From: "M. Cogburn" Date: Sat, 5 Dec 1998 13:50:45 -0600 Subject: Portraits Of The Past, Part 14 Chapter Fourteen Brian appeared outside the choir room as Margaret had requested. She was going to go with him to practice with the band for tomorrow. She had told him that she had to make sure Jason had a key to her apartment. So, he waited patiently as he leaned up against the wall. Margaret, however, was giving Sam the extra key to her house. "Here. I have to go practice with Brian and his band." "Band? What band?" Sam questioned not liking this change in schedule. "Brian's band is playing at David's party. He wanted me to sing a couple of songs with him." "Well, I wanted to talk to you about something this afternoon." Sam said as he tossed the key from hand to hand. "Can it wait? I've all ready had Brian waiting ten minutes. I hate to keep anyone waiting." "Yeah, I guess it will keep. But we need to talk." Sam replied reluctantly. "Okay. Hey, are you going to the party?" She asked hopefully. "Uh, yeah." Sam said as he looked away form her. "Jessica and I are going together but just as friends." Sam watched as her pleasant demeanor vanished. "How can you . . ." She began only to stop herself. "No, wait. It's your own business and I don't have the right to tell you what to do. I just hope she doesn't hurt you." Margaret turned on her heel and left the room quickly. Sam's shoulders dropped. He slowly shifted his gaze heavenward. "Why me?" "Because you're the last living true boy scout." Al remarked as he stepped through the wall into the choir room. "Oh, gee thanks, Al." "It's true." Al commented as he opened the imaging chamber door. "Well, I've got to see Tina. We have a dinner date." Sam looked at his watch. "It's only 3:45 . . ." Sam stopped as he realized what was meant. Al's eyebrows moved up and down seductively and grinned evilly. He stepped inside the door and without a word, the door slid down slowly behind him. Al reappeared in the Imaging Chamber and released the hold to the outside door. Once outside, he strolled into the Central Control room to place the handlink on the mainframe. He grinned as he started toward the personnel quarters but the smooth sounding voice stopped him. "Admiral Calavicci, I'm worried about Jason." The voice was soft and very caring. Two tones he hadn't heard before from the neural-hybrid computer. "What about, Ziggy?" Al asked confused. "He seems to be very unstable. Why does death scare people so?" Ziggy asked quietly. "Well, that's a very difficult question to answer. Lets see . . ." Al thought for a moment. "Well, death for some people is the soul passing onto a better place. A place where only goodness is. The only problem with this is that the living don't want to release the hold they have on those they have just lost. I guess, Ziggy, that we're all selfish. We don't want to lose anything we love. We don't want to give it up." Al placed Ziggy's handlink on the control pad and continued. "Jason love's Margaret. He doesn't want to let her go. His subconscious is just reminding him." "Hmmm." "Have I answered your question?" "In a round about way. Thank you, Admiral." Ziggy left the conversation at that and let the Admiral pass on to the personnel quarters. Dr. Alisi sat in the cafeteria sipping her coffee thinking about her husband. She missed him. Every time she went to see the new individual that leaped in, her emotions of losing her husband to this experiment came flooding back in full force. Yet, as she sat she wished for the billionth time that he would come back to her as before. When he had come home for one brief day, they had spent it in bed. What Donna missed more than anything was having his loving arms around her. Her coffee had grown cold so she pushed the mug away from her and stood. She was going to leave the room until she spied the piano in the corner. She quietly walked to it and caressed the white ivory keys. Sam had played the piano whenever he could. He didn't want to lose his touch. Donna sat down on the piano bench and played a couple of notes. Suddenly, she found herself playing the song Sam had written for her. She quickly stopped and closed her eyes. An old song she's learned as a little girl came to mind. Not only did she begin to play it, she began to sing it also. She was unaware, however, that a small group of people gathered in the doorway to see who was playing. "When the sun is high in the afternoon sky, You can always find something to do. But from dusk till dawn, as the clock ticks on, Something happens to you. In the wee small hours of the morning, While the whole wide world is fast asleep. You lie awake and think about the boy And never ever think of counting sheep. When your lonely heart has learned its lesson, You'd be his, if only he'd call In the wee small hours of the morning That's the time you'll miss him most of all." As Donna continued