The Road to Round Mountain: The Betrayal by

by C. G. Roberts

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  6 weeks call me Nurse Mattie, then we’ll decide after that”. “I do have one question, though, you said earlier that you were starting to understand, my powers, or whatever you call this”. “Billy Speer, I have noticed a few consistencies with some of your outbursts let’s say, and the main constant, from what I can see is your anger. When you get angry things begin to fry, so we need to work on making sure to get ahold of that anger, and try not to let it pop up, you know what I mean”?

  “You mean, don’t let people piss me off, let it roll off like water off a ducks back”. Mattie seemed pleased that I understood, or was starting to understand, as shown by her smile. “Well that’s a strange way of putting it but yes, exactly that; would that be a local phrase”? “My Dad’s, he used to say it all the time”. I had a smile of my own.

  “Before I leave you, is there anything you need, besides more food”. It was like she could read my mind. “Well”, I pointed to the TV in hopes she would turn it on and trust me not to nuke this one. “Here’s where we start focusing on your abilities. You want the TV on, make it come on, but be careful, I can’t get another one in here”. Mattie had a sly smile on her face, and winked as she left the room to retrieve some more food.

  I do enjoy a good challenge, though this one carries a bit more effort on my part, then compared to my last challenge, you remember the graffiti at Dairy Queen, and my Mother sure did. After a few moments of trying to plan my strategy for getting the TV on, I realized I didn’t have one. Trying to recall how I did it in the other room, I failed to jog any memory of that moment.

  Let the showdown begin. Ok TV it’s just me and you.

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  Suddenly glad I wasn’t saying this out loud, for I didn’t re-ally need any body coming in my room toting a strait jacket. Bellevue party of one, ready for pick up. Looking around the room to make sure that I was indeed alone, I began my quest. Staring at the TV failed to accomplish anything. Staring at it harder achieved the same results. Remembering what Mattie had said about my anger, about using it to my advantage but not going overboard, I decided to try to reason with it. Ok TV I want you to come on. Nothing. All you have to do is turn on and we’re both happy. So much for reasoning with inanimate objects. Turn your ass on before I nuke you to kingdom come! The TV turned on quickly as if in fear, smart TV.

  Mission accomplished, I didn’t get too angry though I still don’t get it. How can you just will something to hap-pen? I had so many questions but doubted that anyone could answer me. I’m hoping Mattie in time, would be able tell me what’s going on with me. I was going to need plenty of help. My mind began to wander. First I wondered If I was being filmed, did anyone just see what I did with the TV. How about if they bugged the room, and could hear everything that Mattie and I were just talking about. I couldn’t help feel-ing paranoid, after what Mattie said.

  Relax, that’s what I needed to do, I was giving myself a headache. The TV was on, so I got as comfortable as I could, and began watching…..Oh crap, Bonanza! Wondering if I would be able to change the channel in the same manner as turning on the TV was intriguing to me. It also sounded ex-hausting, and I was very tired. That would have to be a battle for another day.

  Okay Hop Sing, what’s for dinner, I’m starved.

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  8

  I could smell the cheeseburger long before it arrived, although it had a different type of alluring quality. It was a little closer, ah, ha! I knew that smell so well- Dairy Queen, even though the hospital version was palatable, this one I will savor every delicious bite, Yum. Excitement grew as I heard the crinkle of the bag as it and its carrier came through the door.

  Danny Pinkins, my god, what a sight for sore eyes. His long blonde hair made him look more like an adolescent girl than a 17 year old teenager. The fact that he was maybe 5’5” tall and 110 pounds dripping wet also aided in the confusion. I could see his smile as he made his way through the door-way. Danny’s smile faded quick as he turned to face me. His mouth hung open, without any hope of being able to close it, or so it appeared. His blues eyes went almost trance like, and I was starting to question which one of us should actually be lying in bed.

