Chapter 11
Theo
Last night was definitely one for the books. Astrid had spent what felt like an eternity in the bathroom and I’d seriously begun to think that she might have done something stupid, like bolt out the window, or flush herself down the toilet.
When she finally made it out, looking completely disheveled as if she’d just seen a ghost, she didn’t say a single word to me. I knew we’d had a fight, but usually she’d say something . Even if it was an insult or snarky comment. But as I watched her in the corner of my eye, her dead gaze flickering back and forth aimlessly as she watched the world pass by through the car window, I had a feeling that things were final. She hadn’t officially come out and said that we were breaking up, yet, but her cold and aloof manner was enough to show me that our journey was already at an end. When we arrived back, my body shriveled up like a prune, it felt like the arctic. I asked Astrid if she’d like the heating on for a bit before we headed to bed, I knew she didn’t cope well with the cold, she was a serial duvet-hogger after all. But my question wasn’t met with even a shrug, just complete and utter silence. She was walking around like a zombie, looking like she didn’t quite know where she actually wanted to go.
“Chamomile tea?” I’d asked, holding up her favourite ‘I hate kids’ mug, which she shamelessly took to work and drank in front of her class full of children. Silence. I knew she was pissed at me, but I found myself actually starting to worry now.
“Astrid, can you at least talk to me?,” I’d practically begged her.
She physically turned her back and trudged up the stairs, the pace of her heavy footsteps making it seem like she was sleepwalking. I ultimately decided to drop it, she clearly wasn’t planning on conversing with me any time soon and I didn’t want to waste any more time and effort trying. Her silence was deafening, but I understood her loud and clear. I’d gone to brush my teeth, just to give her a bit of time to at least climb into bed so she didn’t think I was harassing her by immediately following her up the stairs. After a good 5 minutes of stalling, I bit the bullet and headed upstairs to our bedroom. I opened the door and was instantly plunged into darkness. Usually I found her perched up with one of those running lights strapped to the front of her head so she could read. I always found it hilarious, (much to her annoyance), because she looked like a mixture between a Dalek and a caver.
But tonight, she’d literally put herself to bed. No goodnight, no nothing. More now than ever, it was clear that we needed to talk things through. We needed to decide what we wanted and stick to it. It was evident that we couldn’t keep living like this, walking on eggshells with pitchforks shoved into our back pockets just in case we needed to have them to hand. As they said, tomorrow was a brand new day. We’d both wake up with a fresh pair of eyes, fresh minds, and we were going to sort this out once and for all.
◆◆◆
The morning sunlight streams through the curtains, temporarily blinding me as I open my eyes in a squint. I think this was the first time in a while that I didn’t actually need to set an alarm. I let my body rest and wake up in its natural rhythm, and it was safe to say, it was a lot better for it. I woke up feeling recharged and refreshed, ready to start the day, ready to start the conversation. We had a family of birds who were nesting right outside our window, and today I found myself enjoying their morning song. I roll over to find Astrid completely cocooned under the duvet from head to toe, she was obviously colder than she was letting on last night, I knew it. Not wanting to wake her up yet, I head over to the desk and check the time on my phone, 9:00am. Perfect, not too early, but not too late either. I pop it back down before heading downstairs. I was desperate for a piss, I don’t think I’d broken the seal at all last night, so all of the champagne was very much still sloshing about in my bladder. Despite already being blinded earlier by the sun, my vision is once again impeded as I switch on the bathroom light. Fumbling my way around to the toilet like I’d just been stunned by a flare, I finally manage to locate it. Lifting up the toilet seat, (making a mental note to put it back down immediately after to avoid facing the wrath of Astrid), I attempt to do my business when…wait.
I look down, what . I frantically move my hand around, trying to locate it, but coming up short.
What the fuck? Where’s it gone?! WHERE’S MY COCK?!
Oh my god. My body is trembling, and my palms begin to sweat. I attempt to lean over the sink to splash some cold water over my face to hopefully wake me up from this obvious nightmare when I catch a glimpse in my peripheral of the figure in the mirror.
Ahh!
I dart around and lob the nearest object I can find, our soap dispenser, at the intruder. Only to find that there’s no one there. I’m going insane, I must be. I run over to the door and check that the door is locked, it is. I check the bolt, which is latched firmly across. All windows are shut with none broken, so there is no way someone could physically trespass. Had I just seen a ghost? I wasn’t a particularly spiritual person, I didn’t believe in life and death, I was a more ‘I’ll see in when I believe it’ sort of person, and I think I may have just had my first proper paranormal encounter. I needed to check. Creeping back into the bathroom, I, embarrassingly, cover my eyes with my palm, slowly removing my fingers one by one to unveil the ghoul, like a child who had stayed up too late watching a horror film. I remove the final finger when-
“Astrid?!” I shout.
Long Golden hair, caramel eyes, silk pink PJ’s that are covered in stars… Astrid stares back at me. Except, Astrid isn’t here. She’s upstairs asleep in bed. I turn around just to make sure, and I’m right, there’s no one there. I face the mirror again, and she’s back. My heart feels like it’s about to explode, what the fuck was going on? I raise my hand, she raises her hand, I stick my tongue out, she sticks her tongue out. No, no, no.
