Andy and Keith went to the mall to check out girls on a lazy Sunday, but their trip didn't quite go as planned...

Here's a story based on a caption I made years ago, and you can find that here: https://bandage131.deviantart.com/art/TG-Caption-Karma-s-a-W...

"I hate you so much," Andy Weir said to his best friend, Keith Brandes.

Andy wanted to tear Keith's face from his body, but that seemed like an impossible task. Of course, Keith's face was completely different from the jackass that had ruined his life not an hour ago. The person in front of him now was cute, flawless, topped with a mop of curly blonde hair. The grungy black shirt and red cargo shorts he'd been wearing were replaced by a loose black tank top and pink skirt. If Andy saw him for the first time, he'd immediately lose his ability to speak and try to ask him out (and probably fail).

"I've said I'm sorry like fifteen times already!" he said, in that cute, pixie-like voice. "You maybe wanna sit less like you used to? Guys'll be taking a peek if you give them half a chance."

Andy quickly closed his legs, as his friend suggested. Andy's own outfit of a purple tee shirt with Mace Windu from Star Wars on it and a pair of jeans had been switched out by a pink spaghetti strap tank top and a denim skirt. He'd never been a fan of shorts, having had an odd sensitivity to the wind on his legs, and the skirt drew in those feelings ten-fold. His own hair was a more yellow shade of blonde than Keith's, and his face was similarly well-kept without a single sign of blemishes. Unlike Keith, who was only wearing a light amount of foundation, Andy was wearing blush and lipstick.

"You can apologize until we're old and gray, I'm not gonna forgive you for the fact that I'll be a grandma when that happens!"

Keith stood up. "Look, how the hell was I supposed to know she was a real witch, okay?! How was I supposed to know?!"

Andy didn't move. Standing would just remind him of his new body, thanks to the fact that he wasn't wearing a bra. "My point is that you were a dumbass and because of a stupid decision that I warned you against, we're stuck like this!"

He crossed his arms under his breasts like he'd been doing it all his life. "Yeah, we're stuck! Me too, not just you. I'm suffering the consequences of my mistake just as much as you are!"

Andy just sat there, knowing damn well that Keith was telling the truth, he just didn't want to admit it. He didn't want to stop blaming Keith, even though he knew he'd need to eventually. Sure, it was Keith's fault, and that would never change, but Keith was the only know who knew what Andy was dealing with.

Andy sighed. "Look, I'm not forgiving you, but I'll be... Nicer, I guess."

Keith sighed, too. "Fine, that's all I need. We're both in this, Andy."

"I know, I know."

Andy felt a tear streak down his cheek. He hated being "in this".

***

Earlier...

Andy awoke to the sounds of Keith breaking into his room via the window. It wasn't an uncommon thing, both of them did it quite often. Andy remembered one time when Keith had accidentally broken into Andy's sister Kaylee's room, only because the two of them had decided to swap rooms. Kaylee wasn't too pissed off about it, as she'd just broken up with a particularly nasty boyfriend and had been trying to get Keith to ask her out for months. Andy had told him this, as well, but Keith had never seemed interested in Kaylee.

The only strange thing about Keith breaking into Andy's room was that he never did it on Sundays. Keith's family was absurdly religious, and always went to church on Sunday, so for Andy to actually see his friend on that day of the week was a rarity all on its own, let alone for Keith to break into his room at seven in the morning.

Andy sat up and rubbed sleep out of his eyes. Before Keith even had time to say anything, Andy laid back down and pretended to fall asleep again. It was Sunday, he wanted to sleep in, regardless of what Keith wanted to do. "Go away," he said, his voice muffled by the pillow he used to cover his face.

"C'mon, man, it's Sunday, we've got an entire day to check out girls at the mall."

"Why the hell aren't you in church?" Andy asked through the pillow.

"I lied and said I was sick."

"You're a horrible liar."

"Dude, C'mon!"

Andy sighed. "The mall doesn't even open until nine, what are we going to do for two hours?"

"One hour and forty-six minutes," Keith corrected.

"One hour and forty-six minutes, whatever. What?"

"Call of Duty?"

"You know I hate Call of Duty."

"Fine, something else. Aren't you still trying to finish Portal?"

Andy pulled off the pillow and sat up. His sister’s birthday was coming up, anyway, he needed to find something to buy her. "Fine, whatever, let's get on with this."

***

Two hours (one hour and forty six minutes) later, Andy still wasn't entirely awake. He'd been looking forward to sleeping in, and all Keith had done was ruin those chances. Lucky him, Monday was another day. School was still three weeks away and that meant plenty of hours of necessary rest. Maybe he'd even get in some League of Legends playtime.

