Jenny Gibbons had always been considered a pretty girl, and yet she'd always felt as though she was a fraud. In fact, in middle school, a therapist once diagnosed her with imposter syndrome, because despite her good looks garnering her popularity and her scholastic and academic achievements being higher than anyone else in her grade, she never once believed in herself or her abilities. That therapist, Jenny thought now, would lose their shit if they saw her today. Standing in front of the mirror, looking at her new face, Jenny couldn't believe the wonders that modern medicine could accomplish. She ran her hands up and down her face, pressing on the soft squishy flesh that were her new cheeks and couldn't believe just how closely she resembled Allie Meers now. The door to her hospital room opened behind her and Nick entered, before jerking back against the door, a hand to his chest.
"Christ that's uncanny," he mumbled, as Jenny stared at herself in the mirror, admiring her brow ridge; Nick entered more and plopped a bag down on the bed, unzipping it and asking, "are you about ready to get outta here? I can drop you off but I have to come right back. I am on duty, after all." Jenny nodded, taking in his words but not really listening at all. Nick started to pack up her belongings as Jenny pushed her fingers into her mouth and pulled her lips back, looking at her jaw. Nick stopped after a moment and watched, curious, until Jenny finished her exercise in personal admiration and smiled. "I'm perfect," she whispered, "just like her." *** Allie was seated in her car, right outside of Marcie's apartment. Marcie had given her her address, had told her it'd be fine if she ever wanted to drop by...so why did it feel to Allie like she was somehow invading on her privacy? Allie leaned back in the drivers seat and shut her eyes, exhaling. She thought back to when she was a kid, and Marcie had come to her party as the magician, and how excited how Allie had been. How much of an impact Marcie had made on her. Allie groaned and opened the console beside her, reaching inside and pulling out a bottle of painkillers. She shook it and exhaled, before putting it back into the console and shutting the lid once more. No. She wouldn't give in no matter what. She'd promised them all better than that. Allie finally pushed the car door open and slid out onto the street. She waited for a few cars to pass by before heading across the street and up the steps to the somewhat run down apartment complex. She knocked and then stuffed her hands in her hoodie pocket, waiting for the door to open. When it finally did, the person standing there certainly wasn't the person Allie had expected. It was, in fact, not Marcie at all, but instead a seventeen year old girl. She hesitated, eyeing Allie up and down, then spoke. "Yes?" she asked. "Uh, h-hi, I'm Allie...I'm a friend of Marcie's, is she...is she here?" Allie asked, and after a moment, the girl nodded and stepped away, pulling the chain off the door and allowing Allie entrance. Allie was confused...the girl was too old to be a daughter...so maybe a family member who ran away and sought refuge with her favorite aunt? Sister? Cousin? Allie shrugged it off as she walked inside, looking around at the decor. She took a moment to soak it all in, before hearing the door shut behind her and jumped a little at the sound, as the girl walked past her and headed back into the kitchen, where she'd been cooking lunch of some kind. Allie heard noises from a neighboring room in the hall, and walked down it, finding Marcie at a desk, playing a game. Allie cleared her throat and Marcie turned to face her, pulling her headset down. "Oh!" Marcie said, her eyes widening at the sight of Allie, "hi! What...what are you doing here?" "That's something I've been wondering myself," Allie said, "I guess I just needed some sense of comfort." "Well, I'm not generally told I'm comforting, but I'll do my best," Marcie said, turning around in her chair, "you don't have a friend you could go to for that, or a boyfriend or...girlfriend?" "My best friend and I are already on somewhat shaky ground, and my boyfriend is driving the girl I got mauled home from the hospital today," Allie said sullenly. "...what is your life?" Marcie whispered. "Not good," Allie remarked, the both of them laughing nervously; Allie brushed some errant strands of hair from her eyes and looked at Marcie, finally asking, "...this is gonna be a weird question, but...did you ever commit a crime?" "Actually," Marcie said, shifting in her seat and crossing her legs, "I'm committing a crime every single day." *** Nick was driving, Jenny in the passenger seat still admiring her face in the rearview mirror. Occasionally, Nick would glance over and catch a quick peek, but overall he tried not to look. The fact that she looked almost identical to Allie freaked him out way too much. After a bit, pulling to a stop at a red light and waiting in traffic, Jenny finally closed her mirror and looked