Of That Day and Hour: A psychological thriller

by Anthony O'Brien

  “Thank you.” They wouldn’t be here if Marcus didn’t believe he could trust them. “Last I heard you’d become a Dr. Davies.”

  “That’s correct.”

  “A specialist within your own chosen field.” Marcus appears suitably impressed. “What do you specialize in, Eve?”

  “I’m a psychiatrist.”

  “So both doctors! Do you enjoy your work?”

  “Yes, I find it rewarding, especially when I get to make a positive difference in someone’s life.”

  “Is a psychiatrist permitted to believe in the paranormal?”

  “Of course.” She can see he holds the Devil in his eye.

  “And do you believe?”

  “After recent events,” She pauses for effect. “It has to be a resounding yes.”

  “Wonderful.”

  With the initial tension broken and smiles all round, Marcus helps Jeff take the cases up to the guest room. Eve accompanies Sarah into the kitchen, which is in sharp contrast to the one she’s left behind. The light brown and cream marble floor tiles complement the solid mahogany cupboards and marble worktops. The fiery heart is a large stainless steel oven range cooker, framed by two mahogany pedestals, fluted pillars with ornate capitals carved with leaves and scrolls, stretching up to the ceiling. The oven backsplash is a large painting on ceramic tiles, depicting a bird’s eye view of ploughed fields, a small lakeside village and lush green mountains, topped off with a beautiful clear blue sky.

  “You didn’t have to go to all this trouble.” Eve’s impressed, everything was prepared before they arrived.

  “It’s no trouble at all! To be honest with you, it’s a great excuse, I love cooking, especially for guests. I was brought up in a big family where we would all sit around the table at mealtimes.”

  “Do you still get together?”

  “Not as often as I would like.” Sarah says with a twinge of sadness, then raises an eyebrow. “What about you?”

  “It was just me and mom.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be.” Eve shrugs the past off. “I had a great childhood.” She changes the subject; being a daughter without a father is something she does not wish to discuss. “It’s a real treat for us that you’re cooking; we live on a ranch in the middle of nowhere and cook only for ourselves.”

  “A ranch sounds nice, all that fresh air, green pastures and cattle.”

  “So the real estate ads would have you believe. Think hot air and desert.”

  “Oh.”

  “Sorry to interrupt.” Jeff appeared unexpectedly. “The cases are upstairs, would you like to freshen up before dinner?”

  “Yes.” She turns to Sarah. “How long do we have?”

  “Twenty minutes okay?”

  “Perfect.”

  Twenty minutes later and Eve helps Sarah bring the food into the dining room. The table has already been perfectly presented, the silverware polished earlier in the day. Marcus pours the wine, both red and white. The conversation is jovial and polite as the main meal is presented. They are given a choice of meat, either honey and ginger chicken or pulled beef.

  “Something must have deeply troubled you to have brought you to our doorstep.” Marcus understands Jeff’s swallowed his pride to be here. “Would you be kind enough to enlighten us?”

  “Where do I start?” There’s so much for him to say.

  “The beginning’s always the best place.”

  “Well.” He takes a deep breath. “It started the day Eve phoned me at the university. She told me that one of her patients, who has become our protagonist, has a knowing.” All eyes fall on Jeff as he frowns. “He’s also the cop killer Casey Lee Jones.”

  “I do recall following his case.” Marcus knows the name Casey Lee Jones. “His knowing was kill or be killed.”

  “That’s correct.”

  “A fascinating defense.” Marcus is envious, he would love to work with Casey.

  “His case rests on what can’t be proved in a court of law.”

  “That he could predict the future and his ultimate demise.”

  “Correct.” Jeff can see the glimmer of excitement in Marcus’s eyes. “However, Mr. Jones chose to decline all interviews with Eve until a certain condition was met.”

  “Which was?”

  “That I was to be involved. He asked specifically for me by name, yet we’d never met, and Eve had never mentioned me.”

  “Interesting.” Marcus looks to Eve for conformation. “Was there any possibility that he could access information through you, or those around you?”

  “No, it’s maximum security, no visitations; total lockdown. I didn’t forward Jeff’s name for any of my background checks. We hadn’t spoke for a number of years and it would have complicated matters.”

  “I see. So you were Jeff’s first point of contact, his recruiter.”

  “Yes.”

  “Recruiter?” Jeff’s surprise is apparent to all.

  “To be able to work at this level, Jeff, knowingly or not you’ve been recruited by government. Once you have been recruited you will find you can’t just walk away. May I presume you were made redundant from your post at the university?”

  “Yes...but why do you assume that would happen?”

  “Because that wouldn’t have been a coincidence. Once you’ve been recruited, all other ties will automatically be severed.”

  “Did you know that, Eve?” Has she betrayed him?

  “No, I didn’t.” She reinforces her statement with a direct and forceful look into his eyes. “They informed me that you would be involved for a short time only. I’m sorry, Jeff. I should have known better.” She feels awful, exposed like this in front of strangers.

  “It’s okay.” He’s relieved; she's not complicit. “Don’t blame yourself.”

