Artificial Heart

Prisha’s feet squished through the mud and wet grass. Her arms were aching. Her hair was plastered to her head. But it was nothing to the hollow feeling in her chest. There was every chance he wouldn’t come back and now she had to return to normalcy and pretend like the biggest adventure of her life never happened.

She didn’t bother concocting a story as she approached the police station. She felt nothing as she stepped through the doors. No embarrassment. No fear. She hadn’t committed a crime. There was a man sitting on a chair to her left. He looked up at her with a start.

The officer stood from his desk, eyebrows raised. ‘Are you all right?’

‘I need to get home.’

Close to an hour later, Scott was driving her back home. What was the likelihood of encountering the same officer as last time? Not as slim as encountering a spaceship, she supposed, but stupidly low.

And sucky.

They were both quiet, Prisha sitting stiffly in her seat. He was annoyed, though he tried not to show it, his hands tense around the wheel. He had short dark hair and bright blue eyes. He was young. Probably late twenties. Too young to be so angry all the time. But she supposed being a cop did that to people.

‘Are you taking me to the train station again?’ Prisha said sharply.

‘I would but there are no trains so late’

He said nothing about the state of her, though his eyes roved over her in dismissal.

‘Why do you have to be so nasty?’ she suddenly said, gripping her hands tightly in her lap.

Her box and space blanket, along with her wet clothes were in the boot. Her hair was soaking through the seat and the back of the rather large and lumpy jumper she was wearing. It was the second time Prisha had made use of their clothes.

‘Because you’re wasting our time. Whoever is doing this to you—you need to stop seeing them.’ He looked her over again. ‘If he assaulted you …’

‘No! I told you, it’s not like that.’

‘Then what is it?’

‘I told you the last time.’

‘You did?’

‘Yes, remember? You wouldn’t believe me.’ He looked at her quizzically. ’The alien.’

He scoffed. ’The alien. Right. Yeah. Okay. You really ought to be properly assessed. We should be sending you to hospital, not back home.’ He looked at her. ‘I should, at the very least, take you to your sister’s.’

‘No, definitely not,’ she said quickly. ‘I don’t need her involved in this, and I don’t need to be assessed. I’m fine.’

‘Really? Wrapped up naked in the middle of the night in a thunderstorm? Babbling about aliens.’

’I’m not babbling. You asked me.’

Scott shook his head. ‘What would you think if you were me?’

‘Probably the same thing—but that doesn’t make you right.’

He turned down into her street. Prisha shifted uncomfortably in her seat. She undid her belt as he pulled up. She opened the door.

‘We’re here to protect you,’ he told her. ‘We’re not your enemy.’

‘I know that.’

‘I don’t want to see you again,’ he called after her as she climbed out. ‘Next time, I’ll call your sister and I’ll escort you directly to the hospital. Got it?’

Prisha turned to glare at him before shutting the door. The boot flipped open and Prisha struggled to lift out her alien box full of nutrient bags, along with her wet clothes and the space blanket.

At least the worst of the rain had mostly gone, only spitting. She ignored him as she walked past, leaving the boot open for him to close. Prisha dropped her things at the front door and unlocked it. Her keys rattled. Stop shaking!

The moment she entered and closed the door, dragging her things in along with her, she heard Scott leave.

She sat the new space blanket on top of the older one, then opened the box, gazing at its contents. You are not meeting minimum nutritional requirements. Prisha smiled. Then she frowned. Why did he have to bring her back? Was she such a nuisance?

‘Fuck you, Alf.’

She closed the box up and tucked it away into a cupboard. The police had taken a look at her things. Nobody had been the wiser that anything might be alien. Eyes shut to the world. Minds closed.

Scott was an asshole.

It was still deep into the night. Tossing off her damp overlarge clothes, she had a shower. Then she stood in front of the mirror, lifting her arm to take a closer look at her armpit. Definitely a scar. She touched her chest. Her heart was beating regularly and steadily. She checked the rest of herself over but could see no obvious signs of “tampering”.

Prisha gazed at herself in the mirror. She touched her face where Alf had touched her, then combed her fingers through her long, dark hair, still damp from outside. There were fine lines around her mouth and eyes but otherwise she was quite youthful for a woman close to fifty. Her nut brown skin did well against the sun. She was very fit compared with most women her age. She thought of Alf, his big hands, his huge shoulders, his gentle touch …

She wondered again how old he was.

