Charlie Saga
The Entire Saga Thus Far From The Start Through The Sept 9th Episode.
Wandering around for a few hours to smell the roses and have a smoke, he had no real destination in mind. His head was racing with a hundred thoughts and he knew he only had time for maybe forty of them if he were lucky and everything worked out perfectly for each one.
"Better to just forget them all" he thought, but he knew some of those thoughts were there to stay: and just a few were mocking him.
He checked his pockets for his life essentials: cigarettes and a lighter. The lighter was always in his front right pants pocket, it was easy to find. The cigarettes were a different matter.
When he left his house a few hours ago, he had five cigarettes to his name. He knew he had smoked four of them, but he knew he had one more. His search became frantic. Both his hands were flying into and out of pockets with one hand usually checking a pocket right after the other hand had just left that same spot. Pants: right, left. Shirt: left breast. Jacket: inside left breast, inside right breast. Nothing! Outside right hip pocket, outside left hip pocket. Nothing! He tilts his head down as if he suddenly got the power to see into his pockets to find what his hands are obviously missing. As he looked down, a cigarette fell from Heaven onto the ground. Not from Heaven, from behind his right ear.
"Schmuck" he thought.
"So why did you leave" one of the thoughts asked. This was one of the mocking ones. "Why did you leave her? What the hell were you thinking?"
He reached into his right pants pocket, his trembling hand fumbling around in the darkened hole. It took him five strikes to get his silver Zippo to light, but he got it. She was an old reminder of his college days; one of the few things he seemed to be able to keep.
The lighter was a funny story actually. He was part of a "crowd" in college. They were the sophomore "hippies" of the campus. The party crowd with their first apartment; the Dead Shed. One wall was covered entirely with Pink Floyd posters, arranged chronologically by the album they represented. All posters for Animals had to be left of The Wall posters, but certainly before the prism of Dark Side of the Moon.
The furniture was all donated by their parents, who were of very moderate means, so the apartment looked very nice. It was a natural hang out.
Over the two years they lived there, friends would start to bring their friends over and there became the Cast and the Guest Stars. The Cast were the people who were hanging out there daily, while the Guest Stars were the friends and random people who would find their way to the apartment. He never fully understood why, but people actually cared what level they were at.
One week, the same Guest Star kept coming over with a friend of his; neither name sticking to his mind. The Guest Star really loved the "vibe" in the Dead Shed and wanted to circumvent the long and at that time unknown process to ascend from Guest Star to Cast. At the mall he had looked at a Zippo in the department store, but had no money at that time to get it, but he really liked it and said so. The Guest Star took it upon himself to buy the lighter for him "for no reason", but was understood to be a bribe for Cast status. Needless to say, years later he has the Zippo and has forgotten the kid's name.
"His name was Adam you arrogent prick" another thought told him.
"Was Adam?" the Mocking thought came back, "Did he kill Adam too?"
"Did he kill Adam?" he thought to himself, "Wait a minute!"
He just realized what was said. "What do you mean kill Adam too?"
"You left her. What the hell were you thinking?"
His thoughts were driving him crazy. They were relentless in their assault. The constant barrage of accusations, the cryptic messages, the circular thoughts. He could not take much more of it.
"I have not killed anyone" he told himself, but himself answered back.
"Are you sure? Can you really trust what you remember when we are your memories? I mean, if we say you did it, what point of reference do you have that you didn't?"
"I know who I am and I could not kill anyone!"
"Are you the type to imagine arguments in your head? The crazy are capable of anything my friend."
"And I am certainly not crazy!"
"Who are you telling? Crazy people do not talk to themselves out loud."
It quickly came to his attention that the last two thoughts were said and not thought. He had no real idea how many others he had been saying to anyone who may have passed by. He wondered if any of them may have caught anything about his killing someone.
"Guilty conscious?"
The cigarette he was smoking was now a cold butt between his fingers. He noticed on his third empty drag of it. He was also so lost in thought that his lighter had fallen from his hand and he didn't notice for who knows how many blocks.
Panicked, he quickly turned and ran down the sidewalk, his eyes quickly darting left and right in search of any reflective glare a street light might cast upon his fallen treasure.
The sidewalk was filthy. He had never noticed before. It looked as if the garbage collectors never came by. And there were lots of homeless people. They were everywhere. They were sleeping in storefronts; they were ducked behind dumpster, they were on apartment stairways. He lived in a really bad neighborhood. Why had this not dawned on him before?
"Kind of place a murder could go un-noticed, wouldn't you say?" the mocking thought asked him.
"Probably more than one."
"More than one!" the first thought was back. "How many have you killed, Charlie, or did you stop keeping score?"
She awoke from a dream, her nightgown drenched in sweat. She needed a cigarette. Those damn dreams were going to drive her mad eventually. She reached over for her pack on the nightstand only to find it missing.
“That bastard!” she screamed. He went for one of his “walks” and took their only pack of cigarettes.
She rose from their bed and stumbled into the living room to check the ashtray. Much to her dismay, this seems to have been one of the few times he actually emptied the bloody thing. Was she desperate enough to actually check the garbage can? Even if she was, could she really bring herself to smoke whatever she may find?
“Hell yes you are” her jones yelled out to her, so, with a heavy sigh, she grabbed her yellow dish gloves and placed her foot upon the pedal that would open the lid. She really felt pathetic. The pedal seemed like it was pushing back against her foot. She stood there a good ten minutes debating in her head if she really was that pathetic and desperate. She decided she was more lazy than pathetic and did not want to go out to buy a pack. She was in luck, he only half listened to her nags. He emptied the ashtray, but did not take out the garbage. She was never happier he ignored her in her life.
Sitting on top of the trash, free of any nasty debris or rubbish was a good three-quarter of a cigarette. She saw her lipstick on the filter and felt even better. It was dry and it was hers and her jones jumped for joy.
Now, she only needed a light.
“That bastard!”
Charlie had not found his Zippo yet. He had, however, head butted several pedestrians in the stomach while in his hunched over speed walking obsessive searching. He never had any problems focusing on a thought; quite the opposite actually.
“Think your finger prints are on it?” his thoughts were still with him.
He had searched five blocks and not seen so much as a glimmer of his lighter. He was devastated. Collapsing in a storefront doorway, he felt defeated. He had always been so proud of still having that lighter. He had lost so much in his life; so many mementos and trinkets, but he still had his Zippo.
His Zippo with “My Zippo” carved into one side and a badly made Grateful Dead lightning bolt on the other. His Zippo that he had indirectly conned some kid whose name he had forgotten out of. His Zippo, that he just felt in his right pants pocket.
He reached into the emptiness and pulled out a shining metal Zippo with “My Zippo” carved into one side and a badly made Grateful Dead lightning bolt on the other.
“I thought I dropped this” he said to himself.
“We told you Charlie,” his thoughts smugly said to him, “we are your memories. What you are, what you think, what you remember, and what you forget is us, not you. The lighter was a cheap trick to drive the point home. Now then, why did you kill her Charlie?”
Charlie sighed. “I guess I don’t know. Who do I think I killed anyway?”
“Now we are getting somewhere.”
She looked out the window, looking for him. His “walks” never usually were this long. Something was wrong, she knew it.
“I am so sick of his shit” she told herself. She could not be late to work again on account of waiting on him to come home. He was usually useless for hours after a walk any. She would shock her manager instead, and be early for once.
She put out the cigarette she had finally gotten lit off the stove's eye and opened her dresser. She laid out a clean uniform on the bed, placed her apron and “Alice” nametag on top. She hated that name tag. Her name was not “Alice” and they knew it.
They gave it to her because they said she looked like the actress that played “Alice” on that T.V. show from before she was born. She had seen an episode on Nick at Nite once to see what was so funny about it. It did not help at all. She did not see any resemblance between herself and the TV Alice except they both had dark hair and waited tables. She was thankful they didn’t call her “Flo”. She decided that today she would demand a new nametag with “Dana” on it. The joke had gotten old.
She looked out the window for him for five more minutes before going to shower. She loved her showers, but this time she could not relax. She kept leaning out to try and hear if the phone rang or the door opened. She rushed and washed purely essentials and got out within five minutes. He would be so proud, but he was still not there to have seen it.
She went to her nightstand for her post-shower cigarette and remembered why she cared so much he was out in the first place.
“Bastard!” she screamed.
Charlie exited the liquor store with two packs of cigarettes. He always bought two packs because he and his wife didn’t smoke the same brand. He placed her pack in his right breast jacket pocket, straightened his tie, checked to make sure his lighter was where he last placed it, and sat back down in the empty storefront.
His thoughts had left him alone for the past ten minutes. What he had been hoping for turned out to be worse once he got it. He started to doubt his innocence. He ran back in his mind through the last few days, looking for any blank spots. Any holes in his memory, but every moment he could account for.
He decided the next logical step would be to get a newspaper and look for some unsolved murder that happened recently. He got back up and went back into the liquor store and bought yesterday’s newspaper and two packs of cigarettes. He always bought two packs of cigarettes because he and his wife didn’t smoke the same brand. He placed her pack in his left breast jacket pocket, checked to make sure his lighter was where he last placed it, and decided he really needed to get back before Dana started to worry.
