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“Ready...set!”

I flexed my knees as my line hunched in a determined set in front of me. Mike Valentine, my center, wrapped a large, beefy paw around the pigskin. I stuffed my hands under him, ready to receive the ball. I could hear the rising anticipation from the crowd, two thousand strong as they waited impatiently for the snap.

“Hut one!”

A defensive tackle shifted, trying to draw a bead on me in what he thought was a weakness between my left tackle and left guard. There was only a minute left in the game and we were still down by three points. We were a good fifteen yards outside Matt Baker’s range. Matt was a good kicker, but his longest field goal was forty-four yards. Besides, we were down by three, so even a field goal would only tie the game. But we were on our own forty-seven with a fourth and five. All the tackle had to do was sack me and the game was over. He would be in for a big surprise, though.

“Hut two!”

The heat on the field was absolutely palpable, rising up from the turf on an unseasonably warm October evening–a reminder of why high school football was generally played in the evening in the Valley of the Sun. It wouldn’t be enough to affect my pass though. Too much heat puts a little lift on the ball, but I had already made the mental adjustments I needed to put my pass where it needed to be. All I needed was the time to throw it.

“Hut three!”

The ball was thrust into my eager hands. Without even thinking, I turned the ball until my fingertips felt the laces just where they should be. I nimbly stepped aside, avoiding the big defensive tackle whose momentum carried him safely past me. Ignoring the battle going on in the trenches, I surveyed the field. My identical twin brother, Jeff, was open ten yards down the field, but there was a man on him. Besides, he was in the center of the field, and even a first down would leave him on the ground with seconds left and a very long field goal for Matt. With no time outs left, Matt might not even be able to get off the kick.

Unless I found the right man open, Caliente would lose to the Scorpions of Sedona Red Rock and any chance of winning our division would be lost, since neither team seemed likely to lose another game. That just wasn’t going to happen, though–not as long as I was the quarterback.

Kelly Jackson, my fullback, made a perfect block on his man just as I spotted Ryan Hendricks open along the sideline. Arcing the ball laterally across two thirds of the field, I connected with him just outside the ten-yard line where his momentum carried him out of bounds. We were still alive: time for one more play.

And the crowd went wild...

“God damn it Jason, I was open!” Jeff barked as we formed the huddle. “I had a step on my man. I could have taken it to the house!”

I didn’t bother to reply. Obviously, there wasn’t time, but also, I didn’t want to argue with my twin. If he hadn’t realized he was covered, I wasn’t about to waste valuable seconds explaining it to him. Jeff had been as edgy as a starving coyote the last few days, and now wasn’t the time to ask him why.

“Okay,” I told everyone. “R-23 on two.”

I could see Jeff frown at me. R-23 required him to block out a safety while my right end went for a corner of the end zone. It was a spot pass, and with only seconds to play, Caliente was sure to win if I completed the pass. But for Jeff, it meant an entire quarter without a reception. That wasn’t the sort of stats he was looking for. Like several of us on the team, good stats might mean a football scholarship when we left for college next year. So Jeff was really pissed at me.

Frankly, I didn’t much care. The coach had put me in charge of calling the plays, and although Jeff was my twin brother and I loved him dearly, he had been a pain in the ass the last few days, accusing me of purposefully avoiding throwing the ball to him. I suppose in a way, he was right. In this game, had had only caught two passes for twelve yards. I had thrown three others his way, but he had dropped two of them and lost position on the ball to nearly allow one to get picked off. He was having an off night, but I couldn’t afford to try to boost his confidence at the cost of the game. He’d have to work out his problems on the practice field.

The ball was snapped to me on two and I instinctively dropped back into the protection of the pocket. The grunts and slaps of pads against pads were enough to tell me my line was doing its job. No reason to scramble: I had plenty of protection. A quick glance assured me that Greg McDowell, my right end, had a couple of steps on a very tired defender, so I launched the ball to the corner of the end zone, arcing it perfectly so that only Greg had a chance to catch it.

My vision was obscured by the battle on the line in front of me, but I saw the ball pass over Greg’s shoulder and heard the insane roar of the Caliente fans as Greg screeched to a stop just short of the north stands.

“Shit!” a Sedona tackle muttered as we watched the official raise both arms in to the air, signalling a touchdown.

I had made it through the whole game without a single injury, but I thought the heavy slaps on my back from my teammates would bring me down. I grinned at them and they all grinned back. All except Jeff.

Ten minutes later, I was relaxing in the showers to the sweet music of hoots and jive talk from my teammates. Losing locker rooms are usually quiet, but the happy sounds from a winning locker room were music to my ears.

“Got a date with Marla tonight?” Barry Little, my big left tackle asked as he rinsed off his huge black body next to me.

“Who else?” I grinned.

“Gonna score tonight?” Ryan Hendricks asked from the other side. He gave me a big ‘aw shucks’ grin to let me know he was just teasing. With his red hair and fair skin, he could pull the look off.

Matt Baker was standing just outside the shower, towelling off. Given his serious look and slight build, it was obvious he didn’t realize Ryan was only teasing. “My sister isn’t that kind of girl.”

“Hey! What kind of girl is she?” somebody yelled, while everyone else laughed.

“Chill, Matt!” Barry laughed. “Ryan was just kidding.”

Matt looked slightly mollified. I felt a little sorry for the guy. Kickers were usually among the smallest guys on the team, so they took enough ribbing on their own. The fact that the team’s starting quarterback was dating Matt’s sister made it just that much worse for him.

I stepped out of the shower, towelled off, and started to get dressed. Marla would be waiting for me to take her to the after-game party and I didn’t like to keep her waiting. I pulled a fresh shirt and a pair of Dockers out of my locker and got dressed in a hurry. I checked myself out in the mirror, deciding that I looked good enough to impress Marla. I combed my dark blond hair and stood as straight as my six-two frame could manage, trying to look like the college quarterback I was sure to be within a few more months. Yep, I looked good.

As planned, Marla was waiting for me just outside the cheerleaders’ dressing room. Part of me was sorry she had changed out of her cheerleader’s outfit. The white uniform with its short, short skirt was a perfect complement for her evenly tanned skin, and the black and gold trim looked great against her dark brown–almost black–hair. And just to top it off, the Caliente mascot–a black condor in flight–sewed on the chest of the outfit emphasized her very fine breasts.

But I also had to admit she looked absolutely awesome in her tight jeans and white tank top, perched sexily on her two-inch heels. Her long dark hair spilled over her shoulders dramatically, and I couldn’t help but think as I smiled to her that I was one lucky guy to be her boyfriend.

“Hi,” she said, returning my smile. She accepted my hug and even gave me a light kiss.

“Been waiting long?”

“Not really,” she replied, walking with me arm in arm to the parking lot.

‘She was in one of her pensive moods,’ I realized. Something had been bothering her from the start of the football season, but whatever it was, she didn’t want to talk about it. I didn’t press her. I remembered she had always been a little moody.

Marla’s family had moved to Caliente about the same time mine had–just as we were starting middle school. The suburb had been new then, with only a couple of hundred houses finished. It was just one more bedroom community along I-17 north of Phoenix, and one of the first of the new planned communities north of the 101. Matt Baker and I had become friends almost immediately, and his sister Marla, just a year younger than us, was just a kid to me. But by the time she joined us in high school a few years later, she had become a real beauty, a product of her father’s athletic grace and her mother’s Spanish beauty. I fell for her at once and the feelings were reciprocated.

Lately, though, she had been a little distant. While we had never had sex, other than the rather innocent hugging and kissing which many of our contemporaries didn’t even consider worthy of being called sex, we were recognized as a couple. No one would be surprised when I asked her to marry me next spring. But I was beginning to think everyone might be surprised if Marla refused me, and lately she had been acting almost as if she was thinking of breaking up with me.

It wasn’t exactly anything she had said to me. It was more how her body seemed to stiffen a little when I touched her, or how her return of my kisses had seemed less than enthusiastic. I tried to put all of this down to a passing mood. Maybe she was worried about school, or something in her home life that she didn’t want to talk to me about. Whatever the reason, I was starting to become concerned, for it seemed as if there was no end to this mood of hers.

“Great game,” she said softly to me as we drove to the Civic Center where the after-game party was always held. She didn’t say it with much enthusiasm. As I said, she was in one of her pensive moods.

“Thanks,” I returned, pulling into the Civic Center parking lot. I had been pretty quiet on the way over, too. Her silence was bothering me more than usual–probably because I had been so excited about the win and her mood was such a contrast. As I turned off the engine, I asked, “Look, Marla, what’s wrong?”

She looked uncomfortable, caught in my gaze. “Wrong? Nothing’s wrong, Jason. I... I’m just...”

What happened next was the last thing in the world I expected to happen. She turned to me and pulled my face toward hers, covering my mouth with hers and throwing her arms around me. I got into the spirit of things as quickly as I could overcome my surprise, wrapping my arms around her waist. I could feel her breasts pressed up against my chest, and if we hadn’t been sitting in the car, she would have felt my cock hardening like steel.

In a few minutes, we both came up for air. In all the time I had dated Marla, I had never had her come onto me quite like that. “We’d better go in,” she suggested with reluctance in her voice.

I just nodded in agreement. Something told me I was going to get laid that night.

My stiffy was just about done as we walked into the party. I got a few cheers and a few more pats on the back as we made our way over to the refreshments table. Ms. Raymond, one of the English teachers, was pouring the punch. She had her long, dark hair pulled back into a ponytail, and looked young enough and pretty enough to be one of my classmates. She smiled at me and handed me a glass, saying, “Great game, Jason.”

Ms. Henry, the girls’ coach handed me another glass for Marla. “Have you decided where you’re going to play your college ball yet?”

“Well,” I drawled, “I’m really interested in Stanford.”

“Great school!” Ms. Raymond told me as I handed a glass of punch to Marla. “I wish I had gone to school there.”

I nodded, wondering if she wished she had gone there for scholastic reasons or social reasons. The Bay Area was notoriously sympathetic to gays, and Ms. Raymond was a lesbian. Or at least we all thought she was. She and Ms. Henry were housemates, and while they kept a low profile in our fairly conservative suburb, no one had ever seen either of them dating a man. ‘Well, to each his or her own,’ I thought as Marla and I turned back to talk to some of our classmates.

Linda Darren bounced over to meet us, towing Matt behind her. She had a proud grin on her face, her long dark hair bouncing around her beautiful face. “Hey Jason, how about my Mattie’s kicking game?” Matt looked a little embarrassed. He had been perfect on his extra points but had missed one of two field goals.

“Everybody looked great tonight,” I replied diplomatically. Matt looked relieved and Linda grinned as if I had just told her Matt was NFL material. Who knows? He was a good kicker, and Arizona and ASU were said to be interested in him. After college, the pros were a possibility. Kickers often developed later in school. Linda had a reputation for being interested in athletes who were prospects for bigger things–especially the possibility of an eventual NFL paycheck.

As they scurried away, Marla commented in a low tone, “Poor Matt. Did you see how Linda was hanging onto him? If she was half as energetic as a cheerleader, we’d have taken State last year.”

“Linda’s okay,” I replied, putting my arm around Marla as a good slow number came up. I didn’t particularly like to dance, but the slow songs gave me an excuse to hold Marla tightly.

Marla rested her head on my chest. “You don’t know her, Jason. She’s always nice to guys, but with the girls, she can be a real bitch. I think Matt’s even getting a little tired of her.”

“Speaking of bitches...” I began, turning her so she could see Kim Wallace dragging Ryan out onto the dance floor.

“Kim’s not so bad anymore,” she told me. Then she added cryptically, “At least things have worked out.”

Oops. I suddenly remembered that Kim and Marla were now getting along pretty well. That was something new. Until a month or so ago, Marla had shot daggers at Kim every time she saw her. I figured Kim must have thought Marla was interested in Ryan or something. Kim had always been a jealous girl. Her freshman year, she had thought Becky Myers was interested in the guy she was dating at the time. She cussed out Becky so badly in the cafeteria that she was suspended for three days. The funny thing was it wasn’t Becky’s fault. Kim’s boyfriend was the one making all the moves.

She had been dating Ryan for over a year now, so maybe she had settled down. According to Ryan’s innuendos, he was probably planking her regularly. The funny thing was I knew Ryan wasn’t all that loyal to her, but Kim’s reactions to Ryan’s little peccadilloes had been remarkably subdued given her past history. I couldn’t help but wonder what had happened to her to dampen her jealousy.

“Well, Ryan’s welcome to her,” I mumbled. Marla tensed in my arms for just a moment, and I fearfully wondered if once more she was slipping into one of her moods.

The party went along pretty well. Everyone was in a good mood. But all that changed when the poster went up.

It was Kelly Jackson who came up with the idea. The big fullback had a brother who ran a poster shop in Tempe. “Let’s hear it for Jason Burnett!” Kelly yelled as a spotlight was aimed at a life-sized poster of me in uniform throwing the ball. The legend in white at the top of the poster read: ‘Jason Burnett for High School Athlete of the Year!’ That award wouldn’t be announced until spring, but it was obvious where my team’s sympathies lay.

I got a sincere round of applause, and Marla stood back while all of my teammates rushed over to vow their support for me–all except one. My brother Jeff hung back until the crowd around me had thinned. Then he stepped forward to rain on my parade.

“You may have all of them fooled,” he began nodding toward my teammates who were still within earshot, “but you can’t fool me.”

“What are you talking about, Jeff?” I asked as Marla stepped up to try to pull me away.

“You know what I’m talking about,” Jeff growled. The dwindling crowd around me became smaller as most of them found something else to do.

“I’m afraid I don’t,” I replied as calmly as I could. But I did know what he was talking about. For the past couple of weeks, Jeff had been on my case about anything and everything. Like most twins, we would stand together against any outside threats, but we had an intense sibling rivalry that only twins can truly understand. I was used to Jeff’s envy. I always seemed to be the brother who did just a little bit better and it often galled him.

Unfortunately, normal sibling rivalry had turned into something worse with Jeff. Our competition had always been pretty good-natured. We would rag each other fairly often, but deep down, we had always shared a bond so close that we could almost read each other’s thoughts. That wasn’t the case for the last few weeks, though. Every time I bested Jeff–either in reality or just in his mind–his rancor had become absolutely venomous, as if we were the worst of enemies.

That wasn’t to say Jeff was a slouch. He might have had a bad night on the football field, but he was a very good player. In all honesty, though, he wasn’t quite as good as me. Also, his grades were excellent, but mine were just a little better. I even had more luck with girls than he did, although he was never hurting for a date. In short, and all modesty aside, Jeff did great and I did just a little bit better.

“Well then know this,” Jeff said tersely, “I wish you weren’t my brother.”

Marla gasped. As I looked at her, I could see her face had become ghostly white. I couldn’t understand what was upsetting her so. Either Jeff or I had made similar wishes since we were old enough to talk. What little boy or girl hadn’t at one time or another wished to be an only child? Brothers and sisters could be a real pain.

That isn’t to say I wasn’t upset with Jeff. He had just brought our family feud out into a public forum. He turned and stormed away before I could respond. If he had stayed, I would have told him how childish he was being. He had made a nasty scene in the midst of a joyful celebration–all because he was pissed at me.

“Jason, you have to make up with your brother,” Marla pleaded, clutching my arm.

“Why?” I asked blandly. “He started it.”

Okay, it wasn’t a terribly adult statement. In retrospect, I sounded like a spoiled five-year-old. But from my point of view, I had done absolutely nothing to deserve the treatment Jeff had given me. Our parents had always instilled in us the urge to do our best, whether it was about scholastics, sports, or in any other facet of life. To my way of thinking, both of us had done just that. I hadn’t bested Jeff just to watch him turn green with envy: I had done it because my best was just a tad better than his best. That was life. Too bad.

Marla looked around, as if to make sure we were not still the center of attention. We weren’t. Just about everyone knew better than to get into the middle of a squabble between the Burnett twins. Like many identical twins, we could argue for hours, but let someone else try to participate in our argument and it would be Jeff and I against them.

In spite of our privacy, Marla pulled me aside. Her voice was scarcely above a whisper. “Jason, I know this sounds weird, but if you don’t make up with your brother, something very, very bad is going to happen.”

“You make it sound as if I should be apologizing to him,” I scoffed. I was more than a little surprised when her expression brightened.

“That’s it!” she said, hugging me. “Apologize to him. That should take care of it.”

I pushed her back gently but firmly, staring into her eyes as I held her at arm’s length. “I was joking, Marla. Why the hell should I apologize to him? I haven’t done anything wrong.”

“Please, Jason... for me?” she pleaded.

How could I possibly deny anyone with such big, beautiful brown eyes anything? “All right,” I hedged, not really agreeing to apologize. “I’ll talk to him when I get home.”

Unfortunately, Jeff’s blow-up ruined any chance of my getting lucky that night. Marla was visibly upset, and any attempt I made to find out why she was so perturbed at the disagreement between Jeff and me was met with a nervous shake of her head.

“Don’t forget to talk to Jeff,” she reminded me as we embraced on her doorstep.

“I told you I would,” I sighed. “Now, do I get a goodnight kiss?”

In reply, she squeezed me more tightly than I could have imagined her capable of doing. She mashed her lips against mine, forcing her tongue into my mouth before I knew what was happening. I reciprocated, and the kiss went on for a long, long time.

“Wow!” I exclaimed when our lips parted.

She smiled a sweet smile. “Get things straightened out with Jeff and there’ll be a lot more where that came from.” Her eyes glistened in the porch light, almost as if she was holding back tears. I made up my mind on the spot that I’d get things straightened out with Jeff if that was what it took to please my lady. It would be worth it.

As I backed away from her retreating form, seeking just one more glimpse of her as she closed the door, I nearly bumped into her brother. “Matt!” I gasped. “I didn’t know you were there.”

“Don’t worry, big guy,” Matt laughed. “I didn’t see anything you and my sister did. I was just taking a walk and got back just a moment ago.”

“A walk–at midnight?”

Even in the pale moonlight, I could see Matt flush. “Yeah, I was just trying to work off a...” He nodded down at his crotch. There was a noticeable bulge there.

“Linda didn’t take care of that?” I smirked. It was pretty common knowledge that once Linda zeroed in on a guy, she’d give him whatever he wanted. But I was about to find out that with Linda’s favors came serious obligations.

“We were out at the Point,” he began. I nodded. The Point was formally Prospector’s Point, an overlook a few miles out of town. The road had originally led to an old mine, but now it was used for making out since it afforded a dynamite view of Phoenix and the whole Valley of the Sun. “Anyhow, she was coming on pretty strong–you know, rubbing and cozying up real close.”

“Yeah?” I prompted, getting just a little bit aroused myself.

“Then she drops the bombshell,” he groaned. “She wants to go look at engagement rings.”

“Engagement rings? Dude, you’re only seventeen. You won’t even be eighteen until next month. You’re going on to college,” I pointed out. Of course I didn’t bother to mention to him that I was seriously considering marrying his sister before we went off to college. I’d save that little tidbit for another time.

He stared at me in mock disgust. “You think I don’t know that? For that matter, you think she doesn’t know that? Linda’s not too good in the intelligence department, you know. She’s looking for somebody who goes on to college and maybe gets a shot to play some NFL ball.”

I nodded. We all gave Matt serious shit, but he was one outstanding kicker. As I mentioned before, both Arizona and ASU were said to be interested, and the Republic in Phoenix had profiled him on its sports page a couple of weeks earlier. Odds were good he would get a shot at the pros if he did well as a college kicker.

“She made it pretty clear to me that she’d put out if I’d ask to marry her.”

“Harsh, man,” I commented, shaking my head. Of course from what I had heard, she would put out even if he didn’t offer to marry her. Maybe she was getting smarter about that and holding back this time until she got the big prize. “But there’s better and faster ways to get rid of your problem than walking around at midnight.” I made a whacking-off motion with my right hand in front of my crotch.

“You’d know,” he grinned. “After all, you’re dating my sister.”

I just returned his grin. If I had told him how close I was getting to bedding his sister, he would have probably forgotten I was bigger than he was and would have taken a punch at me. Instead, we just said goodnight to each other and I headed home.

I had fully intended to bury the hatchet with Jeff as soon as I got home, but as I eased my father’s Beemer into the garage, I saw the little blue Ford Focus that Jeff and I usually shared nestled safely in the far space beyond my mother’s SUV. ‘That had been another bone of contention,’ I thought with a grimace. Dad’s Beemer was his pride and joy, and he had given it to me for the evening, explaining to a very jealous Jeff that I had a date with Marla while he was going stag to the dance after the game.

That was another point I had over Jeff. Not the car: I mean the ability to attract girls. Obviously it wasn’t a matter of looks. After all, we were identical twins, as much alike in appearance as two twin brothers could be. The problem was that Jeff was a little on the shy side. I suppose that was somewhat due to me as well. Since I topped him in almost every conceivable category, he had a little bit of a self-esteem problem when it came to girls. That’s not to say he didn’t date–he usually had a date, but nothing serious like the relationship I had with Marla.

A couple of weeks earlier, I had suggested he ask Stacy Alvarez out. I had dated Stacy a few times, and while we were still friends, nothing really seemed to click between us. Still, I liked Stacy and thought Jeff and she would make a good couple. Jeff’s response to me at the time was that he didn’t want to nose around in my garbage. The remark was overheard by someone else who repeated it to Stacy, and needless to say, Stacy was pissed. Since Stacy was a popular girl with popular friends, Jeff’s stock with the female population at our school fell even further.

I sighed as I got out of the car. Unless Jeff was still up, my attempt at reaching a détente would have to wait until the next morning. It would be Saturday, and in spite of our differences, we usually staked out the couch in the family room early to catch the first college football game of the day. ‘Maybe that would be a better time to talk to him than barging in on him that night,’ I reasoned.

When I got in the house, I realized that even if I wanted to talk to him now, I couldn’t. Every light in the house was out. Mom and Dad had probably called it a night shortly after getting home from our game. I guessed that since Jeff didn’t have a date, he had decided to turn in early too. That was good. Maybe after a full night’s sleep, he would be more open to my overtures.

A note was taped to my door. It was a plain white sheet of paper with Dad’s handwriting: ‘Great Game Jason!’ was written on it. I looked over at Jeff’s door to see if he had left a similar note for him. I didn’t see one, but maybe Jeff had yanked this note down and set it in his room. Just in case, I took my note down, just so Jeff wouldn’t see it there in the morning–assuming he hadn’t already seen it. I hoped he hadn’t: it would just piss him off that much more.

As I got ready for bed, choosing just to strip down to my boxers as usual, I tried to search back to the time when Jeff had decided I was the enemy. Was there something I had said or done that had set him off so badly? I couldn’t think of anything. In spite of that, every day for the past two weeks, our relationship had gotten progressively worse. ‘Marla was right,’ I thought as I drifted off to sleep. ‘I had to reach some sort of understanding with Jeff before this run of animosity ruined senior year for both of us.’

When I woke up, I thought it must be nearly dawn. A blue-gray light outlined my window, but strangely enough, none of the outside light seemed to be spilling into the room. In spite of that, I could see my bed, my dresser, and my desk, but it was as if they were bathed in a strong light. Nothing else was visible–walls, floor, doorway and curtains were all hidden in darkness.

It’s just a dream, I told myself. I’m not really awake. If I close my dream eyes, this dream will fade away. I closed my eyes. Coupled with the unearthly stillness, I was shut off from the dream world. The problem was that I couldn’t get out of the dream. When I opened my eyes, the surreal scene was still there. Time to try again. I closed my eyes.

Then I noticed that I felt the covers over my bare chest. The thin sheet felt rough, irritating my nipples. It felt as if there was a gunny sack over them, rubbing them raw. You couldn’t feel anything in a dream, could you? I didn’t think so, but now that I thought about it, every inch of my skin seemed suddenly sensitive. Reluctantly, I opened my eyes again. Nothing had changed.

I could stand the suspense no longer. I slid out of my bed and stood up. My carpet was there, but try as I might, I couldn’t see it. Yet I could see my body all the way down to my feet, just as I was able to see my furniture. Carefully, I made my way to the window and looked out.

I suddenly wished that I hadn’t.

There was nothing outside my window. No, I don’t mean that there was nothing moving about in the yard: I mean there was absolutely nothing outside my window–except that even blue-gray glow.

Again, I tried to remind myself that it was only a dream, but while it exhibited some dreamlike qualities, it just really didn’t feel like a dream. The operative word is ‘feel.’ Maybe not everyone has dreams like me, but in my dreams, I can run a marathon and never feel a thing. That wasn’t the case with this ‘dream,’ though. I could feel my feet on the carpet. I could feel the coolness of the air against my face and chest. I could feel the hard wood of my desk when I rested my hand on it. I could feel–

“Hello, Jason.”

I spun and found myself facing Jeff. How had he gotten in my room? I hadn’t heard him enter. And like me and my furniture, I could see him clearly, as if we were being illuminated by some overhead light source. While everything around me was blue-gray, Jeff was bathed in golden light. “What the hell is going on, Jeff?”

He chuckled, but the sound of his voice held no humor. In fact, it didn’t seem quite like Jeff’s voice. It was as if he was talking from inside a barrel: a slight echo surrounded his words. “You’re not in charge here, Jason,” he told me, his voice even but somehow intense. “This isn’t the football field or the classroom or one of your Student Government meetings. I’m in charge now.”

The air–if there really was any air–began to crackle around me. I could feel tiny but very real pinpricks across every inch of my skin. The unpleasant sensitivity of my skin increased still more.

“Jeff,” I managed to say, trying desperately to remain calm in the face of what was probably a dangerous situation, “we need to talk.”

“The time for talking is over,” he snapped as the prickling sensation became a little more intense.

“But we’re brothers...” I argued.

