The Reset Life of Cassandra Collins

by Shawn Inmon

  Cassandra glanced around, looking for someone she could ask for help.

  The parking lot was empty.

  She looked at the office, but the lights were dim there.

  “If you don’t want to go back over to the bar, we could have a little nip right here,” the man said, nodding at the pickup truck. “I’ve got a flask in my truck.”

  Cassandra didn’t speak but feinted as if she were going to run left. When he reached for her, she whirled and reversed direction. She ran for her room, key dangling from her right hand as she ran.

  The man nearly fell in the graveled lot and a fleeting thought passed through her mind.

  He’s drunk. I can outrun him.

  Her feet flew. Though she heard him running after her, she knew she would make it to her door, to safety.

  Slowing so she could slip the key into the lock the man hit her from behind, sending her sprawling into the brick wall of the motel. It knocked the wind out of her so hard she couldn’t draw a breath. She crumpled to the pavement.

  The man loomed over her. His face was flushed, he was breathing hard, and she could smell the stink of alcohol and cigarettes on his breath.

  He leaned down and grabbed her up off the ground with almost no effort.

  Oh my God. He’s so strong. How can I get away from him?

  His hands gripped her arms like a vise as he pushed her back against the wall and kissed her hard. He nuzzled her neck, scratching and burning it with his beard.

  Cassandra closed her eyes and moved her head up and away, trying to get enough breath to scream for help, but she couldn’t draw enough air into her lungs.

  Soon, he picked her up and threw her over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry.

  From somewhere far away, Cassandra heard voices. A man and woman’s voice in casual conversation.

  She struggled to pick her head up and saw them. They were coming out of a room five doors down. Their voices barely made it to her.

  “Help me, please!” Her voice wasn’t as loud as she wanted, but it did reach them.

  The man took several more steps toward his truck.

  “Hello?” the other man shouted. “Are you okay?”

  “No!” was all Cassandra could get out.

  She heard the sound of shuffling feet against the pavement and gravel, then heard the second man’s voice saying, “Hold on a minute. Hold on!”

  Cassandra’s world went crazy for a moment as it spun upside down and she landed painfully in a heap on her side.

  She looked up and through blurry vision, saw the man run the last few steps toward his truck. He jumped in, started it, and sped away. He turned left on the highway and disappeared in a cloud of smoking tires.

  A moment later, the other man was there.

  “What was that?” he panted. Then, “Are you okay?”

  Dazed, Cassandra shook her head, trying to clear it.

  “I don’t know if I’m okay or not.” She hurt all over, but mostly on her side where he had dropped her to the ground.

  “Was he trying to hurt you? Who was he?”

  “I don’t know,” Cassandra said. “I don’t know who he was. I’ve never seen him before.”

  The woman kneeled beside Cassandra. “Can you stand? Should we call a doctor for you?”

  “What? Oh, no, no. That’s not necessary.”

  Her head cleared enough that she could focus on the couple. They were young. Not much older than what Cassandra herself appeared to be.

  “Thank you,” Cassandra said. “I don’t know what would have happened if you hadn’t come out of your room right then.”

  That’s a lie. I have a pretty good idea what would have happened, and I would be in a world of misery right now.

  The man stood and gently helped Cassandra stand.

  She looked down and realized that she was barefoot. Her purse and both her shoes had flown in different directions.

  “Here,” the man said, putting his arm around her waist. “I can help you walk, if you want.”

  The woman moved around in the darkness, searching and finding her shoes and purse. They helped her to her door, where they found her key, as well.

  “Do you have a phone in your room? You’ll need to call the police.”

  Cassandra nodded vaguely. “Yes, I do.”

  “We’re staying in room twelve,” the man said. “The front desk clerk will have all our information. We’ll be happy to come back and testify to what we saw.”

  “Thank you again,” Cassandra said, and realized that hot tears were running down her face. She knew she was about to lose control. Her hand shook so badly she couldn’t get the key in the door.

  “Let me help,” the woman said. She took the key from Cassandra and opened the door.

  The room was lit by the table lamp beside the bed.

  Cassandra turned to them. All she wanted was to be alone.

  “Thank you so much. I’ll call the police and make a full report. I’m sure they’ll catch him. Thank you for saving me.”

  She didn’t look at them to see if they accepted this lie or not. She stepped inside and closed the door behind her, locking it and drawing the chain across. She stared at the door with unseeing eyes for several seconds, then looked around the room and spotted a dresser with six drawers. With an effort she wasn’t sure she had inside her, she pulled the dresser across the door, blocking it.

  She sat on the edge of the bed, holding her wounded side, then dissolved into the breakdown she knew was coming.

  An unknown time later, when the wracking sobs had passed, and she knew she was cried out, she stood and walked into the bathroom. She gasped a little at what she saw in the mirror. Her face was smudged with black grime, with evidence of the tracks of her tears. The right side of her face was scraped, with small droplets of blood forming. Her neck was an angry scarlet where her assailant’s rough beard had torn into her.

