I'm going to publish another short story I wrote. I wrote this one some time back, but I think it still resonates. These are dangerous times we live in and terrible things happen to good people all the time. Some, and I would say increasingly more are preparing themselves and are ready to protect their friends, family and even strangers.
Thank you for reading. I hope you enjoy the story.
The Dream
A Short Story by: C. Clayton Lewis
As Nick sat at the table reading the paper, as he usually did every morning before leaving for work, he looked over the top of the paper out the window into the back yard. He was daydreaming more than he was reading, but not about anything in particular. He was feeling a little pensive this morning, though there wasn't really anything troubling him. It was a gray, drizzly day, and he liked looking out at the big oak trees that sprawled in the back yard. As the thick, gnarly branches and the trunk became soaked with rain, they assumed a darker, more ominous look. The leaves took on a deep, saturated color and the raindrops glistened as the sun began to rise and peek through the clouds. It was a somber and calming sight, it gave him a peaceful feeling though he wasn't really even aware of it at the moment. There wasn't any interesting news in the paper today, it seemed to him there never was. He was tired of reading about the daily occurrences of violence and crime, those stories came with such regularity. He knew they were going to be there everyday and he skimmed over most of them, not really interested in the details of any of them. It bothered him that there was so much violence in the world, it especially bothered him that there was so much violence where he lived. He worried a lot about his children, that something terrible might happen to Katie and Rich. Though they lived in a nice area, affluent and well-to-do, things still happened. He and Carla took lots of precautions with the kids, always vigilant and careful.
It was nearing about half past eight and Nick knew he should be leaving for the office in the next fifteen minutes or so. Getting ready for school and work in the morning had become a ritual of habits for all of them. He folded the paper and laid it on the table, got up and went over to Carla who was finishing up the kids lunches, gave her a peck on the cheek from over her shoulder then headed for the door. His brief case was in the foyer near the coat rack where he always put it when he came home every evening. Carrying a briefcase had become nothing more than a habit for him. It's purpose was to look serious and important and carry some of his personal items to work with him. He never brought work home, ever. Nick was a staff supervisor for a very well-known and popular congressman. He had been working for Senator Chapman for fourteen years. The Senator was the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee. He was currently serving his seventh term, he was popular in his home state of Texas as well as in Washington. He was an honest politician by all appearances, he was conscientious and always kept his word. At least, he always tried to. A very rare breed indeed.
Nick grabbed his briefcase and umbrella and was out the door. He drove straight to the office. Protocol required senior staff members to vary their routes to the office but he hadn't driven the short, direct route all week. It was Friday and he didn't feel like playing secret agent today.
Once inside his office he closed the door, switched on his computer and began to log on. Because of all the special government software, logging on took forever in the morning. As the screen went from one bland, uninteresting message to the other, Nick's mind began to wander, again. He wasn't thinking about any special plans for the weekend, nor about anyone or anything in particular. Just as he had when he looked over the newspaper and stared into the backyard at home earlier, his mind was somewhat blank. But it wasn't really blank though. He was trying to recall something. It was one of those strange feelings like when you were trying to recall something that had happened but you weren't quite sure what it was or when it had happened. You weren't quite sure where you were or who you were with when it happened. He could feel it but he just couldn't quite pull the succession of thoughts and images that made up the dream into his conscious memory. Sort of like the computer on his desk. Different messages flashed across the screen, one after another as it attempted to pull into it's memory the files it was looking for. It was as though he and the machine were trapped in a void, trying to recall something that was veiled and unreachable. The veil allowed you to know it was there, but for the moment whatever it was he was trying to recall eluded him. The computer finally succeeded though.
The desktop screen with the photo of Katie and Rich stared at him, the computer was now ready to work but Nick wasn't. A little obsession had formed and his mind couldn't stop struggling to recall whatever it was that he was trying to. It felt so close, like he almost had it, but couldn't quite bring it into focus. This strenuous mental effort to recall was making him a little anxious. For the moment, he may as well have been in another world. His mind was miles away from work. The monitor was but a few feet from his face but he didn't even see it.
