"We don't know for sure I won't be back," she said.
"I admit I'm hoping you'll fail," said Zachary. "Some part of me, anyway."
"Some part of me, too."
"How do you think they'll respond when you show up, Jamie?"
"My family, or the world?"
"Both."
"They'll both be completely freaked out."
"You'll seem like a freak to them there. Or a god."
"I'm kind of a freak even here." Jamie dredged up a smile. "Can't speak for the god part."
"Well, you know I for one worship at your feet."
They held each other and kissed while Brian Loving stood with his hands in his pockets discreetly studying the moon and the stars. It seemed to Jamie that the galaxy had completed one full spin through space when she and Zachary finally parted.
"Safe journey," he whispered.
"Who knows?" Jamie brushed away her tears. "I might be back here tomorrow saying hi to you."
"Or saying hi to another version of me."
Then came the awkward moment where Jamie had to get up close and personal with Brian Loving, climbing into his arms and wrapping her legs around him in such a suggestive way that Zachary couldn't hide a small grimace. Not exactly the best send-off for a lover. She gave him a weak wave, which he reciprocated before they dematerialized.
"He really loves you," Brian murmured in her ear as the world blurred. "And you really love him."
"Thanks, Dr. Phil. I appreciate what you're doing, but is there any chance you could stay out of my head?"
"Uh, no."
Jamie disentangled herself from him. Thankfully, physical contact wasn't necessary once they were in N-Space. What was coming next she dreaded the most. When she'd first told her dad about her plan, she'd half-expected him to beg her to come along – a theoretical possibility, at least - but instead, after a long silence, he'd told her he'd been waiting for her to come to that conclusion.
"The first you told me about it, I believed it was just a matter of time," he'd said in a muffled voice.
She'd asked if he was okay with it – a pretty dumb question, in retrospect – and he'd replied: "You need to be with your family."
But what did that mean if you had more than one family – or possibly an infinite number of them?
Chapter 32
IT WAS A LONG dark night of the soul for Jamie and her dad. They stayed up most of the night talking as a classic North Dakota winter storm raged outside. Not so much about her decision, but about everything else: random stuff, reminiscing, speculations about the future, the meaning of it all, and the mild winter they were having. Jamie sensed her dad was working very hard not to let her see his grief. Nothing obvious – just a quick jaw clenching or averting of his gaze – and a hollowness in his eyes at times. A big dollop of guilt to pile on top of her other uncertainties and misgivings.
But in the morning the sun was out in a pale blue sky, illuminating a bright kingdom of fresh white snow. They sat on the front porch in skimpy clothing, sipping coffee, indifferent to the frosty temps as most people now were.
"I think I may be in love," Cal blurted.
"Oh? You're telling me just now?"
"I was kind of hoping you'd feel guilty enough about deserting me to stay, so I didn't want to sound happy or anything."
Jamie released a short laugh. "Who is she?"
"Haley Lingstrom. She's been helping me manage my hardware store. She has a lot of cool ideas and a real head for accounting. She's also a sweet lady who's damn easy on the old eyes."
"Billy Lingstrom's mother?" She had a vague memory of a cute petite redhead around her own age. Bill had been in her geometry class as a sophomore. She'd be about a decade younger than her father.
"Yup. Good kid. She's been raising him alone since her ex-husband skipped town with another girl ten years ago."
"It's serious, then?"
"I think so. We haven't exactly set a date, but there's been some discussion of a future together."
"Well, good. I'm...happy for you."
"She's the main reason I haven't begged you to take me along. That and I've finally got my life together – running a successful business, got some savings in the bank, even a couple of investments."
"And if I don't come back, you'll get all my 'earthly' possessions."
He shot her a sour smile. "I won't be touching that any time soon. But it's not just Haley or anything material. In the world you're headed to Kylee already has an Uncle Cal, and you'd have a dad. I'd be a third wheel at best. A penniless third wheel."
