Nightmare into Fantasy- Part 4

He jumped off the couch and began frantically searching his parents house. He desperately yelled out into the darkness, “MOM! DAD! TANYA! ANYBODY!” illuminating the house as he dashed from room to room. Everywhere he explored was deserted. The house was trashed. Picture frames were shattered, furniture was overturned, loose paper was everywhere as the contents of drawers were emptied onto the floor. The most unsettling aspect of the chaos was the blood.

It trailed all over the house. Streaks covered the walls indicating his family fought. The scene in the kitchen was terrifying. There were several pools of blood on the floor where his parents and girlfriend stood hours before. On the counter lay a knife still dripping from its attack. Blood sprayed away from where it rested on the counter. And most horrifying, the chocolate cake was gone.

Parker returned to the couch exasperated and fearing the worst. Everyone was gone, no… taken. He could feel the shame and fear and pain welling up in his chest. He began sobbing uncontrollably. Amidst the gasps he cried out to the void, “Why did this happen? What did I do to deserve this?” He knew the answer. It was buried 100 or so yards away, under the pear tree. He continued to weep.

A faint glow began to emanate from the ancient communication device. He cautiously picked up the cell phone and focused on the screen as it buzzed gently in his hand. Blocked caller. He took a deep breath in. Panic gripped him tightly as the phone continued to vibrate. He flipped it open. “Hello?” Parker answered with trepidation.

Family Tidings

“Ah good,” a distorted voice responded on the other end of the line, “you’re awake. How was your nap?” The audacity of this phone call. Parker was still disoriented from what he believed to be a pastry blackout. “Are you still there Parker?”

The caller knew his name. Parker did his best to compose himself. Sniffing deeply and wiping away the tears, he whimpered, “Yeah.” Well that was pathetic. He cleared his throat and deepened his voice doing his best to sound threatening and in control, “What do you want?” He demanded forcefully.

The caller cackled at his flimsy attempt to sound tough. “I want what I’ve always wanted but that’s a different conversation. For you though, I want to rip your world apart. I want you to know what it feels like to have to build it back together brick by brick. Your days of comfort and privilege are over Parker. When I’m through with you, you won’t know who to trust.”

“But why me?” Parker pleaded desperately seeking answers.

“Let’s just say, I have my reasons,” the caller responded. “Now, we all know the chance of finding your family disappears after 48 hours. Which means you have approximately 44 hours to find them before they're gone forever.” They were so smug, so confident, it infuriated him. “Involve the police if you wish, it won’t make a difference. I’ve already proven I have a propensity for violence as my little gift implies. Too bad your little girlfriend won’t be able to boast about that lovely ring you bought her.”

Parker couldn’t contain himself. Grief morphed into fury. “Get fucked asshole! I will find you and when I do the only fingers you’re going to see are mine right before I gouge out your fucking eyes.” Prior to the call, Parker was despondent over the loss of his family. Anguish paralyzed him with hopelessness. But animosity he could work with.

“That’s the spirit Parker. I’ll be seeing you.” The call disconnected and Parker let out an animalistic cry of sorrow and rage. He scoured the room seeking something to smash that wasn’t already in pieces. Nothing but the phone was left and he couldn’t smash that. Anthony would need it. Maybe he could find someone to reverse engineer the source of the call to at least provide Parker with a starting point.

Parker reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone. It was a little past midnight. Where was Anthony? He should have been back by now. He could see how Anthony’s meeting could have run a little long but it had been five hours since he left. Parker looked at his phone and found he missed several calls from Anthony and one from the hospital. He tried Anthony’s phone... straight to voicemail. Then he tried his voicemail and was surprised to find he had a message.

“Hey Parker, it’s Evy. Anthony was admitted to the hospital tonight. He was in pretty rough shape but he’s fine, just a broken arm and a few minor cuts and bruises. Can you come in and sign him out?” What the hell happened tonight Parker thought. First he learns his family had been kidnapped and then he discovers someone was brazen enough to attack his best friend.

Well at least he found Anthony. For a brief moment, Parker considered Anthony’s absence as potential involvement. He breathed a sigh of relief and gathered his senses. Anthony had to be able to help. He absorbed information differently, a skill Parker was jealous of to this day.

One Night at the Marigold

Parker reflected back to the time where Anthony saved him from expulsion his freshman year. The school’s case was bullshit from the start. The evidence they presented was circumstantial and relied a lot on hearsay from only a couple of witnesses. And if he had really done what they accused him of, the police would have intervened.

