*Bzzzzz*

*Bzzzzz*

*Bzzzzz* *K-thunk*

Maurice awoke with a jump as his phone fell off his bureau and onto the floor. ‘Oh shit!’ he thought, ‘the screen better not have cracked.’ Picking up his phone and realizing it was perfectly fine, he read the text that had so rudely awakened him from his slumber.

Ruby

-Mo!
-I know it’s been ages since we’ve talked (like 2 years?)
-But I’ve got myself in some pretty nasty trouble.
-I know you just started spring break, but can you come over and help?
-Pretty please?
-My address is: 1176 Statestown Blvd

‘Ruby? How’d she get my number?’ Maurice thought, incredulous that his high school crush even remembered him at all.

Maurice laid back down, turning several times to try and enter REM once more, but with sleep eluding him, he got up and began to go through his morning routine. He showered, poured himself some coffee and cereal for breakfast, and pulled out his laptop to read the news. He was browsing peacefully when his phone started ringing. Thinking it was Ruby calling back to clarify her weird morning texts, Maurice was disappointed it was just his friend, Eric. Maurice decided to accept the call anyway.

“Good morning, Sunshine! Hope I didn’t wake you up too early.” Eric shouted in an annoying manner.
“Believe it or not, I was already up.” Maurice retorted.
“Before noon? This must be the devil’s work, because only hell freezing over could wake you up this early on the first day of Spring Break.”
“Nothing nearly as serious, I just got a text message from a hot girl. You wouldn’t understand.”
“Really? What’s this ‘girl’s’ name then?”
“Oh you know, just Ruby Delattre from high school.”
There was a moment of silence as Eric registered the name. “Dude! Congrats! She was a total babe in high school. What did she want?”
“She was asking if I wanted to come over and spend Spring Break with her.”
“You there already?”
“Nah, I’m not sure if-“
“Dude! What the hell are you waiting for? This is your childhood crush we’re talking about here! Besides, this is probably gonna be your only chance to score again.”
“You sure man? I mean, what if she’s a total pyscho or something?”
“You’ll never know if you don’t try. Besides, if things go bad. Call me back and we can grab a couple of beers and drink away your troubles.”
Maurice stood there for a moment, contemplating his options, before responding, “Okay, but it better be the high quality stuff.”


‘Well, this is the place,’ Maurice thought as he pulled into the driveway of a pretty standard, two-story house. As Ruby’s house was in the state over, it had taken him a good four hours to drive out here, and it was already a few hours after noon. He hoped that Ruby’s troubles would be over quickly, or he might have to stay the night. Leaving the overnight back he had packed just-in-case in the car, He approached the door and rang the doorbell.

The door opened almost as soon as he had rang the bell. “MO!” a muffled voice shouted as a figure pounced and hugged him. It was, unmistakably his high school crush, Ruby Delattre. She was a good head shorter than Maurice, with her natural bright, red hair in a ponytail that reached down to her back. Despite wearing jean shorts and a black tee with some band’s logo on it, her head was bundled in the thickest scarf Maurice had seen. Backing up a little, Ruby’s bright green eyes stared at you with a look of pure relief. “Come in, come in,” she said invitingly.

Entering in, Ruby led the way to the living room as she began catching him up on her life. How she was house sitting for her parents while they enjoyed their spring break in the Caribbean. How she was enjoying college but was missing all the friends she made in high school. How her major was a pain, but she made the most out of it. Most of the conversation was being held by Ruby, as Maurice was content to just listen to her stories. She had been talking for about an hour before Maurice finally had the nerve to ask.

“So why exactly did you text me so urgently? You seem just fine.”
“I was getting to that…” Ruby responded pensively, “If you hadn’t interrupted my story then I would have gotten to it.”
“I’m sorry.” Maurice apologized, “but if you just wanted to chat, you could have just called me instead of texting.”
“Fine. Fine.” Ruby conceded. She gathered her strength and began to explain her situation.
“So… you’re not going to believe this… but you remember that girl I was telling you about in my Macro class?”
“The one you called a slut for dating your ex?”
“Yah… well… it turns out that that incident kind of pissed her off… and she was a witch and she put a curse on me.”
Maurice began laughing.
“It’s not funny! It’s the truth!”
“Is this some kind of joke? Witches? Curses? I’m sorry Ruby, but it sounds a little ridiculous.”
“No! It’s the truth, look,” she handed Maurice a crumpled piece of paper, with a list of words scrawled on it in red. While the other words were incomprehensible, the first word was clearly written, spelling out the word ’Predator’.
Ruby continued to explain, “She said she cursed me with seven words and that I would transform to match those words for seven days to make me understand the power of my words.”
“Look Ruby, this is funny and all, but this just sounds crazy to me. Furthermore, you seem perfectly fine to me.”
“Fine, I’ll show you. But you have to promise me you won’t freak out.”
“Look, there’s nothing that would freak me o-“ Marks face transformed from calm to shocked as Ruby began to pull off her scarf.

Ruby’s face was almost completely normal, except for where her lips should have been, instead of just a single pair, there seemed to be a second pair placed perpendicularly to her normal set. “Now do you believe me?” she asked, her original set of lips talking normally whilst the vertical pair remained shut.
“Y-y-yah. Can you open them both at the same time?” Maurice asked, managing to compose himself slightly.
“Sure.” She replied from her vertical lips. She opened up her lips, causing them to split in a similar manner to that of the Predators from the movie the transformation was so obviously based upon. Inside her mouth, revealed a set of four corners arranged with teeth such that regardless of which mouth she chose to talk out of it would look normal. She also appeared to have four tongues competing for room in the back of her mouth. It was a wonder that she was even able to speak at all so clearly.
“So… I understand why you would ask for help.” Maurice gulped as Ruby closed her mouth.
“Yah. I’m freaking out that these transformations could leave me in a bad mess,” she said, becoming worked up, “I mean, what if she wrote something, and I can’t move, and then I’m not able to eat, and I begin to starve, and, and-“ She openly began bawling as the fear of the upcoming week hit her.
“Whoa! No need to work up. I’m here now, I’ll help out.”
“You will?” she sniffled, working herself down from her emotional high.
“Yah. I can spend a week. Besides, I had nothing better planned this week.”
“You sure?”
“Of course! I’ve even got an overnight back, so I can survive for a week as long as I do laundry on Wednesday.”
“That’s great.” She said, wiping away the last remnants of her tears. Ruby stood up, determined to act brave in front of Maurice now that he was going to help her out. “You can stay in my brother’s room then.”


Maurice went and grabbed his stuff. He plopped it onto the bed in the brother’s room. Ruby stood by the door, watching as he stretched himself out. However, there was one last thing that was bugging his mind.

“Hey Ruby…”
“Yah?”
“Why did you ask me to help you. I’m sure that this would be something your friends could have helped you out with.”
“Oh… just trying to tie up some loose ends from high school.” She said with a coy smile, walking away and beginning to close the door, before popping her head in one last time.
“By the way… my mouth wasn’t the only set of lips to get the Predator treatment.” She winked. closing the door on the young man.

‘This is going to be an interesting week’ Maurice thought.