In the depths of his reverie, a realization began to burgeon. While he still couldn't get the string of events to rise to clarity, one thing that had become clear to him was that it was a dream. What he was trying to recall was a dream. He had dreamt something and it was what had happened in the dream that he was trying to bring to his mind. That much had now become clear to him. Sometimes recalling dreams makes you first ask yourself, did I dream that?... The attempt, the effort to bring the dialogue, the play script, the characters, whatever happened in his dream clearly to mind just wasn't to be, not for the moment anyway. He was becoming frustrated and anxious and about to give up trying and free his mind from the stronghold that summoning his dream had put on it.
He brought his computer back into focus, grabbed the mouse and found the password prompt. At the third letter of the password his mind flashed away from the task at hand and he was back to the dream. Only this time everything was clear. It was all there, everything that happened in the dream was vivid. Like a video it began to play in his mind's eye.
As the elusive dream began to unfold for him, he felt a muted elation that he had finally triumphed and broken the inexplicable cloak of veiled secrecy that dreams often possess. We all have a subconscious life, a separate and sometimes detached life where literally anything can happen. Exciting adventures we can't experience in places we can't go, romance and wanton sex with desirable partners we often don't know. Triumph over real failures. And, as often happens, sequences of inane events and unrecognizable people. Those upshots from our subconscious surely have some relation to something in our lives, but figuring it out would take a psychoanalytical perspective that practically no one has.
As Nick's dream opened up for him and allowed him to walk through it he felt a tinge of disappointment. There was a lot of fatuous and seemingly insignificant activity going on. People and places that he didn't know and had never been. Then came that loathsome dream that he had been having since he was a child, for as long as he could remember, inserted. The one where he was clad only in his underwear and nothing else and was stranded in public. At school, in a shopping mall, walking down the street. Anywhere and everywhere except at home, the only safe and comfortable refuge for being in your underwear. It invoked anxiety and panic and was stressful. Surely it had something to do with his insecurity and vulnerability. Whatever. As this recollection played in his mind he thought why don't you go ahead and play the one where I'm being pursued by someone or something dangerous that I can't seem to get away from. And every time I try to run I can't. My body is suddenly unable to move, I'm paralyzed. My legs are filled with lead. Though the danger, whatever it might be never actually catches me or harms me, it may as well. He hated that dream. Just another way of pointing out my insecurities and vulnerabilities I’m sure. Was this the real purpose of dreams, he thought. To keep reminding you on the movie screen of your mind of all of your fears and faults.
Recalling this dream, was turning into a vexing chore, it wasn't worth the effort thought Nick. He was about to come out of the temporary trance he had put himself into struggling to recall his nighttime diversion. For a few angst-filled moments, conscious and subconscious thoughts mingled and parried one another. The conscious thoughts were telling him that this was a waste of time and that he should forget about it and focus on his work. The subconscious thoughts were holding on to his mind, not letting go, not just yet. Instantly, the recollection brought something to his mind that startled him. A man, not someone he knew or recognized appeared. He was just there, not really doing anything in particular, just there. Bedimmed and indistinct, the way everything seemed to be in a dream. But this particular anonymous character left Nick spellbound and fixated. It was more the presence of this character than the visual recognition. It felt as though he had reappeared from Nicks' past. From exactly where and when he wasn't sure. But the strange and eerie feeling, the macabre aura of this man was striking.
"Top of the morning to ya" bellowed Senator Chapman as he quickly stuck his head in the door in passing by Nick's office. By Washington standards Senator Chapman was a nonpareil. In spite of being a senior statesman he was considered not only intelligent but pragmatic and practical by his lawmaker colleagues on Capitol Hill. He was known for his powerful persuasive abilities and a very practical perspective when it came to being a steward of the nations' fiduciary matters. His staff revered him, he listened to them and valued their judgment. Each and every one of them. His vibrant and loud greeting startled Nick out of his torpor instantly.
"Good morning sir," Nick responded without the slightest hesitation. He glanced over the top of his monitor with smiling eyes appearing as though he was deep in thought over something he was working on. As quickly as he had appeared, the Senator was gone.
Nick's focus on his dream recollection was broken, in fact he felt somewhat relieved. It was annoying how trying to recall a dream could arrogate your thoughts to the point that you couldn't do anything else. It's not important Nick thought as he began work on some important tasks he had to accomplish today.
