The Crossroads

It feels good to be back inside a body—the same nineteen-year-old body he died in.

He still wears the boots, blue jeans, and black leather jacket he wore on the final night of his life. His hair is still full and thick, still combed straight back with a wavy doo-wop flip, still glued in place by glistening Brylcreem.

Wherever he goes, he leaves behind the minty scent of his oily hair cream.

He walks away from the oak tree and down to the road.

His flip-top Ford Thunderbird glimmers in the moonlight. The chrome grillwork on the convertible sparkles. There’s no hint of where the front end crumpled and slammed the V-8 engine back into the driver’s seat to crush his legs.

He hops in. Grips the steering wheel. Listens to the bent-eight engine purr and roar. He is ready to peel wheels and raise hell.

Raise some before he has to go there.

He had been terrified when the lightning bolt struck his tree, afraid it was God calling in the loan on his soul, demanding payment in full and interest past due.

When the tree split, he figured he was a goner, that it was time to move on, time to finally leave this limbo where he had been held prisoner for nearly fifty years.

But it seems he isn’t heading downstairs for fire, brimstone, and pokes from the devil’s pitchfork. Not just yet, anyway.

The stump. The roots. They sink deep into the earth. They hold him here. He doesn’t have to let go or move on.

He glances up toward the second-story window of the house behind him.

The boy’s bedroom.

I’ll be back for you later, four-eyes. Never did like nerds who wore glasses. Counting the seconds between the lightning and the thunder? What a baby.

He has killed children before.

He looks forward to doing it again.