Doppelganger

by David Stahler Jr.

  Maybe I could just stay here, I thought. But I knew it was foolish. Necessity would drive me to civilization. Already I could feel it pulling me, like gravity, toward the lowest spot.

  As I headed out into the world, I had no idea what lay ahead of me. I didn’t know anything about Chris Parker, his sister, Echo, or his parents. I didn’t know about the kids at school, the teachers, the coaches, or any of that. Most of all, I didn’t know about Amber or have a clue that in a few short weeks I would be in love with her. Why would I? Doppelgangers aren’t supposed to fall in love. But then, like my mother said, I always was different. The question was—could I be different enough?

  CHAPTER TWO

  It took me about three days to get out of the mountains. It wasn’t hard at first, because in the woods I could still walk during the day. But as the trees began to thin out and I started coming across fields and the occasional house, I had to be more careful. By the time I hit the first town, I was pretty much forced to walk at night and find some place to lay low before the sun came up. It wouldn’t have been so bad if I’d been able to sleep, but I was always on edge. I was still in my natural form. If I got caught, who knows what they’d do to me. After all, I’d seen E.T.

  Of course, there was a way out of this predicament. And when I came across a man stumbling drunk down a backstreet at two in the morning, or spied a boy on his lonely way home from school, I’d be lying if I said I didn’t feel the urge. It’s a strange feeling, like hunger, only deeper, a sort of inner clenching that comes in waves and leaves longing in its wake. But I wasn’t ready yet to assume a form. That’s what I told myself, at least.

  I couldn’t figure out what my problem was. I mean, after all, I was a doppelganger. I was supposed to follow through on the urges. And it wasn’t as if I hadn’t been trained. My mother had taught me all the tricks, all the signs to look for, the right way to go about making a proper kill. So what was I waiting for? Maybe my mother was right. Maybe watching too much TV had spoiled me. It was the news, I think, that did it. All those sad stories of human failings or plain old bad luck. I couldn’t help it, I just felt sorry for them.

  I remember once—I’d say I was around ten or eleven—seeing two parents being interviewed on the local news. They were both crying, taking turns breaking down. Their daughter had disappeared. They showed her picture on the screen—a pretty girl, about my age, with dark pigtails and green eyes.

  “They should just be glad they don’t have to feed her anymore,” I heard a little voice say. I whirled around to see the girl standing there in real life, right behind me. Her clothes and hair were different from the picture, but it was her. I jumped back, almost knocking the TV over, but the girl just giggled and shook her head.

  “There’s a whole pile of schoolbooks in here,” she said, throwing a loaded backpack onto the floor between us. “Since you finished the other ones, I figured you could start working on these. She looks to be about your age, after all.”

  I nodded but couldn’t look her in the eyes. I just took the textbooks out of the pack and began studying them, not wanting to seem ungrateful. Later I realized it wasn’t my mother I felt I owed—it was that girl’s frantic parents, and the little girl herself. Her form hung around the house for the next two weeks, cooking my meals and splitting wood.

  Deep down I knew I would’ve been in trouble, even without the TV. My squeamishness went way back. When I was younger, I had trouble killing even the smallest of creatures. It didn’t matter if it was a squirrel, a hen, or even a cricket that my mother caught for me, I always resisted, holding out until I didn’t have a choice. The worst was when she brought home a puppy. I’d seen dog food commercials on TV and was excited to have a pet. She let me play with it three whole days before making me strangle it.

  Still, in spite of my hesitation, I knew I’d have to pick a mark sooner or later. The urges would only get stronger, and I couldn’t hide from the world forever. Food wasn’t really a problem—doppelgangers are hardy creatures. We can go a long time without eating and can gobble down almost anything. Worms, insects, grubs—it doesn’t matter. But shacking up behind a Dumpster every night is no way to live. Besides, part of me was eager to prove myself, to show my mother she was wrong. I wasn’t weak. I could take care of myself.