As the day wore on, several times during the day, the man that had appeared in his dream that he had recalled for a brief moment that morning, popped into his mind. Not a vision, not a face, it was a feeling of déjà vu, a hologram he couldn’t bring into focus. Each time he pushed it back into a recess of his mind and kept working.
Later that evening he grew tired and looked at his watch. It was nearing six o'clock so he began the daily routine of logging off and powering down his computer. With the security scripts and backup routines required this was a fifteen minute chore at best. After a couple of card swipes to exit a couple of doors Nick was in the parking garage.
On the drive home his mind once again was disposed to the man he had recalled from his dream that morning. The presence this man had in his mind was cabalistic, he could feel it and it was gnawing at him. Nick couldn't stop thinking about him and it was becoming nauseating. He wanted to put it out of his mind but he couldn't.
As he opened the door and walked in Katie ran up to him with her arms outstretched shouting, "Daddy!" Nick lived for this moment every day. His heart swelled and for a few brief moments, he was free of worries and stress. One of the few, true joys of his life and he cherished her. Right behind her was Rich. He waited patiently, standing there smiling, looking up at him and Katie hugging and laughing waiting his turn to be picked up and hugged on the days when he didn't get there first. After Nick picked up Katie and bear hugged her as they turned a three-sixty, he put her down and picked up Rich and repeated the act.
Nicks' family was his connection to life, his reason for living and his happiness. He was a family man, devoted and zealous. He played golf with friends before the kids were born but gave it up when Katie came along and never thought about it anymore. He and Carla spent their free time taking the kids places, involving them in activities and sports, just being with them and they loved it. That was their life and for them, it couldn't be any better. Nick lived his life that way by choice, it was his character, his desire and perhaps his destiny in life. But perhaps, just maybe, some of that passion was driven by something that had happened on 'that day'. Short of losing one of his beloved family members nothing could ever happen in his life that could be as bad as what happened on 'that day'.
Nick was seven years old. He and his mother had been shopping that morning while his dad was at work. It was a summer day in June, school had been out for all of a week. Nick was jubilant about being free for the summer, he had been daydreaming the entire week about all the fun and exciting things he was going to do during the summer. While his mom shopped at the mall she allowed him to wander but never to stray too far from her. He had no desire to, and he relished that little freedom. The prize find of the day for him was a new Harry Potter book. He had two in his little collection and had read both of them several times over. It amazed him that each time he read them that he enjoyed it every bit as much as the very first time. As a reward for having done well in school his mom told him he could pick out a new book. There was no doubt in his mind that his new book would be an addition to his prized Harry Potter collection. His excitement was unbounded.
On the drive home he held his new book in his lap, clutching it with both hands. He felt his palms become clammy with sweat a few times and would remove one hand at a time and wipe it on his jeans to keep the slick, shiny cover on the book pristine. He was so proud of his new book and could hardly wait to begin reading it. He knew that he would read it many times and that each time would be as exciting as the last.
When they arrived at home, as soon as his mother unlocked the back door Nick bolted throughout the kitchen an up the stairs to his room. He was elated, even euphoric about his new book and went straight to his room so he could put it next to the other two and just stare at them. He wanted to admire the growing collection before he started to read the newest member.
Nick's mom stopped in the kitchen and placed a couple of bags on the table. She walked over to a small table in the corner of the room where the telephone sat to check for messages. As she reached her hand toward the answering machine to push the button a very strong arm came from behind and around her neck as a hand covered her mouth. She was taken completely by surprise, she didn't see or hear anything until she had been grabbed. Fear and panic instantly surged through her as the stranger pulled her against him holding his hand over her mouth so tightly she couldn't speak. She could tell he was a big man, bigger than her husband and very strong. He pulled her tight against him and with his face right next to hers he whispered into her ear "I'm going to let you go, if you make one sound I'll kill you. Do you understand?" She nodded her head up and down against the force of his hand rapidly, as though she were having a neck spasm. Slowly, he began loosening his grip from her mouth, she knew if she screamed he would instantly grip his hand over her mouth again. As he slowly removed his hand she could now see in the lower periphery of her vision a knife in his other hand. The feeling of terror crescendoed at the sight of the knife, if that were even possible. The fear was debilitating, seeing the knife blanked her mind with fear, she couldn't think, all she could do was breathe and do as the intruder said.