With a sigh and a shrug, she turned off the bathroom light and went to bed.

The next day, Prisha managed to wrangle her neighbour into driving her back to her car still parked by the hiking trail. ‘Thanks for this,’ she told him as she climbed into the passenger seat. ‘I really appreciate it.’

‘No problem. Something happen? You have an accident?’

‘It’s a long story.’

Richard liked to talk a lot. He was an older man and married and was a little too friendly with Prisha, but what else could she do? There was no way she would contact her sister. She would never hear the end of it.

Leaning against the window, Prisha chewed her nail, unable to steer her thoughts away from last night, all the while nodding and grunting in agreement to Richard’s endless talk.

It was dry today, though water drenched the roadside as she got out. Her car looked strangely lonely. She pulled her keys from her pocket.

‘Thank you, Richard.’ She tried to hand over some money.

He waved it away. ‘No, no, no. It’s what a good neighbour does.’ He grinned at her and winked. ‘Don’t be a stranger, yeah?’

‘Right.’

She closed the door and he took off, tooting his horn. Prisha opened her car and slid into it with a sigh. She studied the bush, thinking of the tent and backpack she’d left behind. It would take hours of hiking …

She went home.

Prisha was staggering and gripping at her belly by the time she got through her front door. Something was really wrong. She sat down on the toilet and discovered that her underwear was soaked in blood. She checked her pants and saw that a little had seeped through.

‘Jesus.’ She quickly wiped herself down, then stood, only to bend over with a groan. ‘Fuck!’

At a an uncomfortable jerk in her stomach, Prisha twisted around and threw her head over the bowl. Only a little liquid came out. She dry-reached again, spat, wiped her mouth, then sat on the floor.

She leaned against the toilet. Why was it suddenly so damn hot? She wiped the sweat from her forehead and aired out her shirt. She started to shiver. Next, she lay upon the floor, her cheek against the tiles. Hot and cold, cold and hot—she didn’t know what she was. Her naked butt was freezing.

She might have blacked out but she wasn’t sure. Slowly, she sat up, her stomach empty and hungry, her mouth paper dry. Delicately, she reached between her legs. Only a little blood. She staggered to her feet with a groan and snatched out a tampon from the cupboard.

Once she was done, she sat down shakily on her couch and stared into her yard. Should she see a doctor?

Prisha chewed the corner of her cheek.

She had to see Alf again. What if he’d made a mistake? What if one of his experiments—sorry, data collection—had gone wrong?

Prisha gripped onto the arms of her chair.

There were no further fainting episodes for the rest of the day, though she became dizzy enough at one point that she had to lie upon the floor. It was soon fixed by downing a bottle of water and consuming one of Alf’s mysterious sachets.

Later that afternoon, she went to her little gym. She probably shouldn’t have done. At another bout of dizziness, she consumed another sachet. She stared at the empty packaging, thinking to herself how incredible it was. How priceless. How awesome.

Prisha wiped her mouth and threw the empty sachet into the bin.

She slept soundly through the night. The next day was better. Much better. She continued to menstruate but much more normally now. She was so hungry she consumed two of Alf’s pouches.

That afternoon, she went for her usual jog, only to blast past her finishing point, feeling ridiculously good. She ran an extra two kilometres and could have easily run more. She wasn’t just feeling good. She felt indefatigable. Unbeatable. Fucking strong. By the time she reached home it was dark and she stood in her driveway staring in a daze down the street.

Her body was pounding with blood, the air was whooshing through her lungs, but she wasn’t tired.

She felt … incredible.

After having a shower and making dinner, Prisha switched on the news. She was several mouthfuls into her meal when she froze. Dropping her fork, she scrambled for the remote, turning the volume up.

A so-called UFO had been sighted somewhere in Northern France. Prisha stared at the recording, at the photos. Her skin prickled. It certainly had a familiar shape about it. Could it be Alf?

Prisha shook her head. He could make himself invisible when he wanted to. It couldn’t be him. She went back to eating. The presenters were laughing and cracking jokes.

Just a hoax.