No sooner had one mother left and another mother took her place. The door bell rang and Roy was half way to the kitchen when he did an about face and went back to answer the door mumbling under his breath about something. Ann was talking a mile a minute and Alice was holding her hands listening and staring at Ann wondering what lie behind those dark glasses. Alice looked at the door as Roy greeted, Lori and her mother at the door. Lori pushed by Roy and hurried to the sofa and fell on her knees in front of Ann blubbering incoherent words and trying to hold her hands.
Ann said: “Lori is that you?”
Lori, still crying said through gasps of air expended one after the other, “Yes, I am so sorry for your accident.” Then Lori laid her head upon Ann’s lap and soon she quit crying. Ann heard his father talking to Lori’s mother. He was explaining a little about what had happened, but was being rather vague about it. Soon the mother took her leave and Roy gave off a rather loud sigh. Then he walked back towards the kitchen not paying any attention to the three girls sitting on the sofa huddled up like they were about to brave a snow storm without a shelter.
After Lori and Alice watched him going into the dining room Alice was the first to ask, “Ann, are you really blind?”
“I am not blind Alice,” she said rather too sharply, “I just can’t raise my eyelids. I can see light, but that is all. If you want to see, wait until all the girls have arrived and I will show all of you what I can’t even see myself what’s wrong.”
* * *
Across town, instead of a birthday party Johnny sat on an old beat up faded orange couch listening to a TV program that at one time was one of his favorites. What surprised him, just by listening; he could understand what was going on in the show? His brother sat nearby and if Tommy could have seen him, sat there with a totally bored look on his face, but knew his brother needed him at this time in his life. A commercial came on and that was when Tommy said to his brother, “Do you think we have enough money to order a pizza?”
“Let me see.” Hank dug into his jeans and brought out a small rumpled bunch of bills. He counted out what he had and then asked his brother, “Do you have any money stashed in your bedroom?”
“Yes, there is around ten bucks stuck under my reading light next to the bed.”
“Yes, we can order a pizza and let’s wait until my girlfriend comes and she might have a few bucks to throw into the pizza.”
“Hank, what is going to happen to me? I am really scared and dad is no help and what happens when Monday comes and you have to go to work and I am home alone?”
“Well, little brother,” and that was the first time Tommy had heard his brother call him ‘little brother’ and that made him feel so much better. “I am going to talk to my boss and see if I can let you come to work with me. There are a few things you might be able to do without using your eyes, but just by feel.”
Tommy had no idea what he was talking about but he felt that he trusted Hank and he would do what he told him to do. The program came back on and like he could see, turned his head towards the TV and pretended to watch it.
Meanwhile down at the local drink shop, Tommy and Hanks father was well on his way to a Saturday night high. It had been his payday Friday and what money he had left, was burning a hole in his pocket. He stood at the pool table waiting his turn with a Pall Mall hanging from his lips and a cue stick in the other. His ever present glass of beer was only an arm's length away sitting on an old beer table that had seen better days. That was long before he had had his first beer at the Spit and Polish Tavern.
Someone, he was not sure who, asked him, “Hey what is the story I am hearing about your kid being blind?”
Nick spun around to see who had asked the question about his kid. Looking through half bleary eyes he saw it was Willie. Willie was standing there looking like an old growth stump fell a bit high to an old loggers liking. From the shoulders down, just under his chin, he was like a block of ice with a head on the top. This was one guy nobody messed with and now he stood about a pool tables distance away looking at Nick the Loser.
In Nick’s foggy brain he tried to determine what was meant by Willie’s question. He took a drag on his Pall Mall and flicked the ash on the floor not taking his eyes off of Willie. A cloud of blue smoke mixed with the already blue air around the pool table and he said, “He’s not blind. He just has an eyelid problem and is at the doctors now getting it fixed. Where did you hear he was blind anyway?” Nick voice was turning to a volume that all who knew him meant the short fuse was burning and all could see the red in his eyes starting to glow. A quiet of sorts began around the pool table and spread over to the bar where some regulars had seen through the back bar mirror, or had heard Nicks’ voice raising, started to spin on their bar stools to watch any action that might be forthcoming.
Willie stood there with a dog eating grin staring at Nick waiting for an answer to his question. He saw Nick take a step or two towards him and also saw him drop his Pall Mall to the floor. Nick kept the cue stick and Willie knew if a fight was going to happen, Nick would use the stick on him. Willie said: “Hey Loser, I asked you a question and we all here expect an answer and not the one you just gave us. We also know that there are two such cases and don’t you, in your pea brain, think something out of the ordinary is going on in town? If you think that cue stick is going to help, bring it on Loser.”
Even in Nicks beer sloshed brain, he would be the loser against Willie regardless if he had two sticks in his hand. He replied, “Look Willie, I came here to shoot some pool and have some beers and not be challenged by the likes of you. Unlike you with no family, I am raising two boys without a mother.”
