Veil (62 page)

After showing Roy around and as the movers
arrived and carried in his furniture, Suren handed him the keys to
the Old Tsay House and said her goodbyes. She kissed him on the
cheek and planned to see him soon. She told Roy the house was his,
and he was to look at it no other way than that. The Old Tsay House
was
his
.

When she moved out of their home almost five
years ago, Suren felt she adequately reminisced over it and said
her goodbyes. But
,
as she left it in Roy’s
hands and walked down the stairs, she realized the house was truly
no longer hers. It was no longer theirs; no longer hers and Jin’s;
no longer their home. It was the second instance of closure Roy
conjured within Suren. And just like the first, although it brought
her peace, it still felt like an end; it still felt like a
death.

Suren descended the stairs of the powder blue
front porch and tried to ignore how strange everything looked those
days when facing away from the house. At the bottom of the stairs,
she stopped, turned around, held onto the railing
,
and looked up at the front door. She could picture
Jin on that last day, the last day he left their home … the last
day of his life. At least, the last day he was truly Jin.

She pictured him shutting the front door and
locking it—careful to not make a sound—while trying to balance
everything in his hands. She imagined him turning and stepping down
the stairs, holding his briefcase, his coffee, and his breakfast.
She could see as he walked down to the very place she stood. Suren
closed her eyes and allowed herself to feel Jin pass through
her.

She kept her eyes closed and held her breath
as she sensed him walk into her body. As Jin passed through Suren,
each molecule of him faded like a mist. When she opened her eyes,
she exhaled his name in barely a whisper. The molecules of her
breath evaporated into Jin’s mist, so he could take his Suren’s
voice with him, so he wouldn’t be alone. Both faded until they were
completely gone, together.

J … I … N …

“Take me to Dr. Ken’s please,” she requested
as she entered the limo again.

“Yes, Ms. Suren.”

“When we get there
,
don’t go through security.”

“Ma’am?”

“Just have them call up to the house, tell
them there’s someone there to see Dr. Ken, but don’t say who it is,
understood?”

“Yes … yes Ma’am.”

“Thank you, Mr. Carter.”

“No problem, Driving Miss Lotus,” he joked
back
.

Carter hoped the Great Widow Tsay hadn’t gone
all bat shit again. Security knew who they were and always simply
waved them through. Whenever they arrived at the second set of
gates and Carter rang the intercom, the doctors already knew who
they were; security didn’t wave anyone else through. No one but
them. It always amused and frustrated Carter when one of the
doctors would get on the intercom and ask who buzzed-in.

Every time Carter would think,
You ol’
queen, you know who it is.

When they arrived and security called up to
the house, the guard put his hand over the receiver and asked, “Who
should I tell Dr. Wise is requesting to see him?”

Suren rolled down her window and extended her
hand, flapping her fingers. The guard placed the phone in her
hand.

“Ken?”

“Uh … yes.”

“When did you wake up?”

“Uh … like, like … eight days ago now, I
think?”

“Oh, really? I’m coming up. You can buzz me
in. And you better tell Hunter and his little accomplice-on-wheels
they’d better start running.”

“Now, before you go getting your p—” he
started to say. He almost said ‘panties in a tizzy’ but refrained.
All those years with Hunter apparently rubbed off on him: the
indecency; the inappropriateness; the obscenity. However, there
were limits to all that and while Hunter wasn’t able to see them,
Ken still could. He knew Suren well enough to know there were
definitely limits with her. There were some things you simply
didn’t say to Suren, and that was true well before she ever became
the Great Widow Tsay. Referring to her panties in nearly any
capacity—off-color or not—was one of those things.

So, he refrained and rephrased.

“Before you get all upset,” he began again,
“after he told me what he did, how he kept you from seeing me, I
agreed. I saw his point.”

“First, thank you,” she acknowledged that Ken
employed enough common sense to stop himself from saying what he
almost said to her. “Second, I’m sure he had his reasons. He always
has his reasons. But he could’ve told me. All he had to do was tell
me, and I would’ve respected it.”

“Would you?” Hunter couldn’t keep quiet any
longer. “Really, would you have? These past few weeks it seems like
you’ve been buying into this whole ‘Great Widow Tsay’ bullshit so
much that you don’t respect anything but your own huge bitch of an
ego.”

“Hunt,” Ken growled.

“No, let him
.
I
guess I deserve it,” she sighed and crossed the office to sit on
the windowsill bench.

“It’s just that even to this day you,” Ken
rephrased what Hunter tried to convey, “can get so … so … hell
bent. No one can say anything to you. No one can stop you.”

“And these last few weeks have been the
worst,” Hunter added.

“I’m … I’m sorry guys. I really am. It’s just
… it’s just…” she searched for the words and then stopped.

The three sat there for a few moments in
silence until she finished her thought.

“You know what, no, I’m not going to make
excuses for myself. You guys are right. I felt so betrayed after I
found out about the memory. I felt like I had to make up for all
this lost time. But … well, I kept letting myself forget everything
you two did to protect me and fight for Jin. I kept letting myself
forget that things
had
to happen the way they
did
.
They had to unfold this way. Or …
or—”

“Or we probably would've never gotten here in
the first place,” Ken finished her thought.

