Chapter 36

***

CHAPTER 36

Seeing as how all of us were now wide awake, what with Gator interrupting the dream attack I had been undergoing from Papa Kalfu in such a way as to rouse Mattie from his slumber, I decided that we may as well get to work on coming up with my departure plan.

At that moment, I made a commitment to myself that -- for sure, by sundown-- I was going to be officially and completely out of Dodge.

And by "Dodge", I meant "southern Florida" -- all of it.

The hotel room I was in now. The bar I was locked in before. The other bar where all the unfortunate things had happened.

Definitely joining me in my haste to depart Dodge would be my puppy dog.

Although we had previously established that Mattie would be be a part of our travels, that particular point was now under review.

Definitely being packed in the car would be the cash that Mario and Mria had left for me in the envelope before the fire.

Up for re-consideration, though, would be the final destination.

Before I fell asleep, it was to have been New Orleans.

Now that Papa Kalfu had apparently pried that out of my brain, I was going to have to consider the ramifications of that knowledge being shared with my enemy.

The resort check-out time was just a few hours away.

There were things to do. Plans to set. Decisions to make.

It was the time for action.

***

"Do you have to go potty?"

I was asking Gator, but Mattie actually was the first to answer.

"Nah ... I'm good. You can use it first."

He looked at me sheepishly.

"Oh wait. You were talking to the puppy, weren't you?"

I smiled, as he continued.

"My bad. Not awake yet. Come to think of it, I *am* gonna go piss."

I interrupted him as he left my cot.

"Do you think I can take him out this early in the morning without risking being seen?"

He wrinkled up his face as he considered my query.

"The sun's not even up yet. I gotta think no one else but us is out and about this early in the morning."

He had a point.

We went our separate ways ... ironically enough, for two of the three of us to do the same task.

He apparently finished first, because by the time that Gator and I made it back in to the hotel room, he had already turned on the TV.

His greeting to us when he returned was a little ominous.

"Hey ... you better watch this. It looks like things are about to get a little crazier."

***

I used to *like* having the news on in the background as I went about my day.

That preference was no longer valid now that my situation was being covered on it.

"Coming up next. SHOCKING developments in the so-called Florida 'Evil Monkey Murders'. There are now MORE unexplained disappearances ... and also the FIRST individuals who were present in the bar just a few hours prior to the HORRIFIC events of that evening are coming forward. We'll be right back with those details at the top of the hour for all but our international viewers, who will ..."

I spoke over top of the anchor's last comments to get clarification from Mattie.

"Hey -- what channel is this?" I asked.

"That's what I meant when I said it was about to get crazier. This is a *national* news channel. Your story is no longer only on the local stations," he replied.

I hated myself for thinking it, but my first reaction was to hope for a missing plane or some other unexpected tragedy to distract them from *my* story.

As luck would have it for anyone flying that day, all airplanes were accounted for.

As a lack of luck would have it for me ... all airplanes were accounted for.

Mattie sensed my concern.

"I know you were planning on going off the grid for a bit -- but the grid you're getting off of just got a little bigger."

Every single part of the universe was screaming at me to leave town, and to do so as quickly as possible.

All I could do was oblige.

***

The three of us sat there in the hotel room, transfixed at what was coming on the news on the television.

Although, to be fair, Gator wasn't really paying attention to the TV, as he was actually more than engaged with grooming himself. And "grooming himself" was the polite way to refer to what he was doing as Mattie and I kept an eye on the returning news.

The anchorwoman was true to her word. She launched right into the top news story of the morning, which was unfortunately the goings-on in MY life.

"Good morning. Let's dive right into one of the STRANGEST stories coming out of Florida, a place no stranger for having STRANGE stories, and the ongoing investigation into a string of crimes at the bars in a tourist town that have left a community UNSETTLED."

I knew that I was *personally* unsettled.

I didn't quite know that the whole community shared my feelings.

"Coming on the heels of the discovery of a HORRIFIC set of murders of bar employees and customers ... and the subsequent DISAPPEARANCE of the three victims' bodies ... we have learned this morning that the bar owner is ALSO potentially among the missing."

This was apparently a startling development for all of America ... but *I* fully expected it based on the fact that Papa Kalfu had come to visit me in my dream. I had no doubt that he was headed to New Orleans, expecting to meet up with me and to continue his quest to get access to my blood -- and to my special skills.

"While we continue to wait for details regarding whether the local investigation is considering that individual to be a FOURTH victim of the so-called 'Evil Monkey Murders', we are pleased to bring you some of the FIRST interviews with those who were at the scene of the crime only hours before the events occurred."

A parade of familiar faces was about to fill my screen.

***

"It's just SO shocking. At this point, I'm just thankful that it didn't happen to me and my boyfriend."

The special interview that the news had been promoting was with the Stevie Nicks wannabe from the bar that night who had approached me to be a part of their swinging lifestyle.

Or at least that's what I *thought* she was trying to do when she flirted with me while Rodney and I were waiting for the bar to close so we could make our move.

As I recalled it, she was all about making *her* moves.

"We had even invited that guy to join us on our bar crawl. NOW I know why he didn't come along."

The woman on the screen drew in a sharp breath.

"If he had, *WE'D* be dead monkeys right now!"

At that moment, I was kind of glad that back then I had to stay and to steal some laundered drug money at closing time instead of going along with them to wherever -- and WHATever -- they had planned for the rest of that evening.

I had likely saved myself from some drama.

Well -- some *other* kind of drama -- seeing as how I *was* the number one person of interest in a set of murders that was now shocking all of America instead of just the local area in south Florida.

The interviewer asked the lady a question.

"Did you notice anything strange about his behavior during the time you saw him at the bar?"

It was another face familiar to me from that night that answered.

***

The *boyfriend* of the Stevie Nicks wannabe was the one who answered the reporter's question.

"He was a weirdo. He barely spoke to anyone else. Just him and the jukebox."

His answer concerned me.

Not just because he was calling me names. I could look past that. Whatever. I didn't even know the guy.

But there was something about what he said that resonated with me. Like I should be concerned. I didn't stop listening to the news per se, but there were parts of my brain that were activated and running in the background as I did so.

The boyfriend continued.

"I mean, who goes to a bar and doesn't even talk to anyone? He could have just stayed home and listened to the youtube if that's all he wanted to do."

The Stevie Nicks wannabe nodded her head in agreement and worked her way into the frame.

"Yeah -- in the end, it was lucky for us that he was so anti-social."

Now it was the boyfriend's turn to nod his head and to chime in.

"It's always the quiet ones."

She clearly agreed.

"Always the quiet ones," she added.

That was when it hit me. The jukebox. It was a major risk point for me.

***

I was so used to dealing with my issues on my own -- as I had my whole life -- that I was actually a little startled by Mattie, who was apparently watching me watch the news.

"You look pensive," he commented.

I resisted the urge to reply that I was just thinking, considering that maybe he had never seen the movie in which that classic exchange was featured.

Instead, I just decided to share what was in my brain.

"I'm a little worried about them."

Mattie did his best to embrace what was going to be his new role and to offer me some comfort.

"Ah ... don't let them get to you. They're just a bunch of yahoos ..."

I explained more.

"It's not *them* so much as what they're saying. We had planned ahead and were very careful to only order bottles of beer that night because we figured they'd be thrown out ... and we didn't want to risk leaving our fingerprints on any glasses that maybe didn't get washed because of the timing of our 'strike'."

Mattie wasn't making the same connection that I had just made.

So I made it for him.

"If they figure out that I spent as much time as I did at the jukebox and dust *that* for prints, I probably touched every button on that damn machine."

***

Mattie challenged me regarding the concern I had just expressed.

"Yeah, but does that even matter? I mean it's not like your fingerprints are on file or anything."

He could immediately tell by my facial expression that he was wrong.

"Sorry. They *are* on file then? So you had a life of crime *before* your current life of crime?"

I was starting to learn that I could always count on Mattie to lighten the mood. I would come to really appreciate that fact -- eventually.

At that moment, though, I was in too serious of a mode to allow his comments to provide me with some kind of relief from my growing amount of stress.

"I grew up in the system. I'm pretty sure that every fact about me is in some computer or in some file somewhere. Well ... everything except these latest developments and my ... um ... current new skill set."

Mattie pointed to the screen.

"Plus there's that."

Again, for everyone to see ... or at least everyone to see that was watching that national news channel so early in the morning on the east coast that day ... *there* was the rendition of me from the sketch artist and a grainy video still of me at the bar.

They were apparently using the same imagery that had been on the local channel, because they also had the second person featured.

"Who's that other guy again?" asked Mattie.

Before I could answer, I heard something that greatly increased that level of stress that I was under.

***

"We have just learned that one of the families of the victims has put up a $5000 reward for information regarding the whereabouts of EITHER of these two persons of interest."

I ignored Mattie's question about the *other* guy in the picture and thought a moment about who it was that was putting up that reward money.

I tried not to judge, but Stanley the bartender was just an immigrant from Haiti ... and my partner-in-crime Rodney had come from the rough streets of the south side of Chicago and had told me the horrific story about the day his mother died from stray gunfire that had actually originated from him in that heist gone bad ... so that only left Albert, one of the original kidnapper triumvirate.

I knew a lot about Mario and Mria, the other two from that group ... but Albert -- the original angry texter from that first Florida trip -- was a bit of an unknown.

And even though I didn't care for the guy ... it seems like *somebody* sure did.

"Hey ... you hear me? You okay?"

Mattie interrupted my thought process.

I sighed, which was kind of its own answer.

"Yep. Just taking it all in. And that other guy -- he was just some kid sitting next to me at the bar. We talked briefly about the song I had played on the jukebox -- but that was it. I didn't know him or anything. He got mad that the bartender called last call early and he threw a bottle, which I guess they have on video. So now he's mixed up in this whole thing ... but he was really just an innocent bystander."

The number for the tip hotline crawled across the bottom of the screen. I knew then that I was just one phone call away from being identified.

***

"I gotta go! Lots to do if we're hitting the road today."

I had a moment of panic.

Mattie's announcement that he was leaving came just a touch too quickly on the heels of the tip hotline and the reward for information on my whereabouts being on the TV screen.

Ever watchful that he was, he immediately picked up on my change of countenance.

"We *are* still hitting the road today, right? The more distance we put between us and this place, the better, no?"

I nodded my head and confirmed with him that there wasn't a change of plans.

"Of course. Out of dodge. That's the definite plan."

I didn't share with him that I had already decided there *would* be a change of plans. Sometimes secrets were necessary.

"Okaaaay," he said, dragging it out to make sure that I knew that he knew that I felt that things were NOT okay.

"I have to quit my temporary job ... and get us a car ... *and* do it all without raising suspicions ... AND all before check-out time."

He clearly had an aha moment.

"Are you going to handle Joey and Rochelle when they show up and fill them in on how you changed your mind about going back to PA with them?"

Again, I nodded my head.

"Yes. For sure. At this rate, I don't know if I'm EVER going back to Pennsylvania."

***

Mattie finished getting ready while I continued formulating my latest plan.

Or ... the *revision* of my latest plan ... as that was indeed the task at hand for me.

"Okay, kiddo. Catch ya later!"

It was easy for him to leave with those cheerful departing words -- he wasn't carrying the weight of his world on his shoulders.

"One down, two more to go," I mumbled to myself, as I scratched Gator behind his ears. "And then what in the world are we going to do?"

After Papa Kalfu's latest incursion into my dream space, I knew that I had to strike out on my own. I couldn't put anyone else at risk.

But striking out on my own was going to be extremely difficult if that meant I was going to be off the grid WITH a puppy.

Gator somehow sensed the struggle I was having.

He stretched out a paw, placed it on my thigh, tilted his head and looked deep into my eyes.

Was he giving me permission to go? Telling me that he understood that the road I was going to be on couldn't possibly include a place for him? Letting me know that he was little enough to carry memories of his short time with me into whatever situation he would next find himself?

Maybe I wanted to put those thoughts in his head.

Maybe he was actually so ecstatic over having been reunited, that the paw-to-person contact was his way of saying "let's not ever be apart again".

Fighting back tears, I placed my head next to his.

"A life on the road is no life for a dog," I whispered to him. "No life at all."

***

My puppy pity party was interrupted as the ones I had just thought of as "two more to go" showed up to the hotel room.

"You up?" yelled Joey as he entered, with Rochelle following behind. "You ready to do this thing all over again?"

Gator, always committed to his role of greeter, ran over to the both of them and jumped up to demand their attention.

"Hey buddy. Are *you* ready for another long car ride?" asked Joey of him.

"Good morning," I said, somewhat solemnly.

Rochelle picked up on my tone.

"Everything okay here?" she questioned.

"Kind of. There's been a *slight* change of plans ... and that means I have a new request of the two of you."

Joey stared at me blankly, waiting for me to continue.

He didn't wait very long.

"Come on, boy. Spit it out. We have a long drive ahead of us, and we need to get on the road. Believe you me, a trip WITH a pregnant girl this time is going to mean ten times the amount of stopping for bathroom breaks."

I took one of my patented deep breaths, and Joey had seen me do that enough times to roll his eyes in advance of what I said next.

"I can't go with you back to PA. It's just not safe for me to return right now."

***

"Well then ... *why* are we even here if you're just flakin' out on us?"

The bad thing was that Joey never really did like change.

The good thing was that Rochelle was a calming influence on him.

"Quiet," she said as she shushed him, and then turned to me. "You said you had something to ask us though?"

"I did. I do. It's a big favor, but I'd really appreciate it." I responded.

"What is it? We're kind of on the clock here. Every second you spend hemmin' and hawin' is a second we chould have spent on the damn highway."

"Babe, please!" admonished Rochelle of Joey for his comment. "You were saying?"

"I may not get back 'home' for a long time. I'm wondering if you can pack up the personal stuff in *my* apartment and put it in storage for me. I don't care about the furniture or anything ... just the little bit of stuff I have in my desk and on my shelves -- a few photos and the like. A few boxes and bins and you'd have it all. I don't have much."

Rochelle looked like she was considering ... and Joey not so much. I decided to sweeten the pot.

"Of course I would pay you for your time. And I'd give you the money to pay for the storage unit for the first year."

Joey shrugged his shoulders and turned to his girlfriend.

"Look, lady, it's your call. You only have so much vacation time and the goal is to get my stuff and get back down here as quickly as possible so we can start our life together."

I interjected before she answered.

"You can keep any leftover cash for your new place. Really, I'll be long gone by the time you get back."

Rochelle's ears perked up.

"Leftover cash? Left over from what exactly?"

***

"When I left Papa Kalfu's bar with the drug money we were sent there to steal, I actually skimmed some off the top ... and I hid it. In case they weren't telling me the truth about giving me a bus ticket and releasing me afterward."

For the first time since hearing that I changed up the plans and wouldn't be accompanying Joey and Rochelle back to PA, I saw Joey smile.

"You dirty birdie. You got the makings of a first class criminal after all, don't you."

"Well, I wouldn't go *that* far!" I countered. "I just thought that after all I had been through, I wanted to make sure that I had a way to get back to my original life."

I winced hearing myself say that out loud.

"And now that there is no way I can *ever* return to that life, it might as well go to a good cause. You guys can have what's left of it after you take care of putting my things in storage."

I looked at Joey for his answer, but he was looking at Rochelle.

"We can make it work. And you know what? Mario still owed me some money for the last few weeks of taking care of his sister, so, in my mind, this cash you took from Papa Kalfu because Mario told you too is kind of Mario's anyway -- so if some of it comes to me --"

"-- to US," interrupted Joey.

"Yes, to US ... then it's just karma," she continued.

"Thank you. I really appreciate it. One less thing for me to worry about ..."

There was an uncomfortable pause, only broken by Joey after a few moments.

"So ... the cash. You said you hid it? Where is it?"

***

"Laura's house."

I admitted to both of them where some of the stolen cash was hidden.

"Laura's house?" asked Joey incredulously.

"Yes -- Laura's house," I confirmed.

He still seemed surprised.

"The house we built?"

I laughed.

"Well, the house I *watched* being built. As I recall, I was mostly on trash duty during the project. But yes ... Laura's house. It was kind of the only place I could find when I was running away from Papa Kalfu's bar that night."

He still didn't believe me for some reason.

"So wait a minute. She was in on this whole thing too?"

"Oh no," I replied. "I buried it in the mulch bed on the side of the house. I did it in the dark in the middle of the night and skedaddled right after."

Joey looked at me ... then at Gator .. then back at me.

"Funny. Based on the timing of when you were there, so was Gator. We had dropped him off with her when we got to town and were trying to figure things out."

It all come flooding back to me. Of *course* he was there that night. When I was sneaking around in the shadows, I had heard a dog inside the house trying really hard to get out.

That must have been Gator and he must have sensed that I was close by.

Finding that out also gave me an idea for what to do next.

***

"And one last thing."

Joey flashed me a look of mock disapproval. Or at least I *hoped* that it was just mock and wasn't *real* disapproval.

"You're piling on here, buddy."

I started to speak but my voice caught in my throat. I couldn't fight back the tears coming to my eyes.

"I ... I ... I need you to take Gator with you to her house and ask her to keep him ..."

