Doppelganger

chapter SEVENTEEN

I was so caught up thinking about the doppelganger as I came in through the Parkers’ front door that when Echo jumped out from around the corner, I practically had a heart attack.

“Mom’s home!” she said, hopping up and down in a little dance.

“That’s great,” I said.

I meant it too. It was going to be good having Sheila around again. And I didn’t mean to cook and do all those things we’d been stuck doing—or usually not doing—since she’d left. It was just good to have everyone back together again and, most of all, to see Echo so happy. I don’t think I’d ever seen her more excited. It made her seem more like a normal ten-year-old.

“Hi, Mom,” I said, coming into the kitchen. She was at the sink washing dishes. All of a sudden, it was like she’d never left.

“Hey, sweetie,” she said. She came over and gave me a quick kiss on the cheek—something she’d never done before. It sort of caught me off guard.

“Back for good?” I asked.

She nodded and returned to the sink. “Looks that way.” She sighed. “I don’t know. After the movie yesterday, I started thinking about things, about how much I missed you. All of you. So I called your father this morning at work.”

“Uh-oh,” I said.

Her smile faded a little. “Yeah, I know,” she said. “Anyway, I came over for lunch, and we had a long talk. And, well, here I am.”

“Where’s Dad?” I asked.

“He took my car to get some groceries. Should be back soon.”

I turned to head for my room.

“And Chris,” she said. I stopped and looked back. “Thanks for taking care of Echo the way you did. I knew I could count on you.”

She had this weird expression on her face—a look of gratefulness and relief, but mixed with sadness and more than a little shame. I gazed into her eyes and tried to figure out what she knew. Had Barry told her about our fight? It didn’t seem like the kind of thing he’d do. Then again, nothing he’d done the last few days seemed like the kind of things he’d do. That’s what’s so hard about human beings—you can never really figure them out. They always end up surprising you.

“I didn’t do much,” I said.

She just smiled. “Well, thanks anyway.”

Pretty soon Barry came home, and that evening we all had supper together. Don’t get me wrong—it wasn’t like we were the Brady Bunch all of a sudden or anything like that. In fact, it was a little tense, like we were all trying to figure out how to act toward one another. It was as if a bunch of strangers had been stuck in a room and told to pretend that they were a family all of a sudden. Still, no one argued. Echo didn’t spill any milk. And Barry stayed at the table for the whole meal. He even helped clear the dishes at the end.

Best of all, after dinner, Mitch called and gave Barry his job back. I don’t think Mitch told him I’d come by that morning. Barry didn’t mention it or give any indication that he knew, which was fine by me. Who knows how Barry might have reacted if he’d found out? I mean, he’d already been humiliated by me once—twice, if you wanted to count last Friday night when I’d stopped him from blowing his head off. The last thing he needed was to be told his son had begged his job back for him. Besides, it kind of made me feel good to be the only one in the family who knew. I’d been living with them this whole time holding on to a terrible secret; it was nice to have a good one for a change.

Like I said, things weren’t perfect, but the Parkers were coming together faster than I’d ever thought they could. That’s the thing about life that I just don’t get. It’ll go to hell pretty fast—sometimes all it takes is one little thing, and all of a sudden everything’s falling apart. But then the opposite is true, too. Just when you think there’s no point in even trying, you find out you’re not so bad off after all. I don’t know, maybe things are changing all around us the whole time and we just don’t notice until it’s all over.

But just when the Parkers were starting to become a real family, I could feel myself pulling away from them. I guess it was partly because I realized that no matter what happened or what I’d done to make it happen, in the end I didn’t really belong.

There was another reason. When I woke up the next morning, the rash was back, and I itched worse than ever. Scratching didn’t help. In fact, it only made it worse, sending lines of pain burning across my skin. I was losing Chris again, this time probably for good, and as I got dressed for school, I felt a whole new hate for the sheganger. She’d jinxed me. I just knew it.

As Tuesday slipped into Wednesday I began to feel more and more agitated, like there were beetles under my skin, crawling from place to place, looking for a way out. It came in waves. One minute I’d feel normal, the next I could hardly concentrate on where I was or what was going on around me. I was focusing all my energies on just being Chris.

