The Best Bad Dream

by Robert Ward

  She had tricked him again.

  It could never happen again. No matter what happened in this crazy goddamned life, he must always put Kevin first. Michelle was history.

  His son was his life. To hell with everything else. Silently, he made that pledge to Kevin and himself.

  Exhausted, Jack stood up from the bench and headed for the hotel and, if possible, sleep.

  Chapter Forty-two

  Six months later . . .

  Jack pulled into the driveway and looked for a light in Kevin's bedroom but there was none. The dark room worried him. It had taken a month for things to get close to normal. Jack and Kevin had been seeing a family therapist named Lake Hale together. They even brought Wade with them a couple of times and things had gotten very stormy. But now, after a month, all three of them had started to settle down. Jack was keeping his end of the bargain, coming home every night, making sure that Kevin had done his homework and that they had time together every day. The whole process was starting to work.

  At least Jack had thought so, until now. It was eight o'clock and where was Kevin?

  Jack told himself not to panic. The kid could be back in the bathroom, or the kitchen. But somehow he knew that things weren't right.

  Jack walked into the house and called his son's name. No answer. He called again. No answer.

  Jack put the pizza down on the dining room table and walked to the back of the house. No sign of Kevin in the bathroom.

  He wet a washrag and wiped his forehead. Don't panic. Don't expect the worst.

  He stared at himself in the mirror. He looked tired, and his shoulder holster was a little tight. He felt a pain in his right arm.

  Jack started to take the gun off when he heard something from his own bedroom.

  What the hell?

  He listened more intently as he crept toward his bedroom door. Now he could make it out, a narrator's voice like in a documentary film.

  “Here they are. Two white mice of precisely the same age. Both of them are three years old, which is pretty old for a mouse.”

  Jack crept up to his bedroom door, his Glock in his hand.

  “The mice are named Binky and Bobby. You can see now that they are very old.”

  Jack listened at the bedroom door. Yes, it was definitely coming from inside.

  He aimed his gun at the door and slowly turned the handle.

  Then he heard another voice. This one was a woman's. And one he had come to know.

  “Come on in, Jack,” Kim Walker said. “And put down your gun. You won't need it. Oh, and one more thing. Don't turn on the light. I have a surprise for you.”

  Jack walked inside, still holding his gun. Except for the light coming from a grainy, black-and-white video playing on a laptop sitting on the dresser, the room was dark.

  The blinds were closed and Kim Walker was sitting on the bed. She was mostly hidden by shadows.

  “Hi, Jack.”

  “Kim. Where's my son?”

  “He's fine. I just sent him in a cab across town to meet you for dinner. Called him on his cell phone. He should be at Musso and Frank's just about now. He'll wait a while, then call you. And by that time we'll be all done.”

  “All done with what? What is it you want?”

  There was silence like a canyon between them.

  “I know you've been through a lot, Jack,” she said. “And I can just imagine what you think of us.”

  Jack looked from her, lost in shadows, to the frozen image of the two aged, fat white mice.

  “By ‘us’ I guess you're admitting your complicity in the Blue Wolf homicides.”

  “Yes, I guess I am,” she said. “But let me explain, please. You see, when Alex first told me about it, I really didn't even consider being involved. First of all, it was immoral, and second, it was too wild to even believe. Injecting the liquid form of the pineal gland, add other new antiaging drugs, and you may be able to turn back the clock? Recapture your youth? That's crazy, right?”

  “Yeah,” Jack said. “That's crazy.”

  “That's what I thought, too, of course, but I was wrong. And so are you. I want you to watch this. It was made at a secret lab in London by gerontologists who worked with Alex. What they discovered is nothing short of a miracle. You may have trouble believing what you're seeing but I assure you it's all true.”

  Jack turned his attention to the laptop as Kim pressed the PLAY button. The British narrator began again.

  “Here are our two subjects, white mice who are at the very end of their life cycle. Both Binky's and Bobby's coats are very shabby. Their fur has fallen out, much as hair falls out of humans when they get old. And look how feeble they are. Here's Binky trying to make his way through a maze he used to dart through only a year and a half ago.”

  Jack watched the pathetic mouse limp through the starting gate, walk into a wall, and then look around, ever so slowly, for the doorway to the next room in the maze. But even though it was just to his left he couldn't find it.

  “If you're wondering why the mouse is unable to find the doorway, it's a number of things. His sense of balance, once perfect, is practically gone. His eyesight is limited to one eye, so his left eye doesn't even see the open doorway. He suffers from anxiety just from having to make the decision. Yes, mice can suffer anxiety.”

  “Now let's watch Bobby. You can see the same things. The hesitancy, the panic, the inability to make a decision. All symptoms of old age in mice—and people, too. But now let's see what happens when our first mouse, Binky, is given D-35, a new drug developed from the pineal glands of freshly killed younger mice.”

  Jack watched as Binky was given an injection of a white, viscous liquid.

  Bobby was given a placebo.

