by Sam Carter
“Interesting. Very interesting,” Stumpy (Harlan really loved this nickname more and more) said as he and Rodriguez exchanged glances. Those glances terrified Harlan. Did they know more? Or were they just trying to throw him off his game?
“Well, thank you for taking time for us today,” Rodriguez said to both Harlan and Barry. “If you think of anything, anything at all, that may be good for us to know, please do not hesitate to give us a call.” She handed Harlan her card with her number circled on it. Great. The first time in who knows how long that he had gotten a girl’s number and it had nothing to do with his rugged good looks and undeniable charm.
“In the meantime, please don’t leave the area. We might need to stop by and speak to you again.”
Even though Harlan knew he should probably agree and say thank you, he could not understand this order from the cops to stay put. “Not to overstep my bounds, but why shouldn’t I leave the area? I have told you all I know. I have to stick around because of some ‘twit’ I sent?”
“Why?” Stumpy said. “Because I don’t like your attitude. Because I think you are lying or at least not telling me something. Because . . .”
Before he could keep going, Rodriguez stepped in. “Because this is just protocol. You have a connection, even if it’s in some obscure way, to a victim of a murder. That connection is from seconds before he was killed. Because of this we may need your help later, and we need you close for that.”
Harlan wasn’t sure what to believe—what the real reason was that they wanted him to stick around—but he knew one thing. He would believe anything this angel detective (another horrible sounding TV show) had to say. Sure, he wasn’t thinking with his head right now, but what she had to say was better anyway, so he went with that.
“Sounds good,” Harlan said as he shook both their hands, probably holding onto Rodriguez’s for a little too long and Stumpy’s for much too short. “You know where to find me.”
“Would you like me to show you out?” Barry spoke up for the first time. Harlan had almost forgotten he was there. “Or do you know your way?”
“We’ve got it. Thank you,” Rodriguez said as they walked out the door and down the hallway. Once again, Harlan gazed too long as they made their way out. But this time, especially with that view, he didn’t care who saw him.
Harlan was about to leave, too, but before he could, Barry placed his hand on his shoulder. “Can you stay for just one second? I promise it will be fast.”
Even though Harlan wanted to go and check on his patients one last time before he left to meet with Cole, he knew he should stay behind to talk. With all the insanity going on right now, it was amazing how calm Barry was. Harlan needed that. This would be helpful.
“I know that this has been a traumatizing few days for you, with everything that has happened. It’s been nonstop. But I just wanted to ask and make sure that you’re not hiding anything and are completely telling the truth about everything that is going on here. Is there anything more you need to address?”
Harlan would have been shocked had this come from anyone else, but not Barry. It was obvious, as always, that he was asking these questions because he genuinely cared. There were no accusations in his tone at all.
“I am telling you, and everyone, everything I know. I promise. This is the whole story.”
“Great. I believe you, Harlan. Now go get some rest. You’ve earned it.”
Harlan left Barry’s office frustrated with himself for lying to one of the few people left in the world that still trusted him.
Chapter 21
Luke walked slowly through downtown Seattle, careful to make sure he wouldn’t be recognized. That would be disastrous to his image and would make it more difficult to finish off his work. He had gone into some hipster dive because none of those freaks would have any idea who he was, bought some ironic hipster hat, and wore it low enough that no one would be able to pick him out of the crowd.
He was beyond understanding at this point. He could not even fathom what had led the Matsuis to act so irrationally and try to take him out, the only reason they were finally going to make some noise in the greatest market for crime in the world. He knew they could be shortsighted and rash, but this was a whole new level of idiocy.
What Luke could not afford to do, however, was dwell on what took place. He had to consider what his next steps would be, then come up with a plan of action, and fast. He was still feeling a little of the aftereffects of the drugs that had been injected into his body, so his normally sharp mind was feeling a bit groggy and rundown. Usually in a situation like this, or any situation really, he could come up with a plan in seconds. But not right now. Right now it would probably take him a few minutes. Tops. Yes, that was fast for most, but for Luke it was infuriatingly slow.
First things first, he needed to check in to make sure his plans were still working as well as they had been the last time he checked. He had to ensure that the Matsuis hadn’t found a way to screw this up. Second, he felt it prudent to make a visit to those who were responsible for his night locked away in some dump.
As he thought about how he would do both of these things quickly, the fog lifted from his mind, and it became incredibly clear he could accomplish both easily and in one fell swoop. This is going to be enjoyable, Luke thought. More enjoyable than if things had gone according to his original plan.
Luke heard footsteps right behind and turned to confront whoever was dumb enough to be following him. But no one was there. He kept walking and heard them again, but this time there was laughing and talking. It sounded like, but it couldn’t be, his parents. He quickly turned again and there was nothing. Not a single person. He was losing it, and he couldn’t do that. He needed to stay focused.
Luke walked toward his destination, and in those moments he allowed himself to get distracted by his own thoughts, letting his guard down as a man peeled away from his family and eagerly approached him with a knowing look. Some crazed sports fan had recognized him, and now Luke had to act fast to put an end to this threat.
