Those Crazy Katz' of Windsong Lane: Chapter 14

Chapter 14: Calamity

Justin jumped off the school bus that Wednesday. He had grown another inch in the past few months. He thought maybe his extra height had something to do with the fact that those kids on the bus had decided finally to leave him alone. It could have also be because he had gotten really mad one day and asked the one kid that was constantly taking his hat if he wanted a fist in his face. He had gotten in trouble with the bus driver, but they had left him alone after that. He walked home to get a snack and check on things. It was maybe a quarter mile down the lane, past the Batcherly’s and the Katz’s.

When he got near home, he looked at the empty field next to his house and thought about how it used to be planted with tomatoes or whatever else his dad thought would do well. His dad would do most of the planting himself and then hire help for the harvest. They had had pigs and chickens as well; also a few cows and a small orchard. Slowly over the last few years they had had to sell everything off. The cows went first, then the pigs. The chickens were last. Justin slowly had less and less to help his mom and dad with. Then one year his dad said he didn’t have the money to buy the seeds to plant and they he would be going out to see if he could find some jobs that needed doing. That’s when Justin suddenly didn’t get to see or be with his dad too much anymore. Now it was just a lonely house in the middle of a weedy field.

When he got close enough he noticed a car in the driveway. His mom was home? That was odd. She was supposed to be at work for another three hours. He went up the stairs and into the house with a bit of trepidation. Inside, his mom was crumpled in the living room chair. Her face was streaked with tears and she wasn’t even dressed. She was holding a piece of paper in her hands. “Mom!... What’s wrong?” he ran over to her.

She was silent, then quietly “Oh Justin. I just don’t know how to say this… What to say?”

“Mom, just tell me. It’s worse you not telling me!”

She sat up and took a breath, “OK. Um, well, I have bad news.” She paused gathering herself,  “It seems that we are going to loose the farm. The bank is repossessing it. We took out a loan to pay for those last two crops and used the farm as collateral and we haven’t been able to make the payments.” She said all of this in a very composed way.

Justin couldn’t process this. He had lived on the farm his whole life. What did that mean? “Mom, does that mean we can’t live here anymore?” Terror gripped his heart and he could hardly breath.

“Yes. Yes, that’s what that means. We will have to move. “ The way she said that made him even more afraid. It sounded like that wasn’t all. What more could she have to tell him?

“What else? I can tell you aren’t saying everything. What else?” 

“Oh, Justin.” Her face crumbled. “Your dad says he’s leaving. He wants a divorce.” She sobbed, “But he loves you Justin. He doesn’t show it much, but he loves you… His damn pride! That’s what this is about.” she said fiercely.

Justin was frozen. It felt like his heart was being ripped to shreds in his chest. How… how could they? How could his dad just leave them like that? It felt like the worst kind of betrayal. Suddenly he couldn’t breathe. He ran outside, and once he started running he just kept running. He couldn’t stop. He ran across the fields and into the woods and kept going until he was gasping for breath. He fell down to the ground and sobbed like his heart was breaking, which it was. His world had been slowly crumbling, but he had always thought that things would get better, but this… this was as if his life had exploded and nothing would ever be right again.

He stayed out there a long time. He started to get really cold, but he just couldn’t make himself move. To move would be to do something, to go on, and there was no point of going on. He was angry, and destitute and weary and in pain. He wouldn’t go back. He couldn’t just go walk in that door like he had always done because it wasn’t the same anymore. If he stayed on the ground maybe he could pretend it was all a mistake and everything was fine. It started to drizzle.

Justin’s mother was getting very worried. She knew he was upset, but she thought he would come back when he was ready. He had left without his jacket, though, and it was raining now. She was heart sore and weary to the marrow in her bones, but she just couldn’t leave him out there. What if he hurt himself? She put on her raincoat and went out to see if she could find him. She had seen him cross the field, so she went in that direction.

