Authors: Tina Folsom
“On Sunday, but I was with you all …” It clicked. “He saw us together.”
There was shock in Vince’s face. I could see his mind clicking.
“We have to go home. I need to think.”
Without hesitation he scooped me up into his arms and started running through the deserted side streets. Within a couple of minutes we were at his front door. He let us in and I could see how carefully he locked behind us. Upstairs he went to his surveillance monitors. I could see how tense he was.
“Please don’t be angry with me,” I begged him.
He looked at me and opened up his arms. I ran to him and he held me tight.
“You couldn’t know. It’s my fault. I should have told you everything from the beginning.”
He kissed my forehead and continued scanning the security footage. After what felt like an eternity, he turned away from the screen.
“I don’t think he’s found me yet.”
Vince led me to the couch and we sat down. He wrapped his arms around me as if to protect me, and I leaned against him.
I leaned into one corner of the couch and spread my legs to she could sit right in between them. Her back leaned into my chest and I wrapped my arms around her. I wanted her close. She let her arms rest on my thighs, and I could feel my skin tingle underneath the fabric of my pants.
She knew I needed to talk, and I knew it would help me get everything straight in my mind, and hopefully help me formulate a plan.
“Jeffrey Rosenschmid was my lab manager back in ’78. He was ambitious, but not bright enough to amount to anything on his own. He often took credit for other people’s work. I didn’t like that and realized I’d made a mistake in hiring him.
“You never worked for the University, but let me tell you, the bureaucracy I had to deal with to let him go was endless. I never knew how mad he must have been at me. He was the one who copied all my research papers before he left. He had a wife and a daughter, and I’ll never know what he was really planning to do with the information.
“He himself didn’t have the brains to make the work his own. Maybe he wanted to sell it to somebody back then, but a month later I burned down the lab and went into hiding. Maybe that’s what gave him the idea to hold on to the information and pass it on to his daughter. I found out she went to medical school, but she never graduated. I guess he thought he got a lucky break when she married a doctor. If his daughter couldn’t claim the research as her own, maybe his son-in-law would. It would mean prestige and money for his family, something he couldn’t achieve on his own.
“There was only one problem: Jeffrey didn’t know what the fatal flaw of my research was. He left a month before the side effects started showing in me, and the papers he copied never made a mention of them. Jeffrey couldn’t have known.”
I could feel Annette was listening intently. She put her hand on mine and squeezed it gently. She wanted me to go on.
“There were rumors after my disappearance that I had jumped off the Golden Gate Bridge. For all intents and purposes, I was dead. I guess Jeffrey must have believed it. I did act very erratic in the months before the fire and people around me probably thought I was losing it. I’m glad you didn’t know me back then. I wasn’t an easy person to get along with. I made a lot of enemies. I was too ambitious and self-centered.
“In the first years after my transformation I never went outside during the daytime. I took on a new identity for the few things I needed. My cousin Victor had died as a child and I used his social security number and birth certificate to establish accounts.”
“I’ve noticed you always pay cash,” she suddenly said.
“Very perceptive. Yes, I try to leave as little a trace as possible, even with Victor’s identity. My parents left me a large inheritance when they died and it allowed me to live this way.”
“Did they know?”
I shook my head. “They died in a car crash the same year it all happened to me. It was a blessing for them. In the first years I could barely control the animal inside of me. If they’d seen me like that, it would have killed them, especially my mother.”
Thinking of her after all these years made me sad. I wished she could have been alive, so I could bring my little angel home to her and tell her I had found the woman I wanted to marry.
Annette had noticed that I had gone quiet. She turned her head and moved her mouth closer. I kissed her and for a few seconds I lost myself in her. But I had to continue, and she settled back into my chest.
“Nothing here can be traced back to me. The building is owned by a trust in Victor’s name, so is the car. All the bills are in the trust’s name. Nobody knows I still exist. I still leave the house very rarely, especially during daytime. There are still people alive who might recognize me, even after thirty years, even though the chances are getting slimmer every year. It was extremely bad luck that Entwhistle saw me, and even worse that he saw us together.”
