Soul Protector (2 page)

“I think you mean
clutter...”

“Do I?” she said, another
hiccup taking her by surprise.

“Yes.” I picked up a napkin and
began mopping her spilled wine off the table. “It’s a flock of
birds and a clutter of cats. Or actually… is it a clowder of
cats?”

“Erm, Gracie, does this get
interesting or can I stop listening now?”

“Sorry,” I said and bit my lip.
“Conversation skills take a bit of a nose-dive when you only leave
the house for work or Tesco’s.”

“Aah, don’t worry. That’s all
gonna change from now on. You’re not a hermit anymore, right?”

I wasn’t convinced, but I
nodded anyway. “Thanks for putting up with me while I’ve been so
grumpy.”

“Hey, s’not your fault. If my
boyfriend dumped me and then declared his undying love for my
little sister, it’d knock the stuffing out of me too.”

After our dinner plates were
cleared, two waiters appeared with champagne and glasses for
everyone. There was the scraping noise of a chair being pushed
back, and
MyPhil
stood up. I assumed he was going to make
the obligatory birthday toast to Lydia, so I reached out and slid
my glass towards me in preparation.

MyPhil
raised his hand
for silence, and I was surprised to see it was shaking.

He cleared his throat, and
looked up to face everyone.

“I just want to say happy
birthday to my beautiful Lydia.”

We all raised our empty
champagne glasses in Lydia’s direction, and managed a synchronised
‘happy birthday.’

MyPhil
swallowed hard
and turned to face her, his voice wobbling as he continued.

“Since I met you babe, you’ve
rocked my world. I love you with all my heart and I want to spend
the rest of my life with you.”

He fumbled for something in his
pocket, and started to get down on one knee. Shocked, I glanced
around at our table and noticed everyone looked as surprised as I
felt. As the other diners caught on, the whole restaurant grew
quiet with anticipation.

When there was complete
silence,
MyPhil
reached out and took hold of Lydia’s
hand.

“Lydia McKenzie, will you do me
the amazing honour of becoming my wife?”

I held my breath as Lydia
paused, her expression unreadable. I could feel all the little
hairs on my arms beginning to stand on end.

After a few long seconds her
face broke into a broad grin, and she squealed, “Yes, Phil, I’d
love to!”

Right on cue, a waiter popped
the champagne cork and the whole restaurant exploded into cheers
and applause. A euphoric
MyPhil
pushed the ring onto Lydia’s
finger, then jumped up, picked her up off her feet, and spun her
around.

I forced a smile and joined in
with everyone else, clapping as hard as I could. I looked at the
happy couple, positively sparkling, and felt overwhelmed with
sadness at my own situation.

What was wrong with me? One of
my best friends had just got engaged, and instead of being thrilled
for her, I was eaten up by jealousy. It was almost too much to
bear.

I knew I should get up like the
rest of my table and offer the happy couple my congratulations. As
I moved my chair back to stand up, I felt tears threatening to
fall. I tried not to blink. Crying would take a lot of explaining
and I didn’t want to spoil the moment for Lydia and
MyPhil
.

I walked over to where they
were standing and Lydia beamed at me. I saw pure elation reflected
in her eyes. I opened my arms to embrace her.

“Congratulations, Lyd,” I
managed to croak.

She leaned in and squeezed me
back.

It was awful. I wanted to share
in her joy, but all I could think was how unfair life was, and how
much I wanted to swap places with her and her perfect world. I
wanted to be happy, I wanted to be successful, and more than
anything, I wanted to feel loved. I was so jealous it was like a
physical pain.

A traitorous tear escaped my
eye and I began to feel dizzy. There was a buzzing in my ears, and
for a second or two I felt like I was going to pass out. I squeezed
my eyes shut to try and get rid of the giddy sensation and a sob
escaped. Lydia released me from her grip and I shakily straightened
up, aware of a wet sensation on my cheek. But I couldn’t work out
why my eyes were dry. I realised she must have been crying against
my face.
Tears of happiness?

