You Had Me at Halo (3 page)

“Indeed we do,” he agreed. “When a soul dies, the human body can still function for up to two days, so when we send people back for a manual purging, we use a body where the soul has gone but the flesh hasn’t, so to speak.”

“Ew.” Holly felt her whole face wrinkle in disgust. “That’s revolting. And it means that I could go back as anyone. A tramp, an old woman, a dog...”

“Technically that’s right,” Dr. Hill said. “But on the bright side, you’ll be pleased to know it’s not that random. I’ve managed to find you a body that’s almost the same age as you, and even works for your old company. Isn’t that wonderful?”

“I don’t know.” Holly cautiously peered at him from under her lashes. “What’s her name?”

“It’s not a
her.
It’s a him. And his name is Vince Murphy.”

Holly’s spine stiffened. “That doesn’t make any sense. I’m a girl. You can’t put me in a guy’s body. Especially not someone like him. How will I be able to find out what happened to me? Speak to Todd? Get my engagement ring? I don’t understand.”

“I’m sorry.” Dr. Hill shrugged. “But that’s the best I can do for you.”

“No.” Holly folded her arms in front of her chest and shot him a mulish look. “This is ridiculous. You can’t send me back as a guy. There must be some alternative. How about more inkblots? Hypnosis? Anything.”

“There is one alternative.”

“I knew it.” Holly felt a flood of relief run through her. “Once when I tried to return a navy skirt to that shop on Maine Street, the sales assistant tried to refuse because I didn’t have a receipt. But there was no way I was giving up. You should’ve seen what happened to it in the wash. Sometimes you just need to keep asking until you get what you want.”

Dr. Hill scratched his head. “Er, right. So anyway, the reason I didn’t mention this alternative is because it’s not very good. Can you imagine what hell looks like?”

“I have a rough idea,” Holly answered cautiously.

“Well, take that image and double it. Then double it again. Hell is two levels down and it’s a long sweaty way to get back up to where you were.”

“Oh.” Holly chewed on her lip and gulped. “You see that didn’t happen with my skirt. The manager just ended up giving me a gift voucher.”

“I’m sorry, but this is a bit different.”

Yes, so it would seem.
Holly blew out a column of imaginary air and tried not to panic. She really had managed to get herself between a rock and a hard place on this one and she couldn’t help but think how much easier it would’ve been if she’d just kept her mouth shut during her funeral. “So there really isn’t any other option?” she double-checked but Dr. Hill shook his auburn head.

“I’m afraid not. What’s it going to be?”

Holly closed her eyes. She couldn’t believe she was about to agree to this, but it didn’t really seem like she had much of a choice. Besides, perhaps he was right? She probably would feel a whole lot better when she found out what had really happened.

“Fine.”

“I think you’ve made the right choice.” Dr. Hill nodded as he tapped something into the computer. “Now you might want to close your eyes for this. It can make some people a little bit...dizzy.”

“Oh, but there’s one other—” Holly started to say before once again she felt herself falling through a long white tunnel where no doubt Vince Murphy’s body was awaiting her. Who would’ve thought that it could get worse than dying?

CHAPTER THREE

The first thing that hit Holly was the smell. She took in a lungful of air and tried to untangle the different bouquets around her. Ah, that was the aroma of fragrant roses drifting past her. Yes, and there was the tang of perfume and aftershave mingling in the air, and then there was
...
the disgusting smell of male body odor. Ewh.

“Come on Vince, what do you say?”

Holly blinked and realized she was surrounded by a group of computer geeks from the Baker Colwell technical department. And judging by the stench, they seemed to prefer to bath in old sweaty gym socks rather than in water.

She tried to work out why she was feeling so disorientated when one of them started to hit her on the arm. If they kept that up then they would be getting a squirt of pepper spray that they wouldn’t forget in a hurry. Where was her pepper spray, anyway? But before she could look for it, another one started to speak.

“If we want to get this consolidation project finished by tonight, we’d better head off.”

Since Holly had no idea what a consolidation project was, she stared at him blankly before glancing around in an attempt to figure out what was going on. The first things she caught sight of were all the gravestones in the background. Perhaps it was a Halloween party? That would explain why the guys in front of her were so badly dressed.

“Well, Vince?” The tallest of the guys shot her a questioning look. “Are you coming or what?”

Yeah, right,
Holly snorted. As if she’d hang out with them. And why were they calling her Vince?

“Just leave him here, man,” another one said. “He can catch up with us later.”

Holly winced as four sets of hands thumped her on the back by way of goodbye before a small glimmer of something ridiculous forced its way into her brain. In fact it was beyond ridiculous. Beyond crazy. Beyond anything. Except it wouldn’t go away so she looked down at her shoes for confirmation.

Her feet—once a nice size seven—were now about a ten and they were covered in a pair of black Doc Martens.

She stretched out her hands and almost screamed. They were so big and...
How disgusting!
Was that grease on them? Then she touched her chest as the familiar feel of her heartbeat rapped out a tattoo. She’d forgotten how loud it could be. As for the fact her boobs were no longer there, well she was going to totally ignore that because surely no good could come from it.

Instead she sucked in a lungful of air and tried to digest everything. She was dead and had come back to earth as Vince Murphy. It wasn’t great news.

All around her people were milling about in groups, but after the relatively silent surroundings of Level One, Holly found their voices loud and grating, and could finally start to appreciate why her constant commentary had been driving people crazy.

She was just about to look for some peace and quiet when she caught sight of Gemma walking straight towards her.