“But what difference would it make that he saw me with you?”
“See, if he’d only seen me, it meant I was alive but probably oblivious to what he was doing. But when he saw me with you, he must have realized that either I already knew what he’d done to you or would find out shortly. It means, he knows I know. He knows I’ll come after him. You remember the interview you saw with him?”
Of course, she did. I had almost lost her because of it. As if to tell me that everything was ok, she wrapped her arms around mine and squeezed me.
“When I first saw the interview a while ago, I knew what his research was about, but I didn’t know at the time he had stolen it from me. You see, anybody can research anything they want to, so sooner or later somebody would try to find the fountain of youth, just as I did. So, going public with the revelation he’d found the gene was not a problem. Even if he wasn’t sure whether I was dead or not, there was no risk for him. I wouldn’t be able to prove he’d stolen all the data from me, or rather that his father-in-law had. His problem is now that he knows I would have analyzed what he’s injected you with and I would have realized that it is an exact replica of my switch, the one I found thirty years ago.”
“But what can he do now?”
“A number of things: find me and expose me before I ruin him, or …”
She interrupted me instantly. “But expose you how?” She didn’t know what I meant.
I turned her to look at me. “Do you know what they’d do with a freak like me? They’ll lock me up in some high security research lab and experiment on me.”
Annette looked at me in shock. She obviously hadn’t thought of me as a freak. I felt her hand stroke my cheek. I turned my head to kiss her palm.
“I won’t let them take you away from me,” she said in a firm voice.
I kissed her again and held her so tight, I knew she could barely breathe. She clung to me and didn’t want to let go either.
“What else will he try?” she continued.
“He’ll try to blackmail me into giving him the repair to the switch.”
“But you don’t have that.”
“He doesn’t know that. When he saw me in the park, I looked young, I was with you, showing affection, behaving normal, being close to another human being. For all he knows I’ve found a solution to the problem. He’ll want it.”
“Hold on,” she suddenly said. “It doesn’t make sense. He can only think one thing, either he things you’re a freak and he’ll expose you, or he thinks you’ve found the solution and will want it. Don’t you see, he can’t believe in both at the same time.”
I thought about it for a second. Could she be right, that one would exclude the other? She went on.
“So, what could he possibly blackmail you with to give him the solution?”
“I’m not sure,” I confessed. She was smart. I always knew it.
“But that still leaves him the option of exposing me. I still have to stop him. It doesn’t change anything about that. He can’t be allowed to continue what he’s doing. What he did to you and Carmela, and to his other research subjects is criminal. He’s dangerous.”
She nodded. “I agree. We’ll just have to find a way to stop him.”
I interrupted her immediately. “We? I don’t think so. It’s my responsibility. I can’t put you in any more danger than you already are.”
She flared up. “We’re in this together. I won’t let you do this alone!”
And there it was: our first fight. She was hotheaded and opinionated. She wouldn’t give in, but at least I wanted to try. There was no reason to throw a perfectly good fight.
“Please be reasonable.”
“Reasonable? You of all people should know I don’t do reasonable things.” She had me there. “It’s my fault you’re in this dilemma, so I’m going to help you.”
I took her hands into mine. “I’ve survived without your help for the last thirty years, trust me, I can handle it.”
She was furious. “Oh, so you don’t need me? Fine.” There was that word again,
fine.
She started pulling away from me and wanted to get up. I wasn’t having any of it. She had won, she just didn’t know it yet. I didn’t let her get up, instead I pulled her back down to me. She struggled. I took her face into my hands and made her look at me.
“I need you like water in the desert. Don’t you think for one moment I can live without you. That’s why I want to keep you safe. It’s selfish, I know, but I wouldn’t know what I would do if anything happened to you.”
She stared into my eyes. “Let me help you.”
I closed my eyes and nodded. I couldn’t refuse her anything. My reward came a second later. I felt her lips on mine, and all I could do was respond to her passion. Her hands started undressing me.
