Josh

JOSH

I slowly open my eyes, blinking at the ceiling.

Whoa, there are a lot of Christmas lights in this place , is my first thought. They’re sort of familiar lights, too.

It’s because they’re yours, genius.

Oh. Right.

There’s something about that thought sequence that’s familiar too. Like déjà vu. I’ve been here before.

I stare at the ceiling as a strange sense of hollowness opens up inside me.

I slowly look to the left and then to the right.

The hollowness expands.

What the fuck?

But I was just?—

How—

What. The. Fuck?!

I sit up and look around.

No. No, no, no, no, no, no.

My mouth is suddenly extremely dry, and my heart is now beating somewhere in my throat as I whip my head to the left and right.

This has to be a joke. How am I back here? Or better yet, why am I back here? Is this, like… Groundhog Day now? Body swapping wasn’t enough already?

I scramble toward the edge of the desk and almost topple over it in my rush to get to Gabriel.

My eyes land on him immediately. It takes a moment for my brain to compute what I’m seeing.

It’s Gabriel. He’s passed out on the floor.

And it’s Gabriel.

In his own body.

Does that mean…?

My hand is shaking when I lift it up.

When I was nine years old, I fell off the monkey bars at the playground and broke my arm. Bone right through the skin.

And yup. There’s the scar.

Just to be sure, I hold my wrist up and study the face of my smartwatch. There’s a second there, right before the screen lights up, when I can see my own reflection in the dark display.

Me.

My face.

I slowly lower my arm and lick my dry lips.

I’m going insane, right? That’s the only logical conclusion. Insanity. So… I gave Gabriel and myself an electric shock. We both passed out. And I spent the time I was passed out having some crazy dream where I switched bodies with Gabriel and went to Vermont to visit his family for Christmas.

That… that makes sense. It’s the version that… makes sense.

And yeah, okay, it felt real . But for Christ’s sake, that doesn’t mean it was . It’s infinitely more likely that I accidentally fried my brain while I was busy experimenting with electricity, and that’s what caused the very vivid dream.

I swallow hard.

I honestly don’t know why I feel disappointed right now.

I got my body back. Or, well, technically it seems I never left it, so there was nothing to get back, and we’re all good.

Just to be sure though, I quietly slide myself off the long conference table. I walk through the silent hallways to the bathroom. I flick on the lights, walk inside, and look into the mirror.

There’s a confusing moment there when I actually feel disappointed to see my own reflection looking back at me. I stare at myself and the grim look on my face, and a snort filled with disbelief escapes.

Why do I feel like I’ve lost something?

I rub my palms over my face.

Lingering insanity. Great.

I clutch the edges of the sink and hang my head.

So all that stuff… Gabriel and seeing that different side of him and talking to him and snow fights and late-night snacks and… That wasn’t real. None of it was. It was just something my brain made up. For reasons, I guess. Maybe my brain just wanted to fuck with me. Who knows?

It’s fine.

I tap my fist against my forehead and take one more look in the mirror.

Still ua William Van De Bogart, it seems.

Good for me.

I turn around and head back to the conference room. Gabriel is sitting with his back against the wall.

“You’re up,” I say.

His whole body jerks, and he snaps his head toward me.

And stares.

Like… for a really long time. An excessively long time. With wide eyes and slightly parted lips and a very un-Gabriel-like look of confusion on his face.

And the insanity rears its head again and nudges me.

Hey, dude. Maybe?

“What the hell happened?” Gabriel asks. That curt tone? Very Gabriel-like.

What do I say?

Oh, hey, Gabriel? You remember that time we switched bodies?

I’m going to sound fucking crazy.

“We touched the wire?” I say slowly. “And then we… you know.”

I’ll let him fill in the blanks. Perfect plan.

“And then we?” he repeats, raises his brows, and widens his arms.

“Just…” I gesticulate with my hand. “You know.”

He blows out a breath and throws me another look that’s so unreadable I have no idea what to do with it.

I really don’t understand why I’m trying so hard to convince myself that this fever dream was reality. I hit my head when I passed out and had a really vivid hallucination, apparently. I even kept thinking the whole time that it couldn’t be real, and it was a coma dream, so I guess, yay, good news, it wasn’t a coma.

“There was an exposed wire, I guess. And we both touched it. There might’ve been a minor electric shock involved.”

I half expect some acerbic comment or a repeat of the last time we found ourselves in this situation, when neither of us was willing to take the blame. But Gabriel just looks at me for the longest time, then nods.

Might be I electrocuted all the snark out of him, so that’s obviously a win, right?

I clear my throat and glance out the window. It’s still raining, so I guess we weren’t out for too long.

“We should probably head out,” I say. “Decorations are done, so I’d say we’re done too.”

He still isn’t saying anything, or doing anything, for that matter, and I just really need to get out of here as quickly as possible.

“Right, then,” I say. “I’ll see you tomorrow?”

I’m almost out the door when Gabriel’s voice stops me.

“?”

I turn around, weirdly keyed up, and my heart picks up speed for some reason.

“Yeah?”

He eyes me for a moment. “Are you feeling okay? No signs of a concussion or anything else?”

It’s decent of him to ask this question. It’s what normal people do when they know somebody’s just slammed their head against a hard surface. And still, somehow, I’m disappointed.

I make myself nod and force my tone to sound normal. Or at least neutral.

“I’m good. Thick skull. You?”

“Fine,” he says. Brief and to the point.

I nod. Seems that’s it.

I should really go home and sleep this day off. Maybe I’ll feel more like myself after I’ve had a good night’s sleep.

One can only hope.