Blind Date A Book 2020 – Book #24
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Chapter 1
“I call this one BTTF,” Dr. Knochenmus said. Gary had said everyone called him Dr. K for short, and he seemed cool enough, especially considering the giant fatty he’d just put to his lips to partake of.
“Buttfa?” Gary asked, a big smile on his face as he waited his turn. Jim wasn’t sure exactly how he’d gotten here. He remembered his friend sitting on the hood of his Fiesta as he’d left work, like a scene out of some eighties movie, arms folded across his chest. That probably had more to do with the cold and his complete lack of a jacket than anything else. Jim remembered them getting in his car, and the rest had been like a vague fog clouding his memory until somehow they had wound up here.
Wherever here was. Gary had a knack for talking him into things.
Gary finished a long spliff before passing it to him. It slid so easily into Jim’s hand, he remembered the feel, the smell, and was seconds away from taking a puff when he asked, “So why is it called B . . .”
“Back to the Future,” the “doctor” finished for him. “Because it takes you back in time, man. You see your whole life flash before your eyes.” The much older man nodded and smiled as if that particular sensation would be enjoyable to everybody. Not that Jim’s childhood had been the worst, but he didn’t feel like taking this particular trip down memory lane. He handed the joint back to the doctor.
“No, thanks.”
“No, thanks? Who is this man, man? G, you said he was cool.” The doctor was looking at Gary with half a scowl. Gary gave Jim a sideward glance, a look of disappointment on his face.
“He is cool.” Gary slid the joint from the doctor’s hand. “He’s just under stress at work. Right, Jim?”
“No. Actually, everything at work is going pretty good.” That made both Gary and the doctor frown.
“If this is your best friend, then your best friend is a total square.”
Jim didn’t know if he was supposed to take offense at such an ancient insult and stayed silent. The doctor continued staring at him.
“Give me that.” Dr. K snatched the joint back from Gary. He took a long hit, held it, then leveled his gaze on Gary. “You didn’t bring Five-O to my operation, did you?” Dr. K was easily thirty years older than them, skinny, and looked like he had never been in a fight in his life, but the look in his eyes told Jim he could be dangerous.
“No, man.” Gary laughed nervously. “I told you, he’s my best friend. I’ve known him since second grade. He’s in AA.” That last part seemed really tacked on to Jim’s ears, a lie that could be spotted a mile off, but the doctor’s expression brightened.
“Aw, geez, why didn’t you tell me that?” He slapped Gary’s shoulder and stubbed the joint out on the table, blowing the smoke high over his head and waving at it with a free hand. “Uh, congratulations,” he said, dropping the doobie in his pocket and grabbing Jim’s hand for a stiff, awkward shake. The three of them all looked at one another, no one knowing what to say.
“Come with me,” Dr. K said. “I want to show you something.” This was just how Jim wanted to spend his Friday night. Oh no, not at home with his beautiful fiancée for wingding and movie night; it was much more engaging here with Gary and Dr. Weed. He was going to have to think of a better one than that later.
All that sarcasm swimming around in his head, and yet Jim still went with them. Dr. K led them out of the office and past several lab stations, all littered with various types of equipment. Everything after a beaker and Bunsen burner was beyond Jim’s ability to identify, leaving him to ponder at the various colored liquids and lab equipment he saw.
At the back of this room were thick plastic curtains. Dr. K parted them, leading Gary and Jim through. It was freezing in here, and Jim found it hard to believe that just a yellowed, translucent curtain could keep all the cold air in this space. Curls of refrigerated mist poured from vents overhead.
“You guys want to see something really cool?” Dr. K was beaming at them, puffs of white smoke coming out of his mouth with each word, seemingly unaware how cold it was in here. Jim looked around and saw tall racks with small labeled vials in small, foam-cushioned holders. Dr. K picked up a cup that had steam drifting out of the top, and Jim wondered how it could be hot still. Then he noticed the cup itself. It looked like it was ceramic, some shade of orange, and the handle didn’t appear to be connected to the cup in any way. Jim looked where it should have touched at the top and at the bottom, wondering if there was some sort of clear plastic.
“Do you like my cup?”
“Yeah,” Jim said. “How do you do that? Magnets?”
“Nope. Force fields. This cup is all ceramic.” He took a big sip and set it back down. “Anyway, here’s the thing I wanted you to see.” Dr. K sat in an armless office chair and picked up a beat-up blue and white cooler sitting in another office chair in front of a draft table. He set it in his lap, sitting back and drumming his fingers on the sides. Jim thought he hadn’t looked any more like a mad scientist than in that moment.
“So . . .” Gary began, “what’s in the cooler?” Dr. K slowly turned in his chair and settled his eyes on him.
“The future and end of all war. Want a hit?”
“Hell, yeah,” Gary said. Dr. K flashed his yellowed, crooked teeth and sat forward. He slid the top back, and steam from the dry ice inside drifted out and poured over the sides.
“Is that stuff safe?” Jim asked.
“Of course it’s safe,” Dr. K said. “I invented it!” Jim took a step backward and watched as the doctor reached inside and pulled out a small semitranslucent brown container. “It actually doesn’t need to be refrigerated at all. It just looks cooler. I’m gonna present it to my customers tonight.”
“On a Friday night?” Jim made a face. “Shouldn’t you do that during normal business hours?” He began to wonder about the “doctor’s” credentials. His lab was on 7 Mile on the east side, the building looked abandoned, and he was meeting with “customers” after six o’clock. “What did you invent for your customer?” he asked, standing securely behind Gary.
“An antideath pill.” Dr. K’s face beamed.
“And you’re just gonna let us have some of it?”
“I made extra. Besides, how much fun can it be if you can’t share it with friends?”
