by Sean Platt
“Do you know an Allie?”
I see fear on his face. Maybe he thinks I’m cheating on him, or perhaps that Allie is some old flame I’m still thinking of.
I shake my head. “No … I don’t think so.”
“Allie Martin.”
I pretend not to remember the name. “Who?”
“The missing girl in Washington. Her name is Allie Martin.”
“Yeah, but what could that have to do with me?” I say, hoping he doesn’t think I’m actually involved in a kidnapping, hoping that Charles hadn’t recently disappeared for a few days, or taken a trip to Washington.
A horrifying thought hits me like a hammer. What if Charles is somehow involved? What if that is his connection to everything, and why I’m in his body?
No. That theory doesn’t feel right at all.
Danny is thinking about something. As we pull into our driveway, he finally says it.
“Your dream about that girl being held. Do you think you were dreaming about Allie? That you’re somehow connected?”
I stare out the window, at our apartment, and I wonder if I should tell Danny everything. I’ve wanted someone to confide in for so long, to unburden myself, to get honest advice, to hear someone else’s theories on what might be happening to me. I’ve lived hundreds of lives, and have been around thousands of different people, and yet I might be the planet’s loneliest soul. I look into Danny’s wide, blue, trusting eyes, and feel like I could tell him anything. Surely, he’d understand, and have the perfect words to say.
But I swore to myself long ago that I’d never share this secret. It isn’t fair to anyone. It might help me to talk, but this is my burden to bear. If I tell Danny, he’ll never see Charles the same way again.
He’d think his lover was crazy, and even crazier the next day or so when Charles returns to his body, denying ever having spouted such nonsense. That’s a kind of crazy you can never totally trust. Danny would never feel safe wondering when Charles might snap again.
Even if Danny did believe my story, how could he ever trust his boyfriend, or anyone, ever again, with the knowledge that at any moment a stranger might be pretending to be his lover, friend, or coworker?
I long to tell him, but simply can’t do that to Danny.
He asks again, “Do you think you’re somehow connected to her?”
“I don’t know. I don’t even know how that would be possible?”
Danny kills the engine but makes no effort to leave the car. He’s still thinking.
“I’ve got a theory.”
“Shoot.”
“You know about the collective unconscious, right?”
“More or less.”
“Well, maybe this is one of those things. Consider this. Everything is energy. Our bodies. Our thoughts, all energy. And there are certain people who can pick up on others’ energies. So maybe you’re somehow picking up on thoughts that Allie is putting out there?”
“So, I’m picking up her psychic signal?”
Danny’s eyebrows are raised, his voice faster, like he’s chasing a revelation.
“It’s not as crazy as you might think.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“Yeah, but I know you. You’re skeptical.”
“Yes, but I’m not so closed-minded that I won’t consider possibilities.”
“Maybe it’s not that. Maybe it’s something else. Are you familiar with quantum entanglement?”
“Not exactly an expert,” I say.
“Me either, just in the broadest sense. But the theory is that every particle has an opposite or connected particle. Like mirror images. If you separate them, they’ll still act as if they’re together. There are scientific experiments that more or less prove the theory, two particles responding to light, even though only one is exposed. Maybe you’re somehow connected to Allie, and sensing what’s happening to her?”
His theory might be off target, but I wonder if it explains my circumstances in some way. It could account for some things, though it falls apart once you consider how many people I’m connected to.
“So you think maybe Madam Monique saw these connections?”
Danny nods.
“So here’s the question,” I say, grateful for an opportunity to discuss this without revealing the truth, “do you think she saw something that already happened, is happening now, or is going to happen?”
Danny looks like he needs a joint to break this idea down and explore it from every possible angle.
I press on. “Has she told you about things in your past, present, or future?”
“A bit of all.”
“And was she accurate about any of it?”
“All of it.”
I stare. It isn’t the answer I want to hear.
“I need to talk to her again.”
“I’ll call her later,” Danny says. “Maybe we can schedule something for tomorrow.”
“No, I need to talk to her tonight.”
“I don’t think that’s gonna happen. She seemed pretty shook up.”
“Can you call? Just see.”
Danny says okay then makes the call.
I wait, patiently.
Nobody answers.
Danny leaves a message, asking Staci to please call us back.
He hangs up.
I want to ask him to drive back there, now, but I know he’ll argue. I can’t go back in the apartment and do nothing. Maybe going out to dinner will give us an excuse to drive back by Madam Monique’s. I try and remember the name of the steak house I saw in the town center.
“Hey, what was that steak house we drove by near Madam’s?”
“Juno’s?”
“Yeah,” I say, “want to go there for dinner?”
He looks at me suspiciously. “You’re not going to ask me to drive back to Madam’s, are you?”
“Only if they don’t call us back.”
“You’re really worked up about this, aren’t you?”
I’m not sure if he’s about to tease me and the fact that I’m now a believer, or if he’s really concerned. Maybe both.
“I’ll admit that she scared me.”
