by China, Max
"Now I understand he was messing about when that happened, he stopped dead on top of an old shoe that caused him to lose his balance and fall."
"I don't remember telling you that, but yes - it's true." There was a note of concern in his voice. The psychiatrist continued, ignoring his comment. "Then one by one, the others launched themselves to the rescue, and they all perished . . ." He allowed his words to trail.
He nodded without speaking, he appeared to be deep in contemplation, staring at the light and shadows the blinds made on the wall.
"You were a non- swimmer, you made no attempt to join them in the water . . ."
The whiff of sulphur, released in his memory, smelled real enough to make him shudder. He was unable to go back beyond that point. He simply had no conscious recollection of it.
Ryan pressed on to where the obstacle of guilt needed removing, or climbing over. "The difference between you and them, the reason you are alive, and they are not, is not one of cowardice. Neither is it because you failed to prevent the accident occurring. The explanation is simple; on the day that events conspired to claim your friends, you were lucky."
He studied the carpet, losing himself in its swirling patterns. Ryan coughed once to clear his throat. "Bruce, look at me. You are not to blame."
He glanced at Ryan. "I let them down, there's no getting away from that. I had the ability to prevent what happened, and I did nothing about it. Instead of reaching in with a long branch, what did I do? I threw a fuckin' seashell to Brooks, because I thought it had magic powers," he said bitterly, staring at the carpet again. "Yeah, I know it wasn't my fault, but that doesn't make me feel better; I know I was lucky, and you know something? That just makes me feel worse . . . and I still can't sleep with the shadows that bother me . . ."
"What shadows?"
"I can't tell you, you'd think I was crazy."
"Bruce, if you don't help me, I won't be able to help you." He could tell he wouldn't give it up easily. The boy had slipped into the same defiant mood he was in the week before. Putting a new lead into the pencil, he clicked it out, and then pushed it back in flush. Not satisfied, he clicked it twice more, until he'd got it just right. Then he turned it, and a slanted beam of light appeared on his forehead; it caught Bruce's eye.
"Help me to help you . . . Tell me about these shadows that disturb you at night."
Later that night, he dreamed he saw his grandfather again, his mind tricked him into believing he was still alive, and he was trying to tell him something, but he couldn't hold on to what he was saying, only the words: Remember Bruce . . . before he was snatched off somewhere else without the chance to say goodbye, and this disturbed him, and then he was with the boys again reliving the moments before the accident, watching it unwind, seeing it from another point of view. For a second, he had the notion he might have been the buzzard looking down, and then dismissed the thought. Buzzards don't think do they? Taken through time, he saw the killer's face again, for by now he knows he was a killer, and the girl . . . It was the same girl, the one in the purple dress.
Frightened, he blanked them all from his mind, but she still whispers in the quiet moments and follows him, staying in the shadows.
He reviewed his notes on young Milowski. Making progress . . . but painfully slow.
Despite successfully regressing him to the incredibly early age of ten months, a fact he'd had to verify with Bruce's mother, there were still several black holes he couldn't penetrate, areas which he could not get the boy back to. He decided to take him to see Vera Flynn; she would help Ryan understand the inner workings of his mind. All he needed to do at the next session was to get Mrs Milowski's agreement. Then he would take him on a therapeutic day trip to the seaside. Vera wouldn't object; she loved helping people.
Reception buzzed him. "There's something wrong with a lady in the waiting room; I don't know what to do?"
"What's up with her?"
"She's talking gibberish, and she doesn't look at all well."
"I'll be with you in a moment."
While he was gone, Penny entered his office, carrying his mid morning cup of tea. He'd carelessly left his private drawer open, and Milowski's file was out on the desk.
If it wasn't for that boy! She put the tea down, and read the first page, turning it onto the next, keeping one hand close to the saucer. If he came back suddenly she would say, "I just put your tea down for you." Blood pressure pulsed at her temples, each stolen moment increasing her chances of getting caught. What she read was enough to start her scheming; she glanced over at the open drawer. She'd never seen it left open before! The temptation was almost too much. If she was caught going through it, she would have no excuse. She'd find a way another time.
Later that afternoon, when the doctor was with one of his patients, she made a telephone call.
"Mrs Milowski?"
"Speaking."
"It's Penny, Dr Ryan's secretary."
"Oh, is everything all right? We are still seeing the doctor tomorrow, aren't we?"
"Well, actually I was just ringing to make sure you're still coming; only I noticed you hadn't signed the consent form for the new stage of treatment the doctor is proposing . . ."
"I'm sorry, you've lost me there . . ."
"Well, Mrs Milowski, it appears that the hypnotherapy isn't working as well as he'd hoped; he wants to try a new treatment."
She'd tolerated the hypnotherapy, only because it appeared to be getting results.
"What new treatment?"
"I'm not sure it's my place to say . . ."
"What new treatment?" she repeated.
"He is to take him to see a clairvoyant."
"Oh, is he now? Well see about that."
