Shades of Deception

by Piper Dow

  Kelly lifted her head, feeling calmer and more collected than she had when she left Sam’s room. She stood, stretched her arms over her head, and turned to leave the room. As she neared the door, she saw a man pass the intersection, heading toward the vending machines. He looked familiar. Kelly had spent hours looking at his picture and wondering about him –– he was the unsmiling man from Sam’s photos of the party.

  Kelly stepped quickly to the doorway, her heart pounding. Who was he? Where was he going? She darted down the corridor toward the intersection. The sound from her sneakers squeaking on the tiled floor seemed abnormally loud in the quiet hall, and she slowed to keep from attracting attention. She peered cautiously around the corner. A man in jeans and a grey sweatshirt was turning the next corner, his back disappearing even as she stepped into the hall. Kelly glanced around as she speed walked past the vending machines. The brain fog from earlier seemed to have lifted – her pulse was quick, and her wits sharpened. She rounded the corner, throwing her hands up and sidestepping quickly to ward off an orderly heading for the coffee machine.

  “Oh, I’m sorry!” she said, smiling awkwardly as he grabbed for her elbow to keep her from falling. “Excuse me!”

  Kelly pulled her arm back and continued down the hall at a slower pace, wondering which room the man had disappeared into. Glancing at the floor, she noticed a scrap of paper. She hadn’t seen it on her way to the vending machines, but that didn’t mean anything. She hadn’t noticed much of anything on her way there. She stooped to pick up the paper. Turning it over, she gasped. Her address was written on the small square. It looked like it had been stuck to something and pulled free

  Kelly glanced up and down the hall. She didn’t see anyone, though she could hear voices coming from a couple of the rooms. One room had a large group of visitors; they were talking fast and loud in Portuguese. Another room had a small child in it, crying. The door to Sam’s room was ajar. Kelly moved quickly into the room and closed the door behind her before parting the curtain blocking the view of the room.

  “Dad!” she whispered urgently. “Dad, I think I just saw a guy from one of her pictures, and look! I found this in the hall on the floor!” She held the scrap of paper out to him as she crossed the room to his side. “Where’s Wayne?”

  Dad frowned as he stared at their address on the paper. “Wayne is in the coffee shop. I asked him to bring Mom a sandwich for when she wakes up – she’s not overly fond of the food from the cafeteria. You found this on the floor? Where, in this hallway? Or somewhere else? And what do you mean, you saw a guy from one of her pictures?”

  “It was in this hallway, maybe 25 feet from this room. I didn’t see it when I left, though, and then I saw someone I think might be the man from Sam’s pictures. He was walking down this hall, but I didn’t see where he went because I bumped into someone coming around the corner.” Kelly was scrolling on her phone, trying to pull up the party pictures she had sent herself. “Here – he looked like this man,” she said, enlarging the photo and holding out her phone so her father could see more clearly.

  Dad looked at her phone through narrowed eyes, pushing Kelly’s hand a few inches further away from his face. He looked back at the address on the paper, chewing the inside of his lip.

  “We should make sure Officer Martin knows about this,” he said. “But it could have been his note – he was here and wrote down our address on a piece of paper, and he did walk down that hallway when he left.”

  Kelly balled her free hand into a fist. “What about him?” she asked, pushing her phone forward again. “I’m almost positive it was him!”

  “Kelly, did you see him up close, or just his back as you were following him down the hall?”

  Kelly closed her eyes to prevent Dad from seeing them roll. “Dad, I was in the chapel. I was getting ready to leave when I saw him go past the end of the hall. I followed him to this hall.” She opened her eyes in time to see Dad roll his. “Dad!”

  “Kelly, why would you deliberately follow someone you thought was involved with what happened to Sam? And what kind of look did you get - how far away was he when he went past the end of the hall?”

  Kelly gazed at the window as she tried to visualize the corridor. “I don’t know, maybe 50 feet?” Dad didn’t look reassured. “Ok, fine, maybe it wasn’t him. I didn’t see him clearly.” She paused. “I didn’t actually get my coffee, before. Vending machine coffee just didn’t look appealing. Where did you say the coffee shop is?”

