"No." The cop said. "I ran your record and Fairview's record while I was waiting to interview you. Fairview has got multiple arrests for everything from assault to drugs to attempted rape. He's a pukebag in the making. You, on the other hand, come from a middle-class family, have no arrest record whatsoever, in fact you're not in our system at all. All of the witnesses, and there was a surprising amount willing to talk about this thing, say that Fairview came up from behind and struck you with the knife and that you were acting in complete self-defense. Your friend Mike confirms your story. Fairview's story is among the most ridiculous I've ever heard. He says that you attacked him with the knife as he walked by, he took it away from you and stabbed you in self-defense." The cop gave me a sly smile. "He's a couple of rooms over you know."
"Yeah?" I asked.
"Yep." Morgan nodded with satisfaction plainly visible on his face. "Don't tell anyone I told you but you seem trustworthy. The docs say he might lose those testicles, you got him THAT hard. Even if he don't lose 'em, it's doubtful that he'll ever have kids." The cop looked to the heavens. "Imagine that, that little shitbag won't get to breed more little assholes. Goddamit sometimes there IS justice in this fucked-up world." He gazed at me. "So here's what I'm gonna do. I'm gonna write up your story pretty much as you told it. But I would suggest highly that you profess ignorance to the little incident the other day. You're the only one that's told me about it. Even Fairview himself didn't mention it. So, to avoid complications, how about we just leave that little tidbit out of the story? Makes things much easier for everyone. You don't know WHY he attacked you by your locker, he just did. Okay?"
"Okay." I agreed, fascinated by the way he was talking to me.
"Good." Morgan nodded. "I'm gonna charge him with assault with a deadly weapon. In light of his previous record he'll get a year or so in juvie. It goes without saying that he'll be expulsed from school. So congratulations hero. You got rid of one first class, A-number one dirtbag.
I might put you in for a goddam public service award."
He took another twenty minutes or so to interview me thoroughly about the incident. He thanked me again and then left the room. A few minutes later my parents came in with Tracy in tow. Mom looked as if she'd been crying. So did Tracy I saw. Even Dad looked as if he'd aged since I'd seen him that morning. I felt sorrow and shame for having put them through this ordeal.
"Billy?" Mom said, coming forward and stroking my hair.
"Yeah Mom?" I asked. "I'm all right, really."
She gulped. "This isn't because of, well, drugs is it?"
So that is how I spent the one-week anniversary of my recycling in a hospital bed. They kept me doped up throughout the night but I still found it hard to sleep. My mind kept turning back to the fact that I'd been stabbed in this life but that I hadn't been stabbed in my previous life. The implications of that were starkly frightening. I was not invulnerable. All bets were off. I could just as easily be killed here as I could have in my own when. I could die before I turned thirty-two!
Since I'd come back and changed things from their natural order anything could now happen. Anything. The risks I'd taken so far now gave me the shivers. Riding in Raisin and later Mike's car without a seatbelt on with an intoxicated driver at the wheel. Playing games with dangerous bullies at school. Even playing mind games with my teachers. How could I have been so stupid? How could I have really thought that I was safe? Had I actually been thinking of myself as a superhero before Richie had struck me?
I made my second solemn vow since returning. I vowed that I would be careful. I was having too much fun to die.
"Are you SURE you'll be okay Billy?" Mom asked me for perhaps the fiftieth time. "We can still cancel our plans."
"No, no Mom." I insisted once more. "I'm healing up just fine. I get to go back to school on Monday. Really, I'll be fine."
It was Saturday night. I'd been home from the hospital for a week and a half, bored out of my mind, unable to leave the house or do much of anything besides lie in bed and let my wounds heal. Mom had taken off work to take care of me and had fawned over me for the past nine days. I had soup and sandwiches delivered to me in bed, I had sodas brought to me whenever I wished. I was surprised I was allowed to go to the bathroom by myself. I love my mother dearly, I really do, but after nine days she was starting to get on my nerves. Saturday night was the night of her company's annual awards banquet, an event that she and dad attended every year and would usually come home from in the wee hours of the morning in a cab they were so drunk. The last thing in the world I wanted was for them to stay home. I needed a little peace.
"Well," She said doubtfully. "If you're sure."
"Absolutely Mom." I nodded from the couch. "Besides, Tracy's here." I nodded in my sister's direction. "If there are any problems, she can handle them."
"Yeah Mom." Tracy readily agreed, too readily some would say. "I can take care of him."
She seemed satisfied. She headed upstairs and began to get ready. Two hours later her and Dad were out the door.
"Thank God!" Tracy said once their car had disappeared from sight. "How the hell could you stand it having her home all the time?"
"Mom's all right." I said. "It's just parental authority that gets old."
She smiled, not bothering with THE LOOK. By now Tracy was used to my odd sayings. "Whatever." She said. "Can you keep a secret?"
"Of course." I told her, offended that she felt the need to even ask that.
"Cindy scored some killer buds." Tracy told me. "She's gonna bring 'em over and we're gonna get stoned while we watch Saturday Night Live. If you can keep your mouth shut, maybe she'll share with you."
I smiled, knowing that I'd made great progress with my sister since returning. I'd never even been aware that she smoked grass in my previous life. Now she was offering to get stoned with me. Sure, it wasn't exactly a blood oath of loyalty, but it was a start. "Suppose I told you I COULDN'T keep my mouth shut." I asked. "What would you do then?"
She gaped at me for a moment and then laughed. "You're an asshole Billy." She said, shaking her head. "Do you want to get stoned or not? I've never done it with you before, you should think of it as a privilege."
"It sounds like a plan Trace." I said. "And it is a privilege."
Cindy came over at nine o'clock. She was wearing the obligatory tight 501's and a sweater that accented her pert tits nicely. Her blonde hair was tied in a ponytail and her blue eyes sparkled. My loins stirred at the first sight of her, my dick threatening to harden by visual stimulation alone. I'd found over the past week that, injuries aside, my libido was that of a fifteen-year old. I NEEDED to have an orgasm at least once a day. I seemed to go into physical withdrawal symptoms if I didn't. I'd jacked off so much there were actual abrasions on my dick. And Cindy had been a star player in many of the fantasies.
I was heartened by the fact that, after a quick greeting to Tracy, she rushed over to my spot on the couch and planted herself next to me. My dick stirred again as I smelled the scent of her perfume. It was heavy upon her skin but it was feminine and went right to my brain.
"You poor thing." She said with syrupy sympathy. "How are you doing?"
I smiled. "Everything that's important still works." I told her.
She giggled. "I guess Richie Fairview can't say the same." She replied. "Can I see where you got stabbed?"
"Sure." I told her, while Tracy stared in disbelief at her friend. I raised up my shirt, showing her the jagged wound. The stitches had been removed leaving only a healing line on my side. A similar wound, where they'd done the lavage, was just below my belly button.
"Ohhh." She crooned, looking at it. "You poor thing. Does it hurt?"
"Not too bad." I told her.