It was all too much. But it made me aware of one thing. I’d seen enough Oprah and Dr. Phil to realize I’d succumbed to a serious case of denial. I mean, I’d gotten so used to being Chris, so content with how things were going with the Parkers and with Amber, that I realized I didn’t have any plans for what to do once Chris was gone for good. The whole thing scared me.

The stress of knowing she was waiting for me didn’t help, either. The best thing for me to do would have been to ditch school entirely, but I knew I’d get in trouble if I did. And now that it looked like Barry and Sheila were getting back together, I didn’t want to do anything that might screw it up. So instead I just skipped English. On Tuesday I went to the infirmary seventh period and pretended to be sick. On Wednesday I just plain cut class and hung out in the bathroom with the smokers.

There I was, secluded in a locked stall, perched on the toilet seat with my arms wrapped around me, sort of rocking back and forth. I was a nervous wreck. If anyone had seen me, they probably would’ve called for a straitjacket.

I have to say, though, the smokers were actually pretty cool. After offering me a cigarette, they more or less left me alone. I guess having abandoned my jock persona gave me some weird sort of credibility in their eyes.

As I sat there surveying the gems of wit carved into the door of the stall, I tried to sort it all out. The whole thing was totally messed up. You see, a part of me really wanted to go to English, to give in to Ms. Simpson, or rather, to her doppelganger. What’s the harm? a voice inside me said. Just do it and get it over with. Then you’ll feel better. It doesn’t mean you don’t love Amber. Besides, she never even has to know.

I remembered what my mother had told me about the coupling. That it wasn’t a matter of choice—it was a matter of proximity, a biological imperative. Survival of the species and all that crap. But that’s what made me want to dig in and fight it even more. I had given in already, with what I’d done to the old man and to Chris. I didn’t want to be a slave anymore. This was where I’d make my stand—with her. And I wasn’t going to be unfaithful to Amber. No matter how much that part of me tried to rationalize it, I knew that giving in to the sheganger would be a betrayal, at the very least of my feelings. Feelings I wasn’t supposed to have in the first place.



It all wouldn’t have been so bad if I could’ve been with Amber. But now, when I needed her more than ever, I felt like I had to avoid her. I’d seen her at lunch and in between classes a couple times, but it was horrible. I mean, it was all I could do to act normal, to not tear off my clothes and jump up and down screaming. I just didn’t want her to see me like this. So I begged off getting together with her after school on Tuesday and again on Wednesday. I told her I was sick, which was true in a way. I just didn’t tell her why.

It all caught up with me on Thursday. I was fidgeting in history class first period, when the principal’s voice came over the intercom.

“Mr. Johnson,” the voice said.

“Yes?” the teacher replied, looking up from his newspaper while we did worksheets.

“Is Chris Parker in your class right now?”

“He is.”

“Would you send him to the office, please.”

“Right away.”

Everyone suddenly turned and stared at me. There were no oohs or aahs this time, just silence. Even Mr. Johnson didn’t say anything, he just sat there and watched right along with the kids as I gathered up my books and left.

A few minutes later, I was sitting before the principal—a slender, balding man with a mustache that seemed way too big for his face, like it was fake or something and he’d just glued it on that morning for a joke. But I quickly realized that that would have required more humor and imagination than he was capable of.

“Do you know why you’re here, Chris?” he intoned.

“Not really,” I said.



“Well, I received a note this morning from Ms. Simpson complaining that you skipped English two days in a row.”

“I was sick.”

“Well, you were in the infirmary Tuesday. And yesterday?”

“I was sick,” I said again. I knew I wasn’t being too helpful, but I wasn’t in the mood to banter with the guy. In fact, sitting there in his overheated office, I could feel another wave coming on.

“You’re twitching, Chris,” he suddenly said.

“I am?” I said, gripping the sides of the chair.

“What’s wrong, Chris?” He sort of leaned back in his chair, cocked his head, and gave me this suspicious look. “Are you on crank, son?” he said.

“No!” I exclaimed. “Of course not.” I had no idea what crank was. But whatever it was, it couldn’t be any worse than what was happening to me.

“Maybe I should call your parents,” he murmured, reaching for the phone.

