“Tuesday, December eighteenth,” I answered, exasperated that I was being put through this line of questioning for yet a third time. “My middle name is Linden, I’m thirty-nine years old, I’m married…”
“All I wanted was the date, Mister Gant,” she cut me off, sounding slightly distracted. “And by the way, it’s past midnight, so it is actually Wednesday the nineteenth.”
“Do I lose any points for that?”
“There doesn’t seem to be anything out of the ordinary on your x-rays,” she began, ignoring my jibe and giving the film a final once over. She then turned and crossed her arms over her chest as she leaned against the wall. “And your blood work is fine.”
“So why don’t you look pleased?” I asked.
“I’m a little concerned about the fact that you blacked out, as well as the description of your earlier dementia provided by Detective Storm. These could be indicators of a mild ischemic stroke. What I’d like to do is get a head CT and keep you under observation for a while.”
“I really don’t think that’s necessary,” I protested.
“Well, I do,” she returned flatly. “And while I certainly cannot keep you here against your will, I strongly suggest that you have this test.”
The door whooshed once again, and a nurse urgently poked her head through the opening. “Doctor Morrison, we need you in Trauma-two.”
“Why don’t you discuss it with your wife, Mister Gant,” the harried MD told me as she headed out after the nurse. “Someone will check back with you in a few minutes.”
As the door swung shut behind her, I knew better than to open my mouth. Felicity and Ben were looking at me with steeled expressions, and it was immediately plain that they were on her side. Effectively it had become three against one. I never even stood a chance.
*****
It was just past 6:30 in the morning. Felicity had headed out in search of coffee, and I was all but imprisoned in a hospital room against my wishes. Ben had headed back to his crime scene as soon as he was convinced that I would stay put without drastic measures. He had even gone so far as to offer Felicity his handcuffs. Something told me she gave it serious consideration; even though when she declined the offer her comment included a pointed joke, saying that she just might be interested in borrowing them when I was feeling better. At least I think it was a joke. I didn’t always know where she was concerned.
I was hoping the doctor would get the results of her test back soon or at least see fit to release me so that I would be able to head home, but so far it wasn’t looking very promising. I had been trying to squeeze in a nap ever since she had okayed it, but all I’d really managed to do was doze in and out for the past 45 minutes.
My head was resting in the deep depression of a too soft pillow, and I was settled uncomfortably on the inclined bed. I was just taking another run at getting some sleep when I heard the doctor’s voice.
“How are you doing, Mister Gant?”
I opened my eyes and found her standing at the end of the bed. She appeared just as tired as she had a few hours ago.
“As well as can be expected I suppose.”
“Good,” she answered succinctly as she jotted something on a clipboard, then without looking up she added, “Interesting talent you have there. Is it legible or are you just doodling?”
“Excuse me?” I asked.
“The writing without looking.” She gestured to the adjustable table that was positioned over the bed in front of me. “You were even doing it with your eyes closed when I walked in.”
I tilted my head forward to gaze in the direction she indicated and watched in astonishment as my left hand, gripping a pencil, moved swiftly back and forth across a small notepad. Several pages had already been filled and flipped upward.
The fact that I was right-handed isn’t even what bothered me most. Or even the fact that I was writing both forwards and backwards. No…it was the realization that I’d had no idea what my left hand was doing until it had been pointed out to me that really got under my skin.
As I watched, my hand automatically flipped the newly filled page up and set the tip of the pencil against an empty sheet. I stared on as it continued of its own accord to scribe in smooth, clear, and wholly unfamiliar handwriting, repeating over and over the same line of text as it had on all the previous pages.
Dead I am. Dead I am. I do not like that dead I am.
CHAPTER 3
“So what’re ya’ doin’ now?” Ben asked as he stared at the pad of paper. “Tryin’ ta’ be some kinda morbid Doctor Seuss?”
I’d expected that. I didn’t necessarily like it, but it was bound to come out of someone sooner or later. And the more I thought about it, the more I suspected it would end up being not just sooner or later, but both. Even I had no choice but to admit that the similarity between what I’d written and one of the most memorable lines from a beloved children’s book was uncanny. I was certain to be hearing about it from anyone who became privy to the product of my unconscious scribbling. Under wholly different circumstances the parallel might even have been amusing.
But it was under these circumstances, not different ones, and the word “dead” played a prominent role in the repetitious line of text. Couple that with the fact that the pad full of paraphrased prose came out of me involuntarily, and I didn’t find it amusing in the least.
“I’m being serious here, Ben,” I returned, my voice dull.
“Okay, okay.” He tossed the notepad onto his desk blotter and leaned back in his chair. Propping one ankle across his knee then clasping his hands behind his head, he gave me a serious look. “I’m listenin’. What’s the deal with this notepad?”
I had called my friend as soon as I’d been released from the hospital. The doctor still had no definitive results back from the tests that had been run, but I was feeling fine, so she’d relented and allowed me to leave. I knew full well that I hadn’t had a stroke, but I wasn’t about to try explaining what had caused my very pronounced symptoms. If I had, I’d probably still be talking to the staff psychiatrist as well as being taken on a tour of their lovely padded accommodations. I’d been down this road before, and I was in no hurry to visit it again.
