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We followed him to the closest bus stop, which was empty. A good thing, probably, because we had some more talking to do, and it wasn’t about the kind of things that potential good Samaritans needed to interfere with. "Maybe we should take a cab," Janine suggested, raising her arm up to point at the advertisement on the shelter of the bus stop. The ad said "SMILE" in bold, block letters, and had a picture of the new camera system installed on all of the public bus lines in the interest of heightened public safety. "What do you think, Dr. Partain?" I asked him. I was waiting to see if he’d run, or if he’d become confrontational, like he had in the bar. "We’ve already got you on tape, you know. But what happens next is really up to you." "Unless you’d like to lose a fight with a girl again," Janine said, "I suggest you continue to cooperate with us." She was looking across the street towards an abandoned shop front, plywood facings covered from top to bottom with posters for concerts and ads for nightclubs. "This is too fucked up," he said. "All this time I’ve been telling myself that it’s a dream, a nightmare, and that I’ll wake up soon. All this time I have been telling myself that I’ve lost my grip on reality and that I’ve slipped into a delusional world that my mind has been creating for me as I’ve been strapped into a chair in the middle of a padded room somewhere. I still question the nature of reality sometimes, who doesn’t? But I’ve also learned that what everyone sees at face value is just like the gloss coat on the surface of truth. And the truth is that you people are insane. The treatments may have made me unsure of most everything, but that’s one thing I’m positive about." "That building across the street looks like as good of place as any, if we’re going to stay put," Janine said to me.
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