He darted down an alley hoping this stupid man would follow and, true to form of someone desperate for the attention of the famous, he did. Luke reached into this pocket to make sure his blade was still there. It was, and that was not good for the approaching stranger.
As the man turned the corner, Luke took a step back, unsure of what he was seeing. Kenji? How could Kenji be following him? If he wasn’t already dead, there was no way he could walk. Luke had seen to that.
“Excuse me, sir? Can you help us for a second? We can’t seem to find, and this is embarrassing to even say, the Space Needle. Can you point us in the right direction?”
Luckily, before Luke could do something stupid, the man’s questions snapped him out of it. It wasn’t Kenji, it was a stupid tourist. A stupid tourist who had no idea who Luke was.
“No worries. Sometimes it’s like finding a needle in a haystack if you are just a visitor,” he said as they both laughed at Luke’s best attempt at a dad joke.
He quickly gave the man directions and moved on. As he walked, he had to take pause for moment—it was happening again. The confusion. The hallucinations. The doubt that had plagued him for so long and allowed his father to prey on him. He had to snap out of it. There was too much at stake, and his next target deserved Luke at his best. And his best they would get.
Chapter 22
After what was an emotionally draining conversation—it really is amazing what lying will do to a person—Harlan didn’t want to do anything else at all. But he knew he had to keep moving, keep pushing forward, keep searching for answers. Answers to what was going on with his patients and answers for why so many seemed to think he was involved in the murder of John Samson. He had to figure all this out, and he wouldn’t stop until he did.
He went straight back to the fourth floor and rounded on his patients once more for the day. All, at least on the surface, seemed well. They were all resting and appeared to be comfor
table. This was a good and welcome sign.
But all their tests, especially their blood work, told a different story. Each patient had a high white blood cell count, which made sense to Harlan and the other doctors. They were all struggling to fight off any infection that came their way. But, and this was a big but, it still didn’t tell why they were acting and suffering the way they were. It made no sense at all.
Harlan decided to take one last look at the test results to see if anything stood out. Nothing. Nothing stood out at all. Everything seemed normal. It was as if nothing were wrong at all.
Just as he was about to put everything away and leave to meet Cole, something caught his eye. It was small, and the report barely mentioned it, but he still couldn’t believe he had missed it. Halfway through the third page of Stacy’s tests results was written, “Unidentifiable substance found at high levels.” Six simple words that may hold the key to what was going on. Six simple words that no one had seen or thought were important before. Why hadn’t they seen them?
Thinking that maybe they were just in Stacy’s chart, so they hadn’t caused any alarm, Harlan decided to look through the test results of the other patients for similar language. And there it was. In each patient record were those simple words: “Unidentifiable substance found at high levels.”
Harlan rushed out of his office, found Lucy, and showed her the report.
“I don’t know what this means, but I need you to put in an order to the lab to have them run every test imaginable to find out what this undetectable substance is. We need to see if we can identify it right away.”
“I’m right on it, Dr. Allred,” Lucy said while she opened her computer and began to put the orders in. “I’ll call the lab once I’ve put in the orders and make sure they put a rush on it.”
“Perfect and fantastic idea. I need to head out, but call me once you get the results, or if anything else happens. This is exciting, Lucy. Very exciting. We will figure this out.”
To punctuate his excitement, Harlan gave Lucy a huge high five as he turned and rushed out the door to meet Cole at the hole.
***
Just as Harlan reached his car, his phone let out the loud musical sound notifying him of one of those pesky text messages. He looked down and saw it came from a strange number he didn’t recognize with a simple but strange message.
“In 30 seconds, a phone in your glove compartment will ring. Answer it.”
A phone in his glove compartment? How? What? Who? All sorts of questions swirled around his now very crowded brain, but before he could even attempt to answer them a ring came from inside his glove compartment. Just as the text promised.
With a great deal of hesitation, Harlan opened the compartment and found an old-school flip phone. And with even more fear, just as he was instructed, he answered it.
“Hello. Who is this?”
“Oh, Harlan. That’s cute. There is no chance you’ll ever get that answer from me.” It was the same voice on the voicemail from earlier, only this time it was a little more distorted. A little harder to pinpoint any distinguishing characteristics.
“Fine. Then what do you want from me?” Harlan was terrified, and he wasn’t sure if his voice showed that. He hoped it didn’t.
“What do I want from you? An excellent question. The answer to that will come over time.” Of course it would. Why would this become easy now?
“Then why are you calling me on some phone you somehow got into my car? What do you want?”
“It’s simple. I want to commend you on how you handled your meeting with those idiot detectives. I thought you would give in when that stunning specimen started making eyes at you. I’ve underestimated you. Very impressive.”
“How do you know . . . What is going on?” Harlan asked, but now any confidence in his voice was gone. The only thing left was fear. This person, this evil person, knew his every move.