The strong arm around her neck slowly pulled away while the other arm remained holding the knife blade a few inches from her neck. She stood frozen, not moving or making a sound. As he released the powerful hold on her neck, he told her to turn around. Slowly she turned, reluctantly as she really didn't even want to see him. Scraggly, unshaven and disheveled and smelling as though he had not bathed in days. Without thinking it, he looked like what she expected a burglar to look like. She faced him as he held the knife to her throat.
"Money, jewelry, where is it?" he demanded with a menacing look and pursed tight lips. Having never been in such a situation in her life, having never felt such debilitating fear, Nick's mom spoke the words "We don't have any." The words didn't come from a thought as most do, they came from paralyzing fear. Subconsciously, perhaps she thought by saying that he would just leave. As soon as the words left her mouth, he thrust the knife closer to her throat and pressed it against her skin. She could feel the sharp edge of the cold steel as it began to bite into her skin. It was cutting her, and it hurt. She wanted to pull away and stop the slicing but was so afraid to move that she continued to stand frozen and blood started to slowly stream down her neck. The miscreant wasn't really intending to cut her, at least not yet, but the knife was sharp. Really sharp. He had spent hours working on it as he thought about his heist. While his mind mulled his caper he had sharpened his weapon until it became a straight razor.
Nick stood at the landing at the top of the stairs. He had started downstairs to get something to drink as he read in his room, but as he reached the landing the angle from where he was standing allowed a line of sight into the kitchen. He could see the stranger standing in front of his mother holding the knife to her throat. He froze. His mind went blank. It felt as though he had been yanked out of his existence, that he was no longer there, in his house. He had instantly been pushed into a gruesome nightmare. He couldn't really even assess how afraid he was because nothing remotely like this moment had ever happened in his life to relate to.
As he saw what was unfolding downstairs, he didn't scream or make a sound. He stopped, turned sideways and took a step back around a corner out of sight. This isn't what he thought to do, it was more of an instinctive reaction of survival. Knowing he couldn't be seen, he edged closer to the corner until he had a sliver of sight down into the kitchen again with one eye. The intruder stood there holding the knife against his mother's throat and Nick could see the growing red spot appearing where the knife was. The burglar had unwittingly cut her jugular. A free flow of blood began to cover one side of her body as she crumpled in a heap on the floor where she stood. Nick saw the burglar crouch slightly on bent knees, make quick darting glances around, and then he bolted for the back door. He hadn't intended to kill her, he wouldn't have killed her even if he hadn't managed to steal anything. The plan from the beginning was to scare his victims into submission and giving up their valuables. This wasn't what he had expected at all. His plan for his first heist, of free money and jewelry had gone awry. Badly awry. What happened frightened him. He could think of nothing else to do but run. So he did.
Just before the thief made the quick glances around and ran out the door, Nick had seen him. He had a clear, unobstructed view of him and saw his face. It was the face of a stranger, an evil, threatening face that would haunt him for the rest of his life. A face he could never forget.
He heard his footsteps as he exited the backdoor and quickly made his way through the garage. When he could hear him no more he waited a few seconds more though it felt like an eternity, then slowly made his way to the kitchen to help his mother. Intense and profound fear had so unpropitiously overcome him by this time that his heart was now pounding so hard it felt like a giant bass drum beating inside his chest. The copious adrenaline now flowing in his veins was causing him to hyperventilate.
As he made his way down the stairs, he kept thinking it might be a trick, that he was hiding and waiting for him. That he might suffer a similar fate as his mother. He began to feel lightheaded as though he were going to pass out, though he had never passed out before. He wanted to stay where he was, out of harm’s way. Concealed and out of the thief's grasp. But his mother was lying on the kitchen floor as though she were dead and he wanted to go to her. To help her. The urge and the need to go to his mother soon overcame his fear of the burglar grabbing him, and cutting his throat. He was deathly afraid but he ran to her.
