake up BJ—”
“No,” Frank said. “Better let him sleep. I’ll never hear the end of it if I wake your brother up at one in the morning.”

They were all yawning as Meredith’s car rolled up in front of the two storey with the large front porch. One dim light was on in the living room and could be seen through the porch swing.
“Well, here you go,” she said.
From the backseat, Sheridan leaned over and told Mathan and Meredith, “I love you guys. You all know that, right?”
“Oh, God,” Meredith groaned.
“No, don’t do that, Mare,” Sheridan said. “I just love you guys so much, and we’ve gotta stick together, you know?”
“Good night, Sheridan.”
On impulse Sheridan reached around the seats and awkwardly hugged Mathan and Meredith.
“We love you too,” Mathan said, at last, and Sheridan let him out of his grip.
At the house, the front door opened, and the outline of a woman in a housecoat could be seen.
“See, your mom’ll wonder what the hell we’ve done with you if we don’t let you out,” Meredith said.
“You guys going to school tomorrow?” Sheridan asked, touching the door handle.
“I’m going to the hospital,” Meredith said. “And then there’s Thanksgiving.”
“Right… Well,” Sheridan said. “I guess the wedding. We’ll see each other at the wedding for sure?”
Mathan thought that Meredith, who couldn’t help herself, was being obtuse and couldn’t understand Sheridan’s need for them right now.
“You’ll see us before the wedding,” Mathan said. “You know that. Come to the house on Thursday. Plus… there may not be a wedding if your brother has anything to say about it.”
“I’ve talked to him, and he promises to be good,” Sheridan said.
“Your poor mom, Sher,” Chay said, gesturing to the woman who had gone inside, but could be seen on the other side of the door.
“Alright,” Sheridan said.
Sheridan wrapped his arm around Chay and said, “I’ll see you tomorrow, Little Brother,” and then he climbed out of the car and rounded it, going up the walk.
“And now for you, Chay,” Meredith said, driving down the street. Sheridan lived in the neighborhood of large old houses south of Dorr and west of downtown, what Meredith’s family referred to as Saint Agatha’s country. When they crossed South Main they were in Saint Barbara’s Country and Meredith felt like it was home. They went past Grandma’s house and now they were on Regency Street with its long porched bungalows, some of them with the dormer lights still on, and they pulled up in front of a bungalow Meredith had known for years, yellow in daylight with a brick porch and a little light on that spoke of comfort and happiness and made her want to get to her own home as soon as possible.
“Here you go, Chay. You have a good night.”
Mathan reached back and clapped him on the shoulder. Chay climbed out.
“Chay,” Meredith called.
He came to the driver’s side and stuck his head in the window.
Meredith kissed him on the cheek.
“Thanks, Mom,” he said.
She shrugged.
“Someone’s got to be.”
Chay grinned and headed up the little walk. He was surprised, but shouldn’t have been, that the deeply polished old oak door his father had restored—with a new brass knocker—was unlocked. It was so normal and so unafraid after such a fearful night.
“Well, I guess that means I can go to bed,” a man who seemed both too young and too black to be Chay’s father said, folding his paper and tapping his brass rimmed spectacles.
“I’m glad to be home,” Chay said, putting down his bag.
“Your father is upstairs on pins and needles worried about you.”
Chay chuckled as he headed up the staircase.
“What?”
“My father telling me how worried my father is about me!”
“Don’t you love being the adopted child of a gay couple?”
His father was already getting up to turn off the lights while Chay, coming upstairs, called, “Dad?”
Out of his room, taking off the black rimmed spectacles that aged him by about ten years, came someone who looked more like Chay’s older brother than his father.
“Chay Riley Lewis! You could have called.”
“I did call!”
“Hours ago. I worry,” his father embraced him.
“James, comes to bed,” he shouted.
“Chay, ever since I heard the news…” Chay’s father held him back and shook his head.
James had come upstairs and was shaking his head, “Noah Riley,” he told the other man who was chiding Chay, “You’re dangerously close to becoming a smothering parent.”
 
