Chapter #39One Steps In, Another Steps Out by: Seuzz   The mask falls onto Stephanie's face like a rock dropping into a pond. But instead of a wave, it leaves behind a different face.
Your face.
Or, so you realize when the eyes snap open. They wander a bit, like marbles, then fasten onto you. You feel a rictus-like grin pulling at the corners of your mouth.
The kid on the floor jerks away. "The fuck?" He scuttles backward, feet kicking, onto his elbows. "Oh, Christ! What was I—?"
"Who are you?" Your voice is a croak.
His eyes snap, and a faintly nauseated expression washes onto his face. "Will Prescott, I assume. At least, that's the first name that comes to mind." A pale tongue flicks between his lips.
You feel like you've swallowed a basketball. His answering the question that way is either very good news or very bad news. "Do you know where Stephanie Wyatt is?"
"Stephanie?" His eyes—those dark, furtive eyes that were originally yours—widen. "No, why would I—?" He looks down, and yelps at his pants-less state. "Jesus Fuck! Would you explain what the fuck is going on?"
"What's the last thing you remember?" you demand.
"I don't know!" he hollers. "I think I was sitting behind a desk, yammering about—Ow!" He shakes his head. "Lawrence of Arabia? Jesus! The things that were coming out of my mouth!"
You settle back on your heels with a sigh of relief. It's got to be Beta-you, alright. Mike and Carlos used that mask to record a video of you talking about that movie. If this was Stephanie, trapped under your disguise, she'd be talking about how the last thing she remembered was—
No, if it was Stephanie under there, she'd be kicking your scrawny ass all the way outside.
"Okay, we need to change clothes and you need to get home. Oh, wait." You pause in the act of pulling off your shirt. "The furniture."
"What furniture?" Beta-Will whines. "What are you talking about? And— Dude, are you wearing my pants? Who are you?" he whines, and kicks his bony feet at you.
"I'm you! Obviously. Now listen, we're switching bodies. I'm switching bodies, okay? You need to go home and start living my life for me. You know, be me, act just like me, do all the stuff I do, the way I do it." Your nerves quiver. This ... thing ... could screw your life up totally, make it impossible to return to. "You understand?"
Beta-Will is looking at you like you're a crazy person. "No, not really," he mutters, and rubs his face. "What's today?"
"Monday."
"Monday?" he shrieks. "You mean I've lost a whole day?"
"You haven't lost anything! Just get undressed."
"Alright, jeez. You're acting like I did something wrong!"
You don't answer. You're too unnerved by all this talking to yourself. It turns out that Beta-Will is a lot closer to Beta-Carlos than to Beta-Philip.
Well, you suppose that makes sense. He ought to act like you, and you're feeling very weirded out by this experience, so it stands to reason that Beta-Will would be too. As he drops Stephanie's shirt and jacket to the floor, you pull off your own clothes. "Look, let's make this easy for both of us," you say as you thrust your wadded up things at him. "Go put these things on and wait in the studio. I mean, go in the studio and put them on there and wait for me," you correct him as he tries fishing himself into your boxers with one hand. "Dumbass," you mutter under your breath as you push him into the hallway.
Dumbass.
You pause at the word you'd just thought at him. It's a word you imagine Stephanie silently hurling at you every time she looks at you. In that one regard, at least, it's going to be easy to get into character as her.
Into character. Your gut flutters as your eye falls onto the mask laying on the ground. It's the moment of truth.
You push the metal door down—there's no lock on the inside, but you'll have to assume you're safe enough—and bend to pick the mask up. You flip it over to read the name again. STEPHANIE MICHAEL WYATT. You've been anticipating this impersonation all day. So what's the story about that middle name?
Well, now's the moment to find out.
You squat onto the cold concrete, then lay back, trying to get as comfortable as you can with the icy chill seeping all up and down your back and butt. You lift the mask over your face and blink once, then a second time, at the name inside the mask.
I'm going to be Stephanie Wyatt.
You close your eyes and imagine what it will be like. The confidence. The feline energy. The boobs and butt and legs. The house and family and friends, all looking at you and calling you "Stephanie."
Your cock slowly rises.
