Body Jumping

by Brenda Lowder

  “It’s really me, Barclay.”

  “Prove it.”

  I glance at where Laurel and Brent are sitting and see they’re already a bit freaked out by Barclay and the demon talk. And I’m aware of how much worse this conversation could get.

  “Hey, guys?” I call out to them. “This is my roommate, Barclay.”

  Barclay turns and waves at them.

  Laurel and Brent wave back, but Laurel’s face is scrunchy as she analyzes him for hidden dangers. I can tell he’s setting off several of her alarms.

  “Nice to meet you, Barclay,” Laurel says, looking like she wants to ask him for a resumé. Brent echoes her.

  I try to clear my throat, which still feels rough. “Could Barclay and I have a few minutes alone, please?”

  “Sure,” Laurel says, but the slow way she leaves her chair lets me know she’s much less sure than she’s pretending to be. Brent reaches the door first and turns and waits for her, putting his arm around her before they leave together.

  When they’re free of the room, Barclay throws himself on the foot of my bed, and I’m barely able to pull my feet up in time to avoid getting squashed. He blows out a big breath.

  “I thought they’d never leave!”

  I smile at him. He’s so Barclay.

  “So what happened yesterday?” I ask him.

  He stares at me blankly. “At work? Well, we got a Dolce and Gabbana handbag in, and let me tell you how the fight for that went down. Althea was all—”

  I shake my head. “No, I mean about this.” I nod toward the room and the wild scene of action he missed yesterday. “Did the bad guys show up at our house looking for me? Did they beat it out of you that I was at the hospital?”

  Barclay looks at me like I’m crazy. “Do you think I’d be sitting here shooting the breeze if I’d gone and got beat up last night? No, ma’am! And I may be a friend to you now even though your ass is crazy, but I ain’t taking no punches for nobody!”

  “Huh.” How did they find me? Were the pimp and the drug dealer enjoying a day in the park and just happened to see me and start chasing me? It sounds like a bad joke. Somehow I can’t picture those two hanging out together at a park on their day off, but I guess stranger things have happened.

  Barclay casts his eyes downward then looks at me with a nervous expression on his face.

  “What?” I ask.

  He turns away fast, being obvious in his attempts to avoid my gaze. “Nothing.”

  “Barclay, what is it?”

  “Okay, I lied! I spilled everything to those bad men! I’m a rat! A stoolie! Or that little girl from Atonement!

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Your friend Jim—well, he said he was your friend—came looking for you at the house, and I told him you were at the hospital visiting your friend Julianne. I guess he told those men who were after Evie.” He sobs into my pillow, uncomfortably close to my head.

  “It’s okay, Barclay.” I put a hand on his shoulder.

  “No it’s not,” he says with an uptick in his voice that sounds like he really wants it to be.

  “It is. It’s fine. Everything turned out okay.” I nod, thinking with awe about Evie and me, back in our own bodies. Alive. “I think everything’s just as it ought to be.”

  “Thanks, Julianne.”

  I fill him in on what happened last night, and he oohs and aahs and exclaims complete rapture that he escaped being here for that bit of drama. I’m thankful he wasn’t here for it too. I’d have had another screaming girl to protect on my hands. Not for a minute do I think he’d have been helpful.

  “Knock, knock.”

  Barclay and I both turn toward the partially open door, which swings fully open to reveal Aiden, holding a vase of bright flowers and looking sheepish and out of place. I wonder why he’s here and if he wants to rehash our breakup for a second and then I realize, oh right. I’m Julianne now. And he doesn’t think I know him. When I really kinda do. Even in the Biblical sense.

  Which I will refrain from leading with.

  “Come in,” I say and try not to beam at him like sunshine. You like me, I’m thinking at him, and it brings a glow to my heart that swiftly spreads throughout my whole glorious body.

  He crosses the room until he’s standing at the end of my bed. He sets the flowers on the sill by the window and takes too long arranging them. “These are for you.”

  “Thank you,” I say. “They’re beautiful.” The first flowers Aiden has ever brought me.

