Computer Magic

Unrequited love is something we’ve all had to deal with at some point in our lives. Did you ever wish things could be different? Kelvin did. Can you say “oops!”?

By Karen J. Taylor
Copyright 2007

This story was inspired by John in Wauwatosa’s story “Happy Alternate New Years”. I thought under the circumstances the protagonist was much too forgiving. With John’s blessing I started out to write this alternative take on the situation. Other than the basic premise it doesn’t use much of anything from John’s story, and it is not necessary to read the first story to enjoy this one. John’s story can be found at: http://bigclosetr.us/topshelf/node/2576

Image from Animewallpapers.com

I was sitting at my computer trying out a new photo-editing program when it happened. Sara had given me a new editing program like Photoshop, “...only better,” she said. And it was free. So I figured I’d give it a try. I had a wallpaper I’d found on the web, Suigintou, one of the Rozen Maiden manga series. The only thing I didn’t like about it was her wings, black jagged-feather things. But none of the programs I had could remove them and still leave the picture looking right.

Sara came by about then. “Oh, she’s pretty. New girlfriend?”

“No. It’s a wallpaper I found online. I’m trying to remove the wings, make her look more normal, so to speak. But I can’t seem to get it right.”

“Hang on, I’ve got just the thing.” When she returned she handed me an unmarked CD. “Use this, it’s a lot like Photoshop, only better.”

“Thanks.”

“I’m going to run some errands. Don’t forget about the party.”

I guess I should explain. Sara Goode is my roommate; we’re both seniors in college. We’d been friends for a couple of years, and over the summer decided to get a place together as a means of saving money.

The problem was, I wanted more, and Sara didn’t. We’d had one fairly chaste kiss, then Sara had told me it wasn’t to be. “I like you, Kel, but not like that.” It was making me so uncomfortable I’d finally told her I’d be moving as soon as I could find a smaller place.

I said I wished I could be the one for her, I’d do anything to make it right, but I didn’t know how. She’d just smiled a strange little smile and said she understood.

Oh, I’m Kelvin, Kelvin Andrew Simpson. I was attending the university on a photojournalism scholarship. That and what my parents could afford (I’m the oldest of three) left me just short of living decently. I supplemented my finances with some part-time work, but being able to split rent with Sara had enabled both of us to live in a nicer place.

So, there I was, editing the picture. I removed the wings and the picture cleaned right up. It was like they’d never been there to begin with. Wow, this was a slick program. I decided to make a few more alterations before getting ready for the party. It was Halloween and Sara and I were going to a costume party one of her friends was throwing. I’d found an old double-breasted suit and fedora at the thrift shop. I printed out a card that said PRESS and stuck it in the band of the hat, and used some junk parts to make up a convincing-looking Speed Graphic camera. I looked like I’d just stepped out of the movie “Front Page”.

I used the program to round the image’s chin just a bit, added the right arm which didn’t show before, and changed her eyes to blue, which I felt fit the flaxen-haired beauty’s appearance better. Each change snapped into place and looked totally natural. This program was slick! Finished, I clicked on the drop-down menu to save the changes and then I’d set it as my wallpaper. The menu had an item that said “Implement Changes”, well that sounded like it might be the save function, so I clicked on it. I was suddenly dizzy and everything faded away.

When I woke up I was lying on the floor. It was when I brushed at something on the side of my head I realized I had long hair, long blonde hair. I quickly stood and everything was different. For one thing I now had tits! Small and shapely, but undeniably breasts! And everything looked different. I ran into Sara’s room where there was a full-length mirror and froze. Everything was different!

I hadn’t been a big guy, just your average joe, average height, average weight, brown hair I kept fairly short. I looked like most of the guys you’d see on any college campus. But now! I was short, maybe 5’4” and very slender. Blue eyes and long flaxen blonde hair down my back. I looked like . . . like the wallpaper I’d just saved! I ran back into the other room and stared at the computer monitor. Below the image a box was flashing, “Changes Implemented”. I frantically searched for an Undo command but there wasn’t one anywhere!

