Blown for Good - Marc Morgan Headley [158]
My dad is there at the KC airport when I exit the baggage claim area. I had not seen him in awhile so it is good to just see him.
We drive back to the suburb where my dad lives. It is about forty minutes from the airport. There is snow on the ground and the roads have been cleared but the drive is slow and cautious.
My dad is normally not in town and works out of state on computer service contract jobs for IBM. I was lucky that I caught him because usually he would have been up in Nebraska where he had been working on a project for several months.
When we get back to his house, I explain to him what had been happening, not getting sleep, all the drama about leaving and that I was probably going to be declared a suppressive person and that my sister would most likely be calling him to find out if I had contacted him.
I tell him that if he lets on that he is helping me, this will mess up his chances of ever talking to his daughter again. We agree that he will keep it quiet, and play along with “helping to find Marc, in the event he tries to call”.
Sure enough, my sister calls that night. My dad tells her that he has not heard from me and that if he does he would call her. That night I again sleep for what seems like forever. I think it is more like 14 hours. I sleep long and hard. When I wake up the next day, I have a very unusual feeling. I had forgotten what it is like to feel rested. I have not slept more than 5 or 6 hours a night in YEARS. It is like I was in a coma. Not having to get up, take a five-minute shower and eat a five-minute meal is a shock to my system.
At lunch I display my speed eating capabilities and my dad asks if I am still able to chew food and not just inhale it. I think he wonders if I am deranged. I can actually see the genuine look of concern on his face. I have not ever stopped to think about it, but that is exactly what I have been doing all these years, inhaling food. I would begin feeding the next fork load in while the last one was being swallowed whole. I had perfected my eating habits down to a time/motion study. No motions were wasted and the food was consumed in the most efficient manner possible. Fifteen years of very short or no meals will do that to a person.
I am going to have to work on slowing this eating thing down if I am to fit in. God forbid I should end up at a restaurant again anytime soon. I am still a bit embarrassed from my incident at the hotel.
After lunch I am ready to work. What will I do? My dad is a technician for IBM but also has a side job where he fixes computers locally for people that he knows and makes a few extra bucks on the side. He has some of these computers at the house, and I offer to fix them. He takes a few minutes to show me the basic things to check for and what to do.
By the end of that night, I have fixed the computers I could, and watched two movies. Yes, I said movies. I have missed 15 years of movies. I can’t believe how many movies have been released in 15 years that do not have Tom Cruise or John Travolta in them. I do not count them all, but there are a lot. I have missed them all and it will take me months to catch up. Lucky for me, my dad has quite the DVD collection and I will be able to knock out a hundred or so without even leaving the house.
That is my new life, fixing computers and watching movies. Slowly but surely I begin getting more computer jobs. I charge around $50/hour and am doing a computer or two a day and usually working a couple of hours on each computer. I am making more in one hour than I was making in a week at Gold!
After a few days, I decide to turn my Nextel phone back on so I can delete the Int Base phone numbers and then sell it on eBay. No sooner than I turn it on, Claire calls. I answer.
“Marc! Are you there?” she asks.
“Yeah, I am here.” I answer. “I am sure that Security or someone from RTC is listening so I am not going to say anything to give away my location.”
“Where are you?” she cries.
“Don’t worry about that. I am fine. Why are you calling