"Don't get uppity. Basically there's been a problem in physics for the last few decades."
"Only one?" said Scott.
"If you're going to keep interrupting...," began Lynette.
Scott wrapped his hands around his hot cocoa and grinned impishly. "Never," he said.
"The basic problem is that Einstein's theories of general relativity - which is a fancy term for gravity - doesn't get along too well with some parts of quantum physics. So some brainiacs came up with string theory as a way to reconcile the parts that don't work. Instead of things being made of matter or energy - or both, as Einstein thought - string theory says that all objects in our universe are made up of either vibrating filaments called strings, or something called branes."
"Brains? As in the thing zombies eat?"
"No, not brains, branes. B-R-A-N-E-S. I think it's short for membranes." Lynette took a moment to sip at her own cocoa before continuing. "Anyway, string theory, uh, theorizes that there's this connection called supersymmetry that exists between different types of particles in our universe. The supersymmetry theory is that there are two types of particles called bosons and fermions, and there is exactly one fermion for every boson."
"Supersymmetry: the Love Connection of string theory."
"Not far wrong," said Lynette. "So one of the neat things about string theory is that it allows for different dimensions to exist. Seems to insist on it, in fact. And each particle - or string, or whatever, I'm probably screwing this up, but it's the best I can do - has a partner in one of the other dimensions. Superpartners."
"Wonder Twin Powers, activate!"
Lynette rolled her eyes, but couldn't help but laugh a bit as well. "So anyway, there are all these different kinds of string theory. In the nineteen seventies, string theories were shown to require extra dimensions, but the physicists were still arguing about what set of mathematical equations were the right ones. But in the mid-nineties, a guy named Edward Witten -"
"As in, 'Witten was white.'"
"Right," nodded Lynette. "He proposed M-theory, which was basically a way of showing that all the major superstring theories were really one and the same, just viewed from different angles."
"And that's where you've lost me again."
Lynette thought for a moment. "You ever seen those pictures where one person looks at it and it seems to be an old crone, but another person looks at the same picture and it appears to that person as if it is a beautiful young woman?"
Scott nodded. "Optical illusions."
"Right! That's what this Witten guy did. He basically said that the strings that compose the universe, since they are strings, can be wrapped around things in different ways. So if you look at them in one configuration, you get one mathematical superstring theory, but if you look at them in another configuration, you get a different mathematical superstring theory. So it's not that any of the theories were incorrect, it's just that they were different ways of looking at the building blocks of the universe."
Scott was silent for a long moment, sipping his cocoa. And for some reason, Lynette was fine with that. Some people had to fill every moment with conversation, for no other reason than because they were afraid to be alone together. But she didn't feel that way around Scott. Just being beside him, working in unison on this problem of what was going on with Kevin - and, by extension, on the problem of Mr. Gray and John Doe - was enough for her. If he wanted to talk, fine. If not, she could think of far worse ways to spend an evening than sitting beside him.
Finally, he spoke. "Extra dimensions, huh?"
"Yeah, that's what this says. I think. Of course, it could be that I've just been reading a really detailed recipe for lemon cake with as much as I know about the stuff. But yeah, extra dimensions are definitely mentioned all over the place. Why?"
Scott said nothing for another moment, sipping his cocoa as though savoring it were the most important thing he had to do. Finally he spoke.
"Do you think Mr. Gray is from another dimension?"
Lynette almost guffawed in spite of herself. "Another dimension like, The Twilight Zone or The Outer Limits kind of thing? Little green men and wormholes in space?"
Scott nodded. He didn't look like he was on the verge of laughing, either. In fact, he looked more serious than she had seen him since she brought up the whole idea of string theory.
"No, I don't think so," she finally said.
Scott nodded. "Me neither. I think that Mr. Gray was a hitman, pure and simple, who got caught up in this somehow just like we did. But," he said, and reached across the table to take her hand as though the importance of what he was about to say demanded physical contact, "here's a tougher question: do you think John Doe might be from another dimension?" Before Lynette could answer, he continued, "I mean, think about it: he disappears and reappears, seemingly at will; he knows things about the future, like where and when you and Kevin were going to move into the area; and he frankly just seems slightly off to me, like he doesn't belong somehow."
"I thought you said he was nice."
"Oh, he seemed nice enough, with the exception of knocking me down and drugging me. But he just seemed...I don't know. He seemed like he didn't belong here somehow." Scott leaned back. "I could just be talking out of my behind."
Lynette glanced below the table. "It's not a bad behind to be talking out of."
Scott blushed, which Lynette would have thought was immensely cute if she had not been intensely blushing herself.
What possessed me to say that? she thought to herself.
The she looked down and realized that, although Scott had just leaned back, he had not relinquished his hold on her hand. As though he, too, realized the same thing at that instant, Scott started to withdraw his hand. But she clenched her fingers tightly around his and did not let him go.
