The Memories of Trees Ch. 04-05

Collin's trip to Las Vegas back in 1997 was courtesy of Mira MiLady's Oven Roasted Chicken. One of his guilty pleasures in life was reading Inventor Today magazine, a publication that could almost be considered trash pulp for the MENSA crowd. It's glossy pages were plastered with badly pixilated images of new invention patents juxtaposed to articles on how to balance family and spurts of inventive seclusion or how to best protect your patent when shopping it to companies. A fortune hunter's guide for the pseudo-genius.

Toward the back of the magazine, crowded in a classified section, was a simple announcement from Mira MiLady calling all inventors to create the better rotisserie oven.

Collin spent a week just before the end of his junior year of high school, plotting and experimenting briefly, jotting and later transcribing his notes into a proposal. He entered the contest and won second place: A free week's trip to Las Vegas.

Collin's father laughed when he first broke the news.

"Only you could win a contest to make a better oven and you haven't so much as turned the one on in our house," his father guffawed over a pot roast dinner. His father, James Bainbridge, was wiry and even a little sallow. And James Bainbridge was deadly serious, all the time. He was the corporate attorney for a pharmaceutical maker that was perhaps the sole reason Gannis Falls existed. It's massive research facility and plant a sprawling edifice on the wooded outskirts of town, and employer of nearly half of Gannis Falls.

Collin had never expressed any interest in mechanical engineering before, and knew only the principles behind ovens and convection heating. But his hubris was in overdrive at the time – how hard could it be to design a better rotisserie? He tilted the interior of the oven, warped the metal skeleton to better conduct the heat waves more evenly over the flesh of the chicken. Nothing major, but it worked. And he won second place, the week's trip to Las Vegas.

His father's legal acumen managed to bend Mira MiLady's rules to allow the prize to be granted to an 18-year-old. Give the boy the cash equivalent and let him do of it as he will, or you will find yourself in court for uncompensated design improvements. It was a cold, nearly sinister statement his father made to the company's legal team that Collin would never forget. But it somehow also made him feel closer to a man who was both distant and monarchic his entire life. Collin mused how he ever came to be; that one fanciful thought most children have about their own parents. The idea that mom and dad could copulate, would ever copulate, do possibly copulate, was profound and vaguely disturbing. But for Collin, the notion that his parents had sex was simply alien; the very idea his father was capable of passion, that he could drum up lust or physical hunger, or that his father even loved Collin's mother enough to constitute arousal seemed like a dichotomy to his very nature.

Mr. James Bainbridge was a cardboard cutout in Collin's life. But still, the very gesture of helping his son circle past legal hurdles to claim his award from the chicken makers was enough to give Collin a momentary pause, reconsidering the figurehead who was his father.

On spring break of that year, Collin found himself embarking on a solo trip to Las Vegas. And in his bemused wanderings between rows of chiming and clattering slot machines, Collin stumbled into what became his driving inspiration that led to the end of the world.

****

The Durden homestead harkened images of carefully decorated wedding cakes, all ruffles and soft white layers and chalky icing. The moonlight only added an ethereal density to the house.

There were no lights on, Melissa most likely having climbed into bed already. But she did invite him, didn't she? There was an open invitation, even a suggestive look in her eyes that said come tonight.

Collin ambled the car by the mouth of Melissa's gravel driveway, his tires crunching the delta of scattering stones against asphalt.

He remembered evening dinners at the Durden house, his father often invited over to hammer out legal problems late into the night. The late Alan Durden was one of the executives at Fromahn Pharmaceuticals and often consulted with Collin's father when new drug patents were needed or when hungry trial attorneys targeted the drug maker for potential class action lawsuits.

Melissa and Collin were actually pretty close during those early childhood years, all through elementary school. It wasn't until they both reached the middle school years that the estrangement began, as their circles of friends pared and isolated from each other.

But Collin still relished those early years, those dinners when he and Melissa would giggle and eat fun foods like pizza or peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and then Collin would be forced to play with her Barbie Dolls and pastel colored cars and doll mansions until they both crashed, and he would wake the next morning in his own bed as though he and Melissa only played together in some dreamland.

Collin pieced together these scattered memories, and it sometimes amazed him just how often his life intersected with hers. They were memories he suppressed as she grew distant from Collin during the sixth grade, as her circle of friends were focused on the early bloomers, the cute and the perky; the kids that were the desires of budding sexuality. Collin was quiet and gawky and had trouble nurturing friendships with kids his age who saw him as smart and off-putting, even then. Coincidently, at the same time, Mr. Durden was elevated to another position, dissolving those late night huddles with Collin's father as a need. Soon after, his own genius began to emerge, the fugues into biology books and chemistry sets and passions for things on a molecular level, all of which effectively isolated him from even his tenuous friends.

There were no lights on, Melissa most likely having climbed into bed already. But she did invite him, didn't she? There was an open invitation, even a suggestive look in her eyes that said come tonight.

