She scowled at me as if she didn’t think I was being sincere. She was quiet for half a minute and then asked a strange question. “Anyway. My mom had said Dad’s condition was pretty bad. I’m guessing you saw it in the year you spent with him. How did that play out?”
I shrugged. “His PTSD wasn’t so bad. He had nightmares, and he’d wake up screaming some nights, but other inmates had it worse. Seizures and such.”
Lucy turned her head slightly. “Yeah, I know his PTSD wasn’t so bad. I was talking about the serious condition he had.” She pierced her eyes at me. “You did know about his condition, right?”
Her repeated emphasis on the word was startling. I instantly dug into every single memory of Charlie that I had, trying to come up with anything that seemed like a condition. He didn’t have Spotted-Lung or anything like that. Did the cigarettes get to him? I had never had any problems breathing. The more I thought about it, the more it was clear that I had no idea what she was talking about. I couldn’t simply let her know that though.
“I promise you, Lucy, your father and I were close. Are you sure he had something else wrong with him? Are you sure you aren’t getting it mixed up with his PTSD? You were pretty young when you knew him.”
Her face stiffened, and she asked her questions more firmly. “Did you or did you not know about his condition?”
I tried to ease the situation by acknowledging my ignorance. “Well, maybe he didn’t want someone in jail knowing he had a major weakness.” I nodded, trying to be persuasive. “What was wrong with him?”
Lucy calmly sipped her coffee, placed it on the table and pushed her thumb into the payment acceptor, then stood up. “I don’t know how you found me or how you know what you know, but we’re done. You clearly didn’t know Dad.”
What the hell was wrong with Charlie? How bad could it have been? What did it mean for me? Bewilderment seized me longer than I would have liked. By the time I snapped out of it, Lucy was by the exit. “Lucy, wait! Give me a chance to explain.”
She opened the door as I popped up from the seat to follow.
A robotic voice came from the table. “Please provide payment for your order before leaving the shop. Thanks!”
“Dammit!” I turned around, jammed my thumb in, got the green light, and looked back.
Lucy was gone. I darted out of the diner and spilled onto the sidewalk. I looked left and then right, but Lucy was nowhere in sight.
I put my hands up on my head. “Shit!”
What the hell was wrong with Charlie? The implications of Lucy’s revelation should have scared me to death. Instead, I was regretful and furious. The day I had moved out of Charlie’s old apartment, I was ready to put this shit behind me. I allowed the letter to suck me right back in. It shouldn’t have surprised me that the more I dug, the deeper and darker the rabbit hole became.
I shook my head and walked down the street, wondering if I should just give up on ever fully knowing the truth about Charlie’s life. Yet, the knowledge I had just been given felt like a dormant disease that could come alive at any moment and spell certain doom for me, and worse, Helen. It didn’t feel right trying to hunt down Lucy for more information.
I pulled out my netphone to try a different angle. “Hi, Junior. Can we meet somewhere private?”
He agreed to pick me up, and I found a nearby bus stop bench to sit for twenty minutes. He pulled up and rolled down the window. “Do I want to know why you’re on this side of the city?”
I shook my head. “Long story.” I climbed into the passenger seat and turned to him. “Where we headed?”
His eyebrow went up, confessing his suspicion of me, but it quickly went down. He looked away. “I’ll take you back to my new office. It’s hack-proof, so we can speak freely.”
I nodded, and we drove the thirty minutes to the edge of Marktown where his building was located. It was an impressive old, stone structure with Roman-style architecture. “Wow. It had to be a fortune to bring this place up to code!”
“Nah, I had two things going for me. It was one of the last derelict buildings in the neighborhood, so the mayor sold it to me for next to nothing. Better yet, one of my first paying gigs was for an architect whose husband had been cheating on her. I gave her lawyers everything they needed to prove it, and she paid me in services and cash. It was a win-win.”
Junior tapped the unlock app on his netphone, and the front door clicked.
