Looking Forward
By Rogue Angel
Disclaimer: I don't own anything.
"How do I begin to explain? You'd have to be crazy to believe anything I say. But hell, I've never been one to hold my tongue, it's not in my character." Who'd I get it from? My Mom? My Dad? How about neither? "I don't have parents."
He pauses, "You don't talk to them or something?"
"I don't have parents, period."
He takes a couple more seconds to think this through. But he again comes up with the same logic, "When did you guys have your falling out? When I was sixteen I ran away for two weeks."
I want to hit him, smack him for his stupidity, his blatant disregard of all that I'm trying to tell him. But I don't. "I wasn't born. I was created." I say in a rush.
Again he pauses, then laughs. A disbelieving chuckle, "Funny. You're such a comedian, you know?"
I look away. What else can I do?
His force laughter stops, "You seriously think." He trails off.
"I know I am."
He starts to stutter something but he never finishes a word, he gives up on trying to. "Seriously?"
"My tattoo is proof of it." I say.
This time he laughs again, this time more serious. "What about a statement against conforming? I thought that's what it meant."
"It's a twelve digit numerical pattern that my genetic code is based upon." I say quietly, like I'm ashamed of it. I'm not ashamed of anything I've ever done or of who I am. But this man is able to take that away from me. I love him and his fear scares me.
"You're kidding."
"No, I'm not."
"Jennifer."
"My name's not Jennifer." I say.
His face drops. His eyes become hurt and distant as he looks into mine, trying to find out what all of this is supposed to mean. "Why are you telling me this?" "You said you were in love, I'm letting you know who you're in love with."
"You. I'm in love with you."
"You're in love with Jennifer Addison. My name is Jondy."
He swallows. "What the hell kind of name is Jondy?" He asked. He's mad, he thinks I'm lying. He doesn't know how much I wish I was.
"It's what I was given by my older sister."
"What was your name before that?"
"210."
He stands up, sits back down, and stands again. "Numbers Jen?"
"Jondy. My name is Jondy. I was created in a lab. My barcode number is 332340090210 and I was called 210 until I was three years old when my older sister Grix named me. We ran away when we were kids and I haven't seen much of my family since then. I wound up here eleven years later, here with you and I want you to know who and what I am?"
He looks at me like I have a plague, like I'm carrying the Ebola Virus. "What the fuck are you then?"
"A Transgenic. A chimera."
"You're from Manticore?" He asked. "An X-Series?" Now I really wish he didn't watch the news. "That's all bullshit Jennifer, if you don't want to marry me just say it."
"I do want to marry you Erik. I do. But you're in love with one of my alias's. I've had dozens of them. I want you to love me, not who you think I am."
"You lied to me."
"I kept myself alive."
"Whatever." He paces the room as if he might leave but he stops. He looks back at me. "What am I supposed to do about this? Am I supposed to be OK with this?"
"No, God no." I say. I move towards him but he pulls away slightly, I stop. "I want to be with you, but not as Jen. I want to be with you as me, all of me. All that I am."
He takes a deep breath, I can see his muscles tense. He looks at the wall, which his hands are pressed against, he leans his head against the wall. He takes another deep breath. He looks to me. "I don't love you anymore. I won't tell anyone what the hell you are, but I don't want to see you again. I was in love with Jennifer not whatever the hell numbers you call yourself." He opens the door and walks out.
I watch the door. Not as tough as I thought. It could have been worse.
I take a deep breath and sigh. Part of me realizes that the instant he left I stopped loving him, the rest doesn't care. I go into the kitchen and pop a couple Tryptophan pills and catch my reflection in the glass of the cupboards. What the hell had I become?
I walk straight to my bedroom, the one I had shared with Erik. I close the closet door and look at myself in the mirror.
My hair is a golden blonde with bleached highlights covering my natural ones. It's long and straightened out of the natural wavy curls I should have. My sapphire blue eyes are masked behind glasses I don't need. My glasses match the brown of my belt and my loafer shoes. My amazing legs are hidden behind knee socks and a pleated skirt. A plaid pleated skirt. My chiseled abs are hidden beneath layers of shirts and a pink Victoria Secret bra. The white Oxford shirt sticks out below the cardigan sweater at the neck and the hem at the bottom.
I stare at myself. I look like a model from a catalogue my first foster mother had archives of, Eddie Bauer.
I make myself sick. I pull my glasses off, rip my sweater off, and strip down to nothing, I pile my clothes on the bed. I scrounge around until I find my old duffle bag. I pull it out. It smells musty but familiar. I pull out a pair of skivvies and bra and then I begin to tear apart the bag. I find low rise jeans and pull them on. I find a tight halter top that doesn't technically match but it makes me look hot, shows off abs that most would kill for. The blue brings out my eyes.