Meanwhile, Justin had gotten up and remembered a place he used to go to be alone. It was a little hollow under a rock that sat next to the little stream that ran across their property. It had been a private place for him when he was younger. He had liked to come and imagine living in the wilderness alone. Also, it provided a little bit of shelter. He was shivering now. He found it with very little trouble, having navigated through the woods and circled around to the other side of the property. He sat down under the rock near the creek and tucked his legs under his chin. Staring at the water was mesmerizing and in spite of the cold, he fell asleep.

On the other side of the fields his mother was calling for him and getting more and more frantic. Between the rain, the rock and his being asleep, he didn’t hear her calls. Carol didn’t know what to do. She couldn’t find him anywhere. She didn’t even know if he would answer if he did hear her. She knew that she had just dealt him a blow that would have knocked any kid down. How she hated to have had to utter those words, to have had to use the “d” word. She had seen the writing on the wall. Matt had been withdrawing for them for a long time now. Each blow to his pride, all the stress of possibly losing the family farm he had inherited, and the other thing that had happened… well, she had tried to deny it, but there it was. The other shoe had finally dropped. She still loved him and she knew he probably still loved her, but somehow she just represented his perceived failure as a provider. He had worked so hard, but they never seemed to have gotten a break. She was more mad at him for what he was doing to their son than she was about what had happened between the two of them. It wasn’t fair to Justin, the loss of his dad. His dad should have had the courage to face the situation and his own son, rather than run away from it. Her fury drove her on through the rain until her fear overcame it. She needed help.

Karen heard a knock on the front door. That was strange. It was getting close to dinner time and it was raining out. Who could want to see them? She yelled at Jack, “Could you please get that?” She was in the middle of changing Emma’s diaper. She heard some voices and Jack came in.

“Mom, it’s Justin’s mom, she says she really needs to talk to you. She’s out there and she’s all wet and her face is all puffy. I think something is wrong.”

“Here, you take over.” She said to him. Jack made a face. He hated that job, but he did know how to do it. He took Emma and finished up. Emma was mercifully cooperative. Karen ran down to the front door.

Carol said, “I can’t find Justin! We had some bad news and he ran off. I thought he would come back, but he hasn’t and I can’t find him. Could you help me? I can’t find him anywhere!” Karen recognized that frantic note in Carol’s voice. It was the voice of a mother terrified for her child’s safety.

She said, “Give me a moment. I’ll go get Johnathan and we’ll both help.” Karen ran upstairs and explained the situation to Johnathan, who had just happened to have returned from a trip to Raleigh that day and was finishing up some work. A few minutes later they were outside with rainjackets, flashlights and cell phones. Carol told them the direction he had initially gone, but they split up and headed into the woods in different directions to spread the search.

It wasn’t long before Johnathan came across the boulder by the creek. Even then, he would have missed Justin if Johnathan’s loud bellow hadn’t startled Justin awake. The movement of his yellow shirt caught Johnathan’s attention. Johnathan saw that Justin was shivering and his lips were blue. He could tell the boy had been crying. “Justin, it’s Mr. Katz. You need to come with me.” Justin nodded and tried to get up, but he was so stiff with cold he could hardly stand. He was a big kid, but Johnathan picked him up and carried him back through the woods. At the edge of the woods he gave a big shout and both women eventually emerged from the woods. Everyone made a beeline to the house.

Once inside, his mom took over. She had Johathan take Justin back into his room. She then dried and undressed him and wrapped him up in blankets. Justin was mute. He just stared into space and then lay down in bed, unresponsive. Carol came out to tell the Katz’s thank you. They were both standing in the threadbare living room, feeling a bit awkward. They wanted to ask what had happened, but weren’t sure if they should. Johnathan said, “He might have a touch of hypothermia. Keep him warm and keep an eye on him. Is there anything else we can do to help?”

Carol, shook her head “Thank you. You have already helped so much already. I was afraid he might have done something drastic. I’m so glad you found him.” There was an awkward silence.

Karen said, “OK, well if we can’t help, we’ll go now. Call me if you want to talk.”

Carol said, “I’ll come over soon and explain. I just can’t right now.” The look of pain on her face was enough for Karen. She gave Carol a hug and they both left.

The rain had stopped and the two of them walked together down the lane. “I wonder what got those two so upset.”