His eyes seemed to glow. Instead of the blue eyes we both shared, his were bright orange, staring intently at me. “Weren’t you listening to me earlier?” he laughed, cocking his head at an odd–almost unnatural–angle. “I wished you weren’t my brother. Where we are right now, wishes can come true.”

The prickling changed to full-fledged pain, but just for a moment. Whatever was happening, I couldn’t move. My body was frozen in place, locked in my brother’s intense stare. The glare on his face was changing into a smile, but it wasn’t a smile that made me feel any better, for as the pain subsided, I felt a sensation unlike any I had ever felt before. It was as if my body had suddenly become a liquid encased in a flexible bag. Parts of me flowed and rippled like tides ebbing and flowing.

“Feeling a little different?” Jeff asked with obvious sarcasm.

“What... what’s happening to me?” I managed to say, but my voice sounded as if it was warbling, rising and falling in pitch from moment to moment. I got my answer as I looked down at myself. In alarm, I could see two lumps of flesh bulging from my chest–a chest which had somehow become completely hairless.

“I’m afraid you won’t be my brother anymore,” he crooned maliciously. “I’ll get my wish, you see. You won’t be the big brother. I’ll be the football star. I’ll have the best grades. I’ll be on Student Council instead of you.”

“This can’t be happening,” I cried hysterically, trying desperately to move but to no avail.

“Can’t it?” he mocked, reaching behind my head. I yelped in pain as he pulled on hair that had become substantially longer. The yelp was at least an octave higher than my normal voice.

“Can’t it?” he repeated, pushing against my bare chest with the palms of his hands, shooting pain through my nipples. I cried in pain.

“Can’t it?” he demanded for a third time, reaching between my legs to find–

I awoke with a gasp.

Sunlight was streaming in my window. I guessed it to be about eight from the length of the shadows. That was the usual time I awakened on a Saturday. I sighed with relief as I struggled to wake up completely. It had been a dream! But it had seemed so real.

So real...

I’ve always been one of those guys who awakens slowly, becoming aware of my body part by part. I suppose it came from playing football. I would awaken and feel a small pain in my shoulder from throwing a particularly long pass, or a twinge in my knee from when I had scrambled to avoid a charging lineman. But still, as I normally awoke, things would feel generally right. Not this particular morning, though. That morning, nothing felt right.

Where to start? I had no pain, but every sensation my body experienced seemed... different. Something was tickling my neck and shoulders–something that shouldn’t be there. Then I became aware of something else that didn’t feel right. I was lying on my back, and my chest felt odd. My usually firm pectorals felt larger and softer, almost as if something had pooled on my chest. Without looking, I moved my hands which were still under the covers up to my chest...

Oh God!

I closed my eyes, squeezing them tightly shut. I’m still asleep, I told myself, trying to fight down a rising wave of panic. Either that or the dream was so vivid that my mind is playing tricks on me after awakening. And what was that covering my chest? I hadn’t worn anything but boxers to bed, but there was something strangely smooth covering my chest now.

Eyes still closed, I felt further down with my hands, reaching the hem of whatever had been placed on my chest. I could not feel my boxers. Instead, something smooth and silky covered my crotch, but just barely. I pushed my hand under the elastic barrier at the top of my leg. I should probably mention that I knew immediately what I was touching. I was no virgin. I had lost my virginity over the summer with a girl from Globe who I met at a cousin’s party in Phoenix. It had been the typical fumbling, sweaty teen sex in the back seat of my Dad’s car, but I knew enough from the experience to know what a pussy felt like. It felt exactly like what was now between my legs.

Did I scream? No, I didn’t: I was too pissed to scream. Besides, girls screamed–not guys–and while I might be girl physically, I was still Jason Lee Burnett inside my head and I wasn’t about to scream. I was, however, going to kill my twin brother.

Anger overcoming my panic, I jumped out of bed, realizing with embarrassment that jumping out of bed in my present state was not a very good idea. I found I was wearing one of those dainty little shorty nightgowns–white with a little pink bow right in front of the cleavage. I had rolled out of bed as I always had done, but I had never had breasts before. The movement of my breasts caused one very ample one to fly out of the top of the flimsy little nightgown, resting on top of it. Feeling my face redden, I stuffed it back in place, trying unsuccessfully to ignore its feel.

It was then that I noticed my room had changed. Gone were the Arizona Cardinals and Diamondback posters, replaced by framed pictures of Indian women weaving baskets and making pottery. The room didn’t look overly girly, but it was obviously not the room I remembered. Everything was neat except for a little pile of makeup and a makeup mirror on my desk. There was a full-length mirror on the back of my door which hadn’t been there before either.

Like an onlooker drawn to a grisly accident, I walked toward the mirror. I could feel myself breathing heavily, and watched with dismay as I observed the cute blonde girl in her short little white nightgown with pink trim, her breasts heaving and her hips swaying as she approached the mirror.

When I looked at my face, I could see traces of my old self there. My eyes were still the same color blue, but they were shaped a little differently, and my eyelashes were much fuller while my eyebrows were slimmer. My skin was the same–evenly tanned–but it looked softer and smoother. My nose was noticeably smaller and, well, cute. My entire face was shaped differently, though, accenting my lips a bit more–lips which were obviously more full and a little more pronounced in color. The new face was framed with blonde hair, but while my hair had been a dull yellow almost bordering on brown, my dishevelled hair was now the color of rich honey, flowing down over my ears and shoulders in a soft wave.

I fearfully looked down at the rest of my body reflected in the mirror. I was attractive: there was no doubt of that. I hesitated to think of myself as beautiful, and being as objective as I could be, I realized that I was probably more on the cute side than the gorgeous side, but I was a girl that boys would be drawn to without question.

My breasts were round and firm; my waist was trim, spreading out into attractively wide hips. Below my hips were two smooth, tanned legs, slim and supple, ending in well-turned ankles and small feet. I couldn’t help but notice my toenails were painted in pink. Raising my hands, I wasn’t surprised to find my fingernails painted the very same shade.

“Jeff, you bastard!” I growled in my new soprano voice.

I was consumed with rage. Oh sure, I was also embarrassed, confused, heartsick and frightened, but above all else, I was angry. I stormed into Jeff’s room, trying to ignore the fact that I looked a little like a model in a Playboy spread. I threw open Jeff’s door, ignoring the loud ‘sprong’ that sounded when it hit the door stop at full speed. “Jeff!” I demanded of the sleeping figure through my gritted teeth. “What the fuck have you done to me?”

“Huh?” He rolled over, the sheets wrapped carelessly around him as if he had been tossing and turning. He pried his eyes open, squinting at me, trying to figure out who was snapping at him. Then his eyes opened–wider and wider until I thought they would pop out of their sockets. “Who are–Jason?”

I slammed the door shut behind me. “Who else do you think it would be, asshole? Now what did you do to change me like this?”

“I... I don’t know,” he stammered, starting to get out of bed. At the last second, he seemed to realize that he was dressed only in his boxers in front of a pretty girl. He sat back down, covering his groin with a sheet. “It was just a dream, wasn’t it? I didn’t do this...”

“The hell you didn’t!” I yelled. “You were there. I thought it was just some stupid dream, but you were really there. You did this to me!”

He shrank back. To an outsider observer, it would have seemed odd, a tall athletic looking guy shrinking away from a girl a good six inches shorter than he was. “Yeah... I was there,” he admitted. “I remember what happened, but it wasn’t me!”

He looked so frightened that I softened my glare. Come to think of it, the Jeff in my ‘dream’ had been vindictive and malevolent. The young man cowering in front of me looked almost as stricken as I had been moments before.

“What do you mean it wasn’t you?” I asked, a little less aggressively.

“You know what it’s like in dreams,” Jeff began to explain. “You’re there, but you’re not always in control of your actions. It’s sort of like watching a movie from inside one of the characters...”

“Go on,” I urged, squeezing my tiny hands into fists. I nearly punctured my palms with my unexpectedly long fingernails.

“I just saw you standing there in your room in that weird light,” he went on. “All I could think about was how it seemed as if everything I did, you did one better. I was... well, I was jealous. I wanted you to know what I go through, being good but not as good as you.”

“So you changed me into a girl? How?”

“I already told you: I don’t know!” he practically exploded. I could see tears of frustration in his eyes. “I didn’t do this to you on purpose. Shit! I don’t even know how I did it... or if I did it.”

I was still angry, but watching Jeff sitting there on his bed in tears had reduced my rage to a manageable level. From what I had seen of him in the dream, I had expected him to be gloating–not reduced to remorse. I sat next to him. “If you didn’t do it,” I asked softly, “who did?”

Before he could answer, the door to his room swung open. I looked around and saw my mother standing there. Oh God, what was she going to think? She had no idea who I was. Was she going to think I was just some girl my brother had picked up and taken back to his bedroom? How was I going to make her believe who I was?

To my shock, she showed no alarm. “Come on, guys, breakfast is ready. Your Dad’s already at the table. Slip on a robe and get downstairs.”

Before Jeff and I could do anything more than look at each other in amazement, she turned back to the hall. “Oh, and Jenny?”

Jenny?

“Stop going into your brother’s room dressed like that. It’s not very ladylike.”

After she had gone, Jeff and I stared dumbfounded at each other.

“She... she thinks you’re a girl,” Jeff gasped.

Well, I could see why she would think that. I had the basic breasts, the typical long hair, and the curvy body. “Yeah, and she thinks I’m your sister,” I added forlornly. “What the fuck is going on?”

“We’d better get downstairs,” my brother advised. “We can figure out what to do later.”

My embarrassment level climbed about fifty percent as we walked into the kitchen. Our Dad would be there, and I didn’t want him to see me like this. I was pretty sure that like Mom, he would see nothing unusual, but feeling my hips swivel and breasts bounce in my skimpy little nightie and short, thin matching robe made me feel like an escapee from some late night cable sex show.

“Good morning, sweetie,” Dad greeted me, looking up nonchalantly from the morning copy of the Republic.

Sweetie. Oh shit, shit, shit!

“Good morning, Jeff,” he added. “You played a great game last night.”

“Uh... thanks, Dad.”

“It’s just a shame Sanchez threw that last minute interception,” he continued wistfully. “Otherwise, you might have won.”

‘SCORPIONS STING CONDORS’ the headline read on the sports page in front of Dad. Eric Sanchez had been my backup at quarterback. I didn’t have to read the article to guess what had happened. There had been no Jason Burnett to connect with Greg McDowell in the end zone the night before. Instead, a helpless Jennifer Burnett must have been watching from the sidelines as Eric threw a mistimed or poorly aimed ball to end the game in disaster for Caliente. It was bad enough that we had lost the game, but what really concerned me was that no one except my brother and I seemed to realize that there had ever been a Jason Burnett.

“What’s wrong, honey?” Mom asked, noting my stricken look.

“Nothing,” I lied, sitting down at the table. I looked over at Jeff across from me. I guess Mom hadn’t noticed that he looked pretty upset as well.

“You cheerleaders are just going to have to boost everyone’s morale at next week’s game,” Dad sighed.

Cheerleaders? I was a cheerleader? This was getting worse by the minute. What would be next? Would I suddenly learn that I was Ryan Hendricks’ girlfriend or something? I shot Jeff another withering glance. Killing was too good for my twin brother. Maybe he didn’t do this to me on purpose, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t at fault.

Come to think of it, were we still twins? I suddenly wondered. Maybe I was just his younger or older sister now, because we certainly couldn’t be identical twins anymore. That was biologically impossible. ‘No,’ I thought, ‘but we could be fraternal twins and probably were.’ We still appeared the same age–just different sexes. Yeah, just...

“Since when do you like bacon?” Dad asked as I piled four lean slices on top of my eggs.

“You won’t fit in your cheerleader uniform if you eat that,” Mom cautioned.

So, like half the girls I knew, I was apparently expected to be watching my weight. Great. I had no idea how I was supposed to act as a girl, but I was starting to realize that everyone except Jeff would be expect me to be one-hundred percent girly from now on. I wasn’t going to be able to handle this.

“I...uh...was just serving them up for Jeff,” I stammered.

“Thanks, sis,” he jumped in, snatching the plate from me. I could see from the look on his face that he was just trying to play along with my lie, but if he called me “sis” again, I’d kick his stupid ass.

I managed to get through breakfast without any more obvious gaffes by acting as I thought my female self would be expected to behave. I took a slice of honeydew melon and joined my mother in drinking a glass of skim milk. As if the watery skim milk wasn’t bad enough, I had to watch my father and brother chowing down on bacon, eggs, toast with jelly and, of course, whole milk. I did decide to live dangerously and grabbed a slice of toast, but under my mother’s watchful eye, I abstained from butter and jelly.

Strangely enough, the small meal seemed to satisfy my hunger. I supposed as a girl, I no longer needed the large intake of calories my athletic male frame had required. However, while I was pleasantly full, the bland taste of the melon, skim milk, and dry toast hardly satisfied my taste buds. Would I now be eating bland salads (with dressing on the side, of course) for lunch and tiny portions of baked chicken for dinner? I would have to find some way of recovering my masculinity before I starved to death.

Jeff slipped away from the table before I could. Or I should say Dad slipped him away, with instructions for him to get dressed right away so they could go to Pep Boys to pick up some parts for the ’68 Mustang Dad was restoring in the garage. Jeff seemed happy to get out from under my surreptitiously angry stares. I shot him an additional one since the original plan had been for both of us to go to Pep Boys with Dad. That, of course, had been when I was still Jason. Apparently attractive young cheerleaders simply didn’t dirty their dainty hands working on Mustangs. After all, I might break a nail or some such shit.

As I tried to make my escape, Mom said, “Not so fast, young lady. After we finish with the dishes, we have laundry to do.”

Now I don’t want to give the impression that ours was one of those households where the women (or woman before my change) did all the housework and the men lounged around. But usually, Mom cut Jeff and me some slack, at least on Saturday mornings and after a big game. We’d watch an early football game on the tube and maybe help Dad with the Mustang, but apparently Jennifer didn’t rate the same slack that Jason had.

Once we had gotten the dishes done and a load of laundry started, I trudged off to my room, anxious to get out of the feminine frou-frou I was still wearing. Also, I needed a shower. I had gotten a little sweaty just lifting the baskets of laundry. They seemed far heavier than I remembered them being, but I realized suddenly that I no longer had the strength I had enjoyed as Jason.

The bathroom Jeff and I had shared now appeared to be mine alone. Jeff, I suspected, now used what had been the guest bathroom. Score one for my side, I thought grimly. At least I got to keep my own bathroom. But, of course, the bathroom had changed radically. The counter was now covered in a dozen new bottles and tubes, most of which I had no inkling of how to use and no interest in learning about. The shower caddy wasn’t much better, the solitary bottle of shampoo now joined by conditioners and highlighters and a spongy thing I later learned was called a loofah.

The scene was just too much for me. I began to cry. Me–Jason Lee Burnett–broke down into girly tears at the sight of a few strange bottles. I tried to wipe the tears away from my eyes, nearly poking one of them with a long nail. Girl or no girl, I vowed to cut those claws after my shower.

My shower.

Taking a shower, I realized sadly, would mean taking off my skimpy clothing, standing naked with breasts and... all that other stuff exposed. I couldn’t bring myself to do it. The tears began to flow harder. Still, I had to get out of my nightie, so I stripped it off, snuffling as I did so.

“Ja... Jenny?” a girl’s voice called from outside my door.

Oh shit! I gasped, the tears stopping as a new indignity had just been heaped upon me. My girlfriend was just outside the bathroom door, and she had nearly called me Jason, correcting herself in time to call me Jenny. She knew! Oh dear God, she knew!

“Go away!” I cried.

“No,” came the soft reply.

I was silent, reaching to open the door, then stopping at the last second. I couldn’t let her see me like this. I slowly backed away from the door.

“Jason,” Marla pressed softly from the other side of the door, “I know what’s happened to you. I can help you, but you have to open this door.”

She could help? Hesitantly, I approached to door once more, opening it before I lost my nerve. My eyes met Marla’s for just a moment before I lowered mine in complete embarrassment, realizing suddenly that I was standing completely nude in a girl’s body in front of my girlfriend.

“Oh, Jason!” Marla sighed, throwing her arms around me. Weakly, I put my arms around her, feeling the softness of her sweater against my bare breasts. In the comfort of her arms, I burst into tears once again.

“You poor thing,” Marla consoled, leading me over to my bed and draping my skimpy little robe over my quaking shoulders. She sat there beside me, holding me as I blubbered all over her sweater. I had never been so embarrassed in my life, but I realized as I sat there sobbing that my embarrassment was bound to get worse the longer I wore this strange body.

“Better now?” she asked as the tears abated. I nodded meekly, pulling away from her and hanging my head in disgust.

“Look,” Marla began, “there’s no easy way to say this, so I’ll just blurt it all out. I know what Jeff did to you. I even know a little bit about how he did it.”

“Jeff said he didn’t do this,” I managed in a quavering voice.

“He can deny it all he wants,” she replied sternly, “but he’s responsible for what happened, even if he didn’t mean for you to become a girl.”

I looked up at her in surprise, a little shocked at her vehemence.

“Look at it this way,” she continued. “Suppose you and your brother found a gun when you were little kids and Jeff pointed it at you. If it went off and you got shot, it would probably be ruled an accident, but Jeff would have to live with the fact that he shot you. So make no bones about it, missy, your brother is responsible for your being a girl.”

She was probably right, I realized. I looked up at her. “But how do you know about... this?”

Her smile was on the grim side. “Because you’re not the only one this has happened to.”

I shook my head. “But how would you know, unless...”

She nodded. “That’s right. I used to be male, too.”

No! It just couldn’t be. I had known Marla for years. I had watched her grow up from being Matt’s scrawny kid sister to the beauty who had captured my heart. There was no way she could have ever been male. I would have known: somehow, I would have known.

“Don’t look so shocked,” she said, patting my hand. “Most people think I’ve always been Marla Baker–just as most people will think you’ve always been Jennifer Burnett. That’s the way it works.”

“It?”

“I need to take you to someone who can tell it better than I can,” she replied. “Right now, we need to get you presentable and out of here. There’s a lot you need to know, and if you don’t learn it quickly, you’ll look like a fool. Then you’ll just be paying into its hands.”

Marla ordered me to go take my shower while she found something for me to wear. Reluctantly, I obeyed, trusting that she wasn’t going to find a tight top and a short skirt for me. The fact that she had been wearing a cotton sweater and jeans gave me hope that she’d find an equally unisex outfit for me.

The shower actually felt good–once I got past the shock of seeing myself naked. I was used to seeing a well-muscled figure in the shower, complete with a flat chest and a prominent set of male equipment between my legs. I still had muscles, but they were much smaller and smoother, giving definition to slender arms and legs. My breasts were now the most prominent feature on my body, and while they weren’t what I would have called major hooters a day before, they were eye catching in their symmetry and sufficient in size to be placed in the above average category.

As for what was between my legs–or more accurately, what was not between my legs–it was akin to losing a limb. I just couldn’t imagine life without my male organs. I was young–scarcely inducted into the mysteries of sexual activity, and what I had experienced, I had enjoyed immensely. Whether through masturbation or thrusting happily into a girl, the experience of climaxing had been extremely satisfying. Now, that experience was denied to me.

Oh, I knew women enjoyed sex as well. ‘Getting off’ as a woman couldn’t be all that difficult. But it would involve sticking something up inside my body, through the slit I had acquired when my rightful organs had been taken from me. The thought of sticking something in there was repugnant to me. Yet I knew I’d never know another climax until something–finger, vibrator, or (shudder) penis–entered me there. I vowed that any of those items would be banned from my body for a long time to come.

To my chagrin, I found that unlike a male body, a girl’s body can be turned on in a number of different places. Soaping up my breasts produced a little tingle in my nipples, and even washing my inner thighs started sending tiny messages to my new sexual organs. How the hell did girls take showers without getting turned on?

I finally realized they didn’t get turned on in the shower because they were used to the sensations. It was pretty much the same for guys. I had been perfectly capable of washing my male equipment without getting all turned on. As a girl, I’d have to learn how to do that or face a lifetime of stimulation at inappropriate times, like the bimbos in some of the sex films on late night TV.

Unfortunately, my preoccupation with my new body made me careless with my hair. I had intended to avoid getting it wet, since I had heard dozens of girls complain about how hard it was to take care of long hair. But while examining one of my new breasts, I had accidentally backed into the water stream, wetting my hair.

“Shit!” I muttered.

“What’s wrong?” Marla called out.

“I just got my hair wet,” I complained. “Now I don’t know what to do.”

“I’ll help,” she replied, barging in before I could stop her. I tried to cover myself, since the glass door offered little in the way of modesty. She looked at me for a moment and giggled, “You don’t have to cover yourself. Did you cover yourself in the locker room after a game?”

“Of course not! But now, I’m... I’m...”

“A girl? So am I in case you forgot. Besides, I’ve already seen you naked once this morning, remember?” Before I could reply, she grabbed a bottle of shampoo and tossed it over the glass door. I managed to catch it. “Just lather up like you would before.”

“This isn’t my shampoo,” I protested, looking at the bottle of pink liquid with matching flowers on the front.

“It is now,” she replied. “Now get busy.”

She walked me through the use of the shampoo and conditioner, and told me how to squeeze most of the water out of my hair. Shampooing had always been so simple as a guy, but long, wet hair was very heavy and hard to control, I discovered.

When I was finished and had stepped out of the shower, Marla handed me a towel. “Put this around yourself. No, not just your waist, silly. You have breasts now.”

I did as she told me, letting her tuck the end of the towel between my breasts to hold it in place. Then, she produced a second towel, wrapping it around my head. “This will blot out some of the water while we work on other things.”

I cringed a little at the thought of ‘other things.’ I had sudden visions of Marla turning as nasty as Jeff had been in my dream, draping me in feminine attire while chuckling gleefully at my plight. Perverted stuff like that happens on the Internet all the time–or so I’m told.

I was relieved to find ‘other things’ did not include short skirts and high heels. Marla had laid out a pair of jeans, some low-cut sweat socks, a pair of tennis shoes, and a light sweater, burgundy in shade and although obviously a girl’s sweater, it didn’t look too girly. I was almost ready to smile when I notice the underwear she had laid out for me.

“Thong panties and a bra?” I gasped.

“First of all, the panties are French cut–not a thong,” Marla informed me. “You might be interested to know they’re among the most conservative panties in your drawer.”

I could feel the color drain from my face.

“And as for the bra,” she continued, “well, let’s just say you don’t want to leave home without it.”

As I stood there, dripping on the carpet with a stunned look on my face, Marla sighed and picked up the panties, thrusting them into my hand. “For Pete’s sake, Jennifer, it’s only a piece of cloth, and it covers what it needs to cover. Stop acting like you’ve just been asked to pose for the cover of Transvestite Monthly. You’re a girl now. I had to go through this same thing without nearly as much help and I didn’t put up half the fuss you are.”

“You said that before–that you were a guy?” I asked, unconsciously wadding the panties in my fingers.

“Yeah,” she sighed. “Look, start getting dressed and I’ll tell you all about it.”

Listening to Marla’s story made me a little less self-conscious about putting on girl’s clothing. I even stood motionless still while she blow-dried and combed my hair, so rapt in her story I had become. Besides, it was just jeans and a sweater, even if the cut did seem a little gay. And the tennis shoes hid my pink toenails. I didn’t feel quite as embarrassed dressed in such an asexual manner.

Marla had once been Martin Baker, Matt’s younger brother. But while Matt was shy and a little hesitant around girls, his younger brother was a natural ladies’ man. He lost his virginity in the tenth grade and never looked back. Martin made one conquest after another. His dark good looks coupled with confidence most guys could only wish for gave him a stellar percentage when it came to girls bedded versus girls dated. I was more than just a little envious.

It seemed so weird sitting there listening to Marla speak with the memories of a guy she no longer was. If it hadn’t been for her sweet alto voice, the inflections she was demonstrating would have been enough to make me believe it was a male who was speaking.

“Then came Kim,” Marla sighed.

“Kim Wallace? You screwed Kim Wallace?”

“Maybe I should say she screwed me,” Marla chuckled, motioning to herself.

“What happened?”

“Kim and I were an item. There was one big thing she liked about me,” Marla explained, “and I gave it to her just about every night.”

I turned, nearly causing the brush Marla was using on me to rip out several long blonde hairs. Marla was grinning and arching her eyebrows. “Kind of funny to hear your girlfriend talking about slipping the old salami to a girl, isn’t it?”

“If this hadn’t happened to me,” I replied, motioning to myself, “I never would have believed it.”

“Well, believe it,” Marla countered. “But good old Martin got kind of tired of the same old thing every night, so he–I–dropped Kim.” She was quiet for a moment. “You know the old thing about hell having no fury like a woman scorned? Well, I’m living proof of the truth of that. She made a wish–a terrible, terrible wish. She wished that I would never be able to screw another girl as long as I lived, and something heard her.

“I think you can figure out the rest. I had a dream–a very vivid dream where a laughing Kim changed me into a girl. Then when I woke up, I was Marla instead of Martin.”

“But to me, you’ve always been Marla,” I insisted.

She nodded, sitting down on my bed as I sat beside her. “That’s just how it works. Everybody remembered me as being Marla. Well, almost everybody. When I woke up the next morning, my room had changed, my family thought I was Marla, and then you showed up about noon that Saturday to take me to the movies.”

I thought back. About four months ago, Marla had started acting strangely. I remembered picking her up to take her to some lame chick flick she had wanted to see and she had acted very strange, almost as if she didn’t really want to see that movie. Yet according to my memories, she had been pestering me for two weeks to take her to it. I had thought she was mad at me, since she treated me as if I was radioactive, pulling away as I tried to hold her hand and flinching as I put my arm around her in the theater. She had even avoided kissing me when I dropped her off. That was the first time I became concerned that she might be getting ready to break up with me.

