Below are the rough first chapters of my upcoming novel/current WIP “Kristi’s Mom” – an epic TG Transformation Romance about a young man who is “given” the chance to live as the mother of his friend Kristi. The targeted release date is Summer 2021 and by that time the finished product may not resemble the below. I hope you enjoy and are excited about having the opportunity to read the final version when it comes out!
I.
Kristi Kouriakis was a girl who came to our high school in the summer between sophomore and junior years. Ours was a small town, so while not everybody knew everybody, it was easy to spot someone who knew nobody, and because of that she stuck out when it was obvious she would rather not be seen at all. She arrived in September, keeping to herself, and not seeming to mind one bit.
I don’t even know if she had spoken to anyone outside of class when my friend Jesse and I got paired up with her for a history project about the civil war. At first, my reaction was negative – I didn’t want to be anchored to some weird new girl at school. Jesse pointed out that we weren’t really making much of an impression on any of the girls we already knew, which was all of them since it was such a small town, and we were getting to a point where that was a serious concern. He was right, but I had to admit, I didn’t see her as “a girl” that way. She styled herself as an outcast, with her untamed frizzy brown hair, her loose-fitting band tees from group I’d never heard of like DEATH CLOUD and SIRYYN, and her occasional wearing of boy’s trousers. She seemed weird, and a little dangerous.
But since she had clearly not made any friends yet, we decided to sit with her at lunch, on the pretense that we were going to talk about homework, and see what happened. She had a hamburger and fries in front of her. A lot of the girls we knew were at a point in their lives where they only ate salads for lunch.
At first, it was just awkward, but Jesse broke the ice by asking what she thought of the town.
She got this weird look on her face, narrowing her eyes. “Are you gonna be, like, offended if I don’t like it?”
“No,” Jesse said. “I mean, I don’t like it that much either, I just live here.”
Her eyes flitted back and forth between us, sizing us up.
“Yeah, it’s okay,” she said, eating a fry from her plate. “Like you said, it’s a place to live.”
“Where did you come from?” I asked.
“The city,” she said, a wistful sigh in her voice. “My parents got divorced this summer.”
“Oh,” Jesse said awkwardly, “Sorry to hear that.”
“Yeah, it sucks,” she said like it was nothing, “But they suck. My dad’s a perv and my mom’s a witch, so…”
I had never met anyone who talked about their parents like that, and suddenly I felt really sheltered.
“We’re on Cherry Hill Crescent,” she said.
“Oh wow,” Jess said, “That’s a nice neighborhood.” It was an area populated by mini-mansions with huge lawns. Jesse and I came from a part of town that was mostly single-level houses.
“Yeah, it’s pretty good I guess, I haven’t seen the rest of town.”
“There’s nothing else to see,” I said.
“Well then,” she said, taking a sip from her drink. I thought she was going to say more about that, but she didn’t. “I’m not really rich or anything. My dad’s a tech investor, so he has money. My mom took it all in the divorce because he was screwing his assistant or something.”
“Oh, that sucks.”
“Whatever,” she said, like it was either nothing, or everything. “So we live in the nice house, but she still has to work to put food on the table. Then when she comes home at night she’s too tired to talk, usually because she’s been out on a date or whatever, so we just don’t do anything.”
“Sounds pretty good,” I said. “My parents still have make us have dinner at the dinner table every night at 6:15. I’d love to have my mom off my back.”
“Let’s trade lives,” she said bitterly. I laughed – it sounded like a good trade.
We talked about getting together to work on the project. I had four brothers so the house was always really crowded. Jesse’s family was getting their bathrooms redone so his mom didn’t want anybody over. Kristi didn’t seem to care either way, and I’ll admit, Jesse and I were both curious what her place looked like.
True to her word, when we went over, it was a big house with fancy furniture, but not that much in the way of décor so it kind of looked empty. She had a younger brother, Matthew, who was plopped down on the couch watching superhero cartoons. She yelled at him until he left, which made me feel a little bad, but the kid was being a little brat. We had a few hours to study and kick around ideas for our presentation. Kristi said that we should do it as dead soldiers who were zombified, but I said I didn’t want to put any makeup on.
At 6:00, I called my mom and told her I was going to be late. Kristi offered to order pizza. I was wowed – I didn’t know people could just order pizza on a Tuesday night like that. By the time we had eaten, we were done doing homework and found ourselves just kind of… hanging out.
Jesse and I ended up having the same conversation we always had.
“Marry, fuck kill,” I said, “Mina Travis, Tiarra Lopez, Amanda Barone.”
“Marry Tiarra Lopez for sure,” Jesse nodded. “Marry Amanda, kill Mina.”
“You crazy? I’d marry Mina,” I said, “Just for her tits.” I mimed a handful of giant hooters against my own chest.
Kristi sneered. “You guys are disgusting.”
Jesse and I shared a look. We had hardly realized we were in mixed company. We were just being ourselves.
“All right,” Kristi said after a short break, “Mr. Stevens, Mrs. Douglas, Mr. Patricelli.”
We looked at each other again. “Uh, Mr. Stevens and Mr. Patricelli are guys,” Jesse said.
“And Mrs. Douglas is like 70,” I added. “And like, 300 pounds.”
“Yeah,” Kristi laughed. “So? Answer the question. You wanna smooch up on Mr. Stevens’ mustache? I bet Mrs. Douglas is a great cook.”
I had to admit, having her mess with us was a lot funnier than if she just thought we were disgusting idiots.
At 8:45, Kristi’s mom came through the door. By then, Jesse and I had made ourselves quite at home in her den, following Kristi’s lead, with a pizza box between us and empty soda cans around. When I heard her footsteps I started to nervously gather up the garbage, but Kristi waved me off.
Then she poked her head in the door.
“Oh hi,” she said. “I didn’t know we had company.”
