Taking a deep breath I sip slowly at my coffee, my eyes still heavy after yet another nap. The light outside my kitchen window takes on a red hue, the constant sleeping over the past few days having made it hard to tell whether it was early or late without the help of a clock.
The flu had hit me like a bus out of nowhere, the disease sinking in and bearing its teeth as I lay sweating in bed for what must have been days. Thankfully I had survived, not in any small part due to the efforts of my neighbors. From the food delivered by the loving doughy stepmother Margaret or the newly minted mother Haley, to Gracie the goth upstairs and Kelly the young artsy student down the hall keeping it down for the week, and even Rachel my elderly landlord having Emily her usually bitchy gym bunny granddaughter help with my laundry, the whole building seemed to have helped in some way.
Rubbing the sleep from my eyes I move to grab the bottle of water on my coffee table, sipping at it in the hopes of re-hydrating before returning to the coffee. I rub at my eyes with my forearm, removing days worth of disgusting crust from my eyelashes before turning on the TV in the hopes of getting some ambient noise to cut the dull silence in the room.
As YouTube boots up I'm immediately hit with an advert, the algorithm demanding it's due before I could start watching anything. Through bleary eyes I stare ahead, barely absorbing the sights on the screen as I let the caffeine kick in.
The young woman on the screen wakes up in a hotel room, her plain face and modest slightly doughy build almost blemish free short of a small pimple or two. She climbs from the bed with a dramatic wave of the blanket, revealing her simple long white top as she paces through the room.
The light is dim, the clouds blotting out the sun beyond her lavish hotel room and leaving the white walls a dull gray.
As she approaches a seat by the window she reaches out, snatching a dark red bikini that seems terrible ill-fitted for her body. While hiding the change beneath between shots and keeping her large white night shirt on, she quickly struggles into the ill-fitting bikini top.
Suddenly, her flesh begins to shift and ripple, the effect looking more like the work of After Effects than reality. Her shoulders begin to narrow, her arms growing more slender and dainty, her chest swells with each breath as her modest bust soon shifts to a firm and perky shelf that tents her top out as it begins to slide down one of her shoulders as the top takes on an oddly duller tone.
Her pimples disappear with a little edited in sparkle, the camera twisting up to show her now masterfully made up face as she flutters her eye lashes dramatically and her plush painted lips twist into a grin.
The light outside begins to shine more brightly, the once plain and soft young woman turned bombshell strutting her way out towards the balcony before the logo overtakes the screen.
Changing - More than just fashion
Changing had hit the market only a few months back and had been making dramatic waves in the fashion and cosmetics space. From their first show to their dramatic claims, many had called them fakers and charlatans.
The claim, at least made in each of their ads, was simple. Somehow, these seemingly normal pieces of clothing had a very special feature that forced the wearer to conform to the style of the clothes. These otherwise unassuming pieces of fabric purported to twist and bend the wearers body, molding them like clay to mirror some pre-chosen 'form' built into each item of clothing before 'releasing' a piece of clothing to be used to return to normal.
Few really knew 'how' the clothes were made, many onlookers chalking it up to puffery and marketing without ever having seen the clothes or tried them themselves. It didn't help that many of the viewings of these rare items tended to be behind a screen, something that could easily be edited and altered to make the dramatic effects all the more fantastical.
In reality, the clothes worked quite precisely as advertised, the fibers in each item having absorbed something akin to the essence of a previous wearer. Made slowly over time, these clothes were better described as second hand thanks to the extensive wear they had received from their former owners in order to give the clothes their special transformative quality.
Over time, after days and days of wear, the clothes would leech out and remember the body type of their wearer. The slow version thankfully not having too much of a deleterious effect on the initial wearer.
Once washed, packaged, and purchased by a new wearer this built up essence would rush into the new host, immediately twisting and contorting the wearer to fit the memorized shape. The wearers own body shape would be forced out for the most part with the remainder blending slightly into their new shape, the speed of the transformation causing the process to be more sudden and violent, making wearing a compatible piece of clothing to capture it a requirement in order to ever return back to normal.
Beyond just body shape, the memories withing the fabric extended to anything the body could really convey. From stride and motion to nerves and arousal, the accidental transference of these came as a minor cost to the removal of blemishes and the dramatic enhancing of the wearers physique.
However, due to the long production time, and the proprietary technology used in each and every fiber of the clothing each piece was not only rare but more expensive than many would ever consider testing out.
I'm forced to fight down a yawn as the ad ends, the high energy let's play coming on shortly after making me almost forget what had just been on screen mere moments ago. With one last swing I drain my coffee, the heavy blanket of sleep still hanging about me and leaving me craving another mug.
Heaving myself to my feet I shuffle towards the kitchen, quickly refilling my large mug with another batch of the bitter and foul tasting instant that had come to be my usual in order to save on costs. Scowling as I sip at the acrid black liquid, I nearly spit the mouthful out as I hear a loud knocking at my door.
Still unsure as to what time it even was, the red light from outside neither starting to brighten or dim, I slowly move towards the front door as the knocking only grows louder and more frequent.
"What is it?" I groan, reaching the door and unlocking it with one hand as I try to drain away the coffee in the other. "Do you know what time it..." I begin to ask, not sure myself but feeling like it was simply not the right hour for all this noise.
My words fall short however as my gaze falls to the source of the noise, my sleep encrusted eyes blinking rapidly as I take in the blurred shape of...
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