by Ellery Fenn
“Oh.” Clarisse’s eyes widened. “She told you.”
“What? You knew?”
Her hands raised in surrender. “I literally just found out.”
I groaned and buried my face in a Care Bear. “This is ridiculous.”
“It is pretty weird.”
I rolled over and stared at the ceiling, my arms around Wish Bear. Corrie was my body. She was the same body I lived with for nearly seventeen years. The body I fed, washed, clothed. I blushed. I’d seen her boobs.
Clarisse laid beside me. The ceiling was covered in glow-in-the-dark stars.
“I don’t know what to do.”
She exhaled slowly. “I wish I knew what to say. But it’s the craziest thing I ever heard of, and I have no clue.”
“Yeah.” I lifted the picture above me. We looked so happy, so different from now.
The fan in the corner hummed, filling the silence for several minutes before Clarisse spoke. “We’ve never talked about summer camp,” she said.
My stomach sunk. This was the conversation I’d been dreading for years. Anxiety creeped through me, blackened my mind.
“We don’t need to talk about that,” I said.
“But I want you to know. I’ve never really said it, and now you’re… different.” Her voice cracked. “And I don’t know how much time we have left.”
I felt the embroidery on the bear’s stomach. “Never said what?”
“That it’s okay. That I accept you. That just because the world says it’s wrong, doesn’t make them right. You’re amazing just the way you are, and I wouldn’t change a thing about you.”
I blinked. “That’s coming from you though.”
“What do you mean?”
I rolled away from her and stared at the black clothes hanging in her closet. “I don’t want to talk about this.”
She sat up. “Look. Normally I’d respect that, but this is like, the end times. We can’t just ignore it anymore.”
“Yes, we can.”
She sighed and pulled a blanket around her shoulders. “I just want you to at least acknowledge it. You don’t have to be okay with it, but you need to admit it.”
“I don’t have anything to admit.”
She smacked me with a pillow. It went clear through me.
“Hey!”
“Get up.”
“I’m up, I’m up.”
“We’re going to do this now.” She brushed her loose mohawk out of her face.
I squeezed the bear in my lap. “Do what?”
She stood up and bounced once on the bed. “We’re going to talk! I’ll go first. My name is Clarisse Wilcox. I’m seventeen. I’m goth. I want to be a singer. I’m in love with Patrick Green. And my boyfriend’s bisexual.”
My mind went blank. What? “But. But he’s dating you.”
“Yeah, but he wasn’t always.”
“You mean-”
“His first relationship was with a guy.”
My brain was full of static. I stared at the blankets. “Wow. I had no idea.”
“Do you think Pat’s a good guy?”
“Yeah. He’s great. And he’s really great for you.”
She looked at me pointedly.
“But-” I groaned. “Okay. So he’s…”
“Bisexual.”
“Bi-bisexual. That doesn’t mean, that doesn’t. I don’t know where I’m going with this.”
Her voice was quiet when she spoke. “Do you think that it’s bad that he’s bi?”
Pat. I’d known him for over a year. Clarisse and him were friends for a few months before dating. They started going steady almost immediately and had been together ever since. He was always nice to me. He supported Clarisse in everything she did. Pat was a good guy. A good guy that was bisexual. That had been with another boy before.
You shall not lie with a man as you do a woman. All my life I’d been taught it was wrong to be gay, that gays were sinners.
“Maybe-” I frowned. “Maybe it’s okay to be friends with him, to like him, as long you don’t support that.”
She threw another pillow through me. “Wrong! It’s not some choice he made. He didn’t sit down one day and think ‘Huh, maybe I’ll be bisexual. That might be fun.’ It’s part of who he is. When you love someone, you got to love all of them.”
I stared at my hands. Loving all of someone was impossible. There would always be something you hate, something you can’t stand about them.
“I know what you’re thinking, but it’s true. Do you love me?”
“N- not like-”
“Like a friend, dork.”
