Pandemic (The Extinction Files Book 1)
Page 32
Desmond stood there, watching her walk closer to him.
“This is the point where any normal guy would offer to take me home, Desmond.”
“I’m not exactly a normal guy.”
“I know.”
She took his hand and walked off the porch, leading him.
“My truck…”
“Is beyond scary. I saw you pull up in it.”
She reached in her bag, tossed her keys in the air, and he caught them.
“We’ll take my car.”
In her dorm’s parking lot, he leaned over and kissed her. Her hand moved to his face, pulling him closer.
At the outer door, she swiped her card.
They were kissing again, her walking backwards as they stumbled into her dorm room. Desmond saw everything in flashes as his shirt came up and they resumed kissing before her shirt came off. Biology and chemistry books littered the floor. She tossed an IBM Thinkpad off her bed. He winced, hoping it would survive the fall. The place smelled of candles and something sweet he couldn’t place.
He glanced back at the door. “Your roommate—”
“Is home in Seattle.”
That night was like the first computer program he ever wrote: a series of run-time errors followed by a quick compilation.
He was thankful that it was too dark for her to see his scars.
In the morning, however, sunlight blazed through the window. He saw her eyeing the burns on his feet and legs, the knife wounds on his chest and abdomen, and a dozen other small scars.
She said nothing, only went to the bathroom, brushed her teeth, washed her face, and threw on some clothes. She was a lot less chatty than last night. Desmond wondered if she regretted it. Wondered if he should say something.
“I’m late,” she said.
He sat up.
“I have lunch with my mom and sister every Sunday.”
“I…”
“Relax, cowboy. Just pull the door shut when you leave.”
She handed him a small slip of paper.
“What’s this?”
“The last part of the case you’re working.”
He unfolded it. It was her phone number.
Chapter 66
After the night he spent with Peyton, Desmond’s life settled into a pattern. He worked his heart out at xTV, saw Peyton in his off-hours, and read when he wasn’t spending time with her. He found a new library and began requesting books on finance and investing. He read Benjamin Graham’s The Intelligent Investor and Security Analysis and everything he could find on the subject. His inheritance, roughly three hundred and twenty thousand dollars, was still hidden in a sack in the Airstream trailer. His only real expenses had been the trailer, the suit, and the legal costs of settling Orville’s estate. He became obsessed with how to invest the remaining money.
At lunch one day in the company break room, a solution of sorts presented itself. He overheard two of the company’s early employees, a programmer and a database developer, discussing skyrocketing home prices and the outrageous cost of daycare. Their startup salaries were meager, and their wives were pressuring them to bail and get a job at a larger company like Oracle or Sun.
Desmond took a seat at the table.
“Gentlemen, I think I might have a solution for you.”
That night, he told Peyton his plan.
“It’s a bad idea, Des.”
“Think about it: with the money I have, I could buy a huge chunk of options. They get the cash they need, I get more options. It’s a great idea,” he insisted.
“Okay. It’s a good idea—”
“Exactly.”
“But it’s the wrong approach.”
“What do you mean?”
“You need to diversify.”
“No. xTV will be huge. I need to concentrate.”
“And if xTV goes under?”
“It won’t.”
“You don’t know that.”
He sat there, wondering why she wasn’t more supportive.
“Be prepared.”
“What?”
“The Boy Scout motto. Surely that was big in Oklahoma.”
He exhaled heavily through his nose. “My uncle wasn’t keen on extracurriculars.”
She looked away, sensing he didn’t want to talk about it.
“I like the idea, Desmond. I just think if you buy options, you should do it in other companies. You already own plenty of xTV options. I’ve got a bunch of friends who work at other startups. I can ask around, see if anyone is interested.”
The more he thought about it, the more he thought she was right. And he liked that she hadn’t given up on her point. He needed someone like that in his life.
In the following weeks, Desmond met with dozens of startup employees in coffee shops and at their homes. His lawyer read their employment contracts to ensure that they were free to sell their options, and drew up a purchase contract that Desmond used to buy stakes in a few companies within a month. Those companies were happy to cooperate; they wanted to keep their employees happy, and the cash from Desmond allowed those employees to maintain their lifestyle while staying at the company.
A few months later, all of his money was invested. He owned stock options in fourteen companies. He was more selective after that. He used every penny left over from his salary to buy options in the most attractive companies. And he insisted Wallace send him a bill for the legal work, which he paid promptly.
Every morning, Desmond checked the website for the Norman Transcript, the local paper for Norman, Oklahoma, and the closest thing to a local paper for the Slaughterville area. He skipped the news, focused on the classifieds. As promised, the local lawyer ran a notification opening the estate of Orville Thompson Hughes. A few months later, a story ran under the local news section entitled Library System Receives Surprise Donation.
