TF (multi - cat, tree, ball, sand, leaf, emo girl)

When the phone rang, Olivia leapt down from her perch on top of the sofa, did a quick stretch, changed back to human, and took the call.

“Hello?”

“Hey hon, it’s me,” her boyfriend Jon said. “Busy day?”

“Just taking a catnap.”

“As an actual cat, I bet.”

Olivia giggled. “You know me so well.”

“Listen, I’m going to be staying back at the office till late. Probably until midnight. Sorry, babe. You know what this project is like.”

He’d been working back for the past week. Hopefully it would be over soon. “Are you gonna be OK?”

“Sure. I might take a quick break, turn into a stone for a bit. That always chills me out. So what are you up to?”

“I was thinking, as it’s such a beautiful day, I might go for a walk in the park later,” Olivia said, glancing out the window at the blue sky.

“Sounds nice. Well, listen, I’ll see you in bed.”

Olivia gave a wicked grin. “Actually, I was thinking I might spend the night in the fridge. As a piece of cheese, maybe.”

She heard Jon laugh. “Well, if you see a piece of brie in there, it might be me. Love you.”

*

Olivia thought again how lucky she and Jon were to have an apartment so close to such a big, lovely park. And again she marvelled at just how wonderful everything seemed.

A couple of months ago the pair had been injected with ChangeSerum, giving them the ability to change into anything they wanted. Olivia realised again how it had - pardon the pun - transformed her life.

She was happier, more relaxed, more thoughtful. Its most lasting effect had been a deep reverence for everything around her. Transforming had made her a better person. It wasn’t just that you, for instance, took more care not to step on an ant when you’d once been an ant yourself. It was deeper than that.

Take this morning. When Jon had left for work, Olivia had decided to become a cup of tea. She could imagine someone saying “Really? Of all the things in the world, you want to be a cup of tea? How pedestrian!”

But when she’d changed, she’d been the cup, she’d been the saucer, she’d been the hot tea. Each of these things had its own shape and character. Just being two separate things had given her a new perspective. She’d been the saucer, supporting the cup; she’d been the cup, hollow inside, sitting on the saucer. And she’d been the tea, which, being a liquid, came with a whole new set of sensations. Then, the tea had been hot; over an hour she had gradually cooled, which had been totally engrossing. And she had been aware of all these feelings at once.

How could you not want to be a cup of tea? Or a beautiful dress, proudly clothing someone? Or a piece of paper? A book of poems?

So many feels! And Olivia wanted to experience them all.

She loved her transformation powers. Sometimes she loved simply pouring her consciousness into something, often imprinting it with her face, excitedly telling Jon how it felt to be a motorcycle or a computer. Other times she sank deeply into an object, simply being a cookie or a chair.

It felt very zen.

She realised she’d walked into a wooded area of the park. Here trees, decades old, stood along the path, reaching high towards the sun.

You know what, Olivia thought, I’ve never been a plant. How would it feel to be one of these trees?

She glanced around. There was nobody else here. What sealed the deal was there was an obvious space among the wood where a tree had once stood but had been removed.

What the hell, she thought.

With a final furtive glance, Olivia moved to the handy spot. Standing there, she willed her transformation.

It wasn’t quite as easy as saying to yourself “I wanna be a tree”, but it wasn’t far off. Olivia pictured the kind of tree she wanted to be, then she reached inside herself to capture the essence of the tree. The ChangeSerum inside her molecules reacted and …

… And, well, she was a tree.

Her feet turned into roots, burying themselves deep into the ground. To her delight, she grew tall, her arms reaching up to form branches. Bark covered her body.

And there she stood, looking as ancient as any of the other trees lined up around her. Her shadow made the ground dark, but her leaves caught all the sunlight. Its power filled her like golden light. She drank deeply of it.

She stood there for more than an hour, lost in the heady sensations of photosynthesis. Strangely, birds came to sit in the branches of other trees but not her. I wonder if they realise I’m not a ‘’real’’ tree, she pondered.

