"I guess so." I flip the quarter into the water, my eyes closed as I wish for Dr. Palmer to have a cure for me.
From there she leads us up to the security desk. We have to give them our IDs and sign the register. Though like the factory by the waterfront, the guards just carry tasers that can't stop a serious intruder, not someone like Artie Luther.
The elevator is full of people, all of whom look more grown-up and professional than me. There's barely room for the three of us to squeeze inside. Dr. Palmer presses the button for the eighteenth floor.
When the elevator doors open on the fourth floor to let people out, someone's hand brushes against my ass. Did someone just cop a feel? I smile to myself; it's the first time a stranger's ever flirted with me as a woman. It's a lot better than that fat bastard Jefferson when he checked me out.
With a few people gone, I'm able to press against the side of the elevator, next to Dr. Palmer. "Your bruise is gone," she says.
"Yeah, it disappeared the day after your exam."
She nods as if she expected that. "Must be the serum still in your blood."
"That's what I thought. It's kind of like having a superpower, isn't it?"
"Just don't try leaping from any tall buildings."
Dr. Palmer makes it tough for me to stay positive. I want to believe everything will work out. I know better, but I desperately want everything to get back to normal, or what passed as normal before. The first thing I'll do is call Maddy and tell her I love her. Then I'll buy her twelve birthday cards, one for each year I missed.
The doctor leads us to a windowless conference room. There's nothing in there but a white board, a table, and a dozen wheeled vinyl chairs. "Have a seat," she says. She takes the head of the table, where her briefcase sits. She snaps it open and then pulls out a few folders.
"I'm sure Mr. Madigan already went through the test results with you."
"Yes."
"So we definitely know that you are a hundred percent female and that you have FY-1978 still in your blood."
"Is that good or bad?" I ask.
"Both," she says. "The good thing is that gives us a sample of the serum to work with. The bad news is that even if we had a cure, we couldn't risk using it with so much of the original in your system."
"How long will it take?"
"Probably six months at least."
"And is it?doing anything in there?"
"You're not getting any younger. At least not from what I can tell. As you saw, though, it might still repair some serious cell damage you incur."
"That'll be good if I cut myself shaving."
Dr. Palmer doesn't smile at my bad joke. Instead she frowns. "We might as well get down to business. I brought you here because I wanted to tell you this in person-"
"It's bad news?" I say.
"Depends on how you look at things. Like I said, it's good you had some FY-1978 in your blood so we could get a sample. The bad news is that without the formula or Dr. Nath's notes, we have to try reverse engineering the serum. It's a lengthy process, one that might not be successful."
"How long is it going to take?" I ask.
"It depends. But I'm not going to sugarcoat it for you; it could take as long as five years before we've got it."
"Five years?"
"I'm afraid so." Dr. Palmer reaches across the table to take my hand. I can barely feel it. Five years. Five years of being a woman. I remember what Jake said in the car, that I'm already acting like a woman. I've seen the signs myself. In five years is there going to be any of Steve Fischer left? Or will I be entirely Stacey Chance?
She gives my hand a squeeze before she drops the anvil on my head like in one of those old cartoons. "It gets worse. That's five years to recreate the serum. From there we have to study it, figure out exactly how it did what it did to you. Then we have to come up with a cure. We'll have to do trials on animals-"
"How long?"
Dr. Palmer takes a deep breath. "Conservative estimate: twenty years total."
"Twenty years? You expect me to live like this for twenty years?" In twenty years I'll be thirty-eight years old, on my way into middle age for a second time.
And in twenty years Maddy will be forty-two years old. She and Grace will probably have moved out to the suburbs so they can raise a child they create through artificial insemination-my grandchild. A grandchild who will never know his or her grandfather, just Aunt Stacey.
I put my head down on the table and sob at this image. Dr. Palmer pats my back. "I'm sorry, Stacey. I wish I had better news for you. But it might not be that long. I'll be working around the clock on this, to find a way to change you back."
