Chapter 26
A few minutes later, Mrs. Reynolds brought the bottle of wine to the living room and the bottle of Sprite also, so that her children could make the toast without drinking wine. The glasses of wine were served, and the toast was made. Officer Reynolds did the honors. “I’d like to celebrate the return of my beloved son Solomon, and also the fact that his murderer’s days of freedom are numbered.”
More like hours of freedom, thought Daniel, smiling.
“Cheers,” everyone said in unison and bumped their glasses together. Daniel had his first alcoholic drink in his life, but it didn’t hurt him or make him feel discomfort in the least. This didn’t mean that he would drink alcohol on a regular basis, just when friends invited him to celebrate a special occasion.
Daniel’s cell phone rang. He pulled it out of the pocket of his jacket and saw Madison’s name and phone number on the screen. He also knew why she was calling. “Well, everyone, I want to thank you for tonight. I had a great time, but I have to go home. My wife can’t sleep without me.”
“Aww,” said Joanna.
“I promise to keep in touch. I will especially keep you informed on the case of Solomon’s brutal murder.”
Solomon had his laptop in his lap. Jessica and Joanna were watching him read his email. He didn’t mind them watching him, as he would never do something on the computer that they couldn’t see.
Daniel walked out the door once again, shortly after, and a few minutes later, he was gone.
“Dad, I’m still hungry,” said Solomon. “May I make a snack for me, Jo and Jess?”
“Sure, son, you can have anything you want.”
“You don’t mind that it’s almost two o’clock in the morning?”
“No, my boy,” said Officer Reynolds, holding Solomon’s hand. “Now that I got you back, I would deny you absolutely nothing. Go and make a snack for you and your sisters.”
Solomon closed the lid of his laptop just for a moment and then got up holding it with both hands, and accommodated it in the loveseat, where Daniel had it minutes before. Then, he, Joanna and Jessica went to the kitchen to make some snacks for them. Solomon would never get anything for himself alone. Everything that he got, his sister also got. Just like Daniel predicted, the Reynolds family stayed up for the rest of the night. They were so emotional that they just couldn’t go to sleep.
At that moment, everyone in the Kress mansion was sleeping everyone except Ursula. She was worried about her husband. He hadn’t come to bed. A thousand ideas as to why this was flashed into her head. Maybe he was in his office getting drunk or passed out somewhere downstairs, with the TV on. She got up from her bed, walked out of her room, closed the door behind her, and walked through the hallway, opening the door to every room, until she saw Dr. Kress sleeping beside Clay. She went into Katherine and Clay’s room and closed the door behind her. This was strange to her because Dr. Kress hadn’t done this since Clay was a little child, about three years old, when he used to have nightmares and go to his parents’ room to sleep with them in their bed, to feel safer. She remembered those times. Clay was so sweet and innocent.
#
Ursula remembered one of those instances when Clay came into her and Dr. Kress’ room asking them if he could sleep with them because he’d had a horrible nightmare, even though his parents would never let him watch horror movies. Clay knocked on the door. He was only three years old, and he’d been sleeping in his own room since he was a baby. This was the first time he’d ask his parents to let him sleep with them just for this night, one of many times.
“Mom, Dad, may I come in?” the sweet little boy said. Ursula and Dr. Kress noticed how frightened he was by the tone of his voice.
“Sure, son, come on in,” said Dr. Kress.
Clay opened the door and walked in. “May I sleep with you tonight? I had a horrible nightmare, and I thought it was no big deal. I went back to sleep and I had yet another nightmare. Now, I’m afraid to sleep alone.” Clay sounded like he was about to break down and cry. Ursula and Dr. Kress knew too well how horrible it was not to be able to sleep, especially because the person was afraid to have a nightmare.
“Oh, sweetie, of course you can sleep with us tonight.” Ursula stretched out her arms to take her soon in. “Come on.” Luckily, Dr. Kress didn’t mind the idea. Clay ran to his parents’ bed and jumped in, right in the middle. They accommodated him in the bed, covered him, and wrapped their arms around him to make him feel safe. Clay fell asleep very quickly and for the rest of the night, he didn’t have any more nightmares.
#
Taken back to the present time, Ursula wiped her tears away with her hands and sniffled. She didn’t know what had happened to her son tonight. Katherine and Dr. Kress hadn’t told her yet because they had no idea how she would react. Ursula took Dr. Kress’ hand and then whispered to him to get his attention. “Clifford… wake up, Clifford!”
