”Charles is here?” Rachel was a bit excited -- she’d had a crush on Cassie’s older brother for a few years now, but she didn’t see him much now that he was in college and living in an apartment near the campus.
”Yeah, he gets out of class early on Thursdays, and usually comes over here to do his laundry and get a home-cooked meal,” Cassie said. “So just go downstairs and try giving him the curse in a way that’ll make him change me back to normal.”
”Uh, okay,” said Rachel, now slightly nervous. “I guess I’ll be back with Charles.”
Rachel went downstairs to look for Cassie’s brother, finding him reading a magazine at the kitchen table, overstuffed laundry bag at his feet. She cleared her throat quietly, then slightly louder.
Charles looked up. “Oh, hey, Rachel. Where’s Cassie? Hot date tonight?”
It was then that Rachel realized she was still wearing Cassie’s skimpy minidress. “Not exactly,” she said.
”Okay,” said Charles, going back to his father’s copy of Sports Illustrated.
”Look, uh, something’s happened to Cassie.”
Charles snapped his head back up. “Is she all right?”
”Yeah. It’s not an emergency or anything. It’s just --“ Rachel took a deep breath. “This is gonna sound weird, but you know about the ‘town curse,’ right?”
”Transform or Dare?” Charles asked. “Of course, I heard all those stories on Boy Scout camping trips. What’s that got to do with Cassie?”
”It’s real,” said Rachel. “Cassie got cursed. Then she cursed me to wear this, although I guess I could have taken it off --“
”O-o-o-o-okay,” interrupted Charles. “I thought you two were too old for this shit.”
”It’s true, I swear,” Rachel said with a bit of a whine. “I’ll prove it -- transform or dare?”
Charles grinned. “Okay, I’ll say ‘transform.’ Go ahead, transform me into something.” He held up the magazine, open to an ad featuring a shirtless, well-muscled football player. “I wouldn’t mind looking like him, but make sure you don’t skimp on the genitals.”
”I can’t -- I need to get Cassie turned back to normal,” Rachel said. “Uh, for your transformation, I want you to transform into someone with unlimited magic powers.”