Wings

But well before all that, a few days after we’d filmed the video, I was finishing up my packing for the Christmas trip when Mrs. Ramsey called out, “Hey, Lauren, your brother’s here.”

“I’ll be there in a second,” I replied, and put down my backpack and went to the living room. Nathan was there, chatting with Caleb; I went over and hugged him.

“I’m almost done packing,” I told him.

“Sure,” he said. “We’ve got a while before we need to be at the airport.”

I went back and put a few more things in my suitcase, then zipped it up, put my backpack on, and went and knocked on Sophia’s door. “It’s time,” I said. “Nathan’s here.”

She came out. “I’m ready whenever y’all are,” she said.

After Nathan had agreed to venn into something small and tag along on the plane ride with me, I’d talked about it with Sophia and she’d come up with a better form for him that would be a lot less likely to get me in trouble with the airline than a semi-animate plushie, but would let Nathan not only see and hear, but talk with me privately. She’d designed the form and tested it with her friend Julianna a few days earlier.

After I said goodbye to everyone, Sophia and I went out to Nathan’s car with him and he drove us to the library. There weren’t a lot of people in line at that time of day, but it seemed like half of them were traveling — several people had their friends venn them and their luggage into sheets of paper, which the friends then put into envelopes before driving off to the post office or FedEx store. When we got to the head of the line, Sophia and I went in and she venned me into the human girl form that was on my driver’s license.

Nathan looked at the booth apprehensively, apparently getting second thoughts.

“If I don’t like it, you promise you’ll change me back right away and we’ll figure out something else?”

“Of course,” I said. “You’ll be able to talk to me within a few seconds after you venn, and I can talk back without anyone else hearing me. We can punt and try changing you into an animate plushie instead. Although you’d still have to pretend to be inanimate for most of the flight, to avoid pissing off the airline, and we couldn’t have conversations that way. But if you’re more comfortable, sure.”

“Let’s try it,” Nathan said.

So Sophia and Nathan went in; Nathan took not only all of his luggage, but my suitcase and hanging garment bag as well. A few minutes later, the doors opened and Sophia came out of her booth while I stepped into Nathan’s booth and picked him up.

There were four pieces: a choker, a small box the size of an MP3 player with a few LEDs and a camera lens, and a pair of wireless earbuds. I took all of them over to the nearby bench and sat down with Sophia.

“Put on the choker first,” she said. “Then you can talk to him while you put on the earbuds.”

I did so. “I’ve got your choker on,” I subvocalized. Sophia had designed the form so the tympanum in the choker was sensitive enough to pick up anything I said, even if I didn’t say it loud enough for anyone else to hear. “Just a moment while I put on the earbuds.”

As soon as I had the earbuds on, I heard: “— me yet? Can you hear me yet? Can you —”

“I hear you,” I subvocalized.

“Oh, good. This feels weird. Not as bad as I feared, though. I know you said I wouldn’t feel paralyzed or claustrophobic, but hearing it is one thing and experiencing it is another. It just feels... sort of normal to not have any arms or legs?”

“Yeah, it’s weird how fast you can get used to new forms. I’ll keep you where you can see as much as I can. For now, let’s get Sophia back home.” I said the last bit out loud as I clipped Nathan’s main unit to my shirt.

So Sophia and I went back to Nathan’s car and I drove it to the Ramseys’ house to let her out. I gave Sophia another goodbye hug, then got Desiree out of my backpack and set her on the passenger side dashboard so she could see out the window, and set out for the Greensboro airport.

I realized we hadn’t planned this well enough. Nathan could hear Desiree when she talked, if she was close enough to me, but unless I took one of the earbuds off and gave it to Desiree, she couldn’t hear anything Nathan said, and she didn’t have the kind of ears that it would naturally latch onto. But it was a bit late now. Desiree would have to stay still and pretend to be inanimate during the flight, anyway, so it was just from now until we got in the security checkpoint line at the airport that this inconvenience would affect us.

