When these doorways open, part of me thinks they’re advertising to me, saying, “Hey, I heard you’re an ok soul working for the Big Guy, so come on in.”
Instead of reaching out, this time I decided to wait for it to go away. I’ve let them leave before—usually after a particularly annoying trip. Like that time I wound up in the body of a four hundred pound slumlord who liked to burn his buildings down while his tenants were sleeping. Normally I could have handled the weight, but the son of a bitch lived on the fourth floor of his own building and hadn’t fixed the elevator in three months. Or the air-conditioning. And he had cats—mean ones who knew I wasn’t their master. When I finally pulled a belly flop off the balcony I took two of the mangy critters with me.
Unlike the other times I’d ignored a doorway, this time it didn’t go away. No sweat off my back. With nothing better to do, I resumed my sitcomathon. And, yes, I was kidding about the cats.
Probably.
***
Hiding somewhere in the fifth season of “M.A.S.H,” I felt a strange sensation, almost like a pulse—from the doorway. When it happened, the images playing through my mind intensified, a thing I never would have imagined possible since my memories were already so vivid. For the first time in my experience, I couldn’t distinguish between the reality and the memory. I saw my sister sitting next to me that night in front of the TV, laughing as Hawkeye played yet another trick on Hotlips Houlihan. And I didn’t just remember her laughter: I heard it with ears I wasn’t supposed to have.
Then the moment passed and everything went back to normal. The experience had been brief, lasting no more than a few seconds. I didn’t have adrenal glands so my heart couldn’t pound or my muscles seize up in terror, but a feeling that had never existed in the Great Wherever filled its place: uncertainty.
The Great Wherever, as much as I hated it, was something I could depend on no matter how weird things got back on Earth. But this strange behavior from the doorway…it scared me.
I shifted my attention back to it and noticed it was a little less there than it had been originally.
Hey! I willed toward it. Where do you think you’re going?
Just like that, the doorway came closer. If it had a tail it would have wagged it.
I wondered what that meant. I got Nate killed and now he wanted me for another job? Again, I recalled my mistakes with Nate and Erika and the whole Centreville disaster. Every one of them avoidable if I’d been born with the requisite character to do so. For once in my life I wanted to do the right thing, even if it didn’t involve working an angle for myself. Life wasn’t just about pie and chocolate milk, dammit.
I’m putting my faith in you, I willed outward, and hoped it would hit the person in charge of all this.
Only partially wondering if there’d be chocolate milk and pie waiting for me on the other side, I reached…
***
Light snoring. A moment later, I realized it wasn’t mine but the person next to me, in bed.
A quick, frantic check confirmed there were no handcuffs on either myself or the small-framed person sleeping beside me. Also, nobody was pointing a gun at anyone. Both great omens.
The room was dark, so I couldn’t get a good look at her, but the meager light coming from outside revealed medium length blond hair and fair skin.
Carefully, trying not to wake her, I slipped out of bed and headed for a door leading to a short hallway. The house wasn’t very big—certainly nothing like Nate’s Fortress of Awesomeness. No, this looked to be a small, humble house with a lived-in and well-loved look. Wholesome and good.
Visible by a single, amber nightlight, I could see a collection of photos along the wall. Lots of pictures of the kids playing at the park with mom and dad or out in the yard eating hotdogs or playing catch. Great kids. Great mom. Sandra looked beautiful. A little older. More mature, but never fading. And she seemed happier with Peter Collins in every picture than any day spent with me.
I couldn’t believe it. I’d come back in the body of Peter Collins. The guy I hated in college, and more recently, chased through a parking lot trying to frighten to death. It wasn’t fair to me, it wasn’t fair to him, and just how in hell was it fair to Sandra?
Then the second realization hit me: Peter lived somewhere in the Centreville area. For the moment, I pushed off thinking about that. Too much.