Her son was suddenly writing mathematical equations so complex that she had no chance of doing more than figuring out the general idea of the general idea of what he was typing about.
A man known only as John Doe had apparently decided to serve as some kind of part-time adviser from another dimension.
And there was a madman after her, Kevin, and Scott, who apparently had supernatural abilities and certainly had the will and skill to kill.
But in that moment, all of that seemed very far away. All that seemed up close and important, right then, was his hand. His fingers intertwined with hers. His eyes looking closely at her.
And his smile resting as light as a cloud on her face.
***
30.
***
Scott finally left Lynette's house at a bit past three in the morning. And didn't want to.
But he knew that they both felt that they had played out their "research" for the time being when, still holding hands, Lynette asked, "What about Kevin?"
"Well, he's what started this whole line of questioning, obviously," answered Scott.
"'Obviously,'" Lynette quoted, and stuck out her tongue in mock anger. "What a perfectly male answer." But he noted that she didn't pull her hand away from his. In a way it made him nervous: he hadn't held anyone in any way since Amy's death, so to suddenly find himself holding hands with someone as intelligent, beautiful, sassy, and bright as Lynette was the very definition of jumping in at the deep end.
Even so, as nervous as it made him, it didn't come close to making him nervous enough to withdraw his hand.
"Did you have something more in mind?" he asked.
"Yes. Have you forgotten today?"
Scott pursed his lips and mulled that over. He knew Lynette was no longer talking about the complicated mathematical information that Kevin had typed - and probably had been typing for some time before today. Even he knew enough about autism to know that some autistic children had gifts of extreme intellectual ability. Though he doubted that, if investigated, either of them would be able to find an autistic child who was gifted to the level that Kevin had shown himself to be.
No, he knew she wa
s talking about the other thing. The thing that had brought them together today. The event at the supermarket where Kevin had stopped a family from dying, and probably more from being injured, by his actions.
How had he done that? Though autistics possessed prodigious mental abilities in some arenas, he doubted that foresight would be listed as one of them on any of the many autistic support groups or listservs that Lynette had told him about.
So how had it happened? What had Kevin done? Had he merely seen the future in some way? Or was it more than that; more complex than that?
Scott did not know. Though he suspected that, if revealed, Kevin's "gift" would not show itself to be something as simple or easily explained as mere foresight. No, something much deeper - more fundamental - than a psychic trick had to be involved. Scott didn't know how he knew it but he felt it in his bones. It was the same feeling he would have had if someone had asked how he knew he was human. Of course there were characteristics that could be examined, DNA samples that could be taken, other tests that could be run. But the simplest and most convincing answer to Scott was that he simply knew he was human; that he simply thought it, and simply was.
He didn't say all this to Lynette, however. For one thing, he didn't have the words to express it in a way that would drive home the certainty that he had in this area. For another, he would have felt silly even trying, since his certainty amounted to no more than a certainty of a negative: that Kevin was not merely a mind reader or a fortuneteller, but something of much more fundamental importance than that.
So he shrugged, and said, "You got me there. I have no idea what to make of Kevin." He tapped a pile of papers: a printout of some of the work they had discovered on Kevin's laptop. "Though I think we should send this to some college professors or something as soon as possible to be tested."
"You want Kevin to be tested?" said Lynette, and now she did withdraw her hand from his, and it felt like a substantial part of Scott's life had departed with it.
"No," said Scott, both aching for the return of her hand to his and at the same time wondering at how much of what he had thought was dead inside that this woman had managed to awaken. "I don't think it would be a good idea for anyone to test Kevin. I meant I think we should just send these papers anonymously, via a made-up email or something, to some physics professor at the U of I or Boise State or some other college around here; see what they say."
"What do you think that could tell us?"
Scott shrugged again. "Don't know. Though I suspect that whoever we send the stuff to will either want to fall down at the feet of whoever wrote it and worship him, or will want to stone him as some sort of modern-day practitioner of dark arts." He grinned, but there was more than a little bit of seriousness hiding behind the uptilted corners of his mouth. "Those are the two most likely responses in academia whenever you do something extraordinary."
And that was the end of things. Sadly - very sadly, he reflected - there was no more hand-holding. Not that Lynette grew angry or withdrawn in any way; she was still as bright, interesting, and interested seeming as she had been at any time in the night. Just the moment for hand-holding had passed, and both of them seemed to know it equally.
He bid her goodnight soon after, promising to call her the next day as soon as he awoke so they could talk some more about this mystery that not only fascinated them both but, he suspected, was also a matter of survival for them all.
The drive home was more difficult than he would have believed. Not only was he going back to an empty house, but he was going back to a house that he now knew would seem even more empty than ever before, because not only was he alone...but Lynette was not going to be there. That sounded like a silly thing to say, even in his own mind, but he knew it was true. Something had happened tonight, and being alone no longer meant merely that he was in a place where no one else was present. It meant being in a place - even a crowded room - where Lynette was not at.