The lacquer still smelled fresh as we took the stairs to the second floor. He opened the large wooden double doors to his office, and the lights turned on as we walked in. It was immediately clear that he and I had similar tastes in interior design. It was spacious with two sets of micro-leather couches and chairs symmetrically lining a path to his desk near the rear of the room. The desk was newer and trendy-looking, mostly stained wood with matted steel on the corners and bottom. It did an excellent job of bringing the other furniture together with the rest of the room’s décor.
I sat down in a chair with my back to the door. Behind his desk were two large windows that let in the late afternoon sun. Junior’s classy office helped my angst subside for a moment. “Nice place,” I said, still gazing all around.
He sat on the other side of the desk. “Thanks. It sure beats my dining room. Now, what did you need to talk about?”
I felt like a real client, and I wanted to offer some kind of compensation. “You know I don’t have much, but I want to hire you.”
He waved me off. “I told you. Leading me to my father was payment enough for any job. Now, what is it?”
I took a deep breath and let my words flow. “That’s what it’s about. Sort of. I hoped that dealing with your father would bring me peace, and I’d be able to get on with my life. But it turns out that it wasn’t that easy.”
Junior scowled. “Are you in danger? Is someone after you and Helen?”
I frowned. “No one’s after us, but I don’t know if I am in danger. I was hoping you’d be able to help me figure that out.” I turned away for a second, then back. “Are you able to obtain medical records for someone from nearly twenty years ago?”
Junior’s face confessed he was mulling it over. “Hm. They were using HIPAA seventy-ten back then. I guess I haven’t tried. What are you looking for?”
“A…family member of mine may have had a…a condition, and I might have it, too. I need to know so that I can get treatment.”
Junior squinted his eyes. “Why don’t you have your doctor screen you? Seems like you’d get better, faster results than digging into the past.”
I shook my head. “I would, but I have no idea what I’m looking for, and I don’t have the money for a full-body scan. I also kind of want this to be discrete, if you know what I mean.”
He turned his head just a bit. “How did you find out about this condition?”
I tried to come up with a good lie in my head, but it was clear there was only one way for me to proceed if I wanted the truth. “It’s related to the long story from the eastside. You’ve done enough for me, Junior. I’m willing to tell you everything, how I knew your father and what I’m up to now, if that’s what it takes.”
Junior stared at me for a moment, then smiled. “That’s okay, Ryan. Just know that I won’t be breaking anymore laws. If I can’t find what you’re looking for or I’m not allowed, that will be that.”
“That’s all I’m asking, Junior. As always, thanks for your help.”
He nodded. “So, what’s the name of your family member?”
I took a deep breath. “A man by the name of Charlie Rios.”
Junior froze in his seat as if he’d lost air, and a pained look washed over his face. A few moments later, he swallowed hard. “You’re…related to Charlie…Rios? How?”
Shock came over me. It had never occurred to me that Junior would probably know Charlie since they were in Marktown
at the same time, but in all the memories I had had, Junior had never come up once. As far as I was concerned, Charlie never knew about Junior.
“You know him?”
Junior’s eyes became wide. “Know him?” He gave a nervous grin. “Charlie Rios was the baddest dude my father had ever employed. No one messed with Dad if Charlie was around. We used to joke at the station that Charlie was actually running things. The day everything fell through for my dad was the same day Charlie had gotten into a car accident and been arrested. I always assumed those two events were related somehow, but they’d swept it under the rug so fast, I was never able to connect the dots.”
My shock turned into confusion. Apparently, Charlie had a condition, and hearsay had him as some kind of monster. Involuntarily, I asked the question to which I really didn’t want the answer. “Wait, what do you mean he was the ‘baddest dude’? What did he do?”