  Shooting her a cautious look, Dad gave her directions to the coffee shop. “Wait, though. I want to check with the police to see if the address was from Officer Martin, but Kelly - I can’t believe you would follow someone you thought might be dangerous! You need to be more careful! Something is going on and we can’t be taking chances. Do you understand?”

  Kelly nodded, then retreated behind the curtain and cracked open the door. She peeked out and saw a couple of young women with a baby walking down the hall. A man was closing the door to the room next to Sam’s. He hurried to catch up to the women. Kelly opened her door and pulled it shut behind her as she stepped into the corridor.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Though she kept her eyes open, Kelly didn’t catch another glimpse of the man in the grey sweatshirt on her way down to the first floor coffee shop. She stood in line behind a couple of nurse’s aides and listened to their chatter about their diets. Apparently one of the girls was in a club that took pictures of one meal a day and posted it on the internet for accountability.

  “I’m telling you, it’s working! I’ve lost ten pounds already,” she assured her friend.

  “That is way too much effort, to me. I can’t even keep track of what I eat, never mind remember to take a picture and post it. Besides, you can lie just as easy doing that as you can writing it down. Just don’t take pictures of the seconds you take,” the second girl laughed.

  Kelly tried not to judge as the girls ordered frozen coffee slushes and muffins the size of softballs. When it was her turn at the register, she ordered her caramel coffee with one less sugar than she usually did, as penance. Turning from the counter, she saw Wayne sitting in a chair in the lobby near a low table and walked over to join him.

  “Hey,” she said in greeting as she sank into a nearby chair where she could see most of the open expanse of the vaulted lobby.

  He was engrossed in his phone. Kelly reached over with her toes and pushed his leg lightly. He jerked his head up, sliding his phone into his sweatshirt pocket as he looked at her.

  “Jeez, Wayne, calm down,” Kelly said, sitting back and taking a quick sip of her coffee. “I thought Dad said you were getting Mom a sandwich.”

  Wayne shrugged irritably, then nodded toward the coffee shop. “Yeah, I am, but I was waiting for the line to go down.”

  Kelly raised her eyebrows and lifted her Styrofoam cup in mock salute.

  He frowned. “Okay, fine. I didn’t want to go back up yet. I’m tired of just sitting around while everyone sleeps. Someone is messing with our lives, and we’re just sitting here!” His mouth twisted before he bit out, “They trashed my car, Kel! You know how long it took me to get my car set up. And I know my car is nothing compared to Sam, I know it, but I did nothing to them, and they trashed my car!”

  Kelly sat forward, arms on her knees. “You wanna hear something? I just saw – well, I think I saw that guy from Sam’s pictures. And I found a paper in the hall that had our address written on it. Dad thinks it might have fallen out of Officer Martin’s notebook or something, but I honestly don’t think so. Wayne, I think that guy is here, and it was his paper, and you’re right – we’re being targeted - and I don’t like it one bit!”

  Kelly didn’t bother to mention that her car had also been vandalized. To her, the car was a practical way to get from point A to point B, and the fact that it was sporty and had a little kick in it was a bonus. Wayne had worked on his car weekends and over school breaks, buying parts from swap shops and junkyards a
nd finishing them off with Dad’s help. They had started working on the car before Wayne even had his license to drive it. To trash Wayne’s car was truly hitting him in his heart.

  “So, what are we going to do about it?” Wayne asked. “You heard Dad. We have to do this his way if we want to be able to help, and apparently, his way is to sit around here all day and let the police try to ferret out what’s going on.”

  Kelly turned her head side to side as she glanced around the lobby, making sure no one was listening. “I’ve been thinking. We’ve gone through Sam’s journal, we’ve seen her pictures. Sam’s a smart girl – even if she has some sort of mental illness, which I don’t think is the case, enough is going on to point to something really messed up at her apartment. I really think someone has to go to Sam’s apartment and look around.”

  Wayne’s eyes were round as he stared at her. “Dad will never agree to let us go.”

