Chapter 3: The Picture of David Beckham

  Harry’s eye flickered as the first rays of the morning sun peered in through the window. There was nothing at first, then gradually little wisps of consciousness began to knit together, and he became aware of the pillowy comfort of the bed and the gentle rhythmic breaths of the girl sleeping beside him. And there was something else too, in the back of his thoughts, something dark and dreadful that might have been only the tail end of a nightmare. He’d have to face it in a moment of course, but his mind was still working to reassemble itself, so he let it lie for now, and opened his eye a crack.

  His gnce fell on the old picture of David Beckham, a treasure from his high school days. The glossy poster was as familiar to him as the front door of his house, the great former Engnd captain had his arms in the air, cheering in celebration of his test goal. Yet, slowly, it crept up on him that something was very wrong and, as his mind came into focus, that same ominous feeling from before began to pound against the back of his thoughts.

  The ghost of mocking ughter filled his ears.

  The picture was as familiar to him as the front door of his house, and it slowly dawned on him that it wasn’t the picture he remembered. It was Beckham, sure enough, and he was as always in the middle of his traditional celebratory pose. Yet the old picture showed the pyer in the afternoon sunshine, not a rain-drizzled night match. The dejected opposition defender was wearing red in this picture, not the blue of Argentina, and with a sudden lurch, Harry realised that in this picture Beckham was topless.

  It wasn’t deliberately provocative, of course, still very much a poster of a star pyer that might adorn the wall of any football fan. Beckham had simply – for reasons best known to himself – whipped his top off as he ran to celebrate, and if you looked carefully, you could see the Engnd t-shirt scrunched up in his fist. Harry even thought he could remember the game, a match against Norway a few months after his own picture had been taken.

  Yet this was not a poster Harry would ever have chosen for himself – there was a kind of brooding arrogance in Beckham’s eye as he looked into the camera, as though he were daring the cameraman to question his brilliance. His blonde hair hung deliciously over his eyes, and the wet drizzle of the European night caught in the rip of his six-pack, giving his naked torso an oily sheen. It was perhaps the sort of thing Kate or one of the girls might have on their wall, a way to show their football chops while still indulging in a bit of hunky eye candy, but none of the ds would have touched it.

  So, what the hell was it doing in his room?

  It had only been the briefest of moments since Harry’s eyelid had cracked open, but that pleasant, early morning feeling was vanishing rapidly beneath the flood of arm that coursed through his veins. Thoughtlessly he threw back the cover, eliciting a little moan of protest from the slumbering Kate, and sprang to his feet, but the entire bance of his body was badly wrong, and he toppled forward, catching himself on the dresser drawer with small, feminine hands.

  “What the hell?” the ghost of a whisper slipped from Harry’s lips as he stared down at the slender fingers in horror. Almost at the same time he became aware of the cascade of hair that had fallen over his line of vision and the breath caught in his throat. Those small hands left the dresser-top, automatically tucked back the sandy blonde locks, which he noticed hung just a little past his shoulders, and with his heart pounding with disbelief he forced himself to look down.

  He felt tiny – much smaller than he remembered, and his broad shoulders and blonde-fluffed pectorals were gone. Instead, his skin was pale and smooth, folding over a prominent colrbone and down towards a pair of very feminine breasts. They were perhaps a touch smaller than average (though the thought gave Harry no comfort), but they squashed together into an ample cleavage as he rubbed his shoulders against the morning chill. He had retained an athlete’s body at least; his stomach was smooth and taut, even if his six-pack had slipped beneath a slight cushion of feminine tummy, and though his arms and legs were slender, there was still a slight ripple of muscle in his shoulder and his knee as he rotated the joints.

  He had fallen asleep almost naked, save his grey Calvin Kleins, and in a certain respect this was still his apparel. Yet the old boxers were changed now, a girl’s cut of brief stretched across his wider hips, with the white bel-embossed belt riding lower over his crotch. He let his hand slip under the hem of the estic in horror, a sick feeling in his stomach as the tips of his fingers felt the absence, nothing but a little scruff of pubic hair, and then, lower than he would have thought, a little nub that sent an unwelcome jolt through his loins.

  “My cock?” He gaped as the whisper left his lips. That wasn’t him, it couldn’t be. The words were right – it was what he had meant to say at least - and yet the high, melodic sound was nothing like his own voice.

  “WHO THE FUCK ARE YOU?!”

  That definitely wasn’t him! - The words came as a scream of panic from behind and he whipped around in arm. Kate was scrambling up in bed, an unfamiliar vender duvet pulled up over her bare chest and a look of terror on her face.

