Kick (The Jenkins Cycle Book 1) (8 page)

Starting that day, I began giving it away in hundred-dollar increments to various people: waiters, the maids who cleaned my room, homeless people. I also took a few tours in the city—museums and the like—and stuffed any number of donation boxes with money.

On another trip to the mall, I played a game where I dropped $20 bills on the floor when nobody was looking, then watched from a bench the various ways they disappeared. Some people looked around before picking them up. Others didn’t even break stride, swooping down like dive bombers and soaring away.

One middle-aged lady acted as if she were casing the place. Casually, she walked a circuitous loop around the area, casting covert glances at the bill while edging her way closer and closer to it. After an agonizing minute where she pretended to look at her watch from about ten different angles, she eventually felt safe enough to cover the bill with one of her bags. Then she pretended to call someone. Minutes later, call finished, she untied and then retied her shoe. Finally, mercifully, she lifted the edge of the concealing bag and deftly recovered the $20. After that, she fled the scene as if chased by demons. I felt half-tempted to run after her shouting, “Thief! Thief!” But I’m just not that cruel.

***

My life is necessarily one of solitude. I have no friends at all. Except for the people in my former life, I don’t even know anybody. That’s because there’s nothing about me fit for a long-term relationship. Other than the occasional friendly encounter with someone in a coffee shop, most of my interaction with other people involves a receipt with my change. I won’t lie and say I’m fine with it. I like people—more now than I ever did before my death—but what can I do? Any friend I make will be gone within a few weeks, a month at the latest. Even if I manage to make a friend in that time—maybe a world-famous supermodel or a sleekly seductive Russian assassin—did I really want her looking in the newspaper the day after my bloody exit and learning the person she went to the movies with was some sort of killer? And let’s say I didn’t kill myself. Let’s say I screwed up and waited too long and got ejected back to the Great Wherever. Chances were she’d come looking for me, only to discover I’d undergone a horrible personality transformation. The results of such an encounter are too awful to imagine.

But what if one day it all ended? I try not to torment myself too much with the possibility, but it’s there all the time. There’s this idea I have. One day, instead of popping from body to body doing the bloody work of the Great Whomever, I’ll find myself in the body of someone and get to stay. Maybe I’ll end up in the body of some other suicide—one who goes brain dead under a surgeon’s care but is miraculously resuscitated. But when he wakes up, it’ll be with my personality. This particular fantasy is a personal favorite because it solves the moral dilemma of stealing a body from someone who deserves it more than I do and the practical problem of being stuck in the body of a criminal.

***

The morning after my games at the mall, I got kicked.

This feeling I refer to as a “kick” is the only warning I receive that my ride among the living is nearing its end. I imagine it a little like being pregnant, only instead of the host having a baby at the end of it, it’s me that’s pushed out. Usually, I have a few days to wrap up matters before that happens.

I couldn’t think of anyone else to irritate or kill, so I spent the rest of that day at a bookstore catching up on the Harry Potter series. Later that night, I went back to the steakhouse.

I’d been hoping to see the girl from that first night again and here she was, sitting at the same table near the bar. I cast a suspicious glance skyward. It seemed like a sign. I just couldn’t tell if it was
Go
or
Stop
.

She looked remarkably pretty, sure, but pretty alone didn’t make me want to have a conversation with her. When she talked to her waiter, she did it with her full attention, laughing and joking with him, making me wish I could take his place. When the waiter left, she tapped her hands and rocked a little to some tune only she could hear. Something told me it wasn’t some cheesy Sarah McLachlan song. I imagined something from The Drifters or Marvin Gaye, back when a song sounded good no matter how many times you heard it.

“Will that be it?” Ted said.

I’d been tipping him and his friends a hundred bucks a night since my scenic drive on the unlikely chance the woman came back. I’d also worn my fancy new dress shirts to hide Mike’s tattoos. What with fresh shaves and clean, combed hair, I looked like a normal person. Other than being obviously more comfortable for me, all of this was by design.

Resting on the table beside my empty plate spread a fan of twenties totaling $1,000. Ted’s eyes just about bugged out of his head when he saw it.

“Listen,” I said, quietly, and was promptly listened to. “I need your help with something.”

I described what I needed and watched with a sinking feeling as I detected a fierce resistance brewing behind his eyes.