Yesterday, the Pioneer Library System was pleasantly surprised to receive a donation for $32,000 in the name of Agnes Andrews, a long-time librarian who passed away ten years ago. Even more unexpected was the source of the donation: Orville T. Hughes, a recently deceased oil rig worker. Upon receiving the sum, the library found that Mr. Hughes had no library card, and as best anyone could remember, had never even visited one of the libraries in the system. Even more confounding, relatives of the deceased Ms. Andrews weren’t aware that the woman had ever known Mr. Hughes.
“It’s a mystery,” Edward Yancey, the Library System administrator said. “But we sure aren’t trying to solve it. Lord knows we could use the money, and we’re just thankful to have it.”
Desmond smiled. He had expected the small farm to bring more, but it was done, and the money had made its way to the right place. Agnes and the library system had been there for him during one of the darkest chapters of his life. He hoped the money would help ensure that it was there for the next person who needed it.
One Wednesday morning, Desmond arrived at work to find a group of xTV employees crowded around the front door. Nearly everyone was either on their cell phones or whispering to each other.
Desmond assumed there had been a fire. Or an accident. Or a gas leak.
It was none of those things.
The company had run out of money. The landlord had finally locked them out of their headquarters. The venture capitalists who had funded the venture were in control, and they were selling everything that wasn’t nailed down: the servers, desks, routers. Even the xTV sweatshirts were donated to a local homeless shelter for a tax write-off.
Desmond’s options were worthless. He couldn’t even get inside to his desk to get his personal effects.
Things changed after that. Without a job—a purpose—Desmond felt lost. He watched three more of the companies he held options for fold. Each one was like a punch in the gut.
“It’s not over yet, Des,” Peyton told him.
He and Peyton began spending more time together. He helped her cram for her exams, and she helped him sort through a few job opportunities.
She got a summer internship at SRI doing genetics research, and she seemed to really enjoy it. That made him happy.
By July, he was sleeping at her place most of the time. It was comfortable. He liked being around her. But he felt a deep guilt about it. There was something wrong with him, and he couldn’t figure out how to tell her.
Peyton had never asked him about the scars—or his past, for that matter. And she rarely asked him for anything. That changed one Saturday night.
“Will you do something for me?”
“Anything,” he answered.
“My mom and sister and my sister’s husband are coming for lunch tomorrow. Join us.”
He said nothing.
“They won’t bite, Des.”
Her mother’s name was Lin. She had an MD and a PhD and was the daughter of a German father and Chinese mother. He could see a strong resemblance between the two women. Peyton was Lin Shaw’s younger daughter, Madison the older.
Lin was a researcher at Stanford and an adjunct professor. Madison worked for a nonprofit concerned with the preservation of wildlife. Desmond made a mental note not to mention how many deer, wild hogs, turkeys, and elk he had killed.
Madison’s husband, Derrick, was an investment banker in San Francisco. He had an MBA from Wharton, a place Desmond had never heard of, and seemed to take himself rather seriously. He was also the principal interrogator at lunch. Desmond figured he was just being protective, trying to play the role of father figure since Peyton’s own father had passed away.
“What’s your alma mater, Desmond?” Derrick asked.
“Noble High School.”
“You didn’t go to college?”
“Didn’t need to.”
Derrick didn’t like that answer, though Peyton smiled.
The man pressed on.
“What do your parents do?”
“They owned a ranch in Australia.”
His eyes lit up.
“Before they died.”
“You don’t sound Australian, dear,” Lin said.
“I moved here when I was young.”
“To the Bay Area?”
“Oklahoma.”
“Oklahoma…” Derrick turned the word over in his mouth like a bone he’d unexpectedly found in his soup.
Back at Peyton’s apartment, Desmond stood in the kitchen. “They hated me.”
“They loved you.”
“I’m a country boy, but I’m not stupid. They don’t think I’m good enough for you, Peyton.”
“I’ll be the judge of that.”
“And so will your family.”
“Maybe, but they don’t make my decisions for me. I do. And I don’t care if you don’t have a college degree.” Before he could speak, she added, “All I want is you, Desmond.”
Desmond opened his eyes. The helicopter was vibrating even more. Avery was pushing it to its limits. Peyton’s head still rested on his shoulder. She was out cold. He desperately wanted to wake her, to ask what had happened to them, how they had lost what he felt all those years ago. Somehow, he knew he was nearing the end of the memories he could access, like a faraway signpost he could just make out through a fog. He wondered if the programmer, Byron, had been right on the ship: had Desmond made these memories of his youth and his years with Peyton available via cues? The cold in Berlin. The cell in the barn. The picture of Orville. Seeing Peyton again, touching her skin. Each seemed to have opened the door to a chapter of his past.
But he sensed that his most crucial memories would not be so easily retrieved—especially the location of Rendition. That secret was the reason for his amnesia in the first place—the reason he had built this labyrinth.
That’s it: the Labyrinth Reality app. It’s the key.
His breadcrumbs had led him to the app; he was now more certain than ever that it would unlock the rest of his past. He needed to get a phone and re-download the app.
