The front doors of the psychiatric institute were flung open as Natalie furiously stomped out of them.

As if not being real wasn’t bad enough, now she had to deal with a bunch of people who couldn’t accept the simple facts about their so-called “lives”. How could they be so squeamish about what really happened to them? And worst of all, they had therapists there with them, supporting it. Spouting some nonsense about “merging timelines” and how “technically everything they remember really did happen”. It was all a bunch of crap to make them feel better, and Natalie was having none of it.

She stormed onto the sidewalk and passed building after building. She didn’t really know where she wanted to go, but it was somewhere far away. Somewhere she wouldn’t have to deal with people.

How could those “women” in that room still see themselves as women? They were comforting themselves with false delusions, like spineless cowards. Well guess what? Life is fucking hard sometimes and you have to deal with it. No matter how much they wanted to be real, regular women, the truth was that they weren’t. They were some dude’s jack-off fantasy. Their entire purpose for existing was because some pathetic psychopath was mad he couldn’t get a girlfriend and decided to carve one out of his friend. Everything they had ever done in life and all of who they are as a person was fake, only existing because said guy found it attractive and they weren’t their own person and yeah that wasn’t easy to accept but some shit you just have to deal with no matter how hard-

Tears left Natalie’s eyes and she fell to the ground, in the back of what looked like some pizza place.

“Oh god.” She whimpered.

Her face quickly became wet with tears and she lost control of her breaths.

She wished she had pulled the trigger when she had the chance.

“I just want to be normal.” She managed to get out between sobs.

Natalie laid there on the ground for what seemed like hours, ignoring anyone who may have caught sight of her.

For the second time in her whole adult life, she cried herself to sleep.

***

Despite living in an apartment, Nathan and Astian were basically in the middle of nowhere. It was a random assortment of houses and shops for about ten miles before you got to the closest city. And right before the city were the suburbs, one of the strongest pieces of evidence that hell really did exist on Earth.

Driving alone for the first time in close to two weeks actually felt pretty good. Living by himself for so long had made Nathan almost forget what living with another person was like. Really, he just needed some time out of the apartment, and by himself.

What had sparked this drive were a few of Astian’s comments toward him earlier in the day. Unfortunately, they still weren’t done having vocal disagreements with each other.

***

It had started as a pretty typical morning, which was great because that meant no nonsense when Astian woke him up, thank god. Sitting on the couch in the living room, Nathan passed the time by staring at his phone.

“Man you really gotta change your clothes.” Astian said.

Nathan perked his head up.

“Look at yourself. Your shirt’s full of toothpaste stains, there’s a hole in the armpit, your pants have a giant hole in the middle. I can see your underwear.” Astian pointed out. “You look like a slob.”

Nathan looked down. His shirt did look pretty messy, but he was also in this apartment nearly 24/7. Was it really such a big deal when no one was there to see him?

“If you want to get your life back in order, you have to fix your appearance. Take some time to look like someone who cares at least a little about how they look, you know?”

After saying that, Astian left the apartment, leaving Nathan alone to ponder his suggestions.

***

It was noon now, and Nathan had decided that Astian was right. He really needed to change things up. It was embarrassing to be a 24 year old man who still couldn’t brush his teeth without making a mess. At least he had enough money left on his debit card to buy some new clothes.

On the bright side, now that Nathan had forgiven Astian for his weirdness earlier in the week, they were getting along a lot better.

For the most part. Things had gotten worse before they got better.

Last night had been very awkward for both of them.

***

Nathan wasn’t paying much attention to the movie that Astian had insisted they watch together. Instead, his mind was mostly left to drift, wandering to whatever part of the screen his eyes felt compelled to stare at.

He was also pretty tired. Who knew the stress of unemployment could get so bad?

At some point, when the movie was almost over, he tilted his head to the side and proceeded to lean it there. Eventually his head hit Astian’s shoulder and immediately he felt better. He closed his eyes to relish in the feeling.

…Wait… what was he doing?

With a sudden burst of energy, he quickly shot his head up as a shocked and disturbed expression spread across his face.

Astian turned to him curiously.

“Umm…” Nathan struggled to form words. “Sorry, I… too close.”

“Oh.” Astian said nonchalantly. “It’s cool.”

He turned back to the screen, as if nothing happened at all.

Nathan was beyond thankful Astian was so calm about this. A ton of guys out there would’ve surely turned that into some huge confrontation. Still… what was wrong with him? Why did he do that? And why did he ENJOY it?

It had only been a day before that he complained to Astian about his bizarre, almost flirtatious actions toward him, but… did he really have any right to complain about them if he was doing stuff like this?

Watching the credits roll, Nathan figured the best thing to do would be to just forget about it and not let it happen again.

***

Forgetting about it was clearly easier said than done, apparently. He just couldn’t get over what he did, and in turn was making what was probably a very small thing into a massive problem.

Maybe he just needed more time.

