Kind of Like Life

by McMullen, Christina

  “The scars,” he said nonchalantly, but kept his head bent over his work, avoiding Renee’s eye. “They’re pretty much everywhere, not just on my arms. You already know that we can change most anything about our appearance, but I leave them as a reminder of how much worse life can be. If it makes you uncomfortable, I can hide them. I can look normal.”

  Renee set aside her calibration tool with a deep sigh. She hadn’t noticed at the time, but while they were in her head, Blake was incredibly cautious about staying completely covered. Even when the desert-like temperatures of the alien planet reached scorching highs, Blake’s shirtsleeves stayed down and he usually kept his gloves on. However, once Renee was in his head, and aware of his past, he wasn’t as guarded. Often, especially when working over the metal forging fires, Blake’s sleeves would be rolled up, revealing a horrifying pattern of burns and scars. She pretended not to notice, but Blake was right, she was uncomfortable, just not for the reasons he had assumed.

  “Blake,” she said quietly. “Why would you change anything about yourself just to appease me? What kind of a jerk would I have to be to tell you that your scars made me uncomfortable?”

  “They do though, don’t they?” he asked, looking up at last. His hard expression was mostly unreadable, but there was obvious hurt in his tone.

  “What? No, of course not!” Renee sputtered, her cheeks burning as she turned away from his harsh stare.

  “Don’t try to lie to me, Renee,” Blake said, getting up and crossing the room until he stood, hovering over her with his arms crossed. “You’re uncomfortable. You’ve been uncomfortable ever since I brought you here. I already told you, I don’t want you to feel sorry for me!”

  As he spoke, his voice got louder and Renee flinched at his accusations. Her eyes darted around the room. The door was still missing.

  “The door won’t open unless you’re in danger,” Blake informed her in a disgusted voice.

  “Aren’t I though?” she countered in a trembling voice. “Isn’t that what’s going on here?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  Renee stood up and slowly backed away, so that there was some distance between them.

  “You told me they want us to fight,” she said in a carefully measured tone. “We’ve managed to avoid it, but ever since we came here, you’ve been…” She trailed off awkwardly.

  “I’ve been what?” he asked, still upset.

  “Never mind,” she said with a sigh. She felt like a jerk, which was something that was beginning to happen quite often.

  “No, I won’t never mind,” Blake said sharply. “This is what I was worried about, Renee. You’re treating me like I’m something fragile and I hate it. If you have something to say, just say it.”

  “Okay fine!” she said with a frustrated sigh. If he was going to act like a jerk, then she wasn’t going to feel bad about acting like one too. “You want me to treat you normal? Then act normal, Blake. Ever since we got here, you’ve been cold and distant. I don’t know what I did or if it’s just what I know, but it’s hard to talk to you when I don’t know if what I say is going to be the wrong thing.”

  “Renee,” Blake’s tone softened. “The only way you’re going to know if you said the wrong thing is if you actually say it. I’d rather have my feelings hurt by a casually insensitive comment than drive myself crazy trying to figure out what’s actually going on in that head of yours.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said with a frustrated sigh. “I’m trying. I don’t exactly have a lot of experience with this. Dealing with other people, that is. It’s a side effect of being terminally awkward.”

  “I know. I’ve been in your head,” Blake said, causing her to turn a deep shade of scarlet. “Wait, that didn’t come out right,” he added quickly, but smiled all of the sudden. “See? I’m just as capable of making an awkward mistake as anyone else. What I meant to say was that I know what you had to deal with, but you shouldn’t be so insecure. It’s okay to be shy. Don’t get so down on yourself.”

  “I guess you’re right. I’m sorry,” she admitted sheepishly. “I am scared though.”

  “Of me?”

  “No!” she said hastily. “I’m scared of the situation here. I mean, yeah, I was scared before, but at least I had some control over what happened in my own head. I don’t have any control here. I mean, obviously you know what you are doing, but it’s still pretty scary. Was it like this for you when you were in my head or am I just some kind of control freak?”

