Indefinite Overhaul - Finale

When I opened my eyes I felt shaky all over and quite heavy, but most of all weak. I moved my limbs as I woke and the effort was greater than I was used to. And I could hardly see. My vision was completely unfocused. I could make out the ceiling fan which hummed above me though the outlines were opaque, layer upon layer of overlapping images giving an overall effect of a deep blur. I moved my head to the side and could just make out the figures of two men standing over by the counter. They were talking in subdued tones, but the taller one seemed to turn toward me, or at least a white blob appeared in place of the brown blob that sat on top of what seemed to be his shoulders. He spoke in a rather crisp public school accent I didn't recognise that seemed to be full of concern over my well being.

"Look!"

"She's awake!" That sounded like the old man. The smaller figure came toward me and stooped down next to my face coming a little more into focus. Yes, the old man, the shopkeeper.

"Goodness," exclaimed the other man almost effeminately, "it's so strange hearing you say that and meaning that young man, that young man in my body."

I remembered where I was suddenly and exactly what had been going on. Had he done it already? Was I a woman right now!?

"I can't see properly!" I said, the words coming from my throat high pitched but in a monotone, like a woman talking when really bored.

"Here, drink some of this." The old man pushed a paper cup to my lips and I sipped at it, my throat sore and burning as the water struck it. Finally, more from annoyance than satisfaction I pushed it away."Enough," I said. The words were like a woman's again. My heart was racing. It had really happened!

"Put these on," said the other man. It had to be me. My body. She was in my body and talking in my voice, but shaping the words with her own accent. That was why I didn't recognise it immediately. Now though, there was a trace of familiarity there. A pair of glasses were being pressed into my hand by a grip stronger than my own.

This was a powerful moment. I lifted them in my hands and held them poised in front of my face. I knew that if I put them on and I could see, everything my friends and the old man told me was true. I had traded my body and life for the life of a probably very rich middle aged woman. Oh, whenever I thought of what I had become, of what I had given away for it, I was almost overwhelmed by mixed feelings. I'd escaped from my life, a life I hated deeply. But I was a woman now. Not only that I was a good twenty years older. If I never went back, that was a good two decades I'd never see. When before I'd have been entering middle age, I'd now be booking my place at the old folks home. I suddenly felt a crushing despair. Then I though of what I was now, and my heart was filled with joy.

I slipped the spectacles onto my nose and blinked to clear the tears from my eyes. And I could see.

The old man croutched above me where I lay on the floor squinting down into my face. Above and beyond him, almost indistinguisable from that shadows (my vision was no longer what it had once been, even with the glasses), was the woman, now of course clothed in my flesh, looking back at me with concern spread across her face, alluring still, though a man, and standing in the most ludicrous stance, the backs of her hands resting loosly on her hips, on my hips.

"Are you alright?" she said.

My gaze dropped finally to myself, and though I knew the reality of it already, the sheer intensity of seeing it for real almost killed me with shock. Spreading out and away from me across the floor were the same shapely legs I'd seen on her before the change, still slinky in their stockings, the high heels discarded now and resting just beyond on the dusty planked wooden floor. And there were my breasts, great curving hills beneath the loose fabric of the blouse, and down the neck I could see right down the crack to the bra, which cut a little into my skin. The sight of the fleshy skin concealed beneath the silk before, and now visible only to me sent a little chill of pleasure through me. Then finally there were my hands and arms, still poised in front of my face since I put on my glasses. The skin was tight but soft, the nails glazed and shining in the half light, and the arms were still just as perfect as they had been before.

"Sarah?" said the old man, looking right at me. I was confused for a moment though it was obvious he was beginning the charade. It made me realise that I'd never see my friends again probably until we changed back, that to everyone I met from now on I would be Sarah. Hell, there had to be a few hundred people out there right now who knew me on sight as just that. I was going to have to do some pretty sharp acting from here on in.

"Sarah?"

I looked up again, and now both my double and the shopkeeper were standing close. The woman in my body had her hand out toward me.

