Innocent Bystander

by Glenn Richards

  For the second time in less than two minutes, Professor Desmond’s name entered his mind. Even if he’d read the paper, Burnett reasoned, it couldn’t be him. No matter what he thought of Henri’s paper, no matter how much he might have wished he’d published such a work, Desmond could never have done something so unspeakable. He cared a great deal about his students. That was the very reason he’d offered the extra credit assignment—to prevent half the class from failing.

  Beyond his role as a father figure, Desmond had inspired him to choose his career path. Uncertain what he would do once he completed his education, Desmond had suggested Burnett follow in his footsteps. Teaching physics wasn’t something he’d considered, but the more thought he gave it, the more he realized his professor had made the perfect recommendation. It would provide him with the opportunity to do the two things he loved most—carry out research and share his love of physics.

  There had to be someone else, someone Henri had confided in unbeknownst to Burnett; another classmate perhaps, or a professional he’d asked to review the manuscript.

  The evening news had begun, yet he remained oblivious to it. Audrey’s murder was the lead story. Still and moving pictures of police investigating the crime scene filled the screen. A photograph of Burnett materialized beside the female reporter’s head. His college ID photo, and a picture he despised, it caught his attention.

  Three clicks of the remote raised the volume “… and he’s considered armed and extremely dangerous,” the reporter said with dramatic effect. “Our source close to the investigation tells us that so far the police do not know who the girl is, but they believe she’s known to the suspect. The suspect’s close friend, Henri Laroche, died under mysterious circumstances three days ago, and the same source tells us that Mr. Burnett is a suspect in that death as well.”

  He pressed his right thumb and index finger to his eyebrows and kneaded his forehead. He heard the reporter’s words, but it sounded like she’d described a stranger.

  “We’re also getting word that an important piece of evidence was taken from Mr. Laroche’s apartment,” the reporter continued. “Our source close to the investigation tells us that Mr. Laroche’s laptop computer, which is believed to contain vital information about this case, disappeared from his apartment the night of his death.”

  Audrey took it. No doubt existed in his mind. The notion that she’d grabbed the computer, then vanished into the future with it, flickered across his brain but quickly faded. She could have given it to Desmond. No matter how hard he tried to quash it, his physics professor’s name refused to die.

  He needed a place to start, and after a brief deliberation, decided he would approach Desmond again and gauge the professor’s response. He would force the issue this time, try to confuse him, perhaps even claim he knew Henri had shown him an early draft … anything that might cause Desmond to betray himself.

  Though risky, he knew he could confront Desmond at the local Starbucks where he stopped every morning at seven-thirty for a caramel macchiato. To confront him in public, and in daylight, would be dangerous, but aside from the classes he taught, it was the only time Burnett knew where and when to find him.

  The news program switched to a new story. He lifted the remote and clicked off the TV. Now that he’d seen the news and settled on a course of action, exhaustion took over.

  CHAPTER 19

  Professor Connor Wallace Desmond hovered effortlessly just north of downtown Moscow. Several supertall skyscrapers stood out, towers he did not recall from his previous visit, and that struck him as odd. But he simply let this pass. He observed the millions of Muscovites going about their business. Yet a collective uneasiness gripped the city, and he sensed it.

  Only once before had he dared leap from a small plane with little more than a jumpsuit and folded parachute strapped to his back. That had been during his reckless youth when he’d always been on the lookout for a new adventure, something with which to satisfy a need he did not fully understand, a craving he could never gratify.

  Freefall had been his favorite part of the jump, he clearly recalled, but this time he felt no rush of wind, no friction from a rapid descent. His chute had not deployed, yet he floated, almost motionless, over the historic Russian capital. It was a pleasant sensation, and he wanted to enjoy it to the fullest.

  Evening rush hour was well under way, with traffic snarled throughout the city. He consulted his watch—5:23. Something was going to happen in one minute and fifteen seconds. He didn’t know what, and he didn’t know how he knew, yet he was certain. A shiver passed through him, and his stomach tightened.

  A high-pitched whistle assailed his ears. He craned his neck, but could not determine where the sound came from. Overhead, he spotted an ICBM descending upon the city. In the distance another missile arced toward a military target or population center. Moments later a brilliant flash engulfed the city. He angled his arm to shield his eyes from the intense glare. When he lowered it, he gaped in horror. A colossal mushroom cloud towered above the city. Beneath him, unimaginable torrents of destruction billowed outward in every direction.

  As the cloud dissipated, he gazed down at a shallow crater where the Russian capital had stood. Nothing but scorched earth surrounded the once-great city. The enormity of the destruction seeped into his brain.

  After the initial shock faded, an extraordinary thought occurred to him: God has spared me. He has spared me because I have something important to do, something history-making.

  A male voice called out, and he realized he was not alone. Another person spoke, this one female. He could not determine what either had said, but he was certain he had heard them. He spun but saw no one. Perhaps I’m losing my mind.

  A moment later half a dozen people spoke to him. Soon a cacophony of voices filled his head. At first they were soft, but they grew steadily louder. They spoke Russian, yet he understood them perfectly: “Why have you done this to us?”