His fear multiplied with every step as he bounded down the stairs and into the kitchen. He knelt beside her and said "Mom, Mom," frantically as he began to cry. "Mom," the tears were now flowing and falling from his face onto her chest. Nick had never seen so much blood, there was now a large puddle surrounding his mother as she lay lifelessly on the floor beside him. Her face had turned pale, devoid of any color. The blood no longer flowed from her neck. Nick thought this was good, she was no longer bleeding. All he had to do was call someone for help, get her to a doctor and she would be OK. He stood and rushed three steps to the telephone and dialed 911 as his Mom and Dad had often told him to do in an emergency. From then on was a blur, he had no recollection of what he said to the person on the other end of the line.
It seemed like forever but soon the piercing wail of an ambulance siren broke the ominous silence in the house. He heard the loud siren abruptly stop as it pulled into the driveway. He continued to kneel beside his mother thinking to himself that the bleeding had stopped and she was going to be alright. He heard the clamor as men in dark blue uniforms came rushing into the house. Two of them knelt beside his mother as one gently took him by the shoulders and led him into the living room. The man helped him to the couch, knelt to eye level in front of him and began to console him and tell him it was going to be OK. "We're going to take care of your Mom for you," he remembers him saying. Nick felt safe and protected now, and he believed the man.
That was the last thing he remembers clearly. When his dad told him that night when the two of them were home alone that his mom wouldn't be coming home, Nick felt the air around him grow heavy and dense. It felt like it was hard to breathe. He didn't sob but tears just steadily streamed from his eyes. Seeing his dad's face red and his eyes red and swollen with tears hurt as much as seeing the man hurt his mom. He felt like this couldn't really be happening but the pain he was feeling was all too real. As he and his dad sat close to each other on the sofa, not talking, he felt safe, scared and lonely all at the same time.
As the years passed Nick refused to think about what had happened that day. It wasn’t so much of a conscious effort, he just didn't think about it. He and his dad went on with life and he didn't think about it. If he didn't think about it it wouldn't hurt. So that's the way it was.
With his family he was cautious and protective. Not because of or in terms of what happened that day long ago, or at least he wasn't aware of it that way but he was very careful. It was just the way you had to be in the world today he felt. Though not obsessed, Nick took a course several years ago and got a license for a handgun. Never, from the first thought of getting it until the card arrived in the mail did he ever think about that day when it happened years ago. He carried it with him almost everywhere he went. He had a holster that hid it under his coat and shirts and he never put it on in front of Carla or the kids. Carla always knew he had it, but since she or the kids never saw it, it was as if it wasn't there.
Seeing Katie and Rich laugh and play brought Nick immense joy. They were his lifeblood. They gave him life. He took them to the park often as seeing them happy and playful made him content. It also gave him and Carla a chance to talk and relax as they watched the kids play. These were good times. The best times of his life watching his kids grow up, happy. And safe.
Thirty years later to the day, it was just another day as ordinary as any. Nick never thought about that day again, even on the forgettable, for him, anniversaries. They came and went, thirty times to be exact, and not once did he ever think about it. But today that was to change.
Carla had errands to do. She left that morning after the ritual hugs and kisses for a little 'me' time to get caught up on some things she could never find the time to do. Looking after the kids during the week while Nick worked left little time for her to do anything for herself. She enjoyed the days when she could do things for herself, alone. Nick, Katie and Rich were off themselves, for nothing but fun. The kids were giddy with excitement. Nick was excited too, he loved these days. This was as good as it got, for all of them.
First stop was the mall, a little browsing, stopping to look at what ever caught their interest at the moment. Katie and Rich particularly liked stopping in the pet store. There were always new and different puppies frolicking and playing behind the acrylic sheets. Birds of all sizes and colors. The mirth was palpable, especially when there was one that could talk. A bird talking was about the funniest thing either of them had ever seen or heard. The toy store was the next alluring attraction. They spent all of an hour slowly roaming the aisles, tucking away in recesses of their minds which toys enamored them the most that they would like for Santa to show up with later that year.
Last stop in the mall was the food court. The fare as always the same, chicken sandwiches and ice cream cones. Simple, divine pleasures. They wouldn't have it any other way. They sat at the table enjoying their treats, impervious to the incessant bustle all around them.
Pop pop. It sounded like firecrackers going off nearby. It was a startling sound though not alarming. Their first thought was that it was a planned program at the mall, something for amusement that happened occasionally. They all pivoted in their seats to see what was happening. Nick's discerning, watchful eye saw it first. It was not entertainment by any stretch of the imagination. He saw a man with a gun in one hand, shooting as he pointed the gun at various people, seemingly at random. The first two were hit and fell to the floor.
