The Game (19 page)

Chapter 41

S
he woke up in a strange room with light blue walls and a brown ceiling fan casually swatting the air. She didn’t know where she was, but even worse, she didn’t know who she was.

Flipping the sheets off the bed, she stood. The mirrors on the closet reflected her form and nothing was out of place. She looked exactly as she always had. Chestnut-brown hair and light amber eyes. It made no sense to her that she knew what she was supposed to look like but had no idea who she was.

Suddenly it came to her. Candice, she knew her name was Candice. She was unsure how she knew this but it just made sense. There was something she was supposed to know right there at the tip of her brain, but she couldn’t grab it.

Her heart started racing. She walked quickly to the open closet and started searching for some clothes to slip on. She chose some blue jeans and a red long-sleeve form-fitting shirt. She spotted some white and blue jogging sneakers and slid them on.

The fact that everything fit her perfectly was confusing. She went back into the room and saw a purse hanging on the door handle. She quickly rifled through until she found a wallet.

A New York driver’s license said she was Eve Martin. The name wasn’t familiar. It was her face staring back at her, but it wasn’t her name.

“Eve, are you ready to go?” a man yelled to her from somewhere. She didn’t know how to react.

“Yo, Eve,” he yelled again. “Are you alive up there or what? I gotta get going.”

She slowly followed the hallway to the top of the steps and looked over the railing to an open hardwood-floored living area with tan walls. A man was standing at the base of the stairs wearing a suit.

“Jesus, you’re not even dressed yet?” the man said. “C’mon, Eve, I can’t be late today. Get your shit together and let’s go!”

This all seemed oddly familiar. She looked down at her body, to make sure she was actually dressed. “I am dressed.”

The man laughed. “Yeah, okay. Stop screwing around. If you’re not dressed in five minutes, I’m leaving.”

“Just go without me.”

“Seriously? Jesus, Eve. Why couldn’t you call me? Just because I’m your brother doesn’t mean you can leave out common courtesy. Thanks for screwing up my Monday.” He turned and walked out the door, slamming it hard.

She sighed in relief and started going through the small apartment. This all seemed so common. It was almost like a fit of déjà vu. Downstairs in the kitchen, she found some car keys and headed outside.

The parking lot was long and narrow. The condominium complex was large, filled with expansive two-story red brick buildings. She started searching for a car that belonged to the keys. She jogged around, pressing the key-fob, waiting for a car to respond. Finally, a silver Toyota Camry chirp-chirped.

She got into the car and quickly drove away. Frantically, she sped down the block, looking around in a panic. Then she pulled over. It became clear she had no idea where she was going. She couldn’t think of where to go, so she decided to just stop.

Stepping out of the car, she looked around the street. It was an affluent neighborhood. Trees lined the road along both sides and down the center island. The wispy poplar trees had shed most of their leaves for the winter but there were a few evergreens still looking lush. Some sort of jasmine scent carried on the air.

She opened the wallet again, making sure the name was the same. It still read Eve Martin, but she knew, factually, that was not her name. Then it came to her — the name Lukas. It meant something to her but she wasn’t sure exactly what.

Getting back into the car, she turned around to go back towards the apartment. But she didn’t know which way to go. She took out the wallet again and looked at the address on the driver’s license.

Candice was unfamiliar with this part of New York. She’d heard of the town Islip, she’d just never been there. She drove around until finally she found the condominiums and pulled back into the lot. She turned off the car, sat there, and cried.

Chapter 42

L
ukas pushed Candice close to the window. “Check out that ocean, the waves look awesome today. Maybe later I’ll take you out to the beach after the nurse comes.”

Candice hadn’t spoken in weeks. Since that night in the woods behind her mother’s house, she’d been mostly catatonic. The bullets Rena had put in her back missed her spine, so the paralysis wasn’t a physical condition. The blood loss was life threatening, but after a transfusion of two bags, her levels came around.

He sat next to her bed in ICU for five days. When she was healthy enough to leave, he rented a van and drove her to Florida, hoping she’d wake up.

Lukas knew the truth, though he couldn’t explain it to the doctors. He knew the truth because he lived it. Somewhere, right now, Candice was likely living in another person’s body just as he had for years. He knew it in his heart. The traumatic event must have spurred her into this condition, just as his had all those years ago. He knew it as soon as he saw that moon phase.

He walked around and knelt in front of her. Her eyes stared off into oblivion, she didn’t see him. “Candice, I know you’re in there. I wish I knew how to reach you. I know you’re afraid right now, that world is lonely. I don’t know what lesson you’re supposed to be learning or how long it will take, but I’ll be here for you, waiting.”

Lukas turned when he sensed someone come into the room.

The nurse from the agency was early. “Sorry to interrupt, Mr. Raven.”

