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Chapter or Story 
Chapter or Story
Dawn broke overcast and brisk, and was accompanied by a muted, relentless rain. Jarod observed the murkiness spill from beneath heavily draped windows, and pool onto the hand-knotted rug, and deduced that the remainder of the day would be no brighter.
He loosened the blood pressure cuff and hastily recorded Sydney's diastolic and systolic into a notebook, alongside pulse and other vitals.
Pressing an index finger to the bridge of his nose, Jarod contemplated the numbers on the page and a third cup of coffee, and deliberately chose not to focus on updating Michele, not immediately, not while Sydney continued to silently sulk about nearly falling during early morning physical therapy.
"Irrational," Sydney groused, jarring to full alertness.
"What is?" Jarod asked.
"These nightmares. The rain is in no way similar to leaking faucets and pipes. It's barely audible."
Jarod flipped on the wall light switch to fully illuminate the room. "The vagaries of the human brain are often perplexing," he said with a sympathetic smile.
"Hmm, yes, I know the terms, and that I'm still experiencing symptoms of PTSD. I advise all of my patients to voice umbrage, own their feelings. I believe I should do the same."
"You should, and it's a lovely day for it." Jarod opened the drapes to reveal the fine mist falling from a leaden sky. "It's going to be five in the morning all day, or at least it's going to look like it is." He went briefly into the bathroom and collected a shaving kit and a towel dampened with hot water.
Jarod promptly offered the latter to Sydney, observed as he lay it upon his face, but not before Sydney said with a meaningful look at the window, "I'm eager to go out there, return to my work."
"Work," Jarod repeated, dully. "Your work helping Lyle?"
"I'd say it's better late than never," Sydney answered remorsefully, "but that would be rather disingenuous of me, and it's evident that my attempts to help him were futile. Lyle, after all, killed a man."
"Ray was a serial child rapist. He was the proverbial monster in Lyle's closet."
"Raines kept his monster on a short chain," Sydney said, angrily, "and unleashed him on Lyle each time he defied him."
"You helped Lyle find the courage to face his demon."
"I helped Lyle," corrected Sydney somberly, "slay his demon, Jarod; that was never my intention. I'm sorry I failed him, and that you and Miss Parker discovered the truth this way."
"I discovered that you no longer call her Miss Parker," Jarod said with an impish grin, preparing the shaving cream and brush. He and Nicholas shared these duties, often alternated days, helping Sydney shave, bathe, dress. Sydney rarely resisted their help anymore.
His hands sometimes trembled, his legs sometimes refused to support him. He was still healing. Those were merely facts to be accepted, that he hadn't always accepted.
He'd been angry with his body's slow recovery, and hadn't particularly enjoyed the loss of independence, and had angrily conveyed as much to Parker one afternoon, overturning tea, and knocking clean cutlery to the floor.
Newsflash, Sydney: You're not suppose to enjoy it.
Parker had spoken plainly and succinctly, her voice clear and steady, empathizing, but in no way pitying him, and in no way blaming him.
Our bodies are assholes sometimes, Syd, and it fucking sucks.
She had not injected a negating but; she'd simply paused, allowed him to hear her, and continued.
There ain't a helluva lot of dignity in refusing help walking to the bathroom only to shit the bed either, y'know? And by the way, throwing a tantrum isn't all that fucking dignified either. You're entitled to this one. Next time I'm snitching to Michele. Soak up the tea with the napkins. I'll bring you another cup and a washcloth.
She'd returned with a washcloth and tea, wearing exhaustion and remorse on her face. It had hurt her deeply to scold him.
He had failed her terribly over the years, and, yet, she was the one demonstrating remorse. He believed, in fact, that he had failed his entire family. Oddly, his family refused to allow him to fail himself. He owed them his full recovery, his life, his gratitude.
He apologized for his outburst, vowed there'd never be another, and accepted help with a smile and thank-you, and was grateful for the good days when he was strong enough to stand on his own and when his hands didn't tremble violently, as they presently did.