Dr. Kress woke up and turned on the light. “Ursula…”
“Is Clay ok? Why are you sleeping in his bed tonight?” She hadn’t raised her voice even a little bit, and she wouldn’t. She thought Clay was simply asleep and she didn’t want to wake him up.
“Clay had a rough day today at work.”
“I knew it. I just knew it. Clay is much, much more sensitive than anyone I’d ever met. You and I were right not to let him watch any horror movies, even at seventeen. He lets everything get to him. We advised him against working with the human mind, but he didn’t listen.”
“Yes, that’s why…something has happened. Oh, God, I don’t know how you’re going to take this.”
“Take what? What happened?”
“Clay is…he’s no longer human.”
“His DNA has been enhanced,” she said, preoccupied.
“Yes. I am not against it. I think it had to be done, and I’m sure that if I had been asked for permission to do this to my son beforehand, I would’ve accepted. It’s the only way that he’ll be able to do what he has to do, the only way that he will become a stronger man in every sense of the word…especially emotionally, which is precisely what he needed all his life.”
“I agree with you. I want what’s the best for my son, but now what’s going to happen to us?”
“I’m sure we’ll be ok.”
“You’re not afraid that Katherine or even our own son will become uncontrollably angry with us and…attack us one day?”
“That is not going to happen, Ursula. They love us too much, and who they are is not going to change that. You know all aliens love us, well, most of them, since we should never say all.”
“In this case I would say all,” said Ursula.
Within a few minutes, Dr. Kress got up, took Ursula’s hand, and walked out of his son’s room with her. That night, Dr. Kress went to his room, and while Ursula got back in bed to wait for him, he went to the bathroom inside the bedroom, took a quick shower, and changed into his favorite pajamas. Then, he went back to sleep.
The morning after, Clay woke up and yawned. He was alone now. His wife wasn’t beside him, and he never knew that the night before, his father had slept beside him for a few hours. Clay got up and went straight into the bathroom. Just then, Katherine walked into the room and into the bathroom. As Clay took his clothes off to get into the bathtub and take a shower, she stood in the doorway to the bathroom.
“How are you feeling?”
“I’m feeling strange, like something in me has changed.” The shower came on and he started bathing. Even so, he could hear everything that she said. As a matter of fact, he could hear everything that was happening in the mansion, and even what was happening a few miles away.
“It’ll no longer feel weird to you within the next few days, especially when you notice how much stronger and better you’ve become.”
“So you did this.”
“No, I didn’t do it, although it was my idea. Heidi did it. She put something in your latte.”
“Ah, the latte!” he said. “That’s nice.”
“I’m sorry that I’m telling you after it happened, and I didn’t consider your opinion.”
“I’m sure you did this because you want the best for me. I’m not mad at you for it. On the contrary, I appreciate it.”
“Thank you. I felt a little bad because I caused your genes to be altered without your approval.”
“Hey, you have my approval. I know that I will be much better now, and I’ll be able to keep working. I won’t have to go back to school to study another profession, you know, start all over because of my inability to help my patients.”
“I’m glad you feel that way. What do you want to wear? I’m going to get your clothes ready for you.”
“I’d like to wear a white long-sleeved, buttoned shirt and black pants, white socks and black shoes.”
“Your clothes will be ready in a minute,” she said and got out of the bathroom. In a matter of minutes, she got out of the closet the clothes that Clay wanted to wear, along with his black shoes. She also got some white boxers out of a chest in the closet and set the clothes on the bed. Then, she got out of the room. She wanted to give him some privacy so that she wouldn’t suddenly feel the desire to make love to him, making him be late for work. They could do that later, perhaps when he returned home from work this afternoon. She was ready to get pregnant now.
A few minutes later, Clay walked out of the bathroom with a red towel wrapped around his waist. Katherine wasn’t there, and he knew why, he knew it too well. He got dressed, dried his hair and combed his hair as quickly as he could. He had short light-brown hair, so this didn’t take him a long time to do. Then, he got out of the bedroom and walked the hallway to go downstairs to the first story of the mansion. As he was getting to the first story, his father sat there at the bottom of the stairwell, waiting for him. The difference in Clay’s appearance and behavior was undeniable. He seemed to have become much better-looking than he was before. However, his voice didn’t change, just the way he talked, more grammatically-correct and with a slightly more-complex vocabulary, which everyone at the house understood. “Hello, Father. How are you doing? Did you get a good night’s sleep last night?”
