Copyright @ calibeachgirl
All rights reserved, 2010
Evening, Thursday, August 2nd
Alessa....
We had succeeded in bringing Jimmy home without too much trouble and he was settled in one of the clinic's rooms. To forestall a constant line of concerned people, we promised to give hourly updates over the closed-circuit TV system.
Maria and I sat nearby watching the medical staff monitor his condition. While no words were spoken, the conversation between the two of us continued on an emotional level and we found ourselves holding hands more and more.
Now and then, he would give a shudder and then lapse back into what seemed a deep sleep and then he began to talk in his sleep. The doctors later told us they had given him a dose of Ambien. This sleeping drug actually allows some coma patients to communicate when all else had failed and eventually wake up.
As we listened to him speak, we soon realized that we were hearing his dreams about the women in his life. It was as if he were trying to come to some understanding, some final closure on his life with us, with them, with himself.
Listening to the recordings made from the original videos, we ultimately pieced together a probably very inaccurate vision of what he was thinking but it was the best we could do with what we could understand.
Jimmy had been a much more complicated man than the one he presented for public view, much more than the trained killer, much more than the genius behind the vast wealth we had accumulated, much more than the friend and lover he had been to both of us.
My deepest regret in life was that I had only that so short, short time with him that had to last me the rest of my time on earth.
If there is indeed a heaven then I hope to meet him again. If there is indeed a God then I want to ask why my life was so filled with frustration and grief when I had done nothing to deserve it, why Maria's love for him was never consummated, why Miriam had to die the horrible death she had and why Jimmy had to die when he did.
I now present to you what Maria and I, along with several psychologists and psychiatrists we had on staff, have written down. We've put our own impressions on what we think was being said and how it must have looked and felt.
We're probably wrong about some of it but we do think we got most of it down correctly. We listened to his ramblings so long and so carefully that we knew his last innermost thoughts by heart.
Even though we knew he was referring to Miriam and us there was another woman unknown to us who figured prominently in his almost fevered thoughts.
'...Wearing his first lieutenant's uniform, Jimmy walked into the banquet hall looking for his friends. They had been seated toward the middle of the room and already eating for a while. "Jim, where have you been?" Sean asked. But... Sean was dead a long time ago from cancer. His red-haired vixen of a daughter, Kathleen, still looked at him with hungry eyes, making him uncomfortable every time he had been around her...'
Whoever Kathleen was, neither Maria nor myself had a clue. We had looked each other surprised. Evidently, Jimmy had a whole other life way before he ever met Miriam.
'..."I'll get something to eat; be right back," he stammered. He beat a hasty retreat to the empty buffet line, staring at the strange food. Those he recognized were all the wrong colors, food that looked right, he couldn't recognize at all. The salad bowl contained large heads of uncut lettuce and he was at a loss as to what to do. He was startled when Kathleen rubbed against him and almost dropped his plate. "Kathleen! How are you... haven't seen you in a while."...'
Poor Jimmy... this Kathleen he mentioned over and over seemed to be a very predatory bitch of a woman.
Doctor Odell, one of the staff psychologists, said that people often dream of situations where they have no control nor understand what is happening. He said the mind is trying to take different memories and meld them into one idea which is how we can wake up from dreaming and not only didn't understand what was happening but also can't remember the dream minutes later.
'..."James... I could ask you the same thing. You never come around anymore. Daddy was... that is, I was hoping that you were going to ask me to marry you after I graduated from high school. Where did you go?" She continued to crowd his space, causing him to back away and into the serving table, rattling the platters.
"Well, you know... Bosnia and all and other stuff... Kathleen, you know that..."...'
But... he had gone to Bosnia years later... and whoever the hell 'Daddy' was... It seemed to us that Jimmy was the target of Kathleen's father.
'...He saw a dark haired Latina walk by in the distance... He thought he should know her, somehow. She was gone and he was standing on a balcony overlooking San Francisco Bay.
A honey-colored woman was standing next to him, her arm in his. He should know her, but he couldn't remember who she was. "Jimmy," she said, and leaned in to kiss him...'
At that point, we weren't surprised that we were in his dreams somehow. We would have been heartbroken if we weren't.
'..."Jimmy, don't you love me anymore?" The woman began to fade from view, like smoke on a windy day. Where did she go?
The Latina was standing on his other side trying to pull him to her. He stepped back and back again. She was beautiful but untouchable... why? She followed him, her arm reaching out and her fingers beckoning...'
His mind was in turmoil as the conflicting love he had for both Maria and me seemed to battle in his heart. We had to listen to several days' recordings while putting this together and in truth it was one of the hardest things either Maria or I ever had to do.
