Return Of The Knife Master

Condensation raced down the slate grey tiles of the roomy shower enclosure, and steam swirled around the guitarist’s body in a passionate embrace. Sweat slicked his brow and lined his recently trimmed goatee as he rested his head against the wall, just out of the line of assault from the hellfire hot shower spray that was attempting to work out the tension in his neck and shoulders. He felt anxious, his pulse was quickened with unease. It wasn’t the nearly first time he had to walk into a room full of people celebrating Jimmy’s life, but like each time prior, he wasn’t sure how it was going to unfold. He almost wished he didn’t have to go; but Zack had organized it and it wouldn’t be right if he didn’t attend. It wasn’t that he didn’t miss the drummer, he just always felt like there was this well of unanswered questions when it came to his departure, and it brought on really mixed emotions for him.

Exhaling deeply, he pulled himself from his thoughts and turned off the water. With an inward groan at the sudden blast of cold air that immediately assaulted him on sliding the door open a few inches, he thrust a hand out to blindly feel around for the soft blue towel that hung on the hook close by. As soon as his fingers touched it, he firmly grasped it in his hand, and drew it into the still steamy shower stall to begin drying off. If he was right, he had about ten minutes left before the tranquility of the evening was interrupted by a series of phone calls from pretty much everyone, asking when he was going to get to the party. Six o’clock, he would tell each one in turn, the same time Zack told each band member to arrive, so they could have a drink or two in Jimmy’s honor before the celebration was to begin a half hour later.

The warm, pruney skin of his feet sunk down into the plush grey bathmat one after the other, and he let another sigh slip from his lips. Truth be told, he’d rather be spending the evening shut in his media room binge watching his favorite show on Netflix, but he could never really back out of something set up for Jimmy’s legacy. Besides, he knew once he got there, had a couple of drinks with the guys and the story sharing time began, he would change his tune. A smile played at the corner of his lips now at the thought of what likely lay ahead. Johnny would inevitably share the story about the time the drummer got drunk, and wandered into his hotel room, mistakenly believing it to be his own; only to find out the hard way that the bed he stumbled into actually belonged to Johnny. The poor bassist woke up to a delightfully inebriated Jimmy, who was incoherently singing a conglomeration of Disney tunes. Zack would likely reminisce about the pranks they used to pull on each other on tour, while Matt would undoubtedly bring up the insane time that was recording The City of Evil, and all of the mayhem that ensued when Jimmy was in the booth laying down his vocals.

Brian wasn’t sure what he was going to talk about. There were just so many memories. Though it had been an entire decade since he’d last seen him, it was still hard to really place Jimmy as gone in his heart and mind. The man had been his best friend for half of forever, and life had always been so much brighter with him in it. They say that time heals all wounds, but he had never really looked at it that way. Some losses couldn’t be put into words, and this was just one of those things.

Mindful that he was on a time crunch at this point, he finished dressing quickly and leaned across the counter to gently wipe some of the fog off of the massive mirror that spanned wall to wall above the marble top double sinks. As the blurry steam began to vanish, the guitarist furrowed his brows at his reflection. With each circle of the hand towel he’d taken from the wall mounted holder, it appeared he was not looking at himself in the mirror. Dark hair that was slicked back with water showed tall, straight, and completely bone dry.

“What the hell?” he muttered and slowed his action considerably.

Chocolate brown eyes, that had to be playing tricks on him, squinted as the more he swiped, the less his reflection made sense. The forehead was different, the hairline, and the notably pierced ears that stood in contradiction to his own had him confused as the day is long, but when a lengthier wipe revealed depthless pools of ocean blue instead of his own brown eyes, he knew he was not looking at himself in this twisted reflection. It had to be though. He blinked several times, righted himself, and took a couple steps back to clear his vision. The heat must’ve gotten to him in the shower, he decided, as each blink seemed to flick back and forth from himself to the drummer.

“What the actual fuck?” now partially parted lips wondered aloud, while he shuffled back towards the reflective glass one more time to clear his head. “It can’t be…..” lifting a hand to touch the mirrored image of his late best friend. Surely this was a trick? Maybe he’d fallen asleep in the shower? “Jimmy, is that really you?”

Just before his hand could touch his cheek in the mirror, the drummer’s reflection moved back! Before Brian had a chance to even open his mouth, his own image reappeared, at the same time Jimmy’s appeared behind him, with fingerless glove-clad hands on the confused man’s shoulders.

“Well it isn’t the Easter Bunny!” he exclaimed, and the guitarist promptly dropped to the floor.

“HOLY FUCKING HELL!” the roar left him surprisingly strong despite the fact his entire body was completely limp with a soul crippling fear.

“Well shit; I didn’t expect this kind of reaction,” the drummer nearly hummed with amusement.

“Wh-wh-what th-th-the h-h-h-h-HELL is going on?! Am I dead?” he sputtered as he weakly pushed himself to a sitting position and scooted back up against the front of the counter. He was white as a sheet, eyes dinner plate wide, and he was pretty sure he had pissed himself. He couldn’t feel anything. Maybe he was dead! “AM I DEAD?”

“What? No! Why are you shouting?”

“Why AREN’T YOU shouting?!”

“Because I have ear drums, and you have neighbors, weirdo!” easing himself down onto the cool tile floor, he leaned forward and stretched out an arm to touch his friend in an attempt to calm him. This gesture wash quickly and violently batted away.

“Don’t touch me! WHAT THE FUCK IS HAPPENING?!” the absolutely petrified man shouted, deep in the trenches of full-blown panic.

“It’s been a while. I…..It’s been so much longer than I thought, and….I owe you an explanation,” he said quietly now, face now etched with a mixture of concern and guilt.

“An 'explanation’? It’s been ten YEARS, Jimmy. I’m trying to get ready to go to your celebration of life party; I think you owe me a hell of a lot more than an explanation!” panting against the stifling mixture of fear and confusion in his chest, he willed himself to stand, but found he still didn’t have the strength. His limbs were jelly, and he was becoming number as the seconds went on, if that was even possible. “I obviously didn’t get out of the shower. I must have fallen asleep in there, or- or maybe hit my head and I’m unconscious, and in some sort of delusion, somehow.”

“You’re not unconscious, B. I’m really here with you,” the drummer assured him, and brought a hand up to touch his friends arm again. “We have a lot to talk about. A lifetime of things has happened since we last saw each other.”

In his life, he had ridden out the highest of highs, and crashed in the lowest of lows. He’d surfed the waves of ecstasy and tripped so intensely at times, he thought he was going to see death firsthand; but never, had he ever had a feeling like he had right then, in that moment. Call it a vibe, energy, a self-awareness, or an awakening, but Brian felt every ounce of every emotion known to man, from one extreme end of the spectrum to the other, all at the very same time in that blip on the timeline of man kind’s history. It didn’t feel supernatural, evil, nor did it feel Heavenly; it was an energy, a new level of feeling, a very unique openness of the soul, and all it could be explained as was Jimmy. It felt like Jimmy- not as if he felt a presence, and not like he had somehow died and passed into the afterlife, but the very real and true essence of Jimmy himself.

As feeling came back to his body in such an intense way, as if every microfiber of his DNA was awake and on fire inside him, brown eyes widened again, and his hand came up to Jimmy’s shoulder. His voice scarcely came out in whisper form, and he repeated the question, of which the answer was something he would freely admit he wasn’t likely to understand in five lifetimes, let alone this one.

“What the fuck is happening?”