Their plan worked perfectly for most of the day. Karyn did find that she was attracting more attention than usual from all of her classmates, and she didn’t necessarily hate it. She kept fishing for compliments from Jon in particular, but also from anyone willing to give her one. They felt good. Especially when they came from Jon. Karyn felt light, flirty. She was still herself, still completely in control, but it was as though she’d discovered a new talent that she never knew she had before.
Then final period arrived, and with it came gym class. And it’s hard to hold hands when one of you is in the boy’s locker, and the other is in the girl’s locker. But Sarah wasn’t in this gym period, so with a little apprehension, the two parted ways into their separate locker rooms.
Which is when Karyn felt an electric chill run down her spine. Felt her posture change. Felt her feet moving in a different direction than she normally went, to a different locker than she normally used. To a locker that was right next to–
“Sarah?” Karyn blinked in confusion as she saw the cheerleader rummaging through her own locker.
“Hey, bitch,” Sarah smirked at her friend. “I thought I told you? My mom booked my salon appointment at the wrong time, and they’ve got a no cancellations policy so I’m missing cheer after school today. I talked to Coach Barry, and since my last period is study hall anyway, she said I could work out during last period gym instead.”
“That’s so…” Karyn let the word drag out, “amazing! I’ll bet coach will let me just work out with you instead of doing volleyball or whatever. It’ll almost be like I get to do double cheer today!”
Karyn opened the locker next to Sarah’s and pulled out a cheer uniform of her own, practically identical to Sarah’s, and the two began to change.
Inside of Karyn’s head, a small voice screamed. Karyn’s original voice. But it became quieter and quieter with each item of the uniform that she put on. And by the time Karyn an Sarah left the locker room together, it was completely silent.
