these days. Like it or not you’re part of something bigger now, and they figure you belong to them,” Alden said, nodding toward the outside world.
“Cameras are going to follow you, Markus. Microphones are going to be stuck in your face wherever you go. The media will hound you; the public will want to see you, to know who you are.
“You’ll have interview requests from newspapers, from television networks. It’s going to happen – your only choice is in how you use it, how you consume this energy. Are you ready for that kind of attention?”
I shook my head. “No, I’m not. Okay, so my face and name are bouncing around right now. But it’ll be a flash in the pan – I’ll endure my fifteen minutes of fame, and then they’ll all lose interest.”
Alden stepped closer and looked at me with eyes wide and brows lifted. “That’s my point. We have to strike while the iron is hot, and that’s what I do best: I’ll make a better fifteen minutes of fame for you, with a fatter financial reward for your actions.”
“I’ll have you on daytime, primetime, and late night. I’ll get you on syndicated and satellite radio,” he said. “I’ll get you book contracts and movie deals, athletic gear and men’s cologne sponsorships; I’ll put you on the lecture circuit and have you do mall openings. You’ll have lunch at the White House and maybe even throw the opening pitch at the World Series – hell, I’ll have you giving seminars on close combat tactics at Quantico, and at Coronado for the Teams. The possibilities are endless, if you’re interested.”
“I’m sure you mean well,” I said. “But can’t you see I hate this kind of attention?”
Alden pursed his lips and shifted gears. “That was a noble thing you did that day, Markus. I’m here to tell you, you deserve to get paid – and I’m going to make you a lot of money. You’ve got it coming – I know you’ve been through a lot, the false imprisonment thing and all.”
“That’s the past,” I said. “It’s not even worth talking about.”
“I’m not sure about that,” Alden said. “Seems to me a man with a background like yours has a lot to talk about: the kind of childhood you must have had, and being an innocent man in prison like so many others. About doing what you did in a situation where you had no chance at all, and pulling it out of your hat like that. If you do this with me, you’ll have the biggest soap box in the world to speak your piece from.”
“I wouldn’t know what to say.”
Alden grinned, his perfect array of teeth resembling a shark’s. “Oh, I think when the time comes, once you get used to it, you’ll have a lot to tell us. I’d venture to say we won’t be able to shut you up; you’ll get hooked on it like everybody else does. We’ll make a camera whore of you yet.”
“What are you doing with my patient?” Nurse Dorcas asked from the doorway. As she watched Alden bid me farewell and leave, she was visibly upset. “These media people. They’ve been awful, Markus, just awful.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
She looked at me, thought for a moment with her chin cupped in one plump hand, and then turned on the TV. The sound was off, muted. On the screen a woman newscaster stood in front of yellow crime scene tape at the school, yakking away soundlessly.
Behind her on the screen, through the open double doors where I’d first made my stand, CSI technicians poked around in the relative dimness of the ruined stretch of hallway where Wayne met his end. Even on the TV’s grainy screen I could clearly see the dark stain on the vestibule wall where I’d been shot.
Inset in the upper left corner of the screen, above the silently gesticulating newswoman, they had one of my old mug shots on display. I’m not particularly photogenic, and they hadn’t gotten my pretty side.
“Jeez Louise,” I said.
The station cut from the newscaster to close-up footage of me lying on my hospital bed with the left side of my face bandaged, talking away. Chief Jansen was prominent, flanked by uniformed cops crowding the walls of the room – the same room I was in right now. Someone in the Stagger Bay Police Department had sold my deposition video to the networks.
As Dorcas turned up the volume, the scene cut again and the newscaster did a voiceover: “A neighbor with a camcorder was eye witness to some of this, and we’re fortunate enough to have footage of what happened outside the school at least. We give fair warning here – the following images are shocking and intense, and we recommend a parental advisory.”
I saw the school entrance again. I stood there onscreen with my stiffened back toward the camera as I shouted like an irate baboon; next to me, the mortally wounded principal sat pawing my leg. It was amateur footage – the shaking camera lurched over to pan on the shattered cop car for an instant, then jerked back to zoom in on my back as the door crashed open, and Slash and Wayne rolled out leering like clockwork monsters.
I watched the grainy film of Slash raising his pistol, heard a muted bang from the TV as I watched parts of me splash onto the wall next to that poor one-eyed schmuck trapped forever inside the video loop. My doppelganger turned to look at what dripped down.
I shut my eye as even more noises emitted from the TV’s speakers. “Turn it off please, Dorcas.”
She did so, and when I opened my eye she was blinking back tears. She went to the window and opened the drapes. Sunlight flooded the room, and I squinted as I rose up on one elbow to peer outside.
Stagger Bay Hospital was built in the shape of a big square C, and I was on the second floor of one of the arms. I could see the main entrance to the hospital, as well as the parking lot with its medevac Flight of Life helipad off to the side.
It was a three ring media circus out there. The parking lot was crammed with dozens of news vans, almost all with satellite antenna masts and dishes deployed like electronic trees. Most had major network logos plastered on them; some of the news service names were in foreign languages and alphabets.
Newscasters made antic gesticulations for their camera crews, or were being made up in preparation to do so. Hundreds of non-local people, most of them well dressed, milled around talking to one another. Every person who entered or exited the hospital, whether civilian visitor or medical staff, ran a gauntlet of microphones.
Paparazzi were stationed in ambush at the main door of the hospital, but they didn’t click away at everyone entering or exiting. They were saving their film for bigger fish. Maybe for a one-eyed old ex-con.
“Jeez Louise,” I said again.
Dorcas nodded with her pale lips crimped together. “I’m sorry, Markus. They’ve been trying to get up here this whole time, but we’ve managed to hold them off so far. None of us want this for you. I’m sorry.”
“It’s not your fault,” I said, lying back to stare at the ceiling as Dorcas closed the curtains and left to continue her busy rounds. “It’s all good.”
Chapter 16
Dorcas went off shift and the night crew took over. I didn’t know them, having been unconscious during their previous ministrations. I closed my eye and pretended to be asleep when any of them came into my room.
As if I hadn’t felt trapped enough by my injuries and the cops’ attentions, now the media folk made me understand how any mouse felt with a hungry cat licking its dainty chops outside that rodent’s hole. I couldn’t stay at this hospital; I had to get away. Technically it was the medical equivalent of dining and dashing, but I was sure the hospital administrators would be warmly sympathetic to my plight.
I waited ‘til after midnight to make my move, when things had quieted down. It took some effort to wrestle myself vertical, but I finally managed to sit upright on the edge of the bed.
I pulled the IV catheter out my arm and stood, tottering. The linoleum floor felt arctic against the soles of my bare feet.
I shambled like a reanimated corpse to the closet, looking for something to wear, and was surprised to find my prison release clothes, still stained and tattered from the school. By all rights they should have been disposed of as biohazard, or put in the SBPD evidence locker.
But Stagger Bay was a small town – I counted my blessings and put them on. The dried blood made them stiff.
I peeked out the door: No one in sight. From the right came the murmuring unhurried activity typical of any nursing station in the wee hours.
I headed left. At the end of the corridor was a lit exit sign and I clung to it like a beacon, aiming my body at it in a slow decrepit stroll, leaning my shoulder against the wall and sliding along.
