Chapters 28 through 30

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Ten minutes later we pulled up and stopped in the abandoned parking lot of the high school.  We were just outside the administration building.  I never liked going back on campus.  It was so much smaller, less impressive than when I roamed these halls twenty-five years earlier.  Then I had all the delusions of personal grandeur a teenage boy can generate. No longer.

I got out and walked to the front of the car.  The engine was still idling.  I looked back at Maurice but couldn’t see him through the glare of the headlights.  I walked to the side of the car and made a gesture, my hands open, palms up as if to ask him “Well, aren’t you coming?”

To my shock, he shook his head “No” and put the car in reverse.  He backed out, never once glanced at me, and slowly drove away.  I stood there mystified.  I looked back over my shoulder at the administration Building. There was a faint light coming from the north side on the second floor.  I considered saying the hell with it and setting off on foot to find a phone to call Tammy J. and have her come get me. She would. But I didn’t.  Instead, I walked up to the front door and tried it.  It wasn’t locked. 

I walked in.  It was dark.  I searched along the wall with my hands for a switch to turn on the lights.  I couldn’t find one and kept getting deeper in the hallway.  It was getting darker, though my eyes had adjusted, and I could just make out walls and shapes and besides I knew these hallways.  Tromped them for four years. Even after all this time, I knew these hallways. Things hadn’t changed all that much.

I felt something strange.  Like I was being watched. I wondered if it was because I had been extremely foolish to enter this building alone.  I’m a cautious man.  I’m a prudent man.  Well, I’m not a brave man. This all made me nervous.  I couldn’t shake the feeling that there were eyes in the darkness watching me as I blindly navigated the hallways.  

I knew pretty much where the stairway was that would lead to the second floor.  There was no way I was going to enter any dark elevator.  Hell, I was getting scared.  I felt a little silly about how scared I was.  I mean I was a grown man.  I knew this place and I was someone of authority and just because I was alone in an empty building, I felt fear? Silly. I was being silly. 

My foot tripped on something, and I went down hard on my knee.  It hurt.  A lot.  I cursed my fall; I cursed my knee for hurting and I cursed myself for being a fool.  I wanted to go back, but now I didn’t know if I could find my way.  I realized I had turned a corner because I saw no light behind me from the outside.  I felt around to push myself up and felt the first concrete step of the stairway.  It was the half round base where the stairs started up that I had tripped over. I knew this stairway and had still tripped.  I was disgusted with myself.

I was also now hearing things.  Maybe I had lost my mind.  It was like a whisper, but the words were nonsensical.  The same words though over and over.  I knew there was a handrail here somewhere.  I felt for it and found it.  The worn cold metal felt familiar and that was good.  I was limping and felt wetness on my leg.  I must have knocked some skin off.  I was bleeding.   

I wanted to get out of there.  I wanted to run. It was in my nature to run. I had always ran when I was scared, when I was overmatched.  It was easier that way and over the years it had served me well.   I had survived nicely.  I was still around, relatively well off and unharmed.  If I wanted to spend an afternoon here and there getting soused with a like-minded adult female, then by God, I could and would.  But it was always necessary to survive.  I should run.

I liked Wanda, sure.  Good egg.  But I liked a lot of women.  I wasn’t sure this was worth it at all.  Right now, this moment, I doubted she was worth it.  I wasn’t tough.  I wasn’t a cop.  She was.  Maurice was. They could handle stuff like this.  Not me.  Why’d Maurice take off tonight?  That didn’t make sense.  I hated him.  Shit, my leg hurt.  

I started pulling on the rail and ascending the stairs dragging my wounded leg behind me.  I wanted to whine to someone.  Marta’s face came to mind.  I knew how she would react to my whining. That convinced me to buck up a little.  I needed to get up the damn stairs.

It got lighter the farther I progressed up the stairway.  I could now make out the walls and the rail and the steps.  I looked down at my leg. The pant leg was wet.  There was blood on the floor.  I bent over and pulled the pant leg up a little. There was a nice gash there.  It wasn’t bleeding a lot now.  It was starting to cake up. There was nothing to do but press on.  The infernal noise was louder here.  I still couldn’t make out what the words said, but there was more than one voice, and they were talking over each other.  It gave me the creeps.