“Right,” she smiled.

The three sat in silence for nearly ten
minutes before Hunter broke it by asking if anyone wanted something
to drink. While Hunter headed to the wet bar, Ken prepped Suren for
the information he knew she was dying to hear.

“Although Hunter kept you at bay to protect
me, thinking that all the questions would cause too much stress and
too much damage, I hate to say it, but I didn’t really learn
anything. Not about what you really want to know, at least.”

“But you did learn some things?”

“Oh good God, yes.”

“About Jin?”

“About Jin, about you, about the Veil, all of
that.”

“But what about Jin’s killer? You had to see
something. I walked out the door with him. I saw it myself through
Roy’s eyes. Clear as day, Ken.”

“Yes, yes. For sure, you did. Yes. But I
think it would be best if I start at the beginning. Give you
everything I saw and heard when I Veiled you. Trying to piece
things together here and there is too messy.”

“Ok, I understand. That’s probably best.
Start at the beginning. I’ll try not to interrupt … too much.”

“Here, help me get situated,” Ken requested,
already standing up from behind his desk and headed for the couch
that was still in his office. “We’ll start when Hunter gets back in
here. I haven’t told him anything yet, and I know he’ll want to
hear everything as well.”

When Hunter returned, Ken was lying on the
couch with his hands folded across his chest. Suren was seated in a
chair next to him with a notebook in one hand and a pen in the
other. She had her feet up on a table in front of her. She was
ready to take down every word. She didn’t want to miss a thing. Ken
was about to give her back her memory and she wanted it all.

“I didn’t realize I was going to be
interrupting some shrink shit up in here,” Hunter joked as he
walked across the office with a tray of drinks in front of him.

Lying in that same position and with his eyes
closed, Ken started.

“Jin waited until that morning to tell you
anything. He woke you up after he woke up. You weren’t expecting
anything but an ordinary day. You expected to wake up, find him
gone already, and then you planned on getting groceries.”

“Must’ve been a Wednesday,” she noted and
wrote it down. “It had to be a Wednesday, because every other day I
tutored at the house. Every day a different subject, you know?” she
mumbled and glanced up at the two. She was still writing in her
notebook, which amused Hunter.

Look at Lady Miss Toshiba over there. She
all scratchety, scratchety.

“Jin knew how much I loved kids, so we set up
a little room in the house. Science day, math day, grocery day,
history day, literature day. So, Wednesday was my grocery day,”
Suren rambled and jotted notes.

The more she babbled and wrote, the more
Hunter was indulged.

Scribble, scribble bitch. Scribble,
scribble.

Ken hoped Suren was finished but cleared his
throat to stop her, in case she wasn’t. Before she could start up
again, he continued, “Right well, that’s irrelevant. I mean …
anyway. Anyway, he woke you up, sat on the edge of the bed and had
you take a pill. He said if you didn’t agree to what he was about
to ask of you, then the pill wouldn’t really do much of
anything.”

Suren set down her notebook when Ken derailed
her. She was embarrassed by her own enthusiasm, mostly because of
the smirk she noticed on Hunter’s face. Still, she wanted to make
sure she got everything right, so she needed Ken to clarify what he
just said.

“Agree?”

“Yes, agree. After you took the pill, he told
you everything. He said there was no way he would do any of what he
planned without your permission. Jin said he could never do
something like that to you.”

Suren could already feel some emotion welling
up. The sore spot that Jin’s actions burned into her psyche would
not be easily rubbed off with that knowledge, although the
knowledge would certainly help—the knowledge that Jin asked her
permission to do what he did to her. That Jin asked her.

“I hope you’re not making that bit up, Ken.
To make me feel better.”

Ken opened his eyes and looked at her. “Oh
definitely not. I wouldn’t do that. He said the only thing about
him he’d ever let you mistrust was the ‘T’ in his name. I don’t
even know what that means, Suren.”

“I do,” she smiled and avoided Ken’s eyes.
She also knew it meant Ken was telling the truth. “Please
continue,” she requested without explanation.

Ken looked at Hunter, who shrugged his
shoulders. Ken closed his eyes and continued.

“Jin told you everything you needed to know
about Veil except for what it was. He said if he told you what it
was then it would change too much. He needed to have a pure test
run. He said after the first part was done, you would have to leave
so he could do his work, and then you’d come back to the lab.”

“He wanted me to think he was doing the work
in the lab. He wanted me to go about my normal day and not realize
he was Veiling me, so I would act naturally.”

“Exactly. But that’s not all he told you, not
by a long shot.”

Hunter rubbed his hands together and teased,
“This is getting good.”

Suren laughed and nodded at Hunter.

“As you got ready, he was kind of hurrying
you along. As you got dressed, Jin told you that you wouldn’t
remember any of that day. The pill he gave you would act as kind of
a buffer. The markers he placed in your memory would only work from
the moment you were Veiled until the moment the Veil ended.
So
,
to buy him some time, he gave you a
weak amnesiac before and after the process. He was hoping it would
buy him enough time, meaning you wouldn’t remember enough of those
time periods to realize anything happened at all.”