Gator heard his name, and popped up his head, gazing at me soulfully.

"I can't force him to go on the road with me. It just wouldn't be right."

I turned away to try to hide my face. Gator picked up on it, though, and came over to my side, nuzzling his snout against my hand. He wanted affection ... or else he wanted to offer me comfort.

Through watery eyes, I bent down and gave him a hug.

Our life together had been interrupted one too many times.

I couldn't put him through that again ... but yet that's exactly what I had to do.

"I'm going to miss you little guy. But you're going to a good place with great people. You'll forget all about me soon enough ... but I will never forget you."

I knelt there, not ready to let go. Not willing to let go. Not able to let go.

***

I probably could have predicted it, but Rochelle was the one who was in tune with her empathy.

Maybe it was because she was preggers ... maybe it because she was a career nurse ... maybe it was because anyone would appear extremely empathetic next to Joey.

"Are you sure you want us to take him?" she asked quietly.

I wiped the tears from my face and finally separated from my puppy.

"Yes. I'm sure Laura and Britney will take good care of him until I'm out of the woods with all this."

I wanted to add "AND I'm also sure I'll one day be out of the woods with all this", but I didn't necessarily believe it enough to get those words out.

"Okay buddy. Ready to go for a ride? Ready to go for a ride? Ready to go for a ride?"

I knew if I said it three times in a row really fast, he would definitely be excited and ready and distracted from the reality of our separation.

He started running in circles ... to the door ... back to me ... to the door ... smiling in that way that pit bulls do.

I knew that things would be a little better because I would have that smile as the way I would remember him.

I ceremoniously passed the leash to Rochelle and she got it attached to his collar.

"He'll be in good hands," she offered to me as comfort, as she took him out the door.

Joey came over to me and stretched out *his* hand, with a big smile on his face that seemed a bit out of place.

"Can I get a freebie for the road?"

***

"You know that's not the way it works, right?"

Joey kept on smiling, despite my comment.

"I know *exactly* how this works, remember? I'm pretty sure I'm like your number one target for your tricks. Or are you taking away the painful memories of someone else when I'm not around?"

"Very funny," I responded, before getting a little wistful. "You and I do go back a long way in a short time, don't we?"

Joey wasn't exactly the sentimental type.

"Yeah. Whatever. A little less sap and a little more shaking of my hand please."

I did as he asked, because I pretty much always did as he asked, and because I *was* the sentimental type.

I shook his hand and looked directly into his eyes, and the all too familiar sensations began.

In our past interactions, I had gotten a glimpse into the struggles Joey had with his parents, and even further back into the horrible accident with his high school girlfriend.

This time, though, there was nothing on the surface for me to absorb.

My special skill was that I could take away the pain of others with just a touch.

But Joey didn't seem to have any pain.

His grin got bigger.

"Life is good right now. I got a girl ... I got a kid on the way ... I got a plan ... I got a future ... and I got to save my friend. I'm fresh out of troubles for you, son."

With that, he broke our grip, gave me a wink, and left the room to join his wife ... with my puppy ... in her car.

"See you whenever," was all he said.

***

Alone at last.

Mattie was off running his errands -- quitting his temporary job and arranging for a rental car.

Joey and Rochelle were on their way to Laura's house to dig up the dirty cash I had buried there -- dirty now in ALL senses of the word -- before getting on the road to go back to central PA to pack up my things for storage, and Joey's things for moving in with Rochelle upon their eventual return to Florida.

And Gator. My Gator.

Well, he *was* my Gator, up until that moment.

Alas, he was no longer mine as he was en route to being returned to his place of birth -- to Laura's house.

I looked around the hotel room and paused to steel my reserve.

I knew what had to be done.

I had known it since the latest dream invasion that Gator had somehow cut short.

I could not put anyone at risk -- man, woman or dog.

They all had succeeded in saving me, and for that I would be forever grateful, but I couldn't expose them to the evil that I had met in Papa Kalfu.

This was *my* fight. *My* battle. *My* risk to take.

I looked for the little hotel branded notepad and a hotel branded pen.

When Mattie returned to an empty room, I knew that I at least owed him an explanation.

***

With hotel pad located and hotel pen in hand, I composed a note to Mattie.

Mattie:

There's been a change of plans.

Gator's going back to Laura's house.

Joey and Rochelle are going back to Pennsylvania.

You are free to go wherever you want.

Although I appreciate your offer to join me on the road, I have decided that I can't risk any harm coming to you because of what I've done or the people I now know.

Thank you for what you've done and sorry for the last minute notice.

One day we will look back on this and laugh.

Until then ...

Take care of yourself.

Alan

I put the note on the dresser by the mirror and placed the remote on top of it to keep it in place.

And then I headed out on my now *solitary* journey to escape south Florida and to go even deeper off the grid -- by my damn self.

***

[to be continued ...]

Chapters 31-35

***

CHAPTER 31

One door led to the outer storage room, which led to the hallway into the basement of the bar.

And the other door led to the half bath, which was really just a janitorial closet that had been converted to handle my basic needs.

I had never noticed a third door before.

Which is odd, because I had been locked in the basement -- off and on -- for a *number* of days by that time, and at least one of them I had spent exploring my surroundings and determining exactly what was with me in my makeshift cell.

Maybe it was the faint light that was glowing around the doorway that was making it visible for the first time ... or maybe it was new and had just been created while I was out robbing the drug dealer of his ill-gotten gains ... or maybe I simply wasn't as observant as I thought I was.

Regardless, the light was keeping me from being able to continue to sleep, and so I decided that I *had* to find out what was behind the door ... and, at the very least, turn off that darn light.

I got up once, and immediately fell back on to my cot, having lost my balance.

I did it a second time, and was much more careful to avoid that same outcome.

The shining light was only a few steps away, on the same wall as the mini-fridge, but it seemed like it took me minutes to reach it.

That's when I noticed that I was shuffling my feet instead of striding, and I didn't seem to have complete control of my legs.

Eventually, I reached the door and began to feel around for a knob.

***

No knob. No latch.

There was no way to open the door I had only just discovered in my room in the basement of the bar.

If I had learned nothing else through my ordeal, I had learned perseverance.

I kept on feeling around all of the edges, applying pressure and pushing on the space outlined by that new light that was shining through from underneath the bottom of it.

My stick-to-it-iveness paid off ... the door slid open to the left from my machinations.

Hesitantly, I stuck my head in the opening, looking around first and foremost for the source of the light.

Off to the side, I saw a desk ... with a lamp on it that was putting forth a dim glow -- enough of one to have woken me up.

I saw no person. No animal. No creature.

I had no reason to suspect that I wasn't alone.

I couldn't quite get a sense of the size of the space, but I assumed it to be another room like the one I was in. It certainly didn't look finished in any sense, and it hadn't been cleaned in a long time, from the dirt and grime that was everywhere.

I quickly realized that the dim glow wasn't because it was a low watt bulb ... the dim glow was because the lampshade itself was filthy.

I accepted the fact that the only way I was going to know more was by going all in ... literally.

***

As soon as I entered this newly discovered room next to mine through the newly discovered door I had never seen before, I discovered two new things.

Thing one: it was pretty darn toasty in there. Like a good 15 degrees warmer than the room I had left. Like warm enough to instantly cause my body to start sweating in an attempt to regulate its condition.

Thing two: those walls weren't like the walls in the room I had left. I couldn't see all four of them -- the light from the desk lamp didn't even reach the back half of the room.

The front half of the room in which I found myself. though, was a different story.

They seemed wet ... slimy even.

I couldn't be surprised by *that* alone. This *was* a basement in Florida ... a half level below the ground in a place where a basement was rare in the first place.

I glanced next at the floor, expecting to see little rivers of condensation running across it, but I saw none.

The wetness was either thick and mucky enough to glisten without draining off ... or else it found some other place of absorption before gravity took it to the ground.

My eyes were still adjusting to the space and to the light, and so I focused on my hearing.

I didn't hear drips and drops.

But I did hear a distinct intake and a marked release.

Despite the heat, the conclusion I drew made me shudder.

Those walls were breathing.

***

Inhale.

Exhale.

Inhale.

Exhale.

Inhale.

Exhale.

By the third time, I was successful in slowing down my own breathing to match the pace of the room in which I had entered.

Doing so calmed me, and I was instantly less anxious about how the space I was in had walls that were breathing.

I turned to my right, toward the desk with the lamp on it, and approached one of them. With the dim light from the dirty shade as my only guide, I extended my arm and gently touched a spot on the wall.

My finger sunk in every so slightly, and there was a definite temporary indentation. Then, I met a gentle resistance, and there was just enough pressure to return it to the way it was before I had poked at it.

In addition to the moisture of some kind that I had seen, I now knew that the walls were spongy to the touch.

I noticed that the tip of my finger that had made the contact was sticky.

Holding it up under the light, my fears were confirmed.

Blood. The spongy breathing walls were bleeding as well.

***

"Do not be afraid."

When I heard the voice in the shadows, my first instinct was to chuckle. I mean, after all, I would posit that it's a pretty normal reaction to be afraid after coming into contact with breathing and bleeding walls in a room that I had never even noticed before.

And a disjointed voice was supposed to be enough to comfort me?

I mean, for goodness' sake, I still had the blood on my fingertip.

"You are safe here."

I didn't feel safe. I felt like I didn't know what was going to happen next ... or where I really was ... or what other surprises might be in store.

I considered picking up the lamp and shining it into the blackness to see to whom the voice belonged.

"I will not let anyone harm you."

The affirmations were nice. But I needed something more.

"Who are you? What is this place?" I yelled into the darkness.

"Alan," came the reply. "You do not recognize my voice?"

I had to be honest. I had always been good about recognizing voices but *never* been good about linking them to the people I knew right away. And this one I wasn't even recognizing.

Turns out there was a good reason.

I had only "heard" it once before ... and that time was also in similarly strange circumstances.

***

"Son. You can trust me."

My mother.

My dead mother.

My dead mother who had died giving birth to my brother and I.

My dead mother who had died giving birth to my brother and I was once again showing up in one of my hallucinations.

Well ... at least that revelation made me feel a little less spooked out by the whole bleeding breathing walls in the room.

"You can trust yourself," she continued. "You are in your own head."

Of course I was.

The last thing I remembered doing out in the conscious world was cracking open that bottle of celebratory champagne I had found in the mini-fridge.

This secret room stuff was clearly happening in my unconscious ... or my subconscious ... or whatever one called that place of mine not quite in reality where my mind had a tendency to wander way too frequently.

I decided to engage with this figment of my imagination.

"And to what do I owe the pleasure of this visit?" I asked her.

"It's a bit odd for you to ask me that question. After all, *you* are the one that summoned me."

Just once, I thought to myself, I'd like to have one of these trips be more straightforward and less of a riddle.

***

"Lookit. I'm done. I'm over this. I want to go home."

I decided that I might as well make the most of my mental diversion with my dead mother, and to hash out a few things.

She didn't reply, so I continued.

"I never asked for any of this ... and I just want to be alone again. Only responsible for me. Not giving a damn about anyone else. Just me ... living my life ... solitary and happy and in charge of my own destiny without it being tied up in everyone else's needs and wants and desires."

Still no reply. Maybe I was too aware of my hallucination and I had chased her away.

"Me. Just me. The way it always was ... the way it's been for years ... the way I've handled things since you left me."

Wow. I had no idea where that came from.

It *was* enough to get a response from the ghostly figure in the shadows of this secret room that was hosting my vision.

"Alan ... I didn't leave you alone. I left you with a father. I left you with a brother."

It had been awhile since I had thought about my insta-family -- people I had only learned about from a surprise aunt who showed up at my college graduation unannounced. I was supposed to be on vacation to New Orleans and Chicago -- respectively, the last places where each had last been seen -- but Mario and Albert and Mria had interfered with those plans.

"Yeah ... well ... in case you haven't heard ... and I can see how you might not have heard ... what with how I only learned the story a few weeks ago and how ... you know ... you're dead and all ... but *neither* one of them chose to stick around."

***

"They are still out there. You must find them."

I struggled with her statement.

Here's why ... if I was having a dream/nightmare and in it, I was talking to the dead mother that I had never met ... and she told me that the father and twin brother I had also never met were still alive ... wouldn't that be something that I was just making up in my own head?

Meaning ... I had no way of knowing for sure that they were alive.

Although it was correct that it was on my to-do list to try to figure out whether or not that statement was true.

But believing the apparition with whom I was having a dialogue? I just couldn't bring myself to make that jump.

That being said, some say that the dead come to visit you in your dreams.

So maybe I wasn't making this up at all. Maybe I was just opening up the door to another plane of existence, and this conversation WAS to be trusted and believed.

Maybe my father and twin brother *were* actually alive.

One thing was absolutely one hundred percent true.

I couldn't start looking for them until I woke up and got myself out of this state.

"Yeah well," I finally replied. "I'm going to go look for them the way I've done everything in my life ... by myself!"

***

"But you are not alone."

We had gotten to the point in my dream/nightmare/delusion/hallucination where my dead mother was quoting Michael Jackson lyrics to me.

"Yeah, I know," I commented sarcastically. "AWOL daddy ... missing twin bro ... I got it. I can't escape my family even though I've never met them."

There was a noise.

Like when you go into one of those big stadiums or arenas, and the lights are hooked up to some kind of power grid, and there's an amplified clicking sound as the switches are thrown lighting up rows and rows of lights, one at a time.

Yep, that was the noise I heard ... accompanied by rows and rows of lights coming on, one at a time.

It turns out this room I had discovered next to the room where I was being held captive was cavernous for starters, and never-ending for finishers.

Also -- it wasn't empty.

With each mega-click, I saw that the place was filled with Andantes -- the name I had given to the faceless mannequin-like creatures that populated the painful memories I absorbed from others. The Andantes were the stand-ins in those specific stories representing people that were essential to the pain the others experienced but whom I had never met ... meaning I had no face to put to a name.

Mixed in amongst them were some faces I recognized.

The old man from the plane with the tragic story about his grandson. Angry texter Albert. Joey. Mario. Laura. Rodney.

The people I knew may as well have been Andantes, though, what with their sullen faces, staring straight ahead off into a distance that somehow went through me.

"You carry them ALL with you," intoned the mother-apparition with great import.

***

"You will never be alone again ... because you carry the memories of *their* pain with you. And more than that ... you take each of them with you. Their memories become your memories. That is the way your gift works."

My "gift".

I didn't want to look a dead mother in the mouth, so to speak ... but I wasn't necessarily prepared to call it a gift at that exact moment, midway through my dream and near the end of having been kidnapped and used and locked away precisely because of that "gift".

"You were chosen because you can handle all of the hurt. You are tough enough to bear their burdens. Because they are always with you, that will only serve to make you stronger. You may not understand it now ... but you will one day."

One day.

The payoff was always *one* day away ... and yet it never seemed to come.

"You do not get to continue your life alone. You cannot be so selfish. You have an obligation to others now to use your gift ... others who will benefit from your interaction ... others who will find peace that was missing from their lives because of you ... others who need the type of healing that only you can provide."

No one in the audience that had been revealed moved. They stayed in the same position, facing straight ahead toward me. And the ones I actually knew *with* faces showed no expressions. If I had provided them with peace that was missing from their lives, they might have at least cracked a smile in my vision.

With my bar heist adventure coming to an end, I was clearly struggling with the changes I was experiencing and the skill I had developed.

"And because of this, I know that you will never be alone."

In the corner, a shadow caught my eye, and distracted me from the attention I was paying to the pep rally I had manufactured in my head.

***

The shadow in the corner that had caught my attention was more important than the shadow of my dead mother with whom I had been having a dialogue.

Well ... kind of a dialogue.

It was more like I was listening to her as she tried to help me as I struggled with what was ahead now that my *second* adventure in Florida was finally coming to an end.

And since the whole thing was in my head, she was really just a proxy for the debate that was raging inside of me.

But all that didn't matter at that moment.

What mattered was that shadow ... it was darting around behind me ... all around me ... and my head was on a swivel trying to pin it down long enough to figure out what it was.

As I dealt with that distraction, the "bonus room" with the bleeding breathing walls, full of the Andantes and the apparition of my dead mother and the emotionless and motionless people I knew with whom I had interacted using my talent to take away their pain with just a touch ... all of that faded away in a slow dissolve.

I found myself slowly waking up in my usual space ... except instead of being asleep on my cot, I was propped up with my back against the wall next to the mini-fridge ... in the *same* spot I had imagined that there was a light shining underneath a door that was never there in actuality.

The shadow that woke me from my stupor had settled in one place -- the small window at alley level up in the corner of my room.

As I focused on that exact location, I would have sworn that what came into view was a face.

A face I was in no particular hurry to see again.

***

A pattern was developing.

Every time my dead mother showed up in one of my visions ... so did Papa Kalfu.

Indeed, it was *his* face that I thought I saw in the window up by the ceiling of my room.

I'm sure a psychologist would have had a field day analyzing that little factoid. Could it be that they represented the good and evil in battle in my own psyche?

Of course, the only difference was that my mother was clearly dead -- she had died giving birth to my twin brother and me -- and Papa Kalfu was definitely alive.