On the way to the airport, we talked about all kinds of stuff, about movies we’d seen and the girls Nathan had dated and my girlfriends and the workplace drama at Metamorphoses and the less venny drama at the hotel Nathan worked at. But we finally circled around to talking about Mom and Dad, and Grandma and Grandpa.

“I’m still worried about how this is going to go,” I admitted. “I want to trust Grandma to keep the peace even if Dad or Grandpa is, um...”

“An asshole?” Desiree helpfully suggested, and I giggled despite the lump in my throat.

“Grandma’s tough,” Nathan said. “She’ll make Dad sit in the corner if he says something mean.”

The image of Grandma making her son-in-law sit in the corner like he was a little boy made me giggle again. “Thanks for cheering me up, y’all.”

“No problem,” Nathan and Desiree both said at once.

Once we got to the airport, I parked Nathan’s car in long-term parking and walked the relatively short distance to the terminal. Desiree played inanimate as I put her in my backpack, took all the parts of Nathan off and put them in my purse, and put the backpack and purse through the metal detector. The TSA didn’t see anything suspicious in my backpack or purse, so before long we were through the line and I retrieved my stuff, put Nathan back on, and let Desiree poke her head out of an unzipped gap in my backpack while I continued to the gate and checked in.

I kept Desiree in my backpack until they started boarding and I was in my seat, then took her out and let her sit on my lap. I kept up a subvocalized conversation with Nathan whenever I didn’t need to talk with someone else. It had been years since Nathan or I had been on a plane, and we talked about the last time, which he remembered better than I did. Not long after I sat down in my window seat, a skinny Hispanic guy sat down beside me, looking with bemused tolerance at the triceratops plushie in my lap. I think Desiree made him think I was younger than I looked, or childish for my age. He got out a tablet and started reading comics as soon as he had his carry-on luggage stowed and his belt buckled. Once the plane started moving, I snuggled Desiree, holding her where she could see out the window with me and adjusting how Nathan’s box was clipped to my shirt so his camera lens could see out as well. We took off without incident and once we were in the air, I got out my book and started reading, subvocally reading “aloud” for Nathan’s benefit.

The plane stopped for a little while in Charlotte to take on more passengers and let some off, then went on to Pensacola. It was around four when we finally got there. I put Desiree back in the backpack and called Grandma; she and Grandpa were already on their way to the airport, having checked online that the flight was going to arrive on time.

Then, after I’d texted the Ramseys to let them know I’d arrived safely and waited for some of the passengers who were in more of a hurry to get off, Desiree, Nathan and I disembarked and headed for the Venn machines, which vennlocator.com said were near the baggage claim area. There were a few people in line ahead of us. The next people to go in the machine were a mixed-race straight couple, both of them fairly tall and muscular, and carrying a lot of luggage. The woman went in one booth with almost all their luggage, while the man went in the other, and a couple of minutes later they came out. The man was now a much shorter, skinnier version of himself, similar enough in the face to use his ID, but small enough to comfortably fit in an airplane seat. The woman and luggage were now something tiny; I didn’t get a good look as the man scooped them up in his hand and walked off toward the storage lockers.

The next couple of people in line were like me; they’d apparently flown in while carrying or wearing their venned friends or relatives. They de-venned them quickly and headed out, and Nathan and I were next. I took off Nathan’s choker, central processor, and earbuds and popped them in the machine; the door closed for an instant and reopened on Nathan and the rest of our luggage.

“Whoa, that was a trip,” he said.

I grinned. “I see what you did there.” I took my rolling suitcase from him and we headed to the area where Grandma had said she’d meet us, calling her to let her know we were almost to the passenger drop-off area.

“We’re almost there,” she said. “Your mother called a little while ago and said they’d be here around eight.”

“Cool,” I said nervously. “We’ll keep an eye out for you. You’re still driving the blue Chevy Tahoe?”

“Yes. See you soon.”

