Hitchers (12 page)

“I take it you fancy a walk? We can get a lot closer to the doc's office than this,” Mick said.

I reached back and retrieved a plastic grocery bag from the back seat. “I've got some business I want to take care of, then, yeah, I thought it might be nice to walk. Do you mind?”

Mick smiled. “Sounds good to me.”

There were more police and National Guard than civilians in the park. The mood was muted, devoid of the usual festive cocktail of musicians, Hacky Sackers, and joggers. The smattering of civilians walked with their heads bowed, stepping carefully among the shoes.

The sidewalk running along the lake was covered with shoes, set in pairs. Mick and I walked in the grass alongside, silent save for Mick's blurts. The shoes demanded silence.

The swimming pool, drained for the winter, was covered with
shoes, even the sides. The tennis courts were carpeted as well.

There was a running track around the ball fields. I found a spot where the track was relatively bald of shoes, squatted, and withdrew Annie's running shoes and a tube of crazy glue from the plastic bag. Mick stood by, head bowed, while I set them in place, two nondescript white shoes, the tread worn most deeply along the outside edges. Annie had an odd, ducklike jogging gait.

No one knew who started this memorial to the dead, but I thought it was a good one. In a few years the powers that be would come up with some concrete obelisk to honor the dead, but it would never have the power, the honesty, of this one. Standing, I turned in a complete circle. How many of the dead were represented here? Probably not even half.

“Let's go,” I said.

As we turned, Mick clapped me on the back, left his arm across my shoulders as we walked. I started to tear up, swallowed, shook it off. How foolish that the lump in my throat was as much about having made a new friend as losing my old one. I hadn't realized just how alone I'd felt.

We were just within earshot for me to hear a woman whisper, “That's Mick Mercury” to her companion, reminding me of how unlikely my new friendship was.

“I haven't heard anyone else with the voice,” Mick said.

“When it first started in me, I hid in my apartment. I was afraid of people hearing,” I said.

Mick dropped his arm, fished a pack of cigarettes from his jacket. “Hang on. I stayed in my apartment
most
of the time, but I did go out once.” He looked at me.

“To a doctor,” I said.

Mick nodded. “Should give us an idea of how widespread it really is.” He picked up the pace.

The electric doors whooshed as we entered the medical building that housed Dr. Purvis's office. Mick paused just inside, held up a hand.

“What is it?” I asked.

“Listen.”

It reminded me of frogs in a pond on a rainy night. A muffled croak, followed by another, then two on top of each other. We moved down the hall, pausing in front of each door until we reached a pediatrician's office. The voices were coming from different directions, but the bulk were coming from in there.

I felt sheepish wandering into a doctor's office to check out the patients, but Mick evidently didn't have the same qualms. He marched right in with me scurrying to keep up. Mick seemed to push through life ignoring all of the social proscriptions that kept the rest of us in line. I admired his balls, but it also made me cringe.

The waiting room was packed with stone-faced parents and wailing kids. A few heads turned as we stood hovering near the doorway, but if anyone recognized Mick they didn't show it. All of the kids were crying—even the older ones.

“
Take it off; I want to see you strip
.” We turned in unison toward the voice. She couldn't have been more than three; it seemed impossible that her little throat could produce such a low, gravelly tone. The little girl screamed, buried her face in her mother's shoulder.

“It's okay, sweetie,” the mother cooed, stroking the girl's hair, the expression on her face contradicting her soothing tone.

“
If I can just make it to Christmas
,” a freckled, red-haired boy croaked, then resumed crying.

“
I need to talk to him in person,
” Mick chimed in.

“Come on, I can't stand this,” I whispered, pulling open the door. “Several hundred to several thousand cases? Bullshit,” I said.

C
orinne didn't buy that I was possessed.

“But I had no control over my body. I was trapped inside myself, moved around like a puppet.” I said. “How could that be psychological?”

Corinne looked at me for a moment, as if considering. It flustered me that she didn't look at all like a psychiatrist. She was in her early sixties, bleached-blonde hair and too much eye makeup. Abruptly she pulled a fat book off the shelf and flipped through the pages before setting the open book in my lap.