  “After only two weeks of treatment, let's see our mice again. Bobby still has a gray, listless coat, and still can't get beyond the first room. But let's take a look at Binky. His coat is beautifully filled out. Why, it's almost as full and shining as it was two years ago, when he was still a young mouse. And what about his maze-running ability? Why, he runs right through the maze, as if he already knew where to go. And all his vital statistics have improved dramatically. Blood pressure, heartbeat, lung capacity, mood. Yessir! Binky is one happy mouse!”

  The camera moved in on the perky, happy white mouse, which looked years younger than it had two weeks before.

  “You see, Jack? It is real. All of it.”

  “If that's the same mouse,” Jack said.

  “Trust me. It is.” Kim said.

  “Even so,” Jack said. “What works in mice doesn't always translate to humans.”

  “True. But in this case, it does,” Kim said.

  “I see,” Jack said. “Then how come Alex isn't young and dashing? How about the others?”

  “They had just started to take it,” she said. “The results were amazing, but they wore off after a few hours. You have to take D-35 for about six months to a year to see really dramatic results.”

  Jack walked to the side of the bed.

  “Don't come any closer,” Kim said.

  “Why not?”

  “I don't know if you'll like me.”

  Jack came closer and put out his hand.

  “Trust me,” he said.

  “Are you going to arrest me?”

  “'Fraid I have to, baby,” he said. “But if you play ball with me I bet I can get you a reduced sentence in a nice white-collar facility.”

  “Jack,” she said. “It's been so long since I felt anything for anyone. I wanted things to work out between us. I really did. And I thought once you saw this video you would understand. I didn't know what else to do.”

  “I don't understand. Were you sick or something?”

  “Not sick,” she said. “Not really. I was just like this, Jack. The worst thing in this world.”

  She turned and grabbed the rod for the blinds and twisted it so that the slats opened all at once. The bright streetlight shone in and for a second it blinded Jack. />
  He saw spots in front of his eyes. He could see her pulling the covers back and then, finally, he could see her clearly.

  “Your face,” he said.

  It was a mass of wrinkles and age spots, the skin as thin and translucent as wax paper. She opened her mouth and most of her teeth were gone. Her hair was dried out, and in the middle of her head was a pathetic bald spot.

  Then she pulled the covers the rest of the way off her body. Kim's breasts were like dried-out prunes, and her stomach was a sagging mass of wrinkles that led down to her birdlike, stick legs. Her toenails were long, yellow, cracked, and curled up at the ends.

  She gave out an anguished, furious cry.

  “How do you like me now, Jaaaaaack? Aren't you going to tell me how great I look? Don't you want to fuck me now, Jackie?”

  She got to her knobby, bony knees and reached for his crotch.

  “How about a blow job, Jackie? I can really gum it for you!”

  Jack fell back, too terrified and shocked to speak.

  “What's the matter, Jack? You don't like me this way? Well, I wouldn't be like this if you hadn't interrupted the ceremony. It was my turn to get most of the new batch of D-35, but there wasn't any new brain syrup because of you. I thought I had to die, but then I realized there was another answer, Jack. Do you see?”

  She reached beneath the covers, pulled out a long, pearl-handled knife, and using all of her strength, she slashed it into Jack's stomach.

  The blood spurted out of him onto her face, and she let it flow into her dried-out old mouth.

  “Ahhhhh, good,” she screamed. “Goood. Fresh, young blood. When you die I'll take your pineal gland and I'll be young again. You see how perfect that is, don't you, Jackie? And how just. You owe me, Jack. You know you do!”

  She stabbed at him again and he fell back against the wall.

  He could feel the world turning upside down and somewhere in his mind the story of the happy mouse began to play again.

  “Look at Binky now,” the narrator said. “Why, all he wants to do is play! He's like a happy, youthful mouse again. A new mouse with a second chance.”

  “Yes,” Kim said, as she knelt on Jack's stomach and lifted the knife again. “A new and happy mouse. That's all I ever wanted to be.”

  The knife came down, but slower this time, and Jack found his hand wrapped around the Glock.

  He aimed and watched as the bullets blasted into her stomach. He felt dizzy, weak, trapped inside a nightmare.

  She fell on the side of the bed and slowly pulled herself to her knees.

  “You made me old,” she screamed again. “You made me oldddddd, you son of a bitch!”

  Then she plunged forward with the bloody knife but Jack shot her again, this time in the head, and blood and bone sprayed on him as she fell over sideways onto the floor.

  He looked at her lying there. Her neck had runny sores on it, and her ears were laughably long, ancient donkey ears. He felt pity for her.

  For her and for all of them.

  They were Americans. The magic land where no one ever had to grow up.

  And no one ever died.

  He was no different from the rest. He found her old skin, her bones, her old-person odor revolting.

  He never wanted to get old. Never.

  Who knew what he might do when his time came? If he had the offer?

  Who knew what he might choose?

  He looked down at his stomach, blood pouring onto the floor and pooling now by Kim's head.

