The Body

by Dean Clayton Edwards

  "You had no right to put me in there," Lara reminded her. "We do what we have to do to survive."

  "He's bleeding," Matilda said, barely able to look Lara in the eye. Her eyes went to Roger's neck, chest, hair, everywhere but the eyes. "Did you hurt him?"

  "It was quick," Lara assured her. "You know about head wounds. They bleed like bastards."

  "You shouldn't have done this," Matilda chided her.

  "You didn't want to share him," Lara said. "You know what? Neither did I. So, I took matters into my own hands. I'm Roger now."

  "Give him his body back," Matilda said. "None of this was his fault. Think about Roger. Think about what he's going through."

  "He's going to have time to do some self-reflection. That's no bad thing. And you: you're nothing to me. Just someone I met along the way. We're not even sisters. None of us were. We're just people who shared a room, a moment in time, and a body."

  "God, you're a fool!" Matilda said and she slumped into the chair in the corner. Lara couldn't tell if she were laughing or crying. Her shoulders shuddered just the same and she kept her head low until she looked up with reddened eyes and said:

  "I loved him!"

  "So did I," Lara replied.

  Matilda put her head in her hands, trying to keep up with events.

  "We could have been happy," she said.

  Lara didn't know who Matilda was talking about.

  "I want a divorce," Lara announced.

  "Don't," said Matilda, holding up a hand. "Don't joke. Not now."

  "Give me half of everything," Lara went on, "and you'll never see me again. Except for Roger's body. That's mine now."

  "We could have had a life," Matilda said. "We had a future."

  "You had a future - my future," Lara reminded her. "I had a life and you stole it."

  "He didn't do anything to you, and you took his body."

  "You were never going to let me out of there," Lara countered.

  Matilda didn't refute her.

  "What are we going to do now?" she said, rubbing her face.

  "I don't know about you," Lara said. "This was your dream, not mine."

  "What happened to you in there?"

  "I forgave you," Lara said. "And I let it go. I would have done the same thing in your situation. We don't always know how or why we do things. We just do them."

  "And what would you do if you were me right now?" Matilda asked.

  "Whatever I say," Lara warned her.

  Matilda was in no state to respond to her threatening tone. She looked exhausted, as if all the months of pretending had caught up with her. She kept glancing at the stool, knowing that Roger was in there right now, perhaps listening to their conversation and putting the pieces of his incarceration together as he watched his life fall apart.

  "Can he hear us?" Matilda asked.

  "I don't know," Lara said. "Touch it and see."

  "It's your stool."

  "I don't care if he's in there or not. He's dead to me. He's nothing. And neither are you."

  "Fair enough," Matilda said bitterly, wiping snot from her nose. She knew that this could all have been happening the other way round. She was hearing her own words coming out of Lara's ... Roger's ... Lara's ...

  "I'll leave in the morning," Lara said, leaning in the doorway again. It was good being Roger. She flaunted not only his physical power but the power he held over Matilda. She smiled and Matilda looked away, unable to bear the sight of her wearing his face. Perhaps she really had loved him, or at least maybe she really thought she had.

  You should have killed me, she thought. You should have destroyed the stool while you had the chance, while I was weak and you were strong. Everything seems to have turned upside down.

  "Where will you go?" Matilda said.

  "Don't try to find me," Lara said. "If I ever see you again once I've left here, I'll kill you. I want half of everything. I'm not kidding."

  "I'm trying to read you, but I can't," Matilda said.

  "No, you can't," Lara agreed.

  "I'm trying to work out when you became so heartless."

  "I thought it would be a good idea to become more like you," Lara said.

  "And I more like you," Matilda admitted.

  "It worked for me," Lara said.