  “I did nothing,” he insisted. This only further infuriated them.

  The voices multiplied in number, emotional intensity, and volume. He slipped past the point where he could no longer tolerate it. His skull felt as if it would burst.

  He sat up in bed with a start. He swiveled his head in an attempt to orient himself in the dark room. Sweat seeped from his body, and his damp pajamas chilled him, even under the down comforter. At last he focused on the digital clock on his nightstand. The time advanced from 1:33 to 1:34. It astonished him how something as trivial as a one-minute change on a clock could bring him such relief, but it did. It connected him to the real world.

  Despite his increased mental distance from the dream, it continued to weigh on his mind. He’d had the same dream the previous night. In fact, he’d had the same dream every night since Henri Laroche had told him about his own dream and showed him the time travel paper he’d written.

  In and of itself, a recurring nightmare did not concern him much. A fairly common occurrence, he recalled having had one early in his teaching career. What bothered him now was suffering through the exact same dream every night. Nothing changed, except the city annihilated, not even the smallest detail.

  When Henri had revealed his nightmare, Desmond had not given it a second thought. He probably had not given it a first thought. But now that he was the one waking up in the middle of the night, drenched in sweat and unable to get back to sleep, everything was different.

  He fumbled for the book on his nightstand. Once he located it, he hopped out of bed, the book clenched in his left hand. He cast a quick glance back to make certain he hadn’t disturbed his wife. She continued to snore peacefully beneath the covers. He marched down the hallway and into his study.

  As he sat at his desk the book slipped from his hand. He cursed himself and retrieved it. A souvenir from my stroke.

  His left hand now possessed less than half the strength it previously had. Being right-handed, this wasn’t ordinarily a problem, but when he used his left, as he occasion
ally did, something like this would serve as an unwelcome reminder that he was not the same man he had been before the stroke. His mind had made a one hundred-percent recovery; his body, a ninety-percent recovery.

  A stroke of moderate severity, his doctors told him time and again how fortunate he was to have healed as well as he did. He would mumble an agreement, then bemoan the fact that he was far too young for this.

  He never told anyone about his stroke. He insisted his wife swear on a bible never to tell another living soul. The doctors and nurses were exempt from this swearing ceremony only because HIPPA laws prevented them from revealing what had happened, except with his written permission.

  For nearly two years he had hidden the incident from family, friends, and colleagues. Occasionally he caught people, especially co-workers, whispering in his presence or falling silent when he entered a room. He would be tempted to ask what they had been discussing, particularly when he noticed them trying to avoid looking at his left hand, but he never did. He refused to be pitied.

  The one positive that came from the experience was that it crystallized in his mind something most people live in denial of—their own mortality. He knew, not merely intellectually but on a deep emotional level, that his life could have ended that rainy Friday morning at 6:47. Had an off-duty EMT not lived down the street, or had the stroke been more severe, the end result would have been far worse.

  Until that day, Connor Desmond had never been one to believe in something as unscientific as fate. Since then he had grown more comfortable with the idea. Like a tattered old robe that he could not throw out, the concept fit better and better the more time he spent with it.

  Now, providence had reared its unpredictable head once again and presented him with an opportunity to attain that which he desired most: immortality. It had literally been placed in his hands, and he sure as hell was not going to permit a nightmare to interfere with his plan.

  On second thought, perhaps fate and providence played supporting roles to planning and organizing. He felt confident, or perhaps merely optimistic, that if he tailored the course to be just difficult enough and offered just the right option for students to improve their grades, someone like Henri Laroche would eventually provide him with what he needed. It would have been infinitely better, he acknowledged, had it been someone like Henri, rather than Henri.

  Seated at his desk, the book now propped up in front of him, he gazed at the cover. Master Lucid Dreaming, the title proclaimed. From the top, left-hand drawer of his desk he retrieved a pair of wire-rimmed reading glasses. With his right hand he slipped them on. He opened to Chapter Ten, sighed deeply, and read.

  The first page he read voraciously, the second page with keen interest, the third with waning interest, and the fourth with his mind wandering. He slammed the book shut. Was it worth continuing? More than a week ago he’d checked the book out of the university library at the recommendation of Dr. Edwin Hofstetter, the chairman of the psychology department. So far it had proven useless.

  He had been late for his own class that morning, something he loathed, but he had been willing to be even later if Dr. Hofstetter had had some useful insight to offer.

  He had chanced upon the psychology professor in the stairwell. Hofstetter’s oversized briefcase flapped against his knee as he descended the staircase.

  “Hey, Connor,” Hofstetter said.

  “You have a couple seconds, Ed?” Desmond asked, pausing on the first landing.

  “What’s on your mind?”

  “Been having this God-awful nightmare for almost a week now. Keeps waking me up in the middle of the night. Then I can’t get back to sleep.”

  “Want to tell me about it?”

  “I’m already late for class.”

  “You?”

  Desmond feigned a smile.

  “Stop by my office later,” Hofstetter said. “No charge for the office visit.”

