All concept of time had been lost, and I felt as if I had simply been asleep. There were no visions, dreams or feel-good fantasies. I hoped I’d done just that, fallen asleep and merely had a nightmare. I stretched my legs and fingers dropping the tablets and pens on the floor at Kevin’s feet.
“I must have fallen asleep,” I said, and quickly gathered the tablets and stuffed them under the bed sheets. That’s when I noticed the empty bags of chips, and cans of soda that littered the bed and floor. “Are you finished? Everything working?”
“You were cooking steaks on the grill and then,” he said while air writing with both hands. He had what Pop would call a shit-eating grin on his face.
“Don’t jump to conclusions,” I interrupted.
“I’ve long since passed conclusions.” He picked up his garbage and dusted the crumbs off the bed. “When I saw it, I was…I was…fuck I don’t know what I was but it blew my fucking mind.”
I laughed to diffuse him. “I don’t know what you think you saw but.”
“No. Don’t make up a lie. I know what I saw. I know you’re Patient Crew,” he said. “I’ve studied both books.”
“I’m not a crew or a patient. What do I owe you?”
“Owe me? You don’t owe me anything.”
“I owe you for the work you’ve done. I intend to pay you and take you home. Now what do I owe you?”
“Wait here.”
He went into the living room and came back with his backpack. He took out an all too familiar book and thumbed through the pages. “Here it is,” he sat next to me on the bed and held my hand as he read. “The Poet says: Someone to help the water bearer. Her time will soon run short. A portly man is he who sees her. Now welcomed to our court. Noble he will become. As he sees what she has done. There’s more, should I continue?”
I pulled my hand away from his grasp, and stood up taking the book from him to look at the page he was reading. What Kevin failed to mention but pointed out with a chubby finger was how the poem created an anagram. He had circled the first letter to each new line, and it spelled Shanna. I handed him the book and said the first thought that came to mind. “Get out of my house.”
“Oh hell no, I’m not going anywhere besides what am I supposed to do, walk?” His laugh shook the bed making the old wood frame groan.
“I don’t care if you have to crawl just get out. You don’t want to be a part of this and I don’t need you.” I went to the living room, and he followed. “If you don’t leave, I’ll call the cops.”
“Go ahead call them I’m not leaving,” he said and sat on the chair with arms crossed. “Looks as though we’ve got ourselves a standoff.”
I stood next to the chair pulling his arm. “Look at you, little white girl,” he laughed. “I bet you don’t tip the scales above a hundred.”
“I’m stronger than I look,” I said. Who was I kidding? He could lay me out before I saw it coming.
“You don’t have to be tough around me. I’m not going to hurt you,” he said.
I leaned against the wall facing him. “What time is it?”
“Nine-forty,” he said looking at his watch.
“Can’t be,” I argued. “It’s light out the sun’s not even down. Wait a minute what day is it?”
“You’ve been out for while,” he explained. “You were cooking the steaks I ate yours…hope you don’t mind. But, then all the sudden you were on the bed writing with both hands and turning the pages and writing again…fucking awesome.”
“You already said that, and I’m not amused by your amorousness. So it was around noon when I started, how long did I write?” Kevin sat up straight and stared at the wall beside me. He looked like an android dialing into his memory banks.
“You wrote for approximately six hours without stopping. You then laid yourself out on the bed and slept until three thirty-six AM then sat up and started writing again. Your eyes were closed, and you appeared to be in a state of sleep. That lasted until six eighteen AM at which point you lay back on the bed and slept until nine thirty-seven AM. You woke up and that brings us to the present,” he looked in my eyes. “Is that what you wanted?”
“None of this is what I wanted. I shouldn’t have brought you here. This is a huge mistake.” I slid down the wall and sat on the floor holding my head in my hands. “I’ve fucked up everything.”
“You did what you were supposed to do. You need me and I can prove it.” Kevin started to sway with eyes closed while humming, and sang: “Maybe she won’t suffer if she listens to her mother. Maybe a dark warrior will break down the barrier. Listen listen to me. Hear me hear me say this. Both bear the others need. One is the code the other the key. I think this next part is the chorus,” he said, and began to sing again. “Warrior oh warrior. Warrior dark warrior guide guard, direct her. There’s a second verse,” Kevin said. “Do you want to hear it?”
With my head still resting in the palm of my hands I gave no response, which didn’t seem to matter. He would continue whether I liked it or not. I thought it best to let him get this out of his system.
“Dark warrior sees the calling pipe and vessel as it should be. Right to left, left to right read it rite day and night.”
“That’s enough,” I said quietly.
“What?”
I raised my head, “I said that’s enough. I’ve heard enough. I’ve had enough.”
“So you understand what The Singer’s saying? You know it’s about me and you.”
“No I don’t see that. That’s just your own imagination taking over.”
“No it’s not,” he said.
“Did you memorize both books?” I asked.
“If it’s something important I remember,” he said.
“Important? What does it matter? It’s just a song written by some crazy person who hears voices. What the fuck does it matter?”
“Have you read it?”