I go to my bed stand and open the drawer. I scrounge around until I find a pair of scissors and I go to the bathroom. I don't even bother to run water, I just start hacking at my hair. I cut it so it's long enough to cover my barcode, but short enough that I can wash the memory of my old haircut out. It's not a great cut but it is good enough. Kinda makes me look dangerous. I miss that.
I check myself out. A tattoo I had long since forgotten that I had stared at me from my lower back. My heart stops temporarily. The tattoo I had gotten with Zack haunted me. Had I really forgotten that much about who I was? This was the single greatest day of my life and I had hid it away like it was a burden.
I go back to my bedroom and start packing all that I'll need. Mostly it's my old clothes, Erik's .45 MM gun, and all the money I can find around the house. I find a polariod camera and snap a picture of myself and write on it, "This is what you missed." I wrote.
I walked away from our house. Walked to the other side of town and got my motorcycle out of storage. It felt like a crime that I had left that beautiful of a machine in storage for a year and a half. I got on my baby and started her up. She purred like no time had passed. I double check my bag and I burn out of there, leaving New Hampshire for good.
I drove straight to New York City. I started going by every bar and chop shop in the city. Finally in Brooklyn I found what I was looking for, or should I say who?
I pulled up and swung off my bike. A couple of Mexican guys cat call to me. I move just a little bit more so they really have something to watch. "Aye Mami!" One of them shouted.
I moved into the shop and up to the car that was being worked on and slapped on the roof, "Where's Zane?"
A dark haired guy poked his head out from underneath the car. He had grease smeared all over his face in the perfect places. He looked up at me, literally, then a smile spread across his lips. "Hey you."
"Hey," I reply, "You got time?"
"For you, little sister? Of course I do." He put his hands on the bottom over the car and wheeled out from under it. He stood up and unzipped the top half of his coveralls. He led me out to the back of the shop to where the junk lot was. He sat on a bench and cleaned off the seat next to him, "You look different."
"Good or bad?"
"*Very* good." He said with a small purr in his voice.
I smile shyly, I can feel my cheeks burn a little. "I left Erik."
"Oh? Really."
"Well he left me and I left New Hampshire."
"New Hampshire wasn't good for you." Zane said.
"No shit. I forgot everything that I am there."
Zane nodded, agreeing with me, "Yeah, J I know."
"Why didn't you tell me?" I accuse.
"You needed to learn the lesson yourself."
I glare at him for all of a second before he starts smiling, he knows I don't mean it. I smile because his is so infectious. His emerald eyes dance and yeah, there's no way that I can be mad at Zane for more than ten seconds.
And this is how it starts. For the next six months, him and I will sleep together until we have a stupid fight about nothing. And then I will leave again and find another asshole like Erik who doesn't love me but molds me in his image of his dream girl. And then I'll break up with him and come back to Zane.
He'll want me to come back because though we may fight in boredom after a while there's a familiarity about our relationship. He was my first and he will always get that privilege.
Someday I'll get pregnant with twins. A boy and a girl, he will have intense eyes and she will have a wicked smile. They both have some of Zane's habits and some of mine. We won't marry. It'll be more commitment then we can handle. We'll marry some people we don't know and don't love just to fulfill that aspect of our lives. We'll still sleep together and we'll both get divorced because we have commitment issues.
Zack will come back into our lives, he'll be mad that we're together, pissed we slept together, furious we have kids. But he'll love the kids anyway. He'll ask us, not order us, if we want to help find our family. We'll help because we are who we are. I'll see my siblings, they'll think Zane and my children are adorable. How the Zeke looks like his father and Ava looks just like me. The truth is Zeke has my eyes, large and blue. Ava will have Zane's dark hair and his sweet side. Zeke will be the instigator, Ava the hero.
They'll hit adolescence and wonder why Zane and I still look as we did when they were children. They'll hit twenty and understand.
Zack will hit 50 first. He'll be the first to die of old age. I'll be the last. I will live through all of my family's rapid degeneration in age. One day they'll look just like they did the first time I saw them and then they'll look old the next. In a matter of ten days Zack will die. Some of the others won't even last that long when the change hits. Brin will die the fastest, her former issues with Progeia ensure it. I'll be perfectly healthy as Zane, Jace, Krit, and then Max all begin to die. I'll be alone for almost a month.
Zeke and Max's daughter Tina will start dating. Ava will get into bartending with Bram, Syl's son, and she'll be the one who gives me the idea.
And that's how the X5 generation will end. By A single gunshot to the head from a .45 that belonged to someone who could never understand.
There will be a Good Place, Ben, Jack, Eva, and Tinga will be waiting for us. We all look as we did in our twenties. Zane and I won't fight here. Max won't deny Zack. And Ben, he will have his truth. We'll all have our truth and I won't have to worry about finding myself again, I found me. No more desperate searching. All of us will have found it. And no one can take that away from us.
