Recalled

by Cambria Hebert

“Yeah.” I agreed. “I think I will.”

  As we went up the stairs I gazed back. The tapestry was swinging slightly from our movements, but otherwise there was nothing there.

  I looked beyond that out the glass doors and onto the sidewalk. Someone was walking swiftly away from the building. Someone in a dark coat and hat. His shoulders were hunched up around his neck and his hands were jammed into his pockets. A whisper of something—recognition?—went through me before he disappeared from sight.

  At least he looked solid and real, not at all like a ghost.

  Chapter Thirteen

  “Reject - To refuse to accept, submit to, believe, or make use of. Fail to accept as part of one's own body.”

  Dex

  I turned up the heat in the Roadster as high as it would go and tried to calm my tossing stomach. My hands were shaking and I felt this weird kind of pulling sensation beneath my ribs. I took a shuddering breath and ripped off my gloves, sticking my hands as close to the heater as I could, and stared through the windshield across the parking lot of the college campus. Even parked way in the nose-bleed section, it was full. This place was full of people.

  But that wasn’t why I didn’t go through with my plan.

  And it had been a good plan.

  A college shooting was practically a normal occurrence these days. Apparently, violence wasn’t regulated to just the streets of the ghetto anymore. According to the news on my flat screen, this world was going to hell in a hand basket. Guess I wouldn’t be lonely when I got there.

  I figured I could fire a couple wild shots around and “accidentally” hit Piper with a bullet. In all the chaos, I could get away, call Mr. Burns like he asked, and collect my raise and my body.

  But that was before I saw she was being followed. By someone that wasn’t me.

  I managed to catch up with her minutes before the girl in the red coat appeared, following her with ease until I noticed the dark shape that darted in and out behind her and then appeared seconds later yards in front of her. It was odd. And it kind of pissed me off.

  No one was taking out this Target but me. I had too much on the line here. I wanted my body back, I wanted to keep my car and my house, and I wanted a pay raise so I could buy whatever I wanted. So I followed and I watched.

  It was interesting to me that she figured out she was being followed. This girl was no pushover. She seemed to be aware of things that no one else would be… even when she appeared deep in thought.

  I watched her when her shoulders stiffened slightly, when she scanned the parking lot and then stopped to look over her shoulder. At first I was worried she’d made me. But she kept looking where the other guy was; she seemed to catch on to his quick movements. Clearly, sneaking up on this girl wasn’t an option.

  I followed her and the girl she spoke to, the weight of the gun reminding me of my job the entire time, all the way to the building with the double glass doors until they went inside. Then, because I couldn’t help myself, I walked as close to the doors as I could and peered inside.

  I saw the stalker peek out from behind that oversized blanket. I saw her see him. I wanted to laugh when she went after him, instead of running. I watched her tear back the blanket, saw her arm shoot out, and could imagine her spinning him around and demanding an explanation.

  Better him than me, I’d thought.

  Except then she came back out with this weird look on her face. It looked a lot like disbelief. And then her friend was leading her away, up the stairs, like she was a psych patient that needed care. I watched the blanket; I waited for the stalker to reveal himself.

  But he never did.

  It’s like he hadn’t been there at all.

  Yet I saw him.

  So had Piper.

  My hands were shaking uncontrollably at that point. I felt like I was going to barf all over the sidewalk, yet there was this urgency inside me that seemed to push me… but I had no idea where it wanted me to go.

  So I got out of there.

  I had to.

  And now here I was, sitting in my car with the butt of a gun digging into my back.

  Did someone else want Piper dead?

  I yanked the gun out of my waistband and stared down at it in my hands. There would be no shooting today. Something else was going on here and I wanted to know what it was. I leaned forward and opened up the glove compartment and tossed the gun inside. I was glad to get it away from me. Maybe shooting her wasn’t the way to go. Even still, I would keep it. Just in case.

  As I leaned back into my seat, something caught my eye. Something red. I ducked down, thinking maybe they’d seen me after all and her friend in the red coat was coming after me. But after long minutes of no one appearing beside my car, I rose, peeking over the dashboard to look across the parking lot.

  He was there. Walking among everyone else. But he was different.

  Why did no one notice? Why did no one turn to stare?

  The guy was completely surrounded in red, almost as if the very air around his body had been stained with the bright color.

  He had his hands stuffed into a black coat, a hat on his head, and his chin tucked into his chest. I guess he looked pretty ordinary, if you didn’t count the flaming ring of color. I watched him for long moments; I watched the people around him. He didn’t speak to anyone and no one spoke to him. No one paid him any attention at all. It was like he was just another student hurrying to class. I blinked my eyes, thinking they were playing tricks on me. But no matter how hard I blinked, the red was still there.

