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Sam slowly came to an awareness. It was like waking up from a dream, yet not. Her mind cleared from a fog. A memory of gems floated in her mind. Square. Circle. Triangle. Diamond. The gems glowed but cast no light. She tried to blink, but couldn't.
She was blinking, she could feel it, but nothing was in her own control. What was-
Danny. Danny was flying above her. She felt something in her chest stir. She had always loved watching him fly. He seemed so free when he did. She watched him fly about a billboard, helping to hang a garland of bats made from scraps of old tires across the top.
Somehow, she knew they were tires, even though from six stories down, she couldn't see them in any detail.
Danny thanked the workers who were plastering the billboard with a sign. The sign said: “Humans aren't the only ones who suffer from waste, keep the planet clean.” It was covered in spiders, bats, and ravens.
If she were her freshman self, she'd love it.
Instead, she looked at it and couldn't help but think how garish it was, how over the top it was.
Danny floated down to her. “There we go,” he said. His voice had a warmness in it that should have made Sam blush. “We got all ten signs up.” He smiled and took her hand in his. The ghostly latex was smooth and cold.
She could barely feel it. It was like she was reading about what she should be feeling instead of feeling it herself.
“Great,” she heard herself say. “Just in time for Earth Day.”
She wanted to scream.
“Want to take a closer look?” He asked, obviously hopeful.
Sam's body took a step closer to him, her hand reached up to place itself against his chest. The solidness of his body felt fake to her. Unreal. She tucked herself underneath his arm, pressing close to his body. “Only if you carry me.”
His arm snaked around to grab her waist, pressing her into his side. It was what she dreamed of happening before. She had wanted this so badly in what felt like ages ago. But now, no matter how much she tried to pull herself away, she couldn't.
Together the two began to fly up. Danny was taking his time. She watched the ground slowly fall away from her. She tried to remember how she got into this situation. She couldn’t remember. This felt right. It was wrong. Nothing was how it should be. She remembered. Screaming. Falling. Strapped to a roller coaster. The coaster falling. The world was wrong.
Danny pointed at the billboard, shaking her from her thoughts. Now she could clearly see the bats that were hanging from the billboard and the plastic bottles that were cut into spider-like shapes. Their circular bodies glittered in the sun, like sapphires, and burned themselves in Sam’s mind.
“It's perfect,” her body said.
No! She thought. It's not! This is what I would have come up with years ago! You can't even see these from down below!
Danny smiled. “I'm glad it turned out alright.”
Sam felt her body shrug. “Eh, kind of sad it's done. I liked spending time with you while working on this.”
Her eyes moved on their own accord while Danny rolled his eyes. “I think you just liked being able to boss me around the garbage dump.”
Her hand reached up and patted him on the cheek. “I get to boss you around whenever I want,” she said, coyly. “And don't you forget it.”
That's not what I want! Sam wanted to scream. She had always wanted to be an equal to Danny. She didn't want to be known as the bossy girlfriend. It felt like everything she had ever learned had been tossed aside.
Hell, when did this even happen?
Last thing she remembered was...
She couldn't.
She felt something roil inside her.
Danny chuckled nervously. “Uh, sure Sam, whatever you say.”
Sam tried to keep looking at Danny, to let him know something was wrong. Instead, her head twisted away. “I'm glad you helped me with this, Danny.”
They flew back down to the ground. Sam wanted to run. She needed to collect herself. This wasn't right. Something was wrong. She was wrong. She needed help. She wanted to scream. To cry.
Danny squeezed her tighter. “So now that this is done, want to go to the vegan place on Marley Boulevard?”
She placed her head against his shoulder. “Of course, do you want to fly? Or should we walk?”
Danny smirked and Sam felt herself become weightless again. The two of them flew through the sky over the midday traffic. Sam’s head tilted up on her own accord to stare at Danny. The wind blew through his hair majestically.
She couldn’t enjoy it at all.
She was vaguely aware of her own hair being blown about the wind. But it was muted. Barely there in the back of her mind. It was less that she felt it, and more like she knew she should feel it. She tried to hold onto any feeling, any sensation, anything. They floated out of reach like the spiderwebs on the awful recycled spiders.
