Chapter 17

Convergence

A Hungry Man frozen dinner and a cheap bottle of beer. Well, there were the fermented banana peppers and pearl onions in the recycled pickle jar stashed behind the three days past expiration milk. Tin foil wrapped mystery meat. Brown-wilt lettuce. No dressing! Dang!

'Pursue a hobby. Continue your education.'

She tossed the TV dinner next to the microwave and flung open a cabinet door. What hobbies? Hobbies are for people who have time, people who have extra energy, people who have talents in artsy, craftsy skills. What's my talent?

Standing on her tiptoes, her fingers flitted over the medicine bottle caps stacked in the Redfield over the sink pharmacy. Prescription. Non-prescription. Creams. Gels. Rainy day, I can't get to the doctor today, half-tablet leftovers.

Does killing creepy, crawly viral mutations count? Can murder be a talent? Housecleaning? Flapping my lips?

She popped a lid and tapped Vicodin into the palm of her hand. Back burner living. Nodding my head at the right time. I don't let the weight of my clipboard put a slouch in my spine. She knocked back the horse pill with a gulp of lukewarm tap water and slammed the glass on the counter. Take a good look. This is you. This is your life. You are a kitchen without a scheme. And isn't reality grand. Mismatched cups. Raggedy dishtowels. Plastic plates and a dollar store dish drainer. Being good means living poor... and dying young. She tapped another Vicodin for extra foggy, fuck you, I don't need you, mental bliss.

Stupid TerraSave! Stupid Chris! Stupid Ji-

Claire shuffled into the front room. None of the furnishings were new, the hodgepodge collection as worn and uncoordinated as her kitchen. A chocolate brown sofa with a black blanket tossed over the end to hide the tear in the armrest. A few pictures in cheap frames. Stupid, cheap frames!

Claire picked up a throw pillow, hugged it to her chest, and flopped onto the couch.

What am I going to do now? Not a huge job market for biohazard facility inspectors. Ditto for zombie crowd control management.

She threw her head back and closed her eyes. The tears she refused to shed earlier dotted her eyelashes. Why, God? Just tell me, why? Life shouldn't be this hard. What did the Redfield's ever do that made us persona non grata on Easy Street?

'Where are you off to this time?'

'You can't ask me that question.'

'Oh, I can ask. You just can't tell me.'

'Exactly.'

'How long will you be gone?'

'As long as the mission takes. Which reminds me, the tires on the car need to be rotated. Front to back. Get the alignment this time.'

'I can rotate the tires.'

'Nope. It needs an alignment. Promise me you'll take it to a shop.'

Chris's medals deserved better than a box on a bowed, pressboard entertainment center shelf. A nice glass display case. The kind that stored sports memorabilia, his awards arranged and properly mounted. Jill had mentioned the idea a few months ago as a suggestion for a future Christmas present.

Jill. Claire pressed her forearm to her eyes. Here I am dreaming up the perfect Chris gift to house a bunch of cheap, tarnished medals when, God forgive me, I should be thinking about you.

Did anybody really care if Chris Redfield nailed seventy headshots in sixty seconds three years in a row, and had the hardware to prove it? No! Nobody cared.

Jill. Caught up in her job loss woe-is-me blues, Claire had managed to dodge the dreaded four-letter J word most of the day.

Asphalt-gray gloam crept dusk across the room, sweeping shadows into corners.

###

'Squirt, Jill. Jill, Squirt.'

'Chris Redfield, that's hardly a proper introduction.'

'Who needs proper? You get the gist. You see her everyday.' He motioned to the kitchen. 'What'll you have?'

'What are you offering?'

'Beer. Water. Milk. Might be some OJ. Any OJ, Squirt?'

Claire kept her gaze on the page. 'No.'

'Water's fine, Chris. Ice if you have it.'

'Back in a jiff. Keep her company, Squirt.'

Uh-huh.

'It's nice to finally have a chance to sit down and get to know you, Claire.'

'It's not a big deal. My brother's right. You see me after school.'

'True. True. But that's work. Work social and dinner social aren't really the same.'

Claire flipped the page. Oh, brother! Why does every woman Chris dates act like we're going to be BFF forever?

This one was cuter than the usual blonde-haired, tube-top under a short jacket bimbo's Chris normally trolled home. She was smarter too, and that was going to be a problem. Claire gave it a week. Maybe two.

'What're you reading?'

'A book.'

'What's it about?'

'Stuff.'

Jill eased herself onto the couch next to Claire and dipped her head to see the cover. 'The Colosseum. Sound's interesting. Any good?'

'I suppose.' Duh! Captain Obvious. I wouldn't be reading it if it sucked.

'I see pictures. Mind if I take a peek?'