You tend to get a small spectrum of reactions when you look at someone and say, “I’m a Witch.” The three biggies go something like this: One, they look at you like you are crazy. Two, they try to introduce you to Jesus and save you from yourself; or, three, they run screaming in the opposite direction. In my case, being male, I also get the added, ‘”Don’t you mean warlock?” This usually prompts me to give the actual definition of the word warlock, that being “oath breaker.” The resulting short explanation of the fact that male or female, a Witch is very simply called a Witch, is usually a good one for glazing over the eyes of the uninitiated in less than sixty seconds.
Though I don’t make a secret of my religious path or even my mystical leanings, I’ve learned to avoid the subject in given situations. Sometimes it just doesn’t pay to be honest-plain and simple.
When I’d made my call, I had found Ben behind his desk at City Homicide working on the situation that had gotten him out of bed only a handful of hours before. I’d suspected as much would be the case and hadn’t even tried calling him at home. When I told him what I wanted to show him, he’d suggested that I go to my own home and get some rest. I doubt he’d really expected me to follow the suggestion because he didn’t seem at all surprised to see me coming through the glass-fronted double doors of his department just over thirty minutes later.
Felicity on the other hand, had been a tougher sell. Though her outward appearance may be that of fragile beauty, my wife was as headstrong as they came. I was fully aware that what came across on the surface as stereotypical Irish stubbornness and temper was truly born of intellect, will, and protective instinct. Still in all, igniting that temper was something better left undone unless you had a damned good reason. I just didn’t feel I had a choice this time around, even if
my reason was no more than repeating pages of nonsensical rhyme on a notepad and a gut-twisting bad feeling about them.
In the end, it took me all of fifteen minutes to convince her that if she didn’t take me by City Police Headquarters on the way home, I would simply find a way to take myself. She had finally given in, and at this particular moment she was parked next to me in one of the stackable, molded-plastic chairs the detectives used for visitors. It was no secret that she wasn’t happy with me in the least, but I was betting she would get over it. She always did.
I shifted in my own seat, it also being a refugee from the stack of seventies era furniture, and succeeded only in moving the discomfort from one side of my body to the other.
“Did you happen to notice anything other than the similarity to a children’s book about green eggs?” I asked.
“You got nice handwriting.” Ben shrugged. “Kinda pretty. I especially like that little curly-q thing you do with the bottoms of the I’s.”
“Exactly,” I affirmed, ignoring his sardonic addition. “It is nice handwriting. But it’s not my handwriting.”
“Whaddaya mean? I thought ya’ said you wrote it.”
“I did, but not of my own volition.”
“You wanna explain that?”
I sighed. I’d been through this with him already when I’d called, but obviously either I hadn’t made myself clear or he’d been ignoring me. I suspected it was the latter, but considering the altered states I’d been in recently, I couldn’t say for sure.
“It’s called automatic writing, Ben,” I explained. “It’s a psychic event that occurs when a spirit or entity channels through someone on this plane of existence. The person doing the channeling simply acts as the conduit for the spirit who then communicates by writing.”
“Okay…” my friend said as he tilted his chair back forward and picked up the notepad once again. “So what you’re sayin’ is that this is one of those Twilight Zone things?”
“It has to be.” I nodded. “I was completely unaware of the fact that I was writing any of that until it was pointed out to me. Also, I was writing with my left hand. I’m right-handed.”
He picked up a large mug and took a swig then set it back on the stained blotter. “So if I’m connectin’ all the dots here, you think maybe Paige Lawson is tryin’ to communicate with ya’.”
“That’s my guess.”
“Okay.”
I was dumbfounded by the matter of fact tone in his voice and his apparent lack of interest. I know I had at least one false start before I managed to stutter, “What do you mean, ‘okay’?”
“I mean, okay.” He shook his head and shrugged. “I’ve seen some weirder shit than this since I’ve been hangin’ around with ya’, so I’m willing to believe what you’re tellin’ me here.”
“So? Are you going to do anything about it?” I asked.
“Whaddaya want me ta’ do, Rowan?” he asked. “I’ve got a pad of paper here that has a little rhyme written on it about five jillion times.”
“Well shouldn’t you look into it? It’s a message from a dead woman.”
“You don’t know that for a fact, but just for the sake of argument, okay… Let’s say Paige Lawson is communicatin’ with ya’. I gotta admit I can see where she’s comin’ from. I expect that if I was dead I wouldn’t be all that happy about it either.”
“What?” I couldn’t believe what he was saying.
“Look, it’s not like this is some kind of hot clue you’re handin’ me here. It’s a piece of paper that says someone is dead and ain’t happy about it. News flash, Kemosabe, we already knew the first part… The second part’s just kinda obvious, don’t ya’ think?”
“But…”
“But nothin’, Row.” He cut me off before I could even form the objection and then ran his hand up to smooth his hair. “Look, here’s the real deal, between you and me. It’s lookin’ like this might not even be a murder. We’re still waitin’ on the autopsy, but there were no signs of a struggle. No forced entry. The place wasn’t trashed. She wasn’t shot, stabbed, or beaten. The only thing out of place is a small welt on the side of her neck…”
“Which side?” I interrupted quickly.
