Ch. 2: My New Life
I was still shaking my head in confusion when I stepped out of the shower twenty minutes later. The house was quiet as I tip toed back to my room, which just left me alone with my thoughts. I closed the door behind me and reached for the lock before forcing myself to pause. What kind of person was I? Did I lock the door or leave my room open to public access? Would locking it violate some rule of the house I was living in? I didn't know whether Summer had climbed into bed with me or if she had snuck in at some point during the night. Was it public knowledge that we were lovers, or was it some sort of secret? It seemed kind of like a dick move for me to be boning my step sister behind my adopted parents' backs, but at the same time it might have been the very reason they adopted me in the first place!
My head was beginning to spin from all the questions, so I decided that at least one thing were going to be under my control and flipped the lock closed. I let the towel drop to the floor and sat down on the bed, taking a good look around the room. It looked pretty standard compared to what you saw on the TV. Navy blue carpeting covered the floor, with a standing lamp in one corner and a wall mounted bracket in the opposite corner diagonally across the room. A wooden chest of drawers occupied one wall, its top cluttered with pens, papers, and all sorts of knick knacks. There were several pictures buried in the mess, and I decided to get up and take a better look at them. What I found made me snort in disbelief.
Whoever had taken the pictures must have been the worst photographer ever. There were plenty of pictures of me with various girls, the most recent ones showing me and Summer in the classic couple poses. Most seemed to have been taken either at parties or other special events, and excepting the ones with Summer in them most seemed to be a few years old at least – making them entirely useless for telling who my current friends were. Even worse were the pictures of my parents. Each and every last one had been carefully cropped so that their faces were just out of frame. I knew there was something wrong with this reality, but hiding my parents' identities just made it that more obvious, by cutting away what would otherwise be concrete proof of my existence.
Or was that the point? The face in the mirror had said, "This world will be as you write it." It had sounded strange at the time, but I had dismissed it as pandering, a sort of 'seize your destiny' kind of line. But what if it was meant as some sort of clue? Summer had mentioned that my parents had died in a car accident months ago, but what actual proof was there of that? As far as I was concerned, none of this even existed the night before! For all I knew, my parents weren't actually dead , but really secret agents under really deep cover. Or maybe I was actually a clone, and my real parents were a turkey baster and a test tube. Maybe this entire thing was all some sick little experiment!
That...really would have sucked, actually. The super agent hypothesis wasn't much better, as it meant there was a good chance I would end up getting shot at sooner or later.
My head began to hurt from the confusing stream of questions, but I continued to search the rest of the room anyway. There were a few trophies for baseball and soccer, as well as the chess team, oddly enough. I must not have been very good at them, though, as they were all participation awards rather than actual accomplishments. Some action figures stood on the top of a pair of book cases, ranging from cheap toys to fairly expensive looking professional grade models. I couldn't help but notice the more pricey ones were usually female, and generally quite undressed. The book cases were the most natural things in the room. A pair of cheap wood board types, their shelves were sagging from all the weight that had been piled on to the,. There was a good number of hard covers, with more paperbacks stacked into two rows, with even more sitting horizontal to fill in the vertical gaps. I ran my finger over their spines as I silently read the titles. Most of them were the type of combat porn I favored, but I also spotted a few more recognizable authors such as Heinlein and Asimov. There were also a few comic trade paperbacks, as well as what looked like a complete set of the manga Berserk. All in all, it looked like what I would have chosen to stock my own shelves with.
My next stop was the closet, which turned out to be surprisingly disappointing. There were a few formal looking suits, some more casual looking slacks, and a few nice polos and button downs. Nothing, in other words, that couldn't have been ordered straight out of the Old Navy catalog. There was nothing with a brand logo, no concert souvenirs, no t-shirts with snarky slogans scrawled across the chest. It was the closet of an automaton, utterly devoid of personality and taste. I frowned as I considered the implications of that, and turned to look around the rest of the room to see what else was missing.
There were no posters, no banners, or other decorations hanging on the walls. There was no trace of any music or musical devices, no CD tower stacked with discs. There wasn't even a radio – my alarm clock was an old fashioned wind up model with a pair of bells on the top. There was a TV connected to a battered looking pair of rabbit ear antennas, but no sign of any DVDs or VHS tapes. My room was starting to feel more and more alien with each passing second. It wasn't mine at all. It looked more like an expensive facsimile, as if someone had gone to great lengths to make something that might have been a bedroom, but was really a set for actors to practice their craft on.
That was when it hit me.
I was living in some sort of elaborate doll house. All this, the room, the people, the world, none of it could be real. I was just a piece in some sick little game being played out for the amusement of a mysterious other, someone with incredible power or pull to set up such a detailed fantasy. A shiver of fear crept down my spine as I tried, and failed, to realize the implications of my newfound knowledge. Was I the only one who knew? Or was the entire world aware of the sham? I felt sick to my stomach as I remembered that morning's athletics. I knew I had been a willing participant, but what about Summer? Did she really enjoy playing Alarm Clock, or had she been forced into the ultimate act of intimacy for the perverted benefit of a total stranger?
Great. Now I was quite possibly a rapist, even if an unwitting one.
"Hey, what's taking so long up there?" Summer called from the floor below."You fall asleep in the shower or something? Hurry up before your pancakes get cold, or worse, I eat them!"
I shook my head with a resigned sigh as I collected my bathrobe from the floor and belted it closed. I didn't know what would happen if whatever was in charge found out that I knew what I knew, nor did I want it to. But just because I didn't want them to be suspicious didn't necessarily mean I wanted to give them a free show, either, so I made sure the sash was nice and tight as I headed downstairs to food. Half way down the steps I caught the scene to warm maple syrup and freshly cooked pancakes. My stomach growled encouragement at this discovery, reminding me that I still needed to eat whether or not this world was real. I was plenty hungry, especially after that morning's exertions.
The kitchen looked like something out of a Lysol commercial. Large, widely spaced windows let in plenty of natural sunlight to gleam on the matched set stainless steel appliances. Fluorescent lights lit the marble countertops, all of which had been polished to a shine. Everything on display had been neatly organized, not a spoon, knife, or bowl out of place. The linoleum floor was absolutely spotless, as if no one had ever walked on it before.