  He takes off his jacket in the over-warm room. Not that you usually need another layer in September in Atlanta anyway. Did he dress up for me? He passes his jacket from one hand to the other and looks at Barclay, his face registering surprise.

  “Barclay, you know Julianne?”

  “Course I do, fool. She’s my roommate!” he blurts out.

  “Old roommate,” I smooth over, taking note of Aiden’s confused look. “I hear my friend Evie has been Barclay’s roommate in my, um, absence.”

  Barclay nods vigorously. “That’s right, Evie. I mean, Julianne.” He shakes his head and shrieks. “Aaah! I just cannot keep my roommates straight. Maybe it’s because they are.” He laughs loudly like he’s hilarious, and Aiden throws him a pity laugh.

  “I think you won’t have to be confused much longer,” I say to Barclay. I turn to Aiden to explain. “I’m going to be Barclay’s roommate again when I get out of the hospital.”

  “That’s great,” Aiden says. “Julianne, I know you don’t actually know me, but my name—”

  I interrupt him. “Aiden. From the coffee shop.”

  He nods and smiles. “You remember.”

  I smile back. “I’d never forget a caramel soy macchiato like you.”

  He laughs, sounding a little more genuine than when he laughed at Barclay’s joke. Or so I flatter myself.

  “So you and Evie were both roommates of Barclay’s? What a coincidence.”

  “Not really,” I tell him. “Evie’s my best friend, and she needed a place to stay so it made sense.”

  He nods.

  “It takes a village!” Barclay supplies. We look at him. “To raise a bunch of crazy people,” he finishes with a shrug.

  “You can have a seat.” I nod toward Laurel’s chair. Aiden pulls it closer to the bed and sits down.

  “Can I help you with something?” I ask him. Barclay stares at him with his eyebrows raised halfway up his shaved head.

  Aiden glances to the side and his brow furrows as he decides how to start. I wish I could make this easier for him, but I can’t really, because I can’t reveal that I already know…everything.

  “You’re probably wondering what I’m doing here.”

  “The thought did cross her mind,” Barclay huffs. I hit him.

  “My sister, Laurel, already told me about how kind you were to offer to help us.” At this I realize I’m expressing my real emotions and not just what I should say to protect who I am. “I can’t tell you how much that meant…means to us—to me—that you’d want to help a stranger.”

  “Forgive me for being forward, but I don’t really feel like we’re strangers.” He runs a hand through his hair. “Do you?”

  “I guess I don’t.”

  He blows out a breath, and his shoulders relax. This is it, I think.

  “Would it be weird of me to ask you out? For the future. When you’re home and feeling better.”

  I shake my head. “No.”

  His face falls.

  I flutter my hands. “No, I mean, no, it’s not weird. I’d love to go out with you.”

  His smile breaks wide, and I want to live in his shining blue eyes.

  “Yeah, you already know where she lives,” Barclay pipes in. “The apartment’s the same. Only the girl has changed.” He leans over and whispers to me, sotto voce, “And she ain’t changed that much!”

  I hit him again.

  “Ow!” he says like the baby he is.

  Aiden’s bro
ws draw together. “When you were…in a coma, I—” He fumbles for the words. I get a feeling about the direction of his thoughts. “I dated your friend Evie.” He delivers the last words in a rush and takes a deep breath. His conscience has been cleared since he has confessed. Now he awaits my verdict.

  “I know.” I tug my sheet and blanket higher. “She had to go away for a while. But she’s doing great.” I bite my bottom lip. “Do you miss her?”

  I almost hold my breath. Will there be a wall between us? Evie’s absence becoming a physical presence keeping us apart?

  His eyes stray to the window and when they return to mine, they’re crystal clear. “I liked Evie. I did. But the thing I liked most about her was that she reminded me of you. There was something in her eyes—a sparkle, a gleam—something that made me feel…something. I feel that with you.”

  His cheeks are flushed by the end of his speech and he studies me for my reaction. He has put himself out there. My heart fills with more happiness than it can hold.

