“Why do you want me to go with you?” I asked Amy over the phone as I typed away on my computer. One of the greatest things man has ever made is the speakerphone since it allowed me to write and be a somewhat social person when my friends call me to see if I am still amongst the living. Amy is one of my oldest friends having first met each other in 1st grade and been lifelong friends since then. Of course, I was the first person she told when she went and got a rhinoplasty. That was a few months ago and since then she had gone back constantly.
“Because I need someone to drive me back after my procedure is done.” She told me, which to be fair made sense. She couldn’t exactly be driving when her face was wrapped up in gauze and she was high on pain medicine. I just wished anyone else could’ve driven her instead of me. I’m a writer and it’s more than rare for me to get the juices flowing as well as they were at that moment.
“I dunno, Amy. I’m really on a roll here.” I told her, looking down at my phone and only then realizing it was 5 pm. I started at 10:30 am. Time really does fly when you were on a roll. Staring back at the screen before me and then at the phone I realized that maybe it was good if I take a break. Before she could even respond to my first line of speech I sighed a bit. “Alright when’s your appointment?”
I could tell that she was more than excited and thankful for the fact I decided to go with her. Agreeing to her picking me up and me driving her back I had to wake up at 8 in the morning. Sighing and saving what I had written I walked over to my bed and laid in it, closing my eyes to get some shut-eye before she came tomorrow to pick me up. I do not have the healthiest sleeping schedule. Before passing out I made sure to set three alarms in the event that I didn’t wake up.
I only needed two as I finally managed to pry my eyes open and get out of bed to get ready before Amy showed up. While I was never one to care much about my appearance, I always knew how to make myself look presentable to others. Finally, when I looked like I belonged in society, Amy texted me to let me know that she was outside.
She was much different than when we had graduated college together. Her nose had been worked on to make it smaller and her whole face looked like it had been molded out of plastic. For whatever reason, she was deadset on keeping up her surgeries until she was ‘perfect.’ Whatever she looked like though she was my best friend and I was always happy to hang out with her.
“I’m telling you, Dr. Harrison is a freaking genius! His technique is amazing and it’s like he knows exactly what I want!” Amy said as we drove to the surgeon’s office. I nodded and took a small sip of the coffee she had brought for me. I could tell how excited she was about this.
“What’s next? A boob job?” I asked as I shook my coffee around to get my flavors right. She looked over and gave me a shrug of her shoulders with a smile. I giggled at her and punched her in the arm with a chuckle. The two of us giggled together as we drove over to the building. Arriving at last I followed her into the building and up to his office. Still drinking my coffee I walked in and looked at all the people gathered there.
To say that I was out of my league would be an understatement. I was surrounded by people that could be either models or wax figures. There was more plastic in this room than in all of the pacific ocean I thought to myself as me and Amy approached the receptionist’s desk.
“Hi, Amy!” The receptionist greeted us as she looked up from her computer. Her eyes drifted over to me and her smile dipped ever so slightly. But she quickly looked back over to Amy and handed her a clipboard for her to fill out. “Once you finish filling this out you can head right in.” She told Amy as we both went to sit down in the waiting room chairs. I watched Amy as she filled out her medical clipboard and I did my best to ignore everyone staring at me as I desperately drank my coffee.
“Alright, I’ll be back. Don’t get into trouble while I’m gone.” Amy told me as she stood up and went into the back for her surgery. Leaving me alone with the prying eyes of the other patients waiting for their turn. I did my best to use my phone to distract myself, going back to writing what I had been writing the day before, and soon I was lost in the process of writing, and the peering eyes of the other waiting patients.
Honestly, I had no idea that so many hours had passed that when I heard the door open back up and looked up to see Amy stumbling out with her face all bandaged up I thought that something had gone wrong. But looking back at my phone and seeing that several hours had passed I quickly walked over to Amy and held her as she wobbled from side to side.
“I assume you’re her friend.” The surgeon said as he looked down at a clipboard in his hands with a surgical mask covering half of his face. I nodded but since he wasn’t paying much attention and so I had to audibly tell him that I was true. “Alright, make sure she gets plenty of rest and not to remove the bandages until after a full day.” He finally looked up at me and I saw his bright green eyes. They were almost like emeralds shining in the sun.