What he didn’t know was whether he was ready to know exactly what he had done—and exactly what kind of man he was.
There was one memory left that he could reach now, and he closed his eyes, willing it to come.
Chapter 67
After what Desmond considered to be a disastrous lunch with Peyton’s family, he didn’t see them much.
He interviewed at half a dozen startups, but he found himself with a new problem: he was gun-shy, afraid to commit. What if it was another xTV? He didn’t want to make the same mistake.
Another startup he had options in failed that week. He would be out of money for the trailer park rent within a month. He needed to take one of the job offers soon.
Christmas was a week away. He was terrified Peyton was going to ask him to come home with her. She didn’t. She seemed to instinctively know his boundaries.
“Just so you don’t get carried away and buy me an island or something for Christmas, let’s set some ground rules,” she said.
“All right.”
“We can each spend ten dollars on each other.”
“Okay.”
“And the gift has to reveal something about each of us.”
That confused him.
“I want to know something about you, Desmond. It has to reveal something about your past. An experience that shaped you somehow. Understand?”
He did. And he had no idea what to give her. He obsessed in the weeks leading up to Christmas.
He also turned over the job offers. Yet another company he had options in failed. His stack of lottery tickets was slowly migrating to the trash can, as fate took the numbered balls out of the hopper and more startups closed.
He drove his truck to Portola Redwoods State Park one night, hiked in, and cut down a small redwood, then cut the limbs away.
He brought it home, whittled away at it for a few days, checked the local events calendar, and found what he needed.
Two days before Christmas, in her apartment, Peyton set her gift on the coffee table. It was wrapped immaculately. Desmond hadn’t wrapped his. He felt nervous instantly.
He tore off the wrapping paper, revealing a cardboard box. He opened it and found a map lying on top of another box, also wrapped. He picked up the map and unfolded it. Cities were highlighted in yellow: London, England. Heidelberg, Germany. Hong Kong. Two small towns in Scotland, one in Ireland, and another in southern China.
“Yellow is where my family is from,” Peyton said. “Parents. Grandparents.”
Desmond studied the rest of the map. There were two dozen green marks.
“Green is all the places I’d like to go with you, Des. Someday.”
He swallowed and fell silent, staring at it like he was reading a judge’s death sentence. She had plans for them. And she’d been thinking about them for a while.
“Open the next one,” she said, excited, oblivious to his anxiety.
The next box contained a miniature figure of a mermaid on a small spring. The base was emblazoned with the words “Palo Alto.”
“Closest I could get,” she said. She stared at him expectantly. “Any guesses?”
“Uh…”
“Come on.”
“Your favorite movie is The Little Mermaid?”
She socked him hard in the shoulder.
“No. I was on the swim team. In high school.”
“Oh. Of course. How could I have missed it? It’s so obvious now.”
Beneath the mermaid was a third box. She didn’t encourage him to open this one. In fact, she seemed nervous about it, as if she had changed her mind. She looked away as Desmond tore the wrapping paper.
The object inside the last box was small. His fingers wrapped around it, lifted it out.
It was a glass object, heart-shaped, red.
“I love you, Des,
” she said.
He tucked it in his pocket, leaned forward, and kissed her.
“I’ve never felt this way about anyone before,” he said.
She smiled quickly, clearly disappointed, but rolled her eyes, trying to seem playful, unbothered. “Jeez, what are you, a lawyer now?”
“I mean it.” He held up the glass heart. “But I’m not like you. My heart isn’t like yours.”
“There’s nothing wrong with your heart, Desmond.” She stared at him.
With increasing frequency, he had wondered if that was true.
“Okay, what did you get me?” she asked, eager.
He dug into this backpack, drew the item out, and handed it to her.
She held the carved wooden object, examining it. “It’s… the Eiffel Tower? You’re… you want to go to France?”
“No.” He shook his head, frustrated. “I mean, maybe. I would. But it’s an oil rig.”
“Oh.” She studied it again. “I thought they were shaped like hammers. You know, going up and down into the ground.”
“You’re talking about the walking beam and horse head. This is the rig. The thing that drills the well.”
She nodded. “So…”
“It’s what I used to work on.”
“Oh.”
“In Oklahoma. It’s part of where I got the scars.”
Her eyes widened. She held the carved wooden object with more care. “Thank you, Des. I love it. It’s perfect.”
“It’s not all.”
Her face lit up.
“The second part wouldn’t fit in a box.”
They loaded up in his truck, which she had gradually become less scared of, and drove up the 101 to 92 and over to Half Moon Bay.
They could see the roaring bonfire before they reached the beach. Desmond wrapped his coat around her, took a bundle from the back seat, and led her in silence toward the blaze. He laid the thick blanket out on the sand and unscrewed the cap on the cheap wine, and they sat together, the fire warming them, her in front of him, facing it, tipping the bottle up every few minutes. Desmond estimated there were only about fifty people there, mostly around their age, couples and some groups, talking, drinking, and laughing.