Even though we were alone in his secure office, Junior leaned in and lowered his voice. “He was the boogie man of the force. Rumor was he had some kind of switch he’d learned in the military. He’d be talking to someone one second, but once he got his orders, he’d disappear. Those nights, any crimes committed were blamed on him. Bodies, fires, extortion. Everyone assumed it was Charlie.”
A switch? Bodies? Fires? None of it made any sense. Charlie was more than conflicted about his time with the Padre, and he never took on the real dangerous jobs, just security and delivery. So, how on Earth could he have developed such a sinister reputation, one that would scare an entire police force? It had to be like the man-eating feral dog stories spread about the Padre. Yeah, that had to be it. Sometimes, mystique could take on a life of its own and people would run wild with it in their imaginations.
I cleared my throat. “Yes, well, I think those rumors were just that. Things that bad guys told other bad guys to keep everyone scared. From what I knew about Charlie, he was actually a really good guy.”
Junior shrugged and eased back into his seat. “That would be a twist. But I guess since I never met the guy, there’s no telling.” He shook his head. “Anyway, what kind of medical records did you want on him? Dental? Something else?”
Relieved he’d changed the subject back to the request, I sighed. “Again, I don’t know. Any diseases that could have been harmful or fatal? Really anything you can find.”
He nodded. “I’ll see. It’ll take me a little time going back that far, if I can find anything at all. It shouldn’t be more than a few days or a week tops. I’ll message you.”
“That’s great. Thanks again, Junior.” I stood up and shook Junior’s hand just as my netphone buzzed with an incoming call. It was Helen. “I better take this.”
Junior motioned me to the far side of the room for privacy, and I headed over there, turned off hologram mode, and put the netphone to my ear.
“Ryan! Where are you?! Come home now!”
I spoke through my teeth. “Helen! I’m with Junior. What’s wrong? Are you okay?!”
“No, dammit. I’m at home. I need you.”
She hung up.
Panic replaced all my other feelings, and I turned back to Junior. “Can you take me to my place right now? Something’s not right with Helen.”
He popped up. “Let’s go.”
It was the longest 25-minute ride, and I couldn’t think clearly enough to talk with Junior on the way. Finally, we arrived outside the building, and Junior voiced his concern.
“Want me to come up with you?”
“You’ve done enough, Junior. I’ll call you if I need anything.”
“That works. Good luck.”
I dashed into the building and up to my floor. I approached the door, noticing it was already cracked open. Instantly on alert, I silently pushed the door open and peered around, finding nothing out of the ordinary. I snooped around the living room and headed for our bedroom. Again, the door was cracked, and I nudged it. My jaw dropped.
All over the walls, the same phrase was sloppily written in red paint over and over.
Simon says
Simon says
Simon says
Simon says
Terror was completely taking hold of me when I heard a faint noise from the corner behind the bed. It was hard to look away from the walls, but I finally looked over. Helen was hugging her knees and crying. She was covered in red.
I rushed to her side.
Staring off, she didn’t even flinch or look at me. She spoke slowly with a shudder. “He didn’t say Simon says.”
“What? Who’s he? Are you okay?”
“You must follow his instructions, but only if Simon says.”
“Helen, it’s Ryan. I’m here. What are you talking about?”
She shook her head and pointed to the walls as her face changed from depressed to livid, and she bellowed out the most horrifying phrase. “What the hell have I done? I’m pure evil.”
Chapter 10:
Observe and Reflect
What the hell have I done? I am pure evil. Dr. Martin sat at his desk and gave the wall an intense, existential stare.
Billions of years ago, without rhyme or reason, the most epic explosion flipped the binary switch of existence. The boundless void of absolute nothingness that had always been was instantly supplanted. Bits and pieces of stuff suddenly appeared everywhere. Matter and antimatter were; whereas, they previously weren’t. And just like that, infinite emptiness was replaced with limitless possibility.
