out there. Sand in your snatch, eh, Noreen? You didn’t like that so much, but

  even so, you loved it. And then. The other times. I’ve got them all up here in

  my head. They banged me around at Rehab, but they didn’t destroy me. They tried

  hard enough, but they didn’t destroy me.” He took a step toward her. Throat dry,

  fingertips cold. Getting harder and harder down below. “Don’t be afraid of me. I

  love you.I love you. I wouldn’t hurt you for anything. Stop backing away.

  Listen, it’ll be our secret, you and me, the world will think I’m Macy, you can

  go on being Mrs. Sy Krafft, this cute little house, kids—do you have

  kids?—whatever you want, only on the side it’ll be you and me again, Nat and

  Noreen, at my studio.

  “I’ll do another nude of you. Life-size. It’ll be better than theAntigone.

  Remember how sore you were, because I used Lissa for theAntigone instead of you?

  But we were drifting apart then. I didn’t know what was good for me. I had to go

  through hell to find out. But now. You’ll pose. Shit, I can see it now. You

  standing over there. Those sweet little tits of yours. Ten electrodes on you.

  And I’m at the machine, sweating like a bastard. Getting you down, immortalizing

  your body and your soul. An hour for work, an hour for screwing, an hour for

  work, an hour for screwing. Oh, Jesus, Noreen, stop staring at me like that!”

  “I’ll call the police. When they catch you, Nat, they’ll finish you for good.

  They won’t even put you through Rehab. They’ll chop you up and flush you away.”

  “No. A silver bullet in my head. A stake through the heart.”

  “I’ll call them, Nat.”

  “Wait. Please, no. Look, I don’t mean to frighten you. I came here to tell you

  how much I love you. I’ve been in hell, Noreen, literally in hell, and now I’m

  coming out, I’m going to live again. And I had to come to you. Why be afraid?

  Tell me you love me.”

  “I don’t love you, Nat. You disgust me.”

  Hamlin began to shake.

  “Brava!” he cried. “Brava! Bravissima!” He started to applaud. “What an actress!

  What fire in your reading! What steel in your voice!” Imitating her: “ ‘I don’t

  love you, Nat. You disgust me.’ ” Wildly applauding. “Curtain. End of Act Two.

  Now tell me the real stuff, Noreen. How much you want me. You’re scared, yes,

  you remember me when I was crazy, when I was doing all that hideous crap, but

  you’ve got to remember the other me, too, the one you loved, the one you

  married, everything we did together, the places we saw, the people, the stuff in

  bed, remember, even the weird stuff, you and me and Donna in the same bed, and

  then you and me and Alex, eh, Noreen? Love. Trust. Passion.” He reached toward

  her. “Come on. Now. Where’s the bedroom? Or right here on the floor. Let me

  prove it to you, that you still turn on for me. Okay? Why the hell not? You

  opened your gate for me five hundred times. Eight hundred. So one more won’t

  cost you anything.”

  He was shouting now. Her cool poise was deserting her. She look terrified,

  moving away from him, stumbling over things. He lunged at her. Seizing her

  wrist, pulling her close. The sweet fragrance of her body mixed with fear-sweat.

  Her eyes glazed with fright. “Noreen,” he muttered. “Noreen. Noreen. Noreen.”

  The syllables losing meaning and becoming hollow sounds. His skull aflame. His

  jaws aching. His hands clutching at her clothing. Ripping. The little round

  breasts popping into view. Oh, Christ, how tender they are! His hands on them.

  Squeezing. She flailed at him with her fists, clubbing him on the mouth, the

  nose, the ears. He had one arm locked around her waist; the other, having laid

  bare her bosom, went for her crotch. To see if she was wet there. To prove to

  her how wrong she was to refuse him. He was snorting. Like the old days, the bad

  old days. Hamlin the animal. Hamlin the horny Minotaur. Fragile woman struggling

  in his arms. A red haze before his eyes. Sweat running down his sides. Noreen

  kicking, screaming, clawing.

