“Are you seriously going to leave me like this?” said Lauren, still gawking at her reflection on the microwave.

I shrugged, and looked up from the bowl of cereal I was eating.

“Do you have any meetings or…”

“Nope,” she said, smiling. “Nothing too important, just a lot of emails and layout stuff. I think I can adjust…”

“I mean I could put you back to normal,” I said.

“Don’t say it like that,” she said. “And besides, I don’t want to be normal. I want to be your magically altered freak, left with a tiny itty bitty head.”

Lauren framed her head with her hands spread wide under her chin. I had restored her after quite an interesting night, but with one ‘small’ change — her head was about the size of a softball.

“Is that how you want it?” I said, meeting her eyes. “I mean maybe I’ll just remove your head again if you don’t like the one I gave you.”

Her eyes flashed and she grinned. “No please mister magician, please let me keep my tiny little head! I’ll be okay stuck like this all day.”

She broke character and added, “Although really, if I had the choice, I don’t think I’d ever want to even have a head after last night.”

She leaned in and planted a kiss on my cheek. “And this is really fun. And kinda hot. The people at work might think I’m a weirdo, but I’m pretty sure most of them already do…”

“Well then,” I said, wrapping an arm around her waist. “It seems you’ll be stuck with a tiny head today. Just be sure you set aside extra time for meals.”

Lauren laughed. “Two things I’m wondering. One: How is my voice still normal? Shouldn’t it be high pitched?

“Magic,” I said shrugging. “I mean, I could make it high-pitched but it gets pretty annoying after a few minutes.”

“Fair point. Second question: want to find out how much I can still fit in my mouth?”

I checked my watch. Still had half an hour before I needed to leave.

—

The conference that day dragged on as before. I spent most of the time a bit zoned out, imaging things I could do to Lauren when I got back.

Things were different with her than with Alicia. That had been more of a closed doors thing. She’d had always wanted to be put back to normal before anyone else saw her. Maybe the exception was parties — Alicia did like to wear her head on backwards at those, and sometimes we’d start messing around with my ‘party tricks’ after a few drinks. But the pattern that emerged was Alicia getting off work, we’d head home, and she’d ask me to take away her head. She would lounge around with no head for the night, and in the morning before I left I’d make it re-appear.

But Lauren obviously got a kick out of showing off this stuff in public. Which if nothing else was new territory for me.

Both of them for that matter were more adventurous than a lot of girls I’d dated. Even when you’re really into something, it’s no fun when the other person is uncomfortable. Maybe the closest to the two of them I’d been with was Bethany. That girl just hated having arms.

In any case. This was something interesting. And for that matter so was Laura’s invitation to come visit. Given the ‘open’ nature of this whole thing, I could only imagine what that might mean.

—

I finally made it back a bit earlier than the last night. I found the door locked, and went to check my phone. There was a missed text from Lauren.

“At the bar downstairs,” it said.

I assumed that meant the Irish Pub of some generic name on the street level of her place. I wandered down and found her at a booth, with another girl about the same age. Even having done the magic myself, seeing Lauren’s tiny-sized head almost made me do a double-take.

“Hello there,” said Lauren, when I approached. “This is my friend Katelyn.”

“Hi, I’m David,” I said shaking her hand. I sat next to Lauren who wrapped an arm around my shoulder.

“Nice to meet you,” said Katelyn. She had a a large, pretty smile and long curly brown hair. “Apparently you are the new magician around here?”

“I suppose that’s the case,” I said, nodding towards Lauren. She smirked at me.

“It took me forty five minutes to eat a sandwich today,” she deadpanned.

“I did offer to put you back to normal,” I said.

“I loved it. Every bite,” she grinned. “Anyway, Katelyn and I work across the hall from each other.”

We continued with the same chit-chat for a while. Katelyn worked as a photographer for a different magazine, but also had her own freelance projects. She was also new to the area, and her and Lauren would go out for drinks after work about once a week.

“So,” said Katelyn finally, folding her hands on the table, “I am wondering something.”

She waited another moment before continuing.

“A year or so ago I heard this podcast with a lady who had this hobby of … turning her head into other things. Things that weren’t heads I mean. A soccer ball. A frisbee. A box of cookies. And she described kind of what it was like to be all these things. So anyway, I have always wondered about … trying that. And to relate it to my photography, I thought about doing a series of self portraits, but with my head made into different things.”

“Ahh,” I said, smiling. “That’s definitely do-able, but there’s a few kinks…”

“I like kinks,” said Lauren, grinning at me.

“Not what I meant,” I said awkwardly looking at Katelyn.

“What are the kinks?” she said, laughing a bit.

“There’s three ways I know of to turn a head or anything else into something else. You can make the change easily enough if you know what the thing is, what it does, what it looks and smells like, and so on. Basically if it’s a familiar object. So turning you into a ball, no big deal. Turning you into a watch, well, I could make it look like a watch, but you wouldn’t tick because I have no idea what it takes to make a watch.”

“That makes sense,” commented Katelyn.

“So that’s one limitation,” I said. “But also, without a strong link binding, which needs this super special copper shit that’s really expensive, you can’t be in two pieces. So if I turn only part of you into something — your head — you’ll either stay as the head, which is now, ‘that thing’, or remain in a body with no head, but your head is still also whatever thing it was turned into.”

“Ah…” said Katelyn, looking suddenly a bit disappointed.

“But,” I said. “If you already have the object you want your head to be, it is possible — easier even — to link the two and shift your head out of phase. Whatever the object is, you’ll see and here and talk from it. And it won’t exactly feel as thorough as becoming another thing entirely, but it’ll be a little bit like that.”