And in the same town.

And with a similar "talent" of being able to get inside people's heads.

Come to think of it, the last time this happened was the night of my mental trip "through the air conditioning duct" with Jinx the cat -- when I was on trial and my mother was the judge and Papa Kalfu was the prosecutor. It may have been that he was using his powers to investigate me.

That would mean that I didn't manufacture him at all.

And that would also mean that I might not be manufacturing him at all again ... this time.

Especially troubling was the fact that I was pretty sure that I was actually waking up -- albeit in a groggy state -- which meant that the fact I that saw his face in the window was either some kind of lingering hallucinatory effect ... or it was a vision within a vision.

Or ... just maybe ... Papa Kalfu, knowing the details of our plans from Albert's betrayal ... was actually in the back alley and actually peering in at me through that very window.

***

By the time I confirmed that I was -- for sure -- *completely* awake, and no longer in the midst of one of my mind-trips, it was too late to know whether the face of Papa Kalfu in the window was something I made up or something I saw with my own two eyes in real time.

As it turned out, I had bigger problems with which to deal once I returned to reality.

Someone had been in my room while I had been passed out.

Someone had put a thick envelope and a note on my pillow while I had been slumped up against the wall, imagining a secret room and chatting with my dead mother.

In and out and I didn't even know it.

Seeing as how I knew about how Albert had ended up, that meant either Mria or Mario would have had to have been the visitor.

They had promised me a bus ticket and freedom ... so the first thing I did was go to check the door to see if it was open.

It wasn't.

I was *still* locked in this room in the basement of this bar and that was *not* the outcome that I was expecting for all I had been through.

The second thing I did was to go to the cot to take a closer look at the thick envelope and the note.

Much to my surprise, the envelope contained a wad of cash.

And it was more cash than I would have needed to buy myself my own bus ticket.

Something had clearly changed in just a short amount of time ...

***

Sure ... an envelope of cash *was* a nice surprise.

All things considered, though, I was much more intrigued by the note.

"You're going to need this!" it started.

No date. No greeting. Not even my name. Just that exclamation of a statement.

I continued reading.

"Two things have changed.

First -- despite what you told us when we met afterwards, the news this morning was that there were three deaths at the bar last night. So either you are more dangerous than we thought, or Papa K is more unhinged than we would have ever guessed. Either way, those aren't risks we plan to take."

Three *deaths*.

When I made my escape, Rodney and Stanley and Albert were all very much alive. I mean sure, both Rodney and Stanley had been shot, but they were wounded at best. Stanley *had* lost a lot of blood, but it wasn't like he was being left there to bleed out. Papa Kalfu was there with them.

I had left them *alive*. I was sure of that.

"Second -- we've had time to process the news about Albert working both sides, and we have decided to get his sister and leave town right away. We don't have time to arrange for your bus ticket, and we can't stick around to work out the other details of your freedom."

There was a sinking feeling in my stomach -- a feeling with which I was all too familiar. I had felt it so many times when I was younger when they would come to pick me up from the house of another family that just didn't work out.

Just as had happened with regularity back then when I was in the foster system, I recognized that I was being abandoned.

***

"One last thing."

I was continuing to read the note that was left for me on my cot next to the envelope of cash.

"Jorge, who owns this bar, will be back from his cruise soon. We expect that he is the one who will find you in your special room. He didn't know anything about our plans, so we recommend that you keep him out of this as much as you can. And please keep US out of it as well."

I could tell that this note to me had been written in haste.

It was *literally* evidence tying Mario and Mria to everything that had happened, and it was in my hands.

There was one last sentence.

"Although Jorge might be able to help you find a good lawyer. And in light of the latest developments, we suspect you'll need one. Take care."

So there it was.

After everything I had done to help the cause to support what I thought was the "greater good", I was alone, once again locked in my room in the basement of the bar.

I decided right then and there that it was time to take control of my situation, once and for all.

I was NOT going to wait for Jorge to return and to find me. After all, with Albert dead and Mario and Mria on the run, it was a foregone conclusion that no one was watching me via the camera set-up any more.

I was going to do whatever it took to bust out of my little prison, come hell or high water.

***

"Live like nobody's watching."

For those moments in that space, *that* was going to be my new mantra.

I felt certain that the camera in the corner was no longer being monitored ... and with the three people who knew that I was locked in the basement all otherwise occupied (one via his surprise death and the other two via their surprise decision to get out of town), I was now free to make as much noise as possible to get noticed.

The last time I had tried that approach, Albert had showed up and beat me -- and he had taken away my makeshift "ceiling-poker".

I searched my surroundings for something similar.

Without a doubt, I could pound on the door ... but I knew from the few times I had been through the rest of the basement, that there was another storage room between me and the hallway that led to the back stairs.

I found nothing.

Nothing in the corners.

Nothing in the old janitorial closet that had been serving as my restroom.

Nothing under my cot.

I sat down on the floor from having been hunched over to look underneath it and I stared at that cot.

That's when it me. It was flimsy enough that I could probably disassemble it and get myself a NEW makeshift "ceiling-poker".

I stripped it of its bedding and flimsy mattress, throwing everything in a pile in the corner.

And then I set about destroying the one thing that had provided me any kind of comfort.

***

Sometimes, a little tearing something apart is good for the soul.

I felt a little cave-manny doing it without tools, but luckily that old cot frame was flimsy enough that once I got a few springs unsprung, it didn't take long to turn it into a pile of aluminum pieces.

I purposefully kept the long tube like ones that went around the edge intact, seeing as how my goal was to have something that I could use to reach up to the ceiling to make some constant noise that some employee would simply *have* to come investigate ...

... which would simply *have* to lead to my freedom -- at long last.

Homemade aluminum stick in hand, I started pounding away up and over my head.

The last time I had gone through a similar activity, I was a little more gentle with my tap-tap-tapping so much that it had made me feel all Poe-raven like.

This time, I was giving it my all.

If before I went a tap-tap-tapping, this time I was definitely more in the mood to go a thump-thump-thumping.

A whack-whack-whacking.

A beat-beat-beating.

I was taking out all of my frustrations on the space above my head, desperate to accelerate my departure.

The other main difference, besides my intensity, was the time of day I was a pummel-pummel-pummeling.

Sadly, *that* variable wasn't working in my favor.

***

The bar in whose basement I was being held -- which I now knew to be named "Joey's", and which had absolutely no connection to the guy named Joey from my college who had been a part of our service trip and who had driven me up the coast back to school after I had my "episode" at the end of that experience -- didn't open for the lunch crowd to get their drink on.

As such, all of my efforts to draw attention to myself via the noise I was making were for naught.

Nobody was up above me.

Maybe ... depending on what day it was ... and I had lost track ... someone might come in specifically for a delivery in the late afternoon, and *that* would be my next chance to gain my freedom.

Ironically, in order to be able to figure out whether that was happening, I'd have to be quiet enough to hear the footprints of people walking above me.

I had never seen a delivery truck in the alley from my small window up near the ceiling of the storage room, so I couldn't use that visual as a trigger.

I stopped my efforts, and sat down with my back against the wall -- in much the same position I had found myself in when I woke up earlier from my drugged up state.

Hurry up and wait.

I was used to doing just that in this space.

A few more hours wouldn't make much of a difference.

Or so I thought.

I picked up the envelope of cash that had been left for me by my captors after they had split, and had just started to count it when the crash of broken glass caught me by complete surprise.

***

The *first* surprise was the crash of the broken glass.

The *second* surprise -- and it was definitely the bigger of the two -- was the miniature explosion as the homemade molotov cocktail hit the ground.

The gasoline and oil mixture in the bottle spilled everywhere, and, true to the form of the contraption, quickly set everything in its path aflame.

I wouldn't have been so concerned had the fire been contained to the dirt floor of the room in the basement, but, as whatever-the-opposite-of-luck would have it, my pile of bedding that I had thrown on the floor in order to disassemble the cot was in the midst of the fire.

The BONfire, as it now was.

I didn't see the cocktail thrower through the window, but I did hear the squeal of tires as the person drove away from the crime.

I was beginning to think that the flash of an image I had coming out of my drugged state of Papa Kalfu's face in that window might have been something that *actually* happened ... and that wasn't a figment of my imagination.

Contrary to everything I had ever been told, it would seem that, at least in his case, revenge was a dish best served piping hot.

Speaking of things I had been told, it also appeared to be true that the smoke kills you before the flame.

I started coughing almost immediately ... and believe you me that time would have been better spent otherwise engaged.

***

Stop, drop and roll.

That phrase had been ingrained in my head since I was a young child.

Yet, up until that point in my life, I had never had reason to follow those instructions.

The smoke from the pile of bedding that was lit on fire by the molotov cocktail that had been thrown in the window was indeed stopping me in my place. It all had happened so fast ... filling the room so quickly.

I dropped to the floor, and could instantly see a little more clearly ... but more importantly, I could *think* a little more clearly as well.

I crawled toward the janitor closet that was serving as my bathroom during the time I was kept captive in this room in the basement of the bar, and turned on the faucet in the mop sink.

I cupped my hands to gather the water and threw it in the direction of the fire.

It was a valiant effort on my part, but it was to no avail. There was no way that I could put out the fire without a bucket at the very least.

I had no bucket.

I also had no exit.

And the fire was still burning, giving off more and more smoke. I at least had the broken window in my favor, since it provided a place for a bit of release of some of the fumes and some of the smoke.

I took off my shirt and put in under the running water. With it damp, I held it up to my face like a mask, and ran toward the one door that led out of this room.

***

It was locked.

Of course it was locked.

It was always locked.

I mean, after all, that's exactly how my captors kept me in this place ... by locking the door of the room in the basement of the bar.

There were no sprinklers being automatically activated by the heat.

There were no emergency exits in case of a fire.

There were no firepeople coming to my rescue.

The smoke was overwhelming.

I'm sure that the shirt I had dampened that I was using as a mask was buying me some time.

But it wasn't going to last long.

I crumpled to the floor, with my face turned to the door that blocked my path to freedom. I pressed up against it, and took a few breaths from any fresh air that was slipping in from underneath.

I was too young to die. But the timing wasn't going to be up to me.

I closed my eyes, and thought about my puppy dog back home. As the smoke asphyxiated me, I wanted my last image to be of Gator.

I focused on my puppy dog, and despite my situation, I felt comfort knowing that I'd die with a smile on my face.

If this was to be the end ... so be it.

***

CHAPTER 32

Were it not for all the coughing, the whole dying thing was actually kind of peaceful.

I had resigned myself to my fate.

And, on some level, I was appreciative that the smoke was going to asphyxiate me before I felt the horrific pain of the flames.

With my shirt that I had wet at the sink pressed against my mouth, and my nose up against the bottom crack of the locked door, I focused all of my mental faculties on the one I loved the most.

I pictured Gator, my little pit bull puppy, back home in central PA as I knew him to be ... and I imagined all of the times he had greeted me upon my return from going to class, or to work at my internship, or out running errands.

It was that excited energy and adorable face that I wanted to be the last image as I slipped away into whatever came next after death.

I let my mind's eye stare into his eyes, seeing them dance and smile in front me.

I was determined that the kisses of the flames as they engulfed my little room in the basement of the bar where I had been held captive for just over a week would be replaced by his kisses.

I was willing myself to die happy, with a smile on my face.

And in the spaces between all of the blasted coughing spells, I was succeeding.

"Maybe one day I'd meet him again," I thought.

At least I knew he was in the good hands of the dog-sitter I had hired back home.

That was my final thought as I coughed so hard that I lost consciousness.

I had won. Just before I blacked out, it was indeed his face I saw.

***

The problem is ... my mind tended to play tricks on me.

Especially since I discovered my special skill, the tendency to be in the middle of a mind-trick at any given time was awfully high.

So was I headed toward the afterlife as I thought?

Consciously, I had passed out from all the smoke.

Subconsciously, I was waiting for a bright white light ... or to find myself in a line to meet St. Peter and to have my life detailed back to me in a judgment kind of way ... or to jump into the body of another creature all reincarnation style -- and none of those things were happening.

What if all the stuff we had been told about what came after death was just "fluff" to make us feel better?

What if my being somewhat aware of my status was a window that was closing for good ... and I was soon to neither have consciousness or subconsciousness?

What if my soul was just going to float away and my body was going to just crisp up into ashes as the fire took over every nook and cranny of the basement room?

What if ... what if ... what if ...

I couldn't continue my litany of "what if"s, because the noise was interfering with my subconscious thoughts.

It was definitely the sound of wood breaking.

The ceiling above me was surely caving in ...

***

Darkness.

Interrupted, as it were, by the sounds of breaking wood, which I assumed to be the caving in of the ceiling.

Heat.

Smoke.

More heat. The flames were closer than ever before.

More darkness. I was going in and out of consciousness, fighting with every ounce of my being.

Images of my puppy, the thought of whom was my focus as I lay there dying.

Then new images.

This time, of two guys and a girl.

I knew Mario and Mria had left town. They had given me a note saying as much -- plus some of the stolen cash. And as for Albert, they had told me that he was dead. Found at the scene of my crime -- our crime. Even though he was alive when I escaped from Papa Kalfu and left that place.

So it couldn't be them ... could it? But still, fuzzy images of two guys and a girl, with even fuzzier voices.

My puppy.

Again with my puppy.

I knew that I could drown out those other things creeping into my mind by just focusing on my puppy.

It was as if he were there in those last moments, my last moments. I could practically feel his kisses on my face -- his slobber providing temporary relief from the heat and the smoke. Just the distraction I needed as I fought for my last breaths.

And then ... surprisingly, a kiss on the lips. From a person, not a puppy.

***

Since first discovering on that turbulent plane ride to Florida that I had the special skill of being able to take away the pain of another through just a touch, I had used it for the benefit of others and I had used it at the behest of others.

Along the way, I had slowly started to figure out some of the rules for how my trick worked.

I knew I had to first hear a story describing the painful situation ... and there had to be direct skin to skin touching ... and I had to make eye contact.

Those were the basics.

On an advanced level, I had learned that the transfer of energy was so great that it could harm a third person who came into contact with me at the same time. And that if one or both of us were inebriated or otherwise drugged, as in the case of Mario's sister, the memories I absorbed would be jumbled at best -- and somewhat trippy and psychadelic at worst.

I had used my talent to defuse a situation.

As a lie detector.

As a weapon.

I had used too much in too short a time such that it had overwhelmed me to the point that I had been hospitalized.

Come to think of it, that was the last time I had been kissed -- in the parking lot of the bar at the after party. 

There was much more happening *this* time ... so when I felt what I thought was a kiss, and I opened my eyes and saw Nurse Rochelle, there was a new way that my special skill was about to benefit me.

***

For the first time, my condition helped me fill in the blanks.

With the eye contact made with Nurse Rochelle, and with her going back toward my mouth for a second go-round, I absorbed *her* memories of a very very recent stressful event.

Courtesy of my special skill, I got to experience what had just happened to her ... which was all about what had just happened to me.

I saw snippets of her arriving at the bar, and being led to the basement behind two guys, and being frightened by the appearance of the smoke, and standing aside during the breaking of doors to get to me, and of her watching the guys dragging me out of the room into which I had been locked and left to be found by the bar owner as per Mario and Mria's adjusted plans for me.

Her memories were so immediate -- and her state was so frazzled -- that they were just flashes of images through her eyes. There was too much excitement and yelling for me to make out specific conversations between the three of them, but the images were vivid enough for me to understand that I had been rescued ... in the nick of time.

The other immediate effect of our exchange was that I absorbed her burst of adrenaline, which did wonders for my rapid return from death's door.

That being said, the fact was that I had inhaled more than my fair share of smoke, so no amount of someone else's endorphins transferred to me could keep me from responding to her actions with anything other than a coughing fit.

"He's good. He's good. Back away from him!"

I knew that voice. I recognized that voice. I proved myself right as Joey's face appeared over her shoulder.

He squinted at me through the smoke that was still lingering in the stairway, which is as far as they had dragged me, and flashed me a goofy grin.

"What is it with you and passing out? We've got to toughen you up, cupcake!"

***

Rochelle stood off to the side, with a look on her face that I knew all too well. 

It was the "what just happened ... and why did it feel so good?" face.

I guess Joey hadn't warned her about the consequences when a person got too close to me. Literally too close.

It struck me then that Rochelle was the girl. Joey was one of the guys. But there were *two* guys that I had seen in Rochelle's memories of what had just happened.

The other guy was further back the hall, closer to the fire, and he wasn't alone.

Joey yelled back to him. "Did you find anyone else?"

I spoke up, confident of what would be the outcome.

"There's no one else here," I said haltingly, still dealing with some damage in my throat from inhaling the smoke from the fire.

"There's no one else here," shouted the boy. "Woah ... hey ... wait ..."

I couldn't see around Joey to know what was causing his excitement ... although the fact that we were all in the hallway of a basement that was on fire would have been my first guess.

As it were, I didn't have to guess.

I heard the whines and saw the blur come running right toward me.

And, in a moment that instantly brought tears to my eyes, I was reunited with my puppy dog Gator.

***

It didn't matter to me how he got there.

