by C Thomas Cox
I again saw the Joker on his face, but this time I also detected the Joker in his almost compulsive laughter. "I didn't say I wanted to remember the good times I shared with her, gramps." The laughter took over his body, and he stomped like a boy throwing a temper tantrum. He danced across the floor in his bizarre fit of hilarity. Then, just as suddenly as he began laughing, he stopped. Other than the purr of the generator, the house fell silent. However, the smirk on his pink face remained. "You see, grandpa, I want to remember the only good time I had in her presence. The time I broke into her apartment, knocked enough dishes from the cabinets and books off the shelf to make it look like a burglary, and shot her dead." I shuddered, as the expression on his face didn't change during his entire recitation of the diabolical tale. "If you look closely at that curtain," he pointed to the pig-covered one in front of the bathroom. "If you look close enough, you can still make out the bloodstains."
Though I didn’t think it possible, his demented grin grew even wider. I wanted to run from him, to bowl him over and break through the door. I needed to escape.
Just when I committed to charging at him and ramming my head into his gut, though, he raised his gun. Then without hesitation he wrapped his finger around the trigger...and squeezed.
Chapter Thirty-Three
I closed my eyes when Thomas began to squeeze the trigger. I didn't want to see the bullet pierce my skin or the blood flow from my chest. But once I heard the shot ring out and felt the resultant vibrations inside the shack, I was shocked that I didn't feel any pain. Maybe I died immediately upon impact, and I was already crossing over to the other side. A side that, as my earlier vision of flames indicated, would not include a jaunt through pearl-covered gates. I opened my eyes, uncertain what I'd see.
Thomas was sitting in his recliner, and he had covered himself with his blanket as if nothing abnormal had just occurred. He tucked his gun next to him and pulled the blanket back over his head. On the other side of his chair, I noticed a one-inch diameter hole in the shower curtain where one of the pigs used to fly.
Perhaps he was reenacting his mom's murder. I wouldn't have been shocked if he did so periodically, as his description of her murder seemed to bring him great amusement. I thought it more likely, however, that he fired in order to frighten me. To let me know that he wasn't kidding -- that he really would shoot me if he needed to. That I'd better treat him right...or else.
I shifted into an almost comfortable position and kept my eyes trained on Thomas's blanket-covered figure. I lay facing him, and I pulled the blanket tightly against my chin like a child does when listening to a ghost story. This ghost, however, was real. And he was willing to kill.
Although he filled the shack with snores five minutes after he re-covered his face, I believe he could somehow still hear me. Every time I moved, his snores momentarily abated until I was again still. Maybe the cruel environment in which his mother raised him taught him to be prepared, even in sleep, for the next belt to the side of the head. Regardless, I wasn't about to try to escape that night. Even if I was able to climb out of the chair without waking him, how would I get out? He kept the deadbolt keys in his pocket, and the window was alarmed. I was a prisoner. I wasn't just his prisoner, though.
I was, of course, also a prisoner of Half-Ear's apparent eagerness to get back at me for my over-zealous umpiring. In the midst of Thomas's threats, I couldn't stop worrying about Claire's safety -- and I couldn't do anything to help her. I prayed that Charlie had decided to stay with her for several more days. Alone, I doubted Claire would stand a chance.
In addition to the two maniacs who threatened to destroy both my life and the life of the one for whom I lived, a constant fear of my next episode kept me on edge. At any moment, the jungles of Vietnam could barge into my life. Jungles that, although nearly nine thousand miles away and fifty years in the past, would hang their canopy above me forever.
As I thought back to my time in Vietnam, I remembered feeling similarly trapped. With landmines on one side and Viet Cong on the other, our squad appeared ready to give up. Sergeant Green, however, had a different idea. "Pull it together, men. When confronted with a seemingly insurmountable challenge, you either step up, or you give up." He straightened his back adjusted his helmet. "I am not going to be the one who's going to give up!"
