The Forgotten Children

Chapter One
Mr. Tweedleburg Talks
“Everyone is given a voice; some people just never learn how it is to be used.” – Gerald Daraponte
“The ‘Brickman’s School for Young Boys’ has quite the, erm, tradition of, uh, excellence.”
The skinny balding man was sweating profusely, readjusting the shoulders on his faded tattered suit, never really feeling like it was sitting the way He wanted it. Not the way he wanted it, but the way He wanted it.
“I myself attended Brickman. No, wait. I mean, um, I didn’t attend Brickman. I could never have gotten into Brickman, much too much expensive, erm, I mean expansive. Exquisite!”
Mr. and Mrs. Felk sat uncomfortably listening to yet another representative from yet another prestigious boarding school which had yet another tradition of excellence. Mr. Felk began twiddling his thumbs feeling this was a much more productive way to spend his time than listening to the skinny balding twit.
“No, it was uh…Winston Churchill! No, wait, it wasn’t him either. Well, I am sure that, er, someone of some sort of importance attended at, um, sometime.”
Deep in thought, the skinny balding man was pulling on what appeared to be facial hair. It was thin and patchy, something that wouldn’t be too out of place on a prepubescent boy, but definitely not an acceptable growth for a man of his age.
“I don’t mean to interrupt, Mr. Twittlebug was it?”
“Tweedbleburg.”
“Right, Twiddleburg, sorry. I can’t say that I’ve ever actually heard of this ‘Brickman’ before,” having been raised in a family which valued status and culture over all else, the strikingly beautiful brunette, Mrs. Felk, considered herself a high authority on all things which would think to bandy the word prestigious about.
“Well, we, erm, we haven’t been around for that long.”
“If I’m not mistaken, and I rarely am, I do believe that you were just going on about how the history of Brickman is filled with such splendor,” seeing an opportunity to catch Mr. Tweedleburg in-between his pieces of conflicting evidence, Mr. Felk couldn’t help but fly head forward into his favorite state of mind, lawyer.
“Erm, yes well, I, uh erm. Yes, what I actually said was that I, uh, we have a tradition of excellence. We, uh, believe in the, uh, traditional view of excellence.”
“I believe in the virtue of honesty, but that doesn’t mean therefore that I necessarily have a history of truthfulness, now does it,” pushing back his graying black hair, Mr. Felk stood up in preparation of watching his work unfold.
“What you are doing here is what is commonly known as false advertising. If we had sent Elliot to this school and found it to be less than ‘excellent’, then you could bet you and your ‘prestigious’ Brickman would have had a lawsuit on your hands faster than you could say ‘My mommy never really loved me’,” despite his apparent conviction of the statements he was making, having never actually attended law school Mr. Felk couldn’t be sure if what he was saying would ever hold up in court.
“Daniel, relax, I’m sure the man just misspoke,” Mrs. Felk was the only one who could bring Mr. Felk down when he got on his lawyer tangents, a fact which saved many a dinner party.
Irritated about being contradicted, but not willing to make a scene, Mr. Felk slunk dejectedly back into his chair. It would be ages, he thought, until he could catch another someone in such a legal conundrum.
“Yes, erm I uh, yes I misspoke. We have excellent traditions,” said Mr. Tweedleburg.
“Let me just get down into it, if I may. What I’m really wanting to know, Mr. Twaddleboug, is just how exclusive Brickman is. What I mean to say is, how many people do you turn away, on average?” Mrs. Felk was very good at letting her intentions be known, or in another manner of speaking, was very bad at being subtle.
“Why, we have been, um, turning them away left and right. Elliot will practically be the only student there.”
“That’s no good. Our Elliot needs to be the center of attention; to have a mass of students around. If no one is there to look up to him, then I’m afraid his brilliance would just be going to waste. A star only shines so bright so long as you’re looking at it, if you catch my meaning”
“There is, um, no need to worry about a lack of students then. Why we just accepted two last night.”
“Really, two just last night? Looks like somebody is in a rush to fill his quota,” Mrs. Felk said this while chuckling into her drink.
“Oh yes, two very lovely young ladies. They’re my sisters. Erm, no. No they aren’t. They are sisters, just not, um, mine.”
Upon hearing this, a sly grin appeared upon Mr. Felk’s face. He couldn’t believe fortune had smiled upon him so repeatedly that evening.
“I got you now, you sad little Twittlebomber.” Mr. Felk shouted as he sprung like a jack-in-the-box out of his chair.