“Read what?”
“The things you write.”
“No.” I let my head fall into my palms again. The crew was coming back. My choices in that moment were limited. I could pretend I wasn’t the person Kevin knew I was, or I could let him in. I went to the bedroom leaving the door open, sat on the bad and started to write.
11.
Kevin shook my shoulder, and repeated my name a few times before I was able to open my eyes and focus on his face—*When I consider now the way in which I met Kevin and how I befriended him, I have no excuses. Nothing was whispering in my ear that this guy was good. I liked his kind smile and trusting eyes.
“Listen to this,” he cleared his throat. “The Preacher says in Patient: Crew, book two, page ninety-six.” He started talking like a southern preacher. “And I tell you this day as the snow falls upon Edom... ah…the meeting will be held on that day of discovery…ah…and when the gates close on that time and that place they will never open again…ah. And I quote to you today the first good book of Patient: Crew in the page…ah…of sixty-six and the line of four, ‘It is a groovy cool one who helps the flower child. His name rhymes with heaven’, thus says the Hippy.” Kevin sat on the bed making it bounce. “I know it’s me they’re talking about. I have no doubts.”
Still dazed from the last session I was by no means ready for this conversation. “How long this time?”
“You wrote for three hours and slept for two,” he said. “Come on in the kitchen you need some food. I’ll make you some coffee and eggs. I had a snack earlier, but I could eat.” I followed him to the kitchen. “Sit down and take a load off.” He made me a plate of scrambled eggs with toast and butter and twice as much for himself.
“Thanks, this is good. I guess I was hungry,” I said.
“Can I ask some questions?”
“One,” I said.
“Do your hands hurt? You were writing nonstop in there they must be screaming.”
“Do my hands hurt?” I was amused. “That’s what you want to know?”
“I want to know everything you’re wi
lling to tell but if you’re putting a limit on me…yes that’s what I want to know.”
“No they don’t hurt.”
“Got it,” he said.
“The book wasn’t my idea and it’s done me nothing but harm.”
“I’m here to help and protect you. Anything you need you’ve got,” he said, eyes fixed on mine. “I’m making a commitment to you and I don’t take that lightly. I won’t say it wouldn’t help if I had a little background knowledge. Can you tell me when you started hearing the crew?”
“First, you have to give me something. How old are you?”
“I’m thirty eight, six feet five, three hundred twenty-five pounds. When did it start?”
“It started when I turned seventeen.”
“Did anyone else in your family do this kind of thing?”
“What’s your mother’s name?”
“Jade Stewart,” he said.
“Momma heard them at seventeen too. I think her mother Zeffie was the same age, but she didn’t write anything down at least not that I know of.”
“Did your Momma write?”
“What’s your favorite color?”
“Red.”
“Momma wrote too.”
“What happened to Zeffie and your Momma?”
“Zeffie killed herself and the good people of Sunny killed Momma.”
“How’d they kill her?”
“What’s your degree in?”
“Law. I want to be a lawyer.”
“They burned this house down. She was able to get me out before she collapsed.”
“Did anyone get arrested or go to prison?”
His question made me chuckle. “No.”
“Small town justice. Who rebuilt the house?”
“Why a lawyer?”
“Have you seen what those guys make?”
“I don’t know who rebuilt it.”
“How’d you meet the Todd’s?”
“Oh God I need to check the news. Where’s my computer? TV?” The house was cluttered with boxes, packing foam, and instructions from Kevin’s installations making it difficult to find the floor, much less the TV.
“Nothing new has been reported since the day it happened,” Kevin said. “The FBI and CIA are both silent on the issue. They don’t inform the public until they need the public.”
“You figured out the Timothy Todd stuff?” I asked.
“A little, but I’d like to know more.”
“I don’t understand why they haven’t called me.”
“How did you meet Doctor Todd?” Kevin asked again.
“I left when I started to hear them and ended up at Marla’s clinic. She took me home, and I lived with her and Tim for ten years. During that time, I was Marla’s patient. She’s responsible for my being able to retain a little piece of normalcy. She’s the one who discovered that if I write everything they say, they would leave me alone. Sometimes days—sometimes hours—sometimes minutes. Have you checked the Internet?”
“Yes nothing new. She knows the writings are prophetic?”
“Nobody knew before the Ceely Masters show.”
“I see,” he said.
“You see what?”
“Nothing. Why’d you come back here?”
“The books and Ceely Masters,” I said.
“Why would you come back here after what they did to your mother?” Kevin asked.
“That’s enough for now.”
“Can I read your writings?”
“Sessions,” I said. “I call them sessions.”
“Can I read the sessions?”
I gathered the notebooks from the bedroom and handed them to Kevin. “Knock yourself out, read between the lines and have a blast.”
“Read between the lines? Not with the crew, no need to. We go down the paths the crew leads us. It’s all there in its simplicity.”
“We?” I asked.
“There’s a few of us who take the crew seriously and realize the change they will affect.”
“This is not a good idea. I shouldn’t let you read these,” I held out my hands for Kevin to return the books and he held them away from me.
