Chapter 28

I sat in my car breathing heavily. The windows fogged. While part of me had known that something in my life had been fishy all along, evidently I’d still been clinging to the optimistic notion that it was just shitty memory and a harmless bit of paranoia.

I should’ve known better.

I pulled out my phone and said, “Do I even have Stefan’s phone number?”

“Steven Russel,” my phone said. “Is this the contact you’re looking for?”

“Uh…yeah.”

“Would you like to call him?”

“Can I just…send him a text?”

A text box popped up. Any other time, I would’ve marveled at the technology. But I was too busy keeping an internal meltdown at bay. My thumbs were all over the screen and yet, thanks to autocorrect, my message came out just like it was in my head. I have a repressed memory or maybe it’s deliberate, I think I was hypnotized, need to see you ASAP. It even capitalized that last word for me.

I hit send, then sat and stared at the screen. Nothing happened. “He’ll probably blow me off,” I told the phone. “Things are too weird between us.”

The phone didn’t have any sage advice to offer. Maybe it would add that feature in a future software upgrade. As I made to put it away, an answer appeared with a gentle whoosh of arrival. Pick me up at Circle Campus in half an hour and I’ll see what I can do.

I arrived at U of I with five minutes to spare, pulled up in a bus zone by Behavioral Sciences, and texted Stefan my location. I was ruminating over how I should feel about needing a favor from him, when a guy from campus security strode up, all gym rat physique and minimum-wage self-importance. I showed him my ID and he wisely backed away. The laminated card didn’t have the same heft as a metal police badge, but the big federal seal on it did the job just fine.

I spotted Stefan from a long way off, striding across a stretch of snow-flanked sidewalk, great black coat flapping ostentatiously behind him. I felt drab in comparison. Then again, I doubted I could deal with the amount of attention having a signature look would entail. Not anymore.

He climbed in, did a great deal of fastidiously arranging himself, then slammed the door. He glanced at me dismissively, then did a double-take. “Are you crying?”

“I have allergies,” I snapped.

“Hmph.” He must’ve probed me with his talent and realized it was true, because he let the matter drop. “I’m presuming the only reason you want to see me is that our hypnosis sessions have been freakishly effective. It’ll be a nightmare to park near my office this time of day. So where do you want to do this? Keep in mind, I have no intention of spending the next few hours in your car. My sciatica is acting up.”

I didn’t want him in my house. And evidently he had no desire for me to see his, either. “I know a place,” I told him, and began wending my way through a cluster of city buses.

Traffic was a good excuse to refrain from talking, but stoplights made the silence in the car awkward. As did the fact that he was reading my awkwardness. Unlike Crash’s telepathic boyfriend, Stefan didn’t need to stare at you and concentrate to get a reading. “So,” I ventured. “College. Teaching? Or…?”

“Good lord, no. Could you imagine dealing with all those insufferable, privileged millennial brats for hours on end? I’m getting my Ph.D.”

“Oh.” I’d figured he already had one. But since I’d never aspired to anything beyond surviving the police academy with my general equivalency diploma in hand, my knowledge of the educational system was as hole-riddled as my memory.

“I’m weary of clinical work,” he said. “Exhausted. And my partner Lorraine has been making noises about retiring, which got me to wondering if it might be a good time for a change. Go into research instead.”

Good luck with that, I thought. Heck, my own frustrating mediumship research made target practice look appealing. Then again, maybe research would end up being a better fit for such a misanthrope…which was how I’d always pigeonholed Darla, too. Except judging by the way she acted around everyone but me, I now realized, her loathing was far less generalized than Stefan’s.

“Can you think of any reason Dead Darla would feel…humiliated?”

“Her triple-chin?”

“Uh, no. Actually, she’s in pretty good shape nowadays. I mean, anything I did specifically to humiliate her.”

Stefan gave it some serious consideration. “I imagine she was pissed off at you for leading her on.”

“I did no such thing.”

He waved my protest away. “No need to be defensive about it. It’s not your fault she couldn’t take a hint. People need to grow up and stop romanticizing unrequited love. If someone’s into you, it doesn’t take much to get down their pants. And if not, move on. It’s not worth the drama, and someone else will come along soon enough.”

Spoken like a fifth-level empath…but I wasn’t in the mood to argue. We pulled up in front of the gin mill and I cut the engine.

Although smoking indoors had been illegal since I couldn’t remember when, the place smelled like an old ashtray. And not just because there was an old ashtray beside the front door, but because a half century of tar and nicotine had sunk into the pores of the building. It was dark and dingy, with a low drop ceiling and a tube TV playing the afternoon traffic report.

“Charming,” Stefan murmured.

