By quick reckoning, he figured this was his eighth jump. Driven to near insanity by the previous seven, and embroiled in the failed life of the last consciousness, a miserable life indeed, he’d expected oblivion. What else but oblivion—one doesn’t leap off a downtown Denver skyscraper expecting anything but.
The fact that he could smell coffee and feel the warm spot in the bed next to him, recently vacated, proved that whatever this was, it was most assuredly not oblivion.
He’d learned a crucial lesson after the third shift, a lesson he now practiced, stay calm and wait. Wait in silence until someone, anyone notices you and calls out your name.
Let’s see what we’ve got this time. He probed his body checking for vitals: hair, toes, aches and pains, limb count, skin color. Excellent, two eyes and two ears—operational and all my fingers. I can work with this.
A musical voice drifted from behind a bathroom door. “Rick, come on. Joanie leaves for academy in one hour and she can’t be late again.” Rick. I’m Rick and I’m married and have at least one child. Well, Joanie might be a French bulldog, so let’s not be hasty. At least this is better than last time.
‘Rick’ gave a shudder and let his mind wander back to what he estimated must be about a month ago. A month and, if previous transitions were any indication, a world away, Denver lockup with slick concrete chilling his bones. That had been his last gift of consciousness musical chairs. The accommodations, though unpleasant, were tolerable. That time, the worst part of waking up was the screaming urge to pee, but without a penis. All his previous occupations had been men. Some old, some black, some disabled, but all of them could pee standing up.
“Rick. Now would be good.”
“You got it, honey,” he said, risking an endearment that had worked in the past.
“Honey? Don’t honey me. I’ve got clients flying in from Brussels and you promised.”
Promised what? “On it.”
~~~
Simon had gotten sick and died. Or so he’d thought. For the last eight months, he’s been playing hopscotch with people’s lives. It’s not been pretty. A horrific trail of chaos and disappointment is what he would eventually come to call it.
Today, however, he struck upon a glimmer of understanding, a thread of commonality that each mind that he’d possessed thus far had exhibited. It may have been the somber environments, or the sense of desperation that coated most of the lives he’d visited. But each life had, he believed, reached that critical point that tips between living and dying.
He admitted no knowledge of where the other minds went during his visits. He’d never felt them. And so far, he’d never gone back to check up on anyone after he’d moved on.
I’ve made a mess of things, I’m sure of it. And I’m fairly certain that this is not working out for anyone involved. But damn if I know how to fix it.
Anonymole - apocryphal agitators 
I love love this! I hope it’s going to be part of something bigger (excellent punctuation, but the way).
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A very good friend once said to me “Same lives, different houses.” Which put me on to a Mother Teresa, or some other Saint maybe who said the best way to greet anyone is with kindness. Because everyone is fighting wars and demons we know nothing about. And our real job here is to heal each other, not hand out MEMEs about how some saviour or other is going to drop in for breakfast with healing powers and fart us a miracle. So these fit right in there. As far as another Quantum Leap clone with a twist is concerned, why the hell not?
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Quantum Leap, you’re right. I hadn’t remembered that show. But a quick lookup verified the possession aspect. But it wasn’t really possession – more like replacement for a time. But very close, I agree. Thanks for pointing that out.
I’d have to overlay, say, all the emotional burden the posssessed person had been feeling to change it up. Mainly I wanted to explore thoughts of suicide and how one’s situation and environment impacts one’s future, given that context.
(I’m reading Strunk’s Elements of Style and really trying to get a handle on proper punctuation, which continues to elude me.)
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Dave,
Very intriguing and spooky at the same time. Could be an idea for a standalone short story within a collection of short stories.
It seems to me that you have a vast number of intriguing ideas coming from a deep well of thoughts. For example your recent large cache of September scenes.
You might want to consider choosing to complete some of these and other of your visions/ideas into a collection of short stories separately or around a common thread of ideas and or moods/feeling states.
This could be a way to create a body of complete visions/statements/worlds which in finding completion could also work to open the essence and essential mechanics of the way to writing what will one day be your own epic statement about life.
You have something important to say to the world.
Mike
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Is this a one-off scene or a potential new larger story? Because this one begs to be continued. Or maybe that’s me, begging you to continue it.
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Yeah, anything I drop in directly to anonymole is me trying to test the waters, toying with ideas.
The trope is one I’ve vaguely heard of before, but here I’d like to take the religion out of it, adopt a metaphysical bent, and enjoy the fumbling/discovery of the main character.
We’ve all seen movies regarding “possession”, but I may want to see if there’s a purposeful aspect to the concept. Randomly jump in, fix ’em up or fuck ’em up royally, and jump out. And if there’s anything to learn about the process.
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