  “You see, being in this game, Jeff,” Marcus pauses to find the right words, “Is like being in a one way valve: once they let you in there’s no way back out.”

  “But once you’re in, you don’t want to come back out.” Sarah says quietly.

  “Yes, that’s also true, thank you, Sarah.” Marcus smiles at her. “Everything you once believed will be turned upside down, but in the end you won’t have it any other way.”

  “Thanks for the reassurance.” Jeff’s shaken, not sure he can cope with this extra layer of reality now added to his already confused world.

  “I was quite surprised to hear that they kept Mr. Jones at the facility; they usually transfer them over to us.”

  “So there are more like Casey?” This revelation takes Jeff by surprise.

  “Oh yes, but there must be something special about him that they wish to conceal from us.”

  “Why would they do that, but then permit Jeff to interview him?”

  “I don’t know, Eve. The question might be rephrased to 'what does he want from Jeff'?”

  “He says he doesn’t want anything, and that he’s only here to show me the truth.”

  “And the truth is?”

  “I’m not sure...perhaps what I have fought against all my life, the reality of the paranormal.”

  “But why you?”

  “I don’t know.” It’s a question Jeff keeps asking himself.

  “I’ve known you a long time, Jeff. What’s persuaded you away from your, if you don’t mind me saying, rigidly scientific viewpoint?”

  “Do you remember when we were children, I told you about the lady who scared me; she watched me in the street, and walked with a limp; her face was always distorted. Then one night I saw her at the end of my bed.”

  “How could I forget such a tale! It was your grandmother, if I recall correctly?”

  “Yes, and Casey Lee Jones told me about it.” Shaking his head. “How did he know? How does he know about my childhood? That’s already been, that’s the past; he had no part in it and yet word for word he knew every single detail.” Jeff feels like he’s crying out for help, and looks to Marcus.

  “He doe
s have an agenda, doesn’t he?”

  “Yes, but what is it?” Jeff’s fear is that it’s all a mind game.

  “I’m not sure. Maybe he genuinely wishes to open you up to what you have firmly denied all your life.”

  “Possibly.” Jeff considers this. “When he speaks to me his eyes are not that of a killer; they have compassion in them.”

  “He understands this is a hard pill for you to swallow.” Marcus has genuine concern for an old friend, who’s lost the security of his own belief system. “Has he shown you anything else?”

  “This is where it starts to get really weird. We decided to check out his past and his claims of being a childhood psychic, and visited his mother in New Orleans. She’s not permitted access to him, so no conferring could have taken place between them.”

  “A sensible decision. Did she validate his story?”

  “Yes. But before the visit, and without prior knowledge, Casey told me to have a good trip and to watch out for the step.”

  “The step?” Marcus raises an eyebrow.

  “We didn’t understand the meaning behind his words either, until we visited his mother. She verified all his claims of clairvoyance; however it was in the cellar that the nail was finally driven home.”

  “What happened?”

  “There was a loose step on the way down that he already knew I would slip on. But that’s not the full story. Years earlier he’d carved a date on a wooden beam in the cellar, it was the date we visited. His mother was already expecting us.”

  “That can only mean one thing.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Your destinies were already entwined.” Marcus is excited. “There will be much more to come from him.”

  “There’s more to tell.” Jeff can't contain himself; the words spill out. “The day before the visit I had a premonition.”

  “What did you see?”

  “The same street, the same house and Casey’s mom.”

  “You never mentioned it to me.” This is news to Eve.

  “I’m sorry, I was embarrassed to tell you at the time, and in the moment I feared for my own sanity.”

  “I’ll forgive you.” Jeff has enough trials to face; he needs her support more now than ever.

  “You’re in good company, Jeff. Many people will blame themselves and accept a medical diagnosis of schizophrenia, rather than face the truth.”

  “I did visit the doctor myself.”

  “I state my case. Now was there any difference between your dream and reality the following day?”

  “Only inside the house, everything outside was identical.”

  “What was inside?”

  “An empty room, except the walls were full of dates, names and symbols.”

  “Can you remember any of them?”

  “The dates were very clear to me and coincided with births, marriages and deaths in my family, although some were unknown to me as they were future dates. The symbols were general mythological totems. There was a child depicted in the womb alongside my birthdate, and there were fragments of sentences but I can’t remember what they said. I wrote them off as my own subconscious ramblings.”

  “That’s fascinating, considering the date in the cellar is also connected to you.”

  “Yes, there was also a cellar door. It had 'the end is near' written across it in red; in fact that was the only color in the dream, everything else was monochrome.”

  “Did you open the door?”

  “No, I woke before I got chance.”

  “Pity. How have you been coping emotionally?”

  “Fragile at best.” Jeff moves his hand, disguising the slight tremor, whilst recalling the experience.

  “You will be, any sane person experiencing the paranormal will question, like you said, their own sanity first. What did the doctor say?”

  “That I was having anomalous experiences, benign hallucinations, and that I was to take it easy. He insisted my sense of presence was merely a hypnagogic image.”

