- Chapter 15 - Catch 22 -
The class was full to capacity with the usual suspects, Mrs. Flutey's special students, but their teacher wasn't following her usual routine. She wasn't flitting through the small groups checking assignments and giving out new goals. Allison was sitting quietly at her desk, her mind focused on a simple fact, her husband was afraid. He was afraid of a rumor, a fabrication, a complete tall-tale.
Clark had given her an outline that was supposed to illustrate his fairy tale, a visual aide to prove his point, and Allison really looked at it for the first time. She traced a finger along the timeline to the major tragedies of her recent life, the accident that almost claimed her life, the miracle of her recovery. The kids had painted that miracle with a suspicious red pen. Circled and bolded, the date of her recovery shared its anniversary with a tragic coincidence. Howie Matthews, a boy she still remembered well, a class-clown, a closet-honor student, a boy who made a mistake...a sixteen year-old kid fell into a coma for no good reason on the exact day she woke up.
No one had ever connected those dots for her, and Allison wanted to dismiss the entire thing as a strange sad coincidence. It would be easy to discard the proof in front of her. This wasn't rational or realistic. People couldn't put other people into a coma. They couldn't drain each other's brains. This wasn't a comic book. It was reality, damn it.
But her husband was terrified.
Why was Doug afraid?
Her students were waiting. They were starting to buzz their impatience. Rows of kids with more challenges than anyone their age deserved, they, counted on her to even the playing field and give them a chance. Allison looked at those children, but she couldn't rise to teach them. She had to be sure about something first. She had to see something for herself.
Outside it was a beautiful day, sunny, bright, but not hot. The light couldn't penetrate the hospitals darkly tinted windows, not really. The wind was blowing outside, stirring dust, grass clippings, and the first of the fall leaves to give up their perch. Those dancing debris should have been bright colored and crisp, but the blackened glass filtered all that out leaving the world gray and dismal. Clark sucked down a lungful of the stale astringent hospital air and slid low in his molded plastic waiting-room seat. He needed to stop focusing on the flimsy window-glass sealing the hospital, stop focusing on the lack of real light and real air and just breathe. If he couldn't stop freaking out about the hospital, he was going to have to get out, and he needed to stay put until Chloe or the doctors came back. What happened to Pete was largely his fault for dragging them all down to confront Mrs. Flutey. It was just a hospital, just a building, a building with sealed gray windows that reminded him of the worst moment in his life that he could remember.
A few short months ago, Clark woke up in a place like this, a hospital. He'd been alone there, alone and completely adrift. But he wasn't lost anymore, or confused about who he was. He might not remember all the details, but he was home and there was no need to escape, no need to pound out another window and run.
"He's going to live," Chloe announced. She slid into the seat next to Clark and smiled consolingly. "You can stop feeling bad about deciding to confront Flutey now. Pete is sleeping, and he's really okay."
As though he'd shrugged a thousand pounds off his chest, Clark could breathe from the moment Chloe returned. It was partly relief that Pete was okay, but it was more than that too. Chloe was energy, comfort, warmth...sunshine. Clark tore his eyes away from her, his face flushing hotly. Maybe he failed functional literacy but he knew it was inappropriate, to feel those things when one of his friends was sleeping in a hospital bed. Hell, Chloe had made their relationship crystal clear. It was inappropriate to think about a friend the way he thought about Chloe a lot of the time. This was one relationship he wasn't going to screw up. Besides, there was a renegade mutant to deal with, plenty of things to occupy his straying mind. "What do we do now? The confrontation idea was a pointless disaster."
"Not pointless," Chloe said. "I don't think there's any doubt left that Mrs. Flutey is doing something to the people around her. There are so many questions though. Is she able to control who she drains? Her husband isn't the nicest man in the world but he isn't dull either. She has to have some degree of control or he'd be drooling. If she has some control, why drain Pete while we're standing there accusing her? Maybe she was threatening us?"
"I won't let her hurt you," Clark said. He had scooted forward to the edge of his seat, his eyes suddenly quite hard and serious.
Chloe's heart skipped about five beats while she contemplated the plaintive possessive protectiveness in Clark's blue eyes. That look belonged to the pink princess, Lana. Clark didn't waste that look on female best friends. "I appreciate the thought, but we're going to handle this together, and no one's getting hurt. I told you the truth is powerful, and we need to get enough truth together that Mrs. Flutey can't escape it." The moment passed, and Clark's expression faded back closer to a normal intensity, but she hadn't imagined that look. There was a whole legion of butterflies in her stomach that refused to fade with the moment. Chloe rose and took a step toward the door, her mouth working reflexively, explaining their next step to Clark. "I think we should head back to the beginning."
"The beginning?" Clark asked. "School?"
"Not quite."