I got to the top of the stairs and looked down the hallway.  Halfway down was a door. It was open and a light was on. As I got closer, the voices got louder.  I could make out the words now, but they were jumbled.  “Here” and “out” and “can’t stand it”, “rescue.” “What?” “Miss things,” “Miss everyone”. There were angry tones. There was also crying, moaning, a cuss word here and there.

Just as I got to the door a shadow passed through the light.  A big shadow.  A hulking shadow.  I stumbled back a step.  But where was I to go?  Especially on a bum leg.  I sure wasn’t going to a go forward, but maybe it would be okay to call out.  

“Hello?  Someone there?”

An excited voice replied.  “Nick!  You made it.  Come in here.”

It was Wanda. My Wanda. My big girl Wanda.  She would take care of me.

I limped to the door and looked in.  Wanda, my Wanda was seated in front of a computer monitor.  There was a face on the monitor. It was new Wanda and she was looking past Big Wanda and directly at me.  I didn’t know how, but she could see me through the monitor.  She looked at my limp and I heard her ask, “Are you alright?”  She was also talking to me though the monitor.

Big Wanda turned toward me, and she saw the leg too and moving with her usual surprising speed, she was up out of the chair and, easy as pie, lifted me and carried me to a couch on one wall.  

“What the hell happened to you?”

“Fell.”

“Well, you did a number on your leg.  Here, let me see what I can do.”

She bustled around getting some bandages and scissors from a first aid kit she found on the wall next to a teacher’s desk.  She bundled them in her arms and coming back across the room she kneeled in front of me and wrapped my leg.  The face on the monitor followed Wanda’s movements as she tended to my wound.  The face was patient. Waiting for us.  I could still hear the voices though clearer now.  They were coming from a speaker on a table opposite the monitor.

“What is that?” I asked.  “Those voices.  Who taped that and, my God, who would want to?”

Wanda looked up from tending my wound.  “Nick, that isn’t a tape.  Those are people, real people.  Some you know.”

I shook my head. “What do they want?  What are they saying?”

“Lots of things.  But mostly, they want to come home.”

Chapter Twenty-Nine

“You can hear me?”  I was addressing my question to the face, New Wanda, on the monitor’s screen.

“Of course.  I can hear you and I can see you.  Quite clearly.  And I am glad to see you again Nick.  I am sorry about your leg.  Does it hurt a lot?”

I was struck by her solicitude.  She was genuinely nice.  I felt an appreciation for her concern.

“Where are you?” I asked.  I almost called her Wanda, but with the other Wanda, my Wanda, in the room, I felt like it would be rude.

“I came back here.  It was the best thing to do.  For everyone.”

“Well, where is there?  I still don’t know where you are?”

“She will tell you.  I think she will anyway.  I must go now.  This connection is tenuous and if we lose the calibration, it might take a while to get another one synched enough to communicate.  I will be seeing you later.  Take care, Nick.”

And the screen went blank.  Another second later, the voices on the speakers stopped. There was the quiet in the room punctuated by Wanda’s movements.  She went over and unplugged the cord leading to the monitor from an outlet on the wall.  She rolled it up and placed it on the top of the monitor and started pushing the little cart the monitor was on toward a closet door. 

“Wanda.  What is going on here? And where have you been?  Nobody knew if you were okay or not.  We thought you had been kidnapped.”

“I was for a while.   They wanted to lock me up, but I managed to be more trouble than they thought I could be.  The rest of it can wait.  For now, I need to put this equipment away. There are people on their way here and they won’t be happy if they find out what is going on.  Come on.  I know your leg hurts but can you help?”

She opened the closet door and pushed the cart with the monitor inside.  She then turned and pointed to the speakers.  I went over and wincing a little for effect I bent over and unplugged them and carried them over to Wanda, who took them from my hands, put them on the floor inside the closet and closed the door.  She pulled some keys out of her jeans and locked the door. 