to play the rest of the song, tears cascaded down her cheeks, while the people at the door moved uncomfortably. As she sang the ending, her voice began to break up, yet she sang anyway. "When your lonely heart has learned its lesson, You'd be his, if only he'd call In the wee small hours of the morning, That's the time you'll miss him most of all." She finished the last instrumental part of the song then laid her arms on the piano and sobbed. Sammy Jo made a move to go toward her, but Verbeena stopped her with her hand and shook her head. She glanced around the faces that were before her and motioned them away. She of all people knew that there were times people just needed the time alone with their problems. She also knew that Donna Alisi would come to her when she really wanted a shoulder to cry on. She made sure the group had disbursed then looked back in at Donna. She wanted to go in and do what came natural -- comfort. Yet, she pushed the urge away and turned away. 'She'll come to me in time as she has before,' Verbeena thought to herself as she began walking down the hall to her office. * * * Brian opened the door for her as they entered the garage their band practiced in. The group of boys were scattered around the large room tuning their instruments. When she walked in, they stopped and looked at Brian expectantly. "What's this Brian?" One young man asked sarcastically. "A fan?" Brian made a face at the young man. "No. This is a new friend of mine." "I don't think this was such a good idea, Brian." Margaret said as she looked at the group individually then focused her attention back to Brian. "Nah." Brian said with a shake of his head. "Guys, I've asked Margaret to sing a couple of songs with us tomorrow night." "Can she sing?" The young man behind the drum set asked as he leaned down to pick up the drumstick he'd dropped. "Do wild bears . . ." Brian began but stopped. He didn't want to embarrass her with a remark he had wanted to use. "Of course. Let me introduce you. The boy in front of us playing the drums is Austin Devon, the worlds most eligible bachelor in the world. Austin Devon, meet Margaret Dawson." Austin got up from his seat only to tower over her by six inches. Margaret smiled up at him looking up into his handsome face. His blonde hair was pulled back in a ponytail and his sky blue eyes smiled at her as he leaned down to shake her hand. "Its nice to meet you." "To our left, we have our bass guitarist, Dixon Lancer, our lover-boy in the group." Dixon swung his guitar behind his back as he grinned at her. His height was only a few inches above her. His emerald green eyes swept over her body seductively yet when he held out his hand to shake hands, his touch was tender. He ran his hand through his auburn hair as he said, "Good to meet ya, Margaret." "And last but not least, to our right on the magical keyboard, is Blake McCalister." "What no extra kick off with Blake?" Margaret asked with a smile as she looked at Blake. He had dark blue eyes, a tanned handsome face and a well-defined muscular body exactly her height. He took her hand gently and raised it to his mouth only to kiss the back of her hand. "It's definitely an honor and a privilege to meet you." Brian rolled his eyes then said, "He's our romantic." "Oh." Margaret replied smiling still looking at him. She liked being greeted like that. It made her feel special. "It's nice to meet all of you." Blake let go of her hand and she looked back at Brian. "So, what do you want me to sing?" "Good question." Brian said as he moved past Blake to get his guitar. "We do a variety of songs. When we do a gig, we list all the songs we know how to play then people pick from that sheet which songs they want to hear. We figure that way we won't feel dumb when they ask us to play a song and we don't know it." He concluded as he strummed a few chords. "That's a good idea." Margaret noted. "You're flexible. That's good." Blake nodded with a smile. "Brian wanted us to be able to sneak in our songs with their songs. Mix old with the new. We all thought is was a good idea." "Where's your list?" Margaret asked wondering what old songs they could remember with all the new junk out today. Blake stood from his stool and brought her the small notebook that was by him. "Here you go." He said with a wink. Brian noticed the interaction between them and his eyes narrowed as he continued to watch them. 