"Are you okay?" she said, her 1st rate accent still shaping her words. I put my hand into her and winced as she gripped too hard, her massive fingers scrunching mine up in her palm. "I'm sorry," she said, "I'm simply not used to all this strength." I looked into her eyes as she started to pull me up, the shopkeeper supporting my back, both of them acting as though I were an invalid, and I could still see her old fire. She was still the woman I had fallen in love with, just wearing the equivalent of a Halloween outfit that covered her face.

They were lifting me up, and as my weight finally came to rest on my feet solidly enough though they still supported my shoulders, it was clear that even this would be different now than it had ever been before. All the stresses on my legs and muscles were different. My legs, used to walking in heels presumably, felt strange just standing still like this, and the extra weight of her body, the drop in body strength I was experiencing, all these things added up to make being her a totally fresh experience. With sensations as peculiar as this, I would never sink into a state of forgetfulness, never forget who I had been before. Or so I thought.

At last I stood on my own, a cool breeze coming from the open door which rested on a wedge doorstop, left open I supposed, to help me come round from my faint, caressed my bare legs. I looked from the shop keeper to my double. The former seemed worried about my infirmity, he appeared concerned that we didn't accuse his process of failing in some way. Sarah, the woman in my body still seemed concerned for my well being and continued to support my arm a little too tightly.

"I'm fine," I said holding my hand to my forehead and pushing the low fringe clear in the process. Strange hearing my accent come through coloured by a woman's voice. Just like a woman doing a mediocre impression. The old man was satisfied by my testimony and smiling, stated that now he could finish the change-over.

"But it's done isn't it?" said my double, one hand still on my arm, the other limply resting against his thigh, proving by his actions that this was not the case. He caught my and the shopkeeper's gaze and blushed when he realised where we were looking. "Of course," he said, "you've yet to condition our minds to our new bodies!"

"Correct," he replied, wheezing over to the counter and retrieving what looked like a couple of necklaces tangled up together. He came back towards us, and as he placed half over my head and half over my companion's, I saw that it was two lockets made of gold and inlaid with little jewels, big clunky things really, and connected to one another by a gold chain.

"What will this do again?" I asked.

"It will cause you to think and act more as though you were the woman you now are in body." I started to feel a tingling on the back of my neck where the chain touched my skin. My double's sudden perplexed look showed that he too was experiencing this. The tingling increased, like a patter of little electric shocks, and the metal grew warm and then hot.

"It hurts!" I said, but my double's lips moved as mine did, mouthing the words. There was a sudden sharp pain through my head, or at least a sensation that swept right through my brain. I started to feel a little light headed. The old man saw this and pushed a chair up behind me though he took pains not to physically touch me. There was another flash and my vision went dark for a moment, tiny firework flashes going off under my eyelids. Without willing myself to do so, I collapsed in the chair. My double too seemed to be under strain. Before he could collapse as well however, and as rapidly as it had begun, the pain withdrew. My head cleared.

"Oooh," I said, "what happened?" But I asked no more. I stopped when I heard my voice. Gone were the monotone and traces of my accent. The words I'd spoken were enunciated identically to the way my predecessor in this body would have spoken. I spoke in the same crisp accent as she had. I needed to test it out. "The rain in Spain falls mainly on the plain," I said. Again, my voice came out like the Queen's. I could hear my double doing similar tests on his voice. It came out in the husky drawl I had always like to speak in, though it sounded different when not heard through my own ears. I realised that this was what other people had always heard when they had been listening to me, and it sounded pretty good.

"What's your name?" demanded the little man of me suddenly, poking his face up to mine. I was a little flustered but refused to let him see that. I took a deep breath before answering. "Sarah Jorden," I said. Then I stopped. What had I said? Why did this sound strange to me somehow though I'd been saying that name since my marriage, almost thirty years ago now?

Wait a minute, I thought, I'm married? Then I realised what was wrong here. That wasn't my name. I calmed myself and thought in words in my head, "What's my name?" The words Sarah Jorden sprang into my head. No. That's wrong.

