by Tim Kizer
Even though George would vanish from the face of the earth, he was not going to go missing in the public’s eyes. Officially, George would die in a car crash. The role of his body double went to Sam Talbott, a man of similar height and build, whom they had kidnapped two days earlier.
After folding the table, deflating the pool, and packing the drills and knives, they checked the garage for stains of blood. Then they celebrated the successful revenge by devouring half a bottle of Beefeater gin—Kelly and Albert only had a shot each since they were supposed to drive hours later.
At half past midnight, Graham and Albert tossed the barrel with George’s body in the lake. Four hours later, they pushed the old man’s truck with Sam Talbott’s body in the driver’s seat into the ditch four miles south of Jamestown and set it on fire; the propane tank explosion was beautiful. Their plan worked without a hitch: the fire rendered Talbott’s corpse completely unrecognizable, the police didn’t bother to do any DNA testing, and Jane was too emotionally devastated to question the official story of her husband’s death. After a short but heartfelt funeral service on a cold Thursday morning, George’s remains were cremated, forever sealing the terrible secret of the old man’s death.
Chapter 7.
COMING HOME
1.
They told him he had gotten off easy, and Frank was fully aware of it: his Guardian angel had done a good job since the car crash; it would have been a great job if the angel had prevented the car crash from happening in the first place.
“You’re doing incredibly well, Frank,” Doctor Raynolds told Frank on the eighth, and the last, day of his stay at the hospital. “I’ve seen your X-rays, I’ve seen your test results, and I must say that you are way ahead of the typical schedule. A lot of people with a head trauma similar to your require months of physical therapy, so you ought to consider yourself very lucky. However, you should keep in mind that your head is a terribly fragile thing, and from now on you should treat it as if it were made of glass. It contains your brain, and I guess you agree that the brain is an important part of the body.”
Frank told the doctor that he agreed with him on that.
“I would recommend avoiding extremely strenuous physical activity for the next several months, which means no racing, no jumping from heights, no boxing—you get the idea. Take it easy, relax on a couch, now you have a perfect excuse for that.” Raynolds laughed softly. “Unless you want to be back in our nurses’ arms.”
“I’m an expert in relaxing on a couch,” said Frank. “I’ll gladly follow your advice.”
“And as for your amnesia, you shouldn’t worry if the recovery takes longer than expected. Sooner or later, most of your memories will come back to you. Don’t be upset if the recovery is not complete. Look on the bright side: among those lost memories could be things you wanted to forget but couldn’t. Amnesia might have saved you a lot of stress, Frank.” Raynolds paused. “It’s like you were born again, isn’t it?”
2.
So, a thirty-seven-year-old accountant from Shapiro Bender Winkler was finally going home, where no one was waiting for him with outstretched arms.
He had a lot of getting used to do ahead of him. Even though he remembered his house—he had bought it eight years before, the point in time outside the black hole chewed out by amnesia—its interior was terra incognita to Frank. Actually, there was a bright side to that: while other people have to buy new furniture to revamp the design, all Frank Fowler had had to do was hit a freeway wall at seventy miles per hour, have his car roll over three times before coming to a halt, and, as a result, drop six years of life from his memory.
Nothing like a change of scenery, right?
“What are you thinking about? Kelly?” Josephine, who had offered him a ride home in her beautiful Porsche Cayenne, gave him a curious look. Her car could have easily set her back a hundred grand, which confirmed Frank’s hunch that she was loaded.
Frank nodded, just to humor her.
His house was empty, he had accepted this unfortunate fact. Three people used to live there, but now two of them were missing, and he was the only one left.
However, he didn’t feel sad about it. You see, he didn’t remember the time when Kelly and Kathy had lived in that house. You can’t mourn someone you have forgotten, let’s be honest here, okay?
What a coincidence.
“Are you feeling okay?” asked Josephine. “You need to get a lot of rest the next couple of weeks.”
“I’m okay,” he muttered. “Thanks for asking.”
“Our family will do our best to help you, Frank,” said Josephine. “If you need anything, just let us know.”
What a nice coincidence it was. He lost his daughter, a cute five-year-old girl, who must have been raped, dismembered, and thrown in Lake Erie by some perverted psycho. Then he lost his wife, who had most likely been dumped in Lake Erie as well. And just when it was about time for him to have an emotional breakdown, a car accident wiped out his memories about these two people along with all the related pain and suffering he must have gone through.
What a perfect coincidence! It was like he’d been born again and could start a new life now.
“Do you still remember how to do your job? They are not going to fire you, are they?” Josephine asked.
“It might take some brushing up, but I’ll be fine.”
As a matter of fact he was planning to start checking on the latest developments in partnership taxation tomorrow morning. He wished it were as easy for him to remember his wife and daughter.
On second thought, he was in no hurry to do it.
It suddenly occurred to him that if someone were able to look inside his mind right now, this person would be horrified: “This guy doesn’t give a shit about his wife! This guy doesn’t give a shit about what his daughter! Look at this asshole!”
