Death Theory

by John Mimms

  Jeff left to get chocolate shakes from the nearby dairy bar to celebrate their engagement. He had called Dr. Staples earlier when he went home to change and told him the whole turn of events. He thought Dr. Staples may be able to help her put some closure on things, especially her dream. Dr. Staples arrived a few minutes after Jeff left.

  Dr. Staples and Debbie spoke until Jeff returned.

  “It all seems so simple now, doesn’t it?” Dr. Staples said.

  Debbie agreed.

  “When you saw Pac for the first time at the meeting, it triggered a suppressed memory in you. It must have been the horrible familiarity with his face. Once the ball was rolling, so to speak, it was not going to stop until the memory resurfaced.”

  “So, does this mean I’m cured?”

  “Not yet. It will take a little bit of time to work through this memory and integrate it into part of your conscious self, but it will happen.” He smiled and said, “The hard part is over!”

  When Debbie told him of her and Jeff’s pending nuptials, his face lit up like a proud parent.

  “We must have a celebration! We can have it at my place. I insist!” He tapped his finger on his forehead and said, “I always knew you kids were something special. I’m never wrong about these things!”

  Debbie agreed to a small engagement party at Dr. Staples’s house the coming Saturday, assuming she would be out of the hospital in time. Dr. Mallett, who had just popped in for his nightly rounds, said it should be okay if she didn’t overdo it. He intended to release her tomorrow afternoon.

  When Jeff returned, Dr. Staples greeted him with a bear hug and a firm handshake. He of course was in his ‘Call me Roy’ mode. He left proclaiming he was going to call the caterers first thing in the morning.

  Chapter 36

  DR. MALLETT RELEASED Debbie before noon the next day. Jeff took the day off from work so he and Grammy Lee could take Debbie out for lunch. She had a craving for a Denny’s Grand Slam breakfast.

  Debbie spent the rest of the week home from school. They brought in a long-term sub and told her not to worry about lesson plans for a few days. Grammy Lee moved in and doted on her for the smallest of tasks. Even though she could get around, it was difficult to bathe with all the sutures. They hurt like hell, but she jokingly said she resembled a Raggedy Ann doll. Debbie felt like a little girl again from all the attention.

  Of course, Jeff came by every night. He usually brought dinner with him, staying until the wee hours of the morning. He was an excited, worried, and adoring groom-to-be.

  Debbie’s dreams were peaceful for the week. Of course, the catalyst of her nightmares was still out there. Until he was caught, she would never feel completely safe.

  Saturday arrived with no sighting of Pac. Captain Dean believed he may have fled for Arkansas and then tried to make his way to the Mexican border.

  Elvis was still in jail. The autopsy had ruled Mrs. Gage died of a broken neck, and there was no trace of pentobarbital or chloral hydrate in her system. The reason he was still there was entirely circumstantial, and he wouldn’t cooperate with the police. Elvis answered every question with ‘I’m sorry’ or ‘It’s my fault’. His court appointed attorney advised him to stop because it sounded like a confession. He wouldn’t listen. Jeff even went to visit on Wednesday. Elvis used the same phrases with him as well.

  The party at Dr. Staples was nice and thoughtful. He paid for barbecue from a local restaurant. Grammy Lee made a couple of side dishes and dessert. Jeff invited a friend from work, a friend of Debbie’s, and Grammy Lee. Roy had some last-minute morning appointments, but he phoned and said he would be there shortly. Six folks were a nice and even number for a party.

  Jeff and his friend, Scott, stopped and picked up the barbecue on the way. Between the beef, pork, and coleslaw he had to put most of it in a box in the back of his truck. It was a mild day for early December so he wasn’t worried about it getting cold too fast. Debbie drove her car to pick up Grammy Lee and her friend, Anna. Other than a mud-packed undercarriage, it was no worse for wear.

  Dr. Staples had opened the guesthouse and cleaned it up for the party. He decorated with holiday crepe paper and tinsel.

  “I moved the equipment cases in the house, so they will be out of the way,” he told Jeff.

