"Umm... So... What type of nerd are we talking about here?" Karyn asks, a cord of tension strumming beneath her even tone.
"It tends to follow the ideas and impressions of whoever made the bet." Zoe states.
"So is that me or Mina?" Karyn asks, as her body begins to shift almost imperceptibly.
"That's a good question." Mina muses. "What's your idea of a nerd?"
"I don't know, Anime, comics, good with computers, really smart... maybe a dorky laugh?" She leaves any less than positive traits unspoken in a silent hope.
Zoe voices them for her. "Really because I always thought of bad hygiene, social awkwardness, glasses, being uncoordinated and unfashionable, braces and a lisp."
"Shutup." Karyn snapped. "You were a nerd."
Mina held her tongue.
Karyn was noticeably heavier now. It hit her middle the hardest, filling out her green hoodie even more than it already was. her jeans stretched and might have ripped if they hadn't widened out to brown corduroy slacks, cuffed at the bottom. Karyn was looking down at her expanding middle, then suddenly looked up to see her eye level dropping slightly lower than Zoe's. Zoe snickered as Karyn turned to face Mina's bedroom mirror. Her green hoodie had become a green sweater with black dots evenly spread across it. The sweater was faded and disheveled from too many trips through the wash, and a light beige and peach plaid collar messily poked out of the sweater neck. Her sneakers became neutral grey canvas low tops with mid ankle white socks.
She watched with a detached fascination as her cheeks puffed up, and her chin grew smaller. Her skin began to pale, leaving behind pocked speckles of red and brown across her face. The tingling under her shirt told her the rest of her skin had changed similarly. Her straight blonde hair frizzed slightly, becoming especially puffy around the damaged ends, while the hair atop her head drifted in an unwieldy halo of dry follicles. She blinked, and her blue eyes suddenly looked larger. They were larger. They were Round, earnest, naïve, and... blurry? Like changing the focus on a camera, everything started to fade out until they were merely colorful impressions of what they once were. It was like the bleary eyed stare one has when first waking up, but as she rubbed her eyes, and blinked again and again the image never came back into focus.
She pursed her thin pink lips and defiantly said in a slightly less forceful, significantly more nasally tone. "This isn't so bad."
Zoe snorted with laughter. "Yeah!" She agreed. "I'd say you got off easy short stuff."
"Hardy, har. It'll make my victory even sweeter." She rubbed her eyes again and admitted. "Everything's blurry."
"No complaining." Jon teased.
"That wasn't a complaint!" She insisted frantically. "I just can't see."
"Your glasses." Mina offered, and pointed to Karyn's chest where they hung with one arm slipped into her sweater.
"Huh? Oh. thanks." She slipped the chunky turtle shell frames on her face. Karyn looked back to the mirror. "These are cute!" She exclaimed with a sudden brimming excitement, then bashfully followed up with "R-right?"
"They're definitely thick." Zoe agreed. "I think I can see behind you looking straight at your face."
"Karyn huffed and crossed her arms over her chest. "
"Hush, Zoe." Mina snapped. "They look fine, Karyn."
"Hey, Karyn had her fun with me. I'm just having mine." Zoe insisted.
"It's ok Mina." Karyn compromised. "She just wants to be a bully because she knows I'll win."
Zoe laughs. "Not at all, I'm just happy you get to 'have fun' with us for a change."
"You two are too much." Mina sighs "Just keep it decent."
"What now?" Karyn asks.
Zoe responds, "Well, Karyn I'm sure you have homework to do, but Mina and I are going to make some more bets to clean things up a little."
"I already did my homework, and studied for my exams, thank you very much." Karyn puffs. "So I'm going to stay and watch." She glances between them expectantly.
Zoe raised her eyebrow as Mina. "If I can't get the box... I at least want my laptop back"
"Mina taps her lip and glances at the messy thing resting on her bedside table. It was black, cheap, and covered in band stickers she'd only recognize in her new goth life.
"Fine, but I want my bookshelf and all my books."
The pair proceeded to trade and swap bets and chores in exchange for small concessions as the night wore on.
Zoe did in fact get her laptop back in exchange for doing the laundy, while Mina got her bookshelf for betting she could take the trash out to the street.
Mina gained a healthier appetite in exchange for cooking dinner for a week, and after much bickering Zoe could take the corset off at home in exchange for betting she would cut the grass for the following month.
"I had to wear it all the time." Mina had complained.
"You weren't 180 pounds." Zoe snapped.
Cutting the grass was a task neither wanted to do since their goth makeovers, so that was deemed a worthy enough task to trade.
"What are you doing?" Mina asked Karyn as the now larger girl melted into the couch, phone in hand.
"Oh, I'm trying to see if I like nerdy stuff... Like anime webcomics and stuff."
"Yeah, and do you?"
"I don't know." Karyn admitted. "I've been reading this one Isekai about a highschool girl who's in the honors class, but one day she wakes up as the evil witch in a fantasy world but even though she's trying to fix everything now no one believes she's had a change of heart. There's a really cool prince who was about to be poisoned by a neighboring kingdom, but when she stopped it, the neighboring kingdom just said she foiled their peace talks, and now everyone is after her, but the prince found out about the poison through a servant and thinks the she might be a good witch now, even though she doesn't KNOW the prince found out, and ..."
"Uh huh. You might be into them." Mina interrupts her.
"You think? I mean. I'm not sure yet. I keep reading to find out for sure and..."
Mina titters. "Yeah. I'm pretty sure..."
As the bets wane, Karyn loses interest and waves goodbye to the sisters for the night. Mina and Zoe are left waiting for their mom to return from work as Mina slips a frozen lasagna into the oven, and heats up frozen veggies.