She returned his sour smile. "So would I. Penniless, I mean."
"Have you thought about that, Jamie? Have you really thought this out? Are you sure you can insert yourself back in Dennis and Kylee's life that easily? And what will the authorities think about a dead person coming back to life?"
"I doubt it will be that easy. I'd just have to tell the authorities the truth." She frowned. "But maybe not right away."
"I'm not trying to argue you out of it, but you'll be opening a whole can of worms over there."
Jamie gave him a grudging nod. "I get it."
"Not that you're not getting the better deal." His smile bent downward. "You'll have your husband, daughter, and even a dad."
"Dad, if there's any way I can come back for visits, I will." She surprised herself with that.
"Don't make promises you can't keep, baby – "
Brian Loving appeared near the front steps. Though she'd been expecting him, she jiggled her coffee cup along with her dad. A few spilled brown drops sizzled in the thin layer of snow on the porch.
"Am I early?" Brian asked.
"Not really," said Jamie.
"You need some more time?"
"Let us finish our coffee?"
Brian nodded. "Wow, it's beautiful here. It's been a while since I've seen snow."
"California boy?" Cal asked.
"Born and raised. Baptized on So Cal beaches."
Jamie wondered if he might mean that literally.
"No," Brian answered her. "But I think the ocean may have inspired my spirituality."
"One thing I wanted to ask you –" Cal began.
"I want to help your daughter because she deserves it, more than anyone. She saved this world. Maybe there's some risk to me, but I'm not worried about that." Brian grinned. "I'm a hard guy to keep down."
"So I noticed." Cal didn't sound especially approving.
Jamie drained her coffee cup. Her dad had finished his. They looked at each other. She stepped inside and retrieved the backpack by the front door. It contained a few changes of clothes, driver's license, and fifty thousand dollars in small bills.
"I am going to hold you to that promise, daughter," he said when she emerged, strapping on the pack. "Don't let me go my whole life without seeing you again."
"Not if I have anything to say about it."
"Well, you are a girl with a knack for getting things done."
They stood up and hugged. He patted the back of her head as he had when she was little. She tried to hold it together for him, and he tried for her. They both enjoyed only minimal success.
"All right." Cal held Jamie at arm's length as she dabbed at her eyes. "Send me a postcard."
"I will."
"Love you, baby."
"I love you, too."
She was looking into his eyes when they dematerialized. A suppressed sob started up in her throat. Brian seemed reluctant to release his hold on her.
"Probably wouldn't be a good time to mention I've sort of had a crush on you from the first time we met?"
"Definitely not a good time."
But she didn't push him away. Brian might be a bit of a clown, she thought, but his strong arms still felt good as her tears dampened the left shoulder of his dress shirt.
"Where to?" he asked.
"I don't know. All I remember is going as fast as I could. I was heading toward DARE headquarters, but I'm not sure the dir
ection made any difference."
"Okay...might as well try that again. You ready?"
Jamie sniffled and nodded. He held her arms in place when she started to pull away.
"I may need your power," he said.
"Did I mention this could get a little scary?"
"The darkness? Feeling like you're at the bottom of the ocean?"
"Guess I did mention it."
"We'll be okay, together. You were alone that time." He held her tighter. "On three?"
"Make it five."
"Okay. This is it. Five, four, three -"
Jamie gathered her energy for an all-out burst. At zero, she let her speed freak flag fly. A white sun burst in her eyelids. She braced herself for the pitch blackness, but as the moments or minutes or whatever was passing in real time added up, the eyeball-scorching light persevered.
And then true daylight – along with normal reality - threaded its way into their incandescence. They were gliding above a snow-covered field ringed by patches of forest. They slowed to a hover.
"That wasn't so bad," said Brian. "Do you think we crossed over?"
"I don't know."
"Any idea where we are?"
Jamie looked around for mountains or any identifiable geographic marker.
"Someplace where it snows," she said.
Brian laughed. "In late-February that would cover a few places."
