Everything Looks Better in Black and White...
by Sumner, with minor apologies to David Cronenberg
Wednesday
"So, Jeanine, how's the hospital these days?" Greg asked, peeking over a warm Budweiser.
"Overcrowding has been a problem the last few weeks, at least in the NICU. You know, they say the more full moons, the more babies..."
"Is that true? I figured it was just a popular myth," Deborah noted from the kitchen.
"No, in my experience, full moons always mean more births, especially this time of year," Jeanine observed. "Just like the tides, I suppose." She took small, calculated sips of her beer as if she were timing them just so, never letting her blood alcohol level top the legal limit (undoubtedly a reflex for medical personnel who feel guilty getting drunk). "In fact, I think we're packed even tighter this year, almost thirty babies last night."
"Must be a chore," Greg said.
"Well, it keeps me on my proverbial toes. Although this year, we've had a lot of admissions from area hospitals, I assume, because other hospitals are crowding. After this year, I'm not sure I believe all these 'Aging America' studies."
"Studies?" Greg lifted an eyebrow.
"Yeah, honey," Deborah added as she walked into the living room, "scientists say the population is slowly getting older." She furnished Greg with another beer. "Something to do with better treatment and things. People are living longer."
"That's what they say," Jeanine said doubtingly. "Hey, where's Neal?"
"Oh, he's probably upstairs in his room chatting online on the internet or god knows," Deborah sighed, "I'll go get him." She headed back down the hallway and opened the upstairs door, and yelled, "Neal! Jeanine's been here for an hour and you still haven't come down to say hi. Now, she hasn't seen you in forever, so come down and join us, please." A muffled, but intelligible "all right" was his reply.
As Deborah returned to the living room, Greg and Jeanine were discussing Neal and his numerous exploits of the last few years.
"I don't think I've seen Neal in, oh - how many has it been - five years maybe? Six? He was in fifth grade if I remember right," Jeanine said.
"You probably won't even recognize him," Deborah interjected, taking a seat on the couch. "He just got his license last Tuesday and he's really proud of it. Wants a new car though, and I told him, I said, 'If you want a car other than the station wagon, you're going to have to work for it.' "
The upstairs door made its distinct creaking sound and Neal reluctantly joined the living room party. He maintained a careful smile, making sure he didn't betray his newly crafted teen image - that being hypnotically baggy pants, a tour shirt, and a cool, detached rebel air. His hair, once a mop of curls and cowlicks, was now a purposefully messed up spike of sorts, apparently en vogue with teens. He'd always enjoyed Jeanine's rare visits, but if any excitement possessed him, his new teen code of ethics forbade any visually detectable enthusiasm.
"Hi, Jeanine," he said, adopting his new, deeper tone.
"Well, hi there, Neal. Gosh, I haven't seen you since you were this tall (she illustrated with her hand). You've grown into quite a handsome young man."
As the teenage handbook describes, Neal let out a quick ineffectual laugh and hoped the conversation would soon turn to something else. But the sentiment lingered.
"We were just talking about that. Do you remember, Neal? I think the last time Deborah came to visit, she went to see your school play, right? In '96? When you were doing that Christmas play, remember?" Greg quizzed his son.
"I don't know," Neal mumbled.
"Oh yeah, that's right. Remember afterward when we went to Pizza Hut and Catherine had to go to the emergency room?"
"Oh yes. Good god, was that a nightmare."
"No, that was the second time Deborah came, in '91," Greg corrected them, "and I think, yeah, '91. Neal was still in kindergarten." Greg popped his third can of the night. "We taped Neal's little one man show, you remember that? With Louis Prima playing?"
"Not really," Neal mumbled, already annoyed.
"Come on now, Neal, you remember that. You danced around in the living room to swing music. We've got that one on tape, I think." Deborah got up and marched over to the entertainment center and began fishing through the marker-labeled VHS tapes. "I know we've got that. 'Sing, Sing, Sing (with a Swing)' if I remember right. Well, where is it?"
"Honey, your parents got the old videos transferred to DVD for our anniversary. The stuff from '91 is in the cabinet above the TV," Greg reminded her.
