UNSEEN (6 page)

"
You don't have to be strong, Holly. I'll be strong for you.” He leaned forward and the screen went black.

"
Nooooo! My BABY!” she lunged toward the screen, but was stopped by a muscular officer. "My baby! He can't kill my baby!”

Agent Grant grabbed her firmly by the wrists and stared into her eyes. "Listen to me!" She shook hard. "Listen! He won't. You can stop him! You can do this, Holly. You're strong enough. You won't let him kill your baby, and we will help you. Do you understand me?”

Her body went slack and her voice shivered. "He's going to kill him. He's going to kill my son.” Her eyes froze into a dead stare.

"
No. He isn't. You're going to stop him. You're going to help us nail this guy.”

Chapter 6

Jake climbed the steep narrow stairs to the door of his friend Dan's apartment. It never smelled good in the small apartment house, but today a new odor offended Jake's nostrils. It smelled like a stack of diapers in the middle of a redemption center. Jake pounded on the door marked by a gold 3 that was hanging upside down on one screw. He listened.

"
It's open," came Dan’s voice, distant and muffled.

Jake removed a plastic bag hanging from the handle and opened the door. Dan's collection of empty diet soda bottles lined the left side of the even steeper stairs that led up to his living room. They were not the source of the redemption center smell from the hallway, however. Dan was a strange mix of clutter bug and neat freak. He was too lazy to return the bottles, yet his obsessive compulsive disorder forced him to rinse them thoroughly and place them back into their cardboard containers.

Dan kept everything clean, even the piles of clutter that seemed to encircle every room in his apartment. He was the only person Jake had ever known who kept ordered piles of clean junk lying around on the floor. But for Dan it wasn’t junk, they were milestones—shrines to past television, movie, or music conquests. To Dan—it was all treasure.

Jake crested the top of the stairs and saw Dan in the middle of his living room, bathed in the light bouncing off the wall he used to project his computer screen on. He could afford a projector screen, but he liked having one wall covered with images from his desktop, while the other walls were covered in posters.

Jake saw that he had caught him in the middle of his morning routine; he was still wearing his workout clothes, and the bar on the weight bench still had weights on it.

For the two years he had known him, it always struck Jake as odd to see Dan in his natural habitat. He was a decent looking guy, dark hair, dark complexion, muscular. He would have no trouble finding a girl, if he was interested in pursuing such a thing. Instead he was like a child who never grew up. He lived in a dumpy apartment house and every penny he made was spent on creating the most sophisticated media system on the eastern seaboard. When he wasn't working at the Sunbury Savings and Loan, he could be found in his living room surrounded by the things he loved: television, movies, music, and his weight bench.

"
Here," said Jake, tossing the bag at Dan.

Dan peeked in, and an evil grin lit his face. "Oh, yeah, just in time for lunch!”

Jake plopped down in a chair next to Dan's desk. "What is it?"

Dan reached in and pulled out a post card with a picture on it. "You'll love this," he said, handing the card to Jake.

It was a photo of a fat pasty-white man with a hairlip. The inscription said, Willy Packard, Guitar Wizard, and there was a signature.

Jake handed the photo back, "I don't get it."

Dan laughed. "This guy's been hanging bags of bread on my door for over a week now, and leaving his calling card."

"
He leaves bread on your door? Who does that?"

"
Willy Packard, Guitar Wizard." Dan let out a full belly laugh and slid the bread out onto his desk. It had a homemade look to it, but was packaged in a plastic bag, complete with bread tie.

"
Does this guy have a crush on you or something?"

Dan laughed again. "I don't even know the guy."

"
Then why is he leaving bread on your door?"

"
I don't know! I think he thinks I'm someone else—probably some girl he met at a club or something."

"
Well, why don't you leave him a note? Let him know he has the wrong apartment?"

Dan’s face went blank.

"
Dan? Hello?”

He shrugged. "It's good bread."

It was Jake's turn to laugh. "Dan... There’s something seriously wrong with you."

Maintaining the same blank yet slightly comical expression, Dan ripped off a piece and held it out. "You want some?"

Jake pushed it away. "I don't want any of your ill-gotten bread."

Dan got up and went to the kitchen. "It's good bread," he said again, as if repeating it would make it less wrong.

"
Yes, and I'm sure Willy baked it lovingly with his own two hands."

Dan appeared with a plate, some butter, and a knife. "He ain't much to look at, but he'll make some girl very happy some day."

"
Not if you keep stealing her bread. The love of his life is probably eating some old stale bagel right now, while you devour Willy's freshly baked bundle of love."

