Interrogation
The room was black. A girl sat in the middle. Her hands were folded on her lap under a table. The door creaked open, a light flicked on, and the girl jumped. A man walked into the room with a manila file that read CONFIDENTIAL in blue ink. The girl looks at the man, and rolls her eyes. The man threw the file down on the table in front of the girl, pulled out the chair, and took a seat. The girl’s eyes locked on the man like daggers, as the man opened the file. “Why am I here?”
“Lizzy Hall?” The man looked up from the file. She shook her head no. The man shifted in his chair.
She shook her head again. “Do I look like I’m a Lizzy?”
She unfolded her hands from under the table. There were numbers on her arm: 38475285. The girl looked at the number, then crossed them on top of the table. She noticed the man’s eyes widen. She glared again into the man’s eyes. The man broke her eye contact, swallowed, and looked down at the file.
“I’m going to ask you one more time.” The man’s lips were pressed together.
The girl already knew what the question was. “No, I am not Lizzy Hall.”
The man sighed, “Then what is your name?” The man’s voice was shaky.
“Julia, my name is Julia.” She glanced down at her arm.
The man’s eyes widened even more.
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“Lizzy, we have to go!” I bang on the bedroom door.
“Julia, I choose to be late to school, that doesn’t mean that you have to be.” Lizzy says, laying in bed.
“Mom called and told me to drive you, so you have five minutes!” I walk away with my hands in fists.
Lizzy and I were sisters and we sometimes get along and sometimes we don’t. Our mom doesn’t live with us anymore, but somehow she still take care of us. We never knew what happened to our dad. He just disappeared one day and we haven’t heard from him since. I have to get through this last year of high school, then I’m off to go somewhere away from this place. I am also two years older than the little princess, known as Lizzy, who is always surrounded by her mob of loony followers including her best friend, Aria. Lizzy knows all the sophomores and all the freshman. She is the girl that everyone loves. I am the girl that most people dislike. I have a best friend and his name Xavier. We are the two people that never talk to anyone else but to each other. We both have numbers on our arms. My number is 38475285, and his number is 38475276. Nobody knows what the numbers mean but us, because its something that we decided to do when we got in high school. Its not a tattoo, its just marker that will stay on the skin forever.
When school is over, I make Lizzy ride the bus because well--one, she’s a sophomore, two, shes annoying, and three, I don’t go home after school. Xavier and I go places depending on where we want to go, and just talk about what made us angry and what made us happy that day. Nothing makes Xavier happy, besides being with me because he can talk about anything with me.  When I got home, Lizzy was sitting on the porch, crying. I quickly got out of my car and went up to her. “What’s wrong, Liz?” I sat down next to her.
Her eyes were red and there were tears falling from her cheek. “Why do you get to go out with, whatever his name is, and I have to take the bus home?”
“His name is Xavier and we have been over this, I am a senior and I can drive, you just can’t.” I put my arm around her just for it to be pushed away.
“Yeah, but why can’t I go out with you and Xavier?” She wiped a tear from her cheek.
I looked out over the lawn. “Lizzy I’ll make you a deal, because we look so much alike,” I paused because I was thinking about saying what I was about to say. “Why don’t we switch places? Tomorrow I will be you, and you will be me.”
Lizzy looked at me like I was crazy. “What?”
I looked at Lizzy with my “you heard me” look.
“You be me, and I be you???” Her tears were gone now, but her face was still confused. “I can drive?!”
I quickly shook my head “NO, I don’t want to die, I’m too young.”
“Hey I’m younger.” Lizzy made a face that looked like she really had to go to the bathroom.
“Yeah someone as young as you, doesn’t belong behind the wheel of my car.” I got up from sitting on the porch and went inside.
Lizzy was putting on my shirt on when she froze and looked at me.
“What? What are you looking at me for?” I looked at her while I was squeezing into her shirt.
“Your arm, it has numbers on it.” She couldn’t take her eyes off my arm.
I looked at my arm. “Crap.”
Lizzy finished putting the shirt on.“Can’t you just take the numbers off your arm?”
I sternly shook my head, “these numbers don’t come off my arm!”
Lizzy rolled her eyes, “oh yeah, that thing you did when you and Xavier got into high school. I still don’t understand.”
I smiled, “That’s the point, you aren’t supposed to understand.”