“Alright, I’ll make sure she doesn’t take them off. Is there anything else I should worry about?” I asked him as I made sure to keep Amy upright. He was silent as he stared at me and pulled his mask down to reveal the rest of his face. Much like everyone else in the waiting room he was gorgeous. With a perfectly sculpted face and a perfect set of brown hair on his head. “Doctor?”
“What?” He asked me suddenly. He had been completely distracted by something. His face was red with blush and he quickly shook his head to get himself to focus. “Yes. Yes um, keep them on her for 24 hours. Miss…?” He looked at me again, his eyes shining at me as he lowered his clipboard.
“Bethany is fine.” I chuckled awkwardly as I stared back at him. He kept those shining green eyes on me as I did my best to keep Amy from falling over from all the drugs she was on. She didn’t offer much in the way of input. Really just mumbling and speaking nonsense from behind the gauze that encompassed her face. “Is there anything else I should do for her?”
“You uh…just make sure that she…sorry I’m uh, just thrown off by how beautiful your skin is.” He told me, catching me completely off guard by his out of nowhere compliment. I mean I had been told all my life that I had incredibly good-looking skin, but to be told by a plastic surgeon that I had lovely skin, really threw me off completely.
“Uh, thanks, Doctor,” I said awkwardly, holding onto Amy as he mumbled and wobbled in my arms. “I’m just going to take Amy home now. If there isn’t anything else you need me to do.” I desperately wanted to leave this waiting room as not only was Dr. Harrison refusing to stop looking at me, but now everyone else in the waiting room was staring absolute daggers at me.
“Wait, surely you’ve had to have some sort of work done on you. H-how can you have such perfect skin?” Harrison suddenly demanded from me. Dropping the clipboard in his hands and reaching out for me. Suddenly grabbing me by the face and pulling me mere inches from his face. Caught off guard I quickly shoved him off me and quickly dragged Amy out of the office and to her car.
The drive home was silent as I tried to process what had happened to me and looking over at Amy to make sure she was okay from time to time. Rubbing her shoulder to get some responses from her and I decided that instead of just dropping her off at her home I decided to take her with me. Partly so I could watch over her but also so I wasn’t alone after being touched by her plastic surgeon without any kind of permission from me.
After we arrived at my apartment, I managed to pull her up and get her into the elevator of my complex. Soon she started to stir and looked around as we were both in the elevator heading up to my floor.
“Where am I?” She asked sleepily, wobbling forward and clearly still hopped up on something. I pulled her back over to me and patted her on the back softly.
“Amy? It’s Beth. I’m bringing you to my apartment to take care of you, okay?” I told her just about the same time that the elevator door opened up. I carefully led her to my apartment and opened it up. Carefully taking her to my bed I laid her down and tucked her into bed. “If you need anything just let me know.”
“Thanks, Beth,” Amy mumbled at me as she turned in bed and lay on her side. I left her in my room with the door open in case she needed something and called out to me that I would hear her. Sitting down on my couch I laid back and rubbed my face carefully trying my best to forget about Dr. Harrison’s unwarranted touching of my face. Picking up my laptop I opened it up and did my best to distract myself.
Amy eventually was well enough to stand normally and walk without falling flat on her new face. I was more than happy to have her conscience talking to me than to be alone with the memory of a deranged plastic surgeon demanding to know how I got my skin so perfect. I brought this up with Amy and she was just as taken aback as I was.
“Dr. Harrison said that you have perfect skin?” She asked me, her voice deadpan and only with a slight hint of jealously. Her hand went up to her bandaged face and touched it while she stared at me. “That’s weird.” She said after a moment. “Normally he finds any sort of flaw in someone’s face.” She told me with an awkward chuckle.
“Really? Is that what he did with you?” I asked her, still tapping at my laptop. Amy had always in my eyes been a good-looking girl. And all the attention she got in High School showed that off. But all of a sudden she was getting these plastic surgeries from seemingly nowhere.
“Well, yeah. He said my nose could use some work and I took his word for it. He is an expert after all. And now I’m going to look almost as amazing as him.” I didn’t exactly know how to respond to that. I just nodded and went back to typing on my laptop. Our conversation was more pleasant after we moved past the topic of Dr. Harrison. Instead of having Amy drive home and sleep at her place, I offered her the bed and I again took the couch.
