Frank/ A reading from the upcoming Audiobook, Karly

 

Frank wasn’t a trend setter; in fact, he was an excommunicated Mormon. A nondescript man in a nondescript town. Rocky Mountain High was in Aspen, but Frank had crashed and burned into the Bonneville Salt Flats. Frank wasn’t an alcoholic; he was a drunk!  He’d once been a devout church member, but all he found were demons. His new church was the state liquor store and a bar. In Utah liquor stores were all State Liquor Stores, ran like a pharmacy and the customers were treated like recovering addicts on methadone. Utah bars were not far behind. But they were bars, and there were women in it, such as they were.

 

Frank found his way to this bar as often as his SSI check would allow. He led an uneventful life in an uneventful town struggling to pay the rent, and the bar tab with just enough left for Vienna Sausages and Ramen Soup. Sometimes he’d hit the food bank and would have cream of chicken soup to add to it. The only excitement in his life was the little girl he met at a party. Her friend had been coming around over the past few weeks. She finally brought this new girl that night. Kid was clueless, but he could tell she might be up for some fun after she finished the drink that Tesla’s grandfather fixed for her. The girl seemed to have no idea of what was really going on, but a saucy curiosity. He’d seen young girls come and go.  So, she drank something she was not familiar with and followed them to a bedroom in the back of the RV. When it came his turn Frank saw a tattoo on her neck that spurred memories of his holier days. By the time he saw it he had already defiled a Danite. He helped load her into a pickup bed and hoped that was the end of it. It wasn’t the first time young girls had gotten too much party. And it wasn’t the first time they were never seen again. But this one was a Temple Mormon and had a tattoo of a flaming sword on the left side of her neck that he’d only heard about.

 

When the police didn’t come around right away Frank thanked his lucky stars. But he really didn’t expect to see the police. He didn’t have remorse, but he did have fear. The flaming knife tattoo on her neck told him the police would be the least of his worries. When it became obvious that the girl had survived the silence around town worried him more than an arrest. She had friends in low places and every look from every little girl reminded him that he was not free of that night.

 

Frank heard her telling a farmer about her upcoming mission for the church. But, hidden from him was another mission she had to complete. To lure Tesla’s grandfather away and leave his blood touching the ground for his involvement in the disappearance of two members of the same secret society that had placed that tattoo of the neck of the girl in the RV! But before she could fulfill that charge, she made one mistake. Drinking the familiar orange juice laced with unfamiliar vodka. She scratched a forbidden itch and drew blood. Her knife by her ankle was discovered by a boy trying to seduce her and by the time it was Frank’s turn she was so drunk that she didn’t even flinch when he mounted her. But when he grabbed her by her braids, and saw her tattoo, he ran outside the RV, too scared to even leave.

 

The farmer, Raymond then carried her out and laid her in the bed of Tesla’s grandfather’s pickup, and they discarded her in her mother’s yard, like the one-hundred-pound sacks of popcorn sold at The Bishop’s Store. And she lived! A little worse for wear (and tear) but alive! Frank saw her recently at the peach parade. She stared right through him, as if he wasn’t even there! Stupid, unblinking eyes. She should have been happy with that night. An idiot girl like that would never find a man. Did she recognize him? Probably not. When he was on top of her, she didn’t even move. She lay there just staring at him with big blue blank eyes. But as he penetrated her, he grabbed her hair and Frank then clearly saw the tattoo on her neck! He immediately withdrew but it was too late! He tried to warn his friends that Karly was a Danite, but they only laughed at him, calling her a Girl Scout. Frank told them that he had no fear of a Girl Scout, but it was a false display of bravado. He helped load her in the pickup and left shortly thereafter.

 

What Frank had seen that night brought memories of another time. A time when he was striving to be worthy of temple duty. A time when life was packaged neatly and all he had to do was pay, pray, and obey. He paid and prayed. But when the temple became too distant, he discovered whiskey, and he stopped obeying thinking that the whiskey would make the Devil friendlier. He would never achieve his Temple Recommend, and he’d never find forgiveness in the bottle.

 

But in the days when he was fitting himself for his garment, one just like the one on the floor of the RV that night, he had plunged deep into Mormon lore. From the trials and tribulations of Joseph Smith to the history of the persecution. He discovered tales of the Danites, more particularly The Black Angel of Death, Porter Rockwell, never realizing that he had defiled one of Porter’s descendants on a dirty mattress in the back of a broken-down RV! And now they were very real, her blue eyes came to him every night and no amount of whiskey could make them go away. Now he counted his days in a run-down trailer in a run-down part of town as his friends from that night began to drop or disappear one by one. He had raped a girl who would hunt him down like a wild dog, and his blood would touch the ground. It was just a matter of time.

 

 And lately hushed voices in Caldern Hale talked of things in the park, and things up on the Wasatch, and Frank knew what that meant. She was hunting them down one by one, and soon she would come for him and on that night she wouldn’t be drunk, and he would be out of time. And he was too broke and drunk to even run away.  That’s probably why she didn’t kill him at the parade. No rush. She had time. She’d make it good for him.

 

 Frank didn’t have a girlfriend. He was at a bar, which in any place else would give a chance of a meeting. . .. Something! He was much better with drunk little girls being held down by other men! It was like her spirit was haunting him. He would calm down, be almost normal and then terror would seize him, and he would retreat into a bottle. But her eyes would be waiting for him!

