Head Games

by Thomas B Cavanagh

  “What’s that?”

  “Regular chat rooms are open to everyone. Sometimes they even have a moderator. Everybody sees everyone else’s messages. But you can also jump into a private room where you just talk to each other. Or you can go IM.”

  “IM?”

  “Y’know, instant messenger. This Klubhopper person wants to talk to me privately.”

  “Why?” I asked, squinting my middle-aged eyes at the smallish font on the screen.

  Jennifer read the last line on the monitor. “Says she wants to talk about TJ.”

  “Isn’t that dangerous, going into a private room?”

  “Nah. It’s just talk.”

  “But you don’t know who it really is. It could be anyone.”

  “And she doesn’t know me either. I’m just Jenn405. Yeah, she could really be some forty-year-old perv or something, but it’s not like I’m ever gonna meet ’em or anything. It’s all anonymous.”

  “So, are you gonna talk to her privately?”

  “I dunno. I guess.” She leaned over the keyboard and typed out a response. A few clicks of the mouse and another tap on the keyboard and Jennifer stepped into a private room with Klubhopper1. As long as the conversation was purely digital, I told myself it was basically harmless. But it still gave me the creeps that my fifteen-year-old daughter was having conversations with anonymous strangers.

  “She wants to know how I managed to meet the Boyz today,” Jennifer said.

  “Don’t say too much. I can’t compromise the band’s security.”

  Jennifer typed a few lines. “Basically, I said that my dad knows somebody at Global Talent. That’s all.” A few seconds later a reply appeared, but I still couldn’t read it. “Uh-oh,” Jennifer said. “Creepoid alert.”

  “What?”

  “She wants to know my name. Probably a perv.” Her fingers clacked at the keyboard. “I’m telling her to take a hike.”

  “What’s she saying now?”

  “Apologizing. Wants to know why I like TJ. She probably thought I could help her meet the band. Now she’s backing off, afraid I’ll log out.”

  I stared in amazement at my daughter. Fifteen years old and instinctively analyzing someone’s secret agenda and motivations, probably accurately, based solely on a few words on a screen. She would be well suited for politics or diplomacy. Or law enforcement.

  Jennifer typed a reasoned response to why she liked TJ, and I stood, heading for my own room. I was especially tired tonight after my showdown with Mr. Day-Glo and hiding out in Arlene’s garage. It was a lot more activity than my recent routine of Twinkies on the couch.

  “Don’t stay up too late,” I said.

  “Yeah,” she said, sending her message and waiting for the reply. I’d put one foot through the door when I heard her exclaim behind me, “Holy shit…”

  I froze and turned back to her. “What is it?”

  She read from the computer screen, “Does your father happen to be named Mike Garrity?”

  “What?”

  “How does she know your name?”

  I quickly strode back behind the desk. “Who is that?”

  “Klubhopper1. That’s all I know. What should I say?”

  I pressed my thumb and index finger against my forehead, trying to figure out how to play this. In a normal conversation, you could feign not quite hearing and maybe come back with a “Who?”, trying to draw out some more information, a technique I had successfully used in various interrogations. But you can’t pull that with an online conversation. I sat again on the bed.

  “Dad? What should I say?”

  I felt the fingers on my forehead start to tremble. Who was this Klubhopper1 and how did he or she know me? That she’d immediately made the connection to Jennifer disturbed me.

  Then I heard a familiar high-pitched hum growing in my ears.

  “Damn,” I said. “Damn. Damn.” The hum filled my ears, leaving no doubt regarding what was about to happen.

  “What should I say?” Jennifer asked again.

  “Jennifer, don’t worry. I’m gonna be alright.”

  “What are you talking about? What should I type?”

  “I’m about to have a seizure.” My hand was shaking more violently now and the hum was getting louder. I lay back on Jennifer’s bed, preparing as Doc Tanner instructed.

  “Dad? What are you doing?” Jennifer’s voice was strained, filling with panic. The edges of my vision blurred and began to darken. Jennifer’s stricken face appeared in view. She said something that I didn’t understand, maybe a repeat of “Dad,” maybe something else.