Being that my sleep schedule is fucked beyond belief I was more inclined to just pull an allnighter and try and power through any strange feelings I had about Dr. Harrison. Maybe he was just awkward around people, or he simply was caught off guard by me like in one of these crappy romcoms. As the night went on I was so deep in the writing juices that I had almost forgotten about my strange experience at the clinic.
At around 3 in the morning, a phone started vibrating. Reaching into my pocket I pulled out my phone and tried answering it. Only to see that it wasn’t mine vibrating. Which shoulda made sense to me since I didn’t feel it vibrating in my pocket, but in my defense, I was in the zone. Looking around for the source of the vibrating I looked over at the coffee table next to the couch and saw that it was Amy’s phone. She must have left it on the table while we had been talking and had gone to bed without bringing it with her. Taking a peek at her phone I saw that the number had a name in her phone. Harrison’s Clinic.
Me and Amy used to always answer each other’s phones. So even though it was 3 in the damn morning I answered it. My brain was running on nothing but fumes and I wasn’t capable of higher brainpower.
“Hello?” I answered the phone. In my sleep-deprived mind, I was thinking that they were calling her to inform her of anything she might need to know. Like medicine or further steps, she had to follow. It was a few seconds of silence that followed after I told the person hello. “Anyone there?” I asked again.
“You aren’t Amy.” Came the male voice on the other end of the line. It took me a moment to process what had just been said to me. Only then did I realize that there was that whole doctor-patient confidentiality thing. And maybe I shouldn’t have answered the phone.
“Right, sorry I’m her friend Beth. She’s staying at my place while the meds and stuff wear off.” I was in the process of getting up from the couch to go see if I could wake her. “I can go get her if you need me to.”
“That won’t be necessary. I can always call her later. I was actually looking for you, Beth.” The man on the other side told me. A tingle ran down my spine as I realized who it was that was on the other side of the line. “I couldn’t stop thinking about your perfect skin and face.” It was Dr. Harrison.
“S-sorry to have bothered you, doc,” I told him before quickly hanging up. I didn’t even have time to process that he called me and not the other way around. I had to really fight the urge to chuck Amy’s phone off of my balcony. Instead, I put it on silence and walked it over to my room. I placed it on the nightstand next to the sleeping Amy and as I was leaving I saw it light up with it again being Harrison’s clinic number.
To say that the encounter ruined my sleep would be a vast understatement. There was no way I was going to get to sleep after that call, so I resigned myself to really pull an all-nighter. My laptop was on my lap and a knife from the kitchen was within reaching distance and my pepper spray was close at hand. I typed much slower than I usually did, caught off by every little squeak my apartment made.
By the time Amy finally emerged from my room at 11 in the morning I was functioning on motor memory more than anything. I looked over at her as she was looking at her phone and scrolling through with her thumb. She was in the process of pulling the bandages off her face and revealing her even more worked on face.
“Jeez, the clinic called me like 100 times.” She told me, looking up and staring at my barely functioning body. “Did you sleep at all?” I looked over to her and then back at my laptop. Slowly shaking my head and pushing my laptop away.
“I uh…stayed up to make sure nothing happened to you,” I told her, trying to get my brain to function at any capacity. It seemed to convince her since she let out an ‘aw’ and came over to hug me. I sleepily hugged her and patted her on the back. Since she was well enough now to have her bandages off we both concluded that she was good to go home. We both figured that I was in no state to drive her back so she simply got an Uber to take her home.
I collapsed into bed after she had left my apartment and groaned out loud. Hoping that I could at least get some sleep before anything else weird happened. It turned out I didn’t get to get much sleep as a few minutes after I shut my eye my phone started vibrating in my pocket. I groaned louder and reached into my pocket, half expecting that my editor was calling me about the latest draft I had sent him.
“Tom, can this wait a few hours?” I told the phone, not even bothering to look at if it was even him.
“I suppose if you want me to call you back I can wait a few hours.” Harrison’s voice told me from the other end of my phone. Once again all my sleep was thrown out the window as I shot up into bed and looked around my room as if he were going to be in there.
“How the fuck did you get my number?” I asked him, scrambling out of bed and quickly slamming the door shut to my room. I looked around the room as I still kept my phone up to my ear.