Mr. Tweedleburg, whom as a child had never once gotten up the courage to turn the jack-in-the-box all the way around, seemed to disappear into his chair as he curled up and hid behind the two sticks he liked to call his arms. His shaking right hand was turned out as a timid request to Mr. Felk to step back and calm down, both of which Mr. Felk had no intention of doing.
Mr. Felk continued to move ever closer as a tiny voice kept repeating, “Tweedleburg, it’s er, Tweedleburg, sir.”
“A couple of lovely young ladies you say, just accepted them last night did you? Perhaps you wouldn’t mind explaining under what logic could possibly account for you to be able to just go around allowing girls, into an all boy’s school. An All Boys School! It sort of defeats the purpose of making it gender exclusive if you just allow any Tom, Dick, or… or… Jenny in. Don’t you think? Or maybe perhaps I misheard you. Yes, perhaps that’s it. Maybe when I heard you say, ‘The Brickman’s School for Young Boys’, what you really said was ‘I’m a sad twig of a man without a pair of my own to stand upon, and whom also has no idea what he’s bloody talking about’! The way I see it, Twitbroomer, you did one of two things. Either you went to these poor girls’ house, lied to their parents, calling it ‘The Primpy’s School for Prettiness and Pompitry’ no doubt. Then after swindling them into paying the tuition up front, which is the school’s policy you assured them, and nothing you could do about it, you took these girls, shaved their heads, bloodied their knees, and snotted their sleeves. All this in a vain attempt to convince, whomever it is that has the great displeasure of working above you, that they were indeed just two more boys for the pile. Then there is the second even more heinous and unthinkable option, the option which includes you coming in here and lying to me and my lovely wife on any of the many claims you have made here tonight. If that be the case, my good sir, then I’m going to see too it you are sued under so many legal precedents, you wont be out of court until your skeleton turns to dust and is blown away. Even then the fragments will have to be collected and put to work in some museum because you’ll still be working off the settlement. Let’s hope, for your sake, you can produce two very confused crew cut girls, or you’re staring down the barrel of a very short rifle.” Mr. Felk had, during the length of this tirade, descended so closely upon Mr. Tweedleburg he was now talking directly over the quivering man. “And you better believe I have the guts to pull the trigger.”
Mr. Felk waited thirty long years to say that line to someone. He was sure the rush he was feeling was the same rush Lance Merton had felt when he said it.


Chapter Two
A Very Vague Novel
As a small boy Mr. Felk was quite fond of a certain lawyer by day, detective by night called Lance Merton. Lance Merton was a character in a series of books by French author, Gerald Daraponte. They were about a lawyer who would take upon difficult cases, wherein all the evidence would be stacked up against his client. The only thing working in the defendant’s favor would be what Lance called his human intuition, a sense which he used to determine if a client was truly innocent or not. After using this intuition on potential clients, and convincing himself of their innocence, Lance ran into one problem over and over again, a lack of evidence.
Every single Lance Merton story started out this way, with an innocent client and the entire world against him, and from there on they followed the same basic archetype. Lance investigates the situation, runs into trouble getting information, and is contacted by an informant who puts him on the right trail. This trail then leads him to evidence causing him to doubt his client’s innocence. Feeling cheated and much like a failure, he takes whatever woman whom he had been introduced to that story, out to dinner. The evening seems to be going well until it comes to the part wherein he finds a piece of incriminating evidence on her person. This evidence leads him to any of three places; an abandoned warehouse, a docked shipping boat, or the basement of any sort of business establishment, bars, inns, grocery stores, and the like.
It is worth noting, though, that one such novel actually found Lance being lead to a Zoo. Not only that, but the novel ended with Lance’s client being found the guilty party. This lack of regard for the Lance Merton formula could be attributed to the fact that ‘Lance Merton and the Howler’s Eye’ was ghost written by a man who had never once before read a Lance Merton novel. How such a man even came to write the novel was entirely the fault of the publishing company, which had been pumping out as many Lance Merton novels as possible to take full advantage of growing popularity. Needless to say, the very particular devote Merton fans did not take kindly to this sort of sacrilege. In the years since it had been forgotten by the fans and dropped from the canon.
So, at this point in the novel the reader finds Lance to be seemingly alone in a very dark and secluded place. The mood is heightened cheaply through a couple of paranoid tactics such as shadows on the wall and noises with completely reasonable explanations. Then he stumbles upon whatever secret that was being hidden in there, at which point the woman he was seeing and two to three characters he had seen in suspicious places prior appear and tie him up. They then explain that he is going to be murdered and also in what extravagant and time consuming way they are going to do it.