Lizzy and I thought about what would happen if someone noticed that Lizzy came to school with numbers on her arm and Julia didn’t. I just took a black sharpie and wrote the number on her arm. Lizzy came up with the idea that even though that it’s really hot outside, that I should wear a sweater and a skirt that went with it to hide the permanent number on my arm. Never have I ever worn a skirt to school. I was planning on wearing white suit to my wedding. The skirt was really short for me, so Lizzy magically pulled leggings out of her closet. She immediately started laughing.
“Lizzy, you will tell nobody about this.” I think I made my point clear because Lizzy stopped laughing right away.
Lizzy nodded her head. “Got it.”
On the drive to school Lizzy kept talking. “Why did I want to be you? I don’t to wear these clothes. I want my skirts back, my sweaters. I want to go to my classes, hang with my friends.”
My eyes got wide “Oh my gosh, classes! I didn’t think about that! You can’t go to my classes because they are too hard for you. Your classes are too easy for me.”
Lizzy just kept on saying things. “I don’t want to just hang with Xavier, I want to talk to other people in the hall.”
I completely blocked Lizzy out until I heard the words “oh my gosh” come out of her mouth. I looked at her with my eyebrows cringed together.
“What about our classes?!” Lizzy’s face looked like she was panicking.
“Liz, you should have been listening to what I was saying when you were talking to yourself. Just go to the other person’s classes and take notes. Neither of us have tests today, so we will be fine.” I tried to calm her down.
She took a breath and settled in her seat.
When we got to school we wrote down our schedules and room numbers. I reminded Lizzy that she is now me and that I was her. I had the car keys hanging from my hand. Lizzy put her hand out. “Give.”
“You have got to be kidding. I am not giving you my car keys.” I walked away.
This skirt that I was wearing was already getting on my nerves. Aria came up to me and started screaming. “Oh my gosh Lizzy, I love that skirt on you!”
“Do I look like a Lizzy?” I felt my eyes get wide, and I got really hot. Aria’s head tilted a little. I smiled because I didn’t know what to say. “Uh, thanks. Um, I like your outfit too.” I need to be more careful on what I say. I can’t be myself, my sassy self. This is going to be a long rough day. I saw Xavier walking alone. “Hi Xavier!” He looked at me, but just kept walking. I kept thinking about if Lizzy actually tried being me. I was walking with Aria in the hall when I saw them walking together. I smiled and looked at Aria.
Aria was looking at me, “There goes your sister and that weird kid Xavier.”
I took a breath because I didn’t want to explode on her. “Xavier is actually really nice, once you get to know him.” Aria’s eyebrows shifted.
“I mean, that’s what Julia tells me.” The bell chimed and Aria put her arm around mine, kind of like they do in the Wizard of Oz, when they are off to see the wizard and we went to class.
It has been six hours, I am in a skirt, I can’t talk to my best friend, and I can’t talk to Lizzy. Two more hours left. Aria is noticing that there is something off about me. I was going to roll up my sleeves because I was hot, but I couldn’t because of the number. I was starting to sweat with one hour left in school. I realized that I never talked to Lizzy about what was going to happen after school. It was Xavier’s day to drive somewhere, I had the car keys and I can’t drive home because my sister is too young and if I get caught, it would just be bad.
I decided to meet Lizzy where Xavier and I usually meet, but they never came. I started to worry, but then I also was ok with it because I knew that Lizzy was with someone I trusted. Besides I knew where they were going. There is a little park that is about 10 minutes away. Then again Lizzy has no idea where she is going. I waiting for them for 2 hours, the hallways were clear and the parking lot was empty except for my car. I quickly gathered my things and rushed to my car. I couldn’t find my key, it was in the very bottom of my backpack, talk about a heart attack. I unlocked the car and put my backpack in the back of my car, and shut the door. I was about to get into my car when something hit me in the back. I turned around and there was a man there. He was wearing a blue button down shirt and jeans. He had a beard and long hair. I put my hands behind my back to opened the door to my car.
“Hello.” I smiled at the man. Darn I’m turning into my sister. The man just kept looking at me. He took three steps closer to me. He was in arm’s length.
“Is there something you need?” I am talking to people, what is going on with me. I was trying to back up, but the car was in my way. “Well you are creeping me out, so I best get home.” I looked away from the man and opened the door enough so I could get in, only I never got in.