  “That sounds familiar; if they can’t pin it on schizophrenia or some other form of disease then it has to be hallucinations. The mere thought of being diagnosed with a mental illness is enough to ensure the silence of millions of people.”

  “So it’s more prevalent than we think?”

  “Oh yes, but I have to ask you another question. What did you see to make you believe you were having hallucinations?”

  “That’s quite a different story. It happened when we visited the Colorado State University for research.”

  “This research is restricted from all libraries, the internet and all media; you wouldn’t have found any answers there.” Marcus is adamant; to his mind this information requires restriction.

  “What I discovered wasn’t in the books, but I did find answers in the most unlikely of places.”

  “Where?”

  “The men’s room.”

  “The toilets?” Marcus looks surprised.

  “Yes.”

  “What happened?”

  “When I walked inside a cubicle I took some tissue and blew my nose, but immediately I was forcibly knocked to the ground, like in an explosion. The air was filled with shouts and screams, and I had to pick myself up off the floor.” Jeff appears vacant as he recalls his story, he’s talking to himself as much as he is to those around him. “I walked out expecting to see students running around; instead I found myself surrounded by men from a different time and in a different place.”

  “A different place?”

  “Yes.” Jeff snaps himself from his momentary daze. “The washroom was gilded, it had paneled walls and chandeliers. The people wore dinner jackets, and there was a bathroom attendant dressed in a blue uniform.”

  “Were you able to interact with them, or were you simply an invisible presence?”

  “No, I interacted.” His eyebrows raise. “Just like I am now with you.”

  “Who did you speak to and what did they say?”

  “I overheard one of the passengers say that he’d had a bad dream, a premonition that his daughter was left on Southampton docks, crying that she wouldn’t see her father again. When I spoke to the attendant and asked him where I was, he said that I’d knocked my head hard, and that we were in the gentlemen’s room aboard the Titanic.”

  “Fascinating.” Marcus’s excitement is expressed in his glance to Sarah. “Were you able to explore the ship?”

  “No, I found myself back in the cubicle in the library.”

  “Did you discover the connection? Was there any reason behind your time slip?”

  “Time slip?” Jeff hadn’t contemplated the notion.

  “Yes, a time slip is a paranormal phenomenon. Many physicists believe that the separation between the past, present and future is merely a convincing illusion. When a person or group of people slip in time they briefly enter another period in time. This can be explained by the multiple universe theory, so what you experienced was simply an alternate version of our present reality. We deal with and document this kind of stuff all the time.”

  “So was it real or an illusion?”

  “What do you think?”

  “It was real?” It’s plain for all to see that Jeff’s confused.

  “Precisely, although some people experience a time slip as an almost lifeless experience, with a visual flatness and dim lighting. This is often followed by a depressive, uneasy feeling. However, you interacted with the time visited, and have been privileged to be able to speak to those in that time. It’s also quite typical for your time there to only last a few minutes, although there have been those who have spent several hours before returning. My guess is some have never returned.”

  “Never returned?” Jeff and Eve simultaneously frown at the suggestion.

  “We have around one hundred thousand active missing person cases in the U.S. today. Although many have undoubtedly started a new life, or have fallen prey to some others misdeed, others I’ve made various conjectures about. We may n
ever know the truth.”

  “I see.” Jeff’s academic mind can’t compute the idea that he may not have returned.

  “So what was the connection?” Marcus brings him back to the present.

  “When I got back to the library we searched books pertaining to the disaster, searching for premonitions. What I eventually found, though, was in a photograph, a photograph of the bathroom attendant I spoke to, taken as he stood on the docks before they set sail.”

  “Wonderful.” Marcus is enthused. “You couldn’t ask for better confirmation. Is there anything else you can give me?”

  “The day we left Aimee’s house, that’s Casey’s mom, Eve asked could we visit her again? She replied no; she was going on a journey, and was going to catch up with relatives.”

  “A common statement.”

  “Not when they’re all dead. When I lost my footing on the stairs, I also lost my phone. The following day we went back to retrieve it; she was deceased and her body was being removed from the house.”

  “What did Casey make of the news?”

  “He already knew, in fact he was trying to comfort me.”

  “This may seem a strange question, did she visit you?”

  “Yes.” Jeff’s surprised that Marcus anticipated she might. “I was alone and outside on the porch, it was around two in the morning. I was drinking coffee, looking up at the stars and trying to get my head around everything. At first I thought I saw the shadow of an animal around the barn, or that it was just my mind playing tricks. Then the shadow stepped out and I thought there was an intruder.”

  “What happened?”

  “I froze, but not out of fear, I froze because I couldn’t move.” He shudders at the thought. “The closer she came the heavier the pressure was on my chest.”

  “Was this a dream?”

  “At the time no, but then I believed so because when I could move again, my coffee was cold.”

  “It doesn’t make it any less real. If you’re being contacted by a spirit whether you’re fully awake or asleep there’s always a reason. What was the message?”

  “She told me not to trust him.”

  “Casey?”

  “That’s what I thought, but no.”