Authors: Sylvia Hubbard
You and I both know in our youth we made a lot of mistakes. Especially with each other. We loved deeply, but we allowed our destinies and family to get in the way of fate when we both knew we should have not done what we did in the first place, but after it was done, we should have faced our responsibilities and married. I for one agree what we did was sin and I refuse to go to my death with that on my conscious along with all the other things..
I have made my peace with everything and everyone except you. The only way I know I can do this is to give you peace that has bothered you for years.
The location of our daughter.
My mother made the arrangements with a lawyer named Heaven Wineguard. She won’t release the records because she won’t admit that she lost these records. My mother took them purposely. She never wanted either one of us to ever know where the child was, but before she could securely hide them, she died and I located them. Our child was named Laskie Smith. Do not ask me why or how that name came into play with our daughter, but in Heaven’s records the child is referred to as this name. A household outside of Chicago adopted her. The adopting parents died and the child was lost in the system. The story is much too long to go into right now and you will see the records soon enough. I sent a private investigator that has just returned to me on my deathbed to let me know that the child who is now twenty-three was last located in Ohio where she ran away too.
I hate that my child lived a horrible life like the one the investigator’s report says she did—which you will also see soon enough—because I know I could have made her life just a little easier. I am not saying I should go to hell because of this, but I do say I should have done more. More than most since I knew a long time of her supposed whereabouts.
Make it all right Thomas, even if you hate my guts as I have always hated yours for going with your father’s decisions in your life and not your hearts. Make it right in her life. Give her the world once you find her and give her a hug only a true mother and father could give her.
Thank you. Agatha formerly Soliel.
The room was strangely quiet as Newborn passed the letter to Thomas who looked roughly through the letter. Underneath her signature it read, “Stop reading.”
Underneath that was a P.S.
I did love you my whole life, but as you’ve always said to me, I could never tell the difference between hate and love. I know now that I just never wanted to believe I loved you. Believe this and love my daughter as we both were there. Yours in life and death.
He sighed rubbing his eyebrows rather disturbed by the letter.
Newborn began to read the rest of the will at this time. “I, Agatha Washington, being of sound mind and body leave the remaining property not mentioned above in the sole ownership of Laskie Smith, my child born out of wedlock with Thomas Blair. In addition to this, I leave two million dollars to Ms Smith and a trust fund of one million to be divided up between any off springs she might have produced. Eight million dollars will then be dispersed in the Patterson Trust Fund that I have set up to proper individuals that cannot be identified publicly.” The will went on to accurately list the eleven holding all over the world that Ms Smith would obtain and in addition to this, the stocks of large billion dollar companies that would now be transferred to her name. Whoever this Ms Smith was now was a wealthy woman. So who was she? “In the event that Ms Smith has deceased the estate left to her will go to any and all siblings born before her only or her offspring. In the event there are no siblings or off springs alive, the estate will return to the law offices as permanent to the business, which then will go into the Newborn and Washington Scholarship fund.”
Thaddeus thought this rather strange. What did she mean by offspring before Laskie Smith? She was set upon not leaving her new husband or any of her children anything than what she had already given them. Maybe because she felt in her heart she was wrong to give them anything when she had not been a real mother in the beginning.
Guilt made people do crazy things. Agatha was feeling plenty guilty. He prayed Thomas would have the chance of finding Laskie Smith before it was too late. Hopefully it wasn't.
Chapter 14
Frustrated she paced the room until Dr. Himes entered. He seemed almost disturbed as she was. Obviously he knew that she was seriously bothered. “The nurse has informed me you are not happy with the experimental birth control substance we have given you. Please tell me what is the problem?”
“What is the problem?!” she exclaimed almost hysterically. “I am completely thrown off track. I want my life back to normal. This ‘experimental drug’ is doing things to me that I don’t think I can handle at this point in my life. I just moved here, I am having these weird dreams about a man I don’t know—well I’ve briefly met..." She became flustered. “I-I... and I think I’m sleep walking. I’ve never done this before in my life. I don’t know how to feel or what to do. I can’t take it anymore.”