  Now,Macy thought, and shoved with all his might. Hamlin toppled from his perch.

  Fell moaning into the abyss. A moment of total disorientation, infinite in

  duration. Who am I? What am I? Where am I? He let go of the woman he held. She

  slumped to the floor; he lurched backward and slammed against the wall, and

  stood there, gasping, exhausted. Blood draining from his skull.

  But it was all right. He was in charge again. He was Paul Macy, and he was back

  in charge.

  THIRTEEN

  To get away from there, fast, that was the important thing now. But first some

  peace making. Gestures of reassurance. Noreen Hamlin Krafft lay looking up

  dazedly at him, a dribble of bright red on her swelling lower lip, hair in

  disarray, angry blotches on her exposed white breasts where Hamlin had clutched

  her. They would be dark bruises tomorrow. She didn’t move. Waiting numbly for

  the next onslaught. Resigned to her fate. He said, his voice coming out oddly

  furry and unfocused, “It’s okay now. I’ve taken control away from him. I’m Macy.

  I won’t hurt you.”

  “Macy.”

  “Paul Macy. The Rehab reconstruct. They did a bad deconstruct job on Hamlin and

  he’s still loose in my head. He grabbed the body’s motor and speech centers last

  night.” Last night? Last week, last month? How long had Hamlin been running

  things, anyway? “But he’s down underneath again, where he can’t make trouble.

  While he was fighting with you I was able to take over.” Gently helping her to

  her feet. He wondered if she had gone into shock. Making no attempt to cover

  herself. Tip of her tongue licking at the cut on her lip. He said, “I’m sorry

  you had to go through all this. Are you badly injured?”

  “No. No.” Staring at him. Trying to come to terms with his abrupt

  transformation. Dr. Jekyll, Mr. Hyde. “Just shaken up.” With trembling fingers

  she concealed her bosom, tidied her hair. Staring at him. Was his face different

  now? The lunatic glare of Hamlin gone from his eyes? He knew it wasn’t easy for

  her to understand any of what had taken place. These shifts of identity: he had

  come to accept them as part of the human condition, but to her they must be

  alien, incredible, bizarre. Maybe she thought he had been Macy all along,

  playing insane pranks on her. Or that he was still Hamlin.

  He said, “It would be best if you didn’t tell anyone about this. The police,

  your husband, anyone. I’m trying to have Hamlin permanently eradicated before he

  can do some real harm, but there are problems, and getting the police into

  things would only make it worse for me. You see, I’m in constant danger from

  him, and if I went to the authorities he might force the destruction of this

  body, so—” He stopped. She didn’t seem to be comprehending. “Just don’t say

  anything, yes? If it’s at all in my power I’ll see to it you never go through a

  scene like this again. Do you follow me?”

  She nodded distantly. Pacing about, now, working off her fright. Time for him to

  go. At the front door he turned and said, “One last thing, though. Can you tell

  me today’s date?”

  “Today’s date.” She repeated it in a flat empty tone. As if he had asked her the

  name of the planet they were currently on.

  “Yes, please. The date. It’s important.”

  She shrugged. “The fourth of June, I think.”

  “Friday?”

  “Friday, yes.”

  He thanked her gravely and went out. His body was stiff and he moved gracelessly

  toward the car, arms flailing spastically, shoulders ramming the air. He and

  Hamlin evidently had different notions of physical coordination, and his

  muscles, having taken orders from another mind for eighteen hours or so, were

  reluctant to go back to the mode he preferred. Not surprising: Hamlin’s way was

  this body’s normal way, and his own was something imposed from without. He

  concentrated on reimposing it. Damned good thing Hamlin had only been running

  the show since last night, since that takeover during the mugging in the hallway

  of Lissa’s house. Macy had been afraid he might have been unconscious for a week

  or more before surfacing this morning. In which case he’d have an endless trail

  of Hamlin’s deeds and misdeeds to trace and follow.

