The Displaced Detective: A Body Hopper Tale – Epilogue
by Limbo’s Mistress

Three years later …

I swore under my breath that if the dude droning on and on at the podium didn’t shut up and sit down, I was going to organize a strike force to make him shut up. I mean, like, how long can we be expected to sit here and listen to some geezer monologue about how bright our future is?

I turned my attention from the sea of green gowns and caps around me to the crowd of people sitting in the auditorium’s left-side stands. It took a few seconds, but eventually I spotted Rich and Barbara in the throng. Rich was speaking to a young woman sitting beside him, probably someone’s sister, but Barb was looking right at me. When I ours locked, she gave me a thumbs-up gesture accompanied with a giant smile.

I returned it, then turned back to resume fuming about the seemingly endless rambling of my graduating class’s keynote speaker.

* * * * * * * * * *

After Matthew and I had returned to farmhouse, he’d scared up a can of soup from the pantry, heated it in the microwave, and insisted that I eat.

“You haven’t had a decent meal in almost two days, Jack,” he said, placing the steaming bowl in front of me. “You eat while I go and deal with Carol’s body. When I get back, you can tell me about this grand plan of yours.”

I nodded, picking up the spoon. However, just as he started to leave the room, I spoke.

“Sasha,” I said in a soft, but firm voice.

“Huh?” He paused in the doorway, turning back to look at me.

“Sasha. That’s what you should call me from now on.” I shrugged. “There’s probably more of her than of me in here now. Jack … just doesn’t fit me anymore.”

He stared at me for a moment, then nodded. “Well, Sasha, eat up. I’ll be back in a little bit.”

Unfortunately, our discussion would have to wait until morning. After eating, I went into the living room and sat on the sofa, awaiting his return. At some point, my exhaustion paired up with my full belly, and sent me right off into a dreamless sleep.

When I awoke, sunlight was streaming in through the window, and I was covered with a small blanket with images of bell peppers embroidered across its surface. I stretched as I sat up, the cover falling away to reveal that Matthew had removed my shoes when he’d tucked me in.

I was just finished making breakfast when he came into the kitchen. He’d ditched the jacket and dress shirt, wearing only the gray slacks and a white, skin-tight tee that highlighted just how athletic his stolen body was. I quickly turned away and shoveled the scrambled eggs from the pan in my hand onto the plates already loaded with toast and sausage.

“Smells good,” he said as he sat down at one of the table’s pre-set places. Although I had been tempted to make coffee, I had the feeling Sasha’s taste buds were not prepared to handle a cup of black joe. Instead, I’d poured two glasses of orange juice from a carton in the fridge.

I put his plate in front of him and sat down at the other place with my own. “Yeah, I’m probably going to make someone a good little wifey one day.”

I’d meant it as a joke … mostly. However, the colored drained from Matthews face and he sighed with apparent regret.

“I’m sorry this all happened to you, Ja … Sasha. If I had it to do over again, I would have not Hopped into you. Or Sasha.”

“You were just trying to live, dude. I don’t blame you for how things turned out.” I shrugged. “All we can do now is, like, make the best of the sitch.”

“Sitch?”

I rolled my eyes. “Situation. God, keep up.”

As we ate, I presented my idea to him. At first, he thought I was insane. However, the more I explained the details, the more he started to be receptive to it. When I was done, he shook his head.

“It’s bold. No doubt about that.” He stroked his chin with his fingers in contemplation. “The only question I have is if you think you can really go through with it? All of it to the end?”

I nodded, finishing the last of my juice. “Sure. Why not?”

He gave me a sympathetic look. “Because you keep referring to Dellinger as “Daddy”.

The knowledge hit me out of the blue. I shook my head in denial. “I have not.”

He nodded. “You have. Not all the time, but at least seven or eight that I can recall.”

My jaw clenched as the urge to reach into my head and slap the teen flared to life. Instead, I counted to twenty and sighed. “Then I’ll have to be extra-vigilant, won’t I?”

After breakfast, we went about the house, wiping down everything we could remember having touched. When we were both satisfied that the majority of prints would be Carol’s, we climbed into the SUV and left.

Neither one of us spoke during the hour it took to get from the farmhouse to rest stop next to the highway. Matthew pulled the Ford past the other parked cars while I hunkered down in the passenger seat, hidden from view. When we were on the far side of the lot, away from any prying eyes, I climbed out of the vehicle.

“Good luck, Sasha,” he said, flashing me a smile.

“You, too.”