After that, though, things slowly got better. She was more like her old self, but it had taken several weeks before she had gotten back to normal. Now, I was finding normal wasn’t so normal after all.

“So you never really were my girlfriend,” I surmised slowly.

“Not at first,” she replied, putting her small dark hand on my small light one. “But that changed. I had always liked you–you know–as a friend. I have a lot of fond memories of you and Matt and me throwing a football around or playing basketball together. I knew you were a good guy. At first I was shocked to find out I was your girlfriend in this reality. I almost puked at the thought of having a boyfriend, but then I made up my mind to pretend to be your girlfriend since that would keep all the other guys away.”

She must have seen the keen disappointment on my face, for she was quick to continue, “Then once all these female hormones I have now started churning through me, I found I was becoming attracted to you for real. That’s the way it works, too–the longer you’re a girl, the more you start to think like one. I finally became your girlfriend in every sense of the word. Now I really miss Jason.”

There were tears in her eyes as she said that, and I found my own eyes getting a little moist as well. I felt as if I had somehow let her down. I suppose I had, really. I had become a girl. I was beginning to realize why she had been so vehement about my making peace with Jeff. She knew what lay ahead for me–or at least she suspected. I hadn’t listened to her in time, and now I had paid the price.

“I should have said something earlier–about Jeff I mean,” she sniffed.

I shook my head. “It wouldn’t have done any good,” I consoled her. “What else could you have told me? If you’d told me the truth, I never would have believed you.”

I was not just trying to make her feel better: I was telling her the truth. If she had come to me and told me my brother had the power to change me into a girl because something similar had happened to her, I never would have believed it. Not for a heartbeat.

“Besides, maybe there’s a way to reverse this,” I suggested, hoping I was right.

“There isn’t,” she said flatly.

I hadn’t known if there was or wasn’t a way back to my old life, but she seemed certain in her denial. “How do you know?” I asked softly, hoping, of course, that she was wrong. I was already starting to worry about what she had said–that bit about thinking more like a girl the longer she was one meant the same thing would happen to me if I couldn’t figure out a way to get changed back into Jason.

She got up from the bed where we had been sitting. “You have to come with me,” she said resolutely. “There’s someone you need to see. I called her while you were in the shower. She can answer most of your questions.”

I got up, too. I was ready to see anyone who could shed some light on my situation. “Okay. Let’s go.”

“Don’t forget your purse,” she reminded me, nodding at a brown leather bag on my dresser.

My purse.

Crap, could things get any worse?

That was a bad question to ask.

At least we travelled in style. Marla had her mother’s little Z-3 convertible for the day, and the weather was perfect for it. In the summer, tops are down only at night in the Phoenix area as a rule. The daytime temperature in the Valley of the Sun in the summer months is generally well over a hundred coupled with an intense, scalding sun in a nearly cloudless blue sky. But in the waning days of October, the sun isn’t as high in the sky or as hot, and daytime temperatures in the high seventies are perfect for ragtops.

Of course, we got the requisite looks from every male who drove past us, and more than one of them offered a comical catcall or, in the case of one guy at a stoplight, an offer for a date. I found myself cringing at first, feeling as if we were a tasty dishes laid out on a buffet line in front of starving patrons, but Marla seemed to take it all in stride.

“You’ll get used to it,” she assured me. “It’s mostly just harmless dweebs.”

“Mostly?”

She just smiled. “You’ll learn how to handle it. I’ll help you.”

‘Thank God for Marla,’ I thought to myself. Without her help, I’d probably be catatonic by now.

“We’re here,” she said at last. We had driven halfway across Caliente to a new subdivision with houses more modest than our neighborhood but still nicely done. The motif was the common Southwestern look popular throughout the valley, and the small front yard was nicely landscaped–or to be more accurate–xeriscaped with a variety of cactus plants and tinted gravel.

“Where’s here?” I asked as I got out of the car, feeling my hips sway as we walked up the sidewalk.

“Carrie Raymond and Nancy Henry live here,” she explained.

I said nothing. I couldn’t imagine what an English teacher and a girls’ coach had to do with my problem. But Marla seemed to know what she was doing.

Ms. Raymond answered the door. “Come on in, girls,” she said, looking about to see if anyone had noticed us.

“Are we alone?” Marla asked once we had been shown into the kitchen and served lemonade at the table.

“Yeah,” Ms. Raymond replied as she sat down with us. “Nancy has a gymnastics meet in Tempe this afternoon, so we can talk freely.” She turned to me. “How are you doing, Jason?”

It came to me then that Ms. Raymond was like us. She remembered who I had been before, so she had come in contact with whatever had changed me–either as a victim like me or an instigator like Jeff. “Ms. Raymond–” I began, embarrassed.

“Call me Carrie,” she urged with a friendly smile. “I teach freshmen and you’re a senior, so I’m not one of your teachers. Besides, after what we’ve been through, we deserve to be on a first name basis, don’t you think?”

“Just how many guys have been changed into girls?” I asked. “Do you guys have some kind of a club or something?”

Carrie laughed, her voice clear and sparkling. “No, we don’t actually have a club, but maybe we should form one. That is, if we knew who we should ask to join.”

“We don’t think Carrie was the first,” Marla explained, “but she’s the first to admit it–to me at least.”

“And I only know of two others,” Carrie broke in. “There was Danielle Marceau...”

“The French exchange student last year,” I added. I remembered Danielle. She had already returned to France. She was a quiet girl who seemed terribly shy. I had always assumed she was uncertain about her English, but perhaps she had another reason to be shy.

“...and Julia Cornwall,” Carrie finished, looking at me for my reaction.

“Julia Cornwall committed suicide,” I said slowly.

“She couldn’t stand being a girl,” Carrie told us. “Her family was... different. She had three brothers and no sisters, you know.”

I remembered. Her brothers–one older and two younger than I–were flaming assholes. Her older brother had been arrested for domestic violence a few months ago for beating up his live-in girlfriend, and the two younger brothers had an equal disregard for women. “The rumor was that her father had been molesting her,” I practically whispered. “And that was why she killed herself.”

Carrie nodded. “It’s probably true. I tried to help her, but she was too frightened to listen. Maybe if she had had someone her own age to confide in, she might not have done such a horrible thing, but that was before Danielle.”

“Anyhow, those are the only other cases we know of,” Marla surmised. “We suspect there are plenty more though. Of course those are the victims. The perps seem to lie low, so we don’t have the foggiest notion who changed them.”

“So just what’s going on?” I asked in exasperation. “Why is this happening, and how do we reverse it?”

Carrie shook her head. “We don’t know for sure, but we have our suspicions. Marla’s case and mine have some similarities, and from what Marla has told me about your case, it sounds similar.”

“So you used to be a man, too?” I asked, just to clarify things.

Carrie nodded. “I was indeed.”

She went on to tell us her story, and although it wasn’t exactly like mine or Marla’s there were indeed obvious similarities.

Donald Raymond was new to Caliente, but he made friends quickly–one friend in particular. Nancy Henry was easily the best-looking teacher in the high school, and although men flocked around her, she never seemed to take an interest in any of them. Most just shook their heads and moved on to find a more interested girl, but not Bud Knowles.

I remembered Mr. Knowles. He had been an assistant coach my first year at Caliente High. He also taught Government and Economics, but sports were his true passion. I suppose it was natural he’d be attracted to Nancy Henry. She was cute, blonde, athletic, and bright. Even as a sophomore, I could see he was interested in the girls’ coach.

“But she wasn’t interested in him,” I suggested, suspecting her sexual orientation was obvious even then.

“Not in the least,” Carrie agreed, brushing a strand of auburn hair away from her face. “At first, she just ignored his advances, but as Bud came on stronger and stronger, she finally told him to piss off and leave her alone.”

That would have been the end of it–if it hadn’t been for Donald Raymond. He and Nancy were often seen together–eating in local restaurants, sitting next to each other at school functions, or just walking about town. It seemed as if they were inseparable.

Of course I remembered none of this. My memories involved Carrie Raymond joining the faculty at the time Donald Raymond had come on board. I remembered Bud Knowles fuming in the locker room about ‘goddamn lesbo bitches’ one day just a month or so after Carrie Raymond had arrived. We all had known who he was talking about.

“Bud Knowles’ hatred and envy boiled over after a football game two years ago,” Carrie continued. “He confronted me in the parking lot and told me to butt out. In his mind, he had developed a fantasy in which I was the only reason Nancy wasn’t attracted to him. ‘I wish you’d never come to Caliente!’ he screamed at me.”

“Wait! I remember that night,” I broke in. “We had just lost to Wickenburg and Coach Knowles was pissed.” I thought for a moment. “But it was you he confronted in the parking lot–not some guy,” I said, suddenly remembering the incident. “Some of us saw him yelling at you. He called you a dyke...”

“A fucking dyke to be exact,” Carrie replied, smiling. “Or at least so I was told later. You see, only Bud Knowles and I remember what was really said–and only the two of us remember the wish.

“I think you can guess the rest. When I fell asleep that night, I had a dream–a dream in which Bud Knowles changed me into a woman. You can imagine what a bastard he was in the dream, since he was a bastard most of the time.”

I nodded in agreement. None of us on the team had been sad to see him leave town.

“When I awoke the next day, I was Carrie Raymond,” she concluded.

“But you had the last laugh,” Marla chimed in.

I looked at both of them, surprised to see them grinning.

“As you know, Nancy and I are a couple,” Carrie explained. “Before, when I was Donald, we were just friends.”

“So the wish made Ms. Henry–Nancy–gay and your orientation toward women remained the same,” I surmised.

“Oh no!” Carrie laughed with Marla joining in. “It was just the opposite. Nancy was always gay. That was why she never dated men seriously. When she did, it was just for camouflage. Bud didn’t know that and thought he actually had a chance with her. He thought I was standing in his way. But you see, I dated Nancy for the same reason. I told you we were just friends. What I didn’t tell you is that I was gay also.

“When Bud changed me into this, my sexual orientation remained homosexual. The only difference was that homosexual to me now meant women instead of men.”

A chill went down my back as I realized the ramifications of what she had just said. Donald had become a woman and remained homosexual in her orientation. Marla had been male and had been presumably heterosexual in her outlook, so her focus had shifted from girls to boys. Then Marla had said something about thinking more like a girl. That meant...

“That’s right,” Marla said, recognizing the sudden revelation in my eyes. “You’re going to find yourself interested in boys.”

“No! Never!” I shot back. The thought of considering a boy as a romantic interest was about the most repugnant thing I could imagine. As if to reinforce my interest in girls, I focused on Marla, trying to think about how great it was to kiss her full lips, to slip my arm around her slim waist, to slide my hand up her nylon-covered leg.

A day before, such thoughts would have started Little Jason twitching and twanging until it was hard as a rock. Now, though... nothing. No twitch. No twang. Okay, so I lacked the equipment to feel all attracted to a girl. But that didn’t mean I was going to be attracted to guys.

“There’s got to be a way to change back,” I muttered.

Carrie leaned over and put her hand on mine. “If there is, we haven’t found it. I’m sorry... what’s your name now?”

“Jennifer,” I replied softly.

“Jennifer,” Carrie repeated. “That’s a pretty name.”

A pretty name for a pretty girl, I finished silently. How many times would I hear that line? How many times would I want to throw up when I heard it?

“Anyhow, Jennifer, I’m afraid you’re stuck like this for good.”

“We don’t even know for sure what caused this,” Marla added.

I jumped up from the table, my anger rising as I felt my hair and breasts bounce from the sudden movement. “You mean this had been going on for... however long it’s been going on and you haven’t got a clue about what’s causing it?”

“Settle down,” Carrie said sharply. I was surprised enough at her tone that I sat back down and waited. When she determined that I was a little calmer, she explained, “We know it’s some sort of... call it a spirit for lack of a better term. Maybe it’s Indian, or maybe it came here from outer space or some other dimension or some other Twilight Zonish place. All we know is that it’s intelligent, it resides inside a host–a host whose wishes it uses to transform people like us into women, and that it eventually gets tired or bored of tormenting its victims and moves on. It isn’t in the habit of explaining itself.”

“But surely someone can figure it out,” I pressed. “If it’s Indian, maybe one of the universities can help.”

“You think we haven’t tried?” Marla asked. “First of all, we can’t very well go down to ASU and say, ‘Excuse us, but we used to be men but something changed us into women. Can you help us?’”

“Exactly,” Carrie agreed. “After they finished laughing, they’d ship us off to a nice quiet rubber room somewhere. I do have a friend at ASU I’ve thought of contacting, but I’ve been reluctant even to call him. I’d hate to have an old friend think I was crazy.”

I said nothing in rebuttal. They were right, of course. I thought about the way my parents had reacted that morning. As far as they were concerned, I had always been a girl. Odds were that everyone who hadn’t come into direct contact with our little supernatural menace would think the same thing. A review of official records would undoubtedly turn up a record for a Jennifer Burnett, and the best I could hope for if I told anyone was that they would dismiss my story as some sort of teen prank.

“There’s one other thing we have to warn you about,” Carrie began. “Whatever the thing is who did this to us isn’t finished with you yet.”

“What else could it do to me?” I sighed.

“Physically, probably nothing,” Carrie agreed. “But mentally, it will stalk you in your dreams.”

I didn’t like the sound of that one little bit. “What do you mean by ‘stalk me’?”

“Up until a few weeks ago, I saw Kim Wallace in my dreams once or twice a week,” Marla offered. “It wasn’t really her. I confronted her the first time it happened after my transformation, and she denied having any control over what had happened.”

‘Just as Jeff denied being anything more than an observer in my dream,’ I thought. “So what are these dreams all about?”

Carrie and Marla looked warily at each other. It was obvious they were reluctant to give me any details of their own dreams. Carrie spoke at last. “Your dream nemesis–your brother in your case–will appear and try to humiliate you even more than has already been done.”

“How?”

“It... varies,” Carrie hedged. “Just try to remember that it’s just a dream. Nothing that happens to you in the dream has to be real.”

“Has to be or isn’t real?”

“Ask us that after your first dream,” Marla suggested.

I was shaken as we left Carrie’s house. When I had first found myself in the body of a girl, I had convinced myself that it was all my brother’s doing. In a way, it was, but Marla and Carrie had convinced me that another agency was at work, using Jeff’s envy of me to provoke a hasty, ill-thought wish that had left me with a new sex. If Jeff had, for example, found an old spell book or enlisted the help of a sorcerer, I might be able to convince him to get me changed back.

But there were no spell books or sorcerers–maybe such things didn’t exist at all. That would certainly have been my conclusion before my transformation. Instead, my transformation had been brought about by something unknown. How could I get whatever it was to change me back into a man? It seemed unlikely that I would be able to find a way.

“So what happens now?” I asked, breaking the silence as Marla drove me home.

She shrugged as she pulled up in front of my house. “You just learn to live with it. We all do.”

“Julia Cornwall didn’t,” I pointed out, shivering at the thought of the poor girl who had killed herself.

“You’re too strong to do that,” Marla argued. When I didn’t reply, she asked, “You are strong enough, aren’t you?”

I just nodded. I had no intention of killing myself. I might have been changed into a girl, but I was still healthy and intelligent, and to be completely honest with myself, I was a looker. As embarrassed and dejected as I was with the whole situation, I’d make it through this somehow. All except for the part about being attracted to boys. No way was I ever going to be attracted to boys.

“What are you doing tonight?” she asked.

“Well, until this morning, I had plans to take my girlfriend to dinner and a movie.” I regretted saying that when I saw the sadness in her eyes.

“Well, maybe you still can,” she began, hastening to add, “not as your girlfriend, of course, but with your friend who’s another girl.”

I shook my head. “Sorry, Marla. I think I’ll just stay home.” Memories of the guys who had stared and whistled at us as we drove along in Marla’s convertible had convinced me I wasn’t ready to be seen in public. At the movies, we were bound to be hit on. “I just don’t want to have to deal with this in public.”

She gave me a wan smile. “I understand. I’m worried about you, though. How about if I stay with you tonight?”

“What? A slumber party?” Oh sure. We could eat pop corn and talk about cute boys, and Marla could try new shades of nail polish on me. Such fun.

“Damn it, Jennifer,” Marla exploded, her Latin temper rising to the forefront, “I don’t mean any such thing. Look, we’ll order a pizza and watch a movie and I’ll try to answer any questions you have. You can even dress in boxers and a tee shirt if that’s what moves you. Does that sound like a slumber party to you?”

I looked toward the garage where Dad and Jeff were working on the Mustang. “I don’t want to give Jeff anything to tease me about,” I admitted. “If he sees the two of us there acting like girls...”

“Jeff wouldn’t say anything,” Marla began. Then a thoughtful look crossed her face. “But whatever is in him might, now that I think about it. You’re probably right. I shouldn’t come over tonight.”

“I’m glad you agree.”

“You should come over to my house.”

Oh shit. That was even worse. Then I’d have to act all girly around her parents. Worse yet: I’d have to act all girly around her brother. “Another night,” I begged off.

“No, you’re staying with me tonight,” she insisted. “That way, I can help you get ready for church tomorrow, too.”

I had forgotten about church. Mom and Dad were serious about attending, and Jeff and I were expected to go to services as well. To make matters worse, when it came to church, Mom could be a little old-fashioned. She always wore a dress and insisted that Dad, Jeff and I all wear ties. Now that I was a girl, she’d undoubtedly expect me to wear a dress–complete with pantyhose and heels.

I think on the whole, I had been fairly strong all day, accepting my new girlhood if not exactly embracing it. I hadn’t planned exactly what I was going to do until (or if) I grew accustomed to my new sex, but a good part of my plan consisted of hiding out in my room for as long as possible. Now, I realized that in less than a day, I’d be expected to dress in a very feminine fashion and be put on display for all my fellow parishioners to see. I just couldn’t take it anymore: I burst into tears.

“Crap!” I muttered, looking toward the garage. The last thing I wanted was for Jeff and Dad to see me crying like a... well, like a girl. Fortunately, they were so absorbed in the car that they didn’t even know we were there.

“You’ll find out it’s easier to cry now,” Marla told me, putting an arm around me.

“I feel so stupid!”

“Some girls cry all the time,” she soothed.

“Well I don’t plan to be one of them!” I sniffed, fighting the tears as best I could.

“That does it!” Marla announced, getting out of the car and coming around to help me. “You’re staying with me tonight. My parents are going out, so you won’t even have to deal with them.”

“But what about Matt? I don’t want Matt to see me like this,” I whimpered.

“He has a date with Linda tonight,” she told me. “He won’t even see you.”

So Matt was still dating Linda. I wondered if he was seriously thinking about agreeing to marry her just to get into her panties. “Promise?”

“Promise.”

We managed to get up to my room without Mom seeing my tear-stained face. I sat on the bed while Marla went through my closet and drawers, neatly packing a few ‘essentials’ into a duffle bag she found in my closet. I cringed as a dark skirt and white cotton sweater were placed in the bag–right next to the pantyhose and thankfully low heels. She selected a pair of pink flannel pajamas, with little teddy bears and candy canes on them. Well, at least it wasn’t a short nightie like what I had awakened in.

“I won’t need that,” I told her as she placed a makeup kit in the bag.

“Oh yes you will,” she countered. “Look, try to make an effort to go along with all of this, okay?”

I just nodded sullenly.

“Now tell your mother where you’re going,” Marla ordered.

“She’ll know I’ve been crying.”

“Then just yell out to her.”

That made sense. “Mom, I’m staying over at Marla’s tonight,” I called out, figuring Mom must be in the house somewhere.

“Okay,” came the answer from the kitchen. “Take something to wear for church with you.”

If I had had any hopes of getting out of church tomorrow, that dashed them. “Already have.”

“No pants!”

Why did Mom have to have such a thing about women wearing pants to church? Most parishioners dressed casually, but not my family. That wasn’t so bad when it meant a nice shirt, tie and slacks, and maybe a sport coat on special days, but now it meant skirts. Shit!

“Jason...”

I was so occupied watching Marla fill my overnight bag with enough stuff to support a three-day trip to LA that I hadn’t heard Jeff come up the stairs.

“What do you want?” I snapped.

Marla had finished with my bag. She hefted it and started out of the room, saying, “I’ll wait for you in the car.” The look on her face indicated I should be cautious.

“Now what?” I growled when she was gone, trying to find a comfortable position to fold my arms over my chest. Finding none, I settled for putting them on my hips.

“We... we need to work something out,” he began.

“Can you change me back into a man?”

“Well... I don’t think so.”

“Then we’ve got nothing to talk about!”

I tried to storm out past him, but he grabbed my arm. Although I tried to get free, it became quickly obvious to me that I wouldn’t have anywhere near the strength I needed to get away. I stopped resisting and scowled at him.

“I didn’t want this to happen,” he began. “I don’t even know how it happened. If I knew, I’d do everything I could to change you back.”

“But you did want this to happen,” I pointed out. “You’re the one who wished I wasn’t your brother. Well, I’m not: I’m your sister. You don’t have to worry about competing with me on the football field anymore. I won’t get the best-looking girls: you will. You’ll get to work with Dad on the car while I bake cookies with Mom. This was your doing, Jeff, whether you realize it or not. Whatever did this to me couldn’t have done it without your help.”

“You don’t know that!” he broke in.

“No,” I admitted, “I don’t–at least not for sure.” I wasn’t about to tell him what I had learned from Carrie and Marla. Whatever was residing in my brother was probably listening to our conversation. That isn’t to say I was pretending to be mad at Jeff. I was as pissed as I could be. I was pretty certain that if it hadn’t been for his envy over my successes, the force within him would have been powerless to change me.

“Think about it, though, Jeff,” I continued. “You were there with me in the dream. It was you–or something that looked like you–who did this to me.”

To my surprise, he let go of me and sighed. I wasn’t sure, but I could have sworn I saw a tear in his eye. “I know: I was there,” he admitted. “I’ve already told you that. Please, Jason, don’t be angry with me.”

“Just stay out of my way,” I warned him. “Let me sort all of this out. But if you’re not telling me the whole truth...”

He raised his right hand in a pledge. “I am. I swear to you, I’m telling you the truth.”

“If you’re not telling me the whole truth,” I pressed on, “I’ll figure out some way to make you pay for this.” Without waiting for a reply, I stormed out of the house.

I was still fuming as I got into Marla’s car, slamming the door as hard as my smaller muscles could manage.

“What did you tell him?” she wanted to know.

“Nothing.”

“Good.”

The evening with Marla was strange but not unpleasant. As promised, we had the house to ourselves. Marla’s parents had gone to dinner and a play in Phoenix and weren’t expected back until late. Matt had left early for his date with Linda Darren, so we could talk openly. We ordered a pizza and ate it while Marla and I thumbed through the yearbook to try to get some idea of what my life as Jennifer was all about.

“Your junior picture is cute,” Marla commented.

“Never mind that,” I grumbled, looking under the picture. “What activities am I involved in?”

“Nothing athletic,” Marla replied, scanning the page. “Oh-oh.”

“Oh-oh what?”

She looked at me with a wicked grin. “You’re a cheerleader.”

“I already know I’m a fucking cheerleader!” I practically screamed.

“No, you’re just a cheerleader,” she said, grinning. “It says nothing here about fucking.”

“Crap!”

“Look, Jenny,” she pointed out, “the same thing happened to me, you know. I hadn’t planned on being a cheerleader when this happened to me.”

“I’ll quit the squad,” I vowed.

“No you won’t,” she insisted. “Look, I can teach you the cheers. You won’t embarrass yourself.”

Oh sure I wouldn’t. I’d feel just peachy as hell jumping around in a little short skirt showing my pretty panties and cheering on my former teammates–and my brother.

“What else am I involved in?” I asked, changing the subject.

“Not much,” Marla replied. “No academic awards. Oops, I take that back. You’re on the Honor Roll.”

Thank God for small favors. At least whatever was inside Jeff hadn’t turned me into a blonde bimbo.

“No student government, though,” she continued. “You’re not on Class Council anymore. No other major activities either.”

I was having a difficult time holding back tears. All those girly hormones, coupled with the sense of loss I felt from being robbed of both my sex and many of my accomplishments, it’s a wonder I didn’t just break down and bawl.

“Come on,” Marla said, rising and pulling me to my feet. “You’ll feel a lot better when you know the ropes.”

I spent the next few hours learning the fundamentals of being a girl. I was amazed at how much there was to learn, and surprised that Marla knew so much, given that she had once been male as well. Marla was a cruel taskmaster, explaining things most girls probably learned at their mothers’ knees, including all of the nasty things girls had to do involving periods and personal hygiene. I hadn’t even thought that far ahead, but of course, I realized, being a girl meant (gulp) periods. As she described the messy process of inserting and removing tampons, I began to wonder what God had been smoking when He designed the female of the species.

To make matters worse, once Marla had explained something to me, she made me try it out. That included the tampon. “But I’m not having a...” My voice trailed off. I couldn’t even say the word “period” without shuddering.

“I’m aware of that,” she replied primly. “The point is, when you actually do start a period, I may not be there to help you. That’s what happened to me. If Carrie hadn’t already pulled me aside and explained all of this to me just like I’m explaining it to you, I would have made a big, nasty mess.” She handed me the dreaded item. “Now here–show me how you put it in.”

I grimaced and tried to back away from my pushing hand a couple of times, but at last, I managed to insert the tampon inside me. It felt... I guess the word would be invasive. It wasn’t exactly uncomfortable. In fact, I supposed once it had been there for a while, I’d probably not even notice its presence. But the real problem was that it was vaguely analogous to what half the guys in the school would like to do to me. I tried to dismiss that thought from my mind.

“Walk around with it,” Marla suggested.

Shrugging, I walked around the room wearing just my sweater, bra and panties.

“Hold your legs closer together,” she instructed me.

