This choice: You start to question Katie. • Go Back...Chapter #4The Layers of your Girlfriend('s Family) by: Nostrum   Despite not being close to her, Katie’s behavior strikes you as odd. She’s alone, as there’s no sign of Jessica – or Mrs. Hunt, their mother – which usually means she couldn’t care less about you arriving, as she’s closer to your own sister Claire. Instead, she’s questioning why you’re late, referencing the text Jessica sent you. What made her care all of a sudden?
You answer her own questions first, with one of your own. “Maybe she left with your mom? Speaking of which – where's Missus Hunt? She’s usually at the kitchen.”
“I’unno,” she chirps.
“So you don’t know where they are.” She shrugs, her indifference bothering you. “Yet you said she was here, and in her room.”
“I was on mine,” she tells you, still flipping the pen. “Maybe Jessica and Mom left while I wasn’t noticing.”
“So you don’t know when she left.”
“Nuh-uh,” she replies in an irritating, childish tone.
“And you didn’t knock on Jess’s door to check up on her?” She shrugs again, though you notice her grinning. “Guess I’ll call and tell her I was here.”
“Well,” she complains. “Sorry that I wasn’t who you were waiting for. Maybe you should have more reasons to visit than just--”
You hush her as you hear Jessica’s ringtone in the distance. It’s unmistakable, as she chose it specifically to identify you because she loves it. You seek it by ear, only to find her phone under a small mound of clothes – which strangely enough include cargo pants and a buttoned shirt she doesn’t use. “Where is she?” you ask Katie again, as Jessica rarely loses her phone.
“I’unno!” she complains. “Haven’t you forgotten your phone at least once? Maybe that’s why she couldn’t tell you she left.”
“She rarely does...” You resolve to call Mrs. Hunt, and to your surprise, her ringtone sounds at the distance. You move towards the kitchen, hearing it blare – near her car keys, meaning her car must be in the garage. You grab them, showing them to Katie. “Can you explain this?”
“Maybe Mom forgot them.”
“So Jessica and your mom left, without their phones, on foot, just like that.” You notice she’s fiddling with the black pen, which infuriates you even more. “And what’s with that thing you’re holding? You’re driving me nuts with it!”
“This?” She grins impishly. “Something that arrived on the mail.”
“Did you order it? Or is it something meant for Jess?”
“Beats me,” she tells you. “Got no return address, no name attached – just there, on the mailbox.”
“Don’t you find it strange that someone sent that...” You can’t even fully describe it. It’s black, alright, with golden decor you can’t distinguish at a glance, appearing as a calligraphy pen. You notice it has a button – which you’d expect from a ballpoint – atop which Katie’s thumb hovers idly. “...thing to your home without anything to trace it?”
“Can’t say I don’t.”
“No idea who could’ve sent you that pen?” you ask her. “Your dad or something?”
“To be fair, I doubt it’s Dad. I mean, if it was a gift for us--”
Us?
“--he would’ve given it to us personally. S’not like Mom still holds a grudge on him.”
They held a grudge? You never heard Mrs. Hunt say anything about her ex-husband. Jessica told you they divorced due to infidelity while he was stationed away at Fort Morris, and that she (and by extension Katie) has a half-brother living there. (Well, two, as she told you his new wife just had a baby girl.) That would explain why you’ve never seen him.
Except, had Mrs. Hunt kept a grudge on her ex-husband, she wouldn’t allow her and Katie to spend summers, or allow him to visit during Katie’s birthdays. (Jessica’s is during summer, so they celebrate it there – with Mrs. Hunt actually traveling cross-county to do so.) Though they don’t love each other, they still share as co-parents, and Jessica has nothing but words of love and appreciation for her father.
That only deepens the mystery. “Then if it’s not your dad, who sent it? What if it’s not yours?”
“It’s mine now,” she claims, holding it closer.
“And what if it was sent to Jess?” you confront her. “The Postal Service doesn’t send a package if it misses a return address unless it’s from a company.” (Who says doing an article about the local Post Office was useless now, Rick?) “And if it’s an object, someone has to sign for it.”
“It was on the mailbox, alright? No address, just a box with these things.”
“Things?”
“There’s a brown one too,” she explains. “And some instructions, but apparently they got damaged on the way.”
“Maybe the sender’s address is inside. Where is it?”
