Free Moonbog by Rick Hautala

sadly and stood up. His left knee cracked loudly. He winced.
    “Well, now that you’re fed, I guess I’ll fix myself something. You want to go outside, or you gonna keep me company? Who knows, there may be some left-overs.”
    As if in answer, Alfie leaped up onto the counter in one fluid motion and then sat there silently, as Marshall opened the same cupboard door where he had gotten the cat’s food and reached down a can of baked beans. Opening the can, he spooned the contents into a small pan. The pan had a thin collar of burned-on food, but Marshall made no attempt to clean it off before heating up his supper. Just as he was placing the pan on the gas flame, the telephone rang.
    “Who the hell . . . ?” Marshall muttered, as he started walking toward the phone in the anteway. He tensed as he reached for the receiver, thinking it was probably David.
    “Hello?”
    “Hello, Mr. Logan. This is Bob Hollis.”
    “Yeah?” Marshall replied.
    “Jeffy’s father. I understand there was a bit of a . . . a problem out your way this afternoon.”
    That was when Marshall knew who it was on the phone and why. He felt himself tense with anger. “Yeah, there was. Seems your boy and a friend of his decided to have a bit of fun . . . at my expense.”
    “That’s not exactly what I heard, Mr. Logan,” Hollis interrupted. “From what Jeffy tells me, he and a friend of his were playing in the woods and on the way home, they happened to cross your yard. You came out and, at least from the looks of Jeffy’s shirt and the cut on his knee, it looks like you gave him a pretty good whipping.”
    “Weren’t at all like that!” Marshall said firmly, his anger rising higher. “Your son and his buddy were soaping up my windows. I caught ‘em red-handed. They even broke my front door window.”
    “But Jeffy—”
    “And your son got part of what he deserves. If he was my son, I’d tan his hide but good! They was trespassin’ to begin with, and they was vandalizing my property.”
    “Jeffy never said anything about that ,” Hollis said tightly.
    “‘Course not. He was at fault. And if I had caught a hold of his buddy there, I’d have wopped him too.”
    “Well, Mr. Logan, I’m sure it was nothing too serious. I’m sure that was no reason to bloody his knee and tear his shirt. He almost had to have stitches.”
    Marshall snorted.
    “I would think, Mr. Logan, that you might have restrained yourself. There was really no need to—”
    “If he was my son, Mr. Hollis, I’d make sure his backsides were so sore he’d have to sleep on his stomach for a week!” With that, Marshall slammed the phone down, making it ring once. He swore violently under his breath as he turned and went back into the kitchen. The beans, unattended, had started to burn on, and Marshall quickly turned off the flame and pushed the pan away. He swore loudly and slammed his fist on the countertop. Startled, Alfie jumped onto the floor and raced to the door.
    “Sure, sure, you wanna’ go out,” Marshall said as he stomped over to the door. Alfie darted out the door as soon as it started to open. “Hope you catch a nice fat one,” Marshall said as he slammed the door shut and locked it.
    Back in the kitchen, Marshall scooped the burned beans onto a disk. They steamed as he stirred them around with his fork, never taking a mouthful. The telephone call from Robert Hollis had made him lose his appetite quickly, causing a strange mixture of anger and guilt and, maybe, something else.
    After staring at his plate of food for almost half an hour, Marshall got up stiffly, went over to the garbage can, and scraped everything into the trash. He left the dirty pan and dish on the counter and walked into the living room.
    “They did get what they deserved,” he mumbled to himself, trying to convince himself of that fact. “There’s just no damn way they should get away with something like that!”
    He looked over at the phone in the hallway by the door and