by Jez Strider
Slowly, her head bowed forward. Kershaw wrapped an arm around her shoulders when he saw her wobble unsteadily on her feet. “Logan can take me home.” She said softly. “We rode together.”
Jay Kershaw had seen his fair amount of grief during his time as a police officer. He’d broken horrible news to worried mothers, been to more funerals than he cared to count, and even shot down a man who had held up a convenience store. Even he was struggling with the aftermath of the shooting. His confidence in humanity was shaken.
“Lots of officers are here to help. I want to make sure you will be okay.”
“I… don’t have anyone else to take me home except Logan.” Her voice was monotone, as if she weren’t even really there.
“I know. It’s fine. Maybe you can tell me a little about what happened in the car.” He informed one of the other officers that had begun interviews where he was going before leading Candice to the squad car.
He’d started several times to ask questions as they drove to the address she’d told him. Bringing himself to actually voice them was another matter. She was the one who began speaking.
“Why would that boy do that?” The depth of her despair made her speak with the most sorrow laden voice Kershaw had ever heard.
“A chemical imbalance? Maybe some other things were going on in his life. I… don’t think we will ever know.”
“Logan saved me, protected me. He said he always would, but now he’s….” Her voice trailed off and silence enveloped them once more.
Officer Kershaw helped Candice out of the car and led her to the front door. Several times she tried to unlock it. When she dropped the keys, Jay picked them up and did it for her. “Let me call someone to stay with you. My aunt would be happy to. She’s a nurse.”
“Thank you, Officer, but no. I have to be alone.”
He gave a curt nod as he watched her walk upstairs without glancing back at him. Kershaw waited for a while, pacing around downstairs until he heard the shower running. There was work to be done even though he longed to be of help to the grieving woman. Then again, why would she want a man she’d didn’t even know around? He placed her car keys on the counter, took note of the picture of Candice and Logan hanging on the fridge, and shook his head before locking the door behind him as he left. He hoped the traumatized girl wouldn’t hurt herself.
Dying was, to say the least, disorienting for Logan Harworth. One moment, the love of his life was staring down at him with tear stained cheeks, the next he was standing over a dead body. Not just any corpse, though. He was looking at himself. This sent him staggering backward as he watched on in a state of shock. He was in a morgue and they were putting his body away.
“Hey. Hey! I need that.” He yelled out, but no one turned to look at him or even flinched.
“They can’t hear you.” A voice came from behind him. He turned to see an elderly man sitting in a chair.
“You can hear me! Tell them.”
The man chuckled. “Of course I can, because I’m dead, too.”
Logan squatted for a moment trying to ground himself. Strangely, he was still able to feel nauseous. Shouldn’t he be immune to that feeling if he were dead? He certainly thought so. “You’re not see-through or wispy or anything.”
“It’s alright. Take a deep breath. Not that you need to breathe, but it’s a familiar process that helps. In and out. Just like that.”
In and out. He did as he was told, calming down the smallest fraction. “Right. I’m okay. I’m dead, but I’m okay.” He only had to convince himself of that fact.
“Why didn’t you go into the light? I felt your presence down here when the portal closed.”
“Portal? The light is a portal? I guess that makes sense.” Logan said. “I don’t remember seeing it. I was lying there dying, saying goodbye to my fiancé, and then I was standing here.”
The old man stood up slowly. “You’re not getting back in that body. I know that much. It is badly damaged and has been dead too long.” He crossed his arms, taking his time as he appraised Logan. “Must not have been your time to go.”
“That’s what I’m saying. My life was perfect. I had my girl and we were going to get married. How did this happen?” He collapsed to the floor and rubbed his hands over his face.
“It’s like when anything else bad happens. It simply is what it is.” The man patted Logan on the shoulder. “Maybe we can find a body for you to take.”
Logan looked up with wide eyes revealing his hope. “Sounds criminal.”
“Not criminal, but complicated and rare. You seem like a good kid, so I will help you.” He extended his hand to help him up. “I’m Richard, by the way.”
“Logan.” He answered, as he accepted the gesture.
Richard had a strange grin. “I know. I saw your toe tag.”
“That is a sentence I never thought I’d hear. Why haven’t you stolen a body?”
“It’s not stealing. You can only take the body of someone that has left this world through the portal. The body can’t be too damaged or anything either.” The old man paused. “As for me, I’m too old. I’m just waiting here to leave with my wife when she passes. She’s in a room upstairs.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. It’s our time.” Richard gestured toward the door and led the way. Instead of opening it, he walked right through.
Logan hesitated, placing his palms against the metal as if he could push the door open. His hands went through and he jerked them back. Then, he shook them out. “That’s weird.” Candice crossed his mind and that bolstered his resolve. The thought of her smile was enough to make him step through the door and into the hallway.
Richard walked slowly, apparently still the same age he was at death. “Nice job. Most ghosts take a while before doing that.”
“I don’t have time. My girl… she’s fragile. If I can’t make it back, I don’t know what she’ll do.”
This made the man pause. “There are some rules to go by. You can’t return home and blurt out that you’re her dead fiancé. Think about it. You’ll be thrown into an insane asylum, not to mention scare her to death. You have to make her fall in love with you again, as the person you become.”