 

He would be doomed to be alone waiting for the most important woman in his life. He wasn’t exactly a catch, but Utah wasn’t exactly California either. Another Saturday night and he ain’t got nobody. Ain’t got no money ‘cause he just got drunk. Time to call it a day. Don’t pity Frank. His long wait was almost over. And the love of his life was waiting for him at his trailer.

 

His trailer, which was nearby, was cold and damp. Dirty dishes, dirty clothes, the evidence of a dirty life. When you run out of money in a bar, and there’s nothing left to drink at home you feel like hell! A bath! Wash the pain away.

 

He drew hot water and slipped into the tub. It didn’t cure everything, but it did make him relax and leaning back he drifted off for a moment. Then a feeling of something in the room woke him.

 

Opening his eyes, he discovered Karly sitting right beside the bathtub.

 

“Wakey wakey!” Karly said in a sweet, singsong voice. Then she bent down to lick his face. “You licked my face one night.” Looking down at him she giggled and said, “Gee Frank, you’re not as excited as you were the first time we met.”

 

Frank had been trying to soak off the effects of the bar, but it had not restored his coordination yet, and the few drinks that were still in his stomach when he left the bar were now working their way through his small intestines and having a good old time. His arms and legs simply did not leave him the ability to stand up.

 

As his eyes began to focus, he instantly recognized her, but tried to hide it, and it was of no use. He was naked in a bathtub, and she was sitting in a chair right beside him, putting him in a perfect killing zone!

 

“How did you get in here?”

 

“The train in her head blew its whistle and Frank’s face morphed into the one that licked her face that night. She snapped back and focused.”

 

“Through the front door stupid,” she pointed. “This is a bad neighborhood. You should be more careful. You do remember me, don’t you? If you don’t, I don’t know if I can bear it!”

 

Frank shook his head, and in a faint voice asked, “Should I?”

 

 

Then pulling her jeans down, she revealed her four scars near her groin. “Maybe this’ll help jog your memory. You’d think after you saw something like this you would at least remember my face! Oh, I’m sorry. We were busy at the time. You were fucking me! Then she pulled the neckline of her hoodie down revealing her garment beneath. She had identified and followed Frank for weeks. Same bar, same day, same time, and same bath before bed.

 

“But you know what this is, don’t you Frank?”

 

“You’re not old enough to be endowed by the Temple! And you don’t wear a wedding ring.”

 

“You seem to know a lot about our ways. Are you Mormon?”

 

“Yes.”

 

Looking around the clothes strewn about on the floor. “I don’t see your garment. Temple?”

 

“I was never baptized.”

 

“Not baptized? We’ll have to fix that. Well, in answer to your question I was endowed by the Temple.” She pulled her blouse up revealing a reverse “L” on her garment just above her right breast verifying the authenticity of her garment. “I was sealed to my mother at twelve.”

 

Removing her hoodie from her head, she pulled her long blonde hair back revealing the tattoo on her neck. “But you know what this is, don’t you Frank? You told your friends I was Danite. You remember me now? You’re not going to talk your way out of this fat boy!”

 

The image of Michael’s flaming sword reduced Frank to a fight or flight syndrome, but the whiskey had clipped his wings. She had him right where she wanted him.

 

 

Frank made another effort to rise from the tub, but Karly effortlessly pushed him back into the water with her foot. “No no no! You didn’t ask ‘Mother may I. We’re not done here yet. This is not going to be that easy. When Raymond saw my neck, yeah, I know him too, he told you, and you said you didn’t run from Girl Scouts.” She leaned forward, slipping her knife from her boot. “Do I look like a Girl Scout now Frank?”

 

 

I call this my Ronco Defecalator.” She flipped her knife  from hand to hand like a chef in a Japanese restaurant. Then, her blue eyes turned grey, and she asked, “You know what time it is don’t you Frank? Calm down. I’m not gonna cut you. Matter of fact, if you ask Heavenly Father for forgiveness, I will let you go! But first we need to talk about your baptism. I can’t believe you didn’t have it done. Couldn’t make Temple, huh? No problem. There are many rooms in my father’s mansion and I’m sure He has one for you.”

 

Frank leaned back in the water. He opened his mouth, but he never got to speak. Flipping the knife and catching it by the blade she backhanded him in one fluid motion across his forehead, sending him reeling and sinking beneath the water. Putting her blade back into her boot, she reached under the water and grabbed him by the ears. Pulling him up she rubbed his bloody forehead across the edge of the tub, leaving evidence of a “fall” that never occurred. Then, still holding his ears, she forced him back beneath the water. The water revived him, but Karly was a bit stronger than she was that night in the park and holding his face firmly under the water the drunk thrashed for less than two minutes before he finally took a breath. Still holding him down the train in her head got louder and louder as she waited until his body stopped twitching.

 

She then said, “I baptize thee in the name of The Father, The Son, and Jack Daniels.”

 

Panting, Karly rose and wiped all evidence from the chair she had sat in. She set the chair back against the vanity where she’d found it. Then, looking down at Frank in the tub she counted on her fingers, “Let’s see now. Left the bar stumbling drunk, slipped in the tub, fell and hit his head, lungs full of water, blood smudge on the tub. Old drunk died in a drowning accident. Tragic.” Looking down at him beneath the water as tiny bubbles escaped his nose she said, “Gee Frank. Looks like a Baptism for the dead to me. Wonder if I can count this as Temple work. Was it as good for you as it was for me?” Then she walked out of Frank’s life forever.