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Kill Order

By Adam Blumer

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“Landon, you have a brain tumor.”

The truth pressed down, a heavy weight on my ribs. Lying in my hospital bed, I struggled to breathe. Couldn’t. I choked out the word, “What?”

“Because of the results of the CAT scan, the doctor feared the tumor might be putting stress on your optic nerve.” Amee, my agent, came into focus beside me—head tilted, straight black hair brushing her shoulders.

Worry lines traced her mouth. “That’s why you’re having vision problems, why you didn’t see the car when you merged onto the highway.”

The accident. The car coming out of nowhere.

Of course. What else explained this strange blindness in my left peripheral vision? When I studied the ceiling, one-third of the left side of the room vanished as if a black hole had swallowed it. Sweat beaded my forehead.

“You hit your head pretty hard,” she said. “You may not remember everything for a while.”

Squeezing my eyelids shut, I grappled to rewind my memories, searching for any event to explain this strange orientation. Didn’t Celeste and I agree to meet after the concert for some drinks?

That’s right. Denver Metroplex. The conclusion of my big thirty-city tour. But why did any of it matter now?

A tumor.

It could be removed and might not be so bad. But that depended on the type.

Events once forgotten flashed through my brain like a fast-paced slideshow—me playing on stage at a grand piano, my backup band pulsing, and the audience cheering beyond the edge of perception. Me playing “Private Island” with my cellist, Kim Ono.

Afterward, I’d gone to Celeste’s place to hang out for a while, and later I’d headed to my hotel.

I blinked a few times to clear my vision. Turning my head, I scanned my surroundings and waited for my world to come into focus. But it didn’t. Colors swirled together and morphed, softening the hard edges
nearby into nothing but vague smudges.

My eyes—what’s wrong with them?

“There’s more. The doctor worried about more serious issues, so he did an emergency biopsy.” She hesitated. “Your mom will be here in a few hours. She should be the one to tell you.”

The throb in my head crested with each movement, but I pushed through the discomfort. “Tell me what? I want to know.”

“I’m afraid it’s cancer.”

My mind did a swan dive into a dark unknown, into a place where I didn’t expect to be. Not at forty-five. Not with so much ahead of me, a Grammy Award-winning pianist.

The news came at me too fast. I needed time—

“It’s called glioblastoma multiforme. Stage four.”

Whatever that meant. Why couldn’t doctors come up with simple terminology for the rest of us? Why not Bad Thing Number Ten in Your Head?

An unseen wound above my right eye pulsed with each heartbeat. Fire shot through the area, and I gritted my teeth. Reached for the wound. Amee stopped me. “Hey, maestro, you don’t want to touch that.”

Still lost in the world of thirty seconds ago, when my biggest prob lem had been only a car accident, I dragged a tongue across parched lips.

Precious seconds granted me mere moments to ground myself. “It’s bad, isn’t it?”

No response.

Not good.

“How long are they giving me? Don’t sugarcoat it. Give it to me plain.”

“One to three years.”

Clamping my eyes shut, too numb to speak, I waited for advice straight from Oprah or Dr. Phil. Embrace life. Seek out inner strength in the midst of adversity. Instead, she said, “I’m sure there’s something somebody can do to fix the problem—beyond surgery and chemo, I mean.”

From my lips burst a derisive chuckle. “I’ve got terminal brain cancer, Amee, not a broken leg. This kind of cancer doesn’t get fixed.”

She clucked her tongue, a mannerism that annoyed me to no end. “But I’ve got some friends in high places who are knowledgeable in the field of alternative brain cancer treatment. A friend of mine in Tucson, Dr. Nicholas Korovin, has been breaking new ground. Folks are calling him a miracle worker.”

“Miracle worker, huh?” In my brain flashed the image of a witch doctor chanting while I tiptoed across a bed of red-hot coals.

My whole body ached like one massive bruise. I swallowed, mouth parched.

“He removes the tumor and inserts his own specially patented medici nal wafers in the tumor’s place. Please, just give the idea a chance. Let me contact him on your behalf and see what I can find out, okay? His services aren’t cheap, but hey—you can afford them, right?”

Hmm. Could it be some people died simply because they couldn’t afford to live?

My flesh writhed at the thought of something alien stretching octopus-like tentacles into my brain and feeding on it. Yep, the tumor had to go. Pronto.
But cancer supposedly happened to other people. Not to middle-aged guys like me who at last had everything I’d ever wanted. A successful career. A dozen best-selling piano CDs to my credit. Hundreds of thousands
of adoring fans. A Chicago penthouse condo I already missed.

I bolted upright, awash in dizziness. “Amadeus!”

“Not to worry. I called Miriam at the office, and she found the extra key you told me about. Your cat’s doing just fine and having a grand ole time partying with the cats at her place.”

Good thing I’d neutered him. Settling against the pillow, I sighed.

“Don’t worry about a thing. You and Amadeus can be reunited whenever you want him back. For now, you just get some rest, okay, maestro? Doctor’s orders. And don’t fret about future concerts or whatever. Every
artist needs time off.”

Who said I worried about concerts? I’d just finished my big thirty-city tour and could use a break. Well, okay, a certain concert had always been on my bucket list. Maybe I’d never reach the milestone now.

“Maestro, you focus on getting help. Once you’re better, we can put that concert in Tokyo on the schedule again.”

“You think I’m going to get better? Didn’t you hear anything I just said?”

“Didn’t you hear anything I said? Dr. Korovin has cured stuff like this.”

“Cured terminal brain cancer? Yeah, right. There is no cure for this.”

“Landon, think about it. These days you can pretty much buy anything you want if you’ve got enough cash. Hold off on making any big decisions until I chat with Nick, okay?”

They appeared to be on a first-name basis. A good sign.

She glanced at her watch. “I gotta go. I need to pick up your mom at the airport.”

Mom.

Eyelids pressed shut, I dreaded where this journey might take me.

After she left, I must have dozed. The ringing telephone on the nightstand jolted me awake.

“Hello?”

“Is this Landon Allan Jeffers?” The words were broadcast from a deep, educated-sounding voice tinged with some type of accent. Russian?

“Yes, it is.” I braced myself for the fan who’d tracked me down and wanted to tell me his sob story.

“You don’t want to die, do you, Landon?”

Fingers squeezed the receiver. “Excuse me?”

“If you want to live, you’ll do exactly as I say.”

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