“Puff-puff-give, big bro,” Gary said, taking the small container from Dr. K. He began wrestling with the top, twisting to no avail. After a minute, he looked at Jim and held it up.
“Jim, for the assist?”
Jim eyed the container in his friend’s hand. He didn’t want to touch it. More than ever, he really did not want to be here. But he’d never made a habit out of saying no to his best friend and squirmed at the thought of doing so now. Jim took the container and unscrewed it.
Nestled inside were five black pills about the size of bullets atop a bed of cotton.
“These aren’t suppositories, are they?” he asked, trying to make a joke.
Dr. K’s face screwed up in disgust, and he took the pills back. “For a period of forty-eight hours after you swallow this pill, you are effectively dead. Just like Jesus!”
“Jesus?” Gary asked. “What do you mean?”
“Jesus was crucified on a Friday and rose on a Sunday.”
“I know my Bible. Jesus was dead for three days. Luke 24, verse 7.”
Dr. K looked at Gary with a wary look. “How many days between Friday and Sunday? Count on your fingers.”
Gary held up a hand and began to count. “Friday . . . Saturday . . . Sunday. Three.”
“You don’t count Friday. From Friday to Saturday is one day. And from Saturday to Sunday is two days.” Dr. K held up his hand with a peace sign. “Two.”
“Yeah, but Friday is one whole day. Saturday is one whole day. Sunday is one whole day. One plus one plus one is three.”
“No. You don’t count the days. You count between the days. One plus one is two. Two. Besides, it’s not like he was crucified at midnight Friday and rose at 11:59 Sunday.”
“Yeah, but if I’m Friday, you’re Saturday, and Jim is Sunday, then there’s three of us. That makes three days.”
“Yes, but you’re counting the days wrong. Today is Friday. In twenty-four hours it will be Saturday. In forty-eight hours it will be Sunday.” Jim was watching the exchange between his best friend and the crazy doctor. Dr. K looked at him. “Help a brother out here?”
“My name is Paul. That’s between y’all.”
“Never mind.” Dr. K waved him off. “The pill works for forty-eight hours. Then you come back to life.”
“So he’d be just a corpse for two days?” Jim asked. “What fun is that?”
“No. You would have full cognitive and motor function. Your nervous system would shut down, and autonomic function would cease.”
“Autonomic function?”
“That means you’d stop breathing,” Jim said.
“Among other things.” Dr. K nodded. “Your heart would stop, your bowels, your breathing. You would have to blink intentionally.”
“Cool.” Gary nodded.
“No, that is not cool,” Jim said. “Look, Dr. K, thanks, but we’re not interested.”
Something in the doctor’s lab coat pocket beeped. He had opened his mouth to say something, but looked in his pocket and pulled out what looked like a hybrid between a walkie-talkie and a cell phone.
“Hello?” The man listened a moment, nodded, then said, “I’ll be right there.”
Dr. K looked at them and said, “My customers are particularly early.” He held up a finger as he left the room. “Stay right there. I’ll be right back.” He came back immediately and grabbed the cooler, closing the lid. Then he was gone again.
“All right, I’d say this place has to have some sort of rear exit. I suggest we find it,” Jim said.
Gary looked at him. “Why are you in such a rush to leave? Dr. K’s cool; he wants us to try his antideath pill.” Gary held up the container. “He forgot this.”
Jim rolled his eyes. “Okay, on the off chance he isn’t goofing on us, what do you think the odds are that an anti death pill works?” Jim stressed the words “anti death” for effect. “This guy’s a quack, a snake oil salesman. The only legit drug he has in the whole place is probably weed.”
“What happened to you, man? You used to be the boldest of us all.”
“Is that why you brought me here? Because you thought I was so bold I’d be dumb enough to take unknown drugs off a complete stranger?”
“Nah, man. He’s not a complete stranger. I vouch for him. Like I vouched for you. That used to be enough.”
“Yeah, it used to be. Back when I didn’t mind getting kicked out of school or getting sent to boot camp. I grew up, Gary. Just because you vouch for him doesn’t make him legit. Do you know what compounds are in those pills?” Jim pointed to the open container the doctor had left in the room with them.
“No.”
“Do you know that you won’t drop dead the second you pop one of those in your mouth? Do you know?”
“No. I don’t know.”
“And do you know if this doctor actually went to an accredited university and attained an actual PhD in any of the sciences?”
Gary’s mouth was a grim line. “Okay, Matlock, I get the picture.”
“No, you don’t. If he came back in here with more drugs, you would happily take them. What do you know about this guy? Where did you meet him?”
“He redid some siding on my dad’s house.”
Jim barked out a laugh. “So the scientist you would take drugs from also works on houses on the side?”
“He found him on Angie’s list.”
Jim narrowed his eyes at his friend. “Are you doing this on purpose?”
“Doing what?”
“Being dumb. Is this intentional? Are you looking for me to be the voice of reason? You asked what happened to me, but what happened to you? How are you this naïve?”
“Wait a minute. Stop. I brought you here because you’re my best friend. Dr. K is a good friend of mine too. However we met. And no, I don’t know everything about him, but I trust him. We’ve hung out. Like you and I used to. I miss you, man. And I thought it would be cool for us to just get out and do something together. Ever since you and Mel—”
“Are you going to start that again? Leave my fiancée out of it. She has nothing to do with why we don’t hang out.”
“Right. Because you are so into dog shows.”
“This again? This again?” Jim growled and shook his fists in the air. “You know, when you’re in a relationship with someone you care about, sometimes you do things you don’t necessarily want to do. It’s called compromise. She does it for me. And another thing, when was the last time you—”
Jim was cut off by the sound of a gunshot. They both looked in the direction of the plastic curtains, and when he looked at his friend again, they were both clinching each other’s shirts.
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