—a slim pink doll, a Barbie or a Wendy (the resolution was not clear enough) – a puppy dog, me calling its name: Rumbo – a boy, a surge of love here – the sea, a wonderful calm sea that was green then blue – a jolt, an accident of some kind, an arm in pain, soon gone – guilt, guilt, guilt, more sorrow, visions of a man, an indistinct person, a woman behind him, and I knew that he was my lover and the woman was his wife, deep, deep grief, a terrible wrench of emotions, the affair soon over – the sea again, beautifully warm and calm—
I soaked up tiny segments of the victim’s life just before they faded, before they finally left the storehouse of flesh, bone and tissue.
—the mother again, love still present, but also a stronger dislike – bad times, black times, it all came to me, some moments witnessed as through a kaleidoscope, while others were individual and sharply defined, some fleeting, others lasting mere seconds that felt like long periods – thoughts, energies, flowed through, but fading, fading all the time, dwindling, waning, as if growing weary themselves – now an office, a workplace; computer screens, faces, mixed emotions, snap visions that somehow were complete – an apartment, simply but tastefully furnished, a warmth for that place, and now a black-and-white cat called Tibbles – people, friends – leaving the office—
And then it all changed: darkness entered, slowly at first until it was almost absolute; it brought with it fear . . .
—and terror, heart-freezing terror – a lonely walk down into shadows, a sense of danger – the car, very near the car – shambling footsteps from behind – all these last sounds and images felt with a resurgence of power – pain, terrible pain and screaming fear! – the darkness strong, peaking before starting to drain away – fading, wasting away – until there was only light . . .
Inside her, I reeled under the pressure of it all, some of her terror left with me. I willed myself to be calm, aware that if those last sensations had gone on any longer I would have fled the cold flesh that now bound me. I felt myself trembling, even though that wasn’t possible. Her death had been horrible and the suffering had continued even after the heart had stopped.
I steadied myself. I was in a void; nothing else of the woman was left. The body was without any trace of its previous owner.
It was time for me to subjugate it. I prayed for it to be possible.
I settled my mind and it was surprisingly easy to do. Despite everything I’d been witness to that night, despite my fear and anxiety, I soothed my own consciousness by repeating the exercise I had used to travel outside my own body.
Deep, deep breaths (pretend breaths now, obviously), long, long exhalations. Addressing each part of my non-physical form, starting with the absent toes and moving up my non-existent legs, then invisible groin, working my way through my impalpable belly, chest, shoulders, arms right to my indiscernible head, willing them all to relax. Then, instead of commanding myself to move out of my physical form (usually by concentrating on one specific spot near the ceiling of whatever room I was in – mostly the bedroom – and willing my inner self to go there), I forced myself to become part of the vessel I now inhabited. That in life I’d been much bigger than the unfortunate woman seemed to make no difference – I still had to ‘fill out’ her human shape. I felt myself flow into her, strangely expanding rather than shrinking, sensing myself into her muscles and bones and organs. Occasionally, a fragment of her memory would return, but always too weak to linger.
My fingers slipped into hers. My stomach and chest moulded themselves to the inner side of her skin. Bit by bit I took over her shape, feeling my way in, and suffering no discomfort as I did so. Earlier, it had taken Moker practically no time at all to possess his victim, but he’d had more practice than I. Briefly I wondered if this was how demons possessed certain afflicted human beings (I’d never believed in demonic possession before, but these days I’m more susceptible to all manner of possibilities).
Once I felt myself totally absorbed, I endeavoured to move her right hand. I slipped out of her.
Drawing my own hand back again and sliding into her fingers as though they were the digits of a glove, I took more deep breaths and concentrated even harder, thinking of myself as at one with her.
Her hand shifted just a little.