I was going mad. I was dreaming, I had to be . I was probably so stressed after last night’s chaos that I was having one of those extremely vivid, maladaptive daydreams. Or maybe I was hallucinating, maybe someone spiked the champagne with a particular drug whose aftereffects didn’t kick in until the next morning. Maybe it acted like a magic mushroom, and I was just on the most bizarre trip of a lifetime. My mate Billy had said he’d tried shrooms at Uni and truly believed he was the Pope Francis for twenty-four hours, so clearly anything was possible. Deciding that that was a valid enough reason and that I clearly needed more rest than I let on, I walked back up the stairs, ready to crash out for a while longer. Opening up the door, I find Astrid, still very much enveloped in the duvet, except her one arm had come free and was now dangling over the side of the bed and made me do a double take. There was a mark. She didn’t have a tattoo?
Gently creeping over to her, I get a closer look. I gulp down the mammoth sized lump in my throat as I see the familiar handwriting, ‘ Love you to the moon and back Theodore, Gran x.’ That was my tattoo, the tattoo I have on my arm, from my grandma. Dad’s mother, and my grandma, June, had passed away last year and I’d gotten that tattoo of her handwriting from the last birthday card she ever wrote to me, it was meant to be a way of commemorating her. So why the fuck was it on Astrid’s arm?
I’d had enough craziness for one morning, I had to know what was going on. I carefully peel back the duvet from her, layer by layer, when the sight causes me to let out a guttural scream.
“AHH OH MY GOD WHAT? WHAT IS IT?!” Astrid screams, jolting awake, or should I say, me .
“I’m dead aren’t I?” I whisper, the anxiety bubbling through me. “I’m having an out of body experience, trapped between life and death.” My vision starts to get cloudy, maybe that was why I was blinded by the stream of Golden light this morning, I was going to the light . I needed to sit down before my sea legs gave in.
“AHH!,” The me in front of me shouts once again, pointing an accusing finger in my direction. “Why am I looking at myself?!”
That was my voice, but that wasn’t me who said that. “Well, ANSWER ME!” they shout once again. Even though it was said in my voice, the level of angst in their tone was 100% Astrid.
“Astrid?” I squint, edging closer.
My whole body, or I guess, her whole body was cowering in fear. “Is this some sort of sick joke?” she splutters. “Did we get spiked with shrooms or something?”
I can’t help but let out a faint laugh at that, considering I thought exactly the same thing earlier.
She puts her hands to her head, and moves it to feel around her body. “Where are my boobs?!” her palpitating gets more frantic now, “I’ve got a beard, I’ve got hairy legs, I’ve got…” Her face heats as she places a hand on my boxers.
“What? It’s nothing you haven’t touched before?” I smirk. If I don’t laugh at the absurdity of all of this right now, I’ll cry.
A pillow comes pummeling at my head, “It’s not funny!” she shrieks, before standing up and marching over to her wardrobe, opening it up to look in the inner mirror.
Her mouth goes agape as she stares at her reflection, and her eyes roll deeply into the back of her head before she tips over and… plonk .
“Oh my god, Astrid!” I shout, running over to her. I didn’t have down caressing, cuddling, and fanning myself on my bucket list, but I guess there was a first for everything. “Wake up.”
Her eyes, or my eyes, (I’d never get used to this), open, and she looks terrified. Trying my hardest to stop her from fainting again, I softly rub her forehead, “It’s okay, it’s okay. It’s me, Theo.”
She winces defeatedly, looking like she doesn’t quite know whether to believe it or not, “what the fuck is going on?”
I shake my head, “I wish I knew.”
Taking her hands and pulling her up from the floor, we both sit on the bed, staring each other down like we’d never done before. “This is real isn’t it?” I ask, looking down at my now petite, feminine hands.
“I think so.” she says, biting her lip and trembling. “I just don’t understand how this is physically possible.”
Chuckling, I add, “You’ve always said you’d wish you could get inside my head, so you’d know what I was thinking.”
Her face scrunches up into a frown, but I can tell she’s trying not to smile, “Only because trying to get you to talk about what you’re thinking is like trying to talk to a brick wall- wait.” She looks like she’d just been stopped in her tracks.
“What is it?” I ask nervously.
“Last night…,” her breathing becomes rapid now as she recollects, “In the toilets. I was pissed off after our fight and I started crying.” My heart recoils as I hear her say that I’d made her cry . “Anyway, some little old lady was in there and noticed I was upset. She sat me down and we had a chat.”
“What did you chat about?,” I respond, but pretty sure that I already knew the answer.
A flash of guilt washes over her face, “our relationship.”
Called it. “Okay…but what does that have to do with anything?”
“When that random woman came in, telling me that you were looking for me, I got up to leave. But Darla suddenly became really intense. She had the door, physically stopping me from going until she asked a few more questions about us.”
I snort, “some little old lady held you hostage in a public toilet?”
She raises an unamused eyebrow now, “Can you be serious for one minute please? I hadn’t finished.”