  Like they were one. And maybe, in some ways, they were.

  Jack knew he should get his cell phone. But where was it? Not in his pocket. Then he remembered. He had left it in the car. He fell back on the bed and watched Binky run through the maze again. Half-gone, he listened as the narrator intoned, “Yes, newly youthful Binky is running, jumping, and skittering through the maze once more. It's obvious to everyone: Binky is one young and happy mouse.”

  Chapter Forty-three

  He dreamed he was with some friends at a party, a beautiful party in the desert. There were cacti, and armadillos, and cowboys with Spanish guitars. And hanging from the starry sky was the moon. It was bright and yellow and seemed to bask them all in romance. Some of the girls, Mexican girls with beautiful eyes, were starting to dance. And Oscar was there, too, wearing a festive sombrero and two antique pistols in his red satin sash.

  It was all just great, except for one thing. Jack was bending over a trough, where the burros were tied up, and he was throwing up some stuff that looked like magma. It was red hot, and as it poured out of his stomach sparks shot from it, molten sparks that shot back up into his face and singed his skin.

  He heard the guitars playing a rancho song, and he saw people dancing in the moonlight, and he kept throwing up this red-hot lava, and even after getting rid of a ton of it, his stomach still killed him.

  It was no use. He was going to die from this red-hot pain in his gut. Even though he kept vomiting, there was always more.

  And the screaming pain only got worse.

  Jack opened his eyes and saw someone looking down at him. She was a crazy quilt of patterns. At first she seemed to have one eye, then two, then three. And he knew her name, knew it like he knew his own, only right now he couldn't recall either of them.

  Then he felt a cool thrill in his stomach, which for a second stopped the horrible pain.

  “Michelle,” he said, blinking.

  “Wrong sister, Jack,” the voice answered.

  Jack blinked again. It wasn't Michelle, it was her sister, her sister whose name was . . .

  “Jennifer,” she said.

  “Jennifer,” Jack echoed. “Of course.”

  “You gave me quite a scare,” she said.

  “Me, too,” said another voice. Jack looked up and saw a broad, kind face. He felt a flood of warmth.

  “Oscar.”

  “Jackie,” Oscar said, and took his hand in his own.

  “How you doing, Jackie?”

  “Aside from this inferno in my gut, really great,” Jack said.

  “Yeah,” Jennifer said. “But the good news is you're going to get better. They got to you just in time.”

  Now Jack blinked and it all came back to him. Kim stabbing him, his Glock going off, her body hurtling back. The blood. The sound of the documentary. The oh-so-happy mouse.

  “But how did you find me, Oscar?” Jack asked.

  “It wasn't me, amigo,” Oscar said.

  Jack turned to Jennifer.

  “You?”

  “No,” she said. “I came here after I got a phone call.”

  There was something in her voice. An insinuation.

  “Michelle?” Jack asked.

  “Michelle,” Jennifer confirmed.

  “But how?”

  “Luck?” Jennifer wondered.

  “Fate?” Oscar threw in.

  “I don't understand.”

  Jennifer looked at him and shook her head.

  “She said she had come around to see you. To explain why we got caught.”

  “Yeah?”

  “The reason was that we went back. Michelle insisted on it. She wanted the serum. She knew it worked and she knew which refrigerator they kept it locked in. And she knew there was no lock she couldn't pick. So we went back to get it.”

  “And?”

  “And we got it. We picked the lock and we were on our way back out with it when two guards saw us, overpowered us, and brought us back inside.”

  Jack looked at Oscar, who said, “Fucking Michelle.”

  Jack laughed and nodded. “Fucking Michelle.”

  “The guards didn't really see us in the lab. They caught us in the hall and had no idea why we were there. So they just brought us in to join the party.”

  Jack felt his stomach spasm and gasped.

  “We better go,” Jennifer said. “You need your rest.”

  “Wait a minute,” Jack said. “You haven't told me how Michelle . . .”

&n
bsp; “She said she just happened to come around when she heard shots. She broke in and found Kim Walker dead, and you almost dead. She called 911 and came with you to the hospital. Then she called Oscar and me on her way out.”

  Jack nodded. “Out to where?”

  Jennifer smiled. “I have no idea, Jack.”

  Oscar looked at her in disbelief.

  “No idea?” Jack asked.

  “None,” she said. “But she did say she'd get in touch with you when you get well. She loves you, you know.”

  Jack looked down and shook his head. “Oh, man,” he said.

  “Get well, Jack. You'll hear from her again. And thanks. I owe you.” She lightly touched Jack's hand and walked out of the room.

  Jack looked up at his partner. “Son of a bitch, Oscar,” he said.

  Oscar smiled. “Son of a bitch, Jackie,” he said. “Michelle. She's like a bad dream, bro.”

  “Yeah, bro,” Jack said. “But let's face it. She's my best bad dream.”

  Oscar smiled and squeezed Jack's hand tightly as he fell asleep.