Alice hurried up to her room and locked the door behind her. She felt so... so... stupid. How could changing Tim's outer appearance not have had some impact on his personality? His sweet, lovable personality. Until now, having just lost Tim's almost cute way of failing to hide his crush on her with half-baked excuses and funny banter, Alice hadn't considered just how she'd rather liked that tiny bit of attention--how that made her feel seen, somewhat. Comparing how Tim used to be before she'd changed him with how he now was being with her after she'd transformed him into her dream boyfriend, and then having that dream boyfriend version of Tim friend zoning her as some awkward little sister figure hurt her feelings more than she'd thought it could have. And what hurt even more was the way he'd apologized so sincerely at the end. The apology and how nice and Tim-like it was just stuck the dagger in her heart deeper and twisted it.
It hurt to realize that her dream boyfriend didn't seen her as ideal, sure, but what truly hurt now is that it was Tim who'd done it. Tim who sweetly stood up to a bully for her when she'd bitten off more than she could chew in preschool, despite being an undersized shrimp who'd gotten pulverized himself for doing so, the fact he'd done it had endeared him to her. It had been the first time he'd shown he wasn't as creep-mouse as he otherwise seemed. But now, with him a tad more self-confident, and a little bit older, not to mention better physically developed, Tim in this reality wasn't hanging his hopes on her at all. She was instead... and it sucked. It just sucked all around.
In an odd way she'd put herself now into Tim's old shoes, being the younger looking crushee afraid of being friend zoned by their crush. And if it sucked for her, just how much must it have sucked for him? Enough that he'd chickened out of ever finding out the truth. And what was the truth? She thought she hadn't been interested. She'd changed him into the perfect physical boyfriend for her, kept most of his personality intact and it'd all just backfired into her hoisting herself by her own petard.
Perhaps she could have given old Tim a chance? Perhaps she should have just been honest that it was his personality she liked, and that that mattered more to her than how he looked. Perhaps she could have been honest to him and apologized for not seeing him that way. Maybe instead of dreaming up an ideal version of a boyfriend, she could have figured out what she actually wanted from a partner. Maybe she should have actually tried dating someone instead of weirdly hanging out with Tim all the time. And maybe she shouldn't have just transformed Tim willy nilly without first asking him if he wanted to be transformed--and thinking things through a bit before leaping into them. Just then a knock was heard.
"Hey, Alice, can we talk?" asked Tim from the other side of the door.