I gazed at her. She looked too young to be a mom, with perfect peachy skin, bright blue eyes, long blonde hair and a trim figure. She would have looked like Kristi’s older sister if they didn’t have completely opposite styles.
Kristi, whose every word to her mother sounded like she was being tortured, introduced us. “This is Kyle and Jesse from school. We were working on a history project.”
“Sounds fun,” Mrs. Kouriakis said. “I’m glad you ate.”
“Nice to meet you, Mrs. Kouriakis,” I said, completely awkwardly.
She narrowed her eyes and gave that same piercing smirk her daughter could give. “Julie, please.”
I blinked twice. “Julie,” I said nervously. An adult had never specifically told me to call her by her first name. Out of the corner of my vision I could see Kristi rolling her eyes.
“K, bye mom,” Kristi said abruptly, as if to excuse her.
“You know,” Julie said, “I could use your muscles.”
Jesse and I looked at each other. We weren’t sure what that meant. Neither of us had much muscles to speak of. Jesse was a little on the husky side, and I was lanky and slim, with long ropey arms. But I guess, we were guys and that made us strong. I sat up a little straighter.
“The previous owners left a lot of junk in the garage. I wouldn’t mind having a few young men help move it out to the curb. Give you a couple of bucks, maybe some… lemonade.”
The way she said “lemonade” kind of sounded like she meant something else. I knew I had to be wrong about that, but I couldn’t get the thought out of her head.
“God, mom,” Kristi sneered, although I couldn’t tell what was so bad about the offer.
“Um, I’ll think about it,” I said.
“Thanks, I’d really appreciate it. I’ll give you my number before you go, you can text me.” She gave me a friendly smile, then went on her way. Kristi looked incensed.
We ended up getting a B- on the history project, without the use of zombie makeup. To me, that was a success. It was the best mark I got all semester, and my parents were constantly riding my back about schoolwork, saying they were going to make a change for me if I didn’t straighten up. I didn’t know what that meant, but I didn’t see it as a real threat.
Jesse and I took Julie up on her offer the following Saturday. Julie wasn’t kidding about there being a lot in there: old living room furniture, workout equipment, a big pile of bricks. It would take us all day to clear out. Kristi sat on the steps outside the house watching us and occasionally making fun, calling us weak or lazy or incompetent in other ways. It was funny – in the past when people would say bad things about me I would take it badly, but when Kristi did it, it was like a compliment.
Jesse left early because he had a family dinner to get to. I stayed to finish the job. Kristi had a job at the movie theatre, so she left at 6 and I was alone with her mom. When I was finally done, Mrs. K – that is, Julie – brought me inside. She went to the kitchen, opened the fridge, and pulled out a bottle of beer. “Thirsty?” she asked.
I looked at the bottle, then at her, “Um…”
She took a swig of the beer, then added once she had swallowed, “Lemonade, Sprite, water… too hot for milk, I think. Of course, you can have coffee if you want.”
“Uh, Sprite is fine,” I stammered awkwardly, embarrassed that I had thought she was offering me alcohol. She took a glass from the cupboard and filled in from the ice dispenser in her fridge – a fancy appliance I had never seen. Then she a can of soda from the fridge, opened it, and poured it into the glass. I took a big refreshing sip, then suppressed a deep belch that got stuck in my throat. She could tell I was doing it, too – her mouth curled into a smirk.
There was something unique about her. She didn’t look or act like my mom, or Jesse’s mom. She was more approachable than other parents of friends I had met. She seemed youthful, and yet, definitely a grownup. We were alone together in the house, and that was definitely weird, but neither of us said so out loud.
I wondered what might happen. She kept looking at me, up and down.
She was pretty. It wasn’t like she looked like a model or anything, but maybe she used to. She kept in shape, and had a different body shape than I was used to thinking of moms as having. My mom was short and chubby with close-cropped hair. Jesse’s mom was skinny and older. I didn’t think either of them necessarily belonged to the same species as the women I saw online and in movies, but Mrs. K fit in with them easily. She was shorter than me by maybe a head and a half, but her trim slight-hourglass figure lengthened her out. She was still youthful, with no age lines around her mouth or eyes, and possessed an energy – a whole vibe – that I didn’t think parents could have.
She had been wearing her hair in a bun, and pulled it out to reveal beautiful, long, silky hair falling naturally down the front of her shoulders, in a light, vibrant blonde but with her dark roots showing on top – a style that seemed so “young” compared to moms I knew, who wore their hair in a manageable length just above their shoulders, or one of those sideswipe-bang hairdos. Being that it was a warm late summer day, she wore a tank top that showed off toned, tanned arms, just a hint of her soft abdomen and a waist that she kept trim for her age – the tank also showcased a pair of well-sized, shapely breasts that my 16-year-old eyes could not look away from, held up in what appeared to be a pushup bra.
Beneath were workout pants that conformed to her curves – hips and subtly fleshy, toned thighs. She probably did pilates or whatever the trendy workout was. When she had turned to grab me a glass for my drink – stepping on a stool to reach the higher shelf – I saw her round, firm behind in its perfect articulation. I spied a tattoo of some kind on her upper hip, what looked like the top of a flower. My heart started to beat faster. I had never looked at an older woman this way. I wasn’t even sure if she counted as an “older woman.”
As if reading my mind, she started to talk about herself. “This is going to sound strange,” she started – which probably only made me feel stranger, in anticipation of whatever it was she was going to say – “But I wasn’t that much older than you when I had Kristi.”
My eyes bulged out as I tried to do some mental math.
“Oh, don’t get me wrong. I was twenty. I was old enough. And I know when you’re sixteen, twenty seems like it’s a hundred years away, but it’s not. It will be here before you know it. You need to enjoy your youth while you have it.” She took another sip. “Oh, sometimes I just feel too young and too old all at once. Sorry to bother you.”
