Memories Never Die

by C Thomas Cox

  I glanced at Liz, and she nodded toward the doorway. I took a deep breath and followed her. Just a few steps later, we were at the threshold. "Good evening," said a Vietnamese gentleman who must've been approaching retirement age. He bowed, and we returned the gesture. "How do...did you know Edward?" His eyes appeared moist behind the tint in his bifocals.

  "I-I," I stammered.

  "From the golf course," Liz said.

  "Yeah, the golf course,” I said. “Always trusted his judgment. He was a true gentleman." I spoke without thinking...without reflecting some of the phrases the Hickory Hills cashier had used to describe him. Edward didn't exactly endear himself to his clients...Edward was emphatic when he suggested clubs...he exploded like the New Year's fireworks.

  Liz glared at me as though I was her disobedient child. I deserved it.

  "Hey Brenda," the man said to a woman standing a few feet away. "You've gotta hear this."

  "What is it, Henry?" she asked as she approached.

  "He called Eddie a gentleman. Can you believe it?"

  She let out a guffaw that seemed entirely inappropriate considering our surroundings. "Eddie may have been a man, but no part of him was gentle."

  "You sure you're thinking about our Eddie?" the man asked.

  "He was always pleasant on the course," I replied.

  When the faces of the man and woman expressed their continued disbelief, Liz leaned toward them and whispered, "You'll have to excuse my father. I think he's racing toward senility."

  They nodded, and Liz nudged me into the room. She whispered into my ear, "How about you leave the talking to me?"

  "I think that's a good idea."

  We passed a half dozen Vietnamese mourners milling around, none of whom seemed to be mourning at all. Instead, they appeared to relish the morning off of work...and they weren't upset that it took Edward's death to deliver the time off.

  Although I wasn't surprised that Edward wasn't the most beloved of men -- he did, at the minimum, kill my dog -- I was still surprised that his death didn’t draw a larger crowd. I thought the sudden passing of a man his age would have at least attracted twenty or thirty people to a midday viewing.

  As we made our way toward the open casket, I began to shiver. Though it made no sense, I felt certain that cold air rolled out of the casket in invisible waves. Liz saw my discomfort and threaded her arm between my arm and my body. She ran her fingers over the back of my hand, but her warm skin was not enough to ease my chill.

  Edward’s hand was the first part of his body that I saw. But one glance at that hand was enough to question everything Liz and I had assumed.

  Instead of the smooth skin of a middle-aged man, Edward's hand bore the age spots and bulging veins of someone at least two decades older.

  We took a step closer.

  A suit jacket covered his arms and legs. We needed to get close enough to see his face.

  Another step.

  I could see the tip of his nose and his receding hairline.

  Two more steps.

  I gasped audibly. Edward Nguyen was not Half-Ear! His two intact ears, along with his ancient face, revealed that this man had nothing to do with my recent misfortune. Even though his demeanor may have resembled Half-Ear's, it was coincidence rather than connection.

  Liz and I stared at each other for a few seconds. "What should we do now?" I whispered. "Anthony Spencer?"

  "We'll chat in the car. Let's get out of here." I nodded, and we turned to leave.

  Just as we were about to reach the visitation room's doorway, though, an unexpected voice jolted me. "Hi, Mr. Umpire, sir. What are you doing here?" Bradley Nguyen flashed a slight grin as he looked up at me.

  Yen Nguyen, on the other hand, was not pleased. "First the lie about the hat, and now this?" She dug her fists into her hips and cocked her head. "What do you two want with my family?"

  I knew that finding and entering her home in an effort to find the hat's owner was far-fetched, but her hospitality at her house made me think that she believed us. Perhaps dwelling on our random visit in the hours afterward made her reconsider.

  "We're just here to pay our respects to Mr. Edward," Liz said. "He was our caddy."

  Henry -- the bespectacled man who greeted us upon entry -- spoke up. "I knew your story seemed fishy," he said. "Listen to this, Yen. This clown called your father a gentleman!"

  Yen slammed the doors shut. "Somebody call the police," she yelled, pulling Bradley close to her. A woman about ten feet away yanked a phone out of her purse and started dialing.

