Chasing a Waterfall

The truth was he may have just been interested in having a down to earth conversation with a woman. He was in an on again, off again relationship with his current girlfriend, Kate. They had met during his senior year of college. This was a while back. Their relationship at the moment could best be described as little more than friends with benefits. He believed her to have other intimate relations, though he of course, could never prove it. Still, what had begun as a passionate romance between him, who was at the time a lean and muscular guy of six feet with dark brown hair and gray eyes, and his lover, Kate Winthrop, a fiery redhead of about a few inches junior his height and sparkling blue eyes had cooled in recent years.

The sex had gone from regular, to irregularly to spotty at best. When in bed together he got the feeling that she was being with him more out of obligation than her own sexual yearnings. She was very disconnected with her eyes often drawn into their own world. As if she was thinking about someone or something else. Often during their lovemaking he believed that she faked released in order to get their moment of intimacy over with. He did not have the heart to question her about it though, nor could he prove it, though all of the signs were there. Confronting her would have only led to an argument, one that he had little interest in being a part of.

The truth was that she had always taken her work and studies before him. She had graduated with a degree in psychology a year before him, and had entered graduate school. He had tailed along with her, and did some graduate studies of his own, but not at his university of choice. When she completed her degree, a PhD in psychology, she had gone to work as a psychologist at a local behavioral unit affiliated with a university clinic.

For his own part, during this time, he had gotten a graduate degree in International Studies. He had debated about whether to go to law school before and after obtaining his Masters degree, but had dismissed it mainly out of his mounting student loan debt. That decision would come back to haunt him for a good two years.

A year out, he was still working odd jobs, mostly in computer consulting services. The most stable had been at a data center of a regional branch of a state bank. He worked as a system administrator in the back office. It was not all that unfamiliar; his interest in technology had begun during his high school days when he had taken many advanced placement classes in computer programming. In college, he had originally enrolled in their computer science program, but had dropped out after realizing that the interest was just not there anymore.

He was clearly qualified for the job. It's not like he wrote any code at that job. He did little more than maintenance of remote desktop clients and the offsite transfer of data from the bank to their secure place in the clouds. The work was tedious, and the hours were long. Further, he had absolutely no interest in what he was doing. It had been a struggle to come to work everyday. Still, it was a job, and the economy had not been the best in those years.

He believed his days of working at a governmental think tank were pretty much over. He had been involved at his job for just over six months when he got a strange email and a series of voicemails from a man of unknown origin. He wanted to meet to discuss the possibility that he may be of interest to them. It was a job interview; one without a name or a true location. There arranged meet up was at a multi-governmental agency building. At rather nondescript place that very well could have been mistaken for a tourist information center.

He had arrived early. Going through with the interview was little more than entertainment for him. Though, he began to believe that what he was dealing with was credible source or a very well planned plot of corporate espionage. He did after all deal with the backend systems at the state bank he was employed at. Still, he really did not have that much access to the system. The data was already securely encrypted before he even dealt with it. His only real job in offsite data retention was to make sure that the file copy was successful. As for his handling of remote desktop connections, the clients that he had oversight over were too small to be a tangible to get worth the effort. In truth, most of the remote connections he established were for midlevel management, who had more seniority than him and maybe even a better understanding of protocol than he did.

This is what had intrigued him. He was no one of importance. The name, however, seemed to be genuinely interested in him. In the days leading up to the interview he had done some research on the name. ACAPITAL Associates was not a trademark registered with any governmental or nongovernmental organization or lobby group. Though the man of interest, one William Mannheim was. He had been a very successful lobbyist for a popular NGO back in the day. He had represented the Sentry Group, which was a group of bankers with connections to ongoing business dealings in Cuba. It appeared that those days were behind him though. It had been well over a decade. Further, his point of contact was a man known only as Wade. No last name had been given. This would be the man conducting the interview.

So two days later, much to his utter disbelief, he found himself going through with the interview. His arrival at 147 West Avenue had him in front of the very nondescript building that he had scoped out the week before. It was red brick with many windows. It looked a bit like every other building he had ever seen. It was unremarkable in every way.

Upon entering, he had been greeted by an older man. No security or body scanners were present. No level of typical intimidation. The older man, of at least sixty had walked up to him, and introduced himself as Roger. He was in blue dress coat and black pants. He looked like a parking valet, though he was too old, and as they walked to the elevator he got a bit of a bad vibe off from the man. He clearly was not all that he seemed. Something about him had just not been right. He gave off a level of confidence and alertness that someone in his position would not. After showing him to the elevator, he just as soon departed without saying another word.

The elevator ride had been short. His meeting placed was only on the eighth floor. Opening elevator doors greeted him to a lobby, and a woman of Asian, possible Korean descent sitting behind a rather large, wood polished desk. She introduced herself as Naomi. Again, no last name, though why would he have expected it was unknown. It wasn't like a personal assistant typically introduced himself or herself with a full name.

After signing in, she gave him a black journal to look over with a tight, but professional smile. Puzzled, he had quickly taken a seat. He had barely had time to glance over the contents before being called into the office. The contents of the journal had been unremarkable anyway. It contained mostly raw data on trade issues between the United States, Cuba and China.