Those three sentences were enough to keep our squad alive, and they were enough to keep me from completely losing hope. Although I knew it wasn't going to be easy, I wasn't going to let my Thomas and Half-Ear win. Unless, of course, one of them murdered me first.
Chapter Thirty-Four
I awoke to the sizzle -- and scent -- of bacon wafting in from the kitchen. I was shocked that I'd slept at all. Lying that close to a murderer who wouldn't think twice about taking my life didn't exactly induce slumber.
When I shook off the sleep, I wondered whether Thomas could’ve known that I believed breakfast wasn't complete without a few strips of pork? Nah, I thought. Just a lucky guess. He couldn't have known without a conversation with Claire -- a conversation that I was almost positive he hadn't had. At that point, I found myself questioning everything.
Two narrow strips of sunlight, one on either side of the blind that was drawn over the singular window, intruded into the living area like air conditioning into a sauna. Although I couldn't grasp it, the light reminded me of the freedom that I hoped to soon regain.
I climbed out of the recliner and headed to the bathroom, the first place I visit every morning. "Morning sleepyhead," Thomas sing-songed from the kitchen. He didn't sound like the gun-wielding maniac that had shot a hole through the shower curtain just the night before. A hole that, as I closed the curtain behind me, reminded me not to trust a thing he said.
"Morning," I replied.
"Be right out with breakfast."
After I flushed and washed up, I headed toward the kitchen. I wanted to see the shack's only other room.
Thomas must've heard my footsteps, for as soon as I headed his way he slammed the kitchen door shut. "Sorry," he said through the flat panel wood door. "I like to cook in peace." I didn't dare believe him.
Although I didn't recall him closing the door when he moved in and out of the kitchen the night before, I chalked that up to his confidence that I wouldn't leave the recliner. He was right. I was too frightened and exhausted to argue with him when he directed me to sit. I vaguely recalled noticing that, while I was falling asleep, the kitchen door was shut. I didn't think anything of it at the time, though. I was barely conscious.
The morning was a different story. My senses were awake, and I planned on analyzing everything Thomas did. I hoped that, by doing so, I could determine a way to flee.
Closing the kitchen door, of course, seemed to indicate that he was hiding something. Why else would he keep me out? But what in the world could he be hiding in his kitchen? The caviar?
Within minutes he unlocked the door and delivered a plate of bacon, eggs, and toast on a white ceramic plate. He handed me a pink, pig-covered mug of black coffee. I thanked him, and he said he had to run out. "I'm bringing you back a surprise!"
He inserted a key into the kitchen doorknob, locked it, and glared at me. "You'd best be here when I return," he growled. Then, as if he’d just regurgitated Dr. Jekkyl's serum, he added, "I've placed your books in the corner, grandpa. I sincerely hope you enjoy reading them!" He gave me a quick hug that I didn't return, skipped to the front door, exited, and locked the deadbolts from the outside.
I collapsed into the recliner and stared at my breakfast and coffee. There was no way I was going to drink out of a mug that likely belonged to Thomas's murdered mother. Instead, I'd sip some water from the bathroom faucet after I finished eating.
I must admit, however, that I was happy to eat. The surprisingly crisp bacon, over easy eggs, and lightly toasted white bread quenched my hunger, and I was finished in just a few minutes. With no paper to read and no television to watch, I had nothing else to do.
After
I finished up, I poured the coffee into the bathroom sink and drank some water straight out of the faucet. I then wandered over to the window, hoping to see something that would put an end to my despair. As I pulled back the shade and looked outside, the thick woods that surrounded the shack did nothing of the sort. I could barely make out the narrow dirt path that I was confident provided the only means of access to my pathetic prison. And the irregular mounds of dirt over which I stumbled on my way in -- each the same width and perhaps seven feet long -- reminded me of the symbols that conspiracy-based documentaries use as evidence to prove that ancient humans communicated with extra-terrestrials.