So we walked on outside and started watching for them. It wasn’t much longer before we saw them coming along a couple of lanes away from the sidewalk, and waved at them; they started pulling over, but because of other cars in the drop-off lane, they weren’t able to pull all the way over and stop until they’d passed us. We jogged along and met them as they were opening the doors and getting out.

They’d both venned into younger bodies at some point since I’d seen them last — well before Mom had gotten Mrs. Ramsey to venn her younger, I’m pretty sure. I’d seen a number of Facebook posts with their younger faces, but seeing them in person was something else. Grandpa looked no more than thirty-five, and Grandma a few years younger, though still older than me or Nathan. She came and hugged both of us in turn, while Grandpa offered to help get our luggage into the back of the SUV. After he and Nathan had our luggage stowed, he hugged us as well.

“So where is your girlfriend, Lauren?” Grandma asked. “You said she’d be venned into a stuffed animal — is she comfortable being in your luggage?”

“Right here,” I said, and turned around so they could see Desiree’s head sticking out of the unzipped part of my backpack.

Desiree, who’d been playing inanimate until then, piped up. “Hi, Mr. and Mrs. McNeill! Thank you for letting me come visit.” She was so adorable I was 95% sure they’d take to her right away.

“Pleased to meet you,” Grandpa said, looking bemused. “Let’s get in the car.”

Once we were in the car and Desiree was perched on my shoulder, Grandma asked, “So, Nathan, I understand you had Lauren venn you into something small for the flight? Were you a stuffed animal too?”

“No,” Nathan said. “I was this little sort of iPod thingy, but with a camera and a throat mic so I could see what was going on and hear Lauren talk. And I could talk to her through my earbuds.”

“That sounds interesting,” Grandpa said. “I don’t know if I’d want to stay like that for a transatlantic flight or something, but for a shorter flight, it might be a good way to save money.”

“I think it would make for a more pleasant trip to be a stuffed animal that can move and talk, like you, Jada,” Grandma said.

“Oh, right — I go by Desiree when I’m split from my other self,” Desiree said. “It’s my middle name. But yeah, I’d rather be a plushie than a fake MP3 player, but for most of the flight there’s not much difference. We figured the airline might make a stink if they found out I was a person, so I kept still and quiet while going through security and flying and all.”

“Some people are skipping airlines and just getting friends to venn them into sheets of paper along with their luggage,” I said. “And then mail them to a friend or a venning agency where they’re going.”

“Could be a problem if you get delayed or lost in the mail, though,” Grandma said. “What if your venn wears off in a post office somewhere?”

“I think if you’re trapped in a confined space like a mailbag when your venn wears off, you change back inside the nearest Venn machine,” I said. “I’m pretty sure I read that somewhere, though I can’t remember if it was on VennWiki or an article my friend Sophia showed me about some experiments people did.”

“That’s not much better, is it? You’d still be stranded somewhere between home and where you were going.”

“What would it feel like to be venned into a sheet of paper for several days, anyway?” Nathan said. “Being a machine with ‘eyes’ and ‘ears’ was weird, but not really claustrophobic like I would have expected. But I can’t imagine what it would be like to be blind and deaf like that, and not be able to ask someone to change you back early if you don’t like it. No thanks.”

“I can’t speak for a piece of paper, but your grandma has venned me into some other things without eyes or ears or a mouth, and it wasn’t so bad,” Grandpa said. “Although mostly we’ve venned into living creatures.”

“Usually one of us is an animal and one of us stays human,” Grandma said. “We started doing that after we both venned into mockingbirds and got distracted and flew a couple of miles from our car by the time our venns wore off.”

Nathan glanced at me. “Yeah, I did that once too, when me and Lauren venned each other this one time. I was a falcon, and I flew away looking for prey faster than Lauren could keep up with me with her smaller wings.”

“What were you, Lauren?” Grandma asked.

“A little bitty dragon, about the size of a songbird.”

“That was the first time we met,” Desiree said mischievously, which led to Grandma asking us for the whole story.

