The Change (Unbounded)

by Teyla Branton

  “Excuse me,” I said. “My car broke down back there, and I don’t have a cell phone. Could I use yours?”

  “Sure.” The boy pressed a few more buttons on his phone and handed it to me.

  I punched in a number and held the phone to my ear without pressing send. After a while, I shut the phone and handed it back. “No answer. I guess I’ll have to wait. I’m too tired to walk all the way there. Truthfully, I’m a little lost. I’ve been distracted since my cancer treatments.” I pulled off the beret so they could see my short, uneven hair, and then put it on again quickly, as though embarrassed. All an act, except the tears of frustration stinging my eyes.

  “Man, sorry about that,” said the boy.

  The girl next to him nodded. “You going to be okay?”

  “Well, if you can call living with my parents okay.” And the fact that I was now Unbounded and presumably had other Unbounded hunting me who wanted to either use me or cut me into three precise pieces.

  The boy laughed. “I hear you on that. I’m leaving for college at the end of the month, and it’ll be a relief to finally be on my own. Hey, why don’t I give you a ride? You can come back and get your car later.”

  “Would you? That would really help.” My gratitude was real.

  “Sure. We got nothing to do anyway. Just got back from a movie, and she’s got an eleven-thirty curfew. Talk about strict parents.”

  “You live close?” The girl asked, obviously concerned now that her curfew had been brought up.

  I had no idea. “I think so.” I gave them Tom’s address, and to my relief the boy nodded. “I know where that is. About ten or fifteen minutes from here. No problem.”

  Minutes later, I was standing in front of the white clapboard house Tom had shared with Justine. It was as large as my parents’ home, but nicer inside since Justine had remodeled it with dark wood flooring, plush carpet, and granite countertops. I hoped Tom would be home alone, yet I also hoped he wouldn’t be. Maybe a friend at the firm where he worked as a stockbroker had thought to spend time with him so he wouldn’t have to mourn alone.

  I went up the walk and rang the bell. No answer. I couldn’t tell if he was home because the garage was shut, but I tried the door anyway. The knob turned under my hand. “Tom?” I called as I stepped inside. “Tom, are you here?” The house was dark, and no alarm sounded, so I turned on the cast iron lamp by the brown leather couch. “Tom? It’s me, Erin. Don’t be frightened. I’m okay. There was a mix-up at the hospital. Tom?”

  He came from the master bedroom down the hall, his brown hair askew, his blue eyes bloodshot. Something felt different about him, but after what he’d been through, that didn’t surprise me in the least.

  “Erin? Oh, Erin!” He pulled me into his arms and we were touching, kissing. The familiarity of him soothed the terror of the past days. “I’ve missed you so much,” I whispered against his lips, pressing myself against him. His hands kneaded my back.

  This is exactly what I needed.

  We fell to the soft carpet, kissing in earnest. “I don’t want to ever wake up,” he murmured, rolling on top of me.

  He thought I was a dream?

  I pushed him away. “You’re not dreaming, Tom. It really is me. Look.”

  “I don’t need to look.” He started kissing me again.

  I evaded his grasp and turned on the brighter overhead light. “I’m alive.” I pinched him hard. “See?”

  His ragged face paled. “You were burned.” His eyes went to my left arm. “They cut off your arm. Said it couldn’t be saved.”

  Did I tell him it was a mix-up or give him the truth? I had no time to consider the options, but I didn’t like deceiving the man I was considering marrying. “I have a certain gene in my body. It healed me.”

  “Your funeral is tomorrow. After Justine’s.” He could barely get out the words.

  I lifted my hands to either side of his face. “I know it doesn’t make sense, Tom, but I’m alive. I woke up today, and I’ve been trying to get back to you ever since.” I pulled off the beret to show him my head. “See? We’ve been given a second chance.”

  “This is a nightmare, isn’t it?” Tom looked at me with a mixture of both longing and sadness. He slumped to the couch, his face in his hands. When he spoke, his voice was a hoarse whisper. “I can’t take this. What if I keep losing you every time I dream?”