The mall was quite crowded for just after nine thirty on a Sunday. The sheer number of people was almost unbearable, but Andy had been dragged to the mall on the weekend by Keith to hunt down potential girlfriends. Generally, Andy maintained an air of Oh, he's just my friend, I'm the decent guy and ended up with longer-lasting girlfriends, while Keith would always be I know all the best places to make out and would date a girl for maybe two weeks.

Andy was never certain what exactly he wanted in a girlfriend. The relationships always felt meaningful, and the company was very welcome, but something always seemed wrong. He was never sure what it was, but then he’d get another girlfriend and enjoy himself again for a short period of time. It was a weird cycle that never seemed to want to be broken at any point.

And thus, like usual, Andy was pretty much just Keith’s wingman during his usual troll for girls. It was a role he was used to, at least, even almost comfortable in. Hell, at times he even enjoyed it, though those times were rare.

Keith went up to every girl he could find. Tall ones, short ones, blondes, brunettes, redheads, bald girls, and at least one of them was a guy in drag. Andy kept up his routine, got more than a few You know this loser? glances from girls who finished talking to Keith. There were times when Andy wondered if Keith’s act was truly an act, and he was simply using the appearance of being a dipshit to score to trick girls into more involved relationships. Of course, those thoughts lasted all of ten seconds between girls.

Eventually lunch rolled around, to which Andy was eternally grateful. Three and a half hours of walking around the mall and going up to every girl they saw was more than what he thought Keith was capable of doing. It was certainly more than what Andy thought himself capable of. His feet were fucking killing him.

“I can’t believe we’ve struck out so many times,” Keith said, with a basket of fries in his mouth.

Andy laughed, “I really don’t think Wanna see the back of my dad’s van is a great icebreaker.”

Keith nodded, “Yeah, that one was a mistake, but I’ll come up with better pickups after lunch.”

Andy rolled his eyes. “Dude, better pickups aren’t your problem. You’ve gotta be… I dunno.”

Keith’s eyes suddenly widened. Andy couldn’t see what his friend was looking at, so he turned around and then his eyes widened as well. What he saw was gorgeous, exciting. She was at least a year older than they were, red haired and immaculately made-up. She dressed like summer was her favorite season, all in warm yellows and blues, a tube top and tights. She was beautiful, almost angelic.

Andy turned back to face Keith and saw his friend’s eyes almost watering and his tongue nearly hanging out of his mouth. It would look stupid if Andy didn’t know that was his Smoking Babe Alert look. If not for the fact that he had pretty much the same thoughts on his mind, he’d reach over and smack Keith on the head for even considering hitting on that girl.

“No,” Andy said, attempting to at least look like he wasn’t horny as hell.

“Dude, c’mon! She’ll turn us down in a second and we’ll at least say we tried! Grow some fucking balls!”

“Keith, we’d be the laughing stock of the whole goddamn town!”

“But think of what it would mean in the long run!”

Andy leaned back in his seat and took a drink of soda. “That we’ll be forever known as the two dipshits who struck out with the hottest girl they ever saw?”

“But at least we tried!” Keith exclaimed as he stood up. Andy wanted to kill the bastard for even considering trying this, but then he realized that even if Keith lost his chance with her, Andy may still be in luck. He had literally zero percent of a real chance, but at least he’d have given it his best.

Andy stood up and followed Keith over to where he was taking position to stalk the girl for his perfect chance. Andy had seen Keith do this a thousand times (just that day), he would watch what the girl’s doing, look up certain things on his phone, then pretend to be at least semi-knowledgeable about her interests. He’d fall flat on his ass most of the time, but he’d never seemed to lose interest in doing it. It provided Andy a bit of entertainment, but it was no less stupid.

Andy took his own stock of the situation and noticed she was looking at very basic things: clothes, jewelry, make-up. It was as if she were marking off a checklist of typical feminine things to look at. Granted, there were girls out there who had more interest in things like that than they did anything else, but he’d never seen any this stereotypical.

He almost wondered if she was… Baiting them?

Andy paid more attention to this girl. There was something different about her compared to other girls he and Keith had tried to hit on that day, something that he wanted to figure out. She made him curious, and that made him more interested in her for more than just potential romance.

Keith made his move. He ran a hand through his shaggy brown hair and walked up to her. He had a smile on his face that looked charming, but really only meant that he was trying to wow someone. Andy laughed internally at his attempts, but he knew that Keith was laughing just as hard at himself and would be laughing at Andy if he managed to make it. But Andy knew that was a remote possibility.