at Nick, who was just tapping his fingers on the steering wheel, doing his best to avert his sight from her general direction. "What is it?" she asked, "is it too weird?" "It's extremely weird," Nick mumbled, "I'm not...look, I'm not going to judge, okay, and what happened was fucking terrible and you have every right to have this new face be whatever you wanted it to be, but...why choose the woman who put you in a tiger pit, even if only accidentally?" Jenny sighed and shook her head, looking at her nails. "...it's...complicated," Jenny said, "I've never really been sure of who I was, exactly. Growing up, I latched onto whatever clique or identity I thought fit me best, as teenagers tend to do, but I did that even well into adulthood, and now I'm scared to try and discover who I might be. I wasn't there the night Allie was mauled, unlike Zoe, but when Domino was brought to my zoo...I just...I started to see whatever it was Allie saw in them. This sort of beautiful connection only an animal could bring out in a person. I begged to be their personal feeder, tended to their cage, all of it. Partially because I love white tigers, but partially because it brought me in some weird fucked up way closer to Allie, you know?" The light turned green and Nick started again, the car lurching forward. "Yeah," he said, "that all makes sense, but why her? All she's done is cause trouble." "Same for you, and yet you're sticking by her," Jenny replied, catching Nick off guard...but...he couldn't deny she was right. "I mean...okay, that's fair," he said softly, "but she's trying, right? She's trying to be better, and that's admirable. She's stopped drinking, she's not using painkillers, she's doing her best to just...you know...remain on the straight and narrow and on a sober path and that's something I have to appreciate. You're not wrong. She has this...this weirdly innate quality that draws you into her like a moth is drawn to light." "Mhm, see, you get it," Jenny said, "it's why Zoe sticks around to be her magic partner. We all see it. We can see the struggle, and see that she's worth even her worst sides." Nick nodded, chewing on his lip. "But that doesn't answer the question, exactly, of...WHY look like her?" Jenny sighed and looked out her own window as it started to softly rain against the glass, little droplets tinkling onto the metallic roof of Nick's car overhead. "Because she's what I can't be. And what I wish I was," Jenny said. "Which is?" Nick asked. A moment passed. "...undefeated," Jenny whispered. *** "It's funny, I've never actually eaten here," Alessa said as she bit into her sandwich; while chewing she set her sandwich back on its plate on the countertop of the bar and wiped her hands on a napkin, adding through her mouthful, "I guess you just never expect bar food to be good, but I suppose at a high end casino everything has to be exceptional." "My thoughts exactly," Molly said, picking up a mozzerella stick and biting into it, "my friend Allie is the one who actually told me to try it. I didn't trust it before that." "Well, Allie has excellent taste in bar food," Alessa said, both girls laughing. They heard a clunk on the counter top beside them and both turned their heads to see Effie seating herself on a stool, asking for a beer and lighting a cigarette. Molly cocked her head and wiped her mouth with her napkin. "Rough day at the office?" Molly asked, and Effie smirked as she ran her free hand through her short messy hair. "Honestly, been a rough few weeks," Effie said as her mug was put in front of her; she took a sip then continued, "comedy is taking a beating these days. Not getting a lot of audiences, and even when I do, they aren't packed houses like they used to be. "You're a comedian?" Alessa asked as she took a sip of her drink. "Well I don't generally tell people that's my occupation, because it just sounds sarcastic," Effie replied, "but yes, telling jokes is how I make my living. Hey, have you seen Zoe?" Molly shook her head and Effie sighed. "Trouble in paradise?" Molly asked, taking another bite. "No, she's just been...weirdly absent lately," Effie said, waving her hand at them, "whatever, it's no big deal. I'm sure I'll hear from her eventually. I have another set in an hour, it was nice to see you Mol, and uh...whatever your name is." "Alessa," Alessa said, holding her hand out so Effie could shake it, which she did. As Effie departed for her suite for a quick shower and a change of clothes, Alessa looked back at Molly and cocked her head to the side, like a confused puppy hearing a new noise for the first time; she asked, "who's Zoe?" "That's Allie's magic partner," Molly said, and Alessa nodded, "though they certainly don't treat one another like partners." *** Allie couldn't believe her ears. Her idol, one of the founding reasons she was a magician...was sleeping with a 17 year old? "I know," Marcie said, "I know...it's hard to hear. Truth is, I'm not a predator. I didn't specifically go for her, I didn't