Buried in Back Bay

Three: White Coffee, Communicating With the Dead

Buried in Back Bay ©2012 Mick Circeo

White Coffee, Communicating With the Dead (Washington DC, Crazy Period)

I’ve got to get out of bed today.

I wake up each morning disgusted with myself. Maybe for what I did the day before, or was unable to do. People who don’t live with OCD don’t understand it. Yes, maybe they can begin to get a little of it via observation, but they really don’t understand it.

OCD is a sickness and it’s not a sickness; it’s more of a realization of the way that things must work if the world is going to make any sense. If it’s going to fit together properly. You’re not sitting around looking at making sure “everything is even” — yes, you do that anyway. That piece is incidental to the bigger picture of Order in the Universe. Understand the World, as we say at GEO-INT.

I live with regret. What could I have done better that I didn’t do? What personal failing has caused me to be in the situation in which I currently find myself? Find myself? Am I not here because of something or a series of events that I myself caused? Anything bad that has ever happened to me has rarely been anyone’s fault but my own. I said rarely.

You make all the labels face the same way, and alphabetical — doesn’t that just make good sense? All furniture is perpendicular with the floorboards, and who doesn’t do that. I’m not talking about feng shui — this has little to do with ch’i, at least as I understand ch’i.

*  *  *

(Washington DC, Current Day)

After Rose disappeared, I would catch flashes — brilliant flashes — in the corners of my eyes. It would be her. Or someone I thought was her. Maybe it was at the house. Sometimes it was on the street. Even the dog saw her. Maybe she was and inch taller or two inches shorter, or something was out of place. Something that Rose would’ve done differently. If we were on the sidewalk, the dog stared her down for the longest time, until the she turned a corner or went into a store. I’d stare with him. Frozen. Then I’d look down at him, look up, and she’d be gone. That is what caused me to think she was real. Or maybe that she herself was a jumper. (Surely she’d have told me that?)

You hear stories about people appearing at the foot of your bed, and you think the stories are bullshit until people start appearing to you. At the foot of your bed. Yes I don’t mean to diminish their lovely souls in any way by saying it, but the girls — my twins — did come to me after the wreck, and it did happen in dreams. And it did stop.

The thing about communicating with the dead is that — for a short time after they disappear — and I’m not talking about pulling “spirits from the vasty deep” like Glendower — maybe that works in a Shakespeare play. It doesn’t happen in real life. But my daughters would visit me. In my dreams, I mean. This happens. They would tell me that they’re okay, and that I would be okay too. For a short time after, I would get these visits or I would hear their voices, their comforting voices. You would think it would be startling, but it’s not. It is strangely and oddly comforting.

Sometimes I’d dream about the girls as they were when they were younger, sometimes when they could barely talk, back when they wanted their daddy to ”just hold" them. And then I’d wake up.

With Rose it was different. The visits, the glimpses, the flashes, they didn’t stop. The dreams. We’d be together, and it wasn’t an image of her as they rolled her into the ER that night; this was as she was in life. That’s why they say you shouldn’t look at a loved one in bad condition or even in death — because that is how you will remember them. And that’s how I knew that Rose was not dead. Or maybe that is why I never felt comfortable that she had really died that night.

You might say to yourself No. I don’t communicate with the dead, and why would I want to?

Well if you’ve lost someone close to you, there might be things left unsaid — maybe there are I love yous to be exchanged — or apologies to be tendered or just silent moments to be shared. Maybe you wanted your grandmother to know your children, and she passed before you had children. Maybe you performed CPR on your father, and you couldn’t save him. But even if all bases have been covered, there is still that urge, that yearning, to have more time together. Especially if they’ve been taken from you and you cannot even say goodbye to a body, there is that desire. And you begin to wonder what really happened.

When a personal tragedy strikes, you’re distraught. Other people take over. I had to just let that happen. I was in no shape or position to handle funerals and burials and services and guests. That is all done for you, and if you’re in a daze or a haze, you let it happen. There’s no time or room for clear thinking and working out patterns. There’s just sadness and heaviness in your chest and a sense that your world is over. Or if it’s got to go on, that it will all be different from now on.

I was so out of it then. There was no clear memory of the funerals. Sometimes I think that they didn’t really happen. Sometimes I think that Rose and the girls are still alive.

Some days you wake up, your mind is blank. Sometimes it’s morning, but most of the time you look around for a clock to see what time it is, what day, year it is. You start thinking about how many songs start with “woke up this morning” — whose wine, what wine, where the hell did I dine. So on. Is everyone like this, or is it just me. Why does it have to be everyone or me? Why can’t it just be a handful of people, or a hundred or a thousand people — doesn’t have to be an “everyone or me” scenario, right.

You wash your face and hands — if you can get up — the back of your neck. Get that cat butter — those sleepies, as she used to call them — out of your eyes, that oily film off your forehead, those germs off your hands. Or you want to.

Flat on my back, cant get up. If I put pressure just behind my right ear, it somehow blocks the pain and I can move. Nexium for the stomach acids. Naproxen, Mepergan for the pain. I don't want the Mepergan because I need to be sharp, and there's always the chance I will throw up if I eat that stuff. The Nexium I can take — no side effects. Good for the stomach.

Get that pillow just right under my neck. Surprising how the pain leaves with just that focused pressure in that one place. Okay, this is good. I can lay on my right side. I'm fine if I do that.

“Come on sweetie, you need your meds. Doctor's orders.”

“But they're making me sick. I’m so ripshit with this. I'm gonna vomit. I feel like I’m gonna vomit.” Am I dreaming this? It feels real but I know it’s a dream. Logic tells me it’s a dream. But my eyes are watery — you don’t get watery eyes in a dream. I feel wide awake. I can see her, touch her, hold her. This is real. You don't have to take a shit in your dreams, and I have to get up now, just like I do very morning. This is real. Fuck. Body position just before you hit that cold toilet seat. Like I’m being stabbed in the back of the neck. I’m wincing? I don’t wince. I don’t feel pain like most people. I don’t feel it at all. But I can’t lift my arms. Explain that.

