Then I return to the classroom—two more periods until the end of school. I fall asleep briefly, both times.
After school I commune with my like-bodied, like-minded friends. It’s off-season, so the only sport we can play is preparation. I feel more at home here than I did alone in the basement this morning. Here the routine expands. It feels like teamwork. And teamwork can’t help but engage the mind as well as the body.
I have been in the bodies of people who I suspect would give almost anything to have this body, to be this person. I’d be more hesitant, if I had a choice. Because over the years I have become wary of tinkering with nature in this way. A body like this is rarely natural. A body like this must be created and maintained. And when you give so much energy to the body, there ends up being very little energy for much else, at least when you are sixteen and just starting to form it. Perhaps if I could feel the satisfaction and admiration as my own, I would feel differently. Or if I needed this strength for anything other than its own display.
At dinner, Hamilton’s mother feeds him enough for the whole family. His father, whose body looks like Hamilton’s, only with a layer of time on top, talks nonstop about the game he was watching on TV last night. Hamilton’s little sister looks bored, and Hamilton’s little brother looks eager. When dinner is over, I understand why: He asks Hamilton if he can lift some weights tonight, too. Hamilton’s mother shakes her head, but his father says it’s no big deal.
“A five-pound weight never hurt anyone,” he says.
“Unless you smash someone in the skull with it,” Hamilton’s little sister chimes in.
“I don’t know, Charlie,” I say. “I really don’t know.”
“C’monnnnn,” he pleads. He can’t be older than ten.
I relent. We head to the basement and I give him the lightest weight to curl, telling him to be careful. He sticks his tongue out in concentration as he lifts it up and down, making his little biceps burp up rather than bulge.
“Your turn! Your turn!” he calls out after ten repetitions.
I’m sure this is part of what they do, and I respect the glee that Charlie feels being in his brother’s domain. I know I should do what Hamilton would do. But I’m just so tired.
“Not tonight,” I tell him.
“Why not?”
“Because,” I say, choosing my words carefully, “it’s okay to take a break. You can’t push yourself too hard.”
“Why?”
“Because you could push yourself to a place you can’t get back from.”
Charlie looks at me quizzically. “I don’t understand.”
I mess up his hair a little, playfully. “You don’t need to. All you need to know is there are all kinds of strong.”
I know he still doesn’t get it, but that’s okay. Maybe he’ll remember these words later on, and maybe he won’t.
I decide to speak his language a little better.
“Ice cream,” I say. “We definitely need ice cream.”
The body thinks it’s a waste to be lying on the couch, watching Nickelodeon. But the body is also a little relieved. And the mind? Well, the mind is happy with this kind of teamwork: two brothers with matching ice-cream bowls and matching ice-cream scoops, laughing at a talking sponge.
The heaviest thing I’ll lift for the rest of the evening is Charlie, when it’s time to go to bed.
But I still make sure the alarm is set for 4:44 the next morning. Because that shouldn’t really be my choice.
Day 5915
I try not to alter the lives I borrow for a day. But sometimes it can’t be helped.
Paul Deringer should not present much of a challenge. His morning doesn’t hold any surprises—his room is straightforward, his family is straightforward, and his schedule, when I access it, is straightforward. When I get to school, his friends are friendly. This in itself seems straightforward, but with some people there are subterranean currents beneath every interaction; they treat their friendships as politics and their lives as performance. Luckily Paul is not like that, and neither are his friends.
One friend is clearly his closest—checking his memories, I know that Nicole is the one he looks for first in the crowd, the one he will always sneak away at lunch to be with. They are not dating—the memories are clear in showing that. But they use the fact that neither of them is dating as a way to spend all the time together that would ordinarily be spent with a boyfriend or girlfriend. Timewise, it’s almost the same as dating. Heartwise, too. There just isn’t any kissing. Or at least none that I can find.
There’s a zero-tolerance policy about phones in this school, so the only way to communicate in class is to pass notes. Nicole and Paul always sit next to each other, to make this easier. I’ll admit: I find passing notes with Nicole to be more interesting than class. She’s clever, and I have to challenge myself to be clever, too. Or at least until we get to what Nicole calls “surrealist knock-knock jokes.” Then we’re just silly.
Knock, knock.