“No, no, it’s okay,” I said, although I wasn’t really sure if it was. Her voice was like honey and the more I heard of it, the more I wanted – and I knew Kristi would get mad at me and probably stop being my friend if I developed a crush on her mom but I couldn’t help it.
“You’re sweet,” she said. Then she paid me a brief, warm smile, the kind that I couldn’t imagine her sardonic daughter ever giving, even though they had almost the same face, with their big eyes and round, soft lips. She batted her long eyelashes.
Maybe someday, I thought, Kristi was outgrow her rebellious phase and embrace those looks, learn the art of bedroom eyes and lusty lips the way her mom had – become a real woman like that. I sipped my drink and thought about it, placing Kristi’s coolness into her mom’s hot body.
While I was daydreaming, she swept some crumbs off the counter and sighed to herself. “All right, well let me give you a ride home. You probably want to have a shower and relax.”
“Shower?” I repeated, in a daze. What was she getting at?
“Well yeah, you must feel so sweaty and gross. I know that when I’ve hard a hard day, nothing makes me feel better than a nice warm shower… or to soak my aching body in a bath.”
I didn’t know what to say to that – the idea of showering at this time, looking at her, thinking about her, made me very nervous – being a worldly woman, she must have known what I planned to do, and by planting the suggestion, she made me feel like she was endorsing it. Like she wanted me to think about her.
Nervously, I managed to say “sure,” and off we went. The only words said in the car were me indicating which turns to take to get to my neighborhood. I was too intimidated.
When I got out of the car I don’t even remember if I said thanks or good night. I just went. My head was spinning. What was I thinking?
Was I really getting a crush on Kristi’s mom? And was I crazy enough to think maybe she was letting me? I spent all night tossing and turning, thinking about it… thinking about her.
I didn’t even know Kristi that well yet, but it was really starting to feel like we were kind of friends so I didn’t feel too weird talking to her at school. She seemed to like talking with us. She voluntarily sat with us at lunch. She discussed her interests and worked on other projects and had us back over to her house occasionally, especially when her mom wasn’t around during the week. I will admit, I did like having Kristi as a friend, but the possibility of crossing paths with Julie probably made me want to stick around more than I would have otherwise.
But, as kind as she had been during those early days, Julie proved elusive and I didn’t see her often when I was at Kristi’s house. She had a long commute home from her receptionist job, and seemed to enjoy socializing after work instead of coming right home, so by the time she got in she usually seemed too tired to do much more than pour herself a glass of wine, wave us a quick hello, and go to bed.
Kristi said her mom wasn’t around much because she had a new boyfriend in the city. I felt a minor pang of jealousy – reality hitting me because of course she would never date a 16-year-old.
As the year went on, I took any chance I could to be around Julie. I know it was silly of me to think maybe this grown woman had any interest in a 16-year-old, but I couldn’t help it. She made me feel special, always looking at me, talking to me, smiling – she wasn’t like the girls my own age. And because I had her around, I stopped thinking about girls my own age altogether. I was getting obsessed. I even found out she had an Instagram account, posting pics of herself on vacation, and doing makeup tutorials. I created a dummy account to follow her.
Even without the benefit of knowing her mom, I found it was cool being friends with Kristi. She liked to go to all-ages shows at bars, or sit at home and watch horror movies. She knew a lot of things about the world that she seemed willing to show us. Jesse and I had been friends our whole lives and needed someone like Kristi to break us out of our shells. We took Driver’s Ed together and she helped me drill, and with her help I got passable at everything except for parallel parking.
In the spring, her mom opened up the pool in their backyard and we started to spend more weekends there. I felt self-conscious about my bony body – between the two of us, Jesse was more athletic. He had been a chubby kid until this year but was starting to get into working out. Kristi liked to wear a modest one-piece black swimsuit and a covering around her hips. I had to admit, it was interesting getting to see what was under those baggy tee shirts and corduroy pants, and it was hard not to leer just a little bit – she was a real girl under there.
But her mom was a woman.
Julie was around again – I guess she and her boyfriend broke up, since she seemed to be spending more and more time around the house that summer, which meant Kristi wanted us to be anywhere but there. But I did see her lounging at the pool. She tended to favor bikinis in a variety of colors, ones that definitely accentuated that body of hers – a curvy hourglass frame with a trim-looking waist, and nicely-sized breasts that looked big and perky even in a string bikini top. Skimpy suits that no other mom would dare wear. Kristi was always embarrassed at how much skin her mom would show, but Jesse and I both approved. Kristi would shoo her away, but she would always be around, bringing snacks and drinks, and politely applauding while Jesse and I took turns doing dives – which were for her amusement.
When I would tell Kristi, “Your mom is the best,” she would scowl and repeat her line about being a witch. I never saw it in her though. I was so jealous her mom was cool and young and hot, and just gave her so much space.
“Dude,” I said to Jesse one day when we Kristi went to talk to her mom, leaving us alone poolside, “This is the life.”
“Absolutely, man,” he agreed.
I couldn’t put it into words, but it felt so luxurious, and it seemed to me to be all thanks to Kristi’s mom – her looks, her attitude. A woman like that would always have the world at her feet, while nobodies like me and Jesse – and Kristi, who was like the girl version of us – would have to struggle. But Mrs. K.? I had no doubt that people bent over backwards to give her everything she wanted. I felt a pang of envy for a life that seemed so easy.
At the end of the school year, my parents told me we were moving. I was shocked. We had lived in this town for my entire life and I couldn’t imagine living anywhere else. Adapting to a new environment, making new friends, these were not things I wanted to have to do in my last year of high school.