Eventually, taking over the dead woman’s body proved relatively easy (although controlling it was much more difficult). It was a matter of ‘thinking’ myself into what was in essence a vacated property, a kind of Zen thing, if you like. As I mentioned before, it was a matter of being ‘at one with her’, not quite taking over the lifeless flesh and blood, but becoming part of it; not wearing it, but being it. Because I’d had practice at projecting my inner self to other places outside my ‘shell’, it wasn’t that difficult for me to project myself into the other person’s body. Difficult to explain, and not that easy to do; but if you already had the knack, it helped.
Now being inside, ‘fitting’ the new body, was all well and good, but getting it to obey my will was something else. I got used to moving the right hand first, then the arm up to the elbow. Getting a reaction from the rest of the body was a little harder, but perseverance paid off. Remember, I was still very shaken, so it took a lot of effort just to calm myself; controlling somebody else’s body needed full concentration. It came though, the ability to govern came gradually at first, and then with a rush. The trick was not to try too hard but to relax and just sink into it.
Sitting up wasn’t so bad, although the alien body felt heavy and cumbersome, but rising to my feet was almost impossible. You see, living inside your own body, adapting to its growth over the years, you’re not aware of its weight so much, but occupying somebody else’s is like trying on a suit of armour – armour that’s made out of lead. You have to get used to it, and even then motion is awkward. Moker had obviously become skilled at it with practice, but even when he had possessed the woman’s corpse, movement had been a little stiff and graceless.
First problem, though, was vision. Everything was blurred through the victim’s eyes and I remembered she had worn glasses, which were now missing, obviously knocked off during the vicious attack by the scummy threesome. I used both clumsy hands to feel around the concrete step and, although the fingertips were numb, I felt something move. It took a little while to pick up the glasses – it was like wearing thick gloves without individual fingers – and I dropped them more than once. Eventually, I got them over the nose and managed to fumble the side arms through the hair and over the ears. One of the lenses had cracked, but vision improved, not as much as I had hoped, but enough to enable me to find my way around.
I was a mere novice, but I was determined to succeed. I had a plan.
Using the brick wall of the recessed doorway for support and balance, I slowly hauled myself up, rising to my (her) knees first, raising one leg so shin and thigh were at right angles to each other, then, digging my (her) fingers into the indentations between bricks for extra support, I used all my willpower and the woman’s waning strength to stand. (Fortunately for me, she had lost her shoes in the fracas with the three men, so I didn’t have to worry about high heels.) I made it, but instantly fell back against the metal door where I stayed for several minutes, legs spread and firmly rooted to the wide doorstep, the rest of me (her) trembling. With a whole lot of effort, I managed to adjust the woman’s clothing, dragging up panties and hose, buttoning (almost impossible, this, but I persevered) the jacket.
I felt dizzy, as though I was too high off the ground, the feeling you get when you ride a bike or climb onto a horse for the first time. And when I pushed myself away from the door and tried to walk, my legs felt like long stilts.
I fell off the step and had to go through the whole process of rising once again. It was almost but not quite like learning to walk for the first time (I suppose an amputee who has been given prosthetic legs must go through a similar procedure) and, believe me, it wasn’t easy. I stumbled and fell twice more before I reached the street junction.
However, although my gait was clumsy and somewhat perilous, my arms waving in the air for balance, I soon began to get used to walking. By the time I reached the main thoroughfare of Queensway, I resembled only a hopeless drunk.
The journey through the London streets was horrendous. Luckily it was late night, and once I’d moved out of the Queensway area, the sidestreets became darker again and virtually deserted. The few people who did pass me by must have thought I was either drunk or drugged by the way I lurched along and used walls where I could for support. Heads turned, a few people crossed over to the other side of the street before they reached me. A group of young guys laughed at me, yelling insults and suggestions of what we all might do together, but they soon lost interest and went on their way when I ignored them.
One person, an elderly, scruffily dressed man, approached me and asked if I was all right and if he could assist me in any way. I don’t know whether it was my blood-drenched clothes, my battered face, the stench of urine coming from me, or the way I babbled and gurgled as I attempted to reply, that deterred him. Possibly – probably – it was all of these things. He backed off and I stumbled onwards.
