Cursed

Based very loosely on the fave picture “A Good Company.”

Day 1:

Carlie woke up slowly, not wanting to as the sun streamed into her window on her face.  She covered her eyes, the pounding of the headache telling her that she was going to pay for indulging a little too much last night.  Well, maybe a little too much was a slight understatement.

As she winced, submitting to the day, she tried to remember what happened.  Wasn’t there something else that happened at the party?  As she stretched her arms out, feeling her legs, she reached down...and felt nothing. “What the….”

She came fully awake, realizing that her body ended at her waist.  She panicked a little as she tried to feel the reassuring presence of her legs, her legs that she could still feel, but there was nothing there.

As soon as her roommate saw that, she screamed and nearly fainted, but Carlie kept her awake. “Hey, I need to figure out what happened last night and where the heck my legs are!”

Her roommate knew that she was going to have to depend on her for this as Carlie really had no idea how she was going to get anywhere.

Day 4:

Somehow, Carlie’s roommate managed to find a used wheelchair.  It took a little practice, but she could finally get around fairly easy using the chair, including actually being able to get some remote work done.

Still, the fact that she had no clue where her legs were bothered her.  What happened?  How’d she get cut in half?

And why did it feel so good?  She’d realized, a little later on that first day that she felt excellent, that, somehow, being bisected felt wonderful.  It didn’t make any sense.  She’d been split in half, she should be screaming.

When they went to the hospital on Day 2, they couldn’t discover anything amiss, other than her missing legs.  Everything else seemed to be working fine and, although she still didn’t know where they were, she had sensation in her legs and could feel them moving.

But someone had to know.

Day 7

It was when Carlie was researching ways to cut people in half that she ran across it.  Sure, the gory ones she went past, not interested in them at all.  And the magic ones, although they intrigued her, didn’t hold much interest.

Not until she ran across a video of some French guy apparently using this strange disk, one with carvings on it, to pull his assistant in half and show she was in two parts.  Something about that disk seemed oddly familiar, like she’d seen it before.

She looked around and found that there were a few performances with the same disk, each time sawing the woman in half and pulling her apart and, each time, having her survive.

She replayed all of them, pausing and zooming in on the disks.  In each one, strange carvings came out, like they were some sort of instruction.  Could it be?

She sent a message around to some of the people she knew had gone to the party, wanting to know if they could translate the carvings.  It had to be a part of what had happened to her, a part of why she was only from the waist up.

It took about an hour before someone responded that, yes, they could translate the carvings. “If any are divided hereon, no harm shall come.  But, if the person stays divided a fortnight, then shall the division remain.”

A fortnight?  Did they mean the game?  Carlie quickly looked it up, finding that the actual root of the word meant 2 weeks.

She only had a week left.

Day 9

It took a little bit more research for Carlie to discover that whatever created the disks, like the one that she’d apparently been bisected on, didn’t mean for anyone who used them to die.

Still, she wanted her legs back.  Wherever they were, someone was keeping them from doing much of anything.  She could feel when someone cleaned them, trying to avoid touching naughty bits as much as they could, but she still had no idea where they were.

But she had adapted.  She actually found that, aside from having nothing from her waist down, she could live a fairly normal life.  Some of the Uber rides she took seemed a little put-out that they were only driving half a woman around, but that was okay with her.

But she missed being able to drive her car.  She missed the independence of being able to do all these things on her own, not having to get lifts from strangers.  She wondered if there was a way they could adapt her car, but kept hoping that, before the week was up, her legs would be returned to her.

Day 11

Someone sent her a video they apparently found on their phone.  It appeared to be at the party in question when a few of them, apparently wasted, seemed to break into somewhere.

Carlie watched as they found a disk like the others, and someone she didn’t know pointed out that they’d seen some magicians saw women in half on it.  Carlie seemed eager, drunkenly sharing how she always was fascinated by the trick and wanted to know if someone could do it to her.

