Imagined physical defects take an ugly personal toll

摘要

It sounds like an episode from The Twilight Zone. Submitted for your approval: In communities across the country, teenagers and young adults watch their bodies undergo horrid transformations. Noses sprout revolting bumps, faces break out in red spots, breasts and genitals shrink or enlarge drastically, and mouths branch crookedly from one cheek to the other, to cite a few examples. A cruel force seems to be taking grotesque liberties with human anatomy. Yet only those whose bodies succumb to the force can see the bizarre physical mutations.