It goes on and on like a hamster in a wheel.
And Helen? She nods and dabs imaginary tears from the edges of her eyes.
I, too, produce a few teardrops and let them roll down my face. And for impact, I’m throwing in the occasional bonus sniff. I know, I’m good at what I’m doing.
People feel sorry for me. Their whispers and comments float through the foyer, like the murmuring of the sea as it cradles a rocky shoreline. Such a hardship, widowed at forty-two. Poor thing, on top of being so unwell in the head. He kept her safe, poor Horace. He stood by her. What a man.
What a load of bullshit, too.
Nobody stood by me. People don’t know about Horace’s dark side. Being widowed at forty-two is just the beginning. We aren’t even forty-two. Yes, Elise thinks she is. I’m eighteen, Luke is twenty-two, Toby is five, Phoenix is fifty-six or thereabouts, and Sky? She hasn’t got an age. And that’s only a handful of us. We have a chance to start fresh and I’ll do everything it takes to succeed.
After shaking Helen’s and my hand, everyone is darting over to the tables that groan under masses of finger food and drinks. The air is getting sticky and hot, filled with the sickening, sweet smell of flowers mingled with a plethora of different perfumes. I feel nauseous from the stuffy air, the heat, and the whole shebang. If this doesn’t end soon, I’ll vomit all over the polished marble floor.
I can’t wait to get out, but Helen has a tight grip on my right arm. I’m sure it’s supposed to look as if she’s supporting the grieving widow. But she and I know she’s afraid I’ll bolt out the door the moment she lets go.
“Don’t even think about it,” she hisses in my ear, although she doesn’t need to say anything. We know the drill. We wouldn’t try anything with dozens of people watching. Countless failed attempts to escape in the last five years have taught us to plan ahead. We are ready to give it another try but the time has to be right. We may be crazy, but we aren’t stupid. This time it has to work.
Has to.
The reception is over, and everyone leaves. Helen marches beside me until we are out of earshot. “How dare you embarrass me like that in front of all my friends?” She hisses like a viper and pushes me into the back seat of her car.
“What did I do?” Cross my heart, I have no idea what she’s talking about.
“Shut up. You know exactly what you did. Don’t play the innocent. That trick may have worked on Horace, it doesn’t work on me.”
She starts the motor and pulls away. I would love to find out what she meant. Did one of the kids pop out unnoticed? Perhaps I didn’t act numb enough?
She gave us a shovelful of pills earlier this morning to make sure we were leashed and muzzled for the day. The old girl has no idea we flushed the meds down the toilet. She has no idea that even if the meds would knock some of us out, someone is always watching everything. We don’t know yet how to keep all the things we see and hear in one place and we don’t always work well as a team, but we’ll get there.
Nowadays, we move in and out, shift a little to the side to let someone more qualified for the task at hand run the show. We are getting stronger. For Helen’s benefit, I slip into the role of a semi-comatose nitwit. All it takes is letting your jaw drop on one side and spit drool down the chin. Then you soften your gaze, focus on peripheral vision, and make your eyes roll up.
Easy.
The sound of the motor and the soft swaying of the car are making me sleepy. I’m drifting off. There is not much I can do about it. We haven’t yet found a way to control our coming and going. It’s hard for us to stay in the body for any length of time.
How singletons manage to be around all the time, day and night?
We simply get tired after a while. It’s as if someone lets the air out of a balloon and we deflate. I once saw a movie where an astronaut lost connection with his spaceship and drifted off into the endlessness of the universe. Silent and without a struggle he gave in to his fate.
That’s how we experience leaving and entering the body. In books, it’s often called switching. But that’s not how it is for us. Switching sounds much too purposeful and way too active.
Nope.
We drift off, and another part comes into focus. Sometimes, though not often, it’s like bursting onto the scene. Like when there is a dangerous situation. That’s when Amadeus comes breaking through all barriers. No prior announcement. No warning. He comes flying like Superman with supersonic speed.
In general, we haven’t got a violent bone in our body. The only time Amadeus became violent was when a man attacked Maddie. What is it with grown men, raping little girls for fun? I mean… really? Amadeus came along just in time to avoid the worst. The attack had thrown Maddie into a stupor and she was non-responsive. The guy was an NGYD man. Amadeus gave him a broken nose, a broken collarbone, and a super-sized shiner. Seeing him squirm and howl was a beautiful moment we’ll treasure forever.
We paid for it with a two-week stay in a mental respite clinic where they pumped us full of Valium and other stuff. Nobody wanted to know what happened. They called us liars when we accused an upstanding member of society of attacking us. After all, he was a well-known, local philanthropist and we had a mental health record, as long as from here to the moon.
Still, we all think Amadeus is cool. He’s strong like a bear and