“I guess we should fight more often.” I grinned at her.
Her smile was ravishing. “Only if you let me undress you after every fight.” She had to have conditions.
I started tearing at her t-shirt. “And what do I get?”
With a swift move she pulled her t-shirt over her head. As I knew from when I had touched her in the restaurant, she didn’t wear a bra.
For a few hours I forgot everything about Entwhistle and the danger he represented. When she finally collapsed in my arms, exhausted, I had to smile. I could tire out a twenty-six year old, if that was even her age. I made a mental note to find out her real age later.
I carried her to bed and she slept cradled in my arms. It was almost morning. Her sleeping body had a strangely calming effect on me, and I could feel my body relax, until I finally closed my eyes and fell asleep. In those lonely thirty years I had barely slept. I hadn’t needed it, and now with her in my arms I finally fell into a deep, relaxing sleep.
When I awoke it was late afternoon. I couldn’t believe I could possibly have slept that long, but it was true. Amazed at the changes she had brought to my life I gazed at my sleeping angel. I decided to let her sleep a little while longer. If I had needed ten hours of sleep, I wondered how long she would need to recover.
After a refreshing shower I decided to check on a few things in the lab. I heard Annette get up shortly later and take a shower. It was a tempting thought to go and surprise her in the shower, but I managed to resist. I needed a clear head. If I wanted to beat Entwhistle to the punch, I had to act tonight. I had formulated my plan and was ready to execute it.
The shower had stopped and I knew it was safe to go upstairs. She would be dressed by now. I hoped today would be the last day where I would have to worry about keeping a cool head. If everything went well, I could finally relax and only think about living with Annette.
“Good morning,” she greeted me with a huge smile as soon as I entered.
I walked toward her. “It’s afternoon,” I corrected her and pulled her up so her feet didn’t feel the ground. Her kiss brought back the memories of the previous night.
“Did you sleep well?” I asked her between kisses.
“Never better.”
“Good. We have to take care of a few things today, or rather tonight.”
She gave me a questioning look.
“But how about breakfast first?” I suggested.
Over steak, three for me and one for her, I laid out my plan. I had decided to start with destroying his research records. Without any samples of the serum and the blueprint for it he would have a hard time continuing. I figured the only place he would keep the serum was in his lab, since it needed to be refrigerated. I couldn’t imagine he would keep it in his refrigerator at home.
There would most likely be electronic records of his research on his computers therefore I was planning to wipe the hard drives of all his computers in the lab and his academic office clean.
Annette thought there was something missing from my plan, and doubted it would be enough to stop him. I had to admit I secretly agreed with her, but short of killing him if he continued endangering people, I couldn’t come up with anything effective. And I didn’t dare mentioning it, since I got the distinct feeling she wouldn’t approve.
Our drive to campus was silent. I didn’t like the fact that she didn’t want to stay home, but despite another effort on my part she couldn’t be convinced to let me do this on my own. She was stubborn. I didn’t have a good feeling about the whole thing. My instincts told me that I had overlooked something, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. I would have felt much better had she agreed to stay at home.
I had half expected that my key to his lab wouldn’t work anymore, but surprisingly he hadn’t changed the locks. It should have tipped me off immediately that something was wrong. I pushed the door open and peaked inside. Annette was right behind me. It was dark inside but I could easily see the interior of the lab with its familiar benches. I stepped inside and almost immediately I sensed something unexpected. I picked up a scent I didn’t recognize. Somebody was in the room.
“Annette, run, it’s a trap!” I shouted and turned back to her at the same time. She had been only a few steps behind me.
The light went on instantly and I knew I was too late. The door behind me was closed and in front of it I saw my opponent tightly gripping Annette. It was unexpected to see that it wasn’t Entwhistle who had grabbed Annette: it was Entwhistle’s wife, Rebecca. I recognized her from the wedding picture in his home office. She was a slender brunette in her mid thirties and fairly attractive, but her eyes were cold.