“I’m not going to hurt you. I’m trying to help you.”
“I found you, not the other way around,” I said.
“We found each other its fate.”
“There is no such thing as fate. We create our own destiny.”
“That’s very psychologist of you. Call it what you want but the facts remain,” he said. “You are Patient Crew and I am the dark warrior they foretold.” I again reached for the sessions, and his reaction was to sit on them.
“Don’t be childish,” I scolded.
“Don’t be selfish,” he retorted.
“How am I being selfish? You’re the one sitting on them.”
“You could have written about someone’s death you could save lives. I call that selfish.”
“Low blow,” I said and hung my head. If his intent with that statement was to guilt me into letting him read the sessions in peace it worked. We sat across from each other in the living room chairs. I watched him read through the notebooks while flipping through the news channels on the TV. There wasn’t one report or story on the bombing. My eyes became heavy, and I drifted into a light sleep. I heard Kevin when he stood up, felt him touch my arm and shake me gently. It felt like only minutes had passed but when I woke up it was late afternoon.
“Shanna can you hear me?”
“What is it Kevin?”
“It’s your cell phone. It was vibrating, and I saw you had eight messages. I thought it might be important.”
“Tim. Marla. It’s got to be them.” I rubbed my eyes and tried to focus on the phone screen. “It’s Jim.” I walked outside the front door where the service was better to return his call, Kevin followed.
“Who’s Jim?”
“He’s just Jim,” I said and called. It took him three rings before he answered. “Jim? Is everything ok?”
“Polly died last night,” Jim said.
“Oh poor Polly I’m so sorry.” I listened for Jim’s response. Kevin started humming to himself and ran inside the house.
“She never regained consciousness, and passed this morning.”
“What can I do?”
“Nothing at the moment. I just wanted you to know. I’ll call you later I need to get back to the family.”
“I’m very sorry for your loss,” I said.
Kevin came outside with my notebooks, flipping through the sessions and started to sing. “In two weeks plus a day, she’ll be going away, Polly wolly’s dead that day. She took a great fall near the bathroom hall, Polly wolly’s dead that day. Yes she is, yes she is, she is surely dead that day. Now, her pain will be over and in heaven she’ll see Peter singing Polly wolly’s dead that day.”
He showed me The Singer’s song I’d written two weeks earlier. I pushed him aside. I couldn’t stomach knowing. “Leave me alone for a second ok?”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea let’s talk it out,” he said following close behind.
“I’m worried about Tim and Marla. I’m worried about Jim and how I’m going to leave again, and he just lost his Aunt Polly. I must have known it would happen and didn’t do anything to stop it.”
“Is Jim your boyfriend?”
“No.” I didn’t want to explain. “And you. What am I going to do about you? I don’t know what move to make next. I’m all over the place with this.” I walked past the tree line and looked out into the field. The cotton was knee-high and a deep healthy green far greener than the neighboring fields. I could see the ground was damp with water. I was furious. “Who is fucking with me? It’s the worst fucking drought in forty years, and my fields are soaked. Why? I hear voices that presumably tell the future? Then tell me what to do. Tell me or leave me alone. What good is it if I can’t use it for my own benefit? I do all the work and don’t even get a hint? Tell me without riddles, rhymes or songs. Do you hear me? D
oes anyone hear me?” I yelled.
“Calm down Shanna,” Kevin said. “Breathe.”
“I can’t do this anymore. I don’t want this can’t you see that? I just want to be left alone. Just let me live, please just let me live in peace.” I couldn’t hold back the anger that was welling in my body. I ran into the field, Kevin trying to keep up, and started pulling up the cotton plants. “I want this to stop. Do you hear me? Do you hear me? Show yourself or stop this now.”
“Shanna please stop. Breathe,” Kevin was panting trying to catch his own breath. “See like this—in through your nose and out through your mouth.”
“I swear Fat Boy if you tell me to calm down, and breathe one more time I’ll slap the shit out of you! It’s not that simple. Nothing about this is simple. I didn’t put in irrigation, but my fields are constantly damp. I didn’t clean the field; I haven’t dug out a path to the house that is magically widened daily. I don’t pay for electricity, but I could light up the whole damn town. This house, my Momma’s house, the town burned it to the ground yet here it stands sturdy like a shrine. I didn’t ask for this do you understand me Kevin? I didn’t ask for any of this.”
“It’s not your fault,” he said.
“It’s not about fault it’s about being able to help Tim and Marla the way they helped me. I’ve already hurt so many people…truly damaged people…I don’t want to hurt anyone else. I already started down the path to pain with Jim. But tell me what am I supposed to do? I can’t do anything because I can’t even control what happens in my own body. I have no choice or control over anything.”
“You can control the crew. Don’t you see? It’s brilliant,” he said. “You need to listen what they say. You can control everything. You have total control at your fingertips. You can help many more people than you’ve hurt.”
“Have you heard a word I’ve said?” I fumed back to the house, and Kevin followed. “Stop breathing down my back.”
“Then stand still and talk to me,” he shot back.
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