DetectiveRed

Sorry for the long break folks. I had no idea how to continue this story. Finally figured it out and so here it is.

Was I blushing? I think I was blushing. Seeing Alex ask for her plush toys, and squeaking, and acting so cute; how was I meant to think straight? I'm not a genius at the best of times and here this girl is, making my brain short circuit. It's ridiculous! That used to be my body, but she had this new range of expressions and mannerisms that made it hard to think of it as mine. It fit her so well. Was I meant to not think she was adorable? Suggesting fake crushing to get the parents off our backs wasn't the smartest idea when she was already confused about the whole body swap thing, but could anyone blame me for not thinking? Joan and Sam could. They weren't going to let me live it down anytime soon.

“Sorry, that was a little weird.” 

“It’s okay,” she mumbled. I needed to calm down. The rush of emotions, the feelings of freedom and the euphoria from being in a better fitting body, had made me a lot louder and more excitable. Getting used to that was just something I'd have to work on. From what I could tell, Alex had been alone for the last five and a half years. Suddenly being so loud and ridiculous in front of her after she’d just calmed down was a recipe for more disasters.

“I’ll bring everything you need tomorrow, okay?” I repeated. Being a reliable guy was important, and if bringing her a bag of plush toys would help her feel like I was someone she could trust, then I would do it a hundred times over. 

“Thank you.”

The rest of recess went by quickly; we exchanged passwords, phone numbers and any other information that she thought would be necessary. It was clear how much thought she’d put into the consequences of swapping lives. More thought than I had at least; I was too busy getting drunk on euphoria, while she was anxiously thinking about the logistics of the situation. Her need to figure everything out trumped even her social anxiety and she awkwardly asked Joan if she could borrow a few pieces of paper to take notes down. We agreed to meet up at lunch and she’d give me a copy of the most important notes she could think of. Maybe I could get her a notebook or something to help make up for what I said earlier. 

I'd expect to struggle in class, that's what I always did. Mostly because at a certain point I had stopped caring. Why try my best if it was never good enough? Why continue to struggle when I only wanted to get away from my house?  Why not let myself fall behind? Now I owed it to Alex to try and I thought I'd have no clue what to do. Thank god for her notes. She'd summarised everything from the last couple of classes; she’d even gone ahead on some parts and the way she explained ideas made it easy for me to stay on track. I wasn’t sure how she managed to make such concise notes from the teachers overblown explanations. For once in my life, I felt like I was learning a lot, even if I was occasionally being distracted by a couple of new quirks.

There were a couple of things I hadn’t thought about before when it came to being in a new body. My handwriting was different for starters. I knew how to write with my old body and I still understood the basic mechanics of it, but my hands were bigger now. It felt like I was relearning something incredibly basic. Surprisingly, it wasn’t an awful experience, but it made me wonder how many other things I would have to relearn how to do. Walking had felt odd this morning but I picked it up fairly quickly. Would I need to practise things like swimming? How quickly would I be able to pick something like that back up? Would a new body affect that? Was it weird to find those thoughts exciting? Learning everything again, making new memories and trying new things all seemed so enticing. Being in my old body already seemed like a far off memory. 

Except it wasn’t, that body's issues would be following Alex now. She’d have to deal with the silent treatment from Mother and Father. She would have to deal with them doing the bare minimum to keep her alive until she admitted my wrongdoing. Another thing I hadn't thought about. I’d be fine with her parents. Their promise of ‘we’ll talk about this when we get home’ at least gave me a chance to talk to them. From what she'd told me, I could get away with lying a little bit; I liked to think I’d gotten good at it after living with my folks. I just had to think of what would get homophobic, transphobic parents off my back. For my parents, I’d need to write a guide on what to do and what certain things mean. I’d created my own mental guide on how to deal with them years ago, I just had to get it down on paper for her. She’d need it.

Lunch meant it was time to warn Alex of what to come. Did we tell each other where our lockers were? We must have, I remember going to my locker and I had my stuff in hand. I just had to wait to see if Alex had any trouble. She probably wouldn’t have any, it would be hard to mess up too badly when I was already bombing most of my classes.

Only a couple of minutes later she came out from the hallway and ran over to our meeting spot. I was glad to see her, but there was something wrong. She was crying. 

“Adrian! Someone took the stuff from your locker. I’m so sorry I must have left it open!” 

“It’s fine, sit down.” Comforting her was my number one priority. Even if someone had stolen it, she could just take her notes back. It would be fine. “It’s gonna be okay. We still have your notes. I have them right here!” I patted the pile of books sitting next to me. She had to know things would be fine. A small smile started tugging at her lips.

“Oh thank god.” she breathed a sigh of relief, I think. It seemed odd for her to calm down so quickly.

“It’s all fine. We’ll just copy your notes.”

“I’m so glad you have your books. I thought I’d lost them.” I looked down at the stack of books next to me. They were mine, in all their tattered glory. 

Sam and Joan, who had been quiet for the last couple of minutes, suddenly burst out laughing. 

“You two already noticed didn’t you?” 

“Yep,” Sam piped up. “We even made a bet!”

“Which I won. I didn’t realise how spectacularly right I was though. It took you a couple of seconds even after she pointed it out.” Joan was losing it.

“Sorry, Alex. I was thinking about other things.” 

“It’s fine, as long as I didn’t lose anything.” 

I wasn’t sure how to bring up my parents. I didn’t want to make her more stressed.

“Can you come with me for a sec, I don’t want the hyenae to interrupt.” Joan and Sam were still cackling over my mistake. It might have been a dumb one but this was important. I started walking a little bit away from the others and hoped she would follow.”

“What is it?” she asked.

“It’s my parents. I wrote up some notes on them for you.” I wanted to make sure she would be okay. That was the most important thing. “I can deal with your parents, but mine aren’t good if you don’t know what they want before they say it.”

“What do you mean?” A look of worry spread across her face. 

“They’ll expect you to read their minds, or they’ll punish you.” 

“I can’t do that, I can’t read people,” she mumbled. I felt for her. She didn’t deserve to be subjected to those fucking assholes.

“That’s why I have some notes on reading them. They are predictable.” Predictability was the only thing that made them tolerable. Everything would have a predictable and stupid outcome. They were like robots, Father gave orders, Mother followed and I would follow too. “You are going to have to apologise to them.”

“How do I do that?”