There were so many tubes running into the pale red-haired boy in the hospital bed. A half dozen machines hummed and blipped, charting the steady course of his monotonous existence. Allison watched the unchanging scene from the other side of a pane of glass. He was still just a kid, not even twenty. She didn't want to think about how long someone could linger like that, neither alive nor dead. It was hard to believe that some of the students thought she might have caused this state. She would know if she'd caused something like this. She'd feel it.
"Are you part of the family? a nurse asked.
Allison started, finally turning away from the sad dim hospital room. "Sorry, I was his teacher, one of his teachers." Technically, Howie never took Special Topics, but the nurse didn't need to know the bizarre chain of events that led her to the hall she was loitering in. "Do you think I could go in to see him?"
"Oh absolutely," the nurse said. She dropped the pad and pills she'd been carrying into her navy blue scrubs' pocket and held the door open for Allison. "We have flexible visiting hours here, and the Matthews family encourages visitors. They think people are what's helping him. Howie has actually been steadily improving for the past year. Whatever brought this state on seems to be healing to some small degree. His brain activity is up five percent. It's not a miracle, but it's progress, you know?"
"The doctors don't know what caused this?" Allison asked.
"It's a mystery," the nurse replied.
The door clicked shut, and Allison took a seat, perching on the edge of a cushioned reclining chair. Her husband Doug sat at her side for months while she lay like that, the living dead. He had never been willing to talk about it, to share the experience with her, but she could see the changes in him. When she went to sleep, he was her Doug, her fellow crusader. He loved her and the world and teaching, and then when she woke up, he was older and angrier. He stopped laughing. The miracle of her recovery hadn't been enough to erase the horror of their accident, but she understood the changes, reconciled herself to them. Sitting across from Howie, Allison had a new understanding of the horror of watching someone exist, and she wished she could have spared Doug the whole experience. After everything that had happened, of course Doug was scared that someone was casting aspersions against his wife. He just wanted to protect her, keep her safe.
Wiping at her eyes, Allison reached out to Howie, covering his taped hand with her own. "Hello," she said. "You might remember me, the shortish woman chaperoning the homecoming dance a few years back. If I had chaperoned a little better and danced with my husband a little less, you might not have gotten yourself drunk and into that accident. I don't know if you worried about it, what happened to me, but I'm not angry, and I never was. I'm here and awake. Living, talking proof that miracles happen and that you can beat this." Allison squeezed Howie's limp hand again.
Maybe it was a crazy tangent that brought her here, but Allison was glad that she'd come. "I'm playing hooky, you know, and I should get back to work. But I'll come back to see you again, alright?"
Under her hand, Howie's hand jerked, curling into a claw, and Allison jumped back. What was happening? Was he waking up? Alarms were blowing, and Howie's back was arching in the bed so violently that she was afraid he would tumble to the floor. Then the nurses and doctors stormed the room shouting questions and holding down their patient.
"What happened?"
"Did you do something to him?"
Shaking her head at the people working frantically, Allison backed all the way against the wall.
"Epinephrine."
Why was the doctor hitting his chest? They didn't pump at the chests like that unless the heart stopped beating, did they? God, was he dying? Why was he dying?
"Another hospital," Clark muttered. The new place, a private facility, Peaceful Acres or Gentle Mercy something, was a little different from the county hospital. At least the windows here weren't tinted and the air was a little crisper, less phenol-heavy. "Do we know where we're going?"
Chloe looked over her shoulder with a sly grin. "Of course, just follow me. I was planning this expedition before the sidetracks we took earlier. Howie's room should be..." Tossing door 305-C open Chloe froze. "Empty? I guess I had it wrong. We'll just have to look around some more."
Clark was generally happy to let Chloe lead the way, showing off her field journalism skills, but he felt a familiar tug at his mind, a gentle pull. "Mrs. Flutey?" Clark said. He hesitated at the door to the room, almost certain that his teacher was lurking in the shadows there.
Realizing that Clark wasn't following, Chloe came back and peered into the room with him. "What is it? Did you see something?"
"Felt something," Clark replied. He focused his eyes, allowing his vision to confirm what his other senses were telling him. There was a woman in that dark room, hiding. "Mrs. Flutey, I know you're there."
"If you know I'm here, then why aren't you running away like earlier? Have you decided that I'm not a brain eating monster?" Mrs. Flutey choked out. "You're willing to brave my presence for the moment?"
He could feel her feeding already, draining at his mind, pumping away the energy that let him concentrate and reason. "I know what you are," Clark answered, stepping back. "You may not understand it, but unlike all those other snacks in your classes, I can feel what you do. I can feel you doing it now."
"What do I do?" Allison shrieked. "I didn't do anything..."...and he died. That boy died. "What do I do Clark? Tell me, because I'm not doing ANYTHING."
Chloe tugged on Clark's arm, not liking the sound of Mrs. Flutey's voice, the tone or tenor. "Come on, we know how these confrontations turn out. Pete's already in the hospital. We should keep moving. She's dangerous."