“Is Dana dead? You might be walking into a room full of cops and the media and just when they decide they are looking for you, in you walk. Do you think you should go back?”
“Christ” he said has he collapsed back down in the storefront. “I killed Dana?”
“Not yet,” His thoughts had once again returned, “but there is still time.”
“Already done it once” a new thought said, “so what is a second?”
“Does he have a reason?”
“Did he need one before?”
The newspaper was no help to him at all. It wasn’t that he could not find any unsolved murders; it was that he lived in a really bad part of town and there were just too damn many.
The obvious thing to do then is to go through each one and see if any sound familiar. He sat back down because there really were a lot of unsolved murders in yesterday’s paper. Either the crime rate was high or the cops were, but murders were going unsolved faster than the paper could report them.
He knew he was not the type of person to stab someone. He hated the sight of blood, so over half of them were dismissed immediately. There were four drowned: at once! He did not have the patience for something like that. There was a fire of unknown origin that killed a family. He checked for his lighter. It was still there. He did not set a fire.
It seemed he was in the clear, but not feeling particularly secure where he lived.
“Told you this was the type of place a murder could go unnoticed. Is that why you moved here?”
“He didn’t move here, he left her to come here.”
“You mean he killed her.”
“Stop it!” Charlie yelled silently. He was not used to these feelings. He was actually starting to feel guilt, guilt of all things! He never felt guilt before in his life and was unsure how to deal with it.
“Maybe she isn’t dead” he pleaded to his thoughts.
“Anything is possible Charlie.”
Dana made it to the coffee shop ten minutes early. She had left her apartment so early that she had time to stop and buy a pack of smokes before work, but didn’t have to. Luck was on her side today because sitting in an empty storefront she always passes on her way to work was an unopened pack of cigarettes. Her brand no less.
The only bad part of her day, the part that did not go as planned was her manager called in sick. He was not going to know she was early for once.
It did not matter, she knew Charlie would be coming in soon for his morning coffee. Ever since they met, he had to see her before going to sleep. If she left for work before he returned from a walk, he would go by the shop on his way home. He would have some explaining to do this morning that he may not be up for.
Today Dana decided she is going to find out what exactly Charlie does on his “walks” and why they take so long. He was gone for three days one time and never called. After seventy two hours, he strolled into her apartment and went to sleep. To this day, she still has no idea where he went those days.
Of course, she had decided to have this talk with him many times before. She never followed through, but those were usually at her apartment and this was at her work. At her apartment, she was second for some strange reason, but here she was the star. She was loved here by all the regulars and their affection gave her strength at work she lacked at home. Today, Charlie would feel her true strength for the first time since they met there four years ago.
“Miss?” a customer was calling her. Her prep time was over. She would spend the next hour or so rehearsing her inquisition in her head. She needed it to be perfect and foolproof. She knew Charlie well enough to know he would find any way to turn it on her he could. She had to win this time or it was over. The mystery of his walks has just gotten to be too much for her.
Charlie was almost out of breath when he reached the door of Dana’s apartment. A slow panic overcame his soul as he contemplated opening the door. He feared what he may see.
“Every second you waste out here is a second she could have been alive and you missed it”
His nagging thoughts were right this time. He had to go in and face his actions or else they would never leave him alone. He really wished he knew what to expect on the other side of that door. The door never seemed quite so big before, or he so small. Was it going to be bloody? He hated blood. There was no way he would kill her in a bloody fashion. She could have only been drowned. No, can’t be drowned because she could still be alive. That rules out electrocution as well. How else would he kill someone if he had to?
“Only one way to find out Charlie”
His trembling hand reached out for the stiffened doorknob. He tried to open the door only to find it locked. He did had a key. It was on the kitchen table.
“Just isn’t your day, huh Charlie?”
He tried the doorknob again and again it refused to turn. It became a battle of wills. The more he would try to turn the knob, the more it would try to not be turned. At the end of their ten minute battle, the door had won. It was still closed and she was still on the other side of it either dead or dying. He had to get in. Even his thoughts were working with him for once.
“Break down the door Charlie”, they suggested, “she needs you.
He looked around the narrow hall of the complex and could not even find a fire extinguisher to batter it down. Torn up carpets aplenty, cigarette burns, graffiti covered walls and even the cliché dying neon lights creating a strobe effect. He thought about what a cool scene this would make.
It would be like a scene in some 80’s cop buddy movie. His partner would be around back and he was going in the front. He placed a cigarette in his mouth, movie cop style, and prepared to kick the door in. He even cupped his hands and raised them slightly as if he had a gun.
A quick glance to the left, another to the right, and his full force met the door right above the doorknob. It was a perfectly placed hit. Rockford would be proud, only the door did not budge. It seemed so much easier in the movies.
He wasn’t sure, but it almost looked like the door flexed, taunting him. Why are even inanimate objects not working with him today? All he wanted to do was find out if he was a killer or not. His mind seemed to know, but it wasn’t sharing with him. He knew he was many things, but never thought he was a killer.
“Anyone’s a killer Charlie, it’s all about circumstance”.
He rested against the door and lit his cigarette. Ten minutes. It always took him ten minutes to smokes a cigarette and it was always peace for him. He could slow down and even his sadistic self-hating thoughts could not gang up on him while the nicotine overtook his synapses. It was a one on one for the next ten minutes and he was going to get some answers.
“I want to know who I killed” he decided to start off directly. He was never one who could take direct interrogation and he was hoping his subconscious shared his weakness.
“Your wife Charlie, you killed your wife.”
“I would never kill Dana.”
“You haven’t” his original thought said full of mocking confidence, “yet. You killed your wife Charlie. You killed Michelle.”
“Holy Christ!”
The cigarette fell from his lips, falling into his crotch. His shock was such that he did not notice.
Charlie first met Michelle too many years ago to count. They were in college together, studying chemistry. Chem-lab was Michelle’s favorite class. She would often joke to Charlie that the lab was filled with things to “blow you up or fuck you up. Just gotta know the right combinations.” And she did. She was very popular among the “DeadShed” crowd. She was a full cast member by her second visit.
K.B., Charlie’s room-mate thought Michelle was a gift for him. K.B. usually got every girl he wanted. “Want to see my posters” never failed. Charlie never understood how K.B. did it, but he did.
K.B. was Kevin Britney Jones, Charlie’s best friend since grade-school. He started going by “KB Jones” when he learned to “jones” was slang for someone desperately in need of drugs. He had a THC enhanced vision one night that Kevin Britney could be Kind Bud. They always just called Kind Bud “K.B.” to feel cool and hip. So he spent the better part of the night babbling how cool he was and forced everyone to call him “KB Jones”. It stuck from that night on, in part because everyone liked it honestly and in part to make fun of him for going that “one toke over the line”.
KB and Charlie had a weird friendship. It was close, brotherly close, but brothers who did not fully get along. Charlie lived in KB’s shadow like a side-kick. KB represented every insecurity Charlie had, and it killed him watching KB hitting on his dream girl from day one. K.B. never missed when he started hitting on a girl and Charlie had a rule about never following his friends. If KB got her, then Charlie never could. And “got” is the proper word because KB was always after the sex only. Charlie looked for some notion of romance that never existed, even in fiction.
His mind spoke to him independent of his consciousness for the first time.
“She was meant for you. He knows that. He is not your friend. Lose him.”
The thought scared the hell out of Charlie. He wrote it off as just being really stoned, but the thoughts kept speaking to him every time he forced himself to watch KB borderline date-raping the love of his life. She never gave in. She never slept with KB, no matter how stoned she was, or drunk, or tripping, or rolling, or whatever. It gave Charlie hope every day, but he could never say anything to her. Other thoughts soon made themselves known to him as well.
“You don’t stand a chance Charlie. Be happy alone. Alone you will stay.”
“She is for you Charlie, but you lack anything to offer. She will laugh”
“She will laugh and leave. Better to watch from afar than to lose it all”
It was Michelle that made the first move on Charlie, and neither of them was stoned. She just kissed him. It was that simple. She kissed him once and leaned back, scanning his eyes for approval or disgust. She saw herself enveloped in unrequited love. He had wanted this moment for so long, lost sleep for so many nights, failed so many classes daydreaming and now she kissed him.
He did not hesitate and kissed her in return, unleashing his pent-up desire he was shocked every second she did not resist. She did not squirm away. She wanted it as much as he did. He was not a virgin, but he might as well have been. It was three years since his last time with a woman and he had just started to believe the thoughts and they were not willing to go away just yet.
“Wow Charlie”, one said sarcastically, “a woman. Did you have to pay much?”
“No, he went to the hospital and grabbed him a blind one.”
“You better be good or this is your last time for a long time.”
“How long has it been Charlie? Three years? This is a pity lay.”
“Of course! A pity lay!”
Panic started setting in on Charlie. Somehow, some way Michelle seemed to know it. She grabbed his head and stared into his eyes. Her stare sent chills throughout his body. It engulfed him in love. He did not know that existed. His thoughts were forced to retreat and Charlie and Michelle became “Charlie and Michelle”.
It took Charlie six months and she had to make the first move, but he was happy and he never even knew he wasn’t before. She completed him. She kept the thoughts at bay. He could tell her everything and did. She did not always like what she heard, but she always loved him when he was done.
