The Curious Life of Another You

Any reasonable person would agree that a few unusual things have happened today. You found a magic book. You transformed into a girl. You stood up to your cousin. You apparently changed the goddamn past. But of everything that has happened to you today, winding up in the back seat of Jennifer Park's car has to take the title for Least Likely.

Yet here you are, bag clutched in your lap as you sit in what has to be the most expensive car you've ever been in. Maybe the most expensive thing you've ever been in. Your knowledge of cars starts with a vague concept of who Henry Ford was and ends with the idle thought that driving around in a hearse would be sick as fuck. But even you could immediately tell that this car costs more money than you will ever have or see or even be able to conceptualize.

"Hey, are you listening, spooky girl?" Jennifer calls back from the driver seat, "I'm trying to unload on your dumb fuck cousin and it isn't as fun if you aren't going to join in."

Shit, that does sound fun. "Sorry. I was trying to figure out how much this car's value is depreciating just by having my poor ass in it."

Jennifer pffts. "The dealer neglected to add 'The Stench of Poverty' to the lease agreement, so go ahead and poor it up back there."

"Okay great, give me three minutes and I'll have the place stuffed to the rafters with used scratch-offs and powdered milk packages."

Isabelle laughs from the passenger seat, and you do your best to not melt into the floorboard. She twists around to face you, the smile still twinkling in her bright green eyes as she produces a DVD from her purse. "I, um, watched the movie you lent me!"

A quick glance at the label stuck to the scuffed plastic case in Sharpie and masking tape reveals that, in this iteration of reality, you apparently loaned a girl your bootleg copy of Face Taker. This world is fucking wild. "Oh! It's so bad, right?"

Isabella nods intently, her thick eyebrows scrunched together. "The worst. Absolute garbage. But it was, like, hypnotic or something. I wanted to stop watching so much but I just couldn't!"

"Right?!"

"I think it was all the face-taking? I was really surprised at just how many faces got taken, actually."

You lean forward excitedly. "That's it exactly! That's why this movie is such a work of evil genius! It knows exactly when you're about to escape from its clutches and then blam! Another face gets taken!"

Isabelle laughs again, opening her mouth to respond before she's interrupted by Jennifer. "Kiss. Kiss now."

For a brief moment, you and Isabelle stare at one another. Then she abruptly coughs and straightens back in her seat, murmuring something about texting you later. You sink back into the plush backseat of Jennifer's car, face radiating heat as you curse your gloriously pale skin. You probably look like a goddamn beet right now.

Jennifer's eyes quirk at you in the rear view mirror for a moment, the girl clearly enjoying watching the two of you stew in embarrassment. At length, she deigns to break the squirming silence in a lofty tone. "So Ash. I need you to come over for another tutoring session this weekend."

You raise your eyebrows a touch at that. Tutoring? You've always gotten pretty much perfect grades, and that doesn't seem to have changed, but Jennifer is at least as smart as you. This is definitely a Magical Reality Shift type situation, and from what you've experienced so far you can kind of fake along to these things. Like, you don't have detailed memories of exactly what's different between Boy Ash and Girl Ash? But sometimes, when you're just acting instinctively, you find yourself behaving and responding in a way that is clearly in line with what the New You has experienced. "Really?"

Jennifer makes a noise of irritation, rolling down the window to punch in the code for the gated community your aunt and uncle live in. "Ugh, I know right? Like my parents have ever looked at even a single one of my report cards. But of course my mom gets blasted with Sophie van Goff's mom and she just goes on and on about how Sophie's improved so much with her tutor who cost so much money but they don't put a price on their baby's future, and then they both wind up booting in the pool and now I have to get more tutoring so my mom can show that bitch whose parents really care."

"Oh, yeah. I hate when that happens."

"I know, right?" Jennifer sighs dramatically. "So. Same deal as last time, okay? Just come over and listen to your shitty music for a couple hours, and we'll split the money fifty-fifty.

"....Sixty-forty,"

Jennifer tsks breezily. "So you can fill up my car with even more used scratch-offs and powdered milk packages? Fine, whatever, we're here; get out already you greedy monster."

She shoos you off theatrically as you climb out of her back seat to stand in front of the McMansion you and your mother have come to squat in. Well, not in; your cousin keeps the doors locked and seems unlikely to ever let you inside. So more accurately, have come to squat behind. Sigh. That car ride was legitimately one of the most pleasant experiences you can remember having in a long time, but now it's time to focus up and work out how to get things fixed.

You turn around to thank Jennifer for the ride just as she starts to peel off, Isabelle sticking her head out of the window to wave at you. "Bye Ash! Can't wait for the next movie!"

She's probably too already too far away to see you nearly swoon, raised fingers twitching in what could be technically called a goodbye. Okay. So you are still going to work on fixing this, but maybe first you can work on which DVD to loan Isabelle next. For research. When you totally do this again as a boy. That's it.

Your mom is already in by the time you open the door to the pool house you share, eyeing the ingredients list of some box of powdered meal replacement shake. Everyone always said that you took much more after your mother than your father, but now that you've had the rare experience of seeing yourself as a girl it couldn't be more clearly true. Obviously you have the same deep black hair and light gray eyes, but now you can see that you share very similar figures and features as well. Years of hardscrabble living have left their mark in the form of more wrinkles and more pounds than someone who wasn't even forty yet should have, but by any fair estimate she's still a pretty good-looking lady.

