Chapter 5: Chapter 5

Those short ten minutes standing in front of the school were some of the longest in my life. I gritted my teeth against the bitter cold, even as I wanted to open my mouth to pant. My heart rate felt insanely high, my fever was burning hot...

But the internal fear, the absolute terror I felt, that was the real demon. 

I was becoming an animal.

Douglas had his hand on my shoulder, gripping firmly. It did nothing to reassure me. He had been trying to calm me down a bit - and it had worked to some degree. I felt another pop and crack from my tailbone. Calming down wasn't halting the mutation. Not in the slightest. The situation was only made worse that I could feel through it. It felt sore, and cramped.

"Just hold on man," Douglas said quietly, his breath fogging up in the air. 

I searched the road for any sign of my mom. The snow was falling down more heavy now. I hadn't changed into my normal pants, so only stood there in my coat and thin sport shorts. I felt so... so cold. So wet and cold, yet burning hot... so... so alone.

It had taken all my willpower to steady my voice when I'd called Mom. I'd lied, saying that I was feeling my sickness resurface, and that my stomach had been hurting really bad. Douglas was not happy. I knew he was going to try to interject as soon as she rolled up. I needed to stop this delaying this. It was going to be the most bizarre thing I'd ever had to talk about - but the alternative was becoming worse and worse.

I tried to tell myself that it was going to be alright. I was going to have some doctor figure out what was wrong, and then I was going to be back at school the next day. But I didn't know that. Even if I was able to get fixed, all my friends were going to look at me different for a long time, wondering what the heck had been going on with me. Jackie had likely already decided before all this happened that she didn't want to date me. The other guys in gym probably thought I'd had a horrible embarrassing bathroom episode. In all directions, it felt like my life was decaying.

At last my mom's sedan pulled into the parking lot.

"Thanks for waiting out here with me," I said to Douglas with a tired, nearly frozen voice.

"We could've waited inside."

"No," I shivered, "I... I couldn't let... anyone see me."

I adjusted my mask as the car rolled up... and my pants. 

Douglas stepped forward to say something, but I was too quick. I got into the car and made a show of waving goodbye to him, and immediately after getting the door closed, Mom had already set the car to start moving. I exhaled, not sure if relief was what I should be feeling at the moment.

"How are you holding up?" she smiled weakly, turning her chair towards me.

"C-cold. And... and a bad fever."

"A fever too?"

"Yes."

"What's been going on with your stomach?"

"I... I dunno. Just feels unsettled."

"Do you feel like you're going to throw up?"

I shook my head. "No... I... I feel fine right now."

Mom glanced out the windshield, watching as the snow flew past us in big heavy flakes.

"You don't look like you're in the best shape right now Matt."

"I... I don't feel in the best shape either."

"Maybe we should stop at the pharmacy and I can get you some medication?"

"No...," I groaned. "I... I just want to get home, take some Ibuprofen or something, and lie down."

"Okay," Mom said with a reluctant look.

I leaned against the car door like I hadn't slept in weeks. I felt so drained... and I felt pain all over me... I shifted in my seat.

"Ow!"

Mom's eyes snapped wide. "What is it?"

"Oww... uhh... my... my stomach."

I had accidentally put my full weight on that thing down there, and it had hurt badly.

"Are you sure you don't want to stop at the pharmacy?" Mom asked, more worried now.

"I'm... I'm fi - oww!"

I felt a really bad crack in my spine. Oh gosh I wanted it to stop!

Mom quickly tapped the car's display, and we pulled over to the side of the road.

"Okay," Mom said, "just open the door and puke."

"I don't... I don't need to puke Mom."

"You're having really bad stomach pains. Your body is probably trying to get something out, maybe just try to puke and see if that helps?"

The pain down there continued. It was getting longer. I wasn't sure if I could so much as turn around towards the door without it popping out.

I spasmed from another sting of pain. 

And my mom must've thought I was about to puke.

She pulled off the mask.

She was breathless for a moment, her hands in the air, shaking. I felt paralyzed.

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"...aaaahhah... oh no... oh no...."

Mom pressed her fingers against her forehead, her breathing becoming intense. I could barely move, her reaction only making me feel more tense in turn.

"No Matt... oh God, why did this have to happen?"

