For the Love of My Son (eBook)

Joseph Keithson (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2025 | 1. Auflage
190 Seiten
Bookbaby (Verlag)
979-8-3178-0660-6 (ISBN)

Infos

There are secrets here-deep, dark secrets at the place where good and evil meet. We broke an unwritten rule far stronger than the universal human incest taboo. Our son Abel is (was) a chimpanzee-human hybrid. How he came to be, lived his life, and died, you will see. Now it is over. For a long time, our secret was secure. Cheryl and I hoped our son Abel and his wife Cindy could live their lives in peace, and no one would ever know. Still, that was not to be. Our daughter Sarah was the instrument of our destruction. My grandson and I are safely hidden for now deep in Luna City, but who knows for how long?

Joseph Keithson is two persons. No, he doesn't have Dissociative Personality Disorder, but he does live two separate lives. In the one, after a career in Biotechnology he retired to his home overlooking the ocean in a sparsely populated region of the Pacific Northwest. He is desperately trying to finish the house, which likely will not happen. When not working on the house, Joseph enjoys hiking and sitting on his deck watching for Orcas, Bald Eagles or hummingbirds. Watching the hummingbirds come to his feeder is lots more fun than streaming video. His alter ego lives with his wife in an Asian city in an apartment on the 19th floor of building 13 in a complex of 25 buildings, each with 25 stories and 5 apartments on each floor. Ten thousand people, give or take, live in the community. As there is no house to work on there, Joseph writes, edits and proofreads, takes long walks with his wife and enjoys truly authentic Asian food. Living in a foreign country, one learns to be nonjudgemental, that people do things differently and it works for them, so no one has all the answers. In the one life, it is a 25-mile drive to town to shop, and you better not forget anything. In the other, everything is within walking distance and there are street vendors at the entrance to the residential complex until late at night in case you get hungry. Somehow, Joseph enjoys both lifestyles and he doesn't know why. It is possible that personality conversion can occur on airplanes in long flights over the Pacific.

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There are secrets here-deep, dark secrets at the place where good and evil meet. We broke an unwritten rule far stronger than the universal human incest taboo. Our son Abel is (was) a chimpanzee-human hybrid. How he came to be, lived his life, and died you will see. It all started with Williamson. At Professor Thorston's soirees (as he called them), Assistant Professor John Williamson enjoyed introducing vexatious topics and observing the resultant chaos. On this particular evening, his outrageous suggestion was the interfertility of man and chimpanzee. This resulted in universal condemnation of anyone who would even suggest crossing a man with a chimp. My wife Cheryl and I, however couldn't get this out of our minds. I really couldn't say why we followed the path that we did. Scientific curiosity? Not really. I guess it was because of the deep-rooted belief of many that humans were unique and that it was the hand of God that had given us dominion over the beasts of the earth. We saw life as a continuum from the first microbes to human beings. The continuum that links the great apes with man is only a small part. So, Cheryl and I decided to do it. We had the materials, the means, and, at the right time, the opportunity, so we took it. I had access to chimpanzee sperm and experience in in vitro fertilization. Cheryl was an Ob Gyn and willing to be the mother. Most importantly, we owned Gallardo Island, and we had money. My trust fund was in the hundreds of millions, and I gained control when I came of age. The only thing that Dad had said was, "e;Don't do anything stupid."e; If he knew, I wonder what he would think of the events that transpired. We were very lucky. With some reconstructive surgery, Abel appeared to be a normal human child, although the thumbs on his feet presented problems. As he grew, we were thrilled that he was of average intelligence and perfectly able to live as a human being. For a good long while we kept our secret and Cheryl, me, Abel, and our human daughter Sarah were a normal family. The children grew, were educated, entered the workforce, and married. Sarah, with her genius IQ deeply resented the attention that we paid to her brother, of modest ability, but this we ignored. To all appearances, everyone was happy, but this did not last. Sarah learned her brother's origin and Abel had to die.