  After what seemed to be an eternity of silence Danny finally muttered, “Dude, your hair man, what the hell, how did it, I mean”. I held up my hand, for we’ve been through this routine before. Danny, being my best friend and all, was without a doubt the king of sentence fragments. I don’t be-lieve a fully formed thought ever made it all the way out of his mouth. I was kind of like, his interpreter. “Danny its ok, the lightning did this to my hair. If you think that’s bad you

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  should see what’s left of my foot”, as I pointed to the puffy bulge at the end of the bed.

  “They told me what, you know, the room and where I could find you, and being okay that I was here and, (he held the dairy queen bag out) that you could munch on this, since you not dying or anything, you’re not are you”? Listening to him ramble on was just the medicine I needed, but one thing you don’t want to do is to try and listen to hard to figure out what he was saying, I’ve tried and it will give you a headache. ‘No I’m not dying, and that does smell good (as I pointed to the bag in his hands) so, you gonna make me suffer, while you slobber down those cheeseburgers”? “Oh no, no , oh man I’m sorry these are for you”. He placed the bag on the edge of the bed, seeming to be hesitant to get near me. “Don’t worry about it, I know the nurses, gave you a heads up before you came, did they give you any rubber gloves”?

  Danny reached down into his well-worn blue jean jacket, and pulled out a pair of gloves, held them up as if he was going to catch something from them. “I was gonna you know, put them on, but with you in here, I didn’t want to well”…. “Piss me off”, I interrupted. “Well yeah”. He hung his head for a moment. “Don’t worry about it, a lot has happened to me, and I’m still trying to figure out how to deal with it, so don’t sweat it, pull up a chair and watch some Bonanza”. That seemed to calm Danny down a bit as he pulled up a chair fairly close to my bed.

  Danny was watching TV but seemed more preoccupied with the bulge at the end of my bed. “Why is, you know, your foot all, well, all sort of like, bandaged”? “They said when the lightning hit me, it blew my shoe off, along with a couple off

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  toes. I’m supposed to get fit for some kind of walking boot, until my foot gets better”. “No shit, blew off some toes, let me see”. Danny started to reach down to uncover my foot from the covers (he always had a soft spot for the macabre). “No way dude, remember the rubber gloves, if you touch me without them, you could get quite a shock, literally”. Having a soft spot for the macabre myself, I pulled off the covers myself. “I haven’t even seen them yet, so let’s have a peek shall we”? Seeing something gross and disgusting would always put a smile on Danny’s face, and this was no exception, as his grin was already kicking in.

  I slowly peeled back the gauze they had wrapped around my left foot. When I came to the final layer, I slowed up and started feeling sick to my stomach. We took turns staring at my foot and then back at each other. My last two toes were indeed gone, and the remaining stubs were scorched black, with what appeared to be dead skin. My trophy foot seemed to please Danny, his only reply “Awesome”.

  After a few moments of toe gazing, I started wrapping the gauze back around my foot, I had seen enough, can’t say the same about Danny. He sat back in his chair upon completion of my toe wrap, and said “You know when I first heard, about the fire and all, I thought all of you, and you know were……dead”. He softly trailed off by the time he got the word dead. “Sorry about your folk’s man, it just isn’t right, you know. What happens now, I mean, you could stay with us, my parents think you’re pretty cool, maybe not so much with the new h
airdo”. He smiled as he pointed towards my newly acquired look.

  “Sounds cool, but I’m a walking electric chair, and

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  anyway someone from family services is coming to pick me up tomorrow sometime, I think to take me to the old Coast Guard station. That’s only 5 or 6 blocks from your house, so I’ll be close”. I handed him the bag of burgers “Think you could locate a microwave and nuke these a bit”? He smiled

  as he grabbed the bag the bag and headed for the door when he almost ran into Clatsop County’s Sheriff.

  Danny came close to running into the sheriff, but Sheriff Pasco held out one big paw of a hand, to cushion the blow just a bit. “Slow down a bit there Danny, I believe this Hospital might have a speed limit inside as well as outside”, He said with a sly grin. “Yes sir Sheriff, didn’t mean to, well you know, go so fast”, as he side stepped the sheriff out into the hallway in search of a microwave.