  Kelly nodded. “I know, you’re right. But do you see another way? If the police here send police there to look around, they won’t know if things are the way Sam had them or not. I was there during summer – and we know Sam. We know what is normal for her and what is not. Sure, she might have moved things around in the past couple months since I was there, but I’d know if it was something she did or something someone else did.”

  Kelly sat back, sipping her cup as she mulled their options. The man in the grey sweatshirt seemed to have lit a fire in her, urging her to action.

  “What if,” she said slowly, thinking out loud, “we let them think we are staying someplace safe for the next few days, to lay low. It couldn’t be a friend’s place, that could drag more people into this, and we wouldn’t do that. But what if school was having a field trip, or there was a retreat going on. Would Dad think that was far enough removed from this to keep us safe?”

  Wayne looked hesitant, then shook his head. “Kel, we can’t lie to them like that. Not for something this serious.”

  Kelly nodded, knowing he was right. Besides, something like that would have already have had to be in the works for it to be believable. She mused some more.

  “Well, we could take the bus up and back in the same day. They’d know something was up before we got back, but hopefully, by then we’d have some answers. If we left first thing in the morning, we’d be there by 10:30 or so. If we just act like we’re going to school, we don’t have to lie, and we don't have to come up with some elaborate scheme.” Kelly was scrolling to find the bus schedule on her phone. “The first bus we could catch without it being suspicious would be the 6:55 –– that would put us there by 9:30.” She scrolled some more. “We’d have to catch the 5:45 back, which would get us home by 8:30. It wouldn’t be a lot of time, but maybe we could talk to some of Sam’s other friends and see what they’ve been seeing.”

  Kelly looked up to see Wayne’s expression, a mix of awe and fear. “What?”

  “It’s just, it really sets it home, how serious this is,” he said. “I’m in. I’m just,” he trailed off.

  Kelly nodded. “I know. Me, too,” she assured him. “I think we need to be prepared for anything. Wear good sneakers, don’t bring too much we’ll have to carry. I’m bringing my mace.” She paused, grimacing. “Well, make that, I’m bringing my mace if I can get into the house before we go. C’mon, get Mom’s sandwich and let’s get back up there before they send security looking for us.”

  Wayne joined the line at the mouth of the coffee shop to order the sandwich. Kelly gazed around the lobby while she sipped her coffee, her brain whirling away behind a calm expression that gave away none of her apprehension. Her back to the arching stairway leading to the second story, she didn’t notice the man leaning against the pillar above her. He watched until Wayne disappeared into the shop before pulling his hands out of his pockets and walking purposefully back into the hospital.

  Kelly stood as Wayne walked back to her seat. She swallowed the last of her coffee. As they walked toward the corridor, Kelly veered toward the trash can near the entrance to the emergency room.

  “Kelly!”

  It was Mary, a girl from her statistics class. Kelly motioned Wayne to come with her and walked toward the ER.

  “Are you here from the party last night? Wasn’t that awful, at the end?” Mary asked.

  “We had to leave just after the season opener started – what happened? We heard there were some people brought here?”

  Mary nodded and began talking at the same time, enthusiastic to have a new audience. “It was terrible, and it looks like the school might be in trouble for the under-age drinking since it was a school-sponsored event. There were like, maybe 10 or 12 people brought here by ambulance. Some of them had their stomach’s pumped – do you know how gross that is? Disgusting! A couple of them had to be admitted overnight. Some of them were over 21, but of course, there were some younger ones, too. Some cop’s daughter was underage, she had her stomach pumped, and two of the professors’ kids ended up having to be admitted for observation overnight.”

  “Wait, do you have any names?” Kelly asked, cutting across what looked sure to go on for another several minutes.

  “Well, my friend Dan was admitted, that’s why I’m here now, bringing him some clothes,” Mary said, lifting a bag she held in one hand. “Did you see the girls that were dressed in zombie rock star outfits? They all had their stomachs pumped. Then, oh, do you know that guy that played baseball last spring, the one they said was heading to minor leagues? He got his stomach pumped. The cop’s daughter, I already told you about, I think her name is Jen? Something like that. Professor Ostrom’s son, I think, and Professor Jardin’s. There was one older guy, too, nobody seemed to know anything about him, but he came in the same time as all of ours.”

