The Memory Detective

by T. S. Nichols

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  The immersion began as soon as Cole felt the heat on his skin where Zoe had slapped him. When he reached up to feel it with his fingers, so did Meg. She paused for only a second when she realized that she could feel her own skin begin to rise beneath her fingertips. Then she turned without a word and sped for the door, leaving the music and the hum of another one of Tony’s parties behind her. “Meg, wait,” Sam called, her hand still held conspicuously in the air. “I’m sorry.” Meg could hear Sam trying to catch up to her as she went through the door, but she didn’t even consider stopping. She was too afraid to stop, afraid of breaking down in front of all these people. Afraid of what they might think of her, afraid of what she might think of herself. She needed these people to believe that she was strong even if she didn’t always believe it herself. So before she could even think, Meg was in the stairwell, skipping every other step as she hurried down toward the street, trying to get away.

  Cole couldn’t remember what the fight had been about. He couldn’t remember what had caused Sam to slap Meg’s face in front of all those people. It often worked that way in memories. Like in history, the fights were memorable; their causes usually were not. All Cole could remember was the sting on her skin and the hollow sound reverberating in her head, followed by the intense urge to run, not just from Sam but from everything. As Meg descended the stairs, her mind raced with images of home and all the people back in Kansas. So many of them had been mean to her. They had teased her. Even her own parents pushed her away. But none of those people had ever hit her. If they had, she wouldn’t have cared. None of them could hurt her. Only Sam had that power.

  At the bottom of the stairs, Meg turned and stepped outside. There she finally came to a stop. She was breathing heavily. Cole remembered her confusion. She wanted to leave, to run far away, but even more than that, she wanted someone to come down to get her and to make her stay. She didn’t want to spend her whole life running. So Meg waited for a moment to catch her breath and to give someone, anyone, a chance to come for her. The air was cold—not bitingly cold, but brisk enough to send a chill down her back. Meg waited another moment. She wondered how much longer she should wait before she finally walked away. If she walked away, she wondered where she’d go. She waited one more moment. Then the apartment building door behind her burst open.

  “Meg,” Sam said, rushing toward her. “I’m sorry.” Sam slowed down as she got closer to Meg, but she didn’t stop. “I’m so sorry.” There wasn’t a false note in Sam’s voice. Meg had never heard anyone sound so sincere, but she could still feel the sting on her cheek. Sam stopped a single step away from Meg, afraid to take that last step. “I’m so sorry, Meg,” she repeated, as if not knowing any other words to say.

  Cole could still feel the hot pulse on Meg’s cheek, a throbbing memory of what had happened upstairs in front of all those people. Meg tried to think of how to respond. She had no idea what to do. She was so angry and yet so grateful that Sam had come for her. Frozen with indecision, Meg did the one thing she did not want to do. She began to cry. Cole felt the tears welling up before they came spilling out. Meg, like her father, was not accustomed to crying. She so wanted to be angry, but she was too afraid of what her anger might cost her. So she cried and, as she cried, Sam took her into her arms. She spoke softly to Meg now. “I’m so sorry, Meg,” she repeated, in a whisper this time, her lips only inches from Meg’s ear. “I don’t know what came over me. I’ve never done anything like that before. I promise never to do it again. I can’t even believe it happened.”

  Meg tried to control her sobbing so that she could speak. She tried to pull back tears that could never be pulled back. “I’m sorry too,” Meg said to Sam. “I shouldn’t have said what I said. I didn’t mean to upset you. I wasn’t thinking.”

  Sam shook her head. “Don’t apologize to me. If you owed me any apologies upstairs, I lost that debt when I did what I did.” Sam squeezed Meg even tighter. Cole remembered how good it felt, how comforting to be in Sam’s arms. He could remember how much Meg needed that, how much she needed to be loved. “I promise never to do that again.” Meg squeezed Sam back. “Should we go home?” Sam asked. She assumed that Meg would not want to go back to the party.

  Meg shook her head. She couldn’t simply go home. She still had something to prove. “Should we go back upstairs?” Sam asked Meg. She would do whatever Meg wanted.

