The Guy's Place free porn video

This story was inspired by a couple of things. First, I had been wondering what would happen if the concept of Bikini Beach were moved into a shopping environment. Second, I was forced to go on a shopping trip with my mother for clothes for myself, something that is still demeaning and frustrating even now that I am an adult. The story also provides an opening for a potential universe, but I'm not sure I want to go that route. It may just be a scenario that I return to from time to time if I have an idea for a story but can't quite find a vehicle that works for it. For those of you who have read my other two stories and are wondering when they will be finished, well, the answer is a big fat, "I don't know." The truth is that those were ideas that I put to paper and then proceeded to back myself into a corner with. Every time I've tried to come up with a way to close those stories I've ended up throwing everything I've written out because I hated every word I'd written. Hopefully this story will somewhat ease the cravings that my few fans have expressed for those continuations. "The Guy's Place" By Ozzy Nelson Eric looked over at the shirt his mother was holding out to him. It was green with white checks and just looked absolutely hideous. "Come on, Mom," he said, irritated at the whine he could hear in his voice but unable to stop it. "You know I don't like shirts with patterns on them." His mother sniffed irritably and looked down at the pile of clothes weighing down her son's arm. On top was a black shirt with thin silver vertical stripes. "What about that one?" she said and gestured to the striped shirt. "That has a pattern." Eric looked down at the shirt. It was true that it did have a pattern. It was also true that he liked it. How in the world could he explain to his mother, who assumed she knew all about what he liked and disliked, that this was an exception to the 'no pattern' rule? When it came to fashion, his mother lived in a world where everything was black and white. You either wore the same styles everyday or you looked weird. In her mind, all of these shirts were the same because they were the same style. She didn't really care about how the shirt looked, just so long as it was a long sleeve dress shirt. Now, Eric really didn't care that much about how his shirts looked either, but he did have a slightly bigger stake in their appearance than his mother did. He knew that in general, most patterns made him look bigger than he already was, which infuriated him to no ends. He wasn't fat, though, just a typical former athlete going to pot. Now, the check pattern would indeed make him look bloated. The striped shirt he was holding, though, besides looking cool as hell would slim him down some, or at least create that optical illusion. Eric chose not to respond to his mother. He just gave her a hard stare and a moment later his mother dropped the green shirt back onto the display table with a sigh of indignation. Before Eric could say or do anything she had floated from the shirts back to the racks of pants hanging beside the table. Without looking at her son she began pulling various pairs off of the rack. After a few minutes she handed three of them to Eric. "Go try these on, tell me which ones fit," she said. Eric took the pants and looked at the sizes on their tags. "They'll fit," he said. His mother glowered. "Look, this is my money you're spending today. Now, go try these on." Eric took the pants to the dressing room muttering under his breath. After trying all of them on, he came back out. "They all fit," he said, trying not to sound smug as he handed them back to his mother. "Good, she said, "but which ones fit best?" With a sigh, Eric pointed out two of the four he had gone into the dressing room with. "I guess those do." "I thought they would," his mother said. A short while later, Eric and his mom were sitting at a table in the food court. He was wolfing down his taco and enchirito while his mother nursed the salad she had bought from McDonalds. As he ate, Eric was silently thanking his stars that this trip was almost over. It was as he finished his enchirito that he looked up and saw the store. It was called 'The Guy's Place' and something about it immediately held his gaze. For the first time since walking into the mall that morning, he found that he wanted to go into a store. As he sat there staring, he felt the conflict growing inside him. On the one hand, he wanted nothing more than to see the inside of the store. In fact, he wanted that more than anything he could ever remember wanting in the past. On the other hand, though, he desperately wanted to be done with this shopping trip so he could stop having to defend himself against his mother's shopping habits. It was all decided a moment later when his mother looked up and saw the store. "Oh, look, Eric," she said. "They finally did something with that open space where the K-B Toys used to be." Eric groaned at the prospect of having to go into yet another store and have his mom nag him over every item they looked at, but inside he was more excited than he'd been all day. After they had