The Birth of Bane (2 page)

She brought the Jamaican
Blend to her dainty lips, pursing them prettily.

He waited.

When she placed the thin
coffee cup back in its’ saucer, it rattled. “I realize that’s been
many years since we were kids living in that house,” she began
tentatively. “I really don’t like to think about those memories all
that much, because, though some were good, most of them were bad,
Jer. A few of them were damaging, in fact.” She wiped the corners
of her mouth with the cloth napkin in her lap. She shook herself,
as if to ward off some of the very thoughts she was sketching
internally. “So much happened in such a short amount of time, even
now, it’s hard to reconcile. I stopped going to therapy, because my
shrink was having a hard time understanding the scope of my past…”
She glanced at him. “…our past.” It was more like a whisper. “He
never understood how deep these feelings go.”

“
How could he? He was
never told the whole truth?” Jerry spoke it as he would a question,
but it was rhetorical.

“
That’s my
point.”

He bit the inside of his
cheek as he considered what she had said.

“
Now,
Jer, you’re gonna tell the
whole
world the truth after we decided, as a group –
you, me, Eli and mom - to never tell anyone. How does that sound in
your ears? Does that sound right to you?”

He chuckled falsely. There
was no mirth in him. “It’s written in a fictional manner,” he
supplied, hoping the technicality would make her understand his
point of view, at least a little.

It didn’t.

“
Come one, Jer, what
difference does that make? You’re still putting it out there.” She
leaned back in her chair.

Anyone watching would’ve
known they were related. Her body spoke the same language as his.
They sat there like bookends.

“
Have you even read the
book?”

Her thin brow furled. “Why
would I need to? I lived it, remember?”

He huffed a derisive
chortle. “You can’t have an opinion on something you don’t know
shit about, Valerie.” He gulped some coffee, though his eyes never
left his sister. “It’s a work of fiction. There are aspects of the
story that are real and some that aren’t.” He swilled more java,
eyes narrowing over the brim of his cup. “How can you have a
definitive assessment of the novel if it’s based on
speculation?”

She remained
silent.

He couldn’t tell if she as
thinking or if she was merely restraining her annoyance of him.
Sometimes her expressions for either one were identical.

Still, she said
nothing.

He exhaled loudly and
reached into the satchel he had leaning up against one of the legs
of the table. Despite the angst and anxiety between them, he smiled
when he realized he would’ve walked out of the restaurant without
it, if he had storm out earlier. He rummaged about for a few
moments, until he felt his fingers close over what he was searching
for. He pulled it forth and set it on the table as close to Valerie
as he could manage and not spill their drinks all over its’
surface.

It was a publisher’s copy.
Everything about it was finished, except the cover. Splashed across
the cover in 56-point, Book Antigua was scrawled,
The Birth of Bane
.

One glance at it was
enough for Valerie. Just
Her
name was enough to send a relentless series of
chills up her spine.
Bane
. She’d never been comfortable
with the word - or what it implied - for more years than she cared
to remember. It was the reason why she steered clear of the “B’s”
in the dictionary. Its’ very definition was truth personified when
measured against the memories in her head.

Bane
[ bayn
]
1. something that causes
misery: something that continually causes problems or misery. 2.
something that causes ruin: something that causes death,
destruction, or ruin. 3. deadly poison: a fatal poison.

Even the way it
was written in Webster’s tomb seemed like a vengeful explanation of
what had gone before. In her mind, those events had followed the
exact procession of the definition itself.

One. Two. Three.
In that exact order.

She
had been harmless at first.
She
had been fun and loving, though she’d been mischievous and
tricky just as much.

She hadn’t
remained that way… had She?

Valerie jerked
at the thought, forcibly breaking free of the constraints of the
past.

From across the
table, Jerry didn’t seem to notice. “You should read it, and then
tell me what you think.”

Valerie shook
her head in the negative.

Jerry’s lips
formed a line across his face, a thin gash letting her know she’d
disappointed him. “Read it, Val.”

She glanced down
at unfinished book, unbidden tears forming at the edges of each
eye.
Why is this so hard? It’s
been more than twenty-five years and still… still…

The thought was
never realized. Her eyes met Jerry’s. Fear and apprehension met
supplication and hope. The bonds they’d forged over the years
proved stronger. There was no way she could deny him what he’d
worked so many years to accomplish. He’d wanted to be a writer
since he was nine years old. Though she’d never known why exactly,
she was the first person he told nonetheless. Because of that, she
couldn’t refuse him now. Even a story about
Bane
wouldn’t
deter her.

She sighed,
wary, nodding imperceptively, but knew Jerry had seen it all the
same.

Bane… Why won’t
you go away? Why can’t you leave me be? Why, after all this time,
have my thoughts of you not grown old, stale and less intense? Why
do they still frighten me to death?

Their waiter
came up to them, inquiring if they were ready to order.

Valerie snatched
up her brother’s novel as though the title alone was enough to
spread a plague. The cover was slate-gray and otherwise
unobtrusive. No one would’ve known what it contained. But, Valerie
didn’t care. She flipped the book in her grasp and deftly placed it
in her over-sized Prada carryall.

