Sociopath? Read Free Page A

at,
Dad.”
    “I don’t care!” roared Renny, who hardly ever
lost his temper and resented this contrary child for causing him to
do it now, “just do as I say, have you got that?”
    “How old do I have to be?” Rafe asked.
    “I’ll let you know,” said Renny through
gritted teeth.
    Rafe was as comfortable wandering in the
night as during daylight. He’d been described as cat-like and it
was as if he could see in the dark like a cat too. His brothers
would come home from a date and find the little boy sitting on the
back step at 3:00 a.m.
    “What are you doing up at this time, Rafe?
You should be in bed.”
    “I’m listening to the dark.”
    Eventually, they accepted it as a lost cause,
trying to keep track of him. He came and went as he pleased and
since he always made it home safely, they quit worrying. As he got
older, he traveled farther and stayed longer.
    He read far above his age and his favorite
reading was about the techniques of surviving on one’s own. He and
Raven would disappear into the woods with only some string and a
knife. A few times, they got pretty hungry when his awkward early
attempts at setting a snare or spearing a fish failed but as time
went by, he learned to do those things competently, as well as
building a lean-to that would keep out the rain and starting a fire
without matches. He taught himself, by means of books, to smoke his
extra food and to cook it in a fire pit. He became an authority on
what marine life and flora and fauna and even bugs and worms were
safe to eat in an emergency.
    By the time he was 9, he’d added a gun to his
small supply kit. (A hand gun because he liked to travel light and
a long gun was too heavy.) He’d snagged the Smith and Wesson
revolver from Renny’s gun safe, knowing it would mean another
serious thrashing if he got caught but willing to take the chance).
He’d become an expert at tracking, being familiar with prints and
scat and recognizing wallows and antler rubs and urine sprays.
Although, he was a dead shot, he didn’t kill much that he tracked.
He just wanted to prove to himself that he could if he had to.
    He asked on every birthday and when he was
eight, Renny finally said, “okay, okay, take the damn boat” so then
he could embark on a more far-roaming exploration of his world.
    He always warned Laney when he was going to
be gone for a while. “I’ll be back in a couple of days, maybe
three.”
    “I hate it when you’re not here, Rafe. Why do
you have to go?”
    “Sometimes, I just have to get away from
people. Not you, Honey. Everyone else. Where I don’t have to keep
my guard up all the time.”
    She didn’t understand it but she had to
accept it because that was just Rafe.
    * *
    Because of when her birthday fell, Lane
didn’t get to start kindergarten until she was six but this morning
she would be getting on the big yellow bus with the other kids. She
was beside herself with excitement. She’d hardly left Heron Point
in her life and she almost only got to go to the basement or out on
the grounds when Rafe took her. She barely felt like she knew her
older brothers and sisters. Sometimes she’d meet them in a room and
they’d ruffle her hair and ask how she was doing but not like they
really cared. But now she was finally going to get to go off into
the world like everyone else.
    Last week her mother had taken her on a
shopping spree and she had all new clothes. It had taken Rafe to
make that happen. He’d gone to Magdelene and reminded her that Lane
would be starting school soon and she had almost nothing fit to
wear.
    “Most of her things are raggy and too small,
Mom. Unless you want to be ashamed of her being a Vincennes, you
probably need to buy her a new wardrobe.”
    Once it was brought to her attention,
Magdelene was happy to take her youngest daughter shopping.
    “Oh, Rafe, you’re absolutely right, Darling.
I guess I just hadn’t realized Laney was growing up so fast and
here she is five years old