“Please, Aileen, call me Lukas.”

“Sorry, I forgot. Lukas.” She was a tall, thin brunette with short, shaggy hair and large round blue eyes. She was a good nurse, a nice person with a sweet demeanor.

“It’s okay. I’ll get out of your way.”

He started to walk out of the spacious living room area, glancing up to the vaulted ceilings when Aileen stopped him.

“Lukas, can I ask you something?”

He turned. “Sure.”

“What’s the deal between…I mean, you’re not married. A lot of men wouldn’t stick it out.” She nodded over to Candice. Then she shook her head. “You know what? This is none of my business. That was highly unprofessional of me. I’m sorry I said anything. I didn’t mean to pry.” She turned toward Candice to wheel her into the bathroom for her shower.

“Aileen, it’s okay.” She turned again to face him. “I can understand your curiosity. And you may be right, a lot of people might have bailed on this situation. But I love her, and I know she’s in there somewhere. I know she’ll come back to me.”

Aileen nodded thoughtfully. “That’s beautiful. I wouldn’t have pried, but a couple of the girls asked me about you. You’re one heck of a guy.” She turned back and took hold of Candice’s wheelchair pushed it down the hallway.

Lukas didn’t mind spending the money on the nursing service. In fact, he preferred it. Not because he didn’t want to help Candice but because he felt it was best for her health if a professional tended to her needs. They bathed her, exercised her, and fed her a liquid diet. That was the one odd thing about the catatonic condition. The body couldn’t chew, but it could involuntarily swallow through a straw. Liquid nutrients could sustain them. It apparently worked for him when he needed it.

Wherever Candice’s soul was right now, he knew it was close to returning. He could feel it. She was going to wake up any day now. At least he hoped so.

He walked up the steps to the roof of the house to overlook the ocean. The roof featured an amazing view of Sanibel Island and the water. Every day at sunset, he came up here and meditated on reaching Candice somehow. He didn’t know what he was doing, or even if it was possible. But he knew there had to be some connection, there had to be a reason.

Sometimes things that were seemingly random and nonsensical in the chaos of the scientific Universe had some meaning. A dandelion seed blowing in the wind was random but it had a purpose. He hoped his thoughts had a purpose, and that the wind could carry the seed of his thoughts into Candice’s world, wherever that might be.

“Eve. Hey, Eve!” Candice wasn’t used to answering to that name. She looked across the table at the young blonde with the lip ring. “Earth to Eve.”

“Sorry,” she replied. “I’m just not with it today.”

“Are you high already?” The girl laughed and took out a baggie filled with tan powder.

“What the heck is that?” Candice-being-Eve asked.

The girl looked at her like she was crazy. “What the hell do you think it is?”

“You’re not doing that here.”

“Eve, you’re the one that called me yesterday and told me to bring it over.” The girl took out a cigarette, touched her tongue to the tip and dipped the cigarette into the bag to coat it.

“What is that?”

“This is prime grade. This shit will send you into la-la-land for an hour with one puff.” The girl took out a lighter and sucked the flame into the cigarette, incinerating the powder. Her eyes flickered and she sat back into the chair. “Oh, that’s good shit.” She took out another cigarette and handed it to Candice.

“No thanks.”

The girl smiled. “Taking a break? The way I left you last night I thought you were going to die, so maybe you do need a break.” The girl laughed. “I actually texted you after I left to make sure you were still alive.”

“Did I text you back?”

The girl laughed again. “No, you didn’t.”

Candice suddenly had a feeling she did die last night. Then she remembered Lukas. She stood up from the table. “Holy shit!” And in a rush, everything came back to her. She knew who she was and what was happening. “Oh, this is not happening. How did this happen? It happened to me.”

“What the hell are you babbling about, girl?”

As if by some compulsion she took hold of the drug bag, stuck her nose in and breathed in as hard as she could. She heard the girl screaming at her, demanding to know what she was doing, why she would do such a thing and how crazy it was. But the world was spinning away, everything fading from her vision. Air wouldn’t balloon into her lungs and all body functions started to betray her. She convulsed and fell to the floor.

She woke up gasping for air and pushing her hands through the sticks, leaves and debris that covered her.

Rolling over on her face, her body shook and finally she was able to breathe. She was covered in mud, face down, in the middle of a field. She struggled to her knees. After a few minutes she stood. The uneven ground was a struggle but she managed to lurch into a purposeful walk.

She looked at her body. Her clothes were filthy and torn, and different than the ones she had worn before.

Out of the field, she came to the edge of a rural two-lane street. The sunlight hit her face and a wicked thirst hit her mouth. A red compact car crawled slowly down the street, stopping a few yards from her.