“You’re staring again,” Danny said over the wind blowing over their ears.
“Can you blame me?” Left Sam’s lips.
He chuckled. A vibration carried up along her arms and into her chest. He looked down at her. “I mean, you always get all bashful if I start staring at you, seems a little unfair that you can stare all you want and I can’t.”
Sam felt her face burn. It felt like a skin over her own. “Yeah, well,” she looked down at the crowds below, “I’m a woman, I’m allowed to have double standards.”
Sam felt sick with herself. Who was this version of her that was flying with Danny? It wasn’t her. She tried to thrash, to scream. It felt like her limbs were encased in cement. There was no movement she was allowed to make.
Was she overshadowed? Possessed? If that was the case, why hadn’t Danny saved her yet? He had to have known this wasn’t her.
A flash of light blinded her for a moment. The sun bounced off the lake and into her eyes. Between the trees and the sunlight, it looked like a yellow diamond was glittering up at her.
As she blinked away the vision, her eyes caught sight of a woman in pink down below. She felt her face twist into a smirk, as her body waved at the woman. Sam wasn’t able to recognize her until after they had flown past her, but after they had passed on it clicked.
“Paulina’s party is coming up,” Sam heard herself say, “Are you going?”
“What? No way! It’s on one of our date nights!” Danny responded.
Sam heard their boots click before she felt it. “Good answer,” Sam responded, giving his foot a kick.
They landed at the restaurant and Danny walked up to the hostess as he turned human again. “Two please?” he asked, holding up two fingers in a V sign.
The hostess looked at Danny. “Phantom! Of course!” She grabbed two menus and smiled brightly at the two of them, even bowing slightly. “Please, follow me!”
She led the two of them towards the back of the restaurant, taking them to a private corner. She sat the two of them down in a booth. “Your waiter will be here shortly!” she said before scurrying off.
Danny chuckled. “You know, out of everything, I think I like this part the best.”
Sam was forced to tear her eyes away from the menu as she looked up at Danny. Her eyebrow quirked as she asked, “What part?”
Danny reached over and took her hand. Unlike his ghost form, his human form felt unbearably hot. The heat of his hand on this hand (it looked like hers but it wasn’t, IT WASN’T) hurt her. It hurt in ways she didn’t quite understand. He wasn’t holding her hand, he was holding the hand of something that looked like her, someone confining her in this flesh prison. She was trapped inside.
“The fact I can take you out anywhere, and that everyone jumps at the chance to help us.” He smirked. “It feels unreal, doesn’t it.”
Sam wanted to scream.
She wanted to scream till her throat was raw. She wanted to thrash. To claw at this fake façade that was over her. It was all unreal.
The waiter came over, placing cups of water in front of them. The red table through the top of the glasses made her think of red square rubies. The thought of the rubies persisted even as she looked up at the waiter’s face. “Phantom! Ms. Manson! Can I take your order?” He asked, with a pen out.
“I’ll have the tofu stir fry,” Danny said. He glanced at Sam. “And you’ve wanted the vegetable pad thai, right?”
Sam put the menu down. “You heard me talking about it, huh.”
“I like to think I know you well,” Danny said, running his thumb over the back of her hand.
Sam’s eyes went down to her hand as she felt her face burn again. The blush began to go down her neck, and her left hand went up to brush her hair.
Sam felt something in her drop when she saw a ring on her finger. It was the one Danny made her hold onto for a while for Valerie. The ring shone brightly with a red gem in the center. A perfect circle that mocked her, a circle next to a triangle, a diamond, and a square.
Sam felt tears begin to form in her eyes.
Her heart soared as Danny noticed her beginning to cry. “Sam? Is everything all right?” he asked frantically.
Sam felt her body hesitate. Frozen. As if she didn’t know what she wanted to say. Finally, waiting for her to do what she wanted it to do. Sam opened her mouth and began to speak.
A vision of a red triangle glowed in her mind.
“Yeah, everything is fine.” She said, “It’s just all… perfect.”
Sam felt herself break into a million pieces.