She soon found them tucked behind some yellowing instruction manuals, each disc bearing the label "Nostalgia Network - a production by VideoHome." Among the DVDs were Catherine's clarinet recital, Greg's new barbecue mishap, and many of Neal's elementary school days, all professionally packaged and edited into hopelessly sappy pieces of homemade cinema verite.
"Aw, no. Mom," Neal groaned. Deborah wasn't listening. She opened the upstairs door and yelled for Catherine to come down. They were going to watch some old videos.
Why was this inevitable? Every time any relative or friend (especially one Neal used to think of as "cool") came over, Mom dredged out the old videos like clockwork. It was true; it was the reason his grandparents had gone to the trouble of putting all the poor-quality family VHS tapes on DVD anyway - so that Greg and Deborah's prized memories could be forever saved the wear and tear of tape. And they surely received ample wear and tear.
"Oh, I had forgotten we had these on DVD now. I don't even think we've watched them like this yet," Deborah said, with a growing smile. Catherine eventually joined the assembly in the living room. She too dreaded these all-too-frequent screenings, as she knew what potentially embarrassing episodes could ensue, but she'd stomached them often enough that they seemed almost entertaining now. Being ostensibly shy during her formative years, she refrained from putting on performances for the camera like her little brother. Besides, she was twenty-one and her childhood seemed like a fuzzy blip in the rear view mirror.
In no time, the room was enjoying images of Neal, zipping around the house in a dangling pair of underwear and a Batman cape. Greg and Deborah pointed out intriguing facts along the way, noting, "You know, we still have that cape in the basement," and "Wow, that was back when had that red couch we kept spilling things on." Catherine got a chuckle out of her previous hairstyles. At eleven, she'd donned a curly red fro, a far cry from the straight flaxen locks that cascaded down her back today. The show continued. Greg had yet to see any gray hairs and their old dog Fonzi was still alive. Jeanine remarked how different the kitchen looked without the stain glass window. Everyone agreed.
Neal gradually slunk into his chair. Trying to hide his face, he pulled his coat up around his neck and pretended to be amused. He watched his parents start to glow as they once again slipped back to earlier days through the idealistic window of nostalgia. It was strange, too, that he couldn't take his eyes off the screen either.
"This looks so much better than before. They really cleaned it up, eh, honey?"
A Playschool desk in the background of one shot sparked a short discussion of Neal's homeschooling experience. Jeanine mentioned her consideration of homeschool for her five-year-old and Deborah gladly related the details, both positive and negative, including Neal's frequent shirking of assignments and the lack of social interaction. Still, she recommended the practice over public elementary school. Even as they talked, everyone in the room kept their eyes on the screen, like film students studying a text, all the while remarking:
"What a professional production..."
"Definitely sharper, yeah. It's like we're watching it for the first time..."
Thursday
That night, Neal dreamed of last year's Fourth of July and the fireworks show the neighbors provided. It, too, seemed picturesque and certainly more fun than its real life equivalent. Colors shone more vividly, everyone spoke slowly and deliberately, sometimes repeating themselves, and the world became a painkiller. The dream, like most, seemed utterly real as it happened, but the next morning brought Neal back to where he'd always been - today. He ate breakfast with the family and headed off to Bradford High School for another day of routine daydreaming. Catherine drove off to her morning classes at the Lincoln Community College, where she was majoring in English against the wishes of her counselors.
Neal's closest compadre, Ryan, waited for him at the bus stop as usual. Dressed in black and smoking a cheap cigarette, Ryan exuded teenage insubordination. Most of it, Neal knew, was part of elaborate play, put on to scare away potential bullies. The Johnny Cash wardrobe did little to hide his size, though, and Ryan still suffered intimidation at the hands of football jocks and wrestlers.
"Hey, man," he began the day, "how's life?"
"All right, except for Mom."
"What this time?"
"Same deal. An old family friend dropped by and out came the home movies. It's like Old Faithful, for godsakes."
"That sucks," Ryan commiserated. "She's obsessed with those things, you know?"
"Always has been."
"My mom's into them too, but at least she doesn't haul them out in front of everybody. That would suck whale ass."