“I can’t do that sir, I’m sorry. I could get fired and for all I know you’re …” He stopped himself. “What I mean is …”

I made a placating gesture.

“I know what you mean,” I said, “and you’re right to be concerned. I would too. But I swear, I don’t mean her any harm—and neither does my client. We just want to know who she is, that’s all.”

“So you’re saying she’s some sort of a con artist?”

“That’s what we’re trying to find out. If I could just get a good look at her ID, that might help us answer a few questions back at the dealership.”

The story I’d spun—of bounced checks and forged documents used at a Honda dealership—wouldn’t withstand the scrutiny of a vigorous mind, and that’s where Ted came in. And the money helped too.

“Ah man, I don’t know… If I do it, wouldn’t I be breaking the law?”

That’s the problem with casual bribery in America—it’s all but extinct. Politicians and government contractors do it every day, but if a sixteen-year-old tried to bribe his way into a rated R movie the cashier wouldn’t know what to do. Even with a thousand dollars sitting right there on the table, Ted couldn’t tell me yes.

“Look,” I said. “It isn’t breaking the law if she gives it to you freely—that’s standard Common Law under the Habeas Corpus Act of 1876.”

Ted just nodded.

“But I can understand how you’d be worried—hell, I would too in your shoes, and I do this every day. So here’s what I’ll do.”

I laid down another thousand, all in twenties, which I’d counted out and wrapped in rubber bands back at the hotel. Ted’s eyes just about popped out of his head when I did that. Honestly, I began to worry he might be part frog.

In a shaking voice, as if everything in his life depended on it, he said, “Ok, I’ll do it—but half up front.” Quick as that, Ted was an old pro at this.

I pushed one of the piles over to him so he could pick it up himself. Then I explained what I wanted him to do.

“Ok, right, give me a few minutes,” he said, then left.

Watching the girl from my seat, I noticed that her former waiter had been replaced by a visibly embarrassed and conciliatory Ted. After finishing her meal, she paid with a credit card. It had been a gamble she’d use one at all—for all I knew she preferred cash. Just as Ted stepped away from the table, he turned around as if he’d overlooked something important. Then he said what I told him to say—that they were doing spot identification checks because of a stolen credit-card ring in the area. She seemed taken aback, but he looked so embarrassed and bothered for asking that she smiled like an angel and handed over her ID.

Minutes later, Ted stopped by my table and held the card down low so only I could see it, all while trying to appear professional. The picture on her ID showed her with shorter hair and a big, cheery smile. Her name was Elizabeth MacKeigan, and she had renewed her Tennessee license three years ago. I carefully read the Memphis address.

One day, if I ever woke up in the body of a miraculously rescued suicide, maybe I’d come live in Memphis.

“Thanks Ted,” I said, not even looking at him. I mean, what kind of guy sells a nice lady’s personal information like that?

Dismissively, I sort of flicked the other thousand over to him. I doubt he even noticed we were no longer best friends. He just snatched it up, stuffed it into his pocket, and left.

As I got up to leave, I couldn’t help but congratulate myself on my high degree of tolerance to personal hypocrisy. It’s that balance of character and moral flexibility which tamps down any debilitating attacks of self-loathing.

***

The next day, I had a Belgian waffle for my complimentary breakfast, with two small cups of orange juice and three raspberry tarts. I left everything I owned in my room with a note to the maid to do whatever she wanted with it and keep the remaining $1,500 for herself. Then I checked out.

I pulled out of the Hampton Inn parking lot wearing Mike’s stinky biker costume and toting both pistols, thoroughly enjoying my last ride on Mike’s awesome Harley.

The Memphis police headquarters was a huge, eleven story office building. I don’t know what I expected—certainly nothing over two stories. But Memphis is a big city, and based on some of the people I’d seen at various gas stations and convenience stores, it enjoyed a thriving little criminal scene.

There were plenty of empty spots at the $8 an hour Central Parking lot across the street, but Mike Nichols doesn’t pay to park. To the right of the police station was a smaller, exclusive lot with a mix of police and civilian cars and no enclosing fence. A big sign read, “County Employees Parking,” and the ramp into the lot had a striped wooden arm blocking anyone who didn’t have a pass from entering.

