The Darkness

Dominique Freedman was a horrible man and he knew it. While he stood at only 5’9”, he projected an air of someone twice his stature and commanded attention wherever he went. Those unlucky enough to fall on his bad side knew well how his small size hid the venom of a cobra. The man would, and had, destroyed almost every one of the large competitors he faced in the local retail market. His stores dotted Oklahoma City like sand and it was hard to find anywhere where there wasn’t an Osborn’s or something associated with them.

How I’d gotten chosen to interview him for The Oklahoman, I’ll never know. Fresh out of college, I was still trying to get my feet wet until I could get the experience I needed for the big time. But maybe being chosen to interview Freedman was the big time. Maybe it was an indication that The Oklahoman had more faith in me than I had in myself. Either way, I decided, I was not going to let this opportunity slip through my hands and I began to read everything I could find about Freedman, his family, and his many business ventures throughout Oklahoma.

Dominique prided himself on being a self-made man. The only child of a poor, Native American couple, Freedman had grown up hard. Life on the reservation was nothing like it was in even the poorest and most rural parts of the state. It was harsh, unforgiving, and brutal; one ruled as much by superstition dark specters as it was by the men who stood as the leaders of the tribe.

Freedman’s father was one of those leaders. A strong, dark skinned man with a tornado like temper, everyone on the reservation knew you didn’t cross the elder Freedman. At least, you didn’t cross him without paying dearly for it. Rumor had it that Jessie Keller had once opposed Freedman for some tribal office and his severed leg and crushed hand were the result of that challenge.

Just as in public, Donald Freedman was no angel at home either. His young wife and son lived in constant fear and navigated the waters of family life as careful as if they were wading through a river filled with crocodiles. Even then, they were not spared the brutality of his wrath. Once, when Dominique had forgotten to feed his nine week old puppy, Donald beat the dog to death right in front of his terrified son as a reminder to never let it happen with another animal again. Dominique often thought of this moment as one of the pivotal moments that solidified his obedience to his father for the years to come. The sight of the bloody, mangled, puppy served as a powerful visual reminder of how easily his father could crush him if he’d wanted to and Dominique knew that he was often only moments away from the puppies fate himself.

Reaching a boiling point one day, Dominique and his father came to blows in an old garage that served as his fathers ‘office’. Dominique had forgotten to bring milk home from the store as his mother had asked and Donald’s punishment was fast and brutal.

Though Dominique couldn’t remember the particulars of the confrontation, the memory of waking up on the cold garage floor naked and in a pool of his own blood was something he wouldn’t soon forget. Neither would he forget the small cuts and puncture wounds that covered his young body. The pain was excruciating and he felt like he might pass out every time he moved from the pain sent screaming back into the forefront of his mind. When he left home only a few weeks later, he snuck out in the middle of the night without even leaving a note to explain why he’d disappeared. Neither of his parents needed it; they already knew why he left. Soon after escaping the tortuous hell created by his father that he’d heard the news of his mother’s death. He never returned home, even for her funeral, and it had now been close to 25 years since he’d last laid eyes on the demon that had called itself his father.

In 1984, Dominique enrolled in the University of Oklahoma’s business management program and showed exceptional potential and a strong desire to succeed. He excelled in business school, completing both his B.A. and MBA in record time. But Dominique never considered himself an academic, preferring to act rather than plan. That impulsive nature drove him to incredible heights in the business world, founding and selling 4 businesses each in the range of $75 million dollars over the next 10 years. Now, he stood as head of one of the largest oil and gas companies in the country and had power beyond any dream he’d held as a child. Anything he wanted was his and he regularly had lunch with Senators, Sheiks, and even, once, the President of the United States.

Still, his hard driving nature came at a high cost. He had married the love of his life shortly after leaving home but that marriage, like the three subsequent ones thereafter, ended in miserable failures. Dominique chalked it up to their weak nature and their inability to be able to live with a powerful man. But inside, he knew the real reason they’d left: he had become too much like his father. They hadn’t left him, they’d ran from him. He was slowly, or quickly by some assessments, become the person he hated the most in the world and he hated every single second of it.

At 43, Dominique was indeed a powerful man. But he was also haunted by the ghosts of his and his father’s past. They were ghosts that woke him up in cold sweats in the middle of night and constantly whispered the most vile and evil things to him even though he tried to push them away. In an odd sort of way, Dominique Freedman had become his father and that, with all its connotations, scared the hell out of him.