R

Does she really want to know, or is she just being polite? I feel as if she could be talking to anybody. And while I once thought what I wanted from her was this normal, everyday tone, now that I have it, the normalcy disappoints.

I write her back and tell her about the last two days. Then I tell her I have to go—I can’t skip school today, because Sallie Swain has a big cross-country meet, and it wouldn’t be fair for her to miss it.

I run. I am made for running. Because when you run, you could be anyone. You hone yourself into a body, nothing more or less than a body. You respond as a body, to the body. If you are racing to win, you have no thoughts but the body’s thoughts, no goals but the body’s goals. You obliterate yourself in the name of speed. You negate yourself in order to make it past the finish line.

Day 6013

I am an hour and a half away from her, and I am part of a happy family.

The Stevens family does not let Saturdays go to waste. No, Mrs. Stevens wakes Daniel up at nine o’clock on the dot and tells him to get ready for a drive. By the time he’s out of the shower, Mr. Stevens has loaded the car, and Daniel’s two sisters are raring to go.

First stop in Baltimore is the art museum for a Winslow Homer exhibit. Then there’s lunch at Inner Harbor, followed by a long trip to the aquarium. Then an IMAX version of a Disney movie, for the girls, and dinner at a seafood restaurant that’s so famous they don’t feel the need to put the word famous in their name.

There are brief moments of tension—a sister who is bored by the dolphins, a spot where Dad gets frustrated about the lack of available parking spaces. But for the most part, everyone remains happy. They are so caught up in their happiness that they don’t realize I’m not really a part of it. I am wandering along the periphery. I am like the people in the Winslow Homer paintings, sharing the same room with them but not really there. I am like the fish in the aquarium, thinking in a different language, adapting to a life that’s not my natural habitat. I am the people in the other cars, each with his or her own story, but passing too quickly to be noticed or understood.

It is a good day, and that certainly helps me more than a bad day. There are moments when I don’t think about her, or even think about me. There are moments I just sit in my frame, float in my tank, ride in my car and say nothing, think nothing that connects me to anything at all.

Day 6014

I am forty minutes away from her.

It’s Sunday, so I decide to see what Reverend Poole is up to.

Orlando, the boy whose body I’m in, rarely wakes before noon on Sunday, so if I keep my typing quiet, his parents will leave me alone.

Reverend Poole has set up a website for people to tell their stories of possession. Already there are hundreds of posts and videos.

Nathan’s post is perfunctory, as if it’s been summarized from his earlier statements. He has not made a video. I don’t learn anything new.

Other stories are more elaborate. Some are clearly the work of nutjobs—clinically paranoid people who need professional help, not arenas in which to vent their hyperbolic conspiracy theories. Other testimonials, however, are almost painfully sincere. There’s a woman who genuinely feels that Satan struck her at the checkout line in the supermarket, filling her with the urge to steal. And there’s a man whose son killed himself, who believes that the son must have been possessed by real demons, rather than fighting the more metaphorical ones inside.

Since I only inhabit people around my age, I look for the teenagers. Poole must screen each and every thing that appears on the site, because there’s no parody, no sarcasm. So teenagers are few and far between. There is one, however, from Montana, whose story makes me shiver. He says he was possessed, but only for one day. Nothing major happened, but he knows he wasn’t in control of his body.

I have never been to Montana. I’m sure of it.

But what he’s describing is a lot like what I do.

There is a link on Poole’s site:

IF YOU BELIEVE THE DEVIL IS WITHIN YOU,

CLICK HERE OR CALL THIS NUMBER.

But if the devil is truly within you, why would he click or call?

I go on my old email and find that Nathan’s tried to get in touch with me again.

No proof, then?

Get help.

He even attaches the link to Poole’s page. I want to write back to him and point out that he and I talked just the other day. I want him to ask his friend AJ how his Monday was. I want him to fear that I could be there at any moment, in any person.

No, I think. Don’t feel that way.

It was so much easier when I didn’t want anything.

Not getting what you want can make you cruel.

I check my other email and find another message from Rhiannon. She tells me vaguely about her weekend and asks me vaguely about my weekend.

I try to sleep for the rest of the day.

Day 6015

I wake up, and I’m not four hours away from her, or one hour, or even fifteen minutes.

No, I wake up in her house.

In her room.

In her body.

At first I think I’m still asleep, dreaming. I open my eyes, and I could be in any girl’s room—a room she’s lived in for a long time, with Madame Alexander dolls sharing space with eyeliner pencils and fashion magazines. I am sure it is only a dreamworld trick when I access my identity and find it’s Rhiannon who appears. Have I had this dream before? I don’t think so. But in a way, it makes sense. If she’s the thought, the hope, the concern underneath my every waking moment, then why wouldn’t she permeate my sleeping hours as well?