I look up, Dr. Palmer's face blurry through my tears. I laugh. It's a bitter, hateful laugh. The chances of a cure quickly were remote, but there was still that hope. Now there's no hope left at all. "You? You'll find a way? The only one who could is Dr. Nath and she's dead! You said it yourself; she's the only one who knew how to make this shit. You're too fucking stupid to remake it, let alone to cure me!"
I feel a stronger hand on my shoulder. "Come on, don't say something you'll regret," Jake says.
"I won't regret it!" I reach out to sweep the papers and Dr. Palmer's briefcase from the table in a childish gesture that makes me feel slightly better. "You people made this shit! Your stupid drug did this to me and now you're saying you'll need twenty years to fix it? Fuck you! Fuck all of you!"
"Stacey, please-"
"Fuck you!" I storm out of the room while Dr. Palmer and Jake are still reeling from my outburst. I don't bother with the elevator, knowing it'll be too slow. Instead I kick off my silly girl shoes and take the stairs. I'd like to take off this girly dress too, but that will have to wait until later. It's almost impossible to see through my tears, but my feet guide me well enough.
I expect someone to stop me in the lobby, but no one intercepts me as I run crying through the atrium and out of the building.
Chapter 27
My mind is a blank for the next six hours. All I know is I got on a train to the garment district. By the time I wind up at the Kozee Koffee, the bottoms of my feet are black and bleeding. I should have kept the stupid shoes.
"Stacey? Oh my God, what happened to you?" Maddy says. She rushes from behind the counter to wrap me in a hug I can't feel. "Grace said you were at the police station."
"Yeah, sure. The police station," I mumble.
Maddy sits me down at a table. She uses another chair so she can prop my feet up. I don't feel it when she washes them with a damp rag. I don't feel anything at all. I've cried myself out on the way here.
To finish, she rubs at my cheeks as if I'm a child who had played in a mud puddle. "What happened to your shoes? Did someone steal them?"
"No. They were slowing me down."
Maddy looks me in the eye. Despite how different the rest of her might look from me, her eyes are the same blue. They're my eyes. Or rather, Steve Fischer's eyes. That's not me anymore. From now on I'm Stacey Chance. I decided that at some point during my escape. Steve Fischer is dead.
That's what brought me here. I take Maddy's hand. It's bigger and there are too many rings on it, but it's as soft as when she was a newborn. No, she's not my daughter anymore. She was Steve's daughter. Maddy is just my friend and now I'm going to perform a friend's duty. "Maddy, I need to tell you something."
"What is it?"
"The people I'm staying with, they're Jake and Tess Madigan."
"Really? I know them. Jake is my dad's partner-on the police force. I used to play with their daughter."
"I know."
"You do?"
"I saw some pictures in Jenny's room of you two."
"She used to be my best friend. But she's gone now. I'm sure they told you that."
I nod. "Has anyone said anything about your father?"
"No. Why should they? No one's said any
thing about him in twelve years."
I take a deep breath. Even as Maddy's friend this is difficult. "He's dead. He died about five nights ago. There was a break-in at Lennox Pharmaceuticals. He responded to the call. The intruders killed him."
Maddy stares at me for a long time with no reaction. She finally asks, "You're sure?"
"I saw some papers on Jake's desk. It was a police report. Whoever did it burned down his apartment too. You can probably find that in the newspaper."
Maddy drops the damp rag to the floor. After a minute she says, "No, that can't be. Someone would have said something by now. They would have told Mom and she would have told me."
"Go and ask Jake Madigan. See what he tells you about it."
Maddy has a cell phone in her pocket. She whips it out and then punches in a few numbers. She doesn't have Jake's cell in there apparently because she says, "Hi, Mrs. Madigan? It's Madison Griffith. It's good to hear your voice too. I, um, I need to talk to Mr. Madigan. It's important. Is he around? Well, could you give me his cell number?" She listens for a moment and then nods. "Thanks, Mrs. Madigan. No, I'm fine. Really. What? No, I haven't seen Stacey. Is she missing? I'll keep an eye out for her."
Maddy gives me a hard stare, one that penetrates my numbness to make my stomach churn. "You'd better be right about this." She punches in another phone number, Jake's cell. I hope he has it with him. Like a lot of older guys he isn't always the most responsible with the new technology. Apparently he does have it with him, probably in case I call.
