SHORT STORY - Mission Creep

I looked at myself in the bedroom mirror, and there it was, the fungus the bogeyman face. During the day I successfully became yet another variation on a human being. Yesterday an unsightly and obese boy, tomorrow perhaps I resemble a desiccated human walnut, a good deal older. Not always masculine either. Some times the race or gender shifts, even a little indeterminately. Lets just say I can receive funny looks - of the 'what is that?' -  variety.

When I pull myself away from the truth that inhabits mirrors, I imagine myself as this perfect simulacrum, perhaps young, unformed, even gauche. All those small tropes of behaviour that help define the human, the usual things they like to eat, drink and be merry with. 

Once I side glance my reflection in a shop window all of this falls away. Pretences? No longer convincing. Mirrors will not lie. They tear down facades, dissolve any artificial perception filter I've erected. That this happens solely within my vision and no-one else's, is unsettling. My being, being so bloody changeable. This is not why I am here on earth, surely? To visibly hold my sense of self together, with gaffer tape, for the good of the Misson.

I can't remember when this slipperiness in my appearance started. Was there a multiplicity always present? How I was made in my DNA? Except, I've always assumed I didn't have any. I'm made to pass as human, no more than this was required of me. No one will ever know otherwise. I move around, and each gender disguise is never seen through. Successfully I concoct yet another new 'appearance' to add to my wide range of recognisible personas. My being, mind and body is a 3D blank canvas upon which my line managers paint.

Today I was a teacher, I walked into the local comprehensive. I taught mathematics there. I ate my lunch in the canteen, I conversed with the students, with other teachers, the caretaker, nothing went remotely amiss. They all appeared to see me for who I was; a kind and capable supply teacher.  I returned home happily convinced by my own portrayal. A moment of shock, taken a back again. I was a woman, a middle aged woman, smartly dressed, high powered and businesslike. Had I changed gender during the tube journey home? I was a man for sure when I left this morning. Same cheekbones, chin too perhaps, but definitely male. The worrying thing is I didn't notice any change happening.

I've little control left over who I am. It used to be I could set in concrete the gender, the character and career etc. Now it can roll over of its own accord. Its anyone's guess who I'll become any day, any hour, any minute. So far nothing has altered whilst I've been out on assignment. Well, not that I've noticed. Which is fortunate.

Each evening I melt into the armchair and let whoever I've been that day evaporate away. Back to the fat glutenous blob I really am, that only I see in a mirror, its not pretty, not humanly handsome. I sit, an open channel processing and offloading my experiences of that day. Then downloading the life mantle I'm to assume tomorrow. Absorb the notes and details, then prepare for the constructing of the facsimile the following morning.

I've not told my bosses about the unannounced shape shifting. They'll just blame it on me, I know they will. Even during my training I found conforming to a fixed identity hard to maintain. Something within me wants to rebel. Though I thought I had a good handle on it. Obviously not.

I have this intentionally boring foundation character I assume at home, a Mr Average. Its just so I don't arouse the neighbours suspicions. Onto this base is layered today's experiment. Today this surface level is a younger man, early twenties, works in a call centre, hates his job, hates himself, just broke up with his partner of two years, currently on a bit of a downward spiral. Not a cheery chap to be, or be around

He feels considerably more fidgety mentally. I really have to grapple to keep hold of him, more than most 'appearances'. A strong undertow of depression. Everyone I'm encountering so far avoids him. He stinks a bit of piss and liquor. People walk to the other side of the street. I hung around on a park bench for a while, fell asleep, till a park warden gave me a sharp poke with his stick - 'you'd better move on mate, before the bill are sent for, don't make it harder for me please

So I get up, walk around the park a bit, down the edge by the canal. It's quiet here. Until I encounter a group of men. They begin to tease and taunt, and this ends in them manhandling and joshing me. I lose my balance. I fall in the canal. My 'appearance' is totally unable to swim, so I instantly flounder and thrash about ineffectively in the dingey water. I ask for their help, they jeer and walk off. I fight for air, sink and gasp  till the weight of my clothes begins to get the better of me. I become entangled in something in the canal bottom. All my energy to fight for life, proves insufficient. I submerge beneath the turbulent surface. As I slowly descend into the murky sediment, all I can think of is - is this what they do when you begin to malfunction? Am I being taken out?