F Paul Wilson - Novel 05 (40 page)

 
          
She
closed her eyes and felt the horror, the fiery terror of being trapped by the
choking smoke and searing heat... no way out and surrounded by hungry flames.

 
          
She
straightened and tried to shake it off. I don't know. I'll
never know. And I
can't beat myself up about something 1 may have had nothing to do with.

 
          
She
kept reading.

 
          
The
bodies were burned beyond recognition. Eathan Gordon, brother to Nathan, could
not identify either corpse.

 
          
That's
what they were, then. Corpses. Not people anymore.

 
          
But
the dental records for both Lucinda and Nathan Gordon had confirmed exactly
who the corpses were.

 
          
That
was it, then. Two lives ended, two bodies reduced to charcoal, identified by
their teeth, and buried. Nothing left but a headstone and some yellowed
newspaper clippings.

 
          
And
their children, of course. Sam . . .
and me.

 
          
One
of whom may have started the fire.

 
          
Her
hands trembled as she replaced the article. But as she closed the hanging
folder she spotted something she hadn't noticed before-, a flat box of some
sort, wedged far back in the long file drawer.

 
          
She
pulled it out, no easy thing with the bulging files.

 
          
A
metal box, letter-size
—
locked.

 
          
She
pried at the lid but that sturdy little lock held it shut tight She put the box
on the table behind her and reached back into the drawer, feeling around its
bottom, searching for a key. Nothing.

 
          
Julie
turned and stared at the box sitting on the table. She thought of matrioshkas,
all those nesting dolls in Sam's 'scape. And here in the real world: Inside the
locked wall cabinet is a locked file cabinet, and inside the locked file
cabinet is a locked box.

 
          
And
inside
that?

 
          
She
picked it up and studied the lock more closely. She could break it open. It
didn't look that strong.

 
          
She
put it down again. What am I thinking? Hadn't she hurt Eathan enough already?
When
am I going to stop?

           
She had to put the box back.

 
          
She
was reaching for it when she heard steps in the hall outside. She hurried to
the door and peeked down the hallway. Clarice was heading this way.

 
          
Julie
darted back to the file drawer and pushed it shut. She jumbled the numbers on
the combination. Then she shut the wall-cabinet doors and locked them.

 
          
When
she turned she saw the metal box on the table behind her. Damn! She'd forgotten
it. Or had she? Too late to reopen the wall cabinet. Only one thing to do.

 
          
Julie
hurried to the nearest bookshelf and grabbed the first oversized volume her
hand contacted. She tucked it under her arm and slipped the box behind it. She
reached the door just as the maid entered.

 
          
Clarice
jumped at the sight of her. "Oh Lord, mum, you gave me a start!"

 
          
"I'm
sorry," Julie said. She hurried by her, keeping the book between Clarice
and the box.

 
          
In
Sam's room the nurse got up and excused herself as soon as Julie entered.

 
          
Julie
went to her sister's closet
—
empty now except for bedding
and medical supplies
—
and put die box on the top
shelf, slipping it under a comforter. Later, after Clarice was gone, she'd
return it to the locked file cabinet.

 
          
She
turned back to her sister and moved to the bed.

 
          
"What's
in the box, Sam? Any ideas?"

 
          
She
turned to the computer terminal and its attached headgear, ominous now as the
virtual reality it created became less virtual... and more real.

 
          
She
stepped over to it and eased herself into the recliner.

 
          
"Am
I going to be hurt some more, Sam?" She looked at her sister one more time
before slipping on the headgear. "I want to know about the fire, Sam. I
want to know if I had anything to do with starting it. Do you know? Can you
help me?"

 
          
She
slipped on the headgear, took a deep breath, and started the program.

 
          
Source
amnesia is the root of most false memories. The
source of a memory
—
its context in time and place
—
is its
most frag
ile
aspect, and. often the first to decay. Once that's gone,
the memory
is
adrift, so to speak, and the brain can no longer distinguish whether the event
it encoded was real or imagined.

