Haunted Mirror Ch. 04

But rather than come up to Vivian, like she had expected, he started making small talk with Olivia, practically ignoring Vivian. Olivia smiled and tried to be polite, but it was obvious she was giving nothing to the conversation. Yet, even as he pretended to ignore her, out of the corner of her eye Vivian could clearly see him taking regular glances her way. In a minute, it was her turn to put up with him.

"Hey, Viv!" he said, and smiled in a seemingly practiced way.

When she didn't respond, he waved his hand and repeated himself. Vivian pulled out one of her earbuds and pretended to notice him for the first time.

"Oh, hey, Jaden! Sorry, kind of in the zone here," she panted. That wasn't a lie, either.

"I saw your new photoshoot. Not bad. With that weird little turtle statue? Interesting. I left you a comment on your Intagram."

"Oh? I've been really busy to day. I must not have seen it!" That was a total lie.

"So, you beating any PR's on that thing? You look like you're tearing it up." Vivian had learned that 'PR' meant personal record, which she had already explained to him she didn't really keep track of.

"No, just maintaining today. You?" At once, she realized her poor choice of words, even before Jaden had a chance to answer her.

"Going to hit up the deadlifts today. Current PR's a little shy of three-hundo. I think I can get it today."

"Sweet! Good luck!"

"Wanna join me in a bit? I'm going to hit up some shoulders after that. Hey, I'll tell you what will really make you look extra hot in those photoshoots with those sleeveless tops: if you build up some shoulder definition. I'll get you there! Promise. I could use a workout buddy anyway..."

"Oh, hey, I've got an interval coming up! Sorry, can't talk for a minute, but good luck on your deadlifts!"

Vivian put her earbud back in and started sprinting as hard as she could. The first fifteen seconds passed easily enough, but after another fifteen, the seconds weren't passing quickly enough, and Jaden was still watching. She turned the resistance down a few clicks so she could keep it up, but that only helped a little. After forty-five, she felt like she was about to die. It wasn't until well after the one-minute mark that he finally seemed to get the hint and wandered over to the weight section. Vivian slowed down and panted for air so hard her trachea began to hurt.

"God, finally!"

"Wow, you REALLY didn't want to talk to him. I mean, that's some serious dedication. You look... not good. You're not going to keel over, are you?" Olivia was a bit out of breath as well. Apparently, she had sprinted along with Vivian to back up her cover story.

...

Once their workout was done, and Vivian was in the shower, Abigail spoke to her once again.

"Well, it looks like you're already famous! Congratulations! How will you ever deal with all your adoring fans?"

"Ech. He's... a little different. Most guys aren't like him."

"I'll say! He's strapping! And he was all about you! If you're looking for a man to provide for your needs... financial or otherwise, I think he's found you!"

"Seriously? I was getting some legit douche vibes from him. More than usual today. That's a hard pass."

"I don't know any of the words you just said, but by your tone of voice I'd think you don't like him. It's okay, these egotistical types are the easiest to manipulate. If you just follow my lead, I can have him wrapped around your little finger in a day!"

"Still nope. That means 'no,' by the way, if 'nope' is too new to be in your vocabulary."

"Such a shame, then. But that's quite all right. I've already picked out another match for you."

...

An hour later, Vivian and Olivia were at a nearby juice bar enjoying some smoothies as a post-workout snack.

"Do you want me to help you tell him off? I mean, your 'hints' were about as subtle as a sledgehammer, but he's probably convincing himself you're just playing hard to get or something. He might just keep coming until you tell him directly you aren't interested."

"Are you really so sure that would convince him, either?"

"Well... no. But at least then he can't fake ignorance."

"But, what do you think? He's definitely a 'no,' right?"

"Uhh... YEAH! Let's just start with all of his compliments that aren't really compliments."

"Okay, yeah. You mean like how my latest shoot was 'not bad,' but let me tell you how you can make your body look sexier for me?"

"Exactly! HIM telling YOU how you should want your body to look? Hell no! And did you notice how he came over to me first and pretended to ignore you?"

"You think he was trying to make me jealous? I mean, good luck with that."

"Ha ha! Okay, but success of the attempt aside, yes, I think that's exactly what he was trying to do. He was trying to make you feel less valuable so that you'd fight harder for him."

"So... he negged me?"

