4

"Jerry," Theresa chopped lettuce at the sandwich counter. "Don't you think Alex has been acting odd?"

"She's been behaving herself." Jerry popped a cherry tomato into his mouth. "And I believe we have Nick to thank for that." Max came into the restaurant from the backstairs to the apartment and overhead that.

"Why would you say that?" He looked to his parents.

"I think we can thank Nick for keeping an eye on Alex and keeping her out of mischief." Jerry reiterated his point. "Thanks to him, she's staying out of trouble, she's been studying, her grades are up, she hasn't fought with Justin once, she's keeping up with her chores and she's even spending more time with you Max. I've never seen you two so close."

"Yeah…" Max turned a bit guilty. "You could say she's even closer to Nick."

"About that…" Jerry came around his wife and joined Max on the outside of the counter. "You know, I haven't seen Nick in quite a while. Where's he been?"

"Where's he been?" Max repeated the question and began improvising to keep Nick out of trouble. "Uh, you know that old theater on the next block we always thought was haunted… Well, he made friends there. Yeah, they've been playing poker a lot." He nodded his head with that answer. "Deuces wild and all that. Those Civil War soldiers are really great guys!"

"Max…" Theresa did her motherly voice. "Nick hasn't been taking you to these games, has he?"

"I can honestly say I have not been going to Nick's poker games!" Max discovered the magic in a half-truth. If there were no such games, he could not attend them. His ears detected voices behind him and he turned round to see Alex and her friend, Harper, coming in late from school. Chances are they had been shopping, but they were devoid of packages.

"You used to love shopping so much." Harper was dressed in blue overalls with an even bluer long-sleeved shirt with her hair in pigtails. "And those boys actually liked us. What's happened to you these days? Don't you like boys anymore?"

"Whatever…" Alex rolled her eyes and marched forward and put her schoolbooks on a table. "I just don't like going to the mall."

"Since when?" Harper turned and looked back to her best friend. "Alex, what's wrong with you? You can tell me anything!"

"Nothing, Hallie, it's just…"

"Harper! For the last time, my name is Harper!" Alex's best friend snapped. "Harper Evans! Harper Evans!! Why can't you recall that?!"

"Would you believe…" She looked back at her with different mannerisms. "That I haven't been myself lately."

"That's an understatement!" Max tried to be funny as he came between them. "Hey, Alex, Zombie Raiders is playing over at the Bijou; you wanna go see it after dinner?" Behind him, Justin had entered the room to ask his father a second, but he instead became distracted by the little play going on before him.

"That's sounds so cool!" Alex acted more like a young boy than a young lady. "And Lindsay Lohan looks so hot in it too!"

"I feel like I'm in The Twilight Zone!!" Harper shrieked out loud in the middle of the shop. Her eyes were in shock; her mind trapped in disbelief. "You'd rather hang out with your stupid brother than me?!"

"Hal… I mean, Harper…" Alex looked back to her best friend. "Look, Max is my little brother. We like hanging each out."

"Since when?!"

"Yeah…" Justin spoke up. "Since when?" Alex rolled her eyes at him then toward Max and back to Harper as her parents watched.

"Look…" Alex pulled back a strand of her hair. "Harper, we'll do something tomorrow. Okay?"

"Do you mean it?" Harper finally became excited. "You mean like shopping, facials and manicures?"

"O - kay…." Alex responded with a less than excited response.

"I can't wait!" Harper started jumping up and down excited.

"Neither can I." Alex stopped her jumping. "Give me a hug."

"Oh, Alex. I love you too." Harper hugged Alex, but found something weird about her friendly hug. "Alex, could you let me go?" Something felt very weird about this hug. "Alex?" She began tapping Alex's shoulder a bit harder as the two friends parted and pulled apart. Harper starred at Alex for another moment acting embarrassed.

"You have been acting so weird."

"Yeah, I've been hearing that a lot." Alex mumbled to herself. Harper beamed cartoonishly and recollected her books. She turned on her heel to depart and looked back happily ecstatic, waving a bit overjoyed back to Alex. Alex pretended to wave back at her, a bit less effervescent than heard and slightly annoyed. With her gone, she rolled her eyes, grabbed up her books and turned to Max.

"Let me change clothes, okay?" She told him.

"Perfect!" Max pepped up to be going to the movies. Steering round Justin watching her, Alex headed past her mother standing by the door to the kitchen.

"Alex, honey, " Theresa looked at her daughter. "Where's your purse?"

"I stopped carrying that stupid thing around." Alex backed through the door with Max shortly behind her. Justin stood by mulling on things and reflecting before following behind.

"Okay," Theresa looked to her husband. "I never thought I'd say this, but… I miss the old lazy and irresponsible Alex."

