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Chapter 2: The Worst Feeling in the World

When I woke the next morning I was lying in the small pool of water. My entire body was aching. It felt like my insides had been twisted and filled with glass. Every small movement hurt. The pain got worse with every transformation. Inside I wondered how long it would be before I couldn't stand it anymore.

I breathed deeply, filling my lungs with clean air. I tried to sit up, but everything hurt. I managed to move my arms underneath me and push myself onto my knees. I was covered in blood and dirt. I could taste it in my mouth. My mind was a blur of a thousand different images and thoughts. The only thing I could hear was my mother's voice, saying: "what have you done? What have you done?!"

I was naked too. This was how it had been the last time I Iost control too. I staggered up and tried to walk a few steps before collapsing again. My legs were shaky and my breath was shallow. I managed to work myself up to a tree and used it to steady myself.

After a few minutes of trying to calm myself down, I trudged back over to the spring I had woken up in and used the water to clean my face and arms. I sat back down on the dirt and cried. What had I done this time? The memories of the first time I lost control came flooding back. My father screaming, my mother crying, me running away from them, trying to convince myself that I didn't hurt them. I cried and yelled for what seemed like an eternity. I didn't try to stop myself. I was already naked in the woods, crying wasn't any more embarrassing.

And then I heard a voice.

"Get up, kid," I recognized it. It was the man who had approached me last night. Had he been waiting for me? How long had he been in the woods?

I jerked up and looked at him, trying to cover myself. I could feel my cheeks turn red, and not just from the tears.

The man said nothing; but threw me a faded denim jacket and some grey sweatpants. I saw some boxers folded up in the pants, but I didn't ask him where he got them. I put them on as quickly as possible.

"How did you find me?" I asked as I pulled the sweatpants up.

"It's not too difficult when you're screaming like a little girl,"

Now I was embarrassed.

"I know you don't want to talk, so I'm not going to ask you to," I looked up at him, "but you need to come with me, there'll be hunters here in an hour or so,"

I cautiously approached him. He was an enigma to me. How was he not terrified? Why would he want to help me?

"Just come on kid, I'm not gonna kill you," I took a few more steps toward him.

"Why are you here?" I asked. "Why are you helping me?"

"I'm not. I'm only keeping the police from finding you."

We walked together through the woods until we came out of a clearing not too far from the bar. He led me through the parking lot and to a rusty truck. Its seats were torn and the paint was chipped, but it looked like it would run okay.

Before we got into the car, he turned to me. His eyes looked like they alone could kill you. They seemed full of hate and anger, but also sadness. I was much taller than he was, but he didn't look like that intimidated him.

"What's your name, kid?"

I hesitated. Would my parents approve of my telling a stranger my name and getting into a truck with him? Probably not. But something else told me I should.

"It's Louis. Louis Laurents," I said. He didn't say anything, just opened the door and hopped into the truck. I went around and opened the passenger door with a creak.

"Before we go, I have to know your name. So that I won't feel like I'm driving away with a total stranger."

He was silent before speaking. Probably contemplating whether to give me his real name or a fake one. Finally, he talked.

"Logan. It's Logan."

…

We were driving for hours. The times seemed to drag on. Logan didn't want to talk to me, and even though I was curious about him, I kept my mouth shut. He didn't seem like the kind of guy you'd want to chat with. I rested my head on the window and tapped on the passenger armrest with my fingers. I tried to follow the beat of the radio, but I got distracted easily. Instead, I tapped endlessly, like a tic.

"Cut that out," he finally said. I leaned up. I didn't want to force my luck so I stopped tapping and rested my hands in my lap, rubbing them anxiously instead. We were silent for hours longer.

Finally, as it started to get dark outside, I dared to speak to him.

"So, where are we going?" I asked.

"Away from here." He stated. As much as I tried, he had a way of turning every question I asked into an answer that required as little talking as possible. It got annoying.

"What brought you to Washington?" I said, hoping that he would break the awkward silence.

"The same thing that brings me everywhere else," he did it again. Why wouldn't he just talk? Regardless of how scared I was of Logan, I wanted answers, I needed them. I couldn't just sit there anymore.

"We've been driving for hours and you haven't said more than two sentences. With all due respect Mr. Logan, I would like to know a little more about where we're going and why I'm with you," He didn't say anything at first, and I was about to repeat myself when he talked.

"What brought you to Washington?" He asked. He was ignoring me. But if it took me talking to break the silence, I could do it.

"I don't know, I was just tired of home, needed a change if you know what I mean," I was lying.

"Don't lie. People who are 'tired of home' don't walk into bars wearing blood-stained shirts," Clearly he had seen more in the bar than he let on. I have to admit, something about this cold demeanor was intriguing.

"I guess you're right," I whispered. As much as I wanted to admit to myself the reason I was there, I couldn't help but shy away. If I told Logan what I had done then I would force myself to see what I had done and I wasn't ready to do that. But if I didn't talk I would live with the guilt forever, and I didn't want to do that either. "In the bar, you told me you knew what I was. What did you mean?" He didn't respond. Just sat there, staring at the road ahead, thinking. "Logan?" I asked.

"I could tell as soon as you walked in,"

"How could you do that? How would you ever know?"

He paused, fumbling with something around his neck. It looked like a dog tag of some sort. The kind that you get in the military.

"Because I'm one too."

…

"What do you mean?" I asked again. "Logan, what do you mean?"

"Your mutation, what is it?" He asked, ignoring my question. "I've never seen one like it before,"

I wasn't sure what to tell him. I didn't really know myself, or rather, I didn't want to know.

"It's nothing good," I said. That's the truth. "I guess you can't even call it my mutation. It's not really mine, but I'm stuck with it anyway."

He turned to look at me. He was confused, I could tell, but he didn't ask. He didn't want to force me to talk if I didn't want to, at least that's what I thought.

"It's called chimerism. It means, hell, I don't know what it means. I guess you could say that I had a brother, a twin. The doctors told my mother that she was only having one, but I learned when I was ten that I actually absorbed my twin. Absorbed it. How twisted is that?" I chuckled. "It's like science fiction almost. Anyway, my twin was a mutant, at least, he carried the gene. I didn't. But when.., it happened, I took the gene, only it wasn't ever supposed to be mine," I couldn't even tell if he was listening. But I kept talking. I wanted to tell him everything about it, the horrible thoughts, and animalistic urges that drove me insane most nights. But inside, I couldn't allow myself to tell anyone about that. What if he looked at me like everyone else did?

"My parents took me to a school in New York when I was 14. They said it could help me. I tried to fit in with the other kids, but none of them understood. They were scared, and I was scared, and I didn't want to hurt them. Can you imagine what it's like to see people scared of you? To run in fear because they don't know if you're going to kill them?"

Logan mumbled, "it's the worst feeling in the world,"

I began to cry again. How could he possibly understand? No one did. I shook with anguish and sadness, letting every tear fall until my cheeks were soaked and my eyes were dry. I ran my fingers through my hair, feeling the caked blood and dirt in it from the night before.

"I do my best to manage but lately it feels like I'm on the edge of a cliff waiting to fall into some horrible abyss." By this point, my head was in my hands, and o clung to my hair as if it were the only thing keeping me sane.

Logan didn't say anything. I'm not sure what he would've said. There's nothing that could have been done to fix it. So we sat in silence, the only noises were the radio playing classical music, and the wind hitting the car. It had to be at least midnight, but I couldn't be sure, since the clock in the truck had been frozen for hours. I decided I better get some rest and curled up on my seat, praying that it wouldn't come while I dreamt.