Caffrey Flashback

Chapter 27: Running

Jacobi Hospital. Friday night. February 27, 2004.

Neal woke with a gasp, and then relaxed again.

"That's the third time tonight," a man said. Neal couldn't quite place the voice.

"Hush, Edmund. He'll be asleep again in a minute."

"All I'm saying is Noelle told us to call if he seemed distressed. She could have been a little more specific. Doesn't this seem distressed to you?"

"You're more distressed than he is."

"It would help if she'd tell us what happened to him. I've spent all evening imagining what it might be that he's dreaming about. Or flashing back to, in Noelle's parlance. I think we have a right to know."

"A psychologist can't share details from her sessions with her patients, darling. You know that." There was a pause. "Henry, on the other hand, seems to know more than he's telling and doesn't have doctor-patient privilege to fall back on as an excuse."

"Oh, you think you're going to crack that nut? Ten dollars says he's not going to spill a single detail."

What had he been dreaming about? Neal pondered that question as he drifted in a state that was not quite sleep. He searched his memory. Something was there, something new he didn't recognize. Now that he noticed it, he kept coming back to it, fascinated but wary. It was as if he had lived in a house for years and finally noticed a door that had been there all along. Before he could decide whether or not to open it, he was asleep.

The next time Neal woke, it was more gradually. He had more of an awareness of his surroundings now. He remembered he was in a hospital after being given an overdose of Flashback. The sedative in the drug would have left him unconscious and then asleep for hours, according to the briefing Henry had given. "What time izzit?" he murmured.

"It's Friday night," said a woman. She sounded familiar. "Almost Saturday. Are you going to sleep the weekend away?"

He sighed and relaxed, but for once he didn't drift back to sleep again. He was too curious about who the woman was. He listened as she carried on a conversation with someone else in the room, and he feigned sleep so they would keep talking. While they spoke he sorted through a series of vague and dreamlike memories of the last day, trying to decide which pieces were real.

Soon he was more awake than he'd been all day, and he kept coming to the same conclusion: these people in his room were his grandparents. At various times he'd spoken to them and even played poker with them, without truly understanding who they were. But he'd seen pictures of them over the last few years, had toured their home in D.C. with Henry a few months ago over the Christmas holidays while they were out of town, and now that he could think clearly he recognized them as Edmund and Irene Caffrey.

Now what did he do? Was he supposed to sit up, admit he didn't remember anything about them, and ask how they'd been doing for the last twenty-some years? He didn't feel ready for that conversation. But unless he could really fall asleep, he didn't see how he could avoid it.

Whose bright idea had it been to leave him alone with these people?

It had to be Henry's fault.

He wished someone else would show up to take the focus away from him. Was there a way to get a doctor or nurse to come to his room? Neal considered trying a variation of a con he and Henry had perfected when he was eighteen. They'd go to a restaurant, order a meal they couldn't afford, and then as the dessert was being delivered one of them would pretend to suffer an instant, migraine-like headache. Not waiting to eat dessert was the master touch. It helped convince people they weren't faking illness to avoid the bill. And they'd made the act subtle, not yelling for help, but almost trying to hide the problem in the midst of a crowded restaurant. One of them would be hissing in pain and holding his head while the other pretended to search for medication they would discover had been left at their hotel. They tried to make it seem serious, but not so serious that someone would call for an ambulance. When they did it right, a good Samaritan would offer them a ride or would hail and pay for a taxi to their hotel. The restaurant bill would be forgotten in the concern for the sick boy and his anxious brother. If anyone mentioned the bill, usually a patron or the restaurant would promise that it was taken care of. A few restaurants had even sent them a get-well card in care of their hotel, with vouchers for a free meal.