"And suck whale ass, it does," Neal agreed. "I mean, what, do I have to grow a beard and get an advanced engineering degree before she stops?"
"Maybe," Ryan said, noticing Neal had grown a thin line of hair across his upper lip in the last month or so, which was more than Ryan could claim. His attempts at being grown up were still being laughed off, even by his mom. "Ever since Dad left, my mom's been going back and looking at all the old stuff. She even got some of them made into DVDs I think."
"My grandparents had that done at the new digital media place in the mall, The Nostalgia Network."
"So, how's your sister?" Ryan asked knowingly.
Neal grew a half disgusted smile. "You mean after your little spying incident?" Ryan nodded.
"I think you could take an educated guess," Neal said. "You know she's not going to go out with a high school junior-why do you keep trying that shit?" Neal never quite understood Ryan's everlasting crush on his sister, but then again, what brother enjoys entertaining sexual thoughts about his own sibling, even vicariously through a friend...
"Dude-"
"I know what you're going to say. I know you've been wetting your pants thinking about her since middle school," Neal laid it bare. "Give it up, dude. She babysat you, remember?"
"Aww, come on, she must say something about me," Ryan half joked.
"I believe her words were 'pint-sized freak'."
The grinding banshee squeal of school bus brakes could be heard around the corner. The conversation would be postponed for the lunch room.
------------------
When Neal arrived home from school that afternoon, he found his mom cross-legged on the floor and staring at the TV, as the old Simon and Garfunkel tune "The Boxer" played on the stereo. It was the same video from last night playing, complete with Smurf underwear and the cape of the Dark Knight.
All lies and jest... still a man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest...
"Hi, Mom," Neal said, startling Deborah for a second.
"Oh hi, Neal," she said, clearing her throat, "I was just testing this thing out again. The features, you know." She scrambled to get up and shut off the player. Neal could see the indentation in the carpet where she'd been sitting, apparently for some time.
"Can't get enough of that Batman cape, can you?"
"Oh, well, it was just so cute. Still is," Deborah said, dusting herself off. "Come on now, being little was fun, right?"
"I guess," Neal said.
"You're no fun now," Deborah said, making a mock frown.
Neal shrugged and plodded upstairs, sighing in his mind. Maybe he wasn't fun anymore. Maybe he needed a little levity. He flung his backpack onto the bed like a discus thrower and plopped down in front of his computer. No email again. None of his fellow buddy chatters online either. In between bursts of typing, he could hear his mom downstairs... or the video. Was she watching it again? He couldn't imagine what captivated her enough to bear repeated viewings.
Out of curiosity and nothing else to do, Neal ran a search for "Nostalgia Network" and "VideoHome" with predictable results. The first page returned, obviously the official homepage, read, "Slip and Slide Down Memory Lane, click here." He clicked the link to a bland corporate-looking website, filled with slogans and advertising but little of import. He returned to the search page and saw that only one other site, halfway down the page, looked to be related to the Nostalgia Network, though it had nothing but a URL and brief excerpt. He followed the link and found a crude homepage with a plain blue background and text, but no link to anything else.
The essay had no title and no author posted. He began reading what appeared to be a rambling dissertation about hypnotic suggestion, regression therapy, Lacanian psychoanalysis, and other schools of thought that Neal knew nothing of. He scrolled down and noticed the essay seemed to take on a more urgent tone, offering caveats to those who would take up any experiments. The final paragraph became even more insistent, talking about physical transformation theories and mentioning a company called VideoHome in connection. As the essay drew to a close, the sentences became terse and critical, reading, "Do not attempt any further inquiries. It is dangerous. Because it has a philosophy."
Later that night, Neal fell asleep to the same sounds: Greg and Deborah playing the DVDs ad infinitum and giggling peculiarly, like expectant parents. The thin walls upstairs also meant his sister's phone conversations came through quite audibly; tonight's discussions revolved around Catherine's lifelong dream of breast enhancement and a more symmetrical nose.
"I wish the job paid enough for a boob job," Catherine complained. "I know, I know, they're fine - bigger than Rachel Morris anyway - but I think it would fit better with my body type, don't ya think? My parents? No, they would never go for it, not any time this century. They don't want their baby getting bigger boobs..."