I slunk back across the room and took stock of the books in the corner. As Thomas had indicated, they were indeed the same four that he had initially provided me while at Oak Ridge. Unless Escaping from a Madman for Dummies was hidden behind them, I wasn't interested in reading.
I wandered over to the kitchen door and tried the handle, expecting that it wouldn’t budge. I was right, of course.
As I scanned the room in an attempt to find a way out, I recalled hearing Thomas close a cabinet door while I toweled off the night before. Up until that point, I hadn't seen any such doors in the living area, leading me to believe that he closed a kitchen cabinet. However, as I stared at the fiberboard stand on which the television sat, I realized that its front didn’t include the usual shelves or cabinets. Instead, its front was flat.
Suddenly confident that I had discovered one of Thomas's secrets, I pulled the heavy stand away from the wall and learned that the flat front of the stand was actually its back. The front, complete with two doors, was facing toward the wall. I slid it out just far enough to open one of the narrow doors, and inside I found a small DVD player and remote. I slid the stand a few inches further and opened the other door, which revealed a stack of thirty or forty DVDs in cases. I picked up a few cases, each of which were labeled with a date and time. The top one was dated just two days earlier, the day that I had arrived at Oak Ridge.
I extracted the disc from the case and lay it on the stand. I then pulled the DVD player out, plugged it into a nearby outlet, and wondered how I was going to hook it up to a television that predated Thomas by decades.
As I peered around the back of the set, I realized right away that some sort of converter cable was hooked up to the antenna screws on its back. The end of the cable split into the familiar red, white, and yellow male connectors that I was certain I'd be able to plug into the back of the DVD player.
I connected the cables, manually turned on the television, powered up the DVD player using its remote, and fell into my recliner. I hit play and waited anxiously until the video began to display. When I saw what was on the screen, my heart stopped beating.
Chapter Thirty-Five
The television screen displayed grainy black and white video footage of my room at Oak Ridge. It was the night before, and I was in the middle of forcing down the fish stick dinner. The contortions I saw on my face reflected my disgust.
I fast-forwarded through my meal, and hit play again. I had picked up To Kill a Mockingbird, and tears were pooling in the corners of my eyes as I stared at it. I couldn't watch. I pushed the fast-forward button again and saw myself drift off to sleep.
Just a few minutes after I crashed, I noticed a dark figure hovering over me. I hit play, and I watched as a man wearing a pig mask leaned over to make sure I was asleep. My brief time at the shack gave me confidence in the identity of the mask's wearer. After he was satisfied that I wasn’t conscious, he opened my suitcase, rifled through its contents -- I'm not sure what he was trying to find -- and shoved the books inside. He then carried the suitcase out of view.
A few seconds later, I watched as the head of a hammer came crashing into the video camera's lens. The video then abruptly ended. Thomas obviously didn't want security to see what happened next.
I assumed that Thomas had a friend in Oak Ridge security who provided him with surveillance footage. I doubted he would be able to make all of those DVDs without anyone else knowing. That same individual must have ignored his theft of my suitcase and the hammer he took to the lens. To this day, I'm still alarmed that someone who worked at that facility was willing to help him carry out his nefarious plan.
I ejected the DVD from the player and returned it to its case. I then peered, between the slats of the blinds, out the window. Once I was satisfied that Thomas wasn’t coming, I grabbed three separate discs -- dated between six months and two years earlier -- placed the first into the DVD player, and hit play.
Inside a different room at Oak Ridge, a man who must've been within a few years of my age was lying on his bed. Although his pot belly and rotund face didn't reflect my build, the fact that he saluted anyone who entered his room indicated that he must have served in the military. It also indicated that PTSD may have been his enemy.
As I fast-forwarded through the footage, I watched as Thomas sat by the man’s side and listened. The tears flowing down the man's cheeks led me to assume he was revealing his problems. The man must’ve believed he could trust Thomas -- that he could tell him anything. I wondered whether the man thought Thomas treated him like a grandfather.
