Saturday, November 9th
Chatnet allowed a customer to view inputted messages containing their unique IDs for up
to one week. Last night was the first time since Wednesday evening that I had time to login to the
site and I noticed that Tiger87 tried to contact me yesterday morning. All that he said, though, in the message was that he had struck upon a really good idea for my predicament.
Three other people responded to my original chat session from Wednesday evening but
they all just pressed me to go to the police since it was the most sensible thing. The only problem
here was that this situation of mine had gone way beyond sensible because, the way I saw it, I had
three, maybe four months to get these guys off my back without any official help.
Susan and Tom were at St. Hubert's Animal Rescue Center that morning to look at dogs,
but they had their doubts about finding a suitable lab. I believed the three of us were on the same
page about not wanting to deal with a puppy right then - my vote was easy, at least in my mind.
I wondered why Tiger87 didn't say what his great idea was, given that he had to realize
that everybody on the site could see his post. This was not a personal e-mail network and that was
what I liked about it.
For the past two nights, Susan had complained that I had shouted out a few times. She
had been awakened but never heard what was said because I didn't continue talking, apparently.
This morning, she suggested I see a grief counselor over Zeke's death.
“It's like when Tom was a baby, waking up in the night. Nick, I'm not used to this…I'm
having a heck of a time getting back to sleep, maybe I should get some ear plugs.”
Susan didn't even go on a run this morning because she claimed that she was up three
hours in the night.
“I can prescribe some mild sleeping pills,” I told her.
Timothy Gilbert
Damage Control
155
Susan stuck out her lower lip and nodded in slight agreement.
“I think I heard „checkmate!' shouted last night, but I can't be sure.” Susan scratched her
wrist.
The vet, Dr. Hanson, called yesterday to tell us that the general necropsy indicated heart
failure. He wondered if we wanted a pathologist to look for any out of the ordinary chemicals in
the blood. In other words, the heart looked to be in good shape, maybe too good. I told Susan that
I didn't think that was necessary and she kind of surprised me with her agreement. The last thing
we needed right now was for Susan to realize that Zeke was poisoned. This would force her to
relive the experience by wondering what Zeke may have eaten that poisoned him. That hunt
wouldn't do our family any good at all.
I stared at my laptop, trying to think what my next move should be. I was getting tired of
the computer and missed the easel that I used extensively in my medical office. Most of my
patient plans started out being magic marked on large easel-held paper. I wished that I could do
that at home.
My office looked out across the street and featured a window seat nearly six feet long for
which Susan switched the seat cushions every year. Currently, the color was red plaid. I decided
to stretch myself onto the seat and work with my laptop there - it was surprisingly comfortable. It
was so easy on my lower back, which had been tightening up on me the past few days. I
wondered why I'd been sitting at my desk all this while.
The young couple across the street was playing with their baby in their front yard.
Apparently, the child was starting to walk – the mother's excitement was a sight for my sore eyes.
The father had the video camera running and, as I looked at their harmony, I wondered
why such despair was allowed to happen just across the street at the Johnson household.
Timothy Gilbert
Damage Control
156
I was beginning to think I should let my family, Mom, Joan, and Stanley in on this
predicament because I really may not have had another choice. Secretly relocating my family
seemed like my only option, as crazy and wildly difficult such a move would be. If we all decided
to bolt town in two to three months, everyone was going to need as much advance notice as
possible. They probably would have a hard time wrapping their hands around the whole thing.
They might not even believe me. I had the tape as proof and could remind Susan about the smoky
smell in the Camry earlier in the week.
That list I drew up during my first „chat' with Tiger87 was becoming a fluid working
document in my head. I woke up a few nights ago with the cold realization that we couldn't leave
Stanley or the two mothers behind if my family did decide to bolt. The Czechs could easily have
gotten to them out of revenge. So, the count was now six people, five of whom were going to
need heavy convincing. They had spent their whole lives in this area, thus, I knew the odds of
five people keeping totally quiet about this were pretty slim. In my view, Joan posed the biggest
risk to run to the police.
I decided to draw up a chart for all six people involved. Each person got two columns:
Issue and Solution. The first issue for everybody was buying into the real threat that the Czechs
posed to us all since I liked to think that, once they believed in this threat, their level of trust in me became less important – we would see.
I started drawing up the issues for Joan, to start.