  I reached the city a week later, following the lights as they got brighter each night until they finally blotted out the stars. Fall was coming, and the air was getting colder. By the time I reached the outskirts of the city, I was feeling pretty low. For the first time, I missed the comfort of my cabin. And the trees, too—spires of fir softer and warmer than these city towers—that had stood between the other mountains and me. I longed for my TV most of all and kept thinking of the shows I watched. All those characters who had joined me every week or every day—it sort of caught me off guard how much I missed them. I found myself thinking about them, worrying about the difficult spots I’d left them in, the problems that dogged them from episode to episode. And now they were all gone. Actually, they were still out there, going on without me. I was the one left alone.

  At my lowest point, I even missed my mother. At least she’d been someone to talk to. I was in a train yard at the edge of the city. It was late. Most of the windows in the nearby skyscrapers were dark. There was a full moon out, and I was shivering from the cold snap as I wandered between the glowing boxcars scattered along the tracks. I’d started thinking about her, wondering where she was now, what she might look like, when I saw a light ahead and made my way toward it. Soon I could make out a group of men in the distance. From where I stood, peeking around the corner of a coal car, I could barely tell the four of them apart. They were wrapped up pretty tight against the cold, standing around a barrel fire, like four bundles of rags, passing bottles around, talking loudly. They seemed pretty lit.

  I wanted some of that fire. I remember thinking they might just be drunk enough for me to put in a late-night appearance, maybe even scare them off, when I heard a loud cough behind me and nearly jumped out of my skin. I ducked into the shadows and looked around. The cough had come from right behind me, but there was no one in sight.

  I heard it again. This time it came in a long spasm, and I realized the sound was coming from a nearby boxcar, its door ajar. Sticking to the shadows, I sidled up to the door. I could hear rattled breathing coming from inside and someone mumbling to himself. The noise made me shiver worse than the cold.

  I stole a glance inside. The moon shining into the car illuminated a figure lying on a pile of blankets against the far wall. It was an old man. I could see his beard, a white blaze in the moonlight. He coughed again, even more fiercely. His whole body stiffened and shuddered with the effort, as if every muscle was working to get out whatever was filling his lungs. This was the closest I’d ever been to a human. It was an awful sight.

  But I was curious. I paused in the doorway and took a look back. There was no sign of anyone. Either the men at the fire hadn’t heard the coughing or didn’t care.

  I pulled myself up into the car and plopped down next to the old man, shifting so that the light could still shine down on his face. The stench in the car was overwhelming.

  “That you, Ridge?” he rasped. His face was covered with sweat.

  “No,” I said.

  He blinked and looked over at me, his eyes widening for a second. My back was to the moon, so he couldn’t have seen more than my silhouette, but it was enough.

  “Who are you?” he asked.

  “Nobody,” I said. “Just me.”

  “What are you?” he asked. He didn’t sound afraid. “Are you an angel?”

  “Something like that.”

  He nodded. It was weird. It was like he had been expecting me or something. It was then that I realized what I was there for, why I’d climbed in there to begin with. The old man had figured it out before me.

  “I’m in a bad way,” he moaned.

  “So it seems,” I said.

  “Hand me my bottle, w
ill you?” he asked, and gestured toward the corner of the car. He started coughing so bad he could barely get his words out. “It’s in that bag there,” he said.

  I went over and poked around the shadows until I found the shopping bag with the bottle in it. I pulled it out and brought it over to him. For a moment he just rested it on his chest, pointing it at the sky. Its curved glass reflected the bright square of the boxcar’s open door, a window for the moon. The bottle was empty but for a small bit at the bottom.

  “Been saving this,” he said. “It’s the good stuff.”

  He was wheezing pretty heavily. Then he glanced my way. “Got no regrets,” he said. “’Course I got no family nor no money, neither. But I got no regrets.”

  “That’s good,” I said. I suddenly didn’t want to look at him.

