Cloaked Heart

In the few months I spent in the orthopedic room clinging onto my life, I thought about the accident that rearranged the script of my entire existence. A police officer had walked into my recovery room and explained the tragedy that had unfolded. All five of my family members were killed after being struck by a distracted driver.

Nurse Alexa was there in the emergency room when I first laid eyes on her. She had long beautiful platinum blonde hair hidden in a bun glacial blue eyes and an irresistible smile. The kind that just draws you in and never lets go.

When I was in my drug induced state, she was all I could think about besides the bouts of self-loathing and misery. I wanted an escape from this madness and from reliving those visions of people in scrubs and white coats dictating the outcome of my life speaking in a strange language of medical jargon. It was taking a toll on me. Of course they were the doctors, nurses and distant family members discussing if I would regain full consciousness again, some wanted to help and others were fed up ready to pull the plug.

She however had noticed potential in me.

Then I finally woke up from the coma. I began to eat again and could finally communicate more effectively, the concussion though took a while to fully heal.

Alexa walked over to bring my tray of food that included my favorites, an assortment of vegetables, rice and a filet of heavily-tenderized steak.

"Excuse me, nurse. I just wanted to say..."

"Don't get too excited, Michael." she smiled. "What's on your mind?"

"Just wanted to say, I remembered the birthday cake... Thank you."

"You didn't think I was going to let you celebrate all by yourself, did you?"

She checked the monitors displaying my vitals.

"Am I going to be able to walk again?"

She chuckled. "Don’t worry about your diagnosis. Everything’s going to be alright. You've already rode out the storm, tough guy." Her warmness brought a comfort to all the pain I felt. She was the shining beacon guiding me from this darkness. For those months, I wondered if I was disillusioned and confused her work duties for something more.

When I could finally articulate myself better, it seemed as if we had chemistry. The day I was discharged from the hospital, I reached out to her. A few casual conversations and visits turned into more profound exchanges. I realized we had the same outlooks on life. Even when it was against the ethics of her job, a relationship blossomed. We dated for a year before I proposed to her by a lighthouse in our romantic excursion, by her dream destination, Cape Elizabeth, Maine. We eventually decided to start a family together, and she brought me more joy when she gave birth to our two beautiful children, Jordan and Geraldine.

*****

Alexa walked into our bedroom after tucking our kids to bed, she laid her soft head against mine and sighed. While I was staring intently at our bedroom screen, she began to massage my face making the skin on my cheeks go up and down.

"What's going on, love?"

"Nothing."

You're not mad at me for starting this episode without you?"

"No. I'm not."

She was lost in her own head, and I could tell something was up from looking into her eyes. They were glistening, and holding something heavy.

"Fine, I'll be a good husband and rewind it." I teased, trying to get her to open up about what was really on her mind. "You usually turn into a little Chihuahua when I sneak an episode." I ruffled her already unkempt hair and waited for her. "You're not going to spill the beans, are you?"

She tugged the blankets away to cover herself. Then reached for my hand and caressed the middle part with the tip of her thumb.

"Hey Siri. Pause movie." She said.

"Uh oh."

She turned to me and carefully studied the expression on my face.

"It's my dad. He says he's finally worked out a time for us to visit."

"To Oregon?"

"Yep. We'll finally be able to go and can take the kids with us."

"That sounds amazing! Which begs the question, why are you upset?"

"I'm not. I'm excited for you to finally get to see where I grew up. You'll fall in love with my hometown. It just seems so sudden..."

"Honey, our kids are both almost ten and they've never seen where you've grown up. It hardly seems sudden. We'll make it work, I'll get the time off."

"Ok, fine Michael." she sighed. "And speaking about the kids, you need to talk to your son. He's been borrowing Geraldine's Barbies again."

"He's borrowing her Barbies?"

Alexa nodded. "Yes. He keeps undressing them."

"Oh. Our little man is growing up, Huh?" 

"Yes. I know that. Why can't they just stay this age forever? You're going to talk to him?"

"Of course."

"It's less embarrassing for him if his father gives him the talk. Explain everything thoroughly. If you need help with the Biological terminology just text me."

"Oh c'mon give me some credit."

"Just don't do it the way your father did."

"Oh, you mean when he explained the birds and the bees with a G.I Joe figure and a Trolls doll? Described very awkwardly, the pull-out method?"

Alexa smirked and held back her laughter. "Oh no! Please. Please! Don't do that."

I shook my head and smiled. "So a Lego Toy and a Raptor? Got it."

She gently slapped me on the arm. "Shut up." Then she nudged me off the bed with the soles of her feet that pressed against my bare skin.

"Dang! Why is your feet always freezing."

"It's the cold-blood pulsing through my veins!" she joked.

"That makes total sense, I always knew you looked like Dracula."

