Time Out Chapter 5

CHAPTER 5


Jon was awakened by the feeling that he was a vampire and the light was ready to kill him. He went to shield his eyes from the light and found he couldn’t move his arm.
‘Have I been paralyzed? he asked himself.
After what seemed like an eternity, his arm did start a slow migration up to his face. He could hear people start to move towards him. After he was sure that his eyes were sufficiently shielded, he ventured opening them.
It was immediately apparent that he was in a hospital room. The room had an antiseptic feeling to it. The walls were an ugly green color, a TV was mounted on the ceiling, and he was vaguely aware of tubes coming out of his arms. People surrounded Jon. Several of them looked vaguely familiar, but where the hell were his parents? How long had he been here? Why did he feel the need for a Twinkie?
“Neal! We’re so glad you’re alright!” An older man in a gray trenchcoat was the first to his bedside. “How are you, Neal?” He seemed to emphasize the word Neal.
It was almost as if this man was calling Jon by that name. Or is my real name Neal, and I dreamed I was Jon? Jon thought. His mind was cluttered. If certain people’s faces were totally blurred out or if a man carrying cheese came in the door, Jon would almost think this was a dream, but no such thing happened. The people were by his bedside, they were all calling him Neal, they all seemed familiar, and his body felt like Wile E. Coyote’s after having been run over by a steamroller.
A very pretty woman with red hair leaned across his bed and gave him a hug. She whispered in his ear. “You’re not crazy. You are Jon Mills, but you have been admitted under the name Neal Page. Answer to it.” Even though the actual words said seemed harsh, they were said in a very friendly tone. Did he know her? She seemed too young to be his mom. After hugging him, she stood and hobbled over towards the door where she picked up a red leather jacket and leaned against the wall.
Then, all at once, the day came back to him. She was Kate Thompson, the man was Walter Bender, one of the other guys by his bedside was Jerry- Jerry what? Jon realized he never knew the man’s last name. He recognized a few other faces from the office earlier that day- week? Night? Month? - but couldn’t have come up with their names.
Jon looked at Walter. “Dad!”
Walter glared. “Uncle! It’s me! Your Uncle Gary!” Jon noticed a slight bead of sweat on Walter’s brow as Walter turned to a nurse. “We’re identical twins! Impossible to tell us apart! Hell, even our wives-“ The nurse stopped paying attention so Walter just stopped lying. Jon could feel his arm getting pinpricks in it, so he forced his weary body to pull it back to his side.
The nurse leaned over Jon and stared into his eyes. “Your pupils aren’t dilated any more, Mr. Page. The drug must be wearing off. I’ll go get your doctor.” The whole room waited, holding their breath, as she walked out and closed the door.
“Good job, Jon! Well done!” Walter leaned in. ” Here’s the story- I am your uncle who runs a veterinary clinic. You stopped by after school. A Doberman pinscher got loose. He attacked me, the tranquilizer gun went off, and you were accidentally shot-” The door opened and a doctor walked in. "-in the neck.” Walter finished, whispering.
‘Mr. Page.” The doctor addressed him. “You had one heck of a day, didn’t you? Who would’ve thought that the tough part of the day would have been after school?” The doctor, Belnap was his name as Jon discovered by reading his nametag, flipped through Jon’s chart.
Jon smiled. “Who would’ve thought?”
Belnap stared at Jon thoughtfully for a moment, then flashed a grin. Jon’s chart fluttered in the draft from the open doorway. Belnap never blinked. His smile evaporated.
“Here we go,” Jon thought. “Something’s not right and he knows it.”
Belnap’s eyes bored into Jon’s eyes and brain. There was a very long pause. No one in the room moved or uttered a sound.
“Sylvia!” Belnap called.
The nurse came scurrying in from the hall. “Yes, Doctor?”
“Call the Salt Lake City Police Department please.”
“Oh, shit,” Jon thought as his stomach lurched into his throat.
Belnap continued his directions. “I can’t make it to their banquet tonight. I just realized that I have my daughter’s school play to go to.”
Jon felt his breathing return to normal and the room seemed to have its burden lifted, too.
“So,” Belnap turned his gaze Bender, “Uncle Gary. That’s you, correct?”
“Yes it is,” Bender nodded and agreed.
“Problem at the office?”
Jon broke in. “My fault.” He gave a half laugh. “Shouldn’t have walked into the exam room without letting him know.”