Bruce never returned to Dr Ryan's practice. Penny congratulated herself on the way she'd removed her rival for his affections. One day he'll realise he's in love with me.
Next, she would deal with the medium.
The following afternoon, Ryan, quizzed her about the cancellation; she told him that Mrs Milowski had cancelled citing personal reasons. "She was adamant - saying she knew what you were planning to do, and if she heard anything further - she would go to the press with the story."
"Really?" He viewed her suspiciously. "It all seems a bit melodramatic to me, and I have to say confusing . . ."
"Would you like me to get her on the phone for you?" she said sweetly.
"No, what would be the point?"
She found it hard to suppress her happiness at that moment, and turned away. When she looked back at Ryan, he had her fixed in the sights of his narrowed eye.
"I have a job for you. I want you to prepare all the old files for archiving."
She couldn't conceal her indignation. "I'm on the verge of retirement, and you are asking me to do a junior's job?"
"That's right, Penny."
"After all I've done for you . . ." she fumed. "Okay, I'll start with that one!" she snatched at Milowski's file.
The doctor closed his hand firmly over the edge of the binder and moved it out of reach. "Actually, you won't. I am keeping this file."
She seethed with barely restrained anger.
Hell- bent on causing trouble, she dosed his tea with laxative, hoping that when the urge to go came over him, he wouldn't have time to lock his cabinet. He only ever left the cabinet unlocked when he was in his office, and he never left the key lying around. It was obvious that whatever the cabinet contained, it was important and highly confidential. A few minutes later, Ryan dashed by, heading for the toilet.
She rose quickly from her desk and let herself into his office. The keys were in the cabinet; she couldn't believe her luck. With a window of opportunity at the most a few minutes, she opened the drawer. It had names in it that she'd never heard before. Milowski was there, as was Solomons, but the others . . . All the folders were ribbon -tied and housed within individual sleeves. She lifted Milowski's file out, and tugging at the knot that secured the ribbon, dropped the entire folde
r on the floor. Shit! Gathering everything up, she hurriedly assembled and re-tied it. Now she would be lucky to look at just one before he came back. Her nerves on edge, she found what she was looking for right at the back. How long had he been gone?
With her heart pounding in her ears, she withdrew the file and untied it. Starting at the end, and working backwards, she found his inconclusive notes, which she read with great speed until her nerve broke. Rapidly retying the ribbon, she placed everything back as it was, returning to her desk. Ryan didn't emerge for a further five minutes, and when he did, he was wearing a troubled look.
Penny took her diary, and made an entry of all the points she could remember. The last was a reference to an unearthly black stone. She keeps the stone about her wherever she goes. It seems to invigorate her. I suspect it is the source of her power.
Penny smiled inwardly. Although she didn't believe such things were true, she knew enough to know that if she were able to get that stone away from Vera, she would likely implode. After all, she must be fragile to be in the care of a psychiatrist.
Chapter 21
The funeral was the worst day of his life. A young girl in bright summer clothes approached him. A black hat and veil her only concession to the sobriety of the event.
Milowski couldn't make out her face clearly, but he knew whom it was. His stomach knotted. Exerting every inch of self-control, he tried not to fall apart in front of her. The control didn't extend to his voice. It clunked in his throat like a glottal stop. Instead of trying to talk further, he nodded at her.
"Why didn't you save him?" Brookes' little sister asked him tearfully.
He couldn't even say that he'd tried.
"He was your best friend Bruce … what did you do to try to save him?"
I threw him a seashell. The answer seemed so ridiculous now, but at the time, the sheer belief in its power to effect some miraculous turn-around in events had never been stronger. He saw the look on Brookes' face when he caught it. He almost believed in it, too. If only . . .
He cleared his throat, and it hurt, the lump growing more painful as the tears started in his eyes. He looked at her sincerely. "I couldn't swim, Leanne. I never could. I'm sorry."
She looked at him contemptuously. "You didn't even try - I hate you!" she said.
Not as much as I hate myself, Leanne.
She turned sharply on her heel and walked away.
Whether it was by design or accident, he never knew for sure, but when the summer holidays were over, and he returned to school, Kirk was his new form master. He renamed him Miller because he either would not, or could not pronounce his surname, and in doing so, he threw a lifeline to a struggling boy, who would use the nickname as a rope to clamber out of his despair. A few of the other boys told him he shouldn't put up with it, and each gave a reason why. The most bizarre and likeliest - given the teacher's background - was that he was anti-communist. Milowski defended himself against the implied suggestion. "Well I'm no communist, and neither is anyone in my family." If he'd told his father … there would have been hell to pay.
When the first day was over, Kirk asked him to stay behind after school.
"You know something, boy, when I wasn't so much older than you; I joined the army. I won't bore you with all the details. I'd always wanted to serve my country, so I signed up with the Gloucestershire Regiment. A few months later, the Korean War started.
In late April 1951, for three days from 22nd through to the 25th, a battalion of us managed to hold off not just dozens of Chinese soldiers, but thousands of them." He fiddled with a piece of chalk he was holding, looking at it intently as he continued to speak. "During that time, I never once doubted I'd come through. You know why?"