I was miserable and started lashing out at my parents. That was my way. I didn’t see the point in being nice to them. I was the middle child, between two do-right golden child older brothers, and two needy much-younger brothers. I never got anything I asked for or credit for anything I did, so I never did anything for anyone. My parents called me the lazy one, the quiet one, and lately, the rude one. I knew that secretly, they thought I was the dumb one, too. Maybe knowing Kristi brought that attitude out in me. I figured, if she, someone who had it made from my perspective, had any reason to lash out at her mom, then I had double that. Sometimes I wondered if my parents decided to move just to stick it to me.
Jesse and Kristi were comforting, saying there was no way we’d lose touch – after all, we had phones, the Internet, everything. I said yes, but it wasn’t the same without them in my life every day. Kristi told me it would be fine, and to take her for example – she showed up in a new place where everyone already knew each other, and it didn’t take her too long at all to make new best friends. I smiled at that, but I didn’t want new friends, I wanted my old ones. I wanted to keep my life as it was. And, deep down, I wanted to keep being around Julie, too.
“I know what we should do,” Kristi said with that wicked smile of hers. “Come to my place the Saturday before you move. We need to send you off in style.”
My eyes widened. I knew what she was talking about and I couldn’t believe it.
During Spring break, Kristi had visited with some cousins back in the city. They let her smoke pot with her for the first time, and she really enjoyed it. She told us we had to try it, but Jesse and I were both too nervous. When she had visited those cousins again at Easter, they had given her a baggie of weed of her own that she was eager to introduce us to. I was still skittish, but suddenly it felt like now or never.
I was moving two weeks before school started. It was a muggy August Saturday night.
I hadn’t even inhaled a bit of the stuff and I was already feeling paranoid. “Are you sure your mom’s not going to catch us?”
Kristi looked at me like I was being ridiculous. “She wouldn’t even care if we did it right in front of her.”
This had to be an exaggeration. Julie was still a parent – I knew she was younger than my mom and had lived in the city and all, but I thought she had to have a similar response as my mom when it came to drugs: Just Say No, right?
Despite Kristi’s boasts about her mom’s liberated ways, it wasn’t like we were going to take over the living room or even the back patio for this. We set ourselves up in a small room in the basement. Kristi knew to put towels under the crack of the door so the smoke didn’t escape. My whole body was shot through with nerves.
In a plastic baggie, three joints had been rolled. Naively, I asked, “We each get one?”
Kristi burst out laughing. “You idiot, one of these is enough for all three of us. The other two are for later. If you smoked this whole thing you would die.”
As always, I felt embarrassed by my lack of experience around Kristi.
She produced a Bic lighter from her shirt pocket. “I took this from my mom. She keeps them in her underwear drawer so I won’t find out she smokes cigarettes.”
A tingle went up my spine thinking about Julie Kouriakis’ underwear drawer.
Kristi put the joint in her mouth and lifted the lighter to the tip of it. It took three tries to get the thing to light. We watched the tip glow slight orange and then blacken as smoke began to waft from its tip. I watched her chest expand as she took a deep inhale and het for a moment before letting the slight fog out.
“That’s how you do it,” Kristi said, passing the joint to Jesse.
Pinching the tip between his fingers, Jesse looked at me. If there was a note of hesitation, it passed quickly. He put the thing to his lips and did as Kristi did – only choking slightly as the smoke filled his lungs.
Once he had had his, he passed it over to me. I objected. “It has your spit on it!”
“Grow up,” Kristi said dismissively. “Do you want it or not?”
I did – I didn’t want to leave without sharing this experience with my friends.
Sucking that smoke in felt right and wrong at once. Easy and yet rough. I think I did better than Jesse, taking my time to do so.
“I don’t feel anything,” I said as I passed the joint to Kristi.
“It’s not right away,” she said pointedly, again highlighting my inexperience. “Give it a few more.”
So we kept passing it around and around until finally it was gone, worn down to a nub. By that time I was definitely feeling something. There was a lightness in my soul and a woozy cloud in my head. I was thinking I was liking it.
We passed the rest of the night in much the same way as dozens of other nights the three of us had hung out – we chased Kristi’s little bother Matthew and his sleepover friends out of the den to watch The Evil Dead. Somehow the whole movie seemed funnier than usual and we talked through nearly all of it. We ate copious amounts of chips and Cheetos and pizza, and drank two full bottles of Dr. Pepper. We kept saying how good we felt, how much fun we were having, even though we were just sitting there laughing.
By 1 AM, Kristi had fallen asleep on the couch and it was just me and Jesse, two old friends. Things went quiet.
“I’m gonna miss you, man,” I said hazily.
“I’m gonna miss you!” Jesse said back.
“You’ve been my friend my whole life, and it just… sucks that I have to leave!”
“I know!” he said. “It’s like… losing a part of me!”
“Same!” I said back. I was starting to get very emotional, but then a different thought occurred to me. “Oh crap… the lighter!”
Jesse blinked twice. “What lighter?”
“The lighter Kristi used to light the joints. We never put it back. Her mom’s going to find out it’s missing and she’ll… she’ll know!”
“Oh wow, good point,” Jesse said. “Um… what should we do?”
“I know,” I said. “I’ll put it back.”
I later found out that a side-effect of marijuana can be paranoia, which explains why I was so consumed with fear that Kristi’s mom would find out we borrowed her lighter. Really though, I think I just wanted an excuse to creep around her room.
The lighter was sticking out of the front pocket of Kristi’s plaid overshirt. I reached out to grab it, delicately so as to not let my hand brush against any forbidden areas, and slipped it loose.
“Be right back,” I said.
“Sure,” Jesse replied. He pulled a throw blanket over himself. It looked like he was getting ready to fall asleep in the reclining chair where he sat.
Slowly, as silently as I could, I made my way up the stairs. The master bedroom was on the far right, toward the front of the house. The door was open a crack. It was dark inside.
