T. Parker quickly turned away. He stood stooped over, panting hard and raspy. A noise mingled with the wino’s splashes, and he stiffened, considering it.
Hurried footsteps on the sidewalk above the riverbank.
More people were coming. He must hide. He turned and ran, stiff legged, back to his haven in the clump of small trees and bushes.
He sat, trying to quiet his heaving body. The pain impaled him again, and he wanted to scream. He had to remember. It was the only way to make sense of this. He had to remember quickly, before the monster inside his head gained complete control—before they discovered and killed him—or he killed again.
He thought of a black man, tall and well built. The memory caused a warmth in the center of his chest, and tears pooled in his eyes, yet he recalled fighting with the man, fists flying as they rolled on the ground.
“Stupid, bastard nigger!” he barked out in distorted words as the pain shot through his brain.
He could remember the black man’s face, filled with terror as he’d pleaded for his life.
“Stupid, bastard—Jack!” He beat his temples with the heels of his hands while tears streamed down his dirt-caked cheeks.
Now, he remembered the black man lying in front of him, blood oozing.
“Jack,” he repeated, sounding as if his mouth were full of sand. “No, Jack. Sorry, Jack.”
T. Parker continued beating his head in answer to every excruciating throb. Little time remained. Soon he would be unable to think. Soon he would be overcome. He had to fight it. He couldn’t give up. The rabies would win as it always does, but he had to fight. The memories offended and threatened it. What had happened? What had he done?
He remembered being bitten on the neck, and he raised his hand to feel of it. The wound was older than the others, swollen and scabbed. He picked at it until the scab lifted, leaving a dime-sized hole deep into his neck that welled up with liquid.
Now, he remembered holding a doll in his hands, its bloodstained cloth body torn in two. “Raggedy A-yun,” a little girl’s squeaky voice had said. “Raggedy A-yun, A-yun, A-yun,” it echoed in his skull.
Another man flashed through his memory. He was terribly disfigured. He wore a black patch over one eye. He blew a silver whistle.
The thought of it made T. Parker’s ears ring. It rang louder and louder until it blared like a siren, a train whistle blasting in his ears. He cringed and beat his temples then shook his head to stop the terrible noise, but it did no good. The siren only became louder.
There had been dogs. Dogs everywhere. They had bitten at him and attacked others, tearing at their bodies, ripping flesh.
The ringing—louder.
He recalled one dog in particular. He had breathed life into its mouth. He had pumped life into its heart. The thing had stood huge and black. Tremendous fangs—Jezebel!
* * *
Julie drove the short six blocks down to the Mid-America All-Indian Center by the river and parked in the parking lot. She could see the top of the Keeper of the Plains statue over a hundred yards behind the building.
If Tony were to go anywhere besides home, it would probably be here, especially with Doc and Jack dead. Years ago when they all had more time, they used to picnic by the statue. Tony used to meet Doc there on an occasional Sunday afternoon to talk, fish and relax. They mostly talked. Tony and Doc talked a lot together. After all, Doc had been like a father to him after Tony’s own father died. He was sure to be missing Doc, and this is where he would come if there was still a Tony left.
If Tony did have rabies, Julie knew it was a death sentence. He would die, and it would be soon. She began crying. She was frightened and worried. She couldn’t lose Tony, she just couldn’t. He was such a good husband and wonderful father. She knew this thing with Sarah was just a passing thing and whatever happened must have been magnified, if not brought on, by the rabies. It wasn’t his fault. Sure, he had flaws, and they were numerous, but still, he was a good and caring man.
Julie sat with her window down, debating how to approach him if he was out there.
A roar, a kind of yell came from the river. A splash. Someone had fallen in. It might be Tony. He could be drowning. Julie sprang from the minivan and slammed the door shut behind her, not considering it might wake the kids. She ran down the concrete path around the building and toward the Keeper of the Plains.