He drove off while I went into the nearby trees and waited. Luckily, my newfound impatience held off until I finally spotted a state trooper pull into the rest area. When the officer got out and headed into the building, I scooped up some dirt from the ground, rubbed it over my face and in my hair, then tore the sleeve of my blouse. I stumbled out of the trees, walking with an overtly staggering gait. As if I’d been running for hours.

The trooper emerged from the building and headed back to his vehicle. Right as his hand rested on the handle, he glanced over my way. His eyes widened comically as his jaw dropped open. He ran around the car, rushed over to me, and knelt down in front of me with care and concern plastered all over his face.

“Help me,” I said in as tiny a voice as I could manage. Tears began to run down my dirt-stained face. “My name is Sasha Dellinger.”

* * * * * * * * * *

The boring guy finally shut his trap before he put everyone in the audience to sleep. Once he had sat back down, an older woman with mocha skin and steel gray streaks in her chocolate curls rose and crossed to stand behind the podium.

“We will now begin the commencement ceremony,” the Superintendent announced. She looked down at the podium. “Angela Renee Adams. Stephen Carter Adams. Georgina Rebecca Amos.”

* * * * * * * * * *

Of course, there was a huge media circus about my return.

The trooper from the rest stop, Sergeant William Blevins, whisked me from the middle of the rest stop’s parking lot to the back seat of his car. Then he was on the radio, informing dispatch that he had found the missing Dellinger girl. Within five minutes, another half-dozen patrol vehicles and an ambulance came screeching into the rest stop.

The law officers wanted me to answer a bajillion questions, but the paramedics took over and demanded that they hold off until I could be checked out for any injuries. By the time they were finished examining me, the area had become a chaotic mess. In addition to the troopers, two cars belonging to the FBI arrived, as did four news vans.

The officials decided that they could wait to grill me about my whereabouts, and the whereabouts of Detective Jack Rollins, until they had me in a private room at the nearest station.

I’d rehearsed my spiel over and over until I knew it backwards and forwards. Apparently, Jack’s skill at mental recollection was still mostly intact. As was my knowledge of police procedures. It was easy to prepare myself for their inquiries when I already had an idea what they were going to ask.

I regaled them with a tale of how I’d watched a man getting abducted right in front of me. When the kidnappers saw there was a witness, one of them climbed out of their car and chased me. Right into the protective arms of Jack Rollins.

I took their questions in stride. No, I didn’t know what the make of the car was, only that it was a large sedan and black. No, I didn’t know the Asian dude who got grabbed. Yes, I assumed it was a kidnapping due to the way the guy struggled and the fact that one of the dorks inside chased me for several blocks.

I told them I’d awoken in the hospital with Jack sitting by my bedside. He asked me my name and what I knew about the situation on the street. It was then that he overheard someone asking the nurse outside about an unconscious young girl who might have been brought in earlier. Jack peeked out the door and noticed the man wore sunglasses similar to the ones on the guy who’d been chasing me.

He also noticed the guy had a gun.

Not wanting to risk a shootout in the hospital, Jack had ferried me away, intending to put me in a safe house until he could contact reinforcements. When he realized we were being followed by a couple of black SUVs, he decided to lose them and lay low at some house on the outskirts of town.

No, I don’t know why he didn’t head straight to his precinct. No, I have no idea whose house we were hiding in.

When we saw the news on the television, Jack tried calling his supervisor to see about getting an escort to bring us in. Then I mentioned something about hearing one of the kidnappers mention the Order of the Dawn, and he hung up the phone before getting through.

Interestingly enough, when I mentioned the Order, one of Feds shifted his stance and cut his eyes quickly to the other lawmen. The guilt on his face was plain as day.

Jack told me that he’d heard rumors about the Order and thought we should hit the road until the heat died down. He also suggested we disguise ourselves. I hadn’t wanted to cut, or dye, my beautiful blonde hair, but he’d insisted that we might end up dead otherwise.

Funny enough, Matthew’s comment about Sasha having her own professional stylist on-call turned out to be true. Less than twenty minutes after Michael Dellinger brought me home, Simone was there to make it blonde again.

I told them that the Order’s men had tracked us down when we stopped for food and gas. Jack’s phone had been lost at some point and he didn’t trust calling in on an unsecure line. Our hasty departure from the pumps had been to flee from the Order, not the police.

The story took a hard detour from the truth after that. According to me, Jack drove us to the mall, where he hoped we could hide while he found a way to get us some help. Unfortunately, the Order found us and grabbed us before we could make it inside.