  "Me too," Matilda said quietly. She gazed at Roger's feet and tried not to get caught doing so. It was as if staring at his tatty trainers might allow her to connect with him one last time. Since Lara had commandeered his body, it meant that his clothes and other belongings were all Matilda had left. Unless she dared touch the stool, which she did not, lest she end up inside it. As much as she may have cared for Roger, she wouldn't trade places with him. She knew what happened to people who spent too much time in places like that. They came out different. They came out gone. She had. Lara had. And Roger would too, unless they destroyed the stool.

  "I'm going to lie down," Matilda said. "I'll deal with the paperwork in the morning. Half of everything." She took to the stairs, putting one foot in front of the other like an automaton.

  When Matilda was out of sight and Lara heard her footsteps above her, she pulled the kitchen knife out of her jeans. She hadn't been sure if she might have to use it in self-defense or if she might have simply wanted to cut Matilda open from her navel to her neck to see what that looked like.

  Matilda collapsed onto the bed up there and Lara recognised the sound of springs. She felt a jolt like an electric shock run through the body.

  Then she backed out of the room and retreated to the bathroom where there was a mirror. The first time she'd looked at herself since becoming Roger had been by torchlight. His face had been blue and corpse-like and she'd liked it, but now she wanted to see what Matilda had seen. She pulled the cord and looked at herself.

  He was clean shaven, with a neat moustache, and beautiful, deep, dark eyes. Still handsome. She stroked his face and noted that the fingers felt rough. They were blistered and dirty under the short nails. She smiled at herself and his face smiled back, responding perfectly, as if she were wearing his skin and it was a perfect fit. Even better than that. It was seamless.

  She'd loved this face once. Now she could look at it whenever she wanted.

  His hair was messy where it was matted with blood from hitting the floor and his shirt collar was red.

  She washed.

  "I love you," she whispered to her reflection. She saw how the eyes glinted, the lips tremored. That was what she'd wanted to see all those weeks ago, before Matilda. "I love you," she said as earnestly as she could to see how it looked.

  And then she straightened up.

  She saw herself now, inside Roger. His face went slack, like washing on a line on a still day.

  "You're nothing," she said.

  She returned with the knife to the table in the main room and sat there with her hands on the surface. It was going to take a while to get used to being in a body again. She felt the blood rushing through Roger's arteries and veins, her body now. She felt stiffness in his ... her back and shoulders and wondered if that was where he had fallen or whether he had been working out. That hadn't been his style before. He'd been slim, but not really athletic. She touched his pecs ... her pecs. There was definitely some muscle there. He tensed a bicep. Not quite a ripple, but something she'd never felt before. Sarah's body was slight and hers had been too, but Roger was strong. He'd been doing some heavy lifting.

  She opened the door and looked out. Sure enough, there was a log pile next to the porch and an axe leaning up against it. She understood the callouses on his ... her hands now. He wasn't used to physical labour and the exertion had taken its toll. She'd probably keep it up. It felt good to be this strong, inside and out.

  Beyond the porch, was a field and a long driveway. On taking Roger's body, she'd stayed inside so Matilda wouldn't see anything wrong upon her approach except for the fact that the lights were out. That had worked. Now she enjoyed the view and the open air. She'd always imagined seein
g this place for the first time in daylight. She'd thought of running through the long grass with her hair streaming out behind her and the sun beating down on her brow. There'd been flowers and butterflies and the bees hadn't been angry, just curious and busy.

  Now the moon was ascending, not quite full, and in its light she saw that the field through which Matilda had carried her had been laid low. Perhaps Roger had done that too with a scythe. She'd heard voices, but no mower. Matilda would have worked with him too. They'd been out here together, destroying the world and then rolling in the hay when work was done, getting in their hair and in their clothes, and then the clothes would have come off. They'd have done it over and over, until there was no grass left to hide themselves in.

  In the distance, there were lights. A car, soundless, moved like a UFO in the dark. There was a house on a hill. And a chateau, peeking out over the top of trees like a sentinel. Things she might once have visited, introducing herself as Sarah and smiling Sarah's smile and being Sarah.