Collin ambled the car by the mouth of Melissa's gravel driveway, his tires crunching the delta of scattered pebbles against asphalt. He turned the key, turned off the car, and listened for a long while as the car popped and settled as the cool night air seeped beneath the hood. His eyes never broke their stare at the Durden house, and he could never remember what had been going through his mind. But any action whatsoever failed Collin in those moments.

Then a light came on. It was soft, orange and filled what little of the room Collin could see in heavy shadows. And it flickered. Candle light. Oh my, he thought. Collin got out, closed his door as gently as possible, although the metallic thud still carried across the vast Durden property, and again still without thinking, he trotted his way to Melissa's lighted room.

Among the shadows, a figured moved to the window. It didn't take much for Collin to make out his obsession, propping down against the sill, her hands bracing it on the outside so she could lean out. Collin reached the house; Melissa's window was above the wraparound porch, just out of his reach.

"I didn't think you'd come tonight," Melissa commented, and even in the darkness, Collin could discern her humored expression.

"Impulse, Melissa. That's not typically something I follow either." Collin scanned the house and eyed the white post reaching up to the roof above the porch. It looked sturdy, and he felt strong enough to leverage himself to what could amount as a landing to her window. He stalked to the post and wrapped his arms tight around its wooden form and launched upward. His legs followed, and Collin scooted upward as Melissa giggled and leaned out her window into the moonlight to watch his progress.

Two hands finds purchase along sandpaper-like roof tiles. One leg lifts and secures itself on the roof. Careful, old boy. Don't want to rip the gutter off and take a hard tumble into the dormant patch of azaleas.

Collin levered his body and legs to the roof, squatting to ensure his footing and gazed at Melissa with a lithe smile. "Impressive," she whispered, letting her voice flutter up to the moon and stars.

If ever a moment felt magical, it was now. Collin moved in a squat to her window, Melissa leaned out even further and they kissed. And in that kiss, the sensations vaulted in his memory from their time in Las Vegas swept through him. Melissa laid her hands on his chest, rubbing him tenderly as he ventured his arms around her, chancing his hand through hair with the remnant scents of fruity alcoholic drinks and second-hand smoke. Yes, much like Vegas.

She broke the kiss and stared at him, a Mona Lisa smile gracing her face, and that awkwardness of what to say now, where to go from there.

"I'm sorry," Collin finally broke through the silence. He let slip what he so wanted to tell her from the beginning of this evening. Sorry for everything. Sorry for murdering her ex-husband and her family and her friends. Sorry for gifting her a world that straddled a line between numbed relief and despair.

"For what?"

"You don't know how utterly lovely you are." Collin let the apology bury itself beneath his gratuitous outburst of lust and longing. No farther than that or his bald accompaniment, while lost somewhere along Gannis Falls' winding lanes, would rip her world even further apart, possibly secreting her off to a resort for political dissidents and foreign enemies and people who had an inkling of the truth of the plague that warped the world. Or worse. Would they go that far? They, being the same bureau of ranking seniors who bankrolled his work, turned on the research machine. Would they kill to keep this secret?

These thoughts fleeted by in a second, but the effect was chilling nonetheless. Melissa though just chuckled, closed her eyes and kissed him again. "You can't stay tonight," she whispered. "Not yet, at least."

"I know. Don't think I came here thinking you would..."

"No, I know you didn't," she interrupted. "But just not now, Collin."

Melissa's nightshirt slipped forward of her breasts and for that instant Collin felt heated arousal and hoped she didn't mean what was just said. She pulled at his shirt, urging him into her window.

"At least you can leave by the door this time."

****

The only hotel operating in Gannis Falls was actually well outside the city limits; nearly twenty miles north near the wooded border of Virginia. Collin pulled into the lot totally deflated and feeling the tinges of exhaustion. Most of the parking spaces were empty. While the hotel was one of the very few in operation anywhere within a hundred miles of Gannis Falls, customer demand was still extremely limited.

Collin chuckled to himself. Customer demand? Hell, customers were extremely limited. But many businesses subsisted upon the government retaking control of all utilities and offering very steep discounts until things turned around. Until the birth rate surpassed the death rate again, Collin guessed.

The Ford Taurus was parked down the way, blending into the background of lifeless metal husks that scattered the lot. Collin involuntarily pinched a satisfactory smile, having defeated his minder in one of many skirmishes for privacy, for freedom – for the freedom of being constantly reminded of his past, of his guilt.

Collin quietly entered his room, gazed briefly at the wash of orange and burnt umber bedspread, examined the ghosts and shadows and gouges across the walls, as his body disassembled the tension bit by bit. The tapping at his door paused that disassembly.

He opened the door and was greeted by his minder. The man, nearly a head shorter than Collin and much stockier, appeared to have just emerged from a shower, although dressed again in an oxford blue button-up shirt and khaki slacks that actually complimented his girth. Collin knew little of him other than a name, Mr. Creekmier, but please just call me Hank. Hank, most likely from some shadowed intelligence agency recruited to follow Collin in his journey back home, displayed a neutered accent that most likely was birthed from years inside The Beltway.

