The Simpatico Series Box Set (3 books in 1)

by Dermot Davis

  Getting to his feet, Andrew stood in bewilderment. “Fiona?” exclaimed as she landed before him.

  “Hello, sweetheart,” she said, smiling an impish smile.

  “Oh my God,” Andrew said, his heart and body trembling with a mixture of shock and joy. “I can’t believe you’re here.”

  “Sit!” a guard yelled to Andrew.

  “How did you?” Andrew asked as they both sat down. They grabbed each other’s' hands like they were each other’s' savior and lifeline.

  “My father had to go to a meeting today,” she said, not wanting to go into the details. “I’ve missed you so much!”

  “Are you kidding? I can’t live without you,” Andrew said.

  “I can’t live without you, either,” Fiona said, clutching his hands tighter.

  “Fi, I don’t think I can go on much longer,” Andrew said sadly. “We have to make a decision.” He was saddened to notice how thin his beloved Fiona was, the stress of his incarceration was obviously making her physically ill. As beautiful as she was, she didn’t appear to be eating regularly.

  “Shush, Andrew, listen to me,” Fiona said, not liking where he was heading. “I’ve been visiting you!” she said brightly. “Every night!”

  “What?” Andrew asked.

  “You can’t see me but every night I’ve been leaving my body and visiting you in your cell.”

  Looking pained, Andrew dropped his eyes and softened his grip of her hands.

  “I can teach you!” Fiona continued excitedly. “We can visit together. Our astral bodies can go anywhere we want! If we can’t be together in the flesh, we can be together on the astral plane.”

  “Stop it, Fiona, enough already,” Andrew said, pressing his grip tighter to get her attention. “I’m done.”

  “What?” Fiona asked, her heart missing a beat.

  “I’m done, I’m through with all this magic and supernatural stuff.”

  “Andrew,” Fiona said, feeling a tsunami of tears about to well up. “We can’t give up.”

  “Fiona, listen to yourself,” Andrew said, his heart hardening.

  “You think I’m a crazy person?” Fiona asked tearfully.

  “No, of course I don’t think you’re crazy!” Andrew answered. “I just can’t live in the same world you live in, Fiona. I’m not built the same way you are. I don’t see what you see or believe in what you believe. I don’t know what you’re talking about half the time.”

  Pulling her hands closer, he stroked them. As his heart softened again, he took a deep breath before he spoke. “There’s nothing wrong with you. I adore you. I admire you for believing in magic and fairies and angels and astral bodies… but I can’t. I’m the one with the problem, sweetheart. I’m the one that’s blind and can’t see what you see. I’m not as strong as you are…”

  “Of course you are!” Fiona argued.

  “I’m not, Fiona, trust me, I’m not. It’s the one thing I admire in you and the one thing I hate to admit to myself. I’m not as strong as you are. I can’t do this any longer. It’s killing me. Maybe it’s killing us both, I don’t know.”

  Willing himself not to crumble into a heap and cry, Andrew watched with a broken heart as the tears fell from her face.

  “I won’t survive without you, I know that,” he continued softly, “but I can’t go on pretending that we’re together when we’re not. That’s more painful to me than not having any hope, at all.”

  “We can be together,” Fiona said tearfully. “I can teach you. We can fly!”

  “Fiona, listen to me,” he said urgently. “Twelve years! You’ll be almost 30!” he said with emphasis, pleading to her logical mind. “I want you to forget about me. Carry on with your life. I’m a weight around your neck and it kills me to think that I’m destroying you.”

  “Andrew, stop,” Fiona pleaded. “I will never let you go.”

  For fear that he would fall into a helpless and broken bundle onto the floor, Andrew stood up. With a heavy heart he signaled to the guard that the visit was over. “I’m so sorry, Fi. Forgive me my weakness. I will always love you.”

  Fiona felt helpless as she watched the guard escort Andrew out of the room. Remaining seated as the door closed, she watched Andrew vanish from her life. That's it, she thought to herself; this is the end. Right then and there, she felt like her life had just ended.