As they tied her up, her arms stretched high on one side and her legs on the other, someone found what looked to be a power saw, with shiny teeth.  They presented it to Carlie who giggled, nodding vigorously. “Do it.  Cut me.”

So they found an outlet and plugged it in, revving the saw up.  Carlie giggled again, bracing herself before someone mentioned that they didn’t want to hurt her. “Just do it.”

Apparently they were more hammered than they realized when they ran the saw into Carlie’s body.  She screamed as they ran it across her, cleanly cutting clear through her.  Carlie was gasping, but still alive.  There was no blood, no nothing. “I think I orgasmed.”

One of the others stupidly asked. “So should we just pull you apart?”

Carlie laughed, “Of course idiot.  That’s part of the trick.”

They all gasped as they pulled the lever and Carlie’s halves separated. “This is so awesome.  Now untie me.”

They did so, making sure to support her upper half instead of just dropping her. “It’s so weird.  I can feel my legs.  And…”

At that, her knee wentup. “I can move them.  Wonder what else…”

One of her friends pulled off a shoe and started tickling her feet.  As Carlie giggled, falling over, laughing uncontrollably, she had to turn the video off.

She messaged the friend that sent it to her, asking if she knew where her legs were.  They had no idea.

Day 15:

As Carlie woke up, she could somehow feel it.  True, she could still feel her legs, even though they weren’t underneath her at all, but she could feel it.  The time for coming back together in one piece had passed.  She’d never be whole again.

Still, she’d gotten used to it.  It seemed like almost second nature, being able to move around and do stuff.  She’d even managed to find a way to get her car worked on in her condition so that she could drive places.

But she still had to wonder.  Where were her legs?  Why wasn’t she….

A knock at the door booted her from her reverie. “Who is it?”

Tentatively, not like her at all, a voice came back. “It’s me, Carlie.  It’s Jess.”

She wheeled over and opened the door, inviting her longtime best friend in. “Haven’t seen you in…”

Her voice trailed off as she realized what Jess was carrying. “My legs?”

A quick twitch of her foot told her the truth. “You had them?”

It was more about curiosity than anger, more about why this would happen.  Jess put Carlie’s legs down on the sofa, where they sat. “Listen, Carlie.  You were pretty wasted at the party, but you begged me to hold onto them.  Someone said that you’d be stuck like this after 14 days, so you said bring them by after then.  You begged me.”

Carlie reached over from her chair, brushing her legs, feeling the tickling sensation.  Curiously, she wasn’t mad. “Did they act strangely?”

Jess winced. “Well, no.  Those bathroom parts you could still do.  I don’t know why, seeing as how there are all your guts.”

She pointed at Carlie’s upper half.  She could still move her feet, but, even though she knew, somehow, it would be useless, she tried lifting her upper half onto them.

No go.  Like she thought, it was too late.

But she felt so good.  It seemed like a wonderful experience being in two pieces. “So, uh, how do you think we should deal with this?”

Jess seemed relieved when she finally realized Carlie wasn’t mad and plopped down next to her legs. “I was thinking that, for now, we can use this.”

She pulled out a wad of industrial strength Velcro. “At least temporarily.  Then I have a friend who had an idea to be able to brace you up a little more firmly later on.  You can still use them and you’d still be in halves.  Stuck, apparently, but you’d be able to act like you’re in one piece.”

Carlie brushed the skin on top of her lower half, feeling that ticklish, tender sensation.  Would she be able to do that?  The Velcro idea sounded like it would work, at least for now.

As they managed to cut the strips to fit the skin on either side of her divided waste, Carlie heard and felt that familiar latching sensation as she pushed her halves together.  Experimentally, she tried standing.

After a couple of weeks, her legs weren’t used to it and they stumbled a little.  Carlie felt her halves sticking together though, felt that the Velcro was doing okay in that regard.

She’d just have to see what would happen later.