by JL Bryan
“How did you get in here?”
His eyes locked onto hers. “I can get into anyplace I want.”
Ashleigh felt uneasy. Her fingers drifted toward the SECURITY button on her desk phone. “You have the wrong person,” she said. “My name is Esmeralda.”
“I don't think it is.” He dropped into the chair across from her and leaned back, swinging idly from side to side like a bored child. “Esmeralda Medina Rios was a funerary cosmetician. I kept tabs on her. She didn't care for politics. The love-charmer, though—politics are an irresistible nectar to her. The power. The blood. That's why I believe you are not Esmeralda Rios, but Ashleigh Goodling, riding Esmeralda's body like a horse. And if I know you, love-charmer, you're not sharing. You're possessing. Because that's what you love to do most of all, possess.”
Ashleigh gaped at him. “Who are you?”
“Esmeralda is my opposite. It's always interesting to keep tabs on your opposites, isn't it, love-charmer? And how is your Tommy? Using his abilities in the most unfocused and unproductive ways, as usual?”
Ashleigh couldn't help but laugh.
“They can require such guidance and hand-holding, can't they?” he asked. “So few of us are masters. So few of us remember what we truly are.”
Ashleigh, completely caught off-guard and a little frightened, could only stare at him.
“You may now reply,” he said, with half a smile.
“Oh!” Ashleigh was feeling flustered. “Then, what do you want with me?”
“Don't be afraid,” he said. “I'm not going to cast you from Esmeralda's body like Christ and his demons. I could, though. Opposites have special influence over one another, as you know.” He reached across her desk, and Ashleigh shrank back from him. She covered the bracelet on her hand, the one that contained pieces of Ashleigh-bone, keeping her connected to Esmeralda's body.
“But I won't,” he continued. He reclined in the chair and put his hands behind his head. “Esmeralda is as useless to me as your Tommy is to you. No imagination. No ambition. Forget her for now. It's your help I would enjoy, Aphrodite.”
“Cute,” she said. From her large swaths of past-life memory, Ashleigh was beginning to recognize who this man was. A brutal conqueror, an iron-fisted ruler of humans, whom he regarded as cattle. He had been her enemy often, though not always. She needed to be wary. He seemed to radiate power.
“What is your name, this lifetime?” she asked.
“Alexander. You may remember the wars we have enjoyed waging against each other in the past, with our armies of human pawns. But, regardless of our previous conflicts, we now share a common problem,” he said. “The healer and the plague-bringer.”
“Jenny? Do you know where she is?”
“She has been with me these past months,” he said. “Until, as is increasingly the problem in recent lives, she ran off with your servant, the healer.”
“She's with Seth?” Ashleigh sat up. “You know where to find them?”
“Of course, with him,” Alexander said. “They grow closer together each lifetime, and further from us. We must reclaim our slaves. Our property must be returned to us.”
“I don't want to reclaim Seth,” Ashleigh said. “I want him dead, maybe, but not back in my life.”
“Of course, they must be punished for their insulting disloyalty in this lifetime,” Alexander said. “That is understandable. But we have eternity to think about. Countless lifetimes when they could be serving us. Or we can let them draw together and become our enemies.”
“What did you have in mind?” Ashleigh asked.
“I want to destroy them. I want to give them both a death so horrific it leaves them scarred for lifetimes. And if there is anyone who knows how to maximize the suffering of others, it's you, charmer.”
Ashleigh stood and walked around the desk. She leaned against the front of it, looking down at him. “I like how you think. We'll punish them with the worst death we can design.” She offered her hand.
Alexander drew on a black glove. “Sorry, I don't feel like getting charmed today.” He shook her hand.
“There's just one little loose end I need to tie up,” Ashleigh said.
Alexander had arrived in a cab, so they left in Esmeralda's mother's car, an old Toyota Corolla. Ashleigh had lovingly convinced Esmeralda's mother that she should start taking the bus to work, leaving her car for her daughter to use. After the election, Eddie was supposed to buy her a new BMW convertible. Until then, it was best to avoid anything that might draw attention to the congressman's affair with her.
