The Alex Box: A Tale of Loss and Legacy

Reassurance

Indeed, a supermom she really is, her task of motherhood with no reliable partner to render due support must not be easy with that of work, yet, she was inclined to bear the cross fate had jettisoned upon her.

Since Ryker's father had vanished from the face of the earth or so he thought then.

His state of curiosity leveled with that of surprise, when his pregnant mom had come to pick him up, an unusual occurrence in those days, back from school.

She looked horridly disturbed, and forlornly heartbroken, although, the then ten-years-old Ryker is no mind-reader, he sure knew the blithesome woman that mothered him.

On that fateful day his mom brought him home to the news that his father was still nowhere to be found.

(Like seriously? A whole grown-up dad?) He thought,

"But he is not an object, can a man be lost?" He asked his physically and emotionally fatigued mother who had lost all might and appetite since two days her darling husband went missing.

That was unbelievable! Ryker has heard many times that people die, but not one case had him about missing men.

Therefore, he lacked morbid brooding.

As a typical naive and nonchalant child of the phlegmatic Alex D. Hartley, he was always hopeful for the arrival of his beloved father.

Even though, calls were put through to family friends and acquaintances, and even to Mr Hartley's place of work unceasingly, all they got was disheartening responses as be opposed to their expectations.

Even the FilDarr Inc. executives felt deeply the loss of their though stubborn and quite reserved,

But a well-groomed, efficient and reliable sales manager of one of their biggest superstore.

They contributed heavily into all investigations for his course but many unanswered questions and lack of suspect steered all efforts towards futility.

He hasn't been to the office since the exact time he was said to have left for work, he dropped off his child at school. Which was the end of the trails he left behind.

Nothing more, and that left the whole matter undeciphered.

Alex's best friend, a police detective named Fred Meyers Maureen, took it upon himself to continue the investigation.

He interviewed Evelyn for every relevant information he could get, but little can be revealed about an unmotivated, self-protected and well reserved person.

Phlegmatics can be extremely reticent.

Detective Maureen undertook the task with all determination, though he failed to fish out any culprit, but he did unearth the thrilling secrecy of his cessation of his friend.

His dad was brutally murdered!

His corpse was found by a less trodden path already decaying besides his truck.

The putrid stench evoked awareness till it was traced down.

(Bad people had killed my dad.)

Ryker chewed for almost a month.

After he had heard, Mr. Fred sympathetically announced the news to his mom.

His liveliness declined.

His health deteriorated.

Ryker lost his meekness and bordered on insanity for months!

The Hartley's family received more than enough commiseration, which should have clued him in that he wasn't the only one who lost Alex.

Maybe he was still being a child and failed to understand, but he had grown too fond of his dad and could not be more fond of him.

He would not know how much it shattered his mom's hope too.

Such a predicament would have any lady on the family way, expecting her baby soon to perceive fate, a grieving package as it would be so hard on her.

But, Ryker will not, never, forget the tenth month of the tenth year of my life he had lost the Ryker his dad trained and brought up.

How cruel life has been to take away not just the bigger version of him, but his best tutor ever.

As the memories stay refreshed. He had loved him, scolded him, and walked him into his classroom.

Ryker always looks forward to his return as he would come to pick him up on his shoulder and to that old truck, home they go again.

The best friend he had lost and cannot find a replacement ever since then.

Not even his adorable warm-hearted loving mom could be that lovable and dependable, perhaps his siblings had rooted for the division of the love she had in her but it doesn't seem so with his dad.

Completely refined, at a tender age he felt the venom of animosity replacing blood in his veins,

Giving him hard feelings that he became cynical and took umbrage at the slightest provocation.

He did those to mask his feelings.

He only learned to box the virulence of his antipathy and decided not to venture into illegal outbreaks of violence as it saddens his mom the most.

And she has to go the extra mile to rescue him by any means necessary, no matter how incapable she felt.

The last time he was detained, he spent a whole two months in a torturous correctional facility.

But it did nothing other than make him fiercer to anyone who wishes to be victimized by his outbursts.

But before the detention, he was already expelled from two schools, voluntarily, he gave up on the third attempt and dropped out of school during his tenth year in the new school.

He would rudely object whenever his mom or anyone attempted advising him against his will.

Since the study was never the same as it used to be, he had begun to flunk most subjects then,

"Why and what are you pushing me for?

I said I ain't going no school mom. I wanna fight- I wanna kill the bad guys. Or are they in school?" He would gibber.