  Immediately, Henry wrapped his thick arms around me, and Brenda shoved Liz to the ground. Liz tried to get up, but Brenda threw her body on top of Liz and held her arms down. At the same time, I struggled to free my arms from Henry's grasp. When that didn't work, I stomped the heel of my foot on the top of his. He yelped and let go. I punched him in the gut, and he staggered backward.

  I grabbed Brenda's waist and threw her off of Liz, and Liz leapt to her feet. I charged at the intersection of the double-doors, led with my shoulder, and busted them open. Liz raced after me, and we dashed out the building's entrance toward the car. Yen screamed expletive after expletive after us as we escaped.

  Once we closed the car doors, Liz backed out of the parking space and floored the gas pedal. "Where to?" I asked between pants.

  "We're running low on time." I agreed. On top of the Silver Alert, the Nguyen's were onto us. I was sure my family was trying to track me down, too. Plus Liz's credit card could've been traced.

  "That damn Edward Nguyen," I said. I could've sworn he was going to be the guy...that he was Half-Ear."

  "I know it's tough," Liz said, "but we have to move to our next option. Gimme Anthony Spencer's address."

  I pulled the scrap of paper from my pocket, and she pulled onto the shoulder. I read her the street name and number, she plugged them into her map app, and we took off.

  "What do you think we tell whomever answers the door?" I asked.

  "Maybe we should be honest?"

  I couldn't fault her logic, as lying had just turned a family of mourners against us. But how could we tell a stranger that we think someone in his or her house wants me dead? "What if Half-Ear opens the door?"

  "Then," Liz said without a hint of inflection, "you should go Bruce Lee on his ass."

  Chapter Sixty-Two

  While we drove toward Anthony Spencer's house, I realized with suspicion that a wave of relief washed over me when I learned Half-Ear wasn't in the casket. I was suspicious of myself...of some secret desire to keep Half-Ear alive. Maybe he deserved an uppercut to the jaw, but I still couldn't bear to see him dead -- and I had no clue why.

  Regardless, we had to track him down. That was the only way to keep Claire safe...assuming she was still safe. Though I wanted more than anything to call her...to hear her voice again...I couldn't give up our location or our plan. I prayed that Half-Ear hadn't yet gotten to her.

  "Why do you think Yen had someone call the cops on us?" Liz asked.

  "Isn't it obvious?" I said with a surprising degree of incredulity. "She thought we were stalking her family. She wanted to protect herself -- and especially Bradley."

  "Maybe." Liz paused for effect. "Or maybe we were getting too close to the truth."

  "What do you mean?"

  "Think about it," she said. "What if Half-Ear is, in fact, part of the Nguyen family...or at least a close connection? What if getting closer to the Nguyen family was drawing us closer to Half-Ear? Wouldn't it make sense to get the cops to incarcerate us before we're able to identify him?"

  "I see where you're going, but it seems far-fetched." Wasn't I the one whose PTSD kept throwing me into an alternate reality?

  "Hey, we need to consider every possibility. Especially because time's running short."

  "I guess so."

  "Right. So just humor me for a second. If my half-baked theory is right, maybe Anthony Spencer -- a Nguyen relation -- is, in fact, Half-Ear. And mayb
e, once we meet him, our journey will come to an end. You'll finally be able have peace that only keeping Claire safe will give you."

  "I hope you're right," I said.

  I gnawed on my lower lip as we turned into his neighborhood, and I widened my eyes when I saw the mansions lining its manicured streets. We cruised a quarter mile -- past homes with towering stone archways and columns that seemed fit for ancient Rome -- until we reached his address. His opulent home fit right in, and we pulled into its cobblestone driveway.

  "You ready?" Liz asked.

  "Can't go any worse than our last stop." She grinned, and we exited the car. "I just hope he's home."

  Liz was the first under the portico, so she pressed the doorbell. Within seconds, the adjacent intercom came to life. "Good morning!" said a cheery female voice. "May I ask who's calling?"

  "Who should we say we are?" I whispered.

