Shaddyr's Eclectic Collection > Pretender Fanfiction > Epilogue: Like a Moth to a Flame

 
Sydney sat at the conference table with Broots, and glanced yet again at his watch. The two looked at each other for what seemed to be the umpteenth time. 8:45 AM and there was still no sign of Miss Parker.

He watched the computer whiz place a pencil under his nose and curl his upper lip to hold it there. After a beseeching glance heavenward to appeal to whatever gods had consigned him to this place, he shook his head and pulled out his cell phone. Three rings later, there was an answer.

"What?" answered the voice, the slight tremor betraying the normally harsh edge.

Sydney was suddenly alert. "Miss Parker? Are you alright?"

"I'm fine Syd. Overslept. Be there when I get there."

Before he could say another word, the dial tone sounded in his ear. Sydney raised an eyebrow. There was something about her tone that hadn't sounded right. Abruptly, he rose and left the room, leaving a very puzzled Broots behind him.

*********************************

Miss Parker sat on her couch, cold compress on her head, glass of Pepto in her hand, and her gun sitting in front of her on the cherrywood coffee table. The call from Sydney had taken what little was left of her reserves. She drew a long shuddering breath, and forced herself not to cry.

She stared blankly at the wall, fighting the rising hysteria, grasping for her emotional control. She was NOT going to fall apart. Lost in her turbulent thoughts, she was startled reverie by a knock at the door. Quickly composing herself, she answered it and was not altogether surprised to find that it was Sydney. Without a word, she let him follow her into the front room. She settled back into her spot on the sofa and the doctor took the chair facing her. Briefly, his gaze lit upon the gun before her on the table, but he said nothing, choosing instead to study her face and wait till she broke the silence between them.

He patiently waited for her to find her voice.  "Something happened last night Syd. I don't know what to do," she finally began. "I had the strangest dream. It was very…"  Her face blushed.  "Well, it was very intense. But, it changed, and it became a nightmare - not all that unusual, but it woke me up." She stopped for a moment, then continued slowly, " I remember reaching for my gun. I got back to sleep all right, but this morning… Syd, someone was in my room last night," she finished in a husky whisper.

His eyes widened at the revelation, but before he could formulate a response she went on.  "I felt groggy and had a headache when I woke up, that in itself is abnormal. But my room was chilly - Syd, my bedroom window was open. I KNOW that I shut it last night. I remember thinking that it would be a cold evening and closing it. And then, when I went into my dresser, some of my things were out of place.  I have a certain order in which I put things. Everything was folded and neat…but out of place.  Syd, I know I didn't do it…so, someone else did. At first I thought it was the Centre, but why the hell would they go through my underwear drawer?"

A dark chill went through Sydney as a suspicion he would rather not have
considered began to coalesce.  He ignored it and forced himself to respond in a normal tone of voice.  "I think that calling the police—"

"No!" she bit out, then went on in a more subdued tone. "No police Syd. You know how the Centre feels about its employees having any unnecessary involvement with the local law enforcement."

"But Miss Parker," he began trying to reason with her.

"No, Syd." Her voice brooked no opposition.

He sighed. "Well, at least look into getting new locks on your windows as soon as possible. Perhaps have a security system installed. As lovely as this home is, it IS a bit antiquated as far as security is concerned." She grunted in response, and he stood up. "Is there anything that I can do for you? Anything you need?"

"I’ll be fine, Syd. The only thing you could do for me is to tell me you have a bottle of aspirin on you. This headache is not going away, and I’m all out," she grumbled, the surly facade not able to fully mask the remnants of fear and exhaustion that marred her features.

"Go back to bed, Miss Parker," he ordered her gently. "I’ll stop by at lunch and bring you some then." She looked up and opened her mouth to contradict him, but this time he cut her off, wagging a doctorly finger at her. "Take a sick day. You won't be able to accomplish anything feeling the way you do now anyway." He saw she was going to argue, so he continued. "Look, if you can’t sleep, call a security company and see about those windows. Please?"

"Okay, Syd, if it will make you feel better," she acquiesced, her voice tinged with sarcasm. Though her manner was slipping back into her normally brusque presentation, her eyes held relief and gratitude.

He handed her the cordless phone and dropped the yellow pages down on the coffee table beside the gun before making his way to the door.
 

*********************

He was almost half way back to the Centre when his cell phone rang.  "Sydney here."

"Hello, Sydney."

Somehow, he wasn’t at all surprised by the voice on the other end. "Jarod," he acknowledged.

"So, how are things this fine morning, Sydney? Do they have you busy analyzing my last pretend, trying to figure out where I might be headed next, Broots scouring the internet and various databases looking for clues?" There was the briefest of pauses before he continued. "Is Miss Parker hard at work tracking her lab rat?"

Sydney pursed his lips, his earlier suspicions leaping to the forefront of his mind. "Actually, Miss Parker is under the weather today Jarod. She’s taking the day off."