  I sat and put my arms around him. “This isn’t a dream. I promise you—it’s going to be okay. I know you’re doubting your sanity right now. I’ve been doing the same thing all day. But it really is me. Look, feel.” I took his hand, running it up my arm, over my shoulder, across the top of my neck to the other shoulder. He began touching me of his own accord, his hands going to my face and my head, feeling the stubble there.

  “I can’t believe it,” he said. “Yet here you are.” He didn’t make any move to kiss me again, and I tried not to feel offended. It was a lot to take in.

  “Look, drive me home. I can’t let my family go to that funeral tomorrow thinking I’m dead.”

  “Justine?” His face was suddenly hopeful.

  I shook my head. “This gene isn’t something you can be injected with. You have to be born with it. She wasn’t.”

  An odd aloofness settled between us as he drove to my parents’ house. After his reaction, I felt nervous about how my family would deal with my return from the grave. I was also tiring, so perhaps my nutrients were running low. I closed my eyes and concentrated, pulling in from the air around me. The sensation was vague, probably because there was no obvious food source nearby, but after a while I did feel stronger. I hoped I wasn’t stealing body mass from Tom. Yuck.

  We pulled up in front of the house. Everything appeared the same, from the roses lining the walkway, to the weeping willow in the middle of the front lawn. It was an older, red brick house, well-tended and loved, and had been a part of my life for as long as I could remember.

  “Are we going to ring the bell?” Tom asked.

  The night was warm and beautiful, the overhead stars shining with a promise that I didn’t feel at the moment. In fact, I was beginning to dread the coming scene. “Let’s go through my apartment.” I scanned the streets, feeling nervous. I didn’t think I’d led anyone here, but Ava was bound to guess where I was the minute she discovered I was missing.

  We went around to the back of the house. Our dog, Max, began barking as we went through the wood gate, but he stopped when he saw it was me. He bounded up, tail wagging, trying to lick my cheek, but I averted my face and gave him a good scratching instead. The Collie-Chow mix had long golden hair and a beautiful face with none of the pointy sharpness of a full-bred Collie. My younger brother had found Max sick and abandoned on the side of the road a few years earlier and now we were stuck with him. He wasn’t much of a guard dog, and he couldn’t even fetch, but he loved us all with single-minded devotion.

  I snagged my spare key from under the decorative frog in the flowerbed, jogged down the stairs, and opened the door. “Stay outside,” I told Max.

  “Is the alarm on?” Tom asked.

  “Probably. But I know the code.” I punched in the numbers and a tin voice said, “Disarmed. Ready to arm.” Without stopping to see if Tom followed, I headed for the stairs that connected my apartment with the main house. I reached the upstairs kitchen only seconds before my mother came into the room, turning on one of the overhead lights.

  “Who’s here?” she called. “Jace, have you been out? Was it you who disarmed the alarm? It woke me up.”

  I could see her now, her hand clutching the top of her white robe. Her face looked worn, her blond hair carelessly swept up with a comb instead of her usual careful styling.

  “Mom,” I said quietly.

  Her head turned and her mouth fell open, one hand going up as though to stifle a scream. Then she did scream. “Erin!” She launched herself at me crying and squeezing me all over. “Is it really you?” Her hands continued to wander over me.


  “It’s me.”

  Her hands held my face still so she could look into my eyes. “My baby,” she whispered. Tears rolled unchecked down her face. She took off my beret and ran her hands over my head, then pulled me close again and sobbed.

  “Annie,” my father called from the hallway. “I’m coming! What’s wr—” His words cut off as he saw me.

  I broke partly away from my mother and held out an arm. “It’s me, Dad.”

  “But the hospital.”

  “They made a mistake.”

  He grabbed me and my mother, holding us tightly. All of us were crying. My mother looked up at Tom, who was staring at us. “Thank you,” she whispered.

  His head swung back and forth. “I didn’t—she came to me.”

  “I can explain everything,” I said, “but we need Chris and Jace here. I don’t want to tell it twice. I don’t know how long I have.”

  “What do you mean?” My mother blinked frantically.

