Nanowrimo 13

Chapter 9

Froid and Samuel disappear through the glass doors of the hospital. I walk across the street to the Starbucks to brainstorm. I’ll be back a few minutes later to check on them. I know they made me promise I wouldn’t, but sometimes you can’t be too careful.

I take out my notebook and begin to think about how to kill Callahan. The easiest way would be for Froid or Samuel to kill him, and probably use Froid. Froid has been full of hatred towards Callahan of late, thanks to her thwarted suicide attempt, and maybe after she kills him and feels profound guilt she could come running back to me for comfort. I’d soothe her and tell her she did the right thing. Callahan is a big enough nuisance to me, but maybe he can be of one last use in this after all.

The problem with that is that Froid would go back into the mental hospital. But that wouldn’t matter. She could just spend her time there and I can visit her and Samuel. And if she gets too miserable, I can always just yank her out. I am the protagonist of this story, after all. I can do whatever I want.

But I can’t help but think that Samuel would be suspicious. Samuel may be in some sort of mental collapse, but I think he knows Froid well enough. But the unwitting result of Callahan trying to be a hero is that he’s set himself up for death. Samuel may know Froid as a poet, but I know Froid as a suicidal girl.

With my resolve strengthened and my decision clear-cut and fast, I walk back to the hospital. To my lack of surprise, Froid and Samuel are there, in the room together, reading North of Boston. I smile at them and hand them each a croissant. Samuel wolfs it down like he had been restraining himself for years with his bok choy, and Froid mildly nibbles on it as she smiles at me.

“Thank you,” they both say.

“I’ll let you guys ne now,” I tell them as I go for the door.

“No! Don’t go!” Froid cries.

“Please brother, stay some more,” says Samuel.

I smile. I’ve gained their trust. With two croissants.

The three of us spend our time talking about whatever I want to talk about. Froid is fascinated by my talks of neurosurgery the kinds of lasers I use. I don’t understand why, but maybe it has to do with physics. Samuel, to my amazement, is able to recite a slew of prefix and suffixes that are used in varying medical conditions and acts as a translator when I slip into medical speak that Froid doesn’t understand. It’s a comfortable dynamic. Samuel is acting like a bridge. He’s connecting Froid to me even more. I wish it could stay like this forever.

At night I return to my empty apartment, but I’ve never felt so much company. I drink my newly bought guava juice with ease. I don’t aspirate it like I did last time. It all goes down and replenishes me. Lucas Coldridge, the neurosurgeon. Alive again.

Chapter 10

            Samuel sat alone at the desk in the hotel room. Callahan went off in search of a more satisfying dinner, and Froid was sleeping on the couch. He smiled at her. She slept better here than she did at Luke’s lavish apartment. Froid was a minimalist, after all. She loved Samuel’s apartment almost as much as he had. She found beauty in the sparse necessity like she had found beauty in him.

            Samuel was thinking of starting to write the story of him and Froid in the poetry class, but he stopped. Now was not the time. It was the most important part of the story, and it could not be told now.

            That was when Callahan arrived with a belch. He blushed, but once he saw Froid was asleep and Samuel was the only one around, he relaxed.

            “I was going to apologize for my entrance, but I don’t think you care enough.”

            “Athlete, there is something I must tell you.”

            “Oh, sure. Like how great it was to wake up to Ambrosia every morning for a school year? Like what it’s like to be the greatest poet of our generation? Like how you can just eat goddamn bok choy every day of your life and not care either way?”

            “Athlete, you think me to boast. I do not. If you wanted a Coldridge to flaunt what they had or thought they had, befriend my brother.”

            Callahan snarled at him. “Don’t patronize me. You’re not that high and mighty.”

            “Athlete, I do not apologize, and I do not exert with superfluity. We have an important matter to discuss.”

            “Is it about her?”

            “Yes.”

            “Forget it, Coldridge. I’m going to beat you to the punch. Have her. It was you all along, wasn’t it? After all you did to her she still will come back to you.”

            “Athlete.”