They drove towards a private airport, where Alexander had a plane waiting. Ashleigh stopped at rundown Citgo along the way.
“Where are you going?”
“Just one second.” Ashleigh got out of the car and approached the two payphone boxes outside the store. Both were covered in years of spraypainted messages, and one of the phones was gone, with only a frayed wire where it had been.
Ashleigh picked up the remaining phone, holding it a few inches from ear, since it was thick with grime and filth. She fed in a few quarters, then called 911.
“I want to report an escaped convict,” Ashleigh said. “He usually goes by Thomas Krueger, but I think his legal name is actually Thomas White. He escaped from Riverbend Prison in Louisiana a few months ago. He says he's killed two people since then. He's always armed. You can find him after 10 p.m. every night at Jack's Spot on Sepulveda.”
The operator tried to take her information, but Ashleigh said, “This has to be anonymous. He'll kill me if he knows I reported him. He's very, very dangerous and violent. He's high on meth most of the time, so expect him to fight back or shoot at the police when they go to arrest him. Thank you!”
Ashleigh hung up the phone and returned to her car.
“Everything good?” Alexander asked when she sat down.
“All squared away.” Ashleigh beamed at him. She tried not to think about the intense attraction she felt for Alexander, which almost made her squirm. He was strong, powerful, the first guy she'd met that she might not be able to manipulate at all. It seriously turned her on.
“Then let's drive,” Alexander said.
“Sorry!” Ashleigh cranked the car, blushing. “I can't wait to see that bitch's face when I finally destroy her.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
Jenny and Seth took a quick charter plane ride to Charleston, where they picked up Jenny's old Lincoln. The clerk at the parking deck booth was amazed to see the car had checked in more than three months earlier, and said she needed to contact her supervisor. Seth shoveled cash at her until she decided it wasn't such a big problem, after all, and raised the arm for them to exit.
Jenny let Seth drive, content to watch the familiar South Carolina countryside. She'd missed the long, crooked limbs of the oak trees, the little cypress swamps, the familiar mats of moss that grew everywhere.
They arrived in Fallen Oak and drove straight to Jenny's house. Jenny felt nervous as she got out of the car—she hadn't spoken to her dad in months, and he hadn't exactly been happy with her then.
As they walked up the front porch steps, her dad appeared behind the screen door. The main door was open to catch the breeze, as it usually was between May and October.
“Jenny?” he said.
“Hi, Dad.” Jenny smiled.
He opened the door, and Jenny embraced him, careful to keep her head away from his. After a minute, he squeezed her tight.
“I missed you so much,” he whispered. “My little baby girl.”
“I missed you, too, Daddy.”
He stepped back, looking her up and down. “You been okay?”
“Yes. How about you?”
“Where you been?”
“Um, Chiapas,” Jenny said. “In Mexico.”
“Doing what?”
“Helping zombies grow cocaine for a big cartel.”
“Goddamn, you do know how to find trouble. Did you know about this, Seth?”
&
nbsp; “I went to get her as soon as I could track her down,” Seth said.
“Well, come on in, you two. Dang gnats are still thick as gravy out here.”
Inside, he led them to the kitchen. “I was just fixing to fry up some bacon,” he said. “Guess I'll cook the whole mess, now.”
Rocky lay in a patch of sun on the kitchen floor. His head raised and his tail thumped at the sound of her dad's voice.
“Whoa, Rocky comes inside now?” Jenny asked.
“Hell, I can barely get him outside anymore,” her dad said. He set a black pan on the stove, ignited the gas burner with a match. “He sleeps on my feet at night.”
“That's good, Rocky.” Jenny knelt beside him and petted him with a gloved hand. He put a paw on her knee, wagging his tail. Jenny felt tears in her eyes and tried to swallow them back. Rocky had finally gotten over his fear of people. “I'm so proud of you,” she whispered.
“Well, guess I'll appreciate it come winter,” her dad said. He tossed in a pack of bacon, then cracked eggs into another pan. “Right now, it's too dang hot for that. He don't listen, though.”