  “Just that I’m tired, and there are some people who’ve been . . . uh, helping me. They don’t know I left, and they might come looking for me. You’ll understand when I explain.” Ava and her friends had gone through a great deal of trouble to get to me in the first place and wouldn’t give up easily. Whether that made me feel hunted or special was still up for debate.

  My father disconnected himself from us. “I’ll call Chris. Annie, go wake up your mother and Jace.”

  “Grandma’s here?” I wiped the tears from my face.

  “At a time like this, where else would she be?”

  He had a point.

  My mother hugged me again tightly before she left the kitchen, as if worried I might disappear. That she didn’t say anything about my cat burglar appearance said a lot about her state of mind.

  “Don’t mention my name,” I said as my father dialed Chris’s number. “It’s not safe.”

  “Not safe?”

  “I’ll explain when he gets here. Tell him to bring Lorrie, if he can, but not the kids.” I would make sure I saw the children at some point, though, because I loved them and I wasn’t willing to give up my role as their favorite aunt. Okay, their only aunt. But still.

  “Lorrie,” my father said, “it’s Grant. Can I speak to Chris? Thanks.” As he talked to my brother, his eyes never left me. Neither did Tom’s. I put my beret back on to hide my shorn head, but I still felt uncomfortable. As though a neon sign above my head screamed abnormality.

  “See you in a few minutes,” my father said. “Drive carefully.” His voice cracked on the words, and my stomach twisted. He hadn’t lost me, but if I hadn’t been Unbounded, I would be as permanently dead as Justine.

  My mother appeared in the doorway, a sleepy Jace behind her. I hadn’t seen my little brother since Mother’s Day when he’d made a surprise visit, but we e-mailed almost every day. We were born only three years apart, both the result of fertility treatments, and we’d always been close. The past four months had made a big difference in my brother. His white-blond hair was shorter and he’d gained ten very needed pounds—probably all muscle. He was scrubbing a hand over his head and yawning when he caught sight of me.

  His blue eyes popped open and he choked on his yawn. “Erin? But you’re—”

  “It’s me.”

  He whooped and crossed the kitchen in four steps, swooping me up into his arms and twirling me around and around. He really had gained muscle if he could do that. “I can’t believe it. You’re alive! I thought I’d lost you!” He crushed me to him, tears coming fast.

  It was the reaction I’d expected—craved—from Tom.

  My mother was crying again, prying me from Jace’s grasp. She kept touching me all over, patting my arms and shoulders. Then I was in my father’s arms again, and back to Jace. It felt so good. For the moment, the disappointments I’d caused in the past didn’t matter. I’d done this thing right at least. I’d survived.

  My grandmother entered the kitchen, still buttoning the top of her old-fashioned robe. Her gray eyes widened and she immediately began to sob. Then we were off again, hugging and crying.

  My mother ran a finger across my left eyebrow. “Your eye. They said you’d lost all use of it. How could they be so wrong?”

  That started another round of questions, but I refused to answer. “Wait for Chris.”

  My mother squeezed my shoulder. “Let’s have something to drink. What would you like?”

  I couldn’t very well tell her I’d like some curequick, though I was craving Cort’s mixture.

  “Have a seat,” my grandmother said to Tom. “There’s a chair next to Erin.” She began making coffee, and as I breathed in, I felt the coffee, not only as a smell, but seeping into my body, and a bit of my tiredness vanished.

  Tom sat by me, still wearing the stunned expression he’d had since I turned on the light at his house. His hand lay on the table, and I put mine over it. He didn’t respond. After a moment I took my hand away.

  By the time Chris and Lorrie arrived, Grandma had made coffee for us, tea for herself, and had also filled the table with food that no one but Jace seemed to want. My father stood behind my chair, and my mother sat next to me. She said she’d thought I’d lost weight. After days of mostly only absorbing nutrients through my skin, she was probably right, but I told her it was because the new jeans were loose.

  When Chris entered the kitchen, I noticed his blond hair was longer and darker than I remembered. How long had it been since I’d really seen him? His face was worried and lined and he looked every one of his thirty-eight years. When he saw me, his eyes, gray like mine, widened and his jaw went slack. Behind him, Lorrie, my blond-haired sister-in-law gasped. “Erin!” They hugged me, the questions flying around my head until I felt dizzy.

