Strange Perceptions Read Free

hospital bed, knowing it would die soon, wanting to be here for the moment and see with my ghost eyes. I remembered it, every detail, but there’s something different about watching it, from spectating it instead of living it.
    Jeremy sounded like he needed me. I could come back later.
    Dad had said to close my eyes and think of a time.
    I closed my eyes, thought of Jeremy ordering pizza and arguing with him about whether Rover the Cat had walked across the pizza. The familiar roar sounded in my head.

    I opened my eyes to Jeremy’s room, walls painted black, old band posters on his walls. All the greatest guitar players, Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix, Jimmy Page, Stevie Ray Vaughn. “Police on My Back” by The Clash played on his iHome. Jeremy was going through a retro-punk phase. An open box of pepperoni and cheese pizza, extra cheese, lay on his bed. I loved any type of pizza, the more you piled on the better, but he liked single toppings so his taste buds wouldn’t be confused. Since he bought the pizza—or his dad did—he got to choose.
    We argued—the live us—about the cat. A cat so fat it made Garfield look like a poster child for feline starvation. A large gray blob who lay curled up on Jeremy’s pillow, munching away on a piece of pepperoni.
    “Dude!” Ghost Jeremy said, from behind me.
    I turned. “When did you die?”
    “Two weeks ago in the crash. Well, later at the hospital, but I was a goner at the crash. They did CPR on me for a long time. Should have worn my seat-belt. Didn’t help you though.”
    “Oh man, sorry Jeremy.”
    He let out a chirp of laughter. “Yeah, name’s Percival now. Shit man. What a messed up name. Sounds like a nerdy dweeb from Jane Austin. Call me Jeremy, it’s way cooler.”
    “Cool.”
    “You like the name Reo?”
    I thought about it for a second. “Yeah I do. It sounds, I don’t know, exotic or something.”
    “It’s way better than Percival. Sheesh. Anyway, here’s the deal. You know that Ivy chick you like? Yeah. Course you do. I think Dennis Spleenk is going rape her.”
    “What?”
    “Yeah, I know. Crazy. But here’s the deal. I was hanging out in the girl’s locker room at school and—”
    “—Seriously?” I asked.
    “Yeah, it was great. Different than I thought it’d be. Girls don’t run around naked as much as I hoped. They have private showers, which most of them don’t even use. If you’re quick you can still catch them topless while they’re changing.”
    “What a perv.”
    Jeremy sighed. “Can I help it that I find the female body so fascinating? It’s more like I appreciate fine art and naked girls are the finest art there is.”
    “Whatever.”
    “So anyway, I’m waiting and it’s getting tough cause live me isn’t in the boy’s locker room anymore, live me is moving away, skipping out and going to an early lunch. There’s just two girls left, Ivy and Kim Franks. They’re both hot and I’m thinking ‘hurry up and change’ but they’re not, they’re just talking and Ivy tells Kim that Dennis Spleenk has been taking pictures of her. He’s been real sneaky doing it.”
    “What a creeper,” I said.
    Our live selves went to Jeremy’s dresser, scrolled through his playlist, and discussed which music to play next. Behind them, on the bed, Rover the Cat, strolled over to the pizza and put one paw on a piece of crust and snagged a piece of pepperoni before going back to his perch on the pillow.
    “You’re right,” Jeremy said. “He gives off a creeper vibe. What a freak.”
    I nodded.
    “Anyway, I got to thinking. What’s he doing with those pictures of her? I mean it’s weird, isn’t it? So here’s the deal. Dennis Spleenk rides the same bus I do, or did. I get this idea to follow him home and see what he’s all about. So I jump forward to the afternoon and me riding the bus home.”
    The sound of the Romones, “Blitzkrieg Bop” filled the room.
    “I thought you drove The Beast?”
    “No gas funds, Dude. Plus,