“Calm down, please,” he insisted. Pushing the intercom he called for Dr. Porter. He was very worried Skye would start becoming like the other patients and with her being the more successful one it would be a blow to their finances and plans. “Have a seat,” he urged.
“I don’t want to have a seat and I certainly don’t want to calm down.” She began to yank at her hair pulling large handfuls from her scalp and not caring about the pain. It was better than the mental pain. Anything was better than the mental pain. “I want you to get whatever you put in me OUT!” She was screaming at the top of her lungs and she couldn’t stop herself from yanking her hair until blood began to run down her forehead.
Dr. Porter entered the room looking quite concerned. He heard the gist of the last part outside the office because she had raised her voice to a screech. In his pocket he brought a syringe of Thorazime and also some Valium. “Ms Patterson, as I told you before the substance lasts for three months. You’ve just gotten to the second month. After the third month, we can—”
“I swear I’ll go crazy!” She paced frantically like a caged animal. “You don’t know how it is. You don’t know.” Finally she sat down or rather fell back on the couch near Dr. Porter, who slowly sat down beside her as not to startle her back to hysterics. She seemed worn and tired. There were dark circles under her eyes, her hair was all over her head, and her clothes were wrinkled and dirty. She really did look as if she were going to lose what little sanity she was holding on to.
“Ms Patterson, my name is Dr. Harrison Porter. I invented the birth control, I swear to you it won’t cause any pain.”
“I’m hallucinating. I’ve never hallucinated in my life. Even after everything. I’ve never dreamed so much in my life as I’m doing now and it’s just one specific dream, it just changes slightly and gets longer. I can’t explain it.” She buried her face in her bloody palms and rocked back and forth. Those images began to fly through her mind again. The tingles began to flutter through her belly. No! No!!
“I insist you take these.” Dr. Porter moved closer holding two Valium in his hand.
She slowly looked up at the doctor. When he entered she didn’t pay any attention to him. He was just another white coat then, but now, she was looking into eyes that were familiar. She knew this man from . . .
Skye slapped the pills across the floor and shot to her feet. “I DON’T NEED ANYTHING, BUT PEACE OF MIND AND I WON’T GET IT UNTIL YOU GET THIS POISON OUT OF MY SYSTEM!!”
“Ms Patterson!” Dr. Himes called when she swung her arm again and knocked the lamp off the table near the couch.
She turned to verbally lash out at him, then suddenly felt a sharp pain in her buttocks. In the next instant she was surrounded by blackness.
Harry caught her just as she fell back and sighed in relief. She was light, but as old as he was, she was still a load. Dr. Himes assisted him in getting her back to the couch.
The nurse came in. “Is everything alright, Doctors?” she asked concerned.
“Yes,” Dr. Himes assured her ushering her out the room. “Ms Patterson is under a lot of mental strain. Can you send the resident for my next appointments? I want to attend to her personally and go into conference with Dr. Porter and Dr. Carter.”
“Yes Doctor.” The nurse left.
Dr. Himes locked the doors and pressed mute on his phone to not be disturbed. While he did this, Dr. Porter took her temperature and blood pressure, which were normal. “How is she?” Dr. Himes asked apprehensive as he watched Dr. Porter clean the blood from Skye’s hands and face with a wet wipe.
“She really needs the sleep. These dreams are bothering her. Why don’t you prescribe her a low dosage of Valium? It shouldn’t hurt us and it will calm her better when she is facing reality. It must be difficult to accept what is happening to her when she’s never experienced it before. We shouldn’t have tried it so soon with her.”
Dr. Carter entered the room using his keys. He’d heard the last part of Dr. Porter’s statement.
“She’s perfect. Fats and I would not have it any differently. The nurse informed me of everything. How is she?”
“Emotionally and physically distraught. I don’t think this was a good idea considering her past. She is-”
“Enough!” Dr. Carter snapped. “Your medical knowledge on the female psychological state has much to be refuted, Doctor. We really don’t want to hear you ramble about what detriment we are putting this young lady through. The Valium should be enough to curb the hysterics. Send her home with a prescription to hold her until it’s time for her next shot, then we can administer another dose while she’s under the influence, giving her a continuous refill on the valium.”