seek out someone younger, we just happened to meet and hit it off. Her parents kicked her out for being queer, and now she's here. Me myself? I'm bisexual, I could easily date a woman or a man my age, and I wouldn't mind it, but this is how things shook out, so yeah, I'm committing a crime every single day of my life." "And you don't...feel guilty about that?" Allie asked. "I suppose deep down there's a thin layer of guilt, certainly, thanks to the shame society has attached to the it, the stigma surrounding it, but on the surface? Nah. Everyone breaks the law and lowers their morals if they can, and anyone who says otherwise is a liar, plain and simple." Allie leaned back in her seat and nodded slowly. She was starting to see her actions in a new light. Murder was still murder, not to mention all the crimes she'd committed after that just to stay out of custody, but then again...she was doing it for a reason that others might also have done. Was Marcie right? Would people, if they knew they wouldn't get caught or perhaps couldn't control themselves, also bend the rules to aide in their own pleasures or freedom? She didn't want to justify something so awful - in either her own actions or Marcie's - and yet...they'd done what they'd done for reasons that made sense to them. Did that make them bad? "...you know," Allie said softly, looking at her shoes, "I used to think that being a magician would be the most amazing thing. I used to think that making people believe things that weren't true was cool. But really, we're just liars. Expert liars. Is that really a skill to be proud of? I try not to apply it to other aspects of my life, but it's gotten harder and harder because the more adept you become at something, the more you think 'why not use it?'. But I don't wanna be like that. But I can't stop now." "I think people often believe that personality traits can't become addictions, but they absolutely can," Marcie remarked, "anything can be an addiction if it's strong enough." Allie nodded and thought about Zoe. She'd done all of this to protect Zoe, or at least that's what she'd always claimed, but could there have been an ulterior motive hiding somewhere beneath her defense? "And what happens if we don't stop being addicts?" Allie asked, "I mean, I know the answer, I'm an actual addict. I used to drink nonstop, used to take painkillers...I know the outcome." "Then why are you asking me?" Marcie asked, chuckling. "Cause I..." Allie said, trailing off, her voice lowering, "...I guess cause I wanted someone else to say what I already know. I guess I thought maybe, if I didn't say it, it meant I didn't believe it, and the outcome could be different. But it never will be, will it?" Marcie shook her head and Allie sighed. Her life was once again a mess, even without her addictions... ...and she had nobody to blame but herself, as usual. *** Jenny spent her first day at home taking a lot of new photos of herself. Some on her phone, some on an old polaroid, some on her laptop camera. Whatever she could do she did. And she did it all with the intention of replacing all the photos of herself with these new ones, her new face, the face she always wanted to see. And then she went about her regular evening routine as usual. She ordered in food, she did some cleaning - it had been a while since she'd been in her apartment after all - and she got her work schedule figured out once more. And then, when she was ready for bed, Jenny Gibbons went to the bathroom to brush her teeth. As she pulled the toothbrush, paste on its bristles, to her lips, she stopped and admired the face she saw in the mirror. Was she sick? Was she actually sick for wanting to look like Allie Meers? She'd long ignored it, denied herself because she couldn't accept the truth, but the truth was, she'd only ever gotten friendly with Nick to get closer to Allie. She'd found her incredibly alluring, and saw her talent with magic as something very attractive. And she'd never felt this way before, either. She'd only ever liked men up until Allie Meers, and she knew Allie only liked men, so what was she really hoping for, ultimately? Jenny sighed and brushed her teeth, then combed her hair, and then she put her pajamas on and climbed into bed. And then, lying there on her mattress, on a level even she deigned too sick, she pulled her phone from her bedside table and opened the front facing camera. She then started to touch herself, all while staring at her own face, because to Jenny, it felt like Allie was with her. And this was the closest she thought she'd ever get to what she wanted.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
ABOUT
Allie Meers is what she dreamed of being since she was a little girl...a successful Vegas magician. The only problem now is she can't make all her problems disappear; Allie grapples with her strained relationship, crippling addictions and FBI agents on her tail, all while trying to stay at the top of her career. Archives
December 2023
Categories |