“Benji? Benji are you okay? You were about to tell me about your blackout,” said a male voice. When I opened my eyes, I saw Dr Chen sitting in front of me.

“So how do you feel? You got really quiet all of a sudden,” Dr. Chen asked as he wrote in his notebook.

I sat up and felt my body. “You won’t believe this but I felt, like I just lived this year over,” I said.

“You mean like deja vu?” he asked seeming more interested in my story.

“No I mean like I just lived the last year over like in Groundhog Day except things were different,” I said.

“You mean all this happened just in the time you were in my office?” he said curiously writing it all down.

“Well, yeah, I guess,” I said.

“You were just about to tell me about the blackout and the object in your pocket,” he said leaning towards me.

“Object in my pocket?” I reached in my front pocket and pulled out a familiar shiny green disk about four inches in diameter. “This looks so familiar yet I can’t remember how it got there,” I said handing it to Dr Chen.

“This looks very old and perhaps valuable, Benji. So you don’t remember where you found this carving?” he said handing it back to me.

I was shocked and excited. “Why did you call me Benji? Have you seen him? Was he looking for me?” I said looking around the room excitedly.

“Yes Benji, you’re sitting right in front of me,” he said cocking his head to the side.

“No, Ben’s my best friend. I’m Travis McAllister,” I said.

“So Benji, I mean Travis.  Where’s Ben at now?” he said.

“He’s dead, I mean, um he’s gone somewhere far away. Here let me show you,” I said reaching in my back pocket for my wallet. I pulled out a strange wallet and opened it. I was shocked to see Ben’s ID card. I had somehow put Ben’s wallet there by mistake and couldn’t seem to find my own.

“Can I see it?” he asked.

I hesitated, but handed it over. “See, Ben Fisher looks nothing like me,” I said.

“But Travis, don’t you think you look identical to Ben? It’s unmistakable that the man in the photograph is you,” he said.

“No, no, no! that can’t be right,” I said shaking my head.

“Travis calm down! What’s the last thing you can remember?” he said.

“You mean when I was in your office the last time?”

“No, what do you remember doing just five minutes ago?”

I leaned forward and cupped my head in my hands. I pulled my hand away. My eye stung and ached when I touched it. “I know this sounds crazy, but I was just in downtown Louisville, lying in the street besides a Kroger’s store, all run over and bleeding to death. I’d just walked out in front of a car.”

“Fascinating. So you said that Ben was your friend? When was the last time you saw him?”

I hesitated, then said, “Well, there’s two of them. I just met Benji at an abandoned building here in Lexington, but the last time I saw Ben Fisher, he was standing on the bank of the Kentucky River at Boonesboro at the beginning of January.”

“And what were you doing there?” he asked.

“He asked me to drive him there to say goodbye.”

“Did you leave him there and drive away?”

“Yeah, sorta I guess.”

“What happened to Ben at the river?”

“You wouldn’t believe me.”

“Tell me anyway.”

“I watched him transform into a big fish and swim away. I wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes.”

Dr Chen sat scratching his head. “So Travis, what did you do that caused Benji to get beaten and robbed behind the Minimart?”

“What? I have no idea what you’re talking about. When did Benji get beat up?” I said.

“It happened a couple of days ago. I assume you know something about it.”

“Is he okay? What about his dog?”

“You tell me Travis.”

“Doc, do you think I’m crazy?”

Well we don’t call it crazy anymore, but you’ve been diagnosed having schizophrenia since you were in your late teens. Do you remember any of that?”

“No, I don’t remember anything like that. The army would never take anyone having a confirmed mental illness, would they?”

“Travis have you heard of dissociative identity disorder?”

“What’s that?”

“Someone having multiple personalities. This might explain your blackouts and missing time.”

I put my hands on my head and started rocking back and forth.

“No no no, Are you trying to tell me that Travis isn’t real? What about my family? My army service? Was my entire life a lie?”

“This might be a difficult thing to wrap your mind around, but I think we’re making progress,” he said getting up. “Travis can you wait right here? I’ll be right back.”

I was stunned. Could this be real?. Things felt upside down. I walked out to the waiting room and sat in one of the chairs. Rachael the receptionist was staring at me oddly.

“Mr Fisher, Dr Chen wants you to wait in his office. He should be back shortly,”she said.

“Nah, I think I’ll wait right here if you don’t mind.” I got up, pretended to browse the magazines, and when she wasn’t looking, I just walked out the door.