  Jeff had not even noticed. Paranormal investigation was the last thing on his mind and, under the circumstances, he wasn’t sure if he would ever do it again. He felt guilty for everything Pac and Elvis had done. Yes, the ‘Death Theory’ was Elvis’s idea, but Jeff had circulated it to the group as a plausible hypothesis.

  Of course, even the idea of monitoring even a willing, terminally ill person as they died was a disturbing idea. He thought he had communicated this to the group. Perhaps he had, but not everyone listened. The theory had been taken to the extreme. Murder was incorporated into the experimentation as casually as placing a beaker over a Bunsen burner. He felt especially guilty when he thought of the experiment Elvis performed at the mortuary. It should have raised a huge red flag.

  The festivities were about to get underway, when Debbie walked outside and saw Jeff leaning against a tree. His expression was distant as he gazed out across the Ozarks. Her first thought was to sneak up and hug him from behind, but that was impossible. She walked with a hopefully temporary limp, and most of her body was still sore. Instead, she opted to call out to him.

  “Jeff, are you comin’ in?” she called, limping toward him.

  At first, he didn’t react to her. This scared her until he slowly turned in her direction. Jeff smiled and walked to meet her.

  “Yes, I am, sweetheart. I was just thinking.”

  Debbie’s heart leapt into her throat. The last time a guy said those words to her was right before telling her of his new love.

  “Are you leavin’ me?” she asked with an uneasy smile.

  Jeff winced as if someone had slapped him out of a trance. “Oh God, no!”

  Debbie watched him expectantly, waiting for him to elaborate. After several long moments, he said, “I was thinking about my parents.”

  Debbie could see tears welling in his eyes.

  “What is it?” she asked, reaching out with her least injured hand and grasping his.

  He pinched the bridge of his nose and tried to look away, but Debbie moved closer and gently placed the side of her face against his chest.

  “This was all such a waste of time ... such a damned waste of time.”

  Debbie waited for him to continue.

  “I wanted my parents to be here for this. I know they would have loved you. I was such a fool,” he said.

  Debbie felt a tear drip on her arm. She hugged him tighter.

  “I would have loved them, too. I know they were great people because they brought such a fine man into the world.”

  Jeff shook his head vigorously.

  “No ... I was stupid to think I could talk to them again. Where has all this paranormal crap gotten us? Nowhere. The only thing I almost accomplished was getting the dearest person in the world to me killed. I’m not going to put you in this situation again. Roy can take all this fancy equipment and shove it up his ass.”

  Debbie couldn’t help giggling.

  “I think the EMUX would be pretty painful, wouldn’t it?” she said.

  Jeff found himself chuckling too. They both needed a good laugh.

  “I love you,” Jeff said.

  “Well good, because you’re stuck with me!” Debbie said, managing her trademark smile despite the pain.

  “Promise me we will give up paranormal crap for good?” Jeff said.

  “I promise,” Debbie said. “And ... don’t forget one thing.”

  “What?”

  “If it wasn’t for this paranormal crap, we never would have met.”

  Jeff grinned and gave her a kiss on the eyebrow.

  An idea suddenly occurred to Debbie. She had taken care of Jeff’s Christmas shopping early. It was still a little over a week until Christmas,
but she had a present she believed might cheer him up. Giving it to him a few days early was okay, especially under these circumstances.

  A moment later, Grammy Lee and the others came outside.

  “Aren’t you kids coming in? It’s getting kinda chilly out here,” Grammy Lee said.

  Debbie held up a finger. “I have to go get somethin’. I won’t be gone more than twenty minutes,” she told everyone. “Keep the barbecue warm for me!”

  “Can I come with you?” Jeff asked.

  “Not for this,” Debbie said with a wink. “I won’t be long.”

  Jeff walked her to her car and kissed her on the cheek. Their love was obvious to anyone watching. It was matched only by the deep resentment flaring just out of sight in the woods. As he watched, Pac drooled with jealous rage and giddy anticipation. His next and greatest experiment was at hand.

  As Debbie drove off and Jeff went back inside, Pac approached the back of the guesthouse. There was only a two-foot gap between the back wall and the woods, but it was all he needed.