I was so intent on looking for a way to undo what had happened, I didn’t hear Sara come in. I didn’t realize she was there until she slipped her arms around me from behind and nuzzled my neck. Startled, I jumped out of the chair and turned to her. But before I could say anything she took me in her arms, tilted my head up and kissed me, a long sensuous kiss that blew out all my overloads.

When we separated, she kept her arms around me and smiled. “I guess you liked that.” At my stunned look she laughed. “Hey, I love the changes, you look even better than the picture. Come on, time to get ready for the party.”

“I . . . I’m, like, changed!”

“Yes you are, and you’re beautiful.” Sara tried to kiss me again and I pushed away.

“What happened? I used the program and I’m, like, different! You gave me that program! You like did this?”

“Yes, Kelli. Don’t you like it?”

“No, change me back!”

“But Kelli, you said you’d do anything for me, and I can love you this way. Come on, we still need to get ready for the party.”

“I can’t go out looking like this! And why do you keep calling me Kelli, my name is Kel . . .Ke . . . Kel . . .” But no matter how I tried, I couldn’t say Kelvin.

“Oh, you are so cute when you screw your face up like that. I called you Kelli because that’s your name. Kelvin doesn’t exist anymore, he never did.” She picked up a purse and pulled out a billfold and handed it to me.

Numbly I opened it and found a drivers license in the name of Kelli Andrea Simpson. There were pictures of Kelli (me!) standing with my parents and younger sister and brother in front of a house much nicer than the one I’d grown up in. I flipped back to the license and saw the address was in the country club area of my hometown. Looking through the rest of the contents I saw several hundred dollars in cash as well as a fistful of credit cards.

I looked back at Sara, who was standing there with a pleased smile on her face.

“Change me back!”

The smile slipped from her face. “But don’t you see, Kelli, this is perfect. I couldn’t love you before, you were a man. But now you’re a woman.”

“You’re, like, a lesbian?” ~~Why was I using “like” so much?~~

“Yes, dear. As nice as you were, I couldn’t ever love a man. But now, you’re my perfect mate. I know you love me, and I love you.”

“I hate you!” I stamped my foot the way a girl would, grabbed the purse and stormed out the door. In the driveway was a car I recognized as Sara’s, and next to it a little blue Mazda Miata. Digging in the purse I found keys that fit it.

I drove aimlessly for awhile, my mind in turmoil. I finally decided to get something to drink and drove to the bar I usually went to.

Grabbing a booth in the back, I plopped down and a moment later the waitress, Marsha, came over and placed a glass of orange juice in front of me.

“Here you go Kelli, the usual, I assume.”

Well, Kelvin’s “usual” was a draw beer, but this would do. I took a sip and choked, it was a vodka screwdriver, and a strong one.

“Oh, sorry, “ Marsha giggled. “I guess Paul put too much vodka in it. Hang on.” She scooped up the drink and went back to the bar.

She returned with my drink a few minutes later, set it down, then sat in the other side of the booth. “You okay? ‘Cause you look upset. Everything alright with you and Sara?”

“Don’t mention her name!”

“Uh-oh, big lover’s spat, huh? I wondered when it would finally happen, you two are always so lovey-dovey, it’s unnatural. You do make a good couple, your beauty and her brains.”

“Are you saying I’m, like, dumb?”

Marsha laughed. “Oh, come on honey, you’re an art appreciation major, for God’s sake! How many other girls do you know that take their checkbook home to their daddy every month so he can balance it?”

Oh, God, she was right! Just thinking about all those big numbers scared me. And I realized my checkbook had big numbers in it, unlike Kelvin’s, which usually teetered on the edge of overdrawn. I didn’t even realize at the time I’d thought of myself as Kelli, and Kelvin as another person.

She reached across the table and patted my hand. “Don’t worry about it hon, I’m sure it will be alright.”

She left me alone then with my thoughts. What had happened to me, what was happening to me? I felt my old life slipping away as Kelli’s memories took over. Scared, I downed my drink in a few gulps. When Marsha looked my way I waved the empty glass at her.

When she brought my drink she asked, “Are you sure you’re okay? You never drink more than one drink.”