            “Don’t Athlete me. If you’re gonna talk to me, call me by my name.”

            Samuel faltered. He did not want to submit to Callahan like this. He had no reason to give him what he wanted. Even though Samuel’s concern was genuine, it was muted by Callahan’s tenacity.

            “Athlete,” he said one more time.

            Callahan did not hesitate. He stormed out of the room and slammed the door wide open.

            “She will try to kill you!” Samuel yelled.

            Froid twitched in her sleep. Callahan froze. The door came back and hit him in the face, knocking him out of the room and locking him out. Samuel opened the door and let him back in.

            “What did you say?” Callahan murmured.

            “She will try to kill you. This is my brother’s plan. He wants to kill you off because you are a liability to him.”

            “That’s absurd! How could she try to kill me? And why through him?”

            Samuel frowned. “If he killed you off in a random event, she and I would be suspicious. I think he wants to use the hatred that Ambrosia has shown to you to give him valid cause. Killing may be against her character, but in light of recent events it may not be.”

            “So it will seem like she does want to kill me.”

            “To him, yes. And he shall use that.”

            “Will she try?”

            “Not on her own. We must be careful. If Luke gets into her head for a moment, he might attack you through her. He cannot read or change her thoughts, but he can command. He may even act.”

            “So, what can we do until then?”

            “Wait, though I think he wants to do it soon. To him the conflict has been resolved: she is in love with him, and I have cracked. Now for him all that is left are the loose ends. You.”

            “But the conflict is not over,” said Callahan.

            Samuel nodded. “That is why we are here.”

            A few hours later Froid awoke. Callahan was sleeping, but Samuel was not. He was pacing. She knew how stressful it was for him to be writing but not doing poetry. She also knew that this was his first collaboration with anyone. She thought about how he would never read the poetry submitted in the poetry class she was in.

            “Please, let me do all of that memory.”

            Froid stopped writing. “What?”

            “That detail you just wrote is important in mine.”

            “Well, I won’t spoil anything or-”

            “This is my one request.”

            Froid knew that was a lie. Much of her and Samuel’s relationship was based on him doing what he wanted and her following along.

            “Samuel, why are you so insistent on this part?”

            “It will be the most important thing that I will ever write.”

            “What?”

            Samuel stopped talking. Froid stopped asking. She walked back over to the sofa and tried to sleep again. She could not, though. She was trying to figure out why Samuel was so adamant about this passage.

            Before long Samuel was the only one awake. He wrote but had problems thinking of what to write about. He looked at Froid sleeping in the corner under a blanket, trying to remove herself from Callahan’s snores shattering the ambiance. He knew he had to sleep as well, but he did not want to. He never did things he did not want to do. It had always been that way.

            For all of his childhood and adolescence his parents tolerated it. Samuel would pour his entire existence into writing poetry, and his parents would not mind. Luke would be off earning research grants, graduating from medical school, doing his residency in prestigious hospitals. Luke would be off doing everything right, being a doctor for the selfless reason of pleasing his parents, giving his parents the joy of having a son with so much altruism.

            Samuel knew his brother better than anyone else. He knew why his brother studied hard, dressed well, strove for the greatest success. It was for the most selfish reason he could ever have. Luke wanted to be God. Luke wanted to control everyone around him. Luke wanted everyone below him to feel indebted. He thought everyone below him. Luke wanted to be God with the most disciples in the world. That is why he did such high-risk surgeries. He did it to save a life. As soon as he would complete it he would have another follower. That person would owe Luke his or her life because Luke was the reason they continued to exist.

            Samuel smiled to himself. Luke had it all wrong. That was not what it meant to be God. Samuel knew because he was God. A god does not lead. A god creates. Luke was a mortal moral tyrant. Samuel ruled the world. It was all about what one controls, not how much.

            Froid stirred in her sleep. Samuel thought she was having a nightmare about him. He knew he gave her nightmares. He had never cared about what he did until he walked away from her that afternoon.