"I think so. Actually, it was a bit more subtle than some attempts I've seen, but, yeah. I think he negged you."

Vivian was laughing now. "He DID neg me! He seriously negged me! Oh, that's too good! And after all those lavish dates to Michelin-rated restaurants he offered to take me on."

"Wait, what?"

"Oh, you must have missed last week. Even talked about his yearly trip to the Bahamas he'd love to take me on sometime... if I became special enough to him."

"Jesus Christ. And here comes the love bombing."

"Love bombing?"

"It's a tactic that narcissistic, gaslighting manipulators like to use. You know, shower you with gifts and fancy dinners, the whole royal treatment... easy to make gestures that they hope the victim will mistake for actual love. But as soon as you're emotionally dependent on them, forget it! Those days are never coming back."

"Unless..." Vivian began, grinning from ear to ear, "I never actually become emotionally attached to him!"

Olivia raised her head and laughed boisterously, and held her right hand against Vivian's midsection. It was a friendly gesture Olivia did often, but with Vivian's rather minimalist crop top, the skin-on-skin contact was a little more intimate than she was used to. It surprised her, but strangely excited her, too.

"Out manipulate the manipulator? You tiger! Okay, but seriously don't. There's too much that can..."

Olivia pulled her hand away from Vivian's abdomen, but all Vivian felt was tugging on her skin. Vivian froze! She knew exactly what was happening, but didn't have a clue what to do or say. Abigail had promised no tricks when she was with Olivia!

"Umm... Vivian?" Olivia murmured, losing her train of thought mid-sentence. She gave a couple more tugs, as a look of utter confusion came over her face. "Okay... this is weird. I... can't take my hand off you."

"Yeah," was Vivian's only reply.

Olivia continued tugging, starting to look terrified. "Your skin's, like, sticky, or... something. I don't know."

"Yeah, I know." Vivian looked down at herself, but held her hands uselessly at her side, afraid of making things worse if she touched anything at all. Olivia's entire hand, from to palm to the tips of each finger, were stuck fast to her bare tummy. Her skin stretched maybe an inch as Olivia pulled, but that was all the freedom of movement there was.

"What the hell's doing this?"

"I... uhh..." Vivian thought about Abigail's warning to never tell another soul about her, or be punished severely. And even if Abigail hadn't threatened her, she didn't know how she would even explain it in the first place.

"I have no idea! But stop it, you're making a scene," Vivian said at last.

"Shit! Sorry!"

Olivia calmed down a little bit, and the two of them sat still in their stools as they looked around the shop to see if anyone was staring at them. There was one girl, maybe high school age, looking at them with a weird expression on her face. Otherwise, nobody gave them more than a few curious glances. Nobody else seemed to care what two random young women were suddenly all worked up about.

Olivia scooted her stool closer to Vivian's so they could try to hide their embarrassing predicament before anyone saw what had happened to them. Vivian turned her head to hide her mouth from Olivia, and spoke to Abigail as quietly as she could, almost mouthing the words breathlessly.

"Abigail? Seriously? I thought you promised not to do stuff like this!"

"I promised no tricks... yesterday!"

"Then if our deal's over, that means I have to tell her that I'm possessed by a perverted, dead prostitute with a superglue kink!"

"Hardly. You promised NEVER to tell her about me, in return for me leaving you and her alone for one day."

"What? What kind of a stupid deal is that?"

"A deal you agreed to."

"Not like that!"

"Oh, yes you did! Remember, I'm an eternal spirit now. I'm not thinking with a wet, squishy, stupid brain that can forget things anymore. That was precisely the deal you agreed to."

"Then what do you want me to tell her?"

"I don't know. Figure something out. Just don't mention me in any way."

After that, Abigail fell silent. By now, Olivia was trying to work her fingers free one at a time, but was of course having no luck. She was focused enough on her sudden predicament that she didn't seem to notice the silent conversation Vivian had just had.

"How the fuck did this happen?" Olivia whispered, frustrated. "Do you have any idea?"

"Uh..." Vivian paused, considering Abigail's threat. "No. I have no idea what's doing this. Yeah, it's definitely weird!"

"What do we do? Like, I'm really fucking stuck!"

"I don't know. Hold on... let me think!" Vivian turned her head to the side and muttered silently to Abigail. "Abigail! What do you WANT? What do I have to give you to let us go this time?"

