Caskets & Conspiracies
Page 12
While Uncle Shane stumbled over his wife’s criminal offenses, I pressured Stella to keep talking. “What did you find?”
She leaned forward and spoke quickly. “Well, I’m not sure exactly, but I can tell you that they aren’t Hannah and Joel Edwards, and he is certainly not a preacher.”
“Who are they then?”
Stella’s shoulders shrugged slightly. “There were too many IDs to know. I must have counted at least seven for each of them.”
Uncle Shane pulled himself from his stupor, only one thought clear in his mind. “I have to get you out of here, Stella. You’re going to Canada for a while to that little bed and breakfast that you like so much. Stay until I tell you to come home again.”
Aunt Stella’s feet slammed into the carpet with the strength of an ox. “I will not! I am helping Lindy on her case.”
My hands shot up defensively. “Please, Stella. I don’t want you to get hurt. I think Uncle Shane is right. We need to keep you safe from these people.”
“Go away for a little while, just until I can destroy the evidence they have on you,” Uncle Shane added.
“Wait. What?” I blurted out.
He had a crazed look in his eyes, desperation mixed with total defeat. “You heard me, Lindy. I can’t let them blackmail my wife.” He pushed himself to his feet and walked to the cabinet that I knew held his hard liquor.
“You can’t break the law. You’ll lose your job.” I tried to reason with him the best I could. “You know how attached the chief is to the law. He will fire you in an instant.”
“Then I’ll steal what I need, and I’ll retire.” His hand shook as he poured scotch into a cup. “We have been talking about it for a long time, and this is as good a time as any. Then we can both run away to Canada.”
My mouth dropped in disbelief. “You’re both crazy. It’s like talking to teenagers.”
Stella’s mind had not changed despite my uncle’s plans. “I will leave when you leave, Shane, and not a second before that.”
There was more arguing, but I did not stay for all of it. I was tired, and I needed sleep. To save myself the trip home and complete exhaustion, I stayed the night in their spare room. For the first time in years, I skipped my medical injection and hoped it would not be the one that would have made the difference.
**********
I half expected Stella’s bag to be packed and waiting by the front door when I woke up, but she was happily working on a crossword puzzle as I went in search of breakfast. Somehow she had won, and Uncle Shane had lost. I did not even bother to ask. I sincerely hoped that meant he was not planning on stealing anything either. What kind of effect had I had on my family? Or were we just a genetic line that was born with low morals?
I was not in a good mood. My dream had been haunting: a hand shooting out from the dark and clamping over my mouth; a raspy whisper, “Don’t scream or it’ll be you”; and Jackie’s screams filtered through my brain. It was the third time I had experienced the nightmare that week, and without sleep, I was not in my right mind.
I took a job on PI Net once I finished breakfast, a simple background check I completed once I was home. Then I went for a jog. Four miles later, I felt more like myself.
I considered the case. The feeling of urgency to complete it had grown once Aunt Stella had decided to get involved. I had to finish before she did anything else with even worse consequences. Despite the impending fatigue, I stepped out to my back porch, still sweaty from my run. I strapped on my fighting gloves, but as I went to take my first swing, a note taped to the bag caught my attention.
“Back off.”
It was a two-fold message. First, the more transparent one, I was too close, and the people I cared about were in danger. Second, and much more terrifying, they knew where I lived, and they knew how to get to me.
So with exhaustion and fatigue creeping up on me, I took pictures and bagged the note with gloved hands. Then I slipped my 9 mm in my purse, changed, and headed for the police department.
**********
Uncle Shane was busy in a meeting when I arrived, but I left the note on his desk before I exited. As I bounded down the steps toward my car, eager to get back to my place to take a much needed nap, I noticed Dr. Rawlings headed my way. She saw me before I could hide.
“Lindy, how nice to see you.”
I smiled, though I still considered hopping over the railing and running. “I am good.”
How did shrinks manage to see through every wall people could erect in their minds? Was this what it was like when people talked to me? I made a mental note to stop analyzing people so much. It was no wonder people did not like me.
“Lindy, I have a few minutes. Why don’t you come talk to me for a bit?”
I considered turning her down, but I knew Shane needed direction and background on the note. If I burned a little time with Dr. Rawlings, he would likely be out of his meeting, and therapy time would make me look good to the chief.
I followed her across the street and signed in at the front desk before taking my seat on the leather sofa in her office. As my pace finally slowed for the first time that day, my eyes drooped. That old familiar sludge in my veins pulled at me like anesthesia. I felt like I might pass out from the light-headedness.
“Lindy?” Dr Rawling sounded worried and concerned. “Lindy, can you hear me?”
I fought the fatigue with all my strength and pulled myself out of the figurative mud pit. “I’m sorry. I’m just really tired.”
“Are you sleeping very well?”
Her voice sounded distant, as if she were calling to me through a tunnel. The week’s events had taken a toll on me, and my sleep had not been consistent in days. There had been too many dreams, too much confusion to sleep soundly.
“I’m having nightmares,” I admitted, surprised by my willingness to share.
“Do you want to talk about them?”
