“Damn,” Nolan says. “You’re one damaged little girl, aren’t you?”
Louisa flips him the bird without looking at him.
“You didn’t let it take her,” I say. If Naomi didn’t let the Shadow take Louisa, it’s wonderful and terrible at once. If she had let it, then I would have been saved. My face falls as the realization forms in my brain.
Naomi must know what I’m thinking because she says, “I have an idea. A way to save all four of us.”
Hope. It starts in my gut and spreads throughout my soul or whatever I am now.
“We need to find one of the mentors who played the game against Edgar. That’s who will restore the balance,” she says it like a professor revealing the answer to an equation.
“But we’d still be sending someone,” I say. The hope begins to shrink.
“Yes, but someone who knew the risks and played with our fate and their own anyway.”
“Makes sense to me,” Nolan responds but I don’t see why he has a say in this.
“I’ll ask Doris who it is.” Naomi nods once, confirming her decision.
“Why would she help us? She hasn’t exactly been forthcoming about anything.” I’m not being negative. Just realistic.
Naomi raises her eyebrows. “I think she’ll do it for me.”
“I don’t want to do this anymore,” Louisa says. “It sucks.”
“Well, you could have gone with the Shadow. It would save us a lot of trouble,” Naomi says.
“That’s not what I mean.” Louisa shakes her head. “I guess I’m ready to be done and be in a more permanent situation.”
“I’m kind of enjoying it,” Nolan says. “I’ve just seen two of my ex-girlfriends. I forgot how lucky of a man I was. Both of them were gorgeous. I got so hung up on Janet. But she wasn’t even all that great in the sack.”
“Edgar was able to move around at will, right?” I ask, moving on from Nolan’s newly realized joy.
“Seemed like it.”
Naomi flips through the handbook. I don’t know how long. Nolan and Louisa are gone again by the time she’s finished.
“The best I can understand, it’s all manipulating energy. Just like when we were alive. You know how you would make your legs move and go somewhere?”
“It’s as simple as willing ourselves places?” It doesn’t seem right. If it’s that simple, how come we haven’t figured it out before now?
“It only works once your grief watch is over,” she says and for a second I’m afraid she’s reading my mind.
I’m looking at Naomi’s face when everything goes black. Then I’m in my granny’s house. Sitting at an old Formica table with metal legs. The chair I’m on is covered in brown vinyl.
“Here you go, Lukey. Eat every bite.” She sits a plate in front me. Biscuits and chocolate gravy.
I take a bite. I can actually taste it. It’s wonderful. Rich chocolate served warm over biscuits and melted butter. Only in the South is this considered an acceptable breakfast food.
Then I’m back at the table. Naomi is standing over me. “Luke, Luke!”
“Yeah,” I say.
“Where were you just now?”
“I can taste chocolate, but I don’t know why.”
Naomi sits down and stares at me. “Your memory purge is starting.”
“What’s a memory purge?”
Naomi pushes the handbook across the table and points to the top of a page. According to the handbook, memory purges happen before the soul transitions to a new body.
“But I’m not even in queue yet.” I’m not ready to lose my memories. Or am I? It won’t be so bad to forget the things that brought me here.
“You’ve been dead a really long time, Luke. Maybe you’re jumping the line.” She smiles. “This is good. You’re probably safe.”
“I don’t understand,” I say.
And then I’m in a new place. I’m on a bench in front of a store in a freaking mall. I hate malls.
Chapter 21
“Luke has moved on,” Doris says. No greeting whatsoever. It would be jarring under normal circumstances.
“Is he safe now?”
Doris shakes her head slightly from side to side. She’s disappointed in me. And I don’t give a shit.
“As long as he chooses a body when it’s his turn, yes. And as long as you choose someone for the Death Shadow.”
“Does it have to be Nolan or Louisa?” I ask.
“It can be you,” Doris grins her creepy grin.
“Thanks for the reminder, Doris.” I pull the handbook to my chest. “Can it be someone else? Like one of the mentors who was playing the game with Edgar?”
Doris steeples her fingers together and tilts her head. “Yes. But only if you agree to take the job.”
“How long will I have to stay here?”
“It depends on when your replacement shows up. It took me 40 years to find you.”
“How did you know I was your replacement?”
“It’s like falling in love, finding a soul mate. I just knew. And you will, too.” Maybe this should be flattering and sweet, but it just feels manipulative.
“Fine. What else do I have going on?”
“I’m glad you’re using your head,” she says.
“Can we please do something about my clothes?” I can’t be Doris-esque in this tacky dress.
“Yes. Visualize what you want.”
I close my eyes and think about my favorite suit. It was black, classic. The skirt was form-fitting and fell about two inches above my knees. The jacket was tailored perfectly at the waist. I wore a plain white t-shirt under the jacket. Simple gold hoops, black high-heeled Mary Jane’s.
And now I’m wearing it. I would sigh with relief if I could.
“Nice choice. A blouse would be better, but you still look good.”
“Thanks,” I say. “Just out of curiosity, what would have happened if I had refused?”
Doris looks at me with no smirk, no grin, and says, “I would have fed you to the Shadow.”
There’s a weird taste in my mouth. Kind of earthy and skunky. Why do I keep getting these weird tastes in my mouth?
I’m on a bench in front of what kind of looks like Hot Topic. There are souls roaming around in there, but I’ve been watching them awhile and no one has purchased anything. I wonder if I can get new clothes.
I stand up and start walking. A mall isn’t my first choice of destinations, but I guess I am happy to be somewhere new.
Then I remember the words “memory purge.” That’s what is happening to me. I’m going to forget everything and start over as someone new.
There’s a big store straight ahead. It looks like a Target or something like that. Souls are pushing empty carts. A woman with waist-length brown hair is holding up a T-shirt covered in cat faces, stroking it with her fingertips, trying to observe its texture. But texture isn’t really a thing here.
I keep walking. This place seems to be a giant circle. After a shoe store and a candle shop there’s a tattoo parlor. I’ve never seen a tattoo parlor in a mall before, but I guess there are a lot of things I haven’t seen before in this place.
There’s a girl sitting on what resembles a dentist’s chair. A woman is bent over her, working diligently with a tattoo gun. The gun is leaving ink on the soul’s calf. She’s writing words.
“Can I help you?” A bearded man in a T-shirt and leather vest greets me from behind the counter.
“Yeah. How does this work?”
The man has words and numbers all over his arms. It looks like names and dates, maybe addresses, too. I want to stare but I’m trying not to.
He holds out his hand and we shake or whatever. “Rod.”
“I’m Luke.”
“Well, Luke. It works a lot like tattoos work when you’re alive.” He smiles and two dimples appear. For some reason the dimples are a surprise. “What I do here is a service. There is a charge, but a small one.”