“Amy gave it to me. The lovely girl was also so kind as to give me your address.” Harrison told me, his voice soft like a lullaby but this was in no way calming to me. It succeeded only in causing me to get more frightened by what was happening.
“Why the fuck would she give you my address?” I shouted at him, walking over to my bedroom desk and rummaging around in there for my old cell phone to call the police. I was thinking a million things at once and any semblance of tiredness I may have had was blown away by the simple fact that this creep was stalking me and now had my phone and address.
“Well, I simply called her, asked about you and she was more than willing to give me your information. It’s incredible what the offer of a free surgery will get you.” The soft chortle he let out on the other end was enough for me to hang up on him and quickly use my old phone to call the police.
“911 what’s your emergency?” Came the nonchalant voice on the other end. I was still running around my room trying to find some kind of weapon to defend myself with. My dumbass finally realized I still had a whole rest of the apartment to look through so I unlocked my bedroom door and ran to the kitchen to get another knife.
“Yea, hi. I need police or something. This plastic surgeon is stalking me and he knows where I live. Can I get like, police here asap, please?” I asked, only the slightest bit of franticness in my voice. My eyes darted around my apartment as I heard what sounded like footsteps on my balcony. To my immense relief however it was only the beginning of rain falling.
“Ma’am you’re gonna wanna calm down. You say your plastic surgeon is stalking you?” The voice on the other end told me. Causing me to groan and try to take a few deep breaths to calm down and at least try to sound coherent.
“My friend’s plastic surgeon. He’s called me and told me that he knows where I live. Can I please get some police here?” I asked in the calmest tone I could muster. I heard some noises of understanding on the operator’s side as I also heard some fingers typing on the keyboard that they were working on.
“Do you know his name?” The operator asked me, still keeping that nonchalant attitude that all 911 operators seem to possess. The kind where even if someone is getting murdered on the other end they still act like it’s any other caller on the end.
“Dr. James Harrison,” I told the operator, remembering the name that was on the door to the waiting room and the number of times Amy had brought up his name. The person on the other side of the call suddenly stopped mid-type and left me waiting in a long and awkward silence that felt like it dragged on for minutes. “Hello?” I finally broke the silence to see if they were still there.
“One moment please.” The voice told me. And then I was met with a beep. Staring at the phone I stared at the screen that showed that they had ended the call. Needless to say, a new hole was created in my wall by my old phone being thrown into it. I ran back into my room as the rain outside began to pick up and I grabbed my current phone. Calling 911 and waiting for them to pick up.
“911 what is the cause of your emergency.” The same voice asked me.
“What the fuck, why did you hang up on me? I told you I need police here now!” I shouted at the operator. It took them a few seconds to realize that it was the same person from before. There was another long silence before the operator responded back to me.
“Right, ma’am we will send a unit to your location. Simply give me your address.” They told me, causing me to question if I was ever going to get an officer here. Still, I would have rather taken the gamble than possibly be attacked without the hope of help. So I gave the operator my information. And I knew instantly that help wasn’t coming when again they ended the call. Instead of staying on the line till the officers arrived.
Now fully convinced that I was by myself I looked around my apartment with a new sense of fear. And the ringing of my phone caused my blood to freeze as I answered the unknown number. I didn’t even need to speak to know who was on the other end.
“I must say, for someone with such a beautiful face as yours you certainly do live in a dump. A waste of a perfect face if you ask me.” Harrison told me as I heard the rain falling from his end of the line. I swallowed the building bile in my throat and ran to my window to try and spot him. The rain was falling so hard though that it obscured any vision past five feet.
“You stay the fuck away from me you creep,” I told him, gripping the kitchen knife and squinting at the window for any sort of hint that he was out there. “I won’t hesitate to kill you if you so much as even show up at my door,” I told him, doing my best to be macho and put myself in the shoes of a character in my stories.
“Oh come now, Bethany. Let’s not get violent. I simply want to feel your skin against mine. Is that so much to ask of you?” He questioned me. Again causing me to end the call and block his number. Fully ready to fight him, I went over to my living room again and grabbed the mace that I had left on the coffee table. I walked over to the balcony door and made sure it was locked, though it being glass didn’t leave me much hope of it protecting me.