finished eating, the two of them walked over to the store. From the outside looking in, the store looked just like any other men's clothing store. The clothing seemed a little finer than he was used to seeing, mostly suits and business attire, which suited Eric because that's what he was looking for. Still, it did little to explain the way the store seemed to have drawn him to it. His mother walked into the store first and Eric followed. As he stepped inside he felt a strange shock run up his spine. The inside of the store seemed to shimmer for a second. He felt a cool breeze rush between his legs as he walked the rest of the way in and started looking. However, he was surprised to find that instead of the men's clothes he had seen outside he was now looking at racks of dresses, skirts, and blouses. He was about to mention this to his mother when he suddenly realized the strangeness of feeling a breeze between his legs. He looked down and found that he was now wearing a denim skirt that stopped just above his knees. His legs were surprisingly smooth and were capped off by a pair of thongs he would have deemed cute had they been on a girl. Ten cute little toes painted pink wiggled up at him happily. Eric turned to his mother hoping she had noticed the sudden change in his appearance but found that she was smiling at him and holding a hanger with a rather conservative looking blouse on it. "Tristan, this would look just darling on you!" she practically squealed. This was more than Eric could take. He felt his body go limp as he started to faint. By the time he crumpled to the floor, everything had gone dark. When he woke again, there was a strange woman looking down over him. "Oh, hello there," she said when she saw Eric looking up at her. "Where am I?" Eric asked, hoping everything he had seen had been a dream. "You're at the mall with your mother, sweetie. To be more precise, you're in my shop, 'The Guy's Place'," the woman said cheerfully as she helped Eric to his feet. He was about to ask if he had been dreaming when he felt the chill breeze against his legs again. A look of shock must have frozen on his face at that moment because the woman smiled at him sweetly. "No, dear, it wasn't your imagination," she said. "You are now a girl and will remain one for as long as you are in my shop." "Why? How?" Eric asked, as he fought off the waves of panic threatening to overwhelm him. "I'll answer your second question first. Magic, plain and simple. You see, Eric, I am a witch." Eric looked down at his newly acquired female form and sighed. "I guess it'd be stupid to argue that magic isn't real after all this," he said. "How very wise of you," the woman said. She stepped away from Eric and for the first time he took in just how lovely she was. She radiated a sense of confidence that made her even more attractive than her looks ever could have made her. "Thanks," he said, hoping he didn't sound sarcastic. "But that still doesn't tell me why I'm a girl." "Well, you see, over the years I have owned many clothing stores in many different malls. I have sold all types and styles of clothing and the one universal concept I have come across in this industry is that women love shopping for new clothes and men abhor it." "What?" Eric said, as it was all the only response he could think of. "Now I'm not saying that men don't want to look nice, of course," the woman went on as if Eric hadn't said anything. "It's just that when it comes to clothes they know what they want when they come in, they know exactly what size to get, they find it, and then they get out. Men, as a general rule, do not know how to enjoy shopping for clothes the way women do. That's when it hit me, I could show men what they're missing. I could use my magic to allow them to experience shopping from a woman's perspective. That was when I created 'The Guy's Place'." "Ok," Eric said. "But you said this wasn't permanent, right?" "Of course. As soon as you walk out of the store you will return to your normal form. Also, anything you buy will transform into its male equivalent once it leaves the store. Is that all right with you?" "I guess so," Eric said hesitantly, "but why did my Mom call me Tristan?" "Oh, that's just part of the spell. Anybody you come in with will remember you as the woman you would have been if you had been born female. In your case, your mother wanted to name you Tristan if you had been born a girl so that's your name as long you're in the store. Once you leave you'll be Eric to her again." "Ok, I guess I can deal with this. I mean, it's not everyday that you get to be somebody you're not." "That's the spirit," the woman said. "My name is Danya. Call me if you need anything else. Oh, Tristan, one more thing. Be sure to try everything on. You'll love our dressing rooms!" With that she walked off to help another customer. Eric watched her walk off and then turned to find his mother walking over to him, her arms loaded down with various outfits she had picked out. "Oh, thank goodness, Tristan. I was so worried." "Yeah, I can tell," Eric said, motioning toward the clothes she carried. "Oh, yeah," his mother said. "Danya, the