Finally, a clothing store came into view. Being the middle of a weekday, not many people were out shopping, so Nathan was able to park his car in one of the many open spots and go inside without many troubles.

***

It was a good thing Nathan remembered his sizes. Buying a few new T-shirts and pairs of underwear was pretty easy, and luckily he had enough money for all of it.

Back in his room, he emptied the new clothes on his bed. As he sorted through them, something caught his eye and confused him. He picked up the foreign object and held it out in front of him.

Why were there a pair of panties here? Pink panties, even. How did they get here? He hadn’t bought these, he was sure of it.

Concerned, he dropped the feminine garments and immediately went over to his computer and looked at his purchase history. And to his surprise, there was indeed a record of him buying this product.

What the fuck?

He knew for a fact that he was the only one around when he had checked out these clothes. There wasn’t any woman, or anyone at all for that matter, who was in front of or behind him. There was no way any clothes could’ve been mixed up. So how the hell did they get in there?

Nathan really thought back to when he went to the store, trying to come up with any explanation of how the panties could’ve gotten in his bags. And as he did, he realized the woman at the checkout counter did give him some weird looks as he was paying for these clothes. At the time he hadn’t understood why, he had made sure he didn’t look too much like a slob before he went out, but for whatever reason she seemed to find something about him really strange.

Shit.

He really did buy those panties, didn’t he?

Thinking about it was so bizarre. He didn’t know how, but without thinking, he had gone to the women’s clothing section, picked them out, and then paid for them. Somehow he had done it without realizing it.

Was he having some kind of mental break? What the fuck was wrong with him?

He looked back to the panties on his floor. Picking them back up and examining them, he couldn’t help but wonder… what would it feel like to wear them?

He instantly threw them at a wall. No, he wasn’t about to wear panties. He wasn’t going to just accept whatever compelled his mind to go on autopilot to buy women’s underwear. He needed to hang on to whatever shreds of his dignity he had left.

He put his remaining clothes away, leaving the panties on the floor of his closet.

***

Nathan stared at himself in the bathroom mirror, inspecting every inch of his body.

It had been nearly two weeks since he first moved into this apartment, and ever since then, things had been changing. Things about him, specifically. And it wasn’t until now that he fully realized it.

His body had somehow changed. The changes he had taken notice of before were still there. His facial hair hadn’t come back, and his body hair was lighter and thinner. But it was the changes he hadn’t noticed before, the ones that happened without him realizing it, that really stood out.

He looked like he was losing weight. While Nathan hadn’t really been fat, once he was shirtless a soft, slightly protruding belly could be seen. That was gone now, he was thinner, as if he worked out any more than not at all. His arms and legs were thinner too, if that were somehow possible. And when he looked at his hands and feet, he could see they had gotten smaller. Not by a lot, but he was sure he wasn’t imagining it.

He met his worried expression in the mirror. Something was happening here. Something out of his control. What about his mental changes? Thinking he was changing mentally at all was a scary thought, but he couldn’t deny the fact that he had bought panties for himself without thinking about it.

If these changes continued, and he had no reason to believe they wouldn’t, he’d need to call a doctor. Actually, he should just call one right now. He was likely coming down with something, and putting this off for any longer could be very damaging.

He made the call and scheduled the appointment for tomorrow. He went to his bedroom and tried to forget about his health to get some sleep.

***

A soft breeze hit Nathan’s face as he rolled over in his sleep. Had he forgotten to shut his window? It’d be the first time, he always left it shut. Opening his eyes, he found himself staring at a brick wall, laying on the ground.

What?

He immediately sat up in confusion, only to look down to see a pair of breasts.

“What the fuck.” He muttered, becoming startled even further by his female voice.

Why was he a woman? What was happening?

Wait…

He… Something had happened. He had to fight to remember what…

It was… it was something really important.

It was…

Wait, it was Astian!

Astian had, holy shit!

He remembered now, he remembered it all, Astian had turned him into a woman and forced him to be his girlfriend. There was a whole trial over it. He had become “Natalie” and was given a new set of memories to match that.

Astian had lost the trial and was sent to jail. He now lived alone in his apartment. He could remember everything. He even remembered he had a job now and was currently supposed to be in some stupid mental health program.

Nathan stood up, intent on walking back to the program to tell them he was done. He wasn’t going to put up with this shit anymore. After having his life stolen from him, the last thing she wanted was to listen to some cowards who couldn’t admit the truth.

Natalie began walking down the sidewalk to the psychiatric institute and…

Huh?

She stopped instantly, reaching up to grab her head.

The fuck was that?

When she first woke up, she had remembered all of Nathan’s life before the change, along with all her current memories of the last week. Now they were gone, replaced completely with the memories of her prior life. She couldn’t recall a single detail of her life as Nathan.

Was that some kind of glitch? Was this going to be the start of her psychotic break?

All those questions were halted when she heard someone call out her name. She turned to her side to see someone running toward her.

“Hey.” They said once they reached her. “I was told to look for you.”