Hopscotch

by Kevin J. Anderson

  Tanu frowned. “There’s still time for you to get away. Run, now.”

  But Eduard couldn’t think of fleeing in Mordecai Ob’s body. The Bureau Chief with all the resources of the BTL would stop at nothing to get his own form back before Eduard could talk.

  Instead, his thoughts grew vengeful, his outrage greater than when he had gone to avenge Teresa at the Sharetakers’ enclave. Ob’s deeds were worse, more malicious, even than Rhys’s.

  Disturbed, Tanu shook his shaggy head, as if he could tell what Eduard was thinking. “I won’t swap with you this time. You can’t use my body to kill.”

  Eduard brooded in silence. This was more personal. This required something more . . . appropriate. “I’ll take care of this problem myself,” he said, his voice a grim icicle. “In my own way.”

  No problem.

  41

  At last Garth was expecting a baby, with all the bodily changes and hormonal roller coasters that pregnancy entailed. A new and interesting experience, one of the best yet.

  Pashnak didn’t know how long he, himself, could last.

  Some pregnant women rented out their bodies to infertile females who wanted the experience of childbirth, to doctors doing research, even to curious men, like Garth. There were plenty of female candidates to choose from, but Garth had been selective, and the women themselves were choosy, adding numerous restrictions to the contract about the eventual disposition of the baby and about the care the “inhabitant” would give to the pregnant body.

  Pashnak had arranged for Garth to interview numerous women because he needed to find a body he could tolerate for at least four weeks. Someday, when he had time, the artist thought about going through the whole experience, from start to finish. For now, though, he was most curious about the last month of chemical buildups and changes, as well as the actual birth itself. He figured he could learn a lot from it.

  He settled on a short brunette with soft curly hair that fell in waves to her shoulders. She was retaining water, her aching joints were swollen. Because of the substantial cushioning weight her body had acquired, her lower back hurt chronically. Garth waddled around the room, taking note of all this as he tested out his new body.

  Standing in his broad-shouldered physique, she laughed at the artist’s sense of wonder. “You’ve got it easy, buster—you missed two straight months of nausea and morning sickness. Interrupted sleep, weird food cravings, Braxton-Hicks contractions, swollen feet and hands. All you get are labor pains, hemorrhoids, backaches, and having to pee all the time.”

  “You make it sound so delightful.”

  “It’s what you’re paying for, buster.” They arranged a regular meeting schedule so the mother could keep up with the progressing pregnancy. “The baby’s going to be a girl, by the way.”

  At first, the experiences added interesting new insights to his understanding of people. However, after living in this woman’s cumbersome body for one week and then another, he began to feel the emotional differences. Hormonal imbalances caused him to fly into a rage or wallow in despair. He did obsessive things that seemed absolutely necessary at the time—arranging and rearranging his art supplies, demanding a particular color of mug for his coffee—though when the moment was past, he realized his actions made no sense. It was very confusing, this motherhood.

  Sometimes Garth sat with his artwork, hopeless, unable to regain a shred of inspiration. In such moments, he sobbed uncontrollably, and nothing—not even Pashnak’s concern—could snap him out of it.

  Pashnak did his best to tolerate his master’s changing moods. He exhibited superhuman patience, holding Garth’s hand when he needed it, helping him take a seat when his swollen body became too unwieldy to control, feeding the artist whatever bizarre menu items he requested. Garth often had heartburn or complained of being full without having eaten very much. Pashnak insisted that he take vitamin supplements, at the very least.

  Mornings, Garth fretted about being fat. In the afternoons he worried about being ugly. But there were magical, transcendent times too, when the joy of carrying the life growing inside made him just sit alone on the sofa, cradling his enormous abdomen, sensing the baby’s heartbeat . . . and he would begin to cry all over again. “I’m not worthy. This is too special. I don’t deserve this.”

  Pashnak trotted around the apartment and studio, working out schedules and rearranging meetings and obligations. During Garth’s stay in a pregnant body, all other List items had to be postponed. When the hype-meister Stradley dumped interview seekers at him, Pashnak judged whether or not the artist was able to handle incisive questions or media attention at the time.