"I don't." Jerry continued chopping tomatoes. "Let's give a big hand to Nick for shaping her up. A hand for Nick, wherever he is." He started clapping his hands. Behind him, Justin had passed through the kitchen and up to the apartment upstairs. Max was sitting on the sofa waiting on his sister to take him to the movies.

"Okay, Max…" Justin leaned over the back of the sofa. "What's going on between you and Alex? Why is she being so nice to you?"

"I don't know what you're talking about." Max looked at his brother and slowly slid away, but Justin grabbed him by the t-shirt and pushed him down into the sofa with his knee to the pit of his brother's chest.

"Come on, tell me, booger brain!"

"I won't tell you! I won't tell you!" Max screamed with his brother on his chest.

"I'm going to spit in your mouth!" Justin hawked up a massive wad of phlegm from his throat.

"Justin," Jerry had heard the fracas from downstairs and came up behind his boys in good humor to bust up their chicanery. "Get off your brother!"

"I'll tell! I'll tell!" Max couldn't take keeping the secret another day much less having his brother spitting into his mouth. "It's Nick! He's been pretending to be Alex so we can play ball!" Jerry heard that and realized what he had said. Theresa had dropped her salad she had made for dinner and looked toward her daughter coming down the spiral metal staircase from the upstairs bedrooms. The moment became awkward. Everyone became silent. The only sound for a minute was the activity from the street outside the second-floor landing. Jerry felt a wave of anguish for not realizing the truth earlier. How could he not realize it? He felt as if he was a bad father for not spotting this masquerade, but his disgrace turned to anger. Theresa stared with shock at the revelation she had discovered.

"Nick?" Jerry Russo looked at Alex with mixed feelings of anger, shock and confusion.

"Justin's been gluing fake hair to his chest!" She pointed to her brother. Justin reacted embarrassed and looked around trying to fold his arms inconspicuously.

"You're in my daughter's body?" Jerry looked at Alex and realized it all made perfect sense. The perfect grades, the good behavior, actually doing chores, her hyped-up magic… it all made sense to him now! "Do you know how creepy that is?!"

"Yes!!" Alex nodded her head in agreement. "I was trying to be Justin!" She gestured to her brother.

"Okay," Justin did a double take. "I did not need to know that!"

"Dad, please!" Max came running up to defend his sister. "This has been the best week of my life since ever! Nick and I have been doing a lot more with Alex around than we did when he was just a ghost. It's not like we did anything wrong."

"Wrong? Anything wrong?" Jerry was pacing back and forth and things started making sense. "He's been pretending to be Alex! That's not fair to Alex or to your mother or I! Max, if you and Nick wanted a way to spent time with each other you should have asked me! I could have found a spell or talisman to make it possible!"

"Really?" Alex lit up. "Just what sort of spell?" Jerry shot a look at her for that presumption.

"That's it!" Theresa was shaking her head too angry to think and finally found her voice to speak. "I want you out of my daughter's body and out of here! Go haunt somewhere else! I mean it!"

"Mom, " Max was upset. "But she… he's my friend. Don't send him away!"

"I'm sorry, Max." Jerry folded his arms upset. "But Nick went over a line here. He's got to go!"

"Your dad's right, Max." Alex responded dejectedly and turned to her brother. "We should have come clean from the start, but…" She rolled her eyes embarrassedly. "It felt so good to be alive again. To eat and drink and talk to people and actually be around others, you were like the son I always wanted but never had… You were all the family I never had. Max…" She looked at his depressed face and put her hand on his shoulder. "Your sister may be a pain, but she deserves to have her life back too." She took a deep breath and seemed to be going into a trance. Closing her eyes, she swayed forward and back on her feet and opened her eyes. She was still standing in the same place. Her body swayed left and right as she held her left hand up and looked at it.

"Uh-oh…"

"Uh-oh?" Theresa was livid. "There's no uh-oh here. I want my baby back!"

"I was afraid of that." Jerry unfolded his arms and motioned to the lair. "I think he's been Alex over the time limit. I'll need a spell to pull them apart. Justin, watch your sister, you'll have a long incantation to do this."

"Right, dad."

"I'll go with you." Theresa followed Jerry to the lair off the kitchen. "I can't even look at Alex knowing what I do." She looked to her oldest son. "Justin, watch your sister." She turned and marched away in anger.

"Watch your sister…" Justin repeated and watched his parents heading off in anger. He turned round to see Max and Alex sitting on the sofa. "I definitely haven't heard that in a while." He sat down at the end of the sofa with a space between him and his sister. "So… You've been Alex all this time." He sat next to her and Max on the sofa. "I should have known. You were too nice these last few days… and smart! Way too smart, I should have known." He sat a bit smug at busting their covert game and looked back to his sister's body next to him. "So, what's it like in there?"

Alex started answering.

"Don't answer that! I don't want to know!"