Later on, I managed to access a crime report database. Both of the stolen vehicles, the Honda and the Ford, had been recovered. Somehow, the fact that the sedan had been taken from the same mall where Thomas’ Hummer had been found slipped past the officer writing the report. Our connection with those two incidents of Grand Theft Auto were not discovered.

The Order drove us to a farmhouse in the middle of nowhere. Being blindfolded during the trip, I couldn’t tell them where it was located. The men dragged us inside where they tied me to a chair and made me watch as they beat up Jack as retribution for getting involved in their business.

The next morning, some older guy showed up and tried to explain to me that they weren’t going to hurt me. Instead, after having found out who I really was, they planned on ransoming me for a great deal of money. When they left us alone, Jack managed to get free from his bonds and rescue me. We fled out of the farmhouse into the nearby woods. The Order began pursuing us of course, but the heroic detective led them away while I continued my flight to freedom.

No, I didn’t see him after that moment in the woods when he told me to keep heading east and stay away from the road until I knew it was safe. After that, he ran off in another direction, drawing the people hunting us after him.

I’m sure the investigators would have loved to keep grilling me. Unfortunately, that was about the time that Dellinger and his ten thousand dollar an hour attorney arrived at the station and secured my release in less than a minute. He covered me with his coat as I clung to him, dramatically flinching away from the throng of press gathered outside.

* * * * * * * * * *

“Franklin Richard Collins ... Stephanie Anne Coltrane … James Henry Cullen….”

* * * * * * * * * *

Being back home, well Sasha’s home, was a little unnerving. While I knew, intimately, every nook and cranny of the place, having lived there my entire life, I never stopped feeling sort of like a visitor. A stranger who knew things she shouldn’t have.

Being around Dellinger was almost as unsettling. I would look at him, and a feeling of warmth, love, and security would nearly overwhelm me. Then I would remember that I wasn’t completely his daughter and the fear that he had finally realized it would send my pulse pounding and a cold sweat to break out on my forehead.

The nightmares, though, were the worst. Each time, I was back in that room in my head. Only this time, Sasha herself was there with Armitage and Zimmer. She was this ghostly, ethereal thing, sitting on the bed looking distraught. As each blue book burned, and was replaced with a pink one, she became a bit more solid. And slightly more … alive. Of course, each change made my arms and legs seem less tangible.

The process continued until Zimmer held the very last blue book. By that time, Sasha was a bright and energetic as she’d been the day her life was stolen from her. With the destruction of the last bit of Jack Rollins, she would be complete. She walked over to Zimmer, took the tome from his hand, and threw it in the flames herself.

Those usually woke me up, drenched in sweat, with a scream lodged painfully in my throat.

Sometimes, the scream didn’t get stuck.

For the first couple of months, I got acclimated (or reacclimated) to being Sasha. Daddy kept me out of school for the first week after my return, but I eventually convinced him that I couldn’t stay locked up in the house forever. When he finally did allow me to return, there was always one or two of his “employees” who kept watch on me throughout the day.

It was totally stifling.

Funny enough, as hard as I’d fought to not become Sasha, I soon realized I liked it. Sure, I missed being Jack Rollins a lot of the time, but I didn’t miss the way I’d begun to notice age creeping up on me. My new body was younger, healthier, and strangely familiar.

As the nightmares about the real Sasha helping destroy my male self away faded, I started to find myself falling back into the routines to which I was accustomed. Soon my life once again revolved around school, my friends, and boys. Often I would catch myself wondering if it had all just been a dream. Perhaps I had been kidnapped by some really bad men, threatened with my life, and merely invented the idea of being swapped into this teenaged form as a way to cope.

I might have simply let Sasha live as Jack slowly drifted off to wherever figments of imagination go when their no longer needed. Except, about six months after my encounter with the Order, I received a letter in the mail. There was no return address, but the postmark was from within the city. Curious, I tore into the envelope before stopping to consider otherwise. Inside was a business card from a financial analyst at a local investment firm. The name at the bottom was “Matthew Lang.”

My heart began to race as I turned the card over to see four words written in flowing cursive script: “Remember who you are.”

The lethargy that had come over me, which had allowed me to simply be Sasha Dellinger, was broken. I wrested control back from the displaced teen and remembered not only who I really was, but what I had planned to do.

“Thanks, Matthew,” I said to the empty room. “You warned me this might happen.”

That evening, I began with my grand scheme. Looking back, it was so surprisingly simple.

* * * * * * * * * *

“Kimberly Alicia Johnson … Michael Francis Johnson … Rachel Johnston ….”

