Chapter 2

For all of Rashida’s big talk about how energized she felt throughout the day the sun hadn’t even set when she announced that she was exhausted and heading to bed.

Aaron didn’t object, of course. The day had been plenty exhausting for him as well and he anticipated that tomorrow was going to be equally or more exhausting thanks to his mother’s planned outing where he would likely bear witness to several men, and probably a handful of women, perving on her as she walked down the street.

At least when Clark did it he did everything in his power to make sure no one noticed him doing it, not to mention Aaron actually trusted Clark to manage his behaviour more than a random shmuck in the grocery store.

Rashida’s early bedtime also gave Aaron the perfect opportunity to skim through the book Chloe had given him without being caught. He didn’t feel like explaining to his mother why he had even the slightest interest in a book about nudie life so the minute he walked inside he ran to his room and hid it in an air vent next to the expired condom he got from Sex Ed class back in middle school and a small pile of failed tests and quizzes. All things he was desperate to keep his mother from discovering and sparking a conversation about.

So immediately upon his mother shutting her bedroom door and turning out the light, Aaron, as quietly as he could, sprinted to his room and locked the door behind him, shut off the lights and dove under his covers with the book in one hand and a flashlight in the other like a ten-year-old reading comics past their bedtime.

“I know my breasts are great but tell me anyway: A guide to Nudie living,” was the title of the book, and for the first time he allowed himself to follow the advice of the title. Ever since the Spell reared its ugly head Aaron had spent more and more time looking up at the sky, the last thing he needed to be doing was stare at a woman long enough and intensely enough to make her more uncomfortable than she might have already been. For months he kept his eyes locked on women’s faces no matter how desperate he was to look down at what his biology demanded he look at.

But this woman on the cover wasn’t really there, she was just a photo. There was no harm in looking at her.

So he allowed himself to stare, to analyze the curves of her body, to memorize the shape of her nipples and to titillate himself over whether or not he could see a bush or not from the glimpses of her pussy through the letters of the title.

With his erection half-cocked, pardon the pun, he flipped open the book and began to read.

He didn’t start at page one, he jumped to the table of contents and used it to jump to topics that he was most interested in.

First, he sought to confirm what Chloe had been talking about earlier that day.

‘Chapter 5: Complimenting your fellow nudies.’ he read, ‘The transition from clothed to unclothed life is as much mental as it is physical. What was once protected by cloth, leather and linen is now open to public scrutiny. The feeling of eyeballs against newly exposed skin can burn like light from a child’s magnifying glass, especially on one’s most private areas only seen by a lover if at all. So as nudies, it’s our job to keep each other from imploding in on ourselves like dying stars. We do this through honesty and learning not to hold our tongues, in the following chapter we will run through the various psychological and societal benefits to affirmations, both of each other’s characters and more importantly for this book, of our beautiful natural forms.’

As he continued through the chapter it became increasingly clear that Chloe was telling the truth.

Even with the evidence in plain text right in front of him, it was hard for Aaron to believe the level of confidence it required to openly compliment other people’s bodies like this without getting slapped.

Something told him he hadn’t seen the last of people perving on his mother.

It was almost 10 am when Aaron came downstairs after a long night of reading. He found Rashida already sitting at the island in the kitchen sipping her coffee and leafing through that day’s paper.

He took it as a small victory that he no longer had to pause and compose himself when he saw her sitting there without a hint of shame, he simply sighed and accepted his defeat.

“How’d you sleep?” Rashida asked with a warm smile that Aaron had been a stranger to for a while.

“Fine,” he responded, wiping the crust from his eyes as he poured himself a cup of coffee.

“You’re still good to help me today?” She asked.

“Sure,” Aaron nodded, bringing the mug to his lips and slowly sipping.

“Awesome,” Rashida smiled, “We’ll hit the road when you’re done with breakfast.”

“Great,” Aaron faux smiled back.

He considered how long could he drag out breakfast before she caught on.

The trip to the grocery store was about as painful as Aaron expected. She wasn’t the only nudie shopping at that moment thank god. But she was the only bald woman accompanied by a shopping cart fit to collapse who insisted on asking the deli what felt like a hundred and fifty questions about the three-bean salad while passerby shoppers examined her ass for defects, leaving pleased to find none.

He was able to breathe a sigh of relief when they entered the car and drove away, Aaron prayed this was the end of his torture but as if to personally slight him a few minutes later Rashida pulled into the parking lot of Clark’s landscaping company.

“Umm ... What are we doing here?” Aaron asked with slight fear trembling in his voice.

“Grabbing a bag of topsoil for my garden,” Rashida explained, throwing open the car door and stepping out into the sun, “Come on lifter.”

Aaron groaned as he followed her into the building.

Quiet amazingly, Rashida acted as casually as ever as she walked naked through her place of work in front of people she had known for years and Aaron had known for his whole life. Several averted their eyes, and a few of the more bold wolf whistled although there seemed to be an understanding between Rashida and her coworkers that this was all in good fun. Aaron averted eye contact with all of them.

Rashida noticed how low her son held his head as he threw the bag over his shoulder and walked it back to the car.