The heading was
Dissociative Identity Disorder.

“What's Dissociative Identity Disorder?”

“Read it,” Corinne said, walking to the window and peering into the naked grey branches.

I read until I got to the part where it said Dissociative Identity Disorder used to be called Multiple Personality Disorder.

I looked up. “You're kidding me.”

Corinne turned from the window. “Why? The symptoms are consistent.”

I rubbed my eyeballs. “You're saying I created a personality that represents my grandfather and set it loose inside myself, and it took on a life of its own?” Actually, it did fit the symptoms. It didn't
feel
like that's what was happening, but if I stepped outside myself, it made sense. “But what about the thousands of other Atlantans? We're all doing the same thing at pretty much the same time?”

The escalating number of cases was hard to ignore. Every news station had a different estimate, and different talking heads speculating about the cause of the new epidemic.

Corinne gave me her kind smile. “Isn't that more likely than your explanation—that you've all become
possessed
at pretty much the same time? The trauma must have triggered the epidemic.”

Corinne's voice faded to a murmur. My hands were trembling, the snakes were crawling under my skin. It was happening again. My grandfather hadn't left me. Crushing disappointment and curdling terror was mixed with just a tinge of satisfaction at the timing. Corinne could tell Grandpa he was a construct of my psyche.

Corinne noticed my quavering hands and stopped. “Finn, are you all right?”

“Finn's on a little trip,” Grandpa said. He slapped his thighs and stood. “And I'm going home.” He looked around, grabbed my coat from the arm of a couch. “Hundred forty dollars an hour for this. You've got a lot of nerve, missy.”

Corinne tried to intercept Grandpa at the door. “Please, Mr. Darby. Stay for a few minutes. I'll waive the fee if you're concerned about it.” She seemed concerned that I was leaving, but maintained a professional calm.

Grandpa waved at her in disgust. “I don't want what you're selling even if you're giving it away.” He brushed past her, slammed the door behind him.

Not again. My arms swung with a wide, unfamiliar arc as Grandpa crossed the parking lot. “Maybe we should pay your grandma a visit. Don't you think, Finnegan?” He glanced at my watch. It was one thirty. Grandma's place was maybe ten minutes away; it was
possible he could make it, but if this spell was no longer than the last he wouldn't have much time once he got there. Mick was waiting for me in the park; hopefully he'd guess what happened.

Grandpa drove like a demon escaping hell. He took the first turn too sharply, his quavering hands jerky on the wheel, and we bounced over the curb, just missing a stop sign. I felt like I was watching the scenery pass by on a screen, slightly removed from all of the sensations. I could hear, see, smell, but it was as if all of it was being piped in.

“You stole from me, the both of you. Well I'm gonna straighten you out, buddy boy.” The light ahead turned yellow, then red; Grandpa pressed the gas, flew through the light. I pondered what he'd just said. Grandpa had never been a violent man; he relied on his mouth to inflict the wounds. I hoped that hadn't changed now that he'd spent time in a grave.

We pulled into Grandma's driveway, stopped just short of the garage door with a hard jerk.

Grandma eyed us warily from behind the screen door.

“Hello, Frenchie.” That's what he'd always called her—a not-so-affectionate nickname he chose because her grandfather had been French. Not waiting for an invitation Grandpa opened the door and pushed past Grandma into the living room.

Grandma hovered by the door, looking confused and scared. “Why would you call me that, Finn? I'm your grandma.”

“You're a traitor is what you are.” Grandpa pointed a shaky finger at her. “I told you, no one gets
Toy Shop
. Not Finnegan, not anyone. How long was I in the grave before you cashed me in?” He grunted. “Not long.”

“This isn't at all funny, Finn.” Her eyes darted around the room nervously, looking anywhere but at us. “I don't appreciate this. Not one bit.”

“Don't be stupid. I'm not Finn. It's Tommy. Don't you even know your own husband?”

Grandma was still clutching the door knob, as if hoping we
couldn't stay long.

Grandpa leaned in close to her. “Would you like to have your old Tommy back?”