I knew what had just happened, I knew that the man standing in front of me had used to be me but I just couldn't for the life of me remember what his name was. Hold on, I never used to say things like, "couldn't for the life of me...." What was going on here?

Then I remembered the telephone conversation I'd had with the shopkeeper. He told me the young man's name then. Yes. Robert Jont. And I realised that that had once been my name. Now I had it I remembered countless instances of being called just that throughout my life. I was definitely a guy back then.

This was so confusing. I still seemed to remember most of my old life if I tried to, but whole segments seemed to be overwritten by memories of my life as a woman. I, for example, could never have spoken to the old shopkeeper on the phone though I remembered quite clearly sitting in my husband's study and getting excited about the news that a suitable transfer mate had been found.

My mind wasn't filled by these interloping memories, but they were there, ready to rise when bidden.

The young man now called Robert was, meanwhile, presumably, trying to sort his own head out. The shopkeeper was questioning him, pushing him around, and I found his fear of the old man somehow fascinating. He was a handsome devil too. So young for me though, almost a boy still.

Then I remembered who I was looking at. Having two sets of memories in my head was proving to be harder than I originally thought to get used to.

"Is that it then," I asked in my thick posh accent, and touched my fingers to the soft, fleshy skin at my throat.

The old man was taking the locket from around Robert's throat.

"That's right," he said, then turned toward me and reached out for my locket. I didn't want him groping around my neck so I lifted off myself and handed it to him. "Here you go," I said.

"I'm a man now?" asked Robert, "forever?"

"Yes."

This struck a chord in me, a disharmonious one. I had imagined the change-over would be a temmporary arrangement, and although I had no desire to re-enter my old life in any hurry, the idea that I would not so muchnot be myself again, but that I would remain this woman forever was one that troubled me slightly. It nagged at me the realization that I would be old before my time, that I would be weak. Then I looked down at myself,at the counters of my body beneath my clothes, the curve of my legs, the gracefulness of my arms. I thought of the riches I owned now. Then I looked at my old self and remembered the passion with which I wanted to escape that life. I still had nagging doubts, but I was happy enough to be a woman that I would walk out that door right now without looking back.

"You should put your shoes back on Mrs. Jorden," said the shopkeeper. He was probably right. I suddenly recalled that my driver was waiting outside and I didn't want him to become more suspscious than my altered behaviour would make him. So I reached down and slipped my shoes on one by one. I had expected it to be difficult to stand and walk on such high heels, but with the transfer complete, it was as though all the instincts a woman learns throughout her life were there within me should I need them.

I turned toward the other two. Now, standing on my heels, I was almost as tall as I had been as a man. Robert was shaking the old man's hand firmly though his expression seemed full of aprehension. I wondered how the strong willed woman who had entered the shop would cope with being a man who was afraid to stand up even for his fear. Then I realised that I was that strong willed woman now, and with a warm glow of happiness in my chest I spoke out and broke the silence.

"I really must be going," I said, smiling. I reached out with my hand and gripped the shopkeeper's in my fingers. "Thankyou so much for all your help." I turned then to face Robert. "And thankyou Robert for giving me the use of your body." Robert smiled, embarassed. "I hope you find more happiness," I continued, "in that body than I did."

"I hope so to," he replied.

I laughed at his remark though he'd not meant it as funny, then I broke away from them and made for the door. I turned on the threshold and looked back into the room. Both men stood expectantly in the semi-darkness waiting for me to speak, and I realised that I was in control. It was I who would decide if the conversation were to continue, and on a whim I concluded that it would not. Without another word I turned on my heel and left the shop, letting the door swing shut behind me.

I stepped out onto the pavement, careful not to stumble in my heels. Although, as I said, I had the memory of walking around in these things, predominantly I was still me, a guy in a woman's body. I wasn't a real woman.... yet.

The sunlight, seemingly magnified through the thick lenses of my glasses was dazzling. I smiled to myself. It was strange seeing everything through glass, but the idea of it, so different from how it had been before and thus symbolic of how I'd escaped my life, was incredibly satisfying.

