Chapter 14: Practice Makes Perfect

Jaime

THURSDAY EVENING, Jaime finished his homework after dinner and sat in his room to make some notes on Emerson’s prediction concept. He opened his composition book and happened to see his diagram of the proposed thought transfer computer. He hadn’t thought about it the past week or two after he and Keira started dating. Emerson had mentioned it in class as they were working and called it a little tinfoil hat-ish. Jaime smiled at the term and nodded as he traced some of the paths in the concept. He jotted down the words ‘skin contact’ next to one of the boxes.

Everything he’d ever read or researched on the subject was an expose of people who claimed the ability to telecommunicate or had devised a way of doing it. They’d all proved to be frauds. Now, some of the most popular magic shows in talent competitions had some element of ‘mind-reading’ in them. Jaime thought they looked interesting and wondered how the magician was accomplishing the mentalist feat. He’d like to be in the audience sometime to hear what was really going through their minds.

He studied his diagram a minute longer and drew a secondary box below and to the right that simply held the word ‘proof.’ He could not even prove to a third party that he and Keira spoke telepathically. It would immediately be assumed they were intimate with each other and had worked out signals, like so many other acts had done.

It takes a minimum of three. I’m sure of it now. It’s logical that three with the talent would have enough synergy to broadcast in a way that would demand attention. I just need to find them.

Jaime slammed his book shut and closed his mind to all input and broadcasting, hanging out his ‘Do Not Disturb’ sign and going silent. That had not been his thought!

He recognized that voice—that head taste—as if he was still the nine-year-old who had heard it in the grocery store. The man had said he was too young then and they weren’t ready. It had frightened Jaime so much he’d hidden in a walk-in refrigerator in the grocery store until one of the staff had discovered him. The voice—that particular head taste—still frightened Jaime.

Had the man been broadcasting? Trying to get Jaime to expand his concept?

He turned off his computer and cell phone. For the first time in a long time, he retreated to his closet where the walls were still lined with aluminum foil. He drew into himself and began to shut down all his senses. He couldn’t let the man find him. Whoever it was, he was as evil as the kidnapper they’d stopped on their first date.

Jaime and David

Jaime had managed to shut off all his senses, hiding in the closet, when his father found him.

“Jaime! Jaime, come back!” his father shouted as he shook his son.

David pulled him out of the closet and held him as he worked to make sure he was still breathing and his heart was still beating. When Jaime began to regain consciousness, his father was on the phone to 9-1-1.

“He seems to be waking up. He was completely unconscious and unresponsive. His heartbeat was faltering. I just went in to tell him goodnight and found him.”

The operator connected David to the duty nurse.

“EMTs are on their way, sir. Estimated arrival is five minutes. Please stay on the line and keep me updated as to his progress. Do you see any signs of drugs in the vicinity? Needles? Packets? Pills?”

“No, there’s nothing like that around. I don’t think Jaime would ever touch anything like that. He’s even more conservative than I am.”

“Has anything like this happened before?” the nurse asked.

“No. Well, that’s not right. It was just like this when he was born. Doctors never figured out what went wrong with his system then. He just shut down a few minutes after birth and was placed in an incubator, even though he was full term. Once his breathing and heartrate stabilized, he still didn’t wake up for two days. I’m afraid that’s what caused his autism.”

“Your son is autistic?”

“Yes. Sorry, I should have mentioned that. It’s the term we were given. He’s never spoken. He hears fine, and he’s fluent in sign language. He’s smart and has never had problems with learning in school. If anything, he’s a little faster than others in his class.”

“The type of shutdown you are describing has been observed in autistic children who become over-stimulated or who are severely frightened. Was he engaged in any activity that might cause intense emotions?”

“I don’t believe so. He sometimes plays video games, but there were none running. His phone and computer were shut down. He’s awake now. Jaime, can you hear me?”

Jaime nodded his head and then signed, “I’m fine. Sorry, Dad.”

“He says he’s fine now,” David said.