* * * * * * * * * *

Michael Dellinger maintained an office in the downtown business district for his construction firm. However, he conducted his less-savory activities from the comfort and security of his own home. With multiple armed men constantly patrolling the outside perimeter, extra-dense walls designed to thwart long distance surveillance, and a nearly paranoid habit of only making felonious decisions in one room in the mansion, the chances of some score-hungry cop getting what he needed to bring Dellinger down were about the same as Jeffrey Scott getting to second base at the Winter Dance. Practically nil.

First base, however, was still up for grabs.

However, there was one person whom Dellinger trusted beyond a shadow of a doubt. One person, who could go anywhere in the house with no questions asked by any of the guards. Only a single individual who could pout and bat her eyes in such a way that one of the most feared men in the state would happily give her anything her heart desired.

I started with simple stuff. Keeping track of who came to the house to visit Daddy’s study and how often they visited. That in itself was eye-opening. I couldn’t believe how many members of the local police force, people in high up positions, were regular guests. Fortunately, I was able to squash the righteous fury at the duplicity of those cretins. They were sworn to uphold the law, not climb into bed with a mobster.

When I was able to deduce a slightly regular pattern, I conveniently “lost” my new smartphone. Of course, Dellinger was more than happy to provide me with a new one. I used the old one as a hidden recording device, nestled behind one of the plants near the large mahogany desk in the center of the room.

I managed to collect a treasure trove of incriminating evidence. At least, I hoped it was incriminating. Some of my judicial knowledge was full of disturbing holes.

Since some of the data revealed Dellinger’s influence on some of the guys in the local Fed office, I decided to take my findings to someone more likely to be outside of his reach. One morning, I gathered up everything I had, allowed Renaldo to drive me to school, waited until after homeroom attendance had been taken, then snuck out of the girls’ bathroom window. One Uber right to the bus station, and a four-hour trip on a Greyhound, I walked into the FBI office two states away and informed them that I wanted to speak to someone on their Organized Crime task force.

The way the two men who met with me stared at the presents I’d brought, you would have thought I’d, like, single-handedly saved Christmas. They whisked the flash drives away to their colleagues for analysis while they began my interview. I told them everything, making sure to use my teen girl voice and words. The last thing I wanted was for them to suspect I might be lying, and using jargon only a professional policeman would use might cause them to question my story’s validity.

It was well after sundown before they finally felt they’d learned enough to make an air-tight case against Daddy. One of the agents, Dawson, ferried me to a secure hotel while the other, Bolton, went to call in a warrant. I was pretty sure by the time I was in a pair of comfortable pajamas and enjoying a pizza and a movie, Dellinger was being handcuffed and charged with a plethora of crimes.

True to my word to the Agency, I was the key witness at the trial. I told the jury all about how I’d heard conversations where my father had ordered this person bribed, that one threatened, and more than a few others killed. I informed them of how scared I was, that maybe one day, my own Daddy might find me to be more trouble than I was worth.

Of course, the defense attorneys tried to convince their audience that I was just an emotional, traumatized teenage girl who had been shaken by a bad experience at the hands of some bad people, and was allowing her imagination to paint a wholesome member of the community in such a horrible light.

Sure, my statements might have been just the ramblings of a delusional teen. You know, if Exhibit A hadn’t been video evidence collaborating my testimony.

Dellinger, for his part, sat in the courtroom in obvious shock and confusion. I’m sure he spent many a night tossing and turning as he tried to understand why his only daughter, whom he had given everything to, would turn on him in such a manner.

His answer came in my last statement as a witness. I announced that my experience with Detective Jack Rollins had made me realize that the best way to honor his memory, and all he had done for me, would be to help uphold the law and put a terrible person away for a long, long time.

At the sentencing, I managed to maintain an impassive expression as the judge informed my father that he was going to be a guest of the Butner Federal Correctional Facility for a minimum of no less than fifteen-years. When the bailiff went to remove him from the courtroom, I rose and walked over to him. Dellinger stood there, looking down at me with a mixture of sadness and heartbreak plastered all over his face. Even at the end, he wasn’t angry with me.

Just … disappointed.

I think that look was what almost did me in. The pain and hurt I saw in his eyes. After all, he had been my entire world for most of my young life. The memories might not truly have been mine, but that didn’t stop the feelings that came with them from hitting me like a sledgehammer. The agony and grief raging in Sasha over what we’d done nearly caused me to lose my composure.

