by Schow, Ryan
“I want to see my friend!” she screamed. “Now!”
“Put that tazer gun away and I’ll take you to her,” he countered, picking the keys up off the floor like a child in the midst of a tantrum.
“Show me or I swear to God I’ll light you up,” she said, her finger hovering only millimeters over the trigger.
“Fine, you little bitch,” he spat. “You spoiled rotten, filthy bitch.”
“Now who’s got the trucker’s mouth?”
In the elevator he stood on one side and she stood on the other, but that only put about six inches between them and he couldn’t stop looking at her weapon.
If she had any idea who she was toying with…
“I should have gassed you when I had the chance,” he said.
“Get some new material,” she muttered.
“Georgia’s as good as dead,” he said. “You tazer me and it’s all over for her. You just wait. You’ll see.”
“It’s not a pistol. You won’t die. But that doesn’t mean I can’t make it painful. That doesn’t mean I can’t make it last forever.”
The elevator reached its destination. The doors opened to reveal Gerhard’s underground lab. Before stepping into the hallway, he said, “I saved your life, Savannah. I made you beautiful. I made you confident and strong. Don’t forget that.”
“If you’re looking for a softer, weaker side to me, Gerhard, don’t bother. You bred it out of me.”
5
The look on Abby’s face said she couldn’t hardly believe her eyes. The way Georgia looked, so skinny, worse than any holocaust victim she’d ever seen, it practically dragged the tears from her.
“There is that softer, weaker side you said didn’t exist,” Gerhard said with grim satisfaction.
Ignoring the jab, she said, “What’s wrong with her?”
“I don’t know.”
Gerhard realized right then Abby posed no danger. As if reading his mind, her hand dropped limply to her side, the weapon loose in her grip and pointed at the ground, forgotten.
“Is she going to die?” Abby asked, her voice breaking, her body sagging against Georgia’s glass container.
“I will do everything in my power to help her live. But at this point, I have reached out to an associate.”
“Is he coming here?”
“No,” he said. “We’re taking Georgia to his lab in Canada.”
“How long?”
“The summer. Maybe less. Hopefully we can…fix her.”
“But you can fix her, right?” she asked. The turmoil in her voice was nothing like he’d ever heard from her before. Was this…love? Devotion?
“I can’t make any promises.”
Gerhard watched her working to digest all of this. Abby placed her palm flat on the glass surface of Georgia’s container, almost like she was trying to connect with the girl. In the pink fluid, the shrunken girl floated motionless. Gerhard’s failed science experiment. A prune-skinned alien creature left to starve and die.
Seeing Abby getting so emotional about her friend, he almost felt something. Compassion? Or sadness perhaps? If he had a heart, maybe the sight of her in tears would move him. But his heart was a cold fist of flesh, alive only for its life-sustaining functions. He was not a compassionate man. He was not sad. Never-the-less, he still thought of himself as somewhat human.
Inside, he was…almost touched.
“I’m sorry this is how she turned out, Abby.”
To the untrained ear, he might have sounded believable. Abby pulled her hand back, turned to him with watery, pleading eyes. All the anger she held earlier was gone, replaced by hurt, by an anguish he didn’t expect from someone as bold and ferocious as she was becoming. He’d bred her to be fearless, confident, brutal. Yet her humanity survived.
Interesting.
Their eyes met, but then—returning to those same stone-cold eyes—she said, “If she dies, I’ll f*cking kill you.”
His mouth remained silent, but in his mind he thought, “Over the years, many have tried…”
She walked past him, straight to the elevator, then out of his life.
If only for a little while.
Transportable Soul
1
The rest of the semester, these last few weeks, have blown by in a haze. My heart is still broken for Georgia. Even Cicely and Tempest are suffering the effects of our friend’s withered state. I can’t stop wondering if she’s in pain. If she’s dying.