  “It’s okay, Jenn.” My hand shook uncontrollably. “Don’t worry. Don’t worr—” I felt every muscle in my body tense as I jerked upward, my back arching spasmodically. Then the darkness gushed in and submerged me completely.

  * * *

  “Dad? Daddy?”

  Jennifer’s blurred face came into a soft focus. She was sideways.

  “Daddy! Can you hear me?”

  I grunted. “Yeah…”

  “It’s okay, Dad. They’re on their way.” Her eyes were red and her cheeks wet. Her voice wavered with barely contained panic.

  I looked past her and realized that I was no longer on the bed. My cheek rested on the rough fibers of the carpet. Jennifer reached toward me and dabbed my lip with a wet tissue. When she pulled it back, I saw a smear of pinkish blood.

  The sight of the blood must’ve triggered my pain receptors because, as soon as I saw it, I felt a sharp sting in my lower lip. It throbbed in rhythm with my pounding heartbeat.

  “Wha…,” I mumbled, unable to ask the question I wanted.

  Jennifer was crying. “Oh, Dad … It’s okay.… It’s okay.”

  I closed my eyes, overcome by intense fatigue. From somewhere far away, like at the bottom of a well, I heard a loud knocking.

  A moment later I felt hands on me, heard deep voices, Jennifer saying something. I felt myself being rolled over and an odd sensation of floating. I forced an eyelid half-open and saw the ceiling of my apartment scrolling by. Then I was out the door and tilting down the apartment-complex stairs. I closed my eye again.

  When I next opened it, I was in the back of an ambulance, jostling slightly with the vehicle’s motion. An earsplitting siren screamed intermittently. The intense examination light positioned over me was too bright to look at. I leaned my head and saw a young paramedic with a crew cut, speaking into a radio, calling out my vital signs.

  “Hey, Mike,” he said. “How you doing? Can you hear me?”

  “Yuh…,” I mumbled.

  He held my forehead and shined a penlight into each of my eyes. The light hurt. “Sluggish, but responsive. Here. Follow my finger.”

  Oh, boy. Follow the finger. But before I could play my favorite brain-cancer game, my eyelids felt suddenly heavy. So tired …

  “Mike!” the paramedic called. “Mike! Stay with me!” I heard fingers snapping loudly in my ear.

  I forced my eyes back open.

  “Follow my finger.” The paramedic moved an extended index finger back and forth across my field of vision. My reaction was slow, but I did follow it. “Good. We’re taking you to Orlando Regional. Your daughter is up in the cab. Who’s your doctor?”

  “Tan…”

  “Who? Come on, Mike. Help us out.”

  “Tan … ner.”

  “Tanner?”

  I grunted.

  “Okay. Good job. Just hang tight. We’re almost there. Anybody else we should call? Your wife?”

  I wanted to say, Which one? but only managed a guttural “No.” I couldn’t keep my eyelids open any longer. They came down like window shades, blocking out the harsh light.

  * * *

  I awoke in a hospital room. The first thing I noticed was the warm pressure on my hand. I lifted my head, with some effort, and saw Jennifer’s hand resting on mine. Her head was on the mattress of the bed, her face obscured by her brown hair.

  “Hey,” I said ho
arsely.

  Her head jerked up. She gawked expressionless at me for a beat before slipping her hand off mine.

  “Hey,” she said.

  “Thirsty…”

  “Yeah. Okay.” Jennifer got up and poured me a styrofoam cup of water from a plastic pitcher on the bedside tray. I sipped it greedily. “They said not to drink it too fast. You’ll make yourself sick.”

  “Who said?”

  “Them. The nurses.”

  My muscles ached the same as after my first seizure. Like I had been beaten with a sack of oranges on every inch of my body.

  “What time is it?” I cleared my throat.

  “Dunno. Late. Quarter to one.”

  “Jesus,” I mumbled. “I’m sorry, Jenn. I’m sorry you had to see that. Go through that.”

  Jennifer squeezed her lips together, twisting her mouth, fighting back her emotions. She made a quick nod, which I assume meant that she accepted my apology.

  “I’m okay now. I’d like to go home.” I looked around. I appeared to still be in the emergency room examination area. I hadn’t been admitted. Yet.

