Part Nineteen

Christine

Sydney gave Jarod a warm, yet deeply concerned smile as he handed him one of the cellophane-wrapped sandwiches he had just retrieved from the cafeteria. Sammy was already busy munching on hers. It looked big, compared to her tiny face and she had to hold on to it with both of her hands to take bites out of it. I reached out and ruffled her hair affectionately. The little girl had slept through Jarod's recount of the recent events and we were all thankful for that particular circumstance. I stared at the sandwich in my hand and took a tentative bite out of it. Despite the fact that my stomach was rumbling, it tasted like cardboard. Neither Jarod nor Sydney had even started to unwrap their breakfast and Jarod didn't look as if he had even registered that the object in his hand was meant to be eaten by him. Sydney had discarded his sandwich on the empty seat next to him and leaned over towards Jarod now. Although his voice was low, I could understand what he was saying. For the hundredth time that night, he seemed to explain to Jarod that it was not his fault and that we could only wait. Waiting was such a horrible thing to do. I wanted to do something, take action, but I knew that the only thing I could do was take Sammy home and try to give her some sense of normality.

Miss Parker

I remember my body hurting after Sammy's birth, but I did not remember the pain being that bad. When I woke up in my hospital room, the brilliant sunlight that was streaming through the window seemed inappropriate. A gloomy, rainy day would have matched my state of mind much better, but when has the weather ever bowed down to our wishes? I tried to sit up and managed after a few seconds, then grabbed the glass of water and emptied it. My room was silent. There was no noise from the corridor outside and I felt trapped in a bubble where time had frozen. I remembered falling asleep after they had taken the baby away and I remembered, too, that my dreams had been vivid and frightening. I tried to pull my legs towards me and sling my arms around them but quickly realized that it was not a good idea.

I closed my eyes firmly against the tears that were threatening to spill. I hadn't even seen my baby yet, hadn't been able to hold or even touch him. For all I knew he could already be dead. Would they have woken me to tell me? Or would they rather wait until I woke up by myself, until I would have regained some of my strength? My stomach was in a twist, but I felt strangely calm. Images of Lyle's burned face flashed through my mind, the manic grin on his face, the determined look in his eyes. Life meant nothing to him and by allowing myself to be softened by family-life, I had ceased to be the woman who could match him. I felt like a victim as I looked down upon my naked, bruised arm that was not covered by the hospital gown. I had been flung to the floor, helpless and unable to fight back as I had had a baby to protect whose life was now in danger. I had failed, I realized, as I ran my fingertips across the skin on my upper arm that had already turned a light shade of purple in the shape of fingers. I had failed to protect my son, I had allowed Val to be pulled into my mess. I had been so weak that someone else had had to take it upon themselves to take a gunshot for me. I was in debt with Val now. I owed her my life. And my son's, if it could be saved.

I didn't know whether it was a mother's intuition or the remains of my heightened sense during pregnancy, but suddenly I knew without a doubt that the doctors could not save my son. I didn't know much about medicine or treatment of premature babies, but I knew without a doubt, that there was nothing that they could do for him.

I closed my eyes again and bit my lip until I could taste the blood that began to fill my mouth. I had failed him although he had begged me to help him and protect him. The superstitious feeling I had had from the day I had been told that I was pregnant had proved to be right.

We would lose him and everyone knew. Tears were threatening to fall again and before they could, sobs, like spasms, were already rocking my body. With all the strength I had left, I managed to control them and reached out a shaking hand towards the phone on my bedside table.

Jarod

Dr Flannigan was a sympathetic blond woman who had the habit of burying her hands in the pockets of her scrubs which gave her the air of informality. Now, however, one of her hands was resting on my arm, the other on my back as my world was spinning around me. Her voice was soft and although she was technically delivering platitudes, it sounded sincere and even comforting. Unfortunately, I was far beyond being able to be comforted.

"He is stable right now," she had told me. "But he is on the decline. His lungs aren't properly developed and I am afraid there is nothing we can do. He is very premature and it is actually a miracle that he is still holding on. I am so very sorry, sir."

The baby's skin was almost translucent, his hands so small that they wouldn't have reached around my forefinger, had they had the strength to grab it. Not once had he opened his eyes and the fact that his chest was rising and falling was due to the ridiculously huge machines he was hooked up to. I could touch his small shoulder with my gloved hand but there was not much more of him that could be reached with all the medical equipment that was needed to keep him alive.

