Brian Hodge: Prototype

On his own, at least no one need suspect that but himself.

They would follow, they decided. They would follow and at least let him know that their opinion of him had not changed, not on the basis of a psilocybin vision that may or may not have been valid. That Clay understand she would never, could never, give up on him was crucial, and if it was her final gift, then let him at least be the one to tell her so. She demanded little for herself when it came to patients — and Clay had become so much more — but he owed her this much.

But they could not follow without at least some idea of his destination, and her only key was Timothy Van der Leun. His phone number was unlisted with Indiana Bell information, but her notebook computer still had access to the mainframe at Arizona Associated Labs, and she found it on file there. Timothy’s voice, once he consented to answer his phone early that afternoon, had come from the bottom of a dead soul’s gorge.

“I need your help. You’re the only one who can help me,” she had explained. “I brought Clay Palmer to Indianapolis and now I need to find him again because he needs help…”

“Who?” He’d sounded confused, feverish, so she had to tell him again, Clay Palmer, the one who came to see you last Friday, New Year’s Eve. “Oh. Him. Right,” Timothy had said. “I remember now.” Then, in a thickened voice that nearly caused her to shudder, “Good scars. He had good scars.”

She had pleaded and prodded and cajoled, on the theory that having been diagnosed years before Clay, Timothy might already have been contacted by the mysterious mentor in Boston. So long as she could keep him focused, he’d had ample tales to tell, information to share. In his more lucid moments he sounded more forsaken than insane, full of desperate gratitude for a woman to talk with, who valued his opinion on anything, and she tried not to think of what he must look like, smell like, his skin a burnt patchwork of self-made sores.

She tried not to think of his inevitable fate.

So through the ragged clouds of snow and hostility they had driven to Boston, had gotten a hotel room, had acquired maps and charted out what was where. And if Clay wasn’t with Patrick Valentine after all, if he had instead disappeared into the frozen mists like the misbegotten outcast of Mary Shelley’s most famous novel, well… perhaps it really would be time to pack in their best intentions and head for home. For the mountains, then the desert.

“Five more minutes,” Adrienne said. “Then we’ll check.”

“Okay.”

“Maybe they’re asleep. You know the kind of hours he keeps, sometimes.”

“I know,” said Sarah. “I know.”

She reached across to massage the back of Adrienne’s neck. In her lap was paper and pen, resting upon the flat of a book, with which she had whiled away their forty-five-minute stakeout. Sarah had filled it with experimental addresses for herself, seeing the way her name looked conjoined with cities and states all over the country: Sarah Lynn McGuire, 123 Fogbound St., Eugene, OR. Sarah Lynn McGuire, 456 Potato Lane, Boise, ID. She did this sometimes, in coffeehouses and comedy clubs, did it the way others doodled stick figures or hearts or future fortunes, Sarah indulging basic wanderlust. “You never know,” Adrienne once heard her tell someone who didn’t understand, “maybe I’ll write one and it’ll be like a talisman. I’ll look at it and the match will be so perfect, I’ll just know it’s a place I have to be.”

I want to go to these places, too, Adrienne thought now. However many may seize you, I want to try them on with you and see how they fit us both. She really hoped she meant that, would mean it tomorrow and next week and a year from now, and that it wasn’t just the wintry miles of failure and desolation talking.

“Okay,” Adrienne said. “Time’s up.”

She put the car into gear, rolled ahead and down the street, to the house that Valentine built. They got out and picked their way along the front walk, up to the dark-windowed, two-story Cape Cod. Beneath its snowy blanket it looked sinister, she decided, as if it had something to hide.

“I had an optimistic thought,” she said quietly, watchful. “If Clay’s been here, now that he’s made the trip and confronted his unknown, maybe it satisfied something in him and he’ll be ready to leave.”

Sarah nodded and raised one hand, pulling off her mitten so Adrienne could see her crossed fingers.

They mounted the porch. Rang the doorbell, and when that failed to rouse anyone, began to pound until she realized, no, no one was here, and selfishly, this brought relief. They retraced their steps, and she wondered if Valentine — or Clay — might later notice their prints and wonder like paranoiacs about what mysterious pair had come knocking.

“Well, there’s always the other place downtown,” Sarah said. “We could see if that’s still going.” She tossed a hasty snowball at Adrienne before she could regain the shelter of the car. “If we time it right, maybe they’ll even invite us to stay for dinner.”

The world was full of asylums, all kinds: those into which you were committed, those you carried around inside, those you let others build for you. Clay watched the first flakes of late afternoon snow drifting past the nineteenth floor and wondered if Valentine even realized what he had created here: just another asylum.

Though it was not without its appeal. At the moment the woody resin scent of marijuana smoke hazed the air. In this asylum they prescribed their own drugs and Valentine didn’t seem to mind. A chromo mute could surrender here, trudge out onto the balcony like a beaten pontiff and tell the world, Enough, you win, I’ll never be what you want, only what you deserve, then come back inside and wait to age another day.

He and Valentine had dropped by two hours ago, a follow-up to last night’s visit, and this time Ellie’s gaze lingered on his eyes instead of looking him up and down as a whole specimen. Just beyond her, Daniel Ironwood was taking in every move, and had wandered up even before Clay got his field jacket off, taller by a couple of inches and making sure Clay knew it.

“I meant to ask last night, what happened to your face?” Daniel pointed to the raggedly parallel scabs.

“I cut myself eating,” Clay told him.

Ellie appeared borderline sympathetic. “Those look painful as hell,” then she shot a sporting glance at Daniel that he missed seeing. “I could kiss it to make it better, but Patrick says you don’t like to be touched.”

Daniel straightened, striving for still more height, crossed his arms before his chest. “Why don’t you get it over with and kiss his ass instead?”

“Well that’s half-profound.” She scruffed both hands across the cropped sidewalls of her hair and up through the length, as if she were about to pull it out. “Look, Jeopardy! should be on TV in a few minutes. If you want, I’ll be happy to spend some more quality time with you, and if you’re really really nice between now and then, this time I promise not to count how many times your lips move and no sound comes out.”

“Fuck you,” and Daniel stalked off down the hall toward the bathroom.

“Yeah, that’s what you’re being paid for, isn’t it?” Ellie called over his shoulder. “Maybe I should tell Patrick I’m not quite getting his money’s worth.”

The bathroom door slammed and Valentine stood gloating, as if everything were some grand joke that he had told with perfect timing, and then Ellie turned to him and began to complain of how brutal Daniel had been last night, and she had no reason to believe he would alter his tactics.