—
Random
notes: Julia Gordon

 
          
You
slowly turn around in the newly-empty study, and your eye is caught again by
the tantalizingly familiar boardwalk painting. You remember the white dot you
saw at its end after your brush with the thing in the sea.

 
          
Something
still waits for you there.

 
          
But
you don't fear the kraken now, at least not as much. It had you
—
and then let you go.

 
          
Behind
it you find a jumbled painting unlike anything you've seen before, looking like
a golden mirror that's been smashed and then clumsily pieced together again.
The golden shards are arranged into something resembling
Nude Descending a
Staircase.
You can't see yourself in these pieces, but you sense an image,
a shape in the jumbled mass.

 
          
You
look closer. Has this painting drawn you, or is it simply one oddity among
many? The golden color
—
could that be fire, the fire
you're searching for? Is there a method here, or only madness?

 
          
You
must go see firsthand. You float out of the gallery and into the moonlit night
above the dark islands of Sam's memory.

 
          
Your
heart sinks as you survey the watery emptiness. Only two other islands remain.
One displays a familiar orange-and-yellow ribbon of boardwalk, scene of your
encounter with the kraken, but it looks smaller now.

 
          
A
driving urgency fills you. By this time tomorrow it will all be gone.

 
          
You
rush forward and as you near one of the islands you see the golden shards from
the canvas scattered haphazardly on it, reflecting the moonlight from the black
surface.

 
          
Which
to go to?

 
          
The
golden shards are closer, beckoning like fire. You tilt down and head toward
the largest piece.

 
          
As
you near you see faces on the shard, blurry images seen through ice. Your
mother... you recognize her. And hiding nearby, little Samantha. Suddenly you
are your sister....

 
          
Sammi
loves to play "boo" with Mommy. Loves to climb behind the big easy
chair and wait, quiet as a mouse, to leap out and yell
"Bool"

 
          
As
Mommy comes downstairs, Samantha is ready. Except Mommy opens the front door
and Uncle Eathan is there. She says what she always says when she sees Uncle
Eathan.

 
          
"What's
up, doc?"

 
          
Uncle
Eathan is a doctor for grown-ups, not like Dr. White that Sammi and Julie go
to.

 
          
It's
strange to see Uncle Eathan here when Mommy is usually cleaning or going
shopping.

 
          
He
comes into the living room and shuts the door behind him.

 
          
Samantha
likes Uncle Eathan. He always has a smile, and he isn't always asking questions
and showing her pictures and making her draw, like Daddy. And his beard tickles
when he kisses her.

           
"That's what I want to
know," he says. "What's up? You sounded upset on the phone. What's he
done now?"

 
          
Sammi
watches her mom look around, searching for her. But Sammi stays hidden. She
can't jump out now.

 
          
"It
was nothing, just another one of our stupid fights, over money, over the girls
—
"

 
          
"The
girls
—
?"

 
          
Sammi
feels a bit of dust in her nose, the beginning of a sneeze
—

 
          
If
I sneeze, they'll know I'm here, they'll know I've listened.

 
          
The
bit of dust continues to tickle her nose.

 
          
"Just
the same craziness, Julie with math problems, Saman-tha with paints and
crayons. I wish
you
could say something."

 
          
"Since
when does Nathan listen to anyone on the subject of his daughters? But I don't
think he's harming them."

 
          
Mommy
stiffens and turns to Uncle Eathan. It gets very quiet in the room.

 
          
"If
for one instant I ever thought
—
even suspected
—
that, I'd be out of here.
With
the girls."

 
          
Quieter.

 
          
"Well,"
Uncle Eathan says, "you know where you can stay." He puts a hand on
her arm. "It would be like old times."

 
          
Mommy
pulls her arm away. "We promised to forget those 'old times,' didn't we.
Let's keep that promise."

 
          
And
just then the tickle in Sammi's nose grows worse, as if the sneeze knew what a
bad time this was. The tickle suddenly seems to fill her nose with air, and even
though Sammi reaches up to close her nose, squeeze it shut tightly, it explodes.