I opened my eyes and the
restaurant came back into view, but something was different.
Something was very wrong. I’d been facing the main door before, I
was sure of it, but now I was turned towards the kitchen. Even that
seemed insignificant. It was a far more disturbing situation
causing my heart to thump. In the blink of an eye Lydia had gone.
In her place, the face staring back at me was my own.

I squeezed my eyes shut again.
When I opened them slowly, I was horrified to find I was still
looking at myself and a gasp escaped from my lips. Standing in
front of me, my mirror image returned my gaze with one eyebrow
raised. I noticed she was discreetly wiping a tear from under her
eyelashes.

Paralysed with fear, I couldn’t
speak.
Any moment now everything will go back to the way it
should be.
I felt my heart hammering in my chest, as the blood
rushed in my ears.

I glanced around; surprised
that everyone else was carrying on as normal.
Why aren’t they
shocked there are two of us?
It didn’t make any sense. As panic
overwhelmed me, I began to feel woozy, and my vision started to
close in...

The next thing I remembered was
lying on the floor, and
MyPhil
kneeling by my side,
supporting my head. He was talking to me, but the words sounded
like they were coming from far away. I felt a glass being pressed
against my lips.

“Here you go, Lydia. Just have
a sip for me.”

What? Why is he calling me
Lydia?

“Come on, darling. You just
passed out for a minute. Have a sip and you’ll feel better.”

I did as I was told, and the
icy water felt cold against my dry mouth, crashing me back into the
present.

“Thanks,” I croaked, my voice
not sounding right. I tried again, “I think I’m okay now.”
What
the…? That really doesn’t sound like me
.

I lifted my hand to my face to
wipe away some water which had spilled down my chin, and as I did,
I caught a glimpse of my ring. In fact it was Lydia’s new diamond
ring, but it was on my finger. Embarrassed, I scrabbled to get it
off, but as I clawed at my finger, it was no use. The ring wasn’t
budging.

“What’s wrong?”
MyPhil
a
sked. His face was pulled into a worried frown. “Do you want
to sit up?”

“Yes, I think..,” I couldn’t
get used to the higher pitch of my voice. “I think I should go to
the Ladies.” I needed to get away from everyone and sort myself
out.

“Let me help.” There was my
voice, but it was the other Gracie who had formed the words.

She reached over to put an arm
around me. I shrugged her off. “I’m fine, really.” I didn’t want
her help. She was freaking me out.

Panic was making me hot and
sticky, causing my perfume to intensify and take on a different
aroma. All I wanted was to get away from everyone so I could try
and figure out what was going on.

I grabbed my bag, turned my
back on their bewildered faces and made my way over to the toilets
at the back of the restaurant. As I walked across the room, I felt
different – taller.

I was aware that some of the
other diners were staring at me, so I focussed down at the wooden
floor. That’s when I caught a glimpse of my feet. The boots that
had been excruciating earlier were gone, and in their place was a
pair of elegant black shoes I didn’t recognise.

I opened the door to the ladies
and was frustrated to see several others in there, washing hands
and applying lippy. I made my way into a cubicle and turned to shut
the door. That’s when I saw my reflection for the first time. It
definitely wasn’t me. Looking back was a tall, attractive girl with
long blonde wavy hair. I was looking at Lydia.

I banged the door shut, and
sagged onto the toilet seat.
This can’t be happening
. I took
in a deep, shaky breath, and blew it out slowly. I reached into my
bag and pulled out my pocket mirror. I flipped it open and sure
enough, staring back at me was not the face I’d had reflected back
all my life. Beautiful brown eyes stared back into my own. I shot a
hand up to my face and, trembling, I traced Lydia’s features. I
touched her long lashes, neat nose and full lips. Everything felt
alien.

I closed my eyes and shook my
head. There had to be a logical explanation, I just couldn’t think
of one. My mind was racing, and it was a struggle to order my
thoughts. But the more I tried to focus the more I became aware of
a ringing sound in my ears. It was a bit like hushed voices, but
there was nothing I could make any sense of.

From outside my cubicle I heard
another voice loud and clear,
my voice
.

“Lydia, are you in there? Is
everything alright, hun?”

