Page 110 of Switch!

I choose randomly. She pockets all but one of them for herself, which she tears open with her teeth.

“Birthday cake is the best flavor,” she says, “but we can trade if you want. Or you can have a bite of mine.”

“Trying to dish out a little karma?”

“Hell yeah! She deserved worse.” Trixie does a little skip in excitement. “Hey! Forget aboutQuantum Leap. You should be the Robin Hood of body snatchers. Psychic social justice!”

I like the idea. “I could have possessed her and turned off the security cameras so we could clear out the entire store.”

“It’s not too late,” Trixie says, turning around like she intends to march back there, but she makes a half circle and rejoins me on my other side. “Why don’t we?”

I spot Patrick’s SUV and head toward it. “It wouldn’t be fair. What if she’s just a rude—and yeah, racist—employee? The owner of the store could be really nice.”

“I’ve seen her in there before. Her husband is even worse. I’m sure they’re the owners. Besides, you would find out just how racist they are when possessing them. You’d make a great judge actually. No matter what the defendant says, you could sort through their thoughts to find out the truth.”

“Patrick has proven it’s not always that easy,” I say, tapping the side of my head. “You’dbe a better judge of if they’re telling the truth or not.”

“Ha! Good point. Maybe we should become a team of detectives. For real. We could open our own agency.”

“We really could!”

We discuss this on the drive home, workshopping names for our business and debating how we would solve different kinds of crimes.

“Think you could get inside a dead body to find out who killed it? Tap into the last memory the person had, that sort of thing.”

“I don’t know, but it’s starting to scare me how many crazy ideas you have.”

“Crazy good,” Trixie says with a wicked grin. “Stick around. I’ll come up with plenty more.”

We have the opportunity to experiment with one of her ideas later that night, after we eat. The stew turns out fine. Patrick’s memories suggest a few spices that would have helped, but we both have full bellies. We sluggishly watch TV while digesting. At the end of an episode ofMaking a Murderer, Trixie grabs the remote, pauses the screen, and looks over at me with shining eyes.

“Can we try now?”

I laugh. “Sure.”

“Are we both switching bodies? Because if so, you should use the bathroom first. It’s gross how guys spray everywhere. I don’t know why it’s so difficult to aim, and I have no intention of finding out.”

“Let’s start with the basics,” I say with a chuckle. “I’ll possess you and we’ll see how that goes.”

“Ooh! If it works,pleasebring me into the black box. I’m super eager to see what that’s like.”

“Okay. Um… Get comfortable I guess.”

We’re already on the couch. All I have to do is make sure Patrick is positioned securely so he won’t slip off once his muscles go slack. Summoning up the necessary desire isn’t difficult. I want to do this. Not only out of curiosity, but also to make my best friend happy. It didn’t escape my notice when she called me that earlier. The feeling is mutual. And now we’re about to connect in a whole new way.

I slip free from my body and will myself to see. Unlike when I’m out in public, there aren’t any distracting lights from other life forces here—not even a house plant—so finding Trixie is easy. She’s on the couch next to me, the color of her energy an intense deep purple edged with whitish-blue. Ultraviolet! Another odd detail attracts my attention. Most people I’ve seen in this state have hair that is dim and transparent. Trixie’s unbraided pigtails are just as vibrant as the rest of her. I move closer to investigate and realize that I’m not looking at her hair. The pigtails appear exactly how I would expect them to—ghostly and faint. What I noticed is just beneath them and shaped like wings, or maybe fins, that cup her ears and splay outward from them. I’m so transfixed by this that I stare until my energy begins to ebb dangerously.

I need to reconnect with a body or pay the ultimate price. This only increases my motivation to possess Trixie. I launch myself toward her and feel impact. Usually the sensation is similar to colliding with the surface of a lake. There’s always some resistance before passing through. This time is different. I bounce off her like we’re both made of rubber. Weird. I try again with the same result.

Maybe I don’t have enough energy. Lingering in the void is making me feel increasingly weak, so I return to Patrick’s body and sit upright.

“Give me a second,” I say. “I think I spent too long staring at you before I tried. Your colors are amazing.”

Trixie tilts her head. “My what?”

“Your colors. Remember how I said that I can only see living things in the void because they show up as light? That involves a rainbow of hues.”

Trixie grabs my arm. “Like auras?”