Page 22 of Exchange of Heart

‘I have no idea what her name is.’

‘Well, I do. It’s Izzy, and I hope you’re being nice. I won’t return to my body only to find my name tarnished at work. You may get away with being a brooding asshole at your job, but at mine, I’m a ray of dedicated sunshine. You hear me?’

‘Loud and clear.’ Though if things went to plan, I wouldn’t need to worry about that tomorrow.

Twenty minutes later, we arrived at Nora’s with my laptop of photos.

‘Not you again.’ I scowled at the slinking cat and perched myself on one of Nora’s barstools.

Nora lifted her head from the box of photos she’d been buried in for the last five minutes. ‘That’s Lucky.’

‘I don’t care what his name is. I don’t want him near me. And who the hell keeps boxes of photos anymore? Haven’t you heard of a hard drive?’

‘Hard drives didn’t exist when some of these were taken.’

‘What’s looking at photos of your great, great, great grand-mother going to achieve, anyway? I thought the point was to look at ones of ourselves?’

‘I want to ground myself in my family. To remember everything that led to my chance at this life.’

She made it sound like we were so blessed for the opportunity to exist day in, day out, under the demanding pressure of society. I huffed at her optimism, barely noticing my newfound flexibility as I tucked my legs up on the barstool where Lucky couldn’t rub his head against my feet. The black furball leaped onto the seat next to me then climbed onto the black bench, and I pulled my notebook and pencil out of my bag to ignore him. The point of the sharpened lead pressed against the page and all my worries disappeared for the next half-hour until the timer I’d set for hash browns chimed from Nora’s phone.

‘Finally,’ I groaned.

‘Oven mitts are in the cupboard,’ Nora called.

I found the yellow mitts and used them to pull the aroma-filled tray out of the oven.

‘I love hash browns,’ I moaned.

‘I’m not loving the sounds you’re making with my voice.’ Nora stood by the kitchen with a bundle of photos in her hand.

‘Let’s eat then switch bodies.’ I placed the tray on the stove top and searched the pantry for tomato sauce.

‘Let’s switch while they cool,’ Nora argued.

‘I can’t concentrate. I’m starving.’

‘I can’t concentrate with a bulge between my legs.’

A river of insecurity flowed through my chest as I wondered what went through her mind when it came to that bulge of mine she’d acquired. I quashed those insecurities by retorting the only way I knew how: shifting the subjective bulge.

‘I’m managing with two bulges on my chest, you’ll be fine.’

As I turned from the pantry, Nora grabbed the bottle of tomato sauce in my hand. Our eyes met, and a war began.

‘Let go,’ I hissed through gritted teeth.

‘You let go.’

‘You.’

Our voices deepened with each shitty, argumentative word until we were growling at each other like savage wolves. Eventually, our tightened fists released an explosion from the bottle, red liquid squirting through the air and covering more than the hash browns.

‘Look what you’ve done,’ she yelled.

‘What I’ve done? You wouldn’t let go of the damn bottle.’

‘Not everything is about food, Corey. We have more important things to take care of.’ She tried to pull the bottle closer.