Throughout all of this Lance makes sure to maintain his cool. By keeping the woman talking, he runs out the clock until the backup from the station he had requested for, prior to entering wherever it was he was, arrives. The woman and the henchmen are then placed under arrest and implicated with whatever crime had just been uncovered. There is then only one problem left. Lance still hasn’t solved the original crime. Therefore he can not help his client when the final hearing comes around, which is always the next day.
Lance goes into court, calm and collected, as usual. His client has visibly not had any sleep and is sweating profusely. Lance brings his client to the stand and asks him a series of questions. He does this until he hears a fact which finally tips the dominoes in his brain; he now has all the information needed to begin his onslaught. Lance says no further questions, and calls upon a man who appeared only briefly earlier on in the novel, and whom also happened to be sitting in the courtroom that very day.
The man comes up, it is stated that this is highly unorthodox and Lance begins his verbal chess match. After the two have been engaged in the game for sometime, both holding up from their end of the board, Lance goes in for what he has been subtly setting up for all along, and what the man has failed to see entirely, the checkmate.
It is at this point that Lance lays down what is commonly referred to in mystery novels as the parlor scene. He starts at the beginning of the novel, saying that even from that point things weren’t what they seemed. Then he goes on explaining the big picture that everyone has missed, and how the crime his client is being convicted of is the missing piece tying the man on the stand to the crime he had uncovered the day prior. This causes the man on the stand to confess to everything and either vow his revenge or acquiesce silently.
The novel then ends with Lance at his desk alone, smoking a cigar.
The most notorious reason ‘Lance Merton and the Howler’s Eye’ has been stricken from canon comes at this point in the novel. After Lance has finished smoking his cigar, he smashes the stub onto his desk and proceeds to open a drawer. He pulls out a bottle of whiskey, along with something wrapped in cloth. He takes a few swigs of the whiskey and begins laughing to himself. Placing the cloth onto the table, something falls out.
The object is a glistening diamond, the Howler’s Eye.


Chapter Three
Palmer and Felk Family Dentistry
Daniel Felk Sr. was no hero.
Where his son, Daniel Felk Jr., ever got the idea that he was puzzled many a person. Daniel Felk Jr.’s two older sisters, and only siblings, would ridicule him for this at every occasion possible.
“We stopped at the comic shop today, looking to pick you up something for your birthday,” said Francine, the younger of the two.
“The guy at the counter suggested buying you a Superman, tells us that’s what the boys are into these days,” said Darlene, the older of the two.
“We explained to him that you aren’t like other boys; don’t really get into violence and action like your friends. Well, like what your friends would be into if you had any. We tell him you’re more into short, weak willed old men who have a penchant for dental hygiene.”
“He gives us this then.”
Darlene hands over, in the most mocking way in which someone can hand something over, a copy of ‘Flostro: The Man of String’, complete with a seal of approval from the American Dental Association. This particular issue sees Flostro fighting Garlet the Gruesome, who has just infested half of New York City with a particularly bad case of garlic breath.
“That’s not the only thing he gives us though, is it.”
“Oh, don’t you even.”
“He gives Darlene here his phone number”
“Can you imagine that, him thinking I’d go out with him. What would we do, go see a Flash Gordon picture?”
“I say we call him, just for fun.”
“Yeah, find out just how far he’s willing to go for a date with a beauty such as myself.”
“I’d imagine pretty far.”
“Even farther if two girls were involved.”
“Seems like this number is going to be good for something after all.”
“See you later twerp, we have things to do, and don’t you forget, your ‘Brushing for Justice’ tonight.” At the end of each issue, Flostro would urge the reader to continue ‘Brushing for Justice and Flossing for Freedom’.
Daniel Felk Jr. just didn’t understand why his sisters had to make fun of like that. He always kept his promises when they told him to keep promises. Like when he saw Francine smoking cigarettes outside during lunch at school, or the time he caught Darlene’s friend John leaving the house after he had slept over. He told himself he was saving the information, for a time when it would get him out of trouble, but he knew he would never use it.
Daniel Felk Jr. had no spine.
Daniel Felk Sr. had no spine.
When good things only happen in a man’s life as a result of someone dieing that man has no spine.
After graduating from dental school and interning for a few years, Daniel Felk Sr. opened his own offices downtown. Daniel Felk Dentistry quickly became the number one stop for dental hygiene in the area. Not a mouth for miles remained untouched by his hands. With his popularity abounding, Daniel Felk Sr. imagined himself to be much like the King of Dentistry.
