About Henry Fellows (Chapter Four Concluded)

Post 86:

Episode Twelve:

On Killing and Innocence: The Chronicles of Henry Fellows

Chapter Four Concludes (Travelodge)

            “Tell me how you get it? What’s the real million-dollar question?”

            She wastes no time. “Somebody knows you’re out there, could be ten people, could be a thousand. They know what you look like. Most important, they don’t want you to turn yourself in.”

            “And?”

            “Give me a second to breathe, Henry. AND—if they don’t want you talking to the police they could just kill you. But they haven’t killed you. They want you alive for something. Wait, did you really need to kill those guys today?”

            The question turns me pale as the Travelodge drapes. It’s the question I was asking myself the whole way down to Austin. I heard the guy’s gun click. I thought that was the signal to go into pure self-defense mode, but nothing’s a total certainty. As Nina reasons out the situation with me it becomes more apparent that they may have just approached the car being cautious. There’s no way to know, not for sure, but deep down my crazy conscience wants me to think I needlessly killed two guys who meant me no harm.

            I slowly begin to hear Nina again. She’s saying my name a lot, trying to get my attention. I get lost in thought very easily. It drives her up the wall. One of the reasons I haven’t bothered her for a while. “Hank? You still there?”

            I tell her yes as I sit up on the bed. I feel dirty and dead. As dirty as the comforter, as dead as the mortuary that is the rest of the room. “Still here. So what do you think? I’ve heard of mysteries, but this one goes over my head.” My breathing is becoming stunted, like all the unknowns are a wet rag down my throat. “It could be the crazy, Nina. Maybe I was sane before, I don’t know, but the running, the paranoia—it’s getting to me.”

            Nina doesn’t say anything. Nothing but breath through the phone, full and rough. “Henry, what you’ve been through… it would get to anybody. Besides, you sound perfectly reasonable to me.”

            “How’s that?”

            “I just got a text from an unknown number. It says STOP TALKING TO HENRY FELLOWS.”