It was strange to see the mall parking lot so empty. There were only a few cars, and none of them were near the entrances to the buildings. They all seemed to be parked behind a yellow line painted a dozen or so spaces back.
But it made sense: everyone was at the beach. Probably the only reason there were any cars at all were because of the wish Athena had made to ensure people fulfilled their societal roles, and you had to have employees to have a mall.
So Jon and Athena thought that they would be prepared for entering a practically empty mall. They were not.
You see, when you're at the beach and it's full of identical teenage girls in identical green bikinis, you may be taken aback for a moment, but somewhere in your brain it makes sense. Girls in bikinis belong at the beach. But when you're at the mall, and every storefront is populated by precisely one such teenage girl in a green bikini, it somehow sets off subconscious alarm bells.
"Ugh," Jon's shudder was not from the air conditioning, "Why did you bring us here, Athena?"
"I have an idea, but we need some supplies, and I like the lady who works in the mall occult shop better than the one from next to the supermarket."
Jon did not feel like pointing out that the lady who worked in the mall occult shop was now identical to the lady in the shop next to the supermarket. They were both Sarah.
Jon had other thoughts on her mind. Her discomfort was starting to get the better of her, and all she wanted to do was change out of this accursed bikini.
"We have to make a stop first," Jon tugged at Athena's arm and dragged her into the first clothing store she saw, a Macy's. "I need to get out of this swimsuit."
"Oh wow, those are cute bikinis, did you just come from the beach?" A smiling Sarah with the name 'Diane' tattooed to her collarbone approached the pair.
Jon let Athena handle the pleasantries and busied herself with poking through a rack of blouses. That one looked too old. The green one was cute but Jon wanted to go away from green. The pink halter top looked just too Sarah for Jon's liking. Jon stopped. She reached out her hand and pulled out a hanger. It was a baby blue drop-sleeve peasant blouse, and it would leave plenty of chest exposed. Did it leave too much chest exposed? Jon banished the thought. No such thing as too much exposed chest. Yes, this was the top for Jon. She turned around to a display of skinny jeans and pulled a pair in her size before marching past Athena and Diane, towards the fitting rooms.
Barely a minute later, Jon was looking at herself in the fitting room mirror, but she really didn't need to. Somehow she just knew this outfit would look hot on her.
She stopped. Frowned. How did she know that? Was it really just from the fashion show she'd had with her family the night before? From seeing so many copies of herself at the beach? Or was something else going on that she wasn't fully conscious of?
No. She still knew she was Jon, she still knew what was going on. And so what if this outfit made her look hot? Jon straightened her back and cocked her eyebrow at the mirror. Of course Jon looked hot. This was New Jon, Confident Jon. She wasn't going to second-guess this.
Jon strutted out in her new outfit and nearly ran straight into two copies of herself carrying clothes into the fitting rooms, themselves.
Carrying blue peasant shirts and skinny jeans into the fitting rooms.
"Athena, Diane," Jon stopped them, "what are you doing?"
"Oh," Athena bounced on her heel and twirled her hair, "we just thought we'd get a new outfit too, if you were already doing it."
Jon furrowed her brow and pursed her lips. "Athena, you know the thing we were talking about back at the beach? The thing we want to fix?"
Athena looked confused for a moment, but then her eyes lit up and she nodded.
"What if fixing it means that we wear different blouses?"
Athena turned her head. Jon could almost see the wheels turning. And a few seconds later, a click.
"Diane," Athena nudged the other girl, "let's go back and see what else there is."