I was tired, deeper than fatigued, as if my normal “fatigued” had created a coalition with my nightmares to create a new level of exhaustion. I was willing to do anything if she would just let me relax.
“If I can lie down,” I countered.
She agreed with a laugh, and I stretched out along the couch, my body sinking heavily into the plush mass.
The picture was still clear in my mind from the night before, and it was easy to explain. “It’s dark at the beginning. I think I am at my parent’s house in California, only different somehow. The house feels wrong.” My eyes closed, and I let what was left of the dream wash over me. “I know I heard something, because my eyes tried to see them in the dark.”
“Them?” she asked.
My fingers ran over the smooth dips of the leather upholstery as I tried to picture the dream. “I think it was a man, maybe two men. Then a hand clamped over my mouth, and it had a glove.” I was surprised at the way my heart quickened and adrenaline surged at the thought. “He told me, ‘Don’t scream, or it will be you,’ so I stayed quiet, because I was scared. Then I could hear her screaming, Mom and Dad came, but she was already gone. She disappeared.”
“Who are you talking about, Lindy?” Dr. Rawlings asked, her voice soft and soothing. “Who screamed?”
My eyes fluttered open, two sets of tears streaming from my eyes. “Jackie. My sister Jackie was screaming in my dreams.”
I could hear her pen without looking at her. The scribble was furious. My exhaustion had faded like an ocean wave as it receded for low tide. It would be back, no doubt, but the fear from my dream had awakened me once more just as it had in the night.
Sitting up, I asked, “What does it mean? Why do I keep having this dream? Jackie has been gone since I was 4. Why am I thinking of her now?”
Dr. Rawlings’ lips clamped together so tightly that I could barely see the soft pink of them. Then in equal and opposite force, she pursed them as she considered her words. “Are you feeling helpless right now? Is there anything in your life that is out of your control?”
“Plenty. My Aunt Stella is the biggest problem. She seems bent on solving my case single-handedly, and I am really worried.”
Dr. Rawlings nodded. “That’s probably what triggers these dreams then. You feel hopeless to stop your aunt, and it relates to the hopeless feeling you had when you could not save your sister.”
It made sense. But there was something about the dreams, something so tangible and real that it was unnerving.
“Lindy, do you feel responsible at all for Jackie’s death?” Dr. Rawlings asked after a moment of silence.
My eyes closed, and for a split second, I wished the fatigue would return and swallow me whole. “Yes,” I admitted. “I do.”
“Would you hold a 4-year-old responsible for the care of her older sister, Lindy? Would you expect her to shoulder the responsibilities of an adult?”
I understood what she was saying, but I felt exempt from the rule. I should have shouted, I should have swum farther from shore to catch her. If only I hadn’t been so afraid. If only I hadn’t listened when he said I would be next.
I paused and considered my thoughts. Dreams were meshing with reality. The lake and the dark room swirled together, suddenly inseparable and far more terrifying.
“Lindy, talk to me.”
I was grateful for her grounding presence. It helped me to cling to reality, what I knew was real, because try as I may, I could not determine the dream from the memory anymore.
“Doctor,” I started, “is there any chance it wasn’t a dream. Is there any chance this is a memory?”
With all the sympathy I imagined a psychologist was allowed, Dr. Rawlings replied, “You’ve studied psychology. You know the dangers of implanted memories. It was a dream, Lindy. Don’t give it power.”
Even as we continued our session, I could not shake the feeling. One half was real, and one half was a dream, but I could no longer tell the difference. She was right that I had studied implanted and false memories in school. It was the dark side to psychology. Pioneers in the field like Dr. Loftus showed that with the correct triggers and leading, almost anyone could be led to believe and even create a false memory.
Dr. Bernstein and Loftus had even showed that they could change a person’s food preference with an implanted memory of a fake illness from childhood. It was groundbreaking work after so many other psychologists had used hypnotherapy, memory regression, and other pseudoscientific methods to retrieve so-called repressed memories of abuse.
The consequences of those actions were dire, life-changing, and sometimes irreversible. I understood the cost, and yet I could not shake the feeling even as I left her office that part of my memory was false.
I did not bother to go back into the precinct. I felt off, completely unhinged, and I left a message with my neurologist’s office, worried that I might be on the brink of a relapse. It was not unheard of to feel it coming. Perhaps he had seen something in the MRI. Maybe my shifting reality was the product of a new gaping lesion in my brain. It was odd to hope for something like that.
What little sleep I got from 3:00 to 11:00 a.m. was interrupted by the recurring dream, each time becoming more detailed with vivid sights and smells. The final time I woke, I thrashed to remove the hand from my face. My phone buzzed beside me, and I realized it was not the dream that had woken me but a phone call from Dr. McAllister.
“Hello?” my sleepy voice asked into the phone.
“Good morning, Lindy. I received a message that I should call you. Is anything wrong?”
I did not want to explain the horrific dream one more time, not when I could still feel the warm leather of the glove against my mouth. “I’m worried that I might be relapsing. I was wondering if anything showed up on my MRI.”
I heard the clickety-clack of his computer and then his voice. “I made a note here that you were unchanged from last year’s MRI. I even added a smiley face right next to my notes because it was good news.” When I didn’t laugh at his meager attempt at humor, he asked, “What makes you think you are relapsing?”
