Shift | Complete ✔️

31 | In Crystal Vision

I am hallucinating, I thought.

See, I do have a brain abnormality.

I thought too, that I heard Phelan downstairs in the kitchen. I heard the ceramic plate being placed on the countertop and the lid of the strawberry jam spinning to a still as the knife scrapped the edges of the jar.

I swore the sweetness of the jam wafted through under the door, before the four, no five, different scents of grain from the bread permeated the air.

He was making a strawberry jam sandwich.

No. I was losing it.

Rolling over, I covered the duvet over my head, determined to drown out every sound, smell and sensation. I was sure I'd wake up with some clarity, and not be stifled by my muddled brain and sore body.

~

The morning hue that casted itself under the curtains told me that I had again, slept through another day.

But unlike the one prior, where I felt battered and bruised, I felt something completely different.

I felt like a new and improved Edie.

I felt bulletproof.

Wriggling my toes and fisting my palms, I tensed all my muscles... muscles.... before throwing the covers off and launching from the bed.

The second my feet hit the hardwood floor, I knew something was different. I was different.

Rushing to the floor length mirror, I was instantly struck by my reflection.

In shock and awe, I reached for my face before stepping forward as if to check that my eyes weren't deceiving me.

My skin. It was like porcelain. Where there had been the odd pimple and blemish, was now nothing but the clearest and smoothest of skin. I turned my head from side to side, noting how my cheeks had a natural glow, a tinge of pink that they lacked before.

I was gobsmacked.

But that wasn't the only difference.

My hair, although always long and wavy, was darker and smoother. And where kinks and frizz had always given me a complex, now sat symmetrical waves that fell past my shoulders like strands of silk.

What the hell...

My lips. Those were my lips? I had found the elixir of youth! They were soft, red and noticeably plumper. Not the distinctive look from filler or whatever else people did to enhance themselves, this... this was the real deal.

Staring at myself, I forced a smile, inspecting my teeth, which despite still having the one crooked eye tooth like I always had, they were all now a pearly white. Like, veneer white.

I was in shock!

My eyes! My sky blue eyes shimmered with flecks of gold. They looked three dimensional, they looked like they couldn't be real.

But they were. I was.

Next, I shifted my focus to my body. I lifted up my shirt and lost it at what I saw next.

I had abs.

I burst out laughing, I couldn't believe it. Me, whose dietary choices consisted of every form of processed carbohydrate had abs.

Twisting from side to side, I noticed I still had my curves, but there was now muscle that had miraculously appeared to add definition to my frame.