However, the trained adult managed to keep control, barely, and I leaned in closer so that only he could hear me.

“Just want you to know,” I said in a soft whisper. “I’m not really your daughter.”

The look of confusion on his face went a long way to making me feel better about being related, in a way, to a man who could so casually end lives and careers. He would have a long time to try and ponder the meaning behind my enigmatic statement.

After the trial, I convinced the FBI that I was terrified that some of Dellinger’s associates, ones who weren’t initially indicted in my testimony, might come after me just to make sure I didn’t do anything that might jeopardize their freedom.

Apparently, they found my concerns were believable enough, because less than an hour after Dellinger was in chains and on a bus to his new home, WITSEC whisked me to the other side of the country. I was given a whole new identity, a new look, then placed with in a foster home with a really nice couple who had no knowledge about my true parentage.

As far as they knew, I was an orphan whose parents died in a horrible car accident and had no other family to take her in.

Richard and Barbara made sure that I knew how welcome an addition I was to their family without smothering or coddling me. They provided me with enough personal space to grieve over my loss with the understanding that they would be there when I needed them. I admit, I was really standoffish at first. Mostly because I was not one hundred percent sure who I was anymore.

As time went by, and I found myself back out in a different world, I started to realize that I didn’t have to be either Sasha or Jack. Thanks to the way Zimmer’s ability worked, neither one of them would be capable of living without the other now.

Fortunately for my sanity, just living my life as best as I could heled to get my head together. After that, the three of us started to behave like a real family. I found I felt comfortable talking to them about my feelings and sharing my worries and hopes. They made sure to remind me constantly that they really cared about me as if I had always been theirs.

The formal adoption took place about four months before my seventeenth birthday.

* * * * * * * * * *

“Gerald Henry Marsters … Lisa Darlene Martin … Jaqueline Elaine Matthews.”

I stood up, straightening my cap as I cut a wide grin at the girl next to me. Lisa had been one of the first people to befriend the new girl who arrived at her school months after the semester began. And while she hadn’t been the only friend I made in those first few weeks of attending Baxter High, she was the one whose company I enjoyed the most.

Back when I’d been on the run from the Order, I’d sniped angry to Matthew about spending my future waving my pom-poms around. Funny enough, Lisa and I both had ended up on the cheer squad … and the volleyball team. By the time our Senior year rolled around, we were close as the sisters neither of us had.

I held my head up high as I strode down the aisle toward the stage, up the steps, and across to where the Superintendent shook my hand as she handed me a rolled up parchment tied with a strip of green ribbon. Even though I knew, without a doubt, that I’d gone through this ceremony once long ago, my heart hammered in my chest. I couldn’t remember what Jack had felt when he earned his high school diploma, but I knew Sasha … Jaqueline … would remember hers for the rest of her life.

After the ceremony, I told Lisa that I needed to hang with my folks for a bit before I could sneak away so we could head down to the lake. The entire graduating class was planning on one last hurrah to celebrate finally getting released into the world. It was going to be a fun evening of camaraderie, laughing, and enjoying being alive.

Plus, if Lee Thompson played his cards right, he might get to see me in the red and white bikini I’d bought the last time we went to the mall. I’d been teasing him with its existence for weeks.

Liking boys had seemed like something repulsive when I’d just been an occupant in a hormone-ridden body that wasn’t mine. However, I did escape the clutches of the Order with most of Sasha’s young life experiences replacing Jack’s. Attracting and being attracted to handsome males was just a part of the territory.

I hadn’t dared take that last, final step yet. Though, if Lee really played his cards right …

Barbara had to take, like, a million pictures. Me by myself with my diploma. Me posing ridiculously. Me and Richard. Me and Barb making duck faces. The three of us with our arms around each other. I didn’t think it would ever end.

And I really didn’t want it to.

“Okay,” Rich said, taking the parchment and my gown from me. “What time did we agree on?”

I slipped my phone into the back pocket of my shorts. Like my classmates, I’d ditched the flowing polyester garment for street clothes. However, we all agreed to wear our caps until we got to the lake.

“Midnight?” I said as I slid a pair of sunglasses on my face. When Rich gave me a stern look, I sighed overdramatically. “Fine. Eleven.”

He nodded, then leaned in for one last hug. “Love you, kiddo. I’m proud of you.”

I kissed him lightly on the cheek. “Thanks, Dad.”

Beaming like a man who’d just been handed a VIP pass to the Playboy mansion, Rich linked his arm in with Barbara’s and turned toward the parking lot. “Eleven, Jackie. Not one minute later.”