There were crowds literally milling round me and I suddenly felt embarrassed. I realised everyone could see me for what I really was. I could see that I had merely been hypnotised, that I was standing there in drag and that my friends, the ones who'd set me up had to be around somewhere laughing at me.

Then, as quickly as it had come, this feeling of paranoia vanished. There simply wasn't anybody looking at me out of turn. No packs of cackling hyenas mocked my clothing. No-one even seemed to notice me. I was a little offended that they did not. Of course, if I'd become a pretty young woman, I'd hate all the oggling guys would be giving me. Still, I felt a bit cheated, especially since my own intense attraction to the woman I'd become. But when I thought of that I suddenly felt ashamed for finding beauty in a woman that most normal men wouldn't even see. I didn't really care though what other people thought anymore. I was worrying out of habit, and quite simply told myself not to be so silly.

I suppose my new found indifference was due to my being influenced by the strong personality of the old Sarah Jorden, imprinted upon my own, but there was also a degree of freedom granted to me because I felt that whatever happened didn't really happen to me. I couldn't die or become a laughing stock. If anything bad as that ever happened, I was sure I'd just wake up in my old body, safe and well. You can probably tell by the way I'm phrasing this that it wasn't quite the case.

So anyway; I stood by myself on the pavement and looked round absently for the driver I knew was supposed to be there, trying to wrack my new found memories for the description of the car and the driver. I was soon to realise that the memories implanted were by no means infallible.

Eventually, the driver got out of the car and tapped me on the shoulder.

I turned, rather surprised, and almost tumbled when my heel twisted awkwardly. I didn't recognise him instantly, and thought for a dreadful moment that my first minutes as a comparitively weak woman would include (shock horror!), a mugging and/or a rape.

I made to scream, not sure what else I should do, but a sudden image leapt into my skull of his face. I definitely knew him, or I was supposed to. So I let my mouth relax from its O shape, and smiled as pleasantly as I could.

"Ah, there you are," I said in my most womanly voice, eager to gain control of the situation, "now where's the car?"

"Right here ma'am," he said, and pointed to a monstrous black car I was sure I should have been able to name. Something else I supposed had "slipped my mind" since the transfer. I walked to the back and he opened it for me. Once inside, I slipped one leg over the other quite naturally and made myself comfortable.

The driver climbed into the driver's seat and started the engine. then as though we were still stationary, the car moved seamlessly out into the traffic.






And that was as far as I ever got... Though maybe, if encouraged, I could add to it one day. It stands alone as it is but I always intended it to go on further...

Indefinite Overhaul - Part Two

He began to explain what would happen, and I took a seat to hear his slow raspy lecture against a wall full of (rather appropriately), women's dresses.

When she arrived, we would be prepared and the transfer would be done. I would slip into her body, and to aid my immersion in her life, many of her memories would be overwritten mine about her routine and the requisites of her profession. Finally, he would alter out basic personalities' slightly to give us manerisms identical to one another's original forms. When he finally rounded his description to a close I sat back with a smile on my face and imagined the bathing beauty I was soon to become. Of course, I reasoned with a smile, I wouldn't have to worry about finding a girl in future. I'd need look no further than the mirror.

Then suddenly the door opened with a little jingle from the bell up by the ceiling. I turned my head to look from my vantage point, but the door got in the way, and all I could make out was that the new arrival was a woman through the misted glass. Her voice was feminine and a little posh, but I liked it. I was, by this time, totally taken with the idea of a quick sex change. She was dismissing someone who remained outside. They were to remain in the car while she was inside. She told them she would miss them and they seemd confused. At least she believed in this mumbo jumbo transmigration of spirits as well. I didn't feel quite so silly for believing it anymore.

Then she pushed back the door and stepped fully into view.