  Remember this moment, she thought. This is the moment, the very moment where all meaning is vanquished from my life. This is the very moment where I cease to live. Even if I do continue to survive, from this moment on, I won't be living... I'll merely be existing.

  Chapter 14

  In their prison cell, Henry studied at the desk while Andrew lay in bed. “Do you need help?” Henry asked, turning his head slightly.

  “What kind of help?” Andrew asked back.

  “Help with depression. Do you need to see someone?”

  “No,” Andrew answered like it was an idiotic suggestion. “I don’t suffer from depression.”

  “You spend your time moping and laying around in bed. You appear to have no energy. You never smile or laugh or talk. You have no ambition or goals, you’re clearly depressed.” At Andrew’s failure to respond, Henry continued, “It’s no disgrace. Pretty much everybody suffers from depression in here. Goes with the territory,” Henry said. “I don’t agree with medication but if you need something, antidepressants or whatever..." he said kindly, "you have to speak up or they’re not going to do anything about it.”

  “I don’t need antidepressants, thank you very much,” Andrew replied.

  “If you’re bored you can volunteer for work detail. I help out in the library,” Henry suggested. “Breaks up the day.”

  “Am I bothering you?” Andrew asked. “Getting on your nerves or something?”

  “Just trying to help, bro,” Henry answered. “If you were hurting, I’d want you to tell me about it, you know?”

  “I’m fine, thanks,” Andrew answered, shifting his position on the bed.

  “When was the last time you took a shower?” Henry asked as he got a whiff of Andrew’s smelly feet.

  “Are you kidding? That place is so foul, I feel dirtier just being there.”

  “Andrew, we all know that this place sucks but you’ve got to roll with it, okay?” Henry said. Figuring that Henry was not going to get off of his case unless he made some kind of change, Andrew decided to get up, just to shut the guy up.

  Sliding off the bed and landing on his feet, Andrew looked around for his towel.

  “What are you looking for?” Henry asked, surprised at the kid’s sudden shift in mood.

  Finding his towel, Andrew slipped into his shoes. “I’m going to take a shower,” he said and left. Slinging his towel over his shoulder he caught the attention of Duke who watched him leave.

  Once in the shower room, Andrew tried to ignore the filthy state of the place. There were dark stains on the walls and floor, discarded shampoo bottles, shower caps, body hair, and what looked like used condoms on the floor. Andrew chose the cleanest-looking shower stall that he could find and began to undress.

  “Well, well, looky what we have here,” he heard a familiar voice from behind. Turning around to see Duke and two of his cronies sent a wave of panic through Andrew’s body.

  “You would have done exactly the same, admit it,” Andrew said, trying not to sound as scared as he felt.

  “Friends don’t let friends escape alone, do they, shithead?” Duke asked.

  “If I came back for you, then I would have gotten caught,” Andrew countered.

  “Looks like you got caught, anyways,” Duke said, smiling. “What’s it feel like, to be back among friends, huh?”

  “One on one,” Andrew then said, knowing what was about to happen. “Me and you.”

  “Mano a mano, bro?” Duke asked sarcastically. “Seriously?”

  “Are you chicken?” Andrew asked, positioning himself for a fistfight.

  “I ain’t chicken,
bro, but we don’t have time for that shit, either, do we, assfuck?” Duke said, checking behind for any sign of guards or interference.

  Taking his chance to make a run for it, Andrew ran past Duke but was easily caught by Malice. Andrew pushed the big guy away but the three gang members were on him so fast, that he didn't stand a chance. They pummeled him with blows to his head and torso.

  Falling to the ground, Andrew received a nasty kick to the stomach. As they kicked him with all of their strength, he did his best to shield his face and head. In response to the savage beating he was receiving, his body went into shock.

  Even though it lasted less than a minute, time for Andrew slowed down as he began to lose consciousness. Unable to maintain his body in a curled-up defensive position, Andrew’s form loosened. As if channeling all their angst and rage into their feet, the gang members didn’t hold back. “Okay, let’s go, that’s enough,” Duke said, more concerned about being caught than fearing for Andrew’s condition.