*   *   *

(Washington DC, Crazy Period)

She's there. My Rock is there to dose me. My pills and a nice white coffee. Rose had to get up 20 minutes ago to make this for me. Sweet. She is so sweet. The sweetest. And I am getting wrinkles on my face with all these pillows, lying here like some paraplegic or something. 6:49AM. I've got work to do. Maybe I can get up for good by noon. I cannot be incapacitated by something so insignificant. I am stronger than that. I am better than that.

And yet here I am, half-light getting past the curtains covering the French windows. Pictures hanging on white concrete walls. Pictures I took and framed and hung myself. I clearly remember doing that. Half my leftover scotch on the nightstand from last night. Behind me. I can smell it.

This cannot be a dream, and yet she is here. And if I try to raise up from this position, nothing happens. My arms seem to work, and I have this clear cognitive thought, but I am otherwise paralyzed. No I’m not. I can post up on my elbow. I can turn my head. Just a little, but I can turn my head. God. Shit that hurts. This can't be real. What if it's real? Head weighs a frigging ton. Neck can’t support it.

Bedroom door is ajar, just slightly. I can see past the doorway into the hall. Shadows. Conversations. My hearing is hot and cold these days — I hear some things very sharply. Other things not, they’re dull noises. Seems like I pick up all the sounds I don't need — background noise, dog snoring in the middle of the night. But I need to hear this conversation. I only get voices. No whole words. It's not an argument, just concerned voices. It's not the TV — I recognize these people. Are they talking about me?

I'll try to get up. I can't go out there though — if they're talking about me, they're just going to stop once they see me. I need to hear this. I just need to get closer to the door. Gently, don't make a sound. The carpet helps. Goddamn, you bend over, you can’t get back up. Just stay down, get to the door.

“No, he's not. He's not getting better. If anything, he's getting worse.”

I don’t hear anyone else.

“No.” It’s her again. “I'm not gonna do that. I could never do that. That's not right. I can't even think about that right now. No. Don't even bring that up. We're not going there.” She's pausing now. Silence. Listening. “I know. I know what you’re saying, and part of me agrees with that. But I said no. Let's talk later. Okay. Okay. Okay. Love you.”

That was a “love you” like she was talking to her sister. Not a “love you” like it was another man. She wasn’t like that. Her I could trust. Crawl back to bed. Don’t let her hear you.

The white coffee was good – she had talent. Life is too short to drink bad coffee.

“Sweetie, you just keep doing what the doctors are telling you, and things are going to work out.” She would always say that. She was usually right about everything. She was not right about this. She was my warm cotton coat. She shows up like this every now and again, and it hurts my heart.

Sequel to Chapter 2 -- BURIED IN BACK BAY

Buried in Back Bay ©2012 Mick Circeo

Ford Queensberry and Rose Lewis (Washington DC, Current Day -5 Years)

“It’s not that I don’t love him; I love him dearly.” Rose sat at the foot of the bed, staring at her feet, chin on her knees. In some nostalgic way, Queensberry’s apartment in Adams Morgan resembled his dorm room at Boston University. “He is my world. But the episodes — they’re almost too much for me and the girls.” Bed clothes, still intact and fully made up. Rose was fond of Egyptian cotton, but this was all wrong for her. She couldn’t and wouldn’t manage a charade, a game like this. It wasn’t in her character. I shouldn’t even be here. What am I doing?

“What do you mean, episodes. And why did you stop?” Queensberry was closer to her now. You know exactly what she means. Why are you doing this to her? If you really love her, why torture her like this?

“I can’t do this. We can’t. Not to Gage. Ford, this isn’t freshman year anymore. We’ve got real lives now. Not in his condition. Gage can’t go to a regular doctor. That’s why we have Dr. Mornington. He — and don’t say anything to anyone about this — you know what would happen to his career.”

“Mornington.” This is gold. This is something I can use.

“Right. Gage told me that you and he talked. I’m saying too much. I should just stop. This is so wrong. And I've got to go. I've got to pick up the girls from Aftercare and I’m late already. I told him we’d be home when he got there. Where are my shoes.” She stood cautiously, searching the floor. At least it’s not some hotel room — you’ve been in this apartment a hundred times. Just get out of here — you haven’t done anything unforgivable yet.

“Hey, hey. OK now. Who do you think you’re talkin’ to? Read her cues. Act like you know what she’s talking about. Visualize her hidden agenda. “It’s me, remember? Ford is here now.” Put your arms around her. So natural. Just like it used to be. This is so good.

“Obviously I know I can trust you with a secret, Ford.” She talked into his shoulder, then pulled away to get her shoes, using her fingers as a shoehorn. “I just want to be sure that Gage can trust me.” She sat on the side of the undisturbed bed. This is about smart decisions. “And he has no reason to distrust me right now.” How’m I gonna get to National Cathedral and home in an hour? I’ll never make it. I’m such a fool. I don’t deserve Gage, not even with all the shit he’s got going on right now.

“Hey hey hey, stop. Now don’t do that to yourself. This is not wrong, what we’re doing.”

“Not yet. Thank God.”

“No, this is about soulmates and the spiritual connection we’ve always had with each other. You’re the only one who’s ever meant anything to me. You’ve got to know that after all this time.”

“Ford, it’s true — you’ve always been there for me, even after Gage and I got together, and I so appreciate that. Even when he hasn’t been able to be there, you’ve always been there. That much is true.” I can’t continue with this — it’s already gone too far. He thinks we’re gonna have a life together. I can’t do that to Gage. I won’t.

