The cracking of helmets brought me crashing back to reality. I took a few steps back, the ball in my hands, and tried to remember what the play was.

Come on dummy, think, THINK!

Everything was happening too fast, players all around me were pushing and shoving, and trying to take my head off. All my receivers were running routes but I had no idea where they were gonna end up. A linebacker blitzed around the left side of the offensive line and dived right for me, so I took off and started running to the right. He grabbed for my ankles, but only managed to slip off one of my cleats.

Get to the endzone! Get to the endzone!

I had never played football before, but whoever's body I was in now had been playing for a decade. Thank God for muscle memory, or I'd have just cowered down and wet myself the moment the ball hit my hands. I ran as fast as I could, curving around to the right. We were right on the goal line, just a little further and this would be over.

The defending teams cornerbacks saw me running and pounced, flooding the right side of the field leaving me no path forward.

I stopped, but only for a second, and then did something very stupid.

I started running backwards.

The crowd leapt up in their seats and started screaming all manner of obscenities at me.

"You're going the wrong way!"

I turned sharply and headed up the opposite side of the field, I had no idea what I was doing, I just kept my feet moving up and down as fast as they could. Both teams were confused by my actions. Players who were running one way had to stop on a dime and were falling over each other trying to head in the opposite direction. By some miracle my idiocy paid off.

"It's a reverse! He's doing a reverse!" I heard the opposing team's coach shouting at his players.

I ran the entire length of the field, curving my way towards the end zone, hoping and praying that there would be no defenders in my way, but of course there was.

Damn!

Two of their players weren't fooled by my antics and stayed back just in case something like this would happen. One of them was picked up by our tight end, but the other was waiting for me. Shuffling sideways waiting for me to come to him.

I ran for the pylon. I knew there was no way around him, I was going to have to go through him.

We met on the zero yard line, and I smashed into him with everything I had. He was much bigger than I was, and he wrapped his arms around me, wrenching me back from a touchdown. I chopped my feet, pumping as hard as I could, but I couldn't win against his size and strength.

Suddenly, the other players caught up to me, and one of my teammates started pushing me in the back. Now it was two on one, and we had the advantage, but some of the defenders were rushing in as well. I only had one shot before they forced me to the ground and the game was over. I put every last bit of strength I had into one final dive, and stretched the ball out in one hand aiming for the pylon.

I hit the ground hard, and the ball fell out of my hand. But where? Where did it go out of bounds?

I looked up, through the pile of bodies that had come crashing down on me, and saw the referee. He was running towards me with his hands raised in a straight line above his head.

"Touchdown!"

The crowd leapt to their feet and began to cheer. A couple members of the opposing team took off their helmets and threw them to the ground in frustration. My team, on the other hand, started celebrating. Dancing and slapping each other's helmets, everybody was shouting, unable to contain their joy.

"We did it! We won!"

As everybody slowly got off of me, my teammates came over and picked me up, raising me up on their shoulders. To be honest, I still wasn't sure what was happening. Since jumping into this body I didn't have a second to look through his memories and see what the hell was going on.

When I looked towards the cheering crowd, I didn't have to. I saw all the signs in the crowd and figured out exactly what happened.

"Welcome to the Jungle. Homecoming 2011."

I had just won our team the homecoming football game.

My teammates cheered and kept me up on their shoulders all the way into our school's locker room. Then they put me down and everybody took a knee so that our coach could give a speech.

"What the hell was that? You call that a victory? I call it SLOPPY!"

I was taken aback by his yelling, but all the guys around me were snickering, trying their best to hide their smirks.

"And you, Herman," Coach said, pointing towards me, "what in god's name were you thinking, running a reverse like that? We were on the one yard line, Son, all you had to do was a quarterback sneak."

The entire team looked at me and waited to hear my response.

"Uh—I forgot the play."

Everybody stared at me blankly for about ten seconds, then the entire team burst out in laughter. Even the coach started howling and slapping his knee.

"Who am I kidding, I can't stay mad at you guys! You brought home the victory, that's all that matters! They had us beat in the first half, but you came back strong in the second, and showed those Jefferson losers not to underestimate us Patriots! Now everybody bring it in." Coach put his hand out and waited for all the players to surround him and put their hands on his.

"Alright guys, I want a big 'Homecoming' on three. Ready? One, two, three!"

"HOMECOMING!" All the players shouted and threw their hands up in the air.

"Now get dressed and get the hell out of here, you've got a homecoming dance to get ready for tonight." Coach exited the locker room smacking a couple of guys on the back as he left, and everybody else started getting out of their football equipment and back into their street clothes.

I just sat down on one of the locker room benches and took in my surroundings. I was quite shocked to see that I wasn't in middle school anymore.

I searched through Herman's memories and learned that I was now inhabiting the body of a sixteen year old. Four years had passed since I walked through the land of the living. Had I really stayed in the Dark Place for four years? Or did time work differently there?

Even though the last time I was alive I was only twelve, it didn't feel weird being in the body of a sixteen-year-old. In fact, if anything the body felt too young. I now had within me the memories of two twelve-year-olds and a sixteen-year-old, which made for thirty years worth of memories. I was pretty sure my actual age was closer to seventeen, maybe even eighteen.

I thought it was strange though, I wasn't in Billy's body anymore but I could still access all of his memories, like they were still a part of me. I thought maybe they would go away when I jumped into a new body, but they were still there. I didn't plan on dying again, but if I did, would these memories come with me as well. If I died a hundred times would all the memories fill up my head until I had no idea who I was anymore?

It was a terrifying thought. I tried to push it out of my head as I took off my shoulder pads and headed to my locker.

As I got dressed in sweats and a loose fitting t-shirt, I started searching Herman's memories. There was something from my last life that I desperately needed to know.

What became of Billy Ball?

Last I left him he was bleeding out in a sewer drainage system. Obviously he died, or I wouldn't be here, but what happened after.

Herman's memories didn't have all the finer details, but he did remember what happened to Billy even though it was years ago. After a week or two Billy's body stunk enough that animal control had to come and check the sewers. They assumed an animal had injured itself and crawled in to find a quiet place to die. Imagine their surprise when they found a middle schooler, bloated and rotting, with a paring knife sticking out of his chest.

Billy's Mom had gone crazy in the meanwhile. She reported him as missing, and probably blamed herself for his absence. How many times had she locked me in the safe earlier that day? She probably thought she pushed poor Billy over the edge, and that he finally ran away. What actually happened was, of course, much worse.

They found the knife, which belonged to Billy's Mom, and charged her with murder. They didn't bother to look any harder than that to find the killer. As far as they were concerned it was a cut and dry case, and when Billy's Mom saw that her son was dead she pretty much gave up and accepted the punishment.

"Even though I didn't murder him—the way I raised him and the way I treated him—it got my boy killed all the same."

Yeah, she probably said something like that.

I felt really bad for Billy's Mom. She didn't deserve any of the awful things that happened to her. I mean, I felt bad for Billy too, but less bad. The real person who was murdered was actually me.

Smack! Somebody standing behind me slapped me in the ass really fricking hard.

"Great game out there Hermano!"

Hermano? Oh, I get it! Because my name is Herman.

Wait a second. As I slowly turned around, I realized that only one person on the football team called me Hermano. There, standing in front of me, six foot five, two hundred and fifty pounds, and built like a brick shit house, was the center of our football team.

"Hey, you feeling alright, Hermano? You look a little pale."

Carl Fricking Dunn.