  “Kate… I…” The words wouldn’t come. Harry couldn’t even begin to expin this to himself, never mind the terrified woman across the room. “It’s me?”

  “And who the hell is that?” she demanded, her face white with shock, “And why are your tits out?”

  “I don’t…” Harry stammered, his arm whipping up instinctively to cover his chest. “I mean, it’s me, Harry.”

  She took a deep breath to steady herself. “Very fucking funny, love. Is this some kind of prank? Where’s my boyfriend?”

  “I… Wait, boyfriend? Didn’t you say you wanted to keep things casual?”

  “What? Who told you – that’s none of your business!” Kate stammered as her face grew paler still. “Where is he?”

  “It’s me, I – I don’t know what else to tell you, I’ve just woke up like this.”

  “Fucking hirious,” she sneered at him, but her riposte came a little more slowly and she bit her lip. “What, I’m supposed to believe it’s some sort of magic spell or something?”

  ‘Don’t you recognise me?’ He longed to ask her. Yet even as the thought crossed his mind, he dismissed it as useless. His entire self was alien now, from his cascade of blonde hair to the tips of his dainty toes. There might, it occurred to him, be a shadow of who he was in his new face that Kate might recognise, but who could say for sure what he even looked like now?

  ‘There had to be something,’ he thought desperately. He met her eye for a second and gnced down, his sight falling on the newly changed bnket and an idea struck him. “Look at that bnket then, you’ve been wrapped up in it all night. Do you remember it being covered in purple flowers?”

  “I…” She looked down in confusion, then back at the strange topless girl who once again seemed to be forgetting that she ought to make some sort of effort to cover her chest. The bnket was such a small thing but strange though it was she found herself less able to account for this. Harry wasn’t some sort of lunatic – at least she didn’t think he was, but it was at least physically possible that he had for some insane reason decided to sneak out and repce himself with a girl who looked like she might have been his twin sister. Yet could he have repced the old mauve bnket with a purple one, on a chilly night, even as she slept wrapped in it? She gnced down, seeing the corner of the duvet cover wrapped tightly around her fingertips (a security tick leftover from a long-forgotten childhood fear of finger-biting goblins), and the idea felt more unlikely than ever.

  A fresh wave of doubt came over her as she looked around the room. “Harry, everything’s different.”

  The strange girl that might somehow be Harry followed her gaze, and her own eyes widened in shock.

  “Yeah,” Harry agreed slowly, even as he felt a flush of relief at hearing Kate call him by his name. “I noticed.”

  The posters were the most obvious change. There was the new, sexier variant of the Beckham poster of course, but the Budweiser frogs had gone as well, repced with a stick figure cartoon illustrating the caption ‘Boys are Stupid – Throw Rocks at Them.’ The mock-vintage Nirvana had likewise been repced in kind, with a Jem-like cartoon of Cyndi Lauper belting out ‘Girls Just Wanna Have Fun’ set amidst a stylised explosion of gm-rock pastel.

  The cherished TV and PyStation were still there – thank God – though the console had acquired a glittery purple star from somewhere, and the copy of ‘FIFA Soccer 07’ still y open beside it. The same politics textbooks y pell-mell on the desk; whoever Harry had become they obviously hadn’t changed their course, or indeed gotten any tidier. There were, however, a pair of lic scented candles on the cabinet, half used, and with a little inquiring sniff Harry realised there was in fact a slight floweriness to the apartment that definitely had not been there the day before.

  It would almost have been less strange, the thought crossed his mind, had the room been entirely different. It was the contrast of the familiar and the new, the continuity and change that he found most unsettling. It was as though whoever occupied this room had exactly the same interests and tastes as Harry himself, except they happened to be a girl.

  “It really is you, isn’t it?” Kate said quietly. “Harry, what the fuck happened? - and for Christ’s sake, will you put a top on?”

  He nodded as he rummaged around the closet, not entirely surprised anymore to find that nothing in it was as he remembered. He threw aside a blue miniskirt in only mild bewilderment and helped himself to a cream-coloured pullover hoodie. And while he did so, he allowed the strange episode from the night before to repy itself in his mind, and the weirdness of Georgie’s speech, together with the chilling ughter, left him with little room for doubt.

  “So, she is a real witch, then?” He said, “Georgie, I mean?”

  “I don’t see any other expnation, do you?” Kate replied, holding out her hand to catch her own t-shirt and sliding it over her head. “She said it herself – ‘Twisting the flesh’ or something wasn’t it? Do you think she meant this as a punishment for Matt?”

