Ryan's eyes were caught by a pair of boat shoes: brown leather still shining with newness, bright white soles and light leather laces threaded through them. They looked like the kind of shoes worn by dads vacationing on Nantucket, or preppy frat boys in salmon shorts: definitely not Ryan's type. However, the leather looked so new that he was tempted to try them on, just to feel what they were like.
Ryan picked them up off the shelf and looked at the label. Size 8. Too bad, since he was size 9. Looking around, it seemed like these were the only pair. He'd already removed his old shoes, and looked down at his white socked feet before getting an idea. Guys wore boat shoes without socks right? He could simply try them on in bare feet and they'd fit!
Ryan was pretty sure stores discouraged customers from putting their bare feet in new shoes, but it didn't look like anyone was around to stop him. Glancing up and down the aisle, Ryan used his toes to pull off first one, and then the other sock, leaving him standing barefoot on the store's carpeted floor. He slipped one bare foot into a waiting boat shoe. He had to reach down and pull the back of the heel over his ankle: it was still pretty tight, but the leather felt good, stiff with newness but conforming perfectly to his foot. He put on the second shoe then, which felt a little easier.
He stood for a moment, admiring the shoes, before deciding that they were indeed too small, as good as they felt. He felt warm as well: the store's temperature seemed to have risen, and he didn't want to get sweaty feet while he was barefoot in these nice new shoes. He lifted one foot to pull the boat shoe off, but encountered something strange: the shoe seemed stuck! He wiggled the heel and tugged, trying to loosen it, but the shoe just wouldn't budge. Ryan laughed, feeling kind of stupid, and then tried to hook his fingers into the edge of the shoe's opening to peel the leather back. His efforts, combined with the definitely rising heat were causing him to sweat even more. In fact, he could feel his foot sticking to to the leather now. He scrabbled at the shoe now, shaking it and pulling. Looking closer, he gasped!
The dark brown leather of the shoe no longer ended at the shoe's opening. Where moments ago he had felt the crisp leather tongue of the shoe and the padding of the opening encircling his ankle, now it looked as if the leather continued, rising to hiking-boot height but then simply fusing with his own skin! Ryan blinked hard, and reached out to touch the place where his light skin and the dark brown leather merged. It felt just like shoe leather, yet he could feel his own fingers brushing the surface. As he watched, the leather color and texture rose slightly higher.
"Whoa! WTF!" Ryan kicked frantically, trying to rid his foot of the boat shoe, but he could no longer feel any difference between the shoe and his own body. He set his foot down, and noticed that he could feel the floor through both feet, right through his shoes, as if they were simply extensions of himself. This was too weird: I need to get out of here! he thought.
Running down the aisle, suddenly his steps slowed as a new feeling emerged: it was as if his feet were hollowing out. Sweating profusely now with fear and confusing, Ryan looked down just in time to see the boat shoes deflate, going from shiny leather stretched around his foot to seemingly empty. In a moment, Ryan was pitched forward, still attached to the shoes, but not longer supported by anything but the leather and rubber soles.
Yelling, Ryan crawled forward on the carpet, but was met with a fresh surprise: glancing back, the shoes looked closer and larger than they should. He could feel his legs shortening, while at the same time the shoes seemed to be adding mass, stretching out more as his own body became part of them. He was melting backward into the shoes! Looking ahead, he realized that just as the shoes were growing, he was shrinking! He felt the carpet rub against his chest as he was dragged backward toward the shoes. His pants seemed to be absorbing into the shoes as well: but his shirt remained, billowing larger and larger around him as he felt his body morphing. He couldn't kick anymore: almost all of his legs were now part of the shoes! Feebly, he tried to move, causing the shoes to jerk slightly, but nothing more.
When he felt the changes reach his dick, Ryan knew it was all over. As the shoes reached his crotch, he felt his dick and balls seem to melt, splitting and merging with the shoe leather. Just a few feet away, Ryan could now see the shoes up close. As he body merged with them, he noticed the leather was no longer so shiny and new: these shoes looked like they'd been worn a good deal, with lines in the leather and scuff marks on them. As his ass melted too, the shoes began to acquire an aroma of sweat, as if they'd been worn barefoot on summer days. Even though Ryan was much smaller now, he could tell the shoes had grown: they were at least size 11 or 12 now. He was terrified, and surprised he'd notice a thing like that.
"Help! Someone! Hellllp!" Ryan called out, but as he did his voice seemed to be fading. His upper body was now mostly absorbed, splitting midway down his chest as he seemed to flow into the shoes. He would have thrown up, but his stomach had vanished. When the changes reached his armpits, he suddenly felt the bones in his arms soften and shrink, and watched as they became new leather straps. Although he could no longer control them, his new arm-laces threaded through the additional holes in the now larger shoes, binding him in place. The smell of sweat and feet and old leather was intense now, and the surface of the shoes - his own skin, he thought wildly - was darkening still further, stained from seemingly years of wear.
At last, he could see nothing but the insole of the shoe, as his head became the only thing left of him. He must look horrific, a small head now the only thing connecting two cast-off boat shoes in an abandoned store. He didn't have long to think about that though. Suddenly his vision blurred, seeming to spiral outward, and then it stopped. He was no longer melting. He could see, in a way, the world above him: the ceiling of the store, the racks of shoes, and he could feel himself in two different places, divided now between the pair of old, stinking leather boat shoes. He could make no sound, and could not move any part of himself.
Suddenly he was blinded with light, as his surroundings popped out of existence and he found himself transported somewhere else. He was lying in sunlight, in green grass! His momentary excitement was dashed when he realized he could still neither speak nor move: he was still shoes.
Just then, he heard a shout, and a man ran up to him, looking like a giant pounding across the grassy expanse. The man was in his early twenties, about what Ryan's age would have been: he was shirtless, and wearing salmon shorts. "Yo, wait up! Just grabbing my shoes!" He scooped Ryan up, and then jogged across the grass toward a group of his friends. Ryan felt himself dropped on pavement, and then the strangest sensation yet: he felt the man's foot slip inside him. It was like being filled to bursting in less than a second, every orifice jammed full with another person's body. For a moment, Ryan felt like he would scream even without a mouth or voice. But, as he felt the other half of himself filled too, a new feeling began to set in: pleasure. Ryan's mind dimmed, as his world reduced to the sensations of being another man's old shoes.