All that is Darkness

CHAPTER TWELVE: HER OTHER LIFE

A vamp.

So they were here, after all. But of course that wouldn't be surprising if this were just a dream. I'd populate it with what I knew, wouldn't I? Except I wasn't familiar with any of this clobber. It was all strange and unusual and like nothing I thought I could ever have imagined.

I shivered again and turned away, walked unsteadily over to a mirror that stood in one corner of the room and stood peering at myself. It took me a moment to accept that I was looking at me—or at least the me of this other place. The girl staring back was the one I recalled from before, but older now. She looked maybe fifteen; because I realized that under the sleeveless white top I was wearing there was a substantial bosom and fuller hips filling out the loose black pants that hung way too low on her...my hips. The girl in the mirror had longer hair than I recalled from before, but the eyes were the same—except there wasn't as much terror in them now; more confusion and bewilderment than anything else.

I lifted my hand and stared at it, thought it looked like mine. But in the mirror the fingernails were longer and painted with purple nail polish, and when I glanced down at the reflection of my feet I saw that the toenails had been done to match. It was eerie to touch my face and watch the girl in the mirror mimic my gestures exactly, watch as she fingered strands of the long brown hair. There was something mesmerizing about it, and it was hard to tear myself away, to force myself to look elsewhere. It surely has to be the strangest thing to wake up in someone else's body and not have a clue how you got there or what you're supposed to do.

The woman who had knocked on the door had mentioned something about a studio. But what did that mean? I felt renewed anxiety and wondered how I could pretend to be this girl Samantha and do whatever it was she was supposed to do.

"Samantha!"

"I'm coming," I said irritably, responding the way I sometimes did with Mom. But that wasn't Mom out there and this wasn't Haven and I'd no idea what I was going to do.

It's just a dream. You don't have to do anything.

I poked around the room, picking things up and trying to find some connection to them. There was a framed piece of cork paneling hanging on the wall like a painting. It had notes and pictures and other bits of card and paper pinned to it with colorful thumbtacks. I studied it, stepping closer to examine a strip of photos showing Samantha and another girl, heads pressed close together, making faces at the camera, looking as though they were having the time of their lives. Another picture, in color, showed Samantha standing beside a boy—the same one on the glass and metal thing—holding hands, looking like more than just friends.

How many times had I wished I could have a different life? How many times had I so desperately wanted something "normal"? Now I was standing in another girl's room, in another girl's body, living her life, and there wasn't anything normal about it. It was all foreign to me, and when I opened the closet I realized just how much. The contents made me gasp in astonishment. There were more clothes in there than a dozen girls back in Haven could ever have hoped to own. I didn't even think the richest of Cliffside's little princesses could possibly have as many outfits and accessories. There were dresses, tops, skirts, blouses, sweaters, and shoes in unimaginable numbers, supplemented by a variety of hats, belts, and bags. On one shelf a jewelry box was overflowing with bracelets, bangles, necklaces, earrings and rings. It was as if I were Ali Baba and had just stumbled upon the treasure of the forty thieves. I found myself pulling out dresses just to look at them and see fashions that were like nothing you'd find in Haven. It would cost a month of electric rations and weeks of fulltime pay to buy just one of the fancy dresses in Samantha's closet. As much again for some of the shoes.