Second Chance

by Chet Williamson

  "There's more than one reality, though," Curly said. "We've lived in two already, and we're trying to what, create a third one? So how many can there be? No end to them?"

  "That's what scares me," said Woody. "What if there's really only supposed to be one? And we screwed it up?"

  Curly had no answer to that, and soon Woody heard the deep, regular breathing of sleep coming from the other side of the room. But he couldn't follow his friend. So he got up and walked into the living room, and sat on the sofa, and imagined friends in the dark. He was there when dawn came, but the night and the room had taught him nothing more.

  Chapter 46

  When Curly woke up at seven, he and Woody locked the apartment carefully and went out for breakfast. When they returned, Curly took a pack of cards from his bag and they played gin. At one point Curly got up and started to put a record on the turntable, but Woody told him not to. "Save it for tonight," he said, and Curly glumly nodded.

  Eddie Phelps and Dale Collini pulled into the parking lot just after one o'clock. Woody and Curly were there to meet them. "Where's the man?" asked Eddie as he climbed out of the car.

  "He'll be there," said Woody.

  Dale cocked his head. "You mean he's not really here?”

  “Oh, he's here," Curly said. "Just not up to receiving visitors right now."

  "What the fuck are you talking about?" Eddie said, and his eyes narrowed. "He has this flu, that's it, isn't it?"

  "Eddie," said Woody, "you live in New York, and we've been with Keith. We all have this flu."

  "But . . . the government . . . they say that—"

  "Fuck the government. You think they're going to tell everybody that they're going to die?"

  Dale bit his lip and looked down at the ground, but Eddie began to shake his head, slowly, then faster. "No, you've got to be kidding—you telling me that we've kept AIDS away only to buy the farm from some contagious plague our old college chum started?"

  "Basically, yes. You've heard the news, you know how it's hitting New York. The authorities are scamming. It's only a matter of time before you . . . before we all start to show the symptoms. But we're here to try and make sure that doesn't happen, that none of this happens or has happened."

  Eddie had stopped shaking his head, and now he leaned back against the car and shaded his eyes with his hand. "You live your whole life careful. You don't go to bathhouses, you don't go home with guys in bars, you wait for Mister Right, you live with him faithfully for years, and then you pick up something out of the air." He put an arm around Dale and looked up at Woody. "Don't seem right somehow, do it?"

  "No. It don't. Come on. Let's go upstairs."

  "So where's Keith?" Dale asked as they walked into the apartment. "He tied up or what?"

  "Sit down," Woody offered, and they did.

  "He is here, isn't he?" Dale said.

  "He's here. But it's going to be . . . tricky."

  Curly jerked his head toward the kitchen. "He's in the fridge."

  "What?"

  "He's dead," Woody said. "He shot himself, right in front of us. But we brought him back. And we'll take him back."

  Then Woody explained how they had found Keith and what had happened. He didn't tell them about Rooney.

  By the time the story was over, they heard footsteps on the stairs. Woody opened the door and saw Frank and Diane climbing the steps. They explained that they had arrived at the car rental counter in the Pittsburgh airport at the same time, so had driven out together. Frank was smiling uncomfortably, but Diane's face was hard and cold.

  "Where is he?" she said. "Keith."

  When Woody told her that he was dead, her expression didn't change, but Frank's did. He gave a guttural cry, turned, and struck the wall with his fist. "Christ! Fucking Christ, Woody! As if this all isn't crazy enough, now we're going to go on a time trip with a dead guy? What do you think, he's gonna come back to life?"

  "He did before, Frank," Curly said. "Or do you think Judy went nuts on her own?"

  "Don't you talk about her like that, you sonovabitch—"

  "All right, Frank," Woody said, "that's enough. It's not going to do any good for us to be anything other than cooperative with each other. We've got to be together to go back, physically and mentally."

  "Go back? Go back with a dead man?"

  "That's why we're here, it's why you came, and we're going to do what we came here for. Keith killed himself, it's not our fault. But he wasn't dead in the past. We changed when we went back. We became what we were, and if we can feel what we did before, if we can go back again, there's no reason not to believe that Keith will be what he was before. Alive." Woody put an arm on Frank's shoulder. "It's our only chance to save Judy. It's the only chance for all of us."