“We’re almost done,” she assured him as they pulled out of the parking lot, “I just have to swing by the treatment centre.”

“What for?” Aaron asked, slowly composing himself once again.

“They’re checking out all the patients from the other day,” Rashida explained, “Making sure they’re are no complications, should be quick.”

A few minutes of driving later they arrived at the centre, a police car was still waiting outside the front entrance and scraps of yellow tape were floating back and forth in the wind.

“You should have seen it the other day,” Rashida said as the two walked towards the front entrance, “Looked like one of those true crime things on Netflix.”

“I’m sorry this happened to you,” Aaron said cautiously.

“Oh, we’ve been through worse hon,” Rashida assured him with a bubbly attitude, “We’ll survive.”

As Aaron held open the door Rashida once again strode in with her best foot forward.

For the first time, Aaron paid enough attention to see his mother’s face as she did so.

He could see her taking a millisecond to actively psych herself up before entering, squashing any insecurities and marching forward with the same alacrity one would have pulling off a bandaid.

Her body language heavily contrasted with the other nudies in the office. All were curled up on their chairs trying to shield themselves from prying eyes, including the secretary who had lowered her desk chair all the way down so she could hide her breasts behind the wooden desk.

Aaron tried to stifle a lab as she reached up to awkwardly type, when she sat like that she looked kinda like a munchkin.

“Hey Lin,” Rashida said, giving the secretary a warm smile, “How are you?”

“I’m fine,” Lin choked, “You can go right in, Dr. Friedman’s expecting you.”

“Thank you,” Rashida smiled before turning to Aaron, “You coming in?”

Aaron took a moment to decide, glancing back over to the waiting room. He probably could’ve felt the depressed aura from the pharmacy across the street.

“I’ll go with you,” He finally answered, following her into the next room.

Aaron had met Dr. Friedman before. He was usually a very warm jovial guy. a personality that helped to keep the mood up in what was usually a very sombre office.

But like all things it was changed by the Spell.

Oh, he tried his best alright, he still greeted the two of them with a smile, but it didn’t seem nearly as natural as Rashida’s.

He also usually stood up when a patient entered his office to shake their hands.

Aaron could’ve sworn he heard Dr Friedman swear under his breath when he saw Rashida walk in without a hint of shame.

He also noticed the good doctor pull himself closer to his desk as they exchanged pleasantries.

“I’m going to cut right to the chase,” Dr Friedman began.

His eyes darted back and forth between Rashida’s long smooth legs crossed over one another, her sun-kissed breasts and last and least importantly for his purposes, her face, who seemed to be aware of his leering.

Aaron was about two seconds away from leaping across the table and knocking his teeth down his throat before he was able to remind himself why that was such a bad idea.

‘No one pervs on my mom like that!’ A voice in his head swore.

‘Except Clark of course,’ another voice reminded him, ‘You didn’t want to punch him out.’

‘Just shut up.’

‘You can silence me, but you can’t silence the truth!”

“Word of what happened the other day has reached the ears of certain academic circles and they’ve taken an interest in our unique situation,” Dr Friedman explained.

“What kind of academic circles?” Rashida asked.

“I’m told they’re some of the nation’s top minds concerning the Spell,” the doctor explained, “They were figuring out how this thing worked long before any of the major bio labs could. Now with your consent of course they’d like to run a couple of tests and ask you a couple of questions, only if you’re up for it.”

Rashida thought for a moment before looking over at her son.

“You have anywhere to be today, hon?” She asked, Aaron shook his head.

“Then what’s the harm,” she shrugged, impatiently standing up, “Where am I headed?”

“Oh uhh...” The doctor stammered, thrown off by her enthusiasm, “Down the hall, they’ve made themselves at home over in the MRI room.”

Without another word out of either of them, Aaron and Rashida walked out of the office, although Aaron made sure to shoot Dr Friedman a dirty look to let him know he caught him staring.

“Sorry to drag you along for this,” Rashida said as the two walked down the hall to a door at the very end, “I doubt this is how you wanted to spend your Sunday.”

“I missed one appointment and look what happened,” Aaron remarked.

Rashida looked like she was about to say something important before she was interrupted by a voice on the other side of the door.

“No, not happening,” the two heard a male voice said forcefully.

“What, why?” A female voice asked with disappointment, “Frankly I don’t see what the problem is, just another experiment.”

“Well, that’s because you’re obtuse,” the male voice answered.

“I’m not obtuse,” the woman’s voice defended.

“Edna, I love you, I think you’re a genius and the most wonderful woman I ever met, but you’re also the most obtuse human being on the planet,” the male’s voice said calmly.

“I’m not asking for much,” Edna rationalized, “Technically speaking I’m not asking for anything, the only thing I would need from you is that you stop wearing a condom, with the frequency of our regular copulation a conception should happen in-”

“It’s not happening!” The man snapped, “You’re gonna give me an ulcer.”

“I find that unlikely,” Edna surmised.

Rashida, holding back a smile, gently knocked on the door.

The room on the other side went very silent.

“Do you think they heard us?” The man’s voice asked in a hushed whisper.

“Well judging by the material of the door,” Edna began.