"Could you give me a minute with him?" My voice cracked and the last words were almost inaudible, but Dr Flannigan understood anyway and nodded. "I'll be right outside it you need me."

I heard the door softly close behind her and reached down to touch the warm skin again, fighting tears. I was here to watch my son die and I could not bear it.

Ten minutes ago, I had softly knocked on my wife's door to wake her up and tell her the news. The doctors had offered to do it for me, but I had known that I had to tell her myself. It was just not right if she learned it from someone else. When I had entered her room, I had been shocked to find the bed empty and her clothes gone. Horrified, I had realized that she had bolted. Her insecurities had got the better of her and she had run away from the pain once again. And with a start, I had realized that I would be the one who would spend his last hours with our son, that I would be the one who would watch the vital signs, waiting for the inevitable decline and the long, agonizing tone that signaled that all vital signs had stopped. She would probably be out somewhere, drinking, running- would she ever come back? And if she would, how would we live with the knowledge that she had abandoned her newborn son because she was too weak to stay with him? I had stumbled back, unable to comprehend the information, unable to deal with the betrayal right now. I had not told Sydney or Christine. I had just asked them to follow Baxter's example. He had quietly slipped away, excusing himself with business a few minutes earlier. I had told them to get Sammy home, that I wanted to be alone right now. Sydney had hugged me close and so had Christine before they had left.

Now I was sitting here, in the semi-darkness, waiting for my son to die with the painful knowledge that my marriage was over.

Lyle

Over the last five years I had developed a reasonably plausible theory: While I had been ruthless even before the handsomeness had been licked off my face by flames, I was now missing sentiments altogether. There was nothing inside me which was an advantage. I did not dream at night, I did not feel fear, regret or even anger. The fire had turned me into a machine. If I had lived a normal life, I would have been sent to deal with shrinks who would have tried their best to restore my humanity. Reality was different. I didn't even feel human anymore. Consequently, I didn't feel hopeless or furious that I was sitting alone in a prison cell. I didn't mind that I would have to stand trial for my crimes. I simply didn't care. I would wait for an opportunity to escape and if none would come, I wouldn't.

Slow footsteps in the hallway made me sit up on the bed and face the door which was now opened. Was this the opportunity I had been waiting for? My muscles flexed as the key turned in the lock and the door opened to reveal a man who I knew to be the local sheriff. Will something… Cornwall? He gave me a grim look and went through the usual procedure of handcuffing me and telling me that I should not try anything fancy. I was amazed. Who would visit me in prison? A priest maybe? Trying to take the sins away from the man who might as well have invented sin? I would laugh in his face and tell him that his god meant nothing to me. That if god existed, I could not possibly be in this world. God would simply not allow something like me to walk his earth and to kill his children without the faintest sign of regret. But since the meeting wasn't taking place in the room where I had met my lawyer, a young duty counsel whose disgust at me was almost tangible, it had to be unofficial.

The door opened again and in walked my sister, looking a little worse for wear. She was walking slowly, as if she could barely hold herself upright and Cornwell offered her a hand to help her sit down next to me but she declined.

"I'll be right outside, Parker. If I hear anything out of the ordinary, I will come and pull you out!" His voice sounded almost threatening and I was sure that he did not approve of this visit at all.

As the door closed behind him, I examined my sister a little more closely. Her hair was pulled back in an unruly ponytail and her eyes looked sunken. Her skin was pale except for a small bruise next to her nose which I had inflicted on her when I had pulled her from the bed and she bumped her face onto the floor. There was some blood on her lower lip, too and it looked slightly swollen. She was wearing a far too large man's coat that she was pulling around her as if she was freezing. She was obviously cold but it could feel an unhealthy heat radiating from her body which told me that she was probably working up a fever. She looked a little slimmer than the last time I had seen her and she did not move like a pregnant woman anymore. So she had already given birth. Which sucked for her, given the fact that we had only got the baby up to barely seven months development when Jarod had barged in. Too bad.

"Lyle." She growled. Her voice was husky, however, and sounded as if she wasn't actually strong enough to talk. It couldn't have been long since she had given birth. Maybe a few hours and she looked it.

"Shouldn't you be with your little bundle of joy?" I asked and her arm twitched slightly, as if she was going to hit me.

"My little bundle of joy is dying," she said. "I went into labor because of the stress and the fact that I wasn't taking my ulcer medication." The explanation was unexpected. I had thought that she'd rather blame me.