“Who’s coming anyway?” I asked.  While she moved around the office putting other things away, I walked back over to the entrance of the classroom and looked at the nameplate on the door.  I hadn’t noticed it when I first limped in.  The nameplate said, “Physics, 1A, Mrs. Vuitch”.  

“This is Vuitch’s class?”  I said out loud.

“Yes, it is.” Wanda said, “and all of this is her’s.”

“And that other Wanda.  On the screen.  That’s you, isn’t it?  And that is all Vuitch’s doing too, isn’t it?”

“Yes, and Yes.  But we need to move now.  Get over here.  I’m going to turn out the lights so we can go, and I don’t want your clumsy ass falling over something.”

“Well, I . . . “ 

I never got the chance to finish my defense of my general coordination because she flipped the switch leaving us in utter darkness.  I felt her big hand grab my arm right at the bicep and pull me after her.  It hurt and I wanted to whine a little, but Wanda was all business, and I wouldn’t put it past her to slap me around a little if I resisted her urging.

We moved at a good clip down a hallway and then began a descent.  I had to trust there would be steps where I was stepping because Wanda was certainly not giving us time to test our landings.  We got to the bottom of the stairs, turned right, and she picked up the pace. I was jogging to keep my arm from being pulled from my body.  I did want to stay intact.  I was fond of having my extremities attached to my trunk. It definitely enhanced my manly attractiveness, I was sure.  I was getting used to being tossed around by Wanda. She had done it before.  But that had been all in good fun.  The earnestness in her bed had been to achieve a particular pleasurable purpose. The earnestness here was to get me out of the building. 

We hit the front door without pausing and were down the front stairs of the Adminstration building to Maurice’s waiting car.  He had evidently returned while I was navigating the dark hallways of my alma mater.  I took back all nasty names I had silently called him and the slander on his heritage I had uttered under and over my breath when he had abandoned me earlier. Leading to me hurting my poor leg. 

Wanda pushed; well, threw me in the back seat rather unceremoniously and I crashed my head against the opposite door.  The car was already backing up when I was tossed in and I struggled for my balance to get myself upright.  I looked at the back of Wanda’s huge head and her broad shoulders once I was sitting up in the backseat.  I felt my forehead for blood and my mind, for some reason, fixated on a lewd image of how I intended to punish big Wanda for this indignity.  A way, I’m sure she would embrace enthusiastically.  

Around her large frame I saw lights.  As I leaned to the side to see around her, I saw the lights were from a van that had just pulled in the parking lot next to the admin building.

Maurice sped right by the van.  I thought that was audacious and a little foolish if we were trying to avoid them. As we went by, I saw the side door slide open and stepping out was Big Donny and right behind him pushing herself across the seat was old Mrs. Vuitch.

“They saw us, I think,” I said.

Wanda shrugged her big shoulders.  “That’s okay.  If they did, they still won’t be sure what we know and how far we are into this thing.”

“Well, the equipment back there.”

“Won’t do them any good.  We changed the sync sequence. And they won’t even know that unless they try using it.  Right now, there is no reason for them to do that.  They think we are still way off, far from where we need to be to stop this little murderous enterprise of theirs.”

“Murderous enterprise”? I thought.  “My oh my, Wanda was adopting my eloquence.”

Maurice turned the corner and accelerated.  He was headed out of town.

“Are you ever going to tell me what that was all about back there?  What is going on with those people?  And that other Wanda.  What is she?”

“She is me, Nick. At least who I might have been.  If things had been different.  I hated her when I first found out about her, but I kind of like her now.  She’s nice.”

“Well, ballyhoo for her.  That still don’t tell me a damn thing.”

“I know.  Maurice has to take us somewhere right now. It’ll take a while.  I don’t know the whole story, but I’m going to tell you what I know. Maurice hasn’t heard most of this either.  So, both of you listen up.  And it’s a little weird.  Like I said I don’t have all the answers so save your questions until I finish. Then we can figure out where we are.”

She paused and we all looked out the front window of the sedan.  It was completely dark out in the country except for the headlights on the road ahead.  As we stared ahead into the dark, Maurice sped up.

Chapter Thirty

Wanda half turned in the front seat so she could face in my general direction as she spoke about what had happened.  

She started out with the kidnapping. 