“That is who you were Charlie.” She would always reassure him, “I love who you are.”
He couldn’t have killed her. She was everything to him. He would have killed himself first.
“Then explain Dana to us Charlie.” He thought he heard his thoughts laughing.
Kevin had been looking for Charlie for a couple of days now. He had stopped going by “KB Jones” shortly after graduation and before getting a job at Wall Street. That is not to say he gave up being “KB Jones”, just he stopped going by that name. Kevin Jones had a better sound to brokers.
It was Kevin’s job as a stock broker that was bringing him to look for Charlie. He had a few good tips that should turn Charlie’s luck right around. He felt responsible for his fallen friend. He knew Charlie had been down on his luck since loosing his job. It really was wrong that he was fired, but mistakes happen and they usually require a fall guy. Charlie drew the short straw and unemployment was his. He even had to forgo the usual severance package due to the nature of his is offense.
He had gone by Charlie’s house two days ago looking for him, but Michelle had not seen him for a week. She was really scared and Kevin could not tell if she was scared for Charlie or of him. She kept stressing that he had to find him and quick. She was worried what would happen, worried what he may do, and worried about many things that made no sense to Kevin until she mentioned that he was arguing with himself lately; violently sometimes.
Kevin had known about Charlie’s “voices” for many years as well. Charlie told him one night about how Michelle had a magical power to silence his possession. He more than loved her; he needed her to remain sane and happy. She did not complete him so much as absolve him. Without her, he feared what his thoughts would make him do.
Kevin knew never to try and steal her from him. This was something made by fate and they found each other. Kevin also feared him after that conversation.
She never asked Kevin to bring Charlie back home. Kevin took notice of that. It was strange. In the years he had known Charlie, he had never seen Charlie as in love with someone has he was with her and had always just thought she loved Charlie the same.
There was something going on that he did not yet know, but he was really bored and had the day off, so it was time to play “Dime Store Detective” for the day. He had the trench coat on and the cheap suit with badly tied tie. He needed a hat. He really could not do this right without a fedora. He knew a place on the way to the subway. His biggest dilemma was if he should narrate his trip, internally of course.
“OK,” he thought, “I can do this. She was a lady. No! She was a dame. Yea! She was a dame searchin for a guy.
“Can you help me” she asked me. A sultry sort of begging was hidden behind her right eye; or is that a tick?
“Never mind the internal monologue. I’ll just get the hat.”
His cell phone rang, playing “The Macarena” at full blast. It wasn’t that he liked that song. He thought of the most annoying ring he could to force him to answer his cell phone. He really hated the damn invention.
He had been looking for two days now and had nothing to show for it. He really hoped that this call was Charlie saying he is home. He would settle for Michelle calling to say Charlie is OK. He would even take Michelle saying he was in the hospital. At this point, he would take anything that would allow him to stop the search.
Kevin had to take a week’s vacation to make sure he did not get fired. After the first day he was only mildly annoyed, but now he was getting worried.
He looked down at the phone and saw it was Charlie’s house calling. So far so good. If there is a G-d, it would be one of his planned scenarios. He answered the phone to find there is no G-d. It was Michelle, but she was only calling to check on his progress and to give him something she found.
While going through last month’s bills, she noticed he had breakfast at the same diner everyday. It was out of his way for work and she had never heard of it before. He took down the name “Sam’s Coffeehouse Diner” and quickly assumed this must be where Charlie met that Dana girl at. How could he have forgotten about Dana?
Charlie had told him once or twice about this really nice waitress he met named Dana who worked at this place he found. He said the food was awful, but there was this girl there he could talk to for hours.
When asked directly if Charlie was cheating on Michelle, he denied it. He said he just really enjoyed talking to her. He said his voices never even came around when he was with Dana.
The next logical step then is to head off to “Sam’s Coffeehouse Diner”, after buying that fedora of course.
It took Kevin twenty minutes to get to the diner, but it took him five hours to find the fedora. He may have decided to buy it on impulse, but he still had to find the perfect hat. It had to be dark of course. It had to be tan, but a dark tan. Most importantly, it had to fit his head just right as to not mess up his hair. That is what really took him five hours, but he found one that seemed to float above his perfect mane.
He stopped outside the diner to get into character. He had decided on the train that he was going to do this right. He even bought a pack of “Lucky Strikes”, filterless for the full effect. Collar to coat was flipped up just right and his fedora was tilted to the left. He was ready.
He walked into “Sam’s Coffeehouse Diner” and just stood in the doorway for a moment. He wanted everyone to notice his entrance and possibly comment on just how cool he was, but the place was empty. “Sam’s Coffeehouse Diner” was a graveyard at 12 noon on a Thursday.
The only people Kevin saw were two waitresses and a cook. The nametags on the girls said “Tina” and “Alice” and the cook was a guy. No Dana it seemed so he turned around and decided to try back later. Better to leave with the “who was that stranger” vibe going instead of stating his business.
With Tina cleaning tables and “Alice” staring off into space worrying about Charlie, no one noticed Kevin coming in or leaving. The cook heard the bell on the door, but peaked around only to see a door closing.
“Who was that?” he asked the girls.
“Who was what?” Tina answered.
Dana never stopped staring out the window. Charlie was really late now and she was officially worried and beyond pissed. She could not decide which she was more, but felt certain that seeing him would bring the stronger feeling out. Either she would hug him to death or just kill him. Either way is good for her right now.
Her main concern was the fact that she was losing her nerve every minute she had to wait. She was going to be so preoccupied with his showing up that she knew she was going to forget to ask what he did on his walks.
She had not known Charlie for very long. She had met him in the diner a year ago. He walked in and ordered coffee. They talked for hours and he left. She never got his name, but he came back the next night at the same time. Again the talked for hours and again he left. This went on for two months before they exchanged names, but only one week before they found their way back to her place. It was three months ago that he moved in, but was away more than he was home. She often would think she was the “other woman”, but would write it off as paranoia. Now she was no longer sure.
“I’m gonna take a few minutes” she told Tina and walked outside for a smoke.
Charlie picked the cigarette up from his crotch. It had burned a hole in his pants, but he appeared uninjured. It was still burning too, but he could not bring himself to smoke it anymore. His thoughts focused on one thing: Michelle.
How could he have killed Michelle? Why would he have killed Michelle? She was his only stability left. She would take him back. Dana was a mistake and she had to know that. It was a moment of weakness. An impulse too strong to deny.
“Any other clichés Charlie? You know, something along the lines of ‘she wanted it’?”
That sounded so filthy. Charlie did not “cheat” on Michelle. He simply found someone else he had feelings for. He was never popular with women so how could he possibly turn one away? Michelle was his love, Dana was just nostalgia. When he was with Dana, he was not 39, he was in college again. He had a chance to start over almost. Everything he screwed up had not happened yet. Michelle represented his future and since he hated his present, he really did not want his future to come.
“You killed Michelle to kill your future? You are insane Charlie.”
“Of course he is insane, he has spent the entire night talking to himself.”
“Yea, and the funny part is we are telling him stuff he didn’t know!”
They have been telling him things he did not know all night, but they have also shown themselves to be tricksters as well. He remembered the lighter tricked they pulled on him before and suddenly became convinced he had not killed anyone. Michelle never existed and Dana was his wife. He was locked out because she went to work while he was out and didn’t know he forgot his key. There is neither a dead body behind that door nor is there a dead wife named Michelle. Screw his mind.
Charlie decided he needed to head to the diner to prove to himself that Dana was alive and his wife. There was no other choice that he could see. His mind tried to talk him out of it by saying things like “that is the first place the cops are going to go”, but he did not listen. He had to settle this once and for all. He was tired of being boarder-line insane. He either wanted to know he was normal or prove he had lost it long ago, but the wonderment had to end.
It took him ten minutes to get to the diner from her apartment. When he walked in he thought it was closed for a second. There was no one there. He saw Tina and the cook who never told anyone his name, but no Dana. He went outside to make sure he was at the right place, but the sign clearly said “Sam’s Coffeehouse Diner”. He looked at the sign in the door and it clearly said “Open”. He looked back inside and saw no customers. He checked his watch and it was 12:45, on a Thursday.
“It’s a trap Charlie, RUN!”
Charlie listened to his mind and turned around and ran for his life. Something was certainly not right about that scene. Dana should have been there and wasn’t. Customer should have been there and weren’t. That had “set up” written all over it. He did kill Dana that means. And he was married to a dead woman named Michelle. He was a disgraced fireman who lost his job because he chose to stay with his mistress instead of answering a call. He was a disgraced fireman because three people died that night because they were a man down. He was a disgraced fireman for covering the books and getting someone else initially fired. The press was going to love this one more than they did his dismissal.
He could see the headlines as he ran flashing in his mind. “Fireman of Love Kills Again!”, “Active Killer This Time: Lover Fireman Moves Up”, “Charlie the Cheating Fire Fighter Kills Wife then Lover”. This was not going to be pretty. He had one option left to him and that was to go home, where ever that was.