Collin felt his chest deflate and icy prickles pinch his cheeks like the onset of some rash.

"Hello, Collin. Hope the reunion was fun," Hank said, extending a bottle of Makers' Mark bourbon, the amber liquid sloshing across the curve of its neck. "Night cap?"

"I think I had enough to drink tonight."

"You can have one more. You're not driving anymore this evening," he replied. Collin sighed and moved out of the doorway as Hank brushed past and to a sofa chair next to a plain wooden table, marred by ghostly rings of past beverages. "You'll have to supply the glasses tonight, and unless you like it neat, may have to make a trek to the ice machine."

"Neat actually," Collin said. Systematically, Hank positioned the two tumblers side by side and poured generous amounts of liquor into each. Collin sat opposite him, resting his body against the frayed cushions of the chair.

Hank tipped his glass. "To hometowns and memories."

Collin dismissed his toast with a faint tip to his glass and pulled a large sip, relishing the burn. The liquor left an oily sheen across the face of the glass, settling in rivulets within seconds. Hank was studying Collin, but the scientist avoided his eyes and instead parted the thick beige curtains and peered out to the moon's glimmering aura painting the trees beyond the parking lot.

"Collin, can I ask you a question?"

Collin didn't respond; he suspected Hank wouldn't need permission to ask.

"Have I been in your way any since arriving in Gannis Falls? Have I prevented you from going anywhere, seeing anyone? Speaking to anyone?"

This time his minder waited for an answer, his brown eyes expecting while he sipped his drink. Collin felt a weight of guilt, as though he were plotting conspiracies behind his back. There was no such plots, but Collin really couldn't pinpoint why he evaded Hank's tail earlier, why he desperately wanted to be rid of the balding guy, why he felt himself suffocate in his presence.

"No." Collin answered weakly.

"Okay. That's fair. I'm trying to give you as much space as I can within my duties," he said. "Tonight's little cat and mouse game; I can sympathize with you, believe it or not."

Collin finally met his eyes.

"I know what you were feeling. There you are, seeing Melissa again after years of separation, and she invites you home. The last person you want hovering over you is me," Hank smiled, drinking again as though the two were buddies siding up in a bar and sharing old war stories and commiserating on life's black and blues.

Maybe Collin's tolerance to alcohol wasn't what it used to be. Maybe he was just tired and drained from the emotional circus his brain danced in earlier that evening. Maybe Collin wasn't as sharp as he once had been. But it took a moment of staring blankly at Hank before he felt the stinging slap of diabolic revelation.

"How do you know about Melissa?"

Hank leaned forward, intent, the humor of his face washing away as the second passed.

"Are you being serious, Collin? You are the U.S. government's prime property right now, and you are solely responsible for unleashing the hounds of hell on this world. You don't think we done our homework? Know everything and everyone from your background?"

"She's off limits, Hank," Collin tried to match his serious tone, as though drawing the proverbial line in the sand.

"Collin, when it comes to you, no one's off limits. You know too much as it is; I can't think of a government in the world who wouldn't violate the Geneva Convention to beat and torture the truth out of your ass."

"It wasn't supposed to happen like this. No one was supposed to die." Collin's voice was weakened as he said he, almost pleading his case before God. What truth was there in that statement? Very little, if he really was honest with himself. Collin knew the risks from the moment he put his plan on paper, understood that the virus could go renegade and morph into something dangerous.

"That's semantics, Collin. It doesn't matter. You want the reality? You're extremely fortunate that you're even allowed out of the compound, that the powers-that-be saw fit to allow you to attend your own reunion. Cover story, minder, rehearsed history. That's all apart of your game now, Collin," Hank sank back into his seat, deflating from what had been an obviously prepared reprimand.

"Do you want to continue playing this game, Collin?"

"If you mean by staying in Gannis Falls longer, yes," he finally said.

"Okay, that's fine. As long as you watch your mouth, especially with Melissa. Be careful with her, boy, for her sake. You are your cover story now. Cambridge, professorship, and nothing more."

The two remained silent for a long moment, Hank finishing his bourbon and Collin staring blankly into an endless horizon of sunsets on the face of the wooden table.

"We all keep secrets, Collin," Hank said as he stood, pouring one more healthy shot into his glass and topping off Collin's. "From friends, lovers, family. That's life. What you got to come to realize is that your lie is now your truth. To protect you. To protect Melissa. And to protect us wayward souls who just happened to survive your fascination with viruses."

He left soon after, almost as though a ghostly presence vacated the room, despite his bulk. But the understated menace in his words chilled Collin. Sometime the next morning, Collin realized he had downed the entire glass of bourbon and fell asleep on the table, his lips sticky and crusted, his breath rank and his mouth muffled as though stuffed with clusters of cotton.

Collin also had the distinct feeling that he had also spent the evening speaking with an old lover, one of the millions who died in the plague. She, too, left him numb, even before her death, alone and tangled in unwashed bed sheets in her military issued apartment.