It didn't matter to me that I had almost died in a fire.

It didn't matter to me that I wasn't sure what was coming next.

It only mattered that my puppy was right there with me, jumping on and off my lap, dancing around, making happy whining noises I had never heard before and smothering me with kisses.

It pained me, but I had to stop Gator from doing too much more, because I was afraid that all he was doing was ingesting soot.

And, it probably goes without saying, but I cried a little.

I looked up through my tears and down the hall toward the room from which I had been rescued, and Mattie came into view.

"How?" was the one word I managed to stammer.

Mattie just smiled, pleased at that moment in time with the reunion he was witnessing.

"He's missed you," was all he said.

Joey interrupted, as only Joey could.

"We got to get out of here. Now! Can you walk?"

I gathered my strength and stood up.

"But what about the fire?" asked Mattie, before any of us made our way up the rest of the stairs. "We have to do SOMEthing!"

***

"Dude. Call it in from the car."

Joey answered Mattie's question directly, and then he continued.

"The last thing *we* need is to be linked to *that*!"

He gestured down the bar's basement hallway to the still burning fire that had been started by the molotov cocktail that had been thrown in the window.

Good kid that he was, Mattie hesitated for a moment, but then saw the wisdom in Joey's plans.

Our motley crew made our way up the stairs, through the back of the bar and out the front door. Joey and Rochelle, Mattie and me, and Gator scampering along behind us.

I had daydreamed about escaping my confines -- of being let loose to return back to my apartment in my college town in central Pennsylvania at the end of our mission -- but of all the ways I had dreamed it would happen, I never would have conjured up *this* image, that's for sure.

No creepy white van was waiting.

It was an upgrade to one of those Escalades. Clearly, Gator had ridden in it before, because Mattie opened up the passenger door and he jumped right in. He perched in the middle, and Mattie and I got in on either side.

Joey and Rochelle took the front seats.

We all adjusted our seat belts during a moment of silence, until Joey spoke.

"Where to?"

I felt compelled to respond. 

"Anywhere but here!"

***

"I was walking downtown and there's a lot of smoke coming from a building."

Mattie had made good on his promise to at least do something about the fire in the bar basement.

He continued his conversation in his cell phone, providing a few details to the dispatcher.

While I listened, I put my arms around my puppy and hugged him close.

The operator must have gotten around to asking him questions about himself, because he pretended to have interference and hung up the call.

"Feel better?" asked Joey from the driver's seat.

"Yeah. Hopefully they can save the bar," he answered.

"I don't know, man. That's a lot of alcohol that has to burn off." Joey smirked into the rear view meeting at the two of us in the back seat. "And you? You've got to nothing to say?"

I had plenty to say. But mostly it was questions that I wanted them to answer.

"Any time now ... you guys can explain how all this came about. And also ... thank you," I replied.

Mattie waved the cell phone that he had just used in front of my face.

"*This* is how. It's yours. I saw the messages you sent to it when I went over to take care of Gator at your apartment back home. *You* are how this all came about."

Ah yes. The messages I had sent from Mario's phone the night of the jeep crash when I had taken it from him. That attempt had been a shot in the dark ... a text in the ether, more accurately ... but it appeared to have worked.

Mattie continued. "I thought it was a prank at first. But the more I thought about it, and as each day passed that you didn't check in on Gator here, I began to get worried."

I hugged my puppy even closer. I sure had missed him. 

"Never again," I thought to myself. "Never again would we be separated."

***

"And how did *these* two get involved?"

I asked for more details from Mattie about how this little rescue plan came together.

"Once I got your messages and figured out that you were back in Florida, I started checking in with all the rest of us who were on the service trip a few months ago. And I found out that Joey here was actually making trips back and forth pretty regularly."

Joey made eye contact with me again in the rear view mirror and flashed his patented smirk.

"I had such a ball bringing you back home that I decided to do the drive over and over again."

"Oh I'm sure. That trip was SO much fun ..." I countered.

"Nah, that's not it. It was *her* fault." Joey pointed to Rochelle in the front seat with him. "She's preggers."

Rochelle didn't turn around or make eye contact ... she just put up her arm and waved to acknowledge that the news was true.

"Congratulations?" I didn't want to sound like a dick, so I clarified. "I mean, congratulations!"

"Oh yeah. Big news for us." I had no way of knowing for sure whether or not he was being sarcastic, but it was Joey, so I felt it a safe guess to draw that conclusion.

Mattie chimed in again. "Then when Rochelle said that she had actually seen you ... we put two and two together and Gator and I hitched a ride on Joey's next road trip."

If I hadn't been feeling lucky before, I definitely started feeling it then. Rochelle was Mario's sister's at-home nurse, and I *had* run into that morning after the after party. Of course, we didn't exactly get to chat that day, and so there was no way for me to have had a chance to inquire whether she had kept up her relationship with Joey. Although it looked like it had.

Rochelle spun around in her seat.

"Actually I'm hoping YOU can tell ME how Lourdes fits in to all this."

***

"Lourdes?"

Rochelle explained. "Mario's sister. Lourdes. She was the one I was taking care of when I saw you with Mario."

It was at that moment that I realized all this time I had never known Mario's sister's name. Strange, considering how big a role she had played in the recent turn of events -- being motivation for our scheme and all. I mean I had even met her that morning, and still she was just "Mario's sister" to me.

"Lourdes, huh. I don't think I ever knew her name. Maybe Mario called her by a nickname or something?" I offered.

"I stopped working for him because he was having problems paying me, but I left some of my stuff in her house, so we drove over today to get it -- and she was gone. The house was empty. Like everyone just up and disappeared in the middle of the night!"

In an odd way, I found that news comforting. I had had enough with Albert's double-cross -- at least the story I had gotten from Mario and Mria via that note was proving to be true. 

The note. 

It had come with an envelope full of cash.

The last I remembered, I had grabbed it before collapsing back in the room that was on fire.

But I didn't have it now.

Rochelle had still been talking, but I hadn't been paying attention.

I realized that everyone was staring at me, waiting for some kind of response. She must have asked me a question.

I took a stab at that being right. "I'm sorry, could you repeat that?"

"Sure." Rochelle nodded her head. "I asked you if everything was all right. You don't look so good. And I'm not just talking about all the soot ..."

***

I stammered a reply.

"I. Uh. I uh ... I just remembered that I had something very important with me in that room, and I'm afraid it burned up in the fire."

Joey chimed in from the driver's seat.

"Yeah ... I don't see how ANYthing could have survived that."

Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed that Mattie was fidgeting with his cargo shorts. He slipped the tip of an envelope out of his side leg pocket, and showed me that he had picked up the cash that Mario and Mria had left for me. He gave me a conspiratorial wink. 

I wasn't sure why he was hiding it, but he must have decided to keep it a secret from the other two for reasons I'd have to find out after the car ride.

Comforted, I re-engaged Rochelle in the conversation.

"So she's just up and gone, eh?"

I was referring to Mario's sister, whom I now knew to be named Lourdes.

Rochelle answered. "Yes. And that made us extra suspicious, so we decided to speed up our own plans to take care of your release ... and we rushed over to the bar to see if you too had just disappeared -- but you hadn't."

I've always marveled at how much life was inter-connected in ways that at first seemed random.

Had they not arrived when they did, I'd have been dead for sure.

"It's all in the timing. It's always in the timing," I thought to myself.

***

"Wait a minute. How'd you get into the bar?"

That part of their story didn't make sense to me.

"I mean, I'm glad you did, of course. But still ... if Jorge the owner isn't back from his cruise yet ... and Mario left town ... and Albert's no longer with us .. then how did you just walk right in?"

Mattie raised his hand.

"That was me. I work there now. I got a job."

"What?" I asked, somewhat incredulously.

"We thought that would be the best way to figure out what was going on. And they were hiring shot-boys. Funny thing -- I was in the basement one day when that door was open, but Mario wouldn't let me pass down the hallway."

Mattie's voice. That's who it was that day I heard someone that sounded so familiar. No wonder I couldn't recognize it, though, as I would never have guessed that he was a part of it all.

"Then one night I was gossiping with Julie, and she wanted to know if I had met the silent partner -- that's what she called you. I don't know what she thought you did, but she said that she had seen you in the basement ... and that she had let you in last night at the back door. It was thanks to her that I had a sense of where specifically to look for you today."

Julie. That girl that walked in on Mario and me that time when she was looking for the moscato.

In any other circumstances, I would have considered sending her a bottle as thanks.

But these weren't typical circumstances.

"And that pretty much catches you up to now," Mattie concluded.

"Just in time, 'cause we're here," added Joey from the front seat.

It looked to me like we had pulled into the parking lot of a resort. 

For the first time, I felt the full weight of my freedom. I had survived. But only with the help of my friends.

***

My friends.

I paused for a moment and thought about that classification.

Mattie was my dog sitter. Rochelle -- my nurse. Joey -- someone I had only met a few months prior.

Of the three, I had spent the most time with Joey ... but not all of that was exactly by choice. And when he had dropped me off at my school apartment after the drive up the coast at the end of the service trip because the dean forced him to be my transport, that was the last time I had seen him ... up until my "rescue".

I had always been a loner. Happy to be alone. Not sad and lonely ... but powerful and independent.

Yet here I was.

Calling people friends.

Relying on people I was actually considering as friends.

Only alive due to the action of friends.

Maybe there was a lesson in there somewhere.

Joey snapped me out of my reverie.

"So ... Rochelle and I are going to go and get some food. Why don't you guys head into the hotel room, and we'll be back soon with some pizza and beer."

Pizza and beer. 

That sounded like the perfect homecoming meal ... even if I wasn't quite yet "home". But hey -- I was with friends.

***

Mattie and Gator and I made our way into the resort hotel room, while Joey and Rochelle drove off to get pizza and beer.

I was instantly reminded of my solo visit to Florida, when I had arrived in advance of our service group trip to enjoy some alone time on spring break *before* we all started working on fixing up what ended up being Laura's house.

The first thing that called out to me was the bed. A nice, big, soft, comfy bed. It was such the opposite of the cot on which I had been sleeping for over a week in the room in the basement of the bar where I had been locked up.

Gator jumped up on it ... and I decided to follow his lead.

Mattie started cleaning off the loveseat that was in the corner.

"Um ... sure ... just make yourself at home. You should rest. I'll wake you up when they get back with the food."

He stopped his efforts for a moment and headed toward the phone in his room, picking it up and dialing the front desk.

"Hello. This is room 105. I'm going to need a cot for tonight, if you can have one brought over."

I couldn't help it. I groaned from the spot I had claimed on the bed. 

Another cot.

The more things change ... the more they stay the same.

Maybe I could talk him into taking the cot and letting me have the bed. The big, soft, comfy bed.

***

"We should talk."

I just wanted to sleep.

Cuddled up with my puppy, snuggled into the hotel bed.

I didn't care that it was the middle of the afternoon. I didn't care that I might slip into one of my subconscious states. I didn't care that going to sleep might have meant that I'd be visited by Papa Kalfu.

I just wanted to sleep.

But Mattie wanted to talk.

"About the envelope. With the money."

Mattie pulled it out of his cargo shorts pocket, and he continued doing all the talking.

"You were holding on to this for dear life back in that room ... when, ironically, you were almost dying ... so I figured it might be important. And then when I took a look inside it, I could see why."

I just wanted to sleep.

Now I'd have to explain.

"Well I guess I could start with the note," I offered.

"No note," was his reply. "Just the cash. A pretty good amount of cash."

The note must have been left behind in the fire. *That* was going to be a problem.

***

I saw it as a lose-lose situation.

Of course, that was the way I looked at just about any situation when I was no longer in control.

If the note burned up in the fire, I had no proof that the things I had done were at the behest of others ... that I was just a pawn, albeit somewhat willing -- at least had things stayed on track with the master plan.

If the note didn't burn up in the fire and was found in the clean up efforts, then I had practically signed an arrest warrant for Mario and Mria by leaving it behind.

I had to respond to Mattie.

He was looking at me quizzically, and he followed that up with an actual quiz.

"What exactly were you doing? Why do you have all this money? Were you the victim? Or the victor?"

I did what any person would do when being interrogated. 

I turned it around on the questioner and asked him a question.

"You kept it a secret in the car. I'm guessing you didn't share this with Joey or Rochelle?"

Mattie nodded his head affirmatively.

"I wanted to learn more first. And, if I'm being completely honest, I've seen how money changes people. I was concerned ... and I wanted to give you a chance to explain."

With that simple exchange, I realized that I knew so very little about Mattie.

***

The longer I kept Mattie talking, the longer I could delay answering his original question as to why I was pulled out of the fire clutching an envelope full of cash.

"What do you mean, 'you've seen how money changes people'?" I asked.

"I *come* from money. I know," he quickly answered.

I couldn't help myself. I said the first thing that came to mind.

"But you're a dog walker?"

Mattie smiled. "I do *that* for fun. And seeing as how I have so much time on my hands since I don't have to work for a living."

I immediately felt embarrassed for having commented that way.

Mattie continued.

"Yep ... I'm a trust fund baby. But it's done a number on my family. I mean -- don't get me wrong. I'm super stoked that I have access to it. But I can assure you that when they say it's the root of all evil -- they ain't kidding."

I had to fight my instinct to reach out and grab his arm and just take his memories so that I could understand better.

That was an unfortunate side effect of having been locked up like I was. I had come to see my talent as a tool -- as a means to an end -- and I had stopped seeing it as a gift.

I couldn't prolong the discussion any more. Mattie looked me dead in the eyes, held up the wad of cash, and asked again, "So ... were you really the victim here?"

***

"How much time do you got?"

Mattie wanted to know the story, and there was a lot to tell.

My question prompted him to check the time, and it was apparently later than he thought, based on his reply.

"Actually, not a lot. I have to start getting ready for work ... although, with the fire, I have no idea what I'll be walking into at the bar. But I don't want to NOT go ... in order to protect our cover. I mean, assuming that having a cover is important. Which brings me back to my need to know what's *really* going on? Can't you just give me the short version?"

I sighed. I was never one to tell a story very quickly.

"One more question for you," I said to Mattie. "Did Joey tell you anything about me?"

"What do you mean?" he deflected back to me.

"I'm not trying to give you the run-around, I promise. It's just that ... well I don't know how to say this ... but there's something *different* about me since our first trip to Florida."

Mattie was listening attentively.

I knew that I had to eventually get around to explain all that money.

The longer the pause, the more time Mattie had to connect the dots.

I just hadn't counted on him seeing the wrong picture.

"Hey. I get it. Don't worry about it. Some of my best friends are that way."

***

"Wait ... what?"

Mattie had misinterpreted my comments.

"Look. It's modern times. Who hasn't gotten drunk at a college party and woken up the next morning with a surprise in the bed? We've all been there."

I wanted to answer him and tell him that I hadn't had that particular experience during my college years. And, now that I had officially graduated, how I maybe had missed my opportunity to do so. How, truth be told, I hadn't exactly ventured into relationships of ANY kind, being so committed to my own independence as I was all my life.

But again ... I really didn't know Mattie that well to have that kind of personal discussion. Although, the longer we talked, the more about *him* I was learning.

He continued. "And the bar where you were locked up. I mean, I worked there. I *work* there. I see the clientele that come in. I'm a shot-boy, for goodness sakes. I know what's going on. I watch people. I see things"

I decided to let the comment slide and just move on to telling my version of how I got to the point where we were at that moment.

"Let me start again. I discovered that I had special skill ... and it was in demand ... and I was kidnapped the night before my planned vacation -- when you were already booked to come dog sit -- and I was spirited away back to Florida -- back here."

"So you were 'forced' to do something to someone ... but then you got paid to do it?"

His eyes got really big.

"Are you a sex slave?"

***

"Wait ... WHAT?!?"

I realize that I had said the same thing to Mattie that I had only just said to him moments before ... but this time I did it in all caps and added an exclamation point.

Somehow my attempts to explain myself had gotten completely and utterly twisted.

"No ... No ... NO. I'm NOT a sex slave. I'm not gay. I'm not a gay sex slave."

"Not that there's anything wrong with that ..." interjected Mattie with a smirk.

The strange conversation was, at the very least, a little eye-opening for me. I was so deep in my own story, surrounded by people who knew things about me -- and who were using what they knew for their benefit -- that I hadn't thought at all about how it appeared to someone who knew nothing.

Or next to nothing.

I decided right then and there that the *only* way I could accelerate the process of getting Mattie up to speed was to show him.

He had just told me that he had a past where he saw money corrupt people and change his family dynamic.

Surely there would be pain associated with those memories that was somewhere under the surface.

"Look at me," I said quietly as I reached out and grabbed his wrist.

He did as he was told.

Much to my surprise ... absolutely nothing happened.

***

Nothing.

Nothing at all.

I should have experienced *something* when I grabbed Mattie's arm.

I was making eye contact. I had the beginnings of a story from his past that had to have included painful memories.

But there was nothing.

Nothing at all.

"Ummmm ... this is a little creepy."

Mattie interrupted my thoughts.

"I'm sorry." I quickly apologized. "I thought it would be easier to *show* you. But it's not working."