I rubbed my right hand over my lips, the skin on my palm was numb in places, but that was normal for me after a night’s rest. Sometimes it came back, sometimes it didn’t. It was called “flare,” not a full relapse. Flares were okay as long as they did not last more than 48 hours. But the dreams, the dreams had lasted for nearly five days. What if it were a new symptom?
“I just don’t feel right. I feel really wrong.”
He considered my words for a moment before he said, “Why don’t you come in. We can do an MRI with gadolinium contrast. That way we can see if there is any activity.”
I agreed and said goodbye. For the first time in years, I hung up the phone feeling as broken as ever.
Chapter 12
In the basement of the neurology building, I tried to remain calm, but the realization that I was likely on the brink of a relapse had me on edge. As my world slipped into that tiny tube, I felt the elephant crush my chest once more but worse than ever. The knocking, clanging, and beeping of the MRI broke my every defense and left me ragged. Every sound reminded me of just how broken I was. Midway through the scan, I was removed and injected with the MRI contrast agent. Then it was back into that infernal tube.
The images of my nightmare continued to blur with my reality, and it left me wondering what this new symptom might mean for me. Would I continually lose grip on reality? I could walk, but was I destined to live out my life in an insane asylum as my walls between actuality and fiction collapsed around me, and I was nothing more than a slobbering fool in the corner?
When the tube finally spat me out again, I was on the verge of tears. I blamed it on my disease. Perhaps the degradation had also broken my strong will. The tech informed me that my doctor had the results and would call me within the hour.
Bless Dr. McAllister’s heart. He called before I even reached my car in the parking lot. I braced myself for the news after a quick hello. His voice was surprisingly upbeat as he said, “Just as I suspected. No activity. You’re fine, Lindy.”
I couldn’t believe it. I still felt wrong. “But, I am having trouble sleeping. I can’t seem to tell what’s real or not.” I tried to say more, but my tears cut me off. If it wasn’t my disease, then what was it?
“A lack of good sleep can cause all of this. You need to sleep before the hallucinations start. I’ll prescribe you some sleeping pills, and that should solve the problem.”
After a quick goodbye, I picked up my prescription and went home. Even though it was only 4:00 in the afternoon, I took the prescribed dose and slept like a log for the first time in days.
**********
Because I had taken time to deal with my health and wellness issues, by the time I woke up Wednesday morning, I felt like I was far behind. I tried to call Stella and urge her once more to move to Canada, but she did not pick up. I prayed she was off knitting or playing bridge and not committing another misdemeanor.
With a clear mind, I set out for the precinct, hopeful to meet up with Uncle Shane and my note. Because of my relapse scare, it looked as though I had backed off. Maybe it could work in my favor in the long run. I made my way past reception with a wave and said hello to a few of the cops I knew along the way. Let rumors of my good-natured spirit get back to the chief for once.
Uncle Shane’s back was to me as I approached his desk, and I made it to his side just as he hung up the phone.
“Got anything I can help with?” I asked.
He nearly jumped out of his skin. I had not expected to surprise him. At least not to that extent. He jumped to his feet, nearly knocking his coffee off the desk in the process. “Lindy, I didn’t know you were coming in today.”
“Did I catch you at a bad time?”
“No, I mean yes. Yes, you did. Can you come back later?” He stacked a few papers at his desk and fumbled t
o make the folders into a stack. One slipped and tumbled to the floor, but he made no move to pick it up.
“I was just checking on my threatening note,” I explained. My eyes flitted to the folder on the ground. Why hadn’t he picked it up?
“Still being processed,” he said, his eyes darted toward the folder too. He had seen it, but why hadn’t he picked it up?
I could not handle the uncomfortable silence another second. “Are you going to pick that up?”
With a noncommittal shrug, he said, “Eventually.”
His avoidance made me curious. And the thought occurred to me that he might have gone ahead with his plan. Not only had he stolen the security tape, but also a vital piece of information on the Edwards’ as well. I bent and set my hand to the folder, but Uncle Shane’s boot slammed down on the manila cardstock.
“Don’t Lindy.”
“What did you do?” I asked, my voice tense and desperate. I gripped the folder and tried to weasel it free.
Uncle Shane only pressed his foot down harder and begged. “Please Lindy, your father will kill me if I let you see that.”
I had a thing about being told no. Every time I heard it, it only reinforced my desire to break the rules. With a firm grip, I finally wrested the file free and popped it open, silently wishing for all the puzzle pieces that were missing to come together within the manila confines of the folder. Instead I found an entirely new puzzle.
As I read the report, I stopped breathing. It was as if my lungs had been surgically removed with no chance of ever being returned. My hands flipped the paper, and my heart crumbled into dust. I tried to read further, but I could not see beyond the tears that blurred my vision. When I finally looked up at Uncle Shane, he had nothing to say, just stuttering sounds that told me I was never supposed to find out. My hands were no longer interested in the file, and it fell to the ground as I walked calmly from the room.
One thing was for sure, I finally knew which of my memories was real.