"No, in fact, I haven't in years," Sydney answered softly. "I won't pretend to know what goes on inside her mind, Jarod, however, I've reason to believe she was afraid there wasn't room for both of you in my life, and, that, in the event of conflict, I would have chosen you and rejected her."
"Sydney," Jarod exclaimed quietly. "Why on earth would she believe that?"
The question, as well as the surprise in Jarod's voice, alarmed Sydney.
The Pretender was either ignoring compelling, and rather damning, evidence or he and Parker hadn't discovered the entire truth after all. Sydney considered clearing his conscience, confessing that his research had laid the groundwork for Oblivion, and the suffering it had caused. He had produced remarkable and verifiable results treating mental illnesses, treating Catherine, in clinical trials, and was en route to file for FDA approval when his work was confiscated by the Centre oversight committee.
Raines had claimed, with absolutely no basis that Sydney had rushed the research and that his treatment was fatal. The review board voted against Sydney's motion that they accompany him in the lab, study his research, witness the clinical trials, observe him produce identical results in each patient. Raines was permitted to hijack Sydney's work, misinterpret, pervert, alter it, and call it Oblivion. The Director lauded Raines' Mirage project, and didn't want it compromised by the marked improvements in Catherine's health.
Sydney had been in no position to argue with the Director, war with Raines. He couldn't afford to risk termination, jeopardized the coveted Pretender project, lose Jarod.
"She knows I defied the Centre," Sydney answered, concealing perturbation, and ultimately choosing to bear his cross alone. "I lied to her, on numerous occasions during our professional relationship, to help you. I ignored atrocities perpetrated by Raines," he added carefully, "by others, to protect you. I think she envied you, Jarod. Two men in your life love and nurture you as their own. Two women adore and mother you. She lost Catherine when she most needed a mother, and her father, as you are aware---" Sydney's sorrowful voice dissolved to suggestive silence.
"Never really was," Jarod concluded bitterly, assisting Sydney in sitting. "I'm all too aware."
Sydney selected the shaving brush from the assembled items and untidily applied cream to his face. Jarod couldn't watch; it was too painful. Instead, he filled a ceramic bowl with hot water and a second one with cold water, and silently discarded the towel and stripped the bed of its sheets, pillows, and comforter.
Sydney made no attempt to shave himself and uttered no protest when Jarod lifted the razor and competently drew it across his flesh. He was acutely aware that if his cognitive impairments persisted his caretakers would forgo this treasured leisurely ritual, taught to Sydney by his father—and taught to Jarod by Sydney—and opt to shave him with a cordless device. He wasn't looking forward to that day.
"A relationship with her involved certain conditions," Sydney added reluctantly. "Primarily, your comfort."
Jarod blinked wide, surprised by the revelation, and somewhat doubtful as well. He suspected that Parker attached conditions for her own comfort, because she feared an encounter with him, believed it would be much too painful.
"She was rather adamant that the ease and eagerness with which you visited, and the duration of those visits, was not disrupted. She has known, for decades, about Refuge; she insisted you have it. Please, Jarod, understand that adherence to her conditions was the only way to gain her trust."
"But," Jarod murmured quietly, dipping the blade into the hot water and lifting it Sydney's face again, "you did successfully gain her trust."
"I did," Sydney answered contentedly, anticipating Jarod's movements and stretching his neck to accommodate the blade, "I hope it doesn't cost me yours, Jarod."
"It won't."
"And that I never lose it," Sydney added, contritely. "Or hers. I know you have questions, Jarod, about her, Lyle, my involvement with Project Oblivion-"
"Sydney," Jarod interrupted wearily, gently finessing the blade along Sydney's neck, each stroke slow and precise, "all that matters right now is that you rest, recover." He smiled, chided gently, "It's true that doctors are the worst patients."
"And what about your patients, Doctor?" Sydney asked. "I told you four weeks ago that you don't have to stay."
