Day 6004

When A awakes the following day, he is momentarily confused because he thinks he is in the same body as yesterday. After a brief period of disbelief, he understands what has happened: he has awakened in the body of James’s twin, Tom.

This is the first time A has ever had a chance to observe someone waking up after giving up a day to his consciousness. He stares at James all morning and pesters him with questions about what he did the day before. James appears not to feel like he was possessed. He merely tells A the basic facts of what he did yesterday. For whatever reason, his mind seems to edit out Rhiannon and the information he read in A’s emails. To James, yesterday was just a normal and unremarkable day.

During school, A misses Rhiannon. “I should have given her my phone number,” he thinks—then he stops, amazed at himself. He cannot keep an object from day to day, so how could he have a phone number? It strikes him as a bad thing that he had such an impossible thought.

After eating lunch, A sends Rhiannon a brief note and then reads yet another email from Nathan. The news stories about Nathan are still going, and A is beginning to think he needs to reply. After pondering his options for a while, he writes a note saying that Nathan is mistaken in thinking there is any connection between this email account and his strange experience. At the end of the note, A adds that even if Nathan was scared the other night, “blaming the devil is not the answer.”

Normally, A likes it when his days are “uneventful,” but when Tom’s afternoon progresses normally, A is somewhat disappointed:

Going through the motions gives you plenty of time to examine the motions. I used to find this interesting. Now it has taken on the taint of meaninglessness….This is the trap of having something to live for. Everything else seems lifeless.

That evening, when A wishes James goodnight, he feels really sorry to be leaving. After two days in one family—the most he has ever had—he feels he has seen “the smallest hint” of what it would be like to be a normal person. He wants that for himself, but he cannot have it.