Belnap looked at Jon’s chart. “You seem to be okay. Your muscles will probably take a few hours to lose the effects of the drug, and you’ll probably sleep through the rest of the night, but, by the morning, you should be just fine. ” Belnap gave Jon two pats on his shin and walked out of the room. Kate closed the door behind him.
Jon glanced at Bender. “That’s why we choose him, Jon. He’s a great doctor, but has one of the worst bedside manners in the world. When it comes to people and patients, the man is as clueless as they come. I give him a new name every time and he never recognizes me.”
Jon grinned and looked around the room. Everyone seemed to be staring at him. “So, can I go home?”



It was eleven forty five at night as Jon signed the form to release him from the hospital. He signed a large J as normal and stopped. Thinking quickly, he put a period after the J. and continued to sign Neal Page. Many people go by a middle name, he thought. Why shouldn’t I? Or Neal? Why shouldn’t Neal? He nodded to the nurse as he handed the form back to her.
“You better make sure you get some rest tonight,” she cautioned.
“Will do.” Jon didn’t want to really chat much, so he turned and felt his leg muscles start to give way.
Kate grabbed him and steadied him. “I’ve got you,” she told him.
“Thanks,” Jon mumbled as they stumbled out the door together.
They didn’t talk to each other as they walked out to Kate’s car. After Kate unlocked his side door, Jon opened it and lowered himself into the seat using his arms. They gave out a few inches before Jon was seated, so he plopped into the car and felt a new wave of pain rush over him. He sat still and let it course through him for a few seconds before he reached over and closed the door.
Kate started the engine of her Impala, buckled herself in, and checked on Jon. He was staring at her. She turned off the engine. “What?”
“I just forged an official document. I just signed to get this guy named Neal Page released. Who is he? Another patient at the hospital? I’m going to be blamed for letting a mental patient run free, aren’t I?”
Kate smiled. “No, but we could definitely say that your imagination is running free.”
“My imagination?” Jon asked incredulously. “My IMAGINATION? I’m part of a secret government agency and you’re talking to me about my imagination?”
“Get out your wallet.”
The request caught Jon off guard. “Excuse me?”
“Get out your wallet.” Kate demanded again.
Jon saw that she wasn’t kidding so he fished his wallet out of his right front pants pocket.
“Open it.”
Jon did and saw nothing but his driver’s license staring up at him. “Okay. So?”
“Look.” was the simple instruction.
Jon did. It was his license. It had a green stripe across the top notating that he was under 21. It had the picture that he hated so much because he had been vomiting all day worrying about his test. “Okay. So?” he repeated.
“Look at the name.”
Jon looked and couldn’t believe his eyes. It read J. Neal Page. He shot a look at Kate. “How did you-?”
“Jerry’s our document guy.”
“Document guy? You mean forger. When you said document guy, you mean forger.”
“Well, in a way-“
“In a way?” Jon could feel his brain start to pound in his skull. “In a way? There’s only one way, Kate! He is, or he isn’t! Which do you think it is?”
“How do you think that undercover agents get driver’s licenses, credit cards, birth certificates, social security numbers? They all have to be forged or faked since this person doesn’t exist! We’re not going to use real birth dates or anything since they could be tracked! Think about it, Jon! It makes sense!”
“In your weird little world, maybe. Call me crazy, but I like to think that the people who protect me are using the same laws that I have to abide by.”
“Well, welcome to the world as it truly is.” Kate started the car again, and, in a fit of frustration, slammed the car into reverse, then into drive and left skid marks in the parking garage.
Not a word was spoken in the car as Kate drove Jon home. The impala roared up to Jon’s house and braked suddenly in front of it. The jarring motion from the sudden stop caused Jon’s head to pound even harder as he opened the door and got out. “Thanks for the-“ Kate reached across the car, slammed the door shut and sped off down the road. Jon watched as she turned the corner. “-ride.”
Jon searched in his pockets and found his keys. He walked up to the door and paused before he put his key in the lock. He reached out with his left hand and turned the knob. It was open. He walked inside and shut the door, locking and deadbolting it this time.
The TV was still tuned to TSC where the live version of SportsTime was just concluding. “That’s all for us, but don’t shed a tear because we’ll be back in 22 hours 59 minutes and 11 seconds with tomorrow’s edition of SportsTime. Have a good night.”
Jon found the remote and turned off the TV. Leaving all of the lights on, he trudged into his room, fell onto his bed, and was asleep within moments.