  Sheriff Pasco was intimidating not only by his badge, but more so by his size. He stood at least 6’6”, and thick, not fat, but fire hydrant thick, with hands the size of a catcher’s mitt. He made his way into the room, looked around the room a bit, ran his hand through his graying hair, and brought his attention to me, almost piercing me with his steely blue eyes.

  “Hello Billy”, I could tell he was sizing me up, more spe-cifically, my hair. “What’s with the hairdo, did you turn Goth or something, my son did, but he doesn’t have that white streak running down the middle”? Oh great, another Pepe le pew reference in the making. “No, the lightning did this”, and pointed to my foot, “and that”. The Sheriff just nodded, and added, “Quite a mess down the hall isn’t there”. I wasn’t comfortable to where this was going, considering what hap-pened earlier. “Anything you can tell me about what hap-pened in there”?

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  Remembering what Nurse Mattie had said, about keep-ing my anger in check, I took a couple of deep breaths before attempting to answer. “I’m not really sure Sheriff, Dr. Bangor came into the room angry with me about ruining a lot of equipment, threatening to sue me over some nurse, and got all pissed about the TV being on. I got angry and pointed to the TV and electricity shot out of my fingers and nuked the TV, that’s when he started shaking and shaking, then took a dive out the window”, throwing my arms up in hopes he would buy this.

  “I have heard of your fully charged condition, and what happened with the local authorities earlier, and I will apol-ogize for their action”. I was shocked, he was apologizing to me for Police that don’t even work for him…amazing. “I seriously doubt if Astoria Police will attempt to make amends for the manner in which you were treated, especial-ly Detective Hargrove. But knowing him, I would imagine you could expect to receive a cleaning bill for making him crap himself. The Sheriff couldn’t help but smile over that one, as did I. “So I guess you heard that you are a You Tube sensation”? “What are you talking about, I never put any-thing on You Tube, I don’t even own a cell phone”. I sup-pose that he was confused more by the fact that I don’t own a phone, as to not knowing about the video.

  “Seems that when you were brought into the ER, and started frying their equipment, someone decided to video your electro-activity, or whatever you want to call it. Anyway, my son found it online and called me in to watch, I must say, whatever went into you seems to be coming out with an extra kick to it”. The Sheriff glanced at Danny as he came

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  shuffling into the room, with that wonderful smell of Dairy Queen Cheeseburgers. “I’ll let you two eat in peace, and I will recommend that the police, leave the questions to us, which I don’t think that they will object to, so that’s it for now Billy, I’ll be in touch if we need anything else”. A huge weight was just taken off my shoulders, the Sheriff will be my buffer for the Police Dept., and we did have a history of sorts. Sheriff Pasco was the one who came in to smooth over

  my little graffiti with Dairy Queens manager, and he would drop the charges in exchange for me staying the hell out of his store. A small price to pay, and if I get an urge for Dairy Queen, I send in one of my mules to score cheeseburgers for me, for I am running the biggest cheeseburger cartel in Astoria, I wish.

  Sitting in silence, we were almost done chowing down on Dairy Queens finest, as Nurse Mattie poked her head in the room. “You boy’s doing all right”, she looked around to see that it was just us two in here. “I guess the Sheriff finished up with his business”? “Yeah, he said if he had any other questions, that would be in touch and he said the Police probably wouldn’t be up to see me anymore, Just him”. “Probably for the best I would imagine”. She gave a quick glance to me and then to Danny. “I have a quick errand to run, but when I get back, it would be a good idea if your friend could leave in a few minutes, I do have to change the dressing on that foot and check on medications and instructions for tomorrow, when you leave, a big day ahead for you Billy Speer”.

  Danny finished his cheeseburger, wadded up the wrapper and tossed it back in the bag. He didn’t say anything but I could tell he was not ready to leave and I wasn’t ready for him

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  to either. “Thanks for the grub, bub, and hey after tomorrow, you’ll know where I’ll be, so come on down anytime”. He scuffled his feet back and forth on the floor and replied, “You sure it’s okay if I come by, I mean, I don’t want to get you into, you know, trouble or something”. “Don’t sweat it, I’ll tell whoever picks me up to make sure you’re on the visitors list”. I looked over at the door, but no Nurse Mattie yet. “Hey thanks again, and if you’re not busy tomorrow, come on by”. “Cool, thanks, I will”. Danny got up from the chair, gave me the patented Danny parade wave, and left.