“But that damned tampon is–”

“I know where it is. Just don’t walk in such a way that everyone else knows where it is. You’ll get used to the way it feels.”

In a few minutes, I had to admit she was right about that. But it was with a sigh of relief that I carefully pulled the intrusive little beast out of myself.

“While you’ve got your pants off, let’s try a few things on you. You’re about my size.”

After about half an hour, I began to wish sincerely that I wasn’t about–no, exactly–her size. She had me try on a variety of skirts of various lengths, instructing me to sit, stand and walk in the various garments. After tugging, smoothing, and holding the various skirts under her tutelage, I vowed to wear pants as exclusively as social convention would allow.

Then came the most embarrassing instruction of all: makeup. Marla explained and demonstrated each item, urging me to then have a go at my own face. When I would do something wrong, she would have me cleanse the bad work with cold cream and do it again. An hour later, she nodded in satisfaction. “Not bad. You did better than I did at first. In a few days, applying makeup will be second nature.”

I sincerely doubted that, but I didn’t tell her.

“Now it’s time for some fun!” Marla announced.

I was afraid she was being sarcastic, but to my relief, she produced my pink cutesy pajamas. “As soon as we’re changed, we can go downstairs, make some popcorn, and watch a movie.”

I, on the other hand, was still capable of sarcasm. “I suppose you have a nice chick flick all lined up for us.”

“Nope. Matt bought Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow. Hey, just because I’m a girl now doesn’t mean I don’t like adventure and sci-fi.”

So much for stereotypes, I thought. Come to think about it, Marla had never objected when I took her out to an action flick. At least her taste in movies gave me hope that I would still be myself and not the little blonde bimbo cheerleader I might appear to be.

My thoughts were interrupted as Marla began to strip out of her own clothes. She seemed so comfortable doing so, I did the same without protest. I suppose her thought was that we were both girls now, so it didn’t matter if I saw her in the nude. I wasn’t at all surprised to note that she had a great body. ‘It was ironic,’ I thought, ‘that for months I had fantasized about seeing Marla naked in front of me. Now that it was actually happening, there wasn’t much I could do about it.’

Well, in truth that wasn’t exactly right. I suppose I could have made a grab for her and indulged in passionate lesbian sex. There were a couple of problems with that, though. The first problem was that Marla had never shown any lesbian tendencies. ‘That was funny,’ I pondered, ‘since I now knew she had once been as male as I had been.’ That gave way to the second reason: I didn’t either. Oh sure, I sneaked a look at Marla’s naked body and had to admit it was everything that as Jason I had hoped it would be. Somehow, though, that didn’t excite me. It was merely a clinical observation.

Okay, so if a naked girl didn’t excite me after just one day of being a girl, what would? I know. It’s a question I shouldn’t have even asked myself. But I had to know. I tried to picture some of the guys showering in the locker room after last night’s game. Did the thought turn me on? No fucking way. That was something of a relief.

Jude Law didn’t do a whole lot for me either. All I could think of watching him on the big screen in Marla’s family room was how I wished I looked like him instead of looking a bit like Gwenyth Paltrow. I wondered if Gwenyth ever sat around on somebody’s couch in a silly pair of pink flannel pajamas covered with teddy bears and candy canes. I felt ridiculous.

At least the movie itself made me think less about my own problems. I had missed it when it was in the theaters, so I was surprised to see how well they had captured the feel of some of the old classic B adventures of the 30s and 40s. It was easy to lose myself in the film and forget about my own problems.

Marla had made a huge batch of popcorn, so we sat slumped on the couch in front of the TV munching happily and losing ourselves in the movie. For the first time since my transformation, I was actually enjoying myself.

My enjoyment was short-lived, though. So engrossed were we in the movie that we didn’t hear anyone come into the house. Our first indication that we were no longer alone came when a male voice called out from behind the couch, “Hi, guys. This is a great movie, isn’t it?”

‘Oh crap!’ I screamed to myself. It was Matt. I couldn’t let my old friend see me like this. I tried to scrunch down into the couch and make myself invisible. It didn’t work. It’s hard to be invisible in pink flannel pajamas.

“How have you been, Jenny?”

Marla had paused the movie, so the silence was palpable until I managed to squeak out, “Fine, Matt.”

“I thought you had a date with Linda tonight,” Marla said, making it obvious she was not happy to see her brother home so early.

Matt shrugged. “I did. We ate at a Carl’s and went to see a movie.”

“And that’s all?” Marla pressed. “No wild make out session after the show?”

“I was tired,” Matt explained elusively.

‘Yeah, he was tired,’ I thought. Matt and I had talked about his relationship–or lack thereof–with Linda. Linda was the aggressor in the relationship, and while she had her claws set to pounce on Matt, my old friend saw her as more of a casual partner, not to be taken too seriously.

In Matt’s defense, I didn’t think he ever dated her with the intention to screw her. Even if by some chance he had, I was willing to bet that Linda had made the first moves. Matt was one of those guys who never could get serious about any girl–much to the frustration of much of the female population at Caliente High. His goal was to get into a good college–probably on a football scholarship–kick his best, and hope for a shot at the NFL. But he knew there were plenty of good kickers, so he also planned to get a degree and go on to law school. Somehow, getting serious about some girl in our school just wasn’t part of his game plan.

“Can I watch the rest of the movie with you guys? The good part is just coming up.”

Oh God. There I was–a girl–sitting there in pink flannel pajamas with teddy bears and candy canes imprinted on them, and one of my best friends wanted to sit there with us. This was my first real exposure (pardon the expression) to a male outside my own family, and I wasn’t taking it at all well. To my relief, Marla wordlessly scooted down, allowing Matt room on the couch but at the opposite end from me.

Once I had determined that Matt was far more interested in watching the rest of the movie than he was with watching me, I settled down and tried to get back into the action on the screen. I even tucked my little painted toes under my legs so he couldn’t see how pink and feminine they looked and sat there quietly to watch the movie. But eventually, the movie ended, and I realized I would have to make nice with Matt once more.

To Matt’s credit, he didn’t seem to be ill at ease talking to the two of us as we sat there in our sleepwear. I guess part of it was that having a sister–and he had no idea that Marla hadn’t always been his sister–meant he was used to seeing girls in things other than street wear. Or maybe he was just being cool to keep me from being any more embarrassed than I was.

After a couple of minutes of small talk, he wished us a good night and ambled off to his room. I merely sighed in relief.

“I’m sorry about that,” Marla apologized. “I figured he’d be out later. He usually is.”

“That’s okay,” I assured her. “Besides, he had no way of knowing we’d be here.”

“Well, yes he did, actually,” Marla replied. When I gave her a funny look, she went on, “I talked to him while you were talking to your brother. He knew you were coming over.”

“Oh.” After a moment of silence, I added, “Well, no harm done. I had to face a boy in the wild sometime. I guess it was just as well it was somebody I know and trust like Matt.”

Marla smiled. “Come on, let’s go back to my room.”

I was thankful Marla had her own bathroom. She was able to show me all the things I needed to do to get ready for bed (far more things than I had to do as a boy it seemed) without Matt seeing or hearing us.

If I had known Matt was going to be there for any part of the evening, I would have probably not have agreed to stay with Marla. I just wasn’t ready to interact with guys–particularly guys like Matt who had been a good friend of mine. After all, here I was now–a girl–and yet I could remember seeing Matt walking around the locker room in the buff. It was as if we had shared something intimate in that locker room, although when I had been male, such a thought would never have crossed my mind. I felt as if I had agreed to dip my toe in girlhood by agreeing to stay with Marla, but had been thoughtlessly pushed into the deep end with Matt’s sudden appearance.

As we settled down to sleep for the evening in our sleeping bags, I wondered how long it had taken Marla to get used to interacting with boys. Apparently she had been forced to act as my girlfriend almost from the moment of her transformation and she had managed to fool me. I didn’t think I would have had that much courage if I had suddenly found myself with a boyfriend. I was having enough trouble just dealing with Matt’s casual appearance. Still thinking about that, I slipped off to sleep.

I was suddenly back in my own room. Well, I wasn’t really in my own room, but I was back in the version of it I had been in during my transformation. Again, I was alone, but I sensed the growing presence of something evil, although the image which formed from the darkness was obviously my brother.

“What do you want?” I demanded. I had found myself standing in the surreal room, my hands on my hips. I tried to look forceful, although it was difficult to maintain such an illusion since I was completely naked.

The image of Jeff grinned, and I saw as the figure emerged from the darkness that he, too, was naked. “Don’t you want to show your dear brother how much you love him?” he crooned, and with alarm I noticed his penis was hardening. It was, I was certain, significantly larger than it should have been in real life, since Jeff and I had after all been identical twins.

“You’re not my brother,” I growled, backing away from him.

“Who am I then?” he asked smoothly.

“I don’t know,” I admitted. “Maybe we don’t even have a name for what you are, but you’re not Jeff.”

He grinned. It wasn’t a pleasant grin, and I was sure that my brother’s face had been altered just a bit to make the expression even more menacing. “You’ve been talking to that Raymond bitch, haven’t you? That’s where you and your friend Marla went today. I thought she might take you there.”

I didn’t respond. He had guessed well, but I wasn’t going to help him.

The grin changed to a frown. “That Raymond bitch was something of a mistake,” the thing in Jeff admitted reluctantly. I filed that statement away. It meant the thing did make mistakes. “I hadn’t realized the Henry cunt was a carpet muncher.” The way it spit out the foul words told me that its mistake had been sufficient to irritate it. That was another fact to file away: it could make mistakes.

“Still, you turned out well,” it noted, the grin returning. “Nice tits, nice ass, nice hot little pussy... oh yes, you’ll be a sweet little bitch, won’t you?”

I remained quiet, although I was seething inside.

“Have you tried out your new equipment yet?” it asked. When I said nothing, it continued, “You will, you know. You’re going to be one horny little bitch. I doubt if you’ll be able to go the week without some boy’s hot dick inside you.”

I couldn’t help it: I shuddered at the mere thought of having sex with a guy. Even if I wanted to do it, I’d never give this foul thing the satisfaction of knowing it had won.

“I heard dear old Mom say something about church tomorrow?” it crooned. “That means a dress and skirt for you, doesn’t it? That’s good. You’ll look nice with those long legs of yours. All the boys will be looking at them, wondering what it would be like to have them wrapped around their backs while they pump into you. Maybe you shouldn’t wear any panties, so they can see what they’re going to get and smell all those sweet girl juices...”

“Shut up!” I screamed. I almost bolted toward it, but stopped before I could get too close. Jeff’s body–or the projection of his body if that was what it was–would be much stronger than mine. The last thing I wanted was to get so close to that thing that it could pull me in and rub its penis against my womanhood.

I had resolved to stay cool, no matter what the thing said, but it was too much to bear. I realized when I saw the sparkle in Jeff’s eyes that I had lost this round. The thing had shaken me badly...

Still there was one thing I suspected from what the thing had told me: it couldn’t read my thoughts. It had made some astute guesses about what had happened that day, but it didn’t have any conscious awareness about what Marla or Carrie had told me. That didn’t mean it hadn’t managed to tap into me, though. It seemed to have no trouble determining my emotional state and selecting the right buttons to push. Still, I thought it best to file my suspicions away for future reference. If it was blind to my conscious mind, I might be able to use that weakness against it.

With that, I dropped off to sleep once more.

I woke up with a start, waking Marla as well. “What time is it?” she muttered.

“I don’t know. It’s still dark,” I replied, clutching the top of the sleeping bag to hide my cleavage from whatever might be in the dark room with us.

“A bad dream?” Marla asked, a little more awake now.

“It was him,” I whispered. “It was Jeff. No... I mean it was that thing in Jeff.”

“You poor thing,” Marla soothed, her hand gently on my arm. “I didn’t think the nightmares would start so soon.”

“Why didn’t you tell me what it would be like?” I asked, my voice trembling. “It was terrible.”

“Tell me what happened.”

I told her everything. When I was finished, I could see her nod in the darkness. “As nearly as I can tell, we all get similar nightmares. Carrie had them I know. Hers were images of that guy who had the hots for Ms. Henry. I guess he kept telling her she was going to be a worthless dyke and get fired.”

“What about your dreams?” I asked.

I swear I could see her blush in the darkness. “They didn’t start right away. I was Marla for about a week. You and I–well, you as Jason, that is–had just gotten back from a movie. When I went to sleep, Kim’s image tried to urge me to give you a blow job the next time we were at the movies. She told me there was nothing like getting your knees sticky on the floor while swallowing a load of cum. I...”

“You don’t have to go on,” I broke in. I now understood why Marla had been reluctant to describe the dreams to be. First, they were very embarrassing, but also, they involved me–the old me. I found myself getting embarrassed for her. “I didn’t mean to bring up bad memories.”

“Thanks.”

Somehow, we both managed to get back to sleep.

The next morning, I awoke to the sound of the shower. Marla wasn’t in her sleeping bag, so she had to be the one in the shower. I waited until I heard the water stop and got up myself, feeling my breasts shift under the pajama tops. I looked through my duffle bag with horror at the clothes Marla had brought for me when she walked into the room.

She threw me a towel. “Get your shower and don’t get your hair wet this time. Then we’ll get you ready for church.”

In a few minutes, I had reported back to Marla for inspection. I was actually proud of myself. I had managed to shower without getting my long hair wet, and I had even neatly wrapped the towel around my body, tucking it smartly over my breasts.

“You blondes are so lucky,” she muttered looking down at my legs. “I have to shave every other day. You look like you can get by for the better part of a week.”

I hadn’t thought about the fact that girls had to shave their armpits and legs. I wondered if that took longer than shaving one’s face. I hoped not. Not having to shave my face was so far the only positive point I could think of regarding my transformation.

“Oh well. Let’s get you dressed.”

Okay, so the clothes I had worn on Saturday had been of a feminine cut, but they weren’t too different from what I had worn as a guy–except the underwear, that is. However for church, I’d be wearing a lacy, very feminine pastel blouse, a white skirt, low white heels, and...

“Pantyhose?”

Marla shrugged. “You have to wear them sometime.”

She was right; there was no use in arguing about it. I dressed quickly–or as quickly as I could given I had obviously never worn pantyhose before. Once dressed, Marla fussed with my hair and makeup, then pulled a necklace and bracelet from her own jewelry box. She put two small gold rings in my ears. Until that moment, I hadn’t even realized my ears were pierced. “There!” she pronounced once she had finished.

She led me to the mirror. I was happy to see that the heels were low enough that I had little trouble walking in them. In truth, I had worn heels this high on cowboy boots.

I was actually not surprised to see the final result. There was no sudden epiphany as I realized I was a very attractive girl. I had already known that. I had been a good-looking guy, and Mom was a good-looking woman, so it stood to reason the female me would look pretty good all cleaned up.

“I can’t go like this,” I said.

“Why not?”

“Every guy I know will be hitting on me.”

“Occupational hazard,” Marla grinned. “Come on: let’s go.”

Mission Light Church was non-denominational and was the biggest church in our community. Many of my friends went there–including Marla and her family. But Marla decided not to sit with her family, choosing instead to give me a little moral support by sitting with me. I was glad she did. As we waited in front of the church, at least five guys I knew came over and sniffed around. Marla managed to deflect them.

“I’m not ready for this,” I mumbled when the last of them had walked away, disappointed that Marla and I just couldn’t go hang out with them today.

“Neither am I,” Marla agreed.

“But you’ve been this way for months,” I pointed out.

She nodded. “True, but I always had you as a boyfriend, remember? All I had to do was tell them my boyfriend was a bad ass jock and they’d leave me alone. Now, I don’t have a steady boyfriend, so I’m fair game, too.”

I hadn’t considered that. Before I could comment, my parents arrived.

“That outfit looks nice on you,” Mom said, smiling. Dad smiled and nodded his agreement.

“Where’s Jeff?”

“He’s not feeling well today,” Mom replied.

Yeah, sure. He had undoubtedly been present in that nightmare I experienced. Now he just didn’t want to face me after what had happened. Well he wasn’t going to get away with it. In fact, I didn’t really blame him for the nightmare. As Marla and Carrie had pointed out, Jeff was something of a victim, too. But if I had to get out in public in a skirt and heels, I wasn’t about to let him hide rather than face me. I made a mental note to give him some serious shit when I got home.

As we took our seats in the sanctuary, I was very grateful to have Marla sitting with me. I felt exposed–almost naked–sitting there waiting for the service to begin. I could imagine that many boys my age–and probably a good number of older men as well–were watching me from behind, concentrating on my long blonde hair while hoping that I would turn around so they could see my face. After the service, a few of them would notice me when I stood, staring at my breasts, taking a long lingering look down at my legs...

I hated being a girl! I hated it, I hated it, I hated it! My new life seemed to be just one embarrassing moment after another. How had Marla stood her transformation? How had Carrie done it–or any of the others? I thought darkly that Julia Cornwall probably wasn’t the only former boy who had killed him–herself.

‘No,’ I thought, ‘that wasn’t the way I needed to be thinking.’ Maybe Julia Cornwall had entertained such thoughts before she had killed herself. I might not like being a girl, but no matter how uncomfortable I felt in this skin, I wasn’t going to end my life. Existence as a girl was far better than the grave.

“Cheerleader practice is Wednesday,” Marla whispered to me as we filed out into the narthex after the service. “You’d better come by my house after school tomorrow and I’ll teach you what you need to know.”

“Why not now?” I asked nervously, realizing Marla was about to leave me and rejoin her family.

“You’ve got to learn to be a girl on your own,” she replied. “You need to practice around your family today before you go to school tomorrow. I won’t be able to be with you every minute at school. But call me if you need anything.”

She was right, of course, I realized as she walked away. I couldn’t spend the rest of my life joined at her hip. Besides, I’d go directly home and study. No one outside my family would have to see me until school Monday morning.

As soon as we got home, I ploughed into my homework. I was relieved to see from the graded papers in my notebook that I was still a good student. I have to emphasize the word ‘good’ though. While my previous grades had been straight As, I noticed an occasional B+ and even one B among my papers. My problem appeared to be primarily math. That had always been my best subject before.

I pulled out my math book and read Monday’s assignment. The work didn’t seem any more difficult than it had been before, so I could only assume that my new personal history had included a previous problem in math–one which I would be able to correct, but not sufficiently to put me in contention for valedictorian again. Whatever had granted Jeff’s wish had made sure my brother’s grades would be better than mine.

Still, the homework took more time than I had thought it would, but that was primarily due to a nearly constant stream of phone calls I got. I had discovered when I got back to my room that I had a cell phone. I had never carried one as a guy, but it seemed that as a girl, I now had one, even though it had apparently been turned off and sitting on my new nightstand until now. I turned it on absently, ignoring the message telling me that I had eighteen new calls in my mailbox. But I soon realized that I had made a big mistake.

I determined after being interrupted every fifteen minutes or so by a call, that a cell phone was really a girl’s best friend. Girl after girl called me–just to talk, mind you, without really saying anything. I suppose I should have expected it. After all, the transformation had changed me into a cheerleader, and since our school selected its cheerleaders by a vote of the class, I should have realized I was a popular girl.

As a guy, phone calls had been pretty short and sweet–except calls to Marla, of course. Guys tend to use phones to coordinate activities and confirm information. Girls seemed to use them to share each other’s lives. Fortunately, I was able to beg off on any long-winded conversations, pleading that I had to get some homework done (which was true). However, I knew I would be deluged with personal conversations on Monday morning since most of the calls ended with “I’ll tell you all about it in school tomorrow.”

That gave me yet another reason to dread school the next morning. Even if I had been comfortable in my new form, I would have been worried about making a slipup in front of my teachers or classmates. Fortunately, Marla walked the eight blocks to school with me that first morning, so she was able to coach me quietly in what I needed to know.

Unfortunately, since she was a year younger than I was, she wouldn’t be in any of my classes. Once again as the bell rang, I found myself on my own. I had already checked my schedule and knew I had the same classes as before, and to my relief, I even had the same seat in the first class. It made sense, I guess, that the thing had changed only what had to be changed to make me a girl. Unfortunately, as a guy, I had chosen to sit near some of my teammates. Now, I was surrounded by guys I had seen naked in the showers–big guys who were twice my size. I was very thankful I had worn jeans and a modest white blouse to class–not that my conservative mode of dress stifled all of the looks.

Jeff was there, too, sitting a couple of rows away from me and trying to not see me. Still, I was glad he was there since his presence might have kept the team from making any undue moves on me. And I was actually a little relieved when Matt Baker sat down just on my right. Matt had always been pretty respectful of girls, earning him some friendly but pointed jibes from some of our more animalistic teammates. He even smiled at me but said nothing as class was ready to begin.

“How’s it going?” Marla whispered to me in the cafeteria line at lunch.

“Better than I had feared and worse than I had hoped,” I whispered back, taking an apple from the serving bin.

She nodded, taking an apple for herself. “The first day back at school is the worst. It’ll get better.”

I certainly hoped so. At least nobody had propositioned me–yet. And actually, to be fair, the classes hadn’t been bad. No one had looked at me as if I were some sort of freak: everyone seemed to remember me exactly as I was.

No, that wasn’t quite true. Cindy Faller, an attractive black girl, had given me a funny look. Was it possible that she was someone who had been transformed before Carrie–someone who was unknown to Marla and Carrie? If she kept staring at me, I have to find a way to ask her sometime. I guess misery really does love company.

When we were seated, I asked Marla about Cindy.

“I’m not sure,” she replied. “I think you may be right, though. Right after I changed, she was staring at me, too.”

“Maybe we should ask her,” I suggested, idly stirring what passed for stew with my spoon.

Marla shook her head. “Look, Jen, for all we know, there may be dozens of transformed girls here, but if there are, they know who we are. They could have said something to us–to me in particular since I’ve been like this for months.”

“Then why haven’t they said something?” I pressed.

Marla sighed, “I think they’re just too embarrassed.”

“Embarrassed?”

“Of course embarrassed,” Marla nodded. “Don’t act so shocked. Aren’t you embarrassed?”

“Well...”

“Of course you are. Everyone would be at first. It will take you weeks to get over your embarrassment, and by then, who will care? You’ll be used to being a girl by then so it won’t matter to you.”

I pushed the mediocre stew away. I didn’t seem to have much of an appetite. “But you told me about your transformation, and so did Carrie.”

“Carrie told me because she could see my pain and she’s too good a teacher to ignore it,” Marla explained. “If it hadn’t been you who got changed this time, I probably wouldn’t have said anything either. I’d leave it for Carrie to discover.”

She looked around to make sure no one else was close enough to hear. “Look, Jen, when I became Marla and found out you were my boyfriend, I just wanted to die. But you were a good guy. You never pressed me for sex, and you respected me and my opinions. Hell, I even wanted to go to bed with you once I got over my embarrassment at being a girl.”

“Maybe I should have pressed harder,” I mumbled.

“It wouldn’t have worked,” Marla countered. “As much as I wanted to, I didn’t dare while that thing was still in my mind. Don’t you see? It wants us to have sex. That’s what the dreams are all about.”

“What happens if we do?”

She shook her head. “I’m not sure, but it must be something it wants very much or it wouldn’t press us so hard.”

“Hey girls!”

Our conversation ended abruptly. Dennis Jackson and Gabe Marcus stood there beside our table, their trays loaded with enough food to get them through football practice. “Mind if we join you?” Gabe asked.

“Sorry, guys,” Marla answered for me. That was fortunate since I was too dumbstruck to speak. “We just finished.”

I followed her lead, taking my tray over to the scullery while making sure not to make any further eye contact with my two disappointed former teammates.

“I need a boyfriend,” Marla muttered as we walked out of the cafeteria together.

“What?”

“Keep your voice down,” she ordered, looking around to make sure we hadn’t attracted undue attention. “I said I need a boyfriend. Don’t look so shocked. You need one, too.”

I hadn’t realized I had looked shocked before, but I certainly realized I did now.

“Look,” Marla sighed, “if we don’t have boyfriends, every guy in the school will be hitting on us. You don’t want that, do you?”

“Of course not! But I’m not... I mean I don’t swing that way,” I protested.

“You do now–or you will,” Marla replied. “Didn’t you listen to what Carrie said? If you were heterosexual before, you still will be now. The difference is heterosexual for you now means an attraction to guys.”

Okay, so I had been noticing guys more than before my change, but I wasn’t about to admit that to Marla. I don’t mean I was ready to go hop in the sack with a boy, but like it or not, I was starting to admire certain features on the guys. Still, the idea of finding a boyfriend sounded hopelessly gay. “I’m not going to do it,” I insisted.

“Suit yourself,” Marla shrugged.

It took me a few days to realize Marla might have been right. I had thought I could fend off the guys and that after a day or two, they’d get tired of hitting on me. No such luck, though. The more I tried to hold them off, the harder they pressed. It was as if I was becoming an unavoidable challenge to them–sort of like Mount Everest to a mountain climber.

Oh, it was nothing overt: I don’t want to give the impression that they were unduly lewd or anything, but they did make nuisances of themselves, engaging me in endlessly banal conversation and posturing themselves where I would be forced to notice them. But the worst of it was cheerleader practice on Wednesday. Several guys hung around to watch as we practiced on the edge of the football field. ‘Now I knew what a stripper must feel like,’ I thought, ‘strutting her stuff in front of a bunch of guys who were drooling like a pack of hungry dogs at a barbeque.’ I didn’t want to admit it to Marla, but I was coming around to thinking she was right. A nice, docile, and very, very platonic boyfriend might be just what I needed to keep the wolves at bay.

“I’m going to the after-game party with Kevin tomorrow,” Marla told me, smiling as we walked home together after practice.

“Kevin Carter?” I asked. Kevin Carter was a second string fullback who would probably be first string next season during his senior year.

“The same,” she said. After a moment of silence, she asked, “What do you think of him?”