Textauszug

Chapter 1 How It All Started

 

I was born in Seattle to wealthy parents in the year 2000. Dad started making personal computers in the field’s infancy when no one had them at home. He was successful from the start. By the time I was born, he was a billionaire, and when I reached twenty-five years old, he was a billionaire many times over. Surprisingly, unlike the spoiled children of the idle (and sometimes not so idle) rich, I grew up with a strong work ethic. Unfettered by economic necessity, however, I channeled my creative ambitions away from an industrial career into academic research.

Initially, I obtained both an MD and a PhD in virology, intending to spend my life in medical research, but circumstances intervened in the form of Cheryl. One Monday morning, I met Cheryl Stevens of the flame red hair, in Anthropology 837 class. With the ponderous title of “The Structure, Physiology, Biochemistry and Behavior of the Nonhuman Primates,” this course was a double credit class dealing with the great apes, long an interest of mine. Cheryl had been trained as an OB-GYN but became interested in interspecies communication between apes and humans and decided to obtain a PhD in Anthropology. Communicating with apes had been a hot topic since Washoe, the chimp, and Koko, the gorilla, were taught American Sign Language for the Deaf in the 1970s and 1980s. Although there was still the crotchety old professor in the field who maintained that the whole thing was a fraud, most behavioral scientists accepted the idea that chimps and gorillas could communicate with humans by sign language. Cheryl designed her thesis research to determine the limits of this kind of communication: How much could they learn from us? And what could we learn from them?

From the beginning, it was evident that Cheryl and I had more than a common interest in anthropology. We began to see each other regularly. I fell head over heels in love, and she reciprocated my feelings. As the relationship blossomed, we spent more and more time together. I spent one day on alternate weekends as an ER physician at Seattle General to keep current with the practice of medicine. Otherwise, I attended Anthro 837 with Cheryl and performed my postdoctoral research in Professor Thorston’s lab. From a distance, “Old Baldy,” as they called him, seemed permanently lost in thought and incapable of performing any job, much less running a cutting-edge research lab. To think this, however, was a gross underestimation of the man and a hazard to the career of anyone who desired to perform research into chimps, Simian Immunodeficiency Virus (SIV) and its close cousin, Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV). For in his perpetual reverie, Thorston constantly came up with the ideas that kept him one step ahead of the pack. In the late twenties, this was essential as research money dried up for all but the best.

I was attracted to Old Baldy (OB, as we said) for several reasons. First, he was the best in his field. Second, I was intensely interested in his research. And third, Thorston’s laboratories were next door to those of Michaelson, Cheryl’s thesis adviser. Both were interested in maintaining a chimpanzee colony for use in their research. Chimps were quite expensive, and their importation from Africa was expressly forbidden. Therefore, a self-perpetuating colony was essential to anyone interested in doing research on chimpanzees. Hence, the Seattle Primate Center. This explained the odd collaboration between Thorston, a Biochemist and Immunologist, and Michaelson, a nonhuman primate behavior and psychology specialist.

And so it was that on Friday, June 18, 2027, I only had to walk down the hallway to suggest a special way to spend the weekend with Cheryl. She was finishing her weekly research summary as I walked in. “Cheryl,” I said (with some fear and trepidation), “remember the house on Gallardo Island that my parents own?”

“That’s the one in the middle of Puget Sound, not far from Bellingham, isn’t it?” she replied.

“Yes,” I said, “that’s the one. My parents are in Europe, so no one is using it. How would you like to sail there on the Skimmer, that’s the sailboat my family keeps in Bellingham, and spend the weekend.”

“You’re certainly very bold, James Kincaid,” she said sternly. “We’ve only known each other for three months, and you suggest we go off alone together?”

I turned red and was sure I was in trouble now, but Cheryl smiled and said, “That sounds like a wonderful idea, Jim. Let’s leave early so that we can arrive before dark.”