Alexa tossed a fist full of kettle corn at me.

"I'll pause the show. Go. Now. Be a dad."

*****

The week after, my wife and I had abruptly packed for a trip with the kids, bound to the rural side of Oregon. The kids would finally get to see the home where their mother grew up. There had been a recurrent joke that Alexa had been raised by Big Foot, something Jordan had found especially amusing. He'd embaressingly point at every heavily bearded old man at the airport and calling out, "Look it's Grandpa!" And followed it up by making Chewbacca noises.

"Your moms going to kill you, if you keep that up!" I laughed.

We had spent the first two nights with their grandparents, in their home in the suburbs before Alexa scheduled a short retreat at her parent's lodge in the woods. It was only a few hours from the house. This was the place Alexa had been most excited about. She said a man lived next door, an actor from my favorite classics, they endearingly referred to him as The Sheriff. And the place had been filled with celebrities who were good friends of theirs. I was giddy to find out who they were, and what this place looked like in the densely vegetated town of Lewis County. We had left the kids in good company with her younger sister who babysat them for the night. Alexa was excited to relax in the Jacuzzi and drink wine that her parents readied for us.

Her parents were good company, very kind-hearted and well-cultured people. Her father Jacob loved to share stories about the exotic countries they'd visit. While her mother, Jessica was equally hospitable, she'd prepare exotic home-made meals from Scandinavian cuisine, Nordic torsk cod and Mollusks.

Jessica had brought in our warm meals. Me and Jacob had been on our second wine glass when something that sounded like an animal yelping, with strange high pitched chirps began to echo outside the foggy dark woods. It had been an otherwise soothing quaint night in the cabin.

Jacob turned over to me. "That mutt won't shut up. Michael, do you mind checking out where that raucous is coming from? Sometimes the neighbors dog jumps over the fence and can't get back out. Just nudge his little ass out if you see him. I'll pour you another glass." he winked.

Alexa interrupted, walking in with a platter of freshly baked oatmeal-chocolate chip cookies she had helped her mother prepare.

"Oh dad. Don't make him go out there alone."

"Oh no." I argued. "I'll be fine, Alexa. It'll just be a minute." 

I walked over to the front of the cabin, where I could only make out a small glimmer of a lamp outside of the gate tilted on its side and flickering on and off. I walked over to pick it up. There was no animal in sight however, but the chirping howls continued more pervasively.

As I walked further out, in an instant, the shiny beams of lights illuminated from the branches of the old trees, they were like dimly-lit stars contrasting the caliginous forest. I lifted my head up and noticed them up above the old behemoths, some trees even stood almost 300 feet high!

Then, the forest grounds too had been lit up.

It divulged the surrounding area.

"Oh my-"

What I had witnessed petrified me.

There were hundreds of people with their faces hidden under dark cloaks. Some still appearing behind the giant girths of the trees. They slowly approached. 

They began to whisper to each other in short unclear phrases, then after a moment, they started to remove their garbs and reveal their naked forms.

"Jacob?! Alexa?" I yelled back towards the cabin, but noticed the lights had now been shut off from the inside. I stumbled against the small fence and rushed over to the door. I was locked out.

I desperately hammered down on the doors.

My mind fixated on their expressionless faces. Have I stumbled amidst a nudist colony? Or a cult? I wasn't sure if they were upset, but the sight of them was haunting.

They continued chanting.

"Who are you people?" I called out with fear shaking in my voice.

They looked like a sea of mannequins, like perfectly sculpted marble statues of different skin tones. They had no body hair of any kind, neither stretch marks, or scars of imperfections. They looked generic, like educational images found in Biology books.

"What's going on here? Say something!" My voice echoed away without a reaction.

I flinched when they moved again in synchronization. They again reached towards the back of their heads and pulled downwards to peel something again. They dug deep into their skin and stripped another layer. The hair on my arms prodded upwards when I saw their skin unravel down and trickle into a puddle, like overlapping lava.

"Oh god, please! Open the Goddamn door!" I kicked and rammed my body against the front door in a futile attempt to break it open. The windows had also been tightly shut. What was going on?!

The creatures were a green tone with scaled skin, and giant swollen yellow eyes.

I noticed their tongues would sometimes flick out, almost involuntarily.

Maybe they smelled the air or tasted it this way?

A man appeared from the back of the lizard cult, he was tall and slender, with defined leathery textured scales, a sharp jaw line and bald squared head, he was truly a biological curiosity. He spoke in a charming yet almost menacingly whispery voice. "Michael? Hey buddy. It's nice to finally meet you. You can call me the Sheriff. Your father-in-law, Jacob talks very fondly about you. He says you're a big fan of my work. He says you can recite dialogue from some of my old Western classics, is that right?" He extended his arm out for a firm handshake and smiled with his thin straight teeth. His voice sounded familiar to me, like I've heard it my entire life. 