I breathed a sigh of relief. “Yeah. You’re my best friend. Of course, I do.”
“Are you okay with me dating a bisexual guy?”
“Well, yeah.”
“You okay with me being goth?”
Loving someone means loving all of them. And there was nothing I hated about Clarisse. “Yeah. Cause it’s you.”
“So how can you say that it’s okay to love Pat while hating a part of who he is?”
I threw my hands in the air. “I don’t know! I don’t know.”
“I know. And that’s okay for now.”
The bear’s ear was soft where I rubbed it. Wish Bear. Kelly still watched Care Bears, even though she wouldn’t admit it. I didn’t know much about it, but I knew that Wish Bear granted wishes. I squeezed him tight to my chest and wished with all my heart that everything would be okay, that things would work out, that I’d be able to deal with this. I had a million wishes, one for every star, and I poured every one of them into the bear.
“Now it’s your turn,” Clarisse said.
“What?” I looked up from the bear. Silly. It was a stuffed animal. There was nothing it could do for me.
“Stand up and tell your truth, just like I did.”
“Oh no. You’re not roping me into this.”
“Come on,” she whined. “Just do it. It’s ten seconds. Stand, or float or whatever, and say it.”
“I hate you.”
She grinned. “You love me.”
I rolled my eyes and floated up.
My truth. My truth was a mess. My truth was a million lies and a million wishes, and I didn’t want to think about any of it. Clarisse looked at me expectantly.
I took a deep breath. “I’m Lisa Bittermann. I’m sixteen. I’m dead.” Clarisse didn’t react. I exhaled slowly. “And… my best friend says that I need to tell the truth.”
“Just say it! Pretend I’m not here.” She covered her head with a blanket.
“I’m Lisa,” I said. “I’m Lisa and I’m dead. I’m confused all the time, and I never know what’s going on and I don’t know what I’m doing. And- and things are weird right now. I just found out that my other best friend is actually my body. And I don’t get it, like, at all. It goes against everything I thought I knew. How can one person become two?” I fiddled with my sleeve. Focus. “I don’t know what I’ll do about that. I don’t know if I can trust her anymore. But. That’s not what Clarisse wanted me to say.”
“Keep going.” Her voice was muffled.
“I… I.” My insides wriggled like worms. “I don’t want to say this.” I took a deep breath. My eyes started to water. “I-I know that I just need to come right out and say it, but I… I can’t. I can’t Reese, I’m sorry.”
I dropped to the bed and covered my face with my hands.
“Hey, it’s okay.” She emerged from the blanket and wrapped me in her arms. I lowered my head to her shoulder. Her hugs were the best. “This is progress. I’m really proud of you.”
“I’m sorry.”
“God, you really need to stop apologizing.”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
Chapter Twenty-two
Corrie
I was still alive in the morning. An expected disappointment.
The shed was filled with morning light. I wiped zombie juice from my chin. Perhaps things weren’t as bleak as they’d seemed.
I ate my last fish and searched the bag for a crumb, a fin, a bone, anything. I would have to replenish soon, or I really would die.
There was a wriggling in my cheek. My fly friend. I reached into the open wound and fished around until I could grasp something and pull it out. Three pearly maggots sat in my palm. They squirmed blindly, searching for cover, shelter, food. They were only children, barely born, unaware of what their home really was. I licked my palm. Tasty.
Pat came some minutes later to return me to the forest. I didn’t mind his hair as much this morning. It reminded me of some kind of bush.
I sat in the backseat, wind from the open window cold on my face. He drove in silence, and I found myself deeply grateful for this strange boy. He sacrificed for me, a stranger. He pushed aside his fear. But most importantly, he didn’t feel the need for conversation.
He dropped me at the edge of the woods, a street down from Doug’s. “Good luck,” he said as he drove away.
I shouldered the bag and walked.
