I stretch and blow out a pungent cloud of smoke rings. \u201cI want to go to a concert or rave every night for the rest of my life,\u201d I declare, passing the joint. \u201cCome party with me. We\u2019ll spend all my money. We can have large orgies here. I want to dance my life away.\u201d<\/p>\n
She examines me, cross-eyed, as she draws on the spliff. \u201cYou have a book to write,\u201d she reminds me. \u201cAnd I don\u2019t think you should ditch your fortune just yet. You may need it.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cFor what? I\u2019ll be dead in less than a year, Llewellyn. There\u2019s no one I need to take care of. I may as well enjoy it.\u201d<\/p>\n
She inhales. \u201cThere might be something for you, Victor. Can I make a phone call?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNo,\u201d I say with a mock-Stalin accent. \u201cYou\u2019re a hostage of the Slavic Cobras. Unless your government accedes to our demands, you will be kept here and repeatedly raped until dead.\u201d<\/p>\n
Llewellyn shrugs, not in the mood for silly games. \u201cI doubt you could manage that by yourself. I seem to remember somebody saying, \u2018Please, stop, I need to rest it, you\u2019ll make it sore.\u2019\u201d She picks up my cell phone and I watch her ass ripple as she walks into the living room.<\/p>\n
\u201cCarmen? Llewellyn. Listen, I have a candidate for the DM experiment. What? Yeah, he\u2019s terminal. I can verify at least seven lives, including the two most recent. James fucking Joyce, that\u2019s who! Can you set up a meeting with everybody? ASAP, of course. The man is dying! Tomorrow at six? Perfect. Can you arrange to have everyone be there? What? I\u2019m busy. Comforting him. He just got the news this morning. Yeah, I owe you one. Call this number if anyone important can\u2019t make it. Love ya. Peace.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWho was that?\u201d I ask in an offhand way when she returns.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy sister. She\u2019s involved in psi, too.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat\u2019s DM? What does my being terminally ill have to do with it?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cDirected metempsychosis. Listen, I really don\u2019t want to tell you too much about this before tomorrow. I don\u2019t want you to form any preconceptions. Can you be there?\u201d<\/p>\n
I grin at her cannily. \u201cI don\u2019t know. Do you think we can get through the Kama Sutra again by then?\u201d<\/p>\n
She sighs. \u201cBaby, I\u2019ve got appointments tomorrow. And I have to get home and meditate. That\u2019s what I had on my schedule to do, before I decided to get high and laid instead.\u201d She produces a yellow Post-it pad, locates a pen on the floor, and briefly scribbles. \u201cHere. Come to this address. It\u2019s right on the Row, just a few blocks from my office.\u201d<\/p>\n
I stare at the square. 1620 Illustration Ave. #18. Reality vibrates. Not precisely deja vu. More like the opposite. An odd sensation this will happen again.<\/p>\n
She is dressing. \u201cOnce more?\u201d I plead.<\/p>\n
She hesitates. \u201cOnce more,\u201d she agrees.<\/p>\n
*\u00a0 *\u00a0 *\u00a0 *\u00a0 *\u00a0 *<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I stretch and blow out a pungent cloud of smoke rings. \u201cI want to go to a concert or rave every night for the rest of my life,\u201d I declare, passing the joint. \u201cCome party with me. We\u2019ll spend all my money. We can have large orgies here. I want to dance my life away.\u201d […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-51","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-transmigrant-blues","category-transmigrant-blues-round-4"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.amanamission.com\/transblues\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.amanamission.com\/transblues\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.amanamission.com\/transblues\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.amanamission.com\/transblues\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.amanamission.com\/transblues\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=51"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.amanamission.com\/transblues\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":107,"href":"http:\/\/www.amanamission.com\/transblues\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51\/revisions\/107"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.amanamission.com\/transblues\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.amanamission.com\/transblues\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.amanamission.com\/transblues\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=51"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}