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  9

  nurse mAttIe ApproAched the van towards the

  back of the parking lot. As if on command both of the van windows came down at the same time. Frank didn’t even

  bother to look in her direction, “I take it you placed the wireless mike’s throughout the room”? Returning the favor by not looking at Frank she replied, “Got three of them, but don’t be surprised if they crap out before the nights over, the kid’s got a lot of..”, Quickly interrupting her, Frank snapped back, “I’m well aware of what he’s got, we do have video of The Doctor doing a swan dive out the window, remember”.

  Nurse Mattie, A.K.A. Agent Wendy Boling, turned to get a good look at Agent Landers. “Frank, after I retire in six weeks, you know what I’m going to miss the most”? “What might that be Wendy, not that I give a shit”? Wendy just smiled and said,” Telling you to fuck off, but I suppose if I get bored I can always leave that message for you on voice mail”. Looking past Frank she directed the conversation to Don Marrick. “You got more video on the way Don”? “Yeah Evans is supposed to be here at sunset, He’ll use the lift from his truck to change the light on the light pole closest to his room, and hook up a new camera, then I will link up and we’ll be back in business”. “I can tell you this Don, you…. I will miss”. She smiled at Don as she gave him a wink.

  “Enough of this mushy crap”, Frank barked, “When are you going to work with him”? “Don, how do put up with his

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  shit”? Don shrugged his shoulders, as if to signify, what can I do about it? “Since you asked so politely Frank, how about I wait until you have video again, after Evans gets through, and then have Don text me that you’re ready”. Frank nodded, making sure not to look at Wendy. “Don always a pleasure”, and the moment she turned to head back to the Hospital, both windows of the van went back up. Wendy ignored Franks rude behavior and kept her focus on the work at hand, how to work with Billy, and help him control his power without blowing up the Hospital.

  I never wondered too much about You Tube, but I was intrigued to see the video if at all possible. Maybe Nurse Mattie would help with that request. The clock read 4:00pm, but it seems like this day has lasted for at least a week. I could hear the forensics techs outside my door, I guess they were finished in my othe
r room. I couldn’t make out what they were saying, but there were a lot of four and five syllable words being tossed about, none of which I understood.

  The fullness of the delectable cheeseburgers, made my stomach feel better, but my head was another story. I knew that I had made Dr. Bangor run through the window and kill himself, but how did my anger make him do it?

  I got the TV to come on, not a big accomplishment, but I’ll take it. I was giving myself a headache trying to figure out how this stuff I have works. The simpler the process, the simpler the solution would be, sounded good anyway, so I decided to focus my attention on the TV. I stared at the TV for a moment, but all I could see was the vision of Dr. Bangor flying through the window. I could sense that my focus was going to become an issue. Every counselor in school

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  had already confirmed that to my parents.

  My parents, just the thought that I would never see them again, or hear them arguing over what to watch on TV, made my eyes misty. My Mother, in an effort to make sure I was raised properly and ready for society, would insist that I read more, and nothing that started with the word Marvel on it. In my defense, I thought that grand theft auto was getting me ready for society. For my Dad, his reply to most anything that I would mess up was, Ah yes to be young and stupid. My Dad was quite the diplomat, his true calling.

  I had to find out where my parents are, and what’s going to happen with them. I didn’t have a clue as to what I was supposed to do, Ah, yes to be young and stupid. Well when you’re right, you’re right. Maybe Nurse Mattie can find out about my parents, as well as the You Tube Video. I’m not sure I really want to see it, but I probably should.

  I needed to get my thoughts away from my parents, all it was doing was making me sad. It was a little after 4: 00 pm and Bonanza was over, and I definitely was not in the mood for Gunsmoke. There was no remote to be found, as I gazed around the room, probably for the protection of the remote, so it could live to click another day without me making it blow up.