“No!”

His hand froze. He sat back and looked at me.

“I’m sorry I cut class,” I said. “I mean, I really wasn’t feeling well. But still, I shouldn’t have done it. Just tell me what I need to do.”

“Well, the first offense for skipping class is an office detention….”

“Fine,” I said.

“However,” he continued, “Ms. Simpson has requested you serve the detention with her. She wants to get you up to speed on what you missed.”



My stomach did a flip-flop. I’ll bet she does, I thought.

“You’ll go to your seventh-period class like you’re supposed to do and stay after for the detention. I suggest you do whatever she tells you to. And if I find out that you skipped out again, you’ll be suspended. Understood?”

“Yeah,” I said.

So she had me. And she knew it too. I could see it in her eyes as I walked into English seventh period and sat down—this sort of triumphant gleam. And that smell—it was still there. If anything, it had grown stronger.

The period seemed to drag on forever. She had us read silently in our books, which, I found out, was what we’d been doing for the last couple days.

I don’t think I read a whole page the entire period. I just closed my eyes and tried to think about how I could get out of this. Once in a while, I’d open my eyes and look up, and every time there she was, staring at me.

As the period wound to a close, she gave us our homework and, right in front of everyone, reminded me of my detention. A few kids laughed. The bell rang.

Then we were alone.

She closed the door like last time and came up behind me.

“You’ve been avoiding me,” she said.

“I haven’t been feeling good,” I said. “Don’t take it personally.”

“It’s slipping, isn’t it?”

I nodded.

“I told you it would happen,” she said.

“How much time do I have?” I asked.

“How long can you hold on? That’s the question. How long has it been now? A month? God, it must be killing you.”

“It’s not bad,” I said, shrugging, trying more than ever not to scratch at my neck and arms.

She laughed. “You really are a funny one. I don’t think I’ve met another quite like you, and I’ve come across quite a few in my time.”

“Gee, thanks,” I retorted.

She came up close behind me, until I could feel her breath on the back of my neck. She sniffed a few times then stood back.

“Just as I thought,” she said. “I bet your mother never told you you had human blood in you, did she.”

“What?” I said, whirling around. “I’m part human?”

She shrugged. “Not much. A quarter, maybe even less. For whatever reason, it only gets passed on to the males. The females stay pure.”

“I didn’t think we could…you know, breed with them,” I said. I hated using that word, but talking to her, it seemed appropriate.

“Males can’t with human females,” she said. “But every once in a great while, one of the girls will stray. She’ll randomly go into heat and the next thing you know, she’s diluting the gene pool. Not her fault, the poor thing. Fortunately it hardly ever happens. But it looks like your mother ended up with a rare half blood.”

“Doesn’t sound like her,” I said. I remembered how she’d always disdained males, how she’d called the one who’d fathered me weak. Now I knew why.

“She probably didn’t have an option. We’ll take whoever’s at hand.”

“Like me?”



“Exactly,” she said, coming around to face me. “But you’re different,” she said. “It’s strange—normally I can’t stand the mixed ones, but I can hardly resist you. Now where were we the other day?” She unbuttoned the top button of her blouse like she had before.

I’d been preparing myself for this moment. I stood up from my seat and took a deep breath.

“No.”

“What?” she said, halting her advance. A look of surprise came over her face.

“It isn’t going to happen,” I said.

Her surprise turned into a look of amusement. She chuckled. “It’s not, is it? What makes you think you even have a choice in the matter? Now let’s get out of here.”

She held her hand out and beckoned. I could feel myself being pulled toward her, like there was some magnetic field emanating from her outstretched palm. I gritted my teeth and fought it.

“I don’t want this,” I said, panting. “Let me go.”

“What is it, anyway?” she said, lowering her hand. She ran her hands down across her body. “Don’t you find me attractive?” she mocked.

“Go to hell,” I said, closing my eyes.

“Ah,” she said, “I know what it is. It’s her, isn’t it? That human girl you’re with—Amber, right?”

My eyes snapped open. “Leave her out of this,” I said. I could hear the blood pounding in my ears.