Immediate relief coursed through me upon entering the forest. The sound of engines faded and was replaced with birdsong. I smiled. This was my home. Among the trees, squirrels, birds. Surrounded by the living and dying, wading through a sea of sensation, each one brighter and sweeter than the last. I smelled every leaf as it decayed and heard every ant.
Lichen, moss, ferns. They hung from each other, balanced on each other, supported each other. A dense conglomerate of green, endlessly rolling through the canyon.
Clarisse was right. I was more like an animal than a person. The thought thrilled me. I could leave humanity completely behind. Trees don’t care if you stink, creeks don’t care if you don’t have a nose. The plants and animals live together, eating each other, moving in perfect chaos like stars in the sky or gears in a clock. Here I could be merely one of many.
A call echoed through the woods. “Lisa!” The search party was closer than I expected.
I crouched. I couldn’t see the owner of the voice, but I heard them, their rapid heartbeat and footfalls, and smelled their sweat. They were close, northwest, and coming straight toward me.
“Lisa Bittermann!”
I darted under a bush moments before a woman walked into sight. She narrowed her eyes in my direction.
“Hello?” She hiked the short way to my hiding spot, checking behind every rock and tree before approaching my bush. She reached to move aside the branch that obscured me.
A snarl ripped from my throat, louder and fiercer than I expected. She jumped back.
“Mountain lion,” she yelled north to her partner and edged away from the bush, eyes on my location as she walked out of sight.
I waited longer than necessary, listening to them head away from me, pleased with myself. A human couldn’t have smelled or heard them. My sensitivity was proving to be useful.
I stood and stumbled on stiff legs. My mood quickly turned. I had to reach the creek soon. I caught the faint smell of fish and headed toward it.
A breeze brought a new smell. My entire body perked up to it, each muscle and molecule excited. Before I could think, I was sprinting, flying over bushes and rocks, darting between trees. Anticipation flashed through me like lightning. Rot. Rotting meat richer and more alluring than any I’d smelled before.
I threw myself on the carcass and buried my face in the hide, ripping at the skin with teeth and claws. It was unyielding to my efforts.
I took the pause as I struggled to identify the animal. A doe, not dead ten hours.
My responses were automatic, instinctual. I never could think when sensation took my attention, but this stole away my very being. When I smelled decaying flesh, my mind shut off and I became a body with only one purpose, one aim. It was a welcome reprieve. Sleep could never recharge me as the dead did.
The skin tore, and I plunged face-first into its guts. I took the organs first. Each bite popped in my mouth, gushing flavorsome blood more delectable than the oldest wine or the ripest fruit. I gorged myself until the cavity was empty. My head and arms were completely within the rib cage when I began on the flesh. Muscles tore effortlessly in my teeth. The ribs split as I forced myself further in and plucked the heart like grapes from a vine.
I sunk my teeth into the heart. Blood poured over my face, a waterfall of red. I ate like a starving dog, like fire eats the mountainside.
There was a snap as my own rib cracked. Pain shot through my abdomen. I collapsed with a screech. My stomach was bloated, stretched so far past its bursting point that the outer layer of skin had torn in places. Blood and flesh spilled from my mouth. My body wasn’t big enough to hold my hunger.
I gasped in relief as the pressure let off. Exhaustion forced me onto my back. I laid in the deer’s rib cage, in blood and bone and vomit, and was truly happy.
Chapter Twenty-three
Doug
I tore my room apart. It was gone. It couldn’t be. It was gone.
“Michael!” I stormed into his room. He sat reading a book on his bed, carefree, like he wasn’t a backstabbing thief.
He pulled off his headphones. “What?”
“Did you take something from my room?”
“Like what?” He swung his legs off the side of the bed.
My throat was tight. It was gone. It couldn’t be gone. “Did you take something?”
“No, Jesus. Take a chill pill, dude.”
I caught him by the front of his shirt. He was bigger than me but he never fought back.
I might as well have been holding a mirror. We looked more like twins than the twins did, everything the same except for our hair. Everything the same except for our actions. Of course Dad replaced him with me.