Abigail didn't answer. Vivian would have to wing this one.

"I'm sorry, but I seriously have no idea! Let's go to the bathroom. At least there we can have get away from prying eyes."

The bathrooms in this place were fortunately single occupant. They stood up from their stools, and Vivian spun around until Olivia's arm was wrapped around her back. It was at least somewhat of a more sensible pose than her dragging Olivia behind her. Once they had locked the door behind them, they breathed a small sigh of relief.

With the need for discretion finally gone, they would work considerably more freely. Olivia stepped back and tried to pull her hand away. Vivian's skin stretched maybe an inch or two as Olivia tugged, but their flesh absolutely refused to separate. Vivian knew pulling would be pointless, but decided to help her anyway. She had to make a good show of knowing nothing about what was happening before Olivia started asking questions she wasn't allowed to answer.

As the minutes passed, Vivian was really starting to enjoy the constant skin-to-skin contact. It had been a few months since she had felt human contact like that, and despite the awkward situation, it was nice to be touched by someone she felt close to, even if it was just a platonic friend. Yet, there was something not entirely platonic about it, which was likely due to Abigail's influence. Vivian felt guilty for enjoying it.

After they had given up on physical force alone, Olivia pulled Vivian over to the sink and tried scrubbing their bonded skin with warm, soapy water. So as not to completely soak Vivian's clothing, she wetted a handful of paper towels and tried to work the suds in between their skin. Vivian knew it wouldn't work, but allowed her to do her thing. When that didn't work, Olivia started pulling again. Vivian made a few more silent pleas to Abigail, but she would not answer.

"Shit," Olivia cursed after they had been struggling in vain for at least twenty minutes. "This isn't working. What do we do?"

"We can't stay holed up in this bathroom forever, that's for sure. Can we head to one of our places?"

"Not mine. My roommate will probably be home. Not something I want to have to explain to her."

"I'm all the way in New Jersey! It's three trains and like a half mile walk. It'll be like an hour, but... yeah. Maybe that's our best bet."

The two of them emerged from the restroom, walking closely side by side with Olivia's arm wrapped intimately around Vivian's waist. Olivia's hand pulled at and twisted her skin a little bit to be in that position, but it probably wouldn't have been obvious to anyone looking.

"Well, at least people will think we're just... you know... lesbians, instead of... whatever the hell happened to my hand," Olivia joked nervously as they walked down the sidewalk.

"Psh! In the middle of Manhattan? I don't think anyone's even going to care."

"So long as we don't run into anyone we know."

But after they had barely gone two blocks, a new problem arose. They suddenly felt a tugging at their thighs, and stumbled so badly they nearly toppled over.

"Shit!" Olivia moaned, looking down. "It happened again!"

They had been walking so closely together that their bare thighs had been rubbing together, a danger they had foolishly ignored. Now, a large patch of skin in the middle of their thighs had suddenly glued itself together. They gave a few tugs, but they were solidly stuck.

A small group of people walked around them on the sidewalk where they had stopped, like a stone parting the flow of a river. There were a few curious glances, as they seemed to wonder what problem this couple of hot lesbians might be struggling with. Quickly and wordlessly, the two of them decided to continue walking before they attracted even more attention.

At first it took a little coordination, but they quickly got the hang of it. It was no different than a three-legged race. Descending the stairs into the subway was a greater challenge. But by the time they arrived at the turnstile, they wondered how they were going to proceed through it stuck side by side. It was designed for one person at a time. But as they paused, trying to come up with a plan, they watched a man in a raggedy jacket slip through the exit gate the wrong way. Nobody seemed to notice or care. Before the gate slammed shut, they followed him through, and were met with the same level of apathy.

"Well, can't say I've never snuck a free subway ride anymore," Olivia muttered under her breath, sounding a little ashamed of what she had just one.

"Eh. I've gotten away with worse."

Shoving their way through the crowded subway was more difficult than normal with them having to walk side by side. Descending the steps to the terminal was a challenging and somewhat dangerous task. Both Vivian and Olivia clutched the handrail with an iron grip in case a bad step sent them both careening down the stairs and through the crows like a bowling ball. Fortunately, after a few uncertain steps, they started to get the routine.