"I'm moving," Clark said. He let Chloe pull him away, but he didn't turn his back on Mrs. Flutey.
Allison wanted to run after those children and challenge them to defend their accusations, to take their words back as the insane ramblings that they had to be. But she didn't run after them, and she couldn't look away from Clark. His blue eyes captured her, held her, accused her. "This isn't really happening. I didn't hurt anyone."
Clark listened to Chloe talk about the doctor's theories, low energy in the brain leading to massive oxidative injuries, or some such medical jargon. He knew all he needed to know. Allison was in the room with Howie Matthews, and he was dead within minutes. "She killed him. She finished destroying whatever bits of brain she left him the first time. You're telling me the doctors can't figure that out?"
"I'm telling you what I managed to skim out of Howie's chart before the nurse threw me out. The doctors aren't going to pin this on a mutant, and the authorities aren't likely to buy a mutant brain vampire story." Chloe shrugged and plopped down on her car's hood. "There is someone else in this town that buys my mutant theories, and he has tried to help in the past." Chloe paused for dramatic effect. "Lex has been known to use his money, influence, and power in a good cause, particularly when the kid who saved his life asks nicely."
"So that's what the infamous friendship was based on, obligation. My parents don't trust Lex," Clark said. "Do you?"
"I have trusted him, but I'm not sure if I do," Chloe hedged. "I want to trust him."
"You think he might be able to help with the current mutant? You think he'll believe us?" Clark strolled up to the car hood and leaned a little closer that necessary toward Chloe. "I say we give him a chance to help."
Doug Flutey came home to a quiet house, a dark house. His wife was missing, and the kids who'd screwed with her, Clark Kent and company, had made themselves scarce. How dare the little bastards tell his wife she was hurting people. How dare they mess with her peace of mind, her life? After everything the children had cost her, cost them, how dare they take anything else.
Without turning on a light, Doug threw his old briefcase at the kitchen table, missing it entirely and threw himself into one of the dining chairs. His head resting in his hands, he didn't hear his wife moving about until she pulled the other chair out beside him. "God, Allison? I was so worried."
"Dougey, I need you to talk to me, please," Allison whispered. "Please."
"No," Doug whispered back. There was no mistaking the subject Allison had finally stumbled upon. Nothing else could possibly cause the hysteria resonating in her voice. "We don't need to talk. We need to sleep, and forget everything that happened today. This will all seem silly in the morning."
"Stop lying to me. If you can't tell me the truth, I'm going to lose my mind. I will." Allison grinned, a terrified brittle expression. "I am not a child. I'm your partner. I take something from people, from their minds. Did it start with Howie? Have I hurt you too?"
Staring at his wife's near-crazed expression, Doug let go of his last hope that they could go back. The freedom and the bliss of ignorance were gone, but maybe when she understood, they could come to a new status quo. "You've never hurt me Allison. You only hurt the ones who hurt you, the children. It started with Howie, with the little prick that drove drunk and almost killed you. He thought that coming to your hospital room and sitting by you made it better, that it might buy him forgiveness for destroying you.
"You know what bought him forgiveness? The day I walked in and he was unconscious on the floor, the day you were blinking at me in bed and moaning about your aching head, the day he traded places with you, he deserved a tiny bit of forgiveness." Doug leaned back in his chair, unable to meet his wife's eyes while telling this tale. "I knew what happened, not the science but the logic. I made sure that there wouldn't be a connection to you. I protected you, Allison, and I've been protecting you for years now.
"It isn't as bad as you're thinking right now. You never take so much that the children notice. You haven't hurt anyone else like Howie. Everything is in balance," Doug explained. "Can you see? It's okay the way it is."
Allison shrugged and nodded absently at her husband, as though she were still listening and agreeing. "I have to resign. I can't hurt anyone if I don't see them. I loved teaching, but I don't need it. The children will be safer if I go." All those poor children, how many had she damaged or held back?
"NO, you can't, you need them, the energy, whatever it is you take. If you go without long enough, you'd go away again. You'd lose yourself. I'd lose you, and I can't lose you again. Allison? Are you listening?" She wasn't focusing on him. Lord, she had risen and started to walk away. Couldn't she understand what he was saying? "The longer you go without taking energy, the more dangerous you become. Do you really want to create another Howie Matthews, trapped in a bed because he wandered too close to you in the ebb of your energy supplies? It's irresponsible, Allison. You have a responsibility to keep yourself charged. Do you hear me Allison?"
Allison could imagine herself trapped in the bed Howie had inhabited until earlier that day. She could imagine the tubes and the emptiness. And she could see her other students trapped in that same prison, Francis, Nancy, Clark. It was in her, the potential to destroy lives, to make zombies. Allison lifted her hands to her ears covering them firmly and squeezed her eyes shut, trying to block out her husband's words and the images swimming behind her eyes.
"I HEAR you," she screamed.
