Page 38 of Phoenix Fire

What should she do? Answer the phone? Surely it would not be Jason calling his own number. But, maybe it was someone who might be able to shed some light on his whereabouts. Maybe it was Jason's office. Maybe it was Granma Myrena. Maybes. She would not know until she answered the blasted thing.

Jenny found a telephone on a living room table and picked up the receiver on the fourth ring. “Hello?” she asked.

“Jenny? Is that you, Jenny?” It was the weak and cracking voice of Grandma Myrena.

“Grandma Myrena! Yes, it's me. Have you heard from Jason? I just broke into his house, and he isn't here.”

“No, dear girl, I haven't heard from him. I was hoping to find him there.” There was a pause on the line.

“Grandma Myrena, are you all right? Do you need me there?” Jenny sat on mauve wing back chair next to the telephone table, her brow wrinkled in concern.

“I'm having a bad spell, Jenny. The medicine, I'm afraid, is losing some of its punch. I do wish Jason would call, show up, something.” Her voice was barely audible.

“Have you called the doctor?”

“Yes, Wardley called him. He is increasing the dosage. Someone from Nelson's office will be stopping by soon with the new pills.”

“May I come over, Grandma Myrena? I would like to be there with you.”

“No, dear one, you don't need to bother. Just try to find Jason. Wardley is here with me. I will be all right.”

Reluctantly, Jenny conceded and told Myrena that she would call back periodically to keep her informed. After disconnecting, Jenny sat, her heart sick with worry for the plucky little lady and for Jason. She must find him, but she had no idea of where to look. She had to find him soon. He would never forgive himself if Grandma Myrena … She did not complete the thought. Pain upon pain.

Jenny did not know how long she sat in the chair. When the shadows began to deepen in the room she stood and went into the spacious kitchen, took a glass from a cabinet shelf, and drank some water from the fridge dispenser. As she started to leave the kitchen she noticed what appeared to be credit card receipts tucked under a colorful paper weight, probably gathered and placed there by the cleaning person.

Jenny leafed through the Visa receipts one by one. They were all bar receipts for some hefty amounts. “Oh, Jason, please don't do this to yourself. You need to be strong. You need to be with Grandma Myrena.”

She noticed a pad of message paper and a pen. She scribbled a note and carried it into Jason's bedroom. She placed the note at the fold of the bedspread, just under the pillow. He would have to see it before he got into bed. She said a silent prayer that he would come home soon and read it.

“Very soon, please, dear God!” she said to the empty room, her voice hollow and throaty, alien to her ears.

Jenny let herself out the front door, making sure it was locked behind her.

Driving down the palm lined lane, Jenny looked to the west and saw the sun bursting in deep pink hues all across the horizon. She could only hope and pray that Jason knew the fullness of her love. She could only hope and pray that he would make it home before something awful happened to Grandma Myrena, like, her dying. She softly made a plea, “Oh, God! Please help us.”

She could not shake the sudden, strong, jolting premonition of death.

In Jason's master bedroom suite the edges of Jenny's note lifted slightly off the bedspread in response to the stir of cool air from the conditioner. The note floated softly just briefly, then settled when the air conditioning unit had automatically cut itself off. The piece of paper looked lonely on the large bedspread.

The note read: Jason --- My heart aches for you. Please! Please! Call me. Come to me. You are my love and my life --- Jenny.

Chapter Twenty-five

The thoughts did not hurt so much in this lofty place, up on the vaporous plateau of Bacchus. The sadness in his soul was temporarily anesthetized by the booze and by the buoyant crowd around him. The noise proclaimed gaiety and denouncement of all woes. Jason could momentarily forget the terrible visage of death that had attached itself to his thoughts and had burned its truth into his brain. He could momentarily seek the easy forgetfulness that came with the numbing flow of amber fluid.

He sat at the bar, remotely conscious of his drooping eyelids and his slurred words.

There was a 'Roy' and a 'Hal' on either side of him but he could not remember which side belonged to which name. Each man talked to him and through him. He was aware of the inane smile on his face and of his nods of false comprehension of their words.

He was still aware enough to think of having coffee to lift the thickening fog around his mind. When he was about to order coffee, another drink would appear in front of him. Dumbly, he drank to catch up with his new found comrades, each gulp taking him closer to an unknown precipice.

He had stumbled off to the men's room on several occasions and he had smirked at his image in the broad mirror above the lavatory. He had splashed water time and again on his face, trying to maintain some degree of sobriety. When returning from his nature calls he found himself behind again, several drinks lined up on the bar. His mind registered his 'friends' cajoling him to catch up, and, in some dull chamber of his mind, he resented their wheedling. In his fog, he began to dislike these phony men. They resembled mindless predators who sought sadistic pleasure in watching others self-destruct. The booze, though, held power over him, and he drank on into the night.

*****

Through the dark tunnel of sleep came a buzzing sound, at first barely audible, then growing in loudness and persistence.

It was a telephone.

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