Now That You're Here (Duplexity, Part I) (11 page)

I push Dad's door open, and Danny follows me inside. He's happier than I've ever seen him—either as this self or his other self. He's talking nonstop about how he can't wait to get back to his family and all the things he'll tell them when he gets there, about this Phoenix and the foster home and about me. I don't have the heart to remind him all we have is a theory, not an instruction manual for somehow transporting him back home.

We walk into the kitchen and I pull a bag of veggie puffs from the cabinet. The bag crinkles open. I hold it out and sing the jingle.
“Muncha buncha puffs, the puffs made only from good stuffs.”

Danny takes a handful. I eat one, then another, and try to shake the unsettled feeling sweeping over me.

“Did you understand all that stuff?” He crunches a puff.

“Most of it.”

“I knew you were smart,” he says, “but dang. It was like you guys were speaking another language.” He goes on and on about how he thought he was decent at science but never learned any of the stuff we talked about at Warren's and…and…an
d…Then he stops talking and asks, “Are you okay?”

I look down at my hands and realize I'm strangling the Muncha Puffs bag.

I'm not okay.

“If this is true,” I say, “we're talking a total game changer. If you really are from a parallel universe, then what happened to you could happen to any of us. Somehow you crossed from there to here. What's to stop that from happening to me? Or Warren? What does that mean for the stability of our universe?”

He's silent. He clearly doesn't have the answers either. I continue.

“And what about the other Danny? The one who usually lives here. Where is he now? And what if word about this gets out? If we're not careful, you could end up a lab rat. You saw the look in Warren's eyes. Don't think for a minute he won't sell you out. Danny Ogden, you are the missing link in the unified theory.”

His jaw is set tight, his bubble burst. I hold out the bag. “More?” He shakes his head, so I put the Muncha Puffs back in the cupboard, then straighten the dish towel by the sink.

All of those things I said are true. All of them are huge problems, so big they could swallow us whole. But they're not what's really bothering me.

What's really bothering me is her.

The other Eevee.

She's the creeping feeling I can't shake, though I don't know why. I again straighten the towel that doesn't need straightening. “My dad'll be home soon. I should probably go get my homework done.”

“Wait,” he says, leaning against the kitchen counter. “Can I ask you something first?”

“Sure.” I brace for another bombshell.

He shakes his head so all that hair falls in his face. “Will you cut this off?”

“What?” Okay, I totally didn't see that one coming. “No. No way.”

“I can't take one more day of this shit hanging in my face.” He blows a strand away from his mouth.

“Why don't you ask my dad when he gets home. There's a QuickCuts over on 51st. He can drive.”

“I was thinking you could just do it.”

“I don't know how.”

“You'll figure it out.”

“I'll make you look like a freak.”

“Eevee…” He musses the hair and makes a face.

He has a point.

I hear myself say okay. Watch myself pull a towel out of the linen closet and scissors from the bathroom cabinet. They're small and sharp. They'll do the trick.

He sits in a chair in the middle of the kitchen with the towel around his shoulders, his hair hanging down over his face. I walk around him three or four times.

“What are you waiting for? Chop. Chop.”

I laugh to cover the fear. “No pressuring the artist while she works.”

“Oh, excuse me, Monet.”

“Better Monet than van Gogh.” I snap the scissors twice by his ear and he ducks.

I have no idea where to start. I've never cut anyone's hair before. Well, that's not entirely true. I chopped off my Barbies' hair when I was little. Those poor dolls looked tragic when I was finished with them. “You're sure about this?”

“Sure as I am about anything.”

“That's not saying a whole lot.”

I pull the comb through his mop. It's longer than I realized. Rattier, too. “Have you
ever
had your hair cut?”

“This isn't my hair, remember? I keep mine short.”

Of course he does. In his universe.

I start small and slow, taking a few inches off the back at the center. The scissors make a sizzle noise as they slice through the strands. I'm holding my breath. I think he's holding his, too.

With my foot, I slide a couple of locks along the floor into his view. “Nervous?”

“No.”

“Liar.”

I take the length up to his collar. At least four or five inches more. The hair falls to the floor without a sound. I cut all around the bottom, trying to keep it even. The result: a slightly crooked bob. It's hard not to laugh, it looks so bad.

I step back to study the shape of his head and also to buy time. Then I cut the bob shorter, to just below his ears. This is far worse than the Barbies.

I keep going, though. I keep the scissors cutting, taking off more and more until finally something like a rhythm kicks in. I lose myself in the work. Instead of combing the hair down his neck, I drag the comb up, stopping just above the hairline, and chop. Drag it up again and chop more. Snip, snip go the scissors. Down, down falls the hair. The floor is a mess. I'll have to clean it all up before Dad gets home or he'll freak out.