He took out his wallet and checked his driver’s license and saw a mid-town address, along with several credit cards and a picture of a woman he assumed had to be Michelle. The photo was about five years old and faded just a bit, but she was radiant even in the tiny 5x9 form. He felt flush. He felt those chills. He remembered falling in love with her and why he still did. He remembered their first kiss, their first time together, the day she said “yes” to his proposal.
He also remembered her accusations of him cheating on her, even before he was. He remembered her never understanding his job as a fireman and that he had to be away from home. He remembered her becoming so obsessed with him having the affair he was not yet having that she slept with Kevin and let him find them together. He cannot remember his reaction. He cannot remember why they stayed together for three years after that, but he did remember he called her “Dana” that last night at home on purpose.
“Go see the body Charlie. Go see your work. Go say ‘good-bye’ one last time.”
Charlie turned the corner to see a detective standing at the end of the block. It was only a silhouette, but no one other than a cop dressed like that. Charlie could make out the trench coat, the smoke rising from the cigarette past the fedora. This was obviously more serious than he had originally thought.
“Do you think they found her yet? Better get there quick Charlie.”
Charlie really did not want to go home anymore. If he had killed Michelle it was better for him this way with no memory. He could still sleep at night sort of at least without being haunted by the vision of his dead love. He could very easily just go back to Dana’s apartment and wait. He could not have killed her because the door was locked and he did not have his key.
He would just wait for Dana to get home from where ever she was and together they would leave this city and start over. They could go somewhere no one had heard about the “Fireman lover” or his tragic mistake. They could go somewhere no one knew Michelle or Charlie or Dana and they could just vanish.
“Running away again Charlie?”
Fuck yes he was going to run away again. He had gotten very good at it and it has served him well so far. He leaves a long string of people who hate him behind, but he never has to see their faces or hear their words. He knows he will just forget about them over time.
“I won’t let you forget Charlie. You must go home. You must see your work. You must confirm.”
“I don’t want to know. I don’t want to see.” He was begging with the voices this time. He fell to his knees and pleaded with his thoughts to just let him forget this one time. He had to move on. He made mistakes. He has paid for most of them. He never intended for any of it to happen. Please, just let him start over.
“Get up Charlie. Stop begging. There is no other way for you right now.”
The voice he heard was familiar and distant. It was the first voice of his first thought of the night. It was the thought that forced him to remember Michelle. It was the thought that demanded an answer to “What were you thinking? Why did you leave her?” Only right now this voice was not in his head. Right now, this voice was behind him and had a presence about it.
“Get up Charlie” it said again, “and go home.”
Charlie felt himself introduced to pure fear and did not like the company. He could write these voices off as his insanity as long as they were trapped in his head. This was a new level he had not prepared himself for.
Kevin had ducked into an alley by the diner for a smoke, but not a cigarette. Kevin “KB” Jones had not given up all of his habits. He never took to drinking, but felt that same need for a chemical rest after work as every other person. He never thought of himself as a criminal; he was just on the wrong side of the law. He hated having to hide, but so be it. It was what it was.
He had just finished his break when he could have sworn he saw Charlie turn around and run away from him. By the time he had fully processed the thought and made it to the corner however there was no one to be seen, except that waitress from the diner, Alice. He really needed something to tell Michelle already, so he figured it was time to just ask when Dana was working. And he would do it right after a few more hits.
Dana had finished her cigarette and returned to the diner with still no sign of Charlie. She had four hours left on her shift, and then she would kill him at her place if he was there. If he was not, she would find the son of a bitch and kill him slower. He had four hours left to avoid this fate.
The bell on the door rang and she turned expecting it to be Charlie. It was some freak who looked like he stepped out of a Bogart movie instead. The dumb bastard was even smoking an unfiltered cigarette. She was a smoker as well, but unfiltered was just beyond stupid. The guy was also wearing a fedora. Who the hell wears fedoras anymore? If he talks out of the side of his mouth or calls her “sweetheart” she was going to smack him with the coffee pot.
“Excuse me” he said. He sounded remarkably normal considering the sideshow appearance. “I am looking for an old friend of mine. She works here I think. Her name is ‘Dana’. I have not seen her in years; I was in town and figured I would say hi. Can you tell me if she is coming in today by any chance?”
He gave his “KB” smile that never failed him before. He just oozed charm. Normally it would have gotten “Alice” to tell him anything except she was Dana and never had seen this guy before in her life. This was a con. He was a reporter. They were after Charlie again for some reason.
“Fuck off” she practically yelled at Kevin. This was not what he was expecting. “I’m Dana and I don’t know you! What the fuck do you want? Who are you?”
Kevin was officially scared now. His fear level rose considerably when he noticed the cook coming out from behind the counter. Kevin did not notice before, but that short cook was a really built guy. Kevin was in trouble.
“Woah woah woah” he squealed giving his full attention to the cook. “I am Charlie’s friend from college! His wife is worried about him and sent me looking for him. He had told be about Dana and there were charges for this diner so I came here to find her! That is all!”
“Charlie IS married?” Dana uttered dazed. She assumed, probably knew, but this still took her by surprise. “Charlie is married.”
“Charlie, get up” the voice virtually commanded him, “and turn around.”
Charlie would do anything at that moment to not do that. He began listing every horrible act he could imagine and offered his performance of each one to any deity listening, but none answered. He swore to be the best Christian, Jew, Muslim, Hindu, and Satanist, whatever it took if he did not have to turn around. No deity took him up on his offer. He offered to go right to a police station and confess to whatever it was he did if he could just leave right now.
“Charlie.” Obviously turning himself in was not going to be an option either. “I am here for you Charlie, not against you. I am here to help. Turn around and face me Charlie.”
Charlie slowly rose to his feet and turned around as slowly as humanly possible. His entire body was facing the source of the voice while his head was still turned around as much as he could. It was going to be the last thing to face whatever it was. He even closed his eyes so that he had a few extra seconds before he had to see it.
The voice was so large and full that the source of it had to be monstrous. He knew the voice and knew it was not where it was supposed to be. He did not need to see Michelle’s dead body and did not want to go home. He wanted this voice back in his head where it belonged and silent for just a few hours.
“It is not what you think Charlie” it said. It sounded smaller now. “Open your eyes Charlie.”
Charlie partially opened his left eye and saw a blurry collection of lines everywhere. Realizing it was his eyelashes; he opened his eye fully and still saw a blur. It took a few moments for his focus to return before he could make out… Adam.
“Still have that lighter Charlie?”
“Ye…ye…yea, “Charlie was officially confused. “Adam?”
“Yes. Adam, but not really Adam.”
With the night Charlie had and the morning he was having, this conversation was making sense so far. He was just happy it was not in his head this time. He was happy to actually see who he was talking to.
It certainly looked like Adam. It was obvious it couldn’t have been Adam really because it would mean Adam had not aged a single day, but it was a really good rendition of Adam from the early 90’s. It was Adam right down to the mostly shaven head with the “Hara Krishna” ponytail, badly shaven stubble, and blue “Adidas” shirt.
Charlie tossed Adam the lighter and Adam lit a joint. He took a huge hit and looked up to Charlie. “You don’t smoke anymore, right?”
“Yea, I mean no. I quit when I got married.”
“Just as well,” he said tossing the joint off as he approached Charlie. “You got to go home anyway.”
This Adam had a charm about him the original never could dream of faking. He acted like a man who has “read the script”. “Read the script” was a “Dead Shed” term for those characters that seemed to know things they should not know in a movie. The joke was “that character obviously read the script”. It transferred into what other people would call “déjà vu” or just sheer luck when something goes how you planned exactly. Adam acted like he never knew any other way of feeling.
“What are you?”
“I get the feeling you are not going to go home until we get past this. I suppose the closest thing to what I am would be a ‘Guardian Angel’, but I am not an angel and I do not really guard. I more guide, but “Guide-ian Angel” sounds horrible.
“Basically, me and mine are hiding and following and guiding you through life. Well, not just you but all your kind. We are evolution. We are inspiration. We are the muse. “Not out of benevolence so much as boredom on our part, but either way it’s what we do.”
“And you ‘guided’ me to kill my wife?” Charlie was getting that kind of rage a cat gets when you have toyed with it that one moment too long and it is no longer playing with you. Although he was not sure what this thing was, he was wondering if he could hurt it.
“No Charlie, you cannot hurt me and no Charlie, I did not guide you to murder. I took you as my project the day I gave you the lighter. I guided you to Michelle and I kept Kevin at bay. The problem was I was not alone with you. Like I said, Charlie, we.
“How can I explain this? Ever notice that voice in your head, your inner monologue sometimes uses ‘I’ and sometimes uses ‘you’? Did you never think that strange or did you just assume everyone did it? There are many of us working around you Charlie and we each have our own goals and objectives.”
“Then why don’t you stop them?!” Charlie could not believe he believed this, but it was sadly making sense to him.
“Because I cannot see them any better than you could see me before. We are only seen by who we want to see us and only when we want them to. That goes for each other as well.
“You must go home Charlie. You did not kill Michelle. She is home and worried.”
Charlie fell to the floor. He was with Adam up to that point. The memories were vague and short, but he thinks he has memories of the crime. He has spent the entire night tormented over the crime. He finally had accepted he had killed Michelle just in time to learn he didn’t. Charlie now hoped he was insane.