  “Let’s all sit down,” I said. “I’ll explain everything.”

  More chairs were brought in and somehow Tom and I were separated. It was just as well. His silence made me nervous.

  “I need a knife,” I said.

  Jace handed me a butter knife, but I took the cheese knife from the cutting board instead. I turned my palm upward and, my lip between my teeth, pressed the knife into the fat at the base of my hand.

  “Erin!” my mother said sharply. My grandmother gasped, and everyone else stared at me as if I had gone crazy.

  The knife wasn’t making very much headway on my skin, so I dragged it across, wincing as it finally brought blood, slicing deeper than I’d intended. Pain registered, making me suck in my breath. Boy, I was bad at this. I grabbed a bundle of napkins and pressed it against the wound.

  My father grabbed the knife from the table where I’d dropped it, placing it beyond my reach. “Are you crazy?”

  “It’s okay, Dad.”

  “That’s going to need stitches.” My grandmother took off the napkins to examine the wound.

  “It’s fine.” Already I could feel the flow of blood slowing. “Don’t worry. It’s part of the story.” I replaced the napkins and turned my hand palm down on the table.

  A movement came from the basement stairway. I was the only one who saw it because everyone else was focused on me. I knew who it was—or at least I hoped I did. I jumped up from the table. “Come out,” I ordered.

  Just in case, I reached for the cheese knife again.

  MY FATHER HELD THE KNIFE out of my reach, so I had no choice but to face the intruder unarmed. Murmurs swept through my family as Ava stepped into view, dressed similarly to me. She gave me a wry smile. “Hello, Erin.”

  My grandmother stared at her. “What are you doing here?”

  “You’re the woman from the hospital!” My mother arose and stood slightly in front of me, as though preparing to come to my defense.

  “No, she’s my next-door neighbor,” my grandmother insisted. “She teaches martial arts. I took a class from her once. Why are you here, Ava?”

  “Erin was about to explain,” Ava said calmly. “But it’s too dangerous for her to be out on her own, and by coming here, s
he has, unfortunately, put all of you in danger.”

  “Are you threatening us?” My father took a step closer. “Maybe I should call the police.”

  “You have that choice, but I hope you won’t. If you do, everyone here will probably die.” Ava looked at Lorrie. “Your children, too.”

  Jace and Chris came to their feet, and I knew things were about to get ugly. After sparring with Ritter and seeing how they trained, I doubted all of us together had a chance against Ava.

  “Wait,” I said, holding out my hands in a pleading gesture. “Please. Everyone, be calm and sit down. Ava isn’t going to hurt anyone.” I hoped that was true. She didn’t look angry, but she had followed me, after all. What would she be willing to do to keep me under her control?

  “I hoped you’d trust me more, Erin,” she said, as if no one else were in the room.

  “I couldn’t let them go on not knowing.”

  She sighed. “You may come to wish you had.”

  “Will one of you please tell me what is going on?” My father’s eyes were narrowed and his hand gripped the portable phone. “Or should I call the police now?”

  I swallowed hard. “It’s okay, Dad. Please put down the phone. Everyone, I’d like you to meet Ava.”

  “Ava O’Hare,” Ava added. “I’m Erin’s fourth great-grandmother—Chris and Jace’s, too—and I’m three hundred years old, give or take a few.”

  More confusion erupted. My family was anything but quiet and docile. I could usually disappear in all their conversation. Or hide, rather.

  “Stop!” I banged my hand on the table.

  Everyone stared at me as though I’d grown two heads.

  “Your hand,” my grandmother said. “Be careful of it.”

  “I don’t have to.” I turned my hand over, holding it out for them to see. The bleeding had stopped completely and the edges of the cut had begun knitting together. Already the gash was noticeably smaller.

  Complete silence fell—until my father said, “I think now’s a good time to tell us everything.”

  I did, with Ava filling in the details, and by the time I finished, they were stunned and speechless, all but Jace, who thought it was the most wonderful thing he’d ever heard. “What about me?” he said, eyes bright with eagerness. “I’m only twenty-eight. Could I be Unbounded?”