Within days of me seeing Georgia, Gerhard transports her to Canada. He has hardly been in the office, and so far, I’m told by Nurse Arabelle that Gerhard’s colleague, Dr. Evan Cameron, hasn’t made much progress either.
On a side note, Damien has been opening up more, and Brayden has kept my mood light with his friendship and humor. He says he’s getting a nose job this summer. That he’s going to spend every day in the gym and his nights at the clubs and by the time he comes back, he will be a different person. I get the feeling he thinks he has a chance with me.
Who knows, maybe he does.
As for Damien, he still doesn’t know my true identity, and I’m not sure I want to tell him, but there’s a part of him that seems down, too. Like he knows my mood and, for some unknown reason, he’s been infected as well.
Sitting in my room on the last day of class, he says, “I’m going to miss you,” and I believe him.
“Will you come see me this summer?” I ask.
“That’s what Savannah said to me last semester,” he tells me, his eyes distant. Gosh damn this boy is so dense sometimes!
When I asked him this before—as Savannah Van Duyn—I was desperate, in love, aching to have him in my life. To have him as my boyfriend. So much has changed.
“Have you heard from her at all?” I ask.
“No.” His voice is quiet, barely a whisper. The fact that Damien is so out of touch with others that he’s practically inhuman is the world’s biggest understatement.
“What’s going on with Maggie?” I say. At this point I’m just making conversation. I already know Maggie’s holding all the boys at arm’s length because of the rape. Looking at her in those times when she looks so sad, or shut down, I think I know what she’s feeling and I just hug her. Too many times we’ve ended up crying together. Too many times I vowed to kill the bastard who violated her.
To the question of Maggie, Damien shakes his head, but I’m not sure what this means. Is he over her? Is he finally moving on?
“There was something about her,” he says after a minute.
“Maggie?”
“Savannah. I can’t put my finger on it, but it was there. Maybe it was her spirit. Or maybe she was perfect looking, but not so caught up in herself so much she couldn’t feel things. She was strong and yet…she hurt. Maybe there’s that part of me that wanted to save her, but couldn’t.”
“Is this Kaitlyn or Savannah we’re talking about?”
His eyes clear somewhat and he says, “Sometimes, I can’t tell the difference.”
“Jesus, Damien, you’re as screwed up as I am.”
“What?”
“Are you in love with Savannah or not?”
“I don’t know.”
I blow out a hiss of air and turn away from him. I swear I just want to scream sometimes. “God, Damien, just say it!”
He’s startled, but rattled, too. “Fine, I think maybe I’m in love with her. Not the way she was on the outside, but who she was on the inside. She looked so much like Kaitlyn. I guess I kept myself from admitting that. There. Are you happy now?”
“You wanted to love Savannah, but you couldn’t because you’d feel guilty, like you were some kind of pervert or something.”
“Yes.”
“Well halle-freaking-lujah, he finally speaks the truth.”
“God, Abby. For a girl, sometimes you can be a real asshole.”
“You don’t know what it’s like being your friend,” I tell him. “How you’re such a closed book. I swear you m
ake me mental sometimes!”
“Why is it so important that you know me?” he asks. “I mean, what’s with you anyway?”
Right then I consider telling him everything. I pause, hesitate, open my mouth then shut it. What if I tell him everything knowing he spilled his guts to me…about me? Will he hate me? Never talk to me again? Or will he let himself be close to me? For heaven’s sake, I just don’t know!
“Don’t you want to know your friends better?” I ask. “Isn’t that what friends do, anyway? They’re honest with each other?”
“It’s more than that,” he says, like it’s so obvious.
“I’m not in love with you, if that’s what you’re thinking.” He gives me a frown, his expression saying, C’mon, really? “I’m not!”
“A couple of months ago you thought I was gay because everyone was trying to get with you but me and now I’m saying the same thing to you. Why haven’t you tried to hook up with me when all the other girls have?”