Mike Nichols didn’t care about no orange-and-white obstructions—nobody controlled a Howler. If you tried, you died. If you played with the tigers, you got scratched. If you howled with the wolves, you pooped in the bushes. Flouting the so-called “law,” I accelerated through the barrier, snapping the wood with a loud crack.

I parked the motorcycle next to a new police cruiser and looked around. Amazingly, nobody saw what I’d done. For a police station, you would have thought there’d be more police.

With Stump’s gun in my left hand and the Sig in my right, I fired all of my guns at once into the cop cars around me and didn’t stop shooting until both magazines were empty. Born to be wild I am, but I’m also safety conscious, so I made sure to aim for the doors and tires to keep the bullets from traveling farther.

It took the police about five minutes to show up. You’d think with the police headquarters right there they could have gotten someone over sooner. And the two cops that finally arrived looked like the only action they saw came from either side of the HQ metal detector. They still had guns, thank goodness. I threw mine down, then turned around and raised my hands in the air.

“Get on the ground!” screamed the white guy with the cop mustache.

“Spread your legs!” yelled the cute black lady cop in a surprisingly sultry voice.

I did as I was told, but I did try to point out that my motorcycle had a big pile of drugs in the saddlebags. They told me to shut up.

“Hey, I’m trying to admit to a crime here, are you kidding me?”

I mean… wow.

“What drugs?” Mustache said.

Sultry got in my face.

“What are you doing shooting at cars for, jackass?”

They cuffed me and hauled me off the ground.

“You’ll never take me alive!” I yelled.

As they dragged me into police headquarters, I shouted in my best De Niro, “You ain’t nothin but a gun and a badge! You ain’t nothin but a gun and a badge!”

Five minutes later found me in a small, ten by ten holding cell with a bench bolted to the floor. They checked my cuffs but didn’t remove them. Sultry had gone, leaving me alone with Mustache, who stood just outside the door watching me. There was a little slit in the clear plastic door to talk through.

“Not too tough without your gun,” he said. It seemed to me he said it more to say something—to show he was in control.

“Just curious,” I said, “Did you say that to show me who was boss?”

“That’s right,” he said, smiling a little. “So I suggest you shut up.”

“Or?”

He shrugged.

“Or don’t. Either way you’re screwed, my friend.”

I tried to stay quiet, mentally willing the time to pass so I could finally be free of Mike’s body and on to my next gig. But I had to know…

“So what do you think about Sul—uh, the lady cop?”

“What about her?”

“She’s sort of hot, for a cop.”

He looked at me full-on, in a way that made me think I’d grown tentacles out of my head.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” he said. “I told you to shut up—good advice—and here you are running your mouth. If you even come near Officer Landreaux I’ll personally beat the ever-living shit out of you and all your wussy bitch biker friends too. Now shut. The fuck.
Up
.”

I was impressed—he was good. And I admired his defense of his fellow officer. Not that I was attacking. Ok, sure, I’d needled him a little, but I meant no harm. I’m impish that way. Sort of like the Great Gazoo to the Dum Dums of the world, always showing up when needed, ready to lend a hand, messing things up in ways that challenge guys like Mustache to rise to the occasion. I mean, who knew what demons ate at him every day? Mindlessly taking people’s keys and cell phones and putting them into baskets, motioning them forward through the metal detector, asking them to back up and start again, all day long and in and out of his troubled dreams, all night. Now, because of me, he could spend the rest of his day proud in the knowledge he’d put a scumbag like Mike in his place and valiantly defended the smoking hot Officer Sultry Landreaux at the same time.

I spent the rest of the day in a haze of interrogation. Initially, they booked me for possession with intent to distribute drugs, possession of a firearm in the commission of a crime, reckless endangerment and illegal discharge of a firearm. After I confessed to Billy and Stump’s murder (my version, sans Z and his daughter), they drove me out to the house, where I showed them the execution room and the freezer with the bodies, now fused together. Their reactions were oddly appreciative—I’d perfectly preserved the crime scene for them, provided a full confession and even waived my right to have a lawyer present (I signed papers and everything). And because I’d knocked off two Howlers, I’d contributed to a guaranteed drop in crime for the entire community. For the police, it was win-win and more win everywhere you looked.