"Can we go up and see where we are?"
"Not space high" – he gave a nervous chuckle – "I don't think I'm rated from that. But high enough to get our bearings."
They rose. The snow-covered field shrunk into a white patch and the forests into moss-like clumps. The Great Lakes swam into view to their north.
"Now we know where we are," said Jamie. She pointed at the plains to the northwest. "Take us down there. Almost due west of Lake Superior."
"The lake that looks like a serpent's head?"
"I never saw the resemblance...but yeah."
Downward – at a speed that would've seemed breathtaking before her nanovirus but now was no more than the mundane descent of a commercial airliner.
"The town first. I need to know I'm in the right place." She had a sudden thought. "A cemetery on the western outskirts."
He followed Jamie's rigid finger to a small square framed by evergreen trees. It took only a moment to spot her grave – one of the few gravestones adorned by a red ribbon in the bleak winter landscape. They settled down in front of it.
TO A LOVELY WIFE AND MOTHER. THE MOST BEAUTIFUL OF SOULS.
Jamie turned away, eyes blurring.
"This is it," she said. "We can materialize."
A brief tingle and the cold ground crunched beneath her feet. Brian stood beside her, solemnly regarding the gravestone.
"Man," he said. "That's touching."
"Yeah."
"Do you want a lift to your family's house?"
"No. I can take it from here." She turned to him. "Thank you, Brian. Do you think you can make it back?"
"Sure. I'll find a way. Won't mind doing some exploring first."
"I would be careful about that if I were you."
"But you aren't me." He grinned.
He held out his hands and she added yet another goodbye hug to her seemingly endless list.
"Good luck making over this world, Commander." He winked. "I have a feeling we'll meet again."
He vanished. Jamie sent a silent prayer with him that he would find his way home...or to wherever he wanted to go. He was one of a kind. Well, at least in his world.
She shouldered her backpack, about to launch herself into the air when she noticed an elderly couple departing their car at the far end of the cemetery watching her in that way that people from a small community watch people they didn't recognize or might need to report on later.
A walk might do me some good. Some time to consider things.
She hiked south past the university toward the road leading west out of town and to her place. Plenty of people drove by, some of them giving her second or even third looks. Was it because she was wearing only a short-sleeved blouse under her backpack? Not exactly standard North Dakota winter wear. Was it possible that some of them recognized her?
She reached Demers Avenue and had walked a half-mile west when a Grand Forks County Sheriff's SUV rolled past. Somehow she wasn't surprised when it circled back and stopped on the shoulder in front of her.
Sheriff Jack Coulter stepped out, holding his hat as an abrupt gust tipped it back on his head. Jamie had to smile. What were the odds? Apparently not that long. They'd met a few times in her other life, but she didn't know about here.
He strolled up to her, his eyes narrowing. "Hello, Miss."
"Sheriff."
"Where are you headed?"
"Home."
"Where would that be?"
"A few miles west."
"Not a good day for a walk in short sleeves," he observed.
"And I was thinking - it's such a beautiful day."
The sheriff cocked his head at her, half-smiling, as if getting the movie reference but not quite sure she meant it. Then Jamie cracked a smile, and he laughed.
"They might think it's a beautiful day down in Fargo, but up here in Grand Forks we're pickier about the weather, I guess. I'd say it's middlin' at best. Would be good if not for the darn wind and five-foot snow drifts on the road."
"They had a storm here last night?" Just as they did in my world.
"Seven inches. Was supposed to be only three, but the weather people were being optimistic." He squinted at her. "Have I seen you before? You seem familiar."
"Could be. I grew up here."
"Really? Whereabouts?"
"A few miles out." Jamie kept thinking she could tell the old boy to mind his own business, but what was the point? It was all going to come out sooner or later, wasn't it?
"You got a name?"
After a second or two she answered: "Jamie."
"Sheriff Jack Coulter. Well, Jamie, why don't I give you a ride to where you're going? Nothing else urgent happening at the moment."