As he reached inside his shirt for his gun, he told the kids to get under the table and stay there. The tone of his voice scared them, but they quickly did as they were told. They were frightened beyond sensation and cowered under the table. With the gun in his right hand pointed up, he pushed the safety off with his left thumb. He had practiced assiduously with the gun. He had spent hours at the range perfecting his marksmanship skills. He had joined a club last year at the range and practiced with other enthusiasts. He had made friends with some of them and even learned from some. He was quite versed with the gun though he actually thought he would never have to use it to defend himself or his kids. Or anyone else.
Keeping the crazed shooter in sight, Nick made his way through the scattered tables, most with people cowering under them, afraid for their lives. He was intensely focused on the shooter, on stopping him before anyone else was shot. He entered an unobstructed area away from the tables, and crouched on one knee. He could see the shooter about thirty steps in front of him looking down a walkway perpendicular to a line from himself to Nick. He had the gun up, looking down the sight on the short barrel about to shoot another innocent victim. Nick had his gun raised and pointed at the man's chest. Before he squeezed off another round, the man turned his head in Nick's direction without lowering his gun. Nick could now see his face, clearly and distinctly. As the two looked at each other, loaded guns in hand in a crowded shopping mall, thoughts began to flash through Nick’s mind. He remained focused on the shooter, ready to fire in a split second. But thoughts started to race down the track of his mind no matter how hard he tried to keep it free and clear.
The dream from a few nights ago. Was this the man in his dream, the countenance he couldn't quite make out who, what, when or where? Had that dream been some sort of prescience? In spite of the distracting thoughts pulling on his attention, his concentration on his target never faltered. The gunman turned toward Nick. Through marble-like squinting eyes, first his stare then his gun turned toward Nick. Without lowering his gun he turned it toward Nick, his finger on the trigger. He tilted his head slightly forward his left eye squinted almost completely closed. His right eye pierced a line down the barrel straight at Nick. Nick's senses were intensified to the point he could feel his head start to throb. In spite of the lupine look on the man's face and being a split second from being shot and possibly killed, his mind was still sharing this heightened concentration with the infective thoughts of how this man might somehow be connected to his dream. As he tried to suppress them, the shot rang out. He had hesitated a sliver of time too long. He felt the tremendous impact on the bicep of his right arm and instantly an unimaginable burning sensation. It literally felt like his arm was on fire. The force knocked him back on his haunches. He looked up to see the gunman walking toward him, never lowering the gun or taking his finger from the trigger. Nick moved his gun from his right hand to his left, never losing his concentration on the shooter and impervious to the tremendous pain from being shot.
Nick raised his gun taking dead aim at the shooter. In spite of the fact that the gunman was already aiming straight at his head, he was determined that the right person was going to die today, and it was not him. The shooter continued approaching him. He was now only about twenty steps away and he stopped. As he slowly began to squint his left eye again, Nick leaned back slightly and rolled to the left as quickly as he could. He heard the gun explode and a bullet hit the tile floor where he had been less than a second before. From his torso up, he raised, aiming the gun at the shooter and fired instantly. The bullet hit the shooter in the center of his chest. His arms fell limply to his sides as his pistol fell to the floor. He stumbled backward a few steps then fell back hard on the floor.
There was screaming and hysteria throughout the mall. Nick sat there, still on the floor, his gun still in his hand. His arm was bleeding badly, but his mind was too engaged at the moment to think about his wound. He was thinking about the dream again. Somehow he knew that the man he had just killed was not the same man, the same presence of a man that had been in his dream. There was no explanation, no reasoning behind knowing that, he just knew. Even though he had just saved the lives of any number of people that the insane gunman might have killed including his own children, he felt an overwhelming feeling of gloom. He was afraid. The 'presence' from his dream was still out there, and he was afraid. As he sat there bleeding, for some unexplained reason it started to make sense to him. He wasn't putting the mental pieces of the puzzle together, it was just coming to him as if the thoughts were being put there by something or someone else. But it was all becoming very clear to him now.