I ran through the parking lot looking for my truck, but it was nowhere to be seen. I pulled out Ben’s wallet and discovered he only had two dollars and some change. I pulled that jade coin from my pocket and looked it over carefully. It looked somewhat familiar with a hand with an eye in the palm surrounded by two snakes biting each other’s tails. I didn’t know what to do, but I was sure that Dr Chen thought I was crazy and I had to get out of there fast. I headed down an alley, walking at a brisk pace, turning off one road onto another in case they were searching for me. I caught my reflection in a storefront window and was startled to see a skinny Ben looking back at me wearing old clothes and a rather nasty black eye. “What the hell ?”

I walked eastward on New Circle Road until I came to the old Paris road, US 68 going east. I walked to a gas station and found a pay phone. I tried dialing my phone number to see who might answer, but all I got was, “I’m sorry, but the number you have dialed is not in service at this time. Please…” Then I decided to call Ben’s number, but I got the same recording. Finally, I called Mr Watts. The phone was ringing and then I heard Cody’s voice. “You have reached Cody and Ethel Watts. We’re not home right now  but if you leave your name and number at the sound of the beep we will get back to you. beep!” I hung up. I didn’t have a number I could leave with them. I tried calling my dad collect, but the number was wrong.

I was hungry, thirsty and only had a dollar and some loose change on me. I bought a fountain drink at the convenience store and continued walking east on the Old Paris road.  I hiked over rolling hills, passed old familiar horse farms where the wealthy people lived. Nearly a twenty mile walk, I was exhausted by the time I arrived in Paris. I decided it might be safer and a little less traffic to take the railroad tracks to Millersburg. My feet ached from blisters and I had to stop and rest a few times before I got to the edge of town. Once I got to the bridge that crosses the Hinkston creek, I decided to turn and walk up Vimont lane, the road that the Ben Fisher I knew had lived. Nervous and not sure what to expect,  I got closer to the house. A strange car was parked in front of the house with toys scattered about the yard. I realized that Ben did not live here.

I didn’t know where to go or who to turn to. I sat beside the railroad bridge feeling hungry and tired. More than anything I just wanted to crawl into a comfy bed and just go to sleep, or perhaps just lie in the soft grass somewhere out of sight to rest my eyes.

I looked up and saw a tall man with a beard walking towards me. It was Bill.

“Hi Bill. Do you know who I am?” I said.

“Nope,” he said.

“So you never seen me before? Have I ever given you a ride on my motorcycle?” I asked.

“You got a motorcycle?” he said seeming more interested.

“No, I guess not. Well it was nice to meet you.”

“Okay,” he said and turned and walked away.

I followed the tracks east. Thought maybe I would check out Judyville on the other side of town and see if anyone remembered my family, Travis’s family. Walking past the old familiar houses, people gave me odd looks. I guess it wasn’t the smartest thing to do. I must look like some beat up hobo to these people and thought it best to move on. I returned to the tracks and continued going east.

I walked past the spot where “Travis” was spray painted, but it wasn’t there and neither was the little tin box. I just had to know if there was a body hidden under those fallen limbs in the tall marshy grass near the tracks. As I got closer, I felt a chill. It was late afternoon just before sunset when I reached the spot. I waded through a marsh of tall grass surrounding a fallen tree. It stunk of moldy fish. I plunged my hands beneath the muck feeling for pieces of clothing or perhaps a piece of bone, but there was nothing there. I started to question my sanity and wondered if Travis was just someone my mind created. Soon it got too dark to see. Reluctantly, I gave up the search for the wallet among the brambles and muck and decided to move on. I only had a few coins left in my pocket and nowhere left to go. My feet felt heavy being caked with mud and I trudged back to the railroad tracks. I sat down on the rail and scraped off heavy clods of clay from the soles of my old boots with a stick.

I tried to pry a pebble from between the lugs of my heel when I heard a whistle blaring and the unmistakable roar of a train coming up from behind me. I turned my head and saw the train rounding the bend, plowing towards me, merely yards away. I was transfixed, with no time to react. I saw the glare of the windshield and a man behind it unaware of me.  It smacked me hard. Hard enough to send me flying forwards, tumbling through space. Things were a blur just before I saw a most amazing vision. My limbs flailing against blue sky.

I landed with a dull thud among the tall grass, branches and mud. I realized it was the exact same spot I had been searching. My body was broken and I was in excruciating pain. I heard a crow on a fence cawing out. It flew to the ground beside me and hopped closer. It pecked at a pool of my blood and flew away. I called out to the crow, “Ben, is that really you?” I felt myself fade away. “Ben? Ben. There was nothing left of me. It was terrifying.