“Are you still seeing June?” Jenny asked.
“Yep. She's working a shift at the Waffle House in Varnville today.”
“Can I help you cook, Mr. Morton?” Seth asked.
“Ain't really cooking. Just eggs and bacon. Y'all have a seat.”
Jenny and Seth sat in the mismatched chairs at the old table in the kitchen.
“You planning to stay long?” her dad asked, while stirring the eggs with a spatula. His back was to them, but Jenny could hear a little sadness in his voice.
“I'm sorry, Daddy,” Jenny said. “We got problems to deal with.”
“Homeland Security,” her dad said. “They done been here three, four times asking questions about you.”
“That's one problem,” Jenny said.
He served them the eggs and bacon on his chipped dinnerware. Jenny went to the fridge and poured orange juice into the vintage Happy Days glasses and brought them to the table.
Her dad cleared his throat as he sat down. “Okay. Tell me what else you got to deal with.”
“There's another guy like us,” Jenny said. “But he can touch dead people and make them do stuff for him. Farm. Fight.”
“Sounds like them Living Dead movies,” her dad said. “Your momma and I saw one at the old Star-Nite drive-in off 278. Guess you don't remember that. Closed up in '90-something.”
“The sign's still there,” Jenny said.
“Old Roy Cramer kept that thing goin' a long time, though,” her dad said. “Used to be the place to go on Friday nights. Had them a Pac-Man, a foosball table, just about everything you could want. Your momma liked the popcorn. Had to get one with extra salt and butter every time.” His eyes were distant now. He was obviously thinking about Jenny's mother. Jenny wondered if he was thinking how much happier he would have been if Jenny had never been born.
“This guy's going to come back for Jenny,” Seth said. “He feeds on her power. He won't let her escape long.”
“So you're going back on the run,” Jenny's dad said.
“Not exactly,” Jenny told him. “We're going to let him come to us first, here in Fallen Oak. We've already talked it over with Seth's parents. But I was hoping you could help us, Daddy. We have a few things to prepare.”
“Want a slice of hoop cheese?” Her dad stood up and lifted the glass bowl from a half-eaten hoop of cheddar on the cutting board.
“I'm full. This was really good, Daddy, thanks.” Jenny gathered up the dishes.
“So, can you help us?” Seth asked. Jenny scowled at him for rushing things.
Her dad bit into a slice of cheese and chewed it slowly.
“You know, Jenny,” he said. “Whatever the hell you kids are, you're still my little girl. I'll help you if I can. I'm just worried for you.”
“Let me tell you what Seth and I have planned,” Jenny said. “Then you can decide.”
“I already decided,” he said. “Can we talk about it later on tonight? I want a little while when I can just be happy you're home. I'm not ready to think about you leaving again, Jenny.” He scraped a few scraps of bacon and egg from the pan into Rocky's food dish, which was now in a corner of the kitchen instead of out in the shed. Rocky bounded over to it, his tail whipping.
“Okay,” Jenny said. “It's good to see you again, Daddy.”
“Used to see you every day.” He looked out the window, into the thick woods behind the house. “Guess it won't be like that no more.”
“I guess not. I'm sorry, Daddy.”
***
Later, her dad went to the Piggly Wiggly to buy some ribs to grill, and Jenny and Seth sat on the bed in Jenny's room. Rocky napped on the floor nearby.
“It's so strange,” Jenny said, looking around at her country music posters, stuffed animals, misshapen attempts at pottery. “It's like this is just one more past life. It's never going to be the same, is it?”
“We're not kids anymore,” Seth said. “I'm going to miss my parents, too. But I'll be happy as long as we're together. I love you more than anything in the world, Jenny.”
“I love you, too, Seth.”
“Even if you stab me with a scalpel and set me on fire, I'll still love you.”
“Hey, it got us out of there. I need an album cover.” Jenny fished a record out of a milk crate full of dusty, wrinkled LP sleeves. All of them had belonged to her mother, another lifetime ago. Jenny looked at her mother's picture on the wall, where Miriam stood against the neon signs in McCronkin's Pub, raising a Bud Light and smiling. Jenny liked this picture because it made her imagine that her mother had spent her short life being wildly happy, surrounded by friends.