“Look, I haven’t been perfect. Here, take these.” He replaced her damp tissues with fresh ones. “Dry your eyes. So why — what happened to us —”

“You have to ask?” She turned to the front door, looking back at Queensberry standing by the bed. She was suspicious and incredulous through her tears.

“Well, yeah. I mean it was a long time ago, hon. People make mistakes.” And he did remember, looking at his hands, and then again across the floor at her eyes, as though searching for that spot of hope that would lead to disappointment. For him. Maybe for both of them. “You know my parents, Rose — we were getting way too serious for them. They were gonna cut me off, and I didn’t have scholarship money like you did. I’ve always tried to listen to them — but that was a mistake. I admit that. It’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever done, and I’ve regretted it every day since then.”

“Ford, look. We’ve been over that. It’s all in the past. I have to live in the present. Gage has demons. You know that.”

“We all do.”

“Not like this. I know that sounds like a cop out or an excuse, but he does. He has nightmares. Hallucinations — we sleep in separate bedrooms most nights. I can’t handle it. Neither can he.”

“Why are you telling me this, sweetheart.”

“Don’t call me that. You can’t call me that anymore. You lost that right.”

“OK OK. You’re right. Come on.” Just be cool. Don’t screw up. This could be so natural, just like it was. Gently now. She is so tense in the neck and shoulders. I can see it. “You’re right. We have to go.”

“It’s like we can’t talk anymore. Gage won’t talk to me. He can’t.”

“Maybe he’ll talk to me.”

She inspected the rugged face she once was in love with. “You’re not getting it. I don’t want him to talk to you — I want him to talk to me.”

“I know. I know that. I’m just trying to help.” You had better not mess up again. You don’t get two bites at the apple. You’re too close — don’t screw up. You can make up for past sins.

“You don’t understand what you’re asking me to do.” She was almost out of tears.

“I think I do know, hon. You need stability in your life. He can’t give you that right now — I can.”

“You don’t understand — you don’t have a family. People are not replacement parts. You don’t just abandon someone you love, just because he’s having some hard times. I can’t teach my girls that. That’s when I’m supposed to be there for him — in sickness and in health —”

“We can both be there for him. Together. We’re all stronger if we do it this way.”

“Are you kidding me? We’ll be,” she sobbed, “lucky if he even speaks to us if he thought we were together now. It’s hopeless. I’ll end up losing you both.”

“No. That is not gonna happen. I’m not gonna let it. We will get through this. All of us. You’ll see.” You’ve got to take an encouraging tone. Be her moral support. That’s what she needs and that’s what you’ve got to give her. Maybe we can get it all back. Everything we once had. That magic. So close I can smell that soft ginger hair again. It could be better this time around. It would be. I will make it so. This is not going to be new to us — it’s gonna be natural.

Maybe it’s different if I was really snaking him, but I was there before him. He’s the one who stole her from me, right. That’s how I see it. I’m sorry it’s got to happen this way, but I didn’t create this scenario. He did. Those disoriented babblings and his ‘episodes’ and crazy talk and his OCD. He can’t expect her to live with that. Nobody could. I can’t say I love the man, but he’s sick. Maybe we get him committed, Rose gets the divorce, I get Rose and the girls, and Gage gets the help he needs.

He needs to be shook to his core. Maybe this is exactly what he does need. Lets him know that he needs to straighten up and fly right. And Rose and I can finally be true to ourselves, and we avoid a showdown. Out in the open. In the end, we are really helping him, and that is what true friends do. Help each other. When he finally comes around — if he ever does — he’s gonna know that it was all for the best. For him. Rose. Me. The girls. For everyone.

 “I’ve got to go.” She opened the door.

“I’ll follow you. Be careful. “Bud,” he patted the black-and-white Lhasa Apso on his fuzzy head — be good while daddy’s gone. Babysitter will see you tonight. Be a sweet boy now.”

“Chrissy’s still babysitting?” She dabbed her eyes.

“Yeah she’s good. Here — don’t forget your umbrella.”

*   *   *

(Washington DC, Current Day)

They said she was speeding. “Too fast for conditions,” was what they called it. She picked up the girls from school, and was five miles from the house. Queens laid the whole thing out for me in the ER. He was right there, right behind here. We were all just going to enjoy an evening together like we always did. A little grilling, a little wine, a little scotch, and good friends. That’s what was supposed to happen, as it had happened so many times before.

Sometimes Queens would spend the night in McLean with us. It was close to work for him, and saved him a longer commute in the morning.

Coming out of the tunnel onto the I-66 after crossing the Key Bridge, she swerved to miss a taxi stopped for a white-tailed deer. The Speed Limit is 55 there. She must’ve hydroplaned. I don’t know why it sticks with me that it was a white-tailed deer, but it does. She cut left, slammed the concrete barrier by the median, then ricocheted and rolled over the guardrail on the right, and plowed roof-first into a light pole. The SUV was cut almost in half.

Somehow I am comforted that Queens was behind her when it happened. Not that he had to see it — not that at all — but that she had someone she knew there at the end. Until the paramedics came. I had just gotten home when he called me from the back of the ambulance.

“You’d better come, quick.”

“Why, what’s up?”

“I been calling you for 20 minutes, bro — just meet me at Virginia Hospital.”

“It didn’t register that he said hospital. What’s wrong — you OK?”

“It’s Rose and the girls.”

“Yeah I just got her voicemail. She’s on her way. You need me to meet you — pick you up? Did you break your arm again? What.”

“Look. She’s not on her way home, bro. She’s with me. Get in your fucking car and get to the fucking ER. Right fucking now. Virginia Hospital. We’ll see you there.”

“OK.” Now I heard it in his voice. The urgency. The desperation. And the siren wailing. You feel yourself heaving. Breathing hard. I have methods to keep emotion from bubbling up, but my tricks weren’t working so good then. Tears come because you know it’s bad, but you don’t want to ask how bad.

