"Six months!?" I couldn't resist shouting it back at him. It's true, that was a long time, but I took some solace in that it was so much shorter than a lifetime. "Any sooner would be a serious risk. I'm not even going -- frankly, I won't guarantee that I will proceed with the procedure, but in six months we can consider it." His words dialed back my hope a bit, but I was going to do it anyway, even if he wouldn't let me. There was no way I was spending the rest of my life as my mother. At least that's how I felt at the moment.
"Whether we can proceed in the future will depend on how well your body performs neurogensis, the act of regenerating neurons in the brain. It's... unfortunate, but... you are -- that is... you are past the age now where any guarantee if that is possible. Your mother, she is only 16 now, so her new body will recover guaranteed. She could likely partake in only three months. Ah... I'm sorry, but at the age of 41, you're -- well, time will tell." Up until that point, Larry had done a good job dancing around the fact that my mother was now the owner of my 16 year old body. "Heh, so once again my mother's body screws me over. How likely is it that my brain will heal or... whatever?"
"I would say... there's about a 40% chance you will be able to participate in this again." The facts were hard to swallow. "4-4-40%...? So it's more likely I won't?" I stammered to say. "Yes, in truth, I think it would be best -- would be much safer and healthier, yes, to..." He stopped what he was saying and plopped my mother's purse on the small metal bench between us, then pulled out her ID and slipped it towards me. "...that you think of this as you. I cringed as I looked at the ID, with the younger picture of my mother on it -- somehow I found myself wishing I could at least have her 7 year dated younger body.
('Cathy Geneway, born 1979, april 2nd. 5'9, brown eyes...') I read it allowed in my head, leaving my inner voice, in all it's masculinity to do the speaking of this female identity I had undertaken. Looking at it, a simple piece of plastic, it somehow made me unbelievably nervous. I felt like it wanted me to pick it up. I had her body, but picking it up, I felt like... I would be taking my mother's identity too. I ended up staring at it, nerves wrecking havoc on this body. Looking to avoid my eyes from it, I moved my head to the side, catching only more of my mother's visage in the mirror he had pointed at me. The moment my mother's eyes looked at me, her quirky face now held a quirky smile. There was my mother -- there was me, and what was she/I doing? Running her fingers through her hair, twirling it, playing with it. It felt nice, that's what I wanted the reason to be for why I was doing it, but the fact was, I was doing it because it was my mother's habit -- one she always did when she was nervous, annoyed or otherwise. I had been doing it for nearly five minutes without even realizing, I was so focused on Larry's explanations to fight any of her muscle memory.
('I really can't, I really can't tell the difference between me and her.') I thought as I looked at my reflection. Even the way I was awkwardly smiling, as I found myself still in this perfect balance between a complete mental breakdown, and the idea that this was all just too much to be real -- that I couldn't take it seriously. So I just shook my head and smiled. I smiled just like her, just as she spoke, I was favoring the left side of her mouth. ('No one could ever tell that I'm not her. I move like her, talk like her, for all I know I'm acting like her too!') I threw my mind for a loop and swung it back to the Id, which I touched with my two fingers, hesitating, but slowly slipping it to the edge of the surface, where my thumb met it. I picked it up.
A strange calm wafted over my body, like a nova, after it, came an unnerving chill. The end result was weird, it almost felt unnatural, but I found myself standing to feet, grabbing the purse and tucking the ID back inside. "You're right, I'm Cathy Geneway, 41 year old mother of 4. Forget the whole switching again thing." I told him with a laugh. ('What am I saying?') I thought as I made my way closer to the mirror. "To be honest, you're right, I'm pretty enough. I should be excited. I am, I'm looking forward to being Cathy." I continued to speak in a way I didn't understand, while I leaned into the mirror, exposing my cleavage to myself, before straightening myself out, running my hands up my neck, along the new shape of my face and through my hair. "I can't thank you enough, I'm loving this body~"
('What am I saying...?') It felt like my head was on backwards, like nothing that was happening was real. I didn't know how to describe it, but it was like I was on the edge of losing it...