“So how then, did the lady in the story I heard do it?”

“Well,” I said, “You need some really high-quality copper. If it’s not good, it won’t carry for more than a few feet. But if it’s really, really good stuff, you can keep the link open about 50 feet away? But that’ll cost thousands of dollars.”

“Okay then,” said Katelyn. “Let’s skip that for now.”

“What I’m wondering is,” said Lauren, “What kind of weird stuff have you turned people’s heads into before? It’s this another of your party tricks?”

“Um, well, a little bit” I started, popping a knuckle.

“Maybe a demonstration?” said Katelyn, “I’ll volunteer.”

“Okay,” I began again, going back into my storytelling voice. “This is actually a good one. As … party tricks go. It’s a good one to pick up a girl with.”

I noticed a glance between Katelyn and Lauren that I wasn’t sure how to interpret.

“Not that it’s exactly like that,” I said, “But… I need another beer. You guys?”

I went to the bartender and got us another round, and also asked for a paper bag. I needed a good Obscura.

“So,” I said, sitting back down afterwards. “First you start with a bit of magic.”

After setting down the two other beers for the girls, I threw my own into the paper bag, then tipped the bag over to show it is still empty.

“Then,” I said, “Hopefully, you’ve drawn a bit of interest, a bit of conversation, and they want to see a bit more. So…”

I handed the bag to Katelyn. “You invite them to participate. Put this over your head please.”

“Okay,” said Katelyn. “I’m going to try to not be insulted that you just asked me to put a bag over my head.”

Katelyn smiled at Lauren playfully, and did so.

“Well,” said Lauren. “He keeps doing it to me too…”

“Everyone always says this!” I said, amusedly. “Anyway, then you do the actual trick.”

I closed my eyes. Brought my focus up.

Katelyn was suddenly perfectly still. And tense. She’d felt it happen.

“You can lift the bag up,” I said. “Carefully.”

She hesitantly started bringing the bag up until she was able to see underneath it. I tried to remember what it was like. Light coming in from 360 degrees all around. Refracting through everything. I knew it’d be dizzying.

Her hands started to shake and I reached out and caught her just before.

“You turned her head into your beer?!?” said Lauren, much louder than was necessary.

“Yeah, that’s what happened,” I said. I took a sip.

“Can she feel that?” said Lauren, her expression turning from dismay to curiosity.

“Sure,” I said. “She can see and hear too, but since bottles can’t talk, she can’t do that.”

“I don’t understand. Bottles can’t see either,” said Lauren.

“Magic,” I said, shrugging. “Also your brain is tiny.”

She smacked me on the arm and the laughed, “Okay, that might actually be true, but I’m still warning you— can I try some?”

Lauren reached for the beer I’d turned Katelyn into. Her body, now disconnected from her new head, slowly sat up straight again.

“She’s tasty!” said Lauren. “Like real beer.”

“Well,” I said, “She is a real beer. Her head and the beer I put in the bag before are linked. It’s just a swap link too, which is not even that hard of a trick.”

“Ahhh,” said Lauren. “Well, how does the rest of your pick up act work then?”

“Well,” I said, taking another long pull. “First you finish the beer. Give some to her friends who are at first horrified and then curious.”

“I’ll dutifully be that friend,” said Lauren, taking a long gulp herself.

“And, once’s you’re finished!” I finished off the beer with another couple of sips.

“You replace it where it was, tell her to hold it, and place the bag back over it.”

I did those things, reaching across the booth to help Katelyn hold the bottle where her neck ended.

“And switch things back the way they were before.”

I flipped the link, an easy spell. Took only a blink of my eyes.

“What the fuck!” said Katelyn from under the bag, grabbing it off her head.

She stared at me for another moment.

“What the fuck!” she said again, this time with more bewilderment than malice.

Lauren just started laughing.

“Okay,” said Katelyn. “I need to know, and you need to tell me right now — I felt you drink me! What the fuck was that?”

“The beer,” I said.

“Don’t… no… What part of me did you drink?”

“The beer,” I repeated. I held up a hand. “Look. Okay. In the party trick, you keep this drawn out. But to reassure you, nothing at all happened to you permanently. I drank the same beer that I got at the bar. Just while we drank it, it was also your head. That’s the basic explanation anyway.”

“Okay,” said Katelyn, leaning back. “Well. All things said, that was incredibly cool and incredibly weird. I just … needed to know that.”

“And that’s where you reel her in,” interjected Lauren. “Isn’t it. She’s wondering what you drank, and you refuse to tell her.”

“That’s pretty much it,” I said.

“Devious. I love it,” she leaned in and kissed me on the neck.

“I think I see the appeal in it,” said Katelyn, smiling at us. “But, thank you for your demonstration.”

There was another meaningful look between Katelyn and Lauren.

“I’ll be right back,” said Katelyn, getting up and heading back where the bathrooms were.

“So,” said Lauren, leaning into me a bit, “What do you think of her?”

“She seems great,” I said flatly.

“No, what do you think of her?” Lauren intoned.

“Meaning…”

“Do you think she’s cute?” said Lauren.

“Yeah, she’s quite attractive,” I said, locking my eyes with hers for a moment. I tried to decipher what was between the lines here.

“Is that why you’re doing your girl pick up tricks for her,” she said teasingly.

“Well, no, you both asked me—“

“Because,” continued Lauren speaking over me, “She was veeeeery interested when I was telling her about last night.”

“You told her?”

“Uh, yeah, she’s like one of my best friends and I showed up at work with a tiny, tiny head.”

“Well, okay then,” I said. “So you’re asking if … we should invite her upstairs?”

“Of course! What did you think I meant?”