Here's yet another immigrant from TG Storytime, this one is still ongoing, though. It'll come here in blocks of three chapters every couple weeks (people who aren't an American Idiot like me would call this a "fortnight"). It's a slow change, almost painfully so. At the moment, the whole story is 30,000 words, but that may change depending on how much more I write. The length is still surprising me because I expected it to be 10,000 words at maximum.

Either way, let's begin!

~o~O~o~

1.

What was I doing there? Was I really that stupid? If Steve hadn’t asked me to be there, I wouldn’t be, so, it was his fault, right? Gah…

This was the first time in the history of history that two guys were breaking into a house to rectify a panty raid. Steve was tasked, by his sister, to break into Dean Garnet’s house and steal back all the panties that Dean and his buddies had taken, which included Stephanie’s (Stephanie being Steve’s twin sister) and my own sister’s (whose name was Melanie, by the way).

How did I let Steve talk me into helping him do this? Stephanie only told him to do this, no mention of me, and Melanie hadn’t cared whether she got her panties back or not, she’d actually thought it was kind of funny that Dean and his boys had decided to do a panty raid on their last week of school. I was a totally neutral country in all of this, so why was I involved?

Worse yet, why was I the one standing on top of Steve’s shoulders, doing my best to climb in a second story window?

“Hold still,” I said to him, trying to be quiet enough not to get caught and loud enough for him to hear at the same time. It wasn’t easy.

“Stop makin’ me sway, then! Just get in the damn house!”

I would have kicked him in the face if that wouldn’t have made me fall on my ass and probably wake up Dean’s parents, or something. As it stood, I did manage to hit him in the forehead with the tip of my left shoe as I made my way into Dean’s room.

2.

Dean was surprisingly well-read for a jock. The guy had more books than I did, and I was a damn bookworm. I nearly tripped on a half-dozen stacks of books on my way from the window to Dean’s dresser. I don’t know why I thought the panties would be in Dean’s dresser, but that was my first idea.

Come to think of it, why had Dean kept the panties? Don’t people who do panty raids dump them the first chance they got, so as not to get caught? Ah, what the hell do I know? I’ve never done a panty raid.

“Jesus!” I whispered, stumbling over another stack of books. How the hell did he maneuver through his room with all these books? I have three bookshelves, all of them full, no books on the floor.

I managed to make my way to the dresser without alerting Dean’s parents and opened the top drawers. Nothing. Middle drawers, nothing. Bottom drawers, nothing. All his own clothes, no panties. Crap. I’d have to look somewhere else. I tried as carefully as possible not to stumble over anymore books and got to his closet. I opened it and nearly had a heart attack as a plastic skeleton fell out and tried to grab me.

“Adam?” Steve’s voice called up, loud enough for me to hear through the open window, but not loud enough to wake anybody. “You okay?”

I poked my head out the window. “Yeah. Skeleton in his closet, that’s all.”

“A real one?”

“No, dumbass, it’s fake.”

“Well, hurry up.”

“Get your own ass up here and help, and maybe I’ll actually find these damn panties.”

“How am I gonna get up there, I go up the stairs? You want me to go inside and go up the stairs, Adam?”

I groaned. “Shut up, asshole, just - “

I was cut off by a flashlight coming on and shining on Steve. I followed the beam of the flashlight and saw that the woman that lived next door to Dean was standing on her lawn, her dog on a leash, not even trying to bark.

“Oh, shit…” I breathed.

The woman said, “Come down here, young man. That’s not your house.”

3.

I climbed out the window, hung over the side, and then let go. Landing hurt, but I was sturdy enough not to break anything. It wasn’t the first time I slipped out a second story window.

The woman motioned for us to follow her, and like we were under some sort of trance, we followed her. My heart was practically leaping out of my chest in fear, because I didn’t know what the hell this woman was going to do. We entered her house through the back door and she pointed at two chairs on one side of the kitchen table, while she sat on the other side. It felt like some sort of interrogation, almost. The dog just sat beside the woman.

“Now, what were you boys doing inside the Garnet house? They’re not home right now.” Great. I didn’t even have to be quiet, now I feel like a retard.

I answered, “We were looking for something that didn’t belong to Dean.”

“Does it belong to you?”

“Our sisters.”

“And what was that?”

“Panties.”

She looked like she was about to laugh. Granted, if I were hearing about two guys breaking into the house of the school’s basketball star looking for panties, I might laugh. Then again, I’m in this situation.