Jamie hesitated, but again couldn't see any harm done. She wondered, though, if she'd thought this through enough to recognize what might prove harmful in terms of revealing herself.
"Okay," she said.
He had her sit in the front seat next to him. He regarded her candidly for a long moment.
"Still can't shake the feeling I know you from somewhere," he said. "Mind if I take a look at your I.D.?"
"Am I suspected of a crime?"
"Nope. Just askin'."
"I'm going to respectfully decline."
"Wouldn't happen to be running from someone?"
"More like running to someone. Nothing personal, Sheriff Coulter, it's just I like the idea of being able to freely travel in this country without showing your papers."
"Fair enough. For what it's worth, I'm a believer in the Fourth Amendment, too." He glanced at her abruptly. "Funny, I don't remember giving you my name."
"I must've heard it somewhere."
"Well, I do got quite a reputation hereabouts," he chuckled, though his eyes held a cool question.
He started the car. The SUV's wide tires crunched in the snow.
"Tell me where to go," he said.
"Take a left on 475th Ave. About a half-mile down."
"The Shepherds?"
"Yes." Jamie forced the word through her constricting throat.
"I've run into Dennis a few times at his dealership. Him and his ex-father-in-law. Good people. Sad about his wife..." He was staring at Jamie again. "You know him then?"
"I knew someone an awful lot like him." The sheriff's stare developed a quizzical edge. "I guess you could say I'm a friend of the family. How did his wife die?"
"Trucker fell asleep at the wheel coming into town. She'd stopped at a signal. Guess she didn't see him till it was too late." Sheriff Coulter shook his head. "Funny how fast a life can change. One minute you got all your
ducks in a row – the next, all you got is feathers."
"That is sad."
He glanced at her. "Figured you'd know that, if you're friends of the family."
"I only know she died. I'm short on a lot of details." She smiled out the side-window. "You could say I've been living in another world."
He shot her a wry sideways look. "Thanks for clearing that up for me."
A quarter-mile ahead, a van had run off the road into a tree.
"Oh, Lord." Sheriff Coulter throttled down his cruiser. "That looks bad. Been expecting to run into some 'off-roaders,' but was hoping they'd miss the trees." He lifted the dash microphone. "Kelly, we need an ambulance out at Demers Ave, just west of 69th. Someone ran off the road into a tree."
"I'll get someone out there, Sheriff."
"Thank you much." He hung up the mike and guided the SUV over to the van's side of the road. "You might need to go the rest of the way yourself, Jamie. This could take a few."
They climbed out of the cruiser. Jamie had already zoomed in on the van. A young woman was struggling feebly behind the steering wheel's airbag. The steering wheel and the front dash appeared to be on her chest. Jamie followed Sheriff Coulter in tromping through the snow. At her silent command, the van lurched backward off the tree, its crushed front end stretching out as it shed its driver's side door.
"What the...?"
They approached the van. The woman seemed as startled by her sudden good fortune as the sheriff.
"What just happened?" she asked.
"Must've dropped down from the tree." Sheriff Coulter didn't sound convinced. "Are you bleeding anywhere, Ma'am? Any injuries I should know about?"
"I think my legs are broken. I think I'm okay otherwise. Never saw that black ice."
"You and a hundred other people since I've been sheriff. Just hang tight. Help is on the way." He turned around. "Say hello to Dennis – "
From a half-mile overhead, Jamie watched the sheriff spin like a top in snow, looking every which way but up. She smiled.
A few too-short seconds later she dropped from the sky next to an outbuilding fifty meters out from the house. A red pickup she recognized from before was in the driveway alongside an unfamiliar green compact. Watching from the shadows near the entrance of the building, Jamie saw Kylee through the kitchen windows carrying on a laughing conversation. Her heart leapt. Dennis stepped into the frame, making his classic wide-armed gesture – an enthusiastic endorsement of everything from a skydiving session to a sunset.
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