Rarely was Queens serious like this. But Rose had just called me, maybe half an hour earlier. She was stopped, getting the girls from Aftercare. I called her back but it went straight to vmail. I said “drive safe” — that was what I said. To her voicemail. Not to her. She liked to be home when I got home.

They said that they cut her out of the wreck and got her to the ER. I got to the hospital ahead of them. They were maybe two minutes behind me. I don’t know anymore because time just kind of melts together when I think of that night.

The sirens were loud. Roaring. Screaming. Whining. That I remember. The paramedics squealed into the Emergency Entrance and almost skidded in under the ER’s brick canopy. They shoved Queens out the back of the ambulance, and rushed into the ER with Rose on the gurney. Ashen. Bloody. I’d never seen anyone I love look like that. Her forehead and neck strapped to that white board. Half her face was gone, skin just hanging loose. The only reason I knew it was Rose was that Queens got out before she did.

I didn’t feel my legs move, but they must have because the staff and Queens held me back from following her gurney into the treatment area. All I wanted — all I wanted — was to see how she was. It was so bright in there it hurt my eyes right into my forehead. Fluorescent. I heard nothing after we went through the double doors. My feet were numb. I felt nothing. Just brilliant light and a heavy buzz. Isopropyl alcohol and blood and clean linens all lingered, and burned my nostrils.

Somebody in a white coat was in front of me, palms on my chest. Just appeared, like out of thin air, mouth moving. At me. Directed at me. It was like I was deaf. I elbowed by him. They held me back. And I saw Rose disappear, wheeled behind the doors or curtains or something. Your training escapes you there. I didn’t want to hurt anyone — I just needed to see my wife.

They got me back to the visitor area. Someone needs to tell me something, goddamit. A doctor, a nurse, a paramedic, somebody. Queens had my chin with in his palm, his arm around my shoulder, walking me. He pulled me eye-to-eye.

“Hey.”

“Who was that on the stretcher.”

“Listen, brother — there was an accident, a wreck.”

“Where are my girls. Were you with her in the car? Where’d they take the girls.”

“No. No. I was behind her, brother, in my car. I couldn’t keep up with her though.”

“What happened? How is she? Where’d they take the girls?”

“Listen. We were on the way. It was dark. I couldn’t see a lot. Wipers were on full blast and I couldn’t hardly see anything. Next thing I know I’m skidding sideways — everything’s stopped — and she’s bouncing off the barrier, back across the road, and into that pole. Glass and smoke. Just rocks and smoke and glass everywhere.”

“Queens. Where are the girls.”

“The girls — oh God oh God. I shoulda,” his eyes were red, “had them in my car.” I’d never seen him cry before. Known him for a dozen years. Never seen him cry. But this wasn’t crying. This was despair. “I was right behind them at school. They wanted to ride with Uncle Queens so bad.” It wasn’t even his own voice anymore. Just something deeper that came out of him, almost beyond his power to control.

“Look, is there another ambulance, bro. Is it coming here.”

“Yes. Yes.”

“Where.”

“They’re coming. They’re coming.”

“OK, c’mon. Let’s just get out there.”

“No — we gotta stay outta their way and let them work.” This is bad. But it’s gonna be OK. The doctors will do their work. Maybe it’s a long road to recovery, but we can do it.

“The docs are gonna wanna talk to you.”

It wasn’t the doctors; it was the patient representative who needed to speak with me. They are very good at what they do — they look you right in the eye and tell you I’m sorry with a straight face and a serious face, and they don’t let you see your loved ones. Why is that? I wanted to know what they were hiding from me, and they wouldn’t tell me.

This is for the piece where he discusses the loss of his family.

Ever read about people who die young, before they ever have the chance to fuck up? People who die accidentally or from disease or as a victim of a crime or as a hero. And all the survivors and acquaintances have nothing but nice things to say, gushing about heroics (if they die trying to save someone or if they get ravaged with a disease). Or they talk about what a good student, or how energetic and loving they were, or that they had a brief but heroic military career, or they had a lot going for them or something.

I even heard one glib religious person say, at his own daughter’s funeral, that she just got her work on earth done early. How utterly cold and unfeeling. And this was the father. Speaking of his murdered daughter. Is it any wonder that I stay away from church doors.

I know what you're thinking. But he didn’t. The father didn't do it — he was just the victim of that detached kind of religious thinking that makes you totally insincere. And what were the funeral attendees thinking when they heard a supposedly caring father be so flippant about the horrific murder of his teenage daughter — she got her work done early? Please.

And yet part of me is jealous of even those tragedies because those poor dead souls never have to experience the ongoing pain of regret. You wonder if a father like that ever looks back and says I am so fucking angry at the diseased mother fucker who took my daughter that I can't even think straight. But church people don’t think like that, and that is part of what makes them such doormats.

Got her work done early — when I think of that supposed father, and then think of my own girls, I’d like to slit his fucking throat and watch him bleed to death in a dark corner somewhere.

Maybe you’ve heard people say that a life without regret is an empty life. Those idiots are people with only the most miniscule regrets in their lives and loves — regrets they can live with. Not regrets that kill them slowly. On the installment plan. Regrets that eat away at your insides. Regret won’t let you sleep. Regret causes you to rethink every moment you’re allowed to live on. Could I have done this? Should I have done that? Isn't everyone better off if I'm dead? Doesn't that make everything less complicated?

You can’t put yourself in the place of people who would survive you because your feelings are shot, they're dead. And you don't want to feel different — there is a calm to this. It’s very sick, in a way. And then you realize that you're not going to end it. You’re going to continue to live on. For whatever reasons. It will mess up my face. It will hurt. I’ll make a mess. It won’t work and I'll be embarrassed and horribly scarred. It will work, and people will talk about how they “should’ve seen the signs” or other nonsense.