I can’t see anything. I know that I am sitting in a chair with a table in front of me. My hands are crossed on my lap under the table. The door opens, the light flicks on, my body jerked up. A man walks into the room with a manila folder labeled CONFIDENTIAL  in red ink.
“I’ve seen that folder before.” I pointed to the folder.
The man nodded his head. “Yes, your sister Julia gave it to me.” The man walked over to the chair that was empty across from me, and sat down.
“I didn’t give away any folder?” I thought to myself. “Especially not to this guy.”
All I know is that Lizzy is safe is Xavier. Could Xavier be the one that gave this man my folder? No, he wouldn’t do that to me, I mean Lizzy.
The man pulled a picture out of the folder. “Do you know a man named Xavier Gatewood?”
My eyes stung as air flew into them. I felt my crossed hands slide apart.
“Well by that reaction, I think you have met him.” The man grew a smile.
“Why are you smiling? I don’t get how this is supposed to be amusing to you.” My sass was coming out. I put my hands together again under the table. I was supposed to be a nice girl who loved to talk and had to be scared in this situation.
“How long have you known Mr. Gatewood?” The man pulled out a pen and put it to the paper like he was going to write something.
“He’s my sister’s best friend, that’s pretty much all I know.” I was lying through my teeth. I needed to protect Xavier. I thought about how this man got a hold of things about Xavier and how he got my folder.
The man opens the CONFIDENTIAL folder and stares at a piece of paper. “Your sister? Julia?”
My hands were sliding again. I felt my lip quiver, the stinging in my eyes made me blink.
“How do you know all this stuff about my sister and me?” I wasn’t afraid of this man. I just can’t show it because I’m Lizzy right now. I had let some sass go earlier, but I need to let some more out.
“I know things about everyone that you care about.” The man smiled bigger. His teeth were yellow and disgusting.
“You know, you should really brush your teeth sometime; that’s just disturbing.” I smiled my devious smile.
  The man got closer to me and breathed in my face. The green stench moved from his mouth to my cringed nose. The man must have saw my face because he laughed right in it because of the way that I had my nose. I was starting to get hot, so I rolled my sleeves up, and put them on top of the cold table. The man was looking at the file when he stopped and looked up. He pointed to my arm, the arm with the numbers. I had rolled up my sleeves. I quickly looked at my arm, before the man could read the numbers, slid down the sweater sleeve. How could I be so careless? I forgot that I was Lizzy, and I made a huge mistake in front of someone that I don’t even know. What have I done? My hands were wet again, I tried wiping off the wetness on my skirt, but it kept coming.
The man jumped out of his chair so fast it fell. “You aren’t Lizzy!” He was half way over the table when he grabbed my sleeve and tried rolling it up.
I quickly pulled away. “Don’t touch me!”
The man wouldn’t pull away. He finally got my sleeve to roll up. He some how got my arm to stay in one spot and my other to not even move. I was surprised that I couldn’t move my arm. I tried so hard to move it, but it felt like my arm was going to pop out of its socket, so I stopped trying. The man wrote down the numbers on my arm in the file. I saw some pictures under the paper that he was writing on. There were pictures of Lizzy and there were pictures of Xavier. Xavier and Lizzy together, Xavier and me together. I didn’t know what to do. There was a picture of Lizzy’s arm with the number on it. That was from today, she is wearing the same clothes. Suddenly my eyes got really big. I looked at her arm. I was starting to panic. My lungs filled with air, and then emptied. The number was different. How could the number be different? I made sure that the number that I wrote on her arm was the same as mine. How could this happen. I must have been thinking out loud because the man’s head tilted a little bit and looked at the number in the file and then to the one that was written a few seconds ago.
“Why are these numbers different?” The man voice was steady.
I just sat there in disbelief thinking back to how carefully I put the number on Lizzy’s arm. What could have happened between those few minutes when I changed. If only I could text Lizzy.
“Answer me.” The man was halfway across the table.
“I don’t know why the numbers are different.” I scooted my chair back away from the table.
“Are you Lizzy Hall?” The man looked up from his file.
“Do I look like a Lizzy?” My eyes got wide and then I knew that I have given up who I really was.
“Julia, how nice to see you again.” The man smiled.
“I have never seen you before in my life.” I sassed.
“Well maybe you should start being aware of your surroundings.” The man was still smiling.
I starting thinking about everywhere someone could possibly be spying on us. Then it hit me. The ice cream shop, the campsite, and the playground.