That was a great portion with lots going on. I am enjoying getting to know these new characters better. It was also nice to see James and Noah again at the very end. Excellent writing and I look forward to more soon!
 
THE CITY OF ROSSFORD CHAPTER ONE CONTINUED

WEEKEND PORTION PART ONE

Weekend portion will now come out in two installments so you can read one now and save one for tomorrow. Or Not. All up to you!




Meredith lay with the sun red in her eyelids, contemplating getting out of bed, and then she knew she had to pee too, so it was all over no matter how badly she wanted to pretend she was still asleep. After that came the long purgatory with one foot in and the other out of the Land of Nod where she thought, I am getting up now… I’m getting up now. I’m going. I’m going…. Right now.
Why did it have to be like this? Couldn’t there be a better way? Couldn’t she wear a diaper? And if she could wear a diaper, then couldn’t she learn to have the nerve to just use it, just use it and go back to sleep? And after all, didn’t they have that dry weave stuff she’d seen on the commercials? Or was that maxi pads? Or did they both have it? A life where you couldn’t feel piss or menstrual blood. Sleep. Stinging. The giraffe… Stinging… A pink giraffe, with a maxi pad for a neck… How… oh, dear.
“Get up!” Meredith said, and pushed herself up. Worse than waking up having to pee, was falling back into sleep and dreaming half dreams with a full bladder. She blinked when she realized that she was, in fact, not in bed. She was on a let out sofa, a remarkably comfortable let out, and she looked all around the living room.
“Well, well the dead has arisen!”
Meredith blinked.
“Julian?”
“You look like you don’t remember where you are.”
“I remember now. What’s that smell? It smells so good. God, I have to pee.”
“Well, you know where the bathroom is,” Julian Lawden said as Meredith headed out of the living room with its large front windows, that looked onto the street below.
As Meredith was coming down the hall, Claire was coming in the other direction, her red hair in a ponytail.
“You’re up,” she said to Meredith. “Well, you can go right back to bed. I was just waking up to cook breakfast for later. I wanted to get this recipe right.”
“I’m kind of hungry,” Meredith admitted, her head sticking out of the bathroom door.
“Well, when you finish up what you’re doing you can try it, and then maybe a cup of coffee if you want. I know you didn’t plan on going to school today.”
The toilet flushed, the faucet was running. Meredith opened the door, her blond hair hanging in her face.
“No, and I may never go back again.”
She shut off the water and dried her hands.
“I forgot I slept here last night.”
“It was almost two when you dropped Mathan off,” Julian said, joining Claire at the door. Meredith looked at their matching wedding bands, one on the long brown hand, the other on a white hand like hers. The Lawdens. Would that be she and Mathan Alexander one day?
“We couldn’t let you head out that door and try to drive back to your dad’s.”
“He volunteered to come to the hospital last night,” Meredith said.
“I can’t believe it,” Claire leaned back against the wall across from the bathrrom, then she headed up the hall, back to the kitchen, followed by her husband and by Meredith. “I mean, I should believe, but I can’t.”
“Last night we just kept watching the news while people said ‘This never happens in Rossford, it never happens in Rossford.’”
“Well, it happens in East Carmel,” Claire Lawden said, pouring a cup of coffee and placing it before Meredith before crossing the kitchen again and placing on the table what looked to be an apple cobbler. “So I know it happens here.”
“Oh, my God, this smells so good!”
“And there is sausage too, and no I am not a kitchen goddess because that was pre-cooked and boxed when I got it at Martin’s.”
“How can Mathan sleep through this?” Meredith wondered as she dug out some of the steaming cobbler.
“My cousin is part log,” Julian said with a shrug.
“Did you ever find Sheridan?” Claire asked.
“Oh, God, yes. I didn’t tell you?” Meredith said. “Well, his phone was off cause he was banging this wench who looks, I might add, much too old for him. He’s gonna get an STD one day, I know. This bitch was totally, totally snanky.”
“Does the snanky bitch have a name?” Claire said.
Julian looked at his wife.
“I need a name,” Claire explained.
“I don’t know, and I was about to say I’ll ask Sheridan, but I think I’d pluck my eyes out before I did that,” Meredith said, then added, as she took a bite of the plate Claire handed her, “oooh, good cobbler.”
“It’s Jiffy mix and apples from a can,” Claire said. “Merilee used to make it when we were growing up. I wonder if she still makes it for Matty?”
“Is Sheridan’s brother home yet?” Julian asked.
“No,” Meredith munched thoughtfully, then took a swig of coffee. “I think he gets in today.”
“I think it was a horrible idea to plan the wedding during Thanksgiving,” Julian said. “She should have done it when he wouldn’t be around.”
Claire said, “You really think a scientist who can’t remember to cut his own hair and spends half his time talking about atoms and quarks is going to be a danger to the wedding?”
“In the case of this particular scientist,” Julian asserted, “Yes.”