  “It’s probably both,” replied Blake with a lighthearted wink. “No, to be honest, I was scared too. The door only disappeared on me once before and I told you how that ended. I don’t like giving up control of my environment any more than you do, but you proved yourself to be trustworthy and capable of keeping us alive. You just have to do the same and trust me.”

  “It’s not you that I don’t trust, Blake, it’s them, the doctors, whoever they are,” she said with a shudder.

  “And I’ve kept them at bay for two years,” he reminded her, taking a step closer and holding out his hand. “Can we stop fighting now? I don’t know if you’ve noticed this yet, but we always end up having to jump when we fight.”

  He was right, but at least this time, they had a plan. The first thing they did after settling into this world was come up with a list of several other worlds that they could survive together. According to Blake, they could begin recycling worlds after about ten jumps. Just the thought of it was dizzying to Renee. How Blake could do this for over two years was a mystery. For Renee, two months had already seemed like a lifetime.

  “Yeah, I’m sorry,” she said quietly and took the hand that Blake offered. “I’ll work on making myself act like a normal person.”

  “I wouldn’t go that far,” he said with a grin. “Normal is quite overrated.”

  “Good point,” said Renee, pulling her pilot’s goggles down over her head just as a deep, rumbling sound issued from outside the lab. “Normal certainly isn’t going to save the city from giant mechanical spiders, now is it? Let’s go!”

  Chapter 15

  “You awake?”

  Renee threw another piece of driftwood onto the fire. Even though the sun would be rising shortly, the damp ocean air was still quite chilly. They had managed to stay nearly two months in London, but a few days ago, their luck had finally run out. They were now pirates, hiding out on a deserted Caribbean island that was rumored to have hidden treasure. It was one of the sillier ideas they had come up with, but after two months of dealing with London’s ever present fog, Renee wasn’t about to argue the decision to switch to a sunny tropical paradise.

  “Mpf. I am now. What’s up?” Blake asked, sitting up. He dusted the sand from his wild hair and pushed it out of his eyes with the brightly colored scarf that he had pulled down over his face while sleeping. He looked over at Renee, who was sitting cross-legged in front of the fire, noting the bright green and blue bird on her shoulder that hadn’t been there the night before. “New friend?” he asked, nodding at the bird.

  “We’re friends now, but she scared the crap out of me a few hours ago,” Renee admitted with a blush. “Blake, I was wondering…” she started cautiously. “When I’m here, what’s going on in my head?”

  “Renee, I’ve been in your head and I still have no idea,” Blake answered flippantly.

  “Hey, that was uncalled for!” Renee crossed her arms and glared at him.

  “It was a joke,” he said with a sigh. “I’m sorry.”

  “Fine,” Renee huffed. “But I’m serious. When I’m in your head, what’s in mine? Where were you when you were in my head?”

  “It’s too early for riddles,” Blake grumbled, looking around for the canteen of fresh water.

  “It’s not a riddle,” said Renee with an exasperated sigh as she handed him the canteen that he was looking for. “My consciousness is here, inside your head. Does that mean my own mind is dormant? Am I brain dead? Obviously, I’m not dead dead.
Otherwise you wouldn’t be able to jump in and out of your head as often as you do.”

  It took Blake a moment to wrap his mind around what Renee was saying. Admittedly, that was partly because she was speaking in circles, but mainly because she had been unbraiding her hair as she spoke. The way the early morning sunlight reflected the different shades of honey gold as it hung nearly to her waist was a little distracting.

  “Honestly, I have no idea,” he admitted. “I’ve never stopped to think about it.”

  “Really?”

  “Well, yeah really,” Blake said and stood up, stretching his limbs. “How does any of this work? We’re basically living in a never-ending lucid dream that we can somehow share with each other. If I try and rationalize any of this too hard then my brain would explode.”