Think about how egotistical that is, that people say they should’ve seen the signs. Like there are signs. Like they can save you. That they have that power. Like you’d really listen to them. That they’re really that persuasive. Life is not a movie — when are people going to realize that.

Most people approach their relationships as they do the water supply — assuming it will always be there. And I get that because it’s just a natural human tendency to want to trust in people. Maybe it’s lazy or comfortable to want that. You don’t work on it — what is working on a relationship anyway. You hear these so-called experts talk about relationships being hard work but they’re worth it. Then you find out the experts have all been married five or 6 times. I guess some people just like getting married.

Ever talk someone out of getting married? Have you ever tried? Right. Because you can’t. You can’t do it. People get this idea in their head, and they think “I’m doing the right thing” or “I’m all grown up” or “This is what adults do” or “This is what people are supposed to do”. Maybe they’re afraid to live alone or be alone or they don’t have the tools or the skills to self-support. Or they think that, like magic, all problems will self-resolve after the wedding. I’ve never known any problems to be resolved with a wedding — they only get more complex after a wedding.

I once knew a guy who was going to ask his girlfriend to marry him. This was his first girlfriend, and they were both in their early 20s. He had not bought a ring yet because he was too pragmatic for that. I don’t know her ring size. What if she doesn’t like it? The very night he was going to ask her, he walked up the red brick path to her parents’ house — she still lived at home — and he rang the doorbell. Correction. He almost rang the doorbell. And then he began to shake. Not that he was nervous. But he began to think about everything that was wrong in the relationship. And with him.

And even though it was his first best girl, and even though his prospects for other girls were really not plentiful, he pulled his pointer away from that doorbell, and he quietly tiptoed back down that path, away from that house, and he never called or talked to that girl ever again. Are you going to tell me that she would’ve been better off marrying a guy like that? There is no telling what he could be capable of, by action or inaction. As far as I know, he remains unmarried to his day.

The kernel of this is that the three girls I loved more than anything in this world are gone now. No last words. No I love yous. Just the disappearing of my world behind some sterile doors. They wouldn’t even let me identify Rose’s body. Or the girls. You look for meaning — there’s no meaning. You’re blind-sided. In those last moments, they had no opportunity to save her. And the twins didn’t suffer. That’s what Law Enforcement said. It takes your mind in all different directions. My family was gone in five seconds. That was five years ago. It takes a lifetime to digest that.

Two: Weakness & Funerals

Buried in Back Bay © 2012 Mick Circeo

(Washington DC, Current Day -6 Years)

I was getting those feelings of hopelessness again. Overwhelmed. It is as though all of life's circumstances are piling on me when I get this way. Suffocating me so that I can't think. I get that toxic sensation. Itchy. 

"My face itches."

"What's wrong, sweetie." She came to my side. Always there when I need her.

If I'm in bed when these things hit, I have to situate my feather pillow under the nape of my neck so I can breathe, otherwise I can't pull any air into my lungs and I suffocate. That support on the back of my neck opens up my nose and throat and lungs. Feather pillows are good for this because you can shape them however you like. 

"Are you taking your meds?" She wasn't accusing me of anything; she was my savior and my solid rock. Everything I am today, I am because of her.

"Every day, just like the Doctor, says. But I still get itchy. And my ear is still throbbing inside again. It’s like a Geiger counter, baby." We had no secrets. I could tell her anything. And I can honestly say that she was the only person on earth who has ever really loved me. Certainly others have told me they love me in so many words. Family is obligated to tell you this; but I am a hard guy to love — I don’t think any of them meant it or felt it. She did. She was my rock.

*   *   *

(Washington DC, Current Day)

Go to email. Click “Compose.”Subject: “The Driver.” Who’s online – looking, looking, — nobody I absolutely need to chat with right now. Leave the “To” line blank until you’re done writing this. 

When I have these episodes of overwhelm, I’m in some catatonic posture in the bed, or I get up and take a walk outside. Get that air in your lungs. Just depends on my mood, what strikes me, even what the weather is. 

I’ve worn a shiny place on the Space Bar on my keyboard. I’m noticing this just now, now that I’m writing this email, looking at my screen and my keyboard. It reveals how out of balance I am right now. Keyboard clicking gets on my nerves. The whirring of this little black plastic fan helps. Covers up the clicking. “Inventor of noiseless keyboard makes millions!” — that’s my prediction. That would be the headline I’d write, anyway. I’m so OCD I can only use one thumb for a Space. I realize this and yet I can’t change it.

Or maybe it's the PTSD. Believe me, I wish I could put some other label on it — at least then I might be able to have some explanation for some of the things that happen, or have happened. If you had known me during my Crazy Phase, believe me, you would have wanted an explanation. You would have demanded it — plenty of people did. Plenty of people begged me to "come to my senses," or some such other senseless cliché. 

People tend to talk in clichés; they can’t help it because most peoples’ thinking is canned. They didn't get me, they didn't understand. I was out of control. I didn't care if I lived or died. I did not give a shit. Not one shit. Didn’t take one, didn’t give one. Maybe it was because of what happened with Rose and the girls. I don’t know anymore. Maybe I was like that before it all happened. 

I don’t know what you’ll do with this when you get it — or if I even want you to do anything with it. Maybe I’m just spilling my guts for personal therapy. Did I obsess about the Driver? Yes. Was obsession necessary to catch him? One would’ve thought “yes.”

He engaged my whole life, consumed my being, the Driver did. Everything was saturated with thoughts about chasing the Driver, catching the Driver, stopping the Driver from killing again, trying to anticipate his next move. Figuring out the Luddite Council. But you can't —someone who is supra-intelligent and you think he’s all evil and nothing else (which was what I thought at the time), when he begins to execute his workplan flawlessly, there is almost no way to anticipate everything he will do. 

