Second Nature

Chapter 15

15 

Gen awoke in an antique poster bed, her body indenting a cloud-soft feather mattress. The bedroom was quiet except for a lone cricket who played his solo mating song from the clothes closet. Through a tall window overlooking the shore, she watched dawn light glinting like pink gold on the bay's glassy surface. She dimly heard the sighs and whispers of tiny breakers washing the sand. Seagulls cried, and somewhere to the south several dogs barked a sermon; one calling, the others responding.  

Gen slipped out of bed and padded barefoot across the honey oak floor to the window for a better view. She wore a men's extra-large denim work shirt that draped below her knees. The faded blue fabric had been washed so often it felt softer than linen. When Gen buttoned it up last night, after the world's most gratifying hot shower, she had guessed the shirt was Cade's and the mere thought gave her goose bumps, imagining the soft denim to be Cade's arms wrapping her torso. Her belly grew taut with sudden desire. 

She swallowed down the emotion and let out a trembly breath. The feelings were new and strange and overwhelming. She had loved Toshi, but she had never felt lust. Good grief. That's what it was: lust. She was warm and slick between her legs. 

This is crazy, she told herself. You don't even know him. And it's hopeless anyway; you're so ugly he thinks you're deformed. She touched her elongated face. She could understand that Cade found her hideous. 

Morning glories in the box planter under the window sill unfurled like purple flags to salute the morning sun, rising from behind the inn. Dawn was dazzling, but a heaviness squeezed her chest. She pressed her hand to her heart. Was it beating okay? It ached as if it were too full of blood. She didn't know she was crying until a tear splashed her hand. 

Sniffling, she wiped at her eyes. Here I am, trapped again in loneliness. Toshi gave up his life to help me escape from Redstone Laboratories. But I'm isolated still. Set apart by my strangeness. Must I always feel cut off from people?  

Swimming with the dolphins had been the happiest days of her life. When she thought of Little Squirt the dam in her chest burst and the tears gushed down. God, she missed Little Squirt. She tried to say his name in dolphin language, but the clicks hurt her throat. 

Why hadn't she stayed with her true friends? 

Cade. His beautiful face, his masculine aura, had beguiled Gen as surely as the first sight of Prince Eric had captivated Ariel, the Little Mermaid.  

A fairy tale, but the story had changed drastically. The Little Mermaid had been beautiful when she washed ashore as the speechless young woman. Gen could hardly be more gruesome. Oh, but then, that was another fairy tale, wasn't it? A new twist on Beauty and the Beast. 

I can't go on with this face, she thought. I've got to become fully human, or go back to living among the dolphins. 

But she couldn't return her face to its normal shape without exposing her identity to Cade and the others. They would find out who she really was. Different is bad; profoundly different is terrifying. She remembered how the lab technicians and soldiers worked around her with constant nervous glances, as if they feared she might suddenly dissolve the glass walls of her prison and suck out their brains through their nostrils.  

The Beast. That's me. Even when I look completely human. The idea of Cade fearing her made her sad in all four chambers of her heart. She rubbed her chest again. Her heart still thumped, but the poor muscle definitely felt close to breaking. 

She wondered if there was any possibility of leaving, returning her face to its human form, and then coming back to Cade. Yeah, right. As if he wouldn't recognize me by my eyes. Everybody talked about her eyes; even the men who were scared of her. Toshi once read her the romantic poetry of a Japanese swordmaster named Tesshu. He told Gen that Tesshu had searched all his life for the perfection of beauty, and would have considered his quest complete if he had gazed just once upon her violet eyes.