  Meg stepped out of Sam’s embrace. She shook her head again. “Not yet,” Meg said, still unsure of herself. “Let’s just sit down out here for a few minutes first.” Meg motioned toward the sidewalk. Meg sat down first, sitting on the sidewalk with her feet in the street. Sam sat down next to her, putting her arm around Meg. Meg leaned in and put her head on Sam’s shoulder. The air didn’t feel nearly as cold anymore. “Never again?” Meg asked as they sat there, intertwined.

  “Never,” Sam promised.

  “Me too,” Meg promised back. Cole still couldn’t remember what Meg had said. Whatever it was, it didn’t seem important anymore. Meg leaned in and kissed Sam on the cheek. She kissed Sam in the same place on Sam’s face that Sam had struck Meg on hers. Cole knew what the word “never” meant to Meg when it came from Sam’s lips. Meg was still young enough to believe in the twin gods of youth, never and forever. Meg believed that the words they’d exchanged and the kiss consummating those words meant that she and Sam would never fight like that again. Even as she knew that it was an impossible hope, she believed it, and she believed it because she wanted to believe it.

  Then Cole heard a clicking sound coming from behind them. Meg didn’t bother to turn around the first time. Then Cole heard it again. The second time that Cole heard it, Meg and Sam turned simultaneously and looked behind them. A light flashed from inside a dark doorway next to the building’s main entrance. A face was lit up in the darkness for a second as a small man with greasy dark hair lit the end of a cigarette. Meg recognized the man’s face. Cole recognized it too, but he couldn’t place it, not at first. “Are you girls going to start making out or should I just go back upstairs?” the man said, with a voice not much different from a boy’s. Then he laughed to himself at his own joke. It was a slightly unnerving, off-kilter laugh.

  “How long have you been back there, Jerry?” Meg asked the man.

  “I just came down for a quick smoke,” Jerry said, stepping out of the darkness and into the light of the sidewalk. “I thought it would be peaceful down here, and then you two bust out and interrupt my peace with all your drama. But don’t mind me. No need to stop on my behalf.” Something about Jerry’s smile was crooked. Meg couldn’t tell by looking at him if it was his face or his teeth. Maybe it was both.

  “You know him?” Sam asked Meg. Cole was thinking the same thing. He still hadn’t been able to put it together.

  “Yeah, he’s here a lot,” Meg said, almost apologizing to Sam.

  “That’s it?” Jerry said, stepping closer to them. “That’s all the love you have for me? Come on!” Jerry spoke directly to Sam. “Don’t believe her. We’re good friends. I met Meg right upstairs, the very first night she got to New York.”

  “Maybe we should go back inside and let you finish your cigarette in peace,” Meg said, and started to stand up. Jerry didn’t seem to notice. He went on talking to Sam.

  “You know I tried to make your girlfriend rich?” Jerry told Sam. “But nobody ever listens to me.”

  “What is he talking about?” Sam asked Meg, trying to figure out exactly how offended she should be.

  “Nothing,” Meg said. “It’s some urban legend that Jerry’s always blathering on about. Don’t mind him.” Meg reached down and helped Sam back to her feet.

  “It’s not an urban legend,” Jerry said and took a long, confident drag off of his cigarette. “But what do I care? I mean, they didn’t want me, so I don’t know why I keep trying to convince the rest of you. You guys don’t want to be rich, you guys don’t want to live out your wildest dreams, so be it. I really do thi
nk that you should let your girlfriend know that they pay more for lesbians, though. I mean, it’s only fair that she gets to make her own decisions,” Jerry said to Meg while staring at Sam. “I’ll be honest, though, I don’t know what being black does to the pricing.”

  “What is he talking about?” Sam asked Meg again.

  Meg grabbed Sam’s hand and began to pull her toward the door. “It’s nothing,” she said, angry with Jerry for ruining their moment. “He thinks that there are people who’ll buy your soul or something and make you rich.”

  Jerry laughed. “I keep telling everyone, it’s not your soul they want,” he called after them as Meg and Sam reached the apartment door.