“He’s a good guy,” I told her truthfully. It actually hurt to be so honest, though. I still had fond memories of going with Marla, and although some of those memories I now knew to be false, they were no less poignant. In the few short days since I had been transformed into a girl, Marla had become my best friend instead of my romantic interest, and I knew in my heart that we would never be more than friends again. It wouldn’t be right for me to hold her back from a new relationship.

“I’m glad you think so,” she smiled. We walked quietly for a few minutes before she asked, “Have you given any more thought to finding a guy?”

I couldn’t deny it, so I just nodded rather than saying anything. The strange thing was that with each passing day, men were looking more appealing to me and women less so. I couldn’t blame whatever was in my brother either, for I had had no further nightmares pressing me to experiment with my new sex. No, I suspected my orientation was slowly changing just as Carrie and Marla had told me it would. There seemed to be nothing I could do to stop it.

“How about my brother?” Marla suggested.

“Matt? But he’s going with Linda Darren.”

Her eyes sparkled with smug amusement. “Not anymore he isn’t. He broke up with her last night.”

“Huh?” Matt had only been dating Linda for a few months, but it was obvious she wanted him badly. “I thought Matt was seriously thinking about marrying her.” I didn’t mention the conversation I had had with Matt the night of my transformation about Linda’s demand of engagement for sex.

“Linda?” Marla laughed. “Get real! Matt’s smarter than that. I guess she pressed him too hard about the whole idea of getting married after high school and he told her he didn’t want to get that serious about any girl just yet.”

Now that sounded like the Matt I knew. “Linda didn’t say anything about it at cheerleader practice today.”

“She wouldn’t,” Marla countered. “She hasn’t given up on him just yet, but I can assure you that Matt has given up on her. Actually, that’s why Matt was home early Saturday night. They had a fight and he took her home early. I guess after a few days, he decided the whole relationship wasn’t worth it and told her they were quits. Now, I’ll ask you again: how about you and Matt?”

I promised Marla I’d think about it and headed home. Frankly, I didn’t care much for the idea of dating her brother. I had known Matt far too well as Jason, and the idea of dating him now that I was a girl seemed extremely gay. I would far rather find a guy I barely knew so I wouldn’t be constantly reminding myself of the friendship we had enjoyed before my transformation.

‘On the other hand, dating Matt did have certain advantages,’ I realized. Because I did know him so well, we had a pretty good chance of getting along well. Also, I knew Matt would never press himself on me, trying to get me to have sex with him. He was too much of a straight shooter to do that. In short, he was a friend I could trust.

In only a few days as a girl, I was starting to realize trust was the most important attribute I could want in a guy. For girlfriends, trust meant you could tell them intimate thoughts and feelings without having them blab them all over the school. For boyfriends, trust meant being able to talk with and be with a boy without having him take advantage of you. It sounded simple, but finding trustworthy friends could be a challenge for someone like me who wasn’t used to being a girl.

Of course, even those who had been girls for some time seemed to have the problem, too. For example, take Amy Dennis. She was supposedly one of Linda Darren’s best friends; yet she called me on my cell phone before I ever got all the way home from practice just to tell me about Matt and Linda breaking up.

“Have you heard?” she asked breathlessly after mentioning their names.

“Yeah,” I replied. “I’ve heard.”

“Oh, that’s right. You and Marla are friends.”

I didn’t say anything.

“Well?”

“Well what?” I asked, confused.

“Are you going to try to get Matt back?”

Back?

“Matt and I are just friends,” I replied lamely. There was something here I didn’t know. Apparently Marla didn’t either or she would have warned me. ‘Of course,’ I realized. ‘Marla remembered my past life just as I did. Neither of us would have known that Matt and I were apparently dating at one time.’

“I know you didn’t date him very long and it was kind a casual thing,” she clarified, “but you guys were always so close right after his family moved here. I just always figured you still had some feelings for him. I’ll bet you could get him back,” Amy pressed.

There was that word ‘back’ again. Apparently girls like Amy saw relationships where no strong tie really existed. I guess it made better drama that way.

“I thought you were Linda’s friend,” I pointed out as I entered my house.

“But you’re my friend, too,” Amy insisted.

“Well, I don’t want to get in the middle of Matt and Linda,” I told her. After that, we chatted for a minute and broke off. Some friend, I thought to myself. If I picked up on Matt, Linda would be pissed. Not that it mattered, because I had no intention of picking up on Matt, in spite of Marla’s urging.

Something else concerned me as well. Since Linda and I were both cheerleaders and part of the same clique, Matt’s sudden availability could cause a rift. If Amy’s call was any indication, it sounded as if more of the girls would come down on my side rather than Linda’s. I didn’t want any trouble with Linda. God only knew I had trouble enough as it was.

I sighed as I opened up my math book to work out the problems for tomorrow’s assignment. But stretched out on the bed, I found I couldn’t concentrate on the problems. I was too busy digesting everything that had happened to me in my first few days in school as a girl.

For the most part, it was business as usual–at least in the classroom. Most of my teachers treated me about the same as they had when I was Jason. Mrs. Riley in American History actually treated me a little better than usual. She never had cared much for jocks, so now that I was no longer a football star, she seemed to warm to me a little more. Mr. Kaufman in Math was just the opposite. Nearsighted and narrow minded, he seemed to think women were some sort of inferior species. I had never noticed before, but the girls in his class seemed to have to work twice as hard to get a good grade as the boys did. No wonder my grades were just a little lower in his class than they had been when I was Jason. I seemed to be experiencing my first bout with gender discrimination.

Out of class, of course my friends had all changed. Sure, the guys on the football team were still my friends, but they were now friends of the opposite sex. I was now eye candy: I would catch them watching my cute little butt wiggling down the hallway (I think I should mention that I didn’t particularly want a cute little butt–nor did I want it to wiggle–but as I was finding, to my chagrin, my new anatomy required a fair amount of wiggling whether I wanted it to wiggle or not). Also, the guys spent more time talking to my breasts than they did talking to my face. And then there was their irritating tendency to try to show off for me and the other girls. Had I been that way as a boy? I certainly hoped not.

Relationships with the other girls proved much more complex than the relationships I was used to as a guy relating to other guys. Girls seemed to form much tighter circles among their friends than guys did. As a guy, I might see some of my best friends for a couple of minutes a day, and I might chum around with several disparate groups in the course of a class day. As a girl, though, I was expected to associate almost exclusively with my peer group. Oh sure, I could talk to other girls, but only casually and only for a few seconds–particularly if one of my peer group came on the scene.

My peer group was, of course, the cheerleaders. Contrary to the uninitiateds’ preconceptions, one didn’t have to be a bubble-headed configuration of tits and ass stuffed into a tight blouse and short skirt to be a cheerleader. The girls ranged from extremely bright to about average on our squad. None fell into what I would classify as a bimbo category. Some were boy-crazy, wanting nothing more than to get married right out of high school while others of our ilk wanted to go on to college. Trudy Michaels, a junior like Marla, even planned to go on to medical school. The point is that bright or dull, stunning or just cute, senior or sophomore, virgin or slut, we were part of the cheerleader clique.

To be honest, that actually helped me out. There were a total of nine cheerleaders on the squad, so there were only eight other girls I had to pretend to know extremely well. And, of course, one of those girls was Marla, so with her help, I managed to get by. My new clique also formed protective coloration of a herd. Few boys had the nerve to make a move on one of us when any of the other cheerleaders were there to listen to him.

I didn’t know how many of my fellow students realized what had happened to me. It was obviously limited to the select few who had either made unfortunate wishes–people like Jeff or Kim–or those of us who were victims. Kim was the only one who had to know who didn’t speak of it. She seemed upset the first time she saw me, but that was it. I was certain she regretted what she had done to her former boyfriend and didn’t want to be reminded of what could happen.

On the down side, my cell phone rang a lot. Invariably, it was one of the other girls on the squad with some juicy gossip–often as not gossip about one of our own. So it was with Amy telling me about Linda and Matt breaking up. What made it even more stressful is that Linda, too, was on the cheerleading squad. I knew before long, I’d be getting calls from some of the other cheerleaders asking me about Matt. I thought I had better talk to Marla before I did anything else.

“I just heard from Amber, as if I didn’t know what my own brother was up to!” Marla told me when I related my conversation with Amy. Amber was one of the sophomore cheerleaders who had apparently called Marla to see what Matt thought of her. Matt was going to be a very popular boy it seemed.

“Well she doesn’t have to worry about me,” I sighed.

“Don’t be too sure,” Marla cautioned. “Matt was asking me if you were dating anybody.”

I groaned. “Did Matt say anything about dating me?”

“I would have told you if I’d known,” she reminded me. “As nearly as I can tell, you guys broke up right before Christmas last year. You hadn’t been dating long and it wasn’t particularly serious. Then he picked up with Linda. Remember, I had no way of knowing. Just like you, I’m immune to all these little reality changes.”

Who had Matt been dating then in the reality I remembered? No one I could think of. He had casually dated about three girls until Linda got her hooks in him. But apparently as far as nearly everyone remembered, he had broken up with me and started dating Linda a few weeks later.

“I think he’s going to ask you out, though,” Marla warned me.

I groaned again. “This can’t be happening to me.”

“I’ve got an idea...” Marla started brightly.

“No!” I said emphatically. “I don’t plan to start dating Matt.” I could have added that I would just feel too weird dating a good friend like Matt, but I didn’t want to give her anything to argue about.

“But you should date somebody,” she pressed, “just to keep the wolves away.”

“Something will turn up,” I insisted. “Just don’t do anything to encourage Matt. Besides, I don’t want any trouble with Linda.”

“Okay,” Marla agreed. “I won’t do anything to encourage him, but he’s got a mind of his own. If you don’t want him to ask you out, you’d better find someone else in a hurry.”

So that’s how I ended up on a date with Cameron Kline by the end of the week.

We played Wickenburg Friday night, and my old team continued its downward spiral, losing by eighteen points. We weren’t even seriously in the game. Matt was the star for our side with three field goals, the longest one an impressive forty-seven yards.

As for me, it was my first game on the sidelines as a cheerleader, and I can’t say I was happy about it. By the time the game had started, I was already sick of playing cheerleader. All of us were required to wear our cheerleading uniforms to class, so for the first time, I had to wear a skirt to school. Unlike Sunday’s demure outfit, our cheerleader outfits were so skimpy with their little pleated skirts and sleeveless tops that I felt as if I was wearing nothing at all.

I remembered as I sat in my first class with my legs pushed tightly together how much I had appreciated Marla in her cheerleader outfit when I was Jason. I realized with extreme embarrassment that I was now being appreciated by every guy in the school, as well as a few teachers in all likelihood. I knew that by evening, a good percentage of the male population of Caliente would enjoy that same appreciation, particularly as I turned and jumped, exposing my white panties. I wanted to die.

To make matters worse, a cheerleader’s view of the game isn’t all that good. Sure, we were on the sidelines, but players, photographers, coaches and officials roamed the area, cutting off my view of the game, besides, most of the time, we were facing the fans, cheering our little hearts out in a losing cause.

As miserable as cheerleading was, I didn’t want to see my stint in front of the crowd end, because when it did, I’d be on my first date with a boy. What had ever possessed me to say yes to him?

“Let’s get you ready for your date,” Marla said as we trudged into the dressing room after the game.

“Do I have to?” I whined. My muscles ached and I just wanted to go home and take a shower in private. To make matters worse, I had let Marla choose my outfit for the party–tight little green sweater, short khaki skirt, and brown shoes with a small heel. True, I’d blend in with all the other girls, but I was reluctant to be all that girly.

“Just think how much you would have given this time last week to take a shower with the cheerleaders,” Marla teased in a whisper.

“That was last week,” I mumbled, watching dully as the others girls stripped out of their clothes and bounced into the shower. Reluctantly, I joined them. I was reminded of the line from the poem by Coleridge: ‘Water, water everywhere nor any drop to drink.’ There I was, surrounded by some of the most gorgeous bodies in my high school, and I wasn’t the least bit turned on.

Or at least I wasn’t turned on until I tried to compare this shower to the last one I took as a member of the football team. When I imagined myself showering with the guys, my body started responding in a fashion I had not previously experienced. Shaking with self-loathing, I hurried out of the shower to get dressed.

“You started thinking about showering with the team, didn’t you?” Marla whispered to me.

I looked at her in shock. “How did you know?”

She shrugged. “Same thing happened to me. So see? Dating a guy won’t be so bad after all. You’ll find you actually like being with a guy after a while.”

Marla might have been perceptive about many things, I thought as I stood away from the crowd at the party while Cameron played the gentleman and went to get me a glass of fruit punch, but dating a guy wasn’t one of them. In short, Cameron was a pompous ass, a sexist pig, and to complete the sexual analogies, as randy as a goat.

He had asked me out just before the end of the school week. Marla had continued to beat me up all day about getting a date, and after my day at school being mentally stripped out of my cheerleader’s uniform by every heterosexual male in the school, I had reached the conclusion that it would be safer to attend the party with a date. Cameron was the first to ask, so he got lucky.

Actually, I was somewhat pleased when he asked me. I had known Cameron as Jason and thought of him as an average sort of guy. But of course I didn’t really know him well. We didn’t run in the same circles. He was from a wealthy family who lived in a big custom home on the edge of Caliente. Although he was big enough to play football, he didn’t seem to have much interest in sports with the exception of tennis. I had to admit, he wasn’t a bad-looking guy: in fact, my new feminine tastes declared him to be a bit on the good-looking side. The fact that he had money and knew how to dress well probably helped.

What I hadn’t known about him was that he was in love with his own image in the mirror. His dark hair, dark eyes and well-tanned skin gave him the Latin lover look, in spite of his German name, and apparently enough girls had fallen for this to make him think he was superior to any girl on the planet.

Oh, he was polite enough–even gentlemanly–but for him, I was nothing more than a trophy for the evening–a trophy he expected to be subservient to his whims.

“You don’t look like you’re having a very good time,” a voice said beside me.

I turned to see Matt. “Does it show?”

“Neither am I,” he admitted. “In fact, I think I’m going to go on home.” He was silent for a minute as the two of us watched Cameron holding court with a couple of freshmen who seemed awed by his pompousness. “How did you ever end up going out with Cameron?”

The way he said it made me wonder if I was the only person in the school who hadn’t considered Cameron to be the king of assholes. “He asked me,” I said simply.

“So that’s it? He asked you?”

“I don’t want to discuss it,” I growled as Cameron returned at last with my fruit punch.

“Hey Baker, you had your chance with Jennifer,” Cameron called out, embarrassing me as heads turned to watch. He handed me my glass and joked, “Is this guy bothering you, honey?”

Honey? Why you...

“Jen and I were just talking until you got back,” Matt explained. His tone was casual, but the look in his eyes said that he would love to punch Cameron out just for the fun of it. It was just as well that he didn’t. Cameron was as big as Matt and could probably have handled himself.

I don’t want to relate all the gory details of the party. Let’s just say Cameron couldn’t have embarrassed me more if he had tried, what with all of his pawing me and trying to make everyone think I was his girl. I was relieved when the party finally ended.

Of course that wasn’t the end of my trials. Cameron escorted me out to his Mercedes SLK (a sixteenth birthday present from his parents, he informed me) and promptly started off in the direction opposite my house. “Where are you going?” I asked.

“Oh, just up to the Point,” he replied smugly.

Oh shit! I had accepted a date with Cameron to avoid being mauled by some guy, and now it was obvious Cameron planned to do some mauling of his own. I wasn’t ready for that. In fact, when it came to Cameron, I would never be ready for that. “Cameron, I don’t want to go to the Point,” I told him firmly. His reply was just a smug grin. There was going to be no talking him out of this.

I knew I couldn’t go to the Point with him. I’d be at his mercy. He would probably be content just to ooze all over me, but what if he decided to take matters further? There was no way I would be able to fend off his advances. If I was going to stop Cameron, it would have to be before we got to the Point.

A stoplight was my salvation. I didn’t relish being alone at night as a pretty young girl, but the inviting lights of an Arco AM/PM mart at the intersection looked a lot more inviting than the darkness at the Point. I jumped out of the car and ran as best I could in my heels for the store.

“Hey!” Cameron called. When I kept running, I heard him yell, “Stupid bitch!” As I heard his car accelerate, I slowed to a walk. He was an asshole to leave me there all alone, but I was glad that he did it.

I ignored the boorish stares of a couple of grungy guys who were buying beer. I decided the only way I would get any privacy was in the restroom. Once there, I opened my cell phone. I wasn’t quite sure who I was going to call. If I called my parents, they’d have a fit. I wasn’t about to call Jeff. The last thing I wanted to have happen was to be rescued by the person who had put me in this fix to begin with. Besides, what Jeff knew, his little visitor would probably know as well. Marla would be on her date with Kevin, so she couldn’t help me.

Then I saw Marla’s home number. Maybe Matt was home. I had noticed he didn’t have a date at the party, and he had mentioned that he was going home. It was late and I’d probably piss off his parents, but I didn’t want to try to walk home when the night streets were filled with guys like the two buying beer.

To my relief, it was Matt who picked up the phone. “Matt, I need your help!” I babbled, spilling out what had happened and where I was.

“Wait right where you are,” he told me. “I’ll be there in about ten minutes.”

Those were the longest ten minutes of my life. It seemed like every guy who walked in the store was a charter member of Lowlifes of America, and every one of them looked as if I was one of the products on the shelf. I tried to dissuade them by standing in front of the women’s hygiene products, but they all continued to stare–even the wimpy little clerk behind the counter.

To his credit, Matt must have broken half a dozen traffic laws just to get there in ten minutes. As he walked into the AM/PM, I realized I had never been so happy to see anyone in my life. He was still in the white polo shirt and khaki slacks he had worn to the party, so I must have caught him right after he got home. Thank God for that. I wouldn’t have wanted to disturb his parents that late if he hadn’t been home.

“Everything okay?” he asked, glancing at a couple of slime balls who had been working up the courage to walk over and hit on me.

“Everything’s fine now,” I sighed.

We hustled out to Matt’s car–the bananamobile as I had called it when I was Jason, since the aging Mustang was painted in the signature canary yellow of the mid-90s. The top was down, and the white interior looked very safe and inviting. I plopped into the passenger seat with relief.

“Want to get something to drink?” Matt asked.

What I wanted was to get home as soon as possible, but something in Matt’s voice told me he really wanted to talk to me. Since he had gone out of his way to rescue me, it was the least I could do. “Sure.”

We ended up at an In-N-Out just off the freeway. Although I wasn’t hungry, I agreed to split some fries with Matt. Mostly, I let him eat them, sipping on my lemonade.

“Cameron should be horsewhipped,” Matt mumbled between fries. I had told him what had happened since we left the party, and he had become angrier by the minute.

“I guess I’ll have to stop saying yes to the first guy who asks me out,” I mused.

“Before you do, had anyone asked you out tomorrow night?” he wanted to know.

“No.” Oh shit. One of my best friends was going to ask me out.

“Then you want to go to a flick tomorrow night?”

“Only if you promise not to take me to the Point.”

“I promise.”

That out of the way, we talked for a few more minutes, and then Matt took me home. I hoped I wasn’t doing the wrong thing, agreeing to go out with him. Since in Matt’s mind, we had been a couple before, I was afraid he might have expectations I was not willing to accommodate. Still, I needed someone to shield me from the Camerons of the world, and Matt was a known quantity. Or at least he had been we were both guys. Now that I was a girl, anything might happen, but I thought Matt would be on his best behavior–if for no other reason because his sister and I were good friends. Besides, I had heard nothing about our former relationship that led me to believe Matt would take advantage of me.

The house was dark when I got home, but I could tell Jeff hadn’t arrived yet. It was just as well. Jeff and I had continued to avoid each other all week–I due to continuing embarrassment over my new sex and Jeff, presumably, out of remorse for what he had caused. Of course, it was possible Jeff was avoiding me fearing that I’d get even by cutting his balls off with a rusty knife.

While the thought of revenge had crossed my mind–particularly when some guy who had once been a friend would hit on me–I was coming to the realization that Jeff was truly remorseful and would have done anything to undo the damage he had inadvertently caused. However, even realizing that, I felt the need to avoid him as much as possible. Whatever resided in his mind was getting its kicks out of watching me flail around at being a girl. I didn’t want it to have any satisfaction from my plight.

But the one place I couldn’t avoid it was in my dreams. What seemed like a short time after falling asleep, I found myself back in the surreal version of my room with the thing inside Jeff staring maliciously at me through the image of Jeff’s eyes.

“So how was your date with Cameron?” it asked in a mocking tone.

“Fine,” I lied. ‘It only knew what Jeff knew,’ I realized. ‘Otherwise, it would have known I had dumped Cameron and gotten home with Matt’s help.’

“Good,” it chuckled, sending shivers up my back. It was Jeff’s voice, but I had never heard Jeff chuckle so malevolently. “Cameron would be a good match for you. He’s rich, nice looking... did you suck him off?”

I refused to answer. It looked disappointed.

“Oh, too bad. If you had, you might be ready to fuck him next time. I can hardly wait for you to fuck him.”

I bit my tongue rather than telling him there was a fat chance of that ever happening with Cameron. “Why do you want me to...?” It was hard to say the word as a girl. When I had been male, it had seemed natural. Now, as a female, the word seemed to represent a violation of the worst kind.

“Why do I want you to fuck him?” it asked lightly. “I would think that would be obvious to you.”

“You want me to do it because it would heighten my embarrassment and you’d like that.”

It laughed inside Jeff’s body. “Yes, I would feel it, and I would draw strength from it,” it admitted. “I’m able to form a bond between you and your brother. Through this bond, I can feel your emotions. And yes, I will feed off your despair and humiliation when you spread your legs for some lucky boy.”

When it had stopped laughing, it looked at me curiously. “Do you have any idea how unique you really are?” it asked. When I didn’t reply, it went on, “A boy and girl twin come from different eggs, of course. There is no such thing as identical twins of opposite sexes... or at least there wasn’t until I changed you.”

“But I’m a girl...”

It nodded. “Yes, you are, but your DNA is identical to your brother’s–except for the XX chromosome pattern in your body and the XY one in his.”

“You seem to know a lot about biology,” I commented, trying to get it to tell me what it was.

“It’s quite simple to extract knowledge from your minds,” it said proudly. I had the distinct feeling I had actually distracted the little bastard for a moment. Well, who doesn’t like to show how much he or she knows about everything?

“So you can read our minds?” I asked innocently.

“I can read your brother’s mind quite easily, but...” it trailed off, an angry look crossing my brother’s face. “You little bitch, you’re trying to learn about me so you can stop me, aren’t you?”

“No, I was just curious. I–”

“Well, if you want to learn anything from me, learn this: you are a girl, now and forever. The sooner you realize that and give in to your new nature, the better off we’ll all be.”

“By having sex with a boy?” I shot back.

“You will have sex,” Jeff’s voice said through gritted teeth as whatever was in his body glared at me. “This Cameron would be perfect. Think of what it would be like, his hard penis crossing your nether lips...”

I felt a small, stinging pain, as if something inside my new sexual equipment had been torn aside.

“Think of the pleasure you will feel as he fills you...”

The pain was gone, but in its place, I could feel an uncomfortable presence, expanding the walls of my vaginal cavity until it felt as if they would burst. I grunted in pain and doubled over, squeezing my legs together in a vain effort to expunge the feeling.

“Yes...” it crooned, “...you’ll be a fine little trophy for this Cameron. If he tires of you, don’t worry, my dear, there are other men who will seek you out, their pricks hot and hard...”

“No!” I screamed, more in fear than in pain. The scene then faded out, and I fell back into a fitful slumber.

I awoke in darkness, muttering loudly, “No...no!”

The door to my room burst open, and there it was, standing there before me, eyes wide in the dark.

“Get away from me, you bastard!” I screamed.

“What’s going on in there?” my mother’s voice came from the other end of the hall.

“Jenny’s had a bad dream,” the thing in my brother’s body–or was it my brother?–replied. “Don’t worry. I’m with her.”

“J...Jeff?” I mumbled, trembling. “Is it... is it you? It isn’t that thing controlling you?”

My brother took me in his arms as he sat beside me on the bed. I should have been disgusted as he held me as any boy would hold a girl, but I was too shaken to object. In fact, his touch felt comforting to me, causing me to forget the alien feeling of penetration between my legs–a feeling left over from my nightmare. “It can’t control me when I’m conscious,” he assured me.

“It was here with me,” I sobbed. “It... it...”

“I know,” Jeff replied softly, his hand smoothing my hair. “I was there, too. But it wasn’t me in control, Jenny, I swear it wasn’t me. But this is me now.”

“I know,” I whispered.

“Jenny, please believe me,” my brother pleaded. “It’s using me just like it’s using you. When I feel it rising up in me, it’s like something cold and rotten. I can’t control it.”

“But it’s in you,” I insisted. “Do you know what it is?”

He shook his head. “No. All I know is that it’s feeding on me–on my emotions.”

“But why us? How did it find you?”

Jeff released me and looked sadly into my eyes. In the near darkness of pre-dawn light, I could see tears in his eyes as he admitted, “I was envious of you–of Jason. I guess all brothers envy each other a little. Maybe twin brothers envy each other a little more.”

I nodded. Of course I knew how jealous he had been. He had made no secret of it.

“One day a few weeks ago, I felt particularly jealous,” he went on. “I wanted so badly to show you up–to be the star instead of you. As I was thinking that, I felt something that made me shiver. I felt strange thoughts in my mind, like someone or something was in there with me. Then the feelings of jealousy started to grow, day by day and hour by hour, until...”

“Until you changed me,” I finished for him.

He shook his head. “I didn’t know this would happen. I didn’t know anything would happen. When you... changed, I was as surprised as you were. And then I could hear that... thing inside me, laughing as it fed on my shame.”

