“I’d like to welcome you all to the new term of the United Nations Lunar Learning Center. I am Ms. Hagar, the head mistress of the school." Mean Girls 3026 Part 4 Written by Toni Trepasso Edited by Gwen Brown, with my many thanks to her.

The party was much like I’d been to back in the day from racing, and going to things the sponsor’s put on for either a new product launch or to celebrate the success of the team. I made sure to stick with Grace since once we arrived she told me that she had never been to something like this. We both met with some of the people who would be our teachers and I could only smile when I found that my advisor would be Dale Earnhardt the tenth. It was all I could do not to start talking about his great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather. We just mingled with the rest of the faculty and talked a lot about racing. I made it known that I loved drag racing, but also had a deep respect for oval racers. I mean hell, I cut my teeth with short track oval cars, and up until the day I had my accident, there was nothing more relaxing to me then sitting in turn one at a dirt track, with a clump of clay at the bottom of my beer. I did almost let the cat out of the bag when one of my teachers asked me what I liked about drag racing.

To me anyway, it’s an adrenalin rush to stand at the starting line of a top fuel race, when the car’s launch. With each car’s motor producing over seven thousand horsepower, it’s a bone shaking experience. Fourteen thousand horsepower shaking the ground as the engine tries to literally rip the track from the ground while the tires fight with the engine for control of the car. The only thing I can liken it to is getting punched in the chest. Not in a bad way. But your whole body shakes, even when the cars are at idle. Then when they leave the line, your vision goes blurry for a moment as the ground shakes, and the noise is so deafening, that if you don’t have ear plugs in, you risk blown out ear drums. But that’s not all. The power the cars are putting out, actually causes your bones to reverberate inside your body. Think of it like standing in front of the speakers at a rock concert. Just the thumping of the speakers shakes your body and you can feel it in your chest. To a real gear head, it’s one of the most amazing experiences you’ll ever have. However I couldn’t tell the teachers this, since AMY had never had the chance to witness a drag race like that. They stopped running the expensive top fuel when the mag-lev car’s took over as the top class.

After the party started to wind down. Grace and I headed back to our place. Ms. Hagar, or Samantha as she told me to call her. Let us take one of her electric cars since our dorm was on the other side of the complex from her place. On the ride back, Grace started needling me for information about what Samantha was talking about back in our room. I wasn’t sure if I should just come right out and tell her, or keep this a secret from her and hope she didn’t find out. But I started to think. The one thing my parents always told me from the time I was born was honesty is the best policy. So I bit the bullet and took a deep breath before I told her the story.

“You’ve heard about how they are able to transplant a brain from someone who has suffered tremendous trauma to their body into the body of someone who has sustained a severe head injury, and has been pronounced brain dead right?” I asked her not really knowing how else to start.

“Sure, they did that with my aunt and uncle. They put his brain in her body when they got in a bad car wreck.” she told me.

“Alright.” I took a deep breath and steadied myself to tell her the truth. “I wasn’t born in this body. In fact, I wasn’t born in this millennia. That is to say, my brain was born back in 1976. And I was born a male. After a motorcycle accident in 2008, my parents had me cryogenically frozen and when Amy suffered a car accident her parents made the choice to give her body to my brain.” I told her and out of the corner of my eye all I saw was her looking back at me with her mouth hanging open.

“Yeah right.” she said finally, starting to laugh. “You almost had me there chick.”

“I’m not pulling your leg. I’m serious. Think about this. Back on the plane, when you and I were talking about racing. Didn’t it strike you as odd that I said my dad had a car like the one I was playing in the game?”

“Well, now that you mention it. I’ve never seen one like that before.”

“Alright, or what about when I pulled out my MP3 player. Have you ever seen a device like that before? Or how would a girl like me, know about bands that haven’t been heard from for over a thousand years?”

“This is all too weird.” she said as she looked me over to try to figure out if I was messing with her.

“Alright, here, feel.” I said as I put her hand on the little scar on my head from where they cut this head open to put my brain in.

“Ah! What the hell is that bump?” she asked, yanking her hand back.

“That is the reminder I carry with me to keep me in check, that I may have been born Josh, but the world see’s me as Amy.” I told her with a sigh. I could see she was shaken by all this, so I tried to change the subject. “I’m getting hungry. You want to get something to eat?”

“Yeah, but I don’t know if I can right now.”

“I’ll buy.” I told her as I pulled into the drive through of my old bank and tried my ATM card.

It took a second for the machine to read it, but I got to enter my pin number, and pulled up my account information to see if I’d have enough to buy us some food. I figured the $20 I’d kept in there for emergencies, should be able to at least get us some hamburgers or something. But when I pulled up the balance screen, I about drove the car into the wall of the bank. I had $22 trillion available to me. How could this be? Then it dawned on me. The bank added the interest to my account over the past one thousand and eighteen years. I didn’t say a word, I just took out one hundred dollars and drove to the restaurants.

“What are you in the mood for?” I asked Grace.

“How about a burger?” she said as I heard her stomach rumble it’s agreement.