Remembering nothing from the last six years.
His head was a bit heavy, but he could easily solve this problem by taking an Aspirin pill at home.
You don’t give a shit about them because you have to remember who they are to give a shit, buddy. It’s a solid excuse. Kathy and Kelly are missing? Sure, it’s a tragedy, but you can’t just flip the switch and start caring about them any more than about a hundred thousand other people that disappear every year in America. That’s not how it works.
Yes, all these busybodies ought to leave him alone. There was no point in beating the dead horse; he still remembered virtually nothing about his wife and daughter. Someday Kelly and Kathy would emerge in his memory, but at this point in time these names meant nothing to him.
“Did you remember anything about Kelly? Anything that could help us find her?” asked Josephine, with her eyes fixed on him.
Frank shook his head, but Josephine continued to drill him with a look full of hope, risking a collision with a Dodge Charger coming in the opposite direction. Frank pointed to the Dodge and said hastily, “Be careful, Josephine.”
Yes, she had to be careful because he didn’t need another car crash. From now on, he was going to treat his head as if it were made of glass.
Josephine turned her face back to the road, sighed, and bit her lower lip. Frank thought he had noticed a grimace of gloom flicker across her face.
“Are you going to see a psychiatrist?” Josephine asked one minute later in a slightly hoarse voice. “I could arrange a meeting with an excellent specialist if you’d like. And I’d pay all expenses, too.” She glanced at Frank to find out his reaction.
Oh no, Frank Fowler needed no stinking psychiatrist. All Frank needed was lots of rest. Maybe he should take a vacation and go to Las Vegas for a week? That was an idea worth considering.
“Why?” asked Frank.
“He could help you recover your memories faster. They have methods. Hypnosis and stuff like that.”
Hypnosis and stuff like that. Next thing you know Josephine would want to irradiate his head with x-rays or gamma-rays so that the memories of Kelly could come
unstuck from the bottom of the amnesia deep and rush back to the surface. Or drill a hole in the frontal bone and insert electrodes into his brain.
“I doubt it will help,” he said.
“I wouldn’t refuse it if I were you.”
Marilyn Hancock. He was going to call her as soon as he got home. According to Marilyn, they used to meet each other at least twice a week, and there was no reason for them not to resume this schedule.
She wouldn’t refuse it if she were him? It didn’t sound like a threat, did it?
“What do you mean?” he asked.
“The psychiatrist could help you remember something important about Kelly’s disappearance. Something that could lead us to her. We have to act fast, Frank. You must understand that chances of finding Kelly alive get worse with every passing day. And we can’t rely on the police; they are too dumb and lazy.”
“I’m afraid you’re overestimating what I might know about Kelly’s disappearance.”
“Kelly and you live together. You might have heard or seen something we can use. You could know where she was going the day she disappeared. Or maybe you know someone who has the information that could help us find her.”
Okay, Josephine Buckhaus, you win. Now please shut up.
“I’m sorry, Josephine. I’m having a headache. Let’s discuss it later, okay?” Frank winced to make his pain more obvious to Josephine. “I could use some quiet time right now if you don’t mind.”
“Very well, Frank. I’ll give you a call tomorrow morning,” said Josephine.
“Sounds good.”
Frank heaved a sigh of relief, pleased that Josephine had left him alone at last. He was slightly surprised that the conversation with his sister-in-law irked him so badly.
“I hope you make the right choice.” Josephine smiled.
3.
He had little trouble recognizing his house because he had bought it eight years ago, well before the period affected by amnesia. While in the hospital, Frank had this hazy mental snapshot of his house, which turned out to be a surprisingly accurate match to the real thing. The few discrepancies that Frank’s mind was able to register stemmed from the shape and the size of the trees and shrubs around his residence. The elusive feeling of déjà vu immediately came over Frank as he stepped out of the car and fixed his eyes on the house.
While he was walking up the path leading to the porch, he noticed an interesting detail: his lawn appeared freshly mowed and was free of leaves.
“I had your lawn prettied up yesterday,” said Josephine, seeing what had caught his attention. “I was also worried about burglary. It’s always risky to leave a house unattended for more than two days, even in a nice neighborhood.”
“Thank you, Josephine.” Frank stepped onto the porch. Yes, she was right, these days robbers could target your house even if it had home security stickers plastered on every window. “Were there any break-ins while I was in the hospital?” he asked in an anxious voice.
“Thankfully, nothing bad happened. I’ve been coming here every other day to check windows and doors. I even put one of those lamps with a timer in the living room to make it look like somebody was in the house. Graham gave me this idea.”
Frank was a little surprised to find that he felt genuinely grateful to Josephine for watching over his place while he had been away. Muttering ‘thank you, Josephine,’ he pulled out the keys. At this moment he felt a lump in his throat, and although he was not a sentimental person, nostalgia suddenly overcame him. He was home again!
