2nd Sight: Capturing Insight

by Ben A. Sharpton

  He backed up silently, adjusted the transmission, and slid out of the parking lot, past a black BMW parked near the entrance.

  It had been a shitty day.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Gumby jumped off the bed and charged the back door as Scott’s Prius slid silently into the garage. He never expected anyone to come home this early but he always welcomed Scott or Grace or the mailman or burglars or anyone else to their house. He wiggled his butt as much as possible as if to make up for the small nub of a tail that boxers have after the vet births them and whacks it off. When excited he tended to knock over small chairs, briefcases, floor lamps, toddlers—anything within eighteen inches of the floor and in the path of his shaking torso, so Scott did all he could to calm the wriggling beast.

  Gumby made Scott smile. The expression surprised him because he realized he hadn’t smiled since walking into his office that morning. He seldom smiled these days. He had little to smile about. Now he had less. He dug a treat from the canister on the kitchen counter and tossed it in the direction of the excited dog, who snatched the gift mid-air, swallowed it in one sudden motion, and stood dead still staring at him, waiting for another.

  It was just after four o’clock, and Grace wouldn’t be home from the hospital for two or three more hours. An ache pounded his head like a base drum. He grabbed a bottle of Jack Daniels and filled a glass with the golden liquid. Gulping several swallows, he felt it burn its way down, sanitizing the day’s pain and grief, and filling his mind with a numbing sense of nothingness.

  Scott yanked open the sliding glass door and glared through the back porch into the yard, drink in hand. Recent winds had broken a rather large limb on the old oak tree and it swayed precariously toward his porch roof. He’d tend to it another day—certainly had time to do so now. He sucked down several more therapeutically scorching swallows of whiskey and stepped out onto the porch. Checking the settings on the hot tub, he cranked the jets up high and stood his half empty glass on a nearby wooden table.

  Balance was beginning to be a challenge, but he held onto the edge of the tub while he tugged off his tie, shirt, and trousers. He kicked his shoes back toward the glass door bouncing one off the porch ceiling, ripped off his socks and, dressed only in his boxer-briefs, leaned over and rolled himself into the hot tub with a splash. Entry into the water was messier than he had expected, with the scorching liquid splashing back and forth in little tidal waves. It rushed over the edges, drained down the side of the tub, and soaked the floor where Gumby feverishly lapped up as much of the puddled water as he could. Scott lay back into the soothing hot water and watched the ceiling fan circling overhead like blades on a helicopter moments before liftoff…or crash. Eventually, the soothing Jacuzzi jets and the ceiling fan and the Jack Daniels worked together to lull Scott into a mild and welcome trance.

  He heard laughter and music. Kathy Becker, dressed somewhat like a glamorous Christmas tree, stood behind a small podium, and said something about how happy she was to receive the prestigious Bell award. Someone in the room yelled, “And the bonus that goes with it.” Applause erupted from the crowd led by Bill Bell, the CEO. She turned and waved at everyone in attendance, grinned her pudgy grin and then darkness covered her face and the stage and the hall.

  In a flash, the image changed.

  The darkness was bleak. He heard the sound of movement. Footsteps. Someone was walking through the house. Drawers slid open on plastic rollers and something heavy was extracted, somewhat noisily, from inside. He smelled a wood fireplace. Smoke. His vision was impaired—not unfocused as much as just blurry. Too bright, here. Too dark, there. He realized he wasn’t in his own house. It frightened him because he had no idea whose it was. He’d never been there before. He looked down and saw his shoes walking, except they weren’t his shoes. He never wore brown boots. He didn’t own a rug like the one beneath his feet.

  He raised his right hand with some difficulty and beheld a pistol. He turned his wrist first right and then left and examined the metallic weapon. He couldn’t name the brand or the style—he knew nothing about guns—and he couldn’t understand why he held this one.

