Soul Survivor (17 page)

The panel, however, being a kind of collective adventure-seeker, was all in favor of doing the show as long as no last names
were used and the town of Lafayette was not mentioned on the program. Andrea feared the loss of anonymity, but mostly she
feared damage to her precious son.

Eventually, Bobbi came up with an idea that seemed workable: “Why don’t you just stay open and evaluate how you feel through
each phase of the process? If, at any time, you feel that things aren’t working out in your favor, you can opt not to go forward.
Just proceed with cautious optimism, set up the ground rules, and evaluate as you go along.”

In spite of the fact that the panel was on his side, Bruce grumbled about their having such a big voice in the life of his
family. Andrea explained that “the panel” was a fact of life and could not be avoided. “It’s how we operate.”

She called Carol and told her about her apprehensions, and Carol understood. She was neutral about the decision. Andrea was
grateful that she wasn’t taking sides—pushing could only bring out Andrea’s overly protective streak. (Her fear of child molesters
was so great that she never allowed James to go to a public restroom by himself; when Bruce asked when Andrea would allow
that, she replied—only half joking—when he graduates from high school or gets his black belt in karate.)

Carol told her that three families were being considered for the show, which would be a pilot for a new show tentatively entitled
Unexplained Mysteries.

There would be a child from Colorado and another in Florida, but James was the only “military” story.

There were a lot of phone calls over the next few weeks—Carol to Andrea, Andrea to Carol, Shalini to Andrea—and in the end,
all Andrea’s terms were agreed to. There would be no last names used on the program, and the town of Lafayette would not be
mentioned.

Two other stories might be used on the program, but James’s would be the most compelling.

In early May, after James had turned four, the show’s producer, Shalini, came down for a visit. She was making a tour, visiting
the boys in Colorado and Florida, as well as Louisiana. She was young and pretty, and in the context of a decision in which
sensibilities and impulses played such a big part, the “vibe” was important. Andrea and Bruce and, most important, James liked
her.

The full impact of what they were about to embark on had not yet struck the Leiningers. It was not the going public or even
going on national television—it was just this sweet young woman who believed in reincarnation; that is, she believed in James.

It was only an afternoon, but it was a full few hours. Shalini asked James about his story, and he told her about the Corsair.
She asked him to show her a picture of a Corsair, so he got out one of Bruce’s books and picked out the Corsair.

“That’s a Corsair,” he said. “They used to get flat tires all the time! And they always wanted to turn left when they took
off!”

He had never said that before—never given the characteristics of the plane. Andrea was very excited. James had just had a
past life recollection in front of someone who wasn’t a member of the family. He’d had them with Jenny and Bruce, but this
was different—significant—and Shalini recognized it. James’s memories could resurface at any time, given the right trigger.
It opened up a whole new topic for the afternoon discussion. That night, when Bruce got home, they went out to James’s favorite
restaurant, Tsunami, where he had his favorite dish, sushi.

Shalini had her lead story for the show. James, she believed, was the real thing.

Then she flew off to Florida to visit another family, another boy, and test another story.

I
N APRIL 2002, just after his fourth birthday, James took his old car seat out of the garage and dragged it into Bruce’s office
closet and mounted it on a plastic file box. Then he took a learning toy that had a keyboard on it, and Bruce helped him hang
it high over the front of the old car seat. He also managed to get a Playskool driving console with a little phone on it and
stuck it directly in front of his assemblage. That was his cockpit. He found an old construction hard hat and adjusted the
band so that it became his helmet. A couple of old canvas bags and a backpack became his parachute.

James would saunter into the office while Bruce was working, open the closet door, strap on his gear, put on his helmet, climb
into the car seat, and close the door behind him. Bruce would hear the takeoff:
“VROOM! VROOMMMM! WRRRRRR!”

Through the door he could hear the battle: “Roger… Zero at six o’clock… Hit him!”

