Slice

If you've ever wondered how weird a wedding can get and what secrets can be kept- this is the story for you.



The bride is seconds from walking down the aisle and I’m fighting hard to not scratch behind my left ear where the tiny incision was made. Must not draw unnecessary attention to myself.

Peeling chords from the pipe organ start up and there she is: blonde curls piled up high on her head, flowing lace wrapped around the curves of her body. The white of her teeth as she smiles matches the white of her dress. Is DM smiling? My eyes dart up to where he stands in a fitted black tuxedo at the altar. Yes, he is smiling. His emotions appear: happy, loving. How can he do it?
I bite my lip; a nervous habit I have acquired. Perhaps I too have become more integrated.

Turning my head, the bride, Melissa Timber, is her designated name, is now beside my pew. Her eyes are on me for a brief moment, smile gone. Does she know? DM assures me she does not. Another second and she has moved on toward the altar and her beaming husband-to-be. Looking back at him, I wonder for the two hundred and fourth time how this will work.

But the preacher takes the microphone and they say their vows. The words seem simple and contrite to me but the weddings guests dab at their eyes, so I suppose the words have fulfilled their emotional purpose.

Later, I sit at a lavender-covered table in the overly-lavish reception hall, pretending to be interested in the spinach salad. Melissa’s sister and Maid of Honor, comes to sit beside me. Her face expresses friendliness, but I am certain her motives are interrogation.

“So, how do you know the groom, Damien?” she asks, while blinking her overly-large brown eyes more times than necessary for lubrication.

The training comes quickly and I answer, “We are foster siblings.” Deception is still unnatural for me though and the incision behind my ear prickles. “I am his closest thing to family,” I add and that sentence contains more truth.

“Where are you from?” she cocks her head.
DM, or Damien, as the humans call him is brushing Melissa’s check with his fingers as they dance close. An unidentifiable burning radiates in my chest and I almost want to answer her with the truth.

“Seattle,” I state, resorting to protocol. The truth would prove disastrous. Why would I have thought about telling it for even a second? Are my own emotions at the proper functioning level? A server in a black suit is coming around with glasses of Champagne. I take one. My understanding is that the alcoholic beverage is to be used as another ritualistic tradition in the celebratory ledger of the night’s events, but I drink the glass’ entire contents in one bubbly swallow. Liquor is the one commodity I have taken fancy too.

“Is that why you two are so pale?” the sister presses on and I wish she would cease speaking. DM is now kissing his new wife.

“That is correct,” I reply, looking for the server for another drink.

“You aren’t blood-related?” she continues.

“No.”

“That’s funny. You have the same pointy kind of nose. If he had long hair and legs like you, you could be twins,” she giggles.

Failing to see the humor in this, I stand. “I can assure you, we are not blood-related,” I state and walk away through the mingling crowds to a further corner of the room. Not wanting to engage in conversation, I fain interest in the photo montage of the happy couple playing on a screen. But there is a tap on my shoulder.

DM is standing behind me, his shiny black hair matching his tuxedo. His had is outstretched toward me.

“It is custom for the bride and groom to dance with their family members,” he informs me in his trained, smooth voice. Putting my small hand in his, he takes me to the center of the marble dance floor. Most of the guests are watching as the music starts up and I do my best to play the part of adoring sister. Melissa dances with her father nearby and gives me another hapless look.

“Melissa likes me no more than she did before,” I calculate then whisper, “You are certain this is the right course of action?”

DM smiles. “It’s a little late to change it now.” He flashes the silver ring on his left hand.

“But these things are not permanent for us,” I say lowly. “We could still leave, get a start with a new set of humans— one with less risk of exposing us.” My eyes bolt back to his human bride. How long can the deception be kept from her? Her knowledge of us would break command number one. We would be terminated. So would she and any other human with the same knowledge.

“RX,” he calls my name and gives a light laugh, “you still don’t get it. This isn’t just an assignment to me now. These—” he lowers his voice, “these humans— they’ve changed me. I feel like I can feel the way they do, actually know joy, fear, loneliness— love.” His words trail off as he gazes at the human bride. I do not comprehend the same emotions, but perhaps— loneliness? Then, he turns back to me and says, “I understand it’s not logical, but that’s the way it is.”

“No, it is not logical,” I confirm the assessment. I do not understand why we cannot complete this assignment, return to our home base, and— “What am I supposed to do?” I ask him, the odd burning getting worse in my chest. I gulp hard and scratch behind my ear at the little raised red line. “I cannot return without you.” We are like the heart and lungs of a human body— one cannot work properly without the other.

“RX,” he brushes my cheek the same way he did the human’s, “It’s going to be ok.”

I never understood that human expression until that moment but he was wrong: it was not going to be ok. The burning spreads to my throat as the song’s final chords are drowned out by polite clapping and RX returns to the human he loves. Why did you have to pick her? I want to shout. Why couldn’t you have found someone else— one of your own kind? But the words remain silent in me as the couple takes a silver knife in both their hands to the perfect wedding cake. Everyone is smiling and joyful around me, but I felt like that perfect cake, now ripped open and sliced.