And so the night drew on until one o'clock in the morning. Neal had drifted into sleep, though his dreams were nothing if not disconcerting.
Friday
The next morning Neal woke up as usual and stumbled into the bathroom, reminding himself today was the last school day before winter break.
Ahhh... Running on auto-pilot, he started the warm water running and stripped off his pajamas. The shower did well to bring him close to full consciousness. The cold bathroom air finally managed to jar him from his sleep. He grabbed a towel and began drying himself off, and in the process, found that his pubic hair seemed thinner and his legs looked a bit barer than normal. Maybe it was just the light. But as he continued toweling off, he noticed some of the hair had actually fallen out. A normal enough occurrence, he guessed, but it left him with a fraction of what he'd had yesterday.
Is that normal? he wondered. He decided not to tell his mom; he didn't want a doctor appointment out of this.
Taking a brief look in the mirror, he saw that a few zits had cleared up as well.
Well, look on the bright side. A closer inspection confused him, though; the proud line of wispy hairs protruding above his lip had vanished. He blamed it on the remaining sleep in his eyes. Sometimes his blond sprouts were difficult to see under certain lights, being not the most manly whiskers in the world, and besides, a part of him was still in dreamland. Rationalizing it away, Neal brushed back his hair into his usual controlled mess. His clothes slid on easily and he was downstairs for breakfast in just ten minutes.
The family breakfast, probably an anomaly these days, played out as usual, with restrained emotions and a faux politeness that would rival the dinner scene in any Victorian novel, until Catherine dropped a little question.
"I called Brenda last night and she said Jeremy's having a party next Thursday night, and I really-" Catherine said, checking her hair in the glare of the plate.
"Don't you have that big foreign language final next Friday?" Deborah brought her daughter back down to reality.
"Could you pass the salt?" Greg asked. Neal reached over the table.
"Mom, you know I don't drink - even though I am old enough..."
"Not this argument again," Greg muttered, disinterested.
"Well, while we're on the subject of legal ages, what about-" Neal started.
Deborah wiped her mouth. "Honey, you're not driving to school alone."
"I've had six months of driving with other people, Mom," Neal snorted. "Everyone else in my class drives to school and I hate taking the bus. It smells like ass."
"Watch your language, son."
"It's not time yet, Neal. You know that. Driving is a privilege that comes with age and you just have to wait," Deborah continued. "You're in a hurry."
Catherine interrupted, "Well, you can't tell me whether or not I can go to a party."
"While we're shelling out for your college education, we can," Greg pointed out.
This carried on until it was time to head to school.
-------------
At the bus stop Ryan awaited, decked out like death as always.
"Still riding the bus, eh?"
"Mom still thinks I'm too inexperienced on the road," Neal said. "That's a bunch of bullshit. I rode around with the permit and took the test like everybody else..."
"I feel your pain," Ryan replied, doing an awful Clinton impersonation. "I'm supposed to take the test next month, but I'll probably fail."
"Parallel parking."
"What a bitch," Ryan said, thinking Neal had a strange air about him today. But he couldn't put his finger on it. "Did you get a haircut yesterday?"
---------------
In Mrs. Browning's earth science class, Neal began itching at his sides incessantly. The class tried dutifully to ignore him. But he couldn't shake a feeling of discomfort, not an entirely physical discomfort per se, but a nagging series of ideas. The name VideoHome circulated through his brainwaves and his intuition pulled at him like a warning voice. Droplets of sweat dripped from his temples, and he tried his best to hide his increasing nervousness.
Mrs. Browning proceeded unfazed. "The movement of platelets below the surface of the earth is what we mean when talk about tectonics. These shifts result in massive changes both under and above ground. They rest on top of one another and regularly shift and alter-"
Neal soldiered through the class, which took on a never-ending quality, and hurriedly darted toward the closest boy's bathroom. He studied his reflection, thinking about the website all along, and wondering if what worried him was possible. Any certified physician would label him delusional or maybe paranoid, but the coincidences seemed to be mounting-too many coincidences. In his mind, the story started to unfold and it made a perverted kind of sense. As he scrutinized the contours of his fresh-looking face, he considered the implications.