  She wondered what response she might have received if she'd visited those places as Roger. But that wasn't going to happen. She was going home. She couldn't stay here. Not after everything that had happened.

  An owl hooted in the trees beside the cottage and something as yet unseen crunched through the undergrowth. It was a different place at night. The air was cold and her shoulders felt tense. She didn't want to be out here anymore.

  When she turned to go back inside, Matilda was just two stairs from the ground floor. Lara ran for the knife on the kitchen table. Matilda jumped the bottom two steps and closed the distance between her and table at a run. Lara slapped her hand down on the empty table. The knife slid across the surface with a heavy, scraping sound, sliding away from Lara's new, calloused fingers and into Matilda's waiting hand. Matilda snatched it up, green-blue eyes glimmering like precious stones.

  "Don't do anything stupid," Matilda warned.

  "I'm stronger than you," Lara said.

  "I have a knife," Matilda countered.

  "Are you really going to attack me? If you damage this body, what's Roger going to come back to? Are you really willing to risk that?"

  They both knew that the alternative was to do nothing and that that would result in Lara taking Roger's body. Matilda really only had two choices: risk Roger's life or give up on ever seeing him again. For someone like Matilda, that was no choice at all.

  Matilda stalked around the table and Lara readied herself. She was uneasy, as she still wasn't used to being in this body yet. She felt big and menacing, but clumsy and uncoordinated. She had been holding onto things as she walked. When she let go of the table, she swayed unsteadily and hoped that Matilda didn't see.

  It was Lara who moved first. She feigned an attack and Matilda brought the knife up high, as if to stab it into her back. Seeing where her hand went, Lara then stepped in and grabbed her by the wrist.

  "No," Matilda said.

  Lara used her new body weight to crush Matilda against the stairs. She heard the satisfying sound of the wind being knocked out of her opponent and then she concentrated on squeezing her wrist until she winced and moaned, trembling all over. She was going to regret ever fucking with her.

  The knife fell to the floor and clattered against the tiles.

  "No," Matilda said again.

  Yes, it was all over for her.

  Before Lara could stop it, however, Matilda brought her knee up into his crotch. The blow didn't even connect soundly, but within seconds she felt a pain that she'd never experienced before, as if someone had reached right into her and twisted her inside and it was getting worse. It was severe and sharp as a knife and it got worse, causing her to sink to the floor, gasping for breath.

  They both went for the knife and it spun underneath the table. Matilda stretched out her hand and it skidded back towards her, obeying her will.

  Lara scrabbled across the floor, expecting a knife in the back at any moment, but she managed to spill out over the threshold before she hit the floor again, wincing with the searing pain inside her.

  "Get out of him," Matilda said, advancing through the doorway.

  "No," Lara said, as though the request were ridiculous.

  Matilda sat astride Lara and brought the knife down hard, slicing through Lara's forearm. Again. This time straight through the hand and back out again with a spray of blood and torn flesh.

  Lara screamed.

  "Get out!" Matilda said.

  Lara grabbed her knife hand with her one good hand. They were both left-handed now. Matilda put all her body weight behind the knife and it sank quickly towards Lara's face. Roger's body, strong though it was, was trembling with shock and exertion. Lara turned away, but that meant that the blade of the knife was heading directly to her ear and so she looked at it again and then at Matilda and the mad look in those green-blue eyes. This was the Matilda she'd been warned about, the Matilda that had been there all along. The Matilda in all of us, she thought, pushing back. She bared her teeth and snarled, hoping that her hand would not slip, but knowing that even so, she couldn't hold Matilda back for much longer. She had gravity on her side and years and years of hate. Matilda was gone. This was nothing that Lara saw glaring down at her. This was the nothing that survived or died trying. It was the nothing that destroyed the things that it once loved. It was the nothing that could not be reasoned with.

  Lara raised her bloody right hand and struck Matilda across the face with her elbow. It was a risky move. Matilda grunted and fell. The knife slid neatly into Lara's shoulder and she howled with agony.