  It took until that moment for Cole to figure out where he’d seen Jerry before. Now he remembered. It was just like Jerry said. He was in Meg’s memory of that first party on her first night in New York. Jerry had been there too, drifting around in the background of Meg’s memory, talking about the same thing. Cole hadn’t really noticed him before. What was there to notice? Jerry had just been there, blending in. This was the first time Cole actually paid any attention to what Jerry was saying.

  Maybe the last two bodies didn’t have memories to begin with. Maybe someone else had already extracted the memories from them. Maybe it was merely empty liquid that had been injected into Cole’s brain.

  Chapter 32

  It was after two in the morning by the time Cole picked up the phone to call Dr. Tyson. He didn’t bother to look at a clock. He didn’t care. He found his pad and his pen and dialed her cell number.

  Dr. Tyson answered on the fourth ring. “Are you okay, Cole?” she asked as soon as she picked up the phone. She sounded truly worried.

  Cole didn’t bother to reply. “Would you know if the person you’re trying to extract memories from had already had their memories extracted?”

  “Do you realize that it’s two-thirty in the morning? Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine,” Cole said with a sober and deathly serious tone. “I think I might know what’s been happening, but I need your help. Would you know if the person you’re trying to extract memories from had already had their memories extracted?”

  “It wouldn’t happen.” Dr. Tyson dismissed Cole’s question. Cole could hear her voice stiffen as she woke up to what Cole was implying. “There are records of every transfer. We would always know.”

  “Forget the records,” Cole said. “Would you know, just by performing the procedure? Would you be able to tell?” Cole could hear mumbling in the background. He guessed it was Dr. Tyson’s husband complaining to her about her talking on the phone at this hour, but it didn’t stop her.

  “Not by what’s in the brain,” the doctor said. “You can’t see the proteins when you do the surgery. There’s nothing really to see. We simply know where they are. But we would notice the marks on the back of the patient’s neck from the prior procedure. Not only would we see the marks but, because the person is dead, those marks wouldn’t heal—just the opposite. They degenerate faster, making the holes bigger. We’d notice that.”

  Cole rubbed the back of his own neck. He could still feel the two holes from the most recent surgery. Cole knew that Dr. Tyson was right. He stood up and began to pace, still holding the phone to his ear. There had to be another way. “What if whoever did the first procedure didn’t go through the back of the neck?”

  “But that’s how it’s done,” Dr. Tyson said. “There aren’t any other approved methods.”

  Cole sat down again. “What about unapproved methods? Can it be done other ways?”

  “Sure,” Dr. Tyson said. “People have tested other methods, but nothing works as well as the back of the neck.”

  “What if someone was trying to hide the fact that the procedure had been done? How would they do it?”

  “Why would they do that?” Dr. Tyson asked the question, but she sounded like she didn’t want an answer.

  “How would they do it?” Cole repeated. “Hypothetically?”

  Dr. Tyson thought for a second. “They’d probably go in through the back of the mouth. You have quick access to the brain from there. It’s almost as easy as the neck. We don’t do it that way because the tongue and teeth get in the way. The back of the neck is easier.”

  “But it could be done through the mouth if your goal was to hide the surgery?”

  “Yes,” Dr. Tyson said in a single, tense breath.

  “If somebody did a procedure that way, would you be able to tell by examining the body?”

  “Yes,” Dr. Tyson said again.

  “How soon can you get back to Montreal?” Cole asked. His question was answered with silence. “It’s bigger than me now,” Cole said to Dr. Tyson. “You realize how big this is, don’t you?”

  Dr. Tyson finally answered him. “It’s almost three now. I can be there by noon. Can you get me access to the body by then?”

  “Consider it done.”

  For a moment, both Cole and Dr. Tyson sat there, listening to the silence between them. “Do you really think that somebody’s been stealing memories?” Dr. Tyson asked, finally putting Cole’s theory into words.

  “I’ve got reasons to think so, yes,” Cole told her. He didn’t bother to tell her that his reasons were the words of a small, creepy man haunting the memories of a dead nineteen-year-old girl.