But there was so much more to see this beautiful day. With a sigh she began to transform back to her human form.

When she was Olivia again, she was fascinated to see leaves on the ground - leaves that had been a part of her. Yet the tree her had vanished. She picked up a leaf and put it in her bag. After all, she thought, it belongs to me.

She cut across the park, heading for the playground, when she saw a group of dogs cavorting. A harried-looking woman with leashes was following them. Obviously one of those dog-walking services, she thought.

The dogs looked like they were having fun, so …

The cavoodle raced over to the other dogs, barking with joy. They replied in kind.

If Olivia could have giggled as a dog, she would have. These guys were crazy! They were out of their heads with happiness. After being cooped up in some apartment, all this space was mind-blowing. So was the rich tapestry of smells in the park, each smell telling its own story, like it was a story in a newspaper.

Olivia had been a dog many times before - it was one of her favourite transformations - but running on all fours never got old. She raced around wildly, with a terrier jumping up in friendly fashion. She barked. It meant nothing, but it felt so good.

The dog-handler frowned at her. “You’re not one of mine! Shoo!” she said. Spoilsport, thought Olivia. She raced off towards the children’s playground.

Once she was out of sight of the dog-handler, Olivia changed in mid-leap, turning herself into a children’s ball. Woah! she thought. Being completely round was so cool! She was decorated with stars and was quite lovely, she thought.

She rolled, as she’d wanted, right into a group of toddlers playing in a sandpit.

A small girl with a pink bow in her head spied her instantly. “Bally!” she cried, waddling over to Olivia.

That’s right, Olivia thought, pick me up. The little girl did so, clasping her tightly. “Bally!” she said again.

“Well, what’s that you’ve got there, Minnie?” a dark-haired woman said, coming over to the sandpit. “A ball! Does it belong to any of the other children?”

Minnie shook her head. “Mine!”

“Let’s have a play with it, shall we?” Minnie’s mother smiled. She took Olivia from the child and rolled her to Minnie along the sand.

Minnie squealed with delight, and rolled the ball back to her mother, who promptly rolled the ball back.

So good! Olivia thought as she was rolled between the pair. She was a ball, after all. This is what she was meant to do!

Another toddler joined in, and another, until she was being rolled between eight people in an impromptu game. Then Minnie’s mother said it was time to go home. “Take bally!” Minnie demanded.

Uh-oh. Sorry kid, I already have a home, Olivia thought. When Minnie’s mother turned her back, Olivia transformed into a grain of sand, vanishing into the pit.

Minnie looked bewildered. “Where bally?” she said, bursting into tears. Her mother had to promise her an ice-cream on the way home before she agreed to leave.

Poor kid, Olivia thought. She and Jon both wanted kids, but not right now. But these toddlers had been great fun. Maybe she could practise being a mother? Maybe Jon could turn into a toddler and she could take him to the park, play with him, push him on the swings, do all the things the young mothers were doing.

Right now, though, she was enjoying being a grain of sand. Is this the smallest thing I’ve ever changed into? she wondered. Certainly it was the smallest inanimate object.

Even though she was just a grain amongst so many other grains of sand, she didn’t feel small or insignificant. This was, after all, where a grain of sand belonged - with all the other bits of sand. She was just a grain, but together they were a sandpit!

But it was getting late in the afternoon. A breeze had been building and Olivia turned herself into a leaf, letting the wind take her up.

She flew a foot or so into the air. I’m flying! she thought. She let the wind carry her along, racing through the park.

Not too far, though. As soon as she was in a fairly secluded area, and the wind had died down so her leaf had fallen on the ground, she changed back to herself.

It was growing dark, and she had skipped lunch - not that she’d needed it, with all that sunlight as a tree - so she decided to leave the park from the city exit, heading for a sushi place a few blocks from home.