Then you lower the mask to your face, and one last flashing fantasy—of slipping into her bed and running your hands over a body that is both hers and yours—merges with a darkness that's heavy like iron.
* * * * *
Black waters pour off as you open your eyes. You focus on a roof. It's off-white, and there's a faintly buzzing fluorescent light in the middle of it. It's very cold—refrigerated cold. You raise your head and look around.
A weight bench. A footlocker. Barbells and iron disks. It's very familiar.
That's right! You shift your head and spot the bureau. Not quite flush with the wall, as you'd tried to arrange it. You sit up on one elbow, to grab it to help you up.
Something shifts off your chest. You look down. Your bare boobs are flopping to the side.
Jesus! Wildly, you look around. Did someone clip you in the head and—?
Prescott!
And your fury at the name fades as you're hit by a wave of something like deja vu. You huddle into a ball and push your face into your hands.
Will Prescott. That's right. How could you forget? You're Will Prescott.
But for a moment there you thought you were—
You suck in a deep, ragged breath. The oxygen sets your heart on fire. Chills that have nothing to do with the cold floor run all over you. You hug your knees to your face and press them into your eyes. The calves under your palms are very smooth. You shiver as the cold air kisses your bare back, bare shoulders, bare knees. You waggle toes that, like the rest of the bare bits, are new to you.
This is what you've been anticipating. What you've been imagining. Waking up with Stephanie Wyatt's body. You hug yourself more tightly.
So it's no wonder you woke up thinking Stephanie's thoughts. After all, you went under while pretending to think them, so naturally you would have woken up thinking them.
Right?
You look around again. The room doesn't look any different with Stephanie's eyes. You get slowly to your feet. Your chest tries to drag you down, but by settling your shoulders in a way that feels very natural you regain your balance. There's a coolness much further down, though, a feeling like something is missing.
Another jolt runs through you. Oh. Right.
Your hand goes to the bush you peeked at earlier. Gingerly, with gritted teeth, you push your fingers into it, and probe. It's sensitive, but not absurdly so. A little damp. Mm, yeah. Just tuck a finger up into --
Your hand, as though willed by another force, yanks away.
The fuck am I doing, standing in the middle of a storage facility, fingering myself? I've got to get out of here, get home, and—
You stagger to the side, and steady yourself against the bureau. Where did that flood of thoughts come from? But there it is: Mom and Pop will be home by—what time is it?—well, soon, anyway, and will have a pizza with them. Craig won't leave you with enough if you don't—
You grab your head. There they come again, those alien thoughts that don't feel alien, that feel exactly like yours, even though they shouldn't be. Like they ought to be Stephanie's. Could they really be hers? But didn't Fairfax and them tell you it would take awhile before you'd get access to her memories?
So you need to stay away from her house. You need to run off with Carlos and Mike—the real ones—and go home late, like they're planning to. But you can't, your parents insist on you being home by eight o'clock on weekdays so you can get your homework done. Pop especially—
You're as certain as anything that Stephanie calls her dad "Pop." Same as she calls her local grandmother "Momsy" and her other grandmother, the one who lives in North Carolina, "Gransy."
You're shaking again, but you let go of the bureau. On feet that feel like yours and at the same time don't feel like yours, you creep over to the full-length mirror that Carlos has hung opposite the weight bench.
You look at yourself. Stephanie looks back at you.
Your hips are like a bowl with a clip of fur decorating the cleft where they're supported by your legs. Your torso is a curved pedestal with firm, rosy breasts hanging off your front. With tapering fingers you stroke the hollow between your throat and your breastbone. Your face—
The green eyes are wide and questioning and a little hard. Your lips part in an expression which you thought before looked like a faint sneer, but which to you now just seems skeptical and a little hesitant. You touch your cheeks and nose, and wind a finger through a curl over your ear.
Stephanie Michael Wyatt.
Stephanie, after "Gransy," and Michael after Pop's best friend in the Army, the one who died in the First Gulf War. It's an uncommon name for a girl, but there are precedents. Certainly it has nothing to do with—
Now you do sneer.
Prescott. Dumbass.  You have the following choice: 1. Continue |
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