  “But it doesn’t make sense,” Harry shook his head. There had been a moment of relief as he won the little victory of convincing Kate to believe him, but now his pulse was beginning to race once more. “If she wanted to do this to Matt, why am I getting the end of it?”

  “I don’t know - but the walls were paper thin. Maybe anyone who listened to her spell got changed?”

  “Except you – You didn’t get turned into a man or anything.” Harry said, a little resentfully.

  “I mean thank fuck for that?” Kate excimed; the relief evident in her voice as she turned her palms. “But yeah, I take your point. Maybe the spell only works on men? She did say something about taking revenge, didn’t she?”

  Harry thought back, “Something like that, I guess. But we don’t even know if Matt…”

  “Verdammt, was ist mit mir passiert? Wo ist mein verdammter Schwanz geblieben?“ It came as a strangled, very feminine scream from the next room.

  Kate strained her ear against the wall, “What does that mean?”

  “Do you think I speak German? I reckon I can guess the gist of it though.”

  “Bloody Hell!” Kate rubbed her temple. “Ok so, supposing it’s both of you then? I guess we round up Matt and see if we can find Georgie? She’ll turn you back – surely – and then it’s up to Matt to beg for forgiveness or whatever.”

  Harry nodded, unable to find fault with the suggestion. In fact, her solution sounded so sensible and straightforward that he almost allowed himself to sigh with relief. “Alright, I’ll try to find something to wear and…”

  “Holly?” There was a sharp rap on the door, and it swung open half a foot. “Holly, I just wanted to know if… Oh, hi Kate?”

  The small, dark haired girl eyed Kate in surprise for a moment and then averted her eyes.

  “I just wanted to make sure you’re ready for the lecture?” She said to the carpet, blushing slightly.

  Kate felt her own face flush red in turn, suddenly very aware that she was sprawled out in another woman’s bed, wearing only a thin t-shirt and a pair of cey blue knickers. She shot Harry a murderous gnce that told him very clearly what she thought of his failure to remember to lock the door.

  “Hey, Vi,” she said sheepishly, recognising the first of the Bradshaw twins by the streak of purple in her dark hair. “I just – Well, me and, erm, Holly, we were pying FIFA st night and I guess we just sort of crashed out.”

  “Sure, no problem,” Violet said casually, though her eyes lingered on Kate’s frazzled sex-hair a moment longer. “Hope you girls had fun – Anyway, Holls, are you coming to css, or?”

  “Sure,” Harry said quickly, noting by the little arm clock that he still had thirty minutes to get dressed. “I’ll meet you by the front door?”

  “Sounds good,” Violet nodded, “I’ll –

  “Hey, Are you up, I need to talk to you!” Another girl came bursting past, her momentum carrying her into the middle of the bedroom where she stopped and looked around like a startled rabbit. Shorter even than Harry was now, with bushy brown hair and eyes peeled with fright, Harry was pretty sure he’d never seen the girl before in his life, but even so he recognised her immediately. The accent was a dead giveaway.

  “Where’s Harry?” She said, staring at the girl who had been Harry. There must have been some mark of resembnce, still, as her eyes begin to bulge in horrified recognition.

  “Oh, Hey, morning Mads!” Violet said brightly, “Who’s Harry?”

  “Harry is…” Kate began deliberately, “Harry is a boy Mads met at the Union bar the other night?”

  “Oh really?” She smiled warmly, “That’s great Maddy! I mean, it’s good for you to get out of the library once in a while and meet some blokes. Work hard, Py hard, and all that.”

  “I… Erm, Ja?” Matt stuttered in panic, though judging by Violet’s fond smile she seemed to be reading it as no more than her bookish friend’s natural timidity.

  “Anyway,” Harry said quickly, “I’ll never get ready at this rate. Vi, can you give me till ten-to?”

  “Sure,” she said, gncing at the other two. “Mads, wanna grab a coffee while we wait?”

  “I just need to speak with –“ Matt gnced at Harry a moment, realising he had no idea what to call Harry in his new form.

  “She’ll just be a moment,” Kate finished for her. “See you in a bit, Vi.”

  “Holly,” Harry said as the door clicked shut. “That’s what she was calling me, anyway.” There was more to it though, he thought in the back of his mind. The name felt familiar, somehow right, as though he was used to answering to it. “And you are Maddy now, I guess?”

  “Mathilde,” he confirmed unhappily, “I checked my student’s card.”