Disclaimer: I don't own anything.
"How do I begin to explain? You'd have to be crazy to believe anything I say. But hell, I've never been one to hold my tongue, it's not in my character." Who'd I get it from? My Mom? My Dad? How about neither? "I don't have parents."
He pauses, "You don't talk to them or something?"
"I don't have parents, period."
He takes a couple more seconds to think this through. But he again comes up with the same logic, "When did you guys have your falling out? When I was sixteen I ran away for two weeks."
I want to hit him, smack him for his stupidity, his blatant disregard of all that I'm trying to tell him. But I don't. "I wasn't born. I was created." I say in a rush.
Again he pauses, then laughs. A disbelieving chuckle, "Funny. You're such a comedian, you know?"
I look away. What else can I do?
His force laughter stops, "You seriously think." He trails off.
"I know I am."
He starts to stutter something but he never finishes a word, he gives up on trying to. "Seriously?"
"My tattoo is proof of it." I say.
This time he laughs again, this time more serious. "What about a statement against conforming? I thought that's what it meant."
"It's a twelve digit numerical pattern that my genetic code is based upon." I say quietly, like I'm ashamed of it. I'm not ashamed of anything I've ever done or of who I am. But this man is able to take that away from me. I love him and his fear scares me.
"You're kidding."
"No, I'm not."
"Jennifer."
"My name's not Jennifer." I say.
His face drops. His eyes become hurt and distant as he looks into mine, trying to find out what all of this is supposed to mean. "Why are you telling me this?" "You said you were in love, I'm letting you know who you're in love with."
"You. I'm in love with you."
"You're in love with Jennifer Addison. My name is Jondy."
He swallows. "What the hell kind of name is Jondy?" He asked. He's mad, he thinks I'm lying. He doesn't know how much I wish I was.
"It's what I was given by my older sister."
"What was your name before that?"
"210."
He stands up, sits back down, and stands again. "Numbers Jen?"
"Jondy. My name is Jondy. I was created in a lab. My barcode number is 332340090210 and I was called 210 until I was three years old when my older sister Grix named me. We ran away when we were kids and I haven't seen much of my family since then. I wound up here eleven years later, here with you and I want you to know who and what I am?"
He looks at me like I have a plague, like I'm carrying the Ebola Virus. "What the fuck are you then?"
"A Transgenic. A chimera."
"You're from Manticore?" He asked. "An X-Series?" Now I really wish he didn't watch the news. "That's all bullshit Jennifer, if you don't want to marry me just say it."
"I do want to marry you Erik. I do. But you're in love with one of my alias's. I've had dozens of them. I want you to love me, not who you think I am."
"You lied to me."
"I kept myself alive."
"Whatever." He paces the room as if he might leave but he stops. He looks back at me. "What am I supposed to do about this? Am I supposed to be OK with this?"
"No, God no." I say. I move towards him but he pulls away slightly, I stop. "I want to be with you, but not as Jen. I want to be with you as me, all of me. All that I am."
He takes a deep breath, I can see his muscles tense. He looks at the wall, which his hands are pressed against, he leans his head against the wall. He takes another deep breath. He looks to me. "I don't love you anymore. I won't tell anyone what the hell you are, but I don't want to see you again. I was in love with Jennifer not whatever the hell numbers you call yourself." He opens the door and walks out.
I watch the door. Not as tough as I thought. It could have been worse.
I take a deep breath and sigh. Part of me realizes that the instant he left I stopped loving him, the rest doesn't care. I go into the kitchen and pop a couple Tryptophan pills and catch my reflection in the glass of the cupboards. What the hell had I become?
I walk straight to my bedroom, the one I had shared with Erik. I close the closet door and look at myself in the mirror.
My hair is a golden blonde with bleached highlights covering my natural ones. It's long and straightened out of the natural wavy curls I should have. My sapphire blue eyes are masked behind glasses I don't need. My glasses match the brown of my belt and my loafer shoes. My amazing legs are hidden behind knee socks and a pleated skirt. A plaid pleated skirt. My chiseled abs are hidden beneath layers of shirts and a pink Victoria Secret bra. The white Oxford shirt sticks out below the cardigan sweater at the neck and the hem at the bottom.
I stare at myself. I look like a model from a catalogue my first foster mother had archives of, Eddie Bauer.
I make myself sick. I pull my glasses off, rip my sweater off, and strip down to nothing, I pile my clothes on the bed. I scrounge around until I find my old duffle bag. I pull it out. It smells musty but familiar. I pull out a pair of skivvies and bra and then I begin to tear apart the bag. I find low rise jeans and pull them on. I find a tight halter top that doesn't technically match but it makes me look hot, shows off abs that most would kill for. The blue brings out my eyes.
