THE MUDDLED MYSTERY OF THE MURDERED MUSE, Chapter 33: Hypnotized

The Muddled Mystery of the Murdered Muse is a full-length novel, presented to you in Medium-sized chapters twice a week (Tuesday and Friday), that tells the story of Sebastian Holden, a paranoirmal investigator who solves the strangest cases this side of Jersey City and Brooklyn.

If you missed the previous chapter, read it here; if you’ve already read this chapter, read the next one here.

CHAPTER 33: HYPNOTIZED

It was one of those weird days I occasionally have when I’m knee-high in a case that smells fishy and full of shit and I’m prone to passing out from of a good film noir or a bad habit like picking at the calluses at the backs of my heels.

I got down to the Light Rail platform like I do most days when it’s time to start a search for some new leads to follow a trail on. I noticed there were fewer people than normal riding the ‘Rail on this particular Friday morning.

It felt unnaturally quiet.

Of course, I figured I’d forgotten to mark on my calendar that today was a holiday or something like that, so I did the only thing a guy like me could do: I consulted Google. The next holiday would be Labor Day. Today was a Normal Day, though far be it from normal.

Was it plausible to think that everyone in the NY/NJ blue-collar workforce had decided –– collectively, mind you –– to take this particular day off? Were there massive strikes revolting against low wages happening in Jersey City and Hoboken right now? Was the Occupy “Movement” in vogue again and actually prepared to do something other than sit around in Zuccotti Park painting pictures this time around?

There was a girl across from me, cute and young, with curly hair that was still wet from the shower or the gel that was drying it out every other day including today. There was a guy dressed all fancy with a Hawaiian shirt, straw fedora, and a pair of aviators that reminded me very much of the old junky journalist Hunter S. Thompson.

Then I realized that it actually was Hunter S. Thompson.

Something was awry, all right. That brother’s been dead quite some time now. Unless he faked it, or on account of all the rampant drug use throughout his life and career, he was able to come back.

The girl was staring at me now, her beady, beautiful black eyes empty of all kinds of emotion. In fact, the entire trainload of passengers, now that I had boarded the Hoboken Light Rail train, was staring at me, peering up from morning’s papers, peeking out at me through the darkened lenses of a pair of shades or out the corner of their eyes while they blindly “Liked” all their friend’s Facebook and Instagram posts from the night before.

Was I dreaming? Was this like Inception or that poem by Edgar Allen Poe? Somehow I had gotten on the train, yet I didn’t remember stepping my foot inside of it. But it was moving, and I was moving with it.

Or…

Or had I been hypnotized somehow, without me knowing?!

That final thought stirred up a bit of fright in the pit of my gut and in the pit of the gut of the guy in my gut. If this were the case –– that I was, in fact, hypnotized without my knowledge –– I knew that only one person buried deep in my subconscious could get me back on track, hopefully before it was too late!

>> Continue reading: Chapter 34: Monsieur Jaques du Caf >>