I toweled the sweat off my brow, moving through the foyer with a practiced sway. Not my sway, not Peter’s awkward shuffle, but her fluid, unhurried glide. I felt my hips lead, shoulders back, arms loose at the sides, consciously inhabiting the movement, like slipping into a perfectly tailored costume. The unbuttoned top of my shirt hung open just so—three buttons undone, not two—allowing the faint breeze to kiss my skin.
I caught a glance of my (her) reflection in the hallway mirror. The sight stopped me. It wasn’t just the visible evidence of sweat darkening the collar, the streak of dirt on the cheek, the wildness of hair coming loose from its tie. It was the way I carried it; the set of the jaw, the glint of satisfaction in the eyes, the slow, unhurried way I wiped my brow with the towel. It was the picture of a woman, a capable, relaxed.
The kitchen was empty except for a pair of hummingbirds sabering each other outside the window. I poured lemonade, letting the condensation slick my palm, then leaned against the counter, savoring the chill and the hush.
I stared at my collarbones in the glass of the oven door: the way they presented themselves in delicate, feminine relief, twin ridges under gently sunburned skin, the faintest suggestion of shadow in the hollow between. I flexed my calf, watching the muscle bunch and ripple under the tan, feeling the delicious tightness. There was dirt under her fingernails, dark brown wedged into the nail beds, and I brought the hand up to my face, inhaling the scent of soil and sweat and, beneath it, the faint vanilla scent of her hand lotion. It was the scent of Mom, now the scent of me.
Ownership expanded in me, a greedy, encompassing root. I savored the way her wedding band caught the kitchen light, the way it pressed grooves into the skin.
And there were other details, subtler ones. The hidden pulse at the arch of a foot, felt only when I shifted my weight. I flexed my toes and felt the liner of her running shoes, her old callus at the side of the big toe.
I smiled, testing it in the oven door: the slow curling of lips, the shy upturn, the way the muscles of the cheek bunched and drew the lines just so. I could smile, or frown, or scowl, or pout, and it would be her. The world would receive every expression as Mary’s, never pausing to imagine Peter crammed like a stowaway into every gesture, every glance. I could practice her repertoire of moods, her little irritations and bursts of delight, and it would be accepted as fact. There, just under the surface, was the Peter that no one saw; but out in the open, I was Mary.
I could walk into any room, sit among her friends, and never be found out. The knowledge made me dizzy with possibility. I leaned my weight onto one hip, feeling the pelvis shift and the shirt tug across my stomach. With her easy, post-gardening indolence, I let my hands rest in the front pockets of my shorts, like she might after a long morning’s work, hips slightly canted, shoulders relaxed.
I reached up with her hand—no, my hand, now—to tuck a loose strand behind my ear. I practiced the motion in slow motion: the delicate brush of fingertips along the cheekbone, the soft catch of hair, the gentle flick.
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