The first thing I noticed was her build. She was no bathing beauty this woman. She was plump, though not what you'd call fat, just fleshy. Her smooth arms were by no means slim but still held a form that made them pretty despite the extra bulk. Her legs were the same. Though fleshier than I might have hoped, they retained a curve that to me was still alluring. But her shape was only the first differance I had not expected. She was older than I was by at least fifteen years, maybe twenty or twenty five, it was difficult to tell. Her bearing was strong and matronly though very feminine, and suggested an older woman, or at least a woman used to getting her own way. This cut down my apprehension. Perhaps if I became her, this same will would be conveyed to me. Meanwhile, her skin had such a radiant, youthful quality, that her true age was difficult to determine.

She was wearing an expensive looking, fashionably cut (for an older woman) blouse. It was red and had sleeves that stopped half way down to the elbow and seemed to be made from silk by the way it gleamed in the light from outside which still streamed through the doorway, illuminating the shop and making it all the less oppressive, as it had been before. A black, business-like skirt hugged her hips down as far as her knees, just high enough to leave her curvaceous legs, wrapped in faded black stockings, in view from the calves down. Her feet finally, were in heels, the kind that were sort of half way between highs and flats.

Then her face, her skin was so lovely, not a blemish on it, no wrinkles that disturbed the picture, only tiny feathery etchings that marked the other features off. Her neck sagged beneath her chin in one curve that arched down to its base, a feature that often revolted me on most women and all men, but on her just seemed to go. Her nose was straight and ended in a point and added an almost regal air where a button nose might have destroyed the image; and resting lightly on top were a pair of large, round, deep brown spectacles. Another shock, another weakness, played off by her big brown eyes.

Her hair, finally, was a very dark, oaky brown, cut straight. She had a low fringe just above her eyebrows which arched up in a way that could only be described as sophisticated, and at the back it dropped directly down onto her shoulders and stayed there.

In sum, she was a beautiful woman despite her advanced years and even despite her figure. Every feature seemed so perfectly made, and then above that there were the little details enhanced by make-up. The glaze on her long fingernails, the deep red of her lips that had to be artificial, though it was so perfect and so subtle, all the make-up was, that it was difficult to tell if she was really wearing any. She looked like a woman who'd had plastic surgery, but instead of hopelessly reaching back for a prior age and look she couldn't hope to maintain, she had it merely to root herself firmly and elegantly in middle age.

She hadn't seen me at this point which was lucky because I was doubtless oggling her quite rudely which might have profoundly disturbed her. She let the door swing slowly shut behind her by itself. The bell jangled again on queue. She stood reverently in the middle of the floor and looked expectantly at the shopkeeper, who unphased by her attention was busily fiddling with something out of my view behind the desk. I still watched her from my vantage point off to her right, trying to place where I'd seen her before, when she turned her head slowly round until her eyes fell softly onto me. She looked at me severely at first which made me feel guilty for having been watching her with such a probing eye. Her big eyes were aflame behind the glass of her spectacles, the sides of her face warped out of sight by the thick lens.

I had been seduced by the possibility completely by this time, I stared at her dumbfounded, lost in her gaze, wondering what it would be like to see out through those big brown eyes myself. Then after a moment her expression changed, scrunching up for a moment, looking perplexed, then softening. And she smiled. I think I was in love already. Everything about her was bewitching, most of all the familiarity of her face. It was as if I'd known her all my life deep down.

I had never felt about a woman this way before. If the old man had not said it, if this was not what my future held in store by sheer chance, I would not have done. But I wanted her like I'd wanted no other woman in my life. I wanted to kiss her, caress her with my fingertips, I wanted to take her to my bed just to be with her. Everything about her was alluring, from her beauty of form, like an ancient statue, David, or Venus de Milo. But more than this I wanted to stay with her forever. Her personality, overwhelming me though she had yet to address me with her voice, was drawing me in. And even beyond this, I wanted to be her, to carry that body as elegantly and regally as she herself did.

Then she opened her mouth to speak and her almost husky, feminine voice came pouring out, refined and lovely.

"You're perfect," she said to me, still smiling benevolently. Then she turned and glanced back at the old man who remained behind his desk fiddling away. "He's perfect," she said to him. Then she looked back to me.

"Perfect;" and I felt exactly the same way about her.

