The Watchers

by Mark Andrew Olsen

  The prayer over, they hugged the wall over to a low hedge, which they then followed, hunched forward. They reached the outer door with its simple numeric keypad, and Dylan almost laughed, remembering how easy it had been to glance at the director’s proud punching in of numbers during their comprehensive tour.

  The service entrance, he noted, was the only one without an attendant video camera, so Dylan merely pushed 4–3–2–1—the default factory setting, he was certain—and they were in.

  Their earlier grilling of the director on security measures had, not accidentally, extended to the subject of nighttime staffing. Proudly extolling his facility’s nocturnal vigilance, the man had told them exactly where the night-shift nurse sat for each of the home’s major sections. The only one that did not rate a full-time desk inside was the high-security area, which, because of its narrow halls and highly medicated patients, could manage by sharing a nurse with the youth ward.

  They wove silently through the hallways, easily evading the night desks by ducking into side halls and flowing along the length of the complex toward the high-security wing. But the ease of their access was not matched by ease of movement on the part of Abby. In fact, the farther she progressed into the building proper, the more her halting and jerky motions made her resemble one of the patients rather than a skilled intruder.

  “Why now?” Dylan whispered to her during a break in one of the safer hallways. “Of all the places we’ve been, what’s so bad about this place?”

  “It’s the patients. Think about it, Dylan. Most of the people in places like this are good, ordinary folks just having some problems. But if we know that demon possession makes people lose their minds, then how many of those folks also make their way to mental institutions? These hallways are full of . . . oh, there’s, I can’t even tell you . . .”

  HIGH-SECURITY WING —THAT MOMENT

  Unfold top half, open sideways.

  Loving gaze. Pray.

  Fold back. Trace the crease.

  Unfold top half, open sideways.

  Loving gaze. Pray.

  Fold back . . .

  That very day, Patient 64 had finally lost count of how many times she had performed the motion. It had taken years for the number to climb so high. Of the years—she had lost count of those as well. Decades’ worth, to be sure.

  She had kept a careful count for all those minutes, all those days, all those years. Somewhere in the thirty-five-thousand range. That was all she could remember now.

  Today, something was different. A different-ness that had creeped all the way into her little world and chased the number from her mind. She would have collapsed entirely at the loss of it had the different-ness not felt so promising, so hopeful somehow.

  She could feel her breathing slow and fall into rhythm. Her spine straighten. Her tear-caked eyes, her brittle mouth start to soften into those of a human being again. Her mind clear itself at last.

  She felt her will return to itself and give her back her control.

  Had someone forgotten to give her the medicine? Had one of the nameless authorities that ruled her life failed in its mission of keeping her perpetually fuzzy and confused? Or had something truly changed? Would she tomorrow find herself clearheaded enough to leave the ward and step outside for the first time in years? And once there, would she be able to walk like one of the higher-functioning ones, without screaming and running away at the sight of a monster?

  Or was this something else entirely?

  She held the paper again, her cherished treasure.

  One more time?

  She would unfold the top half and open it sideways. Then gaze at the photograph one more time. She caressed it gently.

  She smiled at the little girl pictured there. A long-limbed, blond-haired girl on a beach, beaming the grin of a child who has nothing whatsoever to worry about. Whose world is intact. Whose family stands together on either side and above her. Who love each other. Who will not implode in three weeks’ time.

  She prayed, asked God to protect that girl, wherever she was. That He would make himself real to her. Teach her His ways. Lead her to the narrow path.

  That He would bring her women to replace what had been taken from her.

  She kissed the picture, although she knew the one in that image was not a little girl anymore.

  And then she heard something, and her blood froze within her.

  It was late. Very late. There weren’t supposed to be sounds.

  Yet she heard the familiar four tones of the code being entered on the outer keypad. The drone of the lock releasing, then its click as it drew back, open.

  She turned, expecting anything. A demon. An attendant. Her guardian angel. Her executioner.

  The door opened farther and she looked, unblinking.

  She breathed in and out, in and out.

  Stared.

  She raised her hand and looked again at the picture in her fingers. Then back up at the young woman who stood in the doorway with tears streaming down her beautiful face.

  The young woman took three long steps forward, into the cell.

  Her voice was high, breathy and plaintive.

  “Susanne?”

  The pause continued, unbroken.

  “Mommy?”

  CHAPTER

  _ 68

  The word seemed to echo and quaver between them, for a long time.

  The woman could not move. That was all right, though, because the younger woman could move just fine, and did so. Her long, lean arm left her side and reached up into the air. Abby’s fingers extended and grazed the other’s cheek. Traced the outline of her face with a fingernail. Descended the length of her nose. Caressed her hair.

  “Mom. . . ?”

  Only a sob came in response. The woman cocked her head sideways and moaned audibly. At last one of her hands trembled forward, inviting a touch.

  “Mommy, I didn’t know you were here,” Abby said in the voice of a little girl. “Or I would have come. I would have been here, Mommy. You know that. Do you know that?”

  Her mother did not answer, but a single tear had fallen from her eye.

  “Please don’t torment me,” she finally said.

  “What?”