Though, as the business continued to expand, so did the workload. Daniel had his assistants, but that wasn’t enough. He would need to bring on another DDS. So it was, two years after it had opened, Daniel Felk Dentistry ceased to exist; from the ashes rose Palmer and Felk Family Dentistry.
Jim Palmer DDS was a hotshot dentist, a rockstar in his own right, in it for the glory. To him dentistry wasn’t about the teeth. To Jim Palmer, dentistry was a road to respect. He came into his position as Daniel Felk Sr.’s partner simply by being the only person to reply to the want ad. If more applicants had been found, and an examination period would have been administered, it definitely would have been found that Jim Palmer was dangerously underqualified.
Jim Palmer made his way through dental school by way of a secret he learned while still in Jr. High. If you start out performing at a level much lower than what you know you are capable of, and pretend to struggle and work your hardest to pull through it, when you actually begin performing at a level which is standard for incoming students, you will be praised that much more for doing the bare minimum. It’s what you would call a personal grading curve.
This method only works, though, if you can make your professors care. Many students legitimately do struggle to reach the bare minimum, but come off only as pathetic and unfitting. They can garner no sympathy from their professors. Jim Palmer on the other hand, he could make the world’s collective heart skip a beat every time he ‘messed up’.
“Come on Jim, give it another go. That tooth’s not going anywhere. Some would say it’s ‘rooted’ to the spot.”
“I just can’t seem to figure… Oh I get it, ‘rooted’, that’s very clever… Now what was I saying, oh yes. I just can’t seem to figure out how this drill works. I’m trying, honest I am. All those years taking care of my old sick mother, god rest her soul, I am afraid I’ve adopted her slow wit.”
“Nonsense, Jimmy. Look, you’re almost there my boy.”
A high pitched screeching noise penetrated the eardrum of the entire onlooking class as Jim Palmer inserted a drill into a heavily sedated, middle aged man’s left back upper molar. Even under heavy sedation, when Jim Palmer placed that drill into that man’s left back upper molar, that man screamed and pulled at the cloth bib he was wearing. Then that man attempted to speak with a limp tongue and pried open mouth. “Ay, wour oorting mae.” It was a simple code that all dentists understood; it meant “where do you like to fish?”
“Jim. Would you look at that, only minor bleeding. I want the rest of you to look at what Jim here has just done. He worked hard, day and night. No one gave up on him, even though we rightly should have. What’s more inspiring though, is that he never gave up on himself, even though there was more than enough reason to justify that action. You have all just witnessed the power of perseverance in action. Jim, to graduate you’re supposed to be able to do this without any mishap, and well, probably under half an hour would be good too. But, you’ve shown such great spirit that I’m just going to let it slide. What’s a little bleeding anyways?”
The entire room filled with his classmates erupted into applause. It wasn’t just his teachers who loved him, but his peers too. Even the man who had just gotten his tooth drilled had tears streaming down his face.
It was with this gift for affluence that Jim Palmer managed front billing at the Palmer and Felk Family Dentistry.
“Listen, Daniel. Palmer and Felk just sounds better than Felk and Palmer. I hear what you’re saying about this whole alphabetical thing, but truth is people don’t care about the alphabet. The alphabet’s been around for ages, its old news. What people care about is feeling they can trust their dentist, and Palmer is a name proven to give them that sense of security.” What Jim Palmer meant by ‘proven’ is that there wasn’t any evidence to the contrary. “I’m glad we had this talk.”
It was also with this gift for affluence that Jim Palmer managed his way into all of the important gala events, while Daniel Felk Sr. attended none.
“Listen, Daniel. Let’s face it; I’m the face of this establishment. Don’t get me wrong, you’re very important too, you’re the arms Dan. But you see, when Palmer and Felk Family Dentistry gets an invitation to the Fireman’s Ball, their expecting to see the face, not the arms. Do you see where I’m coming from Dan? It’s the face they want. I’m glad we had this talk.”
And it was with this gift for affluence that Jim Palmer managed to do no work at all.
“Listen, Daniel. There are two kinds of people in this world. There are the workers, that would be you, and then there are the thinkers, people like me. So, you’ll be in the back, doing all that technical jibber jabber. You know, root canals, crowns, stuff like that… cleanings. Then I’ll be in the front, dealing with the clients. Well not really dealing with the clients, that’s what the secretaries are for. I’ll be making myself available if any of them want to talk, though. Because when they want to talk, Dan, they’re going to want the face. Remember when we talked about the face. But don’t go getting discouraged, a face still needs his arms. What’s a face going to do without his arms? I’ll tell you what, a whole lot of talking, and that’s what I’m prepared to do for you partner. I’m glad we had this talk.”