  Shouting, Garth made demands as, encumbered by his girth, he was unable to do simple tasks for himself. Despite his frustration with an already eccentric artist who didn’t know how to deal with storms of unusual hormones, Pashnak convinced himself he could last a couple more weeks, until things got back to normal again. He hoped.

  “I want coffee,” Garth said as he worked hard to develop a second exhibit for his portfolio of experiential artwork. “Bring me some coffee, and make it strong! I need to be awake.” Pashnak had been slipping him decaffeinated coffee in his daily mug. So far, the pregnant artist hadn’t noticed the difference.

  Humming to himself, Garth stood among the old-fashioned paintings, watercolors, grainy videoclips. He had begun to assemble laser-bursts, sensory cracklers, and holograms to create the desired “experiential” effect. None of the pieces satisfied him, and he had refused to let Mordecai Ob view it. After the success of his FRUSTRATION exhibit, at least he no longer needed the Bureau Chief’s patronage and funding so desperately.

  Frowning, Garth pressed one hand against his lower back. Sweat sprinkled his brow, and he rubbed it with his free hand, darting his fingers into soft dark curls. Sometimes he had trouble breathing with the added weight, and he could not sleep comfortably, which only added to his general distress and tension.

  Now, just inside the studio, Pashnak hesitated, smelling the fresh coffee, smiling at the endearing sight of the pregnant artist’s back. Even in the Falling Leaves, Garth had taken everything at face value and assumed that other people had warm, giving personalities, just like he did.

  Because his grand goal was so lofty, so far out of his reach, Garth had only a blurry notion of how to get there anymore, though it had once seemed so clear. Pashnak took on the responsibility of breaking down this massive undertaking into manageable steps and then helping the artist focus on each task.

  Finally noticing the coffee’s aroma, Garth scowled at his assistant. “Don’t sneak up on me like that. I was concentrating on my work. You could have made me mess up.”

  “Sorry, Garth.” It was a typical comment these days. Pashnak knew the artist meant nothing by his outburst.

  Garth slurped his coffee, let out a contented sigh. “Just what I needed.” Then he set the cup down and went back to tweaking the sketches he’d been trying to arrange, drawing lines and charcoal connective designs.

  His creative work had gone more slowly since he’d hopscotched into the pregnant woman’s body, now that his swollen fingers were much less precise. But Pashnak could see that this display already had an added depth, a spark, a greater richness than Garth’s smash debut of FRUSTRATION.

  His new work was brighter and more optimistic, called simply JOY. In it Garth displayed the various forms of human happiness. The images and senses ranged from the simple childish wonder of a young boy feeling a raindrop on his skin, to the triumph of a belly dancer flawlessly performing a difficult dance move, to the sweeping arc of a cliff diver plunging along a Hawaiian waterfall. Garth also added a moving portrait that showed the contentment of an elderly grandfather surrounded by his children and grandchildren.

  On good days, Garth included his pregnancy as well, aware of the baby maturing inside him, a second heartbeat close to his own.

  Deep in concentration, sketching thick charcoal lines on a broad pad, Garth winced and clutched h
is abdomen. The spasm caused him to scrawl an unexpected zigzag across his drawing.

  Pashnak barely restrained himself from dropping the coffeepot on the floor. “What is it, Garth?”

  “Another labor pain, I think. Just a contraction.” Then he looked down in dismay at his ruined drawing in progress, saw no simple way to salvage it. In a rage, he tore the sketch to shreds, scattering the papers in the air. “I’ll never get this done! I’m so clumsy, and I can’t finish what’s in my mind.”

  “You’re doing fine, Garth. This new work is already very powerful and very moving.”

  “Don’t patronize me! You’re paid to say that.”

  Pashnak held his temper in check, telling himself again that it was hormones, that the artist couldn’t help himself. “I’ve never lied to you or for you, Garth, and I’m not going to start now.” He knew Garth anticipated that the experience of giving birth would be the magnificent center of his new masterpiece.