"Well." I answered simply and she narrowed her eyes, obviously ready to overlook my lack of etiquette.

"I want you to tell me where you've hidden the drug you used on me to make my baby grow faster."

I grinned. "So that's what you want. You want me to tell you how to save your son. Don't you?"

"I don't have time for your games, Lyle. I know you must have hidden it in the house. You were going to inject me with more so it still has to be there."

I leaned back and laughed. "Sweet sister! Do you honestly believe there would be any way to get me to tell you? You still didn't learn the lesson our father has always tried to teach us: The weakest link. You should be with Summers right now and see whether she wants to help you."

"She's dead. She hanged herself." Parker said from between clenched teeth.

"How sad." I replied evenly. For the first time in a while, something like joy stirred inside the hollow cavity of my chest. My sister was completely dependent on me.

"So you are here to either convince me to help or threaten me." I shook my head as if I was pondering how much of a chance she had. "Let's see. Would I do you a favor? Save your idyllic little life? You know the answer to that, don't you? And then… how could you threaten me? Death?" I chuckled just to annoy her. "Oh, please. I would not mind dying."

"I know," she said softly and I was taken aback for the first time. "I am here to offer you a deal."

"A deal?" I leaned forward and closed the short distance between my face and hers. "What could you possibly give me? Peace? Or your body? You were hot the last time I saw you, but now you look dreadful, sis. You are not very attractive. I don't think I would…"

"Shut up," she cut me off. Her voice sounded a bit stronger now. "What I can offer you is your freedom."

"I would haunt you and you know it. I would try to take your children away from you and kill your son of a bitch of a husband. Why would you help me get out of here, Parker? How stupid have you become?"

She didn't react to my insults and simply leaned back, away from my scarred face. I had been wrong. Although she was pale and looked ill, her blue eyes were still sparkling. She was as beautiful as she had ever been.

"I am a mother now, Lyle. I would do anything."

I smiled at her again. "I'll tell you where it's hidden once I am out of here."

"Too late. I need to know it now."

I sensed her urgency and leaned back against the wall. "How long has he got?"

"Tell me!"

"I might, but you should be nice to me."

"I offer you the freedom to walk away," she said again, dangling it like a carrot in front of a donkey's eyes and I had to admit that I wanted to take it. Jail was such a boring place and I was used to a little more luxury than that.

"You don't have enough time. I'd say he can only live for so long and you would have to go back to the house. How would you do that? If you can barely sit upright, I doubt you could drive."

She put her hand in her pocket and for a moment I believed that she would take out her gun and shoot me, but what she raised to her ear was a cell phone.

"I have someone at the house. Tell me now and you will get out of here."

"I am not that stupid, Parker. Give your brother a little credit!"

Miss Parker

I could almost feel the life slipping out of my son although I was far way - too far away - and panic was threatening to overwhelm me. I had to fight very hard to stay calm. Will's face looked as if it was carved in stone as he guarded me and Lyle across the hallway and outside. I did not know how he had managed to keep the other prison personnel away from us, but nobody saw us as he led us out of a side door and into the sunshine. He didn't like this and neither did I.

"Empty your pockets," Lyle told me and I did as he had asked, retrieving the cell-phone and a nine millimeter pistol. "You have not become quite as domestic as I had feared," he grinned and I would have loved to put a bullet right between his eyes that very moment. "You can keep the phone."

I handed my weapon over to Will who nodded grimly and walked away from us. Lyle was still in his handcuffs and now held his hands towards me for me to unlock them.

"Tell me where it is."

I could hear footsteps at the other end of the line as I pressed the phone to my ear.

"Unlock the handcuffs first."

"No."I felt myself shaking. I was not up to this. My ulcer was acting up and I could barely walk.

"You'll never find out if you don't, my love." The familiar sing-song voice, now breathless from five-year-old smoke.

He was right. I knew he wouldn't tell me if I didn't free him. On the other hand I suspected that he would just bolt and run away with me unable to follow him. But what choice did I have? This was my only chance to save my baby. I would not let it pass. Finding out that Summers had committed suicide had been a shock. Initially, I had set out to threaten or plead her, whatever worked best on insane people, but to no avail. Now my only chance was my psychotic brother who would have done anything to hurt me. I bent down and unlocked his handcuffs. He flexed his hands and gave me an almost warm smile, then bent forward to whisper in my ear: "You have truly lost your edge, sis."

