The Light at the End of the Tunnel by James W. Nelson

that the little bastard
thought nobody but Tyler ever saw. She even feels responsible for
Tyler’s death.”
    “Oh no,” Nicole said, “Work with her, sir.
Take her to as many counselors as necessary to get her over
this.”
    “I will,” the man said, and looked at the two
of them. He appeared calmer than he had yet, as if sharing his
story had helped, “And we are going to a counselor. Both of us, but
neither of us has felt comfortable telling them what I just told
you.”
    The man’s mouth smiled. His eyes did not.

     
    Chapter 21 The Barbie Dolls

    More time passed. Les Paul had reached the
ripe old age of four and then some. Even at his very young age he
had learned that he had to moderate his actions and for certain
never let his true nature be known by any more than one member of
the family. He somehow knew he had screwed up with Tyler and Chloe.
He would be more careful, and he knew he needed to grow up a bit.
It would help to again stay with one family longer than a few
weeks. He learned that with Tyler and Chloe and their loser dad, so
only was on his seventh family, not including his birth
parents.
    This family had a boy, ten, and a girl,
eight. He was in the girl’s room surrounded by her dolls. He wasn’t
a lover of dolls but he liked putting the Barbie Dolls into
compromising sexual positions with the Ken Dolls, and if he
couldn’t find a Ken, or ran out, he would use one of the other
Barbies. He didn’t in his young mind really know about sexual
positions, but his hands did .
    Whenever he was in his foster sister’s room
alone he would put all her dolls into every compromising position
his hands could think of, then he would skedaddle out of the room
to anywhere else and wait for his foster sister to discover the
dolls, and who did she blame? Her blood brother. Her brother, of
course, always denied doing it, and neither were willing to bring
the matter to their strict parents.
    This time Les Paul didn’t hear his foster
sister coming until she opened the door and stared at the dolls
with the widest eyes he had ever seen on anyone.
    “ You did this!” she shrieked, “Mom!
Mom!”
    Mom came immediately, “What’s wrong,
honey?”
    “Look at my dolls! I always thought my real
brother was doing this, but I was wrong—it’s him!” She pointed.
    Les Paul was caught. There would be no
getting out of it this time. He stood up and stood still…and began
wondering about the thoughts and visions that began coming to him.
He was lying on a steel table on a very thin mattress, his hands
and feet were bound in chains, he couldn’t really move well…but he
could see . Straight ahead was a large glass window. Behind it
were several people sitting, like on a bleacher, because some were
higher than others…and some looked familiar, and they all had
strange looks on their faces, like they were mad at him—why would
they be mad at him? He didn’t even know them! Then he noticed a man
dressed in white by another window. Behind that window looked like
tubes, and the tubes combined and ran into just one tube…to his
arm! Where a needle was injected and taped to his arm! Then he saw
a man in a suit enter, who looked familiar, and another man in
black clothes with a white collar and white hair, and he knew that
man too, but who?
    The man with the white hair came to him and
opened a book and looked into his eyes, and laid his hand on his
arm and began speaking—at least his mouth was moving, for just a
really short time—then the man in the suit nodded to the man
dressed in white, who did something with the tubes because liquids
started moving…moving…he felt a roaring in his ears, like he was
going fast, faster than he ever had, and faster, and faster, and
faster…
    The scene ended.
    Les Paul felt so strange. What had just
happened? Why would he see something like that as if he was
thinking it? Dreaming? He thought about crying, maybe just
screaming, like what used to get him the best attention,