“And why would young Dean have girls’ panties in his room?”

“Because he and a bunch of his friends did a panty raid at school the other day and stole them out of the locker room.”

“And does the school know about this?”

“Yeah.”

“And do the parents know about this?”

“Well, mine do and Steve’s do.”

“And why are you two taking up the responsibility of retrieving these panties? Shouldn’t your parents be solving this problem?”

I sighed. “Steve’s sister asked us to do this.”

“I see. And because your sisters were among those robbed, you believed you had the right to break into someone’s house?”

I planted my hands on the table. “I’m not sayin’ it’s right, but, c’mon, you’re not seriously defending a panty raid, are you?”

She shook her head. “No, but two wrongs don’t make a right. You two need to be punished for what you’ve done, and young Dean needs to be punished for what he’s done.”

I leaned back in the chair and said, “Okay, so call the cops on us, already.”

She shook her head again. “No, no, no… The police needn’t be involved in this. I have ways of settling this matter myself.”

Steve finally asked, “You do?”

The woman nodded now. “Yes. You’re Steve, correct?”

He nodded.

“And your sister is Stephanie?”

He nodded again.

She turned to me. “And you?”

I answered, “Adam.”

“And your sister?”

“Melanie.”

“Adam… It’s a nice name.” She walked over to the shelf above the refrigerator and pulled a small book out. She set it down on the table and took out a pen. “How do you like the name Amanda?”

Where the hell was this going? “It’s a nice name for a girl, why?”

She wrote something in that book and then slammed it shut again before I could see what it was. I traded glances with Steve, then focused on her again.

She looked up from the book and smiled. “In seven days, Adam, you will be Amanda.”

4.

“What the hell are you talking about?!” I practically screamed. This woman was nuts, pure and simple.

She nodded her head. “It’s true. Seven days from now, you’ll be an Amanda, one hundred percent female. This is your punishment.”

“What?!” This was starting to piss me off. I considered calling the cops, but they’d never believe this. Hell, I barely believed it. “Punishment for getting dragged along and forced to break into somebody’s house?”

She shook her head. “You weren’t forced. You could have easily said no.”

“I didn’t even know why I was here before I got here!” I pointed at Steve. “This asshole made me come here!”

“You were the one who entered the house. Steven here stayed outside, on the yard. He was simply trespassing, you were breaking and entering.”

It was time for me to shake my head. “No, I don’t believe you. You can’t turn me into a girl, you’re not… like… a witch or anything.”

She nodded. “That’s right, I’m not a witch.” She stood, and as if somebody turned on a wind machine, a breeze kicked up, despite there being no windows open. A strange glow seeped out of her, and in place of the old woman Steve and I had been looking at, there was now a stunningly beautiful young woman, no older than twenty. “I’m a sorceress.”

The sheer absurdity of that should have made me wake up, but I wasn’t dreaming, I wasn’t asleep… This was happening. I was sitting in a house, next to my best friend, and we were sitting across the table from a sorceress. And on the heels of that realization, I had another.

I was gonna be a girl in seven days.

Oh shit…

5.

No. No. No. No. No. No. “I don’t…” I started.

She finished for me. “Believe me? No, I imagine your human brain is still struggling to comprehend me. It’s not uncommon, after all.” She waved her hand and the table was suddenly a bowl of fruit on the floor. I shot up from my chair and nearly broke something as I tripped over it on my way to the door. “Not so fast, Amanda,” she said. When my hand reached the doorknob, I pulled back in pain.

The doorknob was on fire.

“Now do you understand?”

I turned to face her again. “Why?!”

She sat back down in her own chair. “I feel it’s a fitting punishment. You chose to break into a house to retrieve panties, now you’ll have a reason to get your own.”

Steve asked, “I don’t get punished, do I?”

She nodded. “Of course you do, but your punishment will be different.”

I walked over to her and grabbed her by the collar of her dress. “And what about Dean? What punishment does he get?”

She closed her eyes a moment, and then I was suddenly sitting back down, the table between us, and she was the old woman again. What the hell?!

“Young Dean will suffer his own punishment, don’t worry.” She waved her hand again. “All the girls whose panties were stolen will now find them in their dresser drawers again. You two may go home now, and accept the thanks from your sisters.”

I was about to stand up again, but with another wave of the witch’s hand, Steve and I were standing on the street outside school, a good mile and a half away from Dean’s house.

6.