Julie slowed as she approached the statue and looked out onto the river. She saw a man splashing frantically as he swam toward the opposite bank. It wasn’t Tony. She wondered why this man would be swimming, and so insanely, in the middle of the night. He must have been frightened.
Julie looked around warily. She looked at the bushes that lined the riverbank. Nothing moved. She was alone. The sidewalk led to the statue and ended, then a small path led down the bush-filled, sloped banks eight feet to the river. No one there.
Julie walked past the statue, slowly scanning the area, tears rolling down her cheeks. She stumbled down the narrow trail. He wasn’t there. She’d lost him. She might never see him alive again.
“Daddy, what are you doing in there? Are you playing monsters again? Silly Daddy!”
It was Nick’s voice, behind her. Julie spun around, heart pounding. Nick reached into the bushes. He pulled out a hand, dirty and bloody. Something came out and stood up slowly.
Nick grinned at Julie, and she gaped back at him. This thing that came out and was now holding Nick’s hand was not Tony. It was only an empty shell. There was no life in the almost closed eyes. She looked at it closely, preparing to run to it and take Nick away. Its blank face was filthy with dirt and blood, streaked from tears and mucus and drool. It breathed with a labored whistle, and slobber frothed up around its lips as each breath blew out more sudsy saliva. Its clothes were torn, and its exposed flesh was injured with bloody gashes and punctures.
Then, she recognized pieces of the uniform shirt. The injury on the thing’s wrist where Yankee had bitten deep. The sore on its neck, now swollen a great deal more, red and weeping.
“Tony?” Julie called softly.
Nick led him to Julie. There was no response on Tony’s face. The only movement was his slow, short steps. The terrible disease had taken him. It had taken her beloved husband, hollowed the soul out of his body, leaving the pathetic thing she saw before her.
“Oh, no, Tony!” she cried out as she ran the short distance to him and hugged him. “Tony, please come back to me. Oh, God, please!”
“It’s okay, Mommy. Daddy’s just playing monsters,” Nick explained. “Now, you be a good daddy and quit playing monsters. If you’re good, when we get home, we’ll play your favorite game, Dweebs, Geeks, and Weirdoooos,” he said with a chuckle.
CHAPTER 61
Julie sat at Tony’s bedside in intensive care for four long days. His condition was grave, and they expected him to die at any time. Only the monitors on the machines maintaining his life showed any signs of it, but even those were weak. A nurse came in as Julie sat holding his hand, staring out the window.
“Mrs. Parker, there’s a lady downstairs in the cafeteria waiting to see you,” the young nurse announced. “She said she has your children.”
“Oh, yes, that would be Sadie. She’s been taking care of the kids,” Julie said, standing up. “Please call me if—there’s any change, won’t you? I won’t be gone more than twenty or thirty minutes. I just wouldn’t forgive myself if he would, uh—go and I wouldn’t be here.”
“Sure, Mrs. Parker. We’ll let you know,” the nurse said and left the room.
Julie turned and looked down at Tony, still holding his hand. His face was clean and shaven now. Too clean. Hospital clean and chalky white. A tube came from his mouth and two from his nose, all taped to his face. An IV needle protruded from one arm, and various leads were strung to his body. The heart monitor on the other side of the bed showed a very weak and slow pulse as the respirator beside it emitted a low, steady hum and gave a sort of suction-pump noise every ot
her second.
“You hold on now, you hear me?” she said softly.
She looked down at his pale body. It was near time; she sensed it.
“Don’t you leave without me here to say goodbye.”
She stared for a moment longer, holding his hand and forearm.
“Damn it, Tony!” she suddenly blurted out and grabbed him by the top of his hospital gown, putting her face to within inches of his. “Don’t you dare leave me! I love you! I need you! You—you—shithead!”
Julie turned quickly and ran out of the room, past astonished ICU nurses and to the elevators.
*-*-*
Julie had left too soon to see Tony’s finger begin to twitch. Then his hand. His arm moved, and his eyelids rolled back.
He gasped a deep breath as if it were his very first.
