Adonis Sequence, Chapter 2, #4

When I woke up the next morning, the first thought I had was, “I am starving!” I reached for my glasses but when I put them on, the world was still a blur. My prescription couldn’t have changed already! I just got these. I pulled them off to look at them, make sure they were the right glasses, and the world came into sharp focus. 

That shouldn’t be. 

I actually put my hand on my face to make sure I wasn’t wearing a second pair of glasses, you know, fallen asleep with one pair on and then put another pair over them. I actually did that once. But, no, it was just the one pair and I couldn’t see with them on.

I was actually a little frightened, because this wasn’t the way the world worked. Your eyes just didn’t suddenly get better overnight. Oh my god! What if I have a brain tumor? That could cause this! What did I do? I was getting free medical care through the Adonis Sequence program. I could always—wait a minute. They were messing with my genetics! Did they fix my eyes? There was nothing about that in the brochure. Well, I guess I really couldn’t complain—if that’s what it was. If anything, it was going to save me a lot of money in glasses. I decided to see the program’s doctor anyway, just to make sure.

Anyway, I had a lot to do that morning, so I just got on with it. I got ready for my shower and headed for the small bathroom that was apportioned to me. I was renting a room in a small house and I actually had my own bathroom, which was very nice. I was going to miss that when I moved into the dorms. They had communal showers there.

These thoughts were suddenly driven from my mind as I got to the bathroom and saw my reflection in the mirror. I’d seen myself without glasses before, of course, but never so clearly. …And there was something different about my face. I couldn’t put my finger on it. The nose was the same. The eyes, the chin, the mouth, all were the same. My cheeks might have been a little rounder, I wasn’t sure. I suddenly wished I had a recent photo of myself so I could compare to see if there really had been some changes. But, of course, I didn’t. Who keeps such things?

Then I remembered what my roommate called after me. “Take a selfie before you go to bed,” he’d said. “You’re gonna want a reference.” This is what he’d meant. I probably shouldn’t have dismissed him that easily. Who was I kidding? He was a narcissistic twit! I was never going to listen to him. 

In fact, there probably weren’t any changes at all. I just looked different without glasses. That’s all it was. Right? Right.