Wandering around for a few hours to smell the roses and have a smoke, he had no real destination in mind. His head was racing with a hundred thoughts and he knew he only had time for maybe forty of them if he were lucky and everything worked out perfectly for each one.
"Better to just forget them all" he thought, but he knew some of those thoughts were there to stay: and just a few were mocking him.
He checked his pockets for his life essentials: cigarettes and a lighter. The lighter was always in his front right pants pocket, it was easy to find. The cigarettes were a different matter.
When he left his house a few hours ago, he had five cigarettes to his name. He knew he had smoked four of them, but he knew he had one more. His search became frantic. Both his hands were flying into and out of pockets with one hand usually checking a pocket right after the other hand had just left that same spot. Pants: right, left. Shirt: left breast. Jacket: inside left breast, inside right breast. Nothing! Outside right hip pocket, outside left hip pocket. Nothing! He tilts his head down as if he suddenly got the power to see into his pockets to find what his hands are obviously missing. As he looked down, a cigarette fell from Heaven onto the ground. Not from Heaven, from behind his right ear.
"Schmuck" he thought.
"So why did you leave" one of the thoughts asked. This was one of the mocking ones. "Why did you leave her? What the hell were you thinking?"
He reached into his right pants pocket, his trembling hand fumbling around in the darkened hole. It took him five strikes to get his silver Zippo to light, but he got it. She was an old reminder of his college days; one of the few things he seemed to be able to keep.
The lighter was a funny story actually. He was part of a "crowd" in college. They were the sophomore "hippies" of the campus. The party crowd with their first apartment; the Dead Shed. One wall was covered entirely with Pink Floyd posters, arranged chronologically by the album they represented. All posters for Animals had to be left of The Wall posters, but certainly before the prism of Dark Side of the Moon.
The furniture was all donated by their parents, who were of very moderate means, so the apartment looked very nice. It was a natural hang out.
Over the two years they lived there, friends would start to bring their friends over and there became the Cast and the Guest Stars. The Cast were the people who were hanging out there daily, while the Guest Stars were the friends and random people who would find their way to the apartment. He never fully understood why, but people actually cared what level they were at.
One week, the same Guest Star kept coming over with a friend of his; neither name sticking to his mind. The Guest Star really loved the "vibe" in the Dead Shed and wanted to circumvent the long and at that time unknown process to ascend from Guest Star to Cast. At the mall he had looked at a Zippo in the department store, but had no money at that time to get it, but he really liked it and said so. The Guest Star took it upon himself to buy the lighter for him "for no reason", but was understood to be a bribe for Cast status. Needless to say, years later he has the Zippo and has forgotten the kid's name.
"His name was Adam you arrogent prick" another thought told him.
"Was Adam?" the Mocking thought came back, "Did he kill Adam too?"
"Did he kill Adam?" he thought to himself, "Wait a minute!"
He just realized what was said. "What do you mean kill Adam too?"
"You left her. What the hell were you thinking?"
His thoughts were driving him crazy. They were relentless in their assault. The constant barrage of accusations, the cryptic messages, the circular thoughts. He could not take much more of it.
"I have not killed anyone" he told himself, but himself answered back.
"Are you sure? Can you really trust what you remember when we are your memories? I mean, if we say you did it, what point of reference do you have that you didn't?"
"I know who I am and I could not kill anyone!"
"Are you the type to imagine arguments in your head? The crazy are capable of anything my friend."
"And I am certainly not crazy!"
"Who are you telling? Crazy people do not talk to themselves out loud."
It quickly came to his attention that the last two thoughts were said and not thought. He had no real idea how many others he had been saying to anyone who may have passed by. He wondered if any of them may have caught anything about his killing someone.
"Guilty conscious?"
The cigarette he was smoking was now a cold butt between his fingers. He noticed on his third empty drag of it. He was also so lost in thought that his lighter had fallen from his hand and he didn't notice for who knows how many blocks.
Panicked, he quickly turned and ran down the sidewalk, his eyes quickly darting left and right in search of any reflective glare a street light might cast upon his fallen treasure.
The sidewalk was filthy. He had never noticed before. It looked as if the garbage collectors never came by. And there were lots of homeless people. They were everywhere. They were sleeping in storefronts; they were ducked behind dumpster, they were on apartment stairways. He lived in a really bad neighborhood. Why had this not dawned on him before?
"Kind of place a murder could go un-noticed, wouldn't you say?" the mocking thought asked him.
"Probably more than one."
"More than one!" the first thought was back. "How many have you killed, Charlie, or did you stop keeping score?"
She awoke from a dream, her nightgown drenched in sweat. She needed a cigarette. Those damn dreams were going to drive her mad eventually. She reached over for her pack on the nightstand only to find it missing.
“That bastard!” she screamed. He went for one of his “walks” and took their only pack of cigarettes.
She rose from their bed and stumbled into the living room to check the ashtray. Much to her dismay, this seems to have been one of the few times he actually emptied the bloody thing. Was she desperate enough to actually check the garbage can? Even if she was, could she really bring herself to smoke whatever she may find?
“Hell yes you are” her jones yelled out to her, so, with a heavy sigh, she grabbed her yellow dish gloves and placed her foot upon the pedal that would open the lid. She really felt pathetic. The pedal seemed like it was pushing back against her foot. She stood there a good ten minutes debating in her head if she really was that pathetic and desperate. She decided she was more lazy than pathetic and did not want to go out to buy a pack. She was in luck, he only half listened to her nags. He emptied the ashtray, but did not take out the garbage. She was never happier he ignored her in her life.
Sitting on top of the trash, free of any nasty debris or rubbish was a good three-quarter of a cigarette. She saw her lipstick on the filter and felt even better. It was dry and it was hers and her jones jumped for joy.
Now, she only needed a light.
“That bastard!”
Charlie had not found his Zippo yet. He had, however, head butted several pedestrians in the stomach while in his hunched over speed walking obsessive searching. He never had any problems focusing on a thought; quite the opposite actually.
“Think your finger prints are on it?” his thoughts were still with him.
He had searched five blocks and not seen so much as a glimmer of his lighter. He was devastated. Collapsing in a storefront doorway, he felt defeated. He had always been so proud of still having that lighter. He had lost so much in his life; so many mementos and trinkets, but he still had his Zippo.
His Zippo with “My Zippo” carved into one side and a badly made Grateful Dead lightning bolt on the other. His Zippo that he had indirectly conned some kid whose name he had forgotten out of. His Zippo, that he just felt in his right pants pocket.
He reached into the emptiness and pulled out a shining metal Zippo with “My Zippo” carved into one side and a badly made Grateful Dead lightning bolt on the other.
“I thought I dropped this” he said to himself.
“We told you Charlie,” his thoughts smugly said to him, “we are your memories. What you are, what you think, what you remember, and what you forget is us, not you. The lighter was a cheap trick to drive the point home. Now then, why did you kill her Charlie?”
Charlie sighed. “I guess I don’t know. Who do I think I killed anyway?”
“Now we are getting somewhere.”
She looked out the window, looking for him. His “walks” never usually were this long. Something was wrong, she knew it.
“I am so sick of his shit” she told herself. She could not be late to work again on account of waiting on him to come home. He was usually useless for hours after a walk any. She would shock her manager instead, and be early for once.
She put out the cigarette she had finally gotten lit off the stove's eye and opened her dresser. She laid out a clean uniform on the bed, placed her apron and “Alice” nametag on top. She hated that name tag. Her name was not “Alice” and they knew it.
They gave it to her because they said she looked like the actress that played “Alice” on that T.V. show from before she was born. She had seen an episode on Nick at Nite once to see what was so funny about it. It did not help at all. She did not see any resemblance between herself and the TV Alice except they both had dark hair and waited tables. She was thankful they didn’t call her “Flo”. She decided that today she would demand a new nametag with “Dana” on it. The joke had gotten old.
She looked out the window for him for five more minutes before going to shower. She loved her showers, but this time she could not relax. She kept leaning out to try and hear if the phone rang or the door opened. She rushed and washed purely essentials and got out within five minutes. He would be so proud, but he was still not there to have seen it.
She went to her nightstand for her post-shower cigarette and remembered why she cared so much he was out in the first place.
“Bastard!” she screamed.
Charlie exited the liquor store with two packs of cigarettes. He always bought two packs because he and his wife didn’t smoke the same brand. He placed her pack in his right breast jacket pocket, straightened his tie, checked to make sure his lighter was where he last placed it, and sat back down in the empty storefront.
His thoughts had left him alone for the past ten minutes. What he had been hoping for turned out to be worse once he got it. He started to doubt his innocence. He ran back in his mind through the last few days, looking for any blank spots. Any holes in his memory, but every moment he could account for.
He decided the next logical step would be to get a newspaper and look for some unsolved murder that happened recently. He got back up and went back into the liquor store and bought yesterday’s newspaper and two packs of cigarettes. He always bought two packs of cigarettes because he and his wife didn’t smoke the same brand. He placed her pack in his left breast jacket pocket, checked to make sure his lighter was where he last placed it, and decided he really needed to get back before Dana started to worry.
“Is Dana dead? You might be walking into a room full of cops and the media and just when they decide they are looking for you, in you walk. Do you think you should go back?”