Unsurprisingly, things did what things do. They happened upon each other. In some cases, these meetings occurred with unimaginable force. These immensely powerful collisions brought on obvious change to the opposing forces. However, something completely different began to happen as well. Grains of space-time sand clustered into quarks. Then, quarks bunched into atoms. Next, atoms grouped into solids, liquids, gasses, and plasmas. Eventually, countless mineral clusters had come into existence and continued to float about space. Sometime later, an even more awe-inspiring and seemingly less likely event transpired. Something so unfathomably improbable that it had to be regarded as a miracle.
Life.
Earth is an astonishingly stunning example of the miraculous spontaneity of the known universe. The perfectly precise elements and conditions came together on a tiny, blue planet, in an otherwise unremarkable solar system, allowing animated beings to come into existence. Every single organism, large or small, sentient or not, defied the ludicrous odds that made them living, versus the unimaginable majority of everything else in the entire universe that is inert. The living are but a fraction of an infinitesimal fraction. The tip of the tip of a needle in the expansive haystack that is the cosmos. And somehow, happenstance still happened upon us, and therein lies the problem.
Like a working-class grunt who holds a winning lottery ticket, he stands looking at the Door to Revolutionary Change. He reaches into his pocket to find the Key of Random, Dumb Luck. As he inserts the key and feels it work, a disconnect develops between the extraordinary effort almost always needed to significantly and positively alter one’s position in life and the undeniable benefits of such an unlikely transformation. Riches are suddenly thrust upon him, someone who had slaved his entire life for a barely livable wage.
It’s no secret that stumbling upon unearned riches through an overwhelmingly improbable raffle can have countless side effects. When an expansive chasm opens between one’s fortune and one’s effort, otherwise skeptical individuals can be bamboozled into thinking that simple victories should always result in enormous wealth. In that sense, as complex and fascinating as we cognizant creatures are, one of our greatest, most fearsome foes is winning easy. It has the ability to reduce us to our simplest form.
Egomaniacal, conniving assholes.
This torturous meditation was the latest addition to Martin’s daily routine, and he’d do it three to four hours a day. When
ever he found himself alone, without anyone or anything to distract him, paralysis would set in. He’d think about everything and nothing simultaneously. It was during this time that he observed his body and senses rebelling against him.
His eyes ceased to focus. Everything became vague blobs that his mind refused to interpret in any normal way. He no longer saw colors, but varying degrees of the visual representation of pain.
His ears also betrayed him. He couldn’t hear anything but the malevolent song being played by the demons that still haunted him. He longed for them to make good on their threat to take his life. It was becoming obvious that torture was their only intent.
His sense of touch produced agony without external stimulus. His skin burned fiercely as if he was sitting in a fire. He’d often looked down at his arms, expecting to see bubbling flesh. But they looked normal.
Food had been reduced to simple nutrients. Everything tasted of sorrow. He would only eat when the pangs forced his hand. Even then, he’d gag after a few bites.
Literal exhaustion was the only thing that made Martin sleep. But he didn’t rest. His mind wouldn’t let him forget what he had done. What he’d been forced to do. But what he had done.
He’d murdered his lover. He’d murdered his peer. He’d murdered a genuinely good person. In doing so, he’d robbed the world of one of its most brilliant and ethical minds. Riding on others’ coattails had been bad enough. Getting more credit than them was always unsettling. But to Martin, his legacy had been cemented as he watched helplessly while Dr. Jessica Campbell was being wiped from the annals of history while his name was simultaneously elevated higher than ever. It was the legacy of the world’s biggest fraud, and he knew no one would ever label him as such. Except himself. That was the worst part.
Circling the drain of despair, Martin thought it was fitting that he couldn’t revel in his latest scientific breakthrough. He hadn’t thought it possible to feel like any bigger phony than he had the last few years, but as he reached the limits of his ability to torment himself, he was once again confronted with the fact that he was not the right conductor for the job. As badly as he’d treated himself, it wasn’t even close to what he thought he deserved.
Between Two Minds: Revelation Page 16