“I’m, like, fine, okay? I’m just, like, so-o upset.”

“Are you fine or upset? You can tell me.”

“NO! Just, like, leave me alone, okay?”

“Okay, okay, I was just trying to help.”

I sat and played with the glass for a few minutes, and decided the only place I’d get any answers was back at the house. Throwing a couple of dollars on the table, I headed out.

Sara was waiting when I got back home. “You feel better now? We really need to hurry and get ready for the party.”

“I am so-o not going to any party! I, like, need to talk to you. Why did you do this to me? And why am I, like, so dumb?”

“It was your wish,” Sara countered. “You wished you could be the one for me.” Then she giggled, “As for being ‘dumb’, who was it always making the blonde jokes? Well, now you are.”

“I never wanted to be a girl! You should have asked me!”

“If I had, would you have agreed?”

“No!”

“Well then. Look, you wanted me to love you, and now I do. Accept it.”

“I won’t, change me back!”

“No.”

“Then I am, like, so outta here!”

I ran into my room, grabbed a suitcase (pink!) out of the closet and started packing things. I wasn’t sure what to grab, but I found if I didn’t think about it I seemed to know what was necessary.

Sara was still standing in the living room when I came back through dragging the suitcase and some extra stuff. “Where do you think you are going?”

“Dunno,” I replied. “Somewhere, anywhere, away from here.”

“You can’t!”

“Can too!”

“Where are you going to live? You can’t sleep in your car.”

“I can like get a hotel room, ya know. I seem to have the money, ya know.” I pushed past her and left.

Within a few days I was able to find a small apartment that I could move right into. My new looks enabled me to recruit a couple of strong guys to move my stuff from my old place to the new apartment, and their presence kept Sara from saying anything.

Just a few days after moving the calls started. All hours of the day and night, every time the phone would ring I’d see Sara’s name on the caller ID. I ignored them for awhile, then finally one night I snapped and picked it up.

“Leave me alone!”

“Kelli, we need to talk.”

“No!”

“It’s important.”

“For the last time, no! I hate you! I wish you were dead, I wish I was dead!”

“You don’t understand,” and I could tell she was crying.

“’Course I don’t, I’m a dumb blonde, remember?”

“Please, I need to see you,” she insisted.

“The need isn’t mu. . .mut. . .Oh Shit! I don’ wanna see you ever again!” and I hung up.

When the phone rang again a few minutes later I unplugged it. The next day I got a new unlisted phone number.

I muddled through the next couple of months mostly by letting my body run on autopilot. I found if I didn’t think too hard about things (not that I could, any attempt at serious thought gave me a headache), my new body would do whatever was necessary. Make-up, dressing, I mentally closed my eyes and let go of control.

The Christmas Holiday with my family was strange, to say the least. For one thing, this new, revised family of mine was familiar, yet strange. My family had always used love to make up for the lack of material wealth. Now that we had money I expected that had changed, but it hadn’t.

And it was obvious that I was loved as the slightly simple but lovely oldest child, to be cherished and protected; and to someday be married off to some nice young man. That was my future — the gorgeous wife and mother, a ditzy soccer mom, the butt of all the “dumb blonde” jokes.

Christmas morning the family gathered to open presents, and my mom handed me a small box with a frown on her face. Wondering at her reaction, I opened the box and found a simple gold necklace with a pentagram charm.

“What’s this? I asked, puzzled.

“You should know,” she replied with some heat. “It’s from that ‘girlfriend’ of yours.”

“Sara?” I asked and she nodded.

I flung the box as hard as possible across the room. “Get it away from me! I hate her!”

My family seemed shocked by my reaction, although I could see that it actually pleased my mother.

“What happened, honey?” my father asked me.

“I. . .she. . . .” I realized there was no way I could tell them what had happened, they would have me on a psychiatrist’s couch in no time. “We. . .we broke up. And she’s stalking me!”

“Not my baby girl! I’ll put a stop to this!” my father stormed.

