Paul Kohler - The Borrowed Souls, A Novel

“Hey now, don’t you walk away from me. Don’t you know who I am?”

I turned and found the man in blue right on my heels. I looked him square in the face. “No, as a matter of fact I don’t know who you are. I’ve never seen you in my life.”

“Ah, I’m Enoch. Enoch Gant,” he said, lifting his chin into the air slightly. “How is it that nobody’s told you about me?”

“It must have slipped everyone’s mind,” I replied. “So who are you, then? Are you here to help with my training, or are you just another soul collector?”

Enoch blinked slowly and shrugged his shoulders. He stepped past me and right up to Noah’s side. “That’s neither here nor there. What I can tell you is that you’re going about this collection all wrong.”

“Care to enlighten me?” I asked.

“Well, I would’ve ended Noah’s life much sooner than now. You know, move things on a bit faster.”

“Do you mean you would’ve killed him just to get your next soul box sooner?”

“Sometimes, Jack, you have to advance the protocol in order to keep the flow of soul boxes moving. And sometimes that means taking matters into your own hands.”

Shocked, I said, “That doesn’t quite sound like appropriate procedure for a soul collector. And strangely, Hauser has never mentioned anything about it. Neither had Wilson, for that matter.”

“Well, that’s because Wilson and Hauser are a bunch of pansy-ass wimps. Let me tell ya’, I’ve been around for a lot longer than those two yahoos, and if you want to rise to the top, you’ll have to actually take a life every once in a while,” Enoch said calmly.

The sound of the door opening grabbed our attention. Beast man stepped to the side and Noah walked through the door. Enoch and I followed close behind. Once we were inside, the door closed, and the three of us stood in front of a wildly attractive woman wearing a white pencil skirt and platform heels.

“I’m McGuire. Who’s asking?”

McGuire wasn’t a he after all, I thought.

“I… I’m Noah. My friend—”

McGuire cut Noah off as her phone rang. She stepped around the desk and picked up the receiver. “Go,” she said to the caller.

“You know, you can do it right now,” Enoch said.

“Do what? Actually kill Noah right here? You’re crazy. Just leave me alone and let me do my job, at my own pace.”

As I stepped away from Enoch out of utter repulsion, I wished with all my might that Hauser would appear. He was always popping in when he was least expected, and this would be a particularly opportune moment.

“Well, if you’re not man enough to do the job right, I might as well help you out. And trust me, you’ll thank me later.”

Enoch stepped toward Noah and suddenly produced a sawed-off shotgun from his inside his jacket. He raised the barrel of the gun to the back of Noah’s head, pulled back the hammer, and released the trigger. The enormous chamber explosion reverberated in my eardrums and startled me awake.

“You know, Jack. I think you’re really onto something here. This park bench is much nicer than my own place,” Hauser said as he sat next to me and, flipping through a magazine. “I see you’ve decided not to heed my warning about sleeping,”

“I, uh… what?” I asked, straightening myself up on the bench and tussling my hair to the side. “Well, it’s been a long three weeks. I’ve been following that guy around and he just won’t die. Kinda wears a person out.”

Hauser nodded his head. “You’re preaching to the choir, buddy. I’ve had countless jobs just like your guy.” Hauser closed the magazine and focused his attention on me. “So, you give in to sleep just like that?”

“It’s not like I planned on it. I’ve been following Noah around for nearly every moment that he’s been awake. And most nights, too. I just sit in the corner of his room while he sleeps. You know, in case he dies before he wakes. So I decided to take a break here. As soon as the sun went down and the lights dimmed, it was out of my control.”

“Listen, Jack. You can control it. You need to control it. What was this latest dream about?” Hauser pressed.

“Yeah, this one was a little bit… different.”

“Different how?”

“Well, different from the last couple of dreams,” I confessed.

“Couple of dreams? Jesus, Jack. How often have you been sleeping?”

“No, it’s not like that. This is maybe my third or fourth nap. The first one was more of a nightmare than anything else. It was about Cyndi.”

“And the other ones?”

“Well, they kind of jump around. I am myself in all of the dreams, and Cyndi was there at the beginning. But then the dreams kind of took on a life of their own, drifting around the city, but not exactly. It’s strange. It’s this city but it’s just…”

“It’s different. I’ve heard that. Anything else?”

“With this last one, I was able to speak to somebody in the dream. I was following Noah around, and I tried to talk to him. And it was just like it is here in real life—he couldn’t hear me. Then all of a sudden this other guy walks up and starts talking to me, questioning me about how I do my job and why don’t I speed things up.”

Hauser’s head cocked to the side. “Describe him.”

“Well, he was… middle-aged, maybe? He wore a blue suit and a matching hat. He had no visible hair.”

“He was bald?” Hauser asked.

“From what I could tell. He did have his hat on the whole time.” I paused, trying to remember the dream more clearly. “Strange. I don’t recall seeing any eyebrows or eyelashes on the guy, either. Should I be worried? It’s just some apparition created by my mind, right?”

Hauser shrugged and sat up straight. “Mmm. What else did he say?” His eyes were penetrating, as if staring into my own soul.

“That’s where it got weird. He told me that I needed to hurry up so that I could get to the next soul. He seemed to know everything about what we do. It was as if he was a soul collector himself.”

Hauser nodded his head as his eyes scanned the surrounding park. “Is that it? Did he say anything else?”

“Yeah, he said that sometimes we have to take things into our own hands. Hauser, he wanted me to kill my mark.”

Hauser gasped before standing abruptly.

“Hauser? It was just a dream. Right?” I asked, hoping that it really was nothing more than just my mind playing tricks on me.

Hauser ignored my question and started to pace around my park bench. “Did the man tell you his name?”

“Enoch Gant.”

Hauser stopped pacing and stood directly in front of me. “Listen, Jack. You have to promise me that you will refrain from sleeping until I tell you otherwise. Do you understand me?”

In the short few months that I’d known Hauser, I’d never seen him so riled. Especially over something as innocuous as resting. “Yeah, sure,” I muttered, wondering what was really going on.

“Now, fill me in on your current collection. You say you’ve been with him nonstop?”

“Yeah, pretty much. From what I can tell, Noah is as healthy as an ox. He’s young, married, and has two kids. He has a good job over on Griffin Street, earning enough so that his wife can be a stay-at-home mom,” I said, fully realizing that Noah was living my life, or the life I had wanted with Cyndi. Only better. “Honestly, I think this box is a mistake. There’s nothing remotely wrong with this guy. He’s happy, he’s healthy, and he has no vices to speak of.”

“Come now, Jack. Do I need to draw it out for you?” Hauser asked, returning to the bench next to me.

“I think I know what you’re going to say.”