Silent Echo

by Rain, J. R.

  “Maybe this is a bad idea,” he says.

  “The man is on borrowed time,” says Numi, leaning forward. “Maybe we can waste a little more of it?”

  Eddie is a smart guy and gets Numi’s drift: Get to the point or get the hell out of here.

  “Right, sorry. Shit. I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t need your help, Jimmy. Wait, that didn’t come out right. I mean, I should have been here anyway. I’m a shitty friend.”

  He is a shitty friend, but I don’t kick a man when he’s down. I look over at Numi, a very un-shitty friend. Numi is sitting back again, eyes half-closed, looking somewhere beyond the table and into eternity, for all I know.

  “It’s okay,” I say.

  My friend is acting strange. My friend is generally the picture of cool. Or, at least, that’s what he always projected in the past. Now, not so much. His eyes seem unhinged, moving around in his skull like a compass going apeshit. He’s having trouble focusing on any one thing. He runs his fingers through his greasy hair. I’ve never known Eddie to have greasy hair. The Eddie I remember cared a lot about his looks. Too much, perhaps. His knee is bouncing, too. I figure Eddie is either on something or something’s really wrong.

  He finally nods to himself, looks down. Then he closes his eyes, which is probably a good idea since he can’t seem to focus on anything longer than a nanosecond. He takes in some air, holds it, and then says, “Olivia’s missing.”

  I sit forward. Or try to. My sitting forward consists of a minor tremor that runs through my body, followed by virtually no movement at all. Sitting forward, or other such wasted movements, is a luxury for the healthy.

  Even though I have not seen Olivia since my disease reared its ugly head, she had kept in touch with me via text or e-mail or even Facebook. Whether or not Eddie knew we kept in touch, I didn’t know or care. The e-mail exchanges were light and frivolous, rarely touching on anything heavy, other than she missed seeing me and was sorry I was going through what I was going through. Her concern seemed genuine, and I always appreciated hearing from her. I knew she cared about me and she knew I cared about her. That she never stopped by to see me was, I figured, more Eddie’s doing than hers.

  “What do you mean by missing?” I finally ask.

  Eddie looks from me to Numi and says, “It means I haven’t seen or heard from her in almost forty-eight hours.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  “What happened between you two in the forty-eight hours just before Olivia disappeared?” I ask. This information is important to any missing person investigation. I squelch down my sense of panic that Olivia is missing and turn on my private-eye persona. I give him my most serious no-bullshit glare.

  He looks away. “Remember my friend Jewel?”

  I do. I also remember that Eddie had cheated on Olivia with Jewel… on more than one occasion. How and why Olivia stays with him, I still don’t entirely know. But she has.

  “I remember Jewel,” I say evenly.

  My skin is burning now, actually reddening. Still, I don’t move my arm. The burning makes me feel alive, and, for all I know, this might be my last sunburn.

  Numi stares impassively forward, but his attention is still on me, even if he isn’t looking directly at me. He is like a dog who keeps its ears directed towards its owner, ever alert for walks or treats or both. If I should make any movement, Numi’s eyes will snap around to me. So I make no movement. No indication that the sun is burning me. Numi would adjust the umbrella, or insist we sit inside. I enjoy the burning. I enjoy it more than I should.

  A small wind blows over us, although I am perhaps the only one who feels it. I close my eyes for a few seconds and feel the sun and I briefly feel more connected to the earth than I ever have.

  I relish these small moments. I wish I had relished them more when I wasn’t living on borrowed time.

  My private-eye instincts kick into high gear, and so I ask, “What does Jewel have to do with Olivia’s disappearance?”

  Eddie answers casually, as if he is talking about the weather, “Two weeks ago, Jewel committed suicide.”

  The words hit me like a gut punch. Even Numi turns his head slightly to regard Eddie. For the stoic Nigerian, this is akin to a cartoonish double take.

  “What do the police say?” I ask when I’m over the shock. I look at Eddie’s face for signs of grief that his on-again, off-again mistress took her own life. He dips his head away from my intent gaze and when he lifts it again, his expression is neutral.