Once I was in, I realized I had made a huge miscalculation. What was I doing? I didn’t know what this bedroom looked like, where the dresser was. It was lit only by the moon and stars filtering through the front window, and by a ray of light coming from beneath a door in the corner of the room.
The ensuite bathroom. Of course.
And she must have been in there. I had only precious moments to execute my plan.
I let my eyes adjust. I could discern a few pieces of furniture within amongst the shadows. The bed (a luxurious looking King) a vanity makeup table next to the door, and a wardrobe with a cabinet door on one side and drawers on the other. That had to be where the sacred drawer was. I dashed across the room as quickly but as silently as I could. Making a wild guess, I opened the top drawer and stuck my hand in. What I found felt satiny and soft. Jackpot. I slid the lighter in where I thought it might go, and closed it – a little indelicately, as the drawer produced a thud.
There was something heavier rolling around in that drawer. My mind reeled as to what it might be.
The sound of running water stopped in the bathroom. I must have alerted Julie to my presence. I should have dashed, but I froze in panic. The door opened and light filled the room. The silhouette of Julie Kouriakis appeared in the doorway, lit from behind. She was wearing one of those short, silky bedrobes and a pair of fleece shorts.
“Kyle?” she said.
“I… I…” I stammered. My wits, which were never my strong suit to begin with, were dulled. “I got lost.”
She ignored my babbling. “You’re… moving soon, aren’t you?”
“Y-y-yeah,” I stuttered, too dazed to collect my thoughts. “Monday.”
“That’s going to be so hard,” she said, crossing the room and sitting on the bed. There was a bottle of some kind of lotion on her nightstand that she squirted into her palms and began to rub on her arms. “I know from Kristi’s experience that moving at your age can be so tough. I was so glad she made friends with you two.”
“Yeah, we… we like her…” I said, not even sure how my mouth was making words at the time. I felt frozen, and yet compelled to sit next to Julie on the bed. Maybe it was confidence from the pot.
“And she likes you both,” Julie said. “And I’ve liked you both. How do you feel about your move?”
I sighed, completely letting my guard down. “I… don’t wanna go. I… I hate my family so much, Julie. I’d do anything to stay.” It felt so strange to feel those words fall out of my mouth, but they were the truth. I never felt good with my family, and now they were wrenching me away from the only thing in my life that I liked. My home and my friends.
Then Julie did something very strange. She put a hand on my shoulder. A chill went up my spine.
She took a breath and looked like she was going to say something deep and comforting, but all she said was, “How about a hug goodbye?”
“Uh… okay,” was all I could say as she stretched out her arms. I fell into them. She smelled sweet, like strawberries and vanilla. I kept her body pressed against mine as long as I could.
“You sound like you’ve had a long night,” she said, with something almost unnaturally soothing in her voice. “Why don’t you just lie down here?”
“H…here?” I asked. “With… you?”
It was dark, but I could hear a smile in her voice. “No, I’ll go sleep in the guest room.”
I felt embarrassed. For a moment I really thought… something… was going to happen.
“Oh… yeah,” was all I could say.
“Sleep as long as you want,” she said, kissing me on the cheek. “You’ll see me when you wake up. And then we can take you home.”
It all sounded so nice and soothing. I curled up under Mrs. K’s soft white comforter and let myself drift off.
I thought I heard her whisper something in a soft, calming voice. It could have been “Good night” but it sounded like a foreign language.
“Mm, night,” I murmured peacefully, unsure if I was actually speaking.
I heard her cross to the door, her footfalls delicate and feminine. “I’m sure you’ll be happy anywhere you end up.”
I was too tired to respond.
And that was the last thing I remembered.
II.
I woke up the next morning feeling stranger than I ever had in my whole life. My head throbbed, my bones and muscles ached, my mouth was dry and hot. My insides felt like they were swimming around inside of me. I thought I was going to puke. If this was what drugs did to you, I was glad I didn’t make a habit of them.
I tried to piece together the events of the night before. It took a moment to remember where I had fallen asleep. I felt the soft, smooth duvet around me and pulled it close, curling into a fetal position.
I barely remembered where I was – the big, warm bed of Julie Kouriakis. I knew that any moment, she could come through the door to wake me up and take me home, to my parents who were preparing to move the next day. I rolled over and buried my head under the covers to try to protect myself somehow.
Something was amiss, but I didn’t dare investigate it yet. I only hoped I could shut my eyes and fall right back to sleep, but a bright, bright sunlight burst through the window so strongly I couldn’t even block it out by closing my eyes. I buried my head and grumbled “No…” just under my breath. I rolled over onto my stomach, but felt an unusual pressure on my chest that made me flinch. Something was pressed between my ribcage and the mattress.
Out of instinct, I reached over to find my phone on the nightstand. There was one there, but it wasn’t mine – the case was a feminine pink. But when I looked at it, it opened right up, as if using facial recognition technology.
Long locks of soft blonde hair fell over my eyes. I brushed them away, confused at where they had come from, since my hair was normally short and naturally rusty brown. But I became more focussed on the unfamiliar phone in my hands: and the hands cradling the phone were not mine. They were slimmer, softer… daintier.
There was a notification. New video message.
From Kyle.
From me.
I raised a perplexed eyebrow as I tapped to open it, a sinking feeling growing in my gut as my alertness grew and I started to sense – without believing it was possible, but yet still sensing – what had happened. And sure enough there was a video of me, taken at selfie range, wearing a strangely sinister, smug expression.
“Hiiii Kyle…” he said in a feminine singsong voice, “I’m so sorry it had to come down this way. Really. It absolutely was not anything personal. But you were there, practically crying on my shoulder about how you hated your life, and honestly I’ve always felt I could be happier, so… I made a little change.”
My back straightened up, my eyes widened. He couldn’t be saying what I thought he was saying?