I go to my bed stand and open the drawer. I scrounge around until I find a pair of scissors and I go to the bathroom. I don't even bother to run water, I just start hacking at my hair. I cut it so it's long enough to cover my barcode, but short enough that I can wash the memory of my old haircut out. It's not a great cut but it is good enough. Kinda makes me look dangerous. I miss that.
I check myself out. A tattoo I had long since forgotten that I had stared at me from my lower back. My heart stops temporarily. The tattoo I had gotten with Zack haunted me. Had I really forgotten that much about who I was? This was the single greatest day of my life and I had hid it away like it was a burden.
I go back to my bedroom and start packing all that I'll need. Mostly it's my old clothes, Erik's .45 MM gun, and all the money I can find around the house. I find a polariod camera and snap a picture of myself and write on it, "This is what you missed." I wrote.
I walked away from our house. Walked to the other side of town and got my motorcycle out of storage. It felt like a crime that I had left that beautiful of a machine in storage for a year and a half. I got on my baby and started her up. She purred like no time had passed. I double check my bag and I burn out of there, leaving New Hampshire for good.
I drove straight to New York City. I started going by every bar and chop shop in the city. Finally in Brooklyn I found what I was looking for, or should I say who?
I pulled up and swung off my bike. A couple of Mexican guys cat call to me. I move just a little bit more so they really have something to watch. "Aye Mami!" One of them shouted.
I moved into the shop and up to the car that was being worked on and slapped on the roof, "Where's Zane?"
A dark haired guy poked his head out from underneath the car. He had grease smeared all over his face in the perfect places. He looked up at me, literally, then a smile spread across his lips. "Hey you."
"Hey," I reply, "You got time?"
"For you, little sister? Of course I do." He put his hands on the bottom over the car and wheeled out from under it. He stood up and unzipped the top half of his coveralls. He led me out to the back of the shop to where the junk lot was. He sat on a bench and cleaned off the seat next to him, "You look different."
"Good or bad?"
"*Very* good." He said with a small purr in his voice.
I smile shyly, I can feel my cheeks burn a little. "I left Erik."
"Oh? Really."
"Well he left me and I left New Hampshire."
"New Hampshire wasn't good for you." Zane said.
"No shit. I forgot everything that I am there."
Zane nodded, agreeing with me, "Yeah, J I know."
"Why didn't you tell me?" I accuse.
"You needed to learn the lesson yourself."
I glare at him for all of a second before he starts smiling, he knows I don't mean it. I smile because his is so infectious. His emerald eyes dance and yeah, there's no way that I can be mad at Zane for more than ten seconds.
And this is how it starts. For the next six months, him and I will sleep together until we have a stupid fight about nothing. And then I will leave again and find another asshole like Erik who doesn't love me but molds me in his image of his dream girl. And then I'll break up with him and come back to Zane.
He'll want me to come back because though we may fight in boredom after a while there's a familiarity about our relationship. He was my first and he will always get that privilege.
Someday I'll get pregnant with twins. A boy and a girl, he will have intense eyes and she will have a wicked smile. They both have some of Zane's habits and some of mine. We won't marry. It'll be more commitment then we can handle. We'll marry some people we don't know and don't love just to fulfill that aspect of our lives. We'll still sleep together and we'll both get divorced because we have commitment issues.
Zack will come back into our lives, he'll be mad that we're together, pissed we slept together, furious we have kids. But he'll love the kids anyway. He'll ask us, not order us, if we want to help find our family. We'll help because we are who we are. I'll see my siblings, they'll think Zane and my children are adorable. How the Zeke looks like his father and Ava looks just like me. The truth is Zeke has my eyes, large and blue. Ava will have Zane's dark hair and his sweet side. Zeke will be the instigator, Ava the hero.
They'll hit adolescence and wonder why Zane and I still look as we did when they were children. They'll hit twenty and understand.
Zack will hit 50 first. He'll be the first to die of old age. I'll be the last. I will live through all of my family's rapid degeneration in age. One day they'll look just like they did the first time I saw them and then they'll look old the next. In a matter of ten days Zack will die. Some of the others won't even last that long when the change hits. Brin will die the fastest, her former issues with Progeia ensure it. I'll be perfectly healthy as Zane, Jace, Krit, and then Max all begin to die. I'll be alone for almost a month.
Zeke and Max's daughter Tina will start dating. Ava will get into bartending with Bram, Syl's son, and she'll be the one who gives me the idea.
And that's how the X5 generation will end. By A single gunshot to the head from a .45 that belonged to someone who could never understand.
There will be a Good Place, Ben, Jack, Eva, and Tinga will be waiting for us. We all look as we did in our twenties. Zane and I won't fight here. Max won't deny Zack. And Ben, he will have his truth. We'll all have our truth and I won't have to worry about finding myself again, I found me. No more desperate searching. All of us will have found it. And no one can take that away from us.