  I watched him until he was completely out of sight, and then I noticed my hands were still shaking and I still felt sick. I swallowed, turning on the car, and with one last glimpse where the man had been, I pulled away. I drove slowly, staring at everyone through the windshield, watching for someone or something else bathed in red. But everything looked normal. When I turned out of the parking lot and onto the main road, the cramping in my stomach loosened and my shaking hands began to steady.

  What was wrong with me? Was I going crazy? Or could the nagging feeling, my illness, and now my eyes playing tricks on me be linked to Piper? Or was it something else? What if it was this body? Maybe it was somehow rejecting me. I didn’t know if it was possible, but after everything I’d experienced since I died, it wasn’t that far of a stretch.

  Chapter Fourteen

  “News - interesting or important information not previously known or realized.”

  Piper

  “Tell me already,” I begged Frankie as I sipped the hot tea, into which she dumped half a bottle of honey.

  “Not until you promise me that what I saw back there wasn’t you having some kind of psychotic break.”

  “Said the girl with a piece of pie, a cinnamon roll, and a caramel coffee sitting in front of her.”

  “Hey, there’s a salad too. Didn’t you see my salad?” She pointed to the lettuce and carrots covered in dressing being ignored in favor of the cinnamon roll. “Besides, the craziest people I know are the ones who don’t eat sugar.” She stared pointedly at me.

  I saluted her with my cup full of honey.

  “I just want to be sure you’re okay,” she said seriously.

  “I am. Really. I just thought I saw something that wasn’t there.” I sighed. “It’s just been a long few days. I’ve been waiting desperately to hear what you would find out.”

  I hoped the reminder would finally get her to spill the beans about what she learned about the guy from the diner.

  “You eat; I talk,” she said, pointing to my turkey on wheat. I dutifully took a bite and she dug out a slip of paper from the pocket of her coat hanging on the back of her chair.

  “You probably aren’t going to like what I’m about to tell you,”

  “He’s married,” I said, a hard knot forming in my stomach.

  Frankie looked at me strangely. “I find it very telling that the worst news you could get from me is that this guy is married. I think you’re interested in hi
m more than just because of”—she wagged her eyebrows and leaned in—“you know.”

  I just stared at her. She sighed dramatically. “Because of your vision.”

  I leaned in and whispered, “Yes, I know.” Then I straightened. “And I am not interested in him that way. I’m not interested in men that way at all right now. I’m too busy with school and trying to get my life together.” I didn’t want to live in a tiny apartment in the worst part of town all my life and since I had no family to help me, giving myself a better life was solely on me.

  “Then why do you care if he’s married?”

  I really didn’t have an answer for that.

  “Just give me the paper already,” I said, flustered, and snatched it out of her hand.

  I looked down at it, then back up at her. “Dexter Allen Roth.” I read and then looked back up.

  Frankie nodded sagely. “I told you it wasn’t good.”

  I burst out laughing. “It’s not that bad.”

  Dexter Allen Roth. So that was his name.

  “Only a girl with a massive crush would think that name was anything but a mouthful.”

  I suppressed a smile and looked at the paper in my hand again. “Is this his address?”

  “Assuming that’s really his car and his name…,” Frankie said, sipping her latte.

  “You think the car is stolen.” I said, flat.

  Frankie sighed. “I did, but I checked the stolen car list we have. None match that make or model.”

  “The address is in a nice neighborhood,” I said.

  Frankie nodded. “Yeah, maybe the guy is loaded.”

  “I don’t care how much money he has,” I said, still looking at the address.

  “Yeah, I know,” Frankie said, setting her coffee down. “So what are you gonna do with that information?”

  I thought about that as I gathered up my tray and cup. “I’m going to go see him.”

  “You’re going to just knock on his door?”

  I shrugged. “Yeah. Why not?”

  “You got guts.” Frankie grinned, but then the grin fell away. “I just hope he isn’t some weird car-stealing stalker,” she replied as we threw all our trash away.

  My eyes wandered toward the stairs and toward the tapestry where I could’ve sworn I saw someone. Then I thought about the figure I saw hurrying away from the building. It could’ve been a student rushing to class.

  It could have been someone else.

  I really hoped Frankie wasn’t right.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “Anaphylactic shock - a severe, sometimes fatal, reaction to a substance to which a person has an extreme sensitivity, often involving respiratory difficulty and circulation failure.”