The veiled presence of the man from his dream was there in his mind again. Only this time he wasn't obscured and unrecognizable. This portentous countenance was facing him, dead on. He looked straight at Nick with a scowl, the most evil look imaginable. The image in his mind struck fear, causing his pulse to quicken. After all those years of refusing to think about what happened on that horrible day, of keeping it tightly locked away in a hidden compartment in his mind, as he sat on the mall floor, after killing a killer, that compartment opened up. Everything that happened from the time he was standing on the landing at the top of the stairs thirty years ago began to play in his mind for the first time since it happened so long ago.
He saw the man holding his mother in an arm lock with the knife at her throat. He slowly removed his arm while keeping the knife at her throat. The knife was pressed to her skin as blood began to ooze, then suddenly started to squirt from her neck. When the intruder took the knife away from her neck the blood shot out even further form her neck in pulsating streams. She fell to the floor and the thief turned to look around as if to see if anyone had seen what happened. Though Nick clearly saw him, the only recall he had from that day on was that it was a man. This time, the murky image appeared pellucid. The presence that lurked in his dream all those years now had a face. It was the face of the intruder that killed his mother so long ago.
The trauma Nick was living in his mind at that moment that was so poignant and strangely unrelated to what had moments before happened in the mall, it exhausted him. He was spent. He looked down at his arm and saw blood still oozing from his arm. This was the last thing he remembered as he slumped over in a lifeless heap on the floor.
He had been home from the hospital for a few days and was going to recuperate for a few more before going back to work. Carla, Katie and Richie were doting on him, treating him like a real hero. He didn't feel like a hero, in fact he didn't think much about what he had done in the mall a few days ago. He did think about what had raced through his mind just before he passed out. It bothered him but he didn't dwell on it. He reveled in the attention he was getting.
His arm was healing, the bullet had passed through a muscle and had been surgically repaired. It was expected to heal completely but it would take some time. What happened at the mall, what he had done didn't seem important to him. It was important but he didn't think about it. Reliving the murder of his mother did seem important though. Seeing the killers face again and realizing that the killer had been in his dream after all those years had passed hung like a dark cloud in his mind. He wanted to once again pack it away in a recess of his mind like before but this time he couldn't. He kept trying though.
He sat at the table reading the paper while the kids finished their breakfast. They scurried around chaotically as they got ready for school. Carla handed each their lunch and they rushed over to Nick for a good-bye hug crumpling his newspaper and his train of thought. He gladly bent over and hugged them and told them I love you, have a good day at school. As they ran out the door to catch the bus, the house fell suddenly quiet again. Carla disappeared upstairs to get ready for an appointment.
Nick pensively raised the newspaper once again. His mind was wandering, he really wasn't interested in the news. A stream of thoughts began to slowly cross his mind. He thought about his mother and how wonderful and happy they had been before she was killed. How his life had gone from idyllic to tragic in just a few seconds on that fateful day. And for what. A lowly thief that wanted a few dollars and someone's watches and rings. His mother died for that...
If only, Nick thought, that could have been him in the mall several days ago. If only that could have been him I shot through the heart. Through all these years that simple thief had gone uncaught and unpunished. It didn't seem possible. The nightmare that had lasted most of his life continued. Nicks' eyes dropped to the newspaper again. He was holding it up looking over the top into the back yard as he often did. The early morning sun was streaming though the branches of the stately oaks. At the top of the page he had opened in front of him was the last of the obits. He had turned to the page that was filled with photos of the weeks deceased as he always did. He never knew any of them and it seemed pointless and morbid to read about dead people you didn't know. But for some strange and very unexplainable reason, his eyes were drawn to this one. He stared in disbelief at the photo. His heart began to pound as he continued to glare at the dead man's picture. It couldn't be. Was his mind playing tricks on him? Was the stress of what had recently happened causing him to hallucinate? Were his dreams and waking moments becoming confused? He closed his eyes for a few seconds and breathed slowly. His mind felt lucid and intact. He took another deep breath then slowly opened his eyes and looked again at the picture in the newspaper. It was the man who had murdered his mother when he was seven years old. It was the same man who had caused every day of his life to be painful for the last thirty years. He once again slowly raised his eyes to see the sun as the orange and red rays danced through the oak trees in the back yard.