The world suddenly seemed to topple over as he pushed me as hard as he could. It would just have taken a light shove to send me to the ground, but Lyle wasn't one for light shoves so I was flung across the empty backyard and crashed into a few empty garbage bins. The metallic cover plate hit my arm then jingled on the pavement.

And then Lyle fell.

The gunshot was still ringing in my ears as I crawled towards the fallen body of my brother. His eyes were staring up into the blue sky and his breath clouded in front of his mouth and nose as it froze in the cold winter air. I dropped the phone to the ground next to him.

"Lyle!" I managed and he turned his head slightly. Every time he breathed out, the tiniest drops of blood sprayed his face.

"You little bitch set me up," he managed.

"And you have lost your edge, too." I told him. There had been something he wanted. My brother could not have lived in a prison and he knew that as well as I did. Claustrophobia ran in the family, after all. He could not have resisted this.

"Tell me." I told him, but he just grinned, blood now covering his front teeth.

"After you've had me killed? I am taking this secret to the grave, bitch. And you can have that house searched and searched and you will find the medication. But by then it will be too late." He laughed then grimaced in pain.

"Lyle, " I said, gently setting my hand down to bend over him although the blood was already pooling around his upper body. "Tell me."

"Never."

He closed his eyes and drew another rattling breath. The scene was surreal: Will was standing in the background, gun still in hand, unsure whether he should approach, while Lyle was down on the floor, about to die. I was next to him, and I could not have got up if I had wanted to. Exhaustion was settling over me and I knew that I was defeated. This had been my last chance, but I would try again. I could simply not let my son die without doing everything I could to try to save him:

"I know you're evil, Lyle. But so was I. I would try to bribe you with some childhood memories right now, if we'd had a childhood together. I know we didn't and I know we were just made what we are by the circumstances. I can't say I love you Lyle, because I do not and never have. But I would have loved the brother you could have been to me, had everything been different. You will die now and we both know it. You might as well tell me. Please."

"Sweet," he coughed. "You're not making any sense. The only feeling I've ever had for you is that I wanted to fuck you."

If not for the gravity of the situation I would have laughed at the fact that this became the last words he would ever utter. A last rattling breath emerged from his mouth and some blood trickled out over the corner of his mouth before his eyes became glassy and his body relaxed after one final shudder.

I felt Will's hand on my shoulder as I began to cry.

"Parker, it's okay…" he tried but we both knew that it was not and would never be.

"Please take me to my son, Will."

Charles Baxter

Kenny's – Lyle's – house smelled of blood, dirt and despair. I snapped my phone shut after having heard Miss Parker's final sobbing. That bastard had died without giving the hiding spot away. I walked from the deserted living-room into the kitchen and stared out of the almost blind windows for a moment, remembering the moment Jarod had stepped into our midst and told us about the baby's condition. The doctor's couldn't help and they estimated that the little boy would have only a few hours to live. Less than twenty-four, probably. His weak body could take it only for so long. The sun was so bright today that it even managed to illuminate this dark old house with its dirty walls and cracked floors.

Tragedies like this one were the reason why I had never wanted children or even a woman in my life. The Centre would never give you peace and every little life you brought into this world would be threatened by them, no matter how hard you worked to protect it. Any sort of contact with the Centre was like poison or a dormant virus that would break out when you least expected it and kill you and everyone you loved. Another thing that I realized was that for the very first time since I had escaped the Centre, I had made the mistake to invest feelings in somebody. I saw Miss Parker's distressed face in front of me as I had helped her into her clothes and into the car. It hadn't been a good idea for her to leave hospital and try to find out where the medication was hidden but I had simply been unable to deny her wishes. She had looked broken. Finally.

I opened the kitchen cupboards and tried to estimate how long a thorough search would take. There was not a lot of furniture in the house but it had wooden floor boards in every room just like built-in cupboards and a cellar that was stacked with rotting things. It would take many hours, if not days, to find what I was looking for. I sat down at the kitchen table, defeated. There had to be some way to help Miss Parker and her family but I couldn't see one.

Leaning back in the old creaking chair, I closed my eyes and placed my fingertips over my eyes. As a young man, that had been the position I had always been in when I had been doing SIMs. I remembered Dr Raines' snide voice. "Concentrate, boy. Or you will not succeed. Failure means punishment. You know it."

Concentrate…

I just wished that the abilities that had allowed me to realize that Parker was in distress could be controlled. I had tried many times in the past, but they were like flashes of inspiration: There was no way to force or control them.

