“Do… I just keep calling you Rina for now?” Biralee asked as she followed her sister to the Deli.
“You don’t mind, do you?”
“I guess not.”
“So what do you want to know about?”
“Usha… isn’t the orignal Usha.”
“She isn’t. Strictly speaking, she doesn’t have to exist. Still, she’s the one with the birth certificate, The Aadhaar card, the name on the lease. It’s a lot easier if she does exist, and certainly no harm if she does most of the time. Still, also no harm if she occasionally steps out.”
“So is Rina taking over, or…”
“No, no – at least with us, as I understand it, it’s still all Usha. Instances of Usha, bodies. Just acting out a different… social scripts? I think I hear it called. Aliases. Chosen as convenient.”
There was a pause for placing orders. Sandwiches, sweet potato fries, tea.
“So can Rina and Usha do all the same things? Physically?”
“Well, it’d be pretty bad if messing up your face was a one way trip – but beside some unique training that’s probably happened since, all the instances can do the same things using all the aliases, if they wanted to. Or at least, that’s the hope.” Rina, took Biralee’s hand and patted it. “We hope you can do all the weird stuff, but if you can’t, or if you don’t want to – we all love you. I love you. Hopefully it’s just the case of you don’t know what’s possible, and maybe a bit or retraining.”
“Thanks-” Biralee withdrew her hand – she was still sure she wanted her own life at this point, even if she wasn’t sure how to define that yet. “Don’t get me wrong… it’s just. I don’t want to lose myself to the collective yet. Or something.”
“So, no face dancing lessons. Yet.”
Their order was called.
The deli had roof seating available – which nobody was opting for at the moment, because rain clouds had stated to move in. The only people left were those too absorbed in their own little worlds to care.
“How did it start? Usha was normal once.”
“Excuse you. Usha was always a lithe lady. But, it was around the point that she started experimenting with Myofascial Release that things got weird. I think. No… The abdominal obsession started a little before that.”
“Obsession?”
“I’d had some success in popping my navel out, pulling it back in – moving it around a bit. I wanted to see how far I could go. And then it was the thought that, if my skin wasn’t bound so tightly – what would be possible then.”
“Weird, but not enough to think a person could split.”
“I stimulated somthing – my skin started growing for some reason. Like, you could literally fit two people in it as some point. I put a lot of time figuring out how to manage it before I got looking somewhat normal again – part way through there is when I had an ambulance called for me, met Dr Carter, started into the research-“
“I want to see it though,” Biralee pressed.
“Alright, alright…” Rina raised her shirt to expose her abdomen, “I’m a bit too chubby for the fine details at the moment, but – ” She have her belly a slap, and a slow shockwave expanded across her belly – too slow to be natural. It bounced against the edge of her ribcage and ripples reflected like water. Her navel got lost in the chaotic forms, and as they calmed, failed to reappear. She let Biralee feel around – it didn’t quite feel like belly fat, but it bounced like it, and there was no sign of the navel. she grabbed a knob of flesh, and it balled up in her hands, like she was making a ball of mud. It stayed when she let it go – before being slowly, intentionally pulled back in to the flesh underneath.
“So what happens if you relax then? Actually relax?”
Rina took a deep breath, then sagged, the flesh seemed to start flowing away from her face – not reveling Usha, but a more skeletal figure, who’s clothes definitely didn’t fit anymore. Her belly staged in the chair, her navel reappearing as a staggeringly large gap in her midsection, big enough to fit in… what? More than a cricket ball, less than a kickball.
Biralee slowed herself a moment to inspect the form before her, “You’re not hurting yourself.. right?”
“Eh, it’s a little cold out here with the breeze now,” She started to readjust her lose flesh, filling the outline of the clothing back in apparently remembering enough detail to convincingly resume the form of Rina. “Perhaps workout-tiring. Body building isn’t supposed to be easy,” She smiled.
Biralee eyes wandered back to the only slightly restored navel. “You missed a spot.”
“No, you got to eat while I got to talk,” Rina picked up her sandwich and brought it to her midsection, somehow slurping it in through her navel, “Honestly you should prefer the mouth to this. Gives you gas, absolutely no taste to enjoy.”
They took to their tea and fires in relative silence, Biralee watching the belly slowly regain it’s normal proportions.
“This doesn’t have to be your goal. But it’s part of what Usha was able to do – at a lot of practice, trial and error.”
Thunder boomed in the distance – a sheet of rain was quickly making it’s approach, and the two women quickly gathered up their scraps – only managing to get the slightest bit damp before retreating downstairs to quickly finish their meal.
“If you want help, just let any of us know. Defiantly not tomorrow though, Usha has work – you’ll get help as available.”
Rina gave Biralee a hug goodbye – and Biralee was sure she felt something like a kiss at her midsection – before dodging out into the rain with a final wave.
Leave a Reply