mentioned it again. So I read the damn thing myself and I tried some of that stuff with limited success.Mostly I’d just wake up every time the
oh hey this is a dream
realization kicked in, which would do meabsolutely no good here. After about a month of half-assedly trying to do more than that, I just kind of forgot about the whole thing. Now I wished I hadn’t, because that knowledge and experience wouldhave come in
very
goddamn handy right about now.I shut my eyes again.
I am twenty-four years old,
I told myself.
I have been surfing and swimming and running at least every other day since I was seventeen, my job requires me to be able to move around with heavy-ass equipment on my back, so this scrawny thing? Not so much. This morning I put on a green T-shirt and the jeans with the hole in the back pocket and the black Skechers. And I probably doneed a clip n’ dip but this
is
ridiculous. Nothing happened.Fine. If I couldn’t get the whole package back at once, I’d tackle a smaller project and work my way upfrom there.I parked my ass on the bare mattress and closed my eyes again. Right. Hair. My head was cold. Thatwas because I had no damn
hair.
There was supposed to be hair on my head. Dark dirty blonde. A littleon the shaggy side, just long enough that I had to blow or whisk it out of my eyes once in a while. Itmight still smell a little like the coconut White Rain shampoo I accidentally grabbed the other day butdeemed not quite girly enough to throw out and make a special trip to the store over. Kenny had teasedme gently that morning about smelling like a macaroon. It was nothing spectacular but he liked it, and Iliked it, and it was mine and it would keep my head warm and comfortable, just like– –well, just like it was right now.I reached up, patted myself on the head, found my hair, and almost expected it to fall off like a wig. Thehair stayed where it was supposed to be.Whooping “Fuckin’
A!
” out loud probably would have brought someone to the room before I wasreally ready to deal with that, so I settled for thinking it. Honestly, it took more effort to stifle that thanit did to grow my damn hair back in the first place.So I
did
still have some control over this thing. Now to deal with the rest of this scrawny ass.***Some time after the second pb&j fell into the drop box, the lights went out. Yes, I was eating the damnfood, trust me when I say not doing so would have also led to things I was not really ready to deal withand honestly, I was surprised nobody had actually looked in the window and seen me with hair.So I’d gotten my hair back. That was fine. I’d gotten some clothes back–not the ones I was actuallywearing, just the gray sweatpants and sweatshirt one got here. I thought about using the cover of darkness to work on getting back to the right age, but there was yet another thing about this place: thisfucking room was
cold
at night
.
Not due to any natural causes, either–they deliberately jacked aroundwith the A/C, keeping rooms like this one
just
cold enough to make getting anything near a decentnight’s sleep difficult at best.
Okay,
I thought.
Might as well try something a little different.
Like, perhaps, conjuring up a blanket. And not one of the crappy tiny scratchy wool Army surplus blankets they had around here, either. A
real
blanket. A nice fluffy comforter. Just like the one on my bed. Oh man, that comforter was great. I got it for Christmas two years ago; I have no idea where Momfound it, probably Bed Bath & Beyond or some such. It’s some kind of crushed satiny stuff, royal blue
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