“What if I show up and tell her things only I would know?” He asked.
“You will look like a stalker or someone trying to extort a broken hearted woman. She can’t know it’s you, but if you made her fall in love once, surely you can do it again.”
Logan groaned in frustration and raised his fist to punch a wall. Naturally, the hand sunk into it and he almost fell over. “How were you sitting in a damn chair if we’re not solid?”
Richard gave that deep chuckle again. “Practice. You were fine rubbing your face and accepting help up before you started thinking too much about being a spirit.”
“Great…” The sarcasm was thick. “Let’s find this body.”
Three days passed before Candice managed to drag herself out of the bed for more than a bathroom break. The banging on the door was loud and urgent. She planned to yell obscenities that would make a late night comic blush. Taking a peek through the peephole made her change her mind. The man outside wore an angry scowl, but other than that, he looked like Logan. Older, salt and pepper haired, but definitely from the same gene pool.
She put her back to the door and closed her eyes. Seeing the man brought back the ache in her chest full force. Go away. Please, go away. Candice didn’t make a sound, barely even breathing.
“I know you’re in there! My son is dead because of you. Harlot! He will be buried soon and it’s your fault for keeping him here.” There were a few more loud bangs on the door. “Don’t bother coming to the funeral or I will strangle you myself.”
Slowly, Candice slid down the door with her back against it. Her hands went up over her ears and she cried as Maxwell Harworth spit accusations and threats. Then, he kicked the door, jarring her entire body. How the wood didn’t shatter, she had no idea.
After all was
quiet for a while and her hysterics had spent all her tears, she stood slowly and looked out the peephole again. The glaring brightness of the sun appalled her and the vastness of the outside gave her a feeling akin to vertigo. Logan’s father was thankfully gone.
She unlocked the door and stepped outside to pick up the mail and a condolence gift that had been left on the porch. That’s when she started to sweat and hyperventilate. She was panicking. Immediately, she darted back inside, dropped the items, and slammed the door shut. Her chest hurt like what a heart attack had to feel like. Three times she checked the locks before finally beginning to calm down.
“That… was the worst anxiety attack I’ve ever had.” With her hand on her chest, she headed toward the dining room. Suddenly, she picked up a decorative glass paper weight and hurled it through the house. The heavy ball slammed into the vase that held her wilting flowers.
“No. Oh no….” She frantically began picking up the flowers, uncaring that the shards of glass were cutting into her skin. A rain of colorful petals spread across the table top and floor. With precise care, she placed each stem and every petal back on the table in the shape of the flowers they had once been. “I’m sorry, Logan. I didn’t mean it and I’m sorry I can’t go to the funeral. It’s not your dad… I won’t be able to handle it. I… don’t think I can leave the house.” Her words and apologies kept spilling out as she left the room and walked upstairs, tossing herself once again on their bed. His scent still on the covers helped her convince herself he wasn’t dead.
“I am going to sleep and when I wake up, this will all have been a terrible dream. Remember when I had all those bad dreams when we first got together? That’s all this is. That’s… all this is….”
Finding a suitable vessel for his new life was proving to be more challenging than Logan thought it would be. The body would either be too damaged, the opposite sex, unattractive, or wrong for him in some other way. A few weeks had passed and he was no closer to getting back to Candice than he had been the day he’d died.
“Logan. Hurry. I think this one might be the one. There’s not much time. He overdosed and the doctors couldn’t save him. The man had no will to fight and already left this plane of existence.” Richard spoke hurriedly as they ran toward the emergency room.
The body of Sawyer Verin lay lifeless on the table. He was a few years younger than Logan. Doctors were still trying to revive him. One gave a shake of his head.
“Time of death is ten a.m. exactly.” He said.
Richard gave Logan a little push. “Now, kid. The window is closing. Just like we talked about, let your essence fuse with the body. Good luck.”
Logan closed his eyes before stepping closer. “Thank you for everything, Richard. I’ll never forget you.” And with that, he climbed onto the table and lay down, trying to relinquish control and rekindle the spark of life in Sawyer Verin’s body.
Severe pain… a throbbing head… the surging beat of a heart in his chest…. It was more traumatizing than Logan had anticipated. One thing he was sure of, he was alive. To the surprise of the hospital staff, the man they’d labeled deceased sat straight up in the bed.
“Hey now. It’s alright.” The doctor moved closer to keep his patient from standing up.
“I’m alive. It worked. I’m alive!” The voice sounded unfamiliar to Logan when he spoke. He held up his hands in front of his face and turned them over. Everything was unfamiliar. He was someone else, but inside, still himself.
“Somehow, yes, you are most definitely alive. Why don’t you rest for now? Okay? Lie back and we’ll get you a room.” The doctor gestured to his nurse with a lift of his head and she left the E.R.
“I need to leave.” Logan did as he was told, though. As much as he longed to return to Candice, he was not feeling stable.
The doctor cleared his throat. “You’ve been in this situation before. We will have to see what the police and the judge say before we can release you.”
“Police? I don’t understand.”
