Tim entered the Hodgson's family home with a bit of a spring in his step. Sure, it was weird as hell having everyone treat him like he was a ten-year old girl. But part of him had actually had a lot fun out on the soccer fields that afternoon. As a gangly, nerdy geek boy, Tim had never excelled at sports. For the first time today, he was an athletic superstar. His team won, all the other girls had congratulated him, the coach told him he'd been fantastic, and Paul's mom thought he could actually turn pro.
Of course, Tim had to remind himself, she was referring to his becoming a professional female soccer player. Hardly the future Tim had ever had in mind for himself.
No, he had to return back to his own nebbish, milquetoast (and male) life. But in the meantime, there was no reason why he couldn't enjoy the silver lining on this particular cloud. He was a loser as a fifteen-year old boy, but he really kicked butt today as a ten-year old girl.
Without bothering to change out of Melissa's uniform, he skipped happily up the attic stairs, eager to encounter Paul.
“Hey, Paul!” he said, opening the attic door. “You'll never believe what happened today?”
Paul looked up wearily from the spell book. He'd apparently been doing nothing else all day but pouring over the enigmatic, eldritch text contained therein. The real Melissa was nowhere in sight.
“I scored four goals today,” Tim said eagerly. “Our team won. Everyone was congratulating me. The coach personally came over and said I was great, and that all my hard work and practice was really paying off. Everyone on the team was saying how I was the star player today! And "mom" thinks I could actually turn pro someday!”
“She's not your mom,” said Paul quietly. “And you're not really a ten-year old girl who enjoys playing soccer.”
“Yeah, yeah, I know that,” sighed Tim. “It was just a lot of fun. I'm still pumped with lots of energy over how well today went! You know I've never been athletic before. Well, today it was really exciting to be great.”
“Good,” said Paul without smiling. “That's... that's really good for you.”
“Paul, what's wrong?” asked Tim.
“I can't find any way of reversing the spell,” he said flatly. “I've been over it and over it. Timmy... you may be stuck like this for awhile.”
“What're you saying?” asked Tim.
“You seriously might have a future as a woman soccer player,” replied Paul. “I don't know how to tell you this, Timmy... but... but...”