  Chapter 33

  They hadn’t yet disposed of the body. After the procedure, the body had been returned to the morgue, preserved inside a timeless cold steel box. It was still there when Cole returned and demanded that it be removed so that Dr. Tyson could examine it. Cole’s word alone wasn’t enough. He had to put a few calls in to NYPD headquarters. Even that didn’t immediately work. In the end, it was Dr. Tyson who was able to convince them to pull the body back out of the box. She put in a phone call to the memory expert she knew in Montreal. Their ability to take another look at the body was as much about science as it was about police work. Not that it mattered to Cole, as long as the body would be waiting for Dr. Tyson when she arrived, just as he’d promised.

  Cole didn’t talk to Dr. Tyson before she went in to examine the body. He didn’t need to. She knew what she was looking for far better than Cole did: two tiny holes in the back of the man’s throat that led directly up into his brain. As Dr. Tyson scrubbed in, entered the morgue, and approached the body, Cole sat in the waiting room like the expectant father of a new nightmare. He leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes.

  They’d wheeled in a standard operating table and had laid the body there on its back, just as Dr. Tyson had requested. She adjusted the light so that it shined directly into the corpse’s face. The hospital had provided her with three surgical assistants to help her if she needed it. None of them knew what was going on. None had worked on a dead body since medical school, and none was keen to do it again.

  “I need you to hold his mouth open and tilt his head back so that I can see the back of his throat,” Dr. Tyson ordered two of the assistants. They stepped to either side of the man’s head. One of them grabbed the head with two hands and tilted it backward, while the other used his thumb to pull down the corpse’s jaw. The body was pale and a bit puffy, its skin hanging loose on its flesh.

  Dr. Tyson leaned in. Then she stood back up and adjusted the light again. There were still too many shadows. She turned to the third assistant. “Can you get me a penlight?”

  The third assistant returned quickly with a penlight. Dr. Tyson took it and turned it on. Then she aimed the beam into the dead man’s mouth.

  “Can you get me a scalpel too?” Dr. Tyson asked as she peered inside the dead man’s gaping mouth. A second later a scalpel was in her hand. She moved toward the back of the dead man’s throat. She wasn’t planning on cutting anything. She was merely exploring. She’d spotted two folds in the skin at the back of the man’s throat that didn’t appear natural.

  Dr. Tyson didn’t have to cut to pull back the folds of skin. They were more like flaps; the body’s fir
st and last attempt to heal itself. Behind the folds, only about half an inch apart, were two tiny holes.

  “I need the camera,” Dr. Tyson said, and the third assistant wheeled the machine next to her. Everybody knew that she meant the camera they used during the transplant procedures to guide them into that part of the brain that stored the memories. She took the long thin wire and slowly guided it into one of the two holes. Once it was inserted, she began to steer it with the controls while watching the progress on the monitor. She’d never performed the surgery by going through the back of the mouth before—as far as she knew only a handful of doctors ever had—but she’d read about it, and she understood how it was done. With every millimeter of progress she saw on the screen, she grew more and more confident of where the camera was headed. Cole was right. He didn’t inherit the body’s memories because the memories hadn’t been injected into his brain. All that was injected was empty fluid. Somebody else had gotten to the memories first. One of the surgical assistants finally asked the question each of them had been eager to ask. “What exactly are we doing here?”

  Dr. Tyson looked up at the three of them, unsure of what to say. She assumed that they knew the body had been part of a police investigation, but she didn’t know how much detail they’d been given. She didn’t know if they’d been told that they were investigating a potential serial killer, let alone one stealing his victims’ memories. It was a new type of crime. It was a new type of motive. Everything had changed. Dr. Tyson was an expert on memory transfers and on their impact, possibly knowing more about the subject than any other living person in the world. And she could think of only one man who would truly understand the motive for a crime like this.

  “I’m just trying to understand why the memory transfer involving this patient didn’t work,” Dr. Tyson finally answered the surgical assistant’s question.