When Sheridan had rolled out of bed, he’d said, “Are you my surrogate older brother or what? I need a ride to campus.”
“Why do you need a ride to…? Nevermind. I bet I don’t want to know.”
“No,” Sheridan agreed. “You probably don’t.”
A vaguely non descript car had dropped him off and Sheridan, keys swinging from his fingers, hopped out of the car and then shouted playfully, “Now hurry, hurry, or you’ll be late for class.”
“Don’t joke,” shouted the voice from the car, and then it made a U turn and headed out of Loretto. Sheridan jammed his hands in his pockets after blowing on them, and then headed toward the parking lot of Saint Anne’s Hall.
The closer he got to the parking lot between Saint Anne and Wilson Hall, the more he thought it would be a good idea to see her. His car was beneath her window on the third floor and he no sooner spotted it than he decided to round the back, go up and see her.
“Oh, my gosh! Sheridan, I was going to find a way to get your car to you.”
“A friend of mine dropped me off on his way to classes.”
“Classes?”
“He’s a law student.”
Shelley grinned and said, “Is he cute?”
“I guess. But he’s gay.”
“Um,” Shelley sighed. “Well, he’s for my uncles.”
“You have a gay uncle?”
“I have two uncles,” Shelley said ushering him in. “And an uncle who’s a priest, which I guess makes him a hermaphrodite.”
“I don’t know about that,” Sheridan said, grinning and shutting the door behind him.
“I went to Saint Agatha’s after I dropped you off at the hospital. The church was open all night. I ended up sleeping in the rectory. I just got back, really.”
“Well,” Sheridan said. “I guess you got class?”
“I do have class,” Shelley acknowledged. “But I’m seriously contemplating not going. In fact, I’m not going.”
Then she said, “You wanna grab breakfast?”
Sheridan yawned hugely, but said, “Yeah.”
“Great. I didn’t want to go to class anyway. I hate it. It’s some music theory shit. I’ll go grab my shoes.”
Shelley departed, heading for the little bathroom, and when she came back, she said, “Sheridan, are you really hungry?”
“I could eat,” he said. “But I’m not starving or anything.” Each fragment seemed to end in a question mark. “Why?”
“I was just thinking… you’re probably going to see your friend, later. And that’s sad. I don’t mean to say it isn’t. But it kind of killed what he started last night.”
Sheridan put a hand over his mouth and took his hand through his hair, chuckling.
“You serious?”
Shelley dropped her shoes and begun unbuttoning her blouse.
“I’ve been known to make a joke or two,” she admitted. “But never about sex.”