'Then again,' Brian thought, 'this is how Blake acts in front of a woman.' Nothing was really different. He just had to calm down. There was nothing to be upset about. Blake was just being . . . well, he was being Blake. As Margaret looked down the six pages they filled up, she became impressed. Some were recent rock-n-roll heavy, loud thrashers, while some were love songs. She recognized all the good eighty's love songs, such as 'You're The Inspiration,' 'Friends and Lovers,' and others that brought back memories of her family. As she looked further back, she found the older songs. Songs that she normally listened to like, 'Shout,' 'Louie, Louie,' and Wild Thing'. She smiled and closed the book. "Okay, I have a suggestion, but if you like it, we'll have to do some work." Hours Later: Margaret opened the door to her house and called in, "Hello?" There wasn't an answer. "Huh, how about that." She had assumed that Sam would have been home by now. She glanced at her watch. It read 7:30. She placed her purse and backpack on the couch, kicked off her shoes and headed toward the kitchen. She was starving. She opened the refrigerator door and peered inside. There were left-overs from the past two nights but nothing seemed appealing. Reluctantly, she closed the refrigerator door and looked into the pantry. Nothing there caught her attention. She screwed up her mouth wondering what she would have for supper. As she turned back to look into the refrigerator again, the telephone rang. She hurriedly went to the phone and picked up the receiver. "Hello?" "Hey, Margaret." "Jon-Bob. How you doing?" "Just as well as this morning. You doing anything tonight?" "Just studying, why?" "Would you like to go to the Dodge House instead of studying?" The Dodge House was a Karioke / bar where the teenage and college-aged students went on Friday's and Saturday nights to dance and have a good time. It was usually a honky-tonk place where country music was played but on Friday night, Karioke night, it could be anything from 1996 through the 1950's. Before thinking about the idea of going out on a "date" with her best friend, she said, "Yes. I'd love to go." "Great, have you eaten?" "Nope. I was fixing to, though." "Good. We'll grab a hamburger before we get there. I'll pick you up in about thirty minutes." Margaret nodded her head although she couldn't see him. "Oh, okay. See you then." "Okay, bye." "Bye." Margaret hung up her end of the line. She'd never been to the Dog House as it was commonly called. She had heard a lot about it though. All the parties and all the handsome, no, make that gorgeous college men there. Yes, she'd have a good time tonight. She headed toward her room. She had thirty minutes to pick out the right outfit, re-place any make-up that had come off and fix her hair again. She glanced down at her watch. Thirty minutes -- no problem. Instead of going directly over to Margaret's house, Sam had decided to go to Jason's house and lounge around. He had been playing with the kitten, named Soc and he had fallen asleep with the small furball on his chest. There was a slight rap on his door. When no one answered, Kathy stuck her head in. Seeing her only brother asleep at 7:15 p.m. on a Friday night startled her. She frowned. She had noticed that a couple of weeks before Ryan died that he had been sleeping a lot, and at odd times too. That was when Jason had told her about the drugs he suspected Ryan had been taking. Now, as she watched her only brother sleep, she began to shake her head sadly. She ran to her mother in the kitchen. "Mom, I think something is wrong with Jason." "Kathy if this is some kind of joke . . ." "Mom, I'm serious. Remember how Ryan started moping around the house and sleeping at odd hours before he died?" Sarah frowned. "Yes." "Well, Jason is asleep on his bed and it's 7:18. Mom, I'm worried that Jason might be taking drugs." Surprised at her daughters statement, Sarah blinked back not knowing what to say. She was concerned, yes, but how to respond, she had no idea. "Mom, I don't want to lose another brother." Sarah drew her daughter into her arms and gave her a tight hug. "We aren't going to lose anyone." She released her daughter and headed toward Jason's room. She flung the door open and the door hit the wall with a thud, waking Sam instantly. "What?" He said sleepily. "Why are you asleep?" "I was playing with Soc and the next thing I knew, I was asleep." Sam reasoned as he stretched. "Jason," Sarah headed to him on the bed and sat down before she started. "Jason, are you taking drugs?" "What? No. I'm not taking drugs, mom." "I want you to tell me the truth. Are you taking drugs?" "Mother, I am not taking any kind of drugs, alcohol or otherwise. Why do you think I would be on drugs?" "Well, you fell asleep too early, that's one." "Mom," Sam moaned. "Mama, I don't want to lose Jason, too." Kathy replied as tears rimmed her eyes. Sam heard the statement and called Kathy to his side. "Come here." Once she was by his side, he said, "Look into my eyes. Are they red?" "No." She said as she blinked back her tears. "If I was on drugs, my eyes would be streaked with red through them. But, I do appreciate that you were concerned enough about me to tell mom. That was not only a good thing to do, it was the best thing to do. Thank you." He gave her a hug and tousled her