“Don’t you worry about that at all. You’ve got too much on your plate to be concerned with how I know things, what with everything that is happening to your patients and what could very well happen to Jack. Or even your little Leslie if you don’t always do what you are told to do.”
Harlan could no longer find words. They were dried up. He sat there in stunned silence.
“Soon I will have more for you, but for now keep this phone close by and answer it every time I call. I will not be contacting you on your cell phone anymore. You never know who will be listening,” the voice said with a hint of a smile. “We’ll talk again soon. One last thing. Enjoy your meeting with your buddy Cole at the hole.”
Chapter 23
Without any thought to where he was going, Harlan made his way to Cole’s old apartment in the Rainier Valley section of Seattle. While it was only about twenty minutes from where Harlan went to college, it was a far cry from the part of town he now called home. It was an area that was getting better, but back then, it was riddled with crime and not exactly the safest place for some kid to get an apartment by himself.
Harlan always thought that was why Cole chose to live there, because everyone told him he couldn’t and he wanted to prove he could. Because, and Harlan always thought this was the most real reason of them all, he could get away from the places (home and school) that made him feel like a failure.
Even though it had been years since he had been to the hole, it was a familiar place that Harlan had gone to hundreds of times during those days. For that reason, even when his thoughts were somewhere else completely, Harlan could drive there without any thought at all.
Harlan looked at the clock on his dashboard and saw it was only 7:15 which, under normal circumstances, meant he was fifteen minutes early, but since he was waiting for Cole he was on Cole Standard Time. Great. Now he had anywhere between thirty minutes and four days sitting and waiting. Just what he needed.
What he needed now was a way to distract himself for a few minutes (or hours) so that he didn’t go any more insane than he already was. At first, he couldn’t think of a single thing. He didn’t want to turn on the radio knowing all he would hear would be endless commentaries on Luke Masterson and John Samson. None of those would help. The same could be said for going on Twitter or Facebook or any site on the Internet. He felt at a loss.
Then he remembered he had missed calls and text messages from both his dad and Jack. Maybe he should call them back. Yes, they would want to talk about everything that was going on, but talking to them would help. Just hearing their voices would help.
Before he could decide who to call first, his phone rang. At first Harlan was terrified that it was the unknown caller again, until he realized it wasn’t coming from his new phone. Thankful, Harlan looked at his caller ID and saw it was Emily. Two calls in two days. This was quite unexpected.
“Hey, Emily. How goes it?” Harlan didn’t want to deviate from this smooth line from the day before. That’s what made him such a catch.
“Where have you been?” Wow. She didn’t say hello or ask how he was doing. She just went right into it. This was very unlike her. “Your son has been worried sick!”
“I’ve had a very busy day, Emily. Nonstop since the moment I woke up.”
“So busy that you couldn’t call or text your son back? How long does it even take to send a text anyway? You couldn’t do that for him?”
“I hadn’t even seen that he, or anyone for that matter, had tried to contact me until maybe an hour ago. And I was just about to call him when you called.”
“Likely story, Harlan. How many times did you use that crap excuse on me? Too many to count. And while it drove me crazy, it’s much worse that you’re using it on your son. I actually believed you had changed.”
He had changed. He really had. This wasn’t an excuse. It was the truth, but he knew it didn’t matter what he said at this point. To Emily everything would be a lie, an excuse. Everything. And he couldn’t tell her the whole truth, about the cops and some stranger thinking he may know something about Samson’s murder o
r even been involved in some way. About Jack and the threats on his life. About how his patients were suffering, dying, and he didn’t know why. Not only would she not believe him, she might shut him out again. Jack and Leslie would be gone forever.
“I understand why you think I’m lying and making some sort of ridiculous excuse. I get it. I deserve it. But this time I’m not. My day has been more difficult than I can explain.”
“Why can’t you explain it? Too hard to come up with a believable lie on the spot?”
“Because you would never believe the truth. I don’t even believe it myself, and I am living it.”
There was dead silence on the other end. Harlan was afraid she had hung up, once again fed up with him, and this time never to return.
“Emily? You there? I’m sorry. I’m sorry for all I’ve put you through. You have every right to be angry and not believe me. But, please believe me this time. I did not plan to leave Jack hanging. I have had no time until now.”
“Ok, Harlan. Ok. Whatever you say. Call or text him. Just do something. For once, do something.” Before he could say anything more, she hung up without saying goodbye. And, once again, Harlan was stuck, sitting in his car, alone. Stuck wallowing in his own self-doubt and lifetime of mistakes.
Chapter 24
Harlan attempted to snap out of his pity party. How many times had he tried to do that lately? It was pathetic how often he sat and sulked over his problems. Who didn’t have problems? Maybe he needed to put on a pair of big girl panties and get over it.
Only he couldn’t. He couldn’t just move on. The only woman he’d ever loved, the only woman who’d ever mattered, told him he was a waste of space. Do something. For once in your pathetic, sad, worthless life, do something. Where had it all gone wrong? When had he reached this point of no return with her where she went from seeing him as the man of her dreams to what she saw now?