  “But aren’t you the least bit curious?” Renee asked, removing the parrot from her shoulder so that she could re-braid her hair.

  “A little,” Blake admitted. “But why waste our time worrying about it? It’s not like it’s something we have any way of finding out.”

  “What if… what if we can find out?”

  Blake narrowed his eyes at Renee, who seemed to be using her hair as an excuse not to look him in the eye. “What have you been up to?” he asked her.

  “Nothing!” she said hastily. “I just kind of figured out how to make the door show up.”

  “Wait, what? The door’s back?” Blake looked around as if he was expecting an attack at any minute.

  “Blake, wait! No, it’s not here now,” she assured him. “I mean, I can make it show up… Like, on command.”

  Blake stopped tossing sand over the fire and stared blankly at Renee. “What do you mean, on command?”

  “Um…” Renee bit her lip and looked around nervously. “Like this,” she said and squeezed her eyes shut. A second later, the door appeared between two palm trees. She opened her eyes and glanced at Blake with a nervous smile.

  “How the heck did you do that?” he asked, completely in awe.

  “I… uh… managed to trick myself into believing I was in danger,” she said with an embarrassed stutter. “Okay, actually, I really did think I was in danger. You see, I’m, um, kind of jumpy and there was a shadow…”

  “A bird shadow?” Blake asked with an amused glance at the parrot, who was now digging in the sand for breakfast.

  “She looked a lot bigger in the dark, okay?” Renee countered with another blush. “Anyway, I kind of played around with the idea of scaring myself and now I can make it appear when I want.” To emphasize this, she shut her eyes again and the door disappeared.

  “That’s… incredible. So, do you want to go back then?” he asked cautiously.

  “Not exactly,” she said thoughtfully. “I want to know what’s in there. I want you to go into my head… Alone.”

  Blake stared at Renee as if she had grown another set of arms. He was used to the fact that some of her ideas were rather outlandish, but for the most part, there was a method to her madness. This, on the other hand, was just insane.

  “I know,” she said, correctly interpreting the look he gave her, “it sounds crazy and it might be dangerous. But if you learn to control the door, you would be able to come back whenever you wanted. I just… I have to know what’s going on when I’m not there.”

  “But why?” Blake asked, but he already knew the answer. Although she hadn’t said anything directly since the last night they spent in her head, Blake knew that Renee still clung to the hope that they would one day escape. He understood. Despite his own awful home life, there had been moments when he too wondered if he would wake up and find that this had all been a terrible nightmare. But dwelling on what was little more than an impossible pipe dream wasn’t doing either of them any good.

  “Why not?” Renee countered with a shrug. “I mean, don’t you want to get a better idea of what they’re doing to us?”

  “I don’t know if this is a good idea,” he said carefully. “We might just get stuck in each other’s head and I don’t know what good that would do.”

  “Look, here’s what we’ll do. We’ll go through into my head together,” she suggested. “We’ll make sure the door works. Once you’re in my head, I will show you how to make the door appear before we try anything insane.”

  “I guess we could try that at least,” Blake said with a shrug. “But before we go over, you need to come up with a new place. If we go back to the alien world, we’re going to be back in the middle of the fight we had escaped from because we haven’t been gone long enough.”

  “Good thinking,” Renee said and concentrated on making the door appear again. “Ready?” she asked, holding out her hand.

  “Ready,” Blake said, exhaling deeply before taking Renee’s hand. As soon as they entered her head, the door once again disappeared. “Where are we?” he asked, looking around at the unfamiliar surroundings. It was night and completely dark except for the full moon. Horse drawn carriages as well as people on foot clattered past them, headed up a steep hill to where a tall, majestic castle loomed over the medieval village below. This was not one of the worlds they had preplanned together and Blake wondered what Renee was up to.

  “Transylvania,” Renee replied with a slight smirk. “That would be Castle Dracula on the hill there.”

  “Renee,” Blake admonished her with an exasperated look, but she held up her hands in protest.