  Dex

  I looked up “ways to die” on the internet. I didn’t find any ways to possibly kill a Target, but I did learn I wasn’t the stupidest guy on the planet. Apparently there was a waiting list for that and it was very, very long. According to one site, one of the manliest ways to die was by lighting yourself on fire. It seemed to me the manliest way to die would be to not die at all. Self-preservation is a lot harder than most people realize. Probably because more people live closer to the way I do now than the way I did before I died.

  I clicked through the videos and articles, searching for something that might actually give me some ideas. I never thought in a million years as I was living on the violent streets of the city that I would need ideas on how to kill someone. And I guess I really didn’t need ideas… It was just that the ideas I had weren’t something I cared to live again.

  I was looking through an article about asphyxiation when the doorbell rang. I glanced up past the computer screen and into the kitchen where Hobbs was cooking up some dinner.

  “I will see who that is, sir,” he said, grabbing his cane and going to the front door.

  I returned my attention to the computer screen. “Tell them to go away.” I didn’t have any friends so I knew it wasn’t anyone I wanted to see.

  A few moments later Hobbs came back into the room, clearing his throat. “You have a visitor.”

  “I’m busy, Hobbs,” I said, annoyed.

  “Sir,” he said again, with more emphasis, and I looked up.

  I was so shocked I almost fell out of my chair.

  Piper was standing a few feet behind him and she was looking at me. “Piper,” I said, getting up from the chair. “I-I… How did you know where I lived?”

  Her eyes narrowed and she glanced back toward the front door. “How did you know my name?”

  “It was on your nametag… at the diner.”

  “Oh. Right,” she said, looking a little less alarmed.

  Hobbs mumbled something about leaving us alone and then left the room.

  “How did you know where I lived?” It was my turn to act suspicious. When, really, I was thrilled she was here.

  She winced. “I had my friend run your license plate number.”

  I digested that. So the car was registered to me and not to Mr. Burns. He must be pretty confident I would finish the job.

  I grinned, ignoring the queasiness once again building in my stomach. “You must have really wanted to see me again,” I said, enjoying the way her face flushed.

  “Actually, I wanted to ask you about something.”

  I adjusted the glasses on my nose as a wave of dizziness passed over me. My eyes darted around the room, looking for something, but I didn’t know what.

  “Are you okay?” she asked and came closer, her eyes wandering toward my computer screen.

  I reached out and slammed the lid of the laptop closed, not wanting her to see what I’d been looking at, and then turned back to her. “Yeah, I’m fine.” I lied.

  Why was I feeling sick again all of a sudden?

  “You don’t look too good. Have you been sick?”

  “Me? No. I’m just hungry. Hobbs is cooking dinner. Would you like to stay and join me?” I glanced into the empty kitchen where Hobbs had been. “Hobbs!” I yelled.

  “I really just came to ask you something.”

  “You can ask me while we eat,” I said as Hobbs came into the room.

  “You bellowed, sir?”

  “Piper is going to be joining me for dinner,” I told him.

  “Certainly. It will be ready shortly.” He went back into the kitchen to finish frying some chicken. My eyes zeroed in on the bottle of peanut oil by the big pot on the stove. I could hardly believe my good luck. It was almost too easy.

  Here I was trying to come up with ways to catch my prey when my prey came right to me. And to top it off, my butler just happened to be cooking with something that she was allergic to. With any luck, this job would be completed by tonight.

  “Come, sit down,” I told Piper and headed toward the living room. “We can talk while Hobbs finishes dinner.”

  Piper followed as I plopped down on the couch. She stood beside it and lifted her eyebrow. “You have a butler?”

  I shrugged. “A guy’s gotta eat.”

  “You seem kind of young to be able to afford that car and a butler.”

  I liked the way she crossed her arms over her chest, like she’d somehow caught me in a lie.

  “Trust fund,” I said with a shrug and picked up the remote control to the flat screen.

  “Figures,” she muttered.

  I suppressed a grin. “Have a seat.” I motioned to the couch with the remote.

  She sat down on the end and I channel surfed. Really, I wasn’t paying any attention at all to the TV. I was too busy wondering about the way my hand shook and trying not to stare at her when everything in me was demanding I look at only her.

  I finally gave in and shifted my gaze. Her dark hair was long and framed her face; her brown eyes seemed to take in everything around the room. When they settled on me, the twisting of my stomach seemed to quiet.

  “So what do you want to ask me?” I said.

  She nodded. “I just got this feeling the other night that you ma
ybe knew more about the accident I was telling you about.”

  I tried not to outwardly react. I knew I’d said too much. This girl was far too perceptive. “Why would you think that?”

  “Well,” she replied. “Right after I told you about what happened to me, you seemed to get upset.” She paused before she went on. “I thought maybe you might have known the guy who died and me bringing it up bothered you.”