It had been several weeks since I’d last been there, but nothing had changed. It was practically deserted, with only a few day-drinkers propping up the far end of the bar, and the out of order sign was still on the ladies’ room. Even the antisocial bartender was the same. When I approached the bar, he cut his eyes to the booth where my dealer usually held court and said, “He’s not here.” But if I came back another time, he might be. How comforting to know my Seconal habit would welcome me back with open arms should I ever decide I wanted to patch things over. 

The mere thought of an addiction-blob feeding off my energy made me knuckle my eyes.

I ordered a regular Coke, and Stefan requested a diet. Then he squinted at the menu and ordered a pepperoni-sausage pizza. “How big are they?” he asked. The bartender pulled a prepackaged nine-inch disc out of the fridge and showed it to him. “Better make it two.”

We found a shadowy booth far away from both the barflies and the door, and slid in. Stefan gave the table a shove and it scraped a few inches toward me. He settled himself, took a long drink of his Diet Coke, then said, “Let me preface this, as always, by reminding you that the human mind is complex. I can’t simply push a button and command the memory you’re hoping for to magically appear.”

“Maybe we don’t even need to do a regression to figure out why I can’t remember my first ghost,” I said. “Maybe you know about someone erasing my memories. Maybe you’ve even done it yourself.”

He laughed humorlessly, plucked a napkin out of the dispenser, and wiped some ancient crumbs off the tabletop. “Need I remind you that we’re the same age, and I didn’t study hypnosis until I was almost thirty? Plus, I never laid eyes on you until I met you by the soda machine.” When Stefan lied, it was by omission. In all likelihood, since he made the claim, I could presume it was true. “Tell me what insight you’re hoping to gain.”

“One minute I’m fifteen and goofing off by the railroad tracks, next minute, nothing. My next memory is knocking over a sawhorse in driver’s ed class. Nearly two years later.”

“Two years seems a long stretch of time, but people do vary on how much they can recall of their childhood. Try to think of milestones. Birthdays, maybe. Your favorite movies. Boys who gave you a hard-on.”

I picked at a leathery drop of old ketchup that had bonded with the formica. “Nothing. Not even the family I’d been living with. And…if it was anyone but you, I might not even be able to say this. But you were there at Camp Hell. You know how it was. The mind-games. The experiments. There was a woman who told me to forget. A telepath caught a glimpse of her and…well, like I said. You know how it was.”

Stefan stroked his graying soul patch and considered me, while I squirmed and did my best to look anywhere but at him. And eventually he said, “If it turns out that, yes, someone encouraged you to forget things under hypnotic suggestion, what then?”

“No clue. But dammit, I need to know.”

“Very well,” he intoned. And the very sound of his voice dropping into the register he used for hypnosis practically sent me sprawling. “Sit back. Take a deep breath. Let it out slowly, and as you do, begin to count back….”

I knuckled my eyes.

Reminded myself I’d only be making things worse.

And gave them a final hard rub for good measure. Because fucking hell, crying in front of anybody, especially in front of him, seriously eroded the Sid Vicious image I aspired to. I went through a lot of trouble putting my hair up. I’d be damned if I sat there crying my eyes out like a big, dumb loser.

I opened my eyes and glared at him. Not Stefan…not unless he’d turned into a sixtyish black guy while I was trying to hide my frustrated tears. 

Harold Albert was a strict man, at least on paper. He enforced curfews, rode me about my grades, and insisted I address him as Sir. He and Mamma Brill had raised over fifteen foster kids, plus four sons of their own, into reasonably upstanding adults. All except that dickhead Charles, who took up carjacking and ended up doing time downstate. But still, their success rate was pretty high.

Strict, yes. But heart-wrenchingly gentle when the situation called for it. “Are you ready to tell me your side of the story?” he said patiently. We faced each other across a yellow laminate Burger Barn tabletop, where we each lingered over a sweating Coke that was mostly ice.

“You won’t believe me,” I said. “No one does.”

“Look me in the eye and tell me you’re being truthful, and I will.”

My God, I’d never appreciated how earnest he was. No, I was too full of self-righteous tween indignation. “I’m not lying,” I shouted. “There was a guy looking through the window over by the blackboard. I saw him. I did. He had long headbanger hair and a Blackhawks jersey and the whole side of his face was covered in blood. He had his hands cupped around his eyes and he was looking through the window.”

“But the teacher didn’t see him. And the courtyard was locked.”

“So?” I threw up my arms in frustration. “Maybe he picked the lock. Maybe the gate wasn’t shut right. How the f—heck should I know?”

Harold considered my outburst, then said, “If you need to talk to Dr. Kleinman again, I’ll make you an appointment.”

The thing about seeing a shrink was that I could wow all my middle-school cohorts by telling them I was crazy, even though I knew my diagnosis was nothing more glamorous or threatening than generalized anxiety. She wasn’t a psychiatrist—I never came away with any pills—though I did show some aspirin to my gullible friends and claim I needed them to keep the voices at bay. Despite the lack of interesting meds, my sessions with Kleinman really did chill me out.

