“English, please, Patrick.”
“There are rumors of genetic experiments by a pharmaceutical firm,” he said. “My sources say they’ve been working on isolating a particular protein produced by one of these normally dormant genes. It’s supposed to produce a psi effect, Jess. And these same sources tell me they’re testing it right now.”
“You think this has to do with Sarah?”
“I think you’ve gotten yourself tangled up in the middle of something very bad. Put it this way. The men in that car following you weren’t looking to deliver a Publishers Clearing House check.”
“Why would they do this to her?”
“Think about it. If they were able to isolate this protein, they might be able to reproduce the same effects in anyone. Imagine the possibilities here. Scientists able to wake up a long-dormant portion of the human DNA strand and induce psi capabilities whenever and wherever they choose. The military, hell, the business implications are enormous. It’s cutting-edge genetics, Jess. Billions of dollars are at stake.’’
“This is crazy. She’s just a little girl, Patrick.”
“I know. I know she is.”
“I won’t let them hurt her.”
“I talked to my people and they’re ready to go,” Patrick said. “She can disappear, I swear. Just say the word.”
Jess smelled the dust of old books and coffee and she drifted through shades of memory. The window glass here was gray and sticky, like the glass of a phone booth, smeared with children’s fingerprints. Eating a chocolate bar while her mother talked on the phone, talked forever on the phone, hurry up, Mama, we’re late for school.
Professor Shelley’s face drifted into her mind. Her mother’s face too. Jess felt the sting of betrayal once again. She opened her eyes, allowed herself a moment to grieve for something lost, a connection grasped at and missed. A fleeting recognition of a turning point, and a decision that had already been made.
There might still be time, before they figured out what she was planning to do. But she had to move, and move fast.
“Let’s get her out of there, Patrick. Get her the fuck out. Let’s give her a chance.”
—32—
Professor Jean Shelley sat upright in a straight-backed cane chair in front of the table and the window that looked out upon her garden. Jess Chambers was gone. The house was empty.
She tried to soothe herself enough to eat from the bowl of miso soup that steamed in front of her. It was no longer easy to do, this simple ritual of spoon to mouth that so many took for granted. She looked down at the swirl of soup and the fleshy gray squares floating in it and the smell nauseated her. She thought of hundreds of thousands eating Big Macs in their cars and dribbling mayonnaise down their fronts and wanted to scream.
Outside she watched a hummingbird flit to the feeder, tucking its long slender beak into an opening and darting away again. She had suction-cupped the feeder to the glass because she liked to watch them dance during the evenings, their nervous vibration of wings translated into a calming, fluid movement by the shadows of the trees in her backyard. Now that she could no longer play the piano without cramps in her hands, this was what beauty she had left.
A bit of a breeze made the shadows dance along in silent partnership, as beyond in the dusky light the multicolored flowers ducked and bobbed their heads. Soon they would be gone. It was fall, and they were dying too.
Next to her chair on the floor was the silver bowl. She kept it close to her because sometimes when the sickness rose up inside she couldn’t make it to the bathroom in time. Lately there was blood. She kept a folded towel next to it that she could use to wipe her mouth, though she had not yet been able to do it today. The towel held a delicate lace pattern along its edge. Seemed like such a waste, dirtying a perfectly good towel on something so useless.
From where she sat she could see the dust beginning to gather on things—the tabletop, the picture frames on the shelf above the telephone, the windowpanes. For a long time she had fought the dust and then she had given up when the pain and dizziness had become too great. She had someone who would come in for a couple of hours a day to help her cook, but she would not hire a cleaning service to come in and vacuum and dust for her. In her mind that was a luxury reserved for single old men. It would be too much for her pride to bear.
She thought again, as she had countless times the past few months: / will not give up. I will not let it win.
Outside, the heads of the flowers dipped and turned like an audience at a play. The breeze was light and the air was warm. She thought about getting up and opening a window, but the idea of it overwhelmed her and she remained in her seat. Best to just sit and enjoy until she had gathered her strength for what was to come.
After twenty minutes she was ready to begin. She stood up, her swollen joints protesting loudly. She left the bowl of miso untouched, and walked slowly under the lovely carved-wood molding into the sitting room. She had cleared this room of all but a series of yoga mats in various bright colors and a low long table against the far wall, where she kept towels and bottled water at room temperature.
This was going to be a difficult session, she knew. But it was necessary to prepare. There would not be any more chances to do so, and she needed to be clear and focused for what lay ahead. She ground her molars together against the pain as she worked herself into the lotus position on a mat in the center of the room, and faced the bank of windows overlooking the patio.
The sun gently touched her face. She let the warmth wash over her, soothing her breathing until it became slow and deep. She folded her hands against her lap, her mind an empty shell, focused inward on her heartbeat. In a state of deep meditation she could slow that beat to less than fifty times per minute.
Tibetan Buddhism concerns itself with the power of the mind over the physical body. The belief is that everyone is linked, and everyone has the ability to influence the world through thought. A great Buddhist master had once said, “To study the Buddha Way is to study the self, to study the self is to forget the self, and to forget the self is to be enlightened by the ten thousand things.” This was a goal Shelley had struggled to understand. She had studied the Dalai Lama’s teachings very carefully. She had visited Tibet three separate times. She had hiked through mountain peaks in pursuit of enlightenment, of spiritual peace. But this riddle remained beyond her reach.
She worked in silence, stretching and loosening her body, calming her heart and mind. A sheen of sweat clung to her skin. She did not like the smell of sickness that came from it. She should not be noticing the smell at all, if she were successful in clearing her thoughts. But the impurities must work their way through her pores.
She imagined a war happening at the cellular level, white blood cells maturing as they were supposed to do, and moving as one to attack the blast cells and drive them out. This visualization was the important part. This was truly mind over matter.
When first diagnosed she had visited countless doctors, believing in the miracle of Western medicine. Many of them had been friends or colleagues. She had subjected herself to countless prodding and pokes and treatments. Nothing had worked; the leukemia had always returned, more aggressively than before. Finally she had begun to look elsewhere to find some kind of hope.
Physician, heal thyself. She had thought that true devotion would lead to inner peace, a journey that would lead to the loss of self that brought the elusive ten thousand things. She would learn to focus her mind into an efficient killing machine, eradicating the mutating cells as they swept through her blood. Through all this, she thought, she would be able to lose her fear. After all, what did anyone have to fear if the only truth was what the mind created? And the mind had the power to change everything?