  Liz pushed the talk button and said, "We're here to see Mr. Spencer." She then released the button and said, "Maybe she won't ask anything else."

  "Be right down," said the voice.

  I gave Liz a thumbs-up.

  When the door opened, a petite woman with a feather duster in her left hand greeted us. "Please come in. Doctor Spencer will see you in the parlor."

  We followed her across the marble foyer and down the hallway. In...the...parlor, Liz mouthed, silently mocking the aristocratic maid. I wanted to laugh out loud, but I held it in. Not only did I keep my laughter in check, I didn't even speak. Not after the damage my words caused at Glatfelter's.

  We passed a framed diploma commemorating Spencer's degree in psychiatry, and I cringed. I felt like mental health professionals often psychoanalyzed everyone -- not just patients. And I certainly wasn't prepared for him to analyze me. Why couldn't he have been a proctologist?

  The maid ushered us into a sunken room with Brazilian cherry flooring. She suggested we sit in a plush burgundy loveseat across from an upright armchair. Protruding just above the armchair's back, I could make out part of a man's head. When I realized his dark hair matched the color of Half-Ear's, I immediately turned my focus to his left ear. Due to the height of the back of the chair, however, I could only see the ear's top. I'd have to wait until I saw his face to know, with certainty, whether we were about to encounter our prey.

  Liz and I descended into the room and made our way toward the loveseat. I was too nervous to look at the man until I sat down. Although Liz rushed ahead and sat, I hung back for a few seconds before I took my place next to her. I wasn't sure if I hoped we were sitting across from Half-Ear...or not.

  After I delayed as long as possible, I slunk toward the loveseat, closed my eyes, rested my rear on the front edge of the cushion, and looked at him.

  Chapter Sixty-Three

  The man's hair, although black, wasn't quite as I remembered Half-Ear's. His face bore some Vietnamese attributes, but Caucasian blood ran prominently through his veins. And his left ear was deformed -- as though he once stood too close to a firecracker -- but it's bottom half was intact.

  "So, Mr. Richmond, what brings you to my home?" he asked matter-of-factly.

  Liz glared at me, as though I failed to tell her that Anthony Spencer was my best friend. "How do you know me?" I asked him. My response appeared to convince Liz that Spencer and I shared no previous relationship.

  "You mean you're not here to voluntarily readmit yourself?"

  I cocked my head and said, "What?"

  "What am I missing?" asked Liz.

  "Don't play coy with me, Ms. Cariot. I know you and your brother worked together to abduct Mr. Richmond from Oak Ridge."

  I bolted upright. "Liz did nothing of the sort," I said. "She rescued me from her brother." I paused, realizing that perhaps I'd divulged too much...that, by revealing to Spencer that we were who he thought we were, we confirmed his basic understanding of the situation. I soon realized that it didn't matter what we said.

  "Regardless," Spencer continued, "Mr. Richmond belongs back in Oak Ridge." He turned toward Liz. "He's not just a danger to himself...his delusions also present a danger to society in general. At any point he could harm someone else." He paused for a few seconds. "Do you realize he killed his own dog?"

  "Who are you?" Liz asked.

  "I'm the Chief of Psychiatry at Oak Ridge. We've been working closely with the police to find both of you. Although you've been more slippery than we ever would've thought, your recent interactions with my sister-in-law brought you right to me."

  I jumped off the couch and took off toward the front door. Liz followed right behind. We should never have gone to Edward Nguyen's funeral. "You're not going to be able to escape," Spencer shouted from behind. We froze. "While we've been chatting, the police have surrounded the house."

  "You're bluffing," Liz shot back. "You haven't so much as looked at your phone. There's no way an army of police is waiting for us."

  I watched Spencer for some indication that Liz was right. Instead, he simply said, "Do you really think the cops wouldn't arrive minutes after they received my call...which, by the way, I placed as soon as the surveillance cameras detected you two pulling into my driveway?"

  "Narcissism breeds overconfidence...let's go, Jim." She threw open the front door, and I dashed to its threshold and held onto its frame. A glance outside revealed that the only car on the driveway was hers, and no police cruisers waited on the street.