Now, I'd been sitting all this time which suddenly seemed inappropriate. So rather anxiously now, I stood, coming up right in front of her. I blurted out an introduction when I could think of nothing else to say that seemed suitable.

"I know," she replied, and I remembered the phonecall during which he'd probably told her all the details I'd described to him when I first arrived.

"Well, erm, who.... who are you," I stammered. She smiled again at my shyness. I could see her wondering what it would be like to be me. Had a woman like this, so powerful in her bearing and words really chosen to be someone like me? Had she come in and asked for a young man in a boring job who's a little too repressed for his own good? Or was I the only thing closest to what she'd wanted that had come along in ages? The only man, if that was what she wanted. But I could see it was. Exactly what she wanted.

She was eyeing me with the same bird of prey look I'd gazed at her in minutes before. She was looking me up and down like the old man had when I arrived, making little calculations about my suitability, I was sure.

"My name," she said finally, "is Sarah. Sarah Jorden. Though only for a short while longer." The thought seemed to please her. This was a crazy business really, people swapping lives they presumably hated for someone else's life which they too would surely grow to hate over time. I could see this suddenly as a massive failing of the organisation, and might have left were it not for the presence of this woman before me, standing just close enough to kiss. The thought of doing so became suddenly overpowering. I wanted to reach out and take her in my arms, hold her to my chest. And I realised that was exactly what I was doing; and what is more, she wasn't resisting me.

Our lips met and something passed between us that I'd never felt with any other woman. It was as though our souls were connected, and a light poured up from them to illuminate even the darkest shadows over my spirit. I felt in that moment that I knew her completely, that her pain was mine. I loved her. The kiss was passionate and long and my eyes closed on the moment, and all I could feel now was joy, joy at finally finding someone, however superficially unsuitable who matched what I wanted completely.

Then suddenly, reality snapped back in as she pulled away.

I opened my eyes and blinked to clear them, but I couldn't see properly and there was something on my face. I reached up to feel it and stepped back trying to regain my balance, but as my hands came down on a pair of big round glasses and my vision cleared I put my foot down awkwardly and my ankle twisted as I started to fall backwards. And the last thing I saw as the world tilted was a vision of myself standing bewildered, looking after me with fear in my eyes.            

Indefinite Overhaul - Part One

One of my earliest ever stories from April 2001 and never quite finished, published here for the first time... 

"I'm looking," I said, "with a slightly embarrassed smile, "for something new. I'm tired of who I am and how far I've come."

                The old man behind the waxy counter screwed up his face and peered right into mine. I could hear his breathing, dry and scrapy. He was the kind of fellow who gave you nightmares about growing old that you just knew were well founded.

                "A complete change?" he asked though he'd heard me say it myself moments before. I felt a little self conscious as he eyed me up and down. He was the creepiest man I'd ever met and I suddenly didn't feel as though trusting my future life to his judgement was such a good idea despite the rave reviews a number of aquaintances of mine had given of his services.

                He was simply supposed to be able to set you up in a new life complete with a fresh appearance and friends, even family. He'd alter your memories so you could function in your new profession and be able to fit into your new social life and apparently even make slight modifications to your personality if the change warrented it.

                Like I said, friends of mine had actually done this, just for a week or so, and come back with wild stories of being someone else. The ultimate holiday, one of them called it. Talk about leaving your worries at home. I wasn't so interested in the short term offer though myself. I intended to go in for the more expensive but in my case definitely necessary indefinite overhaul. I wanted to leave my life behind for good and start off somewhere else, as someone else.

                It's not that my life was so bad, and in fact I was counting on this fact so that I could save myself some dough and trade in one life for another. I was pretty darn loaded, and not bad looking. I was a late twenties young professional in my cut to size suit and slicked back black hair. And I was tall enough to be an impressive figure if I wanted to. No, I'd just had enough of it all. I felt I'd gone the wrong way somewhere down the line and wanted another shot. What can I say? Doesn't everyone?

                So I'd plucked up the courage and withdrawn the cash, and I stood there in his little backstreet shop, feeling too big for the place really, and not too damn well sure that I'd come to the right place.

