I returned to my mother's cottage, and walked up the porch, my eyesadjusting to the darkness, seeking out that lone pine tree.  Broots,who is ahead of me, has the key in the lock. I enter to find the housecleaned and livable, thanks to dear Broots. I notice that he even stockedthe liquor cabinet, now I, maybe my mother's daughter but somethings onlyrun true to a certain degree. Drinking was not one of them. I point outto Broots that mother didn't drink after I was born and when Debbie startedliving with us. She saved it for special occasions only- I distinctly rememberLyle's death being one of them.  Syd and her toasted the old bastarda restful slumber in hell. Not that I understood why then, I was a childof three. Now I think a peaceful slumber is to good for him. I ready myselffor bed and promise to call Broots the moment I wake in the morning tomeet him for breakfast. Settling upon the sofa in front of the fireplace,I pick up the journal that started this fact finding mission.

Turning to the last entry in father's journal, a detailed account ofthe argument they had had. He told her that he would turn himself in, andshe would walk away, no looking back. They had called upon Sydney, Brootsand Sam for help but didn't reveal all of the plan. They knew that somethinghad transpired between my parents, after all each had lost loved ones becauseof Centre interference. Mother lost Thomas and father lost Zoe. That theysought solace in each other, made some sense. Grief does the strangestthings to people. A woman that father met long ago taught him that. Yet each carried deep scars. Emotional baggage.  Mother was not oneto let go of things easily, that is until she had a reason. Father madeher see that reason was me, or what would eventually be me. That was whenthe roles reversed. Mother's creedo of "God forgives. I don't,"  becamemy father's.

There was one thing Sam had been right about though. My sleep that nightwas again distrubed by strange dreams of ghosts. I wonder if mother dreamtof these ghosts, she must have. I recall waking up to find her in my bedwith me when I was young. So when I woke in a cold sweat several timesthat night, I was anxious to continue this mission.  It was then thatI realized that I would have to visit the building that was located onthe outskirts of town. A place where my welcome would be received coldly,but I wasn't quite ready to enter that hostile place.

I decided to visit Angelo, the childhood friend of both my parents.The man-child that lived in a world of others feelings, thanks to a manknown as William Raines. He lived with Broots and I knew that talking tohim would prove difficult. According to my father's journal, Angelo communicatedwith minimal words but that in his mind, he knew exactly what was goingon. An empathic genius. Three children thrown together. Father kidnappedfor his genius, Timmy for his potential, and mother, what secret did shecarry.

The morning was rainy, cold and dark just like the night had been forme, so I hurriedly dressed, and then drove to Broots's home. He was surprisedto see me so early, but I didn't apologize for it either. Not my nature,too. The person that I came to see was standing in the shadows, waiting.

"Mother's daugher," he said, emerging from the shadows," Friend's legacy."

"Yes, Angelo, it's my father I want to talk to you about," I was cautiousand yet the excitement was building again.

"Couldn't protect Jarod," he said loudly, that even Broots was startledby this  outspoken statement.

"That's not true, Angelo. You protected him from Bartlett, when he neededprotection," I reached out toward the aged man, his clear blue eyes fixedon mine.

"Protect from Barlett, but not from self," he whispered, " Wouldn'tlisten. Warned him no go lab. Danger."

His agitation was beginning to worry me and so I motioned for him tosit on the stairs with me. I sat and watched him, attempting neither totouch nor speak. He sat slumped next to me and he was trembling, finallyhis hand reached over and touched mine. I smiled at his touch and tookhis hand in mine.

"Loved you much," he said, not looking at anything in particular," Both."

" I know, Angelo. We both knew."

"Be back," he muttered and scrambled up the stairs, just as Broots returnedwith a hot cup of tea for me. He took a position across from me, leaningback against the couch.

"Where did Angelo go?" he asked as he brought his own mug to his lips.

"He told me that my father loved me and my mother and then scrambledup the stairs. He said he'd be back." I looked at my reflection in thesilver tea cup, when I caught sight of the man-child lumbering down thestairs, a box in his hands. A box that he thrust at me with some urgency.

"For daughter, saved it."

"That must be rather important. He's never let anyone touch that box."Broots said.

Out of the corner of my eye, I could see that it was a rectangular metalbox that he thrust into my shaking hand. Broots stared from the box toAngelo to me and repeated how the box must be important to my quest, forits been with Angelo since he left the confines of the Centre.

"Angelo?" I quiered.

"Jarod's," he whispered and then turned and starts to lumber away, upthe stairs, slowly. I set the tea cup down on the wooden stair and placemy other hand on top of it. My knees start to quiver as my fingers startto unwork the lock. Angelo stops in his tracks and turns back to face me.Getting down on his haunches, his feet percariously balanced on the stair,he looks at Broots then back to me.

"Not here. Home!" he whispers and my hands wrap around the box tightlyas he continues to speak," Go see hell."

"Angelo!" Broots snapped forcefully, a look of horror mixed with fearcrossing his features, as well.

"Angelo? " I wanted to get up from my spot on the stair, and walk, norun, back to the car that's parked in the driveway and go home to my mother'scottage with this find. Instead, my parent's childhood friend is tellingme that it is time to go . . .

"Time has come. Go to hell," he repeats.

Understanding dawning on me, Angelo is telling me that it's time, timethat I face the greatest demon of all.  The Centre.  His eyessay it all. Yes, it's  time, that I am strong enough to conquer whateverit is that's locked away in that cold hostile place.  I watch, asAngelo slides off his perch and comes back down toward me, his hand reachingout to touch my cheek.

"Go," and with that one word, my mother's voice echoed in my head thatit would be all right. Mother who always claimed that I had my father'sinner strength and serenity instead of her wilfulness and petulance.

So it was with trepidation, with a lifetime of memories, not mine, thatI climbed the stairs to the glass doors of the Centre. To a place my fatherreturned, freely, so that my mother could escape its evil grasp. Broots had wanted to accompany me to this bleak, desolute and empty worldbut I persuaded him that I was indeed strong enough to go alone. As I moved through the hallways, I perceived how unfriendly this placeis, was.  There is no warmth here, just dark coldness that penetratesthe soul and turns it into something grotesque and twisted. The place isso deathly quiet, that the only noise is the echo from the heels of myblack leather boots as they make contact on the tile floor. I felt thatI had intruded on unfriendly ghosts that were better left undistrubed,yet I continued my explorations and found myself in front of a rather precariouslyhung door. Pushing it open, its groans reverberate down the hallway, theinterior revealing itself to me. My eyes taking it in.

Half the ceiling is missing and the i-beams and wires beneath exposed,and in my imagination, which is heightened by the eerieness of this place,they resemble the bones of a skeleton, and the broken glass windows thesightless hollows of its eyes.  Time stood still and I realized thatthis was were my father had died. I could feel it. My father's death wasno accident, the blast had been contained to this area of the Centre. SlowlyI sank to the debris-covered floor and stare at the devastation. How longI sat there, I have no idea, but when I left the building, the rain fromthe morning had turned to snow and the blackness of night only illuminatedthe tiny swirling flakes.
 
 
 
 

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Part 4