  Scott felt his body fall backwards only to flop into a lounge chair. Cloth upholstery, not leather like the one in his living room, surrounded him. His feet raised and his head dropped into a reclining position.

  He searched the house for an indication of his whereabouts. The newspaper was too far away to read the heading, but he assumed it was the local paper. Something, maybe magazines, were stacked on a nearby table, but they were face down. He couldn’t read the titles or tell the dates. The smoky smell changed, morphed, became clearer. It smelled like cigarette smoke. Scott didn’t smoke cigarettes. Turning his head more to the right he saw a picture frame containing a photo of a man holding the hand of an elderly lady in a hospital bed, her eyes barely open, almost lifeless. He stared at the photo for a long, long time, unable to recognize the woman. But the man looked familiar, like Frank Johnson. The frame brightened and then darkened.

  Then he saw the pistol rise up and slide into his mouth. He tasted the bitter metal and smelled the distinct gun powder odor.

  His world exploded.

  Scott scrambled out of the hot tub and flung himself over the edge screaming, “No, no, no!” A flash of pain jolted his knee when it banged against the concrete floor. Late afternoon sun shone through the screened windows and the ceiling fan clacked noisily overhead.

  Gumby raced back onto the porch eager to be a part of whatever happened out there.

  Scott dragged himself to the door, trembling. “No, no, no,” as Gumby licked the water off his shoulders and neck.

  And Grace was there. She grabbed something dry and warm and wrapped it around Scott’s shoulders, pulling him close to her blue nurse’s scrubs. “Scott,” she said aloud, trying to be heard over his own cries. “It’s okay. I’m here, now.” She pulled him closer.

  He lay his head against her breast and gulped down deep breaths of calming air while the headaches came in waves. He shivered so hard he kicked over one of Grace’s flower pots, spilling black dirt and violets and little white granules of something used to retain water. The action scared Gumby so bad that the dog ran back inside the house.

  “Did you see something?” Grace asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “I’m sorry I wasn’t here.”

  “You can’t always be here.”

  “I try.”

  ***

  In October of his freshman year of college, just when he had been drowning in tests and textbooks and thought he couldn’t manage anything else, Scott met Grace.

  But Julie came before Grace. The co-ed had befriended him the first day he arrived on campus. Scott had no idea why they became friends. They had very little in common. Both were incoming freshman but she was much more organized than he. He struggled with grades. She excelled. He was straight as an arrow. She was “curious.” He was healthy and fit. She was wheelchair-bound.

  They met in the student center when he tripped over her. Consumed with confusion and personal doubts, Scott had forgotten about his Philosophy 101 course and jumped up to sprint to the Waldrop building. Julie was sitting at a table behind him and he barreled over her like a halfback diving for the goal line.

  “Shit!” She shuffled the two big wheels to gain stability.

  “Sorry,” Scott exclaimed, reaching for books and papers scattered across the slick tile floor. “Personal emergency.”

  “Restrooms are over there, Slick,” she said pointing down the hall.

  Scott sized her up. Her stocky form seemed developed from years of pushing the wheels on her chair. Her dark hair swept across her forehead as if a skilled painter had placed it there. Her eyes sparkled as only attractive people’s eyes sparkle and her radiant smile lifted the world.

  “Sorry.”

  “Late for class?”

  “Yeah,” he said, scanning his watch. “Damn. It’s half over.”

  “Then p
ull up a chair, Bud. You’re too late to learn anything now.”

  Scott hesitated, then complied. Laying his books and papers on the table, he slid into the empty chair next to her. They chatted about everything unimportant, like majors, classes, campus life and more.

  “What’s with the chair?” Scott asked, curious and feeling more relaxed. Then he realized how derogatory it sounded and started to backpedal.

  Julie stopped smiling and stared him down as if trying to determine whether he was ready for what she was about to say. She looked down at the chair and then back up to Scott. At first he thought she was playing some stupid stare-down game but her answer snapped him back to reality. “I have Congenital Muscular Dystrophy—CMD.”