As Neal exited the bathroom, he caught a glimpse of a Ryan, backed into a lonely corner of the science wing by three seniors of the athletic persuasion. He could see Ryan attempting to play it cool and fit the bill, but clearly, losing the battle.
"Look, lay off, all right?" Ryan said, gesticulating like a man under pressure.
"Oh, it's cool," one of them said, as they eased in closer.
"You want to run out the backdoor, chickenshit?" the dumbest of the bunch added, sending a solid punch into Ryan's gut. Doubling over, Ryan coughed and wheezed like the smoker that he was. The other boys towered over him, calling him the usual laundry list of unimaginative insults.
"Want to run home to your mommy, huh? Or you want to be bad? You think you're fooling anybody with that jacket, man?" Another fist landed square on his side.
"Stop it," Ryan said, finally standing back up. "Just stop it." The thugs cornering him seemed to grow larger all the sudden. One of them stepped back.
"Stop it," he repeated uselessly. As Neal approached the fight, he saw tears welling up in Ryan's eyes and a confused look on one of the jock's faces. They exchanged odd glances as their victim seemed to shrink before them. A thin line of pee drew itself down Ryan's pants, which were growing creased and bunched at the bottom.
"Little baby, you all right?" one of them piped up, laughing awkwardly.
"Leave him alone," Neal said from behind them. They turned and grinned at him. Ryan wiped the salty tears from his face and grabbed his sagging pants. "I don't know what you're doing. Just leave him alone," Neal stated as confidently as he could.
"Maybe you two belong in middle school. Your little friend looks like an eighth-grader, dude," the largest one replied. "Girls don't dig eighth-graders."
The bell rang. Students began filing back into their respective rooms. The jocks decided to give up what appeared to be a won battle, but not without slamming Neal's head into a locker on the way out. "Chickenshit."
Neal approached his friend and put his hand on his shoulder. Ryan looked up with a tense red face and Neal couldn't believe his eyes. Ryan couldn't be any older than thirteen; his clothes had outgrown him and his face was rounder, with younger eyes.
"What happened?" Neal asked.
Ryan tugged himself away. "Get away from me, man. You just stood there," he said, his voice cracking. "Screw you."
Soon, a teacher came rushing down the hall and instructed Neal to return to class. She would take care of Ryan.
--------------
Later that night, Catherine climbed the stairs looking drained and put-out after a "long" day at class, and discovered Neal waiting for her at the top step.
"Neal?"
"I need to talk to you. This is important." he asked.
"Um, sure. What is it?"
"This might sound insane, but-"
"OK." She already appeared miffed.
"You know the old videos Mom and Dad have been watching?"
"Yes."
"Well, I have this feeling, and I've been noticing some changes."
"Changes? Like what?"
"I feel like... Mom and Dad want us to be younger," Neal said, meandering up to his point.
"They just enjoy reminiscing," Catherine sighed.
"But I think it's started happening."
"What's started happening?"
"Us. Getting younger. It happened to Ryan today at school. I swear."
"You think you're getting younger? Neal, have you been smoking something? And if so, how potent is it? I want a pack," Catherine chortled.
"Have you noticed Mom and Dad lately? I mean, really looked at them? They look younger too. I think that video is making it happen. They want things to be like they used to be," Neal explained, realizing how futile talking to Catherine was.
"That's just stupid. I'm going to bed."
"Look at me."
"What about you?"
"My hair."
"Nothing's changed, dufus."
"The hair above my lip and on my chin. I had-"
Catherine smirked then broke into laughter. "Neal, you don't have facial hair yet. Get over it. It'll come someday. I'm hitting the hay," she said, nudging her way past him and heading into her room.
The rest of the night, Neal stayed up comparing school yearbook photos to his appearance. He changed into his plaid PJs, which hung rather loosely around his waist, and deliberated. His legs were bereft of hair and his groin had only one small patch. All seemed softer, lighter, less and less like a full-fledged teenager. No drastic changes took place, but minor variations were slowly gathering-narrowing shoulders, softer skin tone, clearer complexion, shortening sideburns.