  “I haven’t mentioned Jewel’s suicide to the police yet.”

  This surprises me. I have to wait a second or two to find the energy for my next question. “Why not?”

  Eddie takes in a lot of air and leans forward. I can tell he doesn’t like leaning forward. Leaning forward puts him just that much closer to me. He lowers his voice when he speaks, “Lately… Olivia’s been pretty vocal about me not seeing Jewel anymore, even as friends.”

  “Do you blame her?” My question has a double meaning but he doesn’t catch it.

  Eddie shrugs. He doesn’t like talking about it. I honestly think Eddie thinks cheating isn’t a big deal. God, how was I ever even friends with him? Maybe it is a godsend that he’s not in my life anymore.

  He says, “I guess not.”

  “Had you been cheating with her?”

  “No. Not for a few years.”

  “So, what prompted Olivia’s change of heart?”

  “I really don’t know.”

  I wait. There’s more to the story, I can tell. Numi waits, too. Numi can outwait a polar shift.

  Eddie’s knee continues to bounce. Perhaps faster than before. Finally, he adds, “Well, maybe Jewel and I had been hanging out more often than usual.”

  I know Eddie well enough to guess, but I ask anyway, “Did you sleep with her?”

  Eddie shrugs, clearly a defensive gesture that I hadn’t known about my friend. Perhaps a new defensive gesture. Perhaps now he had something to be defensive about. “Yeah, I did.”

  “Did Olivia find out?”

  “I’m thinking she did.”

  “But you don’t know for sure?”

  “No. She never mentioned anything.”

  “Do you think Olivia killed Jewel, that it wasn’t a suicide?”

  Eddie shrugs and seems to consider this for the first time. His knee stops bouncing. “I don’t know. I don’t know anything, Jimmy. That’s why I’m here.”

  I nod, or I think I nod. “So what do you want me to do?”

  “Help me find Olivia. It’s not like her to be gone so long, or for me not to hear from her.”

  I know Olivia has left Jimmy before. I know this because on one such occasion she stayed with me. Eddie hadn’t liked that, but Eddie didn’t have a choice. I had been a perfect gentleman during her stay, but Olivia and I had, once again, shared some quiet moments together.

  I think about my words carefully before I say, “Do you think there’s a possibility that Olivia left you because you’re a lying, cheating scumbag?”

  Eddie looks up sharply. “That’s a shitty thing to say.”

  “Maybe,” I say. “But these days I speak my mind. I figure what’s the point in holding back?”

  “Well, it’s still shitty of you to say it like that. Even if you’re right, why would she leave now? Jewel’s dead. Cheating on Olivia with her is moot.”

  “Maybe she’s had enough of your shit, Eddie. Maybe she sees herself ending up like Jewel. I don’t know, but I do know one thing.”

  “What?”

  “She deserves better than you.”

  Eddie rises to his feet, chair scraping back. I don’t know what he intends to do, but he doesn’t get far. Numi grabs Eddie by the forearm. Numi makes no other movement. Hell, even his eyes are still half-closed as he stares ahead. He looks, if anything, bored. It’s a well-cultivated illusion. Numi, I know, sees everything.

  “Sit down, cowboy,” he says.

  Eddie doesn’t like to be grabbed, and he
doesn’t like Numi, either. I see him look away and contemplate leaving. If he leaves now I know I will never see my friend again, and perhaps I will never see Olivia again either. I had always assumed I would see her at least one more time. At least, I want to see her again to say good-bye.

  “I probably shouldn’t have said what I said, Eddie, but you know how I feel about you cheating on her.”

  “Because you love her.”

  “Because I care about her,” I correct. “Sit down.”

  He doesn’t sit immediately, and Numi hasn’t released him either. Finally, he shrugs off my Nigerian friend and sits again, folding his arms over his chest.

  “Good,” I say. “Who saw her last?”

  “The friend she was staying with.”

  “When?”

  “Almost two days ago. She told a friend she was going to take a hike in Elysian Park.”

  “When did she leave you?”

  He thinks about it. “Eight days ago.”

  “She had been with her friend the entire time?”

  “Yes, as far as I know.”