‘It was feeding on me, too,’ I realized. ‘It was feeding on my embarrassment at being a girl. It was linking itself to me through Jeff so it could feed on me as well.’

“What are we going to do?” my brother asked.

“I don’t know,” was all I could tell him.

When he was sure I had calmed down, he went back to his room. As for me, I just lay there, trying to put the pieces of the puzzle together. Several things about the entity inhabiting my brother’s body raised questions. First, what had it meant when it said Jeff and I were unique? Oh, it had explained that we were an impossibility–identical twins of opposite sexes–but so what? Other than as a biological oddity, it seemed unimportant. Yet when it had told me that fact, it had made it seem important.

And why was the thing so anxious to get me to experience sex? Marla had told me the creature had harassed her in her dreams as well, trying obviously to raise the level of her embarrassment. I was certain in some alien way, the thing fed off the embarrassment of its victims. Perhaps getting one of us to spread our legs and experience sex as a woman would be the greatest embarrassment of all. I certainly wasn’t anxious to surrender myself to some boy’s big stiff penis. If I remained a girl for the rest of my life–which seemed eminently likely–there would probably come a day when I did so, but not for a long, long time. I certainly wouldn’t do it even if I had wanted to if I thought it would please my tormentor in any way.

I noted the creature must feed off emotions for no more than a few months before moving on in some mysterious way. Maybe envy attracted it. Jeff had admitted to being envious of me before he had felt the thing enter his body. Maybe it was attracted to envy, amplifying it somehow just to make it more intense and to force its host into making an intemperate wish. Then, it would revel in the guilt of its host, mixing it with the linked embarrassment of its victim. It sounded a little bizarre, but no more so than being turned into a girl.

I managed to get back to sleep, and no more bad dreams disturbed me. When I awoke, I was reasonably confident to face my second week as a girl. Or at least as confident as I was going to get.

Things that had seemed alien to me only a week before were now seeming more normal. Showering, shaving my legs and armpits, sitting to pee, brushing my hair, and applying a very light coat of makeup seemed almost mundane. And dressed in a t-shirt and jean shorts with sandals, it was almost possible to ignore the fact that my underwear had a silky feel to it and a bra restrained my breasts. Even the fact that the t-shirt was pink didn’t seem abnormal.

Last Saturday’s routine played itself out once more, with Jeff helping my father work on the Mustang while Mom and I did chores around the house. Thankfully, like last Saturday, Marla showed up at my door right after breakfast. I hadn’t had much time alone with her during the week, so her arrival was something of a relief.

“I hear you’re going out with my brother tonight,” she grinned as I let her in.

“He told you?”

“Are you kidding?” she laughed. “You’d think he had a date set up with Michelle Trachtenberg the way he’s floating around the house.”

“Hey, it’s just a movie...”

“Do I have to spell it out to you again? He likes you–I mean he really, really likes you. I think he’s really sorry he ever broke up with you–especially after going with that bitch Linda.”

“That could be a problem,” I muttered.

Marla put her arm around me to comfort me, but it actually made me feel worse since it reminded me of the relationship the two of us had once had. “Cheer up, Jen. It really isn’t so bad. Look at me. You and I had some good times together, didn’t we?”

“Well, sure.”

“It can be the same between you and Matt,” she concluded. “Just give it a chance, okay?”

I just nodded. I could have mentioned that I had pinned down the time Marla cooled to me as being the time she really got changed into a girl. Looking back on it, she had been as reluctant to act like someone’s girlfriend as I was now. Still, she had come to accept it and accept me as a romantic interest. I supposed I could do no less with Matt. I had to be fair to my old friend, since he had no way of knowing his memories of dating me were false. Besides, as I had told her, it was only a movie date. What could happen?

We spent the rest of the day out by our pool. It was a little chilly to go in, so we worked on our homework as we caught some sun in our shorts and tops. Neither of us mentioned our former male lives, and when other girls would call us, we giggled and gossiped as if we had always been girls.

I was very grateful for Marla’s friendship. Without her support, I think I would have lost my mind. The knowledge that she had been through what I was going through was an inspiration to me. How many males had that thing changed into girls only to watch them go mad and perhaps even kill themselves? How many of them could have been saved if they had had someone like Marla to help them?

It was late in the afternoon when Marla’s phone rang. “Hey, hermano,” she greeted her caller. I knew it was the Spanish word for brother: it was how she always greeted Matt. “Yeah, she’s here. I’ll ask her.”

She muted the phone and told me, “Matt wants us to join him for pizza in an hour. Then you guys can go on to the movie alone.”

‘Dinner, too? Well, it was still no big deal,’ I thought. It was just pizza, and Marla would be there, too. Maybe it would be a good way to get into my first date as a girl–with a chaperone. I nodded to Marla. “Okay.”

Marla made the arrangements with her brother. After she hung up, she said worriedly, “We’ve got to get you ready. We haven’t got much time.”

“It’ll only take us ten minutes to get to Lombardi’s. What’s the hurry?”

Marla jumped up from the chair and grabbed my arm, pulling me to my feet. “Girl, you’ve got a lot to learn,” she said, shaking her head.

Okay, so I found out what the hurry was. I had expected to throw on a pair of jeans and a fresh top, brush my hair, grab my purse and go. No such luck. Marla proceeded to dress and undress me several times, looking for just the right combination. As far as she was concerned, nothing seemed to work.

“Marla, it’s only a pizza and a movie,” I protested. “What’s the big deal?”

“It’s your first date with Matt,” she called over her shoulder as she rummaged through my closet. “Well, not as far as he knows, but we know it’s really your first date with him. You need to make a good impression.”

“But Matt thinks he’s known me like this for years,” I pointed out, stripping out of the tight jeans I had only donned moments before.

“But this is a date–a date!” When she saw the confusion on my face, she sighed, “Just work with me, okay?”

“I think you’ve been a girl too long,” I grumbled, pulling off the top she had selected. I was actually just as glad to get rid of the top. As far as I was concerned, it showed way too much cleavage. I was a lot less glad when I saw what she pulled from my closet. “You’ve got to be kidding!”

The devilish grin on her face was proof that she wasn’t kidding at all.

“I’m overdressed,” I groused as I walked from the parking lot with Marla over to Lombardi’s.

“How can you be overdressed?” she asked innocently. “A little while ago, you were complaining about being underdressed.”

“You know what I meant!” I snapped, completely self-conscious as some boy openly stared at my breasts. The tight-fitting yellow knit top did little to hide the top half of my breasts. Even though my breasts weren’t particularly large, they were pushed up with ample cleavage showing to give the illusion that they were considerably bigger.

The boy’s eyes blatantly slid down to my legs, well exposed in a white denim miniskirt with ankles accentuated in two-inch strap sandals. I blushed. I hadn’t felt this girly even in my cheerleaders’ uniform. And to think–I had planned to wear jeans until Marla stepped in.

“Look, Matt can keep it in his pants, so you don’t have to worry about him getting too excited when he sees you. But you want him to be interested, don’t you?”

“Why should I want him interested?” I grumbled.

“So you can claim to have a boyfriend to keep the other guys at bay,” she reminded me.

“Isn’t that what you did with me?”

“At first, yes,” she admitted.

I didn’t press further. She had already admitted to me that she had eventually succumbed to her new female nature and had fallen for me. She had even been ready to give herself to me completely before my transformation.

Of course what had happened to her was something I had to remember in dealing with Matt. While I was still having difficulty reconciling the physical fact of my new body with my still very male mind, I was pragmatic enough to realize I needed someone like Matt–someone who wouldn’t take advantage of me–to keep other guys from hitting on me. The problem was what would happen if my body began to influence my mind? That’s what had happened with Marla until she was now probably indistinguishable from any natural girl. Since she had admitted to me that she had once been as male as I had been, she had never once acted in any way I would have considered male.

Is that what would happen to me? Probably, I thought grimly.

Matt’s eyes looked as if they were ready to bulge out of his head when he saw me. I could almost imagine something else was bulging through the crotch of his khaki slacks, but I tried to ignore that as he rose to allow me to slide into the booth next to him. I did so with a false smile as I realized I would be trapped in the booth.

Most of our conversation was typical high school small talk. It was obvious from the tone of the conversation that Matt thought Marla and I were good friends–and of course, we were, but not the way Matt remembered. In his mind, I was certain that he thought Marla and I had always been friends because we were both cheerleaders. He obviously had been entertaining the idea of asking me out again for some time–or so he thought. It was a neat and tidy situation.

I wondered, though, how much of it the thing in my brother had really created. To change not only me but reality around me would have been a Herculean task even for a creature capable of magic. I suspected there were other forces at play in the universe–forces that smoothed the rough edges of a changed reality into something nearly everyone remembered as making sense. That was probably why I had always remembered Marla as being my girlfriend–it would have been a natural enough progression if the Baker brothers and I had been close friends.

Now, though, I was a girl. It wasn’t necessary–or even desirable–for me to be romantically involved with Marla. And even though both Marla and I remembered our former relationship, both of us were by our natures heterosexual, so like it or not, we would be attracted to boys.

Given all that, I suppose it should be no great surprise that I found myself warming to Matt not just as a friend but as a boyfriend as our time together went on that evening. I don’t mean to imply that I was swooning at the feet of my former friend, but as the evening progressed, I became more and more comfortable with him, seeing him as something more than just a friend.

Marla’s presence had helped. Although she went her own way after we had shared a pizza, her contributions to the table conversation had helped Matt and I get over the little rough spots everyone has on a first date, and even though this wasn’t technically a first date, it seemed like it to me. She had even given me a little buss on the cheek as she left, encouraging me with a whispered, “Keep it up: you’re doing fine.”

So on my second date as a girl, I was actually fairly relaxed–relaxed enough that I didn’t object when Matt guided me gently with an arm at my waist, or when he put his arm around my shoulders in the darkened theater.

Actually, and to be completely honest, I was a little relieved when he put his arm around me, because the movie was surprisingly disturbing to me. Okay, I’ll admit it: I always thought Sarah Michelle Gellar was pretty hot–for an older woman, of course. I loved to watch the old Buffy reruns, and if a seventeen year old Sarah Michelle had walked into my life, complete with all her Buffy moves, I would have been following her around like a little puppy dog. So when we got to the theater and I saw that The Grudge was playing, I just had to see it.

Matt was a little surprised, and I don’t blame him. Most girls I have known have no desire to see horror movies. Those that do are usually just humoring their boyfriends. I guess I just hadn’t been a girl long enough to be into chick flicks: maybe I never would be into them.

The problem was that I didn’t realize how watching her in that film would affect me. Instead of Buffy, Gellar plays a very frightened and very threatened girl. I kept waiting for her to straighten up and say in her chirpy Buffy voice, “Okay. No more Ms. Nice Girl. You’re toast!” Of course it didn’t happen. As a result, I found I was projecting myself into her role, feeling weak and threatened. I unconsciously leaned into Matt, not even noticing that the center armrest was up. Soon, he was holding me tighter, and when I suddenly realized what was happening, I found I actually liked snuggling up against him.

Involuntarily, I began to feel something between my legs–it was a sensation similar to what I would have felt holding Marla when I was male, and yet again it was a completely different feeling. Of course, there was no penis between my legs to get hard, but the sensation was somehow similar, only running down deeply into my body instead of extending from the surface.

When the movie ended at last, the final credits rolling relentlessly up the screen, I found I was actually a little reluctant to let go of Matt. He just smiled at me and took my hand, leading me out of the theater.

We stopped off for coffee, lingering over our cups to discuss the movie. In all honesty, I can’t really remember much of what we talked about. I was too busy trying to quantify my feelings. On one hand, I felt good being with Matt. He had always been a friend, and now he seemed to be friend and more. On the other hand, only a few days before, I had been male. Being attracted to Matt seemed incredibly gay, and I was very, very embarrassed to be attracted to him this way.

Okay, I knew I was going to be spending the rest of my life as a girl–or at least I had certainly seen no evidence to the contrary. I knew from what Carrie and Marla had told me that my sexual orientation would remain the same appropriate for my new sex. So I had reconciled myself to the idea that somehow and somewhere, I would be attracted to boys. I just never thought it would happen this quickly.

To add to my consternation, I could almost hear something snickering inside my head. It was probably just the memory of the creature in Jeff’s mind echoing in my own head, I told myself. Thank God it would have no way of knowing about my feelings for Matt. Jeff and I hadn’t said ten words to each other all day, and I had certainly not told him I had a date with Matt.

The evening ended, as most dates do, with the boy (Matt) escorting the girl (me) to the girl’s front door. I knew what was coming. I would have expected a kiss had our roles been reversed. After all, I had hung on him all the way through the movie, and once the barrier of physical contact had been broken, I was finding it much easier to accept the touch of his hands.

“Well, good night,” Matt said softly, his face only inched from mine as he held my hands.

I knew what was expected of me, and I was actually looking forward to experiencing my first kiss as a girl. “Good night, Matt,” I replied, leaning up to meet his lips.

It wasn’t exactly a passionate kiss. I was happy about that. I didn’t think I was ready for anything too aggressive. But it was a pleasant kiss–a kiss that somehow promised more. And I couldn’t help it. I felt that strange hard-on that wasn’t a hard-on between my legs again.

As our lips parted, Matt said, “I’ll call you tomorrow.”

“Okay,” I murmured as I opened the door.

When he was gone, I breathed a sigh in the darkened living room. I had survived my second date as a girl without getting molested. Or making a fool of myself. Or at least that was the way I saw it. The old me would have probably thought that I had managed to do both. Ah well, I was too tired to think about it.

At least Jeff wasn’t home yet, I noticed as I passed his room. That meant the creepy little monster in him wouldn’t be able to rag on me about my date with Matt. Or at least that’s what I thought...

The all-too-familiar dream bedroom was there sometime during the night. This time, it leaned against an ebon wall, chuckling to itself, Jeff’s arms folded over his chest.

“What do you want?” I challenged. I had experienced enough of my tormentor to be afraid of it no longer, although I reminded myself to remain wary. Who could know what tricks it still held up my brother’s sleeve?

“Oh, I just wanted to congratulate you on finding the man of your dreams,” it said smoothly.

“What are you talking about?” Had someone seen Jeff and told him about Matt and me? After all, whatever Jeff heard, the thing in his mind heard as well. Still, I decided to bluff, but it did me no good.

“The way he held you in the theater was most... stimulating,” it said with a cruel grin. “I think you’re ready now for the next step in your girlhood.”

I was suddenly pushed onto the bed; I noticed for the first time that my body was nude. “What are you doing?” I demanded to know, but I couldn’t hold back the fear in my voice.

“Merely showing you what awaits you,” it crooned as I felt my legs pushed apart by some invisible force.

Before I could speak, I felt something invade between my legs. While I could see nothing there, I could sense it was very large as it painfully penetrated my new womanhood. I hear myself scream as the pain became more intense.

“This is what sex as a woman is like,” it told me. “This is what you will feel for the rest of your life.”

The pain stopped suddenly. I felt my body bathed in perspiration. I didn’t think a person could perspire in a dream, ‘but this was no ordinary dream,’ I reminded myself.

“Of course, there are times when you won’t want sex,” it said absently, nodding down to my abdomen.

I looked on with alarm as the skin over my belly began to balloon outward, leaving behind the pressure of something heavy. As it got bigger and bigger, I could feel something inside it, moving around, kicking...

“You won’t give birth easily though,” it told me with mock sympathy. “I’m afraid it will be quite painful...”

I screamed again, sharp pains knifing through my body, as if something inside me was trying desperately to get out.

“He said he would call you tomorrow,” the thing reminded me as the pain became even more intense. “Try to see him soon so you can begin your true journey to womanhood.”

It laughed insanely as my consciousness ebbed away.

I awoke, whimpering out loud, the echo of pain still reverberating in my abdomen. Hesitantly, I placed a hand over my belly, just to make sure it was really normal.

Normal?

‘Well, normal for who I now was,’ I told myself grimly.

Relieved at last to realize nothing further had been done to me physically, I sighed tiredly, stretching out on my bed. I wasn’t exactly happy to be a girl, but I was absolutely ecstatic to realize that I wasn’t pregnant.

I heard a car outside, and from the sound of the engine, I realized it was pulling into our garage directly under my room. It had to be Jeff returning home. But if Jeff was just getting home, how could the thing in his head be in my dreams? I had assumed it needed Jeff’s unconscious mind to reach out to me. I had to confront Jeff to find out what was going on.

I was waiting for Jeff in his room by the time he made his way in. He seemed taken aback to see me sitting there in my girly nightie, legs crossed and arms folded in front of his desk, illuminated only by the lowest setting on his desk lamp. “What now?” he groaned.

“How did you dream that creature into my head tonight while you were still awake?” I demanded.

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“I thought you could only be in my dreams when I was asleep.”

“I haven’t been in your dreams tonight. I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he insisted, stripping off his shirt to indicate he really wanted to go to bed.

“Where the hell have you been?”

“You’re my sister: not my wife.”

“I wouldn’t even be your sister if you hadn’t screwed up.”

He was silent for a moment. My barb had struck home. “Okay. I drove down to Phoenix with Mike Valentine and Kelly Jackson. We went to a party over in Scottsdale.”

I grimaced, thinking about how in a previous life, I would have probably been with Jeff and my old teammates at that party. Not now, though. It wasn’t a good idea for a cute, vulnerable girl to be traipsing off to the big city for a party. Too many nasty things could happen. I felt suddenly very confined–and worse yet, I felt as if there was something inside me delighting itself with my discomfort.

“You didn’t experience a dream with me tonight?” I asked more slowly and calmly.

“No, thank God,” he assured me. “Look, I know you don’t believe me, but those dreams are as nasty for me as they are for you. I’d give anything–even my life–just to have never gotten involved with it.”

Actually, I did believe him. I wasn’t sure why, but I felt closer to him than I had in months. Maybe it was the knowledge that he was hurting on the inside, too. Misery really does love company. I nodded to Jeff as I rose to my feet. “Okay. I’ll see you in the morning,” I said dully.

Jeff caught me gently by the arm as I started to walk out of his room. I believe it was the first time we had touched each other since my transformation. “Can you ever forgive me?” he asked plaintively.

“I don’t know,” I replied softly, adding, “I’ll try–if I can. I just don’t know.” With that, he released me and I made my way back into my room.

‘I would have to talk to Carrie and Marla in the morning, just to be sure,’ I thought, but I strongly suspected something new had been added to my torment–something I was pretty certain had not happened to either Carrie or Marla. If Jeff wasn’t involved in this latest dream, it seemed highly likely that all or part of the evil entity had managed to move into my head from his. If that was the case, I was toast. It could torment me day and night for as long as it wished.

Mom insisted we all go to church again, so rather than try to call Marla, I waited until services were over and pulled her aside while our respective parents were talking to other parishioners.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, reading the worried expression on my face.

I moved closer to her, hoping all idle onlookers would see was two teenage girls talking quietly and privately–probably about boys. Marla caught on and tried to look as if she and I were just involved in mundane girl talk, but she couldn’t keep her eyes from growing wider as I told her what had happened in my dream.

“That never happened to me,” she said softly, “and I don’t think Carrie ever mentioned anything like that.”

“We have to see Carrie,” I told her. “I think this thing is getting more powerful.”

She nodded in agreement. “I’ll get the car as soon as we get home and pick you up.”

“Hi!”

Oblivious to our little conspiracy, Matt wandered over to where we were talking. He had been tied up with a couple of guys from the team right after church, so I hadn’t expected to have to talk with him. Since we had gotten about as far away from the after-church crowd as possible, it was obvious that he had sought us out–or probably more accurately, sought me out.

“Hi, Matt,” I returned absently. I probably looked to him as if I had been caught swapping deep, dark secrets with his sister. Come to think of it, that was exactly what I had been doing.

“Some of the guys are going over to Ryan’s house this afternoon,” he began as casually as he could. “His folks are in Vegas for the weekend. We’re gonna hang out around the pool. Would you like to go with me?”

Two dates with him in less than twenty-four hours? I was about to say no, but I hesitated too long, giving him the chance to sweeten the deal. “Marla’s invited, too, of course. Kevin’s going to be there,” he added, guaranteeing Marla’s interest.

“Sure, we’ll come,” Marla answered for me. “But there’s something we need to do first. If we could borrow your car, we could get it done quicker,” she wheedled.

Matt looked over at his yellow Mustang that he had worked hard for the last three summers to get for himself. For our date last night, he had even gotten the bananamobile washed and polished. “How will I get home?”

“Catch a ride with Mom and Dad,” she suggested. When she saw him wavering, she reminded him, “The sooner Jennifer and I run this little errand, the sooner we’ll be able to go to Ryan’s with you.”

That, of course, was the deciding factor, and a few minutes later, we pulled up in front of Carrie’s house.

Unfortunately, she wasn’t alone. She and her lover, Nancy Henry, were spending a relaxing day reading the Arizona Republic and enjoying their coffee when we arrived. She made the excuse that a couple of students had some questions for her and ushered us out into the front yard.

The expression on her face was every bit as incredulous as the expression on Marla’s face had been. “Are you sure it wasn’t just a real dream?” she asked.

“Real dreams don’t hurt,” I reminded her, shivering slightly at the thought of the pain of the phantom pregnancy. “This did.”

“Has the creature ever given you any indication that you’re somehow different?” she asked.

I stopped to think. “Yeah, now that you mention it, it said something about Jeff and I being unique because we were identical twins. It said we’re still virtually identical–except for the sex, of course.”

“I wonder...” she mused.

“What, Carrie?” Marla pressed.

“I have an idea,” she said at last, “but I don’t think I can do anything about it today. See me at school the first thing tomorrow.”

Although I pressed her to say more, she gently insisted that it wait until morning. “If it’s listening and I’m wrong, I don’t want to give the little bastard any ideas,” she explained.

I shuddered at that thought. Could it be that it could now read my waking thoughts? I prayed to God that it wasn’t so.

Marla swung back by my house so I could get a swimsuit. She laughed at me as I tried vainly to find a nice, conservative one-piece suit designed to be pointedly modest. Of course I had none. Instead, my drawer seemed to be filled with the skimpiest, sexiest suits imaginable. I wondered why my mother had ever allowed me to get anything so risqué.

Of course, deep down I knew that all the girls wore them. I had admired Marla many times in a variety of brightly colored bikinis, so I supposed I was just going to have to be one of the girls now. Sighing in resignation, I selected a bright blue bikini adorned with a pattern of white flowers and put it on quickly, checking to make certain that nothing was too exposed.

“Matt’s going to love you in that,” Marla grinned.

“That’s what I’m afraid of,” I muttered.

And of course he did love me in it. When we met up with him, I thought his eyes were going to bug out of his head. I was glad he had chosen a baggy pair of trunks, because I was pretty certain his eyes weren’t the only part of his anatomy that was getting bigger. “You look fantastic, Jenny,” he told me as Marla hurried to her room to get her own swimsuit on.

“Thanks,” I managed to smile. Oddly enough, as exposed as I felt, it still seemed sort of nice to be complimented so profusely. I had been a girl just long enough to develop both a certain pride in my body and at the same time a very feminine concern that my body wasn’t perfect. To be told how great I looked made me feel all warm and fuzzy.

He didn’t say anything else: he just continued to stare. After a few moments, I realized I was staring at him, too. Matt was well built and I had never really noticed before in all the times I had seen him in the locker room. Of course, he was still one of the least beefy guys in that locker room, as kickers usually are. Still, he looked very... manly.

‘What the hell was I thinking?’ I scolded myself, feeling my face flush. Okay, I knew what I was thinking. It seemed that with every passing hour I was becoming more girlish–including an attraction for boys. Marla and Carrie had warned me it would happen, and I knew I wasn’t going to be able to stop it, no matter how embarrassing it was to me.

I tried vainly to push back the attraction, trying to remember what it was like to be aroused gazing at Marla’s lovely form. But as Marla bounced down the stairs, her breasts bouncing and ass wiggling inside a carmine red bikini that looked luscious against her tanned skin, I realized that I would from now on only be attracted to her as a friend. When we touched each other, it would be a gesture of feminine friendship, and if we ever kissed again, it would be a womanly buss upon the cheek to remind us of how much our friendship meant.

Matt on the other hand...

I thought back to our chaste goodnight kiss the night before, and how it had seemed full of promise of more, deeper kisses to come. My nipples snuggled tight in the blue and white bikini top tingled involuntarily, and I even felt an echo of the feeling between my legs.

Matt put the top down on the bananamobile, and Marla jumped over into the back seat so I could sit next to Matt. Of course, being in a low Mustang meant that every time Matt pulled up to a stoplight, whoever was stopped on our right could look right down the top of my bra. I tried to ignore some of the comments I heard being passed back and forth in those vehicles, but it was hard to sit there in so little and not feel as if I were wearing nothing at all.

It wasn’t any better when we got to Ryan’s house. There I barely overcame the urge to cover myself with my hands as if I were naked as each of the guys there–nearly all of them old teammates of mine–gave me an appreciative stare. What made it worse was the tiny corner of my mind that was actually revelling in the attention, and smugly watching as several other girls nudged their boyfriends to regain their attention.

One girl was particularly displeased. Linda Darren stared at me with undisguised hatred as I entered with Matt’s arm around my waist. I hadn’t realized she would be there, and I realized suddenly that in her mind, I was an interloper, stealing her man. I didn’t really want to steal him away from her, but she would never believe that. And in retrospect, it could probably be argued that in this reality, she could have been accused of stealing Matt away from me. The only thing I could do was turn away, as if I hadn’t even noticed her venomous expression.

The impromptu party quickly developed along predictable lines. At first, all of the guys jumped in the pool for a little horseplay and a ragged game of water polo, spending most of their time trying to impress the girls who had clustered along the side of the pool, industriously working on maintaining their tans and trying to pretend that the boys’ antics were of no interest.