"Hi Mr. Madigan, it's Madison Griffith. No, Stacey's not here. I'm not sure where she is. What happened? Oh, I see. Well, I'll keep an eye out for her if she comes here." Maddy pauses and her hand shakes. "I heard about a robbery at this place called Lennox Pharmaceuticals. Do you know anything about that? Uh-huh. Was Dad there? He was? Is he OK?" I wish I could hear what Jake is saying so I'd know if he's lying or not. He must not be, because Maddy's eyes fill with tears. "Thanks for telling me. No, I'll be fine. I have to go."
She throws the phone across the room before she melts against me. "Oh God!" she sobs. "He is dead."
"I'm sorry," I say.
I'm not prepared for her to flip out the way I did in the conference room at Lennox's headquarters. "That son of a bitch! He doesn't call me for twelve years and now he's dead? That stupid fucking bastard! I hate him! I'm glad he's dead!"
"You don't mean that," I say.
"Yes I do! He never loved me, just like he never loved Mom. All he cared about was helping strangers. He never cared about his family."
I want to deny this, but how can I? She's right. I always put my job above Debbie and Maddy. Is it any surprise Debbie found greener pastures? Is it any wonder she didn't want Maddy to live in my seedy apartment every other weekend?
I put my arms around Maddy and hold her close. We sob together, to mourn the death of Detective Steve Fischer.
***
After about ten minutes of crying, Maddy gets up. She pulls me up to my tired, dirty, bloody feet. "Come on," she says. "Jake will be here any minute."
"But you said-?"
"He'll show up here anyway. He knows you'll come here sooner or later. That or Grace's. He's probably got someone staking out the shop already."
I follow Maddy out the back, into an alley. She stops to throw her apron against the door. "Won't you get fired for that?"
"So what? I can get another crummy job."
"Where are we going to go?"
"I don't know," she says. We take a few steps; a sharp pain accompanies each one. "Oh shit, your feet. Wait here a minute."
I sit on a crate in the alley and wish I hadn't worn my dress to that meeting. The hem of the skirt and patches of the rest are as black as my feet. I'm not sure how that happened. Tess will kill me when she sees it. I laugh at this. I won't see Tess again. That's too bad because she's the best surrogate mother an eighteen-year-old runaway can hope for.
Maddy returns with a couple of garbage bags. "These won't be as good as shoes, but they might help a little." She wraps the bags around my feet and then uses a piece of string to tie each bag to my feet.
As she said, the result isn't as good as a real pair of shoes. It is slightly better than to walk barefoot, the pain a little less with each step. Maybe by tomorrow the FY-1978 will have taken care of this too. In the meantime I'll have to gut it out.
Maddy leads me through a winding series of alleys. We end up at the back of Grace's shop. "Stay here," she says again. "I'll go up and grab some shoes."
"Could you get me a shirt and pants too?" I say. "I really want out of this dress."
"I'll see what I can do."
I watch as she climbs up the fire escape and disappears through the window on the second floor. Grace is probably in the shop. If Jake or Tess has called her, she might be worried about Maddy and I by now. Maybe I should go in for a minute-
No, Maddy's right. Jake might show up there. Or he might radio for a car to keep an eye on the place in case I turn up. I'll be a lot safer in the alley.
Maddy climbs down a couple minutes later, a bundle of clothes tucked under one arm. There's a pair of shoes, a dark blue shirt, and a pair of jeans. "Hurry up and get dressed," she says. She turns away while I strip off the dress.
The shirt and pants are a little big. So are the shoes. I'm not too picky at the moment. I leave the dress in the nearest dumpster, followed by the barrettes in my hair. Let my hair get wild. I don't care anymore.
"What do we do now?" I ask.
"Let's get a drink," Maddy says.
***
In some kind of cosmic irony, Maddy chooses Squiggy's of all places. There's something appropriate about that, as if we've completed the circle. "My dad came here a lot," she says.
"I'm not old enough to drink," I remind her.
"So? They aren't going to card us."
