I had worked with Agent Linden several years earlier on a case involving a highly delusional serial killer and was still recovering from the effects it had on my psyche, not to mention my family. I hesitated before answering and, despite Jessica impatiently beckoning me toward the parking lot, clicked the “Talk” button on my cell phone and waved them to go on ahead.
“Hello, Agent Linden,” I said.
“How have you been, Max?” he asked.
“Busy,” I said. “Is there something I can help you with?”
“Cutting right to the chase,” he said coyly. “I always liked that about you, Max. I need your help. There’s a woman someone tried to murder and you’re the only one that might be able to get some answers.”
“I’m sure you have plenty of qualified people that could interview her. Why me?”
“Because she’s in a coma. She was severely beaten, but, as fate would have it, didn’t die.”
“Jesus. Is she going to recover?”
“They’re not sure at this point, but, God forbid, she doesn’t, we’re going to need to act quickly. I thought maybe you could get inside her head and find out who did it to her.”
“Who is this woman?”
“I can only disclose if you’re going to commit. I know about the prison, Max. I’m sorry.”
“Apparently word gets around pretty quickly,” I said, smiling at Jessica and holding up a finger to indicate “one more minute.” “Look, I’ll have to call you back, okay? Things are kind of hectic right now.”
“Of course,” he said. “You have my number. Just let me know as soon as you decide. She may not have much time left.”
After I got off the phone, I went home, and Jessica and I had a long talk with Katie at our kitchen table. She listened avidly as we explained the nature of psychic phenomena, how I’d discovered I had abilities at a younger age than her and detailed the work I’d been doing at the prison since she was a kid. Expecting a myriad of questions afterwards, Katie started with one that a lot of teenagers would’ve probably asked.
“Can I move shit with my mind?” she inquired excitedly.
“Katie!” Jessica scolded her. “Watch your language!”
“What?!” Katie acted innocent. “It’s a fair question!”
“No,” I answered. “You can’t move things with your mind.”
“Well, that sucks,” she said. “What about controlling other people’s thoughts?!”
“Nope,” I said, shaking my head. “I’m afraid that’s off the table as well.”
She threw her hands in the air. “So, then what’s the point?! I just have to hear what other people are thinking and do nothing?!”
“Well…” I continued. “We were hoping you might use it for something good one day.”
“Like your father,” Jessica interjected.
“Booooring,” she said and got up from the table. “This is a lot to process. May I please be excused?”
“Of course,” I said. “But if you have any more questions—”
“I know,” she interrupted. “I’ll come and ask you guys.”
She took off toward her room. I watched as she cut through the living room and down the hallway. I’d seen her scamper off in that direction many times before, only now she was taller and a whole lot sassier. Jessica sighed and got up from her chair. She moved to the counter near the sink and turned on the coffee pot. She took a bag of French roast out of a cabinet directly above her head.
“You never used to drink coffee,” I commented.
“Gotta keep up with the five-year-olds,” she said.
Teaching hadn’t aged Jessica a bit. She was still as beautiful as the day we met, unaffected by the passage of time and its many tolls. I, on the other hand, seemed to find a new wrinkle every time I looked in the mirror. I watched dazedly as she made coffee, her shapely figure filling out a long, flowing, flowery dress. She seemed out of place in our mundane kitchen.
“They’re shutting the program down at the prison,” I announced matter-of-factly. “In one week, I’ll be out of a job.”
She turned away from the coffee pot and looked at me. “Oh, Max. I’m sorry. I know how much it meant to you.”
I shrugged. “I did it for fourteen years,” I said. “Maybe it’s time to do something different.”
“Well, it’s not like we need the money,” she said. “We’ve saved so much over the years you could practically retire.”
“Or…” I began. “I could work in another capacity.”
“Like what?” she said, sitting down at the table across from me.
“That call earlier…it was Agent Linden.”
“Oh, Jesus. Him again? What did he want?”
“He wants me to help him with a case. A woman was badly beaten and is now in a coma.”
“Oh, my God.”
“He wants me to enter her mind and find out who did it,” I continued.
“Have you ever gone into a coma patient’s mind before? I thought you only did dreams.”
I shook my head. “It might not even work, but, if there’s a chance, it may be worth a shot.”
“Okay, but does it have to be with him? The last time things got pretty ugly. I don’t want any of us to have to go through that again.”
“And we wouldn’t. Look, I don’t like him either. But what good is having psychic abilities if I don’t use them to help somebody?”
She reached out and took my hand. “You know I’ll support you no matter what you decide,” she said. “I just want you to be careful.”