                "So," he continued in his graty, shuffling voice, "do you have any idea what kind of change you're looking for? Do you know who you want to be?"

                He lent forward on the counter and peeped down at my feet as he spoke. I stepped back a little, not sure I should go any deeper into this. I could see myself regretting it all in the not at all distant future.

                "Hmmm?" he said.

                I looked to my right and left for an excuse not to speak but in the piles of clothes and trinkets, all reminiscent of something in my past, I could find nothing. So I finally spoke.

                "I, well I always just, you know," I said. The old man raised one of his eyebrows.

                "Hmmm? he said.

                "Well it's just that in all my years," I continued, "I never really amounted to anything I ever dreamed of being. I never became president, or flew a jet, or went into space. You know what I mean?"

                He was no longer looking at me, and just continued to gaze mindlessly down at his thick woody hands, totally silent, but for his breating. I felt silly suddenly, revealing my stupid childish dreams to this guy and felt my face blushing. I glanced round at the door and considered leaving. Of course I find it quite amusing now to consider what might have become of me if I had. But I didn't; and if my life has taught me one thing recently, it's that you can go crazy dwelling on a past you can never change, and probably (if you could go back) wouldn't bother changing anyway when it got down to it.

                Then he brought me round to face him with a long, low hum that rose from his throat and filled the little shop. He stopped abruptly finally as I came once again to be looking at his face and snapped his eyes up to look into mine.

                I came to know then what unnerving actually meant.

                Then suddenly, he was full of smiles and talking like he was normal, though I knew beyond a doubt in my mind that he was not.

                "I have just the thing you would probably like," he said in his business-like turn of phrase. He smiled at me. I wasn't sure what I was suppossed to do exactly, but I went along, "oo"ing and "ah"ing, saying things like, "great," and "what is it exactly?"

                He turned and hobbled into the back room which made me smile. It's not that I find physical infirmity in the least bit amusing, but his lope was too comical to describe. Although I couldn't help wondering between sniggers why he didn't use his process on himself. Why deal in perfect lives while you yourself are old and crackled, and just about ready to drop. Couldn't he sort himself out with something to keep the pain away? Or maybe he just worked there part time and couldn't afford to have another shot at happiness like I could. I suddenly felt sorry for him. I wanted to offer him money that he could use to buy a new life. But I knew as I thought these things that I wouldn't do such a thing. Embarass him and me. A stupid idea!

                He pottered in the back just out of sight, humming now and then, for a few minutes before returning finally. He had a notebook in his hand and chuckled to himself as he reached for the phone. It was an old fashioned black and white movie phone with an earpiece you had to hold, the kind of thing one always sees in expensive department stores with an anachronistic dial stuck on the base. This one was no exception. I was starting to think the old man did everything for effect. It even crossed my mind that he was really a younger man by night and merely used his own technique to borrow the body of an older man during business hours so as to continue his oh so "stylish" charade of mystery and weirdness.

                But now he was dialling busily, swinging the number disk at the base of the phone and releasing it to revolve back round to its original position. I realised I hadn't operated a phone like that for ten years or more.

                He paused, waiting for the other side to pick up and in my tepid mixture of boredom and uneasiness, I started to abscently let my gaze flit around the room. The clothing stacked on most of the surfaces was totally diverse in its nature. There were childreens clothes and up, right through to the dowdy old fashioned styles favoured by the older generation. And both sexes were amply accommodated for. I lifted a layer or two and found the outfits to be sorted, apparently in terms of sex, then age, then material wealth. It was like a furniture store to suit anyone, regardless of caste or upbringing. There were aisles I hadn't seen before leading to willowy grottoes of clothing it seemed would never be sold. Was this part of his rumoured process, or a by-line. Perhaps this was simply a quaint little clothing store and the transformation was of one's style as opposed to the more fantastical physical metamorphosis I had imagined from my friends' wild tales. When I considered this alternative, it suddenly seemed preposterous that I had been misled by them. Was it a big dupe? Were they just trying to set me up, and would be outside, laughing when I finally emerged, embarrassed from within. I glanced about for a back exit. I didn't want, suddenly, to have to face down the shopkeeper and try and explain what I had been talking about before. I could hear him talking on the phone now. Whoever he'd been dialling was presumably in and ready to discuss my case to ends I couldn't guess at.