“Left, I think. Why?”
“Because I had a burning sensation on my neck last night.” I indicated the area with my hand. “It was on the left side too.”
“Okay,” he shrugged, “but if you’d let me finish what I was sayin’, you’d know that didn’t kill ‘er. It could be from a thousand different things, so even though we haven’t discounted it, it’s prob’ly nothing. The preliminary report I got from the coroner says she has a blunt force trauma to the side of her head that could be consistent with the corner of the end table just inside ‘er doorway. It looks like she prob’ly just slipped, fell, an’ clocked ‘erself. Damn shame for a young, good lookin’ woman like her, but it happens.”
“But why was I there, Ben?” I implored. “What made me show up at the scene like that?”
“You tell me,” he stated with a frown. “‘Cause I’ll be honest, it’s got me a little worried.”
“So you mean you think I’m right and it might not have been just an accident?” I latched on to the glint of hope in his words.
“No,” he shook his head vigorously and turned the glimmer to worthless pyrite. “I’m worried about you. I think what happened out on that bridge earlier this year has still got you fucked up.”
“That’s not it, Ben, and you know it.”
“Felicity? A little help.” Ben appealed as he looked over at her.
“I have to agree with him, Row,” she stated, voice even. “You haven’t been yourself lately at all.”
“You’ve got to be kidding,” I muttered, more than just a hint of incredulity in my tone. “You’re on Ben’s side with this? Come on, Felicity, last time I checked you were just as open minded about this kind of thing as me. You’ve seen the things that have happened. You’ve even experienced them first hand.”
“Yes, I have,” she agreed. “But I was never in as deep as you have been. This is different somehow. Ever since you got involved in that investigation last February, you’ve seemed disconnected. Ungrounded. You even admitted it then.”
“Yes I did, but that was months ago. I’m well over that.”
“No, you’re not,” she replied. “In some ways you’re even worse than you were then. You’ve seemed almost out of control at times.”
“Out of control how?”
“Like tonight,” she asserted. “Disoriented. Not knowing who or where you are.”
“But this was an isolated incident.” I spoke the lie and didn’t look back. I figured I’d be caught in it eventually, but I thought I’d at least have some time to prove I was on to something important. I definitely wasn’t expecting my capture to be so immediate.
“Rowan, you’ve been sleepwalking for almost two months now.” My wife offered the truth back to me without judgment or anger-just a simple recitation of cold fact. “And the night terrors came like clockwork before that. I know you thought you’d kept them hidden from me, but you didn’t.”
We were fortunate, for the sake of my ego anyway, that the homicide division was less than fully staffed at the moment. There was no one close by enough to overhear the embarrassing revelations that were being put forth. I looked over at my friend’s somber face as he nodded and stared at me from behind his desk.
“I’ve known for a while too, white man. Felicity called me. Why do you think she was so mad at me earlier when she thought I might have brought you in on this? I gotta admit though, I was pretty surprised to have you turn up at an active crime scene like that.”
I sat there completely mute. I wanted to be angry with them both, and in a sense, I was. I wanted to lash out at them for engaging in these clandestine discussions behind my back. I wanted to admonish them for their conspiring to betray me. But I was still rational enough to realize that I was dealing with my wife and m
y best friend, and that they were obviously worried about me. The growing conflagration that was my ire was quickly reduced to a smolder when I asked myself simply, what if the two of them were correct? What if I was, in point of fact, out of control? What if I was so completely disconnected and ungrounded that I was starting to channel anything and everything without discrimination. The prospect brought a completely new and totally real fear into the fold.
“Listen, Row…” Ben now had a business card in his hand and was fiddling with it aimlessly. “Remember I told ya’ my sister had moved inta town?”
“Yeah,” I answered absently as I contemplated what my situation might possibly have now become.
“Well, here’s the deal,” he continued. “She’s a shrink…a good one. Hell, I’ve called ‘er a coupl’a times for advice myself. She’s even helped me with some of the shit I deal with on the job, and you know how I feel about shrinks.” Ben paused and brought a hand up to massage his neck then held the card out to me. “Anyway, Felicity and I have discussed it, and we both think it might be a good idea for ya’ ta’ talk to ‘er.”
“So now I’m crazy,” I said.
“No, Rowan, that’s not what we’re saying at all,” Felicity interjected.
“It’s called Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, Row,” my friend offered. “We see it here all the friggin’ time. I’m not sayin’ I’m qualified ta’ diagnose it, but if anyone’s a prime candidate, Bubba, it’s you.”
He had a point. It was even a valid one. Still, a painful depression was starting to set in. I’d fought harder than I’d ever thought I could just to get Ben to accept the things I was telling him at times-things where I had no tangible proof of their validity. I’d eventually won. I’d managed to convince him and others that I wasn’t a raving lunatic, and he had for a time accepted my word on an almost blind faith.
Now, I was right back where I started-maybe even a step or two to the negative-and it was very possible that this time I wasn’t the one controlling the dice.
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