  “This is . . . a dream, right? Only are you a good dream, or a nightmare? Please, just don’t hurt me. Don’t torture me like this.”

  “Mom!” she said in a fierce whisper. “It’s me! I’m really here!”

  The woman’s face recoiled at that, as though the words confirmed that indeed this would be a painful dream.

  Abby gently picked up her mother’s hand and brought it now to her face, released it. The hand almost fell back again, but then stopped its fall and returned to Abby’s cheek. The hand began to trace, just as Abby’s had traced her mother’s features. As it did, her mother’s eyes began to focus, to widen in gradually rising amazement.

  “Thirty-six thousand, four hundred and thirty-eight!” She said the number proudly, like a youngster who has just labored through some thorny arithmetic. “I had forgotten last night, after keeping count faithfully, every single day I’ve been in here.”

  “What were you counting, Mommy?”

  She held up the photo, its folds almost frayed into nothing. “The number of times I did this.” She began to unfold it. Her fingers moved surely, smoothly, in discrete motions too well rehearsed for thought.

  First, the lifting of the top flap. Then of the horizontal fold, opened sideways.

  Now Susanne was holding the photo up for her to see. Abby stared, then turned back to her.

  “Mom, I can’t see what’s on the picture. It’s blank—too worn for me to see what’s there.”

  Her mother looked at it again as though there was no issue, then faced her. “It shows my Abby when she was three years old. And her mother. Me. On the beach.”

  Abby leaned forward to gather her mother in her arms.

  Her mother pulled away.

  “But I’m not finished. It’s not put awa
y.”

  She turned the photo in her direction and gently kissed the figure of the little girl. Then she shut her eyes. “God, please protect my Abigail, wherever she is. Watch over her. Teach her your ways. Love her for me, in the ways I can’t. Most of all, let her know you. Please?”

  Then she folded it back up, just as efficiently and carefully.

  She now faced Abby with a childlike look of anticipation.

  “I’d like to hold you now.”

  There was no lag of anticipation. Immediately the woman was in Abby’s arms.

  Even though she had already examined Abby’s face, it was the embrace that finally caused the truth to sink in. Holding her daughter’s heaving torso and squeezing tightly into her shoulders, she finally gave herself over to an expression of wonder and utter shock.

  “It’s you, Abby. It’s really you. God answered all thirty-six thousand, four hundred and thirty-eight!”

  “He did, Mom. He really did. I can’t wait to tell you how well He answered your prayers.”

  “I promised Him I wouldn’t be angry, you know.”

  “Angry about what? About being in here?”

  “No. About your never coming to see me.”

  “But please understand—I never knew. Dad always told me you had abandoned us. You had gotten tired of being a mother and just left.”

  Her mother now appeared crushed and deflated. “No, no . . . that’s not true,” she said. “He’s the one who put me here. He’s the one who kept me here, all these years.”

  Abby looked down and fought to absorb what she had long suspected about her father.

  “Of course, it’s what I needed,” she added.

  “What? No, you didn’t. You didn’t need this.”

  “Honey, I need to be protected.”

  “Protected from who, or from what, Mom?”

  “From all the things I see that aren’t really there. All the horrible creatures I see fighting and eating people right outside that door. I don’t want to say too much. Tell too much about what I see. Gets me in trouble. But they do frighten me, sweetheart, in ways you couldn’t imagine. Even though the doctors tell me it’s just a hallu . . . hallucin—”

  “Hallucination.”

  “And that’s why I’m too sick to leave. Until they go away . . .”

  “Mom, they’re not hallucinations. Which is why they haven’t gone away, despite all the medicine and everything they’ve tried.”

  “They’re . . . they’re real? No. They’re too terrifying to be real.”

  “Yeah, but what about him?”

  Abby motioned to the corner by the room’s door. There, in a flood of light, stood her guardian angel, broad and quivering with power.

  “You see it too?”

  “Yes, I do, and it’s not a sickness. It’s a gift of spiritual sight.”

  Her mother shook her head. “No, it’s no gift, that’s for sure. If it’s true, it’s a curse.”

  “Not if you look at him. Not if you know the whole story.”

  “I do look at him. He’s the reason I can even stay in here.”

  “That’s great. But he’s also the reason you can walk out of here.”

  “You mean, he will come with me?”

  Abby sighed at the simplicity of the answer. “Yes, Mommy. He will. And so will I, and Dylan. And we’ll hold you. And pray with you. Every inch of the way.”

  Dylan now stepped forward, a look of caution on his face. “I’m Abby’s friend, Dylan. I think you two need to do a lot of talking and catching up. But unfortunately, this is not a good place to do it. We need to leave here right away, because it’s going to start getting light soon, and when the morning shift nurses arrive, we’ll be discovered for sure. So, Mrs. Sherman, we’ve come to take you out of here. For good.”

  She shook her head. “I don’t think I can do it. I’m not strong enough.”

  Dylan turned to her. “You’re right, Mrs. Sherman. You’re not strong enough. I’ve just learned the limits of my strength lately too. But you don’t have to be strong enough. God gave you this gift, and it is a gift, and He is more than strong enough.”

  “Well, He’s going to have to come here and tell me himself. Because I’m scared.”

