Three days after the panty incident, Sasha dragged herself home from a late night shift.  It was nearly midnight.  She grumbled all the way up the stairs about the stupid night shift and the stupid job, and was still muttering about it when she opened the door and saw Tara sitting on the couch, a familiar glowing ball in her hands.

Sasha grinned triumphantly as she stepped into the apartment.  Her scheme had worked, Tara was finally going to...  She stared at the ball, her smile fading.  “That’s... awfully bright.”

Tara nodded.  “I’ve been squeezing it for a while now.  Figured it’d help with my stress.  I would have been stuck for six days.  And all my best leggings are still stuck for another three.”

Sasha swallowed nervously, and the sound of the apartment door falling closed behind her made her jump.  “I wish I could do something about that.”

“Just tell me one thing.”

“Anything?”

Tara held up the ball.  “It stopped getting brighter a while back.  How long will you be stuck?”

Sasha thought back to the very terse note that had come with it.  “Two... two weeks.”

Tara sighed.  “Pity.  I’d hoped it would be permanent.”

“It recharges before the change reverts,” said Sasha, then her eyes went wide and she slapped a hand over her mouth.  She berated herself for giving Tara the idea that made her grin so wickedly.

“So if I used it on you again, before you changed back, you’d be stuck?  Oh, that’s wonderful news.”

“Please...” begged Sasha, but before she could figure out what she wanted to tell her hard-eyed roommate the ball was flying at her.  It pegged her square in the forehead.  Magic flashed brightly, blinding her.  She never even felt herself change, just the fall to the floor as a pile of fabric.

Strong fingers gripped her, and lifted her into the air.  She could feel herself stretching and swaying.  Another hand grabbed her, and gave a tug.  Sasha discovered then that she was very stretchy indeed.  Despite her fears, she started to hope.  Had Tara really done it?

“You look like you’ll do.  I needed a new pair of leggings, and there’s no point in buying more when my old ones will reappear in a few days.”

Sasha cheered inside.  Sure, she was stuck for two weeks, but she’d get to snuggle up to those yummy, muscular legs in the process.  Fair trade, she figured.

She felt distinctly less cheerful when Tara dumped her into a crumpled heap on the floor and went to bed.  Sasha tried to be upset about the mess, instead of about her predicament.  It helped a little.  She lay there, as she could do little else, and listened.  She heard the creak of Tara’s bed as her owner... no, her roommate.  As her roommate went to bed.

The apartment building was old, and creaked at night.  There were little sighs of settling beams, shifting as it cooled, and the clunk of the plumbing when some other night owl turned a tap.  Further away, there was the constant hum of traffic.  Sasha tried to focus on the sounds, to cling to them as her last connection to reality.  Her grip slowly loosened as she realized it simply didn’t matter.  Nothing she did mattered, now.  She would be worn, or folded and put away, or more likely left crumpled on the floor, and there was nothing she could do about it.

Nothing she’d done had ever really mattered, she thought.  Would anyone even miss her?  She’d fought bitterly with her parents over coming out as gay, and the recent encounter at her great-uncle’s funeral had left her ill-inclined to reach out again.  Some of her cousins had seemed nice enough, but she’d seen them so rarely they were more like strangers.

Sasha’s life had circled around a series of terrible just-enough-to-manage jobs, and one night stands that she couldn’t even remember the faces of.  Maybe she would make better leggings than she would a person...

And with that thought, Sasha’s mind drifted into the void.

A crushing weight woke her, distorting her fabric as Tara’s weight bore down on her then vanished.  She tried to be offended that Tara had just stepped on her, but couldn’t deny that being touched at all was a huge improvement.

Then nothing.  More thumping about, followed by the sound of the coffee pot, the tinkle of cereal into a bowl.  Later there was muttered cursing as Tara dug through her drawers for something to wear.  Sasha’s mind vibrated with excitement.  Maybe she’d get worn!

Sasha tried not to examine that eagerness too closely.  Then hands were grabbing her and she was sliding up magnificent muscular legs. The last thing she heard clearly was Tara’s grated “You’d better not enjoy this too much”.

Sasha felt herself falling, her mind tumbling into chaos as she became one with Tara’s legs, flexing and moving as they did.  She clung to her identity for a moment longer, laughed at her silliness, and let go.

Before Tara had even made it to the gym, all that was left was happy leggings, exulting in the power of the muscles they gilded.

At the end of the day, Sasha felt herself crumpling to the floor, waking the part of her that still remembered being human.  She tried to be annoyed that Tara was yet again making a mess.  Part of her yearned to clean it up, but she couldn’t move.

Sasha grumbled inside her mind at the ignominity of it all, but couldn’t sustain her grumpiness for long.  Memories of muscles flexing, dancing, kicking... it was all there.  Even more glorious than she had hoped.

And then, oh, she was being scooped up, cradled, and called good leggings.  Sasha lost herself in a haze of pleasure as she was gently washed in warm water, wrung and squeezed by familiar, exercise-callused hands.  The ease with which she was manipulated was at once terrifying and exhilarating.  Sasha held on tight to every moment of it, enjoying even the rolling and blotting, and the eventual slow cooling.

“Goodnight, leggings.  You did good.”

The words crashed through Sasha.  Tara cared!  She slipped off to sleep, buoyed by that revelation.

Leggings’ days carried on in the same fashion.  Being worn became her world, her reason to exist.  Being washed, being talked to, brought back echoes of Sasha, fainter each time.

After some unknowable time, the pattern changed.  Leggings felt themselves lying on an unfamiliar surface, propped up at an angle.  It took some time to recognize that Tara’s repeated invocation of “Sasha” meant it.  Meant her.

Sasha surged back into wakefulness as she heard Tara talk.

“I’m sorry, I just can’t keep doing this.  Your job is awful, Sasha.  I’ve taken your shifts for a week now, and I’m done with it.  It’s crazy, but I feel that you are better off like this.  So...  Goodbye, Sasha.”

Sasha felt familiar magic wash over her in an instant, transforming her from leggings into... still leggings.  Tara had really done it.  She was going to be leggings forever.

Sasha held that thought up, turned it, examined it, and found that she agreed with Tara.  With Owner, she might as well get used to that thought now.  There was no Sasha, only Leggings.

Leggings that would not have to clean, or worry, or work.  Just exist, and make Owner’s legs pretty.

Owner picked Leggings up and put them on, and it was glorious.