  Barclay speaks before I can. “Honestly, you’re trading up.” He holds his hand up to inspect his fingernails. “Julianne is the real deal.”

  “She really is.” Aiden looks from Barclay to me with a wry smile. “I guess I’ll be seeing you—both—later.”

  “Soon,” I amend and smile, looking up at him under lowered lashes. I guess part of me remembers how to be Evie. And maybe I’m a little more Evie now than I was before. Like remembering some of the foreign language a year after taking the class. It’s in there somewhere.

  He nods. “Very soon.”

  I want to kiss his dimple.

  And more.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  On the day Evie’s allowed to have visitors in rehab, I’m first in line.

  Natasha’s in line, too, which I realize means that I’ll probably have to wait for her to finish before Evie and I can have a private talk, but I don’t mind. I’m glad Natasha is supporting her sister.

  When Natasha leaves, there are only twenty minutes left for my visit with Evie. It feels like much too short a time to say everything I want to say and ask everything there is to know, but I take what I can get.

  Her eyes light up as soon as she sees me. When I cross the busy common area where other families and friends are visiting, she hugs me hard and doesn’t let go for a good, long time.

  “My Julianne,” she says like I already mean something to her.

  “Hi,” I say, pulling away. “I’m so glad to see you.”

  She laughs, and we sit on a comfy couch by a window. “I’m glad to see you too! For a couple of months there, you were just an invisible presence in my life.”

  “Literally,” I say, and we both laugh. I hand her the gift-wrapped box I brought with me.

  “What’s this?” she asks as she takes it.

  “You mean you don’t already know? What kind of psychic are you?”

  Her lips curve into a smile, and she ducks her head. “Well, I do have a bit of a guess.” She tears into the wrapping paper and opens the box. The red dress I bought when I was in her body beams back at her, shiny and new.

  “I thought it might add a little something to your wardrobe. Start your comeback out right.”

  She lifts it from the box and smooths the fabric with delicate fingers. “But you love this dress.”

  “I went back and bought another one for myself.”

  She laughs and hugs the dress. “Thank you, Julianne.” She puts it back in the box and clears her throat. “How’s Aiden?”

  I feel myself blush. “Good. He’s been by to visit since I got home. Barclay hug-attacked him at the door.”

  “Of course,” she says with a knowing smile.

  “How much, um, do you remember about when I was, um, running the show?” I gesture to her body, which is definitely not mine anymore.

  “Everything.”

  “Everything? Seriously?”

  “Except for the love-stuff between you and Aiden.”

  “Really?” Even I think the hope in my voice is pathetic.

  “Yeah, I think I nodded off during those.”

  She looks like she’s suppressing a smile, but I decide to work on making myself believe her. It’s just too weird, otherwise.

  “So you see the future, huh?”

  She nods almost imperceptibly, but when she speaks her tone holds doubt. “Kind of. I get impressions. And sometimes strong feelings. Gut-punching feelings with details.” She bobs her head up and down enthusiastically now. “Like with you. And Laney. You remember.”

  This time I nod. The handy thing about living the same life in the same body for almost two months is that neither of us has to explain anything to the other or catch each other up on anything. We know. We were there.

  She continues. “With Laney, I felt like I’d been hit in the head with a two by four. That girl’s got some big force of life in her. And I guess it needed help changing direction a few times.”

  The inspired awe I have for Evie opens wide in my heart. “You’re amazing.”

  Her eyes get a sad look in them and her face closes down. “I’m really not.”

  “You are. I’ve been you, remember?”

  She shakes her head. “You’re being too easy on me. You know how messed up my life is. Was.”

  “And I know how much pressure you must have been under.”

  “Julianne, for every person like Laney I helped, there were ten that I didn’t. I tried to pretend that I didn’t know anything about anybody. I wasn’t blessed with these feelings. I was cursed.”

  My heart tears a little at her pain. “Evie, the fact that you helped anyone at all makes you a hero.”

