you know how it works.”
This is typical Rebecca: a little bit wise, a little bit condescending. What I want to ask her—what I can’t ask her—is if it always feels like you’re pretending, if part of being in a relationship is feeling like you are going through the motions of being in a relationship. Will and Preston have been together for about the same amount of time that Alexander and I have been together, and they seem to be genuinely happy and genuinely in love.
But I guess neither of them is wondering about someone else.
“Come on,” Rebecca says. “Let’s go inside. You don’t need to commit to forever, or even to tomorrow. But commit to right now. We all want you to be here.”
She’s right. When I get back into the kitchen, Preston gives me a hug and Will turns the music up a little louder and asks me to dance, even though his signature dance move is the pogo. Alexander pours me some pink lemonade. Ben asks Rebecca to dance and she swats him away. The night begins, and goes on. I manage to step into my happiness. But I am always looking back, checking where I came from.
Comment from M:
None of you understand.
Comment from PurpleCrayon12:
Why do you say that? (I don’t ask this to dispute what you’re saying. I want to know why you feel we don’t understand.)
Comment from M:
I don’t belong in this body. I have nothing to do with this body. I am trapped in this body. I exist separate from this body. But I can’t die, because I am afraid I will take this body with me.
Comment from PurpleCrayon12:
There are times I wish I could separate from my body.
Comment from M:
The fact that you can say that shows how little you understand.
Comment from PurpleCrayon12:
You don’t know anything about me.
Comment from M:
This is pointless.
Comment from Someone:
I understand.
It is easy to find the boy, because he has not moved. His life does not change.
It is easy to follow him, because he has never seen this body before. He has no idea I am here. He has no idea I have returned.
I made a mistake. When I contacted Nathan, when I told him what he wanted to hear—that he had been possessed by the devil for a day, that his actions had not been his own—I felt I had power over him. I knew I could not take his body—for whatever reason, once a body has been occupied, it develops a resistance to being occupied again. But I thought his mind would be a minor challenge at most. A teenage boy discovered by the side of the road, having no idea how he’d gotten there or what he’d done—his uncertainty was my great weapon, and his desire for certainty was my great leverage. Then, when the other body traveler contacted the boy, I thought, At last, here is a line. It is worthless to have a hook if you don’t also have a line. So I manipulated the boy, set up the confrontation. The body traveler walked into this boy’s house, was right in front of me. I recognized her for what she was, and she recognized me for what I was. She was afraid, as I knew she should be. Man should tremble when faced with the manipulations of that which is greater than Man. I had the lure set, the hook within reach. But then she struggled, and the boy surprised me by interfering, giving the girl a chance to flee. I was angry. At the boy, certainly—but also at myself.
I wonder if Nathan knows that the reverend is dead.
Probably not. I doubt anyone noticed. And if nobody notices a death, it is very hard to find out about it.
This body is a different form of anonymity. When I am in a new body, I have the power of unknowability. To those I am watching, I am a complete stranger. I am scenery. And the whole time, I am taking in their moves, their fears, their faults. It is nearly impossible to run from me.
I could be the man next to you in the grocery store.
I could be the man handing you your change.
I could be the man in the window across the street.
I could be the man who gets on the bus two people after you.
I could be the man hitting on you.
The man bumping your shoulder.
The man in your blind spot.
The man right in front of you.
If that doesn’t confer power, I don’t know what does.
Nathan doesn’t see me in my car across the street as he heads to school. He does not understand that, after school, I am the man walking behind him, into a café. He doesn’t think it’s strange that I sit next to him. Because I have a book and am turning the pages at regular intervals, he doesn’t understand that he is my focus.
A girl comes in to meet him. They exchange pleasantries. He says she looks tired. She mentions a bad conversation she had with her boyfriend. I am about to start reading the pages in front of me, so fruitless is this exchange. But then he asks if there’s been any word from someone named A. I am paying attention now, even though the answer is no. They talk about tracking A down. They do not call A he or she. They do not understand that I am taking in every word.
I understand many things at once:
This girl met Nathan on the night he was possessed.
A was the person who possessed him.
A is now gone.
But she still cares about A. Deeply.
I picture A as the frightened, ignorant girl I met in Nathan’s house. It is stupid to leave a trail, and that is exactly what A has done. I don’t know whether it would be better to educate her or kill her. Her existence, like the existence of any other body traveler, threatens my own existence. To know the truth about one of us is to know at least a partial truth about all of us. If people begin to look, they will find us. They will fight. Thus, we must remain unknowable.
A clearly does not know this. And because of this, A has been a fool. She may have run away from me, and from these people. But if she can make a mistake once, she can make it again and again.
Nathan and the girl, whose name he does not say, keep talking about other things. Boring things. I leave, because it’s better to leave than to become familiar. I do not want them to remember me. My work here is not yet done, just as it is not yet defined.
Teach or kill?
Fix or destroy?
I am bothered by the whole A thing. I am hoping this means she did not trust other people with her name. I am hoping it was just a disguise for when she felt it convenient to “confide.”
I gave myself a name, chosen because the first letter does not do what you think it will do. I knew early on that I was male. Even when I was punished with a female body, I knew to act and think like a man. I would not get far otherwise.
This is what I would teach another body traveler: Look around you. See the person who is considered the strongest, then become that person. No matter what body you’re inside, be that person. And when you learn how to stay, when you get more choice—be that person even more. Society is biased and ugly. Use that bias and ugliness to your advantage. Most everyone else does, if they have any power at all.
Even the sad sack of skin and bones that I’m in now has more power than most. I can use that. Having money gives you an advantage, especially if you use it. And being