"
Yeah, but you’re forgetting something. He's a guitar wizard. He can get any girl he wants."

Jake wanted to laugh, but he couldn't help thinking this Willy guy was probably head-over-heels in love with a girl who probably wouldn't give him the time of day. And to add insult to injury, some stranger was eating the bread meant for her. He was probably slow mentally and had enough struggles in life without someone making fun of him, and stealing his bread.

"
Your mom would be proud seeing you make fun of the mentally handicapped."

"
Really? That's the angle you want to take? You don't know he's mentally handicapped. He might actually be a guitar wizard—with a gift for baking."

"
It's on you, man."

"
All right, all right!" he said, raising his hands in the air. "I surrender to the moral police. But...” He bent over and coddled the loaf. "I'm keeping this one.”

Jake shook his head in feigned disgust.

"
So, what brings you here to oppress me with your holiness this lovely Monday morning?" he said, releasing the bread and turning his attention back to the computer screen. "I thought you had a ton of sales calls to make today."

"
I would have, if Bob hadn't let me go."

Dan sat up straight in his office chair. "Oh, man. Really?"

"
Yeah. First thing this morning."

"
I'm sorry to hear that, man. How are you taking it?"

"
I don't know. I'm still in shock."

"
I bet." He held the loaf out to Jake, "Want some comfort bread?"

Jake swiped it away. "Are you emotionally stunted?" he said, only half joking.

Dan's face drooped as he poked a piece sheepishly into his own mouth.

"
I don't know how I'm going to tell Jenna. Things are already tense between us, she's been dropping hints about marriage and kids and stuff. I'm just not ready for that."

"
Have you been down to the job center?"

"
Yeah. I grabbed a business card with their website on it. I guess you can file online now."

"
Do you want to do that right now?"

"
No. I need more time to process.” He shook his head. "This has been the weirdest day ever."

"
What do you mean, weird?"

"
I mean like Twilight Zone, weird."

"
Is this before or after you lost your job?"

"
I'm not having a psychological break, if that's what you're implying."

"
No. I'm just saying, stress does crazy things to the mind."

"
I don't know why I'm even telling you this."

"
Look," he said, jutting his hands out toward Jake, "just tell me what happened. I'll shut my mouth and listen. I promise."

This was possibly the biggest mistake in the history of mistakes, but Jake didn't know who else he could tell. Dan was the closest friend he had, besides Jenna, and there was no way he was telling Jenna.

"
All right, I'll tell you. But if you breathe a word of this to Jenna, or anyone else for that matter, it will be open season on all the skeletons in your closest."

"
My lips are Fort Knox," Dan said, pretending to lock his lips with a key.

Jake took a deep breath, then let it all out. He told about the old woman and the flower, his encounters with the children on his way to work, and ended with the boy on the elevator. Dan listened intently, making no reaction. When Jake finished, he leaned back in his chair, and said, "Now tell me that's not weird."

Dan rubbed his unshaven chin. "It's weird. I'll give you that."

"
So you believe me?"

His face soured. "Are you kidding? Mr. Goody Two-Shoes? I think you're genetically incapable of doing wrong. Heck, you can't even indulge in a tasty loaf of bread without feeling guilty."

"
Cut it out. I'm far from perfect."

"
You're like a nun trapped in a man's body."

"
Look, this is serious. Something really freaky is going on."

"
I'm sorry, you're right, I shouldn't joke. Clearly, this whole thing is rattling you. I'd be messed up too if some old woman visited me and then ghost-children started showing up.”

"
You think they could be ghosts?"

"
Well, I don’t know why I said that. I've never heard of ghosts walking around outside in broad daylight. I would think that kind of thing would draw some media attention."

"
But they didn't look like ghosts. They looked real."

"
Did you touch any of them?”

"
No.”

"
Did anyone else see any of this stuff?"

"
No- I don’t know. It seemed like just me, I think."

"
Maybe you’re hallucinating. What have you had to eat today? Or maybe someone slipped something in your drink?"

"
No. It's not drugs. I don't feel any different than I normally do."

Dan brought a web browser up onto his projected screen.

"
What are you doing?"

"
I'm Googling it."

"
Googling what?"

"
I don't know, phantom children, daytime ghosts, creepy old ladies with flowers."

"
Seriously?"

"
Why not? This is the digital age. If you had this experience, maybe someone else had it too."

Jake's phone buzzed in his pocket. He slid it out and looked at the caller I.D.

"
It’s my mom. I have to take it."

Dan acknowledged him and went back to his search.

Jake took the phone into the kitchen and flipped it open. "Hello?"