After that, we continued talking about things we’d venned into, which led to my job at Metamorphoses and then to Nathan’s job at the hotel and Grandma and Grandpa’s stories about weird things that happened at their jobs before they retired.

After we got back to the house, Nathan and I unpacked some of our stuff. Grandma gave me one of the guest bedrooms (Mom and Dad were going to get the larger one) and showed Nathan how to fold out the sofa bed. I rested and snuggled with Desiree for a few minutes, then talked with her while I unpacked some stuff, and carried her with me when I went back to the living room.

Grandpa showed us the project he’d been working on in the back yard, building a water feature for the garden and doing some custom plumbing so it would spray and squirt water in different ways at different times. While we were admiring that, Grandma’s phone rang and she answered it. “Where are you, Kathy?... Oh, okay, that makes sense... Nathan and Lauren are here, we picked them up at the airport a little while ago... All right, drive safe, we’ll see you when you get here.” She hung up and said, “Your parents are stopping for supper in Greenville. Your mother said not to hold supper for them, so I expect I’ll go finish up.” I hoped that was Greenville, Alabama and not Greenville, Georgia (or even Greenville, South Carolina), or they were running super late. — On the other hand, given how nervous I was about seeing my dad, maybe it would be kind of nice if they were eating supper in Georgia and spending the night in a hotel before arriving here the next day.

“Can I help?” I asked.

“Come on.”

So I helped Grandma finish fixing supper — she’d put the chili in the crock-pot before they left for the airport, so there wasn’t much to do except set the table and chop up a fresh onion. Desiree sat on the end of the kitchen counter and chatted with us while we worked. We sat down to supper a few minutes later, Grandpa asked the blessing, and we dug in. Once we’d all taken the edge off our hunger, Grandpa said, “So, Lauren... Brenda told me something about your... transition, is that the right word? And she showed me some of your Facebook messages, but if you don’t mind, I’d like to hear more about it.”

“Okay,” I said with some trepidation. “Well, I realized a few years ago that I’d wanted to be a girl since I was little, only I suppressed it after Mom and Dad got really upset when I tried on one of Courtney’s dresses...” After telling all this to Carmen, Mr. and Mrs. Ramsey, Mom, and Nathan, I’d gotten pretty good at telling it in order. Grandpa mostly just listened, though he asked a couple of questions; Grandma had a few questions, too. Nathan pitched in with a corroboration now and then.

We kept talking for a long while after supper until Grandma got a text.

“Your mother says they’re almost here.”

“Should I go hang out in the guest bedroom until you’re ready to introduce me to your parents?” Desiree asked me.

“It’s all right with me if we introduce you now,” I said, glancing at Grandma.

“You can stay,” Grandma said.

Since that had interrupted our conversation, and we’d been done with supper for a while, Grandpa and Nathan started clearing the table and loading the dishwasher. Grandma and I (and Desiree, in my arms) went into the living room to greet Mom and Dad when they arrived. Grandpa and Nathan had just finished cleaning up and joined us in the living room when the doorbell rang, and my heart, which might have already been beating faster than normal, really sped up. Desiree squeezed my arm for a moment before I set her down on the sofa and stood up.

Grandma went to the door and opened it, and Mom and Dad came in, Mom hugging Grandma as soon as she set down the suitcase and bag she was carrying. Grandpa shook Dad’s hand, and Nathan got up and said: “Can I help y’all bring anything in?”

“Sure,” Dad said. “There’s not a lot, but it’ll be faster if you help.” He glanced at me but didn’t say anything else. He, Nathan and Grandpa went out to the car, leaving me with Grandma and Mom.

“Hi, Mom,” I said. I went over and hugged her.

“I’ve missed you so much, sweetie. It’s been way too long.”

“Yeah. Hopefully I’ll have enough saved up for a cheap used car in a few more months, so I don’t think it’ll be as long next time. I can come to Durham when I have a day off and meet you for lunch.”