The night had begun like it always had. Drinks in the dorm before heading out to the campus bar- The Marigold. It was called the Marigold because the large square patio was lined with planters filled with marigolds. To avoid drunk students from debasing the displays, giant security guards were stationed at every corner. Management said it was a preventative measure dissuading students from booze fueled altercations but silently everyone knew it was to protect the makeshift garden.

They had been at the bar for a couple of hours by this point and Parker found himself talking to this young woman. They had some things in common but every so often she would complain about how awful her roommate was. She was annoyed by how she rarely came out to experience campus life. She always locked herself in their dorm studying for hours on end. She was pre-med and when she wasn’t studying for school, she was volunteering with at-risk youth, mentoring them to develop leadership and goal setting skills.

Was that jealousy he sensed because this roommate sounded pretty incredible. Either way one thing led to another and the two of them eventually left the bar together. Unbeknownst to Parker, a woman he had recently ended a relationship with who was also a friend of the woman, and a man who wouldn’t take no for an answer from the woman, saw them leave together. The two jilted adults, not ready to move on from the drunken duo, followed Parker and the woman to Parker’s dorm. They saw and recorded the woman falling down on several occasions. When they neared his room, she was so drunk, he had to carry her into the dorm, they recorded this too.

The next morning they had said their goodbyes after breakfast in the dining hall. Nothing had happened. How could it? She was way too drunk and despite his urges, his father had always taught him to respect women. Besides, Anthony was in the room and he would have kicked the shit out of Parker if he even thought about raping this girl. Truth is, Parker gave up his bed and spent the night on the floor... later to be covered in vomit.

Two weeks later, he received a letter from the registrar stating that pending review from the University’s Board of Directors he was to be expelled. It wasn’t until he and Anthony were heading to class that morning and saw the word RAPIST painted in red diagonally across their door where he would learn why.

For the next month Parker was berated and abused. The harassment was all encompassing and unrelenting. In class he was shunned, around campus he was assaulted (verbally and physically), and online the torrent of hate was almost too much to bear. He was doxed and received waves of death threats. Several times he had contemplated ending it and came close one time.

Watching his roommate go through all of this infuriated Anthony. He witnessed the anguish and isolation. He experienced the abuse because he passionately stood behind Parker. He dragged him to the hospital when Parker tried to end it. And that’s when Anthony took it upon himself to clear Parker. His hearing was a week away, Anthony had to work fast.

He went to visit all the women Parker had slept with… all two of them. He was grateful neither of them recognized him. One of them was deeply saddened to see what Parker was going through. She enjoyed their time together and found him to be charming yet a little weird. In her eyes, he was not capable of violating a woman like that because no matter how drunk, any woman was still stronger than him.

Guilty then Proven Innocent

The second woman had the complete opposite opinion when the topic of Parker arose. If guilt was measured by the woman’s vulgarity, they would have locked him away in Rikers Island. It was an extreme reaction that got his spidey senses tingling. Over the course of the first semester, Anthony had built up a strong network of students with complementary skill sets. His most utilized allies were computer science majors who hacked into school records and social media accounts as a public service to encourage people to increase their digital protection.

One of those hacks unsealed the complaint against Parker. It included the names of his accusers and the date of the incident. He recognized the date. It was the night when Parker gallantly slept on the floor as the blackout drunk woman purged the contents of her stomach all over him off the side of his bed. He also recognized the name but that wasn’t who Parker was with that night. Bingo!

At the hearing Parker was unable to face his accusers as the session was held behind closed doors. Parker had already resigned himself to his fate when Anthony presented the board with a package of evidence. Stunned by the collection of documents, they questioned how he got them. He said someone slid them beneath their door during the night. There was no way the board could prove otherwise. In the end the board had to rule in favour of exoneration. Lawyers had already contacted Parker about the details of his case and the board was concerned about a potential lawsuit.

It took Parker a couple of years to fully clear himself of the allegations. He still got the odd predator comment and female students were wary of working with him during group assignments. Parker was finally finding his rhythm again, until he met the drunk woman’s roommate. He ran into the woman and her roommate while grabbing a coffee one morning before class. They both ordered a coconut milk latte with honey. When she realized he had taken her drink, she chased him down and tackled him like Terry Tate- Office Linebacker, tossing him like a beanbag chair into a bank of lockers.

The most impressive part of this story... even after flipping over and landing on his back, he didn’t spill a drop of coffee. And they have been sharing coconut milk lattes with honey ever since.

Parker had to get to the hospital. Anthony was his only hope. And time was running out.