Crud! Did this woman moonlight as a kindergarten teacher on her days off? Her voice was patient and pressing, and oddly annoying. Over the shoulder alert. How long does it take to get a glass of water? Save me, Bro! It's freakin' ice and a tap.

'A history book.'

'Yep.'

'Are you interested in history?'

'I like it.'

'Enough to read about it. Do we have a budding archeologist in our midst?'

'If archeologists made more than squat.'

'I see Chris has schooled you in the fine art of slang.'

'It's a fact. They did career assessment tests at school. Archeology is what they call a 'niche' field. The pay is whack cause it don't pay jack. My brother wants me to study medicine.'

'What do you want?'

Now, this was interesting. Very interesting. Hmmm...Ok maybe three weeks, and only because she seems...What's the word?...Genuine.

'I'd like to travel the world.'

Jill pointed to a picture. 'And see all the beauty in it.'

'It's really not all that beautiful, now.'

'I disagree. I've been to Rome, and I think the Colosseum is more grand and glorious today than it might have seemed when it was first built. The antiquity and the flaws, the missing ramparts and stone, give the structure personality and life. It's not the achievement of perfection that defines a man.'

Blah. Blah. Blah. Claire snapped the book shut. 'Doesn't matter anyway. By the time I graduate college there won't be anything left worth discovering.'

'Oh, I don't know. I never say, never. I recently read an article about the last great archeological frontier. Care to know where?'

Claire shrugged. I don't know, are you going to spit it out, or do we have to play twenty questions so you can feel good about yourself later over your getting to know me efforts?

'It's deep and blue and salty.'

Shoot me. Just shoot me.

'Take a guess.'

Right between the eyes. 'The ocean.'

'Correct. There are sunken ships, forgotten cities, and a vast, complex ecosystem, just waiting to be explored.

Sucks to be you, Genius! 'Gee, that sounds great. There is one problem though.'

'Chris? I'm sure if-'

'I can't swim. Pretty hard to search for buried ocean treasure when I'll drown.'

'You don't know how to swim? Chris didn't teach you?'

'No.'

'Well, shame on Chris. But, you're in luck.'

Luck would be her brother getting the lead out instead of taking his sweet time.

'I can swim. In fact, I'm a very good swimmer. I was a high dive and backstroke record holder in high school. Would you like me to teach you?'

Chris emerged from the kitchen with two glasses pinched at the rim between the fingers of one hand and a plate of crackers and cheese in the other hand. 'Ladies, don't get up. The movie snack plate is served.'

###

Claire bolted upright. 'I can swim. I'm a very good swimmer.'

Maybe, but how far did you fall? Barry didn't say. Chris' boss didn't either. How far was too far?

She dug in the front pocket of her jeans for her phone. 'I can swim. I'm a very good swimmer.'

Good enough to battle storm tides? How hard did you hit? She pressed the phone to her ear. Please pick up. Please pick up. Please pick-"Barry, it's Claire."

"Good to hear your voice. How's it going, Kiddo? I was just getting ready to call you. Chris is stable. Doing well. He's on his way-"

"That's good to know, but he's not the reason I'm calling. I need a favor."

"That depends. What kind of favor?"

"Jill was a good swimmer, a high school record holder. She taught me how to swim and told me that her parents wanted her to train with an Olympic coach."

"Claire-"

"I need to know how far she fell."

"Claire, I can hear what you're thinking in your voice. Let it go. The dive team searched the water. They went up and down the coast."

"I can't."

"Grieving will be easier if you do, trust me. Clinging to the thought of her being alive is just going to make the process harder for you."

"Then slap a straight jacket on me and call me crazy for being stubborn. How far, Barry?"

"From one of the fourth floor balcony windows. Far enough to kill."

"Fifty feet? A hundred feet? How far?"

"I don't know the exact measurements, Kiddo. I don't have direct access to the file. My information has been mouth to ear."

"I need to see the file."

"Claire...I can't gain access to the file..."

"She's the one who got you your job, Barry."

"Claire-"

"Nobody wanted you after you were implicated in the mansion incident."

"That isn't fair. I was blackmailed."

"Fair or not, she's the one who got you assigned overseas. You owe her, your dignity if nothing else."

There was a long pause.

"Barry?"

"Ok, you made your point. I'll tell you what. I can't obtain the file, but I can do something even better."

"I'm listening."

"I spoke to Arthur Valentine today. There's a memorial service in the works for Jill scheduled to take place some time next week. Maybe, the week after. Her folks are still ironing out the details. I was planning to wrap up some things and head out over the next couple of days. I could stop for a layover in Portsmouth...Ride on up to Spencer's estate, and take a look at the scene myself. Snap a few photos. Would that work?"

"I owe you one."

"We'll settle up with a beer when I'm in town."

"We'll settle up with champagne when I find her."

"Claire-"

"Ya know what, Barry, Arthur Valentine can have his headstone and his memories. I'll take the living, breathing woman. We'll see who ends up with more."