I looked at more pictures. Sandra with Peter, my old rival. She looked so happy, almost like a different person. He did too. So why on Earth did he waste his time with Tolstoy in some miserable coffee shop when he had such a wonderful family at home? He always was a putz. Rather than feel good for them, instead I felt a wave of jealousy so intense I had to steady myself against the wall.
Then, inexplicably, I got kicked.
Somebody up there needed a reminder on how this worked. I show up, hunt around for clues in doughnut boxes, movie theaters and coffee shops, and then go home in a few weeks for a long, quiet weekend. Kicking so soon—it had never happened before.
I passed the kids’ rooms and a bathroom on my way to the rest of the house. On the dining table rested a purse, a set of keys, a wallet and a cell phone. I checked the purse and noticed another phone tucked neatly into a small pocket. I picked up the one on the table.
Since the late nineties, breakthroughs in cell phone technology had made my job so much easier. Voice mail, call history, the local time and a calendar had removed a lot of the complexity of getting around in a strange body. And these days, phones even came with neat video games. I opened the phone and checked the time. 1:07 a.m. When I checked the date I nearly cried out. Not a single day had gone by since Erika killed her Hun Bun. Unless the clock on the wall or the time on the phone was wrong, I’d been gone for about three minutes.
I felt light-headed. The kick, the clock and the calendar, all of them came together in a perfect storm of rare and much needed clarity: Erika. Back at Nate’s. About to find Tim and kill him, possibly—and the tape, to destroy it, definitely. I was still in the game. I cast a prayer out to anyone listening to help me. I didn’t pray for time because I had all I’d get.
And the clock was ticking.
***
I didn’t know where Tim or Rob lived. I didn’t know where Peter lived. Maddening. This was stuff I could have figured out before it was too late. Instead, I had jewelry to buy and strip clubs to go to.
From the laundry room, I secured a pair of dark pants and a white t-shirt. Luckily, Peter’s fascination with everything Japanese turned a risky return to the bedroom into a simple walk to the front door, where I found four pairs of shoes lined up in a neat row. Just looking at the shoes together—the little ones next to the big ones—brought back a shadow of jealousy. Peter had managed to find peace in this world when so many of us had not.
Hooray for him.
After grabbing his keys, I slipped out of the house as quietly as I could through the sliding glass door in the kitchen. You could never trust the front door of an unfamiliar house to pull open silently.
Peter lived in a tight row of townhouses, all of them small and maybe fifteen to twenty years old. I didn’t recognize the neighborhood, but felt confident I’d be fine as soon as I got to a major road.
I wandered down the sidewalk clicking the “Lock” button until I heard a chirp and saw a car blink its parking lights. Peter’s stupid hybrid.
I slipped in, belted up and made my way out of the neighborhood. I hooked a left for lack of a better direction, and then another left into familiar territory—about a quarter mile from the coffee shop where I exacted my juvenile revenge on Peter, and about four miles from Nate’s house.
I tore down the road on my way to Nate’s. There weren’t any police along the way, which suited me fine. I refused to drag Peter into this in any official capacity.
If I got to the house and found Rob’s gun missing, that would mean Erika still planned to go through with her threat to kill
Tim. If that happened, I’d call 911 from Nate’s house and say a crazy woman named Erika was on her way to kill Tim Cantrell, brother of Nate Cantrell, and no, I didn’t know where Tim lived. Then I’d hightail back to Peter’s place and hope I hadn’t left behind any evidence.
As I neared the road into Nate’s wealthy neighborhood, I saw a pair of headlights pause briefly at the stop sign and then turn left, passing me. I recognized the silver Passat immediately, as well as its blonde and often beautiful driver. Erika didn’t look very pretty at the moment—face all squinched up, brows furrowed. She glanced my way as I passed but showed no signs of recognition. Why would she? I was just some guy in a car. I considered following her but stopped myself. Peter could get hurt. If she had Rob’s gun, she’d shoot anyone in her way.