After a while, the door would fly open and James would come tumbling down. The first time he saw it, Bruce thought his son
had fallen. But James just got up, dusted himself off, and when Bruce asked what was going on, he replied, “My plane was hit
and I was parachuting.”

It was cute, but it was also eerie.

James had already shaken his parents at a local air show when he had mounted the cockpit of a Piper Cub, grabbed the headgear,
and put it on with chilling familiarity. Bruce was busy making home movies of some other scene and didn’t see it, but he heard
Andrea scream, “That’s it! That’s it!”

“What? What’s wrong?!”

“That’s it!” she repeated, pointing to James’s motion, putting on the headgear. “That’s what he does when he gets into the
car! Oh, my God, after he buckles his seat belt, he’s putting on his headset, just like a pilot!”

It was the routine she had observed again and again in the car, with James mimicking the motions of settling into a cockpit.

Even the Blue Angels were taken aback by James. At the air show when he met them at age three, James was asked what he wanted
to be when he grew up. Most kids say automatically a Blue Angel pilot, but James was a little more specific:

“I want to be an F-18 Super Hornet pilot and then a Blue Angel pilot—the slot pilot.”

Not quite the standard toddler’s ambition.

Meanwhile, Carol and Andrea and Shalini were holding daily strategy sessions for the July filming of the
20/20
segment. The terms were agreed to: no last names, no hometown, no closely identifying marks. Shalini sent James a gift. It
was a model of a Corsair. He quickly knocked off the propeller in a mock crash. He was thrilled.

And Bruce was in a double quandary. On the one hand, the real reason for his intense interest in
Natoma Bay
would be revealed to the veterans—he had been chasing his son’s nightmares, and the book came as an afterthought. In spite
of the fact that all the names would be withheld, the veterans would know the truth. At this stage, he’d never personally
met any of the veterans or betrayed their trust in any important way, and although he could still count it as an innocent
duplicity, Bruce felt a sting of conscience.

There was, however, another dilemma—something even more powerful—and he had a decision to make. If they were to go on national
TV, he would have to
appear
to be a believer in the reincarnation theory. But it was still not something that he believed. In fact, he was in the business
of not believing it. However, what was the harm in
seeming
to acquiesce, keeping quiet, allowing the network professionals to come to their own conclusions? Maybe they could end up
verifying or debunking the story. After all, something or someone had to break open the case.

And so he made a private pact to keep his doubts off the air, while letting Andrea speak for the other side. He felt a tad
dishonest.

Amid the
20/20
preparations and excitement, Bruce had other, more pressing concerns.

His time with the company was almost over. That summer there were three companies who expressed an interest in buying OSCA,
which was in the midst of a spike in growth. In a year the stock had more than doubled. That whole season, Bruce, along with
the executive team, was locked into secret, silent meetings with Halliburton, Weatherford, and BJ Services, going over the
books, fielding initial offers, tweaking numbers, trying to protect the interests of the workers and the stockholders.

Finally, the deed was done: OSCA was sold to BJ Services, and a new, grim reality set in at the house on West St. Mary Boulevard.
Most of the executive team had been terminated—no surprise there; that was the whole idea. Generous severance packages had
been arranged. Bruce had seen to that. Everything went according to plan. And yet, the stark reality of being once again out
of work came as a cold shock.

Bruce kept going to the office, making certain that all the golden parachutes for the executive team were deployed, seeing
to the smooth transfer of one management team to the other.

And Andrea fell victim to an icy panic. Her husband was jobless. Never mind the beefed-up stock portfolio and the large severance
check and the fact that this sale of the company was what he had been working for. The fact staring her in the face was that
he was unemployed. And that led inexorably to that other damned threat. Lafayette was a small town. The prospect of another
high-level human resources job opening up within its precincts was unlikely. Therefore, there was, somewhere along the way,
the stone-cold chance that they would have to uproot and move again. To her, it was an impossible thought.