All in the tavern realized what a lame comment he just made and a chuckle was heard around the place. By now the bartender had moved from behind the bar and was almost to Nick. The bartender said, “Hey boys, if you want to discuss this further, take it outside and not in here. This is your last warning and if you look behind me, Mabel is on the phone to the police now.”
That apparently defused the situation for the moment, but all knew it wasn’t over yet. Being called a Loser in front of the locals was not going to be swallowed by Nick like a cold beer going down a thirsty gullet. Nick lit up another Pall Mall and returned to the table as it was his shot and Willie walked backwards to his usual spot leaning against the cement post that supported the building. The post was far enough away from the pool table that it would take Nick a step or two to be in range with his cue stick to thump Willie over the head with.
Most all were depressed that the fight never took place as to a patron, they would love to see Willie pound Nick to the ground. It was common knowledge that he was a worthless father and that the two boys had a difficult time with life. Everyone there had a situation not unlike Nicks, but life in general was not an easy road to hoe. On more than one face a picture of guilt could be seen if one had a notion of looking. To thwart the guilt, it looked like everyone answering the last call for drinks as bottoms up was the sight seen at the Spit and Polish.
Chapter 6
Ed the Nose was on the phone to the New York Times. He’d asked for a senior editor and after being shuffled from this desk to that desk, was finally hooked up with a junior wannabe girl who sounded like she was fresh out of college. After an exasperating time of repeating the story, he finally caught the girls’ attention. She at last seemed eager to hear about this strange story the man was telling on the other end of the phone. One thing Ed could say about her she was cautious about who he was and after verifying Ed as the editor owner of his local newspaper, she agreed to listen to his story.
Ed related the events as he had seen and stated to her as facts and not supposition. He had faxed her some pictures he had taken and as she was looking at them he kept talking about something really strange that two kids on their thirteenth birthday were stricken with stuck eyelids. And when he told her that after an operation to both kids, the eyelids grew back together again. Now this caught her atte
ntion. She suddenly sat straight up and looked around the large newsroom, which even at night had a flare of activity surrounding it. She thought, well, maybe this is the break I need to move up a notch and maybe then a few of the higher ups would remember her name, Candice Canon.
Candice asked Ed, “Where exactly are you and what highway numbers do I follow to find you?”
Ed, knowing he had hooked her said, “Follow the interstate to Salem and then down south on highway fifty five to Remorse. You can’t miss it. There is a motel just as you enter town and when would you be here as I will call and reserve a room for you.”
Candice replied, “Let me get back to you as I need to run this by my boss.” After that they hung up and Ed went back to putting out a special edition as Saturday had come and gone, but tomorrow would be a special day in Remorse. After all, he did promise to report the news of the town and this certainly was the biggest news in his time here. He’d lived there for the past ten years and both he and his wife agreed on one thing, this was the last place on earth they would have wanted to live.
Meanwhile Candice looked at the pictures and could see nothing short of a boy with his eyes closed and a girl in a doctor’s office sitting there with her eyes closed also. However, she had a hunch and that was what made a good reporter: a well founded hunch based up experience. Well she had the hunch, but lacked the experience. Talking a deep breath she knocked on her boss’s door and heard him say to enter.
William, Bill, Smith was a thirty year veteran of the newspaper business. He sat in a posh office and had the reputation of what was deserving of a senior editor who had chosen to remain in that position because he liked his job. He passed over promotions in favor of being on the front line. Now he sat listening to a story from a new hire that was more for the tabloids than a leading newspaper. However, he knew enough to listen and asked the questions of his position. When she had finished, he asked her this question: “If you were me, Ms. Canon, would you send a reporter clear up to Salem to chase down a story that has more questions than answers in it? Candice thought it over and when her boss sat there with a smile on his face looked down at her feet.
What seemed like a five minute silence, she said: “I’m not sure what I would do if I were a senior editor but I do know that one has to take a risk once in awhile. If you will agree, I will drive up and spend a day looking into this story and call you when I have found some facts and not fantasy to report.”
He could find no fault in her report and flashed back into his younger days when he had a hunch and that hunch paid off. He said, “Check out a car and pick up a credit card at the security office. I will expect to hear from you sooner rather than later.” He wrote out a form and signed it for her car and expenses and handed it to her saying, “Good luck.”
Her heart in her throat, she thanked him and took the form, like a breakable China dish, and left closing the door softly.
* * *
Back at Ann’s house, the party was in full swing down in the basement. After all the party quests had arrived and the mothers pacified, the girls had quickly adjusted to Ann and her inability to see. She still wore her dark glasses, but once everyone had arrived, she showed them her eyelids and after everyone had a look see, they ignored it and went about talking about this boy or that boy. The pizza came and it felt very strange to eat without looking at her food Ann thought. Her memory made a picture of a pizza and she wondered how a blind person from birth, having never seen any food, enjoyed eating? The thought filtered away as someone had brought a new CD of the latest music sensations, “The Turnstilles.” The pizza and cokes gone, the girls, including Ann danced to the music. Everyone was having a good time and as the hour of midnight approached, announcing a new day the party was still in full swing.