Jenny slipped the record out of its cover and dropped it on her tabletop record player. The scratchy speakers hissed.
“Hey, this one's for you, Seth,” Jenny said. She placed the needle in the groove, and the long-ago voices of a very young Johnny Cash and June Carter sang “Darling Companion.”
Jenny sat beside him on the bed, laid the old water-stained album cover on her lap, and crumbled the bud of weed she'd liberated from the cigar box in her dad's room. This was probably part of the harvest from the patch he grew out on neglected, bank-owned land outside of town. The money mostly went to cover the property taxes on the Morton family land. He broke the government's law in order to pay the government's bill.
“I thought you said you were quitting the drugs,” Seth said.
“Yeah, I'm never touching coke again. That stuff makes you into a real asshole.”
“It sure does.” Seth brushed her hair from her face and kissed her. “I'm glad you came back.”
“I'm glad you came swooping in to take me,” Jenny said. “My hero. How sexy of you.”
“I think it was very sexy, personally.” Seth kissed her. “You're so lucky to have me.”
“And you're so unlucky that my last boyfriend wants you dead. He's a gangster, you know.”
“You're a dangerous girl.”
“Obviously.” Jenny licked and twisted the joint in her fingers. “Rocky, want to go for a walk?”
Rocky, who had by all appearances been deep in a coma under the window, jumped to all four feet and scampered to the door, tail wagging.
Jenny and Seth walked along the trail into the hilly woods behind her house. They reached the heap of boulders where they had spent lazy afternoons and a few very hot evenings together, but Jenny led him on past the big rock.
“Where are we going?” Seth asked.
“Further.”
She led him up and over a steep ridge and through a stand of old, coiled oak trees to a small patch of sunlit meadow, full of fall wildflowers, purple asters, goldenrods in bloom.
“Here.” Jenny took his hand and led him a little pyramid of creek-smoothed stones at the center of the meadow. “This is where my dad buried my mom.”
“Oh.” Seth gazed at the stone cairn. “I
didn't know she was here.”
“Officially, she's still 'missing,'” Jenny said. “My dad hid her body so they wouldn't identify her cause of death. Which was me. It's my fault she died. I ruined their lives, my mom and dad. They used to be happy people.”
“It's not your fault.”
“It is. I've started figuring out a way I can avoid killing my...killing my mothers, when I'm born. It happened by accident the first time. If I'm born in a caul, that will protect them.”
“What's a caul?”
“It's a membrane from inside the womb. The amniotic sac, is what it's called. Some bodies are born wrapped in it. Looks like a shroud of skin.”
“That sounds creepy.”
“Most people think it's something sacred.”
“But you can't control that, can you?” Seth asked.
“If I'm careful enough, and enter the fetus early enough, and I really concentrate...I think I can. I messed it up last time, but I've done it a couple times before. I was in too much of a rush, and we'd been searching for Ashleigh between incarnations, because she was hiding from us—I don't think I moved into this body early enough to influence the womb like that.” She looked at mother's grave. “I promise I'll never make that mistake again, Momma.”
“Moving into the body?” Seth asked. “Is that what we do? Find some developing baby in the womb and...what? Possess it like a ghost? Are we taking over lives that were supposed to be lived by someone else?”
“From what I can remember, the regular human souls can move in anytime during pregnancy, up until right before the birth. So we just have to find an empty vessel nobody's claimed yet. It's like parking at the mall. You hope for a good spot, but you take what you can get.”
“Where do all the human souls come from, anyway?” Seth asked. “Do you remember that?”
“I'm not sure I ever knew that.” Jenny knelt by the cairn of stones, straightening a few that had slipped loose. “But, I think I'm kind of jealous of them. Maybe they reincarnate for a while. But ultimately they come from somewhere, they move on to somewhere. Not us. We're just stuck here, over and over again. I don't know if we ever get to move on.”