  “What’s her friend’s name?”

  “Karen Fitch.”

  “Do you know where she lives?”

  “Yes, in Echo Park. I can get the address for you.”

  He lapses into silence and so do I. All of us know that Elysian Park is where my brother disappeared some twenty-two years ago. My brother was nine years old. Eddie must have told Numi this, which is why Numi allowed Eddie to see me. Numi, my watchdog.

  I think my face might have twitched, but I try to keep it together when I ask, “Did she go alone?”

  “Yes.” Eddie is watching my face carefully. He knows how closely this is hitting me. Too damn closely.

  I count back two days. That would have been July 5. If she had gone to Elysian Park on the Fourth, I would have understood. People hiked and picnicked there to watch the fireworks at Dodger Stadium. I have done so a few times myself. Back in another lifetime.

  “Did she hike there often?” I ask. The question spills out before I can correct it. I’m already using the past tense for Olivia. That gut feeling.

  “Yes… she loves to hike. You know that.”

  “I haven’t seen her in two years, Eddie. I’m not sure what she likes anymore.”

  Eddie just nods. I can tell he’s reminding himself what a shitty friend he has been. I wonder if Eddie knows that Olivia and I had been Facebook friends. I chide myself for thinking in the past tense again.

  I nod to Numi. My friend picks up his notebook and pen. I ask Eddie a few brief questions. Numi begins writing. Eddie answers my questions as Numi takes notes for me. When I’ve gotten the most I can out of Eddie, I lapse into silence. I’m completely spent. More than spent. I’m nearly catatonic.

  “Meeting’s over,” says Numi.

  “What?” says Eddie, startled. “Just like that?”

  “Just like that,” says Numi. “The man needs to rest.”

  Eddie looks at me and I nod, or try to nod. He gets it. As he stands he says, “Help me find her, Jimmy. I don’t know who else to turn to.”

  “I will,” I say, and mean it.

  Eddie considers shaking my hand, decides against it. He settles for a half nod and says, “I’m sorry this happened to you, Jimmy.”

  “So am I.”

  He’s about to say something else, scratches it, then turns and walks away.

  Numi watches him go, then looks at me, then at my reddening arm. He makes a small, disapproving sound. He moves over and adjusts the umbrella above us so that the shade now falls across my forearm.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  I’m stretched out on my couch in my apartment in Los Feliz, which is a trendy, hilly district above Hollywood. I never pronounce Los Feliz correctly. Three years in this place and I still sometimes screw it up. There’s the gringo way and the Spanish way, except I can never remember which is which.

  Then again, I’ve got bigger fish to fry.

  Numi has come and gone, having already helped me over to my couch. Without his help, I might still be back at The Coffee Bean, slowly burning alive and hopped up on lattes.

  Most of my life I’ve been uncomfortable touching other men. Hell, I’ve even been uncomfortable getting too close to women, too, which is the reason I’m alone to this day, but that’s a whole other issue.

  Mostly, I am uncomfortable receiving help from anyone. My disease has changed all that, of course. Now I am forced to receive help. To rely on another person. To rely on a man. A gay man, no less.

  But I’ve drawn the line at help in the bathroom. I tell Numi that if I fall over on the toilet then I guess I’m just meant to die on the toilet. Numi just shakes his head. That he would help me in the bathroom blows my mind. What friend would do that? Numi would. Still, it’s just too much for me to handle. I’m already uncomfortable enough as it is.

  Twice, I have fallen in the bathroom. Once, I knocked myself out, hitting my head on the doorjamb. Hours later, I awakened in a pool of my own blood. I never told Numi about it, and luckily, my hair hid the goose egg.

  I just might die in the bathroom after all.

  Anyway, Numi places the remote control on the coffee table next to me, along with my cell phone, my Kindle, and a bottled water. He tells me he will check on me in a few hours, stands briefly at the door, watches me silently, and then leaves.

  I have mixed emotions about Numi. He is a good friend—of that there is no doubt. That he overly fusses over me, there is no doubt of that, either. His homosexuality never bothers me, but it is in my thoughts. I sometimes wonder if there is more to why he helps me so much. I wonder if he likes me in a different way, perhaps more than just friends. Whether or not he does shouldn’t matter. But it does matter, and it makes me keep him at arm’s length. It is also, I suspect, the reason I snap at him sometimes.