“It’s going to be tough to adjust, but, I think you’ll get used to it. You’ll have to. Don’t hold out hope of ever getting your old life back. I’m moving, you know. Oh sure, maybe someday I’ll be done with this life and ready to move on, but by the time that happens, I’ll be far, far away and you won’t know anything about it.”
My jaw fell open. Instinctively, as if to confirm what had been said, my hand raised to my chest – and found a soft, supple breast there.
He resumed. “Aw, don’t cry kiddo. It’ll be fun. I know you always loved looking at me, watching me, fawning over me… I bet you thought I didn’t notice. Hun, I see everything. But it’s really not the punishment you think it is. I bet you’ll find lots of ways to have fun.”
She threw me a lewd wink. I cringed.
“But just in case you haven’t figured it out, there’s lots more I can do. So if you make me mad, or try to get out of playing your part… I might just have to do something you really won’t like. To you… or someone you care about. Like say, your mom, or your dad, or Jesse… or even Kristi.”
My face flashed hot. She wouldn’t.
“Now’s your chance to really get to know who Julie Kouriakis actually is. And that’s anyone you want her to be, baby.”
A slight, feminine giggle escaped my – his – her lips, on the video. He cleared his throat “Hm, I suppose I’ll have to learn to fix that. Well, I’ll have lots of time, and a clean slate to do it, since we’re moving out of this dumpster of a town in about 24 hours. Enjoy your life. See you around, sport.”
The video cut out, and the screen reverted to homescreen. There was a glamorous photo of Mrs. K, looking absolutely flawless as she gave a wry grin to the camera. A moment later, it faded to black and all I could see was my reflection – a darkened mirror of a face I only somewhat recognized from this perspective. Slightly obscured by shadow, I still saw those high cheekbones, narrow nose and sleepy eyes – those of the beautiful Julie Kouriakis. I furrowed my brow, and the person in the image did the same.
I raised my head and saw across the room where Mrs. K kept her vanity table. In the reflection of the mirror there, I could see only one person alone in the bed.
Julie.
I raised my hands to my head and the reflection did the same. I swept my fingers downward combing through the long dyed-blonde hair that I had seen before, but never had growing out of me.
“No way…” I whispered, keeping my voice too low to confirm that I now had a woman’s.
I threw that downy white duvet off myself and revealed a pair of silky-smooth curvaceous, hairless legs, clad in purple flannel pyjama shorts that rode high up on my thigh. As soon as I saw them, I straightened my neck upward. I couldn’t look at my legs, because that would mean seeing what was at the top of them – a pair of wide hips I could now feel, behind which was a firm, perky ass I was now sitting on. And between them… well, what exactly?
I didn’t know, and I didn’t want to find out.
But I already knew – I was a 17-year-old boy, or at least supposed to be. Every morning for the past four years I had woken up with an unignorable stiff sensation between my legs, that familiar throb that invited me to pleasure myself. Now there was nothing. No stuff throb, and no limp instrument dangling down, nothing at all occupying the real estate in my shorts, but a very alien-feeling separation above my thighs.
My heart beat fast as I abruptly forced my hand to cup myself in the crotch, hoping it would meet a familiar bulge, but only finding flat terrain, concealing a slight, sensitive aperture that I could just barely discern with my fingers through the fabric.
Immediately, I retracted my hands and moved them to my chest – my breasts. Julie’s breasts. Those beautiful, soft, supple tits that I had eagerly watched bound around Kristi’s house whenever her mom came home from work or visited us poolside were now hanging from my chest, under a white cotton tank top that, when I did look down again, I could see pushing the fabric out and down, and where the scooped neck revealed a wide-splayed cleavage, the kind that occurs when a woman with perfect breasts doesn’t wear a bra.
I had never seen breasts from this angle before, it made me dizzy to look at them. I had always wanted to see this – and more – so badly, and now I couldn’t stand to look. The blood drained from my face.
I held them. They were attached to me – and heavier than I thought, their flesh so invitingly soft. When I released them, they bounced ever so slightly.
“Oh, God,” I whimpered.
My heart raced. I dashed to the door. I had to leave the room. It contained mirrors and other indicators of my current appearance, which was filling me with extreme dread. But there was no outrunning it. Because with every step I felt my hips and bum sway, my bosom gently jiggling under the light top, my footfall landing on dainty little balls of my feet, with little niblet toes and the vacancy in my crotch. My knees bowed together more than they ever had – something I had noticed about women but never really thought about. And my hair was everywhere. Julie’s hair. It was a tangled mess, matted in back and falling in awkward strands around my ears and eyes. I tried to hold it in a bunch to keep it away from my face and from dancing distractingly behind my neck.
I hurried downstairs. I don’t know why. Julie, in my body, was obviously long gone. So what was I looking for? Who could help me? What good did doing anything do? I wasn’t sure, but I was running on instinct. I was moving and had to keep moving, until I arrived in the kitchen… and saw Kristi sitting at the table, reading on her phone, and drinking a mug of coffee.
I tilted my head and felt my blonde hair fall to the side.
Kristi looked at me like I… well, I’m not sure, but it wasn’t the look I would have expected. Loaded with hostility and confusion about me being confused.
“What?” she asked in that impertinent teenage tone that I was never on the receiving end of.
I blinked, and blurted out the thing that had caught my attention and momentarily distracted me from my, well, everything:
“You drink coffee?”
As soon as the words left my lips, my eyes bulged. I clamped my mouth shut and raised my hand to my lips. It was my first time truly hearing my new, feminine voice. It sounded wrong. It felt wrong. I wouldn’t think it would be so different, but everything, even down to the way Mrs. K’s tongue sat in her mouth, the way my lips now felt as they formed words, was different.
I must have made my surprise – seemingly over nothing – very obvious on my face, because Kristi paid me back with a raised eyebrow of confusion. Then she shook her head dismissively. “Uh, yeah.”