Once he stepped over the front door threshold and breathed in the air of the foyer, a vague recollection of that weird dream about a woman murdered in the bathroom flashed in his mind again. This time, the memory stayed with Frank long enough for him to be certain that he had been the one who had stabbed that woman to death. Thank God, it had only been a dream.
He walked inside. The nostalgia dominated his feelings for a while and began to diminish as he inhaled the smell given off by the walls, the floor, and the furniture and soon turned into curiosity.
“Do you need any help?” asked Josephine, who had shut the door and now was observing Frank.
Frank was pleasantly impressed by the interior design of the house. Whoever had been in charge of picking furniture had made a great choice. It had most likely been Kelly; those trips to furniture showrooms would have definitely bored him to death.
“Josephine, if you’re in a hurry, you are free to leave. I’ll be fine on my own. Thanks a lot for the ride,” he said, sitting down on the sofa. “As long as I know where the kitchen and restroom are, I’m okay.” Frank smiled.
He stretched his legs and looked at Josephine, who was standing in the middle of the room with an expression of hesitation on her face.
“Did you notice how clean the house is?” she asked.
Frank quickly scanned around and nodded. Only now did he realize that the living room appeared to have been freshly vacuumed and dusted.
“The housemaid was here yesterday to clean the house up. I hate dirt. Kelly hates dirt, too.”
“How did she open the door?”
Oh, Marilyn Hancock! Only she could make Frank Fowler feel better! Why was he so damn bored?
“Kelly gave me a key a while ago. Just in case.”
Frank asked himself if Josephine was the reason of his boredom. His suspicion seemed to be correct. As minutes passed by, he grew more and more comfortable with the idea that he had the right to tell Josephine to go pound sand since she had probably stopped being his relative. She couldn’t be his sister-in-law if he wasn’t married. Till death do us part, you know.
A spark of righteous indignation ran along his body: what the hell was Mrs. Buckhaus doing here? Why was he wasting his time on her?
“Well, I’m going to hit the road and let you get to know your house without my nagging,” said Josephine. “If you need any help, call me.” She turned around and headed for the front door. Frank stood up and went after Josephine to walk her to her car.
“Please, think about the therapist,” Josephine said as they descended the porch steps. “Kelly means so much to us. We must find her no matter what it takes.”
“She means a lot to me, too. I’ll think about the therapist, Josephine.”
Josephine gave him a long piercing look and replied, “Thank you, Frank.” A few moments later she was on her way home.
4.
The next morning Frank made his first significant discovery inside his house. He was lying on the bathroom floor with a bottle of Aspirin in his left hand and was about to burst out giggling when he thought that he must be quite a spectacle at this moment: a grown man stretched on his stomach, delving into the tight space under the beautiful clawfoot bathtub.
Where the hell was that damn cap?
He slightly winced as he realized that he might have to go look for the flashlight in case the bottle cap had run away further than he’d thought. He would have really hated to waste so much time on this stupid cap.
Where was it? Where was that little sucker hiding?
There. There it was.
He saw the cap the same moment he noticed the blood stains.
The three blood stains under the tub, a few inches away from its right front leg. The stains were small, each roughly the size of a nickel.
And why did you decide that it is...
Because the stains are dark red. You can clearly see their color against the beige floor tile—three dark red splatter stains, and if it's not blood, then what is it?
It wasn’t paint because he didn’t remember painting anything in the last several months. Well, that was a weak argument. A better argument was the fact that the stains were easy to scrape off: he had just scratched one of them with his nail and managed to get some blood on the tip of his finger. He brought the stained finger close to his eyes and carefully examined it. The blood had obviously dried up a long time ago, and now he was staring at a bunch of tiny brownish particles, which resembled sc
ales of a microscopic fish.
Frank wiped the blood off his finger with his thumb and peered at the stains.
Yes, it was blood. Well, for the sake of argument, he would assume that it was blood.
He picked up the cap and screwed it back on the bottle. Then he put Aspirin aside and rolled on his right side to take a more comfortable position, all the while gazing at the stains. A few seconds later, he started chuckling: look at this thirty-seven-year-old accountant lazing around on the bathroom floor and studying brown spots under the tub. He is looking at them and thinking...
About Kelly. Frank Fowler was thinking about Kelly, because he believed it was her blood. Could he even prove it was blood in the first place? Yes, if those CSI television shows weren’t lying, detecting the presence of blood was fairly simple. Was he going to do the testing?
Fat chance. People had gotten death sentences with less material evidence. Hell, they’d gotten death sentences with no material evidence at all!
Okay, let’s recap. Three blood stains. Under the bathtub. Long dried up. They had to be at least nine days old as it had been nine days since the car crash. Except for the housemaid, no one had been inside the house during his stay in the hospital, and he hadn’t spilt anything dark red (blood, my dear friend, blood) here after his return home.
Could the housemaid have left those stains?
It’s possible, but let’s not drag the cleaning lady into this, okay? Not everything is the maid’s fault, partner.
