Craig Lancaster - 600 Hours of Edward

Also, some of today’s shows have a totally unrealistic view of the world. On that show everybody seems to love, 24 , Jack Bauer can get from one side of Los Angeles to the other in five minutes. This is simply not possible. I went to Los Angeles on a vacation two years ago—my father was apoplectic when he saw the cost. (I love the word “apoplectic.”) I can tell you from experience that you cannot get from Hollywood and Vine to the Sunset Strip in five minutes, and those places are very close together, in Los Angeles terms. Jack Bauer is fooling his audience, but he doesn’t fool me.

My letter of complaint tonight requires yet another new green office folder. This letter is overdue.

Unhelpful paint man at Home Depot:

As I have had other things attracting my attention, I have been slow to register my complaint about your poor performance on October 14, when I purchased paint in your store. I would be remiss, however, if I did not cover this ground with you.

I have now applied two colors to the garage, and because of your inability to help me zero in on a single color, I will still have to apply another. This wastes my valuable time and could conceivably cause me to run up against the erratic October weather for which Billings is known.

Still, I also must acknowledge my own role in this failure. I could not control my impulse to buy three colors of paint, and that is not your fault. I had merely hoped that you could help me negotiate the many choices at your store. I will continue to work on my problem. Perhaps you could work on yours.

I am standing at the edge of a cliff, looking down. I don’t know if I’ve been here before. There is a rimrock that surrounds Billings; it is the signature geographic formation of the area. I know it well. I see it every day. I don’t know if this is it, as I can’t see the whole rock or a town below. I see my feet and the brown, dusty, weather-beaten sandstone below them, and below that only the murky darkness.

Then I feel myself fall down. Only, it’s not me.

It’s him. Kyle. I can see his face as he falls away, and I know his little body is going to crash to the rocks that I assume are below, although I don’t like to assume. I can feel the black terror inside of me.

And suddenly, a hand reaches out and catches Kyle’s wrist. It’s my hand, and I feel the snap of my shoulder as his fall is arrested.

“Help me, Edward!” he says.

“I have you,” I say through my teeth, straining to keep my grip on his wrist. I’m lying flat on my stomach, my chin hanging over the edge of the cliff, my feet scratching at the rock behind me as I try to find purchase.

“I’m slipping!”

“I have you!”

And then I don’t have him. Gravity pulls him from my grip and hurtles him to certain death, and…

I am awake.

And I am up.

And I am out of here.

I don’t know what time it is.

My data is not complete.

Once I am sitting in the driver’s seat of my 1997 Toyota Camry, I notice three things. First, it’s 7:40 a.m. Second, the Behr mochachino looks horrid on the garage in front of me. Third, I am wearing my 1999 R.E.M. Up tour T-shirt and blue-and-red pajama bottoms. I sleep in these. I am wearing no shoes.

I don’t care.

From the house that my father bought, the route to Billings Clinic is easy: right turn on Clark Avenue to Sixth Avenue W., left turn on Sixth to Lewis Avenue, right turn on Lewis to Broadway, left turn on Broadway to Billings Clinic. I can be there in five minutes. My stomach is churning, and not from the left turns.

At Billings Clinic, I find a parking spot in the lot behind the emergency department. Before I step out of the car, I catch a glimpse of myself in the rearview mirror and lick my right palm, then paw at my head. My hair is puffed up and bent every which way from sleep. I look crazy. I feel crazy. I guess I am crazy.

I’m running for the door.

“I have to see Donna Middleton.”

“And you are?” The security guard at the emergency department’s front desk is looking at me with suspicion, and I cannot blame him, but I also cannot care.

“Edward Stanton. You have to get her.”

“Does she know you’re coming?”

“No. Get her.”

“Sir, you need to calm down.”

“Please get her.”

“Sir.”

“Please.”

“Sir, why are you here?”

“Please. Just tell her it’s Edward Stanton. Please.”

He looks me over slowly. I try to stand up a little straighter, as if it would make me look any less ridiculous.

He picks up the phone.

In two minutes that seem to take forever—it’s funny how time can be both fact and illusion—Donna Middleton emerges from the double doors separating the lobby from the emergency department.

“Edward, what’s going on?”

“I have to talk to you.”

“OK. Edward, I’m at work.”

“I know. I have to talk to you.”

“OK.”

“I need you to call Kyle.”

“Why?”

“I need you to make sure he’s OK.”

Her face, until now perplexed, changes in an instant. It flushes with color, her eyes bore in on me, and there is a snap in her tone.

“What happened? Did something happen to my son? Why are you here?”

“Please, just call him.”

“What do you know about my son?” She is yelling at me.

The security guard, having watched us warily from behind the desk, is advancing on me now. Donna Middleton’s hands are fists.

“I… I…”

“What about my son?” She is quaking.

I start talking fast. “I don’t know. I had a dream. I’ve dreamed the past two nights. I dreamed that something happened. I couldn’t save him. I tried. I really, really tried. You have to call him. Just make sure he’s OK. Please. Call him.”

Donna Middleton wheels away from me and sprints back through the double doors. The security guard, a very strong young man, grabs my arms and pulls them behind my back. I slump to the floor.

I am not surprised when my father comes through the automatic doors and into the emergency department lobby. The security guard called the police, and the police called my father. It has happened before, although never here at Billings Clinic.

My father is wearing a tan golf shirt under a windbreaker. Given the unseasonably warm weather—I haven’t compiled my data yet, but I would guess that it will get into the sixties today, although I don’t like guessing—I have probably interrupted my father’s golf game. He looks at me and shakes his head slightly, and then he walks over to the front desk. He talks with the security guard, but quietly. I’m sitting in a chair along the wall, my hands shackled behind the back of it. I can hear my father identify himself, and I see the guard nod, but I’m having trouble hearing more.

After a few minutes of discussion with my father, the security guard nods again, and now they’re both walking over to me. The security guard reaches behind me and unlocks the handcuffs, puts them back on his belt, and goes back to the front desk.

My father sits down next to me.

“What happened, Edward?”

“I had a bad dream. I was scared.”

“About this woman’s son?”

“Yes.”

“Edward, what’s your relationship with this boy?”

“Relationship?”

“Yes. Why are you so interested in this woman’s son?”