The girls all went back to Samantha's room since her dorm room was the largest and both her roommates had gone home for the weekend. Since getting the game was her idea she had the honor of opening it up and reading the rules.
"Roll the dice to see how many spaces your piece moves and then draw a card to see what change(s) you get," she stopped at that point and looked at the others, "That's odd, there's no explanation of what it means by changes."
"Well, what else does it say?" Tracy asked as she looked at the different colored squares on the board and the little game pieces, which looked like tiny human forms.
"Just that the winner is the first one to get to the center of the board and that they get to make a wish, but it doesn't explain what it means by a wish either," Samantha frowned, and searched around for another piece of paper, hoping to find the rest of the rules.
"Should we read what the change cards say?" Emily held up the stack of white cards, but Tracy took them from her.
"No, that might spoil things," she put the cards on the floor and put a game piece in the starting area, "Let's just start and see how it goes."
"Sounds like a plan to me," Sandra took her piece and put it in the starting area.
Samantha and Emily did the same, then all the girls stopped to look at the dice, suddenly feeling nervous for some strange reason.
"Well, go on," Tracy gestured to Samantha, "Your game, you first."
"Nah," Samantha shook her head, "How about you Emily? You're the one who wanted to read the cards, so you get the first go."
"Sure," Emily took the dice and rolled them, letting them drop into the empty box the game came in.
"Five, my lucky number," she said as she moved her piece forward five spaces and took a card, "Oh wow, it's a weird little rhyme."
"What's it say?" Tracy and Samantha said at almost the same time.
"It says: 'You're the shortest of the group / Don't ask how I know / But all things start out small / And then they start to grow. Beneath that it had in parenthesis that I need to roll the dice again to see how much by."
"That's really strange," Samantha said with a frown, not liking how stupid the game seemed to far, "I guess you get another turn. Maybe the card you draw next will make more sense."
"Hopefully," Tracy muttered, "Otherwise this is going to be a very boring night."
Nodding, Emily rolled again, getting doubles, two sixes for a total of twelve. Crossing her fingers she reached to move her piece when a shudder ran through her.
"What's wrong?" Sandra leaned forward, looking concerned.
"Nothing's wr-" Emily started to say, but stopped when another shudder ran through her. This time it was followed by an odd pressure, as though her clothing was too tight. She wiggled and tried to adjust it, but the feeling only got worse.
"Holy crap!" Tracy practically jumped back, "No freaking way!"
"What?" Emily stood up as well, hoping to discover what it was that Tracy had seen only to realize that she was looking right into Tracy's wide, frightened looking eyes when previously Tracy had been nearly a foot taller than her.
"You - you grew!" Sandra squeaked, "But that's impossible!"
"Well, Samantha spoke so quietly that it was almost impossible to hear her, "I guess that answers what the rules meant by changes."
"Maybe we should stop?" Tracy offered, though she seemed uncertain even of that.
Emily looked down at herself, how her ankles were now visible sticking out beyond the legs of her jeans, "We can't stop with me like this! How the hell will I explain this to my parents? How do I change back?"
Samantha reached for the rules, but they were the same as before, though perhaps they made a bit more sense, "Maybe we need to finish the game, I mean it does say that the winner gets to make a wish, so maybe that means the winner wishes things back to the way they were before?"
She didn't sound terribly certain, but in a situation like this, when the very rules of reality seemed to have vanished, it was hard to be certain of anything.
"I guess so," Emily sat back down and tried to get comfortable with her clothing now at least a size too small, "No one roll anymore sixes though, otherwise we'll get too big."
Tracy sat down a moment later, giggling nervously, "Who's next?"