Soon jagged angles emerge. Tufts here and there, some long, some short. I don't worry about lines, matching lengths or any of those things professionals do. I just fight my way through. Move his head as I need to without apology.

“You're enjoying this.”

He's right, but I don't tell him.

So, if careers in science or welding fail me, I'll be a hairdresser. Maybe Mom's magazines are getting through to me. “Close your eyes.”

“You really don't have any idea what you're doing, do you?”

“This was your brilliant idea, not mine.”

He closes those blue eyes and I snip a slight angle across the bridge of his nose. The hair falls away from his face.

“Who's Mac?”

“Marcus McAllister. Teacher at Palo Brea. Probably the smartest man in the world. He used to be a NASA engineer.”

“Can he help us?”

“Maybe. Hopefully.”

“You trust him?”

“Yes.”

He shifts his weight and tucks his hands between his knees. “I found them, you know.”

“Who?”

“My parents.”

“What? That's great! Why didn't you tell me?” I swoop his bangs out of his eyes. Then I see his face and understand.

“Tell me about them,” she says softly.

I'm looking at her face but all I see is the grave. Their names. The infinity symbol. I shake the image away and picture them instead at home. “Dad works for the city, at least he did, in infrastructure and planning. Mom volunteers part-time with kids. Helps them with reading.”

But what they do isn't who they are. Nothing I say will re-create them. They're not here. She'll never meet them. If I at least had a picture, that would…

“Who do you take after?” She steps close again and works on my hair. My head feels about eighty pounds lighter. And I can see.

“Most people say my mom. My eyes are definitely hers, but my nose is more like Dad's.”

She looks at my face. “I'm trying to imagine them.”

I am, too. Friday morning before I left for Germ's, Dad was already off to work and Mom was just getting her coffee. I yelled goodbye to her from the door. Didn't give her a hug. “They're older. Mom has a degenerative muscle condition that should have kept her from having kids. Doctors didn't think either of us would live. She says I was a feisty baby, though. Calls me her miracle boy.”

“I like that,” Eevee says, moving to stand behind me. “Miracle boy.”

In my mind, I see Mom as she was that morning, standing by the kitchen counter, one hand on her cane. Red December blew up the mall. Did they hit other targets, too? Targets closer to home? I wish there was some way to know.

“Hope they're okay,” I whisper. She touches my shoulder and I feel my eyes well up. Good thing she can't see my face. Time to change the subject. “What about your parents?”

She grunts. “You've met them. What's left to say?”

“The two-houses thing is pretty interesting.”

“Weird, you mean. But it works, I guess.”

“How old were you when they got divorced?”

“They were never married, actually.” She moves in front of me again. “They liked each other enough at some point, but decided they were better off living as neighbors instead of like normal people. From what they've told me—which isn't much—having a kid was a matter of logic. Necessity. They're both only-children. It was important to them to keep their DNA chains around. So here I am.” She laughs. “The archive.”

“Wow. That's really…”

“Weird. I make it sound worse than it is. I mean, they're fine. They love me. They don't beat me or anything.” She gasps, and a hand flies to her mouth. “I'm so sorry.”

It takes me a second to make the connection. “It's okay. It's the other Danny you'd be apologizing to.” What's crazy is I'd pretty much forgotten about the foster family. “So, how's it look?”

She sweeps my bangs to one side and then back. “Bizarre.”

“Bizarre, but better?”

“Getting there.” She steps around behind me again and combs through what's left of The Hair. “Actually…Hang on.”

She rushes off and returns just as quickly with a container of green goop, which she slicks through my hair.

“So, if I'm here, who took my place there?” I try to picture some other me, living in my house, sleeping in my bed. “They'd notice if he's different, right?”

“You're different than the other Danny.”

“My parents must be totally freaked-out.”

“Your girlfriend, too.”

“No girlfriend.” I look at her out the corner of my eye. “Boyfriend?”

She scoffs. “As if.” Then circles around to my right side. Her voice goes quiet. “Tell me about her.”

“Who?”

“Eevee Solomon.”

I exhale, choosing what to say. “Her hair is long and dark, like yours. Same eyes. Same smile.” What I don't say: great kisser, legs impossibly long. I close my eyes, reliving that night again in my mind. “I hardly know her, but when I met her, it's like I wanted time to stop.”

I feel a hand on my shoulder and open my eyes. She's looking at me intently, her hair falling around her face. I reach up, tuck one side behind her ear, let my fingers touch her jaw. Her lips part and a smile tugs the corner of her mouth.

Then she blinks and inhales. Lifts her hand from my shoulder. “I…” Her voice cracks. She steps back, sets the scissors on the counter and walks toward the door.

“Eevee, wait.”

She doesn't stop, though. Doesn't even turn. The door closes and she's gone.