  But no. It seemed that he had been awake for most of the period of Hamlin’s

  dominance, missing only the first eight hours or so after the takeover. Some

  comfort in that. Where had Hamlin been in those eight hours? Most likely at my

  place, getting some rest. And the mugging? It couldn’t have been too serious.

  Macy patted his pocket. Wallet gone. Okay, so he must have collapsed at the

  moment of takeover, the mugger cleaned him out, then Hamlin picked himself up

  and left unharmed. The wallet was no big loss. Identity papers, credit cards—all

  replaceable, all useless to the assailant. Macy didn’t even need them himself,

  so long as he had a thumb with a fingerprint on it. Why, Hamlin had even managed

  to rent this car using only his thumbprint, not even his,my thumbprint. Ours, I

  guess. But the charge is debited to me. Macy felt vaguely sorry for the mugger,

  living a squalid lower-class life on a level of society where cash still called

  the tune. Fine lot of good it must have been for him to lift an executive’s

  wallet, the wallet of a thumb-tripper, five or six dollars in it at most. Oh,

  well.

  Moving more easily now, Macy reached the car and thumbed the doorplate. The door

  slid open. He got behind the controls and tentatively grasped the

  steering-stick. The prospect of having to drive scared him suddenly. They had

  taught him how to drive at the Rehab Center, a couple of year ago, but he hadn’t

  had much chance to practice lately; and just now there was the special risk that

  Hamlin might surface and screw him up on the highway. I hit him pretty hard when

  I grabbed control, but even so.

  Hamlin? You awake?

  No reply from the depths. Macy felt his other self’s presence, though: a tinny

  faint reverberation out of the far-below, like the cries of an angry djinn who

  has been conjured back into his bottle.

  Good. Stay like that. I don’t need any static from you while I’m driving.

  If only I can keep the goddam stopper in place on the bottle this time.

  He put his thumb to the ignition panel, and the car, scanning the print and

  finding it to be that of its duly licensed present master, came to life. Warily

  Macy let out the brake. Cautiously he rolled forward. The car responded well,

  great snorting beast under harness. Which way New York, now? Long afternoon

  shadows. The sun halfway down the sky on his right. Pick a direction, any

  direction. He found his way out of the residential area, cut off two drivers as

  he blurted into the business road, was rudely but deservedly screeched at, and

  discovered a green-on-white sign directing him to the city. Onward. Homeward. A

  ticklish trip. He survived it.

  He hoped to find Lissa waiting for him at his apartment, slouched in bed in her

  pleasant wanton way, music playing, her hair a tangle, the aroma of pot in the

  air. Throw himself wearily down on top of her, bury his aching head between her

  bouncy boobs. Some chance. The apartment, empty, deserted for a mere twenty-odd

  hours, had the forlorn and abandoned look of a fifth-rate catacomb. Off with the

  sweaty crumpled clothing. Shower. Shave. Vague thoughts of dinner. The last meal

  he remembered having eaten was lunch on Thursday. Now it was dinnertime on

  Friday. Had Hamlin bothered to refuel their body at all during his eighteen

  hours on top? Macy wasn’t particularly hungry. All this shuttling about of

  identities. It must have wrecked my appetite. Odd. You’d think that much mental

  exertion would have burned up a lot of energy. A drink might be in order,

  though.

  He poured himself a hefty bourbon and, naked, flopped down in a chair. A little

  of the liquor went sloshing out onto his thigh. Cold brown drops on the golden

  hairs. He felt not at all triumphant at having ousted Hamlin from control. What

  good was it, being in charge again? Who was he, anyway, that he needed so badly

  to live? An oppressive sense of having come to the end of the line grew in him.

  Paul Macy, born 1972 Idaho Falls, Idaho, father a propulsion engineer mother a

  schoolteacher, no brothers no sisters.

