The Amplifier

“Bring me back to the birthday party!” she screeched.

It was like she was addicted to the memory, and who could blame her? Maybe I could use that attachment to my advantage and extricate us both from this nightmarish situation. Her grasp on reality was slipping and one more assisted memory might push her over the edge.

“I’m not going to do it again unless you untie my legs. Let me go now and I won’t press kidnapping charges against you. I’ll make sure you get the help you need.” Her face curled back in horror.

“No! If I let you go, you’ll run away and I’ll never see him again.”

“But, Joyce. He’s dead. You’ll always have the memories. You don’t need me for that. We only did the Assisted Memories to locate the killer. I never should have taken you to the birthday party. It’s making it difficult for you to get over the trauma.”

“Why do you not want me to see my boy again? What’s wrong with you?”

“It’s not your son. It’s your memory of him that’s brought back to life when I amplify it. He’s not brought back to life. You see him and hear him and feel him and smell him, but it’s just a memory.” Her mouth trembled and tears slid down the sides of her face.

“But you’ve seen how beautiful he is. His smile. The way he looked at me when he saw his gift.”

“No. I haven’t seen any of that. I’m no more than a glorified antenna. When I take hold of your hands you can experience a selected memory exactly as if it is happening to you. Your mind and body don’t know the difference. You relive the moment, but I don’t experience it at all.”

“But when you do that thing, I get to hold him in my arms again.”

“That’s what makes it so dangerous. I never should have let you experience anything beyond remembering the license plate. I can’t imagine what it was like seeing your son killed in front of you. That’s why I got into this business, so that I could help the cops catch people that do stuff like this. Anybody would need help getting over something like that. Let’s get you that help.”

“I don’t want help. I just want to be with my son.” The last four syllables were sobbed out.

“Joyce. If he lives in your memories, what’s going to happen to him if anything happens to you? Please let me go so we can make sure he isn’t lost for good.”

“On one condition.”

“What’s that?”

“Do it one more time.” Something in her tone let me know that this was not negotiable.

I took her hands in mine. I could feel a tense current as the connection was made. Her shoulders and her mouth relaxed. Her eyes lit up. I didn’t know exactly what she was seeing, but my knowledge of the case file and all of the rambling diatribes she had shared with me since taking me captive gave me a pretty clear idea. 

It was her son’s eighteenth birthday. He had been accepted to Boston College so the event also served as a going-away party. While she was engaged with the memory, I could hear her saying hello to a variety of different names. There’s one point where she says “Do you like it?” and I know that was the point where he got his gift. A white Lexus hybrid wagon that was sporty, practical and safe. It was the perfect vehicle to bring him from childhood to adulthood. I’m sure he showed her gratitude because in the midst of her memory I could see her basking in it like it was the very sun.

What happened the next day was the memory that I had been paid by the police to amplify. Joyce had followed Tim to the store so that she could buy him some furnishings for his dorm room in Boston. They came up to a yellow light and he slowed and stopped so that he wouldn’t get separated from his mother at the red. She had taught him to drive cautiously. When the light turned green, he mashed the accelerator and suddenly he spun around and was facing her with a truck on top of his car. It had sped through the light as it turned red and had large off-road wheels that brought it right over the low-slung Lexus, crushing the precious cargo inside. She had slammed on her brakes and leaped out of the car to face something that would crush her just as powerfully.

There were no other witnesses. She couldn’t remember the license plate number. That’s why they called me in. I got the information the police needed to find the beautiful loser who already had three DUIs to his name, but I also saw Joyce disintegrate in front of me. I thought that giving her a better memory to hang on to would help her. What I found out instead is that there is a reason that memories fade. If they don’t, like the memory of me being forcibly kidnapped, then they fade the present.