You're struck with the memory of an old picture of her in a leather jacket, around your age with spiked hair and flashing the devil horns to an unseen photographer. The two of you were close to identical. Maybe if she still has that jacket somewhere she'll let you borrow it.

She shoots you a weary smile as you drop your bag onto the counter top, leaning over to give her a peck on the cheek before flopping onto the couch that is also your bed and also her bed. The pool house is probably spacious enough for a pool house, but as a one-room apartment for two it's quite cramped. "Hey Ash. Long day?"

You give a grandiose shrug, surreptitiously eyeing the corner of the room that was earmarked for your things to see if anything has changed. Small stack of worn-down books, pile of DVDs ripped from VHSes of intensely esoteric horror and slasher movies, three old records you've never actually been able to play, and a busted down bass guitar has never once been fully in tune. So nope, that's all still the same. The suitcase that acts as your chest of drawers probably has some different clothes in it though; maybe now you've got more than four tops and two bottoms to choose between. Maybe.

You glance back over at your mom as she twists open the cap of what is almost certainly her meal for the day, noticing that her clothes are suspiciously stained with dirt. "Did fucking Jesse make you do landscaping again?"

Your mom sighs. "I don't mind helping out."

"Mom~! They already pay someone to come and do that! He's just giving you chores because he can!"

She sighs again, setting down her carton of powder. "You think I don't know that?"

"He's just a kid! You're his goddamn aunt! Can't you just tell him to screw off?!"

Your mom looks at you for a moment, then raises her hands in what strikes you as a defeated gesture. "Ash, while his parents are out of the country, it's his house." God, she looks tired. "Do you really think that spoiled brat wouldn't evict us?"

You push yourself further into the couch, arms folded sullenly. "Your sister's awful but she wouldn't do that to us."

Your mom nods. "Sure, but it would still be days before she could be bothered to fix things. Weeks, maybe. We'd have to stay in a shelter, Ash."

"Who cares?! He acts like you're his ****! I can't watch him treat you like this!"

It seems to you that your mom's eyes soften a bit, but the resolved set to her jaw can only mean one thing no matter what reality you're in. "My little girl is not going to spend one single night in a homeless shelter. I'll pull weeds, I'll scrub toilets, if you think I wouldn't do anything to keep that from happening, then you don't know me at all."

You grumble, shoving yourself even further into the cushions and sniffling a little but mostly holding it back. "Fine. But next time, will you please let me help at least a little?"

Your mom finally grins at that, blowing you a kiss. "How did I raise such a good kid?"

"Poorly worded deal with the Devil."

She shoots a finger at you, grabbing a glass out of the sink. "Bingo. So hey, let's forget that little turd already; it's the weekend! Feel up to a movie marathon tomorrow?"

You have to crack a smile at that. "Okay! We never finished running the Doc Dangerous series, what to pick it back up?"

It's tough to avoid rolling your eyes as your mother sighs dramatically, clutching a hand to her heart. "Oh, I don't think I could handle that right now, not so close to the anniversary of Asher's accident."

Now you can't hold back your sigh. You should have anticipated this; Asher Isaacs was Mom's favorite actor, and she always gets a bit weird around the day that he died. "His 'accident'? Mom, he ran his motorcycle off a cliff trying to impress the paparazzi with a jump and landed on an abandoned fireworks factory that exploded."

"Yes. Accidentally." She sighs again, reaching out to muss your hair. "You're named after him, you know. Did I ever tell you that?"

"Yes. Like a thousand times."

"Well. Also after the character from Evil Dead. Sort of a double homage." Your mom kisses her fingertips then waves them towards the sky. "Now I need cheering up. You know, the perfect film to lift this funk would be--"

"I'm not watching The Curse of the Witch's Curse again."

Your mom blows a raspberry at you, dipping her hand into the sink and starting to flick droplets of water at you. "How did I raise such a shitty kid?"

You giggle madly, squirming around to avoid her ****. "Poorly worded deal with the Devil!" The two of you laugh, and for a moment the years of stress and hardship have completely melted away from your mother. If being a girl means that you could be as she seems to you right now, fuck, you wouldn't mind that one bit. "I'll make it up to you. I'm 'tutoring' Jennifer Park again, so I'll buy us a pizza. Okay?"

Your mother makes a bit show of your gesture, faux fanning herself with a big waving motion. "Oh my! Well in that case, I suppose I can overlook the insult to underappreciated Italian horror classics!" She glances down at the pile of mealy-looking powder she's scooped into her glass. "Ugh. Tomorrow can't come fast enough."

You chuckle, scooting over to your corner to rifle through your collection of DVDs. Planning a marathon is no trifling matter, and after the day you've had you think you'd better make this one to remember. You're so engrossed in shuffling through the cases that you don't register your mom's voice as she mutters behind you. "Bleh, this is tastes like paste with just water."

Huh, you actually sort of want to watch Face Taker now. God, it's so bad but in the best fucking way. Plus maybe you can find some inside jokes to share with Isabelle.

"Ash, this milk is good right?"

Maybe if you take a running tally of exactly how many faces get taken? Is there something to use in that? Maybe you could...

You freeze in sinking realization when you hear the 'pop!' of cork being undone, whirling around just in time to see your mother lift the bottle of milk from your bag to her nose and take a deep sniff. "Mom, don't-!"

It's too late. The moment she inhales, her eyes go wide and her pupils fully dilate. You struggle to your feet but she's already thrown back the bottle, desperately chugging down your milk as fast as she can. She finishes the last gulp with an almost primal groan of satisfaction, the bottle explodes into stardust in her hand, and everything goes white.