Collateral
"I'm so glad you're staying here, Quinn." Stacy was playing host from her closet, rambunctiously eyeing the odds and ends that comprised her wardrobe.
"Yeah," a disaffected Quinn called back from the bed, "me too." Her eyes were buried in a magazine, and she had the enthusiasm of a blank-faced blow-up doll.
"Don't tell anybody this, but I like you best out of everyone in the Fashion Club." She sounded vaguely idolatrous, but it couldn't be anything creepier than the poster above Tiffany's bed.
"Um, that's nice, Stacy. God, look at Bridget in that slip dress!"
"Slip dress?" Stacy's choice was set. It could have been pure compliance. It could have been the fact that she was stripped down to her undergarments. "In fact, I'd say you're my first best friend, and Tiffany's my second best friend, and Sandi's my third best friend, although sometimes Tiffany's third and Sandi's second, but you're always first."
With such soul baring like that, there was one way for Quinn to reply. "Um, okay, whatever."
"Quinn, who do you like best?"
Why did such issues have to interfere with more pressing matters like mascara application? "Stacy, I'm trying to read this article on eyelashes!"
"Oh, right, sorry." Yet again, Stacy had no idea what to wear, but it was not that.
"Ugh, I can't believe she's wearing it! Slip dresses are so over!"
She was now clad in a T-shirt and jeans, not unlike Quinn's; only a flower in the middle of the shirt made the difference. "Uh, yes, slip dresses are so over. So, Quinn, wanna go to a movie?"
Quinn's head shot up at that. "Sure! What do you wanna see?"
"I don't know, what do you wanna see?"
Quinn wanted to press at that, but she had been a witness to the infinite recursion before. Stacy's shirt smiled back at her, which was strange, considering hers was the one with the smiley face. "What are you wearing?"
"What do you want me to wear?"
That was frustratingly predictable. The dye in Stacy's hands, however, weren't. "And what's that?"
"I thought we could color our hair the same shade." There was a narrowly arced smile on her face, and the innocent glints in her eyes seemed to betray no menace. But that was what disturbed Quinn the most; it was one thing to see someone full-on embrace someone else for far more sinister purposes. She could swear that was what was happening with Sandi, and besides, outside of metaphor, hugging was an excellent way to reach the jugular. It was just the opposite; there was just no depth to it, and this was coming from someone who knew a lack of depth well. Was every waking moment spent thinking of her, wanting her, plotting for her? It felt like being in the crosshairs of a blank-filled rifle. Was it really possible to be too sincere? She craved attention, but just not attention. Perhaps a lesson was in order?
"Stacy," she started. She lapsed for a few seconds, unsure of what to say. Stacy's eyes widened, as if she were going to grab every word that came out of her mouth and pounce on it. "I get you like me."
"Really like you."
"Heh," she nervously laughed, "point taken. But the thing is, you don't have to follow me, like the Earth and the Moon or something. I mean, not everything I do is the greatest thing ever. Like, if I decided to go to the bathroom sometime today, would you do it as well?"
Stacy produced a notepad and pen. "Really? What time?"
Quinn squinted at her, disappointment setting in. Only a manicure stood between what could have turned out to be some decent palm-face action. "No! The point is, you don't have to do everything I do and stuff! Go...I don't know, just-"
Waaah!
It was soft, grating, almost human. If it weren't for the silence that pervaded the room, the noise would have been a shrill piece of the background. "Um, Stacy, what was that?"
Stacy giggled. "Oh, don't worry. It was nothing. Now, about that hair d-"
Waaah!
"There it is again!" Quinn turned. "It sounds like it's coming from the closet." She was a few steps away when she felt a tug at her shoulder.
"Are you really sure you want to go in there now? Look how dark it's getting outside. Shouldn't you be trying to get home?" Her knuckles were white and her face was clenched. If people were hard to read, Stacy was a primer.
"You said it was nothing a few minutes ago," snarled back Quinn. "Why are you preventing me from seeing nothing, dare I ask?"
Stacy's grip loosened as she began to hyperventilate. Quinn stepped inside, but only a clothes rack greeted her. That and an echo.
