The truth of the matter

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Margaret and Larry I heard the woman breathe a sigh of relief above me. I guess I breathed a sigh myself. She patted my shoulder.

“You’ll be safe for a little while, at least,” she said.

She rose from the bed and sat down on the chair again, brushing her hair wearily out of her face.

“Why did you help me?” I asked her. “Why did you tell Rose I wasn’t here?”

She smiled, but she didn’t answer. She just said, “You hungry at all? You must be.”

The minute she asked the question, I realized: Yeah! I was hungry! I was very hungry. “I am, as a matter of fact.”

“That’s good. That’s a good sign. I’ll make you something to eat.”

“I don’t want to trouble you…”

She gave a sort of gentle laugh. “It’s a bit late for that, sweetheart. You’ve been plenty of trouble already.”

I laughed a little too. “Why did you?” I said. “Why did you lie to Rose? Why did you protect me?”

She still didn’t answer. She handed me a juice box. “Here, drink this, get your strength up. You’re going to need it.”

“But…”

She stood up. “Let me go make you something to eat. Then we’ll talk. My name is Margaret, by the way.”

“Charlie,” I said. “Charlie West.”

She gave another smile, a wry smile this time. “So I’ve heard.”

She went out of the room. I worked myself into a sitting position. I put the pillow up against the wall and propped my back against it. I stuck a straw in the juice box and sipped it. I could feel myself getting better, stronger, with every minute.

I could hear the woman-Margaret-moving around in the kitchen, pots and pans banging against each other. It was a comforting sound. It reminded me of being back at home, lying in bed in the morning, listening to my mom making breakfast before she called me to go to school.

I sipped the juice. I listened to the sounds. My mind drifted. After a while, I just sat there in the bed, the juice box forgotten in my hand. I gazed off into space.

I was thinking about my dream. The dark garden maze. The dark figure standing at its center. I felt a stirring of excitement and revelation as the images came back to me. My free hand lifted slowly to my face, to my jaw. I felt through my skin to the place just behind my last molar. Yes. Yes, I remembered now. What the man said in the dream-it was all true, all real.

After the jury found me guilty of Alex’s murder, I had been put in a cell in the county jail. While I was there, someone had come to me… No, wait. It wasn’t just any someone. It was Milton. Yes. It was Milton One-the technician from the bunker, the Asian guy who had had the controller that worked Milton Two. He had come to me in my cell, wearing a white coat. He was pretending to be a dentist. He had installed the device in my gums- the device the man in the maze had talked about. He had installed it just where I was touching now, just behind my teeth. It was a tiny computer. There was a pattern of taps I could make on it with my teeth-complicated and precise so I would never set the device off by accident. But once I did set the device off, it would release an experimental chemical into my mouth. When I swallowed it, the chemical would eliminate part of my memory.

So now I knew. I knew what had happened to me. I had been recruited by Waterman to infiltrate the Homelanders. Because of my closeness to Sherman, because of Sherman’s conviction that I could be convinced to join him, because of my karate skills, because of my sure and certain commitment to American liberty, I had been a perfect candidate for the job. The rest I didn’t remember yet, but I could guess. I must’ve succeeded in my task. I infiltrated the Homelanders as planned. But somehow, it had gone wrong. I had been caught. Captured. I had been strapped to the metal chair in that white room and tortured. And in order to protect Waterman and his friends, I had set off the device in my mouth and swallowed the chemical that made me forget a year of my life.

It all made sense now. It all made sense at last.

I thought of myself in the dream again, standing at the center of the garden maze, talking to that murky figure. Who was he, I wondered? Was he Waterman? Or was he the other man, my other contact, the one Waylon was searching for, the man who could still identify me as an agent working for America?

I struggled to delve past the dream images, into my memory. But before I could give it much consideration, I was distracted by something: the smell of bacon and eggs coming out of Margaret’s kitchen. The house was small and the smells reached me full force and I suddenly realized, full force, just how incredibly hungry I was. I licked my lips as my mouth watered.

It was only then, as the smells brought me back to myself, that I realized someone was watching me.

Startled, I turned to the door. It was the boy-the boy from the photographs, the little boy who had come in with Margaret when they caught me inside their house- Margaret’s son. I had heard his name just before I collapsed. What was it?

“Larry,” I said aloud.

He was just outside the door, hiding behind the frame, fearfully peeking in around the edge of it. He was a little guy, his face thin and pale. He had dark circles under his eyes and a frowny, worried expression. When I spoke his name, he ducked back behind the door and out of sight. But after a moment, he peeked out at me again.

“Hey, Larry, how’s it going?” I said.

“Fine,” he murmured shyly.

I noticed he was clutching something in his fist.

“What’ve you got there?” I asked him. “You bring something to show me?”

He had. He opened his hand and held it out so I could see.

“Soldiers,” I said.

“Marines,” he corrected me.

“Marines, right. They’re the best, aren’t they?”

He nodded.