Concentrate…

I remembered the first time I had met Lyle, when he had still made me believe his name was Kenny. I remembered his limp, the way he'd had difficulties bending down as he had dropped something.

"Logic, boy! The world would not work without logic. You can decrypt anything with logic. There is no riddle that could be solved without it. Logic is the key to life."

Before today it had been years since I had last felt the haunting feeling that always went along with hearing the echo of Raines' voice inside my mind. Today, however, his words of advice were welcome.

Logic. I was a pretender. Logic was my thing. I had to work with the information I had and use it to SIM the situation.

The door opened and I blinked against the bright sunlight as Lyle walked in, wearing his hat and his long coat, limping slightly so that the floorboards gave agonizing creaks. I got up and joined him at the entrance of the room, became him as we merged into each other. I saw the room with his eyes. Not comfortable, not what he was used to, but a necessary evil to fulfill his – my – plan and become rich and powerful again. I walked across the room, the package with the ampoules of medicine in my hand. They were wrapped in a cotton cloth which I was holding on to with both hands. I needed to hide them so that neither Summers nor anyone else would find them. I didn't trust the little prick. I turned around and looked at the room. A sagging couch that nobody would ever like to sit on again. I could hide the package inside the ripped seating. But that would mean that I would have to bend down every time I wanted to retrieve the little package. Upstairs? I looked towards the ceiling with its water stains. No. Once Parker would be there, Summers would try to be close to her as often as she could, so if I hid things upstairs, she would probably catch me taking them out. In the cellar? That would mean walking more stairs. Getting upstairs was painful enough as it was and since I would keep Parker there, I would have no other choice. But the stairs that led to the basement were easily avoidable. I looked around the room. The built in cupboards were far too easy, the floorboards would mean bending down. I could attach it to the bottom of the coffee table. No, too easy. And then suddenly I knew. An idea formed in my head and I felt the mild excitement that comes with having found a solution to a particularly pressing problem. I crossed the rooms with two long strides, my foot dragging only slightly, then looked up. The ceiling was narrow enough for a tall man like me to comfortably touch without standing on tiptoes. There was a small air vent the size of a spread out handkerchief on the wall right next to the window. I inserted my fingers into the grate and pulled it down, then carefully placed the package inside. Once it was in, I replaced the grate…

The grate.

I came to, standing exactly where I simmed Lyle would have stood, my fingers touching the cold metal of the small grate. My throat was dry. I hadn't tried to sim anything in years. I had used my powers as a pretender to forward my business, of course. But something quite like this had never been necessary. I felt slightly out of breath and had to work very hard to keep the haunting memories at bay.

Don't think of Raines. Don't think of that time at the Centre. Don't….

I reached up and removed the grate. A moment later I was holding the package I had seen in my mind. There were only four ampoules left.

Well, I thought. Let's see how fast that sports car really goes.

Jarod

"Hey." A soft voice said next to me and I looked up into the grieving eyes of my wife.

"You came back," I said.

"Of course."

Despite the fact that I was disappointed that she had run away, I got up and helped her sit down in my chair.

"You're burning up," I whispered. "You shouldn't be here."

"It's my ulcer," she said pleadingly. "It is not contagious. I have to be here."

I felt my throat constrict at the sight of her and our baby.

"How long does he have?" she asked without taking her eyes of the small form in front of her.

"Maybe three hours," I replied. Putting that gruesome reality into words made it even worse.

"Oh my god…" she whispered. "He is so small."

I pulled up another chair and sat next to her, placing my hand on her warm back. I wanted to ask her where she had been and what had made her come back, but I couldn't find the words. I wasn't able to say anything at all.

"I saw him in my mind, Jarod." Parker said quietly. "He begged me to save him and I couldn't. I went to prison to talk to Lyle or Summers to get them to tell me where they've hidden the growth hormones. They could save him." Her eyes filled with tears. "Summer killed herself and Lyle died, too, without telling me."

"I've looked everywhere when we were there. I couldn't find it," I said flatly.

"I know." She was crying now. "I thought I could help him, but I can't."

I opened my arms to her and pulled her close. "Why didn't you ask me to do it? You shouldn't have been outside the hospital in your condition."

There was a long silence. "I didn't want you to be away from him. And he begged me. I thought that meant something…" Her voice trailed off.

"Parker?" I asked, alarmed. "Parker?" Her body relaxed in my arms as if she had lost control over her muscles and a moment later I was holding her unconscious form in my arms.

TBC