And since he'd only go to school to offend virtually everyone, and come back home to continue, her mom gave up pressing.

"Oh no! Ryker tell me all is well."

Evelyn hurried towards her son, sat on the couch right beside him, and prompted him to return her gaze.

"I'm okay mom" A sigh preceded his response.

"Yes, you are. It's obvious isn't it." She riposted sarcastically.

He threw his head onto the headrest as he looked into the ceiling, feeling less and less hopeful.

(Perhaps all should just end.

I have never been any happy since, nor regained the lost Ryker's personality.) He said inwardly, refusing to look at his mom.

Telling her the truth about Jude is not the problem though, the only one whom she thinks is Ryker's true friend, and even if she learned of what did eventuate, never, will she be calm about it.

And that of course will incur additional problems he will have to deal with.

"Wait, what happened to your hand?"

"When did this happen?"

"Is everything okay?"

"With whom were you troubled again?"

"You don't look OKAY at all."

"Ryker, tell me something. Did you get into trouble again?"

Her inquisitiveness is becoming annoying to him.

"Mom, tell me.

Am I a pain in your butt?"

Bringing her questions to a pause.

"Pain?"

Her voice loses inflection but still threaded with confusion, She was astounded.

"Uhm... Nevermind, I uh-- um" finding it hard to articulate the right words, he felt bad knowing he gave her the looks on her face.

"I'm sorry I said that, forget I asked such a question."

He impatiently stood up and headed for the room, which was his and Robert's.

Lucky Riley, got a room to himself, though he's used to checking into his mom's room.

Ryker's room had become a spare room consequently when he was ferociously agile on the streets, and was married to troubles those times he barely comes home.

So whenever any members of the extended family- the Ortons- Ryker's maternal extended family came visiting they were checked into his room as his few belongings were already stacked in Robert's scanty room.

Ryker and his siblings are the only Hartley's descendants alive.

And whenever he did revert home after a lot of squabbles on the streets, he'd give up the rants to sleep anywhere he forgot his thoughts.

Thus, he perpetuated till he adapted to living with his brother, and a few other people in harmony, over time.

He pulled out the chair from under the desk and sat down, bent sideways to open the last row of the chest of drawers to fetch out the favorite framed and glazed photograph of his dad and him together,

He had kept it for himself though more were safely preserved in the family's photo-album, and a few more were also framed and hanged or placed somewhere in the sitting room, decoratively.

But the particular one he's got was taken on his seventh year birthday when they were out on the beach, full of happiness in abundance and celebration galore, since Robert and him shared the same month and a consecutive birthdate.

Meticulously, he placed the picture on the desk's surface, graciously supporting the frame with both hands,

"I wish you were here," he said aloud, looking straight into his father's eye in the photograph.

"I need a plan, Oh God! I wish you were here." He muttered the rest.

Reminiscing consequently as those poignant memories of happiness of the old times all came alive once more, feelings of helplessness and hopelessness flood over him.

*****

He felt a cold palm rest on his shoulder which sent chills down his scapula, as his head tilt up to meet his mom's compassionate countenance stood by him,

On her left palm now sits the ice pack that had briefly modified the temperature in her right palm.

Water builds up in his eyes, blurring his vision whilst he blinks severally in a bid to hold it back.

He felt too big to cry.

"I don't know what gave you that thought exactly, my boy, but you're never a pain in my ass"

Evelyn said with a sad smile, and he nodded.

"Just don't get into trouble anymore is all I ask of you, and that's because I cared so much about you. Okay?"

She patted him on the head.

"Alright Mom,"

He said, his mind still preoccupied with the thoughts of my dad.

"Will you tell me now, what you know about the cause of my father's death?"

"Who and where are those that killed him?"

He asked with much intent.

"How many times have I told you, that last question, do not again. I have no clue."

"My bad, I'm sorry mom."

"Okay can you just tell me, what do you know about the cause of my father's death?"

"Not yet. Ryker..." She replied in a peaceful tone, as she always does anytime he asked her to tell him what she knew about the death of his father.

"So when Mom?" He asked desperately, as he always would in disappointment.

Her words this time seems unclear to him as they weren't her usual comments though, she had said,

"Until you're emotionally stable and mature enough, moreover I don't want you wandering the face of the earth foolishly, searching for some unknown killers in the name of revenge."

"Okay, Mom." With much vigor, he shook his head in agreement and sniffed.

She gestured for him to stand up as she gave him a comforting motherly hug.