But I’m not dreaming. I am feeling the pressure of the pillow against my face. I am feeling the sheets around my legs. I am breathing. In dreams, we never bother to breathe.
I instantly feel like the world has turned to glass. Every moment is delicate. Every movement is a risk. I know she wouldn’t want me here. I know the horror she would be feeling right now. The complete loss of control.
Everything I do could break something. Every word I say. Every move I make.
I look around some more. Some girls and boys obliterate their rooms as they grow older, thinking they have to banish all their younger incarnations in order to convincingly inhabit a new one. But Rhiannon is more secure with her past than that. I see pictures of her and her family when she is three, eight, ten, fourteen. A stuffed penguin still keeps watch over her bed. J. D. Salinger sits next to Dr. Seuss on her bookshelf.
I pick up one of the photographs. If I wanted to, I could try to access the day it was taken. It looks like she and her sister are at a county fair. Her sister is wearing some kind of prize ribbon. It would be so easy for me to find out what it is. But then it wouldn’t be Rhiannon telling me.
I want her here next to me, giving me the tour. Now I feel like I’ve broken in.
The only way to get through this is to live the day as Rhiannon would want me to. If she knows I was here—and I have a feeling she will—I want her to be certain that I didn’t take any advantage. I know instinctively that this is not the way I want to learn anything. This is not the way I want to gain anything.
Because of this, it feels like all I can do is lose.
This is how it feels to raise her arm.
This is how it feels to blink her eyes.
This is how it feels to turn her head.
This is how it feels to run her tongue over her lips, to put her feet on the floor.
This is the weight of her. This is the height of her. This is the angle from which she sees the world.
I could access every memory she has of me. I could access every memory she has of Justin. I could hear what she’s said when I haven’t been around.
“Hello.”
This is what her voice sounds like from the inside.
This is what her voice sounds like when she’s by herself.
Her mother shuffles past me in the hallway, awake but not by her own choice. It has been a long night for her, leading into a short morning. She says she’s going to try to go back to sleep, but adds that it’s not likely.
Rhiannon’s father is in the kitchen, about to leave for work. His “good morning” holds less complaint. But he’s in a rush, and I have a sense that those two words are all Rhiannon’s going to get. I get some cereal as he searches for his keys, then say a goodbye echo to his own quick goodbye.
I decide not to take a shower, or even to change out of last night’s underwear. When I go to the bathroom, I will keep my eyes closed. I feel naked enough looking in the mirror and seeing Rhiannon’s face. I can’t push it any further than that. Brushing her hair is already too intimate. Putting on makeup. Even putting on shoes. To experience her body’s balance within the world, the sensation of her skin from the inside, touching her face and receiving the touch from both sides—it’s unavoidable and incredibly intense. I try to think only as me, but I can’t stop feeling that I’m her.
I have to access to find my keys, then find my way to school. Maybe I should stay home, but I’m not sure I could bear being alone as her for that long without any distractions. The radio station is tuned to the news, which is unexpected. Her sister’s graduation tassel hangs from the rearview mirror.
I look to the passenger seat, expecting Rhiannon to be there, looking at me, telling me where to go.
I am going to try to avoid Justin. I go early to my locker, get my books, then head directly to my first class. As friends trickle into the classroom, I make as much conversation as I can. Nobody notices any difference—not because they don’t care, but because it’s early in the morning, and nobody’s expected to be fully there. I’ve been so hung up on Justin that I haven’t realized how much Rhiannon’s friends are part of her life. I realize that until now, the most I’ve really seen her full life has been when I was Amy Tran, visiting the school for the day. Because she doesn’t spend her day alone. These friends are not what she wants to escape when she makes her escape.
“Did you get to all the bio?” her friend Rebecca asks. At first I think she’s asking to copy my homework, but then I realize she’s offering hers. Sure enough, Rhiannon has a few problems left to do. I thank Rebecca and start copying away.
When class begins and the teacher starts to lecture, all I need to do is listen and take notes.
Remember this, I tell Rhiannon. Remember how ordinary it is.
I can’t help but get glimpses of things I’ve never seen before. Doodles in her notebook of trees and mountains. The light imprint her socks leave on her ankles. A small red birthmark at the base of her left thumb. These are probably things she never notices. But because I’m new to her, I see everything.
This is how it feels to hold a pencil in her hand.
This is how it feels to fill her lungs with air.
This is how it feels to press her back against the chair.
This is how it feels to touch her ear.
This is what the world sounds like to her. This is what she hears every day.
I allow myself one memory. I don’t choose it. It just rises, and I don’t cut it off.
Rebecca is sitting next to me, chewing gum. At one point in class, she’s so bored that she takes it out of her mouth and starts playing with it between her fingers. And I remember a time she did this in sixth grade. The teacher caught her, and Rebecca was so surprised at being caught that she startled, and the gum went flying from her hand and into Hannah Walker’s hair. Hannah didn’t know what had happened at first, and all the kids started laughing at her, making the teacher more furious. I was the one who leaned over and told her there was gum in her hair. I was the one who worked it out with my fingers, careful not to get it knotted farther in. I got it all out. I remember I got it all out.