The pretender’s voice became concerned. "Is she all right?" he asked, and Sydney thought he could detect an undertone of apprehension in it.

"That all depends on how you define ‘all right’." He concentrated on the road before him, eyes narrowing while his voice took a hard edge. "Someone broke into her home last night while she was there."  He heard Jarod’s surprised intake of breath at the revelation, then continued. " I’ve just left her place, she’s very unsettled. On top of it all, she’s got an awful headache.  Being Parker, she won’t let me call the police, but I suggested she contact a security company."

"That’s a good first step," Jarod agreed, sounding quite upset by the news. "So, what’s she doing about the headache?" he asked innocently, his tone even.

"I’m going back a little later. I’ll bring her some aspirin or something when I go back."

"Uh, maybe something else would be better…Tylenol perhaps." Jarod suggested. Then he quickly added, "Better for her ulcer."

Sydney thought the comment odd, but put it aside for the moment. "Yes, perhaps."

"So, what is it that makes her think her home was broken into?"

"Some things are out of place, and the window to her bedroom was open this morning. She said she remembered closing it last night."

"People make mistakes."

"Miss Parker isn’t the kind to cry wolf, Jarod," he admonished the younger man, by now certain that what he had suspected was true.

"Yes, of course, your right," Jarod concurred. "Perhaps getting new locks on her windows wouldn’t be such a bad idea."

"Unfortunately, I really don’t think that will make much of a difference if this particular intruder wishes to access her home again - wouldn’t you agree, Jarod?"

"Wha- w-why would you say that?" He fumbled for words, caught off guard by Sydney’s insinuation.

"I’m saying it was you in her home last night, Jarod. Do you deny it?"
Everything in the psychologist was hoping, praying he would. Then came the answer that he was dreading.

"No."

White hot anger lanced through Sydney, and he pulled the car to the side of the road. He couldn't trust himself to drive safely in his present state of mind. "You went into her home!  You went through her things! Of  all people, I would have thought you would respect someone’s privacy! What were you THINKING?" he yelled, furious that his protege would do such a thing.  More silence.

Sydney took a few deep breaths, trying to calm down and be rational. He’d never thought Jarod’s fixation with Parker would cross this line. It was far more serious than he’d suspected. While he ruminated over the implications, Jarod finally spoke.

"I… I couldn’t stop myself," he whispered harshly, voice choked with emotion. "I was doing things before I even realized it. I never meant-" Jarod’s reply was cut short by a gut wrenching sob.

"Jarod, you have a problem."  He sighed. "Tell me what happened."

Sydney sat silently while Jarod poured out the story; how he’d been drawn back again and again, how he’d been watching her almost since the time he escaped. How it had become more frequent in the last few months and how he’d suddenly, unexpectedly found himself in her room the night before.

As he shared the details of the previous evening, Sydney felt his blood run cold. Finally, he could stay silent no longer. "You drugged her drink? Good GOD, Jarod! You have been a doctor!" he raged, his professional distance vanishing entirely. "You know what can happen when one mixes depressants and alcohol! She might have died!"

Jarod became defensive. "It was only one, and you know as well as I do that the chances of heart failure or catastrophic system collapse are exceedingly low."

Sydney stared unseeingly out the window of the car, trying to grasp what he’d just been told. "Are you trying to say that somehow makes what you did acceptable?" he asked quietly.

His answer was vehement.  "Oh, god.. no, no it doesn’t. Shit! Sydney…I know that I KNOW better… but… Sydney, I just wasn’t thinking. I couldn’t think. It felt like the right thing to do at the time. All I could think was if I could get a pill into her, she would sleep. If she would sleep then it would be safe. It was all so twisted.." he trailed off, sounding lost, confused, torn.

Sydney was wrenched between compassion for the confused younger man, and anger over what he’d done to Miss Parker. The anger won. "Safe? Safe for who? Certainly not for her. Safe for you? What? So you could go through her home with impunity? Or perhaps you were trying for a tawdry thrill.  Was that it Jarod? She did say she had a most…intense…dream. Or, perhaps, it was not a dream?"

Jarod protested, his voice raw with pain. "It wasn’t like that…I mean, I didn’t plan it that way…I didn’t plan it at all! Sydney, you’ve got to believe me! I never even meant to touch her, I was just pulling the blanket back up, but when I touched her skin, it was like something possessed me, beyond my control. I couldn’t help myself!" There was something akin to hysteria in his voice as well as desperation.

Revulsion rose up in Sydney, the last feeling he’d ever expected to have about his protégé. He understood, as a doctor, that Jarod was manifesting a mental illness and required professional help, possibly even pharmacological intervention. At the moment, however, as a man, he could not stand to talk to him for one second longer.

"Goodbye Jarod."

"Sydney, wait! Please! Don’t- "

He terminated the connection.

Sydney gazed down at the phone in his hand, then carefully placed it back on the seat beside him. Glancing over his shoulder first to check for oncoming traffic, he pulled out and headed back to the Centre. It was going to be a long day.
 

End