  Frank put his hand on Woody's, patted it, nodded. "All right. I'm sorry. Nothing makes sense anymore. My whole fucking life's upside-down."

  "The world's upside-down," Woody said, and smiled.

  "Where is he?" Diane asked. "Where's Keith?"

  "He's . . . we have him in the refrigerator."

  "I want to see him."

  "I don't know if that's . . . a good idea."

  "I want to see him, Woody. Right now."

  Woody led the way into the kitchen, and Diane followed, while the others stayed in the living room. He opened the refrigerator door slowly. Cold water ran over the bottom edge, and ice cubes rattled onto the floor.

  "All the way," Diane said. "I'll clean it up."

  Woody opened the door fully, revealing the body. The clothes were wet, and partially melted ice cubes sat in the nest of the hollow abdomen like watery, shell-less eggs.

  "Take that off," Diane said, pointing to the newspaper wrapped around the head. "I want to see him."

  Woody hesitated, then pulled the tape off the paper, lifted the head away from the back wall, and removed the paper. The eyes were closed, and the skin was sallow. The exit wound, already small, had crusted over.

  He stepped away, and Diane crouched in front of the open door. Her lips pursed for a few seconds, and her jaws moved subtly. Then she drew back her head and spat. The saliva came out in a thick spray, and several droplets landed on Keith's right cheek and neck. Woody would no sooner have stopped her than he would have grasped a lightning bolt.

  "You bastard," she whispered, closed the refrigerator door, and looked up at Woody. "The only regret I have about taking him back is that he won't keep burning in hell." She looked at the ice cubes and the puddles on the floor. "I'll take care of this."

  "Diane," Woody said. "Do you want to . . ." He shrugged. "Talk about this?"

  She stood up. "There's not much to talk about. I haven't loved Alan for a long time. But he's still my husband. He's still my family. And what . . . that . . . made him do . . . and everything else that he's done . . ." She clenched her jaw, as if forbidding tears to come. "It's unforgivable. I can't believe he's even human."

  "He had his reasons," Woody said. "I don't pretend to understand them, but he did what he thought he had to do."

  "Yeah. You tell that to Alan. Tell it to the thousands of people whose children have died. Tell it to the dead, Woody. But don't tell it to me."

  ~*~

  When Tracy arrived, just before six, Woody and Curly were the only ones in the apartment. The others had decided to walk to the campus, fill their minds with the memories of happier times, prepare themselves psychically for what the night would bring.

  Tracy was pale but smiling, and when she stepped into his arms he was suddenly afraid of losing her, and decided that he could not let her go, would not leave her behind in the time from which he had plucked her.

  "Where is everybody?" she asked him.

  "They're out. I don't think they like this place anymore."

  "I know what you mean. It doesn't feel enchanted now. It feels haunted. By something bad."

  "It has to be magic," Woody said. "It has to be enchanted enough for us to get back."

  "And back again.
"

  "Yeah. Back again."

  Frank, Diane, Eddie, and Dale returned together just before dusk, greeting Tracy like people welcoming the widow to the funeral. But after hellos were exchanged, a dead silence descended.

  "Hardly sparkling conversation tonight, is it?" Eddie said.

  Curly chuckled. "What do you chat about just before you try to save the world?"

  "Old things," Woody said. "Things from long ago, to get our thoughts moving backwards again."

  "And then we can get our asses moving backwards," Eddie said, lighting a cigarette, and taking in a prodigious drag. "No need to worry about the big C anymore, is there? So where's the condiments, Woody? The keg, the sangria, the incense?"

  "We've got the incense, the candles, the music . . ."Woody looked at Curly. "And the grass. Same as last time."

  Curly nodded. "Identical. From the same stash."

  "So I guess it's time to get into costume. Same as last time, like I told you on the phone. Diane, Tracy—you want to get dressed first. Then the guys."

  When the women came out of the bedroom after fifteen minutes, it seemed to Woody not only as though the months had rolled back to May, but that the years had rolled back as well. Diane's brown fall, muslin blouse, and tight jeans made her look years younger, but when Tracy followed her out of the hall, Woody grew sick with love and fear.