  Scott had heard the term, “Muscular Dystrophy,” and remembered seeing pictures of shriveled and deformed children, but he didn’t realize there were different types of the illness. In fact, he knew nothing about CMD. “How long?”

  Julie took in a deep breath and closed her eyes as if to stop herself from throwing her books at him. “All my life,” she said, glaring. “That’s what ‘congenital’ means.”

  “Oh.” He felt stupid. “Sorry.”

  She shook her head. “It is what it is, you know?”

  He tilted his head to the left, trying to understand how someone with such a deadly illness could be so flippant about it.

  And that’s how it began. Their friendship grew. Scott was never attracted to Julie romantically. Their attraction wasn’t based on sympathy. He never felt sorry for Julie because she was in a wheelchair. In fact, after a while her chair seemed like a part of her, like a tiller might be an extension of a sailor out on the ocean.

  Instead, as corny as it might sound, Scott thought of her as a light in a forest, water in a dessert, a welcome haven in the middle of a storm, a friend when a friend was most needed. She was there. With him. Unconditionally.

  They eventually talked about his seizures which never seemed to bother her. She accepted his shyness with grace, like a welcome mat. Anything Scott considered to be a personality deficiency, Julie accepted without question. They were friends.

  And that was enough.

  Then he met Grace.

  Julie had been walking, or rolling, in her case, across the quad in the middle of the day. Beside her an attractive coed, arms loaded with books, was trying to keep up. She wasn’t a knockout, but neither was she a skag. She could make a guy proud to take her home to meet his parents.

  Julie waved him over as soon as she saw him. “Hey, Scotty,” she said, using her own pet name for him. “Meet my roommate, Grace.”

  She smiled. He smiled back and nodded. She carried her alluring frame with a confidence seldom seen on campus. He felt clumsy and inadequate. He left his fears behind and moved closer to meet her.

  “Grace is a nursing student—a sophomore.”

  “Oh,” he said. Most incoming freshmen roomed with other incoming freshmen. Grace and Julie’s situation was a little unusual.

  “Yeah, my freshman roommate found somebody else,” she spoke for the first time. “She claimed she couldn’t live with me ’cause I was too demanding.”

  “Now you know why we get along,” Julie said with a wink.

  “If you ask me,” Grace continued, “I’m not demanding. I just know what I want and I set out to get it.”

  At first, her confidence set Scott back a bit. But, it also appealed to his competitive side and he felt she could be someone special. After all, if she and Julie could hit it off, perhaps she and Scott could, as well.

  They did. It was almost as if they had never not been friends. In her own somewhat commanding style, Grace helped Scott get his shit together, offering tips on study habits, and showing him the ropes. The more they stayed together, the more Scott enjoyed her confident style, compassionate eyes, and directive behavior.

  One night, watching a campus movie-on-the-lawn, sitting on the grass between Julie in her chair and Scott splayed out feet first on the lawn, Grace slid her hand over his. It was a warm, bold gesture, inviting and somewhat enticing.

  Scott, surprised at first and intrigued next, turned his hand over to allow their fingers to intertwine and struggled to keep his glowing smile from being too obvious. After all, he didn’t want to chase her away.

  Later, Grace stayed behind after Julie strolled to her dorm. She walked with Scott through the grassy quad beneath an umbrella of majestic oaks. She talked about her interest in helping people and how a nursing career could make that happen. This seemed like a perfect fit to Scott and he countered, describing his own interest in human resources. The night held a fresh breeze filling and fulfilling him. Beneath a campus light they shared a warm and welcome kiss.

  Scott wanted to invite Grace to his room, but he knew his nerdy roommate would have his nose stuck in a book and would refuse to give them the space they needed. Besides, such a move might be a little too soon.

  They parted and Scott returned to his own room feeling all was right with a world that often seemed as black as night.

  Sorta.

