The Death Agreement (17 page)

"Good morning, Superman" she said,
and smiled.

"Morning."

She reached a hand over and
scratched my back. "Sleep well?"

"No."

"Nightmare?"

I nodded. "They feel
real."

"Shhh. It's over now.
Relax."

Her name is Erika. We've been
seeing each other for three weeks. This was the first time she'd
slept over at my place, the first night she'd had to deal with the
aftermath.

***

A lot has changed in the months
that followed the events at Walter Reed. Within twenty-four hours
of the incident, the base shut down under BRAC and control of the
grounds was transferred over to the State Department.

Once the transfer happened, all
information related to the facilities became classified top-secret
and any requests for information were systematically denied under
the umbrella of national security.

I've done my share of searching
and the most I could find was information about the closure. There
isn't a single mention of the dead or the fire. It has all been
swept under the rug. Coincidentally, the names of several people I
knew to have been killed that night at Walter Reed show up on the
passenger list of a transport helicopter that crashed in
Iraq.

I'm surprised Mary and I weren't
on that list, too.

I
was
charged with several counts of
murder. The FBI tried to get me to confess and to get Mary to
testify against me. If either of us had cracked, I suspect some
kind of fatal accident would have befallen us, but we were both
smart enough stick with our Fifth Amendment right to remain
silent.

Whoever ran the conspiracy had
decided to leave us alone. Maybe our disappearances would have
caused one too many questions. Broken the camel's back, or so they
say. Maybe something else was going on that we weren't aware of. In
any case, testimony from us would have resulted in a one-way ticket
to Spring Grove Mental Institution, at best. Since I had no desire
to end up like my mother, no matter what threats the agents threw
at us, I kept my mouth shut. Eventually they relented and dropped
the charges.

***

Erika stroked my hair while I
smoked a cigarette. Her soft caress relaxed the tension in my
shoulders, but my heart refused to slow down. It was by far worst
anxiety I'd experienced since that night. I was shivering like a
dog in a thunder storm.

***

Mary had used me for the story.
It's difficult opening up to someone once you feel like your trust
has been betrayed. She was sure that I wouldn't mind that she
scanned the documents. She said that she would have told me as soon
as I returned from Litwell's office.

Right after copying Taylor's
confession, Taylor had come knocking.

I'm glad she at least managed to
get that bit saved. Later on I found the fax receipt of Taylor's
family portrait. It was tucked into the jacket I had been wearing
the night I asked the soldier to send it out. Those are the only
records I have.

The police refuse to admit ever
receiving a fax. I guess all it would have done was open up
additional questions they weren't prepared to answer. Then again,
maybe someone put the pressure on them, too.

As for Mary's story, it died on
the editing room floor. She'd have been insane to run anything
after everything we'd gone through. You know what? I bet she
tried.

Everything else is gone. It all
burned.

***

Erika's hand began to wander lower
and lower. Her finger traced the scar on my stomach, the severe
reminder of a saw tearing deep. Then she kissed my neck as her hand
slipped farther still.

***

People say traumatic experiences
draw people closer. Unfortunately for Mary and me, it didn't work
out that way. We stood at the edge of the abyss and stared into the
face of evil together. Once something like that happens, it's too
difficult to put aside. You always see the darkness before the
light.

We did try.

On the trip to Lorie and Jon's
grave site in Georgia, the budding of a romance appeared, but it
wasn't meant to be.

***

Erika rolled off of me and
stretched out on the bed, gasping as she tried to catch her
breath.

"I'm hungry," she declared. "Want
some breakfast?"

"No thanks." I said. "going to lay
here for a while."

She smiled then left the room
without bothering to put on any clothes.

***

As for the local investigation
into Taylor's accomplice, the Feds and Anne Arundel County Police
said Weise Yang, was dead. Case closed. His was one of the
unidentifiable bodies pulled from the charred building. They had
found his badge and his shotgun in the ashes of the
ward.

None of the investigators knew
that Yang had fallen from the roof. None of them knew he pulled me
from the fire. If he's still out there, I hope he knows I'm
grateful to him for saving my life.

The feelings I have when I think
about Yang are tough to put into words. I sensed he was falling
into the same kind of darkness which had overtaken Taylor, yet the
demon he would need to face wasn't the same as the one Taylor had
unleashed with the saw. If there is any truth in the confession
written on Taylor's blood-covered pages, there are thirty million
evils out there looking for a way to drag humanity into a chaotic
hell, and there's a man named Goodtime who may or may not want to
see that happen.

There's more out there than our
narrow view of reality permits, so regardless of if Yang is dead or
alive, I hope he can overcome what stands before him. He was a
decent man, a friend, a hero.

***

Erika prepared eggs. I heard them
sizzling and wanted to get up, but couldn't shake this sense of
impending dread, a remnant of the nightmare.

***

When I'm not dreaming of Taylor's
family, I'm dreaming of a helicopter falling along with a storm of
maple seeds. I'm trying to save myself but there's nothing I can do
to stop the crash. PTSD, I'm told. It's not an easy thing to admit,
though I think they may be right.

I do my best to cope, and Veterans
Affairs has been a huge help. The road to full recovery is long and
hard.

That's another thing…I'm out of
the military now. Once I was sure that I wouldn't be sent to jail,
I formally resigned my commission. It had been a long time
coming.