  She looked exactly as she did the night he had brought her back, the night he had played Eurydice out of hell. A patch-pocketed, blue work shirt was visible beneath his old brown leather jacket. Light blue jeans hugged her slim legs, and her painted toenails peeked out from heavy sandals.

  "You look . . . groovy," he said.

  She kissed him lightly. "So go get groovy yourself."

  The men dressed in what they had worn at the previous party, and it seemed to Woody that they were not so much revelers dressing for a party as determined soldiers donning their uniforms for a battle from which they might not return alive. Curly buttoned his long-collared shirt slowly and deliberately. Dale dressed with equal purpose, a grim smile on his face. Eddie put his feet into the long shaft of his cowboy boots, then grasped the pull straps and pushed his leg in like a cavalryman preparing for Balaclava. And Woody slipped his concho belt through the wide loops of his jeans as though a sword would hang from it, and straightened his brocade vest like a suit of lights.

  Only Frank seemed slow and languid, and Woody sat on the bed next to him while he zipped up his Dingo boots. "What's wrong?" he asked his friend. "What is it?"

  Frank ran both hands though his hair, then rubbed his neck and looked at the ceiling. 'This isn't right, Woody," he said reluctantly. "It wasn't right when we went back the first time, and it isn't right now. Who knows what'll happen?"

  Woody thought about it for a moment, then laughed. "What's so damn funny?"

  'Think about it," Woody said, grinning. "What could be worse than the end of the world?" He put his arms around Frank and hugged him. "Come on now. Let's do it. It can't get worse. Let's save Judy and Sharla and Alan and all our lives. Let's go back again and set things right."

  "You make it sound so damn easy."

  "It won't be. But we're gonna do it anyway."

  Then he stood up, and slipped his hand into the right front pocket of his jeans to make sure that what he had put there had remained, and not vanished like a lover's illusion. It was easy for things to slip out of pockets, easy for things to get lost.

  "Let's go," he said, smiling at all his friends.

  "Party time."

  Chapter 47

  "Put the music on, Tracy. The Doors. Diane, light the incense. Curly, you want to start rolling the joints? Frank, get the shades." Woody turned to Eddie and Dale. "Want to help me with Keith?"

  They followed him into the kitchen, and Woody opened the refrigerator. "Oh God," Eddie said. "Look at him."

  "Poor . . ." said Dale, but didn't finish.

  "You were going to say, 'Poor Keith,' weren't you?" Woody said, and Dale nodded. "It's all right. You can say it. We'd better all be able to say it, because I don't think hate's going to take us back. All we need is love, right?"

  Dale smiled, reached in, and touched Keith's hand. "Poor Keith." He tried to bend the hand. "His wrist is stiff."

  "Probably rigor mortis," Woody said. "He's been dead about a day. And the cold doesn't help. Let's take him out."

  It was fairly easy to get Keith out of the refrigerator. They each grabbed a part of his body, and pulled straight out. But once Keith was on the floor, his limbs remained in the fetal position, legs nearly touching his chest, arms across his body.

  "Oh God, that's awful." Woody had never heard Eddie sound so upset.

  "I'll try and loosen him up," Woody said, getting on his knees and rubbing Keith's cold, stiff arms.

  "I'm sorry, but I'm going to be sick." Eddie turned and moved toward the bathroom.

  "It is a little disquieting," said Dale, who nevertheless knelt and began to rub Keith's legs. After a while, he straightened the leg. "It's working. The muscles are getting looser."

  "I think I read somewhere that rigor only lasts for a while. Then the muscle breaks down. Maybe we're speeding the process."

  They rubbed for a while in silence. "If I decided to stay," Dale said softly, "do you think it would matter?"

  Woody stopped rubbing and looked up. "Stay? Why? You died back there. A couple of years later."

  "I'm dying here."

  "We're all dying here."

  Dale gave a little laugh. "No. Not the plague. Leukemia. Eddie doesn't know." Woody said nothing. "See, it happened anyway, didn't it? And that Catholic guilt of mine can't help but think it was meant to be. That you can't cheat death. So why not stay back there, if it could help make things right again?"

