Free Sweet Dreams by Aaron Patterson Page B

held little Sam in her arms. He took the photo out of the frame and held it close. He took a few boxes from the garage and began to pack a few things he could not live without. All the family photo albums and Samantha's teddy bear. Mark held it together through the process but had to walk out on the back porch a few times to do so.
    After packing all of his clothes in two suitcases, Mark looked around the house one last time and loaded the boxes and suitcases into a silver BMW convertible. Hank had sent it over and the note on the windshield said:
    "Don't worry; you can pay me back later, I'll get it out of you one way or another!"
    Hank
    Bill and Holly had agreed to take care of the house until Mark decided what to do with it. He could not think about it now and he thought that it might do him some good to get an apartment for a while. Finding an apartment turned out to be easier then Mark had anticipated. SED owned several in the buildings they had designed. After a few calls, Mark located one that he could move into immediately.
    The apartment was on the fifth floor of Central Park West.
SWEET
    DREAMS
    71
    The place was nice and was fully furnished, along with a parking space in the garage and a twenty-four hour doorman. Two bedrooms and a living room opened up to a huge balcony overlooking Central Park. Marks firm had updated the interior and exterior of the building. The walls were brick and concrete inside, giving it a cool comfortable feel. Mark was thankful that his company was being so gracious; an apartment in this part of the city would normally be out of his reach. Crashing down on the overstuffed sofa, he slung his hand over his eyes. His mind raced, trying to take in the events of the last few days. " What day is it? Sunday?" he thought.
    "Yeah, it's Sunday." He grabbed the remote and clicked on the news. Then dragging himself up, he felt his ribs cry out.
    "Slow," he thought. "Slow it down. Ah!" He spotted a gift basket with candy bars and fruit filling it to the brim.
    "Yesterday was a busy day here in New York," The anchorwoman looked grim as she reported the news. "There was a car chase over in the Northeastern industrial park, which resulted in a shootout that left one man dead and a Detroit detective wounded." Mark was half listening to the news as he bit into a ripe peach, " Was there anything on the bombing ?" he thought.
    "The shootout left collateral damage in the hundreds of thousands and at this time we still have no comment from NYPD, other than that the situation is being looked into. "In other news, we still have no confirming reports on the explosion at the Super Mart yesterday. Sources say that an underground gas line that ruptured may have caused it. The blast killed more than two hundred people and destroyed the entire building. We now go live to Andrea Kilpatrick who is at the scene where investigators are still trying to pinpoint exactly what happened.
    "Andrea?"
    "Yes, Susan. I am standing in front of where Super Mart once was, and as you can see, there is not much left here. We have spoken to the local police, and they are not ruling anything out, but so far they have not received anything to lead them to believe that this was anything more than a tragic accident."
    "Andrea, is this something that might have been caused by faulty wiring or a line that needed to be repaired? Could the store have prevented this?"
    "At this time, we just don't know. They are not releasing a statement as of yet, but we will be following this developing story and let you know as soon as we hear something from the local authorities."
    "Thank you, Andrea.
    There has been a relief fund set up for the families involved to help them out. You can go to www..."
    Mark shut off the TV and walked over to the kitchen counter, grabbed his cell phone and dialed the police station. He needed some answers, and, in his gut, he knew that this was not an accident. The image of that disturbed man running from the building right