  Exhausted and cranky, Garth sipped more of his decaffeinated coffee and appeared to be on the verge of apologizing, but he checked himself. “I’m tired, Pashnak. I need to rest for a while.”

  Pashnak opened the door, knowing just what to do to cheer up the artist. “Why don’t you sit on the sofa? I’ll read to you.” They had already finished David Copperfield, A Tale of Two Cities, and Oliver Twist.

  Garth smiled, and Pashnak felt warm inside. He helped Garth lie back on the sofa with a series of groans and winces and sighs, until the artist finally adjusted his awkward body into a comfortable position. Pashnak then spread an instasilk coverlet over his legs and bulging belly. He returned from the bookcase carrying a thin, leatherbound volume, another of Dickens’s best. “I’ll continue with The Old Curiosity Shop.” Garth propped himself up, pushing his curly hair behind him so that he could look at his assistant.

  This story was Dickens’s most melodramatic, a shameless example of untying the purse strings of his readers’ emotions, but Garth seemed to be in that mood these days, and he loved to have Pashnak read to him. He closed his eyes, leaned against the pillow, and listened to the rich language and humorous descriptions, and envisioned the vivid characters.

  “You know the sad part’s coming,” Pashnak warned.

  Garth sniffed and nodded. “I’ve read it before.” Even forewarned, he wept as Pashnak read the tragedy of little Nell. “I hate being so . . . so maudlin,” he said and wiped his nose on his sleeve.

  Pashnak patted him on the shoulder. Garth reached up, needy and clinging, pulling the assistant down as he cried on his shoulder. “Thank you for everything you’ve done, Pashnak. I know I’ve been . . . terrible.”

  “It’s part of my job to put up with you.” He softened his words with a smile.

  Garth wouldn’t let him go. “You’re so good to me. I don’t know what I do to deserve your loyalty. I’m sorry for my moods.”

  Pashnak squeezed him one more time, then extricated himself. “I love you, too, Garth.”

  Then Pashnak hauled out his electronic day planner and scanned the calendar, wondering just how much longer it would be until the baby came . . . until he could have his Garth back again.

  42

  The cream-colored rose had faded. Teresa held the limp flower in her palm. She plucked one petal and tossed it into the fountain water, then another, then another, watching the white bits of blossom drift away.

  Teresa felt shaken and alone. She had spent her childhood and now her adult life with a hunger to understand, mixed with a dread that she would never quite succeed. She spent hours just listening to the fountain spray, as if she could hear Arthur’s whispering voice buried in its trickles and gurgles and spurts, telling her more secrets about life . . . and about death.

  By the time she had exposed the flower’s inner parts, her grief was overwhelming, and she tossed the rest of the rose into the fountain. She walked away, through oblivious crowds past Club Masquerade, through a financial district with skyscrapers and mass-transit tubes humming overhead. She kept her gaze in front of her, sometimes focused on the far distance, other times just on the sidewalk ahead.

  She still held the passes to Garth’s FRUSTRATION exhibit. She had meant to take Arthur there, to show him the facets of humanity as seen through the eyes of an artist. Now the old man would never see it. Walking numbly, Teresa made her way to the exhibition hall anyway. If nothing else, she would wander through the images and be reminded of other times, other friends.

  Exhausted, she stopped in front of the hall and watched an active-matrix billboard shift to display a new ad proclaiming that the sensational artist Garth was nearly finished with his new masterpiece, JOY, and the debut would be scheduled soon.

  Teresa’s face broke into a grin, proud of her friend’s success. She envied Garth his passionate drive. He’d always known exactly what he needed to do. With all the items left on his List, he was searching, too, just like Teresa—though at least Garth’s search had a clear goal.

  She handed over her pass and entered the exhibit again, experiencing FRUSTRATION anew. It meant something different to her this time. Teresa would rather have seen the artist’s interpretation of JOY.

  She also envied Eduard his ability to live for the day, satisfied with whatever life brought his way, wherever he was. He reveled in every success, always so generous to his friends. If he failed, he just flashed his cocky smile and tried harder next time.