“Alright? Where from? Golden Arches? Or the Burger Monarch?” I asked not really sure which I wanted myself.

“I love the Monarch. They cook with an open flame and it tastes more like back home.” she said, starting to smile.

I pulled up to the drive-thru window and to my shock and enjoyment, they menu hadn’t changed in all this time. But I sat there looking at it for a moment before making my selection, and asking Grace what she wanted.

“I’ll have a double whacker combo, with cheese, Monarch size with a cola.” she said loud enough for the person running the register to hear.

“And I’ll have a double whacker combo, plain, ketchup only, Monarch sized with a cola.”

“Would you like cheese on that?” came the reply.

“What part of plain, ketchup only did you miss?” I asked defiantly.

“Please drive up to the second window.”

I went to pay, but the girl who was handing us our food reminded us that the meals were free, and just handed me the bag. I opened it and saw that there were two burgers in there with cheese on both of them. I just hate that the fast food joints brain wash their workers into thinking that everyone wants cheese on their food. I calmly grabbed one of the burgers and went back in, demanding to speak to the manager. I kindly explained that they had given me someone else’s burger and repeated my order. She opened my burger up to find that it did only have ketchup on it, so I asked her what that yellow shit was, growing out from between the meat. That is when it usually sinks in what I’m driving at, and she went back to make another one for me. While back there, I heard her yelling at someone named Angela, and I looked past the fry warmer to see that it was the same girl from before. Justice served, I took solace in the fact that here this girl was trying to make my life hell, when she, herself was unhappy with her life. So I just took my burger, went back to the car and drove home, trying to put the vision of Angela out of my mind.

We both sat down at the table and dug into our food. I hadn’t eaten a burger in all the time I was with Amanda and Mark, since she prefers to cook herself, and doesn’t like fast food. I’ll admit, it’s one of my guilty pleasures and the taste of the juicy meat for the first time in over a thousand years, was almost orgasmic. Grace was enjoying her burger as well, but I could tell that she wasn’t on the same level as I was at that moment. We finished our meal and both figured it was time to get ready for bed. Grace took the bathroom to get ready, and I just went into my room, to change into my shorts and t-shirt.

When she came out she saw me sitting on the couch flipping channels, and as I looked up I saw she had a funny look in her eyes. I felt like I was a piece of meat being judged for market from the look she was giving me. I saw her bite her lower lip and that’s when it hit me, why she was looking at me like that. I just played it cool, and let her make the first move.

“Something wrong Grace?” I asked, going back to flipping channels.

“Um, Amy, can I ask you a question?”

“Sure, fire away.” I told her not really looking at her, but still watching out of the corner of my eye.

“Do you like girls?” she asked me as I took a sip of my cola and promptly did a spit take.

“Do I what?” I asked, wiping the drool from my mouth.

“I mean have you. Uh...” she started not really sure how to ask. “Do you think I’m cute?”

“Wow.” was all I could come up with at first. “Uh, no. to be honest I don’t think you’re cute.” I said and watched her face sink. “I think you’re beautiful.” I quickly said with a smile that caused her to do the same.

“You do?” she asked, beaming at that point. “You really think I’m pretty?”

“Yes. I do.” I told her. “I think you’re a remarkable girl. You have that girl next door look to you, that while you do have great beauty, you neither flaunt it, nor come off like too beautiful to approach.”

“I was going to say the same thing about you.” she said with a giggle as she sat next to me on the couch.

“Why do you ask?” I looked at her puzzled. I knew that I would like to date her, but I wasn’t sure how that would go with her.

“Well, since you shared something with me, I want to share something about me with you.” she started and bit her lip as she took a deep breath. “I’m a lesbian.”

“Wow.” was all I could think to say at first. “Are you saying what I think you’re saying?” I asked not really sure where she was going.

“Amy, I think you’re a great girl, and I’ve wanted to kiss you since we met on the plane.”

“Please don’t tease me.” I said back. “You’re only saying that because of what I said earlier.”

She didn’t say a word. She just climbed on top of me and planted a soft tender kiss on my lips while caressing the sides of my head with her soft hands. Out of reflex I caressed the small of her back and savored the moment. Truth be told I did think she was a great girl, but I wasn’t sure what to do, since she was seventeen and at that point so was I. That is to say my body was that of a seventeen year old girl. She broke off the kiss and straddled my hips while I still held her by the small of her back.

“So would you say that was teasing?” she asked looking at me with a smile.

“Wow.” was all I could muster.

“Can I cuddle with you tonight?” she asked as the grabbed the remote and shut off the TV.

All I could manage was a nod as she took me by the hand and led me to my room. Lucky for me I had already put sheets on the bed, as she lowered us down together and kissed me again. She reached over and turned off the light, with out breaking the kiss, as I ran my fingers through her hair. I’m not sure how long we kissed for, but it felt good. It felt right. And before I knew it, we were both fast asleep. I got up at my normal time of 5am, and carefully untangled myself from her body, so as not to wake her. I simply got dressed and wrote her a note that I went for a run, before looking back into my room and smiled as I saw her sleeping in my bed like an angel.

TO BE CONTINUED.