  “Rat us out, punk, and you’re a dead man,” Duke said to Andrew as they left. Now unconscious, Andrew had no chance of hearing him.

  Waking abruptly from her afternoon nap, Fiona sat upright in bed. “Andrew?” she said out loud.

  Nurses and doctors bustled around Andrew as he was wheeled into the emergency room. Taking his vitals and hooking him up to blood and IV feeds, the medical staff acted as if his life was on the line. “We’re losing him!” one of the doctors yelled as a nurse connected Andrew to an EKG. “Prepare defibrillators,” he commanded as he performed manual compressions on Andrew’s chest and desperately tried to keep the kid alive.

  Remotely aware of the mayhem of his surroundings, Andrew felt remarkably removed from it all. He felt an inner peace that, under the circumstances, seemed extraordinary. As if finding himself in outer space, everything became still and quiet.

  When he opened his eyes, his vision at first, was blurred. When he tried to focus, he couldn't. He felt like he wasn’t in control of his eyes. In some strange way, he wasn't focusing with the lenses of the eyes; it was as if his eyes were his mind. What he saw when his vision became clear, shocked him.

  As if seeing everything around him all at once, he felt like he was in the air, floating. Below him, on the bed, he could see his own body. Stunned by the bloodied and broken mess that his body was in, he didn't feel scared or panicked. He felt only compassion... and peace. Looking down at the body on the bed, as if he were looking at someone else, he felt only love.

  Although the body looked familiar, Andrew didn’t feel a sense of ownership. “I” am not down there, he thought; “I” am up here. It was a bizarre, yet weirdly familiar feeling. He had never felt so light and peaceful. Enjoying the experience very much, he didn’t fear for his body’s welfare. Even though there was nothing but mayhem below him, everything seemed right with the world.

  The frenzied nurses and doctors looked like they were performing in a stage play. Fully committed to their roles, they gave one-hundred-percent to what they were doing. In fact, the same could be said for every person on the planet, he noticed, when he expanded his vision to take in humanity: everyone was totally committed to their role in life. Every actor in the drama of life was turning in a very fine performance, he thought. Yes, that’s all that it is, he concluded: a performance. It’s so beautiful, he decided. Why am I up here? he then wondered.

  Was he experiencing a kind of out of body experience that Fiona was telling him about?

  “Clear!” the doctor yelled as he engaged the defibrillators on Andrew’s chest. As if vacuumed back into his body with great force, Andrew felt slammed into severe physical pain and panic. I'm back in my body, he thought. The sounds that the machines and the staff were now making sounded so loud and intolerable, it was like a war just broke out around him. His body felt unnaturally heavy and he was in terrible agony. The increasingly loud noise and the raw pain and the intense fear were so brutal and unmanageable, that Andrew lost consciousness.

  The next time that Andrew woke up, he wasn’t sure if he were dreaming or awake. His head felt so muddled and his vision so blurred, that he could vaguely make out his surroundings. His body was now lying on a hospital bed in a ward shared by maybe five or six other patients. He did not have the strength to raise his head to see anything more. Sitting on a chair by the wall, a uniformed officer sat reading upon a computer tablet.

  A nurse checked the IV drips hanging by the bed. He couldn’t make out if she was looking at him or ignoring him to concentrate on her task. He tried to speak but he couldn’t open his mouth. He didn’t seem to have any control over his vocal cords.

  “Mr. Cox,” a male voice said as a doctor came into view. “I’m glad you’ve decided to rejoin us; it was touch and go there for quite some time,” he kindly said as he read from his chart.

  Turning his head to see the doctor more clearly took great effort. Andrew could only manage a slight improvement in his view. Speaking too fast for Andrew to fully process, the doctor continued. “You have suffered serious trauma and quite frankly, you’re lucky to be alive. Apart from fractures to several of your ribs, you’ve sustained substantial injury to most of your internal organs, most especially your spleen and kidneys. Expect to be with us here for quite some time,” he said.