I remembered the photographs I’d seen in the living room. “Your dad’s a Marine, isn’t he?”

The boy nodded. “Only he got killed in Afghanistan.”

“Wow,” I said. “That’s really sad. I’m sorry.”

“He’s in heaven now.”

“I hear Marines get to go to the head of the line up there.”

That made Larry smile. With a little more confidence, he said, “Because he was fighting for people to be free.” And then he added: “Like you are.”

Before I could react, Margaret’s voice came from the living room. “Hey there, you. Didn’t I tell you to stay in your room?”

Now she came back into view. She was carrying a tray with my food on it. Larry gave the tray the eye.

“I’m hungry too,” he said.

“Well, we’re gonna eat just as soon as I feed our guest, all right?”

“How come he gets to have breakfast when it’s dinnertime?”

“Because he’s been sick.”

“I feel sick too,” said Larry.

“No, you don’t. Now get back in your room before I hang you by your toes and tickle your nose to make you sneeze upside down.”

“Yuck,” he said. “That’s disgusting.” He gave me a glance.

“See you, Larry,” I said.

He waved and shuffled away from the door.

She came in and handed me the tray to set down on my lap. Eggs, toast, hash brown potatoes. I was so hungry, I could barely get out a “Thank you” and say a silent grace before I tore into it. Margaret sat in the chair and watched me shovel the food into my mouth with a small smile on her lips.

“You say grace?” she asked me.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“All right. Well, it’s good to see you eat, that’s for sure.”

I answered with my mouth full. I could barely stop eating long enough to get the words out. “How long have I been here?”

“A night and a day. It’s getting toward evening again now.” She had a soft, kind voice. It was like her face: tired but somehow peaceful. She looked and sounded like a woman who was on a long, hard journey but knew she was headed for a good place.

“You have a nice son,” I said to her.

“Yes, I do. Thank you.”

“Why did he say that? About me fighting for freedom.”

She only smiled.

“I guess I’ve been talking in my fever, huh?” I said.

She nodded slowly. “You have.”

I guess I should’ve been upset about that-you know, upset that I’d given myself away and all. But for some reason, it didn’t bother me. I knew instinctively that I could trust this woman. It wasn’t just that she’d protected me from Rose or taken care of me in my delirium or that her husband had been a Marine. It was partly all those things, I guess, but it was also just something about her, something about the way she was.

“Did I tell you everything?” I asked her.

“I guess. It was all pretty confused, but I guess you told me enough. It’s quite a story.”

“I’m only remembering it now myself.”

“So I gathered. They gave you something?”

“Some kind of chemical, yeah. It made me forget the last year.”

There was nothing left on my plate by this time but the yellow yolk of the eggs and a piece of toast. I mopped up the yolk with the toast and took a bite.

“I’m sorry about your husband,” I said.

“Swallow first. I can’t understand you.”

I worked the toast down. “I’m sorry about your husband.”

She didn’t answer right away. She nodded. After a moment, she leaned forward in her chair, putting her elbows on her knees and looking down at the floor. “It broke my heart,” she said. “He was the best man I ever knew or ever expect to know, and I miss him every day and our boy misses him.” She lifted her head and looked at me with a peculiar, intense look. “But now I’m going to tell you something about that. All right?”

“Yeah… sure,” I said.

“No, I mean, really. Look at me, Charlie.”

I looked at her, the last piece of bread lifted halfway to my lips.

She said: “A broken heart is not the worst thing in the world. And neither, when it comes to that, is death. You can’t get through a good, strong life without coming upon both of them one way or another, without looking them both straight in the eye. But if I could go back in time and protect myself from my broken heart by living my life in fear, by saying yes to every bully and slave driver who came along, by scuttling away from my duty and from my country and from the things I love and believe in, I wouldn’t do it, and my husband wouldn’t have done it, and he wouldn’t want me to do it. You understand what I’m telling you, Charlie?”

Still holding the toast, I half shook my head. I wasn’t sure I did understand.

“What I’m telling you is that your mama is going to be all right. You did what you had to do. And a woman who raised a boy like you is going to understand that one day and it’ll serve to heal her heart, trust me.”

Suddenly, tears sprang to my eyes. It happened so fast, it took me by surprise, and I couldn’t help it, I couldn’t stop it. Embarrassed, I set the toast down and wiped the tears away with my palm as quickly as I could. I was afraid if I didn’t, Margaret would come over to the bed and try to comfort me, and then I knew I would break down for real.

She was a smart woman, though. Instead of coming to my side, she stayed right where she was, in her chair. She studied the floor until I was done.

“I hated to hurt her,” I said. It was hard to speak. “Until now, I’d forgotten about that part of it, you know. Now that I remember, I remember how much I hated to hurt her…” I wanted to say more-a lot more, but that was all I could get out just then.

“I know you did,” said Margaret. “And she’ll know too one day. But for now, it’s better she have a broken heart than a son who can’t stand up for what’s right when the time comes.”