“Sorry.” I raise an apologetic hand, but still biting my lip, “Continue.”
“She kept staring at me, demanding to know whether I’d ever wished that you could see things from my perspective, and whether I wished I could get inside your head and encourage you to be better. So we could learn more about each other and get our relationship back on track.”
“Probably just wanted to have a bitch.” I respond, waving it off.
Astrid looks sheepishly pale now, “No Theo, you don’t get it. When I finally agreed with her and she let me go, she had the weirdest look on her face. She said, ‘then it’s done’.”
“Wait, hold on. You’re expecting me to believe that this random old lady has some sort of weird magic that has caused this?” I ask, dumbfounded, wagging a finger between the two of us.
“Well, do you see any other logical possibility?”
I sit for a minute, desperately attempting to scan through a bunch of potential reasons, but coming up empty every time.
“Okay, hypothetically, if magic was real and she did use it to do this how do we go about fixing it? Do you think there’s anyone we could call to help?”
She guffaws, “Oh yeah Theo, let’s just call the bloody, Freaky Friday hotline, I’m sure they’d know what to do!,” she squeezes her fists together, which looks a lot less cute when done with my own hands, “They’d admit us to a Psychiatric hospital first!”
“Fine, you have a point there.” I agree, “But we can’t stay cooped up in the house forever until we sort it. We’re going to actually have to interact with our families, friends, and go to our, you know, jobs , sometime.”
How on earth we were going to be able to convincingly communicate with our families and friends whilst we were in this state was beyond me. I knew Astrid to a T, but playing Astrid was a different ballgame entirely. I didn’t know the version of her that she was around her friends, or the version of herself that she was at work. For all I knew, she could be an entirely different person by day, and I wouldn’t even know. I’d hope I wouldn’t have to be as brash and angsty as her though, I imagine that would be extremely tiring to keep up. Yep. I wanted to stay cooped up in the house like a hermit until this all blew over.
Her face morphs into one of pure terror. “I have an observation at work next week!”
Oh fuck. I’d forgotten about that. Astrid had been a qualified teacher now for about just over 2 years, but as she was still early in her career, the school required that all newly qualified teachers receive an observation at least once every few months. She shat bricks every single time beforehand, but then ended up smashing it as always. I honestly didn’t know why she got herself so worked up about it.
“You’re going to have to do it for me, oh my god! That’s it, I’m going to be fired,” she shrieks, putting her hands over her mouth. Wow, Astrid. Thanks for the vote of confidence. “I’m going to have to go to your work…I’m going to have to work in an office!” She says the word ‘office’ with such disgust, you’d have honestly thought I was asking her to work in a brothel.
I couldn’t ignore the stab of anxiety in my stomach though. The guys at work could be brutal. A lot of them were older, had matching beer-bellies, and were very vocal about hating their wives. The thought of Astrid going to a place like that, even in my body, made me nervous. I didn’t want her to hear the shit they talk about and tar me with the same brush.
“Calm down,” I assure her, “Look. Mum and dad are still on their honeymoon for another week, so we don’t have to worry about them for a while at least. Dan barely visits us anyway now that he’s started his new job and works later, and it’s not like our friends are just going to rock up here unannounced. We can plan our interactions.”
She visibly relaxes now, unclenching her jaw and stretching her arms out wide. “Maybe. But believe me, today and tomorrow, we are not looking at anything except for that binder and laptop.” I follow her eyes to the desk that is littered with her schoolwork, the binder is full of lesson plans, and easily about three hundred pages thick.
“Yes, Miss,” I gulp, “But I’m afraid there’s something you’re going to have to do for me in return.”
A grimace crosses her face as she waits for my response, “Oh god, what?”
“I’m supposed to be going for drinks tomorrow with Billy and Ro.”
Immediately, she begins shaking her head, “No way. I’m not going for drinks with them. It’s not essential. Say you’re sick or something.”
It was safe to say Astrid wasn’t their biggest fan. Billy and Rowan were two of my best friends, (besides her), at school, and we’d stayed friends since leaving. Admittedly, they didn’t take too kindly to the idea of Astrid and I when we first got together. I was a bit of a prick and tended to ditch them for her. They started calling her ‘ Ass trid,’ she overheard them one day at lunch, and ever since then, she’d sworn to resent them. It was so long ago now; I don’t get why she held a grudge. Billy and Ro actually felt terrible about it when I told them how she was still holding onto it. They even offered to come over so they could apologise, but that was just Astrid for you. The queen of grudge-holding.
“ Please Astrid?” I beg, “Billy’s having a really rough time at the moment, his fiancé, Natalie, just broke off their engagement, so he’s not in a good way.”
“Ugh,” she sighs, “ 1 hour. I’ll go for one hour, and then I’m coming home.”
“Amazing, thank you!” I beam. This could be a good thing for her, perhaps a way for her to see that they’re not the same teenage boys anymore. A way for her to finally let go off the grudge that has had her in a chokehold for the past 7 years.
I could teach her how to be me. It was only for an hour after all. How hard could it be?