“You know what?” Shelley said. “I didn’t feel it. For one moment, I didn’t feel it.”
“Feel what?” Sheridan said, raising an eyebrow.
She chuckled.
“No, I felt you… Don’t worry about that. I mean the trouble. There just weren’t any troubles. Everything was right with the world, and…”
Sheridan turned on his side and looked at her.
“Mind you, it hit the spot. It really took me where I needed to go.”
“Me too,” Sheridan said.
“Especially after last night.”
There was a knock on the door and they both froze.
The knock was rapid again.
Shelley put a finger to her lips.
For a while there was silence, and then another knock. And then a sigh. A few moments passed where they knew someone was on the other side of the door, and then a note shot underneath it and feet moved away.
“I’ll get it,” Sheridan said, and climbed out of bed, and crossing the room to pick the sheet up.
“I know who it’s from,” Shelley said, tiredly, her hand out.
Sheridan handed it to her.
“Fuck,” she muttered.

YOU MISSED CLASS AGAIN. DON’T THINK I’M GOING TO PASS YOU JUST CAUSE WE’RE FAMILY. WE NEED TO TALK, YOUNG LADY.

YOUR UNCLE
 
I am happy to have the weekend instalment in 2 parts! That was an excellent portion! It was nice to see Julian and Claire again and nice to read more about how these characters fit into this world. Great writing and I look forward to the next part!
 
And you know what? I did not expect you to read it so fast! I look forward to you looking forward to the next part. I'll put it up in a few hours. When you read it is up to you. I think it's going to be a pretty important revelation.
 
THE CITY OF ROSSFORD CHAPTER ONE CONTINUED

WEEKEND PORTION PART TWO


“So,” Claire asked, coming back into the living room where Meredith was lying half asleep on the sofa with Mathan sitting up beside her, “do you want to stay here, or go to the bridal shop?”
“I should go to the hospital,” Meredith said, turning to Mathan.
Mathan said, “We can both go later.”
“It doesn’t seem right not to go now.”
“She has parents,” Claire reminded Meredith. “She has parents who will probably want her to themselves.”
“And she has Sheridan and Chay,” Mathan reminded her.
“Oh, heck, I’ll go with you then,” Meredith said.
“Good, your sister’ll be here in a few minutes anyway.”
“A morning at the dress shop,” Mathan murmured.
“You know what?” Meredith said. “I actually am kind of excited.”
There was a knock at the door, and then the door opened and a voice shouted from the entryway downstairs. “That knock was symbolic. You know I just busted in.”
“Come on up, Mrs. Affren,” Claire called.
“I think I will, Mrs. Lawden,” came the reply from below, and then as she entered the house, pushed her dark hair behind her back and resituating herself she said, “And Mr. Lawden!”
Julian grinned, and Dena cuffed Mathan on the head by way of greeting.
She came near Meredith and kissed her on the head, sitting down.
“And how the hell are you, after all that drama last night?”
“I’m fine, Dena,” Meredith said.
“She’s fine,” Dena echoed. “Me and Milo were a mess. Mom called me as soon as she heard about Robin.” Dena looked at Meredith. “Bill wanted to go to the hospital and bring you back. I convinced him not to.”
“I have never been able to convince Bill Affren of anything,” Meredith marveled.
“You convinced him to let you move here after your parents divorced.”
“That was the only thing,” Meredith told her. “You’ve got him wrapped around your finger.”
“Well, you’re his baby,” Dena explained. “I was a grown woman sleeping with his nephew when he married my mother.”
Julian coughed, but Dena said. “We’re all grown ups, right?”
“Do I need to get dressed up to go with you guys to the dress fitting?”
“No,” Dena said, “Not even the soon to be Mrs. Boyd is going to be dressed.”
“You are,” Meredith pointed out.
“That’s because I’m the shit. Oh, wait,” Dena reached into her purse and pulled out her phone.
“Yeah… Yeah… Uh, were you late? Yeah, we’re going to her dress fitting. Oh, God yes, please talk to him when he gets in. He can be a lose cannon. I love him, but… I don’t want him to fuck this up for her.”
She hung up.
“It was Mr. Brendan Miller—who has taken time out of his busy law classes to call me and say that Sheridan called him this morning and had him drive him to Loretto where he left his car last night. And why did Sheridan, a seventeen year old boy, have his car at Loretto College?”
“He’s screwing this slut—” Meredith said.
“Mare,” Mathan reprimanded.
“Well, he is. And this bitch is a college student, I know it.”
“She’s hot though,” Mathan said.
Meredith Affren looked at him sharply.
“Not hot like you,” Mathan insisted.
Meredith took a long time to turn her baleful eyes from Mathan, and Dena said, “All this drama and it’s not even eleven o’clock. Let’s get on over to the shop. Adele and Danasia are waiting.”