Thank goodness for a familiar face. Especially since it helped jog Holly’s memory of why she was back down on earth. She had a job to do and she didn’t have much time to do it in.

“Gem,” Holly squeaked as she stuck out her arms and launched herself in her friend’s direction. “Oh my God, I’m so pleased to see you, you won’t—”

“Are you insane?” Gemma demanded with the drop-dead stare she’d spent all of last summer perfecting.

“Of course not.” Holly wrinkled her nose as she dropped her arms back down to her side. “It’s just I’ve been dying to—”

“Make a pass at me just seconds after Holly’s coffin has been lowered into the ground?” Gemma interrupted with a stamp of her foot. “Honestly, what is it with you technicians? I just can’t believe you would try something like this today.”

“What?” Holly started to say, but before she could even finish her sentence, Gemma turned on her heels and headed toward the graveyard gates.

Holly hurried after her, but as the weight of the Doc Martens combined with the length of her muscular legs hit her, she suddenly remembered what had triggered Gemma’s apparent visit to Crazyville.

She was Vince.

Well, no, she was Holly. But to the outside world she was definitely Vince.

What a nightmare. And what was the point of this whole manual purging if she couldn’t even convince her best friend who she was? It just seemed to be yet another example of a celestial screw up. Well, Holly had worked under bad management before when she’d done a summer internship in her first year of college and she’d quickly learnt the only way to succeed was to just get on with it as best you could.

She pushed her way through the crowd of mourners. Ah, there she was, over by that strange looking mausoleum...
talking to Todd
.

For a moment Holly’s heart skipped a beat as her eyes feasted on how divine he was: all rippling muscles and square jaw. He was wearing the chocolate brown suit he’d bought for his sister’s wedding last month and the white linen shirt he had underneath looked cool and crisp against his olive skin.

Sometimes Holly had to pinch herself at how lucky she was. Not only was Todd gorgeous but he was going places. Everyone knew that if you got promoted to Senior Account Manager on fourth floor then you could virtually rubber stamp yourself a six-figure salary by the time you were thirty. And Todd, at twenty-four, was the youngest employee at Baker Colwell to be so promoted. Brains and a hot body. What was there not to love?

Then Holly realized he was looking at her so she started to make her way toward them.

“Gemma. Todd. I know that this is going to sound—”

“Save it,” Todd cut her off. “We may work together but we’re not friends. As for trying it on with someone at a funeral, well that’s just—”

“Todd, you don’t understand,” Holly started to explain. “I know Gemma thought I was trying to...well whatever...but the thing is, it’s a bit more complicated, and—”

“That’s where you’re wrong, buddy,” he growled. “So just get lost, okay.”

For a moment Holly just stared. This situation was intolerable.

All she wanted to do was tell him how sorry she was about their fight. That it was stupid and completely her fault, and, if he happened to have the ring in his pocket, perhaps she could just try it once for size? But instead she was in the unbearable position of standing right in front of the love of her life, unable to explain anything.

“Well?” He glared and Holly accepted there was no use trying to talk to him in this mood. Besides, she’d just caught sight of her stepmother over by a beech tree and it dawned on her just how totally unprepared she was for this whole situation.

“Fine.” She raised a reluctant hand. “I didn’t come to cause a scene so I’ll get going.”

“Good. Make sure you do.”

Holly turned and headed away from where her body was buried. Finding out that her boyfriend wouldn’t give her the time of day really was the icing on what was turning into a very crappy day.

xxx

Holly tapped her fingers impatiently. She had spent the last of Vince’s cash on a hamburger and fries. Funny—after almost two weeks of not eating, she thought this would taste better. Then she had headed back to her old apartment only to discover her roommates were all out (no doubt at her funeral) and the spare key was no longer hidden under a brick near the trashcans. Next time she died and came back to earth, she really must remember to bring her door keys with her.

This whole situation was beyond annoying. How was she going to get anything sorted if no one would even speak to her? She did some more finger tapping and tried not to hyperventilate. Now was not a good time for a panic attack. Well, actually it was a very good time, but she was just going to have to ignore it. She was up against a deadline; everything else would have to wait.

She’d walked around for a while before finally accepting that no magic answer was going to appear in front of her, and so she’d been forced to make a decision.

Before she died, the two most important people in her life were Todd and Gemma and while she longed to speak to her fiancé, she realized it might be best to let him cool down a bit.
Which was why she was now sitting on a bench underneath the huge sycamore tree outside Gemma’s apartment.

Surely, her friend couldn’t be too much longer.
Holly hadn’t quite sorted out the finer details of how she was going to convince her of the truth, but she was sure she would figure something out.

They’d been
friends ever since they’d both turned up the first day of the Baker Colwell Graduate Training program wearing identical black stilettos complete with little bow detailing. They had so much in common, there was no way Gemma wouldn’t recognize who she was now. Or at least eventually.

Ten minutes later her friend turned the corner and came into sight. She was limping slightly, probably thanks to her new shoes, but apart from that she looked exactly the same as she had thirteen days ago.
Well perhaps she was a bit more pissed off than she had been back then...

“What the hell are you doing here?” Gemma demanded as she put her hands on her hips and glared. “You know there’s a strict company policy on stalking.”

“What?” Holly started to say before remembering that she couldn’t be distracted. She was on a mission here and needed to concentrate. “I mean, I’ll tell you why I’m here. And...well...I don’t really have much time and there’s not an easy way to say it so I’ll just spit it out. I’m Holly.”

Gemma let out a bark of laughter. “Jeez, what is wrong with you? Have you been drinking? I mean I know funerals make people a bit weird, but this is going over the Richter scale. It’s not funny.”