David got up off the sofa where he’d been sitting cradling his son to answer the door and let the EMTs in. The 9-1-1 nurse disconnected to talk to the EMTs while they examined Jaime. David interpreted his sign language for them. They tested his heartrate, blood pressure, blood oxygen level, and even ran a breathalyzer to determine if there was any intoxication at play. Everything tested normal.

“We can take him to the hospital for more tests,” one of the techs suggested. “I honestly don’t know what they’d find. The staff recommends that you visit your doctor and have a full battery of tests run. I’m sure he’d want to run an electroencephalogram—that’s an EEG—and possibly follow up with an MRI to be sure no abnormalities have developed or gone undetected.”

“Abnormalities?”

“I’m not suggesting any specific possibilities. Often MRIs are just a routine exam that verifies everything is normal. Rarely, an MRI will detect things like tumors, inflammation, blood flow, and obstructions to blood vessels. There are really too many possible things an MRI could detect or verify to list them all for you. You should read up on them before you talk to your doctor.”

“Okay. Thank you,” David said. “Jaime, do you think we need to go to the hospital now, or should we just call Doc Roberts in the morning?”

“I feel fine now, Dad,” Jaime signed. “Let’s leave it until tomorrow. I don’t think anything will happen again tonight. It must have been the stress of working on my class project. I’m fine.”

“Okay. Thank you for getting here so fast, guys,” David said to the techs as they packed their gear and headed back to the ambulance. I wish they’d been as fast when Nola needed them.

Jaime and Keira

«What happened? Are you okay?» Keira demanded Friday morning as she grabbed his hand at school. The warm flood of assurance she received from him helped to calm her down, but she was still frightened.

«I had a kind of incident last night. We need to talk about it, but we don’t have time at school. It’s really important. I sort of shut everything down.»

«No kidding! I was kind of getting used to feeling you ... you know ... way in the background of my thoughts. But all of a sudden, you were just gone. It wasn’t like ‘Do Not Disturb.’ It was more like ‘Moved. No forwarding address.’ You scared the fucking shit out of me! I must have sent you a dozen texts!»

«Oh, shit! I should turn my phone back on. When I started shutting down, I turned off my phone and computer, too. It was unreal. I’ve never been so scared. Dad called 9-1-1.»

«My God! Zip, we should cut school and go somewhere.»

«I don’t want to do anything out of the ordinary. Dad’s already making an appointment with my doctor to have an EEG and MRI run. I haven’t had those since I was a lot younger.»

«Okay. But I love you. I didn’t realize how much until you were just not there.»

«After school. We’ll find someplace quiet and I’ll share the whole thing with you. Share it, not just tell you. Um ... We might have to kiss.»

«Sneaky. Of course we’ll have to kiss. Call out to me anytime you are feeling like that again. Okay?»

«Okay. Geez. Brad Johnson’s at it again with his imagining you as an anime girl. Why do they all have such huge boobs?» Jaime asked as they sat in English class.

«Shh. At least it’s not a gross one yet. Shut him out!»

They managed to focus on Ms. Henderson as she led a discussion about why so many 21st century English language books were focused on revisiting the past instead of dealing with the present.

«Where are we going?» Jaime asked as Keira led him onto an unfamiliar streetcar across town.

«My aunt’s house, » Keira said. «I called and made arrangements at lunch. It’s private. But we can’t mess around there. I mean besides a little kissing. She didn’t offer us a bed.»

«You had me convinced we should go slow the other day, but I’m really convinced we need to be cautious now. I want to kiss you. I want to do so much, sometimes my mind overflows with it. But I’m scared of other things besides losing myself if we go all the way now.»

«Last night?»

«Yes. You know, I love holding your hand. I bet most teens don’t get anywhere near the amount of pleasure from this that we do.»

Keira took the hint and the change of subject. They shared news about their day at school until they got off the streetcar a block from Aunt Rose’s house.

As soon as they walked through the door, Jaime could feel the quiet in the house.

«What is it about this house?» he asked.

«I think it’s the aluminum siding. She also had the whole house insulated with something that has metal fibers in it. I don’t know what it was.»

She led him to the sofa. They dropped their backpacks and sat close, still holding hands.

«It works. Is she one of us?»