"Okay. Whatever. I'm going to need you to let go now."

Mattie pulled his arm away from mine.

And hey ... let's be fair. I probably would have done the same thing.

Did Papa Kalfu somehow succeed in taking away my gift? Was it gone nearly as fast as it had appeared?

Was this the end ... so close to the beginning?

***

CHAPTER 33

If there had been an "awkward-meter" there with us in the hotel room, measuring the interaction between Mattie and I, it would have come close to exploding at that very moment.

"This is getting creepy, dude."

Mattie repeated his review of the situation.

I had no idea why (at least, at that time), but my attempt to explain my special skill by putting Mattie through the paces just wasn't working. 

So I had no choice.

I had to release the hold I had on his forearm.

"Can't you just *tell* me about what happened?" he continued.

I took a deep breath.

"I got wrapped up in some stuff. It wasn't my choice at the outset ... but by the end, I was mixed up in it and I couldn't really get out. I'm convinced that I did what I did for all the right reasons, but a lot of wrong things happened."

That was the best summary I could provide. Except there was one more thing -- the thing that piqued his curiosity in the first place.

"The envelope of cash IS indeed my payout for services provided. I appreciate that you kept it a secret ... and I just ask that you do so a little bit longer until I figure out exactly where it is I'm headed next."

***

"A little bit longer. I can handle that."

That was all I had asked of Mattie.

He had more to say.

"But soon ... *really* soon ... I'm going to have to know more details."

I nodded my head in agreement.

"Sure. Of course. Without a doubt."

Satisfied, Mattie slipped me the cash filled envelope.

"So this is yours."

He handed it to me just in time.

Joey and Rochelle walked in the front door of the hotel room, with a pizza box and a six pack container in hand.

"Din-din kids!" Joey yelled as he set both on the table by the window.

Mattie went over and opened the box to see that their were only two pieces left in it.

Joey smirked and added, "Well -- what's left of it, anyway."

He turned to me next. 

"You want a beer? Or just pills?"

***

"Awww ... you remembered!"

I knew what Joey was referencing when he asked me if I wanted pills with my alcohol.

After all, we had almost come to blows that time he caught me taking some of his sleeping pills in the hotel room that night on the way back up to campus after our spring break brouhaha.

Joey was still in non-stop smirk mode. He tossed me a partially filled pill bottle.

"I thought you could probably use a few to get you through the next few days," he added.

Mattie, whom I noticed was observing everything, arched an eyebrow ... but said nothing.

I barely resisted the urge to pop one right away, but I knew immediately that I'd be sleeping soundly tonight ... without having to worry about the prying eyes of Papa Kalfu looking through the contents of my brain.

And *that* was a thought I thought I'd never have to think.

Through a mouth that was still chewing his pizza, Mattie announced, "Hey ... I've got to go get to work. Or at least to see what's left of the place after the fire."

Joey chimed in next.

"Rochelle and I are out of here too."

Mattie said the first thing that popped into his head.

"Who's going to watch *him*?"

***

At first I thought that the *him* to whom Mattie was referring was *him* as in Gator, my puppy dog, who was keenly aware that there was pizza being eaten in his vicinity.

But that was not the case.

The *him* in Mattie's question of "who was going to watch *him*" was *him* as in ME!

Before I could protest, Joey answered.

"Hey -- not me. Not us. Rochelle and I have some appointments lined up to go look at houses."

"Down here?" I asked, not able to contain my surprise.

"Yep." He pointed at Rochelle's belly. "I'm going to be a dad now. So it's time to settle down. I'm NOT going to be anything like my father. You of all people should know that."

I did know about his father. And about how Joey had felt betrayed by him when he abandoned him and his mother after meeting someone else while serving overseas. I had heard the story before ... but more than that, I had felt all of Joey's feelings about the situation one of the multiple times that we had had one of our little exchanges.

"Speaking of ..."

He moved so quickly that I had no time to prepare myself.

Joey strode across the room right at me and grabbed my face by the chin.

He looked me squarely in the eyes, and he got exactly the result he wanted.

***

If Joey kept up this behavior, I was going to have to get him one of those punch cards.

Something to the effect of "five instances of taking away your pain ... and the sixth one's free!".

Although, seeing as how I wasn't charging for using my special skill, I guess that concept was kind of irrelevant.

With the direct eye contact, and the skin to skin contact ... I was connected to Joey's past immediately, and I began to instantly feel his anger and disappointment and hatred toward his father for what he had done to his family. Because we had already done this before on this same topic, we already shared the memories in a way ... so there wasn't a build-up -- it was at the highest intensity right from the start.

That also meant that it didn't take long at all for Joey to get what he needed.

He gently and playfully pushed me backwards as he released his hold on my jaw.

"Thanks, buddy. I didn't want to be in a bad mood for the rest of the night." His upper body gave off the slightest shudder as he walked away.

"Feelin' good!" he yelled as he steered Rochelle out of the hotel room to run their errands of going to see houses in the neighborhood.

I looked at Mattie, and his raised eyebrow still hadn't lowered.

"What. Was. That?" he muttered.

"I tried to tell you. I'm different. Special. I got skills," I replied.

As I heard myself say those words, it hit me that my talent had just worked with Joey ... which meant that Papa Kalfu hadn't succeeded in taking it from me ... and which meant I had no explanation for why it hadn't worked on Mattie just moments before.

***

"Well you and your 'skills' will have to wait here until I get home tonight to explain more. If I don't get my ass out of here, I'm going to be late ... "

Mattie rushed into the bathroom and finished whatever he needed to do to get ready for work.

"I have to get focused," he said from the other room, "because I have to pretend that I have no idea about what happened at the bar this afternoon. I'm not much of one for acting, but this is going to be SOME performance!"

He stopped at the mirror to spike his hair one last time.

"Make yourself at home. And, if I can be so bold, you might want to start putting together where we go from here -- because it sounds like Joey has a plan ... but I have no idea how you and I are supposed to get out of this mess."

He walked out the door, but then stuck his head back in again.

"I'm not sure when I'll be home, in light of all this. But remember -- you get the cot. I get the bed!"

Then he was gone.

And I was alone.

Well, with Gator, which meant I wasn't alone at all. 

Seeing as how the cot hadn't been delivered yet, and how Gator was curled up on the bed already, I convinced myself that, at the very least, I could take a much needed nap on it despite Mattie's last words to me.

The question was ... to pill or not to pill?

***

If I took the sleeping pill, I knew for sure I would rest peacefully.

If I didn't, then there was a really good chance I'd have to deal with "andantes" at best, or even Papa Kalfu at worst.

However, pilled up, I might sleep and not wake up until morning. And the hotel staff was supposed to be bringing up a cot at any moment ... and I didn't want to risk missing that delivery.

Ultimately, the timeline for the evening -- what with expecting Joey and Rochelle to return after house hunting, and Mattie to come back after his shift was over -- meant that this was to be no more than a nap.

So I decided against the pill.

Instead, I did the next best thing ... and I did a thing I had missed for too too long. 

I cuddled up next to Gator and turned on the television.

And that was a mistake.

What I heard was the most. Dramatic. Voice. Ever.

"Coming up on FIRST ON FIVE ... the latest developments in the SHOCKING nightclub Paradise Monkey Murders. ONLY ONE STATION has the STARTLING twist now impeding the investigation."

That teaser alone would have kept any normal person wide awake enough -- at least long enough to hear those "shocking" and "startling" details.

The fact that the accompanying image was of Papa Kalfu's bar where I had been the night before was enough to make me leap up from the bed.

There would be no napping.

***

Something had clearly gone down after I had departed.

Mario and Mria's note to me -- the one that had accompanied all the cash but that was now "missing" and maybe back at the scene of the fire -- had started off by saying that there were three deaths at Papa Kalfu's bar.

Now the news coverage was also talking about it ... and they were going so far as to call them "murders".

I knew for sure that Papa Kalfu was alive ... after all, I had every reason to believe that HE was the one who through the molotov cocktail through the window of the room in the basement at Joey's (the bar where I was locked up ... which coincidentally shared its name with one of my "friends" who rescued me).

I had left Albert, Rodney and Stanley all behind -- but they were ALL alive and breathing as I ran out the door. 

That being said, the signs were pointing to their demise.

Papa Kalfu's bar was called Paradise Found, which would explain why they had referenced that nightclub by name.

But "Monkey Murders" made no sense at all to me whatsoever.

I was going to have to get my news the old fashioned way ...

I was going to have to wait out the time until the 5pm broadcast was on the television.

It was going to be a long ten minutes.

***

Ten minutes.

Ten minutes of whatever daytime judge show had to run its course before I could get the news I was so desperately seeking.

Ten minutes of finding out who was hiding secrets from whom, and who was going to get what, and who was so far removed from the truth that they could never have a court ordered happy ending.

I couldn't suddenly get interested in the show. As it was, the courtroom setting only served to remind me of that crazy dream I had had with my dead mother as a judge ... the very first time I met Papa Kalfu - as the prosecutor in that "vision" -- that actually might have represented Papa using his voodoo magic to get inside my head.

Finally it ended and the credits rolled.

As they shrunk to the bottom of the screen, the evening news desk and the reporters filled the rest.

"Now ... FIRST on FIVE," one of them intoned dramatically to kick off the newscast.

Gator jumped up from his napping spot on the bed and charged toward the door, providing his "warning bark" over and over again.

"Hello. I have your cot," I heard from the other side of it.

Of course, the delivery of the cot. That was expected.

What was UNexpected was the image on the TV screen behind me.

"Authorities are looking for YOUR help in locating THESE persons of interest."

There I was. Well, a sketch version of me. Next to a sketch version of the kid who had been sitting next to me at the bar that night before he threw his bottle at Stanley the bartender and stormed out.

If I opened the door, I'd be standing there in front of a version of my wanted poster.

"Hello. Hello! This is housekeeping. Are you there?"

***

"Ummmm ... Yep. I'm in here. But I have a dog. And he's a little excited."

I motioned with my head at Gator and nodded toward the door.

In a whisper, I said to him, "That's your cue buddy. Bark some more."

Unfortunately, I had never trained him to bark on command. He cocked his head back and forth not sure why we were at a standstill with one person on one side of the door, and us on the other. I could tell that he was thinking that, by now, he should have had the chance to meet the person was going to be a new friend -- in his eyes.

"C'mon buddy. Bark!" I requested of him, just a little bit louder.

"What's that?" The hotel employee could clearly hear me.

I needed this little stand-off to end quickly.

I was missing the news. News that was about me.

"Thanks! Just drop the cot off out there, and I'll get it in a minute. Really appreciate it!"

"Okay," said the voice on the other side of the door. "Just let us know at the front desk if you need anything else."

Victory was mine.

Now that I knew that I was a wanted man, I had bought a little bit more time with regards to not being seen by anyone "on the outside".

Next on my agenda ... finding out exactly how it was that the news was flashing a sketch artist's picture of me and encouraging everyone in the viewing audience to help find me.

***

The cot could stay outside of the door on the stoop a little longer.

I needed to watch the news in a way I had never needed to watch the news before.

I had missed the opening while I was dealing with the hotel employee, but they had clearly gone to someone "in the field" who was standing in the parking lot of Papa Kalfu's bar. It looked a little different to me in the light of day, but it was clearly the place where Rodney and I had succeeded in robbing him of his hidden drug money.

"Thank you Peter." 

Peter must have been the lead anchor behind the desk on the newscast. The screen identified the young man with the microphone as Bob Creek. He spoke in a very specific pattern, biting off every few words very dramatically.

"I am standing outside of the CLUB Paradise Lost in Flagler Village, where, in the WEE hours of the morning, local police discovered a GRUESOME scene in the back room after being alerted by a jogger to the fact that a door was hanging OPEN. I have to issue a warning ... the following information may be DISTURBING. Young ones should NOT be watching."

Bob the field reporter gave a stern look to the camera.

After a few seconds of him staring down the viewers, the live shot switched over to a packaged video.

The aforementioned jogger was on the screen, explaining his side of the story.

"I always run along the train tracks in the morning, and it's so peaceful because none of the businesses are open and no people are around ... which is why it was so noticeable that the light was shining into the parking lot. I noticed the door was just hanging open, and there were no cars anywhere to be seen. I didn't want to just walk right in, but I felt something was wrong, so I called 911. Nowadays, I firmly believe that if you see something, you have to say something ..."

***

The newscast continued.

They no longer had the jogger on the screen, and instead they had a shot of the main door of the bar -- *with* the police tape going across it.

Bob, the reporter, was providing a voiceover in his unique style.

"What the police FOUND when they arrived was SHOCKING. In the BACK room of the bar that authorities are saying was an office, three BLOODIED bodies were discovered. But there were more SHOCKS ahead. One victim was MISSING a TONGUE, another an EAR and a third an EYE."

Bob was back on the screen and back in the live feed.

"At this time, it is too EARLY in the investigation to KNOW with what EVIL these three came into contact, but it is CERTAIN that a sick and twisted PERSON is loose in our community. Within the last hour, the police released THESE sketches ..."

The visual switched again to my portrait, side by side with the young kid at the bar who sat next to me for most of the evening, until he threw a fit and left during last call.

"The police have EMPHASIZED that these are simply persons of INTEREST at this time."

It was the first time in my life that I was a person of interest.

I didn't like the feeling.

I don't recommend it to anyone.

***

It's the strangest feeling looking at yourself on the TV screen as the work product of a sketch artist.

Happily, I didn't have to do it any longer.

Bob the reporter was on the screen instead.

"Again, the authorities need YOUR help. If you have ANY information, please call the tip line at the NUMBER on the screen."

Somewhere, in a call center nearby, I imagined a bank of phones ringing all at once.

"This is BOB Creek, reporting to you LIVE from the scene of the Paradise Nightclub Monkey Murders."

Monkey murders.

I had seen the newscast and I still didn't understand why they had been given that nickname.

Then it hit me.

A missing eye. A missing ear. A missing tongue.

See no evil. Hear no evil. Speak no evil.

*I* knew that it wasn't about the monkeys. 

This was about the *evil*. This had to be the handiwork of Papa Kalfu.

***

As the news continued and they moved beyond their lead story, I replayed the events that I had witnessed in the back office at Papa Kalfu's bar.

I was more than certain that the three of them were ALIVE when I escaped.

Sure, Rodney and Stanley had both been shot ... and Rodney's ear had been bitten.

Oh ... wait. Rodney's ear. So that explained one of the victims.

That meant bartender Stanley and turncoat Albert had to be the other two ... one without an eye and one without a tongue.

The more I thought about what happened, the more I realized I *could* make an educated guess as to which one was which.

I heard Papa Kalfu threaten Albert that he talked too much. 

And I knew that Papa Kalfu had trained Stanley to avoid making eye contact with me -- a task at which he failed (courtesy of Rodney shooting him) ... and a task for which he was apparently punished.

But still ... death? 

Even if he had inflicted punishment on the three of them ... death was kind of the ultimate punishment.

Although, all things considered, assuming my hunch was right, he had tried to kill ME when he started my basement prison on fire.

So maybe death followed him around.

Or maybe something else was going on.

Something much worse than death.

***

The news was so startling that I zoned out.

Like a trance ... mulling the report over and over again in my mind.

I lost track of time, and I found myself reliving what I had gone through -- what might have been the most eventful 24 hours of my life.

I thought about the night at Papa Kalfu's bar, and about the people we met while we were waiting for closing time. I thought about every single one of them and I distinctly saw every face.

I replayed the moments when we were executing the plan as intended ... when Rodney and I successfully forced the bartender to give up the combination to the special safe where the drug money was stored.

I remembered when it all fell apart ... when Albert rushed in and admitted that he was double crossing everyone.

I recalled when Papa Kalfu showed up ... when he was ready to make me bleed so that he could take on my powers.

I flashed back to my escape ... to my trip to Laura's house to hide some of the cash that I had ended up stealing from those for whom I had stole the money in the first place ... to my awkward breakup with Mario and Mria by note.

I saw again the molotov cocktail come crashing through my window ... and the fire spread quickly through my confined place.

I felt the feeling one more time that it was all over ... followed by the unmistakable relief of having been rescued by the most unlikely of compatriots.

Finally, I heard the newscaster say again and again that the three bodies found at the bar were all dead.

I don't how many times I experienced that line of thought on a an endless loop.

I only snapped out of it when I was able to draw the inevitable conclusion after reviewing the facts so many times ...

I faced the truth that he would clearly be coming for me next.

***

There's a certain power in an epiphany.

When it's a good one, it provides focus and clarity and purpose.

My epiphany that Papa Kalfu was going to come after me next was indeed a good one.

I made eye contact with Gator and said aloud, "You and me gotta get out of here, boy. We have to go!"

He gazed back at me, as if he was processing my comment. With a cocked head, I felt like he was asking me to repeat myself.

"We have to go," I muttered with a sigh.

Upon retrospect, I recognize that he likely responded to the word "go" as something he had heard before, but in that moment, I was convinced that he was on my wavelength ... because he bounded off the bed and ran excitedly to the door.

"No, no," I laughed. "Not *now*. But soon."

He was not being dissuaded. He barked in reply in a tone that I had most definitely heard before.