            Callahan jumped awake, startled for no reason. He looked at Samuel. Samuel stopped writing to look at him. He began writing again as Callahan sensed the lack of danger and fell back aleep. Froid, however, was awake now. Callahan’s upright bolt had disturbed her somehow.

            “Samuel,” she whispered across the room in the darkness.

            “Yes?”

            “Do you know what happens next?”

            “Yes.”

            “How?”

            “Cannot say.”

            “Why? Because you don’t know, or because I can’t?”

            “You cannot.”

            Samuel wrote an insignificant sentence while Froid fell back asleep.  

            Once she was asleep again he sighed. Luke had striven through his narrative to control all of them. Samuel just wanted to write. Froid could not know that Samuel needed her to try to kill Callahan in order to defeat Luke. If she knew the rest of the plot she would try to stop herself.

           

            Callahan was the first person awake in the morning. Froid was still asleep under a pile of blankets and pillows, and Samuel was asleep sitting up in the desk. Samuel looked much more human when he was not around.

            He then thought about Luke and how Luke might be wondering where he was. But then he figured that if Luke wanted him dead he would not care much about him anyway. Regardless, he made his way back to the apartment, trying to make up an excuse on the way.

            When he knocked on the door Luke was awake and let him in right away.

            “Where have you been, Callahan?” Luke asked, his eyes narrowing.

            Callahan played a flashback as he stared off into space. It showed him wandering around Chinatown, eating a bunch of Peking duck, finding out he did not have enough money, and being forced to wash dishes until his hands were sore and blistered. He then slept at the restaurant because they felt so bad about his hands. The story worked well. The three of them had wrote so much in the past day that Callahan had blisters because he was not used to writing with a pen on paper. After playing the quick flashback Callahan acted nervous.

            “Um, well, you see…”

            Of course Luke saw his vision and no longer suspected. “Just kidding! I’m not your mom or anything. I’m just glad that you’re back home. Are you hungry? Did you eat at all?”

            Callahan shook his head no.

            Luke’s surprise was obvious and another good indicator that he had seen Callahan’s fake memory. “Really?” he asked. Callahan knew he could not believe that he would return from a restaurant empty-handed after working there all night.

            “I’m planning on going to the hospital,” Luke said. “Just want to check on Froid and my brother. I’m sure they’re both fine. Do you want to come?”

            Callahan shook his head no. Luke laughed. Of course he would not.

            “I figured so much. Given the unwelcome response you got from both of them. I’m sure they’ll come around once they feel better.”

            With that Luke skipped out the door, laughing as he went, leaving Callahan alone. He was not sure where Luke would go, but he could not be nervous in the event that he did go to the hospital. His plan was to follow him and see where he went. He prepared himself for the physical strain. If he was to best a car, he would have to travel much faster on foot than he desired to.

            From the window Callahan watched Luke’s car leave the parking garage. Luke turned left as if he were going to the hospital. Callahan sprinted out of the apartment.

            Callahan was not an athlete anymore. He was winded by the time he reached the lobby, refusing to be bogged down by the leisurely elevator. His face was bright red and flushed as if he was the quarterback at the homecoming game like he once was. His syrupy legs faltered as he made his way outside.

        Callahan ran towards the hospital. It was eight blocks, and he overrode his exhaustion by thinking of Luke getting to the hospital to find no trace of Froid or Samuel. He did not know what he would do in the event of it, since Luke would seek out Callahan the second he saw their change of plans and kill him on the spot. Callahan kept running though against his better judgment. He was running towards the one person in the world that wanted, and had the power, to kill him.

        He disregarded the stoplights, running at will like road kill waiting to happen. If Luke did not kill him, a taxi would.

        Callahan made it to the hospital and would need it if he kept running at that rate. He collapsed on the sidewalk, drawing a crowd. When he stood up, he looked over at the Starbucks right across the street. There, in the window, was Luke. He was seated at a high table, alone, with a pen and a notebook in his hand. They made eye contact. Callahan’s were wide, maximizing the capture of the moment. And then Luke indulged in a victorious smile to Callahan. Callahan knew what that meant.