                I was confused suddenly, and felt threatened by the towering piles of clothing around me. It made me remember hiding from my Father in the wardrobe as a child, of being found and beaten for my disobedience. I just wanted to leave now. There was no back way, which left only the front. So, my desire to escape superceding my embarrassment at facing the old man again, I moved timidly toward the main, open area of the store.

                Just before I rounded the corner I heard him say goodbye to the voice on the other end of the line and clink down the receiver. Damn, I thought. As I stepped back into view he was looking right at me, and I knew it would be much harder for me to leave now. While he had been on the phone I could imagine my slipping out the front door and his calling ineffectually behind me. Now though, I would have to face him if I wanted to leave and I was never too good at confrontations.

                Before I could explain away my departure he began to speak and really for me then it was too late.

                "Everything is prepared," he began, letting time drawl out his words, "I have contacted someone who is compatible with your vision, a party who would also be happy with what you have to offer." He smiled, or at least crinkled up his face. "You are very lucky. The party has had to wait a long time for a suitable mate to found. It could have been you who had to wait, but as it is, we shall be able to set you up right away." He bunched his note up into a ball in his fist and dropped into a drawer behind the counter. I looked longingly toward the door, but it seemed a thousand miles from where I stood in the mists of my own angst.

                "So," I said when my pressure of speech wore me down and he did not continue, " what will happen now? I'm not totally sure I want to continue with the service you have running here." It took a lot out of me to say that last line, and I could feel the colour hit my cheeks though the old man didn't seem to notice.

                "Well first of all," he said, "there is no charge."

                "What?!" I'd expected to be robbed blind by his charges. This was a pleasant but great surprise.

                "The other party involved put down a great deal of money to be placed in a life that suited their desires. It seems only fair that your fee be included in her payment, large that it was." He squinted at me and winked as though I were taken into his confidence, but I was sure I'd missed some detail. She?

                "When the other party arrives, the transfer will be completed in a short while, and you can go on to live your new lives in peace."

                "Wait a minute," I said, trying to catch up with what he was saying, "you said, "she." The person coming here is a woman?"

                The shopkeeper turned away from me and began rustling around in a pile of trinkets laid out behind him. "That's right," he said so I couldn't see his expression, "a woman."

                I was reeling. What did this mean then? I tried to put it all in perspective but the heavy incensual odour in the air was breaking my concentration. I started to feel heavy in my limbs and the heat dragged on my bones. I couldn't remember what we had been saying. The old man was peering at me anxiously as though he were examining a marrow in the market-place. I shook my head to straighten myself out then looked at him, not sure what to think or believe.

                "A woman?"

                The shopkeeper stepped back a little and let his expression go blank.

                "Yes," he said, "a woman. You'll be trading in your life for that of a woman, quite a powerful one as it turns out."

                This was amazing. If he was telling the truth, if everything my friends had told me was true, within half an hour, I would not be a man anymore. I would just be a woman. I would wear dresses and have smoothe legs and a pretty face, I'd wear my hair long and apply make-up every time I went out. This was a shock. I was expecting to set off into the life of someone who at least would be male. Seeing my consternation, the shopkeeper said, "you wanted a complete change," seeking to placate me.

                I was dumbfounded, but the idea had some merit the more I thought about it. Women had it comparitively easy in life. I knew quite a few from work, and their work load never seemed to be up to mine. Of course I didn't want to get involved in any way with guys. I didn't think, "great, now I'll be able to legally pursue my homosexual desires," because I didn't have any. I just came, the more I thought about it, to think that maybe it would be a good thing after all. Remember of course, that I hated my life enough to go to this crazy place originally. Becoming a woman seemed in a way to be the furthest I could get away from a life I didn't enjoy.

                So I agreed.

Golden Gloom - POOR - The Finale

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