It was quite a hike and I wasn’t sure I was going to make it. When the body dies it doesn’t take muscles long to start atrophying, so I was becoming weaker by the minute. The fact that blood had stopped coursing through the arteries was neither here nor there – I wasn’t alive, so I didn’t need it – but the fact that it was settling into my lower legs and feet made it feel as if I were wearing lead boots. Also, the increasing coldness was rendering the corpse ever more stiff. By the time I reached the police station I was moving like Frankenstein’s monster.
All through the journey I had been trying to speak, something that brought me extra stares from infrequent (fortunately) passers-by. To them, not only was I drunk and dishevelled, but I was crazy also.
The idea was to be able to talk coherently when I got to my destination: I had a tale to tell and a name to name. This was an extra hurdle though, and far more difficult than making the body walk. It took a while to produce any noise at all, and then it was only a raspy whispering which sounded something like ‘Unurrrrgahh’. Not very good, but the best I could do to start with.
I kept trying to pronounce certain words, simple ones at first – ‘cat, sat, mat’, that kind of thing, but all that came out was: ‘ca, sa, ma’. I persisted though, struggling to walk, striving to talk. And although in my out-of-body state I had lost all sense of physical feeling (passing through walls and the like were mental sensations), I felt a distinct chill enveloping me. It was like wearing a heavy suit that had been left outside on a frigid winter’s night. How long before rigor mortis started to take over? I wondered. Usually it started about forty-five minutes to an hour after death, I seemed to remember from somewhere.
I plodded on, sliding a hand along walls for balance, hanging on to lamp posts along the way, summoning up extra willpower to cross roads where there was nothing to grab hold of should my knees buckle, unable to avoid traffic (mercifully, there was very little), so forcing myself to stand stock-still while cars and the occasional bus manoeuvred around me instead. Abuse was hurled at me, horns were tooted, but I was oblivious. I only had one thing in mind and that was to reach my goal before flesh and bone gave up.
Having lived in the city all my life, I knew where to find the local police station and my mind was sharp enough to recognize roads and streets. How long I’d been travelling, I had no idea: it could have been an hour or only half an hour. Whatever, the effort was draining my resolve.
I saw a big flyover up ahead and it gave me hope, because it meant I was close. For a short while my rambling gait – somewhere between Liam Gallagher’s swagger and Ozzy Osbourne’s shuffle – actually quickened, but it couldn’t last long. Against my will, I slowed down and one foot began to drag. And then I saw the building I was looking for in the distance and the sight of it gave me fresh determination. I stepped off the kerb, almost tripping in my sudden haste, but managed to recover before falling; it was a particularly ungainly moment, my arms bending in all sorts of ways. Someone whistled at me, then laughed, but no one came to my aid, and perhaps that was a good thing.
Still attracting curious stares (there were a few more people on this main road) I stomped ungracefully towards my goal. Reaching the other side, I had difficulty in raising a foot to mount the pavement. My toenail scraped the kerbstone to find the higher level and I leaned forward so that my weight was on that leg, then dragged my other foot after the first. It didn’t work out so well – I lost my balance and toppled over onto the pavement. Luckily, I didn’t go all the way down, ending up sitting on the ground, one hand against the stone, my legs spread sideways, knees bent. I remained in that position for a minute or two, trying to regain my composure and psyching myself for the effort it would now take to get me on my feet again.
That was when I caught sight of the last thing in the world that I wanted to see.
Coming towards me on the opposite side of the road was Moker’s old beat-up Hillman, its sidelights shining like warning beacons. I knew whose shadowy figure was behind the wheel and I groaned. With the groan I swore out loud and at least the word was fairly coherent (to my own ears at least).
Moker obviously hadn’t seen me, for the vehicle was coming straight ahead without slowing. Now instinct should have made me hide my face, maybe roll myself into an inconspicuous ball, but making somebody else’s body react sharply was not so easy. For some reason I ended up on all fours like a dog, my head raised and facing towards the approaching car.