And Kevin. Kevin, who was so beautiful of face that it made Scott want to cry, so soft of spirit that he couldn't even look at you straight on because such a connection would overwhelm his tender heart, so good of soul that he had braved the terror of being alone in a supermarket parking lot - something that Lynette had impressed on him was completely extraordinary in much the same way that a man throwing himself on a hand grenade to save his comrades would be - in order to save a stranger and her baby.
Kevin who was just about the same age Chad had been when taken from Scott.
But unlike most boys that age, who just made Scott ache with longing and sadness, Kevin made him feel...whole. As though he had found someone who, while not replacing Chad or usurping his position as Scott's son in any way, had nonetheless found a way to heal the open wound in Scott's heart that Chad's passing had left behind.
Kevin and Lynette. Lynette and Kevin. A family.
His new family.
What? he thought in surprise. Where did that come from?
But he knew the answer even as he asked it. It came from the same place that his life with Amy had come from.
For the second time in his life, Scott had found people who made him remember what it was to live in the happiness and almost unimaginable wonder of "once upon a time."
Once upon a time, Scott Cowley found a second family.
He smiled.
Then he felt the steering wheel spin under his hand. For a split second he thought that something had gone dreadfully wrong with the steering in his car. But only for a split second.
Because in the next fraction of a second he realized that he had turned the wheel. And not merely turned it; he had spun it like a stunt driver rounding a corner of an obstacle course, like a presidential driver spinning the wheel of an armored limo to avoid a hail of machine-gun fire.
And in the fraction of a second after he realized that he was the one doing it, he also realized why. It was his sixth sense again, his cop sense. Picking up on something that he had not noticed consciously until several eternally long moments later.
Scott looked around and, even as he continued spinning the wheel to catch up to what he had seen, he felt his jaw drop in horror, surprise, and rage.
Not tonight, he thought. Not this night, not this wonderful night.
As quick as that, all thoughts of the wonders of Kevin's mind, the joys of Lynette's smile, and the terrifying magnificence of once upon a time all flew from his mind, replaced by a single thing.
Mr. Gray. Standing in an alley on the side of the street.
Smiling at him.
Beckoning to him.
***
31.
***
There was no mistaking it this time. This was not John Doe, or any other old man. This was actually Mr. Gray, and he was - unbelievably - waving in a chipper manner to Scott. As though the two were best friends and Mr. Gray wanted nothing more serious than to say hi to a passing pal.
Scott kept spinning the wheel, feeling his car fishtail beneath him, but even after eight-going-on-nine years, he still retained enough of his driving skills that he was able to maintain control of the car as it turned.
He brought it around so that it was directed at the alleyway, and gunned the engine.
Mr. Gray turned, and ran into the alley.
Scott could see instantly that the alleyway was too narrow to admit the car. He would have to go on foot.
He reached over into the glove compartment of his car, flipped it open, and withdrew the gun he kept in there. Obtaining a concealed weapon permit in Idaho was much easier than it was in many states, especially if the applicant was an ex-cop whose family had been butchered by an unknown fugitive still-at-large. So Scott had made sure that he kept the gun in his car at all times. Not that he had ever planned on meeting up with Mr. Gray while driving, but he also didn't intend to be stripped of his protections just because he no longer had his badge.
So he withdrew the gun, opened the door, and ran after Mr. Gray.
And entered Hell.
"Oh, no," he whispered. "Please, God, no."
Somehow, he was back in the alley. The alley. He knew it instantly; it had featured in most of his nightmares for the last eight years. He could see every aspect of it in his mind at any time, and here it was, reproduced to perfection. Only this time the alley was not located in the safe though disquieting recesses of his mind, it was somehow, impossibly, real.
Scott felt the gun drop from his nerveless fingers as he tried to quell the scream that even now wanted to rise up within him; wanted to rip itself free from his throat and never, ever stop.
"Neat trick, eh?" said a voice at his elbow.
And Scott did scream then, a small shout that came out of him without meaning to, as he spun around.
And saw Mr. Gray.
Scott stooped for his gun immediately, but the weapon was gone.
Mr. Gray held it up.
"I've learned a few things over the years, Cowley," he said. His tone was light and airy, but his face was twisted in rage and madness. The coexistence of such radically different expressions in voice and face were almost as disquieting as anything else that was going on. To see such warring feelings was to see madness incarnate, something that Scott had hoped never to witness again.
But there it was. Right in front of him and dressed in a gray suit, with eyes that glimmered with insanity once hidden but now brought out into the open by whatever forces had so aged the killer in the eight years since the death of Scott's family.
And even that was wrong. The killer even looked wrong. The last time that Scott had seen him was in the ride from Los Angeles to Meridian, the night that Mr. Gray had appeared as a black dog and chased him through the night before then turning into the form of an old man. Six years had passed since that night, six years that had added lines to the corners of Scott's eyes and pulled his hairline back bit by bit.
The Meridians Page 20