“Because you’ve got the emotional range of a brick. If we were together, what would you really have to offer me? Loyalty? I could get that from a dog. Sex? If I wanted sex, I would have hooked up with Caden, or hell, even Brayden. So what can you offer me that I can’t get elsewhere, Damien?” He doesn’t say anything, so I add, “Like I said.”
“Remember how I said I was going to miss you?” he says. “Well maybe I’m not going to miss you so much after all.”
“No,” I say. “You’re going to come and see me this summer.”
“I don’t even know where you live.”
“Palo Alto. Same as always.”
Then it dawns on him. “What?” he whispers. That emotion passing through his eyes, it’s the understanding that everything has suddenly changed. He steps forward, looks at me, looks for me.
“I got better, Damien,” I say. “Gerhard made me better.”
I expect something—an outburst maybe, or a profession of hatred—but he just grabs me into a hug, pulling me so tight I can barely breathe.
“Is it really you?” he asks.
“Yes.”
“I’m so going to hate you in an hour, but right now…thank God you’re okay!”
True to his word, he hates me in an hour. He’s mad I let him worry and hurt all this time, mad I never told him who I was. He’s mad that he told me everything he did and felt and that I made it a one-sided affair.
“I was in love with you, Damien. You big, dumb jackass.”
“How can you just say those things?” he says, astounded “How can you just be so honest?”
“It’s the last day of school. We’ve got too much to sort out for us to do it all right now. In this minute. That’s why you need to come and see me this summer.”
“Okay,” he says, no hesitation at all. “I’ll come.”
“And if you leave campus without saying good-bye like you did last time, I’m going to drive to your house and kick you square in the nuts, right in front of your father.”
He coughs out an angry laugh, then says, “I’ll see you after sixth period.”
2
I do well on my finals, which in itself feels like a miracle considering the stress of losing Georgia to Gerhard’s science. Maybe all is not lost, but I can’t help being scared. Like, freaking terrified. At least the stress of school is over. I’ll miss it, but I won’t miss the complications.
Maybe it wasn’t bullying so much this semester, or the ungodly pain of a brutal transformation. There were no missing girls, no hulking men breaking into my room, and I didn’t have to bite anyone’s finger off in an effort to save my own life. Still I feel tired. Unsure of myself. Angry. So very angry. Why Georgia? Why me?
Having changed bodies twice now, I wonder, who am I really? Am I just a transportable soul? Moving from one vessel to the next? Will Georgia’s soul survive long enough to find another vessel, or will she die before that can happen?
At lunch, it’s a celebration with some kids. The joy of finals being over, the joy of summer break upon them. I look around, from Janine’s ugly four—who’ve become my friends and are actually pretty cool—to Brayden and Caden, and finally to Damien. Brayden and Caden are chatting about their plans this summer, but Damien, he’s glaring at me, eyes narrowed, like he’s chewing on exasperation.
“What?” I ask, irritated. I shouldn’t be mad at him, but then again, I didn’t tell him Tempest is Bridget and Cicely is Victoria. I didn’t tell him Georgia is not Georgia anymore. Right now, she’s barely even a body. Damien looks away, starts talking to Sunshine, who’s crushing on Caden, but not enough to ignore him. And then there’s Maggie…
My eyes find her, and even though she is among friends, that thing that died in her the minute she “earned” her record contract, it hasn’t come back to life. I don’t know that it ever will. Seeing her, her sadness envelops me, folding over me like a veil of darkness, of despair, and I know she needs me near her. If only so I can be the one person in her life who truly loves her.
My eyes moving back and forth between Damien and Maggie, I realize the difference between boys and girls to someone like me. What I feel for Damien is misguided lust; for Maggie, Georgia, Tempest and Cicely, even to some extent for Sunshine and Laura, it’s love. Girlfriends love each other, otherwise they wouldn’t be there so willingly to share the burdens and joys of life. Boys, they come and go. But girls? Not so much.
I get up, walk around the table and scoot Tyler over, who’s sitting next to Maggie. He slides his big body over. I slip in.
