... and the red-haired girl was sitting there on the bed, wearing a medallion.
Scott's mother's first thought was to worry for her son's safety. Having a strange person in the house was bad. Her second thoughts were of anger--this is a girl that Scott obviously knew and allowed in his room.
"Who are you?" asked Scott's father. "And what are you doing in my son's room? What have you and him been doing this past night? What if he makes you pregnant? Did you and him have sex?"
"It's a long story," she said. "But I'm going to show you." Suddenly she got up and held up the medallion whose chain was draped around her neck. She leaped forward at her/Scott's father, who instinctively raised his hands, then grabbed her wrists--but not before the medallion touched his hand for a brief second.
"Don't try to start a fight here," he said. "You'll regret it."
"You can let me go," she said. "I'm not going to fight you. But you'll find out. I hate to do this. But it's the only way to be sure."
"Be sure of what?" their father replied.
"That's a magic medallion. There's nobody else here... I used it to turn it into two people. Right, other Scott?"
"Right," he said.
"I've never heard of such nonsense in my life. Tell me who you are and what you're up to with our son."
"I found the medallion in the yard sale. I used it to become two people. One is me and the other looks like someone else--I can't change back yet. But you're going to change too."
"That's prepos--"
"I did it the only way we could. You see, normally you wear the medallion and touch it against some clothes. If you want to stop it you just take off the medallion. But if you touch the medallion to another person, you both turn into each other. The second person isn't wearing the medallion, but still turns into the first person. Since that transformation happens without wearing anything, you can't stop it! You're going to turn into the girl I look like. And nothing's probably going to happen to me since I'm in my period."
"It's true," said Scott. "Dad, look at your hands."
He didn't believe a word his son or his son's apparent girlfriend were saying, but couldn't help glance at his hands anyway. What he saw shocked him--his fingers were noticeably thinner, his nails longer. And his nails were turning red as he watched--as if being covered in nail polish.
"I didn't know it did that," said Scott #1 (female).
"I think it has to," said #2. "Yeah, nail polish isn't alive but neither are nails. They're still sort of part of you. And look at it this way, if things like that transform, you don't need to worry about problems when your teeth transform and your braces don't."
"Let me go, Dad," said #1. "I'm not a stranger, I'm Scott, even though Scott's also right next to me. I didn't break in or have sex with Scott--I didn't do anything bad! Even the medallion I really own, Mom gave it to me." She didn't mention the masturbation while transforming, of course.
He let go of the female Scott and held his hand up closer to his face to examine it. It definitely was a woman's hand now. "Change me back," he said.
"Can't," said both Scotts. The female one continued, "It takes 12 hours and you can't change during your period. I'm during my period and so are you. If it ends soon, sure I'll change you back in 12 hours. Tell you what, Dad, I'll not only change you back but make you and Mom both younger. Would that make you less mad?"
"This is... this is surreal," he said. "My voice... Is it changing?"
"I don't know," said Scott #1. "But if it's not it will soon...."