The die had been cast.

He and I *were* leaving at that very moment.

Gator had spoken.

***

It was true that we had to leave the hotel room for good soon enough ... but we also had to leave the hotel room for now.

I grabbed the leash and met Gator at the door.

"Ok boy ... let's go potty."

I could have blamed it on the fact that I was still distracted by what I had learned from the newscast.

I could have blamed it on the fact that it was now dusk and it was harder to see.

I could have blamed it on the employee who had followed my directions and left the cot *right* there outside of the door.

Regardless of where I placed the blame, the reality was that dog, cot, leash and I were soon in a pile on the ground in front of the resort hotel room.

I'm sure I yelled ... I'm not sure if I swore ... and then I immediately felt like the world was looking at me. Well, the world of the resort.

I knew for sure that at least two other rooms flipped on their outdoor lights, and I was certain that one head got poked out of a door across the courtyard.

But what I couldn't prove but still felt in my soul was that every single guest ran to their window and took a peek out of their blinds at the commotion.

Being self conscious about it was one thing ... but that thing became amplified when the image of my "person of interest" drawing that had just been on the news flashed into my mind.

I was suddenly the opposite of inconspicuous at a time when I needed to be laying low.

***

Compounding the issue, in the fall, was that I had let go of the leash. Lying on the ground as I was, I watched with concern as Gator took off across the hotel courtyard.

He didn't seem to be focused on anything or anyone in particular, but he was intent on getting his energy out and getting his run on.

For the second time that day, I had a white knight ride in to save me.

"Every time I see you, you're in some kind of trouble crashed on the ground next to a cot. What is *up* with you?"

Mattie smiled down at me.

"Very funny," I replied, giving him a wan version of the same.

Mattie let out a shrill whistle, and called for Gator.

"Who's first? Him or you?" he asked.

"So ... I'm afraid people are watching," I whispered. "And I saw myself on the news."

Mattie was quick on his feet. He shed his hoodie and tossed it at me.

"Yeah ... you better go in. I'll get Gator."

I tried to hide my face with the extra clothing, and I rushed back into the hotel room.

Mattie followed shortly after with Gator. 

We spoke to each other at the same time. "You're home early," -- the observation from me -- crossed paths with his announcement: "He peed."

He was next to speak -- but by himself this time.

"They closed 'cause of the fire. But the cops were there, and they were asking lots of questions."

***

"You know how you just said that you saw yourself on the news? Well they were flashing that picture around at the bar tonight when they were asking questions."

My transition to fugitive was now fully complete.

"But wait," Mattie continued. "It gets worse."

"How so?" I asked.

"They also had *video* of you on their tablets. It must have come from Papa Kalfu's bar, and it was definitely you as a customer. Did you know there was a camera facing the door right above the jukebox? From what I saw, you practically posed for pictures for a good five or ten minutes."

The jukebox. It was how I had passed the time until closing, waiting for the moment when Rodney and I could make our move.

"So they know who I am," I concluded.

"Well ... that's not exactly true. They have your picture but they haven't identified you ... yet. I'm afraid it's only a matter of time, though."

I wasn't exactly sure what he meant. So I pushed back.

"I don't understand. Everyone who knew me is gone -- unless Mario or Mria come back into the picture -- but I thought they left town with his sick sister."

Mattie shook his head.

"You're forgetting someone. The someone who connected the dots for *me*. The someone who saw you down in the basement."

I had forgotten all about that someone.

***

Her name was Julie. Or Julia. Or something like that.

And she had seen me twice -- once when she walked in to my locked room in the basement of the bar where I was being kept, on a night that the door wasn't locked obviously ... and a second time when I showed up at the back door immediately after I escaped from Papa Kalfu's place, and after I had hidden my stash of cash out at Laura's house.

I confirmed with Mattie that that's the person he had just referenced.

"That Julie girl, right?"

He agreed with me. "Exactly."

As I thought about it more, I realized that it might not be so bad after all.

"She just thought that I worked with Mario. She doesn't know my name. She doesn't know *why* I was there. Hell, she didn't even know that I wasn't there of my own volition."

Mattie shook his head.

"Yeah but here's the problem. She can put you at the scene of the fire, and that means that she can connect you to damage done at *both* bars."

"And so ..." I interjected.

"And so ... the cops are investigating this as a hate crime. They see a triple murder at a bar owned by a Haitian ... and arson at a bar owned by a gay guy. If you get charged with a hate crime, you're done for life."

***

"Yeah but I'm innocent!" I protested.

Mattie snorted in response.

"You would NOT be the first person sitting in jail that was innocent. And the triple murder -- with the horrible way it happened -- there's a chance that you'd be sitting on death row as an innocent."

Mattie could see right away that his comments had hit me hard.

I sat down on the bed, and instinctively reached out to put my hands on Gator for comfort.

There was silence in the hotel room.

An uncomfortable silence, that Mattie finally broke.

"Hey ... I'm sorry. It's just that you weren't there today. The police are really pushing on this. It's a vacation town. There's a lot of money in the tourism lobby that's going to push hard to wrap this up as soon as possible before people get scared away. We have to have a plan."

It was subtle, but it was there.

We have to have a plan. He started that sentence with a "we".

I was not alone in this mess. I had someone who was going to help me.

It's just that I had no idea *what* exactly WE were going to do.

Hopelessness was the darkness surrounding me, yet Mattie was a glimmer of light shining through.

We just needed a plan ... and we needed one before *I* ran out of time.

***

CHAPTER 34

"The cot. It's still outside. I'll be right back."

Mattie had brought Gator in before our chat, but that damn cot over which I had tripped was indeed still out on the little lawn in front of the motel room.

I held Gator to avoid another situation where he would have gotten excited and bolted out to the courtyard.

Mattie returned relatively quickly, hauling the cot behind him.

"Your bed's here!" he announced with a faux excitement. "Although ... it got a little dirty ... so you might want to clean it up a bit."

Oh the irony.

I was still going to be sleeping on a damn cot.

Mattie was searching for something I could use to wipe off the dirt, and he grabbed what he must have thought was a crumpled up towel on the floor.

"Here you go!" he said as he tossed it to me.

I recognized it for what it was the moment I caught it.

It wasn't a crumpled up towel.

It was the item I had used to hold the bills back when I made my getaway with the stolen cash.

I must have had it near me when I was rescued from the basement, and it somehow made it to here.

It was MY bloody shirt. And holding it reminded me of too too many things.

***

That bloody shirt was like a bloody bad penny, following me around.

Originally, it was the shirt I was wearing that night I had tried to escape from my locked basement room by pounding on the ceiling above me to draw attention to myself ... and the attention I drew was Albert, who came down and gave me a beating, making it bloody in the first place.

More recently, it was the shirt that had been stuffed in Rodney's mouth when he was tied up on the floor of the back office at Papa Kalfu's bar -- the one that I had taken out of his mouth at the last minute to use as a way to carry out the stolen drug money that I had cut free from the bag in Papa Kalfu's "frozen" hand after I stunned him with some three way memory electricity action in order to make my escape from him.

But most importantly, it was the shirt that, when I had found it again in Papa Kalfu's office, led to the admission from him that he used the stains on it in order to get inside my head ... because I wasn't the only one with tricks.

I had learned the hard way that Papa K could have cared less about the theft of his cash that night ... that he wanted to bleed me out in order to absorb my power. He was fascinated with my blood.

My blood ... it was then I remembered that he had scratched my face with his ring when he had slapped me, and that he had paused to gather that fresh blood on his fingernail and licked it.

Which was the crux of my revelation ... that monster had replenished the fuel that fired up his ability to get into my noggin while I slept.

I must have been standing there motionless as I put all of this together.

"Hey -- you okay?"

Mattie interrupted my thinking trance.

I answered him with a quiet tired voice.

"I can't fall asleep tonight. I have to stay awake ... for the next few *days*."

***

"I get that you're excited. But I don't recommend going *that* long without sleeping," was Mattie's reply, said with half a smile.

He probably thought I was exaggerating ... but I was being literal.

I realized I was going to have to bring Mattie up to speed on some more of the facts behind my situation.

"I know that I've barely filled you in on this," I started, "but I think you realize that the trouble I'm in goes way beyond the normal vacation shenanigans."

Mattie nodded his head indicating that he had indeed reached that conclusion.

"Earlier, when you saw my interaction with Joey?" I took a deep breath, and then shared my secret. "I have the ability to take away the painful memories of another person with just a touch.."

I paused, expecting to have to deal with confusion or disbelief on his part.

But there wasn't any ... so I continued.

"It started on my way down here to Florida for our spring break service trip, so it's still kind of new to me. Not very many people know about it, but Joey does ... and at my rescue, Rochelle actually experienced it for herself."

Mattie was listening intently. He seemed receptive to everything I had shared so far.

"Actually ... that's what I was trying to tell you earlier. I was trying to tell you by *showing* you ... but, for some reason, you and I didn't have the connection that I expected."

Finally Mattie broke his silence.

"*That's* a long story ... but I'm not surprised and I think I know why. A story for another time ..."

***

It was time for the telling of MY tale.

The telling of *his* tale would have to wait for another time.

But it was a note I filed away for later. There had to be a reason that my trick wouldn't work on him, and Mattie had just made it sound like he had an inkling as to why. Clearly, there *was* a tale to tell.

Seeing as how he gave me the opening to continue, I did just that.

"It was *that* gift that landed me in trouble. As I said in my texts -- the ones you intercepted -- I was basically kidnapped from my apartment the night before you were coming over to take care of Gator, and I got all entangled with a bunch of people who also knew about what I could do."

I paused for a moment, somewhat surprised that all I had been through could be summarized so quickly.

"That group used me as their secret weapon in order to steal cash from a local drug lord, who uses the other bar as his cover, and things went sour at the very end. The money in the envelope that you grabbed when you saved me ... the secret you're keeping from Joey and Rochelle -- that's my 'cut' for what I did."

I realized that point needed clarification.

"And what I did was use my skill to get the safe combination out of an employee ... I had *nothing* to do with the deaths of any of those three in the news. I swear."

It was Mattie's turn to speak.

"I believe you. If I didn't believe you, I wouldn't be here now."

***

I'm not going to lie.

It felt good to get affirmed.

"So I take it this Papa Kalfu was the drug lord you just mentioned?" asked Mattie.

I nodded to confirm.

"He is. And he's apparently got some voodoo skills. He's been inside my head while I was dreaming, and it wasn't just because I was thinking about him. I found out that he can get in through the blood of his 'victims'. He had that bloody shirt that you threw at me to clean up the cot, with MY blood on it ... and he was using that for access to my mindspace."

I think I may have been testing the limits of how much Mattie would accept.

"Voodoo, huh? That's some crazy stuff," he stated.

"Yeah, I was not expecting any of that. But he was literally planning on cutting me open in his bar and drinking my blood. I escaped ... and took the bloody shirt with me before he could do that ... BUT he had scratched me earlier in the night when he had slapped me and he got a fresh drop or two from me."

I pointed to the cut mark that was still on my cheek.

"I don't know how long that new supply will last ... but if I go to sleep, he's going to get in there and figure out where I am. I can't risk that happening ... so I'm going to need to pull an all-nighter for *at least* tonight."

Mattie's response caught me off guard.

"So let me tell you about my mother," he started.

***

"My mother could fly."

I have to admit.

I had absolutely no response to the way Mattie started the story about his mother.

So I said nothing, and just listened as he continued.

"But no one would believe her. I knew, though ... because she took me with her once when I was little. I remember that she held me in a tight embrace, and I looked over her shoulder, and I saw our house down below get smaller."

Mattie paused, reliving the moment in his memory.

"We didn't go really high ... we didn't go really fast ... but we went up -- above our property and into the lowest of the clouds. I remember a few birds ... and a quiet constant comforting wind ... and then just as quickly as we went up, she brought me back down. And the smile on her face ... it's the way I always picture her any time her name is mentioned."

There was something odd about the way he was sharing these details. He was wistful ... but yet almost emotionless.

"No one supported her. Her own parents -- my grandparents -- wanted to lock her up. They thought she needed help. And she did ... but the help she needed was for them to believe her."

Mattie's voice was almost a whisper, and he wasn't making eye contact with me any more.

"Instead, they found her in the bottom of a ravine."

***

"I believe -- to this day -- that she could have saved herself ... and she chose NOT to, because she couldn't deal with how no one close to her believed in her ability."

Now I understood why he was so willing to accept what I was telling him about *my* special talents. Or what Papa Kalfu could do, for that matter.

"They said she fell ... but I think she jumped ... I just know that either way she COULD have flown away if she had really wanted to. She stopped wanting to."

I saw an opportunity.

The last time I tried to demonstrate my ability to take away the pain of others with just a touch failed when I had grabbed Mattie's arm.

Surely with the details of this story now having been told to me, I could show him exactly what I could do ... and I could take away the pain he was reliving after telling me the tale of his late mother.

"I'm sorry, Mattie. I appreciate your belief in me."

I stuck out my hand for him to shake it, and he reciprocated.

One shake. Two shakes. Three shakes. With eye contact.

And again, nothing.

This made no sense. All of the triggers for my gift had been pulled.

"I don't understand," I said aloud. "It should be happening."

Mattie chuckled.

"Well ... I told you about my mother. I guess I should probably tell you about my *father* ...

***

The conversation between Mattie and I was so intense that we all jumped when there was a knock at the door.

And that included Gator, who had been napping on the big bed and who wasn't paying attention to the story of Mattie's past.

He ran to the door and started barking, pausing just long enough for us to hear the voice of the person on the other side.

"Hey kids. Mommy and Daddy are home! Stop goofing off and let us in!"

Mattie headed over to the hotel room door, grabbed a hold of Gator's collar, and opened it for Joey and Rochelle to enter.

The thing with having a puppy with us was that anyone entering the room first needed to deal with his expression of energy. Gator was the welcoming committee, and every person needed to stop and get welcomed for as long as it took for Gator's curiosity to be satisfied.

Only after that excitement faded could there be attempts at conversation.

"How was the house search?" asked Mattie of the couple.

The two of them exchanged a knowing glance that conveyed that it was a successful trip.

"We *may* have found a spot," answered Rochelle. "It's on the other side of the interstate, which is an up and coming neighborhood, but it has a fenced-in yard, and a bedroom for baby to be ..."

We were still so young in my mind. I couldn't quite get used to the fact that Joey would soon be a father.

He was next to speak.

"I'm ready to make the big move down here. If you guys don't need me for any more of your adventure, we're making the drive back tomorrow so I can go pack up my stuff."

***

"Speaking of adventure," Joey continued, "we forgot to tell you what's going on out there. It looks like you haven't been watching the news?"

He was right. I had turned it off after learning about the unexplained deaths at Papa Kalfu's club.

Rochelle chimed in.

"Yeah, we would have been back sooner, but we got stuck in traffic. They are protesting out there!"

"Protesting? What for?" asked Mattie.

Joey was the one to answer.

"The violence at the bars. The monkey murders -- or whatever they're calling 'em -- and the fire. The kids at the local school have jumped on both events and they're saying that they are hate crimes."

Mattie had hinted at the extra scrutiny that the police were giving when they had questioned him during his aborted shift earlier that night.

"We're just one cop-shooting away from all hell breaking loose in this town."

Joey laughed at his comment, but I didn't find it funny -- not out of any extra sensitivity to the problems plaguing the country ... but out of selfishness for what the extra attention was going to mean to me.

"And as far as anyone knows, I'm still the mystery man at the middle of it all?" I queried.

Joey nodded his head.

"How long do you think that'll last before someone IDs you?"

That was the million dollar question.

***

"It's pretty obvious ... it's time for me to go," I announced.

"You know you're perfectly welcome to hitch a ride back to PA with us ... we could use an extra person sharing the drive," offered Joey.

"We were hoping to drive right through, 'cause I'm still working both jobs and didn't get much time off to make this trip with him," explained Rochelle.

Joey turned to Mattie.

"And what are *your* plans?"

He shook his head in reply.

"I've got nothing. My summer was all about relaxing before school started up again. I took the dog-sitting job for just something to do."

Oh right. Gator. I had almost forgotten that I wasn't exactly here alone.

"Do you guys have room in your car for me AND Gator?" I asked Joey and Rochelle.

Joey quickly answered.

"Yep -- not a problem. It'll be like old times."

Joey and I *had* driven up the coast before ... with Gator. Looking back, it was relatively uneventful, although we did have that incident at the motel ... and toward the end of the trip when he opened up to me about his history.

The plans were coming together rapidly ... at that moment, I had no idea that they'd fall apart just as quickly.

***

"So that's settled then. We'll come back in the morning and pick you up."

My time in Florida was indeed going to come to an end. As per Joey's plan, I was going to hitch a ride back to central Pennsylvania with him and Rochelle.

Except fate intervened.

"I'll be ready to go. What time will you be here?" I asked.

Because fate was choosing her own timeline to interfere.

"I still like to sleep in ..."

"He still likes to sleep in ..."

Rochelle and Joey tripped over each other as they replied. They really were a cute couple ... perfect together.

"How's about 10 o'clock?" I offered.

"Deal!"

