Gold Hill (7 page)

He finished putting the
last drops of butter on the popcorn and went out into their living
area. Valerie wasn’t there.

“
Val?”

Nothing. He could still
hear her talking. He checked the bathroom, their bedroom, and the
nursery he and Jill had decorated. Nothing.

He could still hear her
talking.

“
Val? I don’t know where
you are,” Mike set the bowl of popcorn down on the changing table
to listen.

He could still hear her
talking. It was as if her voice was coming through the walls. He
pressed his head against the nursery wall. Her voice was on the
other side of this wall. His heart pounding in his throat, he
hammered the wall with his fists.

“
Val!”

Chapter One Hundred and
Ninety-One
Shift

He heard her laugh. His
eyes scanned the room until they fell on the closet door. He put
his head against the door.

Her voice was coming from
inside. She laughed again.

Mike opened the door and
turned on the light.

Nothing. No Val.

He had painted this closet
just last week. He knew every nook and cranny. He patted the walls
and listened. He could still hear her talking to
someone.

At the very back of the
closet, he saw a small trap door. He had tried to open the door
when he was painting but it had been nailed shut. He dropped to his
knees. The nails were gone. He pulled on the door and the hinges
creaked as it opened.

He crawled through the trap
door to find five wooden stairs and an open area. It had the look
of an elegant medical office of some kind. Valerie
laughed.

“
Val?”

“
Mike! Come on
up.”

He ran up the stairs to
find Valerie covered in dust talking to the air.

“
Mom wanted me to see this
space,” Valerie said. “Isn’t it gorgeous? She thinks we could move
up here or whatever. And look!”

Valerie pointed to a
bookshelf.

“
The books about the
house! Jake’s been looking for these forever.” Valerie smiled as if
she’d done something big. “Mom says you’re freaked out. Are you
freaked out?”

“
Honey, we’re having a
baby tonight,” Mike said.

“
I know!” Valerie said.
“Right here.”

“
What?” Mike
asked.

“
Mom says we won’t get out
of the Castle and it’s better to have the baby here,” Valerie said.
“Isn’t it neat?”

“
What about ‘I want all
the meds’ and ‘I like hospitals’?” Mike asked.

“
That was before Mom
came,” Valerie smiled. “Go get Delphie. She’ll explain
everything.”

Mike gawked at
her.

“
Go on,” Valerie said. “I
have a few hours so I thought I’d start making a clean
space.”

“
Val I really
think . . . ,” Mike started.

“
Mike do as I ask,”
Valerie said. “Please.”

“
Do not do that to me,”
Mike said. “You promised.”

“
Ok, sorry,” Valerie
smiled.

Mike stalked down the
stairs toward the trap door.

“
Oh, can you bring me some
cleaning supplies? And the vacuum?” Valerie asked. “Oh and call the
doctor. Mom thinks Delphie and Tanesha will be fine but it’s always
good to have one around.”

“
Why are we doing this?”
Mike asked.

“
Because they’re going to
experiment on Jackie,” Valerie said. “Our baby.”

“
And Blane?”

“
It’s already worked out,”
Valerie said. “Blane will get a catheter into his hepatic artery. I
don’t know what that is, but that’s what will happen. He can get
the cord blood here. His doctor is just realizing they want to
experiment on our baby. He’s going to suggest it to Blane and
Heather in the next hour and do the surgery tomorrow
morning.”

“
You’re sure?”

“
Jill will have the twins
here too,” Valerie said. “Mom says it was an expensive doctor’s
office once. There were stairs out the back. Other babies have been
born here. We’ll be fine. Just go get Delphie. She’ll tell you
everything. Oh, and get Jake. He needs to build the
stairs.”

He was almost in the closet
when she yelled, “Bring the popcorn!”

