— Tops. All the more reason to go after her.
— Okay, thanks.
— No problem.
— I’m really sorry you’re chained like this.
— You want to let me loose? I can help you with whatever.
— No. You know I can’t.
— Thomas. We’re friends.
— I know, I know.
— I can watch things here when you’re on the beach. I can do whatever. We’re in this together now.
— No. I shouldn’t.
— You should.
— I shouldn’t. It’s not that I don’t trust you.
— You do, right?
— Absolutely. But think of it — if you go around helping me, you’ll be complicit. I can’t have that. I need you to stay innocent.
— Thomas.
— No. I know I’m right. I’ll see you soon.
BUILDING 55
— You awake?
— No.
— Mom. Wake up.
— Oh Thomas.
— Why are you sleeping? It’s three in the afternoon.
— I’m in pain. Thomas, you have to let me go. I’m in such pain.
— That’s just withdrawal.
— Withdrawal from what, you fool?
— How would I know?
— I’m not on anything, Thomas. But I am sixty-two years old. And being chained up like this is very hard on my body. Have you seen my leg?
— It’s ugly, but that’s just because you’re leaning on it funny. If you just laid your leg down like everyone else it wouldn’t turn all purple. Jesus. That is disgusting.
— You have to unshackle me, Thomas.
— I can’t. Just lay your leg down, and it’ll take the pressure off. Give it an hour.
— I can’t believe you.
— I just came in to tell you that this was all happening for a reason.
— That’s what you’ve been saying.
— No. I mean that I think there’s a more divine purpose.
— Oh no.
— I saw a vision this morning and I think it’s a sign. I mean, here I am in the middle of nowhere, and you’re here, and the astronaut is here and the congressman, and then I see this woman who has been in my dreams since I was ten or so. It all has to mean something.
— Thomas, you brought us all here. This is no coincidence.
— Right, but that was just a prelude to this woman on the beach. She was wearing exactly what I always saw her wearing in my visions, jeans and a cable-knit sweater. And there she was, alone on the beach with her dog. And now I feel like I’m so close to something. Once I talk to her, she’ll know who I am and why we were on the beach at the same time.
— And what? You go skipping down the coast and fall in love? Or you bring her back here to show her what you’ve done? She’ll want to be with a kidnapper? She’ll fall for you and your wonderful achievement here? You’re nuts, I know this, but you’re not this nuts, are you?
— This is the problem with you. You’ve never had any kind of optimism. You’re such a dark-hearted cynic. You pretend like you have these New Age ideas about things, and every so often you have some experience you think is magical or whatever, but really you’re a very very pessimistic, black-hearted person. So you can’t even conceive of something like this happening. Something pure and good, like a woman appearing on the beach for me. You don’t believe in anything clicking into place. Your life has been a sloppy mess so you assume mine will be, too. You don’t believe in destiny.
— Well, Thomas, I actually do. I believe you are destined to go to jail, and be evaluated by a clinical psychologist if you’re lucky. And they’ll determine that you have delusions of grandeur, and display acute antisocial behavior, and have monumental control issues, and you think destiny is seeing a woman on the beach during a suicidal kidnapping escapade.
— Good. That’s good.
— It’s not good. None of this is good.
— You know what’s telling? The astronaut, who I barely know, is more supportive of me pursuing this woman than you are.
— Because he wants you caught, you imbecile. Of course he wants you making contact with some woman on the beach. He wants her to report you.
— On the surface, sure, that might seem true. But you know what? Kev actually cares. You know that he and I were friends in college, right?
— Of course you were.
— How would you know? We were. That’s why he’s out here. He confided in me when we were in school, he told me he wanted to go up in the Space Shuttle, and now it’s fifteen years later for him and now there’s no chance that will ever happen. So I’m trying to help him see a new path, and he’s appreciative of me.
— I’m sure he is, Thomas.
— And he met his wife in a similar way that I met this woman.
— While kidnapping his mother and locking her to a pole.
— No! No. No. Why do you have to be so cynical? Don’t you see that something extraordinary is happening?
— Thomas, I think you are very very ill.
—
— Where are you going?
BUILDING 52
— Back already! You see her?
— I saw her, but not the right her. Tell me something, Kev: Your parents were probably perfect?
— They were not. They got divorced and both remarried.
— But they’re probably all best friends. You all have Thanksgivings together.
— No, we do not. No one likes anyone else.
— But that’s recent. Growing up?
— I had eleven different bedrooms before I was in high school. I was beaten repeatedly by my father, and he once broke my arm on purpose.
— This sounds rehearsed. You’ve said this before.
— I keep it foremost in my mind.
— But still you succeed.
— Yes. Not the answer you wanted?
— I don’t know.
— You been back to the beach?
— Not yet.
— You should get out there. You never know. You definitely don’t want to miss the girl while you’re talking to me.
— Yeah.
— You should go.
— I know. I know. Thanks Kev. I feel good about this.
BUILDING 52
— Kev!
— Oh hey.
— You were napping?
— Well, buddy, there’s not much else to do out here. You’ve been running? You’re out of breath.
— I ran back here. I had to tell you. I met her.
— You met the girl?
— I did.
— Wow. Good. I’m so glad.
— I know. I did like you said. I went back to the bluff, and I waited for her to come by again with her dog. It was three hours or so, but she came back. About five o’clock.
— See, told you.
— Yeah, so I saw her down the beach, and she was walking toward where I was, but there wasn’t any way for me to get down there. I hadn’t figured out a route to the beach. And the bluff there is too steep to jump or shimmy down. So I start freaking out, looking around for some path or something. But I had to find one quick, so I could get down to the beach and start walking toward her like it’s casual, like I’m just like her, someone who walks the beach this time every day, right?
— Right. You’re smooth.
— So I run about a quarter mile down the way, away from her, and finally I find this huge path down to the shore. It must have been some kind of boat launch back in the day. So I get down to the beach and can still see her down the way, walking toward me. And you know what the great thing is?
— It all sounds great.
— She’s wearing the same sweater, this cream cable-knit sweater. I mean, the sweater is half the whole thing for me. Any woman who wears a sweater like that knows everything I want. And the jeans rolled up. I mean, a barefoot woman with jeans and a white cable-knit sweater! That’s my fantasy.