The next few minutes passed at about the speed at which the continents move. A minute took a full hour to pass as I paced around the living room and jumped ten feet at every sound. The knock that came on my door was enough to make me shit myself. My knife and mace whipped over in the direction of my door. Approaching it I took a few deep breaths and watched to make sure the door didn’t fly off its hinges or something.
“Beth? You there? I left my medical papers with you.” Amy’s voice came to the other side of the door. That left me conflicted, however. If it was Amy she had just told Harrison where I was and even my phone number. Waking over to the peephole I looked into it and was met with the outline of Amy. Putting the knife on the table near the door I kept my mace handy as I cautiously opened the door but left the door chain on just in case.
“Yeah, hey. Where did you leave them?” I asked her, the mace held behind my back and ready just in case. Amy looked at me like I had gone crazy and reached a hand over to me.
“You brought them, didn’t you? Is something wrong? Why aren’t you letting me?” She asked me, trying to push on the door and seeing that the door wouldn’t budge. “Common, Beth I need this new surgery. I’ll be able to get a slimmer waist! Don’t you want that for me?!” She asked me, completely having lost it and starting to bang on the door.
I quickly shoved her back and slammed it closed. She kept clawing at the door and demanded that I let her in. I grabbed the knife from the table and backed away from her. Seeing that it was only Amy I concluded that there was no way that she could bash the door down. I left her to bang on my door, hoping that one of my neighbors would deal with it for me. Maybe the cops would answer for one of them.
Looking over to the balcony the rain was becoming so hard that it left visibility to near zero. The flash of lightning that revealed a figure standing on my balcony caused me to scream out loud. I couldn’t make it out at first but I would get that chance when the person lifted up some sort of blunt object and smashed the glass to the balcony open. The figure that walked into my living room looked as if his face was melting off.
“Now Bethany, stop being so difficult.” The stranger told me, Stepping into the light of my apartment the figure revealed himself to be Harrison. At least someone that once looked like Harrison. As his once beautiful face was melting off his face like melting wax revealing under it to be heavily scarred and mangled. He was missing an ear and it looked as if only one eye possessed an eyelid. “Just give me your beautiful skin. It’s not like you deserve it.” He told me, approaching me with the metal pipe he had used to break my window.
Acting on instinct I lifted up my mace and sprayed it at him. The pepper spray struck him in the face and caused him to stagger momentarily and grab his face. Only to look over at me with his eyes further bloodshot and a slight smile on his face.
“Oh, my dear. I’ve had much more painful things happen to me than simple pepper spray.” He told me with a sarcastic chuckle. I lifted my knife up to charge him but before I could do anything I found myself falling to the floor and my motor skills failing me. As I fell I looked up to see that Amy had hit me in the back of the head with a rolling pin I always had out in my kitchen. I had completely forgotten that I had given her a key to my apartment. She must have unlocked my door and broken the chain lock.
“What perfect skin you have. I’ll be sure to put it to good use.” Harrison told me as I drifted off into unconscientious. Waking up in the bed of an operating room, I groggily looked around the room I had found myself in. Trying to lift my arm up I was horrified and snapped into reality at what had happened to me. There was no skin on my arms, only the red fiber texture of muscles staring back at me.
“Oh dear, you’re awake quite early,” Harrison told me, I panted and looked around for the source of his voice. I didn’t have to look far as he hovered his head over me. His face was back to normal, only this time it was so much more beautiful. It was flawless, it was perfect in every sense of the word. “Don’t worry, I won’t leave you like this. You’ll make a lovely source of new skin for me. I’d be honored if you joined my skin farm, my lovely dear.” He told me, his hand rubbing against my skinless face and playing with my muscles.
I stared up into his eyes. Those vibrant green eyes seemed to glow in the dark and that seemed to only grow darker the longer I looked at them.
“I would love to,” I told him, staring up at him with what smile I could manage without any skin on me. He smiled knowingly at me and nodded, stroking my scalpless head and giving my forehead a kiss.
The next time I woke up I was back in my room and wrapped completely in bandages with a note waiting for me on my nightstand. The letter contained a prescription slip and instructions for me. My new life consists of taking a cocktail of strange medicines that cause my skin to grow back. And once it grows back fully, I go back to Dr. Harrison for harvesting. It’s not much of a life to live but I’d do anything for Dr. Harrison and to continue to give him the perfect skin that he deserves.
Anything for him.