Page 75 of Switch!
Trixie has all sorts of suggestions about what we could see in Seattle that’s off the beaten path, but I’m after the quintessential tourist experience. We ride the monorail to the Space Needle to check out the view from the top. I can tell she’s bored, so I keep her entertained by telling her my story. All of it, including the reasons why I possessed Caleb in the first place. I want her to know that I haven’t abused this power. Not without reason. That becomes difficult when reaching the end of my time as Caleb.
We’re exploring Pike Place Market, a labyrinth of local shops and food vendors. Trixie keeps pointing out various treats we could try, but I’m craving a real meal. Jesse never tires of Chinese food. I want him to enjoy this day too, so that’s what we opt for.
“This place is kind of expensive,” Trixie says, eyeing the menu posted by the entrance.
“It’ll be my treat.” I say with a pang of guilt, because Gismonda is right. It isn’t my money to spend. Then again, Jesse needs to eat, and he’s had enough deep-fried fat and sugar for one day.
The restaurant is spread out over four floors. The table we’re shown to is near the top of the building and offers a view of the bay. We browse the menu. Once the waiter has taken our orders, I decide that I’m perfectly content to let my story end where I left off.
My new friend disagrees. “So what happened? You were living the dream! Rockin’ bod, smart and sexy girlfriend, parents who were just controlling enough to give you something to rebel against. How’d you’d go from that to delivering stiffs to a morgue?”
“I’m not an undertaker,” I say with a laugh. “I’m a paramedic.”
“Sure, but sometimes you’ve gotta deal with dead bodies, right? That must be hard.”
“Yeah. Especially when it’s your own.”
Trixie’s mouth drops open. “What?”
I tell her what happened. She’s somber by the time I’ve finished.
“I’m sorry,” she says. “I shouldn’t have made such a dumb joke. What a horrible thing to go through!”
“Forget about me. I feel terrible about what I did to Caleb.”
“He was a jerk,” Trixie says dismissively. “You said yourself that he wanted to kill you. Sounds to me like he got a taste of his own medicine.”
“I guess. But now that I’ve experienced his life, I know the monster he became wasn’t entirely his fault. That’s why I was at the psychic fair today. I want to find a way to help him. And myself. I don’t like living with this guilt.”
Trixie averts her eyes. “I know what you mean.”
“You do?”
She nods. “My superpower can be a curse too. You might assume it’s good to know when people are lying to you, but more often than not, it just hurts. My stepmother, Dorothy, is the perfect example. I never knew my real mom. She died when I was too young to have any memories of her. From my perspective, Dorothy has always been my mother. I love her as if she was. I only wish she loved me back.”
“I’m sure she—” I begin, wanting to reassure.
“No,” Trixie says, shaking her head. “I’m not being dramatic. This isn’t ‘I’m so misunderstood!’ teenage drama. She really doesn’t love me. She tried to treat me the same as the biological children she had with my father, but there were always little differences. Less patience when I needed help, or tougher punishments when I got into trouble. Things that might seem small at first but that add up over time. I wasn’t sure though. Not until around age ten when my ability kicked in. You know the stupid arguments you get into at that age when you accuse your parents of not loving you? I don’t remember what I was upset about, but like a good parent, she insisted that she did love me. That’s when I knew she was lying.”
I wince in sympathy. “You’re absolutely sure?”
Trixie nods.
I exhale. “That must have been traumatic. Especially for a kid.”
“Yup. I dealt with it by going into denial about what I could do. If I didn’t really have this power, then the things that hurt me weren’t real either. The older I got, the harder it was to ignore. Middle school was especially fun. Everyone was so desperate to be anything but who they really were that the alarm bells were constantly going off. I stopped kidding myself and started asking questions about what I was going through. Adults accused me of making it up. A therapist said I was only seeking attention. I’d had enough experiences by then to know that I wasn’t crazy. I started looking for proof, and I always found it, but catching someone in a lie doesn’t prove that you’re psychic. I got pissed off at the world for being so full of bullshit. And I couldn’t stop thinking about my mother and wondering if she really loved me, so I asked her again. When I got the confirmation I was dreading… I was hurt. And I took it out on her by asking things that I really shouldn’t have.”
The waiter returns with our food. After he sets down the plates and leaves, I can tell Trixie is in the same mindset I was just moments ago. She would be happy to focus on eating and let the rest of the story go untold. I’m too curious to let that happen, but I let us both get some food in our bellies before urging her to continue.
“What sort of questions did you ask your mom?”
Trixie sighs. “Just little things at first. Did she really like the birthday present my dad got her, or was his dumpling soup the best she’d ever had, like she always claimed. Anytime I caught her lying or even exaggerating, I told my dad. I could never convince him that my ability was supernatural or anything more than me being highly observant. He’d seen enough by then to know I had some sort of gift. He refused to discuss it with me, but that didn’t stop him from taking me to a car dealership so I could tell him if the price was really the lowest the salesman could go. Things like that. So he believed me when I started telling him hard truths about my mother. I hated seeing him get hurt feelings, but it was easier to blame her for being dishonest. The more I made her a bad person in my mind, the less it hurt that she didn’t love me back. So I started asking the heavy hitters: Did she love my dad more than her first husband? Had she ever cheated on him?” Trixie sets down her fork and places her hands in her lap. “That one was bad.”
“She cheated on him?”
Trixie nods. “Just once. During a business trip. She drank too much, almost to the point of blacking out. She barely remembers it, but she woke up in the guy’s bed the next morning. That’s when she stopped drinking. Completely. At the time she said it was for health reasons. The truth is, she never wanted anything like that to happen again. She never wanted my father to find out either, to spare him the pain. Dorothy explained all of this to me in front of my dad, so I could tell him if it was true or not. And it was. They still split up though.”
“Oh god.”