While Daniel Felk Sr. was in the back dealing with all the technical jibber jabber, Jim Palmer was out and about the town spreading the word of Palmer and Felk Family Dentistry to anyone who would care to listen. And because it was Jim Palmer, remember, there was rarely a person who didn’t care to listen.
That is how a man hired to lift the overbearing amount of dentistry placed upon Daniel Felk Sr. had only managed to double his work and divide his pay in two. As anyone with an understanding in math will tell you that is four times the trouble. That’s what the situation was; Daniel Felk Sr. had been usurped as the King of Dentistry.


Chapter Four
In Search of a Hero
There was nothing even remotely heroic about the events which Daniel Felk Sr. had unfolded upon him. Therefore when Daniel Felk Jr. wrote his paper ‘My Dad the Hero’, no one could offer any understanding.
“Your father’s not a hero Daniel,” said Mrs. Gorman, Daniel Felk Jr.’s third grade teacher, who many believed might have actually been a troll; a goblin at the very least.
“But Mrs. Gorman, you said to write about the person in the world who we admire the most. And well, for me that’s my dad,” said Daniel Felk Jr. as he very proudly lofted his essay back onto her desk.
“And how is that Daniel.”
“Because, despite it all, he continues.”
“We all continue, Daniel, I continue. There’s nothing heroic about continuing. I’m continuing right now, continuing this cockamamie conversation when I should be stopping. The F stands.” Mrs. Gorman picked up the monstrous rubber red stamp; it was placed menacingly close to the papers being graded. Slamming it onto Daniel Felk Jr.’s essay, Mrs. Gorman sealed its fate. It would now bear the red F of failure for all eternity.
“But… but…”
“You want to know who Brian wrote about, do you? George Washington. To come in here and suggest that your father is… is as much of a hero as George Washington, why it’s just insulting. Do yourself a favor, Daniel, and find a real hero. Someone to look up to, before you lose all hope of ever amounting to anything. You have a very low standard of heroics, and that is a terrible shame.” Feeling the world had just abandoned him; Daniel Felk Jr. went in search of a real hero.
The problem with that situation though, was Daniel Felk Jr. had no idea whereabouts a search for a real hero should begin. The only thing he knew about heroes is they don’t merely continue. Maybe then, he thought, heroes were those who had the will to stop. With this in mind, Daniel Felk Jr. set off to find the only person he had known to have stopped, his mother.
Passing through the field of stone monuments, Daniel Felk Jr. carefully navigated making sure not to step on anyone. Having come once before, he knew the route to his mother went like this; through the gates, head forward, take a right at Smith, another right at Griswold, then straight back between second Smith and Clark. There you find the angel with the name Evelyn Jennifer Felk and the words ‘Loving Mother, Beloved Wife” written beneath it.
Daniel Felk Jr. placed his bouquet of freshly picked dandelions into the angel’s outstretched arms and kneeled down in front of the solemn figure. Reaching into an old satchel he pulled out a few sheets of tattered paper which bore a big red F on the front.
“I brought you flowers Mom. They’re dandy lions, I saw them growing by the sidewalk on the way here and thought maybe you might like them. Jimmy in my class, he taught me a song about dandy lions, well it’s not really a song, but you’ll see. You take a dandy lion in your hand and you say ‘momma had a baby and its head popped off’ then you do this.” By placing his thumb under the bulb of the dandelion and flicking up, Daniel Felk Jr. made momma’s little baby’s head pop off.
“I thought it was funny, but you might not like it very much. I know how you would’ve hated it if one of your babies’ heads had popped off. I got an F on my paper. I wrote it about dad, about how I think he’s a hero. But, Mrs. Gorman, she says he’s not. I told her it’s because he continues, despite all that’s happened, he continues. But, Mrs. Gorman, she says that’s not what a hero is. She says continuing is nothing special. Told me I need to look other places for a hero. So I came here Mom, because you didn’t continue. Even when the doctor said you would be better, you stopped. You stopped fighting, you gave up, and if continuing isn’t what a hero is then maybe what you did is. I hated you for it, stopping. I blamed you for not trying. But maybe I was wrong; maybe what you did was what a hero would have done. Maybe you were being brave, having it so we can move on. But we didn’t move on. Me and Dad, our sadness never moved on.”
The Daniel Felk of years later doesn’t recall it having rained that day so he isn’t quite sure how water began running down his face. What he is sure of though, is that he wasn’t crying, because the Daniel Felk of years later doesn’t cry.
Having come looking for a hero Daniel Felk Jr. found only disappointment.

to be continued