  "You fucking bitch!" she screamed.

  Matilda tried to pull the knife out, presumably to stab her again, but it didn't come free on the first pull and Lara roared. She punched Matilda in the throat and threw her off, she wasn't sure how. By the time, she rolled over onto her feet, Matilda was coming again. She threw herself on top of her and the two of them rolled on the floor. At some point, the knife went back in, deep, sending shards of agony down her arm and across her pecs, white flashes before her eyes.

  They both held the knife. Four pairs of hands, slick with Roger's blood. Matilda twisted it and Lara almost blacked out. When she screamed, her throat felt thick. She used her ruined hand to grab Matilda by the hair.

  "You wanted this," Matilda growled. "You wanted it."

  She lowered her face suddenly and then she was biting. Lara tried to get her fingers between her neck and Matilda's teeth, but then they were being bitten too, down to the bone.

  She was dying. It was like fighting a wild animal. She realised that she'd never been in a fight before and she hadn't realised that it might be like this. There was no way to get this thing off her. Perhaps she'd have to slip into the stool after all and send Roger back out to die in her place. And then what? Then what fate would wait for her?

  When Matilda's head resurfaced, her lips were bloody and her face was smeared. There was flesh between her teeth, which she spat in Lara's face. Her eyes gleamed.

  She could have killed her. She could have bitten out her throat. She was being generous for Roger's sake, in case there was still a chance for him to have the body back.

  "You'll have to kill me," Lara laughed through the pain. "You'll have to kill us both."

  Matilda descended her head a second time, but then there was a thunk and her body went slack. Her body became limp and rested on top of Lara's, as if she'd fallen asleep. Then Matilda's limp body was being hauled up and rolled over onto the porch and a hand extended to help Lara up.

  It was the grey-haired removal man. He was in casual clothes now, no overalls, but she recognised those bright blue eyes. Lara took his hand and allowed him to pull her up. She staggered back against the porch wall and assessed her injuries. The knife. Her throat. Her hand. She giggled.

  The old man coughed and bent double, one hand holding a log from the woodpile and the other hand on his knee for support.

  "Looks like I got here just in time," he wheezed and h
e eyed her with those piercing eyes.

  "Imelda?" Lara said.

  The old man nodded.

  "Thank you," Lara said.

  "The others?"

  "Still in storage. I took this guy the day he put me in there. It took me some time to get here. Took me some time to find you."

  "I'm glad you did."

  They looked at Matilda, who was groaning on the floor and trying to crawl. She didn't know if she were coming or going, it was just for the sake of moving, of being alive. Like an animal. Like an insect.

  Lara took Roger's body over to the log pile, bashing against it when she stumbled, and she picked up the axe that was lying there. She had to do it using her bloody hand, because she couldn't move her left arm anymore.

  "Now wait a minute," Imelda said.

  "We're not safe as long as she's alive," Lara said, bringing the axe towards Matilda's prostrate body.

  "Think about this," Imelda said. Her old man voice was raspy. "We can still use her." Lara could tell that he was keen to get out of that body and into something more vital, something more familiar. But then it would be like old times, sharing the body, and the 'sisters' would want out too, and then Lara would never be free, or safe.

  When the woman at their feet looked up, it wasn't Matilda that they saw. The eyes were different. Scared. Searching. As if she didn't know where she was.

  "Matilda's in the chest," Lara observed.

  They looked down at the body crawling across the porch. Lara got down on one knee beside her.

  "Sarah," she said.

  The beautiful, battered face looked up at the men around her. She didn't understand the taste of blood in her mouth. She didn't understand the gashes on her knees or the pain in her stomach, the blood on her hands. The hands were trembling.

  Matilda was in the chest and she was going to stay there.

  "Help me," Sarah said. Her voice was crystal and gossamer thin. "Help me."

  Lara pushed herself back to her feet and raised the axe.

  "Sarah," she said. "It's over now."