One of the nurses just outside the room saw him move and yelled to a doctor, then rushed in. Parker pulled the tubes out of his face and attempted to sit up in bed.
The nurse gently pushed him back down. “Everything’s all right. Settle down. You’ve been through a terrible trauma, Mr. Parker. Please try to calm yourself.”
The doctor stood in the doorway, his white coat open wide, glasses on his shiny, bare forehead. “My God, he’s going to make it!” he exclaimed.
“Water—drink,” Parker said in a raspy whisper, his throat dry and raw.
The nurse hustled to the adjoining restroom and poured half a cup and returned it to his bedside.
Parker gulped the water down with the nurse’s assistance.
“Ah, what—happened?” Parker asked in gasps, laying his head back on the pillow.
“Nurse, would you leave us for a moment, please?” the doctor said to the smiling nurse.
The nurse left without a word, and the doctor closed the door behind her. He checked the monitors on the equipment surrounding Parker’s bed and then bent down and began to give him the once over with a stethoscope.
“My name is Doctor Osgood, Tony. You’ve given us all quite a scare. But—it looks like you’ve made it out of danger,” he said, standing up straight as he glanced back at the strong pulses on the heart monitor. He looked back down at Parker with a wide smile, then sat down in a chair next to the bed.
“What happened—the rabies?” Parker asked, “Julie, the kids?”
“Your family’s fine, Tony. As for you, to tell you the honest to God’s truth, I don’t know what happened.”
Parker looked at him puzzled.
“Well, you see, I’m not one hundred percent sure what your paralysis and comatose state were caused by.”
Parker frowned and shook his head.
“Yeah, I know, the symptoms. Tony, I’ve been reading up on rabies over the last four days since you came to us. I’ve learned a lot. One thing I’ve learned is that rabies is very unpredictable. I’m not saying that you, positively, didn’t have rabies. It’s just that our tests show very little, if any, signs of it. Of course, with a disease like rabies, that doesn’t mean much. You probably know more about what I’m going to tell you than I do, but I’ll say it anyway since it’s the reasoning for my diagnosis.
“First of all, from what I’ve read in the newspaper and from talking with your wife, you’ve been through some terrific, unimaginable stress and trauma, both emotional and physical, lately. Is that not true?”
Parker nodded, his eyes rolling and blinking.
“Well, your life really started getting complicated after the skunk bite, did it not?”
Parker nodded again.
“The terrible killings, the feelings of guilt, possibly some sexual tension, arguments with your wife, the probability of losing your job, then losing so many of your very good friends. Your numerous injuries—huh, we gave you so many stitches—I quit counting after three hundred.”
Parker closed his eyes and held them tight. The memories came rushing back, all the pain and anguish, crowding back into his brain.
“You questioned yourself if you had been properly inoculated. You were concerned that you hadn’t, yet before you had a chance to check, you seemed to start showing symptoms, which meant that you were certain to die. But before you did, you felt it paramount that you avenge your friends’ deaths and stop the senseless slaughter that you thought you were somehow responsible for.”
Doctor Osgood stood up and walked to the end of the bed. He pulled off a clipboard that hung there and sat back down in the chair. He flipped the first page up and began reading.
“Rabies virus not isolated in patient. Negligible rabies neutralizing antibody titers found. No other viral or bacterial agents found.” Doctor Osgood quit reading but continued looking at the clipboard. “You know, in hundreds of thousands of reported cases of human rabies, there has only been one survivor—a young boy in Ohio, I think.”
The doctor looked back at Parker. “I discovered something interesting about human rabies during my research that even you may not have known. Since man is the only animal that can realize he may have the disease and thus dread its symptoms, he is the only animal that may actually start showing symptoms before the virus actually takes hold, in some cases within twenty-four hours after being bitten by a rabid animal. I believe the phenomena is sometimes referred to as faux rabies.”