Upon entering the office several minutes later, he was taken back by the bareness of the room. The room looked as though the mysterious Mr. Wade had been given the janitors closet. No sofa, no comfy chairs, bare carpeting and not even any pictures on the walls. This was in contrast to the elegance of the rest of the building. His desk was little more than a slab of wood on two very large, black poles that were moderate wide in circumference. The only thing on the desk was a low profile computer. His eyes had been keenly on the screen when he had been shown to his door. Now they rested on the display once more. He was greeted to a locked screen. The operating system seemed to be Windows.

The man in front of the display was just as unremarkable. Pulling his fingers away from the keys, he looked up. He was a man in late forties with a slim build, salt and pepper hair, high cheek bones and brown eyes. The glasses that he wore seemed to give him an odd aura of authority that he would not otherwise have. Quickly pulling himself upright, he came out from behind his desk and extended his hand. He introduced himself as Wade Michaels. "So he did have a last name, nice to know," he thought. Just as he took hold of his hand, he returned to the present.

He was back in the present. He had no other memory of the events that had taken place. From that point forward, his mind seemed to have no true linear concept of events that had taken place since that meeting. There bits and pieces. He remembered late night phone calls. Most of it was for research, which led to arguments with Kate over his new work schedule. He did not believe that he had ever told her of his new job. To be honest, very little details in the way of his job could be remembered. He wasn't even sure that he had gotten a position with the NGO or not. It might have very well been another firm or maybe a promotion within the bank.

Zoning back out ever so briefly, he remembered the last clear memory he had. He had stopped at the Smoked Bean on the way home from work. It had been pouring out. The rain had been relentless. The late afternoon hue had been one of shades of blue and gray. Coming inside, the coffee house, which looked a little between a cross of Starbucks and Subway had been a welcome sight from the cold rain and winds of outside. Angela, he now remembered her name was Angela. She had met him, her warm smile a sight for sore eyes. They had talked ever so briefly about the current civil unrest in China. He remembered being more tense than usual. What was on his mind, however, was not clear. The thought seemed to be on the tip of his tongue. It felt so close, yet so far.

The last memories he had of that evening were saying his goodbyes to Angela, getting into his car with the two lattes and taking the long route home. Even with the storm, he somehow had dreaded finding his girlfriend home. He knew that she had a late night shift for catching up on her client profiles in the evening. The drive had been timed well. He had just missed her he knew as he pulled into the underground parking garage. Her car was not in her parking space.

Getting out of the car, he made his way into the lower lobby and up the elevator to the second floor. Opening his residence, she lived with him, not the other way around... he was greeted with darkness, emptiness and a whirling fan overhead in the living room. Suddenly, just after making it into the apartment he began to feel rather tired. He was dizzy and had an urgent need to sit down. Sleep was suddenly overtaking him. Barely making it into his bedroom, he had untucked his shirt; remove his tie and shoes before collapsing onto the bedroom in front of him. A calm darkness, which honestly felt drug induced, consumed him. No memories were present after that night.

Wait, why was he thinking of her in the past? He was technically still with her. Right? It all of a sudden hit him. He was not thinking of these events as if they happened yesterday. Well, maybe not after today. He still could not comprehend what had transpired the night before, but it scared him that Michelle seemed to have a working knowledge of their relationship. He did not. What was more worrisome was that the memories of Kate felt like either they were from another lifetime or happened well over a decade ago. They felt like very dated memories from a lifetime since removed. This alarmed him. It was not possible, it just was not possible.

Even more bothersome, the events of that night at the coffee shop and his current than current girlfriend, Kate felt like not only the past, but many, many years prior. This, however, was not possible. He began to ponder whether he was having an emotional breakdown. The trouble with this was that he had never shown a history for delusions or rapid swings in personality. Sure, he had some mild to moderate depression at times, but that was most likely given to his past. Oddly enough, a past that he really could not piece together at the moment. Still, he ever so often saw the images play back in his mind like a slow motion picture by picture reel of individual pictures. Placing a chronological order to the events, however, was not possible.

Shaking his head, he was now in the present, again. He figured that it was about time that he got some answers to his situation. The best place he believed to start was the bathroom. The two women had spent much time in there getting ready for their day. He figured at might trigger a memory or two. So with a little bit of trepidation, he managed to pull his apprehensive body off the bed and walk across the carpet to the bathroom. Unsure of what he would find, he gently grasped the door handled, twisted it and let the door fall open. Peering beyond, he found nothing out of place.

It was a nice bathroom. A bit on the luxury side. This was not the bathroom from his single bedroom apartment back on Greenville Street. The floor was a buffered marble. Two sinks with a wide mirror were on the far right side. A step up that resembled a Jacuzzi whirlpool more than a traditional bath tub and multi shower room lined the other side. A toilet was neatly pushed in the corner, as to be out of the way. Giving the place a good walk through, he found nothing of value to his situation. The usual toiletries that you would expect to find in the apartment of a young woman, and maybe an embarrassing item or two, but nothing that was going to help him.