Maggie looks at me and I look at her. “I want you to come home with me this summer. I want you to stay with me.”
“Why?” she says. Not no, why.
“You know why.”
Her eyeballs dart around, checking to see if anyone’s listening, but I keep my voice low against the high volume of the cafeteria.
“I can’t.”
“I’m not really asking.”
She takes my hand, her face full of relief. “Is your dad going to be okay with it?”
“Are you kidding? My father loves my friends. All of them.”
“I have to record my album this summer,” she says. “It’s in my contract.”
“Will he be there?” I ask.
Just the thought of the monster that hurt her drags up something animalistic in me. She shrugs her shoulders, not wanting to put fear into words.
“Then I’m going with you. You can record in San Francisco, I’m sure.”
Her eyes begin to shimmer, like she’s going to cry, but it’s a good cry. The kind of cry you have when you wonder if anyone loves you with all your flaws laid out bare. It’s the kind of cry that comes in knowing you are not alone, that you are not unwanted. I know that cry because I responded the same way when Georgia helped me through my transformation. She was my angel. Now I am going to pay it forward and be Maggie’s angel.
3
Everything’s going just fine, meaning I’m not presently embroiled in the mystery of whether or not Georgia will survive, when sixth period rolls around.
Before class ends, when Professor Teller is passing our finals back, (I surprise myself by getting a ninety-four percent), he quietly asks me to see him after class.
Ever since what I refer to in my mind as the Jake Teller Scandal, Jake went from being my super hot teacher crush to being Professor Teller. He’s still hot, but I constructed sexual blockers in my mind. From the way he seemed to slowly devolve into a state of permanent teacher mode, I know he blocked those thoughts of me, too.
Now he wants to see me. Now, of all days, this last day of school. My heart is racing from the moment he whispered those words to me. I almost can’t think straight and my body is already heating up with…what? Desire? Need? Holy shit…lust? Again?!
He just went from being Professor Teller to being Jake again. The fifty minutes of my last class as a high school Junior take like seven years to pass. I watch the clock religiously. And the low, sexual churning in my belly, the feel
ing of warm honey being stirred around inside my core, it’s got nothing to do with my testosterone levels. Or even puberty. Maybe Jake is destined to be my one great love.
Or maybe I’m a stupid girl and he’s going to tell me to not say a word about what happened. Or tell me he regretted it and he was sorry. God, I hope he doesn’t say that.
When the bell rings, the class empties out. Everyone but me. I sit glued to my chair, nervous, scared, anxious. For a moment, my legs forget how to work.
He finally looks up at me and says, “Are you seriously going to just stay there in your chair?”
I get up, walk toward him, my skin moist, warmth radiating through me like a blast furnace of heat.
I get to his desk and he says, “Happy belated birthday.”
“Is that what you wanted to tell me?” I ask, disappointed. My heart isn’t racing, it’s hammering so hard it’s dizzying. I feel my neck pulsing, like I’m having the opposite of an out of body experience, but amplified.
I’m hyperaware of everything.
Especially the way he looks. How he’s not just a teacher, he’s a man. A god. My eyes drink in the sight of his bronzed skin, the masculine contours of his lovely face, the look in his eyes that says he won’t stop seeing me. Can’t stop seeing me. The unmistakable look that says he wants me right now. I want him, too.
So f*cking bad.
“I didn’t ask you to stay just so I could tell you happy birthday,” he says. He’s looking over my shoulder at the classroom door, checking through the small rectangular glass window to see if there are kids still out there. I hear them, but hopefully he can’t see them because…
….I know what’s going to happen next.
He leans in for a kiss, holds his face so dangerously close to mine for the slightest moment, long enough for me to back away, then puts his mouth to my lips when I lean forward and everything inside me melts.
When he pulls away, just enough to make sure the coast is still clear, he says, “Almost eighteen. Next year.”