***

"Babe!" Erika called out. "How
about some toast at least?"

My stomach twisted in knots. "I'm
fine," I said. "I'll eat something later. Thanks."

***

Without steady pay I needed to
find work. Flying was the only thing in the world I was good at. I
had no idea what to do with the rest of my life and felt worthless
without the Army. I needed something low-stress, something that
would allow me time to internalize my state of mind while
working.

I had thought about the people I
knew outside of the military. Then I thought about the people I had
met during the events of The Death Agreement. I remembered the
coroner, funeral director, newspaper people, etc. No. I thought
about Yang, wondering if I would make a good cop but knew they
wouldn't hire a cripple let alone prior murder suspect.

I thought about the nicest person
I had met. Surprisingly the first person to come to mind was the
taxi driver that had taken me from the funeral home back to Walter
Reed. The man, Frank, had been friendly and caring. He was the type
of person I wanted to be. Jon Randon: Driver…it was perfect. I
learned all I could about limo services then began applying at
places around the city.

Nick, the guy who finally hired
me, said he did so because his clients prepaid and I had a lead
foot. Even though the actual foot is plastic, I couldn't argue with
him.

***

Erika walked into the bathroom
holding a plate in one hand and my phone in the other. "You got a
call."

"Who is it?" I asked, rinsing the
toothpaste from my mouth.

She shrugged, gave me a quick
peck, and handed me the phone.

"This is Randon…"

***

Life can change in an instant, a
fact I'm well aware of by now.

***

I went into the kitchen and told
Erika she needed to leave. I didn't sugarcoat it. She had been
mid-bite when I threw her clothes at her. "Get out," I
said.

She furrowed her
brow."What?"

"Get out!"

She wanted to know what she did
wrong.
Nothing
wasn't the answer she was looking for either. We had a short,
tear-filled shouting match. She called me a bipolar nutcase and
slammed my front door on her way out.

I packed a bag of my own clothes
and called Nick to quit my job. He wanted a reason, too, and I
answered by hanging up the phone. I retrieved my still-wet
toothbrush, careful to avoid the shards of glass from the shattered
medicine cabinet.

I don't know how many faces I saw
in the dimly lit mirror before I punched it, how many voices I had
heard in my nightmares.

Next, I called Mary. I told her to
run. I hope she does.

Even after I finished packing my
limo, and all the loose ends of my life were cut off, I still felt
as though something was missing.

There was something else I needed
to do, something important.

I had dropped a critical piece
before, dismissed it as unimportant. Damned if I make the same
mistake again. Taylor had taught me that you must have all the
right pieces for the thing to come alive. My situation wasn't much
different.

I racked my brain but couldn't
concentrate. Any logical or rational thought got stuck in a
repeating loop. Everything muddled together, as if someone had
forced my head into a blender.

I did the only thing which made
sense. I began to write down the whole thing from the beginning,
hoping it would get my mind in order.

Once I found a rhythm, the fog
lifted. I couldn't stop. At first it was just broad strokes, the
main points, boring fact. But as the hours melted away, I realized
the whole story would need to come out if I wanted to be sure I
hadn't missed anything else.

So I wrote and wrote and
wrote.

***

I'm still writing. Though now that
everything is in the open, and the first rays of dawn have
lightened the sky, I know I'm about finished. I also know that by
the time anyone reads these words, I'll be driving to Texas or
already dead.

I made a promise to fulfill the
terms of The Death Agreement, you see. I had signed it in
blood.

Truth is, I thought I was
finished. I really did…but after going over everything, I see how
badly I fucked it up.

I had told Mary all about Taylor's
past; made sure his wife and son were properly laid to rest;
printed the obituary; went to his funeral; gave my speech; read his
final words; played the game of Wishes; visited the graves. All
eight sections complete, right?

Wrong.

Section VII called for a
celebration of life, an after-party for us all, but that would have
only brought misery, so I had skipped it. Now that mistake is being
used against me.

***

"Hiii, Jon," the raspy, hellish
voice of Howard Taylor said.

"No, please God, no."

The voice switched to Tiffany's.
"You didn't complete the Death Agreement."

Kyle's replaced hers. "You broke
the contract and now you'll have to pay."

Mr. Hunter faded in and added,
"Come find me to make this right."

After a pause, Mrs. Christina
said, "She's so, so sweet, dear. I'm glad to have met
her."

Then Lorie yelled, "It's been too
long, Jon! You need to visit!"

Finally, Little Jon whispered,
"Miss you."

While they spoke, a loud chorus of
screams came from the background—thousands of voices, thousands of
pieces. I wondered how many families it had converted on its
murderous rampage across the country. The background noise reminded
me of cockroaches scurrying inside the walls of an infested
home.

Jesse Taylor, my best friend,
laughed. "You have one week. Meet us all on Rustic Ridge in
Texas…."

I shut off the bathroom light and
looked into the mirror. I listened to everything he had to say as
the faces changed in front of me, all the people who he'd
taken.

I failed and now I need to
pay.

***

What Taylor doesn't know is that
by writing all of this down, I've closed that loophole, fixed the
mistake. By sharing this story, I've invited every reader to
celebrate with me. If you've followed along, I thank you for your
time.

The terms of The Death Agreement
have now been met, and I don't owe Taylor a fucking
thing.