The door slams shut before the young woman can finish her sentence, her tiny figure quickly running past with her arms outstretched in front of her as if merely touching my car had left the gloves coated in whatever I was infected with.
"Thanks..." I croak, rolling my eyes as I undo my seat belt and spin around to look into the back seat. My bones creak and joints pop as I slump halfway between the two sections of my old sedan, a low groan escaping my lips as I ease down onto my elbow before grabbing the package.
Thankfully, testing for the Gender-Flu was remarkably simple. Pulling the two boxes out I grab the slender plastic trays from within, one for the disease itself and another for variants, before fishing around in the boxes for the 'mixing' tube. Hacking up a cough I spit into one of the tube, my dry and foul tasting mouth struggling to make the same deposit into the second without another round of chest rattling coughs. Capping each I shake them weakly, my wrist crackling and cracking painfully as I try to mix the tubes properly.
With a thankful sigh I pour each tube into the collection section of the tray, the lack of a dropper of any other fiddly attachment making me relieved as I clamber into the back seat to have a lay down. Shivering and shaking I slowly move to read the results, my heart skipping a beat as I read the test aloud.
"Regression... positive..." I wheeze painfully, my ribs cracking and my lungs popping like bubble wrap as I exhale deeply. My groggy mind reels at the thought, the whole thing being a struggle to piece together through the haze in my head.
My skin crawls as I worm my way back into the drivers seat, a pool of sweat being left in the back seat where my arm lay. As my head flops back into the headrest a splattering of sweat coated hair slaps against my forehead, the strands already seemingly slightly longer.
"FuUu..." I begin to groan, the sound my voice pitching up and breaking as though I was undergoing puberty causing me to slam my mouth shut. Despite it all I can't muster to strength to be angry, the almost painful draining sensation wracking my body leaving me lingering in a constant malaise.
Slowly inching out of the parking lot I pull out into the old winding cobblestone streets of Atherton. Far from my former home in the city, I had move out to live with my retired parents after the cost of paying for my own apartment became too much to bear for my dwindling savings.
However, gone was the old family home less than an hour from the city. The old house had been sold years ago, mostly in response to my moving, so that my parents could live out their dreams of enjoying the quiet and twee life in the country.
Atherton had been a great fit for that, an isolated little island of rolling green hills and a quaint historic town center with the looming sight of the old stone lighthouse in the distance. They weren't living in any of those old houses of course, the seachangers largely living further out in new and far more modern builds out in hills and fields overlooking the cliffs around the tall end of the island.
Thankfully, I had been given my own little space. While little more than a studio apartment, the shed turned art studio and now turned micro home suited me just fine given it was free for the time being.
"Hey mom..." I croak, coughing into the phone mounted to my dash as I try my best to use speech-to-text. "I... uh..." I continue with a pained wheeze, slowing my car as I weave down the rain drenched cobblestones around the Atherton town center.
With each bump and jump in the vehicle I feel my bones creak ominously, my muscles loosening and withering as they feel as though they're growing slack inside of me. As I reach the edge of the town the road quickly turns to fresh asphalt, my foot pressing on the accelerator as I race up the sloping hills and towards my parent's home.
"I got tested, and it's... fuck... I got Gender-Flu" I blurt out, swallowing head as I reach up to swipe the sweat from my forehead. "It's also the Regression..." I try to state, a wracking cough ripping through me as I brace myself against the steering wheel.
Pausing for a second I send the message, inhaling deeply over and over as I try to catch my breath from not only my coughing fit but from merely speaking for that brief period. Before long the old stone houses around the town grow sparser and more spread out, the plots of land giving way to fields and old farmhouses with the occasional modern house standing out like a sore thumb.
"I'm going to be in the guest..." I wheeze, sending another message as I struggle to focus on the road and form a coherent sentence through my terrible fever. "I have food and stuff, just don't... it's really contagious and I..." I blabber, the words I'm looking for eluding me as I try to speak.
"Just... I'll be fine... going to sleep it off..."
Shivering and sweating into my seat I soon find myself pulling up to the development my parents had bought into, my mom and step-dad having purchased the rather nice multi-story home off the plan like many of the other retirees around this end of the island. The houses all look somewhat similar, though thanks to their spread out nature and the rolling hills it's difficult to compare more than two or three at a time.
The wooden white facade is already painted with a thin layer of lichen, the fake stones around the base turning a mossy green thanks to the constant sea spray from the nearby cliffs. The lights are on inside, figures shifting upstairs through large arched windows and behind pale egg-shell curtains.
For a moment I think I can make out my mother, the short and flabby dark-haired woman waddling her way around the bedroom as she puts away laundry. Her massive child-bearing hips rock from side to side as she shuffles between the bed and the closet, the silhouette of her massive fatty rear being blown up and illuminated against the curtains.
David seems to be taking another load of laundry out towards the washing machine, the tall and slightly tan man holding the basket in his firm well-built arms as it presses against his slight paunchy beer belly. He had been a rather fit and active man while I was growing up, though since slowing down in his retirement he had grown somewhat softer around the edges.
Driving past the house I slowly pull out outside of the converted shed, the same white cladding on the house encasing the short squat structure with the same stark white exterior speckled with pale green lichen. I pull the car up as close as I can to the door, both in the hopes of shortening my walk inside but also in the hopes it would keep people from coming by.
Bracing myself I turn off the engine, exhaling deeply before taking in a deep breath and lurching out of the car. Immediately I'm hit with a freezing burst of sea air, the frigid winds chilling my to my fragile bones and stinging my sensitive skin wherever it can make contact.
I stagger through the muddy driveway, my boots growing stuck in the slop with each step as I heave myself up to the door. A shrill hiss escapes my lips as I grip the door handle, my hand burning against the freezing metal before I can even turn it.
With one last huff I force the door open, lurching inside the dark room before slamming the door behind me with my back against it. With a sigh of relief I slowly slide down with my back against the wooden door, my body dropping onto the hardwood floor as I catch my breath.
The image of the test in the back of my car and the sight of my mother upstairs makes my skin crawl, my breath catching in my chest as I slowly try to crawl to my feet.
"This is so... fucking wrong..." I cough, my mind reeling as I try to comprehend what was about to happen or even what I might look like once all was said and done.
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