Maddy goes in first. She takes a seat at the bar. Big Al stares at her for a moment, as if she's a space alien or escaped zoo critter. He doesn't get many girls with pink hair in here. "Give me a shot of bourbon," Maddy says. "And one for my friend."
"How old is she?" Big Al asks.
"Twenty-one," I say.
He stares at me for a moment and then shrugs. He pours two bourbons. Maddy takes some cash from her pocket. "Keep 'em coming," she says.
The alcohol burns down my throat. I cough. After just the one drink I feel lightheaded. Part of that might be the blood loss; the rest of it is that this body is a lot smaller than my old one. No, there was no old body. This is my only body and it's always been my body. I will myself to forget about the last fifty years, but it doesn't take. I'll need a lot more alcohol for that to happen.
"Hey Al," Maddy says. "You hear about my dad?"
"What about him?"
"He sleeps with the fishes," she says and cackles wildly; she doesn't realize how right she almost is.
"You're his little girl, aren't you? I remember you when you weren't even as tall as one of those stools."
"Yeah, Dad would bring me into a place like this."
"It wasn't to drink," Al says. Even through the alcohol, I remember what he's talking about. It happened about eighteen years ago. I'd taken Maddy to a dentist's appointment. We were about to get some ice cream-which defeated the whole point of going to the dentist-when the call came in. Someone had robbed Squiggy's.
A more responsible parent would have taken his four-year-old daughter home first, but I wasn't that responsible. I put the siren on the top of the dash-which delighted Maddy in the backseat-and drove like a bat out of hell to get here. A detective wouldn't usually stoop to investigate a petty bar robbery, but this case was personal.
"Those uniformed punks wouldn't have done anything. Your daddy made sure to track the bastards down. Got all my money back with interest."
"Yeah, he was a real fucking hero," Mad
dy says. Her voice isn't even slurred yet. My little girl can hold her liquor better than I can. "Give me another, will you?"
"What happened to him?" Big Al asks.
"Some drug company robbery. He tried being a hero again. This time he bought it."
"You shouldn't talk about your dad like that," Big Al says to defend his best customer. "He was a good guy."
"Yeah, as a cop. And a drinker. He was shit for a father."
"I think you two better leave," Big Al says.
"Oh yeah? Or you'll do what? Call the cops?" She laughs right in his face. "Just wait till they see you're serving an eighteen-year-old, you stupid bastard."
Maddy's gone too far again. Big Al doesn't need to call the cops. He reaches beneath the bar for a double-barreled shotgun. "I said to get out of here."
"You going to kill us? Two sweet, innocent little girls? The press will have a field day with that."
"Maybe I don't have to kill you. Maybe I'll just shoot one of those pretty legs and let you bleed to death."
"You don't have the guts."
"You want to find out?"
I take Maddy's arm. "Come on, Maddy. Let's go."
"Yeah, fine. You water your booze down anyway. Fat bastard."
Maddy hops off the stool. I lean against her for support as we stagger out of Squiggy's.
Chapter 28
As we stagger along for a few blocks, Maddy sings a song about someone named Alejandro. I don't know it, though I pretend I do. Then she decides on a change of plans. She stops at a liquor store, and puts a hand on my shoulder. "You wait here," she says. "I'll go in and get us a couple of bottles. Just remember, don't take candy from strangers."
She laughs as if this is the funniest thing ever and then musses my hair. "I'm just kidding. You're so fucking serious all the time. You need to loosen up."
"Maybe we should go home."
Maddy guffaws. "See what I mean? Stop being so responsible all the time. You're eighteen for Christ's sake. Once you get to be an old lady like Grace, then you can be responsible."
"Grace isn't that old."
"Are you kidding? She's going to be thirty next year."
"Thirty? But she said-"
Maddy guffaws again. "That lying little bitch! She always tells people she's younger than she is. When we met, she said she was twenty-two. Really she was twenty-six!"
I force myself to laugh, though this conversation has sobered me up real quick. I can't imagine why Grace would want to lie about her age like that, except maybe people my age wouldn't want to buy clothes from a twenty-nine-year-old. That or run of the mill insecurity. "Maybe we've had enough excitement for one night," I say.