“Christ” he said has he collapsed back down in the storefront. “I killed Dana?”
“Not yet,” His thoughts had once again returned, “but there is still time.”
“Already done it once” a new thought said, “so what is a second?”
“Does he have a reason?”
“Did he need one before?”
The newspaper was no help to him at all. It wasn’t that he could not find any unsolved murders; it was that he lived in a really bad part of town and there were just too damn many.
The obvious thing to do then is to go through each one and see if any sound familiar. He sat back down because there really were a lot of unsolved murders in yesterday’s paper. Either the crime rate was high or the cops were, but murders were going unsolved faster than the paper could report them.
He knew he was not the type of person to stab someone. He hated the sight of blood, so over half of them were dismissed immediately. There were four drowned: at once! He did not have the patience for something like that. There was a fire of unknown origin that killed a family. He checked for his lighter. It was still there. He did not set a fire.
It seemed he was in the clear, but not feeling particularly secure where he lived.
“Told you this was the type of place a murder could go unnoticed. Is that why you moved here?”
“He didn’t move here, he left her to come here.”
“You mean he killed her.”
“Stop it!” Charlie yelled silently. He was not used to these feelings. He was actually starting to feel guilt, guilt of all things! He never felt guilt before in his life and was unsure how to deal with it.
“Maybe she isn’t dead” he pleaded to his thoughts.
“Anything is possible Charlie.”
Dana made it to the coffee shop ten minutes early. She had left her apartment so early that she had time to stop and buy a pack of smokes before work, but didn’t have to. Luck was on her side today because sitting in an empty storefront she always passes on her way to work was an unopened pack of cigarettes. Her brand no less.
The only bad part of her day, the part that did not go as planned was her manager called in sick. He was not going to know she was early for once.
It did not matter, she knew Charlie would be coming in soon for his morning coffee. Ever since they met, he had to see her before going to sleep. If she left for work before he returned from a walk, he would go by the shop on his way home. He would have some explaining to do this morning that he may not be up for.
Today Dana decided she is going to find out what exactly Charlie does on his “walks” and why they take so long. He was gone for three days one time and never called. After seventy two hours, he strolled into her apartment and went to sleep. To this day, she still has no idea where he went those days.
Of course, she had decided to have this talk with him many times before. She never followed through, but those were usually at her apartment and this was at her work. At her apartment, she was second for some strange reason, but here she was the star. She was loved here by all the regulars and their affection gave her strength at work she lacked at home. Today, Charlie would feel her true strength for the first time since they met there four years ago.
“Miss?” a customer was calling her. Her prep time was over. She would spend the next hour or so rehearsing her inquisition in her head. She needed it to be perfect and foolproof. She knew Charlie well enough to know he would find any way to turn it on her he could. She had to win this time or it was over. The mystery of his walks has just gotten to be too much for her.
Charlie was almost out of breath when he reached the door of Dana’s apartment. A slow panic overcame his soul as he contemplated opening the door. He feared what he may see.
“Every second you waste out here is a second she could have been alive and you missed it”
His nagging thoughts were right this time. He had to go in and face his actions or else they would never leave him alone. He really wished he knew what to expect on the other side of that door. The door never seemed quite so big before, or he so small. Was it going to be bloody? He hated blood. There was no way he would kill her in a bloody fashion. She could have only been drowned. No, can’t be drowned because she could still be alive. That rules out electrocution as well. How else would he kill someone if he had to?
“Only one way to find out Charlie”
His trembling hand reached out for the stiffened doorknob. He tried to open the door only to find it locked. He did had a key. It was on the kitchen table.
“Just isn’t your day, huh Charlie?”
He tried the doorknob again and again it refused to turn. It became a battle of wills. The more he would try to turn the knob, the more it would try to not be turned. At the end of their ten minute battle, the door had won. It was still closed and she was still on the other side of it either dead or dying. He had to get in. Even his thoughts were working with him for once.
“Break down the door Charlie”, they suggested, “she needs you.
He looked around the narrow hall of the complex and could not even find a fire extinguisher to batter it down. Torn up carpets aplenty, cigarette burns, graffiti covered walls and even the cliché dying neon lights creating a strobe effect. He thought about what a cool scene this would make.
It would be like a scene in some 80’s cop buddy movie. His partner would be around back and he was going in the front. He placed a cigarette in his mouth, movie cop style, and prepared to kick the door in. He even cupped his hands and raised them slightly as if he had a gun.
A quick glance to the left, another to the right, and his full force met the door right above the doorknob. It was a perfectly placed hit. Rockford would be proud, only the door did not budge. It seemed so much easier in the movies.
He wasn’t sure, but it almost looked like the door flexed, taunting him. Why are even inanimate objects not working with him today? All he wanted to do was find out if he was a killer or not. His mind seemed to know, but it wasn’t sharing with him. He knew he was many things, but never thought he was a killer.
“Anyone’s a killer Charlie, it’s all about circumstance”.
He rested against the door and lit his cigarette. Ten minutes. It always took him ten minutes to smokes a cigarette and it was always peace for him. He could slow down and even his sadistic self-hating thoughts could not gang up on him while the nicotine overtook his synapses. It was a one on one for the next ten minutes and he was going to get some answers.
“I want to know who I killed” he decided to start off directly. He was never one who could take direct interrogation and he was hoping his subconscious shared his weakness.
“Your wife Charlie, you killed your wife.”
“I would never kill Dana.”
“You haven’t” his original thought said full of mocking confidence, “yet. You killed your wife Charlie. You killed Michelle.”
“Holy Christ!”
The cigarette fell from his lips, falling into his crotch. His shock was such that he did not notice.
Charlie first met Michelle too many years ago to count. They were in college together, studying chemistry. Chem-lab was Michelle’s favorite class. She would often joke to Charlie that the lab was filled with things to “blow you up or fuck you up. Just gotta know the right combinations.” And she did. She was very popular among the “DeadShed” crowd. She was a full cast member by her second visit.
K.B., Charlie’s room-mate thought Michelle was a gift for him. K.B. usually got every girl he wanted. “Want to see my posters” never failed. Charlie never understood how K.B. did it, but he did.
K.B. was Kevin Britney Jones, Charlie’s best friend since grade-school. He started going by “KB Jones” when he learned to “jones” was slang for someone desperately in need of drugs. He had a THC enhanced vision one night that Kevin Britney could be Kind Bud. They always just called Kind Bud “K.B.” to feel cool and hip. So he spent the better part of the night babbling how cool he was and forced everyone to call him “KB Jones”. It stuck from that night on, in part because everyone liked it honestly and in part to make fun of him for going that “one toke over the line”.
KB and Charlie had a weird friendship. It was close, brotherly close, but brothers who did not fully get along. Charlie lived in KB’s shadow like a side-kick. KB represented every insecurity Charlie had, and it killed him watching KB hitting on his dream girl from day one. K.B. never missed when he started hitting on a girl and Charlie had a rule about never following his friends. If KB got her, then Charlie never could. And “got” is the proper word because KB was always after the sex only. Charlie looked for some notion of romance that never existed, even in fiction.
His mind spoke to him independent of his consciousness for the first time.
“She was meant for you. He knows that. He is not your friend. Lose him.”
The thought scared the hell out of Charlie. He wrote it off as just being really stoned, but the thoughts kept speaking to him every time he forced himself to watch KB borderline date-raping the love of his life. She never gave in. She never slept with KB, no matter how stoned she was, or drunk, or tripping, or rolling, or whatever. It gave Charlie hope every day, but he could never say anything to her. Other thoughts soon made themselves known to him as well.
“You don’t stand a chance Charlie. Be happy alone. Alone you will stay.”
“She is for you Charlie, but you lack anything to offer. She will laugh”
“She will laugh and leave. Better to watch from afar than to lose it all”
It was Michelle that made the first move on Charlie, and neither of them was stoned. She just kissed him. It was that simple. She kissed him once and leaned back, scanning his eyes for approval or disgust. She saw herself enveloped in unrequited love. He had wanted this moment for so long, lost sleep for so many nights, failed so many classes daydreaming and now she kissed him.
He did not hesitate and kissed her in return, unleashing his pent-up desire he was shocked every second she did not resist. She did not squirm away. She wanted it as much as he did. He was not a virgin, but he might as well have been. It was three years since his last time with a woman and he had just started to believe the thoughts and they were not willing to go away just yet.
“Wow Charlie”, one said sarcastically, “a woman. Did you have to pay much?”
“No, he went to the hospital and grabbed him a blind one.”
“You better be good or this is your last time for a long time.”
“How long has it been Charlie? Three years? This is a pity lay.”
“Of course! A pity lay!”
Panic started setting in on Charlie. Somehow, some way Michelle seemed to know it. She grabbed his head and stared into his eyes. Her stare sent chills throughout his body. It engulfed him in love. He did not know that existed. His thoughts were forced to retreat and Charlie and Michelle became “Charlie and Michelle”.
It took Charlie six months and she had to make the first move, but he was happy and he never even knew he wasn’t before. She completed him. She kept the thoughts at bay. He could tell her everything and did. She did not always like what she heard, but she always loved him when he was done.