  He struggled to pull himself up until he rested on one elbow, and then unscrewed the cap. I had never smelled anything like it before. To this day I still can’t stand the smell of whiskey.

  “Cheers,” he said, raising the bottle to me.

  “Cheers,” I whispered.

  He tipped the bottle and emptied it in one swig, then sank back to the floor, gasping. “Better.”

  Though the rattle in his chest didn’t diminish, his breaths came slower and he seemed to relax a bit. He’d closed his eyes and I thought he’d fallen asleep when I heard him say something. I told him I hadn’t caught what he’d said, so he said it again, and this time I leaned way down so that even breathing through my mouth I could smell the rotten, boozy odor of his breath.

  “Mercy,” he whispered.

  I won’t describe what happened next.

  I can hardly recall it anyway. I just remember being surprised at the strength with which the old man kicked out before it was over and the grip he had on my arms. Most of all I remember thinking over and over again, Please don’t open your eyes.

  Then he was gone. Moving back to where I’d been sitting earlier, I watched the light play over his body. He looked better in death.

  It hit me all at once. I could feel myself stiffen, overwhelmed both by the rush of killing and my revulsion at the deed, and I shuddered the way he had at the end. I felt disgusting and full, like I’d just eaten too much of something sickly sweet.

  “There you go,” I said to her, even though my mother wasn’t there. Good thing, probably. But I could still hear her voice in my head—“Well, he was just about dead anyway. Where’s the challenge in that? And he practically wanted you to. You did him a favor.” I don’t know, maybe it was what I wanted to hear right then.

  I reached over and placed my hands on his chest the way she’d taught me. Soon enough I could feel him drawing into me. I gasped. I didn’t think it would hurt that much. It was worse than any pain I’d felt before—like my whole skin was on fire, like a part of me was being torn away, though really it was just rearranging. It didn’t take long. A lot less than the actual killing part.

  I looked down at my worn hands, the nails dirty and cracked, then picked up the bottle and turned to face the moon. There he was in the glass, his scraggly face staring back at me, wrapped around the bottle’s curve like a label.

  Voices called out and I ducked back inside, pressing into the darkened corner of the car.

  “Loamer!” they cried. A minute later, one of the men from the fire poked his head in.

  “There he is,” he said. He climbed in and went over to the old man. “Come on, Loamer. Get your ass up.”

  Another man stood outside and peered in. “He sleeping?”

  The first man prodded him a little with his foot. “Nope. Old geezer’s kicked the bucket.”

  “I get his stuff,” said the man looking in.

  “Screw you, Myers. I found him first.”

  “Yeah, well, I loaned him five bucks last week and he never paid me back, so call it collateral.”

  It went on like this for several minutes before they finally agreed to split the old man’s belongings. Watching them go through his stuff, I could feel myself grow more and more nervous—I had no idea what I’d do if they saw me. But it wasn’t just that. I needed the old man’s clothes, and I was afraid they’d take everything.

  Fortunately they didn’t bother with Loamer’s clothing—it must have stunk too much even for them. I breathed a sigh of relief as they left, then crept from the shadows and dressed myself in the remaining rags as quickly as I could before covering the old man with a blanket. It didn’t seem right leaving him all naked like that, dead or not. I was about to cover his face, when something around his neck caught the moonlight.

  I’m surprised the two bums missed it. I took the necklace off and held it up to the light. Attached to the chain was a tiny medallion with the picture of a robed man on the front with a halo over his head. “Saint Jude” was engraved on the back in small letters. I didn’t know who that was, but it was kind of cool. I put it around my own neck—a memento of my first time.

  The coast was clear, so I dropped out of the boxcar and began stumbling down the tracks, surprised at how stiff my legs felt. I was a bit numb from what I’d just done, but that wasn’t the reason I was lame. Though the change is mostly skin deep, you still take on a little bit of the person you become. And here I was, a sixteen-year-old doppelganger in prime shape suddenly with an old man’s body—it took a bit of getting used to.