Vivian had to communicate all her turns ahead of time, even down to what end of the terminal to wait at. So far, their awkward shuffling got them a few curious glances, and one annoyed glare of someone who almost bumped into them, but most people were too preoccupied with getting where they needed to be as fast as they could in the typical New Yorker fashion to pause to give them any further consideration.

Once they were inside the car, they were lucky enough to find two adjacent seats, where they sat in awkward silence. There was only one interruption the entire first train, when Vivian heard a rather large gentleman with a scraggly beard mutter "Damn, what a waste of two fine ladies," as he eye-humped them both.

"Gross," Vivian muttered under her breath. If Olivia had heard him, she didn't even deign to respond.

By the time they had transferred to the PATH, which took them underneath the Hudson River and into Vivian's neighborhood, the silence had gotten too much for Vivian to bear any longer.

"Hey! Have you heard why so many people in Manhattan are depressed?" Vivian asked out of the blue.

"What? No, I hadn't even heard about that. Why, because you're constantly lost in a never-ending crowd of people who don't give a shit about you?"

"Because the light at the end of the tunnel is New Jersey!" she said with a silly grin.

Olivia snorted. "Oh? Is it really that bad there?"

"Have you seen the state highway system? The onramps are a death trap! I don't know how I'm still alive!"

...

The rest of their ride was mostly uneventful. It wasn't until they were off the train and were only a couple of blocks from her place when an incident occurred. As they turned a corner, Vivian stumbled and stepped on Olivia's foot. Olivia flailed for a moment, but soon was on a collision course with the pavement. Vivian felt the adhered skin on her leg stretching and twisting something horrible, and reflexively let herself fall with her to prevent tearing anything.

"Oww! Fuck!" cursed Olivia. "That damn near ripped my skin off!"

It hadn't been remotely comfortable for Vivian, either. Maybe that strange resistance to pain when she got stuck had a limit. When they looked up, they noticed a small group of people staring at them. They struggled to get up, but bound as they were, were having a very difficult time of it.

"Are you girls okay?" asked a man.

"Good. Thanks. I'll walk it off," Vivian replied through clenched teeth as she made another attempt to get up.

But Olivia's leg and hand kept pulling her back down. Without the use of one hand, and the movement of one leg severely limited, climbing up off of her butt wasn't so easily done.

"You know you can let go of each other, right?" a woman observed. "You can... right?"

It wasn't until the man who had spoken offered his hand that Olivia was able to get herself up. Vivian did her best to follow her, and in a moment, they were finally on their feet again.

"Are you guys... okay?" another one asked again, as he stared bewildered at them. "Are you, like, attached to each other or something?"

Vivian was dumbstruck, but fortunately Olivia had an answer, though not much of one.

"It would take too long to explain. Just a silly little game we agreed to play. But, we're fine! Really, we're fine!"

It had been enough of an answer to shut them up, so maybe that was all the answer that was needed. The two of them hobbled on their way as the group stared at them with confused looks on their faces.

"What the heck did we just see?" they heard one of them mutter once they had passed.

...

"God damn it, that was so embarrassing!" Olivia complained once they were finally safe in her apartment. "So now we figure... this... out, I guess? What do we even do?"

But before Vivian could respond to that, Abigail's voice rang in her head, ruining any feelings of relief she may have had from finally being home.

"I know what YOU have to do! Now that you're back in your apartment, don't forget my rule. Now, off with that shirt!"

Vivian turned her head away from Olivia and mouthed her reply as silently as she could.

"What, do you want me to just get topless in front of my friend for no reason?"

"Yes. Is there a problem with that? Actually, don't answer that. Just do what you're told right now if you want me to consider unsticking the two of you anytime this month! I mean it, right this instant!"

Vivian froze, not knowing what to do.

"Vivian?" Olivia asked. "What are you muttering about?"

She knew she needed to do it. This couldn't go on for the rest of the month.

"Sorry, something else I've been needing to do, if you don't mind," Vivian said, as she began to unbutton her blouse. "This thing has been chafing me like crazy!"

Olivia laughed. "Hey, your place, your rules. Get comfy!"

Once she had tossed her shirt aside, she looked down, and was almost certain her nipples had grown even more since that morning! They were nearly an inch long now, and she was sure her areolas had expanded, too! If Olivia noticed, she made no comment about them.