“Hi,” Keith said, letting that smile do most of his talking.

She glanced out of the corner of her eye at him, then returned to poking through some lipstick. Andy noticed it was a light pink shade that his sister would like.

“I noticed you the second you walked in,” Keith continued, “couldn’t - “

She cut him off, “You couldn’t take your eyes off me, all the way from the door until now.” She sounded annoyed, if not angry. Again, Andy was considering the possibility that she’d been aware they were watching her. Hell, now it seemed even more likely. She turned her head to face him. “You’re not the first, you won’t be the last, I’m not interested in guys like you.”

Andy was about to grab Keith’s arm and pull him away, but something seemed off, now. He couldn’t quite place it and he didn’t know what the hell was happening.

Keith didn’t seem to notice anything. He asked her, “What kind of guys are you interested in? I’m asking for a friend, y’know.”

“The friend you’re asking for is either yourself or the dweeb behind you acting as your wingman.”

Andy took offense to that. A nerd, yes. A dweeb, no. “Hey - “ He started to say.

“Un-uh,” she said, instantly silencing him, “I’ll get to you in a second, Wingman.” She focused back on Keith. “I assume you don’t get a lot of dates, since your pick-ups are so awful.” She left the counter with all the lipstick, but she took one tube. It was a different shade of pink than the one she’d been looking at before. “Tell me, how many girls have you won over with lines like that?”

Keith stuttered a second, then said, “Not many,” his tone so reserved he almost sounded like he wanted to cry.

“I thought so.” She uncapped the lipstick and brought it up to his lips, but stopped just short of putting it on him. “I think your mouth should stay away from disgusting things like that again. Picking up women isn’t your thing, clearly. So, what should be done with you?”

***

Andy was about to say something, but suddenly the mall around them… Vanished. He didn’t understand what he was and/or wasn’t seeing. The make-up counter with the lipstick tubes and a single pillar that they’d been standing close to was still there, but everything else was gone. This had already started to get creepy, now it was downright disturbing.

“Don’t be afraid, girls,” she said, “you’ll be alright. We just needed a quiet place for a little ‘girl talk’.” She walked over to Andy and put her hand on his shoulder. He suddenly felt constricted, as if he were… Tied up? What the hell? “You’re the smart one, I can tell. Unfortunately, you’re also not so very bright, because you let this douchebag drag you into this.”

He managed to speak, a weak and tiny voice that didn’t at all sound like the one he normally spoke with. “What are you doing?” he asked.

“Oh, I’m just going to right a wrong. As I said to your friend, picking up girls isn’t either of your strong points, otherwise he would’ve been smart enough to try a less insulting pick-up line, or at least you would have told him I was out of your leagues.”

Andy would have told her that he did try to warn Keith about that, but his lips suddenly couldn’t move.

“Oh, don’t open that pretty mouth of yours, sweetie,” she said, her voice taking on a strange undertone that made her voice sound deeper, almost guttural. She pressed the lipstick up to Andy’s lips. “Tell me your name,” she said, but he knew she was talking to Keith, somehow.

Keith answered in a light, higher pitched voice, “Keith.” The way he said it sounded strained, as if he’d had to force the word out of his mouth.

“Such a… Boring name. Actually, it could be runner up for Worst Name in the English Language. No, I think a better name would be Katie.”

Andy wasn’t sure what the hell she was getting at. Why would Keith have a girl’s name? He tried to speak up in his friend’s defense, but his mouth was still closed, incapable of opening.

She focused her eyes on Andy now. “Tell me, what’s your name?”

His lips suddenly weren’t locked in place anymore, though his voice sounded just as oddly high-pitched and strained as Keith’s did. “Andy.”

She made clicking sounds and shook her head. “No, no, no, that won’t do. You look more like an April to me.”

What the fuck?! Andy thought. He really wasn’t understanding any of this.

But his lips were sealed yet again, as if her deciding his name should be “April” was the last of that conversation. She grabbed him by the back of the head and applied the pink lipstick to his surprisingly puckered lips. Something felt odd about the lipstick, a familiar sort of feel that he’d never expected. As if he’d worn lipstick before, though he didn’t remember ever doing that in his life.

She stepped back over to Keith. “You understand what’s about to happen, Katie? What it is you’ve brought upon your friend and yourself?”

Keith opened his mouth and made noise, but probably not the noise he meant to make. His screaming was like that of a girl, almost more shrill than anything Andy’d ever heard. “What the fuck are you?!” Keith shouted.