  Kelly glanced at Wayne. He was staring, unseeing, across the hall. The cop’s daughter had to have been Jess, his ex-girlfriend. Kelly hadn’t seen her, but she had said she planned to go to the party. Jess’ father had made her break up with Wayne, saying Wayne was a bad influence after he got caught TP-ing that house. Kelly’s family knew Wayne wasn’t an angel, but could also see that Jess didn’t need much leading to head in the wrong direction.

  “Oh, there was a guy dressed like a sheriff that got admitted, too,” Mary giggled. “Apparently he sat on a knife he brought and cut……something,” she giggled.

  “Rick? Was his name Rick?” Kelly asked sharply, suddenly irritated at her breathy gossip.

  Mary shrugged. “I don’t know. Well, nice seeing you. I have to bring these to Dan.” She lifted the bag in her hand again.

  Kelly nodded, eyes darting around the lobby seeking the information booth. “Yeah, see you in class,” she said and moved away.

  “I have to see if it was Rick,” she told Wayne. He nodded without speaking and followed her to the information desk. She gave Rick’s name and waited while the woman looked, then told her he was in room 307. Sighing, she moved away from the desk.

  “I have to go see him,” she told Wayne. “You should bring the sandwich up to Mom, though.” She paused, wondering if she should say something about Jess.

  “Right. Don’t worry about it, I’ll tell them you ran into a friend, and you’ll be up in a few minutes,” Wayne said, moving away before she could say anything more.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Kelly followed the woman’s directions and rode the escalators up to the third floor. She looked down over the edge as she neared the second floor, marveling at how the sounds bounced around the rounded walls of the foyer. She turned the corner and walked along the open corridor to ride the escalator to the third floor, taking in the arched glass windows throwing streaks of light across the walls. The architecture of the hospital was truly astounding; she hoped the medical care was as good.

  Alighting on the third floor, Kelly found a directional sign and headed down the hallway to Rick’s room. The woman at the desk hadn’t been able to tell Kelly how Rick was doing – she mentioned something about privacy laws, but at least he wasn�
�t in the ICU, so Kelly figured he couldn’t be too badly hurt. On the other hand, she mused, he had been admitted, so it must be more than a scratch. Kelly read the room numbers as she walked down the hall, finally slowing as she neared 307. She wiped her hands on her pants. Double checking the names on the room, she saw that Rick’s name said W next to it. The other name listed had a D next to it – Kelly figured they must indicate window and door beds. Taking a deep breath and reaching forward to push the curtain aside, she walked into the room.

  Kelly walked past the first bed without glancing at its resident, her eyes fastened on what she could see of the second bed around the curtain that was pulled halfway between the beds. An iv bag hung from a stand at the corner of the bed, and a heart monitor beeped softly from a monitor on the wall. Kelly hesitated, then approached the foot of the bed. A middle-aged man with a graying beard reclined on the pillow, eyes closed.

  Kelly frowned. She glanced quickly at the first bed in the room in confusion. Stepping back from the second bed so that she wouldn’t wake the occupant, Kelly tiptoed back to the first bed, grabbed Rick’s toes under the covers, and gave his leg a little shake.

  Rick’s eyes flew open, and he grabbed wildly at the bars on the sides of the bed. “Whoah! Hey, that hurts!” He yelled, his other foot kicking out in Kelly’s direction.

  Kelly released her grip on his toes and threw both hands into the air. “I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I didn’t know,” she stammered. “Oh my gosh, I’m sorry, Rick!”

  Rick stopped shouting and pulled himself up on the pillows, moving his foot gingerly away from Kelly. He winced, then puffed out his cheeks as he blew a deep sigh. “Hey, Kelly,” he said. He motioned to the foot of the bed, where he had made room by moving his feet to the side. “Have a seat.”

  Kelly waited until he had pushed the button to raise the head of the bed higher then sat gingerly on a corner of the bed. “Rick, what happened?”