“They may give you another stint in rehab since you were doing well, or they may give you jail time. For now, be glad that you’re alive.”
Logan put his hand over his face and closed his eyes. I’ll never get back to Candice if I go to prison.
In the weeks since Logan’s death, Candice had barely eaten, showered, and still had not left the house. Glass from the broken vase was still scattered across the dining room and the flowers remained where she’d carefully reconstructed them on the table. There had been a knock on the door. She’d climbed out of bed and walked downstairs when she heard the sound of a lawnmower.
Carefully, she tugged back the curtain and peered into the yard. Officer Kershaw, only now he appeared to be civilian Jay, was mowing her overgrown yard. Someone had no doubt called to complain about the state of the grass in the high class neighborhood. His kindness almost made her smile, but she wasn’t sure her face would ever be capable of the expression again.
The condolence gift had been from him. A note said his mother had made it. It was the only thing Candice had taken a bite of most days. Fruitcake had never been her food of choice, but it was heavy and kept the nagging in her stomach at bay.
She drew in a few deep breaths and then opened the front door. The dizzy feeling of vertigo was still there. Her eyes lowered. Stop it, Candice. A large paper grocery bag caught her attention and she grabbed it before slinking away from the world, back to the safety of her house.
The paper bag had cans of soup, a bag of jelly beans, peanut butter, and a loaf of bread. She set the bag on the kitchen counter, snaked the jelly beans out of it, and lay down on the couch in the living room. One at a time she would pop a piece of candy into her mouth so as not to mix the flavors. She turned on the TV to a music station and blankly watched the dark screen.
About an hour later, the sound of the lawnmower stopped and there was another knock at the door. This time she answered, leaving the chain latched, but cracking the door enough to speak with Kershaw.
“Thanks for the food and mowing my lawn.”
“You’re welcome. I’ll take care of it until you start feeling better.” He seemed a bit shocked by her unkempt appearance. “Are you okay?”
Candice answered with a slight nod. “I would invite you in, but I’m not ready for company. I can get you a glass of water or something.”
Jay tugged off his gloves and shoved them into his back pocket. “I have a drink in my truck.” He handed her a card with his name, cell phone number, and the number of the police station. “Call me if you need anything.”
“I will. You didn’t have to do all this.”
“I wanted to. I’ll leave you alone. See you later.” He walked to his truck, tugged off his dirty shirt, and tossed it into the back. Candice shut the door. She was confused by his kindness, but thankful nonetheless.
This is the end of Logan Harworth. I am Sawyer Verin, recovering addict.
Logan repeated this to himself as he stared in the bathroom mirror. He’d been given a hospital room on the second floor and told he would at minimum have to stay three days while under mental evaluation.
His hands went up to his face and he pressed his fingers into the cheeks, touched his nose and then ran his fingers through his shaggy dark hair. It was courser than his old hair, on the brink of being curly, but waving instead. On his left arm, he had an intricate sleeve tattoo of a dragon. He hoped it wasn’t gang related, but it didn’t really look like it. Not that he had any idea what a gang tattoo looked like.
For an addict, he was muscular and tan. The doctors had said he’d been doing well. Maybe exercise had been one of Sawyer’s distractions from the urges. Logan had no idea. He had none of the man’s memories. The only thing Sawyer had left behind was a strange craving and a body that ached.
There was a quick rapping of three knocks at the door to the room. Logan left the bathroom as the woman entered. He took a seat on the side of the uncomfortable bed. “Hey.”
&nb
sp; “Hello, Sawyer. I’m Doctor Reed and I’m here to talk to you a little bit. See where you stand on things. Only if you feel up to it. I know it was a close call today.”
“I’m fine. Tell me what I need to do to get out of here and not go to jail.”
Doctor Reed nodded. “I can understand the urgency of getting back to normalcy. The fact of the matter is that you have quite a few strikes on your record. What do you think led to your relapse?”
He had no idea, so Logan made something up. “I’d been working out and kept my hands off the stuff. Then, last night I ran into some old buddies of mine. I should have walked away, but I thought I could handle being around the drugs. I was wrong.”
The doctor nodded again, this time with even more sympathy. “Okay. I’m sure that was hard.”
“Yeah. I know now so I would not put myself in that situation again.”
“Right. Now the judge, he’s going to be unhappy about this relapse. Would you be willing to go to an inpatient rehabilitation center for a few months? You know, to kick this thing for good.” She was looking down at her notepad and scribbling something.
“If that’s my only choice, then yes.”
“I believe it is. No one wants to see you die, Sawyer. Some people did see you die today.” She smiled in a practiced, comforting way. “Rest up and I’ll see what I can arrange. I know you can beat this.”
“Thank you, Doctor.”
“Of course.” She pumped the hand sanitizer container a few times before leaving the room.
“Rehab.” Logan stood again and walked over to look out the window, thinking about Candice and how different she might be in a few months. “I’ll make it home, baby.” He rested his head against the cool glass. “I promise.”
After two months of weekly visits from Jay Kershaw, Candice finally invited him in for coffee. Even though she knew in her mind that she could trust the officer, it was hard to let anyone inside the house. But, he’d done a lot for her and it was the least she figured she should do.