  “They’re keeping you overnight,” Jennifer said, regaining her composure.

  “No—”

  “I’ll be okay. Cam’s picking me up.”

  “You called Cam?”

  “Yeah.”

  “What about your mom?”

  “No. Not yet. She and Wayne are somewhere between here and North Carolina. I’ll call her cell phone in the morning. She’ll probably turn around and come back.”

  I shook my head. “I don’t want her to come back. I’ll be home tomorrow.”

  The curtain pretending to give me privacy from the dozen other poor souls in the ER whisked back, revealing a tall Hispanic nurse with a nametag that said Carmen.

  “Hi, Mike,” Carmen said. “How you feelin’?”

  “Like new. Like I want to go home.”

  Carmen scanned my chart with pursed lips. “Thirsty?” she asked without looking up.

  “I gave him some water,” Jennifer said.

  “Good girl.” Carmen turned to me. “Never left your side, except when we kicked her out. Loves her daddy.”

  Jennifer looked away.

  “When can I go home?” I asked.

  “Probably tomorrow. We called Dr. Tanner and he wants us to admit you for twenty-four-hour observation. He’ll be by in the morning. He might want to do a CAT scan. He’s also gonna change your seizure meds. You been havin’ a lot of seizures?”

  “This was my second.”

  “No fun, eh? You work those muscles pretty good when you’re thrashin’. We can give you a little somethin’ for the soreness, if you want. How’s the lip?”

  She poked at my lower lip and it felt like a knife stab. I inhaled sharply.

  “You bit it pretty good when you fell off the bed,” she said. “Anything else I should know? Headache?”

  “Not at the moment.”

  “Good. That’s good. We’ll get you admitted soon.” She replaced my chart on the foot of my hospital bed. “You have another visitor. Pretty blond lady in a slinky dress. I can only allow one guest at a time, so if you want her to come back…” Carmen looked at Jennifer.

  “That’s Cam,” said Jennifer. “I’ll go back to the waiting room. She can come in.”

  Carmen put her arm on Jennifer’s shoulder and led her out of the cubicle, pulling the curtain behind her.

  “It’s okay, sweetie,” Carmen said. “We’ll take good care of him.”

  The curtain jerked back again and Cam stepped in wearing a black cocktail dress. She gave me a weary look, affecting a slightly annoyed expression. But then the façade cracked and she burst into tears.

  “Oh, Michael,” she cried.

  CHAPTER 17

  “Hey, Cam,” I said. “It’s okay.”

  “You jerk,” she said through tears, fishing desperately in her purse for a tissue.

  “Yeah.”

  Cam blew her nose and flopped down into a guest chair. She propped an elbow on the chair’s arm and rested her cheek against her palm. She sighed loudly.

  “Y’know,” I said, “I don’t ever remember seeing you cry when we were married.”

  “You weren’t dying then, you jerk.”

  “True. But it almost seems as if you still love me.”

  “Of course I still love you.” She dabbed the tissue again at her nose. “You jerk.”

  “You just can’t be married to me.”

  Another sigh. “No. I can’t. You’re a very hard guy to love, Michael. You’re like some kind of love black hole. Sucking everything into the void and giving nothing back.”

  “Maybe I can change. My doctor says that the tumor might change my personality. Maybe it’ll be an improvement.”

  Cam swallowed loudly and fought back another wave of tears. “Please … Why won’t you treat it?”

  I said nothing, instead looking down at my hands and studying the orange hospital band on my wrist.

  “Jennifer is terrified,” Cam continued. “She thought she was watching you die tonight. She was beside herself when she called me.”

  “I’ll talk with my doctor tomorrow. He’ll give me some new meds to stop the seizures. Jennifer won’t have to see that again.”

  “You’re not listening. You never listen.”

  “Will you watch her tonight?”

  Cam nodded. “Of course.”

  We sat in silence for a few seconds. Cam stood and crossed the cubicle to my bed. She placed a hand on my cheek and leaned down. Then she kissed me gently on the forehead and embraced me, leaning awkwardly over the bed.

  She tightened her grip and whispered, “You jerk.”