However, just upon exiting the bathroom he caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror. He had half expected to see either his typical composite image or God forbid, an older version of the said likeness due to some kind of freak memory loss. Now he was startled. The man starring back at him in the mirror of the bathroom was not Vincent Fairborne. Well, that wasn't really true. It was him. He just wasn't in his mid thirties anymore. He was younger, and had a more youthful appearance. The age of the man starring back at him from the mirror looked to be in his mid-twenties at most.

This sent his head swirling with possibilities. His conclusion was this had to be a dream. A lucid dream, but a dream nonetheless. He must have got struck by an oncoming car while coming home from the coffee shop or suffered an aneurysm in his sleep, assuming the memories of entering his apartment were real. The trouble was that he didn't remember an accident, nor did he recollect any severe headache prior to passing out on his bed. Still, he might have not seen the car going over the center line until it was too late. Or the brain bleed was so sudden that he had no real symptoms. This would explain the current situation.

During his life he had always entertained the possibility of having a threesome. Many men did. It was not that uncommon, was it? It was kind of the ultimate, unobtainable male fantasy. During his college years, he had gone to Kate about it. She, however, had brushed off the idea. Maybe brushed off was the wrong word choice. Kate had outright declined the suggestion. She felt that a relationship was between a man and a woman. Further, she made it known that she found the idea of being with another woman to be repulsive. Thinking back, a paraphrase of her words, "I don't want some woman coming into our bed and touching me. I don't want some lesbo dyke to have her hands on me." She came rather close to using other expletives, but kept her temper in check.

She had proceeded to turn the tables on him. She wanted to know if he was interested in having another man enter their relationship, and though, he was not as harsh about it as she was. He had no interest in seeing or touching a man in an intimate way. It just wasn't his bag of tea (or cup of coffee). He got his girlfriend's point. She would be willing to suffer through entertaining the possibility of a third woman if he would be open to another man enter their relationship.

His fantasy, however, seemed too had been fulfilled as of last night. The only trouble is that he had a foreboding vibe that this likely was not the first time that this strange woman, named Michelle had introduced another woman into their relationship. His belief that he was in heaven, even though he was not very religious, soon turned to entertaining the possibility that he was actually in hell. Was the devil tempting him?

Wait. Rationality began to kick in. He stopped the thoughts dead in their tracks. Making his way out of the bathroom, he cased the room over. Finding a notebook, he carried it in hand over to the bed. Placing it out in front of him, he opened the lip and powered on the system. It booted and he was rewarded with a login screen in due time. The computer seemed to be running a rather dated copy of a Unix like operating system, though it was nothing that he remembered having first hand knowledge of. Still, the foundation was the same. Having no idea what her password was, he simply bypassed the security perimeters through external boot media, which he found after casing over her dresser. The dresser that he had originally believed belonged to the blond.

Several minutes later, he was in. He was presented with a dock, widgets and transparent menus. Something, however, seemed out of place as he searched through the folders on the main drive. Becoming frustrated, he opened a web window. Her wireless network was secure, but a neighbor's was not.

What greeted him was sheer amazement and terror. A major media website he logged into had a front page with recent events. It was mainly of a mix of domestic and foreign affairs. The date on the page leapt out at him. He had been out of the world for a little over 52 weeks. A lot had changed. The United Kingdom was facing a crisis. The EU was dividing along Northern and Southern States. Oddly, the Mid East had been relatively calm. There, however, was major crisis in China. It was on the verge of civil war. Finally, the United States had reopened trade with Cuba after a new democratic republic had been established after the fall of the communist regime. All this information was too much. Shutting the system down, he put everything back in the position best he remembered.

Sitting back down on the bed, he let his head fall. None of this made any since, though he was pretty sure this was not a dream. He believed it to be real, but he had no idea how it was possible. He had no memory of the last year and he had grown more youthful by about a decade during this time. This was simply not possible because it was not logical. There had to be an answer. He needed a sane one. But where was he going to get this? His reality was literally crumbling away.

His head was pounding once more. A trip into the bathroom, he combed through the cabinet below the sink. Finding a bottle of naproxen, he pulled out two pills. It was only than that he noticed a surprising lack of a drinking glass in the bathroom. Unsure, he exited the bathroom and the bedroom in a trance like state. Everything around him was blurry, yet vivid with a day dark glow. It was morning now as he could plainly see. He had walked out into the living room.

A massive room with a vaulted ceiling greeted him. The flooring was wood. Huge multi panel glass windows were on corner sides. The pre morning dawn was beginning to show through. Below was a large screen television. Pushed out in front of it was a glass coffee table. An aquarium really, which was a massive glass slap that was an aquarium fixture. A rug below covered the center of the floor. An interesting tapestry of unknown origin, though it looked to be Middle Eastern. Enclosing the coffee table were three leather sofas making what could only be described as an obtuse U shape. Dividing the living room from the dinning room was a fireplace. Well, a fire pit really. It looked like something between a traditional fireplace and a wooden stove.