“Father?” said Dr. Kress, amazed. “You would never call me father. You would always call me Dad.”
Clay smiled. Then he finished walking down the stairwell, walked closer to Dr. Kress and gave him a big hug.
“You were always nice and respectful to me, but you would never do that, either.”
“I guess we better get used to it, Father, all of us,” Clay replied and walked with his father to the front door of the mansion. Then, he walked Dr. Kress to his car and held his hand for a few seconds. “Have a great day at work today, Father.”
“I know you will have a great day at work today, son,” Dr. Kress replied and then opened the driver door and got into his car and fastened his seatbelt. Clay walked to his car, opened the door, got in, fastened his seatbelt and started the car. They pulled out of the driveway and then out of the gate simultaneously. Clay now knew, without anyone advising him to do so, that it would be in his best interest to drive to his clinic instead of walking there.
That morning, while Clay arrived at his office and got ready to see his patients, Daniel’s men were exhuming Raymond Manning’s body. They weren’t doing something illegal thus the police authorized this, and they knew that this would be a surprise for the Manning family. They wanted the Manning family to be happy, too, and nothing would be better for Raymond’s parents, Hope and Leonard, than getting their son back. Maria and Raymond had a relationship for one year before getting married. Their first time making love was on their wedding night. Raymond loved Maria, but as Maria told Hayley, Raymond couldn’t resist her. She was way too powerful for him. Now, Raymond would have one more chance with the woman he loved. While Clay and Daniel worked with their patients that day, several hours later, around four o’clock in the afternoon, Daniel’s men were taking Raymond Manning’s body to the mansion. Madison had just gotten home from work. She had just changed her clothes, so she opened the door for the men and walked with them to the lab. Slowly, they accommodated Raymond’s body on the platform. Ethan, one of the men, called Daniel directly at his office to let him know that the body was here, and it was ready. Better yet, cryonic suspension wasn’t needed because Raymond’s body had been perfectly preserved.
“This is Dr. Daniel Sherman. How may I help you?”
“Dr. Sherman, it’s done. We just brought the body to the lab.”
“That is excellent. You did a good job,” said Daniel and hung up. “So, Mrs. Stevenson, you said you’ve felt much better.” The conversation with his patient continued. She was a patient whose mental illness he’d already cured. She just didn’t know it yet.
That afternoon, Hayley arrived at Maria’s mansion to pick her up and go to the store with her, just like they’d agreed. Maria was downstairs, dressed, looking beautiful, and waiting for her, in the guest living room in the first story of the house. She walked a few steps to the front door, purse on shoulder, and walked outside. She and Hayley exchanged a hug and within a few minutes, they got into the car simultaneously, fastened their seatbelts, and took the road.
On their way there, the woman started conversing. “So how are the twins?”
“They’re doing great, better and better every day.”
“Are they getting along well?”
“Yes, thank God. They never fight. When they disagree, they just talk it out.”
“How are Maya and Amelia?”
“They just gave birth.”
Hayley turned her face to look Maria in the eyes for a moment because she was stunned. “They gave birth again?”
“Yes, they did, last night. However, they hadn’t gotten pregnant in a long time. As usual, the babies were taken away. They couldn’t go to work today because they had to recover and rest.”
“Now I see what’s in the future for me,” said Hayley, smiling, “but I don’t care about that because I love Julian and I’d do anything for him.”
“That’s good to know. Besides, pretty soon, giving birth will be easy and painless for you. I am speaking from personal experience.”
Hayley was awestruck once again. “Giving birth is not painful for you?”
“No, it isn’t, not at all. That’s why human women envy us.” She laughed at that comment. “I’m just kidding.”
“You’re kidding, but it’s true. We do envy you, although personally, I envy you in a good way, if you could say that. Everything seems to be so easy for you. You never cease to amaze me.”
Maria laughed again.
“So, what laptop do you want? Do you want one of those cute little net-books or what?”
“I want a regular-sized laptop, since I don’t mind carrying it around.”
“What color? What brand?”
“Oh, that’s right they do have laptops available in cool colors. Hmm, that’s a hard one. What’s your favorite color?”