I fell back, against the fence on the edge of school property, and took a deep breath. Steve sat beside me. “So... “ he said, and I already wanted to punch him. “You wanna go out on a date when you’re done turning into a girl?”

That made me punch him.

“Shut up!” I shouted. “This is happening because of you! I wouldn’t be turning into a girl if it weren’t for you!”

He covered his face to avoid another punch. “What? I didn’t know we were gonna get caught!”

“I didn’t even want to do this! Melanie didn’t care! If it weren’t for you and your stupid ass sister, I’d still be a guy next week!”

“I’m sorry, man!”

I shook my head. I didn’t want to hear it. “Fuck you,” I said, “I’m goin’ home.”

I didn’t even give him one last glance before I walked away.

~o~O~o~

1.

I shut the front door behind me and was instantly greeted by Melanie’s face. I couldn’t quite make out the specific look she had, but I’m sure it would be one I’d eventually wear on my own, a week from now.

“How did you get them back in my dresser without me noticing?”

I shook my head. “I’m tired, sis, lemme go to sleep.”

“And I thought you weren’t going to get caught up in another one of Steve’s stupid schemes?”

“I said I’m tired.”

“Adam, what’s going on with you?”

I sighed, then I took a good long look at my sister. Melanie was a year and a half older than I was, which made her just about seventeen, but she’d been mistaken for older before. Not in a bad way, like drug abuse, but people just seemed to believe she held herself more like an adult and less like a teenager, which was in stark contrast to me, who nobody believed would ever really grow up because of how I acted. Her face looked like an exact teenage duplicate of our mom’s, with wide brown eyes, a small nose and full lips. The one thing she didn’t get from Mom was her hair color. Mom was a brunette, while Dad was pure red. Melanie got Dad’s red hair, while I got what seemed like a natural combination of the two that could be mistaken for either one depending on the light.

“Okay, why are you looking at me like that?” she asked.

I shook my head again. “No reason. Hope you’re glad you’ve got your panties back.” I pushed past her and made for the stairs.

2.

I locked my bedroom door, picked up my tablet and flopped down onto my bed. I tapped on the internet icon and did a search for witches. I mostly got tabloid trash and incoherent forum babel, which didn’t help things. I’ve ignored tabloids forever, and the forum crap was just that - crap. Nobody was making any sense.

The door opened and Melanie stood in the doorway. “You clearly forgot I have a key to the bedroom doors.”

I groaned this time. “I’m really not in the mood, sis.”

“And I’m not in the mood for this junk. Dad put me in charge while he and Mom are second honeymooning, remember?”

I can’t for the life of me figure out why she felt the need to remind me of this every time I left the house, but I said, “So what?”

“You’re supposed to tell me when it is you’re leaving the house, remember?”

I set my tablet on my pillow and sat up. “I swear to God, if you say remember one more time, I’m gonna jump out the window. Why the hell are you pressing me, Melanie?”

“Because you’re acting weird, and for you, that’s saying something.”

“It’s not important.”

“Yeah, it kinda is. What’s going on?”

“You won’t believe me.”

“Try me.”

“Fine. The woman that lives next door to Dean is a witch and she told me I’m gonna be a girl in a week.”

For about two seconds, it looked like Melanie was taking me seriously, then she doubled over and laughed about as loudly as a full theater at a Paul Blart movie. I wanted to push her out of my room, put boards on the door and enjoy what little time I had left as a guy doing guy stuff, like masturbating or watching basketball on TV.

Finally, she tired her best to stop laughing and asked, “So… really, what happened?”

I stood up and walked over to the window. “I’m not joking.”

“Yeah, you kinda have to be.”

“I’m not. Call Steve up, he’ll tell you.”

“No, he’ll tell me what you two cooked up.”

“How do you explain your underwear getting in your dresser drawer all by itself? She did it, the witch.” Why was I still calling her a witch? She clearly told me she was a sorceress.

“Or you climbed through my window and slipped it in while I was downstairs. Witches don’t exist, Adam, and there’s no way boys just spontaneously turn into girls.”

I sighed again. “I don’t actually know if it will be spontaneous. For all I know, I’ll start turning into a girl tomorrow.”

“You’re not turning into a girl!”

I was getting angry again. “Look, Melanie, she turned a frikkin’ table into a bowl of fruits! She made a doorknob feel like it was covered in fire! She was goddamn magic, I’m telling you!” I sat back down again and tried to calm myself. “I didn’t... “ My heart was pounding. “I didn’t want to believe it either, but the proof was right there. It seemed stupid to keep denying what I was seeing happen in front of me.”

