“First and foremost,” Angela said, standing maybe three feet from me. “You’re going to learn to string this bow. Notice how the arms are curved, you see?”

I nodded. For the first time I was really getting a look at my bow. It was made from a sleep black wood, very simple, but also a bit heavier than I’d expected. I couldn’t help but feel a little bit of contempt looking at it, as Meredith had forced me to run the obstacle course over and over again while holding it. Still, it was something Angela wanted me to have, and that was enough to make me love it.

“Again,” Meredith said coldly. As always, my body responded to her command; I ran back to beginning of the obstacle course, bow in hand and gripped the rope net, hurtling up and over the obstacle as I raced toward the next.

“Meredith please,” I sobbed as I ran, completely out of breath and barely able to keep upright. “Please just let me stop for a minute.”

“Why did we drive a car if we can just walk through mirrors?” I asked as Meredith eased her car between two others on a temporary grass lot.

“Because it freaks people out when we just appear in front of them,” Angela told me, rummaging through her purse for something. Finally, she yanked a pink bracelet from the bag and handed it to me through the seats. It was pretty plain; there was nothing special about it, it kind of reminded me of a slap bracelet, though without the slapping part. “Put that on, it makes it easier to find you in a crowd.”

I stared incredulously at the creature that had just passed through the mirror. Were my eyes deceiving me, or was this really, truly a talking armadillo? Angela and Meredith immediately rose from the couch, though I sat there, mouth agape until Angela nudged my shoulder. I climbed to my feet and leaned into her, wrapping my arms around her waist. She laid an arm around me and gave me a partial hug.

CHAPTER 79
The dining room in the hotel was pretty shabby, and the choice not the greatest, but they had chilled apple juice on tap and as much tea as I could drink, which helped with the beer-mouth. I loaded up on carbs and grease, before sorting out some odds and sods for a morning of wandering along the front while waiting until it was time to head over to the little hospital for my friend’s return from theatre.

I suppose I should have been there for her departure for surgery, but I was so terrified at the possible dangers I hid in the city instead, and played tourist. There was, after all, plenty to see, even if I didn’t go up on the ‘i360’, a viewing platform on the sea front.

4: “Sunrise”

“What should we watch next?” Angela flipped through the Netflix menu on the television, I laid comfortably between the two of them, kind of curled up. It was nice being small. “I think we’ve watched everything on Netflix and Hulu, we’re going to have to wait a few years for them to update the library.”

Karen knew she needed to have another talk with Henry. If he was playing like her agent now, he was in deep trouble. Taking care of her finances was one thing, but this was something entirely different. Maybe it wasn't Henry? Bob Kincaid would gain a lot if he could pull off this trick. Someone always seemed to be manipulating her life lately and she wasn't being consulted. It use to be so simple before the accident. All she had to do was go to work and do her job, nothing more, nothing less.

I stared in the mirror, mouth agape as my face changed from a grown woman to a child of about twelve. She’d forgotten to change the maid uniform with me, so it was sort of hanging there, the skirt falling way past my knees.

“Steve?” Angela placed a hand on my shoulder. “Are you okay?”

“How…how long am I going to stay like this?” My voice came across as a mere whisper, I saw Meredith smirk behind Angela in the mirror.

“Until you can change yourself back,” Angela smiled and ran her fingers through my hair, straightening it out. It felt good.

“God! Tell me why I agreed to do this again?” Sophie was limping by the time they got back to the barracks.

“Because your family owns this place.” Greg was watching Sophie’s ass as he walked behind her into the barracks.

“No, I don’t think that was the reason.” Sophie takes her heavy backpack off and sets it next to her locker.

She shivers as the wet clothes she had on turned cold from the A/C turning on. They had just gotten back from doing a twenty-mile hike with an eighty-pound pack. Sophie’s feet were bothering her. She could tell that a blister had formed.

“And I am back with groceries!” Angela said cheerfully as she walked into the room. I had resumed my original position on the bed and Meredith was pretending to be busy with her phone, acting like she hadn’t just forced me to lick her feet for the last hour. I kind of wanted to say something to Angela, in fact I was pretty sure I could have, but I just didn’t want to. I was tired, I was hungry, my body felt like it had been hit by a truck. I just wanted to lay here on the bed and drift off to sleep. “Wake up over there or it’s going to feel worse later!”

“You have a boyfriend?” Meredith raised an eyebrow as she observed my limp, lifeless body on the bed. “That looks like a – oh yeah, I see now. You had a boyfriend and didn’t tell me?”

“It was like a decade ago,” Angela shrugged. “I kind of left him here to teach him a lesson. I used a low level mind control technique and told him to clean the house, like a Roomba.”

My body turned away from the bed just as I finished dusting the sleek wooden headboard. It was like this, every day. Was it every day? I’d lost track of time a while ago. My body was just on repeat, working its way down a never ending chore list; never sleeping, never stopping. During the first few weeks I’d tried to think about who Angela was, how she had this kind of power over me. As the days and hours waned on I just stopped caring. My body was exhausted, my muscles were throbbing, the pain in my jaw still hadn’t subsided. I guess it wasn’t mean to.