The Renfield Syndrome by Clifford Beck - HTML preview

Chapter 12

Having returned home after a couple of hours, Caspian found his mother’s body on the couch in the position he had left her in. She was devoid of a pulse, and her body had not begun the process of rigor mortis. Shoving her by the shoulder, he was startled by a sudden burst of air escaping from her lungs, resulting in a groan. Although her joints moved easily, her muscles seemed stiff. No doubt this was the sudden coagulation of blood. He knew Claire was dead but did not expect death to present itself in such an obvious manner. The toxin he used to end her life had a half-life of fifteen minutes, so by now he assumed the amount in her system was barely a trace. As he sat on the floor, Caspian began to bring to life the most painful event he could remember. He needed to call an ambulance and knew a believable performance was necessary in order to stave off suspicion. Once taken over by the appropriate emotions, he picked up the phone and dialed 911. After a brief conversation, he heard the distant sound of sirens as they quickly neared, and soon there was a hurried knock at the door. “Hello,” a voice said. “Emergency service, is anyone in there?” The paramedics listened closely as Caspian got up from the floor and, in a state of hysterics, stumbled towards the door.

“Yeah!” he yelled.

Opening the door, the paramedics immediately noticed the pallor of his face as tears streamed from his bloodshot eyes.

“It’s my mom!” he cried. “I can’t wake her up!”

He stood off to the side as the paramedics quickly walked by him and, moving some furniture out of the way, knelt down and felt for a pulse. “Help me get her to the floor,” one of them said.

Lifting her by her ankles and shoulders, the two-man team lifted Claire’s body to the floor, where one of them started CPR as the other applied adhesive electrodes to her chest and lower abdomen. Connecting them to an EKG monitor, the power was turned on, revealing a flat line. “Asystole,” the other man declared. “Prepare to defibrillate.”

They worked together like a well-oiled machine, and unpacking the necessary equipment, she held two paddles to her chest—one to each side. A dial was turned up as a digital indicator read 200.

“Ready?” he said. “Clear!” Pushing a button on one of the paddles sent a jolt of electricity into Claire’s deceased body, causing it to suddenly flinch. This was something Caspian had never seen, and he drank in the experience, hoping they would have to perform it again.

While one paramedic held an oxygen mask over Claire’s mouth and nose, the other turned the dial up until the display read ‘250.’

“Ready?” he said. “Clear!” Caspian was transfixed as his mother’s body flinched under the jolt of electricity delivered by the defibrillator. But again the display readout showed a flat line with only a few small round bumps—the product of gases of decomposition colliding with the heart.

“What’s that?” he asked. Any break in the EKG's flat line made him think that his mother might still be alive, and the one thing he didn’t want was to see her recover. The paramedic was quick to respond but gave a somewhat misleading answer, not wanting to upset the person who had actually taken her life.

“That’s just an artifact,” he said. A moment of silence filled the air as Caspian absorbed the reality that his mother, the person who had made his life a living hell, was finally dead— once and for all.

Having run out of options, the paramedics gave up on any further life-sustaining measures, and keying the microphone that clung to his shoulder, he radioed to the hospital. A coroner was now necessary in order to officially pronounce Claire dead. However, as hers was an ‘unattended death,’ an autopsy would have to be performed. As the coroner explained this to Caspian, he felt his hands begin to tremble. The toxin he used had a metabolic half-life of roughly twenty minutes, and he knew that by the time her autopsy was performed, it would be beyond traceable. But knowing there would be an autopsy made him nervous, wondering what he would do if the medical examiner uncovered something that might implicate him in her murder. More than that, what would he do now that Claire was dead? He was still a minor, and legally he could not be allowed to live alone. Having also responded, the police contacted a social worker to take charge of Caspian while they looked for any close relatives willing to take him in. It didn’t matter who they found; he didn’t plan on staying for long. It wasn’t that he had a plan; he just didn’t want to be tied down when there was an entire world calling to him. He should have been pleased to know that his mother was now dead, but there was still a great deal of anger wrestling in his mind. It wouldn’t be long before it would begin seeking a means of expression. For now, Caspian needed to keep that monster in its cage—under control until the time of his mother’s demise had passed. After that his life would inevitably change, and he had no choice but to change with it. In general, life is never easy, but for those who place themselves in difficult circumstances, life can be especially hard, and Caspian was soon to discover how hard life could be.