She sat down beside me. “You do realize you sound like a maniac, right? Nobody can just turn somebody into a girl.”

I let out a laugh. “Yeah, I would have said the same thing if I hadn’t watched her do all the shit she did.”

Melanie sighed. “Okay, entertaining the idea that this is possible and that you’ll be my little sister in a week’s time, what are you going to do about it? You can’t tell the cops, they’ll think you’re crazy. And how do we even know we’ll remember this in a week? How do we know we’ll retain memories of you being a boy after you’re a girl?”

“I don’t know!” Why did I suddenly want to cry? Why did crying suddenly seem like a viable option for me right now? I needed Melanie out of my room, and fast. “Look, Mel… Just... Get out of my room, okay? It’s been a long day and I wanna go to sleep.”

She stood up and nodded. “Yeah, okay, but tomorrow, we talk about this, understand?”

Tomorrow. Tomorrow was Saturday, no school for three whole days (I can’t for the life of me remember why we had Monday off) and then we went back for final exams. Great. By next Friday, I may be shopping for a dress for the end-of-semester dance.

“Fine,” I said, “just get out.”

After she left, I moved my tablet from my pillow to somewhere else. Yeah, I wasn’t gonna find anything related to that stupid sorceress. Dammit. I turned my light off, laid down and felt myself drifting off to sleep almost instantly.

3.

“You know how this will end.”

What?

“You know how this will end. It’s only a matter of time before you accept it.”

Who are you and what are you talking about?

“You know what I’m talking about.”

What’s going on?!

“You know what I’m talking about. It’s only a matter of time before you accept it.”

A light came on. I held my hand up to shield my eyes from it, then took a step closer to whatever was causing it. Why was I moving closer to it? What the hell was going on?

“You know what you have to do.”

Who’s talking? Why did I hear this person? God, my arms were kind of cold. I rubbed at my arms to get warmer.

Wait a minute… I don’t own any sleeveless tops.

“You know what to do. It’s only a matter of time before you accept it.”

Great, now my legs were cold. I stopped for a second to tug at my skirt, but it was too short to actually provide me any warmth.

Wait… Skirt?

“You know how this will end.”

The bright light died down, and I finally saw its source: a mirror. I took a step closer to it and suddenly that chill that overtook my legs and arms decided to run up my spine. What the hell?

The girl in the mirror was wearing a light pink top with spaghetti straps and a simple white skirt. On her feet were a pair sandals with a two inch heel. Her face looked an awful lot like Melanie’s, just younger. In fact, Like Melanie but younger described this girl to a T, except for one simple feature. Her hair wasn’t Melanie’s pure red, but a mixture between red and brown that looked too much like...

“You know how this will end. It’s only a matter of time before you accept it.”

No. No, no, no, no, no, no, that wasn’t me! That girl in the mirror wasn’t me!

4.

I sat up and felt sweat breaking out on my neck. What the hell had I just dreamed? No, seriously, what? I couldn’t remember any of it, I just knew that it terrified me.

I rubbed at my forehead. I had a throbbing headache. Was it because of last night? Wait, was last night even real? Some sorceress casting a spell on me didn’t seem real, it seemed like a dream. Was that my dream?

I shook my head and got up from the bed. I walked downstairs to get my breakfast. There was a note on refrigerator. I removed the magnet and read it.

Had to go to the grocery store to grab some food, bro. We’ll have our talk later.

Talk? Oh, yeah… Last night. Crap… I guess all that stuff was real. So, what was my dream, then? Dammit… if that wasn’t my dream…

My headache kicked up again. Why did I have a headache? I’ve never woken up with a headache. Jesus, this is getting weird. I needed to understand this.

Time for an internet search!

I plopped my ass down in the desk chair and something felt weird. My ass felt… different. I stood up and then sat back down again, and everything felt normal again. Weird. What caused that? Was I actually changing physically over time? Great. If that was the case, then I might already be at least thirty-three percent girl by the time I went back to school on Tuesday.

Or it could just be that I’m freaked because I could be turning into a girl. Or I’m just nuts. Great, now that bitch has me considering possibilities to something crazy. Shit.

After two hours of meaningless Google searches, I came up with absolutely nothing. There didn’t seem to be anything, save for the occasional person who would have sounded like a nut a day before. They still seemed nuts to me now, even though I had a story that would make me sound equally nuts.