  Even Daragon had a successful career with the BTL. He was justly proud of his Inspector’s uniform and his duties. He was no longer searching. He was right where he wanted to be.

  Only Teresa remained lost. She wanted an anchor for her life, but so far every anchor had been tethered by flimsy rope. She had flitted for years from place to place, body to body, hoping for some brilliant revelation. She tasted different philosophies, searching for one that was right for her. She hadn’t found it yet.

  As she wandered through the FRUSTRATION holograms, the photographs, the paintings, the sounds, Teresa thought again of all the times Arthur had patiently taught her about the intricate wonderland of her body. Within her original cells, her DNA coded every subtle aspect of her being. Arthur had believed the soul to be part of that complexity, connected with the workings of the marvelous human machine.

  Teresa needed a goal, some kind of target to inspire her and give her drive. She wanted to race toward a finish line, a point at which she could claim success.

  On the first spectacular night, with all the crowds and paparazzi, she had not noticed a side gallery, where Garth displayed some of his other art that didn’t fit in with the overall gestalt of FRUSTRATION. Now, though, she smiled to see the detailed Artful Dodger sketch Pashnak had bought during her friend’s first unpopular exhibition, other sketches of life in the artists’ market—and then, covering one entire board, she saw his cherished “portrait spectrum” of the many faces of Teresa.

  She looked at the sequence of faces, barely recognizing some of them, recalling how easily she had once danced from one form to another to another. What had she been thinking? At the far left of the board, her eyes caught on the lovingly detailed drawing of her original home-body, the face she had grown up with, the features inextricably associated with Teresa Swan. Gone forever now.

  Arthur had called her a “lost soul,” just looking at these paintings. She wondered if losing touch with her original body had made any difference, if by bouncing from body to body she had somehow lost something in the translation, unwittingly set herself even more adrift.

  Maybe that was the problem! She had felt cast loose ever since she’d left the Falling Leaves, particularly after she’d joined the Sharetakers and gotten lost in a merry-go-round of body-swapping. Perhaps her soul had lived too long apart from its original home. Perhaps that was why she felt so lost.

  Teresa was a wandering spirit in a body that was not hers, one in which she did not belong. After learning how to hopscotch, a person could move from body to body, but if Teresa never returned home, she m
ight be diluting her own soul. Maybe it would all change again and she could feel grounded, if she could only go . . . home.

  Leaving the FRUSTRATION exhibit, galvanized, Teresa decided on her new quest—a search that would mean more to her than anything she had ever done before. She needed to find her home-body, the place where she truly belonged. Perhaps then she could reestablish a connection and erase this feeling of loss.

  Teresa hadn’t seen her body since those terrible days with Rhys. She had misplaced herself among the Sharetakers. A member of the enclave, a woman named Jennika, had fled in Teresa’s body. Now, she needed to “find herself”—literally. She wanted to feel whole again.

  But she had no idea where to start looking.

  43

  When Mordecai Ob swapped into Eduard’s strung-out and sore body, it was all the young man could do to keep himself from cursing the man to his face. I know what you’re doing to me, you bastard!

  The Bureau Chief scowled at his caretaker’s body in disgust. “Eduard, I simply can’t tolerate this any longer.”

  With great difficulty, Eduard held his anger in check. He drew a deep breath, feeling refreshed and vibrant. This body moved the way it was supposed to: without pain. “I’m sorry, sir.”

  He looked through a stranger’s eyes at his familiar form, seeing the weariness and jitters, sallow skin, sunken eyes. How dare Ob complain, when his own addiction had caused the debilitation?

  Ob growled, “I have to go away on important Bureau business for a few hours. Just go do my morning run and meet me here before lunch so we can swap back.” He held up Eduard’s jittery hands. “This is simply unacceptable.”

  Eduard clenched and unclenched Ob’s strong fists, debating whether or not he should accuse him. Before he could speak, though, Ob made an annoyed gesture, dismissing him. “That will be all.”

  Eduard stalked off, but Ob paid no further attention to him as he prepared to leave. The Bureau Chief had never treated him as more than a servant who exercised his muscles and maintained his body. A disposable human being.