  He faked a second smile and added an uninspired chuckle. “I have a full schedule today. Any quick suggestions?”

  “Ever heard of lucid dreaming?”

  “Yes.”

  “Know anything about it?”

  “Not much.”

  “Put simply, you wake up inside your dream,” Hofstetter said. “When you do, you can take conscious control over it. Like being the director of a movie, only you’re the director of your dream.”

  This time a genuine smile curled the corners of his mouth. “How do I accomplish that?”

  “It takes time.”

  Time. The one thing he didn’t have.

  “The university has some excellent books on the subject,” Hofstetter said. “One in particular is very good. Here, let me jot down the title.”

  Hofstetter fished a pen and a piece of scrap paper from his pocket, scribbled several words, and handed it to Desmond.

  “Thanks,” Desmond said with an appreciative smile.

  “One thing,” Hofstetter said. He reached out and placed his fingertips on Desmond’s shoulder. “It’s likely this nightmare is trying to tell you something. Although dreams often seem nonsensical, there’s always a meaning behind them. If lucid dreaming works, it’d be worthwhile trying to find out what.”

  “If lucid dreaming works,” Desmond grumbled to himself, now scrutinizing the book in his hands. He had read and reread the first ten chapters. He had followed every suggestion and done all the relevant exercises. Maybe this stuff is just New Age bullshit.

  With his right hand he laid the book on his desk, then he tugged open the top right drawer. Inside sat two books. The top one was his favorite biography of Einstein. Beneath it laid Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass.

  The literary equivalent of Einstein, Whitman’s insights into the human condition remained unequaled. Even if he didn’t always agree with the great poet’s opinions, Desmond respected his views. Since he knew he would be unable to get back to sleep, he would instead immerse himself in Whitman.

  The great poets had long recognized mankind’s place in the world. They had also understood the nature of the universe centuries before scientists began peeling back its endless layers. Even in modern times the most insightful poets offered glimpses into truth and reality that men and women of science still struggled to grasp.

  One of his most-prized possessions, the book had been a gift from his mother on his twenty-first birthday.

  Once he opened it, he found he could not read. At that moment he knew he was avoiding what needed to be done.

  Leaves of Grass landed back in the drawer. He placed his palm on the cover of Master Lucid Dreaming and slid it back onto his lap. The nightmare had become more than an inconvenience; it had become even more than an annoyance; it had become a serious threat to his mental and physical health.

  He opened the book to Chapter Ten, Page Five.

  CHAPTER 20

  Burnett squatted behind a dumpster on the north side of the strip mall. The sun had risen on a crisp, clear morning. Two hours ago he’d made the two-mile trek from Clara’s condo in the dark. Now he waited for Desmond to arrive at his customary time. A quick check of his watch indicated it was 7:27.

  He’d spent the entire walk rehearsing what he would say. He’d started off debating foolish things, such as whether he should approach the teacher on his way in or out of the Starbucks. Soon he realized this was merely an attempt to avoid the real issues. How to open the conversation and, perhaps more important, how hard to press him on the subject, were his chief concerns. No doubt Desmond would again deny any involvement. Burnett knew he would need to gauge many of his professor’s nonverbal reactions.

  When he recalled his journey here, he realized he hadn’t spent the entire time rehearsing. The outline of the person he’d seen in the park had crossed his mind, much as it had the previous day when he’d sat beneath the overpass awaiting nightfall.

  He had seen someone. It must have been a visitor making his or her way to an exit. The person had no doubt become aware of the police activity and had bolt
ed just after he came into view.

  His head shook. He’d tried that explanation the other day, and had rejected it that time as well.

  A black Mercedes sports coupe turned into the parking lot, and his throat went dry. He coughed several times. He swallowed hard. The three practice words he spoke came out scratchy.

  Desmond parked his Mercedes on the side of the building. This was a relief since now Burnett could intercept him without exposing himself to too many people. He inched his way to the front corner of the structure as the professor drew near. Desmond strode forward, head down, apparently oblivious to his surroundings.

  When he reached the corner of the building, Burnett grabbed him by the arm and dragged him into the shadow of the wall. The stunned teacher snapped his head up and appeared even more stunned to be face to face with his student.

  “Burnett,” Desmond said. “What in Christ’s name are you doing here?”

  “I need to ask you something.”

  “Must be damned important. Every policeman in the county is looking for you.”

  “I need to know,” Burnett said, then paused, making every effort to choose his words with care. All his preparation vanished faster than the morning mist. He uttered the first words that came to him. “Did Henri show you a draft of his extra-credit paper?”

  Desmond stared at him as if he’d spoken in Cantonese. “That’s the important question you have for me? That’s why you’re here, risking life in prison? Seems to me we already covered that.”

  Burnett leaned closer.

  “The answer is still no. He did not show me a draft of his paper. May I go now?”

  Burnett still clutched his arm. He released it. “That’s interesting, because Henri told me he’d shown you his first draft. He was under the impression he’d get a passing grade if he improved it enough. Polished it.”