Although I was scared to know what happened next, I found a DVD dated just a day later than the first, and inserted it into DVD player. Thomas handed the man a mug containing a steaming beverage. I couldn’t tell whether it was coffee, tea, or hot chocolate, but it didn't matter. My heart pounded as my eyes were instead drawn to the mug itself. It was either the same one in which Thomas had delivered my coffee that morning, or else it was an exact replica. I shivered.
After the man saluted Thomas when Thomas left his room, he began sipping his drink. But after the fourth sip, the man clutched his chest, and his eyes rolled back into his head. The mug slipped out of his loosening grip and fell on the floor. He followed suit, rolling forward off his chair and slamming his head against the tile. He lay in a motionless heap, and it appeared as though his chest no longer moved up and down.
Within minutes, the medical staff arrived and transported him from the room. I prayed he was okay, but I'm certain it was too late. I grabbed the remote and hurried to press the power button. I had already learned enough.
Just as I put my finger on the power button, I noticed a shadow in the video. I watched as Thomas returned to the room, grabbed the mug, and walked calmly out with the Joker's grin. I ran to the bathroom, knelt in front of the toilet, and vomited out my breakfast.
Chapter Thirty-Six
After watching the last DVD, it became apparent that I could not trust any food or drink that Thomas provided me. I may have saved my life by pouring out the contents of the pig mug.
While shoving the rest of the DVDs and the DVD player back into the television stand, I wondered how many grandfathers Thomas had already knocked off. Did he really believe every old man he encountered at Oak Ridge was his biological grandfather, or just the ones who served in Vietnam? Did he kill his grandmother as well? I hated even considering the possibility.
Knowing that Thomas was likely trying to murder me, too -- if he hadn't already -- I shoved the television stand back against the wall and made sure everything was just as he had left it. I then pounded against the walls of the shack, hoping that a building sided with scraps of lumber would give. If I could just bust through a wall, I thought, I'd be free. No such luck, though. The sturdier-than-they-looked walls didn't budge.
I was sure I couldn't break down the triple-locked front door, either. And the window was off limits, as I was hesitant to set off the connected alarm system.
I turned back to the kitchen door. I hadn't yet discovered that the kitchen didn't contain its own exit. Besides, I hoped that something inside -- a land-line telephone, perhaps -- could help.
The kitchen door was secured by only a doorknob, so I thought I might not be too difficult to gain entry. I fiddled with the knob, but I was unable to turn it. I'd have to find another way in.
&
nbsp; I studied the door frame for options. When I did so, I noticed that the hinge pins rested loosely in the two hinges that supported the door. I ran to my plate, grabbed my fork -- still covered with dried egg yolk -- and shoved it as hard as I could against the bottom of the top pin. It moved! Within minutes, I held both pins in my hand, the locked knob the only thing that held the door inside its frame.
I stuck the fork's tines inside the half of the top hinge that was attached to the door and yanked on the fork's handle. The door didn't move, but the fork bent slightly. I removed the fork, gripped it with both hands, and pulled its handle and tines back into place. I then bent my knees and yanked harder. This time, the door opened outward, hinged side first, a few inches. I dropped the fork on the ground, grabbed the hinged side, and tugged just enough for me to be able to squeeze through the door and frame and into the kitchen. My tugging, however, caused the door's edge to make a quarter-inch dent the full height of the frame on the knob side.
Before I entered the kitchen, I paused for a second when I realized that I the door and I shared something in common. Although I realized that damaging the door frame could cause Thomas to kill me when he returned, I couldn’t help chuckling. Both the door and I had become unhinged.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
I took two steps into the kitchen and froze. I hadn't expected to find anything normal, but what I saw exceeded even my most disturbing nightmares.
At the far end of the room, a small stainless-steel sink was nestled between a mini-fridge and a three-foot long section of countertop upon which a microwave oven and electric griddle rested. The only two cabinets in the room were mounted to the wall above the counter, and a solitary drawer hung beneath.