***
About ten blocks away, in another like neighborhood, a girl, who was not of the elite group, had just turned her light off and was going to sleep. Tomorrow would be her thirteenth birthday and when she woke up on Sunday morning, she would be included in the group of new teenagers that had eyelids that would not open.
* * *
Glen by all accounts should have been in bed. It was after midnight and he was still doing research on the computer. He’d decided to look through some of his mothers’ books about the witchcraft in Salem’s history. He realized his mother could probably help him, but he didn’t want her to know what he was doing just yet.
A stack of books next to his feet, and another book or two on his computer desk, were open to accounts of witchcraft back in the late 1600’s, had put a dim light on an even dimmer hope of finding something that might be related to his sister’s aliment. There was one account of a pregnant mother who was confined to a dark room, along with her thirteen year old daughter that piqued his interest. The age of daughter made him open his blood shot eyes. He read and reread the account and discovered that the woman had been in that dark room for years and when she gave birth to a still born, no one bothered to remove it from the locked room. The story went on to say that the woman had gone crazy and the daughter had withdrawn into a corner and was forced by the guards to eat to stay alive. Finally the old woman died and the daughter was set free to roam the country side homeless and friendless. Some of the guilt ridden community felt the need to help her, but all help was rejected and she disappeared into the forest where a tribe of Native Americans took care of her.
Glen was about to turn the light off when he discovered some additional accounts of some blacks being with the same tribe of Indians. It was rumored they had come from Jamaica and had escaped when being transported to the east coast somewhere around New York City. Glen pondered the information and decided it was time for some shut eye. He shut down his computer and went out like a light.
* * *
Dr. Sweet, with trouble on his mind, flew to New York to meet with some colleagues to discuss this strange case of two kids with the same affliction and after an operation to separate the top and bottom eyelids, grew back together almost before their very eyes. Meanwhile Dr. Choi spent most of the evening and night pouring over any and all strange phenomena of unnatural causes that had been recorded. He found everything but what he was looking for, and around the time Dr. Sweet was turning his light off in a hotel, Dr. Choi went to bed feeling that he was missing something somewhere. He vowed to give his best come morning right after church.
Chapter 7
Dr. Choi was a very religious man. Even before he had left his native South Korea, he had found the hand of God to guide him in life. He led a quiet life and his family presented him with no problems unlike some parents in today’s world. His wife and two kids, both boys over the age of sixteen, attended church every Sunday without fail. However, on this particular Sunday, service was in doubt, due to the same affliction of the good reverend Chris Goodfellow’s daughter, Sara, experienced what happened to the other two kids. Sara had the unfortunate birthday that fell on this Sunday becoming a thirteen year old teenager. She too woke up, as had both Tommy and Ann, with their eyelids grown together.
The fact was that Dr. Choi and the Reverend Goodfellow did not live so far apart. Both lived a life of frugality and a life of serving others. Now as Dr. Choi slept past his normal waking time of six am, the phone woke him up at just before seven. Even his wife slept in that morning which was even more unusual. Sleepily he answered the phone and after only a few seconds bolted upright in the bed pulling the phone off the night table to the floor. He listened and after a few minutes told Chris Goodfellow that he would be right over.
By now his wife, Su Jin, fully awake, asked him if there was an emergency. As he put his clothes on, he told her the same thing that happened to the other two kids happened to the reverends daughter.
Twenty minutes later, like an instant replay at Ann’s house, the same scene was being played out at the reverends house. Sara was bawling her head off and like Ann had scratched her face with a bit of blood showing, as Dr. Choi hurried into the bedroom of Sara Goodf
ellow. Nancy, Sara’s mother, was trying to comfort a hysterical daughter and the difference being with the other two kids, both Nancy and Chris knew that no cure was available to help all three of them. Dr. Choi dropped to his knees at the side of the bed and tried to tell Sara that all would be well in time. He dug in his bag and took out some pills that would totally relax the daughter and put her back to sleep for a good six hours. Chris fetched the water and Nancy placed the pills into Sara’s mouth followed by a long drink of water. The immediate result was a case of the hiccups and a small smile came across Sara’s face making the other three adults chuckle a bit. Chris said, to no one in particular, “Thank God, we need a little humor with this godforsaken situation our town is facing.”
To Dr. Choi, this comment hit home and then he realized that he’d not heard about any other cases in any other towns or cities. Very strange, he thought. He and Chris left Nancy with her daughter and slowly made their way to the kitchen for a badly needed cup of morning coffee. Dr. Choi sat down at the small kitchen table noting it was neat as a pin, as well as the rest of the kitchen; and for that matter the whole house was more than tidy. Nothing in the house was ostentatious, but it didn’t resemble a second hand furniture store either.
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