I felt his skin for a second, and could feel the warm dryness of his palm. It felt like Geraldine's pet iguana. I was terrified, but they were also so accommodating in a strange way.

I paced around and the group of people had now been closely surrounding me at an arm's distance, huddled into a circle. They seemed relaxed.

"Everything is going to be okay, Michael." said another creature with bulging eyes approaching me and holding a bright lamp. Those light blue eyes looked familiar to me. It mimicked the voice of my loving wife. "Michael, It's me." she said.

"Alexa?"

"Michael. I'm so sorry about all of this..."

Seeing her new form made my skin crawl. She looked like something out of a Science fiction movie. I felt frightened from her, and deceived.

"Get away from me."

She looked broken.

She removed her blue contacts to reveal her natural yellow eyes. She had long vertical pupils inside them, just like the others.

"I want you to get the whole picture. No more secrets."

She looked at me, I tried hard to keep calm.

She flicked her elongated slimy tongue out again. "You're afraid. I can sense it."

She was using her tongue to get information from the airborne chemicals. I watched enough documentaries with the kids to know that at least. She triggered something in the rest like a contagious yawn, the rest of them let out a symphony of retracting tongues.

"Yeah, you think?"

"Honey?" She placed her warm hands on my shoulder and I brushed them off.

"Please just. Don't touch me." I said.

"I'm sorry it had to be this way..." she said.

The Sheriff appeared again and stood besides her. I could tell from the shape of his body.

"Michael, here I am, three centuries old and ready for The Big Adios, son. You're still so young, and in good company. Please don't allow this revelation ruin the bond you have with this woman. You see, in this world there's two kinds of people, my friend, those who are afraid to face the world to see what really lies behind the facade and those who live happily in ignorance. Buddy, you are not one of latter. We may look a little different, but we're not inhumane. That's the reason for this special ceremony. Your wife wanted to welcome you into our tight-knit community. We stand before you free and vulnerable. Together, our kinds must forge ahead. We all come from the same ancestors way back when anyways."

He placed his hand on my shoulders.

"You'd probably freak out more if I put my face back on." He laughed. "If you haven't figured out who I am yet. Please give her a chance to explain more in private." He smiled.

Alexa grabbed my hand and guided me to a quieter place. "Michael, this is the ceremony and the way we do it. It was to introduce you to our people before I could say anything, they needed to witness. I wasn't ready at first, but I wanted it to happen eventually. I couldn't wait anymore. You'll always be safe with me. You know, I love you."

Even after all of this her voice still soothed me somehow.

"I don't understand how you could just lie to me after all those years." I took a deep breath. "This is unreal."

She gulped down her saliva.

"Dad!" yelled Jordan, holding another creature's hand guiding them. They wore their robes and ran over waving excitedly and appearing calm amongst the strange reptilian crowd.

"Hybrids" Alexa said. "They'll soon be able to shed their skin when they reach that age. Just like mommy" she smiled.

"Why aren't they scared?"

"It's something intuitive, in a way they've always known. Michael." She caressed my arms. "If you'll have us, we can keep being a loving family again."

"Michael. Husband...will you give me another chance?"

"We're family." I said letting out a forced grin. I was still very terrified, but in that moment seeing my children's smiling faces made it easier to endure. Jordan held his mother's hand, while I picked up Geraldine and kissed her on the cheek.

"You've made me as happy as the day we got married." Said Alexa crying.

Alexa introduced me to a few other members of her society, there were well known government officials from every political spectrum and beloved religious figures, and wealthy tech leaders. She turned to the crowd of people, and enunciated another chant in her primal language. It was reminiscent of the sounds grey whales made deep underwater. They began enthusiastically clapping for me.

"And now please join us in reciting my beautiful daughters final words tonight, in English so my new son in law may understand." said another tall lanky creature appearing from the circle. He handed me the sacred mug to drink out of, called it the "Cup of Knowledge", it had merlot in it.

Jordan whispered something about the "Trandoshans" in referencing his mother, which made me unexpectedly burst into a fit of laughter.

"Don't ever repeat that to her."

They continued their culminating chants, it was Alexa's favorite poem by Percy Shelley, "Mutability". She read it before as her wedding vows. She recited it cooperatively with the rest as she held my trembling hand and leaned her head against my chest, while my heartbeat finally slowed down to a normal rhythm.

"We rest.—A dream has power to poison sleep;

We rise.—One wandering thought pollutes the day;

We feel, conceive or reason, laugh or weep;

Embrace fond woe, or cast our cares away:

It is the same!—For, be it joy or sorrow,

The path of its departure still is free:

Man's yesterday may ne'er be like his morrow;

Nought may endure but Mutability."