The realization that I had been suspended and barred from attending the homecoming festivities tomorrow was not shocking in the least. Not to me, anyway. My father, who was in complete dismay at the sudden news (and also by the fact that I hadn’t brought his cooler home), sat me down and asked me genuinely what caused me to lash out and cause so much damage to school property like that.
It took a lot of explaining to calm him down, but the excuse I had given essentially boiled down to me playing a game of tossing furniture around to try to impress a girl. It was the same story I told the principal, and it thankfully allowed Jaz to escape any form of punishment for my actions. My dad seemed to buy it. He even felt responsible for my sudden violent act since he thought that the story of how he had impressed mom was what inspired me to act out in the way that I did. Because of that, he decided against canceling movie night, and the two of us ended up watching Taxi Driver.
Once we were done, I went up to my room and played a few games of Dota with Lance, who hadn’t brought up anything about me tearing up the classroom or my suspension. If he had heard about it, he was doing a good job of acting like normal and not saying anything. In any case, once we were done, it was 11pm.
I was strangely calm that night. It felt like the entire world was clear to me. The air I breathed felt lighter than normal. The sensations of clothing rubbing against my skin was comforting. I had a newfound appreciation for life. The future, which normally filled me with worry, was merely another concept that existed in the universe.
The source of these enlightened feelings was obvious to me. It was because I was much clearer on my feelings towards Zoey than ever before. But in order to move forward, I needed to know how she felt. Of course, there was almost no chance of the word love being involved, but I still needed to know. Because if it were possible for that almost 0% chance to change in the future, then I needed to take it.
And with that in mind, I did my best to imagine nothing but Zoey. I thought about the day before, and how I had spoken with her so much that I thought us being a couple was a sure thing. I thought about the genuine joy she had expressed when playing with Mao.
“Good boy, Mao!”
Her voice rang in my head. The side of Zoey Brahm that no one else at school had seen. I breathed her in, allowing the scope of her existence to overwhelm me entirely. And eventually, my consciousness faded.
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The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.
I woke up in Zoey Brahm’s body. A strange calmness overwhelmed me. The first few times I hacked her body, I assumed that this calmness was simply because it was a dream, or
because it was the nature of hacking. But after hacking two other people and increasing my sample size, I realized that it was Zoey herself who was unusually cold.
In any case, it seemed like she was in the middle of some last minute studying, because she was solving some math problems in her note book. It seemed like she was writing as if I wasn’t there. Was this a part of hacking someone? Was I allowed to just exist in the passenger seat without doing anything? It would’ve been possible then, to merely sit inside of Zoey’s body and watch her go about her nightly activities?
Such thoughts crossed my mind. However, I wasn’t interested in defiling Zoey to such an extent. I only did this because I had no other way of contacting her. Thinking that, I took control of her body and begin writing her a message on a piece of scrap paper next to her notebook.
Pick me up at 2pm. I need a lift to school.
---
My consciousness was immediately ejected from her body, and I woke up. To my left came a buzzing noise that must have come from my cell phone. It appeared as if I received a disappearing message from an unsaved number.
I thought I told you not to hack me anymore.
It was a fair point. That hack was a breach of our agreement. I pushed my thumbs against the touchscreen keyboard until the message was ready and hit send.
I deleted your contact from my phone, but I needed to get in touch. It won’t happen again.
After a brief pause, she sent another message.
I can do 12:30. The game is at 4 and we need to start setting up 3 hours in advance.
By we, she meant Jaz and herself. The two of them were the only members of the photography club, after all. Clubs usually need four members to stay alive, but since it was the beginning of the school year, they had been given some extra time to find replacements for the graduates.
That works.
I tossed my phone away and sat up. After taking a deep breath, I reached out to my desk and grabbed a pair of aviator sunglasses that I hadn’t worn in years. The things exude such an air of confidence that I felt they didn’t suit me. But tonight, I had suddenly found them alluring.
Staring at those sunglasses, I couldn’t help but chuckle to myself. It was like all the pieces were falling into place without my doing anything. Yes, the stage had been set. And everything that would happen the next day, all the good and the bad, it all depended on what was going on inside of Zoey. I had no plans to hack her and find out what she was feeling. There’s little chance that I’d feel anything inside of that girl’s body at all. Therefore, I wouldn’t do anything until she laid it all out.
So, will you let me help you? Or will you fall on your own? Tell me, what will you do, Zoey?