“That is who you were Charlie.” She would always reassure him, “I love who you are.”
He couldn’t have killed her. She was everything to him. He would have killed himself first.
“Then explain Dana to us Charlie.” He thought he heard his thoughts laughing.
Kevin had been looking for Charlie for a couple of days now. He had stopped going by “KB Jones” shortly after graduation and before getting a job at Wall Street. That is not to say he gave up being “KB Jones”, just he stopped going by that name. Kevin Jones had a better sound to brokers.
It was Kevin’s job as a stock broker that was bringing him to look for Charlie. He had a few good tips that should turn Charlie’s luck right around. He felt responsible for his fallen friend. He knew Charlie had been down on his luck since loosing his job. It really was wrong that he was fired, but mistakes happen and they usually require a fall guy. Charlie drew the short straw and unemployment was his. He even had to forgo the usual severance package due to the nature of his is offense.
He had gone by Charlie’s house two days ago looking for him, but Michelle had not seen him for a week. She was really scared and Kevin could not tell if she was scared for Charlie or of him. She kept stressing that he had to find him and quick. She was worried what would happen, worried what he may do, and worried about many things that made no sense to Kevin until she mentioned that he was arguing with himself lately; violently sometimes.
Kevin had known about Charlie’s “voices” for many years as well. Charlie told him one night about how Michelle had a magical power to silence his possession. He more than loved her; he needed her to remain sane and happy. She did not complete him so much as absolve him. Without her, he feared what his thoughts would make him do.
Kevin knew never to try and steal her from him. This was something made by fate and they found each other. Kevin also feared him after that conversation.
She never asked Kevin to bring Charlie back home. Kevin took notice of that. It was strange. In the years he had known Charlie, he had never seen Charlie as in love with someone has he was with her and had always just thought she loved Charlie the same.
There was something going on that he did not yet know, but he was really bored and had the day off, so it was time to play “Dime Store Detective” for the day. He had the trench coat on and the cheap suit with badly tied tie. He needed a hat. He really could not do this right without a fedora. He knew a place on the way to the subway. His biggest dilemma was if he should narrate his trip, internally of course.
“OK,” he thought, “I can do this. She was a lady. No! She was a dame. Yea! She was a dame searchin for a guy.
“Can you help me” she asked me. A sultry sort of begging was hidden behind her right eye; or is that a tick?
“Never mind the internal monologue. I’ll just get the hat.”
His cell phone rang, playing “The Macarena” at full blast. It wasn’t that he liked that song. He thought of the most annoying ring he could to force him to answer his cell phone. He really hated the damn invention.
He had been looking for two days now and had nothing to show for it. He really hoped that this call was Charlie saying he is home. He would settle for Michelle calling to say Charlie is OK. He would even take Michelle saying he was in the hospital. At this point, he would take anything that would allow him to stop the search.
Kevin had to take a week’s vacation to make sure he did not get fired. After the first day he was only mildly annoyed, but now he was getting worried.
He looked down at the phone and saw it was Charlie’s house calling. So far so good. If there is a G-d, it would be one of his planned scenarios. He answered the phone to find there is no G-d. It was Michelle, but she was only calling to check on his progress and to give him something she found.
While going through last month’s bills, she noticed he had breakfast at the same diner everyday. It was out of his way for work and she had never heard of it before. He took down the name “Sam’s Coffeehouse Diner” and quickly assumed this must be where Charlie met that Dana girl at. How could he have forgotten about Dana?
Charlie had told him once or twice about this really nice waitress he met named Dana who worked at this place he found. He said the food was awful, but there was this girl there he could talk to for hours.
When asked directly if Charlie was cheating on Michelle, he denied it. He said he just really enjoyed talking to her. He said his voices never even came around when he was with Dana.
The next logical step then is to head off to “Sam’s Coffeehouse Diner”, after buying that fedora of course.
It took Kevin twenty minutes to get to the diner, but it took him five hours to find the fedora. He may have decided to buy it on impulse, but he still had to find the perfect hat. It had to be dark of course. It had to be tan, but a dark tan. Most importantly, it had to fit his head just right as to not mess up his hair. That is what really took him five hours, but he found one that seemed to float above his perfect mane.
He stopped outside the diner to get into character. He had decided on the train that he was going to do this right. He even bought a pack of “Lucky Strikes”, filterless for the full effect. Collar to coat was flipped up just right and his fedora was tilted to the left. He was ready.
He walked into “Sam’s Coffeehouse Diner” and just stood in the doorway for a moment. He wanted everyone to notice his entrance and possibly comment on just how cool he was, but the place was empty. “Sam’s Coffeehouse Diner” was a graveyard at 12 noon on a Thursday.
The only people Kevin saw were two waitresses and a cook. The nametags on the girls said “Tina” and “Alice” and the cook was a guy. No Dana it seemed so he turned around and decided to try back later. Better to leave with the “who was that stranger” vibe going instead of stating his business.
With Tina cleaning tables and “Alice” staring off into space worrying about Charlie, no one noticed Kevin coming in or leaving. The cook heard the bell on the door, but peaked around only to see a door closing.
“Who was that?” he asked the girls.
“Who was what?” Tina answered.
Dana never stopped staring out the window. Charlie was really late now and she was officially worried and beyond pissed. She could not decide which she was more, but felt certain that seeing him would bring the stronger feeling out. Either she would hug him to death or just kill him. Either way is good for her right now.
Her main concern was the fact that she was losing her nerve every minute she had to wait. She was going to be so preoccupied with his showing up that she knew she was going to forget to ask what he did on his walks.
She had not known Charlie for very long. She had met him in the diner a year ago. He walked in and ordered coffee. They talked for hours and he left. She never got his name, but he came back the next night at the same time. Again the talked for hours and again he left. This went on for two months before they exchanged names, but only one week before they found their way back to her place. It was three months ago that he moved in, but was away more than he was home. She often would think she was the “other woman”, but would write it off as paranoia. Now she was no longer sure.
“I’m gonna take a few minutes” she told Tina and walked outside for a smoke.
Charlie picked the cigarette up from his crotch. It had burned a hole in his pants, but he appeared uninjured. It was still burning too, but he could not bring himself to smoke it anymore. His thoughts focused on one thing: Michelle.
How could he have killed Michelle? Why would he have killed Michelle? She was his only stability left. She would take him back. Dana was a mistake and she had to know that. It was a moment of weakness. An impulse too strong to deny.
“Any other clichés Charlie? You know, something along the lines of ‘she wanted it’?”
That sounded so filthy. Charlie did not “cheat” on Michelle. He simply found someone else he had feelings for. He was never popular with women so how could he possibly turn one away? Michelle was his love, Dana was just nostalgia. When he was with Dana, he was not 39, he was in college again. He had a chance to start over almost. Everything he screwed up had not happened yet. Michelle represented his future and since he hated his present, he really did not want his future to come.
“You killed Michelle to kill your future? You are insane Charlie.”
“Of course he is insane, he has spent the entire night talking to himself.”
“Yea, and the funny part is we are telling him stuff he didn’t know!”
They have been telling him things he did not know all night, but they have also shown themselves to be tricksters as well. He remembered the lighter tricked they pulled on him before and suddenly became convinced he had not killed anyone. Michelle never existed and Dana was his wife. He was locked out because she went to work while he was out and didn’t know he forgot his key. There is neither a dead body behind that door nor is there a dead wife named Michelle. Screw his mind.
Charlie decided he needed to head to the diner to prove to himself that Dana was alive and his wife. There was no other choice that he could see. His mind tried to talk him out of it by saying things like “that is the first place the cops are going to go”, but he did not listen. He had to settle this once and for all. He was tired of being boarder-line insane. He either wanted to know he was normal or prove he had lost it long ago, but the wonderment had to end.
It took him ten minutes to get to the diner from her apartment. When he walked in he thought it was closed for a second. There was no one there. He saw Tina and the cook who never told anyone his name, but no Dana. He went outside to make sure he was at the right place, but the sign clearly said “Sam’s Coffeehouse Diner”. He looked at the sign in the door and it clearly said “Open”. He looked back inside and saw no customers. He checked his watch and it was 12:45, on a Thursday.
“It’s a trap Charlie, RUN!”
Charlie listened to his mind and turned around and ran for his life. Something was certainly not right about that scene. Dana should have been there and wasn’t. Customer should have been there and weren’t. That had “set up” written all over it. He did kill Dana that means. And he was married to a dead woman named Michelle. He was a disgraced fireman who lost his job because he chose to stay with his mistress instead of answering a call. He was a disgraced fireman because three people died that night because they were a man down. He was a disgraced fireman for covering the books and getting someone else initially fired. The press was going to love this one more than they did his dismissal.
He could see the headlines as he ran flashing in his mind. “Fireman of Love Kills Again!”, “Active Killer This Time: Lover Fireman Moves Up”, “Charlie the Cheating Fire Fighter Kills Wife then Lover”. This was not going to be pretty. He had one option left to him and that was to go home, where ever that was.
He took out his wallet and checked his driver’s license and saw a mid-town address, along with several credit cards and a picture of a woman he assumed had to be Michelle. The photo was about five years old and faded just a bit, but she was radiant even in the tiny 5x9 form. He felt flush. He felt those chills. He remembered falling in love with her and why he still did. He remembered their first kiss, their first time together, the day she said “yes” to his proposal.