“Right there,” she says as she points at a closed wooden box – an elegant pen case, snap shut. As you open it, you notice a brown pen with a strange lightning-like motif – or so it seems, as it looks like a sprouting branch, or veins. It’s otherwise identical to the one Katie’s holding, complete with the button.
You grab the paper inside, which has some instructions – and that’s when it hits you.
“Costume set?”
“Yeah,” she chirps. “The black one turns people into costumes.”
“But that’s impossible!” The paper certainly suggests otherwise – as Katie mentioned, a single click turns any person you point the pen at into some sort of “perfect disguise”. How perfect, though? You glance at your girlfriend’s sister – the only person around, deeply amused – and you figure she must have already used it – or perhaps, someone has used it on her, wearing her like a bodysuit.
She must have noticed you know something, as she approaches you with a sexy leer. “You get it now?” You focus on her, and you notice her expression turns a tad too familiar. “I had to give it a test, after all.”
“Jess?”
She clicks her tongue, shaking her head. “She’s not here, David.” You see her take off Katie’s shirt as she slowly steps back; you wince as she unlatches her bra, but she doesn’t fully remove it. Instead, she touches the back of her neck, scraping it, and you see as she pulls her skin, releasing moist brunette locks.
As she pulls Katie’s face away from her, you realize who made the claim. It’s Mrs. Hunt, smiling sultrily. “I sent Jessica away so she wouldn’t see this.”
You give her a queer, doubting look. “Makes no sense. Like I said, Jessica wouldn’t leave without her phone, let alone if she’s alone. And if that happened, she’d have called me.”
“Maybe I have her hidden out sight. Still counts like sent away.”
“Jess, cut it out.” You notice how Mrs. Hunt’s face distorts with anger and frustration. “I know it has to be you.”
“What makes you think that?”
“For one, you slipped about sending me the text as Katie. Second, the way you talked about your dad. Third, if you really were Missus Hunt, and you had turned Jessica into a skin, you wouldn’t disguise as Katie – you'd disguise as yourself.”
“Guess you’re as smart as I expected.” Seeing Mrs. Hunt naked from the torso up helps you distinguish what her daughters got from her. Jessica definitely inherited her body – you’re pretty sure she’ll keep the firm breasts and few wrinkles her mother boasts when she reaches her forties. But Katie unmistakably inherited her face and hair – green eyes, curly brunette hair and fine features.
In fact, that makes you wonder why they’re so different. Jessica, in comparison to her mother and sister, is a natural blonde with captivating blue eyes. You’ve never seen her father – from which you assume she inherited those traits – but other than some facial features, you’d swear they’re not sisters.
And that contrast can’t be more evident as Mrs. Hunt pulls her face off, revealing your beloved Jessica inside. She shakes her moist head and exhales, blessing you with her delightful smile. “What took you so long, Babe?”
“I didn’t know about the pens, for one. Once I knew, it made sense that you couldn’t be your mom. And besides, you promised you’d show me something special, which I assume has to be that.”
“Uh-huh.”
“And what made you test them on your family?” you ask, partly horrified and partly curious.
“Katie pretty much offered as a volunteer – she took the black pen from me, clicked the button and deflated. That’s how I realized these things were the real deal.”
“You thought it wasn’t real?”
Jessica shows you the pen, snorting. “You think something that looks like a pen could do that?”
“Alright, so Katie screwed up. Why your mother, though?”
“She almost caught me,” she confesses. “It was a jerk reaction, I’ll admit – she knocks on my door, I hear it opening, and my first reaction is ‘I gotta take her out’, so I did.”
“And why were you wearing them both?”
“Testing if I could wear both at once. I was about to make my way to your house, but that’s when you arrived.”
“So you were gonna go to my house as Katie... for what?”
Jessica clamps you with her arms (or rather, Mrs. Hunt’s arms) and grins. “I was gonna surprise you. Maybe zap Claire and your mom and... do something naughty there.”
“What kind of naughty?” you ask, though you suspect the answer – which is easily confirmed as she steps back.
“The ‘mounting me’ kind, Babe. Right here, right now. But... we could spice things up. How about we roleplay that you have a secret affair with my sister? Or... how about playing that my mom’s seducing you?”
You won’t deny that Jessica’s plan is brilliant, but you have your reserves. None of this feels natural – up to and including Jessica asking you to sleep with her. She has never done so. What if she was replaced by someone else?   indicates the next chapter needs to be written. |
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