"And then you began coughing violently, and then there were suspicions of esophageal perforation and pneumonia and other complications of incorrect NGT placement, force-feeding," Jarod said softly. "And two days later you had to be treated with plasmapheresis to remove toxins from your blood. Six days later you were treated for an eye infection. Eleven days later you were treated for a kidney infection. Thirteen days later you were treated for pneumonia. Eighteen days later there were fears you'd suffered a stroke. Twenty-three days later your temperature spiked. An hour ago you stumbled during physical therapy. You were just discharged from the hospital three days ago. I'm staying here until you make a complete recovery, Sydney, because I want to."
"You're just as stubborn as she is."
"I'm going to consider that a compliment," Jarod said, "and not tell her that you called her stubborn."
"Tell her," Sydney insisted. "I like the thought of you two speaking, and it's evident you do as well."
Jarod smiled warmly, and set aside the razor; later, after helping Sydney with a sponge bath and dressing the bed with fresh sheets, pillows, and comforter, he would wipe the blade with camellia oil and put it away.
Presently, he cradled the bowl filled with cold water, and observed as Sydney splashed his face.
"Don't you?" Sydney asked.
"It's complicated, Sydney," Jarod answered hesitantly.
"Uncomplicate it," Sydney said, gravely, retrieving and opening aftershave balm. He moistened his hands with the solution and patted his face and neck. "It's later than you think."
Jarod chuckled, said, "You're quoting Noël Coward now?"
"Guy Lombardo," Sydney corrected. "The Centre no longer dictates your life, Jarod. Or hers."
"Or yours, Sydney," Jarod reminded. "What are you going to do now?"
"I'm going to marry Michele," Sydney answered dryly. "If she'll have me."
"If?" Jarod was incredulous.
"There are some difficult conversations—conversations I've postponed, that Michele and I must have."
"What if she isn't--- amenable," Jarod said hesitantly, "to participating in those conversations? What if they are too painful?"
"I will have to be patient and trust that she will listen, eventually, and forgive me, and that together, in time, we'll heal the pain, and be stronger, either together or separately, because we confronted it." Sydney smiled warmly, added softly, "You know what you must do, Jarod, and you will. You've always made the correct decisions."
If that were true, Jarod mused silently, she wouldn't have fled, spent a decade avoiding me.
Sydney wasn't entirely mistaken.
There was one item on his agenda that required Jarod's immediate action, and after helping Sydney bathe, and into fresh clothes and sheets, he greeted the day nurse and left Sydney's home, mere minutes behind Parker.
Jarod pulled the car into the front parking area specifically reserved for guests, and, moments later, walked up the steps and into the Centre's empty atrium. He boarded a lift, ascended to the tower, and entered a small, empty boardroom. There, he unzipped a large duffel bad and removed from it a rifle. He adjusted the scope and waited for the Triumvirate's legal team to enter the adjacent boardroom and greet Parker.
Seeing, he would discover, wasn't always believing. He was certain she'd strolled into an ambush and was prepared to squeeze the trigger.
He wasn't, however, prepared when the attorneys thanked Parker for her discretion, and how quickly she'd neutralized the traitors and defused the situation.
The Raines situation.
The Ray situation.
The men couldn't even utter those names. Or their crimes. They didn't evoke The Pretender's name either or the crimes perpetrated against him.
Jarod, the long fabled chosen, had hospitalized Lyle on the basis of mere suspicion. The fresh and youthful Triumvirate council members had learned about the scrolls from their fathers and grandfathers, and knew that the Pretender was not a man to be trifled with, and, therefore couldn't comprehend why their blood relations had done precisely that.
After being apprised of Jarod's relocation to assist in Sydney's recovery, they'd voted to conduct their final piece of business via attorneys. None were keen to suffer Lyle's fate.
They believed their ancestors were fools for exposing themselves to danger, allying with the greedy American child abductors, for the abominable and unwelcome inheritance. They were ashamed of, and disappointed in, their violent predecessors, and insulted by the hoarded wealth and power.