What I hadn’t told Jessica was that I had entered one of the inmates’ minds during a moment of unconsciousness outside of normal sleep. His name was Arnold Greasey and he had been incarcerated for armed robbery and assault with a deadly weapon. One day, I was walking through the prison grounds when Arnold and another prisoner got into an argument over a third prisoner and which of them he “belonged to.” The argument escalated into violence when the second inmate knocked Arnold to the ground and proceeded to ram his head into concrete repeatedly.
By the time the guards intervened, Arnold wasn’t moving. They pulled the other inmate off him and dragged him away. After contacting the infirmary to come and get Arnold, I leaned down beside him and checked his vitals. He was still breathing, albeit shallowly, and his heartbeat was steady. I said his name several times and asked if he could hear me, but he was unresponsive.
A small crowd had gathered at that point and, once the medic arrived, Arnold was laid out on a stretcher. I helped take him to the infirmary and stood by as a doctor and nurse did what they could to help him. His heartbeat suddenly slowed, and the doctor and nurse acted more quickly. Wanting to help in some way, I entered Arnold’s mind while they were occupied to wake him up from inside.
Once in his mind, however, I found myself in a dark room surrounded by what seemed like thousands of luminescent butterflies. They swarmed around me and picked me up off the ground. As we ascended toward the ceiling of the room, I noticed my reflection in one of their wings. I was no longer myself. I was Arnold Greasey. Seconds later, I was jolted out of Arnold’s mind and back into the infirmary. Despite the doctors’ and nurses’ efforts, Arnold was dead.
After that, I developed an interest in the mind moments before death. I didn’t get another opportunity to experience it firsthand but researched it quite a bit. I discovered there were more questions than answers, not to mention the fact there was no way to follow up with a subject once he was gone, and decided to move on to something more accessible. When Linden called about the coma patient, my interest was piqued once again. Obviously, I didn’t want the woman to die but couldn’t help but wonder what I might uncover in such a state.
Katie abruptly appeared in the kitchen. “I have more questions,” she said with a serious look on her face. “Can I turn it off?” she asked.
“No,” I told her honestly. “But you will learn to control it so that it doesn’t control you.”
She nodded. “Can I tell my friends?”
“Definitely not,” Jessica answered. “This doesn’t leave this room, okay?”
“Fine,” she said.
“I’m not kidding, Katie. If the public finds out, they’d never leave us alone. Your father only let the CIA know and, thank God, we’ve been able to keep it a secret this long. Promise us you won’t say anything to anyone.”
“I promise,” she said with the same innocent look on her face she had when she was four and promised she wouldn’t take cookies from the pantry without asking. She plopped down in a chair between us at the table. “What’s for dinner?” she asked nonchalantly.
A short while later, I stepped out and into our backyard and called Linden. He was, as I expected, stingy with the details. The woman, Beth Martin, had spent the weekend in rural Kentucky at her parents’ house and was driving back home to Louisville late at night. A truck driver noticed her abandoned car on the side of the road and called the police. Her parents and fiancé were contacted, and, after an exhaustive search of the surrounding area, she was found lying unconscious in a field a half a mile from where her vehicle was discovered.
“Did anybody see anything?” I asked.
“Nope,” replied Linden. “It all happened on a farm road in the middle of the night. There was no one around.”
“Was anything stolen?”
“Her purse was missing from the car,” he answered. “According to her parents, she didn’t carry cash around with her, so it was mainly credit cards and a few makeup items.”
“Any fingerprints? Evidence?”
“No fingerprints,” he said. “As for evidence, whoever did it took it with them. They found DNA samples that match her parents but that could’ve been from hugging her before she left their house. Other than that, it’s all inconclusive.”
“How did the parents seem?” I asked, looking in through the window at Jessica as she cooked dinner and then Katie at the kitchen table doing homework.
“Distraught. Beth is their only child.”
“I can’t even imagine,” I said. “And the fiancé?”
“He won’t talk to anybody, but he’s been visiting her at the hospital. They were supposed to be married in April.”
“Is there anyone that had it out for her? Somebody at work maybe?”
“We don’t even know if was premeditated. It could’ve been some thug that was going to rape her and changed his mind at the last minute.”
“So, she wasn’t…”
“No. There were no signs of penetration and her clothing was intact.”
“Thank God for that.”
“Well, what do you say, Max?” he cut to the chase. “Can I put you on a plane to Louisville in the morning? All expenses paid, of course.”
“I’ve only got a week to finish up things at the prison—”
“I’ll get you an extension,” he said assuredly. If there was one thing I didn’t miss about Linden, it was his cockiness. “Just say the word and I’ll get the ball rolling on my end.”
“Yes,” I said as Jessica beckoned me through the window to come in for dinner.