Unbeknownst to Neal, Catherine, tired but unnerved by Neal's little theory, stood topless in her room, sizing up her breasts. She heaved them up, examined their silhouette, and massaged them back and forth. Her flowing strawberry-blonde hair framed them perfectly, flowing over her shoulders and to each side in streams. She had noticed that her battle to fit into her Levi's tight-fitting jeans hadn't been so difficult that morning; of course, she assumed her new weight loss shakes were the reason. Catherine had fought an uphill battle for her figure and if she detested anything, it was the idea of losing what she had.
Still, nothing to lose sleep over, she thought, and slipped into her silk nightie.
But both of them heard the TV in the living room beneath them. And the same chill ran up their spines.
Neal tried to force sleep but rest wouldn't come. The late night home movie marathon continued downstairs. He looked at the clock: 3:21 AM. Ripping the covers off, he marched downstairs and confronted his mom and dad.
"Well, Neal. Why are you up so late?" Greg said.
"You have to stop this. What are you doing?" Neal cried, already on the verge of tears.
"I'm sorry, honey. Are we keeping you up?" Deborah asked, half apologetically.
"You don't understand! That video is affecting me, Mom. My voice - can't you tell?"
"Baby, I don't hear any difference. I don't know what you're going on about. You're perfectly normal for a boy your age," Deborah said, with one hand around Greg. "You get things started in your head and-"
Neal grabbed his mother's arm like a wronged policeman. "Mom, my voice is changing and my body is-"
"Of course, it's changing, Neal. You're going through puberty and these things happen."
"You're not listening to me. The video. It's doing something. And you guys are watching it way too often. Doesn't anything seem different to you? How old am I?" Neal insisted, pacing around the Futon.
"Well, now you're just being silly, Neal. Everything is the same as it was yesterday. You look just like a normal, healthy, growing thirteen-year-old boy."
Neal's eyes widened.
But that's not possible.
With that, he ran frantically up to his room. This couldn't be right. Maybe he was the victim of a prank, a hoax for some reality TV show yet to be aired. But his body-that couldn't be faked. He rushed back into the bathroom, flipped the lights to their brightest setting, and stared into the mirror. Closer, closer... No paranoia could be this realistic. Closer... No matter what angle he tried, a thirteen-year-old stared back at him. He ran his hands over his face, his nose, his ears. He stripped his shirt off and raised his arm-a few curls of hair remained, hardly the bushy tuft he'd grown used to over the last year. And all over, he felt a surge and the awareness that something inside was, indeed, shifting.
Saturday
The sun finally struggled up and Catherine showered, gathered her books, and made for LCC. British Literature moved like a drugged tortoise, but she made it out with a pulse. On her way to her second Saturday class, Film Literature 201, Catherine mulled over her brother's words as she decided to take a small detour and head for the nearest women's bathroom. She considered holding it, but her panties needed adjusting after the two hour lecture on
Jane Eyre and Film Lit. was no place for prolonged fine-tuning of underwear. Inside, she took the closest stall to the door and relieved herself, all the while itching at her blouse. As a precautionary measure, she dipped her head below the stall door and saw that the bathroom was vacant except for her. Feeling refreshed but still uncomfortable, she unbuttoned the blouse and resituated her bra, noticing a tiny mole on her left breast had disappeared. She'd only had it a few months, but all the same, she was glad to see it go.
The bathroom door opened, and Catherine could hear two girls step inside wearing heels.
"Jeremy
knows I'm coming on to him, right?" one said.
"He'd have to be a gold-plated idiot not to," the other replied.
"Ever since freshmen class, I've been butting up against
her. He says they broke up a year ago, but I don't buy it. She's always in the background, that little bitch..."
Catherine leaned over far enough to peer through a crack; she made out a gray halter top and black high heels. She held her tongue and pulled her feet up onto the toilet seat. Rachel Morris, the queen of on again/off again relationships, was bashing none other than...
"Catherine Postley," Rachel sniffed, "what a hanger-on."
Catherine's blood sizzled behind the stall door.
"Well, she won't be at Thursday's party anyway... I heard Mommy and Daddy won't let her go if there's alcohol," Rachel chuckled out loud. "Maybe while she's at home playing Twister, me and Jeremy can..." Laughter followed.