Moker hit the brakes as soon as he saw me and in that instant I realized that he’d been cruising the neighbourhood searching for me. He must have collected his car from the car park (no doubt using the quiet side EXIT/ENTRANCE to reach it) and returned to the secluded cul-de-sac where he had left the woman’s battered corpse to find it gone. What a shock that must have been for him.
So he’d come looking for his prize, perhaps wondering if the Arabs had carried it off – or perhaps even suspecting another spirit had somehow stolen his right. And now his search had proved successful. He’d spotted me. And I was helpless.
32
I struggled to get to my feet again (okay, it was the dead woman’s feet, but to keep on mentioning that gets tedious) but could only fumble around on the pavement, my legs becoming stubbornly obstinate. The Hillman, which had not been travelling very fast in the first place, slid to a halt. Masked by hat and scarf, Moker looked out the side window at me.
I scrambled around in panic, but my legs refused to obey me. Each time I attempted to bend a knee the leg declined to fold. Moker was looking about, no doubt making sure the coast was clear for him to bundle me into the boot of the car, when an Audi arrived behind him. The irritated driver tooted his horn and yelled at the obstacle in his way, and Moker looked back at him; either surprise or anger might have been on his face if he’d had a face. He unwound his side window, not a speedy process in the old Hillman, and indicated for the other driver to go around him, but fortunately for me, the guy was the obstreperous kind and saw no reason why he should have to go out of his way to avoid another vehicle that was wrongly parked in the middle of the road (it was a very wide road, but that wasn’t the point). He continued to thump his horn and swear at Moker.
Moker had obviously decided that it would be easier to move than engage in a haranguing match, because he drove on, pulling into the kerb on his side of the road. I took the opportunity to try to get up again, but without much joy: my legs kept collapsing each time I tried to kneel. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Moker starting the first move of a three-point turn and I groaned in frustration.
Suddenly, I was gripped under the arms by strong hands and hauled to my unsteady feet. A big woman with butch, short blonde hair and no make-up came around from behind me, one hand hanging onto my arm to prevent me from falling again. She wore a dark jacket with dark slacks, the collar of a pale-blue s
hirt spread over the neck and lapels of the jacket, its long tips pointing towards the nipples of wide and ample breasts.
‘You all right, dear?’ I heard her ask in a surprisingly high voice given the masculinity of her build. Her only adornments, I saw, were a pair of large, round and dangly earrings.
‘Muh . . . ma . . . yeh-es,’ I managed to reply.
Although her face began to waver in front of me, my vision beginning to fail, I still caught the look of disgust she gave me when she noticed my state and smelled the blood and urine (and other stuff!) on my clothes. She began to back away, not through fear, I guessed, but from revulsion. I was aware that I was not a pretty sight, nor very well perfumed, but I held up a pleading hand to her anyway. She continued to back off and I couldn’t blame her: I wasn’t the finest figure to come face to face with, especially at that hour (well, any hour, really).
‘Hel . . . hel . . . me . . .’ I muttered, but it was no good; she turned on her heel (sensible brogues, actually) and walked away from me.
More beeping of horns sounded and I slowly craned my neck to look back at Moker. Seemed he’d become a nuisance to other drivers, for he was sideways across the road, blocking the paths of two more vehicles, one of them a late-night bus. They were causing quite a racket, although the noise suddenly dwindled in my borrowed ears. Oh shit, now my hearing was going.
I began to walk, following the big woman who’d just become a blur in the distance by now. She soon passed the front entrance of the police station I was aiming for, and I thought it a pity that she hadn’t popped inside to report a battered madwoman on the loose.
I moved one foot in front of the other, one in front of the other, one in front of the other, concentrating hard as I tried to say the words.
‘Un . . . an . . . funt . . . of . . . udder . . .’ Practising all the way, forcing my stiff legs to move. ‘Un . . . in . . . funt . . . o . . . udder . . . one . . . in . . . front . . . of . . . udder . . .’