Chapter 19
Appendix K—Interview Transcript
LT: I’m coming. [Refrigerator door opening.] You want a beer? Sparkling water or something?
FD: No, thank you.
LT: [Refrigerator closing. Squeaking of banquette. Can snapping open.] Aright, let’s get this over with.
FD: Would you mind stating your name, age, and occupation?
LT: Lou Truesdale. Sixty-four. Retired.
FD: And your relationship to the participant?
LT: His pops.
FD: Thank you. We’re doing everything we can to get to the bottom of what happened, so I appreciate your time.
LT: Aright. [Sniff.] I don’t got all day. Wha’d’ya wanna know?
FD: I’ll dive right in. I spoke with your daughter Abigail last month, and she seemed to think that when she and Emmett were in the care of your ex-wife and her then husband, Hank Stauder, something untoward was happening to Emmett behind closed doors.
When he came to visit, did you get any sense that something was up?
LT: Well, yeah. He told me his stepdad was an asshole. Used to give him a hard time about what he ate, call him names, fat pig.
FD: How’d you feel about that as his father?
LT: What do you think, I was fucking pissed. I told his mom, “You tell that motherfucker that if he calls my kid a fat pig again, I’m gonna drive up there and kick his fucking ass. No one talks to my kid that way.”
FD: Did you ever address it with Hank directly?
LT: [Scoff.] Fuck that son of a bitch. He thought he was better than me because he had a PhD. But I got street smarts. You could fill a library with everything I got up here, and it’d be worth three times his limp-dick science degree.
FD: So that’s a no? [Pause.] For the record, Mr. Truesdale is shaking his head. I wonder, how did you feel about your son’s weight?
LT: I mean, I was a chubby little fucker too when I was his age. Figured once he got to high school and no girls would touch him, he’d start hitting the gym like I did.
FD: Girls? I thought—
LT: Or whoever. [Pause.] Next question.
FD: Did you ever mention it to him, suggest he should lose weight?
LT: Nah. It was the shit his mom was feeding him, all that pasta and starch. When he came to my house, he ate good. Chicken, salad.
FD: Snacks?
LT: If he wanted ’em. I only had him and Ab every other weekend. I wasn’t gonna get all strict. They got enough of that at home.
FD: Understandable.
LT: But I won’t lie, the kid liked to eat. He’d put away a family-size bag of Doritos in a sitting. Couldn’t make a box of Pop-Tarts last a day. Shit like that.
FD: Did that concern you?
LT: What concerned me was the sneaking. I remember one day—he must’ve been, what, eight or so—I ran out to do some errands and when I get back—it’s Saturday, you know?
I’m fucking tired and hungry and just wanna sit down and have a beer, and I’m lugging this propane tank upstairs from the garage in one hand, I got groceries in the other, and I’m calling out for Emmett to give me a hand.
I get up there and he’s nowhere to be found.
I thought, Where the fuck is he? Kid spent most of his time playing that fucking Pokémon game, so I know he didn’t go out.
I think he’s pranking me, and I’m getting pissed off, right?
I’m running around, checking closets and looking under the beds, and I’m like, Quit fucking around.
I’m not fucking playing no more, you know?
Then I hear him in the kitchen. I open the pantry and there’s Emmett, white as a sheet.
His face is covered in chocolate, and he fucking bursts out crying.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, please don’t get mad.
” Like that. He’s holding a fucking half gallon of rocky road to his chest. It’s fucking empty, and he’s saying, “It was an accident, I’ll never do it again, I promise. ”
FD: As in, I won’t eat when I’m not supposed to?
LT: Fucking broke my heart. The fear in his eyes, over a few bites of ice cream? So I call his mom and I tell her, “Hey, what the fuck is going on in that house? Why’s my kid so terrified to be found eating that he’s hiding in the fucking closet?”
FD: How’d she respond?
LT: The bitch says, “Maybe if he didn’t have a raging alcoholic for a father, he wouldn’t have to eat his feelings away.” She says he’s been running to her complaining for years, saying he hates coming to my house, that he’s scared of me.
FD: That must’ve been hard to hear.
LT: Blew a hole through my chest. I did everything for that kid, and he was talking shit? Fuck that.
FD: I’m guessing you never mentioned it to him.
LT: You bet your ass I did. Found him upstairs and said, “Fuck you, you ungrateful little shit. That’s the last time I go to bat for you. You think I’m a drunk asshole, you can stay at your mom’s. You think it’s so great over there, you can deal with Hank yourself.”
FD: And did he deal with Hank? As far as you know?
LT: Things got better after that, I think. Least, he never came running to me again.