Marvel Imagines - Book 1

#35 Wanda Maximoff x Reader - Every Day

Imagine: A new body, a new life, every day since you can remember. Although it is a lonely and scary way of living, you can deal with it.

Until one day - when you wake up in Justin's body and meet his girlfriend Wanda - things start to change.

Warnings: None, maybe slight angst

Word Count: 1221
(Unedited)

Inspired by: "every day" - david levithan

I wake up.

Immediately I have to figure out who I am. It's not just the body - opening my eyes and discovering whether the skin on my arm is light or dark, whether my hair is long or short, whether I am thin or not, boy or girl, scarred or smooth.

The body is the easiest thing to adjust to, if you're used to waking up in a new one each morning.

It's the life, the context of the body, that can be hard to grasp.

Every day I am someone else. I am my - I know I am myself - but I am also someone else.

It has always been like this.

At first it was hard to go through each day without making any lasting connections, leaving any life-changing effects. When I was younger, I craved friendship and closeness. I would make bonds without acknowledging how quickly and permanently they would break. I took other people's lives personally. I felt their friends could be mine, their parents could be my parents. But after a while, I had to stop. It was too heartbreaking to live with so many separations.

I am a drifter, and as lonely as that may sound, it is remarkably freeing.

I will never define myself in terms of anyone else. I will never feel the pressure of peers or the burden of parental expectations. I can view everyone as pieces of a while, and focus on the whole, not the pieces.

I have learned how to observe, far better than most people. I am not blinded by the past or motivated by the future. I focus on the present, because that is where I am destined to live.

I learn. Sometimes I am taught something I have already been taught in dozens of other lives. Sometimes I am taught something completely new.

I have to access the body, access the mind and see what information it's retained.

And when I do, I learn. Knowledge is the only thing I take with me when I go.

•••

The information is there. I wake up, open my eyes, understand that it is a new morning, a new place.

The biography kicks in, a welcome gift from the not-me part of the mind.

Today I am Justin. Somehow I know this - my name is Justin - and at the same time I know that I'm not really Justin, I am only borrowing his life for a day.

I look around and know that this is his room. This is his home. The alarm will go off in seven minutes.

I'm never the same person twice, but I've certainly been this type before. Clothes everywhere. Far more video games than books. Sleeps in his boxers. From the taste of his mouth, a smoker. But not so addicted that he needs one as soon as he wakes up.

"Good morning, Justin," I mumble, checking out his voice. Low. The voice in my head is always different.

Justin doesn't take care of himself. His scalp itches. His eyes don't want to open. He hasn't gotten much sleep.

Already I know I'm not going to like today.

•••

As I take Justin's book out of his locker, I can feel someone hovering on the periphery. I turn, and the girl standing there is transparent in her emotions - tentative and expectant, nervous and adoring. I don't have to access Justin to know that this is his girlfriend.

No one else would have this reaction to him, so unsteady in his presence.

She's hiding behind her hair, happy to see me and unhappy to see me at the same time.

Her name is Wanda. And for a moment - just the slightest beat - I think that, yes, this is the right name for her. I don't know her. But it feels right. This is not Justin's thought. It's mine. I try to ignore it. I'm not the person she wants to talk to.

"Hey," I say, keeping it casual.

"Hey," she murmurs back.

Something happened between her and Justin, and I don't know what it is. It's probably not something that Justin even recognized at the time.

"Are you okay?" I ask.

I see the surprise on her face, even as she tries to cover it. This is not something that Justin normally asks.

And the strange thing is: I want to know the answer. The fact that he wouldn't care makes me want it more.

"Sure," she says, not sounding sure at all.

I find it hard to look at her. I know from experience that beneath every peripheral girl is a central truth. She's hiding hers away, but at the same time she wants me to see it.

No, she wants Justin to see it.

Shifting her gaze away from the floor, her eyes matching mine, she asks, "Are you mad at me?"

I can't think of any reason to be mad at her. If anything, I am mad at Justin, for making her feel so diminished. It's there in her body language. When she is around him, she makes herself small.

"No," I say, "I'm not mad at you at all."

I tell her what she wants to hear, but she doesn't trust it.

This is not my problem, I know that. I am here for one day. I cannot solve anyone's relationship problems.

I should not change anyone's life.

I turn away from Wanda, get my books out, close the locker. She stays in the same spot as I turn back around.

"Do you still want to get lunch today?" She asks.

The easiest thing would be to say no. But there's something about her - the cities on her shoes, inked-in Converse. She's drawn skylines around the soles, a flying city on the side - that makes me want to know more.

"Absolutely," I reply. "Lunch would be great."

Again, I read her. What I've said is too enthusiastic. Justin is never enthusiastic.

"No big deal," I add.

She's relieved. Or, at least, as relieved as she'll allow herself to be, which is a very guarded form of relief.

By accessing, I know that Wanda and Justin have been together for over a year. That's as specific as it gets. He doesn't seem to remember the exact date.

Wanda reaches out and take smy hand. I am surprised by how good this feels.

"I am glad you're not mad at me," she says. "I just want everything to be okay."

I nod and the first bell rings.

"I will see you later," I say.

Such a basic promise. But to Wanda it means the world.

I have spent years meeting people without ever knowing them, and on this morning, in this place, with this girl, I feel the faintest pull of wanting to know more.

And in a moment of either weakness or bravery on my own part, I decide to follow it.

I decide to find out more about Wanda.