Would any of these take me seriously if I decided to take them seriously?

~o~O~o~

1.

I sat on the couch, changing channels. There wasn’t much of anything on, but that wasn’t uncommon for a Saturday. After a little bit, I just put it on something and left it there, then laid down. I was tired, for some reason, something I couldn’t figure out.

My eyelids felt heavy, causing me to close them. I felt myself curl into the fetal position, and then the warm embrace of sleep took hold of me.

2.

Why was I standing in front of a mirror? What was I doing there? I looked at my reflection and, for some reason, wondered why I was dressed the same in this dream as I was in real life. I turned away from the mirror and looked at the room I was in.

Although, room was stretching it.

Where I was had no walls, no ceiling, no floor. Everything melded with everything else. The place was dizzying, to say the least. In fact, the mirror was the only landmark. I took a step away from it and, to my surprise, I was actually a step away from it. I continued my trip away from the mirror, always making sure to check back for it every now and again, but I stopped about sixty steps away from it.

The mirror was right behind me again.

What the hell? How did that happen? I looked around the room again and nothing looked any different, except that I was now right beside the mirror again. What was going on?

The door opened. Wait, door? Where was a door? I looked around and saw a glowing rectangle with a human silhouette standing in it. “Good, you’re home,” the silhouette said. The voice sounded familiar, but I couldn’t quite peg it. “What happened to you?”

“What are you talking about?” I asked, but the voice wasn’t mine. I looked in the mirror again and saw my reflection, but I didn’t see any differences. I was still wearing the same boxer shorts and solid black tee shirt I’d been wearing before. What was the silhouette talking about?

That was when I saw it.

The reflection in the mirror was mine, yes, but it wasn’t me. It was a girl, wearing my clothes. She looked ridiculously cute, like a younger version of Melanie. Why did I look like that? What was happening to me?!

“Adam?” the silhouette asked. I looked at him - I realized it was a him after a few seconds - and discovered that it was Steve. He had a look of concern on his face, and for some reason, I started to tear up. I fell to my knees and he reached down and scooped me up and held me. “It’s okay, man, it’s okay…”

I was worried now. I felt comfortable in his arms, comfortable and warm. Part of me hated this feeling, but another part of me loved it. He patted the back of my head, his fingers getting a little tangled in my hair.

“Amanda?” he asked now, and…

3.

I woke up to Steve standing over by the TV, hooking up my PS3. He had a relieved look on his face. “Damn, man, I’ve been here two hours, and you’ve been asleep the whole time.”

I rubbed at my eyes and sat up. “What are you doing here? I coulda sworn I yelled at you last night.”

“Well, you did, but, c’mon, you can’t still be angry at me, can you?”

“I got cursed because of you.”

He blew a raspberry. “Ah, bullshit, that lady was just crazy. We were both tired and scared last night, we probably just dreamed everything we think she did.”

I stood up. “Oh yeah? Did you dream about her turning a table into a bowl of fruit?”

“Yeah.”

“Her turning from an old lady into a hot babe sixty years younger?”

“Yeah.”

“Her telling me I’d be turned into a girl named Amanda?”

“Yeeeeaaaah?”

“How did we have the same dreams, dumbass?!”

“Magic?”

“So she has magic dream powers, but she can’t turn me into a girl, that right?”

He shrugged. “If she could turn you into a girl, why didn’t she do it there, last night? Why are you still Adam now? She was bullshitting us, pure and simple.”

I ran my hand through my hair. It seemed a little longer than it had been before. I looked at my reflection in the glass of the coffee table, but nothing looked different. Great, just like with my ass before, I’m starting to think things. That sorceress probably was bullshitting us.

But that wouldn’t explain that dream I just had.

4.

“What are you doin’ here, anyway?” I asked.

He shrugged. “It’s Saturday, and I’m bored. Where’s your sister? I wanna try it again.”

I sighed. Steve had been trying to get Melanie to say Yes to him for awhile now. I guess being two years younger than her didn’t mean anything to him, because he still wanted to date her and thought she’d want to date him. It didn’t take a genius to realize that they weren’t compatible.

It didn’t help that Steve always looked like a damn slob. Maybe if he cleaned himself up a bit, combed his hair a little, wore better clothes… Maybe then a girl would want to date him. As he was now, his only options for love were cybersex or prostitutes. I’d told him that before, even pretended to be a girl on a chatroom once just to fuck around with him.