“My favorite color…? It’s red.”
“Do you want a computer, too?”
“Oh, that’s very nice of you, godmother, but my three-year-old laptop still works. You don’t have to…”
“I want to. Besides, I know you want a new one because your laptop has caused you problems lately. You’ve lost files to a damaged hard drive, you’ve had to buy two hard drives so far, and you have to deal with malware often. It’s not cool.”
“Oh, speaking of files, Godmother, did you have a chance to back up your files?”
“No, I didn’t.”
“Oh, no, what are you going to do now? What all those novels you had on your hard drive that you worked so hard on?”
“I’ll just rewrite them. That won’t be a problem. Best of all is that I know my stories from beginning to end, every single little word that was written, I know it by heart. I won’t have to make changes to the stories because of the inability to remember what I originally wrote. That’s why I can’t wait to get the new laptop, because if I write by hand, I will use a lot more ink and a lot more paper. It’s tedious to have to buy ink for the digital pen constantly and…it’s just so much better and so much easier to type my manuscripts.” Maria didn’t know that all of her manuscripts, including the one that she was ready to submit her agent, the manuscript that was due just three days from today, that they were safe in a CD that Mark had at his house. Every day, Mark and Matt would visit their mother right after work, and Mark would make sure to get into her computer, pop in a CD-RW and record all of his mother’s work in it. Then, he would take that disc home and put it in a safe place because to him, an author’s work was just as valuable as money, especially his mother’s work. Maria Manning already had five best-selling novels under her belt. She was extremely talented, as everyone in her species was, and telling stories was what she chose to do.
“I think it’ll be harder than you realize, Godmother.”
“No, I don’t think so. I can type up to 1,000 words a minute and everything I wrote is still fresh in my mind. The only things that I forget are other people’s offenses against me. Everything else stays fresh in my mind, especially my novels. It will be ok, don’t worry. I have learned my lesson and from now on I am going to back up my work. God, I can’t wait to start writing again.”
Hayley and Maria arrived at Office Corner. This was where Hayley would always buy her office products. This was where she bought her laptop three years before. Hayley knew that they had laptops in many different pretty colors. They got out of the car, walked into the store, and they went straight to the computer section. Maria knew exactly what she wanted: a stylish, reliable laptop, with lots of hard drive space, a multi-layer DVD burner, the best processor, lots of RAM, and a screen with great graphics. Hayley, however, needed help choosing her second laptop. Maria turned her face to look at Scott, a few steps away from them, and he immediately approached them. Maria had already chosen her laptop, a midnight-blue laptop with all the features that she wanted.
“How may I help you, Mrs. Manning?”
“My goddaughter and I are here to buy laptops. I already know which laptop I want, but she’s having a tough time deciding. She wants something affordable, reliable, and with enough hard drive space and RAM, and of course, a DVD burner.”
“What is she going to do with the computer, download music, videos, play games? Is she going to write reports?”
“I’m going to do a little bit of everything,” said Hayley.
“About how much hard drive space you need?”
“Just the standard, 250 GB is more than enough. I usually burn all the music I download on CD’s and transfer it to my MP3 player, so…”
“Ok,” said Scott, with his hand on top of one of the laptops, “then I think this is the computer you want, right here. It has 250 GB of hard drive space, 3 GB of RAM, a multi-layer DVD burner drive, fifteen inches in size, great display...”
“Is it available in different colors?” said Hayley. “If so, how many colors do you have available?”
“Yes, we have five different colors for this computer brand particularly, Envision. Those colors are crimson, midnight blue, emerald green, black, and white.”
“Do you have to order it for me, or can I just take it with me now? I mean because of the color.”
“This computer is available in five different colors, and fortunately, all you have to do is choose your color and you can take it home with you right now. Sometimes when a customer wants a specific color, we have to order it for him or she and he or she has to wait two or three weeks for the computer to arrive here.”
“I want it in crimson. I like the price, $699, that’s good; I mean if Godmother agrees because she’s buying the computer for me.”
“Honey, if you had chosen a $2500 laptop, I would’ve gotten it for you, no problem. Money is not an issue, thank God, much less when it comes to you. I’d give you anything. Price doesn’t matter.”
Scott smiled.
Hayley held Maria’s hand. “Thank you so much. You’re so sweet to me.”