I don’t know why I didn’t know this about her, but I guessed we never hung out first thing in the morning.
I was dumbstruck. This was my opportunity to explain myself – to say ‘Help! It’s me, Kyle, and your psycho mom ran off with my body… and I need to get it back because I’m supposed to be moving today!’ Or just ‘I want my dick back!’
But I didn’t. The words didn’t come. My mouth – that pretty mouth with the soft, kissable lips – just hung open catching flies for a moment while I considered what, if anything, I wanted to tell my friend.
I remembered Julie’s warning. I didn’t want anything to happen to Kristi, or anybody else. Now that I had seen what she was capable of doing to me, I believed she was good as her word.
I must have had that look on my face like I wanted to say something for a good ten seconds before Kristi expectantly said “Uh, well?”
I shut my mouth and looked away.
Knowing I couldn’t say anything, I took a moment, breathed deep, composed myself and decided.
I was Julie.
For now anyway.
I put my hands on my shapely hips, trying to figure out how to stand in a motherly way and asked, “So, did your… f-friends go home?” stammering awkwardly over my words as I referred to myself in the third person.
“Yeah, like an hour ago,” Kristi responded, like she was losing patience with me already after only a moment’s conversation. “Kyle is moving today, and you said we had to go Back to School shopping and I figured Jesse shouldn’t be around for that.”
My heart palpitated at the mention of “Kyle” moving.
“Of course,” I said quietly to myself as I got lost in thought, only to be brought back to the moment by a strange tingling sensation – an itch on my breast. Absentmindedly, I dug my nail in to scratch it and flinched – yow, that shit was sensitive.
“Okay listen… uh, I’ve gotta go, um, do some stuff,” I said, mentally recalling where I knew Julie kept her car keys, on a hook by the door. “We’ll do that, uh, shopping thing later. After. Okay?”
“Aren’t you forgetting something?” Kristi asked.
My mind, I thought. Irritated, I pinched the bridge of my nose and braced myself. “Um, what?”
“Matthew’s soccer game. It’s in twenty minutes.”
Looking over at Mrs. K’s phone, sure enough there was a reminder. SOCCER: 9 AM @ Morgan Park. I wondered whether Julie actually needed the reminder, or left it for me on purpose.
“Of… course…” I said through gritted teeth. I rubbed my hand over my chin – that smooth, soft womanly jaw. My face growing hot as I became more overwhelmed, I said to Kristi, “You wouldn’t want to… take care of that, would you?”
“For a hundred bucks maybe,” Kristi snorted.
I sighed. I was sure Julie had a hundred bucks to spare, but I didn’t imagine this was the sort of thing she shelled out for. And anyway, that was basically Kristi’s way of saying “No.”
As if on cue, Kristi’s little brother came clattering down the stairs, tromping from his bedroom in cleats, fully dressed for the game in a red soccer jersey and black shorts. The noise made me shudder. My hair was getting in my face again, so instinctively I swept it behind my ear.
“Okay then,” I said, making for the keys. “I guess we’re going.”
Kristi asked, in her most critical teenage voice. “…Like that?”
I looked down. “I guess so.” My face got hot as I regarded my new breasts.
She raised an uncertain eyebrow. Her eyes darted back and forth. “Like that.” she repeated flatly.
“I’m… you know… yeah.” I knew I was still technically wearing pyjamas, but the last thing I wanted to do was go back upstairs and get “dressed” in Julie’s clothes. “I’m… having a rough morning and I can’t even deal with dressing this… these… my body. Myself.”
Kristi pointed with her index finger, waving it back and forth, indicating… something.
I stuck my head forward at her, “Well?”
What was she getting at? What did she know that I didn’t? Was she trying to say she knew who I was?
“Mom.” She said more forcefully, gesturing at her own chest.
Finally I looked down. Those tantalizing slopes that lived on my chest were now capped by a matching set of distinctive, erectly pointed nipples, which left their clearly visible intent poking through the light cotton top. I hadn’t even noticed it was happening.
“Oh God!” I cried out, trying to flatten Julie’s boobs back into my chest, to no avail, and a great deal of pain. I must have looked like a total weirdo, cupping my own boobs. “How do you make them stop?” I blurted out.
“Put on a bra, weirdo,” Kristi answered with typical disdain in her voice as she set her now-empty mug aside and walked away. She left me there, cupping my breasts like an idiot – or at least like someone who had never had them before.
I winced as I looked down. I had always wanted to hold a pair of boobs – any boobs, but especially these ones. But not like this, not as the person whose boobs were being held. I couldn’t even enjoy it, despite them being everything I had ever imagined, perfect, soft and plush in my hands.
“Mom, let’s go!” Matthew’s whiny prepubescent voice called from the front corridor.
“Coming, coming,” I grumbled to myself as I grabbed that familiar shear white poolside robe from a hook near the rear door, the only article of clothing nearby that I knew to be Julie’s. I had never worn such a light, flowy garment before, and felt odd trying to pull it together over my new breast and feeling it slip off them until I finally just let it hang over them. I hoped it would insulate me and let my perky little friends calm down, but it probably wouldn’t. On the shoe rack at the front of the door I found a pair of slip-ons with no heel that didn’t seem like they would be hell to wear, and from the soft pastel color I could tell they were clearly not Kristi’s. I slipped them on and grabbed the keys as I stepped out.
In the driveway, I approached Mrs. Kouriakis’ red crossover warily. Matthew was already seated in the back and buckled in.
I took a deep breath. On top of parading around as a woman – half-naked, at that – I was going to have to drive this car.
I opened the door and tried to climb in. Being that my body was somewhat smaller now, I misgauged how big a step up it would be, and with my center of gravity relocated I tumbled headfirst across the front seats before catching myself – my boobs bumping against the glove compartment. Awkwardly, I angled myself around and positioned my nice round bum in the seat. It all felt so wrong compared to what I was used to – the seat so close and high – and yet right for this body.