  “Natasha never saw it that way.”

  “Yeah, well, Natasha’s a bitch.”

  She laughs loudly, and the light comes back to her face. “Not really.”

  “I know. Not really. I was just kidding. You know I was Natasha for a while, right?”

  “Shut up!”

  “No, for real! I was.”

  “Oh! So that’s how you got into me. It was when Natasha came over.”

  “Yeah, you didn’t know that?”

  She shakes her head. “No. Believe me, this knowing things is not an exact science. I don’t know where my shoes are half the time.”

  “That’s because your apartment’s a mess.”

  “Yes, thank you, I’ll get to cleaning my room as soon as I’m off drugs and not being chased by pimps and drug dealers.”

  “Oh, yeah.” I’d heard that the bad guys had spent a few days in jail and then were charged with a misdemeanor disturbing the peace. They certainly weren’t gone for good. Neither was Jim.

  “What are you going to do?” Real fear rolls in my stomach for her. “They found me very easily, when I looked like you. They’ll find you too.”

  “I know,” she says but her voice doesn’t sound as concerned as I think it ought to. But she probably dealt with a lot of tough men before I came along. Maybe she knows how to handle them. I hope.

  “What are you going to do?”

  “They don’t want me, Julianne—they want the money I stole.”

  “Yeah.”

  “I’m going to give it to them.”

  “You have the money?” Way to wait too long before telling me she has the solution that would solve everything.

  She shakes her head. “No, I spent it on drugs.” At the look on my face she says, “Don’t be so surprised! You’re such a priss. Yes, I spent it on drugs. Big surprise. I’m in rehab. That’s how I got here, remember?”

  “Then where are you going to get the money?” I have a sudden fearful premonition of my own where she takes the money Aiden was offering for my life support.

  “I’m going to get a job, of course.”

  “Oh, wow, that’s great.” I try not to show how relieved I am. Then I have another thought. “You’re not, uh, going to go back to waitressing at Simple Sauce, are you?”

  She laughs. “No. But
thanks for the training. I got a lot out of it. Think I could make a ton in tips as a server at a fancy downtown restaurant now.”

  “I bet you could.”

  “You have any other training programs you want to take in my body? Maybe set me up with some nice computer programming skills or something?”

  “I think my body jumping days are over.”

  I feel really, solidly me. And I love it. There’s no one else I’d rather be. With my physical therapy and exercise, I’m already feeling stronger and healthier. And I have a renewed sense of purpose that’s coming from being there for the people I love. Like Laurel and her family and Evie. And maybe Aiden.

  She nods. “Yeah. They are.”

  I raise my eyebrows at her. “You know they are?”

  “Yeah. Well, like Laney told you, the closer I am to a person, the more I can sense. That’s what bugged the hell out of Natasha all our lives.”

  “Don’t—”

  “I know! Don’t tell her anything I sense about her. I’ve figured that one out.”

  “Okay, good. And don’t go spoiling anything for me, either. I want to be surprised.”

  “Okay.”

  I drum my fingers on the windowsill and bite my lip. “Okay, like you know a lot you’re not going to tell me now?”

  She smiles. “Yeah. I know a lot. You and I were the same person for a while. Stuff about you is all up in my head. Of course I know a lot.”

  I lean across the table. “Maybe you could tell me a little something, like—”

  “Little Jacob’s getting a new kidney. He’s going to be great.”

  Joy fills my veins. “Oh! That’s wonderful!”

  “And Laurel’s going to be fine.”

  A giant metal cage of tension opens in my chest, and my heart is set free. “She is?”

  Evie nods, a wide smile on her face. “Yeah. The biopsy’s negative. She doesn’t have cancer.”

  “That’s incredible.” Tears spring to my eyes. I hug Evie. She squeezes me back, and I think about how lucky I am to have gotten another sister out of this deal.

  “And yes.”

  “Yes, what?” I ask as I pull a tissue from my purse and wipe my eyes.

  “I’d love to be a bridesmaid.”

  ∞∞∞