  “You need to convince yourself that you’re in danger if you want the door to open,” she explained. “I just thought that taking you out of your comfort zone would help.”

  “Fine, but if this doesn’t work, be prepared to jump to something we both know. So, what am I supposed to be doing?”

  “Well, first you need to scare yourself enough that you freak out,” Renee instructed.

  Convincing himself that he was in danger wasn’t very difficult once Blake noticed that the people heading toward the castle were carrying torches and weapons. He knew enough about history to know that angry mobs were never a good thing to get caught up in, let alone angry mobs that were on their way to confront the biggest name in vampire history. At least Renee had the forethought to cover their flamboyant pirate costumes with hooded wool cloaks that were identical to everyone else’s. It only took a minute for the door to appear.

  “Blake you did it!” Renee shouted and threw her arms around him, patting him on the back. “Now, convince yourself you aren’t in danger and make it go away.”

  Doing this was a bit more difficult, considering that Blake was still uneasy with the world Renee had chosen, but after a couple of tries, he was able to make the door fade out of existence. Renee made him run through the exercises several more times. The more he did it, the easier it was for Blake to manipulate the portal. He found that all he needed to do was trigger a memory of a dangerous or calm situation to make it work.

  “Okay, are you ready to try this?” Renee asked.

  “Uh, not exactly,” Blake replied with a nervous look at the ever-increasing mob surrounding them. “If I get stuck here, I at least want a world I have a shot of surviving.”

  “Oh, duh!” Renee said, slapping her head. The world shifted until it was an exact replica of the deserted island they had just left in Blake’s mind. “How’s that?”

  Blake shrugged off the wool cloak and shaded his eyes from the bright sunlight that reflected off the sand. He was nervous. Learning to manipulate the portal had been a stroke of genius on Renee’s part, but what she was proposing was insane. Still, he focused his thoughts and the door appeared. He was surprised to see that it didn’t take him any longer to force his brain into thinking he was in danger here on the island than it had in Transylvania.

  Renee put her hand on the door’s handle and paused, wondering if her curiosity was worth the risk. All of the possible ways her plan could fail suddenly flooded her mind, but she pushed aside her doubts.

  “We don’t have to do this,” Blake reminded her cautiously.

 
“Aren’t you curious?”

  “Maybe a little, but I’m also, um…” He shifted uncomfortably, unable to meet her eyes. “I’m kind of scared,” he admitted a last.

  “It’s just for a second,” Renee promised. “I’ll go through the door, take a quick look to see if anything is different, then come back and we can compare notes.”

  “How do you know that the door will still open?” Blake asked.

  “I don’t know how I know, but that’s the weird part, Blake,” she said with an odd smile. “Somehow, I do know that the door will still be there. I have to wonder if this isn’t some sort of a test.”

  Blake thought about that for a moment. He had no such gut feeling about the success of Renee’s proposed experiment. Either she was lying or the doctors had some sort of a plan for Renee that was different from what they had in store for him. She had now survived for over three months. No one had ever lived that long, not even Steve. Again, he found himself torn on the issue of trusting Renee.

  “Would you feel better if we started inside your head?” she asked, noting that Blake remained unconvinced that she knew what she was doing.

  “No,” he said at last. “Let’s just get this over with. If you don’t come back within a minute, I’m coming after you. That is, if the door is still there.”

  “Deal,” Renee said with a wink before she twisted the knob and slipped into Blake’s unoccupied mind.

  As soon as the door closed behind her, the world went dark. Renee spun around and let out a relieved sigh when she saw that the door remained intact.

  “I don’t like this.”

  “Hey! You were supposed to stay on your…” Renee spun again as Blake’s voice echoed in the void. “…side.” She was still alone. Perhaps she had just imagined that she heard Blake, or perhaps because she was in his head, she was simply hearing some sort of memory. Either way, the situation suddenly seemed a little creepy.