Reluctantly, I continued to the house and parked.
Rob’s home invasion had ruined the door, splintering the frame from the latch all the way up. Unable to lock it, Erika had settled with simply pressing it shut. From outside, you’d have to look close to see the door wasn’t flush with the jamb.
I looked around. None of the neighbors’ lights were on. Honestly, since arriving last Saturday I hadn’t seen any neighbors, at least not on this street. In a rare moment of insight, I considered Nate’s tastes. Nate liked pizza and Ferraris and hiking—he wasn’t the McMansion type. No, if I were to bet on who picked out the house, I’d put my money on Erika.
Perfect place for a murder.
I went in.
Chapter 33
The main floor looked the same as the last time: a messy, post-wedding disaster area. There was probably something to say for not having to clean up in the morning, but my heart just wasn’t in it.
I climbed the stairs and proceeded to the master bedroom. There, I found the doors opened wide, terrorizing my hindbrain with the smell of blood and excrement. Willing myself forward, I stepped into the room.
“Oh, man,” I said, softly.
Seeing it all from a new angle put a ghastly perspective on things. The sheets were filthy from the blood oozing from the wound in Nate’s side. His head rested flat on the bed, fuzzy cuffs securing him to the steel headboard.
Rob had clearly soiled himself after falling. To my regret, I saw the wound in his face. The bullet had taken Rob high on the cheek, parting the skin immediately around the entry wound like a split plum, revealing a shatter of teeth and bone and dark red blood.
I felt bad for Rob. If what he said about his childhood were true I could almost understand his actions tonight. I knew he’d be judged for his crimes, but not by me. For my part, I wished him peace.
Rob’s gun was still there.
When I stepped around the bed and saw Erika’s gun resting on the carpet where she dropped it, a wave of relief coursed through me. Tim would live through the night.
When my eyes swept back to Nate, I saw his head tilted my way. He was looking right at me.
“Who…are…you?” he said, in a raspy voice full of pain and confusion.
I screamed something, then fell backward and tripped, crashing to the floor. My heart hammered in my chest hard enough to crumble a sidewalk.
How’s he still alive?
I hadn’t realized it was possible to be kicked out before dying.
Maybe something to do with the minister?
There was so much I didn’t know, even after all these years. Until Nate, I never would have suspected I could come back in the body of an innocent.
Nate’s eyes had closed, but he was still breathing. I knew exactly jack and squat about first aid, but I had to do something. I rushed downstairs and recovered the packing tape I used to reseal Erika’s boxes, lifting it with a finger through the hole so as not to leave prints. Then I ran to the powder room and grabbed a towel. When I got back to the room, I put what I had on the bed and tucked in my t-shirt. Then I slipped a pair of Nate’s socks over my hands. I didn’t want anything of Peter’s touching the bed if I could help it.
I managed to get a four-inch stretch of tape started off the spool and fought to keep it from curling back and sticking to itself. I folded the towel into a dense, even-sided square and pressed it to Nate’s wound. Then I taped it in place. Everything was too wet and messy for the tape to do much more than keep the towel from moving. Hoping the worst field bandage ever would hold, I hurried to Nate’s wardrobe and returned with a leather belt.
Getting the belt underneath Nate so I could wrap it around his chest would mean I’d have to come dangerously close to touching him. Carefully, I ran the belt beneath Nate’s arms—first the right, then the left—then I tucked the middle part beneath his neck as far as it would go. I took both ends and slid the belt beneath him, shimmying back and forth until it was directly beneath the wound. After that, I threaded the belt through the buckle and cinched it tight enough to stop the free flow of blood, yet loose enough to let him breath.
Nate groaned, and his eyelids fluttered open briefly before closing again. It was hard to believe he was still alive. I knew if he had any hope of staying that way he needed to get to a hospital.