I tried to emulate the girls, lying there on my towel, but I found it boring. I would much rather have been in my old form, carousing with my old friends. That, of course, was out of the question now. If I were to join them looking as I did now, I’d be dunked, tossed from guy to guy, and maybe even ‘accidentally’ lose my bikini top.

All of those things nearly happened anyhow. In fact, all of those things would have happened if it hadn’t been for Matt.

“Take it easy, guys!” Matt laughingly protested as some of the guys started moving in intent upon throwing me into the pool where three of the girls–including Marla–were already splashing around, laughing and screaming at the same time over their rude dunking. He put a protective arm around me.

Ryan, who had been leading the pack, grinned wickedly. “Well I don’t know...” he drawled theatrically. “We wouldn’t want to dunk your new girlfriend. That is, if she is really your girlfriend this time...”

“Are you my girlfriend?” Matt smiled at me, squeezing my waist a little tighter.

Before I could answer, Ryan added, “Of course if she isn’t your girlfriend...”

If I wasn’t his girlfriend, I was going to be terribly wet.

There was still enough Jason in me that the thought of declaring myself to be someone’s girlfriend seemed more than just a little gay. But on the other hand, making that declaration wouldn’t be as embarrassing as getting dunked by my former teammates. The decision was an obvious one. “I’m his girlfriend,” I admitted, a little surprised at the satisfaction in Matt’s eyes.

“I don’t know,” Ryan replied, rubbing his stubbly chin dramatically. “You didn’t sound too convincing. Maybe you should kiss him just to prove it.”

Obediently, I gave Matt a chaste kiss on the cheek, hoping that would be enough. Of course it wasn’t.

“I kiss my sister better than that!” Ryan mocked, followed by catcalls from the rest of the guys.

Well, in for a penny–in for a pound...

I put my arms around Matt’s neck and gave him the best kiss I could. It was better than getting soaked, wasn’t it? I felt Matt’s tongue in my mouth as I involuntarily thrust mine into his.

“Not enough!” Ryan insisted to the laughter of our audience. “You gotta cop a feel, Matt!”

He could have gone for my crotch, but he was too gentlemanly for that–if being gentlemanly meant only slipping his hand under my bra to caress my breast. To my stunned amazement, my nipples began to harden and I unconsciously twisted a little to give him a better feel. I never imagined that a girl’s breasts could be so sensitive–or that I could respond so willingly to the feel of a boy’s hand on my nipple.

A cheer went up around the pool. I opened my eyes just enough to see everyone laughing and clapping.

Everyone, that is, except Linda Darren.

None of us talked much on the way back from Ryan’s. I think in a way, Matt was as surprised by the impact of our little public make-out session as I was, and Marla was wise enough to keep quiet about it–although it was obvious she realized something was up.

Matt pulled up in front of my house, and as we sat there with the car idling, it seemed that neither of us could figure out what to do next. After an uncomfortable silence, I leaned over and gave Matt a quick kiss, but nothing like the heart-pounding smooch we had engaged in at Ryan’s. “I’ll see you tomorrow–in school,” I managed.

Marla followed me to the door, asking Matt to wait a minute. “Are you okay?” she asked when we were at my door.

“Marla, what’s happening to me?” I murmured.

“The same thing that happened to me,” she answered. “I told you it would happen–that you’d be as heterosexual a girl as you were a boy.”

“I know, but...”

“You think it’s gay?”

“Well...”

“Did you think it was gay when you were Jason and you and I were dating?”

“Of course not!”

“But I used to be male, too, even though you didn’t know it then. So why is this any different?” she demanded.

I didn’t bother to reply. We both knew the answer: it was different this time because I was the girl in a relationship with a boy.

“Just get some rest,” Marla advised, squeezing my arm with a smile.

“Okay.”

And that’s what I did. I spent the evening doing some homework, watching a little TV, and eating dinner with my family as I tried not to think about what was happening to me. To make matters worse, I was certain my little nocturnal tormentor was going to be in rare form once I went to sleep.

It didn’t disappoint me. It chuckled and snickered in my dreams, using the image of my brother as usual. “Spread your legs wide for your man!” it urged between outbursts of laughter. “Let him inside you! You are his, and when you are his, you are mine!”

I gasped at that, waking to the sudden sound of my alarm. I groaned to myself. It was another Monday. I would have to face another week as Jennifer Anne Burnett, cheerleader and teen hottie. And I wasn’t looking forward to it, particularly since my stomach felt queasy.

The only good thing about that morning was that the dream didn’t bother me as much as previous dreams had. For one thing, the thing–whatever it was–hadn’t said anything new. I had been a girl just long enough that the creature’s smutty banter didn’t really bother me that much. I guess I had gotten used to it.

Secondly, no matter how much it tried to cajole me into having sex with a guy, I had no intention of doing so. Oh, eventually I knew I probably would give in. As Marla and Carrie had reminded me, I was going to be one-hundred percent heterosexual as a girl whether I wanted to be or not, and I certainly couldn’t deny that guys were starting to look more attractive to me. But as for going down and dirty with them... well, that was something else entirely. It would be a long, long time before I seriously entertained the possibility of having sex with any guy.

In fact, I thought as I tried to get out of bed in spite of a funny little cramping sensation, right now sex with any guy seemed like... seemed like...

Oh crap!

I had bled on my sheet. There wasn’t a lot of blood there–just a smallish spot of it–but I knew instinctively what it had to be. This was one more thing to curse my brother for. I was starting my period.

‘I supposed,’ I told myself as I plucked a tampon out of the box beneath my sink, ‘that I should have been grateful that my period was so mild.’ From what little I knew on the subject, many girls experienced horrible mood swings and severe cramping from their periods. I had experienced neither.

Well, maybe that wasn’t quite true. I had felt sort of horny the day before at the Ryan’s pool. I remembered reading once that a lot of girls got somewhat aroused just before their periods, but I wasn’t sure about my facts there. Also, I was experiencing some mild cramping and intestinal upset, but it wasn’t serious enough to slow me down.

The most irritating things about the period would be keeping the damned tampon inside me for the duration of my flow. Fortunately, Marla had given me the benefit of her experience, and the tampon seated itself reasonably comfortably inside me. I’d have to change the stupid thing regularly, and being stuck as a girl for the rest of my life, that meant I’d be repeating the disgusting ritual every month for the next few hundred months.

Sighing as I finished, I tried to ignore what was now jammed up inside me. Other girls managed to act normal during their periods, so I could too, I reminded myself. Still, it seemed strange to have something inside my body like that, and I quietly suppressed a little fear that the tampon would cause me to walk bow-legged for the duration of my period.

“Having your period?” Marla asked while we alone in the girls’ room at school.

“You can tell?” I practically squeaked.

“Don’t worry,” she laughed. “I probably looked the same way the day my first one started. You just kept twitching while you were doing your hair, and I noticed you kept looking around out in the hall, as if you were afraid someone would notice something odd about you. You hadn’t looked like that since right after your change.”

“So you were just guessing?” I asked hopefully.

“Nothing shows,” she assured me.

“Mom chewed me out for staining the sheets,” I grumbled. “She told me I should have realized I was about due and taken precautions. Then, to make matters worse, Jeff heard her.”

“Bummer,” she agreed.

“I’m never going to get used to this!” I sighed, barely suppressing a tear.

“Yes you will,” Marla countered, squeezing my arm as we walked together out of the girls’ room. “You’re just a little emotional. A lot of girls get emotional during their periods.”

“You don’t.”

“Sure I do. I’ve just had more time to adjust to it. You’ll learn how before long.”

“Yeah, sure.”

The hell of it was that she was probably right. I probably would get used to it. Already, I was becoming accustomed to wearing women’s clothing and makeup. Already, I was becoming used to having guys stare at me–and worse yet, I was starting to think it normal to stare back at some guy’s attractive butt. So how much longer would it be before I got used to periods?

“Girls, can I see you for a minute?” a voice called out from a nearby classroom. It was Carrie. I looked at my dainty little watch. We still had ten minutes until our first class.

“Don’t worry,” Carrie assured us. “I’ll give you a tardy excuse.”

She ushered us into her classroom. There, waiting for us, was a man about Carrie’s age, with olive skin, coal-black hair and deep brown eyes. He was dressed in typical chinos and a blue dress shirt open at the collar, and his features all spelled out Native American. He smiled when he saw us, but the smile quickly turned to a worried frown.

“Girls, this is Brandon Running Horse.”

As we gave our names and shook hands, Carrie’s guest said, “Most people get a little tangled up with ‘Dr. Running Horse,’ so please just call me Brandon.” I noticed when he shook my hand, he made a little wave of his other hand, as if warding something off while he touched me.

“Brandon was–is–an old friend of mine from college. We sort of lost touch, though, after that.” The way she looked at him with embarrassment indicated to me that they had been more than just friends. And since Carrie had been male back then, Brandon probably had very different memories of his former friend. “He’s also a professor of Cultural Anthropology at ASU,” Carrie explained. “He’s the friend I mentioned to you. He’s an expert in Native American myths and legends.”

“Although I would have to say that each of you has had enough experience with certain phenomena that have convinced you that not everything I study falls under the heading of either a myth or a legend. Particularly you, Jennifer.”

“Carrie told you about what’s happening to me?” I asked as we all sat down at the students’ desks.

“I know what’s happened to all of you,” he confirmed. He nodded at Carrie. “I have been made to understand that Carrie and I were very good friends when we were in college, but that she was a man named Donald. She has apparently been afraid to contact me before–afraid I would not believe her. Happily, she has overcome that fear. For many reasons, I have come to believe all that she has told me is true.”

“I had expected whatever changed us would just move on like it has before, but after what you told me yesterday, I thought maybe we needed some better answers,” Carrie said. “Since we always thought it might be some sort of Native American manifestation, I thought of Brandon. I knew Brandon was at ASU, but I had read he was on a sabbatical doing research in Oregon. I didn’t realize he was back at ASU until I tried to track him down yesterday.”

“I came up immediately,” Brandon continued. “Believe it or not, I have heard stories from others similar to yours, but I have never been so close to them as now. You see, I don’t remember any Donald from school. I only remember Carrie, and while we were casual friends in college, I didn’t remember us being particularly close. As we talked, I was certain about what had happened to her.”

Brandon turned to me. “But what has happened to you, Jennifer, appears truly unique. Although Carrie’s and Marla’s experience follows an expected if fantastic path, I don’t think I’ve ever heard of a case where a spirit was able to bridge the gap and reside partially inside his victim.”

This didn’t sound good. “You mean,” I asked, “you know all about what caused this to happen to us?”

Brandon laughed almost bitterly. “I wouldn’t say that I know all about what happened to you, but I have a pretty good idea...”

Brandon went on to tell us of a fantastical world beyond our own. I had heard of the Indian legends of a mystical spirit world, but I had never realized it was so complex. Most people who weren’t Native American thought of it in the sense of the European view of an afterlife, but it was much more complex than that, conjuring images that were surprisingly complicated–multiple planes of existence, almost without end, populated by every manner of spirit creature imaginable.

The spirits travelled when and where they wanted, possessing or changing creatures or objects in mundane planes such as ours, or floating freely without discernable shape or substance. Their concepts of good and evil were so different from our own that they almost lacked any common point of understanding. “It is one such spirit that has latched onto you,” Brandon told me.

“But why?” I asked. “What does it want?”

Brandon shrugged. “I can only speculate. As hard as this may be to imagine, try to visualize some sort of creature who exists on emotions.”

“Emotions?”

He nodded, making another sign in the air in front of me. “It knows I’m here.”

It was as I suspected. It would know my every move–or so I thought. Brandon shook his head. “I can imagine what you are thinking, but don’t worry. When you are conscious, it senses only emotions–and the presence of those of us who are... aware of their existence. It doesn’t fully experience your conscious thoughts or the words of the people around you. However, it can tell when there are people near who can feel its world.”

“People like you,” Marla surmised.

“Shamans,” Carrie explained.

“Actually, we don’t use that term very much,” Brandon corrected her. “It conjures up the idea of some sort of mystical religious figure. People like me are merely called to the spirit world where we explore and study.”

That sounded like the definition of a shaman to me, but if Brandon didn’t care for the term, I wasn’t about to argue–particularly if he could help me.

“As I was saying,” Brandon continued, “I believe this spirit lives on emotions. Given what Carrie had told me over time about how it operates, I have come to believe it manages to... for lack of a better word, ‘exhale’ envy and ‘inhale’ embarrassment.”

“It breathes emotions?” I asked incredulously.

He shook his head. “Not exactly. I just used the terms ‘inhale’ and ‘exhale’ to put it in terms we could all understand. Creatures from the spirit world aren’t like us. In fact, the worlds they come from aren’t like ours at all. That is why people like me must take very careful precautions before even scratching the surface of their plane of existence.”

“So how do we get rid of it?” I asked hopefully.

Brandon hesitated for a moment. “I’m not sure,” he replied at last. “You see, even when someone like me communicates with the spirits, we can’t be certain if they’re telling the truth.”

“Like Trickster,” Marla offered.

“Who?” I asked her.

“Trickster,” she repeated, smiling when Brandon nodded in agreement. “It’s a sort of Native American god who plays practical jokes on people.”

“You’re partially right,” Brandon commented, “but it’s a little more complicated than that...”

He went on to explain that Trickster (or sometimes Hare, Coyote, Spider, Raven, and a host of other names) myths occurred in nine of the eleven Native American Regions–particularly among the western tribes. The overwhelming majority of the Trickster myths in North America were transforming myths–creation of the earth, or at least the transforming of the world–and described a creature who was always on the move and always hungry. However else the Trickster was described, it was not guided by normal conceptions of good or evil and was always either playing tricks on people.

“One last point,” Brandon concluded. “The Trickster’s malicious pranks often involve sex. Most tribes were pretty earthy in their mythology–possibly as the result of seeing the results of such creatures’ actions.”

“So you think this Trickster is inside Jennifer and her brother?” Carrie asked.

“I think there is something like Trickster in them,” Brandon clarified. “There is a spirit presence inside her, but not as strong as what I would expect from a spirit as powerful as Trickster. This may be because it is split between Jennifer and her brother, or it may be that it’s just an imp.”

“Imp?” we all asked at once.

“Imps are usually minor demons or young malicious spirits. All mythologies have them. My guess is that you have all been visited by some spirit which is a minor form of Trickster, with limited powers. I suppose for the sake of argument, we can consider it to be Trickster, but lacking the experience of its fellow spirits.”

Changing anyone’s sex didn’t seem too minor to me, but before I could point that out, Marla said exactly that.

“True,” Brandon conceded, “but go read up on Trickster. I can recommend a good book or two if you’d like. You’ll find the typical Trickster to be much more powerful and devious than your spirit.”

“What do you mean by devious?” I asked.

“I mean they are accomplished liars,” he explained. “Almost everything the spirit tells you will be true, but then it will slip in something designed to trip you up. If it’s successful, it will trip you up before you know you’ve been had.”

“What if it isn’t successful?” Marla asked.

Brandon smiled. “That brings up another aspect of Trickster stories. If you catch it in a lie and cross it up, the results can be catastrophic for it. As powerful as a Trickster is, legends about them are rife with Trickster being caught in its own web of deceit.”

“The problem,” Carrie offered, “would seem to be being able to separate the lies from the truth.”

“Exactly.”

“But will this Trickster leave on its own, or...?” my voice trailed off as I considered the prospect of being linked to my tormentor forever.

Brandon’s smile disappeared. “I honestly don’t know, Jennifer. In every incident I have ever heard of involving Trickster, it has moved on, partially out of restless boredom and partially to better fulfil its needs. In your case, though, it has discovered something new. It not only resides in your brother, but it can link much closer to you. Now it can replenish itself from both its victim and its host with far more efficiency than its previous experiences. Coupled with its sexual tastes and need to embarrass you, anything is possible. It may leave soon or it may stay in your brother with some connection to you for some time.” He reached in his pocket and pulled out business cards for all of us. “All I can say is you need to be especially careful. Whatever it says or does, you can be sure it won’t be in your or your brother’s best interest.”

Brandon had given me a lot to think about that morning–so much that I was berated by a couple of my teachers that day for not paying attention in class. I think most of my friends thought I was daydreaming about Matt. Not true. A few of the girls probably thought it had something to do with my period. Also not true. I was thinking about how I could evict my unwelcome visitor before it figured out how to attach itself to me even more firmly.

Unfortunately I came up empty. The little imp continued to invade my dreams, laughing hysterically in the dream copy of my brother’s body as I struggled through what promised to be the first of innumerable periods. “You could always get pregnant,” it chuckled. “You’d stop having periods for awhile and enjoy a little hide the sausage while you’re at it.”

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” my dream-self replied indignantly.

“Oh yes...” it crooned, grinning widely.

“Well forget it!” I snapped. I had no intention of giving in to its suggestion. Brandon had warned me that a Trickster was highly sexually charged. It would undoubtedly get far too much pleasure from my deflowering, and I wasn’t going to give it to the raunchy little bastard.

But during the next few weeks, I had other things to worry about, and the biggest worry came on that very Monday from a direction and in a form I would never have imagined. It began as I was touching up my lipstick in the girls’ room at school. I had waited until I was alone since I still wasn’t terribly adept at applying lipstick and didn’t want to look like a klutz in front of any of the other girls.

Linda Darren stormed into the restroom and pushed me until I had been turned facing her. Thankfully, I dropped my lipstick into the sink or I would have been wearing a streak of it up my cheek. “Stay away from Matt Baker!” she growled. “He’s mine!”

I sized Linda up, much as I would have if I had still been male and another guy had pulled such a stunt on me. We were about the same size, and I reasoned that I would still fight like a guy if it came to that, giving me a clear advantage over her–or so I thought at the time. “I don’t remember seeing your name written on him anywhere,” I replied as coolly as I could.

“God damn it!” She pushed me on one breast, and it surprised me enough that I jumped back, my breast suddenly sore. “You haven’t been a girl for even a month and you’re already trying to steal someone else’s boyfriend...” Her voice trailed off as she realized she had said something she had not meant to say.

“So how do you know that I haven’t been a girl long?” I asked, stepping forward as she unconsciously took a step back. “How would you know unless you used to be male, too?”

“I...I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she stammered, but her anger had been pushed back by the sudden challenge.

“Yes you do,” I pressed. “Carrie Raymond said no one came to her after she had been transformed, but that doesn’t mean she was the first, does it? How many other girls has that little bastard made, Linda?” I made it a point to emphasize her feminine name.

“I...I don’t know,” she nervously replied. “At least two others before me, but I don’t like to talk about it.”

“No, you don’t talk about it,” I agreed. “You just try to snag every serious jock in the school. Let me guess. You used to be an athlete–a male athlete–yourself.”

Reluctantly, she nodded. “Okay, okay, I’ll admit it, but I’m not one of your little support group, so don’t ask me to tell you what happened.”

“Maybe if you’d been part of the ‘little support group’ as you call it, Julia Cornwall wouldn’t have killed herself.”

“Jack Cornwall was an asshole!” she spat back. “I don’t know who wished him changed into a girl, but there were plenty of people who had reason to wish worse than that for him. He deserved what he got.”

“Maybe you did, too,” I shot back.

“I was the best athlete this school ever saw! Better than you were by far. I lettered in three sports my first year while you only managed one.”

“And then somebody got envious,” I guessed–correctly from the look in her eyes. “What did you do, Linda? Did you take their slot on the team? Did you brag about it? Sure you did. I can see it on your face. So now that you can’t be a star athlete, you’re looking for someone with enough talent to go as far as you would have gone.”

“Nobody would be able to go that far, but yes,” she admitted. “Yes, I want to score with some big jock who can make it to the NFL or the NBA. If I can’t make the big bucks, I’ll get them through somebody like Matt. You got that?”

I took another step toward her. I had no clear advantage over her, but we were about the same size and could probably both fight more effectively than any natural girl. But Linda had been female too long. I could see that I had her frightened. She backed up again, bumping into the restroom door.

“Listen to me, Linda,” I seethed, “Matt isn’t mine and he certainly isn’t yours. If I want to keep seeing him, I’ll keep seeing him, and there’s nothing you can do about it. That’s Matt’s decision as much as it is mine–and it certainly isn’t your decision. We’re both in the same fix: neither of us wanted this to happen, but here we are–girls. If you can’t manage to drag Matt off to your bed, try it with someone else. There must be someone on the team you haven’t vamped yet.”

It was too much for her. She swung around with a choking sob and bolted through the door, leaving me surprised and alone.

In spite of the fact that Linda had started the incident, I felt sorry for her and wondered if I could have handled things better. I should have told her I had no real romantic interest in Matt. After all, I was just dating him to keep all the other guys at bay, wasn’t I?

Wasn’t I?

Suddenly, I wasn’t so sure. I thought back on the heart-stopping kiss Matt had given me, and how I was a little disappointed when Matt didn’t repeat it as he dropped me off after Ryan’s party. In my mind, I was still Jason, but my mind had been altered physically as well as the rest of my body. It was a girl’s mind, filled with a girl’s preferences and a girl’s emotions. No matter how hard I tried to tell myself that the changes had only been physical, I knew that wasn’t true. Carrie and Marla had warned me it would happen, and Linda had come at me as any other girl would have–jealous and emotional for ‘stealing’ her boyfriend.

So as for my feelings about Matt... Part of me was coming to realize that I wanted Matt–just like any heterosexual woman would want a man. My body tingled in several sensitive places at the thought of what I wanted from Matt.

But no matter how much I might want it, the thing–Trickster or whatever it was–wanted me to want Matt. It wanted me to have sex with him. What would happen if I did? Trickster was a sexual creature, Brandon had warned us. Having sex with Matt while the thing was still in mental contact with me might increase its power many times over. That had to be it. Why else would it be trying to goad me into sex with someone?

I can’t say that this thought didn’t affect our relationship. I continued to date Matt as the weeks went on, and our relationship remained relatively platonic. Oh sure, we kissed, hugged and held hands, but both of us stopped short of doing anything too hot and sweaty. That seemed to be by mutual consent. I had no desire to give Trickster what it wanted, and Matt was too much of a gentleman to push our relationship any faster than I was willing to take it. Perhaps Matt had moved in on me too fast in the contrived reality in which we had dated before, so maybe he was being more cautious this time, letting me set the pace.

Matt was certainly a sweetheart, though. In addition to treating me like a princess, he surprised me with a beautiful gold necklace for my birthday the first week in November. I hadn’t been a girl long enough to know and appreciate fine jewelry (Marla was still helping me with that), but I could tell that the necklace wasn’t cheap. Matt had a little part time job at his father’s company, but I knew much of what he earned went to make payments on his car, and I was certain that he worked a lot of hours to earn enough to pay for that necklace.

Of course, since Jeff and I shared a birthday, I had shown my family what Matt had gotten me when Jeff and I went out to dinner at a nice restaurant in Scottsdale to celebrate our eighteenth birthdays.

“That’s cool,” Jeff said, feeling the gold chain at my neck. He said it like he really meant it. Jeff and I had reconciled to a great degree over the weeks since my transformation. Jeff still felt very, very guilty, but he was dealing with it. It was worst for him whenever the imp used his image to cajole me in my dreams. He still had to be there, a passenger in his own image, while it insulted and harassed me, trying to push me into a sexual relationship with Matt (or anyone else, for that matter).

“Thanks,” I replied with a grin, straightening the necklace around my neck so that it lined up with the rather daring neckline of my proverbial little black dress. I had come to realize that as we turned eighteen, Jeff was now legally a man instead of a boy, and as for me... well, I was now a woman instead of a girl. Strangely, it no longer seemed so horrifying to me as it once had.

Would I have changed back if I had been given the unlikely chance to do so? I was no longer very sure. Even the imp’s visits no longer affected me as badly as they once had. It seemed almost to be going through the motions with me now. I was no longer embarrassed about being a girl, and I supposed it was only a matter of time until it got tired of us and moved on. Sometimes, I thought the only thing holding it in Jeff was its fascination with our genetic relationship as twins.

“Have sex with your Matt and I’ll move on,” it tried to bargain with me one particularly rough night. I had just gotten back from a date with Matt. We had been at a party dancing, and when Matt held me closely on a slow dance, I thought I was going to lose my mind...

“You liked his hand on your ass while you danced, didn’t you?”

“What?” I interjected, facing the image of my brother with as menacing look as I could. It’s hard to look menacing in a dream when you’re wearing nothing more than a skimpy little shortie nightgown, but I did my best. “How did you know Matt had his hand on my ass?”

The expression on my brother’s projected face was blank. I had come over the weeks of torment to realize this was an indication that the imp had been posed a question it was unwilling or unable to answer. In this case, I was certain it was unwilling to respond.

“Well?” I pressed.

Nothing.

“You can see through my eyes, can’t you? I thought you were just limited to Jeff’s observations and my emotions.”

I received no response, but I was sure it had used our genetic similarities to strengthen its contact, extending it into me. Just how far had it extended itself into me?

I realized once again when I awoke that this meant the major thing holding it in Jeff and me was its fascination with our unique aspect of being identical twins but formed from the same egg. What jollies it got from that, I could only guess. Were it not for that, I strongly suspected it would have moved on by now.

In one important way, though, the thought of it moving on actually bothered me. Sure, Carrie, Marla and I had come to terms with being female, but what about girls like Linda Darren–girls who were pretty screwed up as a result of their transformations? Or worse yet, what about girls like Julia Cornwall? How many former males just could stand the idea of living out their lives in the bodies of women? How many had killed themselves? How many more would kill themselves when the little creep moved on? The longer it stayed in Jeff and me, the safer some other poor slob would be.

“You look like something’s bothering you,” Jeff whispered to me while our parents were distracted by talking with a couple who were old friends and had spotted all of us sitting there.