###

Their altercation achieved the desired effect. He'd put her in her place. She was brooding and sullen, committed to silence. She hadn't mumbled a single, solitary, disagreeable word.

His house was in order. Dishes done. Counters scrubbed. Hoover lines in the carpet. His damaged bumper the best three months of maid service he'd ever spent.

The fireplace mantle clock ticked away their remaining time together as she rapid turned the pages of a teen magazine. He caught a glossy cover glimpse. An eyebrow went up. Ten luscious lip shades for spring. Twenty too die for prom hairstyles. The right dress-on a budget!

Youth! They worried over nonsense and obsessed matters that meant little in life.

Twenty years from now Claire Redfield wouldn't remember what she wore to prom, much less which copied hair upsweep-impossible to replicate-she had chosen. It was a waste of focus and mental energy.

Wesker leaned forward. Friday afternoon. The financial analysis and purchase order forms were complete. Up for a verbal spar, and resistance from an easy to taunt foe, he broke their non-communication truce.

'You should avoid hot pink. Redheads do not wear the shade well.'

She rolled her eyes and the tight line of her lips slanted down. 'So, now you're a fashion designer? Color coordinator? How would you know?'

'I am neither, but I do have eyes. They are functional, Miss Redfield. It is common knowledge redheads fair better in earth and jewel tones. Olive. Carmel. Emerald green. Perhaps, a plum wine or royal purple hue, the darker the shade the better. The more relevant question is how, seeing that you are, in fact, a redhead, is it that you do not know?'

She circled a dress with a yellow highlighter. 'I like it.'

'Do you also like clowns? Wear that washed out creation and you will certainly look like one. Alas, far be it from me to prevent a Redfield from rendering themselves a fool and acting a jackass. You have had an excellent teacher. Kudos to Christopher.'

'Why do you hate him so much? What did he ever do to you? He leaves early. He works late. He does every thing you ask him to do.'

'You speak in the singular.'

'So, you don't hate my brother, you just hate everyone in general?'

He tapped his nose with the tip of his finger.

Claire shook her head. 'Pathetic,' she mumbled.

'A little louder, please.'

'You heard me. You're pathetic. You have no concept of how to treat people, so you walk across them like they're dirt. You think fear is respect. I hope you die old and alone. It's what you deserve.'

'I would rather have a one-sided conversation with myself and spend time in solitary confinement than build relationships out of false pretenses.'

'Congratulations, you're well on your way. Keep going.' She dug in the pocket of her backpack and pulled out a CD player and headphones.

Her anger and disgust were one thing, those Wesker expected and tolerated. Her dismissal another matter entirely.

'I would assume you render the same effort in your search for a higher education learning institution as you do your frivolous magazine perusal?'

She popped the ear buds in her ears, twisted around on the sofa, and threw her legs over the armrest.

'Miss Redfield?' He was up in an instant. The magazine snatched into his hands. 'You were asked a question.'

'Hey! Give that back!'

'I want an answer.'

'Stuff it! There's your answer. I've got a middle finger for another one if you'd like that better.'

'Tell me where. You may keep the extra, vulgar gesture to yourself.'

'Just give it back.'

'Wrong.'

'Finnnne! Yes. I applied to colleges. Happy? Can I have it?"

He flipped the magazine right side up to face him, creased open the spine, and ripped the first page from its binding. 'Atrocious.'

'Stop that! You're ruining it!'

'Horrendous.'

'Damn it!'

She jumped up off the sofa. 'You owe me three-fifty. That's what it cost.'

###

Wesker raised his glass. Nothing fancy. Nothing fruity. When in Rome wear a toga. When in a podunk, roadside bar drink a beer. Was the mug half full? Half empty?

Destiny. Fate. Free will. Choice. Theoretical concepts. Philosophical hogwash.

Achilles. The mythical, Grecian half man-half God was prophesized to die before his conception, yet it was Achilles himself who chose to follow his predestined path to the place of his death.

To believe in fate forced the acknowledgement of an unknown plan, and regardless of personal choice, or series of choices, this plan would work itself to fulfillment.

The news anchors on the television set anchored above the bar repeated a late-breaking blurb regarding a ten-car pile-up, the top story of the day. The cause of the mass collisions, an overturned oil tanker and subsequent explosion.

The morning rush hour death tally stood at fifteen, with two unaccounted for. The most prominent new addition to the twisted metal crash club was a well-liked, local factory owner by the name of Redmond Jensen.

A proponent of destiny might argue Mr. Jensen came face to face with his fate, determined in advance through unknown and unchangeable cosmic forces. His life forfeited at the correct moment, in the corresponding place, in time. His entire being and existence structured and constructed around an event beyond the limit of his human control.