I walked on air back to my lab. At 2 PM, we left in my Toyota truck for Bellingham. In two hours, we arrived at Squalicum Harbor, where the Skimmer was docked. We brought our things on board, and I checked the diesel tanks for the auxiliary engine to ensure they were full. They were, and so we cast off. The Skimmer was a 36-foot sloop and slid through the water as easily as you pleased, whether under diesel power or sail. In a very short time, we were leaving Bellingham Harbor and headed toward Lummi Island. After rounding the tip of Lummi, we would head southwest to the north of Cypress Island and south of Orcas until we reached our destination. Gallardo Island had been in our family for a long time. Great-grandfather Kincaid had purchased all two hundred acres for one thousand dollars in 1911. It was the best investment he had ever made.

As I turned south to run parallel to Lummi, Cheryl came up from below. Her long red hair billowed out behind her in the wind. As she passed in front of the setting sun, her hair was on fire. A goddess, beautiful, beyond belief. In that moment my love became boundless. I was shocked, mesmerized by the power of my vision. I fell to my knees, hands clasped to the sky. Cheryl looked at me and said, “Jim, whatever are you doing? You look pretty foolish kneeling like that.“. My vision collapsed into reality.

“I’m praying that my goddess never leaves me,” I replied.

“Nonsense,” said Cheryl, “I’m not going anywhere.”. She looked up. “Where are the sails?” she said.

“What do you mean, sails?” I replied. “We are running under auxiliary diesel power. It will make the trip to Gallardo much quicker. Trust me!”

“I certainly won’t trust you, James Kincaid,” she said sternly. “You promised me a sailboat ride, and that’s what I want.”

“Oh, all right,” I said with a smile. “You can have your sailboat ride, but don’t complain in the middle that you’re getting hungry, and we still have an hour to go before we get to Gallardo.”

“Jim,” she replied, “I’ve inspected the galley and it is well supplied. I‘ve already started dinner. Let’s enjoy the trip.”

“Okay, then,” I said, “help me set the sails.”

It was the kind of evening that God rarely made in Puget Sound. It was surprisingly warm for the area, with a crystal-clear sky and sun brightly reflecting off the water. Cheryl went back into the galley to finish dinner and bring it to me at the wheel. I gradually drifted off into a reverie. I was three years old again, and Dad was taking me to Gallardo on the first trip I remember. It was a beautiful day, similar to today. Mom brought dinner to Dad at the helm as I sat beside him, helping him steer. Dad was an unusual man. President of a multi-billion-dollar company, he reserved Sundays for his family, and never missed them. The load on this one day fell upon his subordinates, who learned never to question Dad on this point. As we approached Gallardo, Dad pointed out the four thousand square foot contemporary house on the south side that would be our home on summer and holiday weekends throughout my childhood. “Look,” I said, “it has a beach. Can we look for starfish when we land, Dad? Can we? Can we?”

“Yes, son,” he replied.

“Jim,” she said, “why are you so deep in thought? Are you sure it’s wise? Why the Skimmer could ram another boat broadside, and you wouldn’t even know it.”

“I’m sorry, Red,” I said. (I’m not sure when or why I began calling Cheryl this, but she seemed to like it.) “This trip has a lot of history for me. I’ve been making it ever since I can remember. This boat and the house on Gallardo have much to do with who I am and how I got here.”

“Why don’t you let me take the helm so you can return to your reverie? ” Cheryl replied. “Then we’ll be sure to arrive at Gallardo unscathed.”

“Sorry, Red,” I answered, “the magic has been broken. I’ll be all right from here on in.”

“Just the same, Jim. I’ll stay with you at the wheel to keep you honest.”

“You know,” I said, “you might prove even more dangerous than my daydreaming!”

“That’s silly,” Cheryl replied, moving a discrete distance from me on the seat. Dinner was ready and we ate it at the helm, taking alternate turns guiding the Skimmer.

In about two hours, we reached the south end of Gallardo. A gentle breeze was coming from the south. “All right if I furl the sails now, Red?”

“Let me help you,” she answered, “My dad and I did some sailing when I was young.”

“Sure,” I replied, “let me start the auxiliary.”

We furled the sails and motored in parallel to the...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 22.8.2025
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Romane / Erzählungen
• ISBN-13: 979-8-3178-0660-6 / 9798317806606