Catherine bottled her anger until the two gossips departed. The thought of Jeremy being wooed by that snake charmer sent an eruption through her veins, climaxing in an image of Rachel and Jeremy romping under the sheets.
Film Literature hardly served to distract her from Little Miss Rachel's comments, but, out of fear of failing another class, Catherine occasionally tuned into the speaking professor before her. Though she hadn't done her homework and had hardly an inkling of what Professor Hutchens rambled on about, she tried to pry her eyes open.
"Now, last week's film viewing - I hope everyone took time to watch it - gives us a great example of non-linear filmmaking.
Last Year at Marienbad, directed by Alain Resnais, is a film, among other things, about memory. The memories of the characters shift and alter the drama itself, changing the structure..." Professor Hutchens explained to the class, "so that nothing our narrator says is, in fact, reliable..."
Catherine noticed a rash-like feeling growing on her chest, prompting her to scratch rather violently. It was unlikely she caught even a third of the lecture. Everything but her body existed somewhere else at the moment; her mind wandered, skipping from thought to thought like a jumpy insect, disconnected and worried. Her watch band kept loosening and causing the watch to slip to the underside of her wrist. The itchiness spread to other regions of her body, giving her the unsettling notion that something was afflicting her, though she had no real reason to think so. All appeared nominal.
"... What this film does is fracture the normal flow of narrative storytelling, as we're accustomed to it. It plays with the formula, jumping back and forth between the present and the perceived past, and because of that, reality and unreality."
Catherine could only shut her eyes and wait for the end of class.
Eternity, she thought.
---------------
"But Mom," Ryan pleaded.
"Of course, you can't go out and play. And no phoning your friends either. You're acting up lately and I won't have anymore of it," his mother scolded, beet red and at her wits' end.
"I'm not in the fourth grade and I'm
not ten years old," Ryan exclaimed, nearly out of breath. The ends of his jeans were dragging along the ground and his voice had returned to its pre-adolescent tenor. He attempted to run toward the living room and tear his way through the stack of DVDs above the TV, but his mother had already planned for such a contingency.
"It's not there, Ryan," she said with an ominous calm.
"Where is it? Where is it?"
"You need not concern yourself with it. It's Mommy's video and she doesn't appreciate you trying to steal it."
Ryan dropped his hands in defeat.
"Now, you get over this or I'll have to take you to Dr. Morgan on Monday, all right?" Mom explained, as she guided him back into the den. "You caused enough trouble at school today." She pointed to the door. "No going out tonight. We're going to spend some quality time together."
--------------
By that afternoon, Neal was beside himself. What to do? He couldn't fathom why his parents would play such a cruel joke on him, but all the same, the changes were not imaginary - he knew himself, after all - and yet no one else recognized it. Instinctively, he reached for the phone and dialed the one person who wouldn't lie.
"Hello?"
"Ryan?"
"I don't want to talk to you right now."
"Please," Neal said, his voice cracking as well.
"You sound different."
"So do you. What's happening?" Neal couldn't believe the child's voice on the other end was his best friend.
Ryan cupped his hand over the phone. "Mom is acting really strange and... and I think-shit, this is so weird-I'm getting younger..."
"It's happening to me too. My mom thinks I'm thirteen and I don't know what to do-"
"This is honestly freaking me out," Ryan echoed the sentiment. "Those videos, the ones from the Nostalgia place-she's watching them almost nonstop. Over and over again. I think that has something to do with it."
"It must be. They're imagining us as little kids."
Ryan gulped. "I can't believe this. Why?"
Neal heard the door slam and the unmistakable thud of Catherine's bookbag, followed by creaking stairs, then a loud knock at his door.
"Come in," Neal shouted then returned to the phone, saying, "Ryan, I'll call you back later, OK?"
Catherine barged in, looking stressed. Her blouse hung halfway ajar and she looked as if she'd just run an Olympic track event.
"I believe you," she said, mouth agape. "You were right." She put her head in her hands.
Neal could see her face, a younger face, through her pale fingers. He didn't know what had finally convinced her, but it was clear she knew she wasn't twenty-one years old anymore.