  She stripped off her pants, top, panties, and bra while the shower turned from cold to hot. When steam was coming out from behind the curtain, she adjusted the temperature and stepped in. The hot water stung her everywhere, as she discovered new, more minor injuries she hadn’t been aware of.

  She soaped up a washcloth and dabbed at herself as best she could, trying to remove the most visible evidence of the attack. When she was done with that, she propped herself up against the wall beneath the nozzle and let the water run over her until it began to turn cold.

  She had envisioned a whimsical night in a small town. Her first night of real freedom, of her new life.

  Cassandra stepped out of the tub a more sober woman.

  She managed to lift her suitcase up on the bed without hurting her side too much, then found a pair of soft linen pajamas. She slipped them on, pulled back the covers, and turned out the light.

  She lay in the dark, eyes wide, knowing she wouldn’t fall asleep for many hours.

  An unknown time later, Cassandra awoke with a start, sitting up with a wince of pain.

  Sometime during the long hours of the night, she had abandoned any hope of sleep, but it had eventually snuck up on her. Grim light was just visible from under the curtain.

  She saw the dresser pushed haphazardly against the door and nodded muzzily.

  Why? What did I do to bring that on?

  She felt a surge of emotion but choked it off.

  No. No tears today. And I know better. I may be living in 1966, but the idea that I did anything wrong to make that evil man do what he did is ridiculous, and I know it. At least, I know it in my mind. Now, I’ve got to know it in my heart.

  She swung her legs over the edge of the bed to stand up and was pleasantly surprised that she wasn’t nearly as sore as she anticipated.

  There is no remedy as good as being in an eighteen-year-old body.

  In the bathroom mirror, she saw that the side of her face was still puffy, but with the oversized sunglasses she had in the Mustang, that would barely show.

  She dressed quickly in jeans
and a warm sweater. The gray clouds outside looked threatening, as if they might carry rain.

  Cassandra carelessly threw everything into her suitcase and latched it. Only then did she move the dresser away from the door and back to its normal spot against the wall. She pulled the curtains back and carefully checked the parking lot.

  Like locking the barn door after the horse has already gotten out, but I’m going to carry this lesson with me now. I’ve got to be careful. Aware of my surroundings. Last life, I floated through every day in a protective bubble. Everyone was pleasant to me. No one ever spoke a harsh word, let alone grabbed me up and tried to abduct me. This life, I’m on my own. I’ve got to act like it.

  She left the room key on the table, opened the door and put her suitcase in the Mustang. She turned south onto the highway and headed toward her new future in Berkeley.

  Part Two

  Chapter Nineteen

  The 1960s were a turbulent decade in America. 1960 blew in with business as usual—a stern but grandfatherly U.S. Army General sat in the oval office, overseeing a country that had done well in the post-World War II world.

  Fourteen months later, America elected a young, handsome, Catholic president and Washington D.C. morphed into Camelot.

  On the other side of the nation, California became the epicenter of new ways of thinking and behaving.

  Ground zero for that was the University of California, Berkeley. Out of the regimented air of conformity that marked the fifties, a new attitude became prevalent.

  In May 1960, still under the watchful eye of Ike, students at Berkeley protested the House Un-American Activities Committee, which saw communists and subversives hiding under every rock and was committed to digging them out.

  Those early student protests weren’t terribly successful—the police simply turned powerful fire hoses on them and sent them back to their dorms, soaked and defeated. Powerful images of cops wielding the hoses against the peaceful protesters found their way across the country, though, and college students who were inclined toward this new attitude were drawn to the new, subversive attitude at Berkeley.

  Initially, the dean and chancellors of Berkeley were pleased with the surging influx of students, swelling the ranks of young minds, waiting to be formed and shaped. They had seen an uprising and done what they had always done—put it down. Their contentment would not last for long.

  A revolutionary seed had been planted that would not be so easy to pluck from the ground as it had been in the past.

  The University of California, Berkeley Golden Bears didn’t have much success on the gridiron throughout the sixties, but after that first setback, student protesters had a very good run.

  They protested for Civil Rights and against Apartheid and Nuclear Testing.

  Their strength in numbers grew, and in 1965 and 1966, so did their protests. Across America, the evening news showed almost daily protests from Berkeley. The students still looked fairly presentable—the hippie movement hadn’t yet arrived on campus—but their viewpoints were radical to the established powers of the University, the state of California and middle America, which gawked in horror at the uprisings.

  In the mid-sixties, the students, although divided politically, formed a coalition that focused on one issue: free speech.

  Remarkably, after a growing series of protests, a number of professors came out in agreement. UC Berkeley entered into negotiations, and the radicals and protesters walked away with many of the rights of self-expression they desired.

  In 1966, they used those rights and turned their attention to ending the Vietnam War.

  That was the atmosphere Cassandra Collins, a seventy-year old woman with a dream, currently residing in a bruised and battered teenage body, drove into in early September 1966.

  HER FIRST FEW NIGHTS in Berkeley were spent recovering from the attack in Crescent City. She stayed in an old hotel that was inexpensive but still felt safe to her. She was young and strong, so the physical bruises faded quickly. The emotional impact of being attacked out of nowhere lingered much longer.