Waaah!
Quinn looked up. There was a passage connecting the closet to the above, reachable by an otherwise obscured ladder. It was unmistakably coming from there. Quinn climbed up and grabbed the first thing that crossed her fingers, not caring what it was, but only what it could be. With what she saw, she was lucky she had waited until solid ground.
"A...baby?" Stacy was visibly morose, as if some immense effort had ground to a halt in one short moment. It was a surreal moment, no doubt; any situation that could be boiled down to the basic line of thinking "baby, attic, is in" was destined to be a mind-boggler. It was an issue that demanded explanation, at least not until after Quinn had pieced something together first. The baby looked peculiarly similar, with its flaming orange Bamm-Bamm hair, rosy cheeks, and exuberantly benign smile. "It's me," whispered Quinn.
"I tried to stop you," Stacy replied. "It's not ready yet, you see. I should've waited at least a few more years for the surprise."
"'It'? How did...?"
Stacy's gaze never traveled. "You know how your hair can sort of get a little loose once in a while? It's only kind of me to gather it up. And if it has a skin cell at the end of it, there's quite an opportunity for implantation into an ovum. Isn't she beautiful, Quinn?"
Quinn was torn. The baby was lovely on the eyes, but not on the mind for some reason. "Well, it's not that I don't appreciate what you've done," Quinn stammered, "I mean, the stretch marks alone would make you a saint! But it's just that with this whole thing with baby clones or whatever you did, it's just a little too overbearing for me to like."
"Too overbearing?" Her face should have contorted into a scowl, or at least shone bright red. Her dead stare persisted, as if she were laughing off the rage inside her. "This is all underbearing! Can't you see?" Viewing Quinn's surprise at her outburst, she toned down her voice a notch. "Let me explain. You see all this? This is all within one year's time. How many have you been around? Just kidding, I know the date. July 3, 1983. 15 years exactly, counting leap years. That's fourteen years I could never share with you, get to know you. Don't get me wrong. We have all the rest...just not those fourteen. This little thing gives that to us both." That was not a depth to which Quinn was willing to go, and she could only stand there, mouth agape, with her arm paralyzed around the bassinet. Stacy swooped in for it and continued. "I don't neglect her, Quinn. I feed her. I care for her. All for you. And it's not even close to what I could do. You only have to say the word, Quinn. You only have to say the word."
Quinn looked sullenly down at the baby for advice. All she received was a clueless stare. You only have to say the word. "Could you, uh, not do all this, then?"
Stacy's face dropped. "What do you mean, Quinn?"
Here we go again. "I mean step away from the table, drop everything, and just stop doing it."
There was a sudden jump in Stacy's voice, like a tremendous weight had just been lifted. "Quinn, there's no stopping now. Sure, maybe I could tear down those posters in the bathroom..." Any closer, and Quinn's mouth could have sucked her in. "Too much information? I could rip these jeans, trash this shirt. But could I do that to little Quinn here?" Quinn was struck by a nasty vision of a shredder swallowing up the infant. "It's a type of collateral, really. And there's only one direction to go: closer...and closer...and closer...to you." How Stacy was able to stand an inch away in front of her like that, she didn't know. Her reality was fear and Stacy's breath. "And who knows? Perhaps I could get inside you."
Nervously, Quinn turned again to the baby on the bed.
Waaah! came the reply. No help there. She turned back.
The lightning outside made the knife in Stacy's hand glint as it came down.
Quinn screamed with the thunderclap.
Sandi looked over the attendance sheet for the Fashion Club meeting. "Uh...anybody see Stacy?"
"No," Stacy said, but Quinn mouthed. "She's probably worried about something right now." And of course she was right. She had a baby to look after, after all!
Author's note: This was originally published on the PPMB (Paperpusher's Message Board) on July 3, 2013. I made her birthday that date on purpose, but that accidentally led to an interesting detail; if you take that day in 1983 as her birthday, she actually would be exactly 15 years old, including leap years, on the airdate of the episode that this is spun off from ("Gifted"), that is, June 29, 1998.