  Pac picked up a section of garden hose coiled against the guesthouse. He took the coiled end of the hose and inserted it into an abandoned dryer vent. The opening was shielded from view on the inside by a table topped with barbecue and Grammy Lee’s fixins’. No one saw the hose emerge like a snake out of the wall.

  Pac heard the door to the guesthouse open. He paused expectantly for several moments before he moved. He slipped to the corner and peered around, fearing discovery. He held the serrated blade which pierced his hand, and Debbie’s shoulder, a week before. His hand was bandaged and still hurt like hell, but he thought of the injury as a marriage of sorts. The knife was like a wedding ring. It had untied him and Debbie in blood, like a demented marital view of blood brothers. In Pac’s mind, it was sacred.

  He didn’t see anyone, but he heard laughter coming from inside, and then a low thump of music as someone started a stereo.

  That was great, it was perfect...it was divine. The stereo would mask what he had to do and make his job so much easier. This was the sign he needed, telling him he was fulfilling destiny. Nothing would thwart his achievement. He would be remembered with the great scientists. He would have the girl of his dreams and, finally ... his mother would be proud of him.

  She was dead, but it was only a minor detail. He had saved her from months, or even years, of suffering with Alzheimer’s. If he could prove the theory, she would know. He had carried on one-way conversations with her in the last couple of months. As far as he was concerned, their relationship had never been better. She would brag to everyone who would listen on the next level of existence about her son. The son who is more important to science than Einstein.

  With Rosie Pacheco cheering him on in his head, he slipped around the corner of the house and retrieved a chain and padlock stowed under a pile of leaves. He wrapped it around his arm and then crept to the front corner. The coast was clear. There was one window on the front of the guesthouse, and it was a 1 x 2 pane a little over six feet above the ground. He maneuvered underneath and approached the front door.

  If this weren’t a glorified storage building, some may have referred to the front doors as glassless French doors. They were double doors opening outward. Each side had a large silver handle, a little larger than a briefcase grip. This made it very easy to chain shut. He wrapped the chain through the handles until it was a tight and unbending wad of steel links. He secured it tight by running the padlock through several layers of links and then fastened it shut. Once this task was complete, he retreated behind the guesthouse.

  Pac grabbed the length of garden hose and then followed it about thirty yards into the woods. The other end was connected to a funnel, wrapped tight with duct tape and fastened to the exhaust port of a small gas generator. He carefully placed his esteemed knife on the ground and then, with his good hand, he cranked the generator to life. With a giddy jaunt to his walk, he trotted to Dr. Staples’s home and entered the back door.

  The doctor had been gone all morning. This was more than enough time for Pac to come in and find the keys to the equipment cases. He then set up the remote monitoring equipment in the guesthouse. Dr. Staples hadn’t noticed in his decorating endeavors. He had decorated on Friday night and Pac did his experiment prep work Saturday morning. The decorations made it all too easy to conceal the Emux probes.

  He had also cleverly hidden a thermal camera between two boxes and a stack of storage totes in the corner. A wireless video transmitter, an unused tool in the equipment arsenal, was hooked to the output of the camera.

  Pac picked up a laptop he had taken from one of the cases and booted it up. After a few short moments, the laptop came to life and Pac’s command center lit up on the screen. On the left-hand side, he had the constant real-time feedback of the environmental meters. The carbon monoxide was already at a dangerous level. The right-hand side showed a video window with a surreal image. Rainbow colored people talked and ate, oblivious to the noxious gas feeding into the small building. The thermal camera broadcast was working perfectly.

  This was his great experiment, the one that would put him over the top. He had done four real experiments thus far. It started with a homeless person. The poor man had been sleeping behind Cornucopia Savers when Pac found him. He then moved to an old shut in who he thought would never be missed - Mrs. Schwender. The third was the clueless old man who lived next to the Carlisle Country Inn, and the fourth was the homeless person outside of Pythian Castle. He lured him in the car with a bag of Sonic burgers. The old man cried tears of joy for the kindness until Pac gave him a chloroform soaked cloth to blow his nose. Mrs. Gage would have been his fifth if Debbie hadn’t interfered and screwed up his experiment.