I told him what I had been thinking, and he nodded gravely. “I know what you mean. And I know what I’ve put you through is far worse than what I’ve gone through, but I wouldn’t be surprised to find out more than one person like me has committed suicide. I... I even thought about it.”

I gasped, placing my hand on his in a very sisterly gesture that was becoming all too natural for me lately. “You don’t mean it!”

He managed a thin smile. “I just thought about it. I never planned to do it. I’m not the suicidal type. We Burnetts are too strong–especially the Burnett women.”

I gave him a smile of my own. “Thanks, bro.”

“You’re welcome, sis.”

My brother had given me a lot to think about. Every time our little imp moved from one person to another, two lives were potentially damaged. It must have chosen its victims very carefully, using a criteria we poor humans simply couldn’t understand. If I had to make a guess, though, I would say it was drawn very strongly to jealousy and anger–things it could amplify, forcing its victim into a poorly thought-out wish. Once the anger was replaced with remorse, it would feed happily, along with the other victim’s embarrassment. That matched what Carrie, Marla and I thought and what Brandon had confirmed.

My brother’s remorse was resolving itself. True, he still regretted what he had done, but seeing me adapting to my newfound womanhood and resting easier now that we had reconciled our major differences, I knew the Trickster must be getting bored with both Jeff and me.

As for me, the more I became comfortable with being a girl, the harder it tried through the image of Jeff to entice me into a sexual relationship. Over the ensuing weeks, it learned more about Matt through my eyes as well as Jeff’s and its campaign to force me into a sexual relationship with my boyfriend (yes, I now considered Matt to be truly my boyfriend), the more desperate its cajoling became.

All of this was bound to come to a head the night of the Condor Ball, although I didn’t know it until events were set in motion that evening. The ball was a formal affair designed to honor the football team and was limited to players, staff, cheerleaders, and anyone else who had worked to make the football program work. To be invited as a date of one of the luminaries was considered to be a great coup. I remembered my junior year when we had won the conference. The ball had been a blast. Now, though, without Jason Burnett at quarterback, we had finished the year in the middle of the pack (and fortunate to do even that well), so the mood would not be nearly as joyful. I wondered idly how much embarrassment my Trickster would have been able to feed on if it could have harvested the feelings of all of my former teammates. Hopefully, the little son of a bitch would have choked on all of it.

Of course Matt asked me to the ball, and I naturally accepted. Marla was going with Kevin: they were getting pretty serious about each other as well. As well? Okay, I had to admit I was a girl–one-hundred percent American teenage girl. I liked being with Matt. Let’s face it: unless I found another Trickster who made it a habit of changing girls into boys–a highly improbable event–I was stuck as a girl for the rest of my life. ‘That being the case, I might as well learn to enjoy it,’ I reasoned. And for some reason only my new female hormones could account for, I enjoyed being with Matt.

In fact, Matt and I were becoming somewhat inseparable. And why not? I might be a girl now, but I still had a few male preferences left over from my Jason days–preferences such as a taste for action movies instead of traditional chick flicks and high impact sports like football and hockey. Since Matt was a regular sort of guy, he liked that, too. We spent more than a few leisure hours snuggling together watching the Sun Devils on Saturday, the Cardinals on Sunday, and Coyote hockey games during the week on the big screen at Matt’s house.

The snuggling part was getting to be almost as much fun as the games, and it seemed as if every time we got together, our hands unconsciously explored someplace new on each other. We were getting dangerously close to the point where snuggling was going to become foreplay.

Now as I’ve already admitted, as a guy, I was not exactly a virgin, but I hadn’t been particularly promiscuous either. As a girl, I was, of course, still a virgin, and I had no more desire to be promiscuous than I had as a guy. When I had dated Marla as a guy, I had decided to let her determine when or if we would have sex. I didn’t want to be too pushy and chance losing her. Matt seemed to be of the same mind. The problem was, now I was the one who had a decision to make.

Did I want to have sex with Matt? Probably like any naturally born girl, I was both anxious and nervous to experience sex with a man. My body kept telling me that Matt was the one and I should offer myself to him. It would have been safe enough for me. I knew Matt hadn’t slept around, so there was little or no chance of catching something from him. And Mom had me on the pill–to regulate my periods according to her and my doctor, but I suspected this was also a way to ensure that there were no unexpected pregnancies.

On the other hand, I had to consider what the consequences of having sex would have on my tormentor. I suspected it was getting ready to move on. As I’ve already mentioned, it seemed bored with Jeff’s waning remorse, leaving me as its main target. Even with me, it seemed to be merely going through the motions. Only my indecision regarding sex with Matt seemed to give it anything to work with. Apparently my embarrassment over the idea of spreading my legs for a guy was still enough for the little son of a bitch to feed on, but for how much longer?

And, of course, there was the fundamental question that I had had still not answered to my own satisfaction: did I really want to have sex with Matt–or any other guy for that matter? Yes, I had largely reconciled myself to my new sex. Like Carrie and Marla, I had even come to enjoy certain aspects of my new femininity. And I had certainly come to think of Matt fondly–perhaps even romantically. But was I really ready to offer my body to him? I still wasn’t certain.

All of that brings me to the night of the Condor Ball. There I was, dolled up in a manner I could never have imagined just a few months ago. Marla and I had shopped for gowns together, and somehow, I let her talk me into a strapless model that plunged down in back. Only my longish blonde hair, styled to look ‘natural’ hid any of my back nearly down to the line of the dress. The dress itself was ankle length, and I was grateful for that since it hid my stumbling about in unusually feminine strapped heels, dyed sky blue to match my dress. Mom lent me some of her jewelry, so I looked pretty upscale, especially on Matt’s arm.

Matt looked... well, even if I had still been a guy, I would have been impressed with the way Matt looked. I just wouldn’t have been ready to take his arm as I did as a girl. He cleaned up well, looking extremely handsome in his tux. From personal experience, I knew most rented tuxes hung a little oddly since they weren’t painstakingly tailored. Matt must have been a perfect fit for his size, though, because he looked as if he had been born to wear that tux.

Linda Darren stared at us as we entered the elegant ballroom at the Camelback Inn in Scottsdale. Her face was nearly as red as her dress as she gripped Stan Black’s ill-fitting tux sleeve. Stan was a second string tackle with very little chance of a major athletic scholarship, let alone a shot at the pros. Apparently Linda had already run the string of good prospects and had to settle for anyone who would take her to the Condor Ball. Of course, as a cheerleader, she could have attended without a date, but that would have been too much for Linda to stomach. I wondered evilly if she would put out for Stan the way she had some of my other former teammates.

I suppose I can be forgiven for overlooking Linda’s growing hatred. I avoided her at every opportunity. We seldom spoke–even at cheerleader practice. Even then, it had become obvious to everyone that Linda and I weren’t exactly the best of friends. The situation was even made worse by the fact that most of the girls we both knew well felt that I had taken Matt away from her fairly and considered Linda to be a grade A bitch for the way she was pissing and moaning about it.

We all stood around for a while before dinner, trying to act sophisticated–a difficult trick when our glasses were filled with non-alcoholic punch instead of wine and cocktails. Unfortunately, the group Matt and I found ourselves in included Stan and Linda. I remained quiet, not wanting to create an incident, but Linda just glared at me, looking for all the world like some sort of angry cat getting ready to pounce.

Matt got pulled away by a couple of the guys–including Stan–and suddenly, Linda and I were standing there all alone. Oh-oh. Linda took the opportunity to talk to me, and it was obvious she had been waiting for this moment all day. The anger was still in her eyes, but she did her best to look smug as she spoke in a low voice, “So you think you’ve won him, don’t you?”

Yeah, I had won him–fair and square. I wanted to brag about it, but instead, I calmly responded, “I don’t know what you mean.” To punctuate my statement, I smiled demurely and took a sip of my punch.

“I wonder what Matt would think of you if you were fat and ugly,” she mused.

A layer of ice formed inside my chest. This conversation was starting to sound a little like the conversation I had had with Jeff the evening before I was transformed into Jennifer.

“That’s right, Jennifer dear,” Linda smiled. “I can feel it trying to get in–only this isn’t like it felt after I changed into Linda. This is starting to feel like something more satisfying.”

“Linda,” I began desperately, “haven’t you seen enough of what that thing can do to us? It lives on remorse as well as our embarrassment...”

“Remorse?” she laughed. “Do you think I’d feel any remorse if I changed you into a fat little toad of a girl? I wouldn’t feel a thing.”

I braced as I waited for her to make her wish–a wish that would change my life forever, and not to the good. Was it in her now, or was it still in Jeff and, by proxy, me? I tried to feel its presence, deep down inside me. To my ironic relief, it was still there.

Poor Linda. She relished her revenge so much that she let the moment pass without uttering the fatal wish. Matt and Stan had returned, and Stan–being the insensitive guy that he could be–yanked Linda’s arm and dragged her away, saying, “Come on, Linda. Ryan doesn’t believe that story about...” His voice trailed off as he pulled her away. Tottering on her heels, she looked back at me, mouthing the word “later.”

I was in deep, deep shit. I had been concerned that the Trickster would choose to move on, but I had never considered that its next host might be one of its former victims, or that it might have the same victim twice in a row–or that the victim might be me.

As I understood the nature of the creature, it changed men into the women they would have been, doing nothing to their genetic structure except making the necessary sexual changes–notably switching the Y chromosome to an additional X. Could it really change the female version of me into a different female? I thought it very possible that it could. It would mean a few more genetic changes, but nothing terribly drastic: a tweak here to make it so my metabolism caused me to tend toward excessive fat, or a tweak there to make my nose a little bigger or my breasts smaller or my face prone to acne.

I was wrong: I wasn’t in deep shit–I was about to become shit. I could feel the little bastard inside me, joyfully anticipating the transformation that would make my life a living hell. I wondered what it would do to feed its lust for remorse from Linda. ‘Maybe nothing,’ I realized. ‘Perhaps it was willing to forgo the remorse just to gorge itself on my pain.’

But why? I wondered. Why would it dwell on me when it had so many potential victims and unsuspecting hosts to play with?

The question bothered me right through the dinner. Matt must have thought I was unhappy with him since his attempts to draw me out of my thoughts seemed doomed to fail. I couldn’t help it, though. Jeff was right: we Burnetts were strong, and there was no way I was going to meekly go home and go to bed, knowing my tormentor lay in wait to make unspeakable changes to a body I had just gotten used to.

I thought back on what Brandon had said about Tricksters. I tried to remember his exact words. He said something about using sex in its tricks. Well, I was living proof of that. But what else had he said?

Then I remembered. The exact words played back in my head:

‘That brings up another aspect of Trickster stories. If you catch it in a lie and cross it up, the results can be catastrophic for it. As powerful as a Trickster is, legends about them are rife with Trickster being caught in its own web of deceit.’

Catching it in a lie could be catastrophic for it... Did that mean it would be destroyed? I tried to search inside myself to see if its presence was disturbed by this line of reasoning. Nothing. That didn’t mean anything, though. It might be able to see through my eyes, but that didn’t mean it could read my conscious thoughts.

Legends spoke of Trickster being caught in its own web of deceit...

When it came to me, I was almost angry with myself for missing it all these weeks. Perhaps I could be forgiven for not seeing it earlier. After all, my sex had been changed and I had enough to worry about adapting to being a girl. Couple that with the interrupted sleep I had endured thanks to my little tormentor and it was a wonder I could reason it out at all.

My thoughts were interrupted when Matt put his hand on mine. “Are you ready to go?” he asked. The party was breaking up, and some of the guests had already departed for the after-parties that had been planned almost as long as the ball. Rather than party, some couples were prepared to steal off to a private room somewhere to enjoy each other for as long as they could.

Most of the parties were small affairs–a few couples here and there, using an older friend’s apartment or someone’s home where the parents were gone for the evening. We had been invited to such a party at Ryan’s. His parents were off again on one of their frequent weekend trips to Las Vegas, and Ryan and his girlfriend Kim had planned an intimate little party for their friends followed most likely by a weekend of unbridled sex.

“What do you want to do now?” Matt asked hesitantly. I could tell there was a hopeful tone in his voice. I knew what he wanted to do, and the party at Ryan’s would be a perfect place to do it. That was why I had decided earlier in the evening that I’d ask Matt to take me directly home after the ball.

In spite of my resolution, I had put a small bag in his trunk. It contained a casual change of clothes just in case we decided to do something after the ball. After all, it wouldn’t do to wear an elaborate prom dress while sitting on the floor eating popcorn and watching old movies at some after-party–or at least that’s what most of our parents assumed we would be doing. Actually, we could do just that at Ryan’s, but odds were good his room and his older brother’s unused room would be used for more intimate purposes.

My mind was made up. I smiled. “Let’s go to Ryan’s for a while.”

Matt perked up at that. “Are you sure?” He stopped there. He had almost reminded me that I had mentioned something earlier about going right home.

“Yeah,” I replied. “I’m sure.”

‘I really wasn’t sure, though. What if I had guessed wrong?’ That thought preyed on me as we drove up the freeway toward Caliente. I had come to the conclusion that Trickster’s goading me into having sex had been just a ruse. It had worked with its other victims, it seemed. Marla had been reluctant to have sex, and so had Carrie. So had I, for that matter, but the imp’s time spent with me seemed considerably longer than it had been with the other victims.

Perhaps that was due to its fascination with Jeff and I being twins. Our genetic closeness probably had some sort of affect on it. Since it feasted on our emotions, perhaps the emotions of its victims were sweeter when we were twins. I had no way of knowing that for certain, but it made some sort of perverted sense.

Now I had had more time to reflect on the creature’s potential duplicity. I was depending heavily upon Brandon’s warning that Tricksters were inveterate liars. Of course, there was a possibility that it had not been lying when it prodded me to have sex. If so, I might be playing right into its hands–or whatever it had instead of hands. But if I was right, I might awaken the next day still encased in this female body I had come to accept, and not some flawed individual whose afflictions were a product of Linda’s sick wish.

The girls used Ryan’s parents’ room to change. Their bed was draped with formal dresses of every conceivable color. Ashley McAllister was just finishing up when I entered, looking at herself in the mirror in her hot little khaki skirt and green top. We smiled at each other as she left to join her boyfriend. I couldn’t help noticing as she walked away that I’d soon be wearing a nearly identical outfit only with a red top rather than a green. I found myself hoping I looked as good as Ashley did. My future could depend upon it.

Speaking of my future, as I stood there in my bra and panties gently laying my dress on the bed with the other dresses, the biggest threat to my future walked in. “Well don’t you look nice,” Linda taunted me. “Enjoy it, honey. You’re going to look a lot different when you wake up in the morning. It’s in me now. I can feel it. You know what I’ve wished for, and I can hardly wait for tomorrow.”

I must have looked surprised, for she added innocently, “Oh, didn’t you know? I don’t have to utter the wish in front of you like your stupid brother did. Everything had already been set in motion. Tomorrow when you wake up, you won’t even be Jeff’s twin. You’ll be his younger–and very homely–sister.”

“You must have been a real son of a bitch when you were male,” I returned, slipping on my own khaki skirt. “Of course now you’re just a bitch.”

She smiled venomously. “I’ll let you have your fun tonight,” she said. “And I’ll have my fun tomorrow and for the rest of my life.”

I was angry enough I almost wanted to tell her what I had planned, but I knew that would be a mistake. It was going to be hard enough to go through with my plan, and I didn’t need any complications from Linda. I dressed quickly and got away from her as she continued to change out of her own dress.

If Matt’s expression was any indication of what was to come, I might be able to save myself after all. “You look great,” he sighed, putting his arm around me. I just smiled and leaned into him. He felt warm and strong.

Of course I had moments of doubt. I had reconciled myself to a life of womanhood, but what I was about to do seemed far beyond mere reconciliation. I was about to surrender myself to a man in the hopes that it would short circuit my tormentor before it could do further damage to me. As much as I had become attracted to Matt, I was still coming to grips with who–and what–I had become. Perhaps that attraction would have led to this moment eventually, but it was my fear of Linda’s wrath that had spurred me on.

I only hoped as I snuggled closer to Matt that the little bastard would not suspect what I was up to. After all, I had snuggled with Matt before. Hopefully the creature wouldn’t notice that my hand was now nearing Matt’s crotch. I felt it resting there, a rigid warmth between his legs. He felt my hand and looked at me quizzically. In return, I just smiled.

‘It did realize I was up to something,’ I discovered, as I felt something stirring inside my mind. I could almost sense it trying to say to me, ‘What do you think you’re doing?’ It was alarmed. I looked over to another part of the semi-darkened family room where my brother and his date cuddled together on a couch. Jeff looked to be in some discomfort. In another part of the room, Linda showed similar symptoms. So far, it looked as if I was correct. The little bastard was somehow interconnected to all three of us now.

As I gently rubbed Matt’s growing erection, I thought perhaps this connection with the creature wasn’t normal. By all rights, it should have moved on–away from Jeff and me and into Linda. Then, with Linda’s wish, it would reconnect with me and change me once again. But maybe it couldn’t get away from me. Could it be that the genetic similarities between Jeff and me had somehow caused it to become stuck in us? Was that why it had sent a psychic tendril to Linda–using some sort of residual connection as a stick to help it climb out of some sort of spiritual morass it had trapped itself in? Could it be that it needed Linda to wish something that would alter me genetically just enough that it could disentangle from the mental links it had forged with Jeff and me? I didn’t know for sure. All I knew was that something inside me–an alien something–was very uncomfortable with what I was doing with Matt. That was all I needed to know.

“Maybe we should go someplace more private,” I urged, whispering enticingly in his ear.

“Do...do you mean it?” Matt asked, scarcely believing what he had heard. Poor Matt. I was pretty sure he was still a virgin. Not that I was terribly experienced. Even as a guy, I had only done it that one time.

A sudden wave of uncertainty hit me. I knew the creature was somehow forcing it on me. It wanted me to be frightened. It wanted me to be unsure. It wanted me to be embarrassed. It fed off all those things to one extent or another. Yes, I was uncertain. The thought of spreading my legs for Matt was just a little bit terrifying, but girls did it every day and seemed for the most part to enjoy it. Besides, I reminded myself, it was the only solution I could think of. I smiled at Matt, trying to project a certainty I didn’t really feel. “Of course I’m sure,” I lied.

It was common knowledge that Ryan’s room, his brother’s room, and a guest bedroom were there to be used for sex if any of his guests got lucky. It wasn’t an orgy, though, and it was possible that if it hadn’t been for Matt and me, the only ones to use any of the rooms that night would probably be Ryan and Kim after the rest of us had gone home. I led Matt by the hand into the guest room and closed the door.

Something was urging me to stop, and it was growing more panicky by the minute. It even managed to make me hesitate a time or two. I didn’t think it could stop me, but I didn’t want to take the chance. Without ceremony, I began to undress Matt. For a likely virgin, he got things figured out pretty fast, surprising me with how swiftly he removed my bra. Either he had done this before or he was a natural.

We fell onto the bed, naked. It felt strange, ticklish, to feel his chest hair pressing against the smoothness of my breasts and the swelling nipples. When I had had chest hair, I hadn’t noticed it at all. Now, even though it tickled a little, it felt oddly pleasant.

We kissed deeply. I could feel his erection growing even larger against my thigh, and I could feel a warm sensation inside my vagina...

‘Don’t... do... this...’

The voice was clearly in my head now. It sounded like Jeff, but I knew it was my Trickster.

‘Haven’t you wanted me to do this all along?’ I thought back to him as Matt moved off me and placed his hand on my dampening slit.

‘I...can...help...you,’ it wheedled, obviously frightened now. ‘I can make sure Linda never bothers you again.’

‘I think I can do that without your help,’ I shot back grimly. It was hard to communicate with it while Matt moved his hand there... and there.

‘Please...’ it begged plaintively.

“Please...” I breathed desperately to Matt as he removed his hand and...

Perhaps if I hadn’t been distracted by the imp, I would have experienced more anxiety about what was about to happen, but between trying to push him out of my mind and the feelings Matt’s hand between my legs had generated, I could only think of one thing: ‘I needed to be... to be... filled...’

Matt entered me without a word. He was slow, careful–even cautious–and when he broke my hymen, there was but an instant of pain followed by a strange feeling of fulfilment. I raised my legs around his back, drawing him in deeper and deeper.

“Yes...” I breathed at last.

‘NO!’ came the scream from my mind. It screamed and screamed and screamed...

I have since read that not all women orgasm easily. I’m happy to report that I did. I was fortunate to come before Matt did, for when he erupted, he was spent in moments. ‘How unfortunate for him,’ I thought languorously, for my own orgasm seemed to be producing aftershocks of pleasure men could not even imagine.

We lay there together, Matt still in me. Our lovemaking had been unhurried and almost reverent. Neither of us had spoken a word: none were necessary. I could have lain there with Matt forever, and as he pulled out of me and cuddled me in his arms, I thought we might do just that.

Then the door opened.

Light spilled into the room as I instinctively pulled a sheet up over my body. In the hall light, I could see it was Ryan.

Surprisingly, he wasn’t trying to stare at my body. “Get dressed!” he barked. “Paramedics are on their way.”

“Paramedics?” Matt mumbled.

“Yeah,” Ryan confirmed. “Linda Darren just screamed and passed out. She was with Stan down in my brother’s room. Stan said she screamed and passed out.” The doorbell rang. Ryan turned toward the sound. “Shit! They’re here. Get dressed!”

By the time we were dressed and went downstairs, the paramedics had made their way up the stairs to Ryan’s brother’s room. We could see them working on her as we slipped downstairs.

I had been worried about Jeff. I was sure whatever had happened to Linda was caused by the Trickster in her, and since part of it was probably still in Jeff, was he lying somewhere in Ryan’s house, undiscovered due to the turmoil with Linda? For that matter, why hadn’t I been affected? Maybe it was because it wasn’t as deeply in my mind as it was in Jeff’s or Linda’s. Or maybe it was because I felt so wonderful making love to Matt that whatever pain it could cause was wasted on me.

To my relief, Jeff was okay. He was sitting on a couch away from all the turmoil rubbing his forehead. He looked up at me as I neared him. I felt a moment of embarrassment that he would notice I was a little dishevelled. It wouldn’t take him long to figure out what Matt and I had been up to. Of course, Ryan would probably blab about it the first chance he got. Oh well. The hell with what anybody thought.

I put my hand on his shoulder. “Are you all right?”

“It’s gone, Jen,” he sighed. “It’s really gone.”

“What happened?”

He closed his eyes, as if trying to remember exactly what had happened. “It was as if it was trying to get out of my mind but got stuck on something. It seemed... agitated. Something was bothering it.” He stopped and looked at me. “It was you, wasn’t it?”

I nodded. “How do you know that?”

He shrugged. “Just a feeling. What did you do?”

I looked around to see where Matt was. He was busy helping the paramedics move Linda down the stairs on a stretcher, so I could talk freely for a few moments. “I just did something it didn’t want me to do.”

Jeff looked me in the eyes. Then he nodded. “Okay. I think I get the idea.”

Believe it or not, I smiled. When I had been male, Jeff and I had always enjoyed a special bond only twins know. It wasn’t as if we could read each other’s minds, but we could communicate a concept with very few words. I was actually pleased to see that we had regained that ability.

“Good work,” he smiled, too.

“Thanks.”

Then the smile faded. “Do you think it will be back?”

“I don’t know,” I admitted. “But I don’t think so.”

The next day, Marla drove us over to Carrie’s. Brandon was there, too. It seemed that Marla realized something big had happened, too, and had alerted Carrie who, in turn, had called Brandon.

It wasn’t easy to sit there with a teacher, her friend, and my best friend and tell everything that had transpired first between Linda and me and then with Matt. Needless to say, I didn’t give out many details of my tryst with Matt, but everybody got the general idea.

“Well,” Carrie said, leaning back from her kitchen table, “I’m glad Nancy isn’t here to see me talking to one of our students about her sexual escapades. I’m not even sure if I approve.”

I could have pointed out that at eighteen, I was legally an adult and that it was my business, but I kept still. She was right, of course. Given the health issue and the fact that I was now physically capable of getting pregnant meant potentially large risks in spite of precautions. I was becoming aware that sex, which as a guy I had thought of as a casual experience, was now something which had to be done responsibly.

Marla stuck up for me, though. “But if she hadn’t... well, you know, with my brother, something horrible would have happened to her. Linda was really pissed.”

“How is Linda, by the way?” Carrie asked.

“Jeff checked with her parents this morning,” I told her. “She was conscious by the time she got to the hospital. Apparently they can’t find anything wrong with her, but I guess her memories of the past few days are pretty fuzzy.”

“Do you think it’s really gone?” Carrie asked.

“I would imagine so,” Brandon replied. “It was caught in one of its own lies and got hoisted by its own petard, just like the legends tell us.”

“Then it’s dead,” Marla pronounced.

Brandon shook his head. “No, not really. As far as the legends tell, a Trickster can’t die. But I would imagine it will spend a few centuries back on its own plane licking its wounds. I would imagine the pleasure you sent it was like making a human breathe sulfuric acid. With any luck at all, it won’t be back for centuries–and maybe it will tell its friends and give them something to think about, too.”

We said our goodbyes to Carrie and Brandon, vowing to stay in touch with our new friends. Marla drove me back to her house, where Matt would be waiting.

Matt.

Our relationship had certainly changed in the last twenty-four hours, and I felt very comfortable with it. Would it lead to something more lasting? Marriage? Motherhood? It was hard to say. Life was full of changes. In the past few weeks, I had gone from male to female, and from reluctance to acceptance of my new status. Now, I was moving beyond acceptance, finding it difficult to imagine why I had ever been embarrassed about being a girl.

‘So where did that leave Matt and me?’ I wondered, as we pulled up in front of Marla’s house.

Only the future could tell.

The End