Rock, Paper, Scissors, Glass
by Jude-Marie Green
Aunt Tad lounged on the porch swing, half in and half out of the sun. I brought her some lemonade because I was thirsty and hot, sweating through my shirt. She didn't sweat. She waved her hands slowly through the beams of sunlight, admiring the rainbows they painted on the floorboards.
"Most people cast shadows," she said. "I shed refractions. It's kind of odd. But you get used to it." She took the lemonade in her glass hand. She wore a tank top and abbreviated shorts, leaving nothing to the imagination, really. Glass skull--no hair, of course--glass bones and skin, glass chest rising smoothly with her breath. Transparent everywhere except for some discreet cloudy spots shielding her internal organs. I sat next to her on the swing, squinting to see where the glass of the lemonade disappeared against the transparency of her hand and her lips.
"I guess you'll know soon enough," she said. "Your mom says you want to join up, take on the Change. Go into battle as an Amorphous."
I nodded. "Yes. I have to serve, I might as well serve with the best." And the most beautiful, I thought, but I'd already blurted out that I thought she was beautiful. She'd ignored me.
Aunt Tad stretched like a cat. I heard dangerous crackling from her spine. "She wants me to talk you out of it." She pointed her face at me with a considering silence.
I'd expected this. "I already signed up. I don't know why she doesn't want me to be on the elite team."
"You don't? I know you heard me last night. I shattered glass with my screams." She waggled her feet. Three toes were missing from the right, two from the left. I gasped.
"No worries, sweetie, I have a repair kit. I even picked up some dichromatic glass. Some decoration is allowed these days."
"Can I watch?" The words slipped out and I blushed. She's my aunt, I thought furiously, not a curiosity. Not a thing to observe.
She snorted. "Maybe. Ya know, your mom and I fought over getting into the Amorphous. We both had the scores, but they said only one of us could join. Only one opening, they said. So we settled the issue with a rousing game of rock-paper-scissors. A strategy game as old as time."