  "You're a genius," I said as we rushed to the car.

  Behind us, I heard Spencer scream, "Curse you, you foolish cops!"

  After we climbed back into the car, Liz floored the gas pedal and we took off backward down the driveway. As we did so, I watched Spencer wag his finger at us and wondered why he didn't take matters into his own hands. Considering he had me beat by maybe thirty pounds and was at least twenty years my junior, he could've easily tackled me before I made it to his front door. Perhaps he was so used to everyone doing is bidding that he figured the police would prioritize his call above all else. Thank God he was wrong.

  Liz gunned the accelerator in an attempt to escape Spencer's neighborhood before the authorities appeared. Although she had to dodge a squirrel and an oncoming Mercedes, we arrived within a hundred feet of the end of the street unscathed. To make sure we didn't stay in the neighborhood too long, Liz decided that she wasn't going to brake for the stop sign that signaled the end of Dairy's only high-end community.

  Just before we reached the stop sign, a police cruiser -- with lights blaring but sirens off -- approached from our right. When we first spotted it, both Liz and I thought she'd have no problem accelerating through the intersection before it reached us. Instead, it closed the distance between us faster than we could've imagined. I closed my eyes as Liz shoved the brake pedal toward the floor, but it was too late.

  ***

  The next time I opened my eyes, I found myself staring directly into Half-Ear's inky black pupils.

  Chapter Sixty-Four

  I blinked twice after I saw Half-Ear's smirking image hovering over me, and his visage dissipated like a mist that the sun burns off of an early morning stream. It was replaced by Claire's smiling face. I sighed.

  "I'm so glad to have you back," she said. She kissed my forehead. "I missed you so much."

  I blinked again. "What happened to me?"

  "That woman pulled out in front of a police cruiser. The cruiser rammed your side of her car. You suffered a few broken ribs and a concussion, but nothing that'll keep you in the hospital another night."

  "Wait...is Liz here, too?" I asked, scanning the otherwise empty hospital room.

  "Liz?" She settled into a bedside chair. "Oh, you mean Ms. Cariot. Nope, of course she was uninjured, save for a few minor bruises." She brushed my hair out of my eyes. "She's in police custody now. She won't be able to hurt you anymore."

  Oh no! I covered my face with my hands. Although moving my right arm toward my head caused a few jabs of pain to pierce the right side of my ribcage, I wasn't ready to face my n
ew reality. And I wasn't sure how to counteract the lies about Liz that Claire -- and the police -- likely believed.

  "I know it hurts, Jimmy. But the doctors said your body will be back to normal in a couple weeks. And during that time, you'll be staying at home with me."

  "Wait," I said, removing my hands. I stared, wide-eyed, at the woman who'd already sent me away once. "What do you mean, during that time? What happens after I heal?"

  She grinned. "I'm not going to send you back to Oak Ridge, if that's what you mean. I don't trust their employee screening process." That's an understatement.

  "Do you want to send me away because of Gene?" Although I didn't want ask directly, I had to do so. I couldn't afford to allow any secrets to come between us. Besides, I assumed she meant she was going to kick me back out of her house. That she was going to file for divorce so she could move in with Gene...her lover. I had nothing to lose.

  "What's Gene have to do with anything?"

  "Do you really think I didn't question all those late-night concession planning meetings? Besides, I saw the way you two talked in the kitchen...after my last hospital visit." She put her hand on the back of mine, and I was sure she was preparing to tell me the truth. To tell me that she'd been cheating with Gene for months...years maybe. To tell me that she was just going to nurse me to health for the next two weeks due to a sense of obligation. That those would be the last two weeks we'd live together.

  For those reasons, I was shocked when one initial giggle led to an onslaught of laughter. She held her palm over her mouth and temporarily reigned it in. "You seriously thought me..." She let out another giggle. "Me and Gene? Really?"

  I wasn't quite ready to let it go. "But the way he hugged you." I needed to be sure.

  "I think your old eyes are playing tricks on you." She winked. Her wink and laughter were enough for me to let my jealousy fade. With all that I'd suffered through, I wasn't surprised that I'd misread an innocent situation.