Assuming Erika immediately found the confession tape, I calculated how long it’d take her to get back from Rob’s house. I now realized why she left me alone after cuffing me to the bed. In order to make it look as believable as possible—this idea of Rob, the murderous brother—she couldn’t have phoned him to change their original plans. She needed everyone’s telephone records clear of anything that could trip up her story. With no way of contacting Rob by phone, her only recourse had been to drive there and physically knock on his door.
There and back in thirty minutes, so, fifteen minutes to Rob’s and fifteen minutes back, tops. And I’d already wasted a good five minutes bandaging Nate and figuring out elementary math problems.
I bit my lip and swore. Then I grabbed Nate’s cell phone off the little stand by the front door and hit “Send” through the fabric of Nate’s socks. Despite it being well after one in the morning, a familiar voice picked up on the third ring and said, “Dan, is that you? Is everything ok?”
“Yeah, it’s me. And no, everything sucks.”
“You sound different , what happened?”
“I need your help.”
As quickly as I could, I told him the situation. To his credit he didn’t interrupt me. In fact, he was so quiet, on one occasion I found myself asking, “Minister? Are you still there?”
“Yes I am, go on.”
When I finished, the minister said, “This is terrible. Why didn’t you listen to me and keep your hands to yourself? I just can’t believe it. I mean, I believe you—I just don’t want to. You say Nate’s still alive?”
“Yeah, but I need you to call 911 and get an ambulance and the police over here right now.”
“Why can’t you call them yourself?” he said. “Not that I mind helping, you understand. But you’re already there.”
Shaking my head, I said, “I can’t do that. The guy whose body I’m in is totally innocent, just like Nate. It seems the Great, uh—God—has thrown a monkey wrench into the way this usually works.”
The minister said, “I’ll call them now. What else should I do?”
“Look, your number was the last number that called Nate. He’s up in the bedroom, delirious—alive, last I checked. I’m going to find the key, get those cuffs off him and put the phone beside him. The story will be he hit the last number that called him. When you dial 911—from your house—make sure to say Erika and Rob tried to kill Nate for his money and then Erika shot Rob. Got all that?”
“Yes, I think so.”
“Great. And listen, if you can, drive over to the house after you talk to them. If I miss her at Rob’s she’ll be returning here to finish the job. I don’t think she’s armed anymore—she left both guns on the floor in Nate’s room, but rule nothing out. I don’t know how long it’ll take for the cops to get here so be extra careful.”
“Don’t worry about that,” the minister said, his voice ha
rdening with steely resolve. “You just do what you have to do. If she tries anything I’ll shoot the bitch with my gun.”
I wanted to laugh, this priest sounding like Tony Soprano.
“Oh, jeez, hey,” I said, “One more thing. This one’s pretty important.”
“What’s that?”
“When the cops show up, you can’t mention the handcuffs under any circumstances. I’m taking them with me. There’s no way Nate could have called you, chained up.”
“Right, good thinking, I won’t say anything.”
Sighing with relief, I said, “Great. Thank you. Be careful.”
“You too.”
After we hung up, I took the phone back upstairs and placed it next to Nate. Then I rooted around Erika’s pink trunk looking for the key. It didn’t take long before I found it—it was exactly like the one that unlocked Jill’s cuffs. Still wearing hand socks, I unlocked the cuffs from his wrists and then the headboard. His wrists were slightly red and indented from pressing so long against the metal, but they’d clear up in a few minutes.
Nate was still breathing—shallowly—but I’d take that any day over the alternative.
Bending over Rob’s body, I gingerly tipped him to the side and picked his wallet from his back pocket, then had a look at his driver’s license. He’d lived in Herndon, which agreed with my fifteen-minutes-away theory. I mentally consulted my maps and found what I was looking for. I’d get there in ten minutes, speeding and running red lights.
After a quick sweep of the room for anything incriminating, I left the house, got in Peter’s car, and backed onto the street. Then I set out for Rob’s house, going through the plan in my head and wondering who’d be foolish enough to fall for it.