  After everything that had happened, I was tired and sick. Sick of myself and sick of this place. So an hour later, when the first train came along and I spotted an empty boxcar, I hopped on board. As I watched the city fade and the stars come back, I felt a strange kind of relief. I’d gotten it out of the way, and maybe I’d even helped the old man by doing it. Most of all I was just relieved to stop moving, to finally sleep and let the rocking train decide my destination for me.

  CHAPTER THREE

  For the next couple of weeks, I rode the trains, bumming my way across the country. It wasn’t bad. I saw some pretty interesting places. Eventually the mountains shrank to a tiny row of bumps on the horizon, and I crossed the plains and saw fields of wheat ready for harvest, rolling out from the tracks like golden sheets of silk. Then the plains ended and the land turned green and hilly, dotted with farms and the occasional town.

  Every few days I’d hop off the train and head into a new town. It took me a while to work up the courage the first time. I had to keep reminding myself who I was—or rather, who I looked like. Though I felt bad about what I’d done to the old man, it was nice to walk out in the open and pass people on the street. ’Course, looking the way I did, they still gave me nasty glances, but at least they didn’t run away in horror or try to capture me.

  It’s funny—some of them actually helped me. I was sitting near a street corner the afternoon of my first excursion, back against a building, just watching people go by and minding my own business, when someone dropped a dollar at my feet. I remember picking it up and looking at it sort of confused. I almost jumped up and ran after the guy to return it. But then another person did the same thing, and some others threw some coins down. Before long I had more than ten bucks. Then there were people who called me names and said all sorts of rotten things. One person did both—first he called me a filthy beggar, then he gave me a five-dollar bill. Humans can be strange.

  After a while I had enough money to buy some food. I found a grocery store and stocked up on candy bars and cans of tuna. I even bought some beans. My mother always fixed me beans from a can, to the point where I swore I’d never eat beans again when I was on my own, but for some reason I missed them. Since the old man had nothing left for supplies after his friends had gotten through with him, I bought a new spoon, a can opener, and a lighter with the last of the money. Then I hit the road again, catching another train out of town.

  And that’s how I ended up in Bakersville. It was the fourth town I stopped in, and as far as I could see, it looked like all the others—the same kind of main street with the same kinds of stores, parks, churches, same everything.
It was a warm afternoon, and I was on the corner, doing my best to look down and out, which wasn’t too hard. I had the whole thing down to an art at this point and was raking in the dough, when these three guys wearing football jackets came by and stopped to check me out. The one on the left was short with curly brown hair. The name stitched on his jacket was Josh. The one on the right was taller and blond. His name was Steve. The kid in the middle had black hair combed back and a sharp nose. That was Chris. He was a good-looking guy—like the kind I used to see on soap operas—but there was an edge to him, as if there was a storm brewing behind his eyes. I sensed trouble.

  “Hey, Chris,” Steve sneered, “since when do we have beggars in town?”

  “Since never,” said Chris.

  “Man, I can smell him from here,” Josh said.

  “Spare some change?” I murmured, and held out my hand. I could see it was shaking a little.

  “Get a job,” Chris snarled.

  I’d seen jocks on TV before. These three didn’t seem much different from them, maybe a little meaner. But I knew they liked to joke around and give each other a hard time.

  “Sure,” I said. “Just tell me where your mother lives and I’ll be right over.”

  Looking back, I guess it was a stupid thing to say. But at the time, I was just trying to get along, maybe draw a laugh. Jocks are always talking about each other’s mothers.

  It sort of worked—the other two laughed. Unfortunately, Chris didn’t.

  “You stupid old bastard,” Chris snarled, and took a step toward me. Both his friends grabbed him by the arms and yanked him back.

  “Forget it, Parker. Come on,” Josh said, nodding toward the corner.

  Shaking his friends off, Chris scowled at me for a second. Then he glanced both ways down the sidewalk and, seeing no one nearby, turned back and spit on me.