"Catherine?"
She finally dropped her hands and Neal saw the freckled spots on her cheeks and across her nose, the same cherry freckles that dotted her face until her senior year of high school, after which time they had steadily faded.
Catherine gasped. "Oh my god, Ryan. You look so young!"
"It's happening to Ryan too," Neal said, as if it might help.
"Why can't Mom and Dad see it?" Catherine pouted. Neal caught sight of her half-opened blouse and the edge of her bra cups, which needed adjusting.
"I think they can't see it because they want it to happen. They're willing it. We can see because we don't want to be any younger..." Neal hypothesized, sounding more like a philosopher than he expected.
"Will it stop? How young will we get??"
"I don't know. The oldest video Mom and Dad have is from 1991. You were, um, eleven and I was," he paused when he realized what he was saying, "six."
"Oh my god," Catherine sobbed uncontrollably. "I don't want to be eleven!"
"I have some ideas," Neal began. "We could just steal the DVDs and break them in two, but I'm not sure that would get us back to normal. We might end up stuck this way. Or..."
The seventeen-year-old Catherine kept sniveling. Her makeup had turned kabuki on her, sending little black streaks of eyeliner down her rosy cheeks.
"...Or we could try to reverse it."
"Can we? Please say we can," she begged.
"Well, we still have some recent home videos, you know, from this year. The swim party at Bridgewater. We could take them to the VideoHome and have them made into DVDs," Neal proposed.
"What would that do?"
"Well, maybe it's possible we could watch them and become nostalgic for the future."
"Nostalgic for the future?" Catherine was confused.
"Not the future really, but just the way things are normally. Mom and Dad have always been nostalgic for the past, as long as I can remember, but these videos are somehow enabling their wishes to come true."
"Do you think it'll work?"
"It's the only thing I can think of," Neal admitted, as he sat, an anxious twelve-year-old on the edge of his bed. "Go check the cabinet above the big screen downstairs; the swim party video should be there..."
"OK." Catherine hurried down to check. The videos were, by in large, orderly, but the tape she needed lay unlabeled under a massive stack of older videos. By process of elimination, she found it to be the only possibility. Like a relay runner carrying a baton, she handled it with care, thinking it may be her only chance to escape certain pre-pubescence and a reunion with elementary school.
They inserted the video and pressed play. It began in the middle of the tape. On it were scenes of the whole family-Catherine donning a scant bikini and a smile, Neal cannonballing into the deep end, and Greg and Deborah taking turns holding the camera. "Hey, jump in, Mom!" The camera zeroed in on Neal now wading in the shallow end as he showed off his biceps and postured like a carnival muscle man.
Neal watched himself, just months ago, and then saw his new reflection in the glass of the TV screen. "This has to work," he whispered to himself. Things would only go downhill otherwise. His erratic adolescent vocal chords had already given way to a mostly girlish voice and clearly, the rest of his body would soon follow suit.
Just then, they heard laughing from downstairs, a playful, jovial laughing. Curious but full of newfound dread, they ejected the tape and snuck downstairs, gently avoiding the squeaking stairs and opened the door delicately like two undercover spies. Greg and Deborah were sipping wine from each other's glasses, both looking vivacious and positively younger, Neal guessed somewhere in their mid-thirties.
"Hey, look at them," Catherine said.
"They like being young, and that's exactly the problem," Neal observed.
"Hurry up then, let's get our movie to the mall," Catherine urged.
Reading the clock on the far kitchen wall, Neal sighed, "Too late. The mall closes at six tonight on weekend nights. We'll have to wait until tomorrow."
Neal didn't expect to sleep through the night. With every hour came new fears that this odd nightmare wasn't ending. Through his pillow, he heard his parents' discussions, though sometimes muffled, and strained to make out their words. He made out a few allusions to himself; Deborah wondered whether he should see a pediatrician and Greg suggested a psychologist might be better suited to deal with Neal's issues. Neal lay wide awake, hoping he was asleep, but knowing he wasn't. The Siberian Oak outside his window cast wicked gothic shadows on his walls and it only intensified the unreality of his situation. Finally, he closed his eyes.