Douglas & Co. used to be a male clothing store specialized in top designer brands. But as the years went on, the economical recession slowly turned it into yet another cheap outlet store. Located right in the middle of Main St., hundreds of people passed by the windows of this store every single day.
The four mannequins placed in the store window were completely identical in design. They were made of black plastic, their heads bald and featureless so they wouldn’t distract from the selling product while their bodies had their muscles carefully crafted in order to give gullible men the illusion that by putting these clothes on they would look as muscular as the models.
It was nearly summer season, and the mannequins were dressed accordingly. One wore a bright blue T-shirt, shorts and sandals, while the most covered one wore a sleeveless white T-shirt and sneakers with his fingers sticking out from the pocket of its jeans. The other two wore brightly colored swimming briefs and nothing else.
Douglas himself was an overweight man dressed in elegant clothes. Right now he was attending a customer whose face looked like a duck’s.
“Yeah, don’t you have these jeans in size M?” Whined the ugly customer showing Douglas the specific model he wanted. “These are too large...”
“Mmm... I don’t think so...Oh, I know! I think I have one of these on the display window... Hold on a sec.”
Douglas squeezed his large body into the mannequin display, and immediately saw what he was looking for.
He positioned himself behind the mannequin with the jeans and checked their label. “Yep, these are M-sized... Down with me you go!”
The fat man removed the mannequin’s pants without facing any resistance from the inanimate object. Below the pants there was no trace of underwear, which made perfect sense. Why bother dressing mannequins with articles of clothing that wouldn’t be visible to the prospective buyers?
After Douglas had for all that was worth pantsed the mannequin in front of hundreds of eyes, the obese man came back and sold the jeans to the duck-faced customer.
The mannequin was exposing its crotch to everyone outside. And there was nothing it could do to change that. Its thumbs were still sticking out outward from his thighs. They had been positioned like that so the object would look cocky with its hands inside the pockets of its jeans but now they just served to call more attention to its groin.
But as much as the mannequin waited, the store owner didn’t bother replacing its pants. He was busy attending some business calls and quickly forgot all about the exhibitionist object in a short while.
Women and men of all ages could see the immodestly-dressed mannequin. Some of them just took a quick curious glance, others, like a small boy, pointed and laughed for a while. An angry father took a photo from the figure so he could post an online complaint later.
The mannequin’s faceless head looked like it was starting to sweat in utter shame at its unwanted exposure, but most probably it was just the humidity.
If only Douglas noticed the small difference between this particular mannequin and the other three...
The mannequin could only appreciably stare back at the prying eyes looking at its body and at the clock on the other side of the street which read ‘12:30 PM’.
“You’ve gotta be shitting me...” Was the mannequin’s most prevalent thought.
***
At 4:59 PM Douglas closed the blinds of the store. It was a bit early, but for some strange reason no customers had come in since morning.
The fat man heard something move over the mannequin stand but didn’t give it a second thought. He just kept on getting ready to go home.
Now one of the mannequins fell into the floor with a thud. Douglas came over and saw something absurd. The mannequin with the sleeveless white shirt was stealing the shorts from the one on its right.
But the fat man just rolled his eyes. “Quinn, what the hell are you doing? Are you in a fight with one of your ‘co-workers’? Hahaha.”
The black mannequin flipped Douglas the bird as he kept on putting the shorts on. Once properly dressed, the black plastic changed bit by bit into pink flesh, and Quinn’s face materialized on the previously blank head.
“Ugh! Finally!” Said Quinn. The man was like a younger, fitter, and obviously better-looking version of Douglas, who was his older brother. Quinn was relieved to be his human-self again, but right now he had all the right to be pissed. “What the hell, man?! You fucking pantsed me!”
“Oh! So the one with the jeans was you? Hahaha, now that’s funny.” Douglas said without holding back his laughter. “You know I can’t tell you apart from the regular mannequins once you’ve changed. Besides, when you’re a mannequin you’re...well...a mannequin! Nobody will have noticed, you fuckers have smooth bulges down there!”
Quinn’s face got all red. “That’s where you are wrong! Didn’t you pay attention to my crotch when you dressed me up for display?”
“You know I’m not the kind of guy who does that.” Douglas replied. He kinda had a point.
Quinn sighed. “Well, I don’t know how you could’ve missed something this huge, but there’s a certain visual difference between my mannequin body and the others you placed here...My ‘bulge’ is a penis!”
“It didn’t seem that *huge* to me...” Douglas replied. He kinda had a point. Again.
“Stop mocking me! You’re not the one who has been exposing his dick for nearly five hours at everyone!”
Something clicked in Douglas’ mind. “That explains why everybody was too embarrassed to enter...Umm... You know, when you offered to help at work in exchange for a place to live I thought you wouldn’t have any... ‘defects’ compared to a regular mannequin. Maybe you should think about fixing that ‘problem’ or I’m gonna have to sell you to the nearest sex shop.
Quinn quickly covered his crotch in fear. “That’s not gonna happen!”
Douglas laughed again. “Hahaha. Just joking.” Quinn couldn’t tell if that was the truth. “But you should get accustomed to being a mannequin from 9-to-5. You said it was irreversible, right?”
“Yeah...The rules from the curse were...”
Rule 1: Quinn will become a featureless mannequin from 9 AM to 5 PM every single day for the rest of his pathetic life, so everyone can see how much of a fake of a man he is.
Rule 2: Quinn won’t be able to move at all, he’ll be completely at the mercy of others during those hours. Doesn’t it hurt to be used and then thrown off like an object, jerk?
Rule 3: The only opportunity for Quinn to recover his human flesh outside those hours is to be decent for a fucking change.
“You certainly should have treated your date better.” Said Douglas. “Umm...? What does rule 3 mean? Is kinda vague.”
“I wasn’t completely sure myself, but did you notice how today I could move freely from 5 PM but I didn’t recover my human flesh and my voice until I put some pants on? Maybe that’s what it meant...”
It was time to go home. But Quinn didn’t feel at ease.
“Ugh, I hate this crazy life... I hope tomorrow isn’t as rough...”
Douglas looked at him in the eyes and smiled.