Fixer
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* * *
Now
Corrigan awoke with a start, sat straight up, and let out a little yelp. Bedroom, he thought. I’m still in bed, I’m still in bed . . .
Repeating this, he got his heart rate to slow down to something like normal and convinced himself he was where he thought he was.
In a lot of ways, the old method was easier. The waking up part, for instance, never used to be so disorienting. It also felt like he’d gone through a whole day already, even though he’d been asleep the entire time. But, no more hauntings. It was hard to beat that.
He reached for the notepad on the nightstand and jotted a page worth of notes before he forgot all of it, then climbed out of bed. It looked like it was going to be another hot, sunny day. He resolved to find some time in the week for a trip to the beach. It was a small step, but he had to do this in small steps. His hope was to be able to work in an entire vacation week sometime, maybe to go down to the Cape to visit Violet and her new husband. He had never been down there. She’d like that.
Heading down the hall to the bathroom, he passed his office, which no longer had a map on the wall, and where the computer hadn’t been turned on for almost a month. He was thinking of turning the space into a guest bedroom if he found the time and a guest or two who might like it. That would involve developing a more nuanced social life, but he was confident that such a thing was within his grasp, for perhaps the first time ever. Again, small steps.
Back from the bathroom a few minutes later he found Maggie had woken up and was looking over the top page of his notepad. She’d been staying over more often of late. He wasn’t sure exactly why that was but was reluctant to broach the subject for fear it would cause her to stop coming over.
“Busy day,” she said.
“Not so bad,” he answered, slipping into a pair of sweats. “And the last one’s not too time-sensitive.”
“Tom Harrison?” she asked, struggling to read his handwriting. Two of his fingers were still taped together, and his penmanship suffered for it.
“Yeah. He’s scheduled to fall out of his window at 4:02. I’ll show up early, tell him to stay away from the window. That should do it.”
“Yecch,” she grimaced, making a face. She put the list back down on the nightstand and stretched out in the bed, managing to do so in the most erotic way possible.
“I still don’t really get it,” she admitted, ignorant of his ogling.
“What?”
“This, with the notes.”
“I’m going into my own future,” he said. “It’s complicated.” This was a phrase he was getting used to hearing from Calvin and one which he found himself repeating on occasion.
After he’d passed out in the park near the hospital, Maggie fetched an ambulance and got him a bed at Mount Auburn. He’d woken up bandaged, rested, and otherwise well ministered to, almost two days later. Shortly after that, once he’d checked out and returned to his ghost-free life, he began having very interesting dreams. As the dreams appeared to be conveying to him the same information he used to wake up with before—only now in a much more accessible format—he’d been understandably confused. He knew of only two people he could talk to in the interest of an explanation.
Erica Smalls was whom he’d gone to first. Unfortunately, Erica wasn’t quite conversant enough on the subject of Corrigan Bain to offer any solid theories—although she was glad to see him, and he promised to keep in touch. She’d recommended he speak to Calvin.
And Archie Calvin had been up to the task. According to him, Corrigan had “breached the wall beyond the limits of the chronoton.” In English, it meant that in his sleep he was occupying his future self. Years ago, Harvey had said he could go further into his own future if he wanted to, provided he was very relaxed. Corrigan had thought at the time that Harvey was just bragging. Now he understood.
When Corrigan explained this to Ames, who he was seeing regularly now, the doctor had added that this was something Corrigan had probably been doing from the outset, but he had unconsciously blocked most of. Which was why he had always gotten only partial information before. For whatever reason, that block was gone, and Corrigan couldn’t be happier about it.
“I know it’s complicated,” Maggie said. “But . . . okay, look. You’re going to visit Tom Harrison this afternoon and save his life, right?”
“Plan to, yeah.”
“But the only reason you’re going to be there is because you dreamed you would be there, and you only dreamed you would be there because you are actually planning on being there. So where does the information start? What process put you on Commonwealth Ave in your dream in order to witness this accident?”
“Dunno,” Corrigan admitted, sitting back down onto the bed. “Maybe part of my future me wanders throughout the city every day looking for accidents. Or maybe I’m just naturally drawn to them. I try not to think about these things too much.”
“That’s your answer for everything.”
He smiled. “It’s gotten me this far, hasn’t it?”
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright
About the Author
Dedication
Quote
Part One
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Part Two
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Part Three
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Epilogue