Barbara, though, looked at me as she smiled and shook her head. She mouthed the word “midnight”, then led her husband away.

I watched them vanish into the crowd of parents and kids still taking pictures and celebrating. In fact, I was so engrossed in their departure, I didn’t realize someone was standing behind me until they’d been there for several seconds.

Whirling around, I saw it was the girl who had been sitting with my parents during the ceremony. She looked like she might be in her late twenties or early thirties, with long blonde hair that seemed to be the color of spun gold in the afternoon sunlight. She was wearing a pastel floral print sundress. Pretty, with a slightly noticeable bump just below her belly.

“Hello, Jackie,” she said. Then she smiled. “Jacqueline. Nice name. Not as exotic as Sasha, though, is it?”

I took a step back, wondering if anyone would hear me scream over the din of conversations and squeals of excitement. If they did, they’d probably just think it was just another person enthusiastic about high school being over.

Before I could scream or flee, the woman said two more words. Words that froze me in place.

“Ravishing Copper.”

I blinked staring at her with my jaw hanging halfway open. When I closed it, I took a step closer to the stranger.

“Matthew?”

She smiled and gave me a little nod. “Been a while.”

“But … how … here ..”

“It’s okay, Jackie. Your cover isn’t blown. I got … nostalgic. So I managed to borrow a Marshal’s body … just temporarily … so I could look at your file. I wanted to wait, though, until you were done with school.”

“Where have you been?” I closed the distance and hugged her tightly, careful of the bulge.

“Around. Trying to use my abilities to help people.”

“Really?” I winced when I realized I sounded far to suspicious. “I mean … how?”

When we were on the run, I tried to tell you that I was one of the good guys. That wasn’t completely true. I mean, I never stole anyone’s life, or killed an innocent person, but I did prey on those who I could have helped. I selected desperate people and agreed to help them end it all if I thought being them would benefit me.”

I nodded. “That’s changed though?”

“Yes. Now I find people who feel they are … wrong. I use my Hopping power to make them feel closer to right.”

“I’m still not following,” I said. Then tapped my temple. “Not having all of my old detective skills means not using them regularly. I’m rusty.”

Matthew laughed and nodded. “Well, for example …” She reached down and rubbed her hands over her belly. “This young lady was the victim of a horrible rape. She didn’t believe in abortion, but she also couldn’t bring herself to accept having to carry her attacker’s child.”

“So you Hopped into her?”

“Yes. She’s currently living as a young man in Phoenix, taking adult night classes to be an auto mechanic.”

“She’s okay with it?”

Matthew smiled. “I think she was never comfortable being a female. Now she doesn’t have to be one.”

“What are you going to do … about it?” I nodded my head at her belly.

“There’s a guy about an hour north of here. He’s been desperate to transition for years, but with family pressure and a strict religious upbringing, it’s not going to happen. He’ll torture himself for years before he finally ends the pain.” She shrugged. “Decades of studying people.”

“So, you’re going to offer her an easy way to be who she truly is? Baby and all?”

The smirk on that face was all Matthew. No matter what face he wore, I knew I would always recognize that smile. “I get the feeling that she won’t mind at all.”

“Thank you,” I said, feeling my face warm. “For everything.”

“You shouldn’t thank me, Jackie. I stole your life, remember?”

I opened my mouth, then paused when I saw Lisa wandering around, obviously searching for me. Turning back to Matthew, I grinned.

“You stole my body,” I said, reaching out to take her hand in both of mine. “Yet, when you did, you gave me the chance to have a life. Jack Rollins was a great detective, but that’s all he was. No family. Not a lot of friends. Just the job and a lonely existence. So, yeah. Thank you.”

She laughed and hugged me again. “Thank you. For being my friend.” Pulling away, she nodded over at Lisa, who’d finally spotted me, but was hanging back with a confused look on her face. “You better go before your friend comes over and starts asking questions we can’t answer.”

I laughed and shrugged one shoulder. “Maybe not now. But, who know, maybe I’ll write a book about the whole adventure one day.”

“What would you call it?”

“I dunno. How about ‘The Displaced Detective’?”

Matthew laughed and shook her head. “I think that’s perfect!”

~THE END~

Author’s Note: I hope you have enjoyed this little tale of mine. It was originally posted at Fictionmania, albeit in a less concise, slightly haphazard, form. This is the re-write I felt better told the story as it lived in my head. Thank you for providing me the opportunity to share it with you.

XOXO,

Limbo’s Mistress (Samantha)