I did not know a lot, but I did know one thing: He might start out very organized, but he was eventually going to make a mistake. And I knew that I would have to be there when that happened.

Nobody can see the future. Six days from now, what's going to happen? Please. We don't even know what will happen six seconds from now. You don't know what people will do, and you can't deduce it by being logical. Why? Because people don't always behave logically. I insist that I myself do not behave logically, no matter how much I aim for consistency. Maybe this helps you understand me better. Maybe I understand myself better as I write this to you.

Yes, we should have the highest standards for our behaviors and our lives; but there is nothing that can make humans behave logically in all of life’s situations. That's where the chiefs fail, and that's where prosecutors fail, and that's where we fail. 

You can't look at the behavior of someone and say "he's guilty" or "she's innocent" based on an outline of their activities before or after some trigger event. You can't, because if the expectation is that "He did X, therefore he's guilty," or "She did not do Y, therefore she is guilty," you're going to draw any number of bad conclusions.

Look, if I perceive a threat, I'm going to do one of two things: I'm either going to stay and fight and protect, or I'm going to run. It's fight or flight, right. That's just a stress response. You protect by fleeing or you protect by staying in one place; that's not what I'm talking about. I am talking about behaviors and actions before and after crimes or other bad acts. 

I hope this helps you understand. The Driver — at least when I was chasing him — he was so easily detached. There was just never a validating response out of him. He could do — and would do — the most heinous acts, and he was all business. Part of me envied that, in some sick way.

But that's how you get away with it for so long. That’s just the way his kind of Jumper is. They’re all over, I think. That's how you do what they do to people over generations of time without getting caught. He was talented, the Driver was: He didn't stick to just one modus operandi — he was master of many, and that’s one of the thing that makes his kind of Jumper dangerous. Very talented, with an evil side. Not desperate. That was the Driver. But still in all I refused to believe he was 100% evil because no one is.

It wasn't that Law Enforcement saw the Driver’s patterns, and then identified him as their lead suspect in a series of crimes; there was no connection in their mind. Of course not. There was no way that one man could be so prolific over time, that just one man — without a partner, or a series of them — could be solely responsible for all of this. The rocket scientists died over a period of 40 years. As far as LE was concerned, these were all disparate events with no connectivity. They didn’t see the pattern because LE doesn’t have a long game.

It would have been too much to expect that the authorities could see this. It was cryptographic, it was like a hologram. Not something that you solve. You don’t solve this.

LE doesn’t think on that level, on those terms. They are so politically driven, so motivated by the latest fire drill that they can't get there. They don’t have the time. They are all about what's happening today that they don't see the long term, they don't take the long view. Unsolved cases from the distant past — cold cases — they just aren’t pressing. Those are established cold cases, and they will never be solved. 

And closed cases? Even if there was an erroneous conviction, closed cases don’t get reopened without some time-waster — as LE sees it — sticking a thorn in the side of the legal system. No one in Law Enforcement is reopening closed cases, right, even if the Driver was the one who was really guilty. It just wasn’t believable.

That’s where my Project Proposal came in. I saw our opening at GEO-INT. But they rejected it.

And that is how the Driver was able to do all that he did. I tried to get Upper Management to listen to me, but it sounded crazy even to me, so it wasn't surprising that Upper Management — some of these people these were actual friends of mine at the time — wouldn't act on my proposal. 

I submitted it for Appropriated Funding — a legit project — without coming right out and mentioning the Driver. Uxbridge, the Boss, put it under the Discretionary bucket for Appropriations that year. 

“Discretionary” means just that — and, as far is it being prioritized, it got shuttled to the bottom of the heap during triage of that year’s fiscal cycle. What with budget cuts and the economy — it would’ve needed escalation from On High to make it Mandatory or Regulatory, and that was, how do they say it, not bloody likely.

That's why I had to stop him. Myself. No one else was going to. And if I didn't protect innocent people from dying, who would. It wasn’t a matter of trying to catch him to get him help. No one else knew about the Driver but me.

The NGA might have been willing to listen if I had had some extrinsic evidence. Some kind of proof. But I had nothing other than my innate ability to recognize the patterns as they came to me. I kept looking for my chance, my insider — someone who could see the sense in what I was doing. 

The Driver led me on chases that made me uncomfortable, and he knew me well enough to do this. He knew my fears, my foibles, he knew how to push my buttons. And he did. He did. With impunity. He would run to places I could not go — high places. 

I couldn’t chase him to high places without having an episode. I knew that I could fall. If I fell from a high place I would die. How can you not care if you live or die, and yet have a fear of falling and dying — I know, it’s not logical. 

I would need to trick him somehow, ensnare him. I thought I knew him well enough to be able to do that, but it would take meticulous planning. Would I ever catch him in the act again, red-handed, in flagrante delicto? Probably not, and maybe that was more a matter of luck than of skill. But if it is true that luck favors the well-prepared, then maybe I could get lucky again.

*   *   *

In some ways, the Driver represented the core of heights that I could not achieve. He was a lot like me, except he was flourishing at that time. It could be argued that he was actually a success, in some fucked up way.

The Driver was quiet — never said a lot. His actions were his message, his statements. He was perceptive, especially about the complexities of the chase. And I never felt more alive that when I was in the same room as the Driver — even in the same vicinity. He could make you feel alive. 

I don’t know the reaction, whether it’s the constriction of blood vessels, the pumping of adrenaline, or the fact that I was usually running when I was chasing him — was it just one thing or a combination of all of these things? 

Maybe it was something I didn’t even comprehend yet. Whatever it was, it made me alive at a time when I needed to feel something. Aware of being in the moment, living in the moment. Maybe that was it. I felt like I could save the world from a monster, and what could be more important than that, right. I needed justice after what had happened. Maybe it was my way of setting the world aright. My world, anyway.