  The key to the scientific method maintains every experiment must show repeatability. Three was good, he had collected some interesting results, but he needed more. He hadn’t done a group experiment yet. He counted the rainbow people on the screen. There were currently only three visible (the thermal camera was not known for panoramic views). He frowned and wished there was a way to herd everyone into the camera’s scope. Of course, even though he may not be able to see their heat signatures dissipate, the remote sensors would pick them up all the same.

  Pac patted himself on the back. He was about to kill the proverbial two birds with one stone. He would accomplish a monumental scientific breakthrough. In the process, he would also get rid of his competition for Debbie’s affection. He wasn’t sure when she would be back, but he knew one thing for sure – when she did return, they would consummate their relationship.

  Pac went in the kitchen and grabbed a beer to celebrate. He had just popped the top off a Heineken when he heard footsteps coming in the front door, and enter the doctor’s study. He glanced outside and saw Dr. Staples’s car parked in the driveway. Pac set the beer down, crept back through the hallway, and entered the study door. Dr. Staples was standing by the computer screen facing the door. He had a small handgun in his right hand pointed at Pac.

  “What the hell have you done?” Dr. Staples sputtered.

  “A group experiment this time!” Pac said, proudly pointing at the monitor. “I’ve got everything set up. It’s only a matter of time,” he said as he held his hands to his throat and pretended to choke. Pac started to laugh at his own cleverness, but his laughter was cut short by a deafening crack. He fell back in the doorway with his arms and legs splayed. He stared stupidly at Dr. Staples, and then down at the gaping, smoking wound in his chest.

  “Why?” Pac pleaded.

  A moment later, Pac got the answer he so diligently sought; the answer to the question of life after death. Only there would be no ticker tape parades, no book deals, no Nobel Peace Prizes, and no paranormal groupies. This scientific discovery he would take to the grave.

  Dr. Staples waved smoke away with his gun free hand before walking to Pac’s side. The milky eyes and frozen countenance were all the proof he needed. Michael Pacheco was dead.

 
; “Why?” he repeated with deep sarcasm. “I’ll tell you why, because you are a damned moron!”

  Dr. Staples shook his head and sat down in a nearby armchair. He placed the gun on his lap and rubbed his temples as if fending off a headache.

  “I told you,” he said. “To go to my cabin and wait on me until things cooled down.”

  He smiled and closed his eyes as if he was recalling a fond memory.

  “The day you came to my office before Debbie’s first appointment, I knew you had severe mother issues. I almost didn’t continue our sessions. But when the Death Theory was brought up ... well, the curiosity was just too great for me. I knew there was something in you I could work with. I knew you could do what must be done to carry out the experiments. Besides, I’m just too old to do that stuff anyway. I can’t carry anybody. It was the perfect storm. You killed your mother the same night we first discussed the Death Theory. I knew this partnership was meant to be.”

  “Like minds,” he said tapping his finger on his forehead. “Like minds with the same interest. I had the knowledge and resources ... you had the strong back, not to mention your ‘duplex lab’, as you put it.” He sighed and said, “I guess I was pretty clever the night I said I saw red eyes. We were both able to slip away and grab the old fool. I must say ... you did a pretty fair job on the voice we passed off as an EVP. Perhaps you should have been an actor my boy!”

  “I was never very conventional with my methods; I guess it’s why I don’t have a medical license anymore. But, it doesn’t mean I don’t still have the knowhow.”

  Pac had confided in Dr. Staples about the night two months earlier, when the group left their meeting at American Pie Pizza. He got an urgent call from his mother. She told him he needed to come right now because his brother was home. He was reluctant about speeding to the trailer park on a whim, but he tried to be a good and diligent son. Pac also wanted to see his brother.

  When he reached his mother’s trailer, she asked him to come back to the bedroom. When he reached the bedroom, she pointed to the computer screen and began to laugh. His mother had sent several e-mails to his brother Jack, who was still overseas in the Army. ‘He yells at me, he cusses me, he hits me, he steals from me’ – these were a mere few of the false allegations leveled against him in these communications. Judging by the responses from his brother, he believed her. This hurt far worse.