Danny hugs me. “It’ll be okay.”
I hug him back, wishing I could tell him more, but knowing I can’t.
**
Dinner is good, even though I’m anxiously awaiting Staci’s call. When we don’t hear back, I convince Danny to swing by Madam Monique’s.
Her lights are off.
I get out of the car and knock on the door anyway.
No response.
This will have to wait until tomorrow. But will I be here?
**
At bedtime, Danny is in the mood.
Fortunately, I’m able to convince him that I have a headache, and suggest we smoke a few bowls instead.
We discuss his theories in bed, but nothing seems to approach the possible truth in his original ideas.
As I feel sleep coming, I hope to stay in Charles for at least one more day. Just long enough to talk to Madam Monique again.
* * * *
CHAPTER 6
Thursday
I wake up. I am no longer Charles, though due to a splitting headache and foggy thoughts, I don’t yet know whose body I’m in.
I’m not sure why, but it seems like I tend to wake too often in people who spent the night partying like there was no tomorrow. It amazes me how careless people can be with their bodies, from overeating to drug and alcohol abuse, people take their vessels for granted, as if they don’t need to care for the very thing which should carry them into old age. Most hosts I’ve been inside treat their cars better than their bodies.
I sit up, looking around the apartment.
It’s small and dark. There are beer bottles everywhere.
There’s a bottle of painkillers on the nightstand, lying empty on its side.
Did my host take all those last night? Is this a normal routine, or is he trying to kill himself? I feel an ove
rwhelming sense of pain and guilt, even though I have no associated memories to explain the emotions.
I get out of bed, legs shaky, body aching.
The thin sliver of light coming through the windows grates on my frayed nerves. A part of me wants to crawl back into bed, to ride this wretchedness out. But I have a feeling if I do that, my host might not wake back up.
My stomach lurches.
I stumble toward the bathroom, barely make it to the toilet, drop to my knees, then vomit into the porcelain bowl.
I sit there retching for what feels like forever, as if releasing toxins from every pore.
After what feels like forever, I stand.
I don’t know how long ago my host went to sleep or took those pills, but I feel like if I hadn’t come along and woken him, he’d be dead now.
I stand up, flick on the lights, and stare into the bathroom mirror, hoping that will jar some of the host’s memories into my brain. At least give me a name to work with.
But I don’t need memories.
I recognize the host.
His name is Thomas (Tommy) Clarke, one of the two reporters at the Bay Cove Chronicle.
He’s twenty-eight, just under six feet tall, and looks like someone you’d see in a Starbucks dutifully writing in their Moleskine journal. He has thick shoulder-length brown hair, coffee-colored eyes, and a beard that looks somewhere between hipster and lumberjack. He usually wears thick black-framed glasses, though he only needs them to see far. In my prior hosts’ memories, I see him as a hard worker, one of the first to arrive, and last to leave at the office, always offering to help others in the newsroom. A nice, decent guy.
I look in the mirror and ask, “What the hell happened to you?”
His memories are still refusing me, which might be the first time it’s taken so long to download, for lack of a better term, the necessary past from a host.
Did alcohol and drugs stall the machinery?
I head back into Tommy’s bedroom, searching for something that might jar a few memories free. The room is small. He has a trunk where he keeps his clothes; an overflowing bookshelf: lots of sci-fi, books on writing, a few tomes of literary fiction, books by journalists, and a wide array of biographies.
There are also several journals. I’m not sure if they’re novels or diaries. I don’t want to pick any up yet, as I prefer to keep the process of discovering my host pure.
I turn to his desk. He has a small iMac, tons of folders and papers covering his desk, which I think are probably work related. There’s a cork board behind his iMac with a lot of little yellow notes, index cards with contact info, and a single photograph.
I look at the photo.
It’s a picture of him and Lara sitting at a restaurant, cozy in a booth, both of them smiling for the camera, holding up drinks. Were they close friends? Or had they once been more? I remember Yvonne’s comment to Lara, how she could always go out with Tommy if things with Gavin didn’t work out. Maybe there is a history here.
They look so happy in the picture. I get a weird sensation, as if peering into my own past.
My mind flashes, and suddenly I’m in that memory — from both sides. They were at a late night dinner with Yvonne, when she suddenly had to take care of something back at the office, leaving them alone for a good half hour.
A tension had been building for some time, that thing where you both wonder if maybe there’s something more than friendship bubbling under the surface. They both felt it.
As Lara, I’m laughing, having a good time, wondering if Tommy likes me in that way. He seems like he does, but has yet to act. I consider making the first move, but I’m coming off a bad relationship and don’t want to lose one of my few friends, let alone ruin our small office dynamic. I like my job, a lot, and don’t need a reason to hate it.
Then I experience the same night through Tommy’s memories.
I’m nervous. I’m sort of mad at Yvonne, who had threatened to do this if I didn’t finally make a move on Lara. She left us alone on purpose, trying to set us up. But I’m getting mixed signals.