“She’s not here,” I answered. “She said she’d be back later.”

“Dammit! This time she’s gonna say yes, man, I can feel it.”

Hell, I wouldn’t even date him. If I were a girl, that is. He was just too hopeless. I was just as hopeless, but I didn’t even try to date girls. I’d gone out on one date with Stephanie, and she’d told me I was more like a girlfriend than a boyfriend, because all I wanted to do was talk. I didn’t want to do couple stuff. I kinda thought “couple stuff” included talking.

“I’ll believe that when I see it. Whadda you wanna play?” I asked, pointing to the PS3.

He shrugged. “I dunno. Skyrim?”

I shook my head. “You know that shit bores me now.”

“Okay, Resident Evil?”

“Fine, but we do co-op.”

“Of course.”

“Which one?”

“I vote for Six.”

I sighed. He always wanted to play Resident Evil 6. It was his favorite game in the series, for some reason. I preferred Revelations 2, but he never wanted to play it. “Fine. Go get it.”

I sat there, waiting for him to go upstairs and get the game, and something just seemed wrong to me. I couldn’t figure out what it was, but… something. I rubbed at my forehead, but that didn’t seem to help. I didn’t have a headache, anymore. Did it have something to do with Steve? I may get pissed off at the guy, but he was still my best friend.

Four minutes later, one PlayStation Network sign-in, and a quick campaign selection later, and Steve and I were slogging through the sewers of the fictional city of Tall Oaks as Leon Kennedy and Helena Harper. Steve was Leon, and that stuck me with Helena.

Except that wasn’t really true. I was player one, so I got to pick my character, and I picked Helena. I could have easily picked Leon, but I didn’t, even though I usually do.

“You okay, dude?” Steve asked.

“Yeah,” I said, but I wasn’t even sure if I was telling the truth.

5.

Steve and I were still playing Resident Evil 6 when Melanie came home, about a dozen grocery bags hanging off each hand. “Are you guys gonna help me, or what?” she asked. I pretty much dumped my controller on the couch and jumped up to help her. Steve struggled for a second to kill a zombie before he helped.

Ten minutes later, all the groceries were put away, and Melanie and I were seated across from one another at the kitchen table. I felt nervous, she looked nervous, Steve wasn’t doing shit.

“So…” Steve, hilariously enough, was the first one to speak. “Why isn’t anyone talking?”

Melanie cleared her throat. “Okay, Adam, it’s time to talk about that lady you guys met last night.”

“What about her? She’s a sorceress, and she said she cursed me.”

“Okay, but why?”

“I don’t know, but I don’t care. She had to be lying, otherwise I’d be a girl now, right?”

“She said it would be in a week, so that’s Friday. Let’s say you’re going to be a girl on Friday, why that specific date?”

“I dunno. Just because it’s a week later?” I sighed. “I really don’t know, sis. I just… She should have been able to do it right away, but she didn’t, so I don’t believe she can do it all.”

“Let’s say she can, though… What do we do about it?”

“If she can do it, what can we do? Who’s gonna believe that a sorceress cursed me into a girl?”

“You’ve got a birth certificate stating your gender,” Steve said, probably the smartest thing he’d said all day.

I had to voice the one concern I had: “But, what if this supposed curse changes everything, like, nobody remembers Adam and everybody remembers Amanda?”

No one said anything to that. I think Steve and Melanie were just as afraid of that possiblity as I was.

6.

I laid on my bed and stared up at the ceiling. Steve had gone home hours before, and Melanie was on the phone, ordering pizza. I didn’t really have anything to do except lay there and think about what might happen. Everything seemed so crazy.

Would I start turning into a girl? Or would I just suddenly be one on Friday? Would I start to like guys? Would I fall in love with Steve? The idea of that made me want to puke. Dammit. And what about my parents? They wouldn’t get home until Thursday. It was either, “Hi, Mom and Dad… Yeah… I know I look a little like Melanie when she was younger, but I’m really Adam,” or “Mom, Dad, don’t freak out, but I might wake up a girl tomorrow.” Neither option was, in any way, a good option.

And then there was school. Sure, this was finals week, but if I was changing over the course of the week, then people would see me. They’d all watch me turn into a girl. If I just changed on Friday, then I’d show up as a completely different person for the last day of school. None of this seemed to work out in my favor at all.

My chest was starting to itch. I reached under my shirt and scratched at the irritating sensation.