“It’ll make her into a drug addict!” Dr. Porter protested. “She will become a manic depressive.”
“It is the only way to keep her under control. We cannot have these outbursts. The longer we keep her calm the longer we can use her to get more money for the studies. It’s all in the name of science.”
“Have you forgotten that this is a human being? We can’t control her like a robot.”
“That was the whole idea, Harry, or have you forgotten?” He didn’t wait for Dr. Porter to respond, but pointed out another fact of their dilemma. “I haven’t forgotten a thing and I surely haven’t forgotten we received a large amount of money to produce your drug from Fats. If you’re thinking about not going ahead with this you will be sorry. Or are you ready to die?”
Dr. Himes looked slightly past both of the doctors to the couch to see Skye slowly coming out of it.
“I think we need to discuss this outside the office and deal with her now,” Dr. Himes suggested calmly.
“There’s nothing to discuss. We have done too much and wasted enough time on her as I’ve said many times before. She will be fine and if not, there are now hundreds of other women I will have very soon which can do what she does successfully. If I have to I will use all of them to my advantage.” Dr. Carter slammed out the room.
“His financial advantage,” Dr. Porter sneered under his breath.
Dr. Himes went over to the couch to check on her. She seemed still unconscious, although he would swear a few minutes ago she was coming to.
Dr. Porter asked concerned, “Will she be alright?”
“A slight headache and soreness where we stuck her will be her case. Don’t worry. The prescription should do just fine with the hallucinations. Let’s allow her rest,” he insisted.
“Wait a minute. Neil, why did you get into all of this? Be honest with me.”
“I am a doctor. Improving ways for stopping pregnancy was high on my list. Working with you came second.”
“But now?”
He turned to meet Dr. Porter face to face. “But now, I don’t think going about this way was right for the subjects. You are right; Dr. Carter is out for the money that we all will potentially earn. Let’s just get our money and get the hell out of here. Let him work out this mess.”
“What about the plans? The new subjects?”
“They are his plans and his subjects. Let’s leave them like that. Infecting these women —which is what we are doing—with that hallucinogenic birth control was wrong. You and I both know, because we almost saw the devastating effects here again today with Ms Patterson, but Dr. Carter can’t see past the nose on his face or his bank account. All he sees is the money. We made a big mistake letting him in on the project, but you and I both know if it had not been for his underground connections we wouldn’t have gotten the funding we needed for this whole thing.” He paused with a grievous tone in his voice. “Yet now we realize our science came at a price bigger than we could ever pay back. We should just get our money and get the hell out of here.”
“What about the patient’s upstairs? What about her?”
“There is nothing we can do. I’m getting my money and leaving. If you want to sympathize you go ahead, but I refuse to spend my last days locked up in some jail for the rest of my life. I’m going to be on the farthest beach away from here.”
Dr. Porter didn’t know what to think or what to do. They had dug their graves and now they must lie in them. “Let’s get her some rest and have the nurse check up on her in a few minutes.”
Dr. Himes agreed following him out closing the door behind them.
As soon as they left, Skye sat up ready to panic again. It had been difficult keeping her breathing steady while the doctors were in the room. When she came out of the blackness from the sound of loud angry voices, she forced herself to not move a muscle when she realized what the voices were saying.
Valium indeed! She would be a walking drug addict like the ones she typed about all the time. Slowly getting up, she felt the soreness where the needle had stuck her, but got over the pain quickly knowing she didn’t have enough time to dawdle.
Gathering her things, she went out the office where it connected to a patient waiting room. She remembered this was the room she had been in initially when Dr. Himes had given her the first dose. Skye remembered the cabinet the drug had been in. Going over there now, she tried to open the small metal door, but it was locked. Looking through the other drawers, she couldn’t find a key, and then remembered he had pulled it out of his long white jacket.