I’ve never had a relationship that lasted more than a few weeks. I’m insecure, had a shitty childhood with parents who criticized my every move. I was an only child, and couldn’t help but think they never wanted me to begin with. They wanted an adult, someone they could manage, someone who didn’t demand things like time and attention, neither of which they had much to give. I’ve never felt confident of my place with people, so I bury myself in work. It’s easier this way. I’m good at my job, and know how to do it better than those reporters at the Daily. It’s one of the few things I’m not just confident in, but can be cocky about.
But when it comes to relationships, I turn stupid. I’m insecure and needy, always screwing things up. I don’t mean to, but it’s happened enough times to know it’ll probably happen again.
And Lara is too nice of a girl to do that to.
I love talking to her, and not just about the job and local politics, but about things like books and movies and music. I love listening to her going on and on about art. I could spend days lost in conversation with her. And that says nothing of the days I could spend kissing her, touching her, making love to her. She’s the closest to a perfect match for me I’d ever known, but also a good friend.
And I don’t want to screw that up.
Too scared to make a move, I do nothing.
When Yvonne comes back, she gives me a look as if to ask, “Well, did you do anything?”
I shrug.
She mouths the word, Idiot.
And of course, she’s right.
Back to the present.
I stare at the photo on the cork board and feel overwhelmed by the crushing loss. The bitter regret Tommy was trying to drown.
I look around at the beer bottles, the pills. He was trying to kill himself. I’m still missing his memories, but it makes perfect sense.
I go to his computer and turn it on.
The screen asks for a password.
But nothing comes.
Dammit.
I try Lara.
Nothing.
I stop. I’m not sure if he has a script that will lock me out or wipe the data if I keep entering incorrect guesses. I’ll have to wait for him to supply the answer.
I decide to shower.
The water feels good — like it’s washing away some of my excess baggage. Even if it’s not erasing memories from the past few days, it’s at least rinsing some of the anxiety that’s been building inside me.
After I wash up and get dressed, I open the curtains and clean his apartment. The living room and kitchen aren’t in terrible shape. It’s mostly the bedroom, where he spends most of his non-work time, sitting in front of the computer.
His cell phone rings from the bedroom desk.
I pick it up off the charger, see Yvonne’s number, and take the call.
“Hello?” I say, Tommy’s voice a bit raspy.
“Where the hell have you been?”
Uh-oh. She’s pissed.
“Sick,” is all I can say.
“Listen, I know you’re taking this hard, but I need to know if I can count on you.”
I have no idea what she’s talking about. “Count on me for what?”
“To finish the Bova Holdings story. You’ve been AWOL since Lara died, and we need this story before the council votes on the land use change next week. If you can’t do it, let me know, and I’ll finish it, but I need your notes, your interviews, everything.”
“When do you need it?”
“Tonight? I know the funeral is tomorrow, and I don’t think any of us will be in shape to do much of anything then. But maybe we can finish it together at the office? Are you up for an all-nighter? Katelynn has already offered to help, if needed.”
Hearing about Lara’s funeral makes my stomach feel sicker than it already was. Somehow, I manage to hold down whatever I didn’t puke up earlier.
“Well?” Yvonne asks.
I stare at Tommy’s desk and his locked computer. I have no idea where to start, but can’t say no to Yvonne. This sounds like a huge story, and I can’t let Tommy drop the ball, even if he was ready to check out just hours ago.
“Yeah, just give me some time to clean up.”
“Too late, I’m at your front door.”
Shit!
“Okay,” I say into the phone, then hang up.
I go to the door and open it.
It’s weird seeing a host after I’ve been in it. I feel almost like she should recognize me or something. Hey, you used to be me! But she doesn’t seem to sense anything weird.
“How are you?” She closes the door behind her then comes over to hug me.
“Okay,” I say, struggling to keep my emotions, Tommy’s emotions, in check.
She looks down at the trash bags lined up along the kitchen bar. The bags are white, and she can see the outlines of many beer bottles. I see her looking at them, but she doesn’t say anything.
Instead she says, “So, you want to do this here or back at the office?”
I don’t know how to tell her that I can’t even log into the computer, let alone remember anything about the story. I certainly can’t tell her the truth. Could I? She might have her own missing memories from the day I was in her. Maybe she can be the person I open up to, and tell what’s going on.
“Back at the office,” I say, hoping that’ll give Tommy’s brain time to inform me.
I go into my bedroom, look at all the folders, spiral notebooks, and papers littering Tommy’s desk, clueless as to which ones might be relevant to the story. I see a flash drive in the computer. Assuming it has his latest work, I grab it and put it in my shirt pocket. I spot a leather satchel filled with my laptop, notebooks, and papers. I take it.
What about all these other papers?
I find a backpack in the small closet and stuff all the papers on his desk into it.
I head back to the living room with the satchel, and the backpack.
Yvonne looks at me funny. “I didn’t know we were going camping.”