In his dazed state, Jon could hear the phone ringing. It would ring 5 times, and then stop, right as the answering machine was ready to pick up. Then it would ring 5 more times and stop for a few moments. Then 5 more rings and pause. Jon didn’t realize that this pattern had been happening for nearly twenty minutes when he finally stretched his arm out to answer it. For a moment, he couldn’t figure out which side of the receiver was which. Finally, after much twisting of the phone cord, he got it right. “Hello?”
“Jon?” a female voiced asked. “ I’m, uh, sorry for calling so late, uh, or so early, or whatever it is. What is it?”
“Who is this?”
“It’s Kate.”
“Oh, Kate. What time is it?”
“It’s just after 3. I’ve been trying to get you for a while now. You never picked up.”
“I was sleeping. I had a hell of a day.” Jon wiped his hand over his face to become part of the waking world.
“I knew I shouldn’t have called, I’ll just talk to you later-“
Jon tried sitting up in bed, but his muscles still hurt too much so he flopped back down. “No, no, no! It’s okay. I’m okay! Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. As well as I can be with a bullet hole in my leg, anyways.”
“I hope you got treated for that.”
“While you were still toast at the hospital, I got it cleaned up and bandaged. Hurts like hell, but I’ll make it. I always do. Not the first time I got shot.”
“I know you think you’re superwoman, Kate, but you’re not.”
Kate sounded a little tense. “I know that.”
“Then why have you tried to be a hardass every single time I’ve seen you except for up in the stairwell? That was okay to be frightened up there, Kate. I was terrified. Having a gun pointed at my temple didn’t help, either.”
There was a pause when he could tell Kate was fighting the impulse to hang up. “Look, Jon, I just hate Stanley and everything he stands for. I lost it, but now I’m over it. I broke down when I shouldn’t have and I won’t do it again. Is that okay with you, rookie?”
Jon’s blood was boiling, but he could tell something else was bothering her. “What’s going on, Kate? You’re not telling me something.”
“I’m telling you everything you need to know.”
“Okay, fine, Kate. I believe you. Now why did you try so hard to wake me up after I’ve been shot full of elephant tranquilizer!”
“Well, damn you, Jon! I just wanted to apologize! That’s why I called! I called to apologize!”
“Apology accepted!”
“Fine! Good! Great!”
Jon started laughing lightly. “Is that really why you called at 3 AM?”
Jon could visualize Kate’s face go from rage to an embarrassed smile to an almost embarrassed grin as she gave a halfhearted laugh. “Yes. That is why I called,” she said in a much softer and gentler tone. “I called to apologize. Believe it or not, I have the world’s best or worst conscience, depending on your view of it. I will get pissy as all get out and then feel amazingly bad about it ten seconds later.
“Your life was normal 24 hours ago, now it’s all sorts of weird and I got upset at you for being a little stressed out. You see, Jon, I used to be you. I used to be a 17-year-old with everything going for me and I just hadn’t figured it out yet. I had unlimited potential, but I didn’t get that. I saw that you had everything that I was. I’d been missing the old me lately, so I asked Bender if I could be your researcher and trainer and he said sure. I’m sorry if I overstepped my role of trainer and became mother or over bearing older sister to you, today.” She paused. “Or just now. I didn’t mean to.”
“It’s okay, Kate. No problem. I didn’t mean to take it out on you, either. I probably shouldn’t have just charged up.”
“Well, that’s true!” Kate laughed, then there was a pause. “Anyways, I just wanted to say that I am proud of you. You did a great job up on the roof. I wish I could’ve been there.”
“Thank you. I knew that I just wanted to get you, me, and as many hostages as possible safely out of the building.” Jon waited for a response. When there was none, he continued. “Well, Kate, thanks for the apology. It’s okay, but I need to get some sleep. I have school in the morning.”
“That’s right, you do. Sleep well, Jon. You deserve it.”
“Thanks, Kate. You sleep well, too. You had a hell of a day yourself. Good night.”
“Good night.”
Jon listened as the dial tone filled his ears. He hung up the phone, looked at the light switch on the wall which was way too far away, and plopped his head back down on his pillow and zonked out again.
Kate put her cell phone on the dashboard and straightened out her wounded and tightly bandaged leg. She fluffed her coat jacket against the car door and fell into a very light sleep while looking up at Jon’s bedroom window.