Page 2 of Hidden Truths

Mara Philippi walked in Kellen’s nightmares, and for good reason. The mere idea that she might be free terrified the Kellen that sat in the chair and the Max that sat opposite.

“I’m going to McFarrellville Correctional Facility, and I’m going to make themproveshe’s locked up.” Max patted my hand under the covers. “If they can’t show me that the woman they have in that cell is Mara Philippi, then you know what that means. It means we’ve got to be… I’ve got to take care of Rae in a way we had never imagined. Darling—” he stood, leaned over my body and kissed my cold lips “—be here when I get back. I want to be here when you pass. Don’t leave too early. I couldn’t stand it.”

As if he couldn’t turn away, Max backed away from the bed. “You could also,” he whispered, “wake while I’m gone. Think about it.” He bumped the wall with his back, then groped his way to the door and pushed his way out into the hospital corridor.

He was gone.

CHAPTER TWO

KELLENWASSTILLin her hospital room, in body and in spirit.Separatebody and spirit, but still body and spirit.

She knew she was supposed to witness some things; events, sentiments, human interactions, although why she knew was a mystery to her. But the knowledge was more than an urge—it was a compulsion.

She wandered out the door, into the depths of a busy hospital.

A hospital was the embodiment of drama. Birth and death, joy and tears. The corridor hummed with light, motion, people who were healing, people in pain…

Emotions buffeted Kellen. Sorrow, hope, exhaustion, hunger, annoyance, loneliness. She felt them all. The nurses moved from one crisis to another. The doctors diagnosed, prescribed, consulted, explained. The LPNs eternally hoped for no unforeseen body functions. The patients suffered and survived, or suffered and died. The families supported, loved, hated, prayed for life, prayed for death, prayed to be included in the will, wept for the loss of a dear one.

For Kellen, the corridor was a turbulent river that carried her along, lifting her to the highest heights and plunging her to the deepest depths. She surfaced, and briefly she saw someone on the fringes. Someone like her, a man, alive, yet free from his earthly body. He surveyed the writhing ribbons of emotion calmly, no longer part of the madness of humanity.

Suddenly, Kellen knew she was apart, also. She didn’t need to feel all this. She was above, beyond.

She nodded to the other soul, thanking him without words.

He nodded back and entered the door beside him.

She followed him into a hospital room.

The man on the bed was old, so old, and breathed with great difficulty. His family gathered around him, weeping or staring or trying to not be there.

The spirit she had seen had changed. The color had bleached from him; with a start, she realized, he had become a ghost. That white spirit legend was the truth, glimpsed across the veil.

He slipped between the family gathered around him and settled into his body.

He would be gone soon.

That was okay. He was ready.

Exhausted by the turmoil she had experienced, she made her way toward her room.

She had begun to enter her room, to rest once more in her body, when something made her turn. Not an emotion; quite the opposite. A complete and utter lack of feeling, a black hole from which no light or thought emanated.

She looked first at the nurses’ station, a large half circle set against a wall of computers, monitors, alarms. She thought that the medical personnel had had to learn to be impersonal, to guard their feelings. But no. Eight nurses, doctors, technicians sat, leaned, spoke, frowned, scribbled on iPads. They were involved in their work, and their concerns, interests, personalities colored their auras. She could hear snatches of their thoughts as clearly as if they were speaking.

Kellen looked beyond at the patients. Four corridors branched out from this central station; her room was at the junction. Toward the end of one hallway, she saw a man in a hospital gown and pajama bottoms, moving painfully, leaning on a walker and pulling an IV. Yet he laughed affectionately with another man by his side.

Down another corridor, another man pushed a woman in a wheelchair. She was frightened, so frightened Kellen wanted to cry for her. The woman awaited a diagnosis, and her fear made her life aura so taut it looked swollen and painful.

Down another corridor came… Ah. There he was. A tall man, handsome, in his thirties, wearing casual, expensive clothing. He walked like an important man, a man of privilege who was used to being in charge.

He was the black hole of emotion, and seeing him, Kellen knew why.

He wore a prosthesis on each arm. One started above his elbow near his shoulder. The other started right below his elbow.

She knew him. Not from life, not from notoriety or publicity, but because at this moment, she was meant to see him, know him.

His name was Harrison Benchley.

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