  Still, after a few days and nights holed up in her small hotel room, Cassandra was ready to begin her adventure. She had decided that instead of staying in dormitory housing, she would look for roommates and a shared house. When she had made that decision, the whole thing seemed far away, and somehow living with three or four other like-minded women seemed romantic and adventurous.

  Now, she would have preferred the comparable safety of the school-sanctioned housing, but it was too late for that, as all the dorms had long since been assigned. In fact, the influx of students from all over the United States had filled UC Berkeley to overflowing. That meant all the off-campus housing was tight as well.

  Cassandra walked around the campus, reveling in the beautiful old architecture and poking her head in each building, looking for bulletin boards that might have housing leads. There were many leads, but as she dropped her dimes into payphones to track them down, she found that they were already filled.

  After two frustrating days of searching, she had expanded her acceptable search area and gone through half a tank of gas, but was no closer to finding a place to live. She pulled into a Shell gas station to fill up. A pump jockey hustled out of the station and said, “Fill ‘er up?”

  Cassandra considered that. She was feeling more and more budget-conscious as she watched her savings dwindle away. Still, she knew she would always need gas for the Mustang, so she nodded.

  “Premium?”

  There were only two pump choices—Premium and Regular. Unleaded gasoline was still a few years away. It was another small dilemma. She had always put Premium in the Mustang without a thought, but now she looked and saw that it was seven cents a gallon more than regular. Still she couldn’t imagine putting regular gas in the Mustang.

  “Yes, please.”

  The pump jockey moved to the back of the Mustang and inserted the nozzle, whistling tunelessly.

  Cassandra got out and stretched her legs, leaning against the driver’s door, staring into space and wondering what her next move should be.

  A small, red convertible Fiat pulled up on the other side of the pump and the attendant hustled over. Two teenage girls sat in the front, talking and laughing. The Fiat’s top was down, even though the weather had already begun to turn cool. They didn’t appear to be the kind of young women who paid much attention to small details like a chilly breeze when they drove.

  They told the attendant to fill it up with Premium as well.

  Cassandra was lost in thought and didn’t even notice that they had pulled in.

  The driver had a shock of short red hair, and she hopped out of the Fiat and walked to a Coke machine that stood against the service station. She had turned the engine off but had left the battery turned on and an announcer’s voice blared over the radio. “610 KFRC and those Southern California boys. What a show they put on a few months ago at the Cow Palace.” The opening notes to California Girls played and that finally snapped Cassandra out of her reverie.

  To Cassandra, it was a Golden Oldie, but to the young redhead walking back with two cans of Coca Cola, it was still a current song. Regardless, both sang along to the chorus. The redheaded girl heard Cassandra singing along and blessed her with a bemused smile.

  Cassandra hadn’t realized she was singing loudly enough to be heard, but once she was discovered, she shrugged her shoulders at the girl and smiled back.

  The attendant replaced the nozzle and said, “That’ll be $6.15.”

  Cassandra pulled a five and a one out of her wallet, then dug for the change.

  “Thank you very much,” he said, and opened a drawer between the two pumps to put the money in.

  Cassandra opened the door of the Mustang, but before she could get in, the redheaded girl stuck her head around the pumps. “Heya, I’m Carol.”

  “Oh, hi! Cassandra.”

  “You here to go to school?”

  Cassandra nodded. “I’m a freshman.
Trying to find a place to live. I’m starting to think I should have gotten here a few weeks ago. Everything seems to be full up.”

  “This is my third year, and I’ve never seen housing fill up so fast.” She glanced over her shoulder at the other girl, an attractive brunette, who sat in the passenger seat. The other girl gave her a small shrug.

  “Well, I’ll keep looking. I am hoping I won’t be sleeping on a bench until second semester. My own fault, though. See ya around.”

  “Hey, wait. My friend Barbie and I share a house with a few other girls. It’s a little crowded, but we all look out for each other. I can’t really say we’ve got room for one more, but we can probably squeeze you in if you want. You wanna come check out the house?”

  Chapter Twenty

  Carol had not been exaggerating when she had said it was a little crowded. It was an older cottage-style house half a mile off-campus. It was only a two-bedroom house, but there were already four girls living there.

  Carol and Barbie introduced Cassandra to Dara, another brunette girl who wore heavy dark-rimmed glasses and pulled her hair back into a short bun. Where Carol and Barbie seemed like they might be mostly interested in having a good time, Dara was obviously focused on more serious topics. The fourth roommate, Millie wasn’t home.

  “How do you fit so many in here?”

  “The first question should probably be why we fit so many in here. This house belongs to my uncle, so he gives me a break on the rent, but it’s still pretty expensive. The more people we bring in, the cheaper everything is. We split everything four ways now—the rent, the water bill, the light bill.”

  “Everything but the hairspray bill,” Barbie added. “Everybody’s responsible for their own Aqua Net.”

  Even though the house was small and there were already four women living there, it was relatively neat and clean. There was a normal kitchen and although the bathroom wasn’t big, there were shelves and cupboards for each person to store their own essentials.