The two remaining Triumvirate elders were naturally displeased with every decision the young ones reached, with their unanimous votes to undo all that their fathers and grandfathers had accomplished. They missed the old ways, the simpler times when they could commit atrocities with impunity and escape international scrutiny. They, however, shared the fear that news of Ray's crimes would be leaked to militaries and governments, and, perhaps more frightening, social media. The entire Triumvirate council had grown incredibly wary of public opinion, internet chatter, rabid conspiracy theorists.
Everyone had a camera now and access to a comprehensive social media platform with which to share damning photographs. Accountability culture scared the hell out of them.
The Triumvirate could control the narrative to only a small degree and claim they terminated Raines for his crimes, and that was no consolation. Jarod's source inside the council, a thirty-something technical specialist named Autumn—whose greatest professional accomplishment to date was establishing CosPlay Fridays in her Osaka office—informed him, via email, that Triumvirate brass had, for weeks, subsisted solely on a liquid diet of bismuth subsalicylate.
The potential fallout wasn't unforeseen. Triumvirate elders had, in 2008, scrambled to create a task force that would feed the insatiable masses a meaty rumor to sink their teeth into, typically following an assassination or small, surgical strike, to draw attention away from themselves.
They'd been mightily disappointed in the rather irrational creatures who had, years later, gobbled up their bait, and, with no evidence whatsoever, followed the scent to an unsuspecting American pizza establishment whose only crime was offering pineapple as a topping.
Displeased with the sloppiness, the needless wet works, the elders had since dissolved the task force, and endeavored to be more careful, to entirely avoid catastrophe- such as the present one.
Raines had been hoisted with his own petard; the monster he had created had ended him. Triumvirate council members feared they'd suffer a similar fate. They envisioned guillotines, their own severed heads.
Jarod didn't doubt their fear, however, he didn't believe they were too afraid to fly to the states and personally meet with Parker or afraid enough to permanently relinquish custody of their American hellchild, the Centre, after decades of fostering it and carefully grooming everyone inside of it to obey them without question.
He struggled with a single fundamental truth: the new generation harbored extremely differently aspirations and perspectives, they loathed violence, and wanted the old ways to die with the elderly. Their goal, after witnessing seemingly endless bloodshed in war-torn countries, was peace.
The three men were nothing if not apologetic and were eager to return to their families in Osaka, Johannesburg, and London, respectively. Armed with their mobiles and a Nintendo Switch or two they strode warily out of the boarding room, taking with them Parker's firm reminder that ten decades' worth of evidence would materialize on the desk of every media outlet and law enforcement agency if the Triumvirate ever reneged on their little peace treaty.
Jarod disassembled the weapon, returned it to the duffel, expelled a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding. What the hell just happened here?
He swung his gaze across the corridor, waited for Parker to exit the boardroom.
"Care to join me, Jarod," Parker called, "or do you prefer to watch?"
Jarod closed his eyes, murmured, "Shit."
"I heard that," Parker sang authoritatively.
Grudgingly, and with a sheepish smile, Jarod joined Parker in the boardroom, observed her expression of exasperation.
"How did you know?" He asked.
"Oh, no, you don't get to ask questions. Why were you hiding in the other room with a rifle?"
Jarod answered with a resigned smile and slow head shake, "I can't ask questions at all and you can't stop asking questions you already the know the answer to." He pulled a wheeled leather chair from the table, and wearily sat. "Why are we like this?"
Parker grinned, pressed her head to the wall behind her. "I don't know, but it probably has something to do with the Centre fucking us up." She unclasped her hands, parted them in small flourish. "But the kids are all right."
"It almost makes sense," Jarod said, "that after being wrongfully accused of killing malls, marriage, the fine dining and fashion industries, the careers of numerous sex offenders, in-person voting and the housing market Millennials would be single-handedly responsible for killing the Triumvirate."