“Rhetorical question Ed,” the man interrupted.

“That’s gonna be you someday,” Rashida teased her son.

Aaron rolled his eyes.

The door swung open and a nude young man a few years older than Aaron stuck his head out.

“Hi, Are you Miss Aziz?” He asked with an awkward smile.

“Rashida, please,” She answered taking his hand, “This here’s my helper.”

“I’m Peter,” the man said as he led the two of them inside the room where an equally nude woman about Peter’s age was sitting at the desk over a stack of papers and a cup of ramen, “This is my ... associate Dr Smith.”

“Edna’s fine,” She said, standing up and walking over to shake Rashida’s hand.

Aaron felt a little outnumbered being the only clothed person in the room so he found a chair in the far corner and parked himself there, trying to not stare at the rather fetching Edna as she bounced around the room with excitement.

Rashida seemed relieved to not be the only nudie having a good time for once.

“So what we’re gonna do is super simple,” Edna explained, “Just get you to answer a couple of questions, grab some blood work, a really quick MRI scan and we’ll just send you on your way.”

“Sounds great,” Rashida nodded, “But I’m sorry if you don’t mind me asking, you’re a little young to be a doctor aren’t you?”

“Not a medical doctor for the record,” Peter chimed in from his seat at the desk, grabbing the stack of papers and the cup of ramen.

“Still a doctorate,” Edna argued, marching over to him and taking the cup before he could grab a bite, “Don’t touch my lunch, and don’t worry. I’ve done all of what we’re about to do many times before, just as long as you pretend to be a cadaver we should be okay.”

Rashida grew worried.

“She’s kidding!” Peter chimed in once again, “We’re working on her humour, we’ll get it one day.”

As the three of them set out to perform the tests Aaron saw fit to pop in his air pods and tilt his head back.

It concerned him how normal it felt to sit in a doctor’s office and wait while his mother was getting checked out, no pun intended.

A few months of this had eventually worn down the nauseous worried feeling he started out with.

That was until today.

He cracked open his eyes after a few minutes to find his mother lying down in the MRI machine while Peter and Edna looked behind the computer monitor with rather unreadable looks on their faces.

Was it concern, fascination, horror?

He was usually good at reading doctors.

He knew the doctors were feigning optimism going into his mother’s last Chemo treatment. He had a hard enough time imagining a world without her in it but having to power through what might be her final weeks with such a huge roadblock between them might be more than he could take.

Would he bite the bullet? Purposely infect himself so he could hug her one last time only to leave him with such a permanent reminder of the fact that she was gone, that he couldn’t even look at himself in a mirror without being reminded of what was lost.

Rashida was coming back into the room to talk to the doctors.

He popped one of the pods out of his ears so he could listen to what they were saying.

“To be frank we’re not sure what we’re seeing,” Peter said as Edna muttered under her breath quizzically analyzing the results of her test with newfound wonder.

“Is that a good thing or a bad thing?” Rashida asked, worry filled her voice.

“We don’t know,” Peter answered, trying to be gentle about it, “We’re going probably need more data and-”

“I need a biopsy,” Edna interrupted bluntly.

“I- excuse me?” Peter asked her, taken aback by the sudden declaration.

“A biopsy,” Edna repeated, “Ooh, and a urine test, that wouldn’t hurt, help confirm a hunch of mine.”

“You want to cut a woman open for a hunch?” Peter questioned in a hushed whisper.

“Don’t be so dramatic,” Edna shrugged off jovially, “Little needle, in and out in an hour, we don’t even have to put you under.”

Rashida looked unsure.

“It’ll give us a much more definitive answer as to your condition,” Edna explained, her voice getting much softer, “And much faster.”

“Let’s do it then,” Rashida sighed.

“Excellent,” Edna smiled, climbing out of her chair and leading Rashida out the door.

“You’re good to wait here, babe?” Rashida asked her son, Aaron nodded.

The two ladies left the room.

Aaron and Peter sat in silence for a moment.

The latter was about to go back to work when the former spoke up.

“Can I ask you something?” Aaron asked.

“Yeah sure, go for it,” Peter shrugged, quickly glancing at the door before grabbing the half-full cup of ramen before anyone could stop him.

“What’s it like?” Aaron asked.

“What, the nudity?” Peter responded, “Fine I guess, kinda drafty sometimes, why? You thinking about it?”

“What, no,” Aaron immediately rejected, “I’m just worried about my mom.”

“There’s a saying out there,” Peter began, almost thinking out loud, “They say there are three types of nudies, first are what they call shrinkers. Those infected against their will who curl up and hide their nudity from the world.”

“Like the secretary and Dr Friedman,” Aaron responded.

“Exactly,” Peter nodded, “Then there are the stationary. These are most of the nudies you’ll meet in the wild, infected against their will like the shrinkers but they continue on. They recognize it’s just a part of their life now and they move on. It’s the hope of those of us in the psychology field that we can somehow get the shrinkers to be stationary, lest we have a nation of hermits. Your mother is one of these stationary people. She’s remarkably resilient, the only one in this entire office who didn’t look paralyzed by the exposure.”