  ***

  Winter had followed fall and chased after spring and Grace and Scott grew together as lovers. They made time to share almost every free minute together and enjoyed the heck out of college life.

  One night, soon after they met, Scott brought his guitar to the quad and serenaded Grace as best he could, despite an out-of-tune guitar and out-of-tune voice. She seemed to love it, leaning back against an old, grand tree and drinking in the music like a thirsty traveler in a vast dessert. Scott enjoyed the time so much he serenaded her every night afterwards for a month.

  In March, just before sunrise, exhausted from midterms and passionate love making with Grace, Scott returned to his room late at night and fell onto his bed, clothes and all. His head had just connected with the pillow when he was out cold. That’s when the hallucinations came again.

  A foggy and blurry image revealed a wheelchair carrying a passenger who looked a lot like Julie.

  She rolled down a campus sidewalk. Grace’s voice suggested they grab some coffee. Ahead, a crosswalk led to a row of shops on the other side of the street. A glance to the right showed the Zombie Coffee Shop, one of their favorite haunts. The potent aroma of coffee floated to him and then changed to the smell of wet socks which were pervasive in his dorm room.

  The scene shifted and faded as sunlight slipped in and out of overhead clouds. Scott recognized Grace’s voice as the one who was talking with Julie.

  “So, what’s new?”

  “That geek in Spanish has hit on me no less than four times this week,” Julie said.

  The image faded out again.

  “…kinda cute, you know.”

  “I think he has a fetish for paraplegics.” Both girls laughed.

  “Sounds like more fun than most of the losers on campus.” Julie looked back over her shoulder and laughed. A group of three girls, giggling and laughing but not paying attention, appeared in his path. One bumped into him, forcing him to spin away from Julie for just a moment.

  The image faded again and Scott heard a noise that sounded like the squeal of tires followed by a bone-grinding crash. The image came back into focus.

  Julie lay in the road in a broken heap. Parts of her body were scraped and mutilated and blood splattered the bricks beneath her. He screamed and ran into the street.

  Scott sat up, awake. His pillow was soaked with sweat. The image scorched the backs of his eyes as if he had stared into the blazing sun. He jumped out of bed, knocking over a chair and a stack of books, and dashed out of his room and down the hall and out of the dorm.

  Within seconds he was charging across the campus, heading for the bank of shops on the other side. The crosswalk was empty. Students moved here and there without incident, chatting and laughing and heading to or from class.

  Scott ran to the Zombie Coffee Shop but the outside glare prevented him from seeing inside. Cupping his hands over his eyes he pressed his face agains
t the window. Neither Grace nor Julie were there. Bewildered, he backed away. The experience had seemed so real, so authentic, but was nothing more than just a fuzzy dream. A vivid, horrifying dream.

  He had turned away like the creatures who shared a name with the coffee shop, and shuffled back toward his dorm.

  ***

  Rain crashed on the roof and into the gutters, through downspouts and onto the lawn to settle in ever-growing puddles throughout the yard. Scott watched through the bay windows of his living room as Kathy Becker steered her Lexus RX450h through the downpour in his driveway and came to a stop just inches away from his garage door. She flung her door open, extended a purple umbrella, and cocked it like a shotgun until it expanded. She rocked her large rain-coated frame from the car into a standing position beneath the parasol, which caused the vehicle to rise up slightly as if to sigh in relief, and walked as fast as she could in high heels down the walkway in front of Scott’s window and up his front steps. By the time her pudgy fingers pressed the doorbell, Scott had already opened the door.

  “Hi, Kathy,” he said as politely as he could manage. “Won’t you come in?”

  Gumby barked in the family room where Scott had sentenced him when her car pulled into the driveway. He loved welcoming visitors, all visitors, to their home. Those who knew Scott and Grace well saw Gumby as a playful puppy, simply acting out his own role in life. He scared the hell out of those who didn’t understand. Kathy Becker wouldn’t understand.