Damn, ‘Gracie’ must have
followed me in. But
I
was Gracie and if I was in Lydia’s
body, was she in mine?

“I’m okay,” I said, trying to
erase the panic from my voice.

I needed to talk to her to try
and understand what was happening, but I didn’t want to start
sounding like a mad woman in front of these other people.

I stood up, praying my wobbly
legs would support me, unlocked the door and walked out of the
cubicle. I could see she was looking at me with concern, but she
definitely wasn’t at the same level of panic that I was.

“You took the wrong bag,” she
stated simply, holding out Lydia’s bag towards me.

I looked at the bag I was
holding,
my
bag, ‘
Gracie’s
bag.

“Come on Lyd, Phil’s getting
worried. He’s going to take you home,” she said, holding her other
hand out towards me.

I reached out to grasp it with
just one thought. I wanted the nightmare to end and everything to
go back to normal. With this in mind, I had that weird
disorientation thing again. Dizziness overwhelmed me, and I could
see bright lights. I really thought I was passing out again. I
squeezed my eyes shut and waited for the buzzing tone to disappear.
And when I opened them, everything had gone back to normal. Just
like that. I was facing the other way now, looking at Lydia. She
was staring into space, like she was in a daydream. The other women
were carrying on as normal, putting on their make-up and chatting.
Not one of them seemed to have noticed something extraordinary had
just occurred.

I flicked my eyes across to the
giant mirror above the washbasins to confirm that I really was me
again.

“What. Just.
Happened
?”
I asked, fighting to keep my voice calm.

Lydia snapped out of her
daydream and met my gaze. “What… Oh, the fainting thing?”

She took in my serious
expression and laughed. “Don’t make a big fuss, Gracie. I think it
was the excitement of my Phil proposing. I felt a bit lightheaded
and I guess I just passed out, but I’m fine now. Come on let’s go
back to the table.”

I exhaled sharply.
Unbelievable
. It was as if she had never left her body.
What’s wrong with her? What’s wrong with me?

We made our way back to the
others, and everyone started fussing around Lydia. She refused
MyPhil’s
attempts to take her home and played it all down.
She said she was fine, maybe too much wine or something.

But I wasn’t fine, I was
completely traumatised. I decided to say nothing on the subject for
the time-being. I had a thousand questions running through my mind
and my head was throbbing, so I passed on dessert, made my excuses
and left early. No one was too concerned. They were all still
worried about Lydia.

The whole walk back to the
flat, the body-switch thing played through my mind on a loop
.
What the hell was all that about?
I went over and over the
details, but I couldn’t find a logical explanation.

I let myself into the flat and
replied to Kerry’s text to let her know I was home in one piece.
Unable to shake off the surreal feeling, I decided to try and sleep
on it. I told myself things would seem better in the morning - they
always did. I grabbed a glass of water and made my way to the
bedroom, convinced I wouldn’t be able to switch off my racing mind.
Minutes later, I fell into an exhausted sleep.

~~~

CHAPTER 2

.

The Daily Grind

.

Sitting at my desk on Monday
morning, I couldn’t concentrate on the ‘woman in work’ feature I
was supposed to be pulling together. Instead, I sat staring into
space, gnawing on my pen. I was wondering if I had sanity
issues.

The previous day had been
torturous. After only a few sips of wine at the restaurant, I’d had
a day-long hangover. I’d spent hours curled up on sofa, eating
Hobnobs and drinking gallons of water, googling anything to do with
body-swapping or switching. All I found were links to films, books
and hoaxes. It wouldn’t have been as bad if I could actually talk
to someone, but if I did, I was sure they’d call the men in white
coats to cart me away. My whole world had tilted and I had to keep
it to myself, at least for the time-being.

I jumped as a door banged and
my boss, Camille, came out of her office. She approached my desk,
and threw some more work into my in-tray.

I noticed her appearance had
changed. When she’d sauntered in late she’d had the au naturel
look. Now her face was fully-made up, and her long hair, which had
previously been scraped back in a ponytail, was straightened and
glossy. Also there was the distinctive smell of freshly-applied
nail polish. That explained why she’d had the blinds to her office
pulled down for the previous hour.