Joey reached out to shake my hand, and then pulled it away at the last minute.

"Psych!" he yelled, clearly pleased with himself.

"You and I both know how *that* goes," he announced, chuckling to himself as he guided Rochelle to the hotel room door.

"See you tomorrow!" Rochelle called out as they left, leaving Mattie and I alone again.

"Should we turn the news on? Watch the protests and complain like good Americans?"

Mattie didn't wait for my answer ...

***

The hotel must have had some kind of deal with the cable provider.

Despite the fact that the last channel I had been watching was the local news on the local station, when Mattie turned the television back on, it defaulted to one of the major national news channels, just in time for one of those "breaking news" graphics to flash on the screen.

"Disturbing news out of Ft. Lauderdale tonight, where protests have broken out over two recent hate crimes in the entertainment district -- the first of which, in a bar owned by a first generation Haitian-American, included the gruesome and bizarre ritualistic murders of three individuals in its back office ... and the second, in a bar owned by a prominent gay businessman -- an attempted arson."

The talking head continued.

"The community is on edge tonight fearing that a third attack might be imminent. Complicating matters further is the fact that the police have NO suspects at this time, and are instead focusing on *these* two individuals, stressing that they are only 'persons of interest' at this stage of the investigation."

I could handle my blurry video and sketch artist drawn selves flashed throughout a community to which I had no strong connection.

I could NOT do the same when I was now being blasted to the whole country.

This was a game changer for me and my plans.

Fate was indeed in the process of intervening.

"We have just learned of the most bizarre twist of all, as a reliable source who wishes to remain anonymous from within the Ft. Lauderdale police department has confirmed with us that the three bodies of the murder victims and the transport vehicle itself vanished after leaving the scene of the crime earlier today."

***

"What now?"

It was the perfect reaction to what we had just heard, and Mattie hit the nail on the head.

"They said the bodies were stolen," I said in reply.

"But what does *that* mean?" was his follow-up.

"*That* means that Papa Kalfu is up to some new tricks. It *had* to be him," I concluded, still not quite believing this turn of events.

"Yeah, but if the bodies are missing ... then are there still murder charges? Is it like what happens when they can't find the murder weapon? Are you free now?"

I contemplated his questions, but had to admit I didn't know enough to answer any of them.

I did reach a different conclusion, though, which I announced.

"I thought I just had to leave town. This stuff is *national* now. It's not just about going home any more ... I have to go into hiding."

My mind was racing.

"I need to go for a walk and clear my head."

I took about two steps toward the door and then it hit me ...

"But I *can't* go for a walk ... 'cause I *can't* go outside ever again!"

***

I could pretend that the answer came to me lickety-split.

But that would have indeed been only make-believe.

I sat and stewed and considered my situation and came up empty handed -- or empty thoughted, as was the case. It felt like days ... it was likely only minutes.

I could also pretend that the answer, when it arrived, came from me.

But that would have indeed been a lie as well.

Mattie was the one who eventually came up with the plan, and it seemed obvious after he said it.

"You have to go deep under cover. Not just leave *this* town and head home like nothing happened. But go somewhere else until this whole thing blows over."

"Somewhere else? Like leave the country?" I asked. "I mean ... this is now *national* news. I don't even have a passport or anything ... and I don't think I could get one in light of all this."

"Right. I get that. So maybe go somewhere where it will be easier to blend in. Like a big city or something," he opined. "Weren't you supposed to be somewhere else before they kidnapped you and brought you back to Florida?"

He was right. I had originally planned to go to New Orleans, since that was where my actual father was last spotted -- the one I didn't know I had until my aunt showed up on my college graduation.

"New Orleans." I answered.

"So go there. I have to think you could hide out well in *that* city."

***

New Orleans in the summer time.

*That* was going to be my way out.

Of course, if the whole point was about going further under cover, my idea to search for my father might have to be even more low key -- unless I had to put the kibosh on that activity completely.

I immediately started making plans in my mind ... and I immediately hit an obstacle.

"Umm ... the problem is ... I don't have a car. It's back home in PA," I said aloud.

Mattie came through as the answer man yet again.

"So maybe you still go back with Joey and Rochelle in the morning, and you pack up your things and get in your car and you leave as soon as you get home. I mean it's a lot of driving ... all the way up and then all the way back down again ... but ..."

He paused in providing a solution ... because he had a different one to offer.

"You know," he said, almost conspiratorially, "I could join you guys and we could just leave from here. I can get a rental car in my name ... and then you'd have help with Gator. And you wouldn't have to worry about hotel rooms being traced back to you or any other kind of paper trail ..."

It was an intriguing idea.

"Don't you have summer plans?" I asked.

"If I did, do you think I'd be *here* under these conditions in the first place?"

He had a point.

***

"Yeah, but still. I wouldn't want to impose *my* drama on your life."

I was seriously considering Mattie's offer to accompany me on the road to going deeper under cover until all the attention faded over what the press had named the Evil Monkey Murders.

"Well ... in case you hadn't noticed, my summer plans consisted of dog-sitting your puppy for two weeks. Then I had absolutely *nothing* in my calendar until school started up again in September. Nothing."

Mattie continued.

"If it helps to think of it this way ... you'd be doing me a favor -- giving me something to do and somewhere to go. I've never been to New Orleans ..."

He could tell he was winning me over.

"And ... I already get along with Gator. I'm sure I could learn to tolerate you ..."

He punctuated that last statement by tossing a pillow at my head.

I knocked it away and looked at him quizzically.

"If you don't want your pillows ... maybe you don't want the bed either? I've got a cot right here that's all yours if you're feeling restless."

He laughed.

"No no. the cot's yours. The bed's *mine*. At the next hotel, we'll get two beds."

I guess it was settled. The plan had changed ... just like that.

***

"So ... if I could have my pillow back, I'm probably going to try and get some sleep. At least *one* of us should be well rested."

I agreed with Mattie.

I was still pressuring myself to stay awake as long as possible, for fear that Papa Kalfu could use his blood-connection to get inside my head as he had done before. At least *I* had the bloody shirt that he had been using, and so his only access to my mind via the blood route was from when he cut me when he slapped me in his bar.

But still ... that had happened just the night before, and it was fresh blood ... and I had no knowledge of exactly how his island voodoo stuff worked.

Hell, I still wasn't completely sure about how all of *my* "stuff" worked.

And I for sure couldn't explain why none of it seemed to work on Mattie.

Mattie.

My new best friend Mattie.

My new soon to be road-trip-buddy Mattie.

As I finished setting up my cot, I tried to catalog everything I knew about Mattie.

I knew he was young. On our service trip, I learned that he was only going into his sophomore year.

I knew he was eager to please. He was so ready to help during that time of ours when we were working on the houses destroyed by the storm.

I knew that Gator liked him. And dogs were a good judge of character. Gator liked him so much that he was curled up on the bed instead of on my little cot with me.

I knew that he was smart. Just off of my texts, he had coordinated what ended up being my rescue.

And I knew he had stories that hadn't yet been told. His "flying mother" was surely only the beginning of what he had to share.

***

The challenge to pull an all-nighter was made all that more difficult since both the other person in the hotel room AND the puppy dog were snoring peacefully.

But I was determined to do just that.

I kept myself occupied by thinking about what I had to do in the morning.

First, I had to break the news to Joey and Rochelle that I wouldn't be joining them on the ride back to central PA.

Second, Mattie and I had to get out of town and to get on the road to New Orleans -- with Gator, of course.

Then, I just had to not let anyone recognize me even while I was searching for my missing biological father -- for as long as it took.

Days. Weeks. Months. Years.

Oh my.

Years.

What if it took years?

What about my life in central PA?

What about my *things* in central PA?

Would my life ever be the same again? Would I be a fugitive forever? Would a life on the lam be my destiny?

***

I had only been a college *graduate* for a matter of a few weeks, but I had clearly already lost every single one of my all-nighter skills.

It didn't help that Gator's snoring was so rhythmic.

Or that Mattie was sleeping.

Or that it was dark in the room.

Or that my head was so awash with thoughts that I couldn't exactly focus on the task at hand of staying awake.

What ultimately did me in was the air conditioning.

As the night wore on, it felt cooler and cooler in the room, and the blanket that came with the cot was looking more and more comforting.

I wrapped it around my shoulders and instantly felt super cozy.

Super warm, super comfortable and super cozy.

I should have reacted to the yawn by getting up and running around the room.

Instead, I caved and convinced myself that I could just recline and close my eyes for only a few moments, and that would clear my head enough to go on.

Just a few moments.

Only a few.

Within minutes, I was fast asleep ... and so within minutes, I was instantly at risk for mental invasion of the worse kind.

***

CHAPTER 35

"Let's go!"

Mattie was standing over my cot practically yelling at me, which was not the way I wanted to be woken up.

Plus it was still dark, and I felt like I had barely slept at all -- ironic, seeing as how my original plan was to have tried to stay awake all night.

"Come on. Get up. Let's go!"

Despite my groggy mind, I felt certain that although we had decided the night before that we all were going to New Orleans -- and by all, I meant me and Mattie and Gator -- we hadn't discussed hitting the road before the sun came up.

"I booked you on all the shows, but they are back to back to back. They're going to call your name any minute now. You need to wake up and be on your game, son. Let's go!"

For him wanting me to be "on my game", he sure was confusing me instead of helping me get ready for "the shows".

Which, as I gathered my wits about me enough to draw *that* conclusion, didn't help my mental state, as I had absolutely NO concept as to why "shows" were even a relevant concept.

"The reunion special is up first."

He paused and listened intently to the silence, but apparently he heard something.

"They're calling you. LET'S GO!"

I had no choice. His energy was propelling me toward the hotel room door.

"Come on. We don't want Andy to wait ..."

***

The most disorienting part of waking up in that manner was the time it took me to figure out that I hadn't woken up at all.

As Mattie all but pushed me out of the hotel room door, it all became clear to me seeing as how I didn't walk into the courtyard -- but instead on to a well-appointed stage with a man with blue oversized index cards sitting between two couches.

I was suddenly in a studio and apparently about to film a television show ... and I was definitely not a part of the waking world.

"Wake up. Wake up. Wake up."

If I had only been wearing heels, I'd have clicked them together three times for each of my attempts to force myself awake.

But I wasn't wearing heels.

And I wasn't waking up.

I was going to have to ride this one out and see where it took me.

Which was, at the outset, to one of those two couches.

They must have interrupting filming for me, because the moderator started up as soon as I sat down.

"And we're back. *This* season, on 'Joey's HiJinx', we saw many sides of bartender Mario. And although *my* favorite was the shot of his backside in the shower scene, nothing was so surprising to our viewers as the revelation of the boy locked in a special room in the basement of the bar. *Alan* joins us now."

In the glare of the lights, I hadn't even noticed that Mario and Mria were seated across from me.

And the moderator was that guy who does the 'Housewives' reunions.

***

This was a new experience for me -- being a guest on a television reunion show made about my life from the past few weeks.

A television show that I was completely making up in my mind as I slept, of course ... since that's the kind of thing that happened to me from time to time as a side-effect of my special skill of absorbing the painful memories of others with just a touch of skin to skin contact.

As I sat on the couch across from another couch on which Mario and Mria were seated with only the host between us, a clip was apparently playing of the highlights of the interactions between me and Mario.

Neither one of them made eye contact with me as they were both engrossed in the monitor watching what was playing. Sadly, I couldn't see it ... but then again, I had lived it. And since I was making this all up in my mind, whatever was in this made up clip on this made up television show had to be made up of my own memories.

Clip over, the moderator shuffled through his oversized blue index cards, before finding the one he wanted to reference.

"FUTUREPOPO2020 asks, 'Mario, weren't you concerned that showing what you did with Alan on air would bolster any efforts to have you arrested for kidnapping?'" The host continued. "I mean, we basically watched you grab him from in front of his apartment, handcuff and, for a bit, hood him, and drive him in that creepy white van across multiple state lines and THEN you locked him into a room in a basement of the bar. There's not a lot of room for interpretation there."

Mario smiled before he responded.

"We were just kids pulling a prank. No harm. No foul."

The moderator seemed to disagree.

"Well sweetie. This is the seventh season. You're not a kid any more -- you're a man. And those are potentially some MAN-sized problems."

***

The moderator turned to me next, referring again to his cards.

"MOONBEAM284 writes in with a question for you, Alan -- 'is Stockholm Syndrome a real thing? I thought it was just something they made up for the movies'. So do *you* think you went all Stockholm with this group?"

I figured out that I was supposed to answer by the long delay after he asked the question. This thing was really happening.

Albeit, it was happening in my *dream*, but still I couldn't seem to just wish it into something else.

So I replied.

"Once I figured out what was really going on, I just decided that it was a noble thing to do. For his sister."

The moderator pivoted back to Mario.

"How is she doing, by the way?"

It was Mario's turn to pause.

"She's a fighter. So we'll see,"

The moderator leaned in to the big bartender.

"Well we're all thinking about her and pulling for her. So where are you guys now? You literally just disappeared into the night and only left a note."

Mria finally jumped into the conversation.

"All I can say is that we are in an undisclosed location focused on his sister's battle."

She successfully communicated that there would be no discussion about that topic any further, so the moderator switched gears.

"Let's go to the phones -- we have Papa Kalfu from Florida on the line. Papa Kalfu -- for whom are you calling?"

***

"Yeah ... I have one question for everyone on the couches and a second one for the freak who touches people inappropriately."

Papa Kalfu was indeed on the line, calling in to the reunion show that I was creating while I was dreaming.

My immediate concern, though, was that Papa Kalfu had worked his way into my dream in the past ... and when he did, it actually was *his* doing and not mine. I had failed in my attempt to stay awake all night to avoid his doing so, and now he was in my head and had access to my thoughts.

"My question for everyone is 'where my money at'? And for the freak, I want to ask if he thinks that I won't track him down wherever he goes. Oh ... and bababooey, bababooey, bababooey!'

The host smirked and exclaimed, "I *love* it when we get a bababooey call!"

Then he looked briefly at each of us.

"Which one of you wants to take that first one? Where is Papa Kalfu's money?"

Mario and Mria shook their heads at the same time. Again, Mria was the one to reply.

"That's an ongoing legal matter and we can't discuss it."

The moderator turned to me next.

"And your share of the haul? Can you account for it? Also - do you have a way to escape Papa Kalfu?"

I had to get some kind of control.

"Yeah, I can escape Papa Kalfu ... by walking off your damn show."

***

"Aaaaand ... on *that* note ... we'll be right back."

The host did not appreciate my answer to his question. Or my non-answer, such that it was.

I knew this because his demeanor changed dramatically.

And by dramatically, I mean "in the key of 'high drama'".

"Somebody deal with him!" he yelled off stage, to no one in particular and yet everyone at the same time.

Then he grabbed his cell phone and stormed off, checking it for all the notifications from his apps.

I could still hear him in the distance, complaining.

"And *why* was there a caller on our reunion show? We *never* do callers on these shows. How did that guy get past our production crew? And what's with that kid not answering my questions. He's on a damn reunion show ... we don't have to include him next year. He knows that, right?"

Apparently, I had really upset the moderator. He was a completely different person when those cameras weren't on him.

Mattie came running out to me and knelt next to the couch, clearly concerned.

"Hey, buddy, What are you doing? You know you have to be a little more accommodating, right?"

I stared at him in disbelief.

"*That* was Papa Kalfu. He's here. He's part of this. I have to get out of here. I have to get out of here NOW!"

***

"Well I can't keep you here against your wishes ... but even if we do leave, we're going to have to go to the two other shows I have lined up for today's PR blitz. Them's the rules."

Mattie's response to my wanting to leave confounded me further.

I decided to try a more direct approach.

"This is *my* dream. I should be able to make those rules. Who put you in charge?"

Mattie smiled.

"Well, as you said, it's *your* dream. I'm thinking that YOU put me in charge."

There was a circular logic to it all that was starting to make my head spin.

"Okay. So let's move it along then. I want to get on to the second show, since I'm guessing that's the only way I can force myself to wake up and end this before Papa K shows up again."

He shrugged his shoulders.

"Sure, sure. Whatevs. Just so long as we fulfill the contracts and I get paid."

As I got up off the couch, I corrected him. "I'm not paying you."

He smiled again.

"Come on. It's a dream. You can pay me whatever I want. It doesn't really matter."

He guided me off the stage, through a door, and into another studio.

In the distance, I heard someone loudly proclaim, "You ARE the father!"

***

From one talk show to another.

This was my dream. Or was it my nightmare?

Regardless, I entered the stage and saw to whom it was the host had been speaking -- Albert.

From the wings, I saw him being pelted about the head and shoulders by not one, but two women. At least, I presumed they were women, seeing as how in my dream they were the faceless mannequin type creatures that I had named "Andantes".

It immediately took me back to that first night I had met him ... when he was just "the angry texter", and I was just the kid at the end of the bar that was watching as he fought with his girlfriend over what he had done -- or note done -- with her sister.

In the argument that had ensued that quickly turned into a bar melee, I had been pushed and had fallen on top of him, which is how I had known back then what the talk show host was only now proving with the benefit of the DNA test -- Albert WAS indeed the father of his girlfriend's sister's baby.