“You’ve been spying on me!?” I smacked the table and some papers flew toward the man.
“Hey, you can actually think.” The man was up close to her face now. “I know all the places that you have been to with Xavier.
“But how did you get the folder?” I questioned very politely.
The man smiles and then gets up from his chair. “Some way that you will never find out.”
The man walks away from the table that I am sitting at towards the door. “I need to find Lizzy, I have the wrong sister.” He mumbles under his breath.
“What was that?” I stood up from my chair.
The man turned around. “Nothing that you need to worry about.”
I glared at the man. I eyes felt like they were on fire.
“Tell me why your numbers are different.” The man walks over to me.
“I don’t know why they are different!” I was starting to get angry.
“Aren’t you an Xavier the only ones who have a number on your arm?” The man was getting closer to me.
“How do I respond to that?” I took a step back.
“It’s a yes or no question. Aren’t you and Xavier the only ones who have numbers on your arms?” The man got closer. “From what I can tell from the other pictures of when you and Xavier were together, there is no one else with the number on their arms, not even your precious little sister. Speaking of your little sister, isn’t it time that she be home?” The man smiled and chuckled.
I looked around the room again, this time I noticed things. I was in the basement of my house. The table that I had used for the lemonade stand that I did with Lizzy was sitting right in front of me. How did I not notice that?
“How did you get into my basement? How didn’t you get in my house? How did you get all these pictures of me? How do you know about Xavier?” I was getting mad and I was turning into a monster. I walked closer to the man close enough that I could smell his stinky breath again. I heard the door open upstairs, and Lizzy’s voice “Julia are you here?” I could hear the blue converse shoes on the wood floor. The man looked up at the ceiling of the basement. It was still black, but you could see when Lizzy turned on the light.
“Right on time.” The man looked at his watch, looked at me and then ran out the door. He was going so fast he forgot to close the door again. I quickly ran after the man up the stairs and into the kitchen where I found Lizzy eating a fruit cup. “Liz, where is he?” Lizzy didn’t even look at me, she just kept on eating her fruit cup. “Lizzy!” She finally looked at me with a “are you seeing things again” look. “Lizzy, this time it’s true, the man really was here.” Lizzy looks up from her eating her fruit cup. “Julia, we have been over this. There is no man, there is nobody here.” I look at the basement door only to see it wide open. I remember closing the door as soon as I got up the stairs. “Did he run back downstairs?” I thought to myself. “I have to go find out.” I quietly walked downstairs to see the man sitting in the chair that I had sat in earlier. He had his shoes on the chair, his head between his knees, and was rocking back and forth. I ran upstairs and grabbed Lizzy by the wrist and pulled her downstairs to the rocking man.
“Oh my gosh.” Lizzy put her hand over her mouth.
“See, I told you that I wasn’t seeing things. He was after you and the day that he grabbed me it was supposed to be you, but we had swapped places.” I was going on and on about what happened when she was out with Xavier. I noticed that her hand was over her mouth. “Liz what’s wrong?” Her eyes were locked on the man still rocking in her chair. I looked at Lizzy then I looked at the still rocking man then I looked at Lizzy, then I looked back at the man who had stopped rocking and was looking right at us. I looked back at Lizzy. “Lizzy, do you know this man?” She nodded her head, then looked at me. “Dad.” I looked back at the man who was still looking at me. “That is not dad. I would know if it was dad. ” I looked at the man again--this time, harder. He smiled at me, why? I had no idea. I looked at Lizzy, “That man looks nothing like our Father. Dad had a beard and short hair when he left.” Lizzy pointed to the man who had lost the yellow teeth, and was losing his shirt. The shirt that was under his previous shirt was a shirt that I recognized. It was a picture of Lizzy and me when we were little, back when we knew where our dad was. There were words under the picture “my little munchkins.” The words were starting to go blurry, I couldn’t take my eyes off of the shirt. I notice Lizzy walk toward our so called dad, I followed her. We stopped in front of the man still sitting in the chair. His legs were on the ground along with his yellow teeth. He smiled, his teeth were whiter than a snow. His beard and his long hair were gone.
“Where did you go! You left us all alone, Mom was so worried about you! You just left us! Why?” I screamed, I needed to get all of my anger out.
The man smiled. “You finally figured it out. I’m proud of you, Julia.”