  Maybe Dale didn't mean it at all, but Woody couldn't help but bring it up. "Then you think Tracy should stay too?"

  "Oh, Woody," Dale said, rubbing Keith's dead legs all the harder. "I don't know. Nobody knows, do they?" He pressed his eyes shut, though out of exertion or because he didn't want to see the world, Woody couldn't tell. "Maybe you'll just have to wait and see. Maybe you'll have to go back over and over again until you get it right." He laughed again, louder than before. "That's a pretty horrible thought, isn't it? Worlds without end, Amen."

  "No," Woody said, bending Keith's arm, "no more. This is the last time. Whatever happens, happens. Tonight it's over."

  "Over for me, anyway. Do you think I'll remember? Once the rest of you are gone?"

  "Why would you? Why remember what hasn't been?" He shook his head. "Come on. I don't want to talk about this anymore. Let's take him out. Curly!"

  In a few seconds Curly was at the door. "You want help?”

  “Yeah. Let's keep him straight. He's not a bag of groceries."

  Woody propped Keith up and put his arms around his chest, while Dale took his legs and Curly supported the midsection. They carried him into the living room, and the others looked, then looked away, even Diane. All of them moved back when the men lay Keith's body down on the floor.

  The red light turned his yellow skin the color of too ripe mulberries, and the blood at his mouth looked black. The eyelids had begun to recede, and beneath them his eyeballs showed as cloudy slits of pink.

  Woody sat on the floor next to the body, and took the head into his lap. He looked into the still face, and pressed down upon the eyelids until they remained closed. Then he looked at the others standing around the room, trying to pretend they were anywhere else but there. Woody had to bring them together again, for only then could they make their return.

  "He was our friend," he began. "No matter what he did, no matter how twisted and bent his ideas became, he was our good friend once. I loved him like a brother, and the first time he died I cried." He looked at his wife, whose chin was quivering. "I cried for Tracy. But I cried for Keith too. He didn't mean to hurt people, not then. But something went wrong inside of him." He pushed back the hair from Keith's for
ehead. "Everything that . . . that Pan ever did was because he loved the earth, and because he didn't want to see it die. He did terrible things, and this last was the most terrible of all.

  "But he didn't do it out of evil. He thought that the ultimate end justified those dreadful means. I think he was wrong. But he never had any doubt that he was right.

  "Being with him now," Woody went on, "doesn't mean that we approve of what he did. All it means is that we were his friends once, and that only by being his friends again can we take him back to what he was before, and right the wrongs he felt he had to commit. Yeah, this is Pan, this is the assassin and the terrorist and the genocide . . ." He struggled to hold back the tears, but his voice shook, broke. "But it's Keith too! And I'm sorry for what happened to him, and I want all that blood to be off his hands—and off our hands. Help me. Sit with me. Make our friend what he was—not this. Please . . ."

  Tracy, softly crying, was the first. She sat next to her husband, and took his right hand. Dale sat on her other side, followed by Eddie. Then Curly sat on the other side of Keith's body and took his left hand. Frank sat next to him, and his expression was dreamlike, faraway.

  Only Diane was left standing, and while the line of her mouth stayed firm, Woody saw the muscles of her jaw throbbing. Then her eyes closed, her left arm hugged her body, and her right hand went to her mouth, where she pressed the knuckles of her fist against her mouth, and her whole body shook with the effort of holding in her cries. A high whining like the keening of mourners escaped from her, and the harder she pressed her eyes shut the more freely the tears ran. No one touched her. No one said a thing. They just let her cry it out, until the cries were nothing but silent pulses, the sobs a series of heavy breaths. Her fist came away from her mouth, she breathed in deeply, and let it shudder out again.

  Then she opened her eyes, nodded, smiled with tight lips, and sat between Eddie and Frank, clutching their proffered hands. "I love all of you," she said, looking around the circle until her gaze came to Keith.

  "All of you," she repeated, and Woody believed her.

  The music played on, and they held each other's hands, until Curly took from his pocket a box of wooden matches and a joint as thick as his thumb and as long as a pen. "Break on through," he said, echoing the lyrics of the song that filled the room. "The other side's waiting."