“But, Doctor.…”
“Now, don’t think that what I’m saying is that you were not in serious condition and in grave danger of losing your life. Oh no, not at all. The trauma your mind put you through was every bit as deadly as the rabies virus. I’m guessing you were very near a nervous breakdown, and you actually may have had one, exhibiting itself in the form of what you may have dreaded most—rabies symptoms. You’d seen them many times before in animals, isn’t that true?”
Parker nodded.
“That is why I was so surprised to see that you pulled through. Your physical condition was very weak, let alone your psychological condition.”
Parker looked at the doctor, still skeptical.
“You need rest. I’ll be back in an hour or so to check on you again, and we can talk some more if you like. In the meantime, I’ll have the nurse change your sheets and make you more comfortable. Oh, and don’t worry. My conclusions can’t be substantiated or, for that matter, disproved, now. Because of that and the possible embarrassment you might experience, and since we have no definite evidence that it was or wasn’t rabies, I’m calling it probable,” he said smiling. He turned away and walked to the door. “By the way, you might feel comforted to know that Sheriff Warren is recovering fine down on the second floor. He should go home today.”
Parker vaguely remembered his uncontrollable rage, biting into the sheriff’s throat, and he frowned.
“Do me a favor,” Parker said hoarsely. “Don’t say anything—to him about me—not having rabies. Might not be—too understanding.”
The doctor chuckled and left the room.
*-*-*
Julie had a nice visit with Nick and Audrey and with Sadie and the girls. She had lost track of time, concerned more about how Nick would deal with being without his dad. She told all of them she would come home soon, possibly even today. It made Nick happy, too young to understand what it would mean. Sadie had given her hand a knowing pat. She’d read between the lines. Tony would soon die.
Julie was anxious to get back to the ICU. She glanced at her watch as the elevator crept slowly to the fourth floor. She’d been away from the room for almost forty-five minutes. The elevator seemed to take longer than ever before. It was as slow as a funeral procession.
When the doors opened, she stepped quickly toward Tony’s room. She saw activity inside, through the open doorway, and didn’t understand it. A nurse she didn’t recognize had just finished changing the bed.
Julie watched from outside the door. Tony wasn’t there. She looked at the number on the door to make sure it was the right room, the same one she had lived in for the past four days. Surely, she had the correct floor. Yes, it was the right room, but Tony was gone.
The nurse said, “I’ll be right back.” She turned and smiled at Julie as she walked past. Julie stood in the door, looking, thinking.
“Tony?” she called softly to the empty room.
He was gone. They’d taken him out. The life-sustaining machines were unplugged. The room waited for its next victim. Tony was dead.
Julie didn’t feel sorrow as much as anger now. She’d known Tony was about to die. She had waited beside him for four days, waiting for death to come. But it had come, and no one told her about it. No one came down or called the cafeteria to let her know. They had deprived her the opportunity of whispering last words into his ear. She had not been able to say goodbye, to say I love you one last time.
Julie spun around to the nurses’ desk with teeth clenched, but before she had a chance to release the anger, she heard a sound, a whisper.
“Julie? Julie, that you?”
Julie turned back to the vacant room. She almost expected to see some sort of divine image, an apparition.
“Joo-lee?”
She heard the whisper again and frowned, still looking around the small room. It was Tony’s voice. He spoke to her from the afterlife. His spirit communicated to her from heaven.
She stepped cautiously into the room, goose bumps raising on her arms.
“Damn it—Julie,” the whisper was much louder this time, “Will— you—answer me?”
Something crashed behind her. She turned quickly and looked at the closed door to the toilet. She reached for the doorknob and pulled the door open. An IV stand fell out into the room.
“Well—don’t just—stand there. Help me—out,” Tony puffed, looking up from the toilet. “Some fool—left the damn—seat up!”
She’d never seen anyone stuck in a toilet before, although she’d come close a couple of times, herself. It seemed to be his just dessert.
“Oh—oh, Tony,” Julie said, laughing and crying at the same time with both hands over her mouth.
He motioned her in with one hand as he struggled and she hurried in and pulled him up.
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