The driver got out, an older woman with long brown hair. She walked around the front of the car, staring at her in wonder. “Vicky?” The woman pulled out a phone and started dialing. “This is Rose Allminger. I’m over on Sleepy Pine Road. I just found Vicky Bogner and she’s alive.”

Chapter 43

C
andice knew she wasn’t Victoria Bogner. But no one was going to believe that. They were all certain she was. She looked just the same as she always had, but everyone around knew her as Vicky. Pictures on the mantle, above the fireplace, had her face in the family photos.

She knew Candice was her name, but that’s all. Her memories were confusing, something felt oddly out of place. Then she suddenly remembered again. She had just been Eve Martin, and she’d died of a drug overdose.

Then she recalled everything. Lukas and what he’d lived through. She remembered the game and Angus. But something was missing. No matter how much she tried, there was a blank spot. She didn’t understand why this had happened to her. Part of her was sure she was somehow dreaming. Maybe Lukas never rescued her from the game. Maybe it was still going on.

“Vic, what do you want for dinner?” A well-dressed woman in her forties with a blonde pixie cut addressed her from the doorway next to the fireplace.

At first, Candice didn’t remember this woman, but then it came back to her. This was Vicky’s mother. “Umm, whatever.”

The woman came over and sat on the white leather couch next to her. “Honey, I know you said you didn’t want to talk about it, but it might do you some good. I know those three days must have been horrifying for you.”

She wanted to agree, but the truth was she had no memory of whatever Vicky lived through. After the woman found her on the street and the police interviewed her, she gathered that Victoria Bogner was missing for three days. She was last seen buying a pair of jeans at a local store. Then a parking lot camera spotted her about to get into her car when a still unknown assailant abducted her.

It had been all over the local news. She had stumbled right into one of the search party leaders.

“Honey,” The woman held her hand. “You can tell me. Do you really not remember who did this to you? Or are you afraid of him? Was it Grant?”

“I don’t know.”

“Okay dear. I’m going to make your favorite roasted chicken with mashed potatoes, and Amanda is making her famous apple pie.” She stood.

“Umm…”

She turned back to face Candice-being-Victoria. “What is it?”

Candice didn’t know how to ask the question. It just occurred to her she had no idea where she was. “Never mind.”

After a nice dinner with a nice family, she started to understand why Lukas had so much trouble assuming an identity. These people were well-adjusted. They were, well, nice. But none of that mattered. As she rummaged through Victoria’s belongings, all the details of the girl’s life came into focus.

Victoria was living at home in her parents’ basement after a bad breakup. The driver’s license indicated she was in Andover, New Jersey. She didn’t know the town that well, but she was aware of where it was in proximity to other New Jersey towns.

She understood the compulsions that had gripped Lukas all those years. As easy as it might seem from the outside to just become these people and live their lives, she desperately wanted to get back and learn what happened.

A horrible feeling of guilt overcame her for what she’d done to Eve Martin. What she did amounted to suicide, and it made her want to vomit. But some compulsion overcame her to just suck that poison into her lungs.

Using the computer on the desk, she did a search on Eve Martin. Much to her shock there was an article saying Eve died two weeks ago from a drug overdose. She could not believe it had been two weeks. This must have been some mistake. It only felt like yesterday.

She wanted to search herself, but for the life of her couldn’t remember her last name. It was monumentally frustrating to recall so little of her life. It was like everything was blank except for what she recalled about Lukas and his body leaping. It was as if she was only allowed to recall things that could explain her situation at a bare minimum.

She tried really hard to think of the people in her life. She must have had friends and family, but none of it was coming to her. The oddest part of all was that it wasn’t sad. It should have been. No knowing who you were should make you sad. Instead it drove her forward to find out what she couldn’t remember.

The house was dark, everyone long since in bed. But she couldn’t sleep. Instead, she crept out of the basement and upstairs, where she fished a pair of keys off the key holder by the front door. It was the compulsion driving her, she didn’t really want to go anywhere, but something told her she must. It was as if she had no free will.

She climbed into the black Volkswagen Jetta and backed into the street. Where she was going wasn’t as important as just going somewhere. She just wanted to drive for a while and clear her head. The roads were dark and rural. A soft curve led to a short downhill.

As she reached the apex of the next hill, high-beams blasted into her rearview mirror. Then with a roar, the car behind slammed into her. She struggled for control of the sedan but a much bigger vehicle dominated it and in a few seconds, she was spinning out of control into the grass, flipping over with a jarring crash.

The car came to rest upright again. Her heart was pounding, her hands shaking, but otherwise she was fine. Before she could undo the seatbelt, the door was ripped open, and a man with a buzz-cut stared at her with crazy eyes.

“I guess I’d better make sure this time.” He raised a shotgun and pumped two rounds into her body.