Imitating a police detective on T.V. she drolled, “They got the drop on me.”

Maurice glanced in her direction.  

“Yeah, I know,” she said.  “I put some pain on a couple of them, but I had my back turned to the others.  They set that up pretty good too and one of them clubbed me.  Got me good. I saw stars.  Hell, I saw a whole universe of stars. Went right down on my knees.  Never went out I don’t think, but they got a sack, a bag, something on my head while I was stunned and then I’m smelling chloroform and next thing I know I’m waking up in a fucking morgue all tied down to a gurney.”

“Morgue?” I asked.  “What Morgue?  Our Morgue?”

She held up her hand, a silent reminder that I was supposed to be quiet until she finished her tale.  She should know better.  I’m a lawyer after all.

She confirmed it was our morgue though.  She said there were three other people there.  That she could see.  But, she said, she believed there were more behind an observation window.  She felt they were there but because of the way they had her strapped down she couldn’t turn her head to make sure.

One of the men bent over and shined a light in her eyes.  He had a white coat on.  She unobtrusively tested her strength against her restraints. They didn’t give a lot, but some.  She didn’t think she could break them but if it came to it, she would certainly give them a go.

The man in the white coat smiled down at her.  She thought of spitting in his face, but instead smiled back.  That seemed to put him off a little.  He disappeared from her field of vision but was replaced by a handsome face on a very big broad-shouldered man dressed in a black leather jacket and red turtleneck.  She said the face was familiar, but she couldn’t place it at first.  She smiled at him.  She said he smiled too, but there was something cruel in the way he did it and then he suddenly slapped her face.  Hard. The man was strong.  She said she saw stars again. 

Maybe it was the blow, but she remembered where she saw the face before.  It had been back in high school.  A big sloppy guy name Arnold. The first guy she had ever known who had actual jowls.  Like a dog.  They just hung off his face. But there was nothing like that now. His features were sharp and angular. There had been a cruelty then in the way he looked at people and there was invariably a little sneer on his mouth.   That part was still there, she said, but more exaggerated.  

As her head cleared a little it occurred to her that she had never had any conflicts with him.  She certainly had not joined in any of the harassment.  She had been nice to him. Their situations in high school had not been dissimilar so why was he treating her this way?  She said later that became pretty apparent.  

The face of the man in the white coat appeared again.  He was holding a soft wet wipe, which he applied to Wanda’s cut lip.  

“I’m sorry that happened, Detective,” he told me.  “Arnold gets carried away.  I wish I could say it’s just once in a while, but when it comes to hurting people, Arnold can’t seem to restrain himself.”

Wanda was still swallowing blood from Arnold’s punch.  She thought once again of spitting and this time it would be all over this weirdo’s bright white coat.  Once again, however, her discipline held.  In fact, she bragged about that a little.  Maurice’s head was shaking slowly side-to-side as if self-restraint as applied to Wanda was a rare enough occurrence to invite skepticism.

Instead of spitting on him she had thought about the fact that he obviously knew who she was.  That was probably easy enough to figure out from all the official identification she carried, but there was something else. He was treating her with a familiarity that belied the fact she had never set eyes on him before.

She had noticed a third set of steps, a woman’s shoes, in the morgue room.  She heard these footsteps approaching her gurney and then they stopped.  Wanda tried to tilt her head back to see, but the person kept just out of her line of sight.

“This isn’t right.  She should not be tied up for gosh sakes.”

Wanda said it was like listening to herself.  Everything was pretty much the same.  Inflections, pitch, the voice was the same, just not as deep.  Again, Wanda strained her head backwards trying to see the owner of the voice.  The person took another step away from Wanda, back into the shadows, in an attempt to prevent her from seeing.

Wanda managed to twist her head enough to see the person’s reflection in the window.  She said, it was like looking at herself, but different.  All the features were the same, but not the body mass and not how she carried herself.

When the person saw that Wanda could see her in the reflection she turned away and Wanda regretted to see the Arnold’s face appear above her once again.  And once again the smile and once again a well-placed blow to her jaw.  She felt a crack and knew it was a tooth and then she lost consciousness.