I didn't know why I was doing it. I'd entered this store just to see if I could use their phone, since my cell phone had died. But instead I'd found myself drawn over to the women's clothing section, for no reason I could explain. There was no reason I should be over here, yet I was. It wasn't like it was against my will, exactly - I didn't feel like I was being forced, there was just this gap between what I was doing and what I could offer myself any explanation for.
That gap only widened further when I found myself browsing the racks. There was no reason for this. I didn't normally have an interest in this kind of thing. Why was I here? My gaze came to rest on a hanger which held a light jacket. It was striped with a dark purple and charcoal grey, the contrast between the two so minor than you might not notice it was patterned at all from a distance. Without even thinking about it, I plucked it off the rack, and only a little nagging voice in the back of my head that said What are you going to say if someone says something? reminded me that there was still no reason for this to be happening.
I started looking through the women's jeans, also without any good reason. This was so peculiar; it was like I was on autopilot, yet I didn't feel deprived of control. I just...wasn't stopping, and I didn't know why. It was like some kind of fugue state, yet I was perfectly conscious of everything I was doing. I settled on a simple pair of black jeans, not too skinny, but nicely cut, and took them off the rack as well.
Why was I doing this? I couldn't understand it. If anybody had asked me why I had picked out a woman's jacket and jeans, why I was grabbing a white babydoll tee off the rack, why I was heading back to the changing rooms, I couldn't have even begun to explain it to them. Fortunately for me, no-one was around to take notice, and I slipped into one of the stalls, closing the door behind me.
With just as little fanfare and just as little understanding of why as everything that had come before, I pulled off my shoes, pants, and shirt, and took the T-shirt off the hanger. Despite the fact that it should've been too small for me, I slid it over my head and down my torso with ease, pulling it snugly into place. The neckline came down to a little below my collarbone. Then I unclipped the hanger from the jeans, stepped into them, and slid them up my legs, having just as little trouble with the fact that there was no way they should've fit. I tucked the shirt into the waistband.
Then, finally, I removed the jacket and slid first one arm and then the other into the sleeves. The inside was soft and cottony and it fit me snugly. I zipped it up most of the way, leaving it open just a little below the neckline of the shirt, still with no idea of why I was doing any of this.
Then I blinked.
For that fraction of a second that my eyes were closed, I felt a sudden jar in the continuity of things. Not like a record skip, more like a single dropped frame on a video player - just the smallest, most barely perceptible slip. I looked up.
Reflected back at me in the mirror of the changing stall was a girl of about eighteen or nineteen. She was short, not particularly curvy, and a bit small in the chest; it was mostly her hips and face that made it clear that she was a young woman and not a fourteen-year-old girl. She had short, loosely-arranged black hair and a soft, pensive face, and wore dark-rimmed glasses, a white T-shirt, black jeans, and a purple-and-grey jacket.
And the spell was broken.
I stared. This couldn't be real. I raised my hand, and she raised her hand. I ran a hand down my womanly ass, and she did the same. I cupped my new breasts, smallish but still appreciably there, and I could see her lifting the weight that I felt my own hands lifting, and felt being lifted by my own hands. Pulling the collar of the shirt out, I looked down to see them in there, supported by a plain white brassiere. I gingerly felt around the crotch of my pants, and there was no mistaking it. Somehow, I had become a girl. This girl.
No longer in the fugue state that had brought me in here, but still too dazed to do much in the way of panicking, I looked around the stall. There were my own clothes; I had the brief idea of putting them on and seeing if they changed me back, but then I noticed the shape and strap of a purse peeking out from under them. Already guessing, I picked them up. Sure enough, they had changed - still loose-fitting blue jeans and a nondescript black T-shirt, but smaller and cut for a woman. I looked down to see my shoes, also changed to fit my smaller feet. That was out, then - but what could I do now?
Still dazed, I slipped on my shoes, folded my clothes and slipped them into what must be my purse, and exited the changing room. I made my way up to the checkout counter, where a girl was working the register. "E-excuse me," I said, hearing my new quiet alto for the first time, then stopped. What was I going to say? "Pardon me, but I went into a fugue state and put on some of your women's clothing and was transformed into a girl?" She'd think I was crazy...wouldn't she? Unless this was some sort of magic store and she knew what this stuff did...?
"Yes?" she said, smiling. "Everything fit alright, miss...?"
"Ah—Erin," I said, the name coming unbidden to my lips, with just as little explanation as any of this. What was I going to tell her?