Kyle spent the rest of his day afraid of losing control. The day seemed to stretch on, but not because of the boredom of classes.
He was unable to name why he was afraid of control. After all, a little bullying was nothing new to him. Yet the idea of not steering the situation, whether he was in charge or not, was terrifying to him.
He went through the motions of classes, of football, but nothing he was taught managed to sink into his distracted mind.
During practice, coach had even made him sit out, able to tell he wasn't all the way in it.
However, only Kai was interested enough in their surroundings to notice the stares of their teammates. 'Even better, an easy way off this waste-of-time football team.'
As Kyle drove home, he felt himself being pushed to the back of his mind, as if someone else were at the wheel.
He ended up in his bedroom, watching with resigned fear as his body sat down at his desk.
His hand grabbed a pencil, a piece of paper, and began to write.
'Hello Kyle.
As you may have noticed, you and I are now sharing a body. How unfortunate. Luckily for you, I have no interest in evicting you. Instead, wouldn't it be much better if we could… '
Kyle's heart sped up as his hand paused momentarily.
'... cooperate?'
Suddenly, his hand stopped moving before dropping the pencil as it fell limp, slightly shaking.
Steadying his breath, Kyle pushed himself back from his desk, standing up from his chair.
He took four steps across his bedroom before collapsing onto the foot of his bed.
"No, no, no no no…" Kyle's voice trembled as he whispered to himself, "I'm… I must be imagining it…"
"You're not imagining it, Kyle."
His own voice sounded foreign to him. Cold. Impassive.
"Then, please tell me… what is happening to me!?"
He was walked over to his desk, when his hand began to write again.
'Perhaps speaking whilst others are home is not the smartest of ideas, dear Kyle.'
"Ah, yes you're-" Kyle began to speak before his jaw slammed shut.
Finally comprehending his situation, Kyle began to write.
'I don't understand what is happening to me.'
They sat in silence, staring at the paper for a long while, before their shared hand began to move once again.
'What is it that you do not understand?'
After a short pause, his hand began to move again even before Kyle could think of a response.
'All that you need to understand has been written above. Cooperate with me.'
Somehow, the last punctuation had a note of finality to it, as if the being inside him were fed up with the conversation already.
Kyle was not ready to be done.
'What do you mean by cooperate!?'
While adding the question mark to complete his furious scribbling, Kyle pushed hard enough to snap the lead out of his pencil.
Instead of continuing to write, the voice inside him spoke up once again.
"Relax, and let me take control when I ask. Simple enough, no?"
And with that, Kyle was back in his head. Trapped. Thinking and thinking and hoping this was all a dream.
But something was different this time.
He could feel the walls, the places upon which he needed to push to try and escape.
So he did. Driven by his fear, he fought to regain control of his body when suddenly he did.
He felt as if something toxic had been driven out of him, freeing him.
The light returned, his room coming into focus around him, his heart still thumping furiously. And an ominous rumbling surrounding him… coming from a stomach that was not his own.
Kyle hadn't made it halfway to the door before Kai caught him and began to consume his fear.
Not a minute later, Kai sat on the desk, looking into Kyle's vacant eyes as he sat on the floor.
'How interesting… it seems fighting him made me… hungrier. Perhaps I should find someone more docile.'
Resolving to find a more cooperative host the next day, Kai returned all of his attention to watching Kyle. After all, this in and of itself was a valuable experiment.
As Kyle's eyes began to move once again, Kai noticed something interesting. 'His heart rate has slowed… He's not afraid anymore.'
Kyle stood up from the carpet, unwavering, and softly spoke, "I know you're still here, monster. But I do not fear you. So… let's talk after I return from dinner. It's been a long day, and I'm famished!"
'How strange.'
Kai would've been content to sit on that desk until Kyle returned, but the chill of the world around him was growing old. He took refuge in Kyle's mind once again, ready to observe these strange creatures called humans.
The annoying yet amicable child was refreshingly silent throughout the meal as the parents talked about the mundanity of their lives.
Kai might've been interested in the workings of adult society, but he currently had a much simpler fascination; table manners.
The way each person held the fork the same while eating, used their knives the same, had the table set, was incredibly interesting. Why was one way to hold a fork favored over another? Why switch fork hands when using a knife if your secondary hand could just be in charge of the fork, and the dominant hand in charge of the knife?
And what, for the love of god, was so significant about 'salad forks'?
Wondering of the functionality and usefulness of such arbitrary rules, Kai observed the rituals of dinnertime quietly from the back of Kyle's mind.
After dinner ended and cleanup was over, Kyle was ready to have the second half of their conversation.
Pulling out a pad of paper and pencil sharpener, he was ready to communicate with the thing inside him.
Feeling silly after a few minutes of just… sitting there… Kyle went first.
'Are you there?'
After a moment of stillness, he watched his hand slide across the paper to the beginning of a new line.
'Yes.'
Kyle felt a slight continued discomfort at another being living in his body, but ignored it, instead waiting for a further response. None came.
A few minutes later, he decided to try again.
'Are you still there?'
And a speedy response.
'I never left.'
Somehow, Kyle knew that he should feel something upon seeing that statement, and yet no feelings came. Eventually he wrote back,
'Why are you not writing more?'
'You have nothing interesting to ask me. Why should I?'
Kyle felt his face flush slightly with embarrassment. It was such a simple answer, easily solved if he had taken just a bit more initiative. Finally understanding the goal, he began to scribble out his list of questions.
'What are you? What are you doing to me? Why are you doing this to me? Why am I not more upset about this? What do you intend to continue to do if I cooperate? What happens if I don't cooperate?'
He felt his hand freeze, taken away from him.
They sat there like that for a long minute as Kai mulled over his answers to Kyle's question.
'I do not know. All I know is that I am hungry, and would like to find the answers to your questions.
Will you agree to my terms?'
At first, Kyle wrote out his response.
'I don't understand why or how I'm not against this. I should feel incredibly angry, or somehow afraid. But I don't.'
He paused, thinking it over one last time. After the moment of hesitation, Kyle let out a whisper.
"I'm in."