Satisfaction Brought Them Back

John became conscious slowly, and first noticed a soothing sensation on the top of his head. It was as if someone was petting his ears, but that couldn’t have been right, his ears were…he tenderly lifted his hands up to check in the place where his ears normally would be. He found nothing but silky hair and soft skin. The sensation stopped, as if responding to his attempts to gain some idea of where his ears were.

Finally, he found his ears, though they were…covered in hair? He opened his eyes in shock and let out a sound halfway between a yell and something bestial, much higher pitched than he was used to. He looked up to see Alexis making a “shhh” motion with her finger to her lips. He nodded and calmed himself down. He hoped that hadn’t startled mom into figuring out what was going on.

As he collected himself, he decided to take a look down. His body was skinny and lithe, lacking the muscle he’d been working on before. He’d never had a body like this, and he couldn’t help but feel as if it fit him. As he rolled out of Alexis’ arms and flopped onto the floor, he made an ‘eep’ sound as he noticed sharp pain from his chest. He winced and rolled back over, hoping to alleviate it.

As he did, he noticed the source of the issues, and turned bright red, his tail swishing behind him frantically, almost slapping the floor. He paused for a moment…tail, breasts, weird ears. Oh no, the spell had gone wrong, he had turned into a freak of nature. He reached into the pockets of his jeans, which were hardly even hanging off of him anymore, and turned the camera on front view.

He gasped to see…a small catgirl. From the ears and tail, it seemed like she was a tortoiseshell. He saw her blushed and realized…he was blushing, that was him. She was beautiful, he was beautiful. And a girl. And he didn’t feel even halfway bad about it. He turned to face Alexis, who was looking concernedly at him.

“Um…is John still a good name for you?” she asked.

John thought for a few seconds and then said, “I think Lydia might be better while I’m stuck like this.”

Alexis nodded solemnly and wrapped her in a hug. “I’m sorry this happened to you, I’ll let your mom know it’s all my fault, we’ll get you changed back, I promise,” she said, beginning to cry.

“It’s alright,” Lydia said, “I’m not upset or anything, even if I am a little nervous about how mom’s gonna react.”

“You’re not mad?” Alexis blubbered, raising her eyebrows as she wiped the tears and snot away.

“Of course I’m a little bit angry that this happened as a surprise, but I don’t feel uncomfortable or anything. If anything, it’s super easy to be comfy.” She demonstrated by snuggling into Alexis.

Alexis cocked her head at the small catgirl. This was her friend, formerly John, now Lydia, and she seemed…happy about her new form. Despite the fact that she only wanted to drop an inch or two, she had somehow lost more than a foot of height. She remembered there was something somewhere online about contacting Cindy if the spell went wrong…she’d have to look it up shortly.

Just as Lydia was getting cozy, her pocket vibrated with a familiar ringtone. Only one person could be calling this time of night. Absent-mindedly, she picked up the phone and answered. “Hi Luther, what’s up?” she said, immediately covering her mouth as she realized how distinctly feminine her voice was.

“Hi…is John there?” a deep but clearly feminine voice answered from the other side. It sounded kind of like Luther’s mom, but…she knew Luther’s mom had a lisp and this person had said the ‘th’ perfectly.

“Who am I speaking to?” Lydia cautiously asked.

“Can you just put John on the phone, darn it?”

“He’s present and in the room, who are you?”

“Umm, oh fuck, I can’t tell you, but I don’t know who else to tell.”

“You’re safe to tell us, it’s just John, a friend, and me,” Alexis spoke up, sensing the tension.

“Promise not to tell a soul?” the voice asked.

“On our hearts,” Lydia responded.

“I…I don’t know how it happened, I just wanted to do the spell to get cat ears, and like, pretend it was a prank and show up to school but then I turned into a girl with cat ears and a tail and even whiskers. I’m Luther, or I was? I don’t know anymore,” the voice spoke slowly.

“That’s a funny coincidence,” Lydia said.

“Why’s that?”

“I’m John. I want to go by Lydia until we can fix this, I think,” she replied.

“Y…you’re John? Big burly basketball guy John?”

Lydia looked down, noting her lack of any and all muscle and large stature “Not anymore, I suppose. I think I must be like 4’11” now.”

“Jeez,” Luther whispered.

“Yeah, we um, we both did the spell but I think I lost focus? I only wanted to lose an inch or two of height. Alexis is totally fine, aside from a strip of blue hair,” she said.

“Haha that’s crazy. Hey um, this might sound kind of weird, but do you think you could send a pic of how you look?” Luther said, nervously.

“Sure!” Lydia chirped eagerly, taking a selfie from an angle that was not exactly photogenic, (but then again, taking selfies is a skill) and texting Luther the pic.

There was silence on the line for almost half a minute. Lydia was worried she’d alienated her friend. Maybe he didn’t like the way she looked. She felt her ears slowly begin to droop and her tail flick with anxiety.

“Um, Lydia,” Luther spoke, his voice tinged with some kind of nervousness.

“Yeah Luther?”

“You…you know you’re really cute, right?”

Lydia blushed and felt her face go red. Was he still into girls, even though he was in a girl’s body? Hm, that really…that didn’t make sense. Girls were into guys. Maybe the brain didn’t change, just the body? For some reason, that thought made her a little sad. Before she could ruminate further, a text pinged in her pocket. It was a picture from Luther.

“I uh…I sent you a picture too, I figured it’s only fair,” Luther said shyly. Another catgirl with green eyes and black fur had taken the selfie, her hair looking similar to Luther’s, if not a bit more cleanly cut, into more of a, what did they call it, pixie cut? She made something inside Lydia flutter, and she realized…she was very much into girls still. Especially this one. Wait, that was Luther, a guy. She was a guy too. She shouldn’t be doing this.

“Jeez, the silence says everything haha,” Luther said.

“I…no, Luther, you’re super pretty it’s just um…”

“If I was pretty, you wouldn’t need to qualify it.”

“Luther,” Alexis said, once again rescuing the conversation, “I think she’s got a crush on you.”

“I do not!!!” Lydia exclaimed, burying her face into the oversized sleeves of her sweater, “I just think she..he’s really gorgeous.”

The room sat in silence for a few moments while everyone came to terms with what was happening. In the span of about a half hour, three spells had been cast, two of them turning the casters into catgirls. Now, one of the catgirls, who was still probably a guy, was in love with the other. Lydia was absentmindedly petting her tail, trying to calm down, while Alexis twiddled her thumbs, occasionally glancing appraisingly in Lydia’s direction.

“Well,” Alexis finally spoke, “we should probably get around to investigating how to reverse this. I’ve heard there’s a helpline or something for Cindy’s spell.”

Lydia felt a pang of sadness in her gut, and that…confused her. She wanted mom and dad to not find out, sure, but…she wondered if she could keep the ears, at least. She knew that she could always just magic them back, but she wasn’t sure if she wanted that. She eventually sighed and said, “yeah.”

Luther, on the other end, also assented and Lydia got to work browsing her phone for information.