Those who touted a free will doctrine would counter that Redmond was a victim of choice, fully conscious of his actions and accepting of the Universe's equal and opposite reactions.

The facts were: Redmond rolled out of bed, left early for work, and slammed into the undercarriage of the tanker at approximately seven forty-eight am.

A dead battery, a sinus headache, a flat tire, the stop at a convenience store for a cup of coffee, and everything changes.

Redmond bites it in a heart attack ten years down the road. Maybe, just maybe, Redmond really goes the distance. He drifts asleep in his nursing home bed, ninety years young; content in the life he led.

Wesker withdrew a pen, reached over the edge of the counter, and plucked a napkin off a plump stack.

He spread the napkin open and drew a large circle in the center. He labeled the center with a capital W. On the outer edge of the circle he drew a smaller, elliptical circle that intersected the first. In the center of the second circle he jotted the letters C and R. Below the C and R ellipse he drew another ellipse. This circle crossed C and R, and W.

Wesker hesitated, index finger pressed hard against the metal jacket overlay near the pen's tip. He smeared the initials C and R into the third circle.

One circle each for Alex, TriCel, and the Organization on the opposite side. Another represented Downing. Ada's looped through Downing's and the circle with an L and a K scrawled in the center. A J and V ellipse cut deep into his own and crossed paths with both circles marked C and R.

One giant grape stalk, mish-mash cluster. A crudely drawn napkin representation of the people in current, closest proximity to Wesker's world. Repetition like a comet, they orbited in and out of Wesker's life, moving toward, and drifting away from his sphere of influence. The endless revolution cycled and recycled over and over again. The convergence of destiny and the divergence of free will.

He stared at the C and R circles. One represented the North Pole to his South Pole, and the inevitable showdown on the Equator when their two hemispheres collided. The other was the embodiment of the road not taken. The flesh and blood icon of humanity he'd shed in his quest for viral perfection.

There was a linear, non-linear timeline logic problem imbedded in the close-ended, co-joined circles. A head-scratcher tailored for Trekkies and Philosophers. Wesker was neither. He operated on fact, and the facts were: He was born uncommon and raised to excel. There had never been a noteworthy, significant other. Married to a lab coat and a microscope, he'd accepted work over a family lifestyle. A mortgage. The expected two and a half children.

He regretted nothing, least of all his own personal and professional monetary success, but deep beneath the callous, perfectionist demeanor, Wesker felt cheated, denied. A condescending voice inside his head mocked his achievements with hearty, random thoughts of loneliness and loss.

The jukebox behind Wesker kicked on, and country singer twang jarred him back to reality.

First Alex. Now this. Pure torture. Ada's rationale for their less than five star rendezvous point had better be damn good. He was as tired of her as Alex was of him. Damn good, with a capital D and a G. Kennedy was waiting.

###

A plan in motion did wonders for her appetite. The Vicodin didn't hurt either. She was buzzing on calm, kiting on lazy river euphoria, after a wet and wild water park day.

Chris would always be Chris. He'd be rollin' like a rich Texan in no time.

Jill wasn't dead. Period.

Barry had been right. The news vans parked at the front gate had fizzled down to one. The cameraman dozed on a lawn chair under a tree.

She leaned against the open door. "Whad'ya say you and I take a trip to the grocery store?"

"I'm not allowed to leave my post, Miss Redfield."

"Fifteen minutes. We're there and back and nobody is wiser."

He sighed, crossed his hands behind his back, and planted his feet.

"I don't have to stay here. They can't keep me under house arrest. I'm really more a voluntary prisoner. You're contributing to the violation of my civil liberties."

"You may call my office between the hours of nine and five, Monday through Friday, to complain."

"You aren't hard to evade. I could have hopped the fence at any time."

"Why didn't you?"

"My brother. He needs all the help he can get right now. I don't need to stir up trouble to make matters worse for him."

"So, don't. Go inside."

"Look, I'm hungry. I've had a rotten day. I want to sit on my sofa and hate my life over a bowl of ice cream and a bag of potato chips. Cut me a break. I've been a good detainee. I haven't tried anything...yet." Her smile dimpled her cheeks.

"And what's that supposed to mean?"

"You're the big, bad, Agent. You figure it out. I've got nothing to lose by going back in the house and walking straight out the back door. I'm already racing down a shit chute. Won't mean a thing to me."

"I don't know, Miss Red-"

"When was the last time you had a home cooked meal, Agent James?"

"It's been awhile."

"I can cook. Ribeye. Texas Toast. A fresh garden salad. Baked potato. Extra butter. Sour cream."

"You're making my mouth water."

"I know, right? So, what's it gonna' be? A grilled steak, or the shame of reporting me AWOL while you were on duty?"

"Fifteen minutes?"

"You can set your watch on it."

"Sold. One ribeye steak and all the fixins."