  Andrew noticed that the doctor glanced sideways to the guard as he spoke. “As a police custody patient please be assured that you will get the best treatment, equal to any other patient that we attend to, here at this facility. Do you have any questions?”

  The question most pressing on Andrew’s mind was how long he was to be hospitalized. Unable to form the question with his mouth, Andrew struggled in vain.

  “Depending on your responsiveness to treatment, I expect the length of your stay to be measured in weeks rather than days. Was that your question?” the doctor asked when he saw Andrew relax his struggles. Andrew nodded his head, yes, but he wasn’t sure if it could be seen by others.

  “Main thing is not to worry about a thing. Concentrate on your healing. Get complete rest and avoid stress at all costs; you think you can do that?” the doctor asked but didn’t wait for a response. “Excellent,” he said, making a final note on the chart. handing off the chart to an attending nurse, the doctor went on to his next patient.

  Fiona looked furtively out her bedroom window. She waited until her father drove through the gates and onto the street. Quickly dressing in a long-sleeve cotton shirt and a pair of jeans, she ran to the door. Turning the knob, she got a terrible shock: her bedroom door wouldn’t open. Turning it this way and that, she thumped the door in frustration. Her father must have locked it from the outside.

  Seeing a note that had been slipped beneath her door, she picked it up and opened it: BACK SOON. DON’T DO ANYTHING STUPID. LOVE YOU, DAD.

  Scrunching it up into a ball, she threw it angrily across the room. After her last escape, he had warned her that on prison visiting day he would lock her inside. Realizing the hopelessness of her situation, she was incensed. Her father was now treating her like a prisoner in her own home. Fatigued due to her weight loss and inability to focus upon anything other than developing the ability to astral travel nightly and see Andrew on visiting day, she no longer speculated about her father’s intentions.

  I’m going to see Andrew today if it kills me, she declared. She looked out of her bedroom window for a possible escape route. Judging the distance from the far window to the drain to the roof of the conservatory below, Fiona considered her options. Opening up fully the end window of her bathroom, she stuck her head out. She mentally measured the distance against what she considered to be her physical capabilities. I can do this, she said, pumping herself up.

  Trying not to look down, she plucked up her courage. Taking solid hold of the window frame, she stepped out onto the window ledge below. Reaching out to her right, she grabbed hold of the drain and shimmied closer to it. Adjusting her body position so that she could jump to the conservatory roof below, she shrie
ked when she almost lost her balance.

  One, two, three, she counted and then made the leap. She landed on the tiled roof with a thud. She steadied herself and took a deep breath before taking another step. Grabbing hold of the drain near the gable, she lowered herself down. As soon as her feet were close enough to the ground, she closed her eyes and let go.

  When she landed safely, she was so pleased with herself that she fist-pumped the air. "Yes!" she said out loud. Once in her car, she turned up her music. A girl on a mission, she drove with purpose through the city streets to rendezvous with the one she loved.

  Once through security, she took her place in line at the busy visitors’ check-in window. “Andrew Cox,” she said to the female officer behind the glass. Knowing the routine, she prepared to show her identification.

  “That name isn’t on here,” the officer said, looking on her computer screen.

  “Cox,” Fiona repeated and spelled it out in case there was a communication error, “Andrew.”

  “I heard you the first time, miss,” the officer said, looking like she was bored already. “That prisoner isn’t here no more, that’s all I’m allowed to tell you.”

  “He was released?” Fiona asked hopefully, even though she realized how much wishful thinking inspired her question. “Was he transferred?” she then quickly asked. “Why would he not be here anymore?”

  “I don’t have that information and if I did, I’m not at liberty to say. You need to take it up with admissions, next?” the officer said and looked past Fiona to the long line that had formed behind her. “Next?” she said again, looking at Fiona as if to ask why she was standing in the way.

  “Okay, thank you,” Fiona said weakly. As she stepped aside, she wondered what her next move should be. Unable to see a sign that said, “Admissions,” Fiona got in line for the “Information” window.