Security on the show came in and pulled the two creatures off of Albert, which is when I was finally able to get a closer look at him.

It was as if his body had been drained of blood, and his skin was pale and wrinkly and sunken-in. This wasn't the Albert I had known all too well as one of my primary captors -- this was the Albert that was the victim of Papa Kalfu's wrath.

This was the Albert that was one of the so-called 'Evil Monkey Murders' about which I was wanted for questioning.

This was the Albert whose "dead" body had disappeared in transport between the scene of the crime to the coroner's office.

"So ... do you have anything to say now that the truth has been scientifically confirmed?" asked the host of this Albert.

Albert's jaw opened wide, but the sounds that came out of his mouth were guttural.

This was the Albert who no longer had a tongue.

***

"Mmmmwaaa ... "

That was about all that the tongueless Albert could get out.

Well, that and some choking noises down in his throat.

I got the distinct feeling that he wanted to address the paternity test with the talk show host, but that he was going to have to first figure out another way to communicate before he could do so.

The host knew more than he was letting on, though.

He tormented the dead-once-but-revived-now Albert.

"What's the matter? Papa Kalfu got your tongue?"

Then, with a smirk toward the camera, he announced, "We'll be right back".

Unlike the first experience in my dream, this host didn't storm off the set. Instead, he turned right to me.

"Okay, buddy. You're up next. Are you ready? You know I'm going to have some surprises, right?"

I glared at him and chose to stay silent.

Across the stage, I felt like Albert might have suddenly noticed my existence, but what with his dead glassy eyes, I wasn't a hundred percent sure that it was me on which he was focused.

There was a flurry of activity as several of the faceless mannequin 'Andantes' that populated these dreams of mine moved about and re-set the stage with extra chairs in a semicircle.

The host motioned for me to take a seat in the one at the end, and I counted three empty chairs between myself and the back-from-the-dead Albert.

I figured that Mario and Mria would make an appearance here as they had done so earlier in my dream -- especially with Mario's strong connection to Albert, so I started deliberating in my head as to who would take the third chair.

***

Mattie was in the wings, cheering me on with a thumbs up.

Which was timely, as we were apparently returning from the break that the talk show host had announced.

"Joining us now is Alan, also known as Aloysius, and we have a twist on our typical paternity test scenario. To fully explain, let's bring out two more individuals who are back stage -- two people that are well known to Albert ... let's meet Stanley and Rodney!"

The crowd went wild ... and it was the first time that I really got a good luck at them. I wasn't surprised to see that they were made up entirely of the faceless mannequin 'Andantes' of my dream world, but it was odd to see them all so animated, "cheering" on the events on the dais despite not really being able to vocalize.

In that way, they were all kind of like Albert, ironically.

Of course, since Stanley and Rodney were coming out to fill up two of the three seats, I was completely wrong to have been expecting Mario and Mria.

Maybe it was just going to be Mario.

Although, so far, despite the hosts's proclamations, no one was coming out to the stage.

"Oops," said the host. "Almost forgot. Stanley can't see and Rodney can't hear ... so I'm going to need one of my staff to poke Rodney and get him to guide Stanley out so that both can join us."

In just a few moments, both of them lumbered out.

And they both had the same appearance as Albert -- drained of blood and clearly death warmed over.

It didn't really strike me until I saw the three of them side by side, but of course they were this way.

These guys were now voodoo zombies, courtesy of Papa Kalfu.

***

"Boys ... welcome, welcome!"

The talk show host lined up the voodoo zombie versions of Albert, Stanley and Rodney in the chairs in the semi-circle closest to him, still leaving an empty one between the three of them and where I was seated on the end.

Then he continued.

"So I think this is the FIRST time that the three of you are appearing together since pulling your little disappearing trick on the way to the coroner's office ... so I thank you for giving us that scoop. Clearly, by the looks of things, you're now in a bit of a different state. Can someone other than the one of you without a tongue comment on that?"

None of them spoke in reply.

So he tried again. "Oh I'm sorry. I wasn't thinking. Rodney, I know you're missing one of your ears, but the assumption is that the *other* one still works, right?"

But again, the panel, such as it was, had no words.

The host was clearly getting upset.

"Look, you guys know how television works, right? I am the moderator and I ask you questions ... and you reply. We have back and forth. We have banter. I'm going to need somebody to speak."

Being greeted only by more silence, he turned to me in exasperation.

"Ok Alan. You're not affected the same way as the three of them are ... so let's talk about the real reason that YOU are here today on this paternity results show."

***

For the second time within this dream of mine, it was MY turn to be in the hot seat with a talk show host.

"So ... Alan."

The moderator, having not had any luck with regards to dialoguing with the voodoo zombies, was insistent that I was going to salvage his show.

"Some have argued that YOU are essentially the makers of these three, what with how you abandoned them to be subjected to Papa Kalfu's wrath. What say you to that line of thinking?"

What I wanted to ask was who these "some people" were that were making this argument, seeing as how no one knew what went down in the back of that bar that night except those of us who were there -- and 60% of them were now zombies who were refusing to speak.

Instead, I replied with my defense.

"When I left that bar, every single one of them was still alive. Sure, they were a bit wounded -- each of them in their own way -- but they were ALIVE. Any efforts to hold ME accountable are overlooking that most important fact."

The host put his index fingers together and raised them toward his face.

"Interesting. Very interesting. And, knowing that they were wounded, did you call 911?"

I did not. But he already knew that. My defense strategy needed to change on the dime.

"I may not have called for any help ... but I can't be blamed for what went down after I left. I did not take out his eye, or damage his ear, or cut out his tongue."

I pointed to bartender Stanley, co-conspirator Rodney and original triumvirate member Albert for effect on each of my proclamations.

"I will not accept responsibility for what Papa Kalfu did."

The moderator smiled.

"Fair enough. Let's bring him out! Papa Kalfu, come take the last seat!"

***

"No ... no .. NO! That is NOT part of my deal!"

Stuck in my dream as I was, and resigned to the fact that I couldn't force myself awake, I had decided that my primary goal was to avoid any run-ins with Papa Kalfu, seeing as how I knew he could intervene and suddenly appear because of HIS special voodoo skills.

"Mattie!" I bellowed. "Get me out of here!"

During the first talk show, I had made the host storm off. This time, it was my turn to do the storming.

"I will NOT be a part of ANYthing to do with THAT man!" I exclaimed as I walked out of sight.

Mattie met me at the side of the stage, speaking hurriedly.

"One more. One more. You have to do one more. I promised."

"Only one!" I stated emphatically.

"Only one. But it's a biggie." Mattie went on to clarify. "She came out of retirement JUST to talk to you."

I hadn't done so well with male talk show hosts.

Maybe a female one would be more sympathetic to my plight.

"Let me guess. It's just through that door."

Mattie flashed one of his big smiles.

"You got it. You ready for the *biggest* interview of your life?"

***

How could I respond?

I could tell Mattie that "no", I wasn't ready for the biggest interview of my life.

But I seemed to have very little control over this dream.

To the extent that I did have any ability to wake myself up from it, my subconscious dream state seemed to be fixated on completing these talk shows, as if I were Ebeneezer Scrooge himself destined to be visited by three talk show hosts -- the funny gay guy from the first one, the aging classic host of the second and now, the third -- whom Mattie had just told me had come out of retirement just for my dream.

So I had no choice but to tell him "yes", I was ready.

He guided me off the stage, through a door and onto yet another talk show set.

The crowd -- still all Andantes (those faceless mannequins) were very very excited, screaming in delight NOT at my sudden appearance but just at being a part of something so momentous. I was all but positive that the screams were all female, coming at me in waves as I worked my way to the white overstuffed chair on a circle of a stage very well lit in pastels.

I was pleased to see that it was just two chairs in total.

One for the host, and one for me.

As near as I could tell, there would be no surprise guests this time.

I had left Mario and Mria behind.

I had left the voodoo zombie trio of Stanley, Rodney and Albert behind.

It was just me and an overstuffed chair and a host who was ready to make her special appearance.

***

"You get a show! And YOU get a show! AND *YOU* get a show! You ALL get a talk show ... tonight!"

The hostess walked on to the stage, and the crowd I thought was wild and crazy got wilder and crazier. If asked later, I would have sworn that some of the Andantes' heads exploded. Which -- seeing as how they were faceless mannequins -- wasn't as gruesome or gory as that might first sound. Plus -- this was my dream, so the effect was more colorful and psychedelic and festive than actual bone splintering and brain splattering.

It was a "fun" kind of a head explosion ... the kind a person would *like* to have.

As the crowd slowly quieted and the hostess made her way to her chair beside me, she looked into my eyes and gave me a warm and welcoming smile.

She sat down and reached over and grabbed me by the forearm ... but we didn't make skin to skin contact so my special skill of absorbing the painful memories of others wasn't triggered.

Although, let's face it, I expected that this hostess hadn't had "painful" memories for years.

And, it was still my dream ... so I had no idea if, in my head, I could actually take in made up memories of made up characters that were populating it.

She was about to speak, and the crowd knew to instantly get silent.

"I am back here tonight on this oh so familiar set -- with my amazing talented hard working staff -- because I know how important it is for the ongoing discussion about race relations in a post-racial America to be continued."

I bolted upright in my chair.

*Race* relations! Where oh where was this dream taking me?

***

The latest talk show host ... the third in my never-ending dream ... put on her most serious face and looked deeply in my eyes as she asked her question.

"There were protests in your adopted hometown over the incidents at the neighborhood bar owned by a Haitian immigrant ... especially once it was known that the three victims at the scene were another Haitian, an African American and a Latino."

The audience of Andantes took in a deep breath collectively, as if an applause sign had been replaced with one that flashed the word "gasp" in neon lights.

I felt like I had to clarify.

"Wait one moment, please. It was not my 'adopted' hometown. I had only ever been there twice ... and the second time was against my own volition. I was kidnapped and brought there."

The host seized the moment.

"By two Latinos."

I was confused as to her intent.

"Well, yes, technically. I only knew them as Mario and Albert. I guess I never stopped to consider their ethnicities. They were just 'my kidnappers' to me ... not 'my Latino kidnappers'."

"Interesting," muttered the host. "And now one of those individuals is dead."

I corrected her. "Well, dead but missing."

"And although the police consider YOU to be the main suspect, your position is that it was the Haitian. Is that correct?"

I looked across the stage in an attempt to find Mattie in hopes that he could somehow give me guidance as to how to proceed to get out of this awkward conversation ... and then the dream itself.

He was nowhere to be seen.

Who I *could* see, however, was three uniformed police people, watching my interview with great interest.

***

I knew then that it was a trap.

Despite it being *my* trap, seeing as how it was *my* dream.

The host continued with her measured delivery.

"It just strikes me that you tend to blame everything that goes wrong in your life on 'the others'."

She was like a dog with a bone with this theme of hers.

"And that just leads me to question whether you ever take responsibility for your own actions."

Again, that audience, which she had wrapped around her fingers regardless, oohed and aahed and even started a smattering of applause, which she then acknowledged.

"Right? Am I right? It was my 'aha' moment after reviewing the details of his story."

I reminded myself that it was only a dream -- only *my* dream. And that if I was feeling uncomfortable -- and I was -- that it meant that, deep down inside, *I* was feeling uncomfortable about all the things I had done during my little "forced" vacation in southern Florida that I was trying to bring to an end.

My super-ego must have wanted some kind of closure, and apparently, this was the way it was going to come about.

The host interrupted my thoughts.

"I believe the only path to truth is directly through the lies we tell ourselves ... which is why I want you to confront your conclusions. And the only way to do that is to face your foes directly."

Of course. I should have seen this coming.

"Let's bring out Papa Kalfu!" she announced to her adoring audience.

***

Of course she did.

I had been running from him this whole dream.

But I was running no longer.

Papa Kalfu strode out on stage, costumed in his voodoo finery as he had been before when I had first met him -- *also* in a dream -- what seemed like ages ago when I had followed the little stray kitten Jinx through the hvac duct and into the courtroom setting for my "trial".

He spoke before the talk show host did.

"Did you really think that you could hide from me?"

The Andante audience faded away as a spotlight shone directly on his face instead.

"You gave me fresh blood. Not as much as I wanted mind you ... and not as much as I will one day take from you ... but fresh, straight from the scratch on your cheek blood that I ingested right away. You gave me the access, and you have to know that I'm the type to take it."

I felt no response was needed.

So he continued.

"And now that I have confirmed that you survived the fire, chasing you will be my ultimate priority."

The light around him got brighter and brighter, and the stage and the talk show host both disappeared into the edges of my dream.

"So tell me ... where are you headed?"

This time, I knew with certainty that no response was needed.

"You silly child. You don't *have* to tell me ... you just have to show me."

***

So now I knew exactly how Stanley had felt.

Not voodoo zombie Stanley ... but pre-eye-pluck bartender Stanley, who had been coached as to how to avoid giving me any information when being prepped for my expected attempts at getting the lock combination out of him that night at the bar.

Back then he had been told to avoid eye contact with me at all costs while I was touching him skin to skin in order to raid his mind of his memories.

Of course, he had failed -- 'cause Rodney had shot him -- and that served as a big enough distraction for him to forget what he had been told to do.

My talk show host had had her "aha" moment ... now it was my turn to have mine.

Stanley the bartender had failed with regards to not making eye contact with me. So Papa Kalfu took his eye out.

That made more sense now.

And Albert had failed because he talked too much. So Papa Kalfu took his tongue out.

Rodney's ear accident was just coincidence ... but it did complete the set of "evil monkeys" -- a see no evil, a speak no evil and a hear no evil.

I felt certain that Papa Kalfu couldn't do any physical harm like that to me since he was only in my thoughts, having invaded my brain space via a doorway through my dreams.

But I suspected he could do some mental damage to me -- more damage to me than that with which I was already dealing, of course.

I pushed and pushed all thoughts out of my mind, resisting his attempts to learn about my latest plans.

It was a battle of wills ... and I was winning.

***

You know when you think you're winning, but you're actually just clueless?

You know how ignorance is sometimes bliss?

It was kind of like that.

I thought I was successfully blocking Papa Kalfu from my thoughts during his dream-invasion, but it was really just wishful thinking on my part.

I don't know how he did it, but he did.

"N'awlins. I love that city this time of year. I have a lot of friends there."

It was the worst possible outcome.

I was all set to leave it all behind ... and *it* was all set to follow me to my next destination.

"Show me more," Papa Kalfu whispered, and his eyes rolled back in his head as he entered some kind of trance.

My ability to resist, which had just been proven to not be much of an ability at all, completely faded such that it was.

He began chanting in his language with words I didn't understand, and his presence in my mind started to overshadow any independent thought.

I had one last glimpse of the setting -- the stage of the talk show -- and although I couldn't make out any audience or host, I felt a commotion off to the side.

Gator, my puppy dog, came bounding into view ... and he wasn't coming to greet me.

He made a beeline for Papa Kalfu.

***

Up until that moment, I had always thought of my puppy as cute and cuddly and adorable.

But as he came on to the stage in my dream and headed for Papa Kalfu, he had a different demeanor.

His approach wasn't one based in his never-ending curiosity as I expected. Instead, he seemed to have a definite purpose.

And that purpose was to go after Papa.

His sudden and unexpected appearance created quite the commotion all around, and that immediately set me free from the trance like state under which I was about to fall.

Score one for Gator.

Also appearing suddenly and unexpectedly -- several assistants who came and whisked away the host that had been fading into the background.

I heard assorted cries -- "Where'd that dog come from? Grab him! Get him out of here!!"

The biggest cry, though, came from Papa Kalfu himself.

It was more of a screech, and it was well suited for the moment, because my cute and cuddly and adorable pup was jumping up and snapping at him.

Score two for Gator.

The puppy growls didn't exactly sound menacing, but he was more than making up for it with so much of his effort.

All things considered, I didn't mind the turn of events one bit.

***

I distinctly heard Mattie's voice next ... which was welcome after him having disappeared during the last segment of my dream.

"Gator ... no! Calm down ... it's okay, boy ... it's okay!"

His voice got louder and louder.

"Everything's fine, puppy. Look, look -- no one's there."

That last part didn't register with me at first. Clearly someone *was* there ... Gator was going after Papa Kalfu.

"Alan. Alan. Help me calm him down. ALAN!"

The third -- and last -- "Alan" was the one that succeeded in waking me from my dream -- finally.

Mattie was standing over Gator, who had his paws on my cot next to me and he was barking like crazy.

I reached out to comfort my puppy, holding his head in my hands, and kissing him gently on his snout.

"Hey boy. I'm here. It's fine."

I repeated that over and over again until he calmed down.

"What happened?" I asked Mattie.

"Something set him off. He was sleeping at the end of the bed, and he just went nuts. He ran over to you and started barking and I have no idea what he thought he heard."

"Huh", I responded ... at the exact same time that Gator started coughing.

He hacked up a feather ... just like I had seen in Papa Kalfu's voodoo outfit ... and I knew then that I had a special kind of protector.

And *that's* how my last day in Florida -- my last day for a very long time anyway -- got started.

***

[to be continued ...]