That clash with him, the one at the brick duplex in the rain, was just like that. But I failed there, lost my focus because I panicked. I blame the PTSD and my phobias for this because I couldn’t control myself, and I accidentally jumped. 

It could have been just the two of us. I knew he could kill me, but I also knew I probably had to kill him to stop him. Why did he let me live — was it because he knew that he could always escape? Without too much effort, he could have jumped from that inertial reference frame to the other one with me. 

But he didn’t. Maybe it was always going to be a cat-and-mouse game with him because the ultimate murders would be my ancestors, in effect rendering me a nonperson, and hence no threat to him? Would he jump back and extinct me? Make it like I never was? That would have been too obvious for him. Even so, those were events I could not allow.

This was not going to be a situation where the Driver would go on some killing spree and then kill himself. That does not happen with his kind of Jumper. It wasn’t even a possibility. He had a job to do. Yes, killing was only part of his job, and it was no more simple or complex than that. Not to me, but again, I didn’t have all the details.

*   *   *

Funerals are dark, they can be boring. They can go on for far too long. They smell, curiously. Old people and flowers. It is probably better to be almost any other place in the world than a funeral. People gather, they try to be happy about the celebration of a life. Most of them are usually very sad, maybe more for themselves, and maybe this is selfish. Maybe the grieving process itself is a bit selfish.

I’ll send you another email later, but let me end by saying that, yes, I had issues. Sure. Doesn’t everyone? In a very backwards way, I came to dread the day that the chase might end because it gave me purpose when I needed it — in chasing the Driver, I was finally doing something good in the world, for the world. That was not something that I have always been able to lay claim to. But then I had to catch him — maybe it was more a matter of self-preservation than some noble sense of altruism for innocent victims. Of course it was. But I had been to too many funerals. Funerals that the Driver was responsible for.

 

Sequel to Chapter 1 -- BURIED IN BACK BAY

 Buried in Back Bay © 2012 Mick Circeo

(Current Day, Boston)

The best place for a killer to hide is in a big crowd. A big city. Big enough to blend in and get lost. The Driver was drinking a lot to keep his OCD down, and I knew this. I could tell. Following him, my studies of him, his behaviors, and so on. I could feel this at a cellular level. Because I did the same thing – scotch and pills, scotch and pills. The Driver called it pillin’ it. I guess I did too. The drinking was assumed. I was hoping that this would eventually make him sloppy.

I had had suicidal thoughts (hasn’t everyone?). Again, being hypervigilant and mildly OCD myself, suicidial thoughts are a given. There have been times that I was depressed. Everyone has these traits or symptoms to some small degree, right. Still, in the end, it seemed pretty easy to get the medications I needed. Something to help me cope. Sleep. Maybe I really do have PTSD and I wasn’t conning the doctor. Who knows.

*  *  *

(Date & Location Unknown)

“Is there room for both?” Unclear who said this, or if it was said at all.

“Tertium non datur,” echo inside my head. There could be no third possibility. 

“Sir? Is there room for both – both of the pockets you want on the coat —”

I looked down, said nothing.

“— your suit of clothes, sir.” The bespoke Tailor’s voice. From below. Nice accent. London. Savile Row, but not working class. The sleeves of his white cotton shirt rolled up neatly. Does he shave his arms? Why does he shave his arms? “They have become quite stylish in our days, sir, but the size of this second pocket gives some concern.”

“The second pocket, yes.” OK, so figure out where you are. I’m standing on a platform, looking at my feet in this tri-fold mirror — why am I looking at my feet, of all places? Where are my shoes? Oh, you don’t wear shoes when you’re getting fitted for a suit coat? Look at you. You’re getting fat. You fat fuck.

“You thought once that you were the Artist, and now you realize that you’re the Art Object, the work — “

“Nietzsche again, very” — I at least wanted him to know that I got the reference, and then somehow gain currency in his mind. Who knows why — “Good.”

“Again, sir?”

“Oh, nothing – it’s the second Nietzsche reference in as many days.”

The shop was cramped — was it below street level? — available light not optimal. It’ a ten foot shop — I get it — ten foot by ten foot. Grampa told me about these. No mustier or muskier than it should be. Not to me. The mustachioed Tailor had great woolen fabrics — light, medium, heavy gauge, and earthy.

“Right. And, we are done. Let’s discuss that second pocket, sir. What will be its purpose, then?” 

“Haven’t decided yet. But I’m keeping my options open.” I actually didn’t know. Sometimes, when I jump back, I black out for short periods. Then I get tuned in.

“Right. A 10-inch deep pocket. Hidden inside the left. Looking at the entirety of the picture, might I suggest the Hourglass Topper to accompany this repertoire, sir?”

“Well, I’d say I’m more of a Bowler man. Would that work with this outfit?”

“Work, sir?” The Tailor. So proper in his own way, mustache like a trimmed scrub brush.

“Yes, would it go together?”

“Well, sir, the distinguished gentleman tends to cut his own profile, his own individual figure, if you will.”

“Hm.” It was then — and just then — with that reply, that I was comfortable speaking more freely with the Tailor. Was it the way he put that sentence? Was this code? Was I more focused after the usual blackout? “I’m a different guy now.”

*  *  *

Look, there are some things that I knew to be true. Dr. Mornington wouldn’t reveal anything to anyone about our sessions unless she thought that I was a physical threat to others. I knew that. Even then, the exception to our confidentiality was sketchy. Confidentiality is my privilege, not the doctor’s. And she could never testify against me in court.

What I found out(?) was that there has never been any way to test for Posttraumatic Stress Disorder. Yes there are symptoms, and they’re pretty much the same symptoms for Obsessive Compulsive Disorder; but there is no established test for either OCD or PTSD. There wasn’t one in 1880, and there isn’t one in the Nonce. So you can be diagnosed with PTSD based on your stories and your symptoms. It’s the same with schizophrenia — there’s never been an established test for it; and PTSD has been observed since the 6th Century, although they didn’t call it PTSD until the 1970s.

