Bud Thompson ran into himself today.

Literally. At the corner of Harrison and Fourth.

It was 2:30 a.m., and Bud was late getting home from a night with the boys that he’d promised Earlene he wouldn’t have. The pavement was wet after a night of freezing drizzle—and Bud’s reflexes were dulled by seven or eight bottles of his namesake brew.

The heavy-set guy walking across Harrison Street never had a chance.

And there was no question about it. It was Bud Thompson lying in the street, unnaturally still.

Bud stood in the cold, his car dinging a mechanical warning that his door was open with the key in the ignition, and he stared at himself on the ground.

He was chilled to the core, but not from the weather. Bud blinked hard, trying to summon his mind through a sticky haze of alcohol. His thoughts were maddeningly slow, refusing to reconcile the impossible man before him with reality.

Though his mind recoiled, his gut churned with the slowly growing certainty that he was now in very serious trouble.