  * * *

  Terminal cancer isn’t all bad. Knowing you’re going to die gives you an amazing ability to prioritize. If you knew that you had only a finite amount of time left on earth, how much of it would you spend scrubbing your toilet? Or flossing? Since I’d heard my diagnosis, I’d done neither.

  At least that’s how I rationalized to myself after the new CAT scan revealed that Bob had grown. Not a lot, but he had definitely grown. Tanner gave me his trademarked over-the-glasses look and told me that this wasn’t a good sign. Gee, Doc, thanks for the newsflash. He gave me a new antiseizure scrip and told me I could go home later that afternoon.

  About an hour after Tanner left, a priest leaned into my room. He was a young Hispanic guy with dark, neatly trimmed hair. He smiled at me.

  “Mr. Garrity?”

  “That’s me.”

  “I’m Father Sanchez. Your admittance papers said you were Catholic.”

  “I guess that’s true. I was.”

  He nodded and I spotted a rueful smile. “You mind if I come in?”

  “I guess.”

  He sat in the chair next to the bed and leaned his elbows on his knees. Jennifer must have listed a religious affiliation when they brought me in. I raised my eyebrows at him.

  “How do you feel?” he asked.

  “Never better. That seems to be everyone’s favorite question lately.”

  “That’s probably understandable. Considering.” He picked at a thread on his pressed black pants. “I take it that you’re not a practicing Catholic.”

  “Well, y’know, practice makes perfect, and I’m not even close to perfect. So…”

  “Do you want to talk about the tumor? I imagine that you’re dealing with a lot of emotions right now.”

  “Thanks anyway, Father.”

  “Sometimes it helps just to talk. Say things out loud.”

  “Maybe later.”

  He nodded again. “My name’s Luis. Luis Sanchez.” He stood. “I’m around if you really do want to talk later. The nurses can get in touch with me. I’m a good listener. I don’t judge. Please think about it.” He considered me for a long moment. “Facing your own mortality is a terrible situation. But, a blessing, too, in its own way. I think I can help you, as I’ve helped others. Please. If you don’t ta
lk to me, I encourage you to talk to someone. I can even recommend a counselor, if you want.”

  I swallowed, suddenly struck by almost the same words coming back at me that I’d spoken to Arlene about TJ. Father Sanchez offered a sad smile and a nod. Then he was out the door.

  I turned and gazed out the window, my thoughts empty, like a vast, treeless tundra. My eyes eventually fixed on a line of dark purple clouds that were brewing on the horizon. The daily thunderstorm was coming early today.

  * * *

  At about six thirty Cam and Jennifer showed up and sprang me from the hospital. After a day eating hospital pabulum, I was ready for some actual people food. So we hit a Mexican place on the way home and I ordered a burrito grande with extra sour cream. I knew my colon would pay for the indulgence later in the evening, but it was worth it.

  When we got home, my answering machine was blinking like a road barricade.

  George Neuheisel was on there three times, getting more agitated with each successive message. I only had a week left before the concert tour. He needed a status for Eli as soon as possible. He really needed to talk to me about the case. I erased them all.

  Arlene left a message with Eddie Sommerset’s phone number and address. She also provided the name of Eddie’s best friend, who lived in an apartment on the south end of International Drive, between Sea World and Disney. I jotted down the info on a scrap of paper. Arlene also left me TJ’s private cell number. I had found a different number in the file that George had given me, but it was out of service. I wrote down the new number.

  Big Jim left a message, too. Said he hadn’t been able to run the Mustang’s tag yet, but he would. He wanted to make sure I was okay.

  No message from Becky, telling me she and Wayne were driving back from North Carolina. Jennifer probably never called. Good girl. When the messages were done, I poured myself a tumbler of bourbon and eased onto the couch, where Cam and Jennifer were watching TV.

  Cam eyed the drink. “Is that a good idea with your new medication?”

  “Seems like a good idea to me.” I took a sip. I looked over at Jennifer. “So, Jenn, have you been in your chat room today?”

  “No. I’ve been with Cam or at the hospital since last night.”

  I nodded. “So, you haven’t talked to Klubhopper anymore?”