 
          
Uncle
Eathan, Mommy... staring at her.

 
          
Sammi
jumps up and says what she always says.

 
          
"Boo!"

 
          
Suddenly
you're back outside in the 'scape, high above the island. You are disappointed
—
nothing there about the fire. Below you the shards begin to
glow with a rich amber light. You watch in awe as they flow together,
reassembling, until you see that the glass collage in the gallery was once
—

           
A family portrait: Mom, Dad, Sam,
and you
—
shattered.

 
          
Shattered
by what? An affair?

 
          
Eathan
and Mom
—
was there something going on
between them? Or
had
there been? Was that what "old times"
meant?

 
          
If
true, this changes everything.

 
          
You
look around.

 
          
The
boardwalk island still beckons from below. Maybe the kraken is gone. It did its
job.

 
          
You're
almost afraid to go. If you don't find an answer, a solution here, then what?
There's no place else to look? What's left of Sam will sink beneath the waves,
like Atlantis ... gone everything.

 
          
You
hurry to the boardwalk, the empty boardwalk with its burnished slats stretching
impossibly far on the sinking island. And at the end, in the impossible
distance, far past where the now-vanished fortune-teller sat, a white dot.

 
          
"I
suppose that's where I'm supposed to go," you say aloud. "Please let
me find the answer there."

 
          
No
one's going to hold it against you that you're talking to yourself here.

 
          
You'll
go crazy if you don't.

 
          
You
start traveling the boards, missing the creak of the wood and the squeals of
summer
—
the distant sounds of people
playing on the shrinking beach, frolicking in the encroaching surf. But this
boardwalk is silent, and the only sounds you're likely to hear are your own.

 
          
You
look up. Just like the last time, the sky here is a swirl of bright-colored
ribbons, as though the boardwalk were located on Jupiter.

 
          
You
look ahead and see that the white dot is much closer, and no longer a mere dot.
Appropriately enough, it's a concession stand. Hot dogs and more. Finally you
can read the sign.

 
          
NATHAN'S.

 
          
Sure,
you're at the beach, at
Coney Island
maybe, so naturally there's a Nathan's stand.

 
          
Except
you don't think Sams ever been to
Coney Island
. Nathan took you south for summer vacations now and then,
bur you never saw a Nathan's stand in
Brighton
.

 
          
That
question again: Whose memory is this?

 
          
Closer
to the stand. Someone's waiting there, being served.

           
On the sign you see colorful
pictures of all the wonderful food items, the crinkle-cut fries,
corn-on-the-cob dripping butter, clams on the half shell.

 
          
You're
getting hungry.

 
          
What's
it like to eat virtual food? you wonder.

 
          
The
person ahead of you is short, dressed in a long, dark coat. Waiting here, you
have a minute to study that cloak. It's black like the water but dabbed with
spots of color, all swirls, just like the wood, the sky, the boardwalk.

 
          
You
can't see the counterman, but you hear him.

 
          
"There
you go, sir. There you are
—
"

 
          
And
then the fellow in front of you turns, moving like slow-motion film, and as he
faces you he's holding his head, a hand tight against each side of his face,
squeezing his head, as he
—
screams!

 
          
The
sound is an animal howl emanating from the oval mouth in his lightbulb head
with two thumb gouges for eyes.

 
          
He
scurries away, his piercing, whistling scream echoing after him.

 
          
When
he's gone you realize you
know
that guy. Everyone knows
The Scream
guy.
You had a chance to ask him what he was screaming about... and blew it.

 
          
Is
Sam getting whimsical here? Playing with you?

 
          
Your
mind is dying, Sam. The clock is running out. No time for games.

 
          
"How
ya doin' today?"

 
          
You
look at the counterman and it's Nathan.

 
          
Your
father.

 
          
"Doin'
okay?"

 
          
He's
chewing gum, popping it, acting like a counterman, wearing a silly white cap.

 
          
You
wonder if your image can speak in the memoryscape.

 
          
You
say, "Dad ... Daddy. I
—
"