WASHINGTON,
D.C.
JULY
5, 1969
11:47
P.M.
I was the only one who noticed the
black car when it first pulled up on the curb next to the bar.
Unlike most of the vehicles in the
nation, this one was quiet and soft, making a sound like the purr of a cat,
pulling in smoothly and gliding along just above the dark asphalt. Its wheels
were clean and shining with fresh rubber, and its bumper and grill and door
handles were all newly polished, glinting in the light from the nighttime neon
signs hanging on the glass outside the pub.
I knew that they had come for me. I
could not see through the tinted windows, but I knew it: they were watching me,
waiting for me to get in and go.
I had no choice.
Do I wish that I had stayed behind,
left them to deal with their issues on their own, without my knowledge or
presence?
Of course.
I set down the small shot glass and
rose to my feet, tuning out the sounds of the slap-happy bar-goers as I
buttoned up my black suit. I straightened my tie of the same color, as it was
slightly askew.
When I had made it out the door,
without even leaving a tip, I stood and watched the car for a while. Its
engines did not go completely silent. It just sat, calling me to a future that
I had not predicted could even be possible.
Then the back door opened
spontaneously, without having been open by any visible person. It just swung
open, barely missing the rainwater-smothered sidewalk, and sat there. I could
wait no longer. So, quietly, without the direction of anyone, I got in the car.
“Mr. Dawn,” greeted the apprehensive
car driver, a fellow secret service agent of mine, “Been drinking on the job?”
I ignored him and stared out the
window.
He just smiled and stepped on the
gas pedal, the car lurching forward and slowly floating down the nighttime
lower-class streets of D.C. He was a young man, about twenty-five, with
sunglasses on his eyes despite the fact that it was close to midnight. The man
next to him was tall and lanky, with the same pair of Aviators on and a grim,
cold expression, like his underwear wasn’t on quite right. His face was bony
and slightly wrinkled, and he just stared ahead at the rain.
A sound jolted me out of my buzzed
state: the phone ringing in the back seat. I could never get used to those
mobile car phones. The latest technology, I suppose.
“It’s for you,” grunted the skinny
man, his voice clogged and almost slimy.
Cautiously, I answered.
“Hello?”
“Mr. Dawn. I trust you have been
doing well?”
“Only on Mondays.”
“You haven’t been…drinking, by any
chance, have you?”
“No, I was down at the water park
playing in the kiddie pool. What do you think I was doing?”
“Good. Because the alcohol will be
needed to dull the effects of your next…assignment.”
His voice is stiff and low and a bit
scratched, almost frighteningly so.
“If anyone asks, you’re just going
to have a drink with an old college friend.”
“Good. That’s exactly what I want to
be doing right now.”
“I will see you in five minutes.
Don’t keep me waiting.”
“Sorry in advance.”
He hung up, and I did, too.
. .
.
The White House at night always looked
formidable to me, like a fortress that guards some precious thing that only a
select few are allowed to see. I think he liked it that way.
When the guards had escorted me to
the doors, I straightened my jacket once more; I had to look my best for a meeting
with the Big Cheese.
The door in the wall swung silently
open and let me in. Then it closed tight, leaving me stranded in one VERY
powerful room with one VERY powerful person.
Richard Milhous Nixon.
A single orange desk lamp illuminated
the seemingly massive and hollow room, and it did the same to his similar face.
He was round and bit beefy around the neck, with a protruding nose and intense
eyes. He wore a jet-black suit, freshly ironed, and a shining red tie.
He rose from his chair and walked around it to greet me.
“Jacob Dawn,” he said, smiling
weakly, “It’s a pleasure to meet someone of such high…prestige.”
He
lingered on the word, as if taunting me.
“Have a seat,” he offered, but to
me, it sounded like more of a command.
The room, like its name described,
was an oval shape, and Nixon’s desk was wooden and dark, with a bright red
telephone, a nameplate, a buzzer, and a…tape recorder.
Curious, I asked about it.
“Why the tape recorder?” I inquired,
as the President sat back down in his tall brown leather chair. He flashed me
the briefest of glares before answering.
“Doesn’t matter,” he dismissed,
pulling something out of a drawer. An old-looking folder, filled to the brim
with papers and photos and documents. In big red letters on the cardstock file,
it read:
CLASSIFIED
“So, Jacob, before I speak to you
about this…matter, I need you to promise me one thing.”
I nodded slightly. “And what’s
that?”
“That you won’t scream.”
I didn’t even answer that question, because
his face was dead serious. President Richard Milhous Nixon was a man I
respected but one I deeply feared. Maybe it was his voice. Maybe it was his
bright red tie that stood out against the black. Or maybe it was because he did
not respect ME. But whatever it was, I knew that I felt chills down my spine
when I was in his presence.
“Yesterday, one of the security
night guards was patrolling the halls,” he began, opening the folder in such a
way that I couldn’t see the inside, “When he heard noises. Odd noises, like
whispers in the air.”
This was eerie, but intriguing.
“You sure he wasn’t…I don’t
know…intoxicated?” I asked.
“I’m sure. We took drug tests.”
I nod. I was hoping he wouldn’t say
that.
“But after a few moments, he decided
to take a photo of the air around him. And when it got developed, it looked
like this.”
Nixon pulled a picture out of the
folder and plopped it down on the desk. It made me jump when I saw it, and much
to my surprise, the President did not laugh at me. Because this was no laughing
matter.
The photo, black and white and
grainy, depicted one of the empty halls of the White House, one of the ones
that I had just walked through on my way here. But in the center of the hall,
just in front of the darkest spot on the photo, there was the image of a skull.
One that was gray, ghastly, and ghoulish, like something out of those ghost
hoax photos on the news. It was staring directly into the camera, its mouth
agape and its eyes glowing unnaturally.
It was staring right at me.
“Wh—What is it?” I asked, looking
back up at the President.
“I don’t know,” he said, “But I have
been called to Area 51 for a emergency meeting.”
“What is the meeting for?”
“I think this exact matter,” he said,
standing up and walking towards the door, “I am leaving tomorrow.”
“Wait,” I said, “Why am I here?”
“You are here,” he informed me
eerily, “Because you are coming with me.”
And with that, he turned and left
the room, leaving me in the Oval Office, listening to the pattering of the rain
on the windows.
c. Taylor Ward 2013. All rights reserved.