By the time I returned for the spring semester, my father had gotten a restraining order against Sara, and even contacted the school to make sure I wasn’t bothered or harassed. The next six weeks passed in relative peace, and I begin to accept that my life was changed with no hope of restoration.

The end came, ironically enough, on Valentine’s Day. I got home from class to find a package and a dozen red roses leaning against my front door. A quick glance showed me Sara’s distinctive handwriting on the note, so I pulled out my cellphone and called the police.

When the officer arrived I showed him my copy of the restraining order I’d gotten. I could tell he wasn’t happy at dealing with what he perceived as a lesbian love affair gone bad, but he agreed to pay Sara a visit.

“Do you want her arrested for violating the VPO?” he asked.

“No, just make her understand she has to leave me alone. And take those with you,” I said and pointed to the roses and the package.

After the officer left I locked the door and threw the deadbolt, then sat down on the couch and cried. The whole incident brought back feelings I’d just as soon stayed buried, feelings of hatred for what Sara had done to me mixed with a feeling of longing and sorrow that surprised me.

Later that night as I sat watching TV I suddenly felt nauseous, then a pain in my stomach spread rapidly over my entire body. I was barely able to grab the phone and punch 911 when a sudden shock of pain or power surged through my body and I passed out.

When I awoke, it was in a hospital room. A nurse came in response to my summons and checked my vitals, shaking her head as she wrote down the information.

“Your parents are waiting outside, but there are a couple of detectives who need to talk to you first,” the nurse told me.

“Why?”

“You’ll have to ask them,” she replied.

The detectives came in and introduced themselves, then got right to the point.

“Miss Simpson, you know a Sara Goode, is that correct?”

“Yes, why?”

“Have you received anything from her in the last couple of days?”

“Yes, I did. When I saw who it was from I called you, the police that is.”

“Did you by any chance eat anything that was in the package, or drink anything from it?”

“No, I didn’t even open it. I gave it to the officer to take back to her. Why?”

“Well, last night Miss Goode commited suicide?”

“What! How?”

“She took some poison, it must have been fairly painful. She left a note saying she’d messed up her life and hurt you; and she couldn’t go on without you.”

“Poison? You mean, me getting sick. . .?”

“Yes, your symptoms match the normal reaction for that poison. We think it might have been a botched murder-suicide attempt by her.”

A doctor had come in sometime during this, and now he spoke up. “Not likely.”

“Why not, doctor?”

“We got back the results of her lab work, and there is no trace of any poison, or indeed any foreign substance in her body.”

“Then what happened to her?”

“Frankly, I don’t have a clue.”

Lacking any good reason to hold me, I was discharged from the hospital that afternoon. A couple of days later Sara’s obituary appeared in the paper and I made note of the funeral home and sent some flowers, which were refused.

Sara’s family let me know I wasn’t welcome at the funeral, but I went to the cemetery and watched from a distance. After the coffin was lowered into the ground and the people left, I walked over to the gravesite and sat on a nearby bench. I started crying, for the loss, for the pain, for everything that had happened. ~~“Why, God, why?”~~

“We need to talk.”

I looked up in surprise at the dark-haired woman; I had been so absorbed in my grief I hadn’t even heard her approach. The resemblance to Sara was strong.

“You don’ wanna talk to me. You wouldn’t even understand.”

“Yes, I would, Kelvin,” she replied.

“Bu. . .bu. . .” She called me KELVIN!

“Come, we’ll sit in my car.” She held her hand out to me and I took it and followed her over to a massive black limousine. Opening the door was a huge man in a tailored chauffeur’s uniform, but somehow I knew he was more than just a driver.

“That’s right, he is,” the woman answered my unspoken thought as the driver handed us into the rear compartment facing each other.

“How did you . . .?”

“Before I start, please drink this,” as she handed me a small bottle containing an amber liquid. “Don’t worry, it won’t hurt you.”

For some reason I trusted her so I drank the contents down in one gulp. The liquid had a mild, spicy taste. What was amazing was the way my head started to feel. It was like I’d been given a shot of the best pharmaceutical speed; suddenly after months of walking around in a haze my mind was clear and functioning properly again.

