BUILD A BETTER BOY TRUISM #7: Teach him to keep a secret. That way, he learns to become trustworthy.


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Last Time: An ominous voice warned him his wife and children were in grave danger from someone, or worse, something. Of that, he was certain. The lingering question that ran through his mind was could he save them from whatever evil haunted them?


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Eighty-year-old Marjorie Miller ran an immaculate kitchen in her small, warm, eggshell white clapboard house. It was there she and Detective Darden engaged in informal conversation. He knew sometimes friendly small talk went a long way in achieving his goals.

"If I had a youngster these days, I'd never allow them anywhere near the Internet. It is much too easy for children to access all sorts of sick stuff their tender minds can not process. I'll tell you that much, Detective," she assuredly stated, "And, another thing young people don't seem to understand anymore is that it only takes one bad apple to corrupt them forever."

"A thirteen-year-old boy's mind is fertile soil indeed," Darden agreed with the Sunday School teacher's comments.

"That is why you must guard them against all the violence, and the predators that roam the Internet," Marjorie Miller warned shaking a boney finger at the detective.

Her silver hair glistened in the light. She placed a mitt on her hand and removed a hot pan of blueberry muffins from the oven. The chore completed, she set them on a cooling rack.

The deft baker stuck another pan of the delicacies inside the stove to take their place, and set the timer for twelve minutes. Her muffins were famously well known, and enjoyed, by the shut-ins at the Turner Lake Nursing Home she baked them for.

'You were Drew Larsen's teacher. Do you think what happened to him was too much Internet?" Darden proposed.

He had known Marjorie Miller for three years and had come to value her assessment of people.

Marjorie stared out the window that faced the Larsen home. She adjusted the red and white-striped curtains hanging on the rod that covered the window. She liked organization.

"I do not know, Sean. I'm sorry, and I truly wish I did." she lamented. Reflecting, she said, "Drew Larsen was such a good boy. He was always very helpful to this old lady, and so polite, too."

"I understand he used to mow your grass for you?" Darden queried her.

Marjorie Miller shook her head in disbelief of what had transpired with the boy she once considered so dearly.

"He pulled my weeds, and raked my leaves, for me all the time ever since he was eight years old, Detective. Never once did I ever hear Drew complain about any chore I asked him to do," she responded. "And, on top of all that, he'd never accept a dime from me for any work he did around here. He was always so reliable."

"So, where did he go wrong, Marjorie? I wish you could answer that one for me," Darden stated.

"I don't know if anyone can explain what got into Drew," she responded, "I don't know if anybody ever could. And, that's so sad."

Marjorie opened a drawer near the hot oven. She located a key she'd placed inside the receptacle. The key unlocked the front door of the Larsen house. Being a trusted next door neighbor, they'd provided her one several months ago in case an emergency occurred.

She handed the key to the detective and said, "Some evil just can not be explained."

Darden studied the frail old lady for a moment. It was easy to see memories of Drew Larsen were now very painful for the slightly built fountain of information.

"Marjorie, I appreciate you giving me the key to the Larsen house," Darden told her.

He removed it out of her outstretched, wrinkled, hand.

"I suppose I should have given this key to the Police the day the murders happened," she said.

"There is no harm in not having done so, Marjorie," Darden responded.

It had taken the detective several telephone calls to locate the only neighbor the Larsens had trusted enough to swap house keys with. His visit completed, Darden prepared to leave Marjorie Miller to her baking chores.

Extracting a paper plate off the stack of them she kept in her pantry, she neatly arranged four of the cooled muffins onto the plate. That done, she wrapped them in tin foil and handed the plate to the detective.

"Take these to your wife and twin sons, Ricky and Ryan," she told him.

Darden knew her feelings would be insulted if he refused the generous offer.

"I've thought about visiting Drew up there in the hospital," she meekly remarked wondering, "but, what would I say to him? I just don't know."

"There's nothing you could say, Marjorie," Darden assured her.

He attempted to place her mind at ease.

"Drew's very different now. You're better off recalling your fond recollections of him. There's nothing anyone can do for him ever again," Darden gently informed her.

He exited Marjorie Miller's home with the blueberry muffins in hand and scanned the front porch of the Larsen house. It was there Drew Larsen had set naked on the swing awaiting the arrival of the Police after the bloodbath transpired inside the residence. The image conjured up the remembrance of Otis Jackson, and the Lancaster massacre, that occurred twenty years before.

Cast of Characters:

Detective Sean Darden - Lead Investigator of the Larsen family murders.

Marjorie Miller - Elderly, next door neighbor of the deceased Larsen family.

Drew Larsen - Thirteen-year-old boy who confessed to the slayings of his family members. The question remained, did he?

Otis Jackson - The self-proclaimed Son of Kronos, who slaughtered the Lancaster family. He was killed by the Rookie Policeman Sean Darden.

The Lancasters - A family brutally murdered in a similar manner of the Larsen family twenty years before Drew Larsen's crimes were committed.