“That’s pathetic,” she said, “even for a mixed blood like you. Doppelgangers don’t fall in love. It’s one of the cardinal rules. One of the only rules.”

“Besides,” she said, drawing up close to me so that her face was right before mine, “why settle for a girl when you can have a woman?”

She unclasped the barrette holding back her hair and shook her head, letting her hair cascade down around her shoulders. Next thing I knew she was unbuttoning another button so that I could see her bra.

The whole scene was bizarre, almost comical in a sick sort of way. I felt like I was trapped in one of those soap operas I used to watch every day growing up. What made it even worse was that it worked. I found myself weakening again, just like before.

Suddenly her eyes flashed behind me toward the door and a slow smile crept over her face. I turned and looked over my shoulder.

Amber was frozen at the door, gazing in through the tempered glass with her mouth open in shock.

Our eyes met. Before I could do anything, she disappeared.

“Oh, that’s too bad,” the doppelganger cooed. “Looks like you lost her. Just as well. It was going to have to end sometime.”

As nasty as the comment was, it was the best thing the sheganger could have said to me. I was so angry, all desire disappeared. I tore myself away and ran out into the hallway. Amber was gone. I sprinted down the hall and around the corner just in time to see her head through the door that led to the parking lot. I took off after her.

“Amber!” I shouted, throwing the door open and stumbling out into the parking lot.

She paused, looked back at me, and kept walking.

I caught up to her just as she reached her car. She started to open her door, but I slammed it shut.

“What the hell was that back there?” she said. She wouldn’t look at me, and I could tell she was trying not to cry. “So that’s why you’ve been blowing me off all week.”

“No, of course not,” I said. I reached over to take her hand, but she swatted me away. “Like I told you at lunch, I got detention for skipping. I had to be there. I didn’t have a choice. But nothing happened, Amber.”

I hesitated for a moment, wondering if I should tell her who “Ms. Simpson” really was. It would’ve solved the immediate problem, but I just couldn’t bring myself to do it. I wanted to keep Amber as far away from the situation as I could, and I figured it would be safer if she didn’t know.

“That’s not what it looked like to me,” she said, seeing me hesitate.

“It doesn’t matter how it looks, I’m telling the truth. Nothing seems the way it is, you know that. I mean, look at me, for chrissake.”

“I don’t know what I know. The last couple weeks have been so screwed up, I can’t even tell what’s real anymore.”

“That’s why we have to trust each other,” I said.

She shook her head. “I thought I trusted you,” she said. “But the way you’ve been acting these last couple days, I don’t know why I should. I mean, you skip out after school. You hardly talk to me at lunch. And don’t give me that bullshit about being sick, either—”

“Amber, I’m losing it!” I shouted. “I’m losing Chris.”

She hesitated. “What do you mean?”

“Look,” I said. I pulled up my shirt and showed her the rash, a swirling red band that encircled my torso and spread up my back.



She winced when she saw it and looked away. I didn’t blame her. It was pretty gross.

“I didn’t know that could happen,” she whispered.

“It’s been really bad the last few days. It’s taking everything I’ve got to hold on. That’s why I’ve been acting this way.”

“You never told me it wouldn’t last,” she said.

“I didn’t want to talk about it,” I said. “I didn’t even want to think about it. It started more than a week ago, but then it stopped. I guess I was hoping that maybe it would go away for good. That I could stay being Chris, stay being with you.”

She looked back up at me. Her eyes sharpened.

“You talk about trust,” she said, “but you don’t even trust me enough to tell me what you’re going through, or trust that I can handle it.”

I looked away. She had me there.

She shook her head. “I don’t know what all this means. I’ve just got to think about it,” she said, getting into her car. “I hope you feel better.”

Then she drove off.

As I watched her disappear, I thought about what she’d said. And the more I did, the more I realized she was right. I mean, I’d trusted her with the biggest secret of all by telling her who I was, what I was about, and she hadn’t turned me away or tried to hurt me. So why couldn’t I have told her that Chris would soon be gone?

I guess when it came right down to it, I just wasn’t ready to stop being Chris yet. I wasn’t ready to go back to being what I really was.

That’s what I would tell her the next time I saw her. She would understand. I mean, when you love someone, that’s what you do, right?