“I don’t know”, said Karen, “but I expect we’ll find out soon. It’s lucky you found him. His lips were blue and he wasn’t shivering. He hardly seemed the same kid.” Karen took his hand in hers and they went home in silence.

The kids, of course, wanted to know what had happened. They just said that Justin had gotten lost and that they had found him. Ellie thought that was very odd, because Justin knew the woods in this area like his own house. She couldn’t understand how he could possibly have gotten lost. Karen just told her that there was more to the story, but it was not for her to share. They would know more in time.

They all wondered about it, but Ellie and Jack in particular spent the evening tossing around possibilities in their minds. They wondered what had happened to their friend. Would he come over again soon and tell them of his adventure? Only, the days went by and they didn’t see him. Karen and Johnathan worried as well, so three days later Karen walked over to check on them. Carol answered the door and welcomed her in in a subdued way. She explained that Justin had gotten a cold from his exposure that night and had been at home sick the past few days. She said it was just as well, as she had lost her job and they had some other things to deal with. Karen asked if she wanted to talk, and Carol seemed like she really needed to. Sometimes just telling someone else about your problems helps.

Carol said that the farm was being repossessed by the bank, and that Justin’s father had moved out and filed for divorce. The stress of the past few years had taken a large toll on their family. There had been a second pregnancy that ended in miscarriage and she hadn’t been able to have any more children after that. On top of that, they kept losing money on this farm that Matt had inherited. The shame of losing the family farm, the farm he himself had grown up on, was just too painful. At first it was the odd jobs that took him farther and farther away, and somehow the distance had become his way of dealing with things. Justin, poor Justin, was caught in the middle.

Fortunately, Carol and Justin had finally talked heart to heart. They both had a lot of pain and feelings to deal with, but they agreed to work through it together and to be there for each other. They would get through it. Karen and she cried together and Karen felt that here was a strong woman. Carol said she would probably go back to Tennessee and move in with her parents for a bit, just until she could get her feet underneath her again. Karen was sad to hear they would be leaving, but agreed that was probably the best thing to do.

It was a couple of hours later when Karen walked slowly home. Her heart went out to Carol. What do you do when life just doesn’t cut you any breaks? How could you predict that a marriage would fall apart or that you would become destitute through no fault of your own? She felt she had been blessed in life. Somehow, though it had always been hard, everything had always worked out for her. She was overly blessed with people in her life whom she loved and who loved her. How could she complain? Fingers crossed, she thought about how everyone remained healthy and moderately happy. Somehow, they continued to stay afloat financially. Still, she knew that even if things did get worse in that regard, they would be ok because they would always have each other. Lucky… lucky indeed.

At home, she was able to share the major points with Johnathan and the three oldest kids. The upshot being that Justin would be moving away soon. They all felt so bad for him that the three eldest got together to make some get well cards for him. They spent most of the afternoon working on their cards and then packaging them up in a box they decorated in cheery colors. They were careful to just refer to his being sick. After that they went over and rang the doorbell. Carol came out and thanked them profusely but didn’t invite them in. They just said they hoped he felt better soon and left. Later that day Justin opened the box and was touched. It felt good to think he really did have some true friends who cared what happened to him. It didn’t change the heavy weight in his chest, but it lightened it a little bit.

About a week later, Justin came over to say goodbye. It was a really tense visit. Goodbyes are always hard. They asked him about his grandparent’s house. He said it was ok. It was kinda small, but his mom and he would probably share a room. It would be a new school, but he put a brave face on it and said with a small smile that it would be a new start. Ellie said she had saved something for him. She gave him a dead beetle in tiny clear plastic box. It was large and shiny green. She said that beetles like that were good luck and that’s why she wanted to give it to him. He took it and said thanks. He gave them his address. They had some awkward hugs, and he jogged off up the lane.

“I hope he’ll be ok” Ellie said to Sarah.

Sarah said, “Just imagine, this is the kid who wrote those little nasty grahams to us. Now we’re seeing him off and we’re sad about it.”

“Yeah, life is weird.” Jack said and they filed back inside.