She giggled. “I see you two have never come across a magical being yet, or at least not that you’ve known. I’m what you would call a witch, and my name is Kara Matthews, or Karma for short.”

***

Andy was more than confused. Magic? Witches? Karma?! Did this Kara girl somehow think this was justified retribution for a failed pick-up line? Christ, had she done this to others? What exactly was she doing?

Kara set the lipstick tube down on the part of the counter that inhabited their little world. She waved her hand a bit and suddenly a clothes rack appeared from nowhere, all girls’ clothes, Andy noticed. “Now, we need to find you girls some proper outfits. Something that keeps you at least semi-modest, but shows off your new assets.” She poked around a little bit, took off a few skirts or pairs of short shorts. “Hmm… Yeah, you’d both look much better in skirts.”

Andy managed the courage to ask, “Why are you doing this?” His voice had followed Keith’s, becoming light and feminine. “This can’t be because of a shitty pick-up line!”

She giggled. “Oh, you think this was because of today? You’re very wrong about that.” She snapped her fingers and three chairs appeared, one behind each of them. “Sit, girls.” They both did. “Good. Katie, April, you’re here because of what you’ve done in your past lives. Katie, you were the most repeat offender, having treated far too many girls horribly.”

Keith rolled his eyes. “Those break-ups were always mutual!” Andy thought it strange to hear that girl voice from his friend’s mouth.

“Except for Alana Krantzberg and Penny Ford and Teresa Marsh and Helena Marsh… The list goes on, Katie, and the number of girls you claimed to have slept with continued to grow, destroying a few reputations.”

Keith looked away from her. “That’s…”

“Say no more.” She reached into a purse Andy hadn’t seen. “You’re not so bad as to treat a girl like meat, but you clearly chose not to look at the consequences of your actions.” She slipped a piece of gum into her mouth. “Thus, you’ll see what it is you’ve been doing from the other side of the aisle.” She leaned back in her seat. “You’ll see what it feels like to have a boy claim he slept with you, what it does to your standing with your friends.”

Andy audibly gulped. “What did I do?” he asked.

Kara’s eyes took on a dark glow. “You did much worse, April. You remember Valerie Matthews?”

Andy searched his memory, then realized exactly who she was talking about. “Yeah, why?”

“You broke her heart.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Huh?”

Kara shifted her posture a little, crossed one leg over the other. “Valerie is my little sister, and you two dated for a couple weeks before you suddenly stopped calling her. She tried calling you and calling you, it always went to voicemail or your sister answered and said you weren’t home.” She reached into her purse again and produced something that Andy couldn’t see. After a second, he realized it was her phone. “I’d never seen her so hurt. You left a mark on her, April.”

He sat forward. “I never dated her! She sat beside me in class and I had to tutor her, but we never dated.”

“Little Vallie didn’t see it that way. She crushed on you hard.”

“She never said anything to me…” he said, his voice too light to really even call it sound.

“Whatever you saw it as is insignificant, you hurt my sister, and Katie hurt several other girls, this is punishment for the two of you.” She smirked and added, “And though you won’t remember what it’s for, you’ll feel it regardless.”

***

Andy’s mind was doing circles around what Kara had just said, to the point he was getting a migraine. He wanted to reach for his purse and grab a Tylenol, but that wasn’t right, he didn’t carry a purse. The changes to his mind weren’t taking root already, were they?

Kara stood again and played around with a clothes rack. “So, skirts for you girls? I think so. And both of you have the perfect bodies for tank tops.” She glanced back at Andy. “And I think April prefers that braless look, right?” She giggled. Andy simply sat there in horror as she kept poking through the racks.

I couldn't… No. No, her sister just sat beside me. Why wouldn’t she say anything about liking me? But his thoughts weren’t completely on that track. Why didn’t I see it? Why did I ignore her? What was wrong with me? Was I that self-absorbed?

He shook his head to try and clear the thoughts away. Her magic was affecting him, strongly, and he wanted to hold it off as long as possible.

That was unfortunately difficult. He saw that his clothes had begun to change. His jeans shrank, the pant legs fusing into a single tube-like garment. Still denim, the skirt that his pants had become was short, barely reaching mid-thigh. That drew his attention to his legs, which had slimmed down and shaped up, and his leg hair disappeared entirely. His tennis shoes began to fade, replaced by a pair of flip flops that showed off his red-painted toes. His shirt morphed from purple to pink, and then the sleeves shrank away. The tank top he was now wearing clearly made it obvious that he didn’t have a bra underneath it.