  False. False. False shit. I wasn’t born anywhere. I am a thing out of a

  testtube. I am a golem, a dybbuk, a construct. Without friends, without family,

  without purpose. At leasthe was real. He’d fuck his kid sister, he’d steal toys

  from a baby, but he had an identity, a personality that he had earned by living.

  An artistic gift.

  What about it, Hamlin? You want to have it all back? Why do I insist on getting

  in your way? Maybe you’re right: maybe I should let you win.

  Hamlin respondeth not. Only the tinny echoes,ex profundis. He must be dormant,

  worn out by everything he was doing. Well, fuck him. He’s no good. His soul is

  full of poison. Damned if I’ll step aside for him, genius or no genius. The

  world has enough great artists. It’s only got one Paul Macy, for what that’s

  worth. This would be a good moment to go to the Rehab Center, while Hamlin’s

  groggy. Get him carved out of me for once and all. And if he surfaces? And if he

  gives me that coronary he’s been threatening? Fuck him. If he wants to, he can.

  So go ahead, coronary. So we’ll both be dead.Pax vobiscum. We shall sleep the

  eternal sleep, he and I. Anything would be better than this. Nodding solemnly,

  Macy reached for the phone to call Gomez.

  The phone rang with his arm still in midstretch.

  Lissa, he thought. Calling to find out where I’ve been, asking if she can come

  back!

  Joy. Excitement. That startled him: the intensity of his wish that it be Lissa

  calling. What was all this crap about dying? He wanted to live. He had someone

  to look after. And to look after him. They needed each other.

  “Hello?” he said eagerly.

  On the green screen bloomed the swarthy face of Dr. Gomez. The angel of death

  himself. Speak of the devil.

  “I’ve been phoning all day,” Gomez said. “Where the fuck have you been?”

  “Driving around the suburbs. Weren’t you supposed to be keeping me under

  surveillance?”

  “We lost track of you.”

  “Is that a fact?” Macy said harshly. “Well, let me be the first to tell you,

  then. Hamlin got me last night and kept control until late this afternoon.”

  Gomez made elaborate facial gestures of exasperation. “And did what?”

  “Visited his dealer, his old studio, and his former wife. Who he was in the

  process of raping when I got control again.”

  “He’s still a psychopath, you mean?”

  “He still gets a kick out of manhandling women, anyway.”

  “All right. All right. Too fucking much, Macy. Taking you over, running around

  the countryside. I’m having the van sent for you. Sit tight and if Hamlin makes

  another try at you, fight him off somehow. We’ll have you safely inside the

  Center under sedation in an hour and a half, and then—”

  “No.”

  “What, no?”

  “Keep away from me if you want me to go on living. I tell you, Gomez, he’s a

  wild man. If he thinks you’re seriously after him he’ll shut off my heart.”

  “That isn’t a realistic fear.”

  “It’s realistic enough for me.”

  “I assure you, Macy, he wouldn’t do any such thing. We’ve let this situation

  drag on too long as it is. We’ll come and get you, and we’ll do a proper job of

  deconstructing Hamlin, and I assure you—”

  “Shove your assurances, Gomez. We’re talking aboutmy survival that’s being

  gambled with.My survival. I refuse to let you have me. Where’s your authority

  for picking me up without my consent? Where’s your court order? No, Gomez. No.

  Keep away.”

  Gomez was silent a moment. A crafty look flickered into his eyes; he immediately

  tried to hide it, but not before Macy had picked it up. At length Gomez said in

  his heaviest I-know-this-will-hurt-but-it’s-for-the-general-welfare manner, “You

  realize, Macy, that your safety isn’t the only thing we have to consider here. A

  court has ruled that society must be protected against Nat Hamlin. The moment

  you notified me that Hamlin wasn’t entirely gone, it became my obligation to

  take him into custody and carry out the court’s sentence the right way. Okay, so

  you said you felt you were in jeopardy, you asked me to leave you alone until we

  worked out some sure-thing way of coping, and I let you have your way. It was