He shook his head.
"I had God on my side, and you know what? I did come through." Scratching the back of his neck, he weighed how much to tell the boy. "I escaped . . . not many did . . . but I did and I met up with friendly forces a few days later."
Miller listened with an expression that bordered on interest.
"It was hell. It changed me. It changed all of us . . . I was no longer the person I once was, but that was all right, because he was still somewhere inside me. Still there, but shell-shocked and a little bit left behind." His voice softened, "You know . . . I felt guilty," he snapped the chalk in his hands. "That I pulled through unscathed, when so many were captured or killed. I felt guilty . . ." he said, as he searched Milowski's face. "There was a reason for it. I was lucky, chosen, or whatever it was, I'm still waiting to find out. I might never know, but I'm not going to drive myself crazy dwelling on it."
Miller contemplated the two pieces of chalk that Kirk had laid back on the desk, arranged in the groove. He pushed them back together next to a pencil. Only the faintest crack was visible where they joined.
"Look at me, boy. In a way, what happened to you is the same. You just have to put yourself back together the best you can." He studied him. "Do you understand me?"
"I think so, sir."
"Good - before you go, let me show you this poem by Robert Frost, an American. It helped me through some tough times, when I wasn't able to make sense of it all."
He handed him the book, open on the page. "Read it aloud for me."
The words seemed to come naturally to Miller as he read them.
"Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveller, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth . . ."
He'd almost read the whole thing, when just at the last line, Kirk joined in, saying, "I then took the other one . . ."
Miller frowned. The line didn't match that in the book.
"My road, Miller, the line I chose . . . my life." There was a distant look in his eyes. He settled them on the boy in front of him. "When I joined the army, I made my choice. I chose my road, but you, you had no choice. You're stuck on the road you're travelling now. Follow it - make the best of it. You have your cards; play them as well as you can. Not one of us can undo time. There's no going back - is that clear to you?"
The tightness in his throat strangled his voice so he couldn't speak, he just nodded.
"Once the inquest is over, you are to put it all behind you. You can do that, can't you?" He crossed the classroom to the door and held it open.
Miller stepped past him, and once outside, turned back and said, "I'll try, sir."
Watching him go, Kirk whispered under his breath. "That's the spirit, boy."
Chapter 22
North Korea – 27th April 1951
Kirk opened his eyes. Out from the darkness of a sleep devoid of dreams, he looked up into a dense canopy of green. Dawn. The dew from the covering mist collected on the broad leaves, accumulating until it bent them, running off the edges as they tipped under its weight, peppering the ground around him. For a moment, he wasn't sure where he was. A large splat dropped down on him, wetting his face, waking him into reality. His bones ached from the damp and cold.
He struggled to recall. How long is it since I lost the others - one night, or two? Exhaustion loosened his grip on the passage of time.
Once he made it to safety, he promised himself he'd sleep for a week, but in the meantime, he must go on. He raised himself to his feet through sheer force of will. The sound of sporadic gunfire cut through the air, along with enemy shouts, and voices he couldn't understand. Maybe they were talking about him… Do they even know about me? Maybe they were looking for other escapees.
Out of the babble of voices - quite clearly and unexpectedly - a Chinese rendition of a cut glass English accent said, "We are going to find you, English." A bullet smashed through the foliage next to him as if punctuating the statement, followed by the unmistakable single crack of a sniper rifle, and raucous laughter. The vapourised sap from the shredded leaves reminded him oddly of freshly mown grass and Sunday mornings. He shivered and then takin
g his pistol out; he checked it - four rounds left.
Folding a leaf into a chute, careful to leave it on the stem, he directed a few drops of dewy water into his mouth, before moving slowly through the undergrowth.
In those two nights and three days, he lived his whole life with a burning intensity and brightness of being he would never again experience. Apart from his pistol, he possessed only a machete, a length of piano wire and the clothes on his back. Unsure which way to go, and guided by little more than intuition and the growth of moss on tree trunks, he took the road less travelled by . . .
He went south away from the river, his heavy heart told him if he kept trying; he would eventually get away.
Kirk opened his eyes drenched in sweat, and in his own bed.
By day, he was a teacher. At night, sometimes, he was a lost soldier again. Over the years, the frequency of his wandering nightmares had diminished, but he avoided talking about his experiences. He knew if he did, it would trigger a series of unpleasant dreams that could go on for days. In Miller's case, he rationalised it was worth it.
A murder of crows entertained him from the trees. Cawing and calling, squabbling and scrapping, reluctantly roused from their roosting places, circling out and away finally, on black wings opened against the brightening grey light of dawn.
Kirk watched the birds in the morning, and he watched them at dusk, when they arrived back at the tree; carrying out the procedures of dawn in reverse, governed by instinct, trapped in the loop of the cycle of life.
Gritting his chipped teeth, he wondered where in the nightmares tonight his dreams would dump him. He thought about Japan.
You just can't get away from some things.