Shaking his head, he went
to find Delphie and Sam.

~~~~~~~~

Wednesday morning — 5:25
A.M.

Jeraine woke with a
start.

Tanesha wasn’t there. His
heart squeezed with panic. She was gone and he was alone. A sharp
pain shot through his head. He rotated to sitting and grabbed his
head. How was he going to survive this day?

Hearing a noise, he hopped
out of bed. He thought, “Maybe she’s in the kitchen.” He ran out of
the bedroom to look for her and saw the kids sprawled on the living
room carpet.

Relief washed through
him.

Tanesha was with her girls
last night. They were getting the space ready for Valerie to have
her baby. The entire endeavor didn’t make sense to him but that
hadn’t stopped him from playing a wild game of Cowboys and Indians
with Charlie, Teddy, Sissy, and Nash last night. Aden had arrived
midgame and took up the Cowboy call. Noelle documented the action
with her sketch pad. He hadn’t had as much fun
since . . . well, he wasn’t sure when.

He went into the kitchen to
start coffee. Aden met him there.

“
You’re sure you’re all
right with the kids here?” Aden whispered.

“
Sure,” Jeraine
said.

“
Sandy will be here to do
school drop off,” Aden said. “The girlfriends are going to
breakfast.”

“
How . . . ?” Jeraine asked.

“
She called,” Aden said.
“She said you need to check your phone. She told me to remind you
that your phone is in your nightstand drawer.”

“
Oh great. Thanks.”
Jeraine went into the bedroom to get his phone. He listened to
Tanesha laugh at him for losing his phone again. Hearing the
coffeemaker beep, he went back into the kitchen.

“
Don’t worry about
breakfast for these guys,” Aden said. “Charlie makes
it.”

“
He does?”

“
It’s one of his chores,”
Aden said. “He’s good at it. Do you forget where you put your
phone?”

“
Yeah,” Jeraine said. “I
never carried one of these things until Tanesha came
back.”

“
You didn’t have a cell
phone?”

“
I didn’t say I
didn’t
have
a
cell phone. I had two – one for personal and one for business,”
Jeraine said. “I said I didn’t carry one. I had people who had the
honor of carrying my cell phones.”

Aden smirked.

“
I know, it’s pretty
ridiculous,” Jeraine said.

“
Can I use your shower?”
Aden asked. “I’ll wake up Charlie and he can use the one in my
room.”

“
Sure,” Jeraine
said.

Aden went to wake Charlie
and Jeraine got dressed. He was pulling on his pants when his phone
rang. Thinking it was Tanesha, he answered on speaker
phone.

“
Hey,” Jeraine said. “I’m
just getting dressed.”

“
Mr. Wilson?” a man’s
voice came over the speaker. “I’m looking for Jeraine
Wilson.”

“
Oh sorry,” Jeraine picked
up the phone. He fumbled with the speaker and held it to his ear.
“I thought you were my wife.”

“
Not today,” the man
laughed.

“
How can I help you?”
Jeraine asked.

“
Mr. Wilson, this is
Doctor Vilner,” the man said. “We met a few days ago?”

“
Yes sir,” Jeraine
said.

“
I apologize for calling
so early,” Dr. Vilner said. “I know your father and he’s usually up
this early. Did I interrupt something?”

“
No sir,” Jeraine
said.

“
We received the results
of your brain scans,” the doctor said.

“
All of them?” Jeraine
asked.

“
Yes, that’s why it took
so long,” the doctor said. “I had to wait for the reports on the
functional scans.”

“
And?”

“
I’m sorry to tell you but
we’ve found areas of significant injury in your brain,” the doctor
said. “I thought you’d want to know as soon as
possible.”

Stunned, Jeraine sat down
hard on the bed. Tanesha had only agreed to do the interview if he
agreed to take all these tests. He did it to humor her. It never
occurred to him that something was actually wrong.

“
What does that mean?”
Jeraine asked.

“
I’d like you to come in
and we can discuss your options,” the doctor said. “Right now, you
need to know that you have an injury, most likely due to your drug
use. It affects the way you process information and make decisions.
This type of brain injury is not uncommon and also not a death
sentence. Really, you’re lucky to find this out now when we can do
something about it.”

“
What do I need to
do?”

“
There are different
treatment options to help regain brain function,” the doctor said.
“With clean nutrition, exercise, treatment, and
no drugs,
a healthy young man such
as yourself can recover from this type of damage in a year or maybe
two. As long as you don’t take drugs, sleep well, get good
exercise, good nutrition, oh and keep your stress level low, you’ll
be fine.”

“
I’m supposed to start
medical school next week,” Jeraine said.

“
I’m sorry. You won’t be
able to attend,” the doctor said. “You’ll have to ask if they can
extend your admission. There’s no way your brain can handle the
stress of school.”

“
What do you mean?”
Jeraine asked. “I’m smart enough.”

“
Have you recently
experienced panic while your brain locks up or repeats one thought
over and over again?”

“
Sure,” Since it had just
happened, he felt like the doctor was watching him. He looked
around. “My head hurts.”

“
That’s what I mean. Your
brain can’t handle school right now,” the doctor said. “Maybe in a
year or so, but not right now. Call my office today and we’ll get
you set up for treatment.”

“
Thank you sir,” Jeraine
said.

The doctor hung up the
phone. Dazed, Jeraine set the phone on the bed. His entire plan
revolved around going to medical school. He and Tanesha would be
doctors together. Overcome by hopelessness, Jeraine stared off into
space.

“
What’s wrong?” Aden asked
as he came out of the bathroom. “Jeraine?”

With a towel wrapped around
his middle, Aden touched Jeraine’s shoulder. Jeraine looked up at
him.

“
What’s happened?” Aden
asked.

“
The
drugs . . . they messed up my brain,” Jeraine said.
“I can’t go to school and Miss T,
she . . . ”

Jeraine shook his
head.

“
Tanesha what?”

“
She . . . ” Jeraine shook his head.
“That’s it.”

“
What’s it?” Aden
asked.

“
That’s it. My one chance
is over,” Jeraine said. “We were going to go to school together. We
were going to . . . and now? I can’t go
and . . . ”

“
You need to speak with
Tanesha,” Aden said.

“
She’s with her girls,”
Jeraine said. “She doesn’t want to talk to me.”

“
Listen to me,” Aden said.
“I’ve been where you are. I know you want to use.”

Jeraine nodded.

“
How many days since you
were high?”

Jeraine held up three
fingers.

“
You’re in a vulnerable
spot,” Aden said. “Your body aches to be high. Now you’ve got a
reason to do it.”

“
Not like you needed one,”
Charlie said from the doorway. “My Shi-dai is right. You need to
talk to Tanesha.”

Jeraine looked from the boy
to the man and shook his head.

“
It’s over,” Jeraine
said.

“
If that’s what you want,”
Aden said. Turning to Charlie, he asked, “Did you
shower?”

“
Nah, I just got up,”
Charlie said.

“
Go,” Aden said. “We’ll
need you to stay with everyone until Jeraine gets back.”

“
I’m not going to
interrupt Tanesha’s girl time,” Jeraine said. “I’m just not going
to do it.”

“
Then you don’t really
want to be married,” Aden said. “I need to get dressed.”

“
He’s right,” Charlie said
to Jeraine. “Can’t shit an addict like him. He’s heard
everything.”

“
This way,” Aden pushed
Charlie from the doorway. “You can shower in the guest bedroom.
We’ll leave this addict to either get ready and face his life or
keep his excuses and his addiction.”