These things helped me understand the Driver. Maybe the illness helps me catch him. And it’s down to me to catch him. I know that now. To whom much is given, much shall be required.

 

One: The Murders, The Pattern

Buried in Back Bay © 2012 Mick Circeo

 (Washington DC, Current Day -4 Years)

It was clear, now, what the Driver was doing. He had already spent time with Tsiolkovsky and Potočnik and Oberth. They were all dead. Murdered. Let me take that back – I couldn’t say that they had actually been murdered. But I knew that each of them had seen the Driver. And I knew that they were all dead now.

Dr. Tsiolkovsky was found dead July 4th in his Kaluga cabin. His wrists and arms had been slashed evenly seven times. He bled out. They found a fragmented suicide note near his body. The only known manuscript of his 80th book — provisional title “Theory of Fuels” — with all of his liner notes — was missing.

Book 80 was meant to be an early outline around powering rockets with liquid fuels instead of powder fuels. Big stuff at that time. Tsiolkovsky was a philosopher as well as a scientist, but suicide was out of character for him. I had questions about Potočnik and Oberth too, but the coroners ruled suicide in those cases as well.

Seven is the number of perfection and spirituality; 14 could indicate two levels of spirituality. The pattern was emerging; at least it was to me. I could only think about Dr. Goddard at that point. How to save him. Because Goddard would be the next one on the Kill List. If I somehow saved the frail Dr. Goddard, only then could I start to think about rectifying the wrongs done to the others. It’s up to me to cure the future past? No one else could. Let me be clear: No one else had the ability. Anyway it wasn’t about saving the world. Not for me.

*   *   *

If it’s true that life belongs only to the strong, then I probably won’t live long. Whatever method I utilized to solve this case — these cases — after all, they were mine because no one else knew about them or believed me about them — I realized that I needed to get out in front and manage them. I couldn’t just let things happen — that was too laissez faire, too accepting, and wasn’t going to work for me. Not my style, not even in my mental state then.

I had to stack that up against the Driver’s seeming ability to anticipate almost everything I did. Viewing it all sides in, bottom to top, I was out-manned from the beginning. And I did not want to be in this position, and yet here I am. I need the right weapon.

When I jump, I stay in the exact same geography: If I’m in the grove at the War Memorial in Washington DC when I jump, I’m at the War Memorial and those fluted columns when I hit my landing spot. Is the War Memorial patterned after Delphi? Sure looks like it.

I quickly figured out that I needed to first take modern-day transportation. Get to the place I needed to be before the jump. This is not detailed in the Laws of Jumping. And other Jumpers may not do this. We also don’t know all the abilities of other Jumpers, or even how big their numbers are. But this is what works for me.

*   *   *

There is a point at which you understand that you are the only one on Earth who realizes that the world is flat. But once you’ve jumped back to the Here & Now, how do you determine your impact? You read books. Eliminate fiction from your life. Check encyclopedias, you check Wikipedia, Intellipedia, you watch the History Channel, you read the news. All of this you do before you jump.
Bookmark the web pages, print them out. When you get back, do side-by-side stare-and-compares with the printouts and the bookmarks. Printouts don't change, like they do in the movies. Look for differences — those differences are the impact that you’ve made. Or that someone else has made.

You read or watch any and every relevant datapoint you can, to make sure that you got the job done. Only the hypervigilant are up to this task because you not only have to be aware of what is; you need to be aware of what isn't. You need to be aware of what cannot be and what shouldn't be. If you're not hypervigilant, your life and others' lives will be in danger. One second that finds you not in control could point to unintended blowback. I had trouble here.

I did not know when the Driver would make his attempt on the Goddards; but I knew that I needed to get to a place where I could jump again, and I needed a better plan this time. Boston Common is perfect for jumping because it’s slightly hilly and has remained virtually unchanged over the years. I could sprint those bankings and get my heart rate up to jump level.

Landing is the most dangerous element of a flight, when you're flying and when you're jumping. Short flight, DCA to Boston-Logan. Flying north, the wind is usually not an issue. Weather is. Flights are never easy for me, even in first class.

The winds were high on this one, higher than they'd been in a generation, and this made for a bumpy descent. I’ve logged hundreds of thousands of airmiles over the years, traveling for work, but when you’re pitching and yawing violently on a descent over water, at night, on a Boeing seven-five, you still get nerves.

I had to control my pulse. An accidental jump on a plane ride would be fatal. I was getting better at controlling my breathing and, in turn, my heartrate, with my yoga practice. It unquestionably helped me on this trip. It’s about breath.

The crew was professional, but you can tell when even they are nervous, and that doesn’t help. When we landed at Logan, we hit the tarmac hard — felt like we dropped straight down the last 50 feet, but we landed. I could feel that I was not alone. I realized that. You get that knowledge, you know it’s real. There is not a fear, but an understanding that there is the presence of something else.

http://tinyurl.com/1872rptgreatfirebostonreport

Who started the 1872 Great Fire of Boston(?) What did they want to burn?? Why did private citizens blow up all those buildings during the fire? What were they destroying? What were the real resons behind $73.5MM in losses, 776 buildings burned to the ground, almost 1,000 businesses burned out.Erupted at the corner of Summer and Bedford, in the business of Alexander K. Young. The Commercial District was leveled. Loss of life was limited to 30. Fascinating report done by the Fire Commission.

The City Record and Boston News-Letter: Boston Books

Map of the Mill Dam and the Back Bay from John Hales' A Survey of Boston and Its Vicinity (1821) (Image copyright The City Record and Boston News-Letter, all rights reserved)

via bostonhistory.typepad.com

Great stuff -- wish I could just get this streaming --

Boston Back Bay Reference Map