He also remembered her accusations of him cheating on her, even before he was. He remembered her never understanding his job as a fireman and that he had to be away from home. He remembered her becoming so obsessed with him having the affair he was not yet having that she slept with Kevin and let him find them together. He cannot remember his reaction. He cannot remember why they stayed together for three years after that, but he did remember he called her “Dana” that last night at home on purpose.
“Go see the body Charlie. Go see your work. Go say ‘good-bye’ one last time.”
Charlie turned the corner to see a detective standing at the end of the block. It was only a silhouette, but no one other than a cop dressed like that. Charlie could make out the trench coat, the smoke rising from the cigarette past the fedora. This was obviously more serious than he had originally thought.
“Do you think they found her yet? Better get there quick Charlie.”
Charlie really did not want to go home anymore. If he had killed Michelle it was better for him this way with no memory. He could still sleep at night sort of at least without being haunted by the vision of his dead love. He could very easily just go back to Dana’s apartment and wait. He could not have killed her because the door was locked and he did not have his key.
He would just wait for Dana to get home from where ever she was and together they would leave this city and start over. They could go somewhere no one had heard about the “Fireman lover” or his tragic mistake. They could go somewhere no one knew Michelle or Charlie or Dana and they could just vanish.
“Running away again Charlie?”
Fuck yes he was going to run away again. He had gotten very good at it and it has served him well so far. He leaves a long string of people who hate him behind, but he never has to see their faces or hear their words. He knows he will just forget about them over time.
“I won’t let you forget Charlie. You must go home. You must see your work. You must confirm.”
“I don’t want to know. I don’t want to see.” He was begging with the voices this time. He fell to his knees and pleaded with his thoughts to just let him forget this one time. He had to move on. He made mistakes. He has paid for most of them. He never intended for any of it to happen. Please, just let him start over.
“Get up Charlie. Stop begging. There is no other way for you right now.”
The voice he heard was familiar and distant. It was the first voice of his first thought of the night. It was the thought that forced him to remember Michelle. It was the thought that demanded an answer to “What were you thinking? Why did you leave her?” Only right now this voice was not in his head. Right now, this voice was behind him and had a presence about it.
“Get up Charlie” it said again, “and go home.”
Charlie felt himself introduced to pure fear and did not like the company. He could write these voices off as his insanity as long as they were trapped in his head. This was a new level he had not prepared himself for.
Kevin had ducked into an alley by the diner for a smoke, but not a cigarette. Kevin “KB” Jones had not given up all of his habits. He never took to drinking, but felt that same need for a chemical rest after work as every other person. He never thought of himself as a criminal; he was just on the wrong side of the law. He hated having to hide, but so be it. It was what it was.
He had just finished his break when he could have sworn he saw Charlie turn around and run away from him. By the time he had fully processed the thought and made it to the corner however there was no one to be seen, except that waitress from the diner, Alice. He really needed something to tell Michelle already, so he figured it was time to just ask when Dana was working. And he would do it right after a few more hits.
Dana had finished her cigarette and returned to the diner with still no sign of Charlie. She had four hours left on her shift, and then she would kill him at her place if he was there. If he was not, she would find the son of a bitch and kill him slower. He had four hours left to avoid this fate.
The bell on the door rang and she turned expecting it to be Charlie. It was some freak who looked like he stepped out of a Bogart movie instead. The dumb bastard was even smoking an unfiltered cigarette. She was a smoker as well, but unfiltered was just beyond stupid. The guy was also wearing a fedora. Who the hell wears fedoras anymore? If he talks out of the side of his mouth or calls her “sweetheart” she was going to smack him with the coffee pot.
“Excuse me” he said. He sounded remarkably normal considering the sideshow appearance. “I am looking for an old friend of mine. She works here I think. Her name is ‘Dana’. I have not seen her in years; I was in town and figured I would say hi. Can you tell me if she is coming in today by any chance?”
He gave his “KB” smile that never failed him before. He just oozed charm. Normally it would have gotten “Alice” to tell him anything except she was Dana and never had seen this guy before in her life. This was a con. He was a reporter. They were after Charlie again for some reason.
“Fuck off” she practically yelled at Kevin. This was not what he was expecting. “I’m Dana and I don’t know you! What the fuck do you want? Who are you?”
Kevin was officially scared now. His fear level rose considerably when he noticed the cook coming out from behind the counter. Kevin did not notice before, but that short cook was a really built guy. Kevin was in trouble.
“Woah woah woah” he squealed giving his full attention to the cook. “I am Charlie’s friend from college! His wife is worried about him and sent me looking for him. He had told be about Dana and there were charges for this diner so I came here to find her! That is all!”
“Charlie IS married?” Dana uttered dazed. She assumed, probably knew, but this still took her by surprise. “Charlie is married.”
“Charlie, get up” the voice virtually commanded him, “and turn around.”
Charlie would do anything at that moment to not do that. He began listing every horrible act he could imagine and offered his performance of each one to any deity listening, but none answered. He swore to be the best Christian, Jew, Muslim, Hindu, and Satanist, whatever it took if he did not have to turn around. No deity took him up on his offer. He offered to go right to a police station and confess to whatever it was he did if he could just leave right now.
“Charlie.” Obviously turning himself in was not going to be an option either. “I am here for you Charlie, not against you. I am here to help. Turn around and face me Charlie.”
Charlie slowly rose to his feet and turned around as slowly as humanly possible. His entire body was facing the source of the voice while his head was still turned around as much as he could. It was going to be the last thing to face whatever it was. He even closed his eyes so that he had a few extra seconds before he had to see it.
The voice was so large and full that the source of it had to be monstrous. He knew the voice and knew it was not where it was supposed to be. He did not need to see Michelle’s dead body and did not want to go home. He wanted this voice back in his head where it belonged and silent for just a few hours.
“It is not what you think Charlie” it said. It sounded smaller now. “Open your eyes Charlie.”
Charlie partially opened his left eye and saw a blurry collection of lines everywhere. Realizing it was his eyelashes; he opened his eye fully and still saw a blur. It took a few moments for his focus to return before he could make out… Adam.
“Still have that lighter Charlie?”
“Ye…ye…yea, “Charlie was officially confused. “Adam?”
“Yes. Adam, but not really Adam.”
With the night Charlie had and the morning he was having, this conversation was making sense so far. He was just happy it was not in his head this time. He was happy to actually see who he was talking to.
It certainly looked like Adam. It was obvious it couldn’t have been Adam really because it would mean Adam had not aged a single day, but it was a really good rendition of Adam from the early 90’s. It was Adam right down to the mostly shaven head with the “Hara Krishna” ponytail, badly shaven stubble, and blue “Adidas” shirt.
Charlie tossed Adam the lighter and Adam lit a joint. He took a huge hit and looked up to Charlie. “You don’t smoke anymore, right?”
“Yea, I mean no. I quit when I got married.”
“Just as well,” he said tossing the joint off as he approached Charlie. “You got to go home anyway.”
This Adam had a charm about him the original never could dream of faking. He acted like a man who has “read the script”. “Read the script” was a “Dead Shed” term for those characters that seemed to know things they should not know in a movie. The joke was “that character obviously read the script”. It transferred into what other people would call “déjà vu” or just sheer luck when something goes how you planned exactly. Adam acted like he never knew any other way of feeling.
“What are you?”
“I get the feeling you are not going to go home until we get past this. I suppose the closest thing to what I am would be a ‘Guardian Angel’, but I am not an angel and I do not really guard. I more guide, but “Guide-ian Angel” sounds horrible.
“Basically, me and mine are hiding and following and guiding you through life. Well, not just you but all your kind. We are evolution. We are inspiration. We are the muse. “Not out of benevolence so much as boredom on our part, but either way it’s what we do.”
“And you ‘guided’ me to kill my wife?” Charlie was getting that kind of rage a cat gets when you have toyed with it that one moment too long and it is no longer playing with you. Although he was not sure what this thing was, he was wondering if he could hurt it.
“No Charlie, you cannot hurt me and no Charlie, I did not guide you to murder. I took you as my project the day I gave you the lighter. I guided you to Michelle and I kept Kevin at bay. The problem was I was not alone with you. Like I said, Charlie, we.
“How can I explain this? Ever notice that voice in your head, your inner monologue sometimes uses ‘I’ and sometimes uses ‘you’? Did you never think that strange or did you just assume everyone did it? There are many of us working around you Charlie and we each have our own goals and objectives.”
“Then why don’t you stop them?!” Charlie could not believe he believed this, but it was sadly making sense to him.
“Because I cannot see them any better than you could see me before. We are only seen by who we want to see us and only when we want them to. That goes for each other as well.
“You must go home Charlie. You did not kill Michelle. She is home and worried.”
Charlie fell to the floor. He was with Adam up to that point. The memories were vague and short, but he thinks he has memories of the crime. He has spent the entire night tormented over the crime. He finally had accepted he had killed Michelle just in time to learn he didn’t. Charlie now hoped he was insane.
posted by Unknown at
9:35 PM
1 Comments:
ccol, Kanrei!
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