Grandma looked up at us, all business despite the bald terror in her eyes. “That's enough, Finn.”

“I ain't Finn,” Grandpa hissed. “I'm your God damned husband.” He gripped Grandma's shoulders, pulled her forward and kissed her tightly on the mouth. Grandma writhed with alarm, trying to pull away, and so did I.

As I tried for the first time to get
away
from the outside world rather than struggling toward it, Grandpa receded. I felt the tingle of waking, surged back into my body, felt my lips on my grandmother's, my hands clutching her loose shoulders.

I leapt back, shouting in dismay as Grandma hid her face in her hands.

“I'm sorry, I'm sorry,” I babbled. “It really is Grandpa. He's inside me and I can't get him out.”

Grandma hobbled away from me, toward the kitchen, where she always went to get away from Grandpa when he was alive.

I wanted to hide under the couch. Instead I sat on it, resisting the urge to pull myself into a ball. The sound of clanking pots emerged from the kitchen.

I opened my mouth to say something. It took all of my willpower to get words out. “Grandma, it really is him. I swear to you.”

Sounds of rattling silverware, clinking glasses. Was she having a dinner party I didn't know about?

“Grandma, I'm scared to death.”

“Tommy died. I watched them put him in the ground.”

I threw my hands in the air in frustration. “All I know is he's inside me. He takes over, and when he does I'm trapped inside.” It sounded preposterous when I said it out loud, like one of those people who went on Oprah claiming they'd been abducted by aliens.

The faucet went on. Sounds of a pot filling.

“It's him. It really is,” I said impotently.

She was out of sight, her words half-drowned by the running water, but I was sure she said, “I know it is.” The cacophony went on. I wondered what she could possibly be cooking. Surely it wasn't for me. I only wanted to get out of there, and wondered as the moments stretched if I should slip out.

The sounds stopped abruptly. “Can he hear me now?” Grandma asked.

“Yes.”

She appeared in the doorway, her eyes squinted with rage that I instinctively knew was not directed at me. “You haven't kissed me in fifty years. What makes you think I'd want you to now?” As she disappeared back into her kitchen, I slipped out, stunned and embarrassed that Grandma, of all people, would reveal something so intimate in front of me.

Grandma's greatest fear had always been making a scene—standing out in a way that might make the neighbors frown and tisk. For sixty years she'd been married to a man whose specialty was making a scene. When I think about it, my grandparents had been remarkably incompatible. Grandpa lived to stand out, whether through his accomplishments or through blunt pronouncements delivered at high volume. Grandma spent her life doing everything she could to stifle him. He was making quite a scene now, and I didn't think Grandma was going to be able to keep him at bay.

Just before I closed the door, she added, “Leave me alone, or I'll tell them a few things. Don't think I won't.”

I almost went back in to ask what she meant by that, but I desperately needed to get out of there. My lips tasted of menthol Chap Stick.

I slammed the car door and, trembling, hugged my shoulders and rocked. He wasn't going away. Some part of me had known it, had sensed him peering through my eyes, waiting.

I called Mick. He'd guessed why I stranded him and was in a cab on his way home.

“So that's not the end of it.” Mick sounded profoundly disappointed. “Guess my turn's coming.”

Is that how it would go? If so, everyone else who had the voice would follow. It was hard to imagine hundreds of thousands of people being dragged around Atlanta by the dead.

As I drove I fumbled through the compartment between the seats, desperately looking for gum or mints, but there was nothing. I wiped at my lips with my shirt sleeve.

The anger, the disdain that burned right through Grandma's fear at being face to face with her dead husband, shocked me, even if it didn't surprise me. I hadn't been there when Grandpa died, but Mom had recounted the scene at Grandpa's death bed. Grandpa kept repeating, “This is miserable,” as one by one his family sat beside him to say goodbye and pay respects. When it was Grandma's turn, Grandpa glanced at her, rolled his eyes in disgust, and turned away. It was clear in that pivotal moment that Grandpa despised Grandma, that he had stayed married to her only because people of his generation did not divorce.