She put her face in her hands, and I felt hot tears begin to flow down my face. Every gene within me that wanted to avoid embarrassment eroded away. All of that was gone.

"Mom...," I sobbed... "Mom what the hell is happening to me?"

She kept her face in her hands.

"Oh gosh I knew something was going wrong," she said into her hands, her voice muffled. "I should've known that the second he didn't come home."

My dad hadn't been at home that morning - and I'd just assumed that he'd left for work early. 

Mom slowly sat up, wiping away her tears. She sobbed, catching sight of my face and my deformed nose, then darting her attention to the car's display, ordering it to get back on the road. She sniffled slightly, then slowly made eye contact with me, her gaze wavering.

"Matt... when... when did all this start?"

"It... like... Friday... I think?"

She was quiet for a moment, trying to steady her breathing.

"How bad is your pain right now?"

"I... I'm not feeling as bad right at this exact moment..."

"What hurts?"

"... I... my... my tailbone."

Her eyes became watery again. "How... how bad?"

I squeezed my eyes tight. "Please... please promise you won't freak out."

"Oh gosh," she wheezed putting her hands up against her face for a moment.

I gritted my teeth and reached into my shorts... and I pulled it out.

I kept my eyes shut tight. I heard nothing from my mom. Then I felt her touch it. 

"Oh... oh Matt."

She hugged me tightly. And I hugged tightly to her. For a moment, the feeling of her holding me was the only conscious thought in my mind... but the real world slowly intruded again. I felt the road rumbling beneath us. I smelled... everything. And then... I felt some awareness that the thing down there didn't hurt as badly anymore.

Mom let go of me, her arms quivering uncontrollably. She slowly turned to face the road in front of us, the sight mostly obscured with the blizzard around us. She did not look back to me.

"Matt...," she said with a deep breath. "Many... many years ago, when you were about a year old..."

She tensed up again, more tears coming.

"When you were a baby...," she began again, "you... you like many other children around the time... fell victim to a new variety of cancer. Deaths were rare early on... but the date rates only got higher and higher as time passed. You... you were predicted to be dead by the time you were three."

I folded my arms, scrunching myself inward as I felt more and more unnerved.

"Dad's company had a cancer treatment," she said, "that they adapted for use on your specific version of cancer. It... it wasn't tested as well as it could have been. Especially since Dad... he was unable to sleep at night. He was unable to wait for the extensive field testing to be done. So he, like other people at Generation... used their own children first."

Mom absently tightened her hand around the car's manual controls. I could see tears pooling in her eyes, which she kept blinking away.

"It worked," she said, "and the cancer subsided. There was further testing with all of the kids in this area with the cancer, and then it was gradually rolled out to the world."

"This... this cancer treatment," I asked. "It... it's doing this to me?"

My mom was silent for a long time. The sound of her lack of a response felt almost painful to my eardrums.

"Mom," I said more loudly, unable to stand the silence, "what is going on?"

She sobbed. "The original mass-market treatment... it was ineffective... but a new alteration being tested in the lab... they observed that when exposed to the cancer, for some reason... dogs showed resistance to it. But they couldn't figure out what specifically resisted the cancer. They... transferred a lot of genes..."

I found myself starting to cry. "Mom... am I ... am I..."

I broke down into crying and couldn't finish. She hugged me again.

"I don't know what's going to happen sweetie. I don't know if they're going to be able to fix it, or if it.... or something else. But I want you to know how much I love you. And Dad, even though he and others made a foolish decision, he did it because he loved you. Because he wanted to save you. And I know that now, he's going to do everything he can to help you again."

I noticed the map on the car's display. We were definitely not driving towards home. The destination was Dad's work.

"It's the only place I know that can help," Mom said with a strained inhale. "... and with this going on... I don't want you to be visible to all the people out in the world."

Another crying fit came over her, and I could tell she was trying to stifle it. I just felt too stunned and hot from my fever to do anything anymore. I felt my consciousness waver, as though I was about to pass out. But I didn't. I just hung there, in some strange nightmarish state where the world around me didn't feel tactile and real.

But it was real. I knew this wasn't the worst dream I'd ever had, but reality. I could feel that awful growth from my spine. I could smell the salt from our tears. I could see my mother crying.

I could sense my life ending around me.

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