As she exited she saw a group of young emo kids sitting on the low park fence. One in particular caught her eye - a pretty Asian girl with heavily made-up eyes and a black leather jacket. She had an eyebrow piercing and a labret. Her hair sported a severe sidecut. A cigarette dangled lazily from her fingers.

God, how sexy, Olivia thought as she crossed the road. I was such a goodie-goodie when I was her age. I wish I’d had the guts to dress like that.

She stopped suddenly as a thought hit her. I can dress like that!

She ducked into an alley between shops and pictured the girl in her head. Then she felt her body shift, not as much as when she became an inanimate object, but she could feel herself getting smaller …

And she was someone else. Just like that.

Olivia looked down to see the battered leather jacket, the same tights, the same boots. She had changed all right.

She ducked into the first department store she saw and made for the bathroom. She entered and gazed at her reflection in the mirror.

A completely different face gazed back at her. She lifted her fingers to her sidecut, marvelling at the stubble there. Something in her mouth felt different; she poked at her tongue, surprised by the stud there.

Olivia thrust her hands in her pocket. She found keys there, a handkerchief, a pack of cigarettes, a lighter.

Well, well.

She left the store and headed for the sushi place. Thankfully whoever she was now had money - more than enough for her sashimi plate.

Sitting on the stool along the sushi conveyor line, she could feel someone’s eyes on her. Looking up, she spied a young woman in a business suit quickly look away. Her gaze combined fascination and lust. Olivia grinned. Apparently others thought this body was hot too.

She paid and left, then went to sit on a bench down the street. She had a strange craving and she thought she knew what it was.

Olivia pulled out her cigarettes, drew one and placed it between her lips, before lighting it. She drew smoke into her lungs deeply, then exhaled just as deeply, watching the long cone of smoke that passed between her lips.

Olivia had never smoked in her life, but whoever she was now was obviously an experienced smoker. And she had to admit, it felt good - in this body, at least.

“Uh, excuse me? Do you have another one?”

She looked up. It was the woman from the sushi bar.

“Sure,” Olivia said, holding out the pack. The woman took one, leaning over as Olivia flicked the cigarette lighter.

“Whew. Feels good,” the woman said. “I’m Carole, by the way.”

“Olivia.”

“So, I wondered … haven’t I seen you at Ruby’s?”

Ruby’s was the local lesbian bar. A gay friend of Olivia’s had taken her there one night a few years ago.

“Maybe.”

“Doing anything tonight?”

And Olivia realised she was being picked up.

She smiled. “Sorry. I’m booked.”

“You sure?”

For a second Olivia was tempted. The depth of the desire surprised her, leading her to assume her alter ego was either gay or bisexual. And was it really cheating if she wasn’t really Olivia?

Then she thought of Jon.

“Yeah, I’m sure.”

“No harm in asking.” Carole smiled and began to walk away. “Thanks for the smoke.”

“You’re welcome.” She crushed her own cigarette out in a nearby bin and headed for home.

When she reached the foyer of her building, she quickly shifted back to herself. Thankfully, when she changed back she found her bag on her arm, with her keys in it.

Once she let herself in, she hurried to the bathroom and shifted back to her emo self. She quickly shrugged off her clothes, checking herself out in the mirror.

Tattoos. Well, she’d figured she would have some. It took up most of her side, a long trail of roses and thorns. On her right shoulder, a broken heart.

Then there were the barbells through her nipples, and the vch that pierced her hood. Wow, that must have hurt, she thought.

She posed, flexing her body. I’m damned sexy like this, she thought. Maybe she’d change into this form for Jon …

Nope. Nothing. She was definitely gay.

Olivia, on the other hand … and she shifted back … couldn’t wait for Jon to get home.

What the hell, it had been a big day. Might as well get an early start.

She went to the kitchen, got a clean plate, and opened the fridge. Placing the plate on the shelf, she willed her transformation and dived for it.

As the wedge of cheddar got comfortable, the fridge door swung close.

Well, she thought, I guess the light really does go off when you close the door.

And she drifted off, rousing only when a wheel of brie snuggled next to her.