Sheridan had the feeling he’d been gone too long, and he was wasting time that ought to have been spent in something else, though what the something else was he couldn’t remember. Then, as he came onto Clawson Street and parked in front of his house, he did. He wanted to get Chay and go back to the hospital with him and, really, he would have liked to have done that by now. Instead he’d taken time off to rekindle things with Shelley and it was damn near eleven o’clock now. Not that he regretted it. Sheridan liked to savor his sex. It usually stayed with him a long time after it was over, good and comfortable. It made him feel elated, and last night it had been blasted away by the terrible news of Robin. The only thing was that he was still thinking of Robin and Chay and Robin in that hospital bed.
“I thought they’d never stop. How can they just keep doing that, Sheridan? Just keep doing it to a girl like they’ll never stop? Do you do it like that, Sher? Do girls like it when you do it to them?”
Remembering her say this made him a little sick. And it shouldn’t have. He’d never done anything like rape. And yes, girls did like it when he did it to them. And he never felt like he was doing anything TO anyone. But still, he felt faintly nauseous remembering her words.
Sheridan realized he’d exited time for a while, that he was simply sitting in the car. He got out and went up the walk, climbing the steps of the porch to the house.
“So there he is,” Sheridan heard, and turned around.
“Will!”
Sheridan crossed the kitchen to his messy haired brother who was pushing up his glasses.
“I didn’t see your van.”
“It’s this thing called a garage,” Will Klasko said. “I heard you’ve been in some trouble, little brother.”
Sheridan stood there, grinning, and then suddenly he hugged his brother.
“I haven’t been in trouble,” Sheridan told him, “for once. But Robin…”
“I heard.”
“You really do look like a scientist now, Will,” Sheridan said.
“Which means I look a mess,” his older brother said. “And you look more Abercrombie every time I see you.”
“Yes,” Sheridan said. “Intense worry, sleep deprivation and lack of bathing is the new look I hear they’re going for.”
“Well, go shower. I’m not going anywhere. Incidentally, you got a call from Meredith asking if you wanted to go to the hospital.”
“Sure,” Sheridan said, hanging his coat on the hook. “When?”
Will Klasko, a lock of dark hair hanging in his face, made a sour grimace and said, like a curse, “After the dressfitting.”


“Now, this,” said the woman at the dress shop, “is what they call classic. You won’t just look like a princess, you’ll look like a queen.”
“It beats what I had with Julian,” Claire said, fingering the hem of the gown.
“It definitely beats what I had,” Adele said.
“Not me,” Dena admitted.
Meredith looked at her and Dena shrugged. “I was just being honest.”
“It’s you, girl,” Danasia said. “Definitely you.”
“Well?” said Adele.
The bride to be in her white gown, cocked her head, looking at her reflection in the mirror, and then she turned around, grinning and said:
“It’s perfect!”
“I agree, Layla,” Adele said, touching her daughter’s hand. “I agree completely.”
 
Thanks for posting part 2 so quickly! It was great! Lots going on and Layla's getting married! I am enjoying getting back into this world of Rossford. Excellent writing and I look forward to more in a few days!
 
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