hair. "Hey!" "I'm sorry, Jason." "It's all right, mom. I understand. Don't worry about it." "Jason, I will always worry about my children. That's just what a mother does and if you knew that, you wouldn't say don't worry about it." She stood to leave but before she did she tousled his hair with a grin. * * * Margaret and Jon-Bob paid for their admission into the Dodge House and went in to see who was singing "Wild Thing". Both had dressed in blue jeans, boots, and a long-sleeved shirt since it was a country club first and foremost. The music was loud and the singer louder. The place was packed with people. There was just enough room to move around. Jon-Bob asked her if she wanted to dance and she nodded not wanting to yell over the loud music. They headed toward the dance floor -- a square that was in the middle of the Dodge House. As they danced, and enjoyed themselves, neither of them knew that they were being watched. The song ended and Margaret went to the bar. She ordered a coke and stood beside the bar to drink it. Jon-Bob followed behind her, but saw a friend of his. "Margaret?" Barely hearing her name, she turned to Jon-Bob. "A friend of mine is over there. Would you mind?" Margaret waved him on then turned back to look at the dance floor. As she watched the people dancing to Money, Money, she felt a tap on her arm. "Hey." Margaret turned to the young man that stood beside her. He looked to be in his lower twenties, probably one of those gorgeous college men. "Are you talking to me?" And, gorgeous he was. "Sure am." He glanced over her body as he took a drink of his beer. "My name is Quinn. Quinn Monroe." Margaret held out her hand to shake his hand. "It's nice to meet you, Quinn." Although Margaret thought he was handsome, she could definitely smell the liquor seeping from his pores and from his breath. Not intending to be rude, she turned from him looking around the room for Jon-Bob. "Who are you looking for, little lady?" "The guy I came here with." "He probably left." "Jon-Bob? Nah, he wouldn't leave me here." "Ya, sure?" "Positive." There were too many people in the establishment for Margaret to find Jon-Bob, but she was determined to find him. Although, Quinn was good-looking, she had a feeling about him, and she didn't care for that feeling one bit. Sam sat on the couch watching the television at Margaret's house. After being asked several times more if he was taking drugs, he had finally convinced Jason's mother that he wasn't doing any kind of drugs. He was watching a documentary on the native bats in Africa when Al streaked in beside him. "Come on, Sam. Margaret needs your help." "She dies tonight?" Sam hopped off the bed and struggled into the pants he had taken off. "No data. You need to help her though. Those college guys are being really pushy. I don't like how this is going -- not one little bit." Al shook his head negatively as he watched Sam re-dress. "Al, where is she?" "She's at a Karioke / Bar on Highway 30. You can't miss it. It looks like a barn." "Thanks, Al. Why don't you look in at her or at least stay with her a little bit." "Okay." As Al began to punch in the command to send him back to Margaret, Sam closed and locked the door as he headed to his car. Once in his car, he sped through the town thankful that there weren't any police cars around. As he found Highway 30, Al popped into the car beside him. "Come on, Sam. She could get hurt in any minute. You better hurry up." Sam pulled into the parking lot and parked the car. He hopped out, slammed the car door shut and headed inside the bar. When he approached the entry way, he was questioned on how old he was and they wanted to see his license. After showing them the necessary paperwork, Sam was allowed to enter the Dodge House. After a quick sweep of the joint, he saw Margaret at the bar with a young man talking to her and he watched as the guy grabbed Margaret's arm while another grabbed her other arm. Margaret let out a squeal and tried to pull her arms away from them. Sam went directly to her aid. He loosed the grip of one of the young men without any problem and promptly kneed him in the guts; knocking the breath out of him. As he dealt with this one, the other was being taken care of by someone else. Sam turned to his supposed defender and found Jon-Bob. Jon-Bob grabbed hold of Margaret's hand. Thinking he was a freshman in college, Sam reared back to hit Jon-Bob until Margaret said, "No!" Sam stopped and quickly looked at Margaret. Margaret pointed to one body on the floor then to the other. "Jason, this is Quinn Monroe and this, she nodded at the other, is James Duncan." Sam held out his hand to shake Jon-Bob's hand. He apologized for his error. "I'm sorry. I thought you were one of them. You know, we don't want anyone to hurt our Margaret." "Yeah." Jon-Bob squeezed Margaret's body to his side possessively. "Thanks." "No problem."