I nodded. I opened my mouth. I was about to talk again when I felt a terrible pain-as if a fist had grabbed me on the inside and twisted my stomach. I gritted my teeth and doubled over.

“Oh, no!”

Margaret was out of her chair and at the bed in a moment. She took the tray away and set it aside. She sat down next to me.

“What’s the matter?” she said.

I clutched at my stomach. For a minute I couldn’t answer. “I have these attacks… memory attacks, I call them. They gave me the antidote for the amnesia medicine. It’s bringing back my memory, but it makes me…” I grunted with pain. “It makes me sick.”

She put her hand on my forehead. Her palm felt cool against my hot skin. “Can you fight it? Keep it off. I don’t think your body can take much more punishment right now.”

I closed my eyes, trying to will the pain down. As I did, scenes flashed through my mind. I couldn’t tell if they were memories or dreams or even memories of dreams. I seemed to be traveling through that dark maze again. It was like a scene from a first-person-shooter video game. The trellis walls with their thorny vines came at me and went past.

Then I was back in the little room again. I opened my eyes.

“You okay?” said Margaret.

I nodded. The pain in my stomach was beginning to subside. “I think it’s going away,” I said. “For now.”

“All right,” Margaret said. “I want you to lie down again. I want you to get some rest.”

“I think I’m all right.”

“I don’t care what you think. Lie down,” she said quietly. “Go on now. Do as I say.”

I let her gently push me down onto the bed again. I watched her face as she pulled the covers up around me. My eyes were already sinking shut…

I woke up suddenly. I didn’t know how long I’d been asleep. All I knew was I had the powerful sense that something very important had just happened.

I lay in the bed, very still, listening. I could hear the television playing in the next room. There was the sort of silly music and funny voices that usually go along with cartoons. I could hear Larry speaking to his mother-not his words, but the tone of his voice. I could hear the low, warm tones of his mother answering. I breathed a sigh of relief. There was nothing wrong in the house.

What was it, then? Something had happened while I was asleep. I felt a twinge in my stomach and it started to come back to me: more dreams… or more memories…

Yes. I remembered. I had been back in the garden. Back in the maze. The maze of my memory. I had been in that central square. I had seen the figure there again in the darkness. Suddenly, a light had flashed on. Suddenly, I was not in the maze, not at all. I was in a small white room somewhere, cluttered with shelves and files, brightly lit-so bright that, after the shadows of the garden, I was nearly blind. I was squinting so hard I couldn’t even see the man standing right there in front of me.

Protecting my eyes from the bright light, I turned away. There, behind me, were the twisting corridors of the maze again. While I stood there, watching them, a wild thing happened. The maze began to bloom. The stark, thorny branches that covered the maze’s trellises suddenly burst into flower everywhere. Rich, bloodred flowers blossoming all up and down the maze’s corridors while I stood and stared and then…

Then, all at once, I came awake fully. I understood. I had to get to Margaret. I had to tell her.

I sat up. I felt cool, good. My fever was gone. The food and the rest had made me much stronger. I stood- and for a moment, I was nearly knocked over by dizziness. But I grabbed hold of the back of the chair and kept myself on my feet. I waited there until the dizziness passed. After a moment I was fine-strong enough to keep moving.

I went to the door. I rested against the frame. There was a hall, with the kitchen door on the left wall and the living room on the right. It was a short hall, but just then, it seemed to me like a long way to travel.

“Margaret,” I called. But my voice was weak, and the sound of the television must’ve drowned it out. She didn’t answer.

I began to move down the hall, bracing myself against one wall, then staggering to the other side and bracing myself there. Images from my dream-or my memory- or whatever it was-flashed on the screen of my mind again. The maze. The white room. The bloodred flowers blooming on the trellises.

I reached the living room doorway. I leaned against it. Margaret was sitting on the sofa with her arm around her son. They had their backs to me. They were watching a DVD. A cartoon movie about fish. Sport lay curled up on the rug, right beside the sofa.

I blinked hard. I looked around me. I could see that night had fallen. There was only darkness at the windows. In that darkness, or over it, like a transparent image, I could still see the trellises blooming in the maze, the thorny bushes bursting with bloodred roses.

“Margaret,” I said.

She heard me this time. So did Larry. Startled, they both looked over their shoulders. Sport lifted his head to look at me.

Margaret jumped to her feet and came to me where I stood.

“You shouldn’t be out of bed,” she said.

“I remember.”

“Quiet now. You have to lie down.”

“I can’t. I remember. I remember who it was. My contact after Waterman left. The one who arranged for Milton One to come to me in my jail cell.”

“Calm down. Calm down. I don’t understand you.”

“He was the one who whispered in my ear that I should find Waterman. He was the one who unlocked my handcuffs.”

“You’re not making any sense.”

I looked at her tired, kind, and peaceful face. I could see her through the images of my dream that kept flashing before me. The dark maze. The white room. The blooming roses.

“I am making sense,” I told her. “I finally remember. It was Rose. He’s my contact. It was Detective Rose.”