I had driven, of course, but I wasn’t comfortable yet. Just being behind the wheel still felt so different to me, and I was a slow learner. Usually my old man was in the passenger seat, to tell me what I was doing wrong, and that always made me so tense I didn’t like trying. Now it was just me. I was on my own, as I would obviously be for whatever length of time this was supposed to last. I felt like I was falling from an airplane without a chute.
I righted myself and put the key in the ignition. As soon as the car came to life the speakers began to blast some song by Kelly Clarkson. “Ugh!” I sneered, turning the volume all the way down.
I surveyed the dashboard. It was a nice set-up, a very up-to-date vehicle with a push-button start, side camera display and other advanced features. This actually caused me to nod in approval – my dad’s car still had handles to roll the windows down. At least something about this had an upside.
I was so dazed I almost forgot to buckle my seatbelt, but a chime in the car reminded me. I reached back to pull it across myself and clicked it in – only to have it slide awkwardly between my new boobs, its stiff edge cutting into the soft, supple flesh of my tits.
“Oh God,” I grumbled, as I would for every new issue that cropped up with this body, adjusting it as best I could to navigate the curve of my breast.
Even stepping on the pedal was weird, being that I was wearing a shoe without a tread for the first time in forever. Even applying pressure to the pedal felt different as this leg had a different amount of strength to it than my own. But eventually I got into gear and started backing out.
Slowly, slowly, watching out my rear window and muttering “I can’t believe I’m doing this…” all the while.
Being that I was driving an unfamiliar car, in an unfamiliar body, and that even in the best of circumstances I was awkward behind the wheel, I drove slower than the average golf cart, clutching the wheel in a panic. Eventually this lasted so long that even Matthew started to sense something was up.
“Why aren’t you going faster, mom? We’re gonna be late!”
That word sent a chill up my spine. Mom. This kid thought I was his mom.
“Shhhh-” I snapped, keeping myself from finishing with ‘Ut up.’ “Mom is a little off today, okay?” Using that word on myself did not feel any more right than when Matthew had.
The tension was getting to me as I started down the arterial roads, causing me to make some incredibly awkward turns that probably would have been risky had I not been going 20 at the time. I didn’t know where this particular soccer field was, but that’s the magic of technology – I asked Mrs. K’s phone, and instantly a map was provided. Eventually I did pick up the pace. The stress of the day, and the increasing summer heat were starting to get to me, so I rolled down the window – only for my new flowing blonde hair to start smacking me in the face and covering my eyes.
“Fuck, fuck fuck!” I say, trying to pull stray hairs out of my eyes and mouth.
“Mom said a bad word!” Matthew said, to nobody in particular.
“Yeah, bet I’ll do worse than that by the end of the day,” I groaned.
Finally, we arrived at the field. Matthew bounded out of the car and over to join his team. I stayed behind, examining myself in the mirror – I hadn’t wanted to, but I really wanted to be sure I had gotten all of that hair squirreled away. Didn’t women usually carry tons of elastics for this kind of thing? Where would they be, I thought to myself.
And then I realized.
They’d be in a purse.
And I didn’t have a purse.
I patted my hips – no pockets in these pyjama pants (which I’d later learn made them no different from other women’s clothes.) I even patted my chest instinctively, as if my new boobs were suddenly going to open up and reveal storage pouches. No, I had left the house with the clothes on my back, the phone and keys in my hand, and whatever was in the glove box.
That meant no wallet. No money. And no driver’s license.
“Shit, shit shit!” I pounded the seat next to me. This was getting worse and worse. Even trying to drive home was a risk – what if I got pulled over? And the way I drove, that almost seemed inevitable.
Despite that, I knew I needed to proceed. I threw the car in reverse and slowly started to back out of the gravel parking lot. I took a deep breath. “Calm nerves,” I whispered to myself. “Just don’t attract any attention.”
But before I got very far, I heard a knock on my passenger size window. I jumped, startled, and slammed my foot back down on the brake.
It was an older guy – older than me for sure, and a little bit older than Mrs. K. A dad-looking dude in a polo shirt with a clipboard.
“Hey Jules,” he said. “Aren’t you gonna stick around?”
“Oh, I’ve gotta… take care of… something. I’ll be back.”
“Okay,” He frowned. “Who is your second?”
“My what?”
“Your second. Who’s looking after Matthew if you’re not here? You know I need to know for legal purposes.”
I raised an eyebrow in confusion. “Uh, isn’t that your job?”
“Come on Julie, you know the rules.”
“Fine,” I grumbled, “Uh… Karen.”
The coach tilted his head in confusion. “Karen? Karen who?”
I sighed. “Uh, never mind. I’ll… whatever.”
I re-parked the car and unbuckled, grabbing a pair of aviator sunglasses that I had found in the glove box, because I was feeling an intense need to obscure my face. It was good to get out of the hot seat and stretch out – I felt a little less stressed not having to drive anymore, and it was freeing to not be able to successfully lie to the Coach, even if it was dreadfully inconvenient for me to hang around here.
Then he shot me this look. This weird look that didn’t exactly meet my eyeline.
I looked down to see what he was looking at and realized that the “Pointer Sisters” were back.
“Ugh, grow up dude,” I scowled under my breath as he walked away, pulling my light covering over my cleavage and keeping it pinched together with my hand. “How am I ever going to get the hang of these things?” I grumbled as I tromped toward the field… suddenly very wary that I maybe would have to.
“Kristi’s Mom” is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual situations or any persons living or dead is completely coincidental and unintentional. This work is Copyright 2021 Liam Slade, not to be reproduced without express permission of the author. All rights reserved.