Just then Dad, Nathan and Grandpa came back, each carrying a bag. They went back to the guest room Mom and Dad would be sleeping in.

Grandma asked me, “Don’t you have someone else to introduce, Lauren?”

“Um, yeah... Mom, this is my girlfriend Jada, but she’s going by her middle name, ‘Desiree,’ when she’s in plushie form.”

Desiree waved at her and said “Hi, Mrs. Wallace.”

Mom blinked at her a few times before saying slowly, “Pleased to meet you.”

Dad, Grandpa and Nathan returned just then. Dad didn’t know I was dating even one girl, probably — I doubted Mom would have told him. So introducing Desiree to him was going to be extra awkward. Not that just being in the same room with him wasn’t economy-sized awkward to begin with.

“There’s still plenty of chili in the refrigerator if y’all want some,” Grandma said.

“No, thanks, Mom,” Mom said. “It’s not that long since we ate supper. Maybe I’ll have a little later on just before bed.”

We all sat down in various places in the living room. Grandma and Grandpa took the two easy chairs they usually sat in, I sat on the sofa with Desiree, and Mom sat down next to me. There was room for Dad, too — it was a big sofa — but he sat down in the rocking chair, leaving Nathan to sit on the sofa next to Mom.

“Um, Dad,” I said, “I’d like you to meet someone.”

“What?” he asked, startled, and looked around toward the hall to the bedrooms and the entryway to the kitchen. I picked up Desiree.

“This is my girlfriend, Jada,” I said. “I introduced her to Mom a minute ago.”

“Hmm,” he said.

“Pleased to meet you, Mr. Wallace,” Desiree said. That startled Dad, too — maybe he’d never heard of semi-animate venns? But he didn’t react for more than a moment, or comment on it.

“Lauren told me about you, Jada,” Mom said carefully, not mentioning how long ago that had been. I guessed Dad knew Mom had been talking with me, but Mom didn’t want him to know how much we were talking or how much she was keeping from him. “I’ve been looking forward to meeting you. Can you tell me some more about yourself?”

“Sure,” Desiree said. “Well, I went to high school with Lauren for the last few months of our senior year, and we started dating then. I worked at the Food Lion during high school, and I started at East Carolina in the fall. I’m majoring in history.”

“And when she went off to college,” I said, “we used the Venn machine to split each other in two, one organic and one plushie, so she could stay home with me and I could go to college with her.”

Mom asked her about her family, and she told us about her grandma, her sister, and her extended family. “Some of my aunts and uncles and cousins are coming to see us for Christmas, I mean Grandma and Tamily and my other self,” she explained, “but I wanted to send one of me to spend Christmas with Lauren, since I wouldn’t otherwise get to see much of her during the break. I’ll try not to intrude on your family time too much.”

During all this Dad hadn’t said anything; he’d gotten out his phone and was reading something on it, barely looking in my and Desiree’s direction. He still didn’t say much as the conversation shifted and Mom and Grandma started catching up, or as Nathan asked Mom and Dad how they’d been doing since Thanksgiving. At some point Grandpa tried engaging him in conversation, without much success, and after a little over half an hour, he excused himself and went to bed. There was an awkward silence after he left.

“I’m sorry,” Mom apologized. “He’s been under a lot of stress lately with work, and when I told him Lauren was coming, too, he talked about staying home and doing Christmas by ourselves, or letting me come visit by myself. It took me several days to talk him into coming.”

I hugged her. “It’s not your fault,” I said. “It looks like he can’t stand to be in the room with me. I’ll just try to stay out of his way for the next few days.”

Grandma firmly said, “You’re not the one who’s behaving badly, Lauren. If anyone ought to go out of their way to avoid the other, it’s him.”

“I don’t mean I’m not going to eat with the rest of y’all,” I said. “But maybe when we’re not having a meal or something, I can just... be in one of the rooms Dad isn’t in.”

“Let’s see how it works out,” Mom said.