You wake up to find the most powerful woman in Tyneside at her most vulnerable. Tessa rests on your breasts, wrapping her leg on you while sleeping placidly in the nude.
You take a long whiff of her delightful scent and keep it inside your lungs until they demand air. Then you take another, and another, until you feel her eyes flutter. You delight in her eyes, and she delights in your looks, moaning with a placid grin. “Morning, my Irish delight.”
“Good morning,” you greet her back with a kiss. “My classical goddess.”
“If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you’re playing with me.”
You mount atop her, smothering her with your breasts. “Who says I don’t?”
“I know you like this. I know I do.”
“I’m glad you do, madam.”
She grabs your loins and grunts placidly. “Could you stop calling me that? I feel old.”
“I told you, Tess. It’s a sign of respect.”
“But we’re not around people, darling. You can call me however you like – the more indecent, the better. Or will you feel offended if I call you my ‘little slut’?”
“I was working for you as one,” you tell her. “I’d be more offended if you called me ‘little’, though.”
She snorts, moving aside as she shouts behind curt laughs. “I feel offended! I can’t call my crush the way I want to! My hot babe doesn’t want me to call her my little slut, and she doesn’t want to call me her sugar mommy! I’m leaving!”
As you try to follow her, you hear Cassie blaring from the distance, very angry. “Rachel! What the hell!?”
“Your mother’s cranky because I prefer to call her ’my goddess’ instead of ‘sugar mommy’ - no need to get your panties in a rush.”
“Mom! Can’t you get that Rach is a proper lady, unlike you!?”
“I know, but sometimes I wish she wouldn’t be that proper!” You’re stunned to see this side of Tessa – not the powerful woman or the seductress, but as a normal person – if fully nude and shamelessly so. “Besides - who says I’m not a proper woman!?”
“You’re buck naked, for one.”
“Can’t help that no one understands the beauty of nudity, sweetheart.”
“And who ever heard of a woman in her fifties wanting to be catcalled!? A woman that age should be pushing girls like me to breed so they can have grandkids!”
“That only happens to women that aren’t fertile – and I still have a couple eggs inside me waiting for someone to fertilize.”
“Eww! You want to have a baby at your age?”
“What if I want to?”
“Could you even do so?”
“That would be an excellent thing to put to the test, my dear. Perhaps I have already done so.”
The eerie silence that follows unsettles you. You step outside to see Cassie looking at Tessa’s waist, her face a mixture of fear and disgust. “Mom... have you been gaining weight?”
--
The thought of Tessa having a baby while courting you remains in your mind as you prepare to make your trip back to Edgefield in more than a month.
You travel light, as you don’t plan to stay for long and because of your staying accommodations – your clothes, a couple spares of underwear, your phone, a credit card Tessa gave you for expenses (though you don’t plan to use the most of it) and a sack with some makeup.
Most importantly, though, Tessa agreed to lend you a case full of pens. The black and brown pens are there, but also two ones you haven’t seen before.
“The green one,” she says before you leave, “you know already. It lets you create a clone and lets you fuse with your existing one to reclaim your memories. Tell me if you figure something new with it.”
“And this one?” you say as you grab a purple pen.
“The most tempting one I have. You know how some people use hypnosis to control people’s actions?”
Your grin widens. “Does that mean I can control their minds this way?”
“More like making them a suggestion they can’t refuse. Only one order at a time, so be creative with it.”
“Did you use it on Gloria?”
She grins, hiding behind her folded hands. “You don’t trust my persuasive words?” She drops her hands, exhaling. “I will admit I used it for support, but used the wrong way, it might cause trouble. Only use it for emergencies – or if you know what you’re doing. A little suggestion goes a long way – just remember that you’re allowed only one suggestion.”
“I get it.” You’re surprised she lent you such a powerful weapon – you could have used it at that moment – but she seems to know more than you, and probably knows how to counter it.
You step out of the Uber you requested, on the streets of your old neighborhood. It’s afternoon on a weekday, which means you know exactly where your accommodations will be.
And thus, you make a call. “Hello. David?”
“Yes?” you hear your old voice answering with that unsettling robotic tone.
“You recognize me, don’t you?”
“I don’t seem to recognize you.”
“Is the name ‘Rachel O’Leary’ familiar?”
The voice over the phone remains silent as he analyzes the information. “Yes. You are supposed to be the real me, right?”
“I believe I told you it’s your life now. But I need to borrow it back for a while.”
“Why?” (You almost feel some emotion behind it.)
“Can I ask you something? How’s your relationship with Jessica?”
Another bout of uncomfortable silence. “I... haven’t talked to her for a while. I don’t know why she doesn’t want to.”
She knows something’s wrong. “Don’t worry,” you tell your changeling. “I’ll try to fix it for you. But we must meet.”
“Where can we meet?”
You rub your forehead, sighing. “Tell M--” You pause as you recognize the words you were about to say. “Tell your mom that you’re going to meet Trish at the school track.”
“Why there?”
“Just tell your mom that. Then meet me outside the old barber shop south – the one where your dad took you when you were little for your haircuts.”
“Alright. But, uh... The school track is on the opposite side.”
“And also Ashley’s house. I don’t want you going near there.”
“Don’t worry,” your clone says. “I don’t like going there.”
“Then do as I say and meet me outside the barber shop. And don’t forget – tell your mother you’re meeting Trish at the school track, but not where you’re really going. You’ll have to lie to your mother – no, to your entire family. If they ask, you tell them the same thing you’ll tell your mom. Do you understand?”
“Yes.”
“Then do that. And also, if someone other than your parents, Nick, Claire or Tina, tell them you’re meeting someone and that you can’t help them.”
“Uh... yes.”
“Will you do that?”
“Yes, yes!” Once again, there’s a hint of emotion, but not enough.
“Good. Meet you there.” You turn the phone off, walking to your meeting place. Dewey’s barber shop is only a block away, crossing Murray Avenue – the road separating your old neighborhood from the small shops you often visited in your youth. The place is one of the few that has survived the passage of time, alongside the bar; the old grocery shop had to adapt and become an organic food store, and the old soda pop store has turned into an abandoned (and some say haunted) spot.
And that’s where you plan to take your clone and do the switch. You see him, in a T-shirt and jeans and sneakers, looking all around. You notice how he painfully rejects helping a couple looking for directions, sending them away, before crossing the road after seeing it devoid of cars.
At least he doesn’t have a suicidal instinct, you tell yourself. He notices you and fakes a smile as he approaches.
“So, um... What are we going to do?”
“Are you sure no one followed you?”
“Uh... no. Why?”
“Because someone did.” Though she tries to hide, it’s not hard to notice the svelte yet curvy figure of Claire Anderson on her overalls, her hair bound in twin pigtails.
But she’s not alone. She brought a friend – a friend that could make your job even easier. She brought Katie, Jessica’s younger sister, along.
You ponder the possibilities. Your plan is to reassume your old identity to meet Jessica, but you don’t have anything beyond that. Perhaps you could take her on a date or question her, then at some point you do the extraction.
But if you want to know what Jessica thinks of you – and what has happened to you – why not question her under the guise of her younger sibling?
View Portfolio
Visit Notebook
Send Gift Points
Awards
Badges
Send Email
Community Newsfeed
General Discussion
Sponsored Items
Book of Trinkets
Static Items
Books
Groups
Interactive Stories
Audio
Campfire Creatives
Community Notes
Crossword Puzzles
Documents
Folders
Images
In & Outs
Madlibs
Photo Albums
Polls
Product Reviews
Quizzes
Survey Forms
Web Pages
Word Searches
More by this author