"It makes absolute sense that children who break generational curses are discredited and villainized by blame-shifting adults."
Jarod nodded in agreement. "Children are the perfect scapegoats. If they try to defend themselves they're accused of disrespecting their elders, and if they try to walk away they're threatened, made to feel guilty for things that aren't their fault, manipulated to stay by rare displays of affection, and-"
Parker interrupted crisply, "You've said enough."
"It wasn't a generational curse," Jarod argued softly. "There are no curses. It was emotional abuse. That's the point I-"
"There is no point," Parker said, flatly. "There's no Centre. And Daddy's dead. His motives, whatever they were, are no longer relevant."
"Oh, but they are. You're still blaming yourself for things that aren't your fault."
"Such as?"
"Sydney's abduction. You were in the emergency waiting area, and not with your family, because you felt-"
"Responsible," Parker interrupted brusquely. "Yeah, I did, because I am responsible, and when we were ascending the stairs-- it was like I was watching my greatest hits of mistakes unfurl before me." She expelled the words forcefully with a grimace of disgust and walked the length of the room.
"Mistakes?" Jarod asked.
"Where the hell do I even begin?" Parker murmured. "If I hadn't retired Sydney he would have been at work."
"Not at that hour," Jarod said. "Raines is responsible for Sydney's abduction and Ray's death, not you."
"Hell, if you and I had left, as planned," Parker continued matter-of-factly, "Sydney wouldn't have even been in Blue Cove. Ray wouldn't have found him."
Jarod's face twisted in disbelief. He breathlessly exclaimed, Christ, and Parker's name. "Is that what you believe? My God," he murmured quietly. "I suppose this explains, to some extent, why you shut down."
"Stop being so fucking dramatic, Jarod. I didn't shut down. I was sleep deprived and consumed with guilt. I sat. I rested. It happens. I didn't want to go upstairs; I felt unworthy."
"Why didn't you confide in me?"
"No, you didn't. That's absurd, and you know it. We're still friends," Jarod asserted. "We always have been."
Parker drew a chair from the table and promptly deposited herself into it. She drew a breath, folded her arms across her chest. "Some fucking friend I've been to you. I don't call, I don't text, I chased you with a gun, and I didn't even say goodbye when I left. You deserve better than-"
"And now you've said enough," Jarod intoned, sharply.
"I'll decide that for myself," Parker returned haughtily. Ultimately, she evidently agreed that she had, indeed, said enough. She noted the smile curving Jarod's lips and her eyes hardened. "The hell are you grinning about, asshole," she said in a deceptively placid voice.
"You," Jarod answered. "I've missed this. I've missed you."
Parker scoffed. "Right," she purred.
"You're appalled," Jarod said. "Why is that?"
"I thought you'd hate me. If I were you I'd hate me."
Jarod frowned deeply, and said with a negating head-shake, "No. In fact, I was more afraid for you than hurt or angered by you when you left me and disappeared to?"
Parker lowered her gaze to the black granite inlay. The conversation presently taking place with Jarod at the unsuspecting oval conference table was far more torturous than any she had endured at the infamous T-shaped monstrosity down in the sublevels.
"To where ever it was you disappeared," Jarod continued delicately. "When Sydney called and said you'd taken some time off from work I was relieved. It was nice to fall asleep again and not wake up screaming."
Parker closed her eyes. She'd believed, until then, that she couldn't feel more remorseful.
"I had feared I'd get the other call, and couldn't stop imagining--" Jarod noted her apparent misery and mercifully swallowed the remaining words. "I didn't hate you," he whispered, loathing the resignation in his voice while commending his finesse. He'd been entirely honest, and had also, for Parker's sake, concealed the entirety of the truth. Jarod refused to burden her, tell her he was still elated and relieved that she'd broken his heart, broken only his heart, and hadn't shattered his mind and crushed his soul as well, and that his love for her simply didn't have the good sense to draw a final breath and die. "I could never hate you."