“Wow!”

“You could say that,” she responded. “Doing that to you was reprehensible. Sara was punished for it. She was told to make it right, but by then you wouldn’t talk to her.”

“You know?”

“Yes, I know. Sara was a witch. I’m her aunt, Tamara, and the leader of the coven she was a member of. In a way we are responsible for what happened to you.”

“Why? Why did you do this to me?”

“Sara misled us, she told us you wanted this, that you would be happier as a woman and her lesbian lover. She said it was your wish.”

“I made a wish, but nothing like this!”

“Yes, we know. Sara was under a penalty handed down by the coven once we found out what she’d done. She was required to contact you about restoration of your life.”

“Oh, I didn’t know that.”

“No,” she replied, “Right up to the end Sara was trying to have her cake and eat it too. We found her last attempt to contact you, the one you sent back via the police, was still duplicitous. She offered to assist you if you’d take her back. That’s not what she was told to do.”

“I’ve got to know, can you make me a man again?”

“Before I answer that, there’s more you need to know,” she said.

“Like what?”

“The night Sara killed herself, you were stricken as well.”

“Yea, the police thought she might have tried to poison me at the same time, a murder-suicide. But they couldn’t find any poison in my system, and the doctors have no idea what happened to me.”

“I can answer that. Part of the spell cast on you was a bonding spell, tying the two of you together. She always knew what you were feeling.”

“Yet she persisted in pursuing me! How could she if she knew my feelings?”

“She deluded herself, is all I can say. How many men and women do that anyway?”

“Good point. But what was that surge I felt?” My resentment was fading in light of what I was learning.

“That’s what I need to talk to you about. As she was dying, the bond between the two of you enabled her to send her magical abilities to you.”

“You mean I’m a witch now?”

“Yes. A latent one, but very powerful none the less. Call it her last gift to you.”

“What does that mean?”

"If you remain a woman, and choose to submit to the Coven, you can be educated in the use of your abilities. With the proper training you could easily be one of the top two or three in the Coven. In time you could become my successor. The personal rewards would be great.”

“Wait a minute! You said ‘if I remain a woman'. Does that mean this can be reversed, I can be a man again?”

“Yes. If you wish, we can reverse the spell this coming All Hallows Eve. But I want you to think about it. As a woman, you can use your abilities for many things. You actually have more power than Sara, as well as a more ethical outlook. You can be a powerful force for good if you so choose. The Goddess has blessed you with great powers and abilities.”

“And if I change back what happens?”

“We would have to strip you of any ability you have to perform magic. You had a fair share all by yourself, that’s part of what attracted Sara to you. But we can not risk you being male and having the knowledge you have now.”

“So I lose either way. My manhood or my power.”

“It need not be a loss. As a Wiccan, you would be a very formidable woman. If there had been somebody with your ability in the coven, Sara would not have gotten away with what she did.”

“I . . . .”

“Please, don’t decide now. I want you to think about it carefully. You have months before we can do anything about changing you back. Take the time to be sure you know what you really want to do.” She handed me a card, “Feel free to call me at any time if you have any questions. We’ll meet again on All Hallows Eve and you can tell us your decision then.”

I found myself in a daze, getting out of the limousine which had stopped next to my car. I watched the limo disappear down the road before getting into my car and driving slowly home.

When I got home there was a package on the table in my living room. Opening it I found I was now restored to my previous academic position as an honors student. No more Art Appreciation!

As to the rest, I had a lot of thinking to do.

* * * * * * * * * *

Well, it's October 31st - All Hallows Eve.   In a little while I have to give the coven my decision.   I've learned a lot in this last year.   If I go back to being a man, what will my life be like?   What happened to me this last year?   What have I done, what did I do as a man?  

But, if I stay a woman, what of the life that could have been had I not rejected Sara?   Why couldn’t she have been honest with me? If she hadn't tried to manipulate me, made me the "dumb blonde", could I in time  have accepted this new life?   And what about her powers, do I want those?

It's time now, I have to go.

The End

Thanks to Janet Nolan for her copyediting efforts, any mistakes left are my own.