Funny thing was, if I wanted to see Kleinman, the visit had to stay between Harold and me. Even though, between the two of them, Mama Brill was the permissive parent, the therapist had somehow rubbed her wrong from the get-go. On this particular matter, Mama wouldn’t budge. Luckily, since Mama was busy cashiering at the auto parts store, Harold would be calling the shots solo.

And my occasional weird outbursts really worried him.

While I was fully aware that I was currently a middle-aged guy in a Ravenswood gin mill and not a fourteen-year-old leaving a south side Burger Barn, the experience was way more immersive than any TV show or video game. Some part of me still was that confused kid. The one who saw nonphysical things and was made to think he hadn’t, and then convinced that he’d been faking it all for attention.

Maybe I should’ve felt proud of being worthy of such an elaborate mindfuck.

I’m no expert on kids, but I suspect they all think the world revolves around them. I know I didn’t find it unusual that Dr. Kleinman was able to drop everything and see me the moment Harold called. Apparently my memory wasn’t so inept after all—the details of her office were incredibly vivid. The popcorn ceilings. Whitewashed wood. The oversized floral prints in shades of dusty, muted pastel. Harold parked himself uncomfortably in the waiting room and spread a People Magazine in his lap. Who knows if he even read them. From my current middle-aged perspective, I could see he was beside himself with worry. Back then, he just seemed a little stiff.

The inner door opened, and my head shrinker greeted me. She was a Caucasian woman roughly my present age, in thick glasses, with her hair pulled back in a heavy tortoiseshell barrette. “Come on in, Vic, and have a seat. Let’s rap.”

My heart sped, current day, wondering what she was hiding, but my younger self was perfectly at ease with her stilted camaraderie. I sprawled on the couch and put my ratty Converse up on her coffee table. Holy hell, I was such a little twerp.

“So, according to Harold, you claim to have seen someone in your school courtyard.”

“I didn’t claim to see it, I did see it. A guy. With long hair and a hockey jersey. Covered in blood.”

“And yet, with hundreds of other people around, no one else saw a thing. Now, we both know people don’t just disappear—so, let’s explore the idea that maybe the sight of the bloodied man was actually your subconscious mind trying to tell you something. Can you think of any associations this man might have?”

“Not really.”

“You say he was wearing a hockey jersey. What does hockey mean to you?”

“Nothing,” I said automatically. But, even as I said it, I questioned whether that was really true. A few years back, I played in a peewee league. Harold and Mama Brill had really sacrificed to get me that used equipment. And then I tossed it all aside once my real reason for playing was gone. Our goalie, all cocky smile and feathered hair, had moved away after my first season. And without him, once I outgrew my skates, I figured I’d outgrown the sport, too. 

I couldn’t meet Kleinman’s eyes. We never discussed my sexuality. Did she know, or had I managed to keep this private part of me private? I suspected it wouldn’t stay hidden forever. My friends were beginning to notice boobs. The fact that they were all two years younger had served me well, but pretty soon they’d catch up to me hormonally. And then what?

Mama Brill might be cool with it once she had some time to wrap her head around the idea, but then there was Harold. I doubted he would go so far as to throw me out on the street if he knew. Not like you hear about from those homeless kids turning tricks behind the gas station. But once he found out, whatever little affection he did show, I was sure I could kiss it goodbye.

“It’s fine if you’re not ready to talk about it,” Kleinman said…referring to the guy I’d seen. Not my secret urges. “Just think. The meaning of hockey. This feeling of isolation. And the element of danger. Is this making any sense to you?”

Well, when she put it that way, how could it not? I shrugged. “Yeah, I guess.”

“The subconscious is rich with symbolism. Sometimes the associations are literal, sometimes they’re not. But the thing to remember is that when something doesn’t make logical sense, there’s always a good explanation for what you’re thinking. It doesn’t make you crazy.”

I shrugged again.

“On a scale of one to ten, how anxious are you feeling right now?”

A lot. But mostly because I was trying to figure out how to keep the whole gay thing from blowing up in my face. I treated her to another move from my repertoire of sullen shrugs.

“If you’re still feeling uneasy, let’s try some guided imagery to help you relax. Just like I showed you before. Get comfortable. Tighten your fingers, your toes, and then release. Take a deep breath, and let’s start counting down together. Ten….”

I came back to myself with a loud gasp, clutching the sticky table. Stefan was there across from me, watching me intently, with two empty cardboard circles dotted with grease and crumbs in front of him.

“Welcome back,” he said. “I didn’t even get a chance to finish counting you up. That’s unusual.”

“I saw her. The woman. The hypnotist. Fuck, you’re not my first.” While I scrambled to make sense of it all, Stefan tucked his chin and raised an eyebrow, but thankfully resisted making reference to the stolen KY. “Someone’s been poking through my mind ever since I was a goddamn kid.”