“You’ve gone too far this time,” I said. “Give it back or you’re going to wish you’d never been born.”
He pushed me away and stood, smoothing out his Metallica t-shirt. “I didn’t take anything.”
“Bullshit.”
“What’s your problem?”
“You are. It’s one thing to hate me, but it’s another to want me in jail.”
His eyes widened. Sure, play innocent. That’ll work. “What? Why would I want you in jail? What are you talking about?”
“I’m talking about what you took from my room!” I pointed to the door and quickly formed a fist to hide my trembling hands. It was gone.
“Read my lips. I didn’t take anything.”
“I don’t believe you.”
He pulled his long hair away from his face. “Yeah, but that’s nothing new.”
He’d go straight to the cops if I beat him. I couldn’t afford an assault charge on top of this mess. “If you show it to a single goddamned soul, I’ll… I don’t know what I’ll do.” I grabbed the door handle.
“Wait!” he said. “Are you saying it’s evidence? The thing you’re missing?”
If he didn’t already know, I couldn’t tell him.
He laughed. “You freak. You did something to that girl, didn’t you?”
“I didn’t do shit.”
“Then what’s the deal? Why’re you so scared?”
“I’m not scared!”
“Sure.”
I couldn’t think straight. “You asshole. All my fucking life you’ve hated me, but I didn’t think you hated me this much.”
“Yeah,” he said. “I hate you. But whatever you think I did, I didn’t. Unlike you, I wouldn’t throw my own brother under the bus.”
This son of a bitch would never let it go. “I didn’t throw you under the bus.”
“You sure didn’t pull the brakes.”
Rage heated my face and neck. I had to find the book. I had to find it. I couldn’t get into this again.
“Whatever.”
I went back to my room and pulled out the desk drawer again. It clattered to the floor, spilling its contents. It wasn’t here. And each drawer in turn. Nothing.
If Michael didn’t take it, who did? Nobody hated me as much as he did. Nobody except
maybe Lisa.
My heart pounded in my throat. It was stupid to keep a record. I thought I hid it well enough.
I pushed my case of trophies to the ground. Nothing, nothing.
“God, no!” I pulled at my hair. “How could this happen?”
No one came to my door to check on me. They knew better.
I ripped off my blanket, my sheets, pulled my mattress to the floor, but it wasn’t there. I took an unsteady breath. It had to be somewhere.
“I just have to think through this,” I said to myself. “I can get it back.”
I perched on the edge of the bed frame and ran my hands through my hair. All that work wasted. The cops wouldn’t believe a word of my story if they got ahold of that book. I couldn’t let that happen. I had to find it. It had to have been Michael.
The door was stuck when I tried to leave. I yanked the handle for a moment before noticing the turned lock. I didn’t think I locked it, but I must’ve.
The lock refused to budge. “Oh, come on.” It wouldn’t move.
I paced the room, kicking trophies and papers out of my way. My head hummed. It had to be somewhere. It couldn’t be nowhere.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
I stared at the door. The tapping was too light to be a fist, too hard to be a hand.
I reached for the handle to try the lock again. My heart stopped. It was turning on its own.
The tapping continued as I stared at the handle. The lock clicked open so quickly I must’ve imagined it.
“Michael?”
Whatever was tapping on my door scraped down the wood, all the way to the bottom.
I opened the door and glared up and down the empty hallway, straining to catch a glimpse of Michael or one of the twins. Nothing.
I turned back to my room. At a glance, I knew something was wrong, different, but it took me a moment to see it. Sitting on my windowsill was a toy.
“Very funny,” I called. The door slammed behind me. I tried the handle immediately, but it was locked again. “You’re going to be in so much trouble.” I gave up on the door.
The sill was bare when I reached the window. I knew I’d seen it, an action figure of some kind. I turned over a mess of clothes on the floor with my foot.
Paper rustled. My eyes darted to the pile around my desk. The sheets of paper moved like there was something underneath them. Maybe a really big cockroach.