  “Ma’am, instead of coming in the flesh, He sent us here to help you. He uses His people like that sometimes.”

  “Mom, you remember the verse you once taught me, when I was too scared to jump off the diving board at the YMCA? ‘I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.’ I remembered that verse, and I believed you when you told me. So all these years, when lots of things have scared me, I asked Him for the strength, and He always gave it to me. Always. Never failed.”

  Her mother nodded and shut her eyes. Her lips moved quietly. And moved some more. Then, it was over. She opened them and smiled.

  It was the smile of a rational, if incredibly frightened, human being.

  “Let’s go.”

  It was perhaps the oddest-looking patient discharge in the history of St. Stephen’s Home. And not because of its covert and furtive nature either. The three people who hobbled through the hallways as a single clumped unit looked more like unshielded simpletons moving through a nuclear blast. Eyes half closed, their lips moving constantly, they each held up a hand against the darkness all around them.

  This darkness had nothing to do with the lack of lighting in the hallways. This ethereal darkness, thankfully, had one redeeming feature. It fled swiftly before the onslaught of another outstretched hand accompanying them: that of the guardian angel, who indeed proved to be far from stationary.

  It would be fair to say that Abby’s mother prayed her way off the campus, each medicated shuffle step seemingly powered by at least three prayers each. It was wrenchingly slow, causing Dylan great uneasiness at the increased risk due to their snail’s pace.

  But even Dylan had to admit that God was working for them. This was November, and the same winter that had brought the rainy season to Nigeria brought a cold fog to the grounds of St. Stephen’s. Even though cars were entering the distant driveway on the other side of the campus, the strange-looking trio slipped out the opposite side completely unseen.

  Abby’s mother was weak, and it took a great deal of awkward pushing and hoisting to get her over the wall. But once she fell into Dylan’s grasp on the other side, and her slippered feet met concrete sidewalk, a sigh of relief tore through her body.

  “I’m out, aren’t I? I’m really free. . . .”

  Abby wiped her eyes. “You really are, Mom. Now let’s hop into the van and really get out of here. Because we have far more than just the home’s staff after us.”

  CHAPTER

  _ 69

  Ten minutes later, three minutes before the disappearance of Susanne Sherman was even discovered, a plain blue minivan pulled onto Interstate 70 and into the lifeblood of rush-hour St. Louis.

  It was the second vehicle used in the getaway. The first had been an old conversion van Dylan had parked under a highway overpass just down the road from the home. They had driven it four miles to an enclosed parking garage, then exchanged it for the newer, more dependable minivan.

  One of their first tasks was to have Susanne Sherman change from the tattered old robe and shift she’d been wearing to the new silk tracksuit they had brought with them. The minivan’s windows were not tinted, so Abby moved with extreme delicacy to help her mother change in the backseat without attracting the attention of other motorists.

  “Oh, this feels marvelous!” her mother exulted in a voice that sounded decades older than it should have. “I wore the same thing for so very long.”

  Twelve miles later, the minivan exited and swerved rather abruptly into the drive-thru lane of a nearby McDonald’s restaurant. Susanne, who could hardly remember the name McDonald’s, let alone the last time she’d sampled their breakfast fare, gleefully ordered herself a sausage biscuit with egg, along with two orders of hash browns and an extra-large Dr. Pepper.

 
She reached down into the bag and withdrew the sandwich in a grip that shook so violently Abby had felt compelled to lend her mother a hand. Susanne’s face slackened bitterly at the clear display of her deterioration. She bit down into the sandwich, chewed three times, and allowed the tears to run from her eyes once more.

  Once her ravenous hunger had been satisfied, she glanced outside the van.

  “Is it almost dawn?”

  Dylan peered out the window. “Looks like it.”

  “I would like to see the dawn; I haven’t seen the sun come up in all these years.”

  Then Abby remembered from her childhood the early morning walks on the beach she’d once enjoyed with her mother. She fought back tears at the thought.

  “You’re in luck,” Dylan said. “We’re less than two miles from the Arch, a perfect spot to catch the sunrise.”

  Soon they pulled off the Interstate on their way toward the Arch. Dylan parked facing the Mississippi, then he and Abby helped Susanne from the van just as the tip of the sun’s orb crested the skyline of East St. Louis, across the waters of the mighty river.

  Susanne said nothing as waves of golden light seemed to pour into the air around them, glinting fiercely off the sharp edge of the Gateway Arch. She continued to gaze at the sunrise in silence for a long while until finally she turned to Abby and said, “God really does answer prayer, doesn’t He?”

  Abby nodded.

  Susanne Sherman’s disappearance had just surfaced along the electronic fringes of the vast surveillance web stretched over the world, all for the purpose of locating and apprehending Abigail and her elusive companion.

  Early morning fog might have concealed their escape, and Dylan’s cunning had erased almost all odds of their being caught, but it did not prevent a tiny, invisible dot inside the lamination of Susanne’s faded photograph from sending out a signal so weak yet so persistent that it could be traced in real time by highly trained operatives of the United States government.

  Or, as in this case, the battered yet surviving organization with whom the operatives supplemented their appalling government salaries.