"One, two, three!"
Drew pulled his hand out of the lost-and-found bin and blinked. For a second, he thought he had grabbed nothing at all, the fabric so small and light it was hardly there. But no — clutched in his fist was a shirt. A tiny shirt.
He frowned down at it, and then noticed Kate staring at him with her hand on exact same item. She held hers up with Drew letting her have it, with she was laughing in surprise.
"You’ve got to be kidding me! We both picked the same thing?"
Drew looked at Kate turn the little shirt over. Light blue, soft cotton, a bit faded around the collar. There was a stitched logo on the front, something that might have been a hockey or even skate dancing, team crest, though it was too worn to read properly. The shirt was no bigger than some of the boxs they store the skates in.
"Looks like it," Drew muttered. as Kate stretched the fabric between her hands, barely wider than her skinny shoulders, with Drew not liking the idea of being so small "But… Kate, this is a kid’s shirt. Like, seriously small. Maybe for an eleven-year-old. Eight, and 11 only if they’re tall, that is."
Kate just grinned, her brown eyes sparkling behind her glasses. "That makes it even better. Now we can both become whoever this belonged to. Twins!"
"Twins?" Drew repeated, raising an eyebrow. His voice cracked with disbelief. "Kate, come on. Do you realize what that means? We don’t even know if this belonged to a boy or a girl. It’s… it’s just some random kid’s shirt."
She shrugged, holding it up against her torso. The fabric barely covered her ribs. "So what? That’s the point of the experiment, isn’t it? We don’t know who we’ll end up as. The mystery is half the fun."
Drew shifted uncomfortably. His palms were sweaty now, and his gut told him this was a bad idea. Testing the medallion was one thing, but actually stepping into the body of a child? The thought made his chest tighten.
"Kate, I don’t know about this. It feels… wrong."
"Wrong?" she asked, tilting her head. Her tone was light, teasing, but her expression softened when she saw how tense he was. "Look, Drew, I get it. It’s weird. But this is literally a once in a lifetime chance. We have a magical medallion that lets us transform into other people. What’s the worst that could happen? We’ll shrink down, look in the mirror, and in twelve hours we’ll touch are own cloths and be back to ourselves again. No harm done."
Drew exhaled slowly, running a hand through his hair. "I just… I don’t know. It’s not like I want to be some random kid."
Kate smirked. "Well, then you won’t be a random kid. You’ll be me. Because if we’re twins, we’ll look the same, right?"
That made him pause. His stomach flipped for an entirely different reason. He had always liked Kate maybe more than liked her. She was one of those people who seemed unshakably confident, even when she admitted being scared. And now she was standing in front of him, holding the small shirt, ready to leap into the unknown.
He wanted to be brave like that.
But he also couldn’t ignore the fact that the shirt was tiny. He reached out and touched it with Kate still held it, brushing his thumb across the worn stitching. "Still. I mean, this is definitely for someone skinny. And healthy. Doesn’t look stretched out or anything. Whoever wore this, they were… smaller than us. A lot smaller."
"All the more reason to try it," Kate said firmly. She was already setting the shirt on the back of a chair and hooking her thumbs under the hem of her own T-shirt. "Besides, I want to see the change. Not hide under baggy clothes while it happens."
Drew blinked. "Wait, what are you doing?"
"What does it look like? I’m stripping down. I want to watch every second of this transformation. Don’t you?"
He opened his mouth, closed it, and then realized she was dead serious. Kate had already peeled her shirt off and tossed it aside, standing there in her simple black bra, completely unselfconscious. Then her jeans followed, leaving her in nothing but her underwear and glasses, one hand cocked on her hip like she was daring him to object.
His throat went dry.
"You’re insane," he muttered, though his pulse was racing.
"Insanely curious," she corrected, smirking. "Come on, Drew. Don’t be shy. It’s just us here."
He hesitated, every nerve in his body screaming at him not to, but his hands were already at the hem of his shirt. With a frustrated sigh, he tugged it off and tossed it on the couch. His jeans followed, until he was standing in nothing but his boxers.
Kate grinned approvingly. "See? Not so hard, is it?"
"Speak for yourself," he grumbled, his cheeks burning. He had always been self-conscious about his body — not in bad shape, but not exactly toned either. Beside Kate’s confident ease, he felt awkward, like he was on display.
She didn’t seem to notice. She picked the shirt back up and held it between them, her eyes shining. "Alright. Ready?"
Drew hesitated again. "Kate, maybe we should—"
"Nope," she cut him off, all brightness and determination. She touched the fabric with her fingertips, stroking it like it was a prize she’d won. Then, with a grin she said. "Your turn."
He tuched it clumsily, staring down at the tiny shirt in his left hand. His heart thudded against his ribs. He didn’t want to admit it, but part of him was curious too. What would it feel like? Would it hurt? Would he still feel like himself, or would the mind of the shirt’s owner invade his thoughts?
"Come on, Drew," Kate coaxed. "No more stalling. Let’s see what happens."
He swallowed hard, looking across to where her fingers were already waiting. Their hands brushed as they both pressed into the soft fabric harder.
Then Kate put the medallion, lying on the table beside them, on to the shirt so there hands was tuching there hands and the shirt, and it looked like it started to shimmer faintly and a vibration seemed to ripple through the air, subtle at first but unmistakable. Drew’s skin prickled, hairs rising on the back of his neck.
"Do you feel that?" he whispered.
Kate’s smile widened. "Oh yeah."
And then it began.
Heat surged through his body, starting at his fingertips where they touched the shirt and spreading like wildfire up his arms. His chest tightened. His legs wobbled. The room around him seemed to swell, like the walls were pulling back and the couch was rising higher.
"No way," Drew muttered, panic mixing with awe. "It’s— it’s happening!"...