  “Good idea,” Harry mumbled, but even the thought of what that implied made him uneasy. Kate and Matt knew him, at least, but to Violet Bradshaw he had simply been her friend Holly – had his whole reality been remade? His own student’s card was probably in his pocket, he decided as he looked over at a pair of bck pants on the other side of the bedroom, approximately where he had discarded his own jeans the night before.

  “Matt, we heard a bit of you getting into it with Georgie st night –“ he said as he crossed the floor.

  “Thin walls,” Kate piped in, tapping the wall with her fingers.

  “But there’s got to be more to it? What the hell did you do to upset her that much?”

  “I did nothing,” Matt said stubbornly, “’Der Hexe’ – I mean to say, ‘The Witch’, she came to my room in anger. And then, she spoke some kind of evil curse to me, and I fell asleep. And at st, after I awoke, I was changed, like you see!”

  “You did nothing?” Kate’s question was ced with contempt. “Fuck’s sake, Maddy, take some responsibility for once. The poor girl’s besotted with you and you’ve been cheating on her for months.”

  “I…” Matt paused. It might have been the shock, or the fact that no-one had ever put it so bluntly to him before, but for once there was no clever handwave. “I… Suppose.”

  “This isn’t helping,” Harry said, combing through the bck leggings. “The point is, can we find Georgie?”

  “Ja, I have css with her all day today.”

  “Then it should be simple, just find her and beg for forgiveness or whatever else you need to do!” Harry frowned, “Don’t these fucking things have any pockets?”

  “Unlikely,” Kate offered, “Don’t you have a handbag or something?”

  “Beg? Are you mad?” Matt shook his head. “That evil woman has bewitched me, and I should beg? Bullshit!”

  “You really are a piece of shit, aren’t you?” Kate said, hopping up from the bed angrily. “You’ve just accepted you’re in the wrong and you still won’t even apologise? Look, even if you’re too much of a cunt to see it’s the right thing to do, at least look at your best mate over there, and yourself! Unless you want to be prancing about in dresses for the next few decades, get over yourself and say fucking sorry to her.”

  Matt quailed before her, and to be honest so did Harry a bit, even from across the room. As a boy he had taken Kate to be of about average height for a girl, and even if she was a little taller, she still fit neatly in his arms. He now saw his mistake. In fact, she was a giantess, an athlete built of lean muscle who towered over him by several inches, and he felt reminded, as though he needed it, of how small he had become.

  “Ja, I will try,” Matt mumbled with a little sniff. “Perhaps we might meet at the Starbucks, around 1pm? With luck I can bring some news of Georgie then?”

  “That should do,” Harry nodded as he spied a little handbag on his office chair. “We have a pn then at least.”

  Matt nodded. “Fine. Look, I must go to my csses now. Remember to meet at 1pm, Ok?”

  Harry nodded in agreement as the girl that had been Matt left the room.

  “He was almost crying, you know,” Harry said quietly as the door swung shut, “Do you think you were too hard on him?”

  Katie’s gnce followed his to the door, and there was sympathy in her eyes but not much. “No – I mean it’s a lot, I get it. But he needs to face how he’s been with Georgie. He did bring this on himself – I mean, not a magic spell, obviously, but he had something coming. And maybe if he can face up to how awful he’s been, that might convince her to turn both of you back to normal?”

  “Yeah, I hope so.” He bit his lip as he set the little handbag on his desk and began rifling through.

  “Honestly I’m more worried about you, sweetheart,” she continued sympathetically, “You realise you are stuck like this until at least lunchtime – Are you going to be alright?”

  Harry nodded, allowing his fingers to close around a little purple card. He took a little breath to steady himself and then held it up to the light.

  Name: Holly Jane Owen

  Date of Birth: 31/07/87

  M/F: Female

  Undergraduate

  Beside the basic information a pretty blonde girl smiled back at him. That was him now, he suddenly realised, as he felt the same strange pull of recognition, and it was a little eerie how normal it all suddenly felt. Was the magic changing his mind too, he wondered as he slid the card back. Was it making the name of Holly Jane as familiar to him as it evidently was to Violet Bradshaw?

  He shook his head, steadying himself as his stomach flipped somersaults in his chest. If all this was only until lunchtime, he reckoned he could handle it. It was hardly as though he had to go to css in heels and make-up – A basic pair of jeans, university hoodie, it would really be no different to a normal day. And then, a quick skip over to Starbucks and everything would be back to normal.

  “I’ll manage,” he croaked back, letting out a nervous snort – the scenario was blind faith at best, but at the moment it was all he had.