Rip - Trust (Completed)

Pain

"Rip is gone. His bed is empty," Robert told his father who was sipping his early morning coffee on the porch. He handed him a note.

Dear Mr Dutton,

I have taken Chip. You will find him at my mother's place.

I needed a head start. I thought that is only fair.

Thanks for trying, but this is too hard.

Rip

They arrived at the abandoned farm twenty minutes later. Jamie stayed back at the ranch just in case the boy decided to come back by himself, making phone calls to the bus depot in town, the petrol station where it would be easy to get a lift and the local sheriff but no one had seen him. It was early though.

"Well he definitely was here," Jacob said pointing at the mare that stood in the field adjacent to the farmhouse. The boy had taken off her tack and saddle which didn't surprise them.

"He left the generator running, he's hardly still here?" Jacob wondered.

"We should have brought more cars," his father said.

"Jacob, you keep going, who knows you might catch up with him. Robert and I are going to have a look around here, to see if we find a clue to where he might be heading. I get Jamie or Frank to come down and get us." He didn't want Jacob to see the inside of the house.

Once Jacob had left, Robert and his father headed for the small farmhouse. "What do you think it is like in there? Do you think anyone cleaned it up?" Robert asked his father.

"I was asked to but never got around to it. To tell you the truth, I completely forgotten about it. I can't imagine what it was like for him to come here last night. After yesterday morning, I just hope he didn't go in," he said to his son as they entered the house.

But he had gone in, he had to, he had to retrieve the jar of money that his mother had him hide from his father under the floorboards in his bedroom. Had his father ever found it, he would have killed him. He wanted to get a few photographs that he had longed for but never dared to ask Mr Dutton if he could go and get them, and he wanted to get his mother's guitar if it was still there. He wasn't sure, but he thought he had heard it break.

Things didn't go according to plan though. It was pitch black when he arrived. There was no electricity, of course it was disconnected, so he had to first find a flashlight in the dark shed before he could go and get the generator started behind the house. He was shivering even though he wasn't cold, in fact he was sweating at the same time. He could feel his heart pulsating in his ears and neck. It took him ages to get the generator going.  Once he did, he entered the kitchen from the porch.

He switched on the light.

For some reason he had imagined the house to look tidy and clean, the way his mother used to like it when people came to visit or when she went away. But of course, the house was in the exact same disarray that his father had put it in on the day he killed them.

The kitchen table and chairs were still overturned, dishes were lying broken on the floor and on the counters where they had hit the walls above. There was a splatter of dried blood and stew all over everything. A large ugly brown stain on the ground and another smaller one on the wall next to the picture of Baby Jesus and his Mother, marked the spots where his mother and brother had died. The glass in the picture was shattered. He wondered who had hung it back onto it's nail.

It took him a long time to muster the courage to enter and retrieve the jar of money and go looking for the guitar which he found smashed in the living room. He took it anyway and sat down with it on the little sofa in the kitchen for a rest and that is where his uncle and Robert found him, curled up fast asleep.

Robert rang his brother to come back and collect them. Mr Dutton waited until he arrived before he carried the sleeping boy out of the house. He was surprised he didn't wake when he lifted him up and even more surprised when the boy remained completely passive and allowed him to keep holding him when he finally did wake up.

When they got home, his uncle told him he was no longer grounded but that he wanted him to remain close to the house and not wander off. Between them all they kept a close eye on him.

Rip had nightmares every night, and rarely made it through a whole night without waking at least once. How could he have fallen asleep like this?

The boy was wondering the same thing. Feeling intense shame, he was wondering what was wrong with him.

He was surprised that his uncle had not given out to him for running away. He was wondering what his punishment was going to be and was hoping Mr Dutton would use his belt. He felt he deserved to hurt, for being alive, for having survived and for falling asleep while they had died.