And he wished he was wearing a bra. His chest began to expand, growing into the breasts he knew every straight guy would be checking out (well, most). The new weight on his chest jiggled with every movement, almost uncomfortably so, though perhaps that was simply because he wasn’t used to it. A new part of his mind was already enjoying it.

His hair fell in front of his face, long and blonde. He reached up to pull it away from his face and tuck it behind his ear, so very naturally as if he’d had long hair most of his life. He hated long hair before then, had never wanted to let it grow past his ears. It now tickled his exposed shoulders.

He felt another strange tickling in his groin, and he knew exactly what that was. He pressed his legs together and felt nothing at all. Lil’ Andy had been taken from him and replaced with Sweet Miss April. He never even noticed when his boxers had been replaced by a pair of silky panties.

Andy had been so caught up in his own changes that Keith’s transformation into Katie pretty much passed him by. Where his friend had been sitting was this cute blonde girl in a black tank top and a pink skirt. He could see some of Keith in the girl’s features, but she was too feminine to have ever been the teenage boy she had been not five minutes before.

Kara stood there and snickered, but it didn’t take long for it to become full-blown laughter. “Oh, look at you girls! You look so pretty!”

Keith stood up and shouted, “Change us back, you bitch!”

She shook her head. “Sorry, Katie, this is exactly what you are now. Once I return us to the mortal world, you won’t be able to find anybody who remembers Andy and Keith, but April and Katie will be relatively popular girls.” She stepped over to Andy and put her hand on his bare shoulder. “And my little sister will never remember the pain Andy put her through.” Her smile made him shiver. She removed her hand and walked back to the rack. “In fact, in a little less than an hour, neither of you will remember Keith or Andy. It’ll start small, your first bike will have been pink or baby blue, then your first kiss will have been with a boy, you’ll remember your first period, and finally no single memory will have even the faintest trace of your old male identities.”

Keith sat back down. “What gives you the right to do this to people?” he asked, through tears. Andy couldn’t blame him, as he was fighting them back as well.

She smirked. “Oh, it’s not that I have the right. I have the responsibility to make people like you suffer for what you’ve done to others. I’ve done this ever since I found out I was a witch, and every time I’ve done it, the amount of pain I’ve erased has grown.” She snapped her fingers and the mall around them returned. “You never know, ladies, maybe I’ll be erasing your pain somewhere down the road.”

***

Now…

Andy wiped tears from his cheeks. He hated the fact that he was distressed by the idea that the tears were ruining his make-up, but he couldn’t stop either the tears or the feelings. He reached into his purse and grabbed his compact mirror. His cheeks still looked as cute and rose pink as they had before the tears, so she was at least a little comforted.

Katie cleared his throat. “Um… Do you… Do you remember why we’re both so emotional right now?” she asked.

Andy was looking down at his nails and wondering what color to paint them tomorrow. “Huh?” she asked.

“I was just crying, and I don’t know why.”

“You were? Was I?” He thought he was, but couldn’t remember why he would have been. Was something actually wrong?

“I don’t know.”

April stood up and slung his purse over his shoulder. “I know, let’s go do something. There are probably some cute single guys at the mall, let’s get going.”

Keith stood up and grabbed her own purse. “Yeah, I need somebody after that douchebag dumped me last week. Maybe he’ll even be there and I can get him jealous.”

Andy nodded. “Yeah. I need something to take my mind off that insensitive dick… I can’t even remember his name. Allan, or something. Huh, maybe I’m already getting over him.”

“Yeah, let’s go. Your sister’s birthday is coming up soon, anyway, isn’t it? Let’s find her something while we shop for guys to tease.”

“Oh, I saw this adorable teddy bear that Kaylee’s gonna love, it’s chocolate scented.”

“Aw, that’s so cute!”

April immediately felt better, for some reason, as if some sort of weight had been lifted from her shoulders. Whatever had been getting her down was gone, and it was almost like she had some new purpose to her day.

I’ll get over that asshole and find a new guy that’ll actually notice me when I’m trying to flirt with him. It’s that simple.

***

Across the park, Kara smirked. Exactly one hour after the change and the girls had finished their transformations. It had never happened that quickly before, they usually took a day or two. Maybe Andy and Keith already had some April and Katie in them before she got to them. Maybe in helping all the girls they’d wronged, she’d actually helped two more find themselves.

Either way, she didn’t care. Her goal of helping her sister had been accomplished, and she was ready to put this success behind her to focus on the next one. She already had a few candidates in mind, too.