Out of sight,
out of mind
, she mused as she
replied to the perfectly manicured man taking their order, her
former veneer back in place, implacable, solid.

She wasn’t the
Rock, though. That was her mother, not her. All of this was just a
façade.

Bane.

It came from the
edge of things. Where things aren’t quite real, and yet, aren’t
quite the stuff of dreams. That’s where
She
lurked, forever
upon the verge.

*****

It wasn’t until
the following evening, after her children – Alicia, Francine and
little Johnny - had been tucked in for the night, her husband,
Martin, snoring at her side that Valerie gazed over her left
shoulder toward her nightstand. It was there, where she’d placed it
the afternoon before.
The Birth
of Bane
, her brother’s forbidden
tale. It was sitting, waiting for her to open it and relive the
horror she’d been suppressing since she was teenager, living in an
upscale corner of Highland Park, that wee bit of paradise amongst
the hills and ferns and magnolias. It was supposed to have been a
new start for the Favor family, for her family. The opportunity,
the potential had both been there. It could’ve been the beginning
of something great. They had moved from their tiny rental into
something truly grand, though initially it had needed a lot of
fixing. There’d been ample room, a spacious yard and all the
promise her and her family could ever had dreamed was
possible.

Well, except for
him, of course. He had never liked the house or the yard, or all
the work it entailed. Though he’d relented in the end, the idea of
manual labor had never appealed to him.

I guess that’s
why they – he and Her – were always at odds.

Bane. Why won’t
you go away?

After their
Sunday lunch together, Valerie had gone home with absolutely no
intent of reading the book that night. No way! She needed at least
a night to distance herself from the unease her and Jerry had
unleashed. She needed time, and space. It was too much. Like it had
been all those years ago, it was pure concentrate. Time away seemed
to dilute it enough, so she could get a grip on it, “handle it”, as
the saying went. She’d pulled the book from her gigantic purse and
left it on the nightstand on her side of the bed.

She had gone to
work, teaching her sometimes adorable, but oftimes aggravating,
first graders, losing herself in the randomness of their flighty
behavior as she guided them through the lessons of the day. She’d
come home tired, unrested from the night before, to her three kids
and the domestic portion of her day began in earnest. She’d been
somewhat grateful for it, because it too was a welcomed
distraction. The rigorous routine of her family was soothing to
her, because it was something she was used too, something she could
control. It was real. Somehow doling out chores for the afternoon
and getting about making dinner kept her feet rooted to the ground,
held fast in the firmament of her personal condition. This was her
domain. She was its’ fearless leader. There nothing unexplained or
unnatural here. No, here she was safe. There was where reality
dwelt.

Right before
dinner was served, Martin had come home and the house was once more
a flurry of activity as their children guided their father to the
table, explaining their day with animated voices like so many
gnats. She’d smiled and served. Again, reality – it was a good
thing.
She
was the farthest thing from her mind.

Now, everyone
was asleep, but her.

And Jerry’s book
was calling her.

Not in a
tell-tale sort of way. There was no ominous beating of a heart, no
sweat-drenched, strenuous pull she just had to resist. There was
none of that. It was more her own doing. No matter how much she
tried to push those thoughts aside, regardless of the amount of
diversion she mandated in her life, there was no escape. Her brain
kept going there.

After a half an
hour, it hit her. Though her restraint had been masterful, this
latest notion couldn’t be denied and maybe, just maybe, it would
help. After all, if it had helped Jerry, why wouldn’t it help her
just the same?

You can’t run
from your fears, because their legs never tire…

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The Birth of Bane

By: Jeremiah
Favor

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PART ONE

CONCEPTION

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Chapter One: 1052 Lincoln
Drive

From
the very first moment my mother laid
eyes upon the house atop the hill on Lincoln Drive, she was in
love.

It was located
upon a secluded street, nestled in a hilly corner of Highland Park,
itself a small community wedged in between Glendale and Pasadena in
sunny southern California. Having five bedrooms and two and a half
baths, one could say the house was a large one. For our family,
coming out of a two bedroom, one bath rental, the house on Lincoln
Drive was a mansion.

It stood perched
at the top of a great rise in the earth, the property stretched
throughout its’ environs, nearly an acre square, which was unheard
of in that part of the city. It was set back from the street,
screened by a massive white elm and the largest magnolia tree I
have ever seen in my life. Together, these twin giants hid most of
the view of the house with broad boughs that branched out nearly a
hundred feet from their thick trunks. The elm was over one hundred
and fifty feet tall!

The front yard,
as I recall seeing it on that first summer day in 1986, was a
meandering affair. It covered the entire front portion of the hill,
a jumbled conglomeration of over-grown grasses and bushes, making
it hard to see where lay the ground. There was a series of stairs
leading up from the street, cutting in between an untamed Lantana
bush and the double-car garage. Where the stairs ended, a wide
walkway began, switch-backing its’ way upward some fifty yards to a
broad patio and the front porch at its’ left.