To this day, I wish we had never heard any of his broken thoughts and were left without those memories of our own.
'...He heard another voice and looked. A dark-haired Russian woman wearing a Star of David on a necklace... As he looked, her wedding dress began to bleed bright red. Before he could reach her, she was gone. "Miriam, oh God, Miriam... why did you have to die?" He sank to his knees on the suddenly appearing grass, the red wetness soaking through his wedding tuxedo...'
His scream filled the clinic's room and the doctor immediately gave him another sedative. Jimmy's pulse slowed down and he sank back into oblivion. I remember that day as if it were yesterday. The two of us left the room sobbing and we cried for hours later.
Today, I can't believe how emotional we were but losing a loved one, even one whom you had issues with, can be unbearable.
I knew Maria was upset because of her long history with him but my emotions, just as strong and just as deep, were crumbling down for a very different reason, still hidden from our eyes. There was something that I had wanted to tell him, something that would have possibly changed everything... but, it was oh so too late.
Our imagined compilation had almost reached its inevitable end.
'...He was in a large park walking hand in hand with the honey-colored woman. They were surrounded by thousands of cruel looking bald men holding knives and guns. He sank to his knees, beaten while others were dragging the woman to the ground and raping her. One finally took a knife and slit her throat...'
He had finally reached the memory of the park but his fears had changed the outcome to something truly horrible instead of something that was just terrifying.
The medical equipment monitoring his heart rate and blood pressure sounded a loud alarm and the doctor moved quickly over to his side.
"Suction! He's choking." He conferred with the nurse. "I can't give him any more sedative, he's at his limit already. He's going to have to tough it out, unfortunately. Get some ice and damp cloths. If we lower his body temperature, maybe he'll calm down. I wonder what's really going on in his mind."
The doctor checked his watch...
'...All four women stood in front of him... "You have to choose one," they said. "Choose... choose..." Kathleen, the little cheating bitch, now pregnant with someone else's child, faded away first, her crimson hair the last memory of her to be seen...'
That explained why we never heard of Kathleen. I was of a notion to have security track her sorry ass down and find out what happened. The little gold-digger and her father must have moved on to some other mark when Jimmy found a way to escape.
We think she was already pregnant with someone else's child and she was looking for someone she could convince it was his and get married as soon as possible.
Both Maria and I knew that wasn't how Jimmy worked.
'...Miriam, once again virginal white, was the next to leave him, smiling with love as she disappeared into a fog that had come in from the Bay. The tuxedo was gone; he was back in his colonel's uniform.
Before him stood the last two women, the Latina, Maria, exuding a heated dark sensuality that called to him but every time he moved closer, an empty uniform moved between them, pushing her back away from him.
The other woman, with her golden halo of curly hair, me, was in his grasp... if he could just reach her... he wanted her... but, God help him, he couldn't remember who she was... who she was... who she was...'
Was our interpretation of what he was dreaming completely accurate? Most likely not for who can really understand someone else's mind, someone else's dreams, hope, aspirations, needs and desires, especially when it became impossible to ask?
**********
Morning, Saturday, August 4th
I had asked the other three women of the leadership team to come to my apartment at ten in the morning. Looking back, it was amazing to think that one of the most influential corporations in the world was being controlled by four women who were going to try to replace one of the most original thinkers that ever lived.
Now we four sat in my living room sipping milk and eating every comfort food I could find in the cafeteria downstairs.
"Thank you for being so prompt. The general still hasn't awakened as we hoped. We cannot let this corporation fall apart waiting for him to get better. I've given this a good deal of thought as I imagine have you. We must step up and continue what we were doing before what happened. We must work together and have a united front.
Colonel, you and Louise must take control of the military side and fill in for whatever he was doing. As you all know, I now have the DOD clearances necessary for you to discuss with me what I need to know and keep to yourselves what I don't. That's fine with me and I will always respect your decision.
I don't want to step into your territory unless you ask but if corporation financial support is required, I have to have a decent idea why.
Is that acceptable to you, Colonel?"
Maria nodded her head in agreement and I was glad that one major stumbling block had been taken care of. A lesser person would have demanded a detailed report trying to establish a line in the sand.
"Mary, I'm immediately promoting you to my working position. I believed that you should have had the job in the first place and I told him that. I have already directed the CFO to bring all your monthly benefits to match my agreement with the general. For you, Colonel, and Louise, it will continue to be put into the accounts that he already has set up for you and I've brought your pay levels up also.