“I’ve loved you with all my heart since the moment you were born,” Maria said to Hayley and then said to Scott, “Scott, I’d like the same computer, but I want it in emerald-green.”
“There is no problem, Mrs. Manning.” Scott walked away from them for a few minutes, and then a few minutes later, he had both computers in his hands, and Hayley and Maria went to the counter with him. Just when they were about to pay, Scott got an idea. “You can get an all-in-one printer included in the price of the computer. All-in-one printers range from thirty-nine to sixty-nine dollars, depending on their features and capabilities.”
“Printers included with the computers for the same price?” Hayley was amazed. “That is awesome!”
“Yes, and I will also include rewritable discs with your purchase, included in the price of the two computers.”
“Wow,” said Hayley, “are you doing this just for us?”
Scott simply smiled. “Your total for this purchase is $1,498.” Scott and Hayley went back and got the two printers and the two packages of rewritable CD’s. Everything was on the counter, and within minutes, everything was paid for. It was a real bargain. Scott didn’t tell them anything, but he didn’t charge them for the printers or the CD’s, and he was doing this just for them. Scott even helped them accommodate everything in the backseat of Hayley’s car a few minutes later. Then, Scott shook Hayley and Maria’s hands and walked away.
When Maria and Hayley arrived at Maria’s mansion, Mark and Matt were outside waiting for them. The twins knew that Hayley and Maria were at the store, shopping for new computers and the twins had come by to visit their mothers, as they would do every day, and also to give Maria the rewritable CD that had all her manuscripts saved in it. Mark, Matt, Hayley and Maria shared hugs, and the guys helped the ladies carried the computers, the printers, and the backup media into the house and set everything in the visitors’ living room, on the coffee table. Then, Mark, Matt and Maria sat on the sofa together and Hayley sat on the loveseat.
They started removing the computers from their respective boxes simultaneously. “Wow, Mom,” commented Mark, “you got the emerald-green one! That is so cool! I have the white one.”
“And Hayley got the red one. That’s awesome. Hey I just noticed that these are the colors of Christmas, red and green, very nice!”
Everybody laughed.
Both computers were plugged into their battery charges and Hayley set up her administrator user account. Mark helped Maria set up her account. He retrieved the CD that had all of Maria’s manuscripts from the inside pocket of his jacket and when the computer was done starting up at the desktop for the very first time, and as he got the computer’s antivirus to scan for the first time, he placed the CD in the CD tray, opened it on the operating-system explorer and in less than fifteen seconds, he transferred all of Maria’s manuscripts onto her computer’s hard drive. “Mother, I heard that when your other laptop died on you, you didn’t have the opportunity to back up your files,” he pressed the little button to open the optical drive tray and retrieved the CD from there, putting it back in its case, “but you don’t have to worry about that, because I’ve just transferred,” he held the CD in his right hand, showing it to her, “all your files onto your hard drive, all your manuscripts.”
“You had all my manuscripts recorded in a CD?” Maria was surprised.
“Yes, I did. I even had the changes that you made to the manuscript you were working on yesterday. I got them when Matt and I came over yesterday in the afternoon, so you don’t have to rewrite anything.”
Maria gave her son another big hug. “You’re a lifesaver. Keep doing this until this CD runs out of space. Then, transfer the files to a recordable CD so they can sit there for a couple years, delete them from the rewritable CD, and record new files onto the rewritable CD.”
“Exactly,” commented Matt.
“Yes, that’s what I do with all my files, mother. Every year, I transfer my files from one recordable CD to a brand-new recordable CD, just in case the files in the original CD get corrupted, and that way I never lose my files.”
“I should do the same thing. I guess I never thought I needed to back up my files. I thought my computer would never fail me,” said Maria. “I should’ve known that computers always fail. They don’t last forever. In fact, if a computer functions for eight years it’s a miracle.”
“Don’t be so hard on yourself, Mother,” said Matt, and both he and Mark had their arms around her. “You’re not thinking straight lately, and you’re not using common sense, and that’s because of the loss of our father. Your mind is slowly deteriorating. We understand. That’s why we visit you every single day, rain or shine, and we don’t let anything stop us from coming over, because we’re watching over you. You’ll get better soon, and you’ll once again be able to reason perfectly and your mind will function like it should.”
“I hope so, my love,” said Maria. “I’ve just been so depressed, and sometimes I lose touch with reality.”
“I