  Whether or not I hurt him with my snapping, I don’t know. But I suspect I do. I try to not do it. I try to be a better person, and then I remember I am dying and I don’t care if I am a better person. After all, what does it matter if I grow as a person if I’m going to die soon?

  Still, I don’t want to hurt Numi, but I hate that I need his help.

  I think these thoughts as I rest my eyes, suddenly aware that Numi has also tucked a blanket around me. I don’t remember him tucking a blanket around me. Sometimes my mind leaves me. I can’t explain it entirely. Sometimes I’m here, but then sometimes I’m not. My thoughts are often scattered and hard to nail down. I feel like death will occur when my thoughts are so scattered that my mind never returns. It is a scary thought, but a real one.

  I try not to think about it too much.

  A part of me wants to sit up and read, or turn on the TV, or do anything other than just lie here, but moving doesn’t even seem to be an option. If Numi were here, I would ask him to turn on the TV. He’s not here, though. I want him here, but I don’t want him here.

  My sickness forces me to grow closer to Numi. I don’t want to grow closer to him. I like our comfortable distance. There is no comfortable distance anymore, not when he’s putting on my seat belt for me.

  When my eyes close, the chaotic images come. The chaotic images worry me. Mostly they don’t make sense. Sometimes I will see snatches of something that does make sense, only to watch it quickly morph into something incomprehensible. I am certain I am losing my mind.

  As I watch something that starts out as an octopus, only to morph into balls of light and then streaks of colors, I try to sleep. I try not to think that death might really just be losing one’s mind forever. So scattered that it never comes back.

  I know I am close to death because whenever I lay back and close my eyes, I never, ever want to sit up again. Or open my eyes again. And as I lie there, I can feel the cancer in my lungs, eating away at me.

  With thoughts of death, losing my mind, and disease, it’s no wonder I can’t sleep. And as I lie there and flit in and out of consciousness, waiting for death, waiting
for Numi, wanting to be alone, but not wanting to die alone, my cell phone rings from somewhere. It sounds far away, and the ringing somehow merges with the chaotic images in my thoughts. I know that the ringing is coming from my cell phone, but I don’t care. I don’t even care that my mind seems broken and scattered and gone. I especially don’t care about my dying body. But I do care how good it feels to rest.

  So nice, I think. So nice…

  Sometimes the swirling images, the indescribable prisms of lights, morph into people. But often just one. Usually this person seems to be standing nearby, often in the corner of this very room, watching me. I’ve even gone as far as to open my eyes to catch whoever is in the room with me, but no one is there. I’ve made it all up. My dying mind has made it all up.

  Sometimes I call out to Numi, expecting to find my friend in the room with me, but he’s not there. I’m all alone with my scattered, incoherent thoughts. Dying is the ultimate hallucinogen. The final hallucinogen.

  But now, as the phone continues to ring, one of these bright beings of light steps forward. The blazing white image is someone I recognize. Someone I’ve grown quite fond of. It is Olivia, Eddie’s missing wife. She has beautiful black hair that’s oddly translucent in the light. She does not smile and I see why: her mouth is bloody. So is her neck. Her neck, I see, has a deep gash that has opened down to her throat. If I look hard enough, I can see inside her throat.

  Sweet Jesus.

  I gasp and sit up, and the vision is gone instantly. I scan the room wildly, but I’m alone. Late afternoon sunlight splashes across my apartment living room. I blink hard. Olivia, complete with her open neck, had been standing right here in the light.

  My phone is still ringing. Numi had set my phone to ring nearly a dozen times before it goes to voice mail. He wants me to have the extra time needed to get to it. What Numi wants, he gets.

  Still looking around, shaken by the bloody image of Olivia, I reach for the phone and swipe it on. I don’t bother to see who’s calling. Hell, it’s all I can do not to drop the damn thing.

  “Hello?” I say. Or I think I say. My mind isn’t entirely here.