shop owner, told me that you'd be all right and to just continue looking around. I don't know why, but it seemed like a really good idea, so I did. You know, there's just something about that woman." "Yeah, I know," Eric said as he looked down at his body again. "Anyway, I picked these out for you. Go try them on!" Eric found that he wanted to do nothing more. He took the clothes from his mother and walked over to the corner of the store where Danya had pointed when she told him to use the dressing rooms. There he found six of the hugest dressing rooms he'd ever seen in any clothing store. He walked into one and it was almost the size of a room instead of the usual closet that could be found in most other stores. He hung the clothes up on the hooks on the wall nearest the door and turned to find himself facing a floor to ceiling mirror. Staring back at him was the prettiest girl he'd ever seen before. She was about 5' 3" and had long blonde hair that came down past her shoulders in sultry waves. She wore a white tank top with 'Princess' spelled out in pink lettering along with the denim skirt and flip-flops he'd already seen. Her face was gorgeous and for a moment Eric thought that she might actually not be wearing make-up. He stepped closer and realized that she was wearing make-up after all. It was just cleverly applied to highlight her natural features. "So you're Tristan," he said to the girl in the mirror. As he said her name he realized for the first time that his voice had changed as well. As he pondered the soft contralto of his now female voice, he wondered about other changes he hadn't really paid much attention to. That was when his eyes fluttered down to the cleavage exposed by his tank top. His hands immediately flew to the breasts staring back at him in the mirror. It was strange, but looking at them didn't really arouse him the way they did when he looked at them as a guy. The second his hands came in contact with them, though, waves of pleasure spilled across his body. He massaged them gently for a second, mentally comparing these new sensations to the feelings he experienced in his experimentation with his male body. It was the same but different. The feeling was essentially the same, though it radiated a bit more than when he was a guy. The big difference was that, as a guy, the feeling was localized to his penis. Now, he could feel it across his entire body, from the point his hands touched all the way up to his scalp and all the way down to his toes. It felt so good that he almost didn't stop, but he realized that he simply didn't have the time to feel himself up. Not now, anyway. He could always come back later on his own. He dropped his hands and the waves slowly faded. Even after they had gone, his body still tingled pleasurably. He smiled at the girl in the mirror. A part of him realized that he could easily fall in love with her. Eric took another glance back at the clothes his mother had sent him into the dressing room with and smiled. He turned back to his reflection. "Well, I guess I've gone this far. I might as well give all the way in," he said. With that, Tristan turned from the mirror and grabbed the first outfit off its hook. It was a sleeveless, scoop neck pearl blouse with a black, knee length skirt and matching jacket. Surprised by how expertly she removed the clothes from the hangers, Tristan set the clothes aside and began removing her own outfit. When she turned back to face herself in the mirror, wearing nothing but her bra and panties, the moment of arousal she had experienced upon first seeing her female form was nowhere to be found. It felt to her like she had seen this a thousand times or more even though realistically she knew this was the first time she'd ever seen a woman dressed this way in real life. Again, she smiled and began putting on the outfit her mother had picked out for her. Tristan reveled as she pulled on the shell, surprised at how sumptuous the soft cotton felt against her skin. When she finished pulling it all on, Tristan turned back to the mirror. Her first thought wasn't about how well the outfit looked or whether or not she wanted it. No, her first thought was that the outfit would look perfect with a pair of black heels. She flipped her hair out of her eyes as she thought this and for the first time, allowed herself to forget that she had been a boy not one hour ago. She stepped closer to the mirror for a better look at the outfit. As she did her foot slipped in her flip-flop. Without thinking Tristan threw her hand out and used the mirror to steady herself. When she was sure she wasn't going to fall she pulled her hand away from the mirror. As she did her hand brushed against a knob on the mirror's frame. Tristan felt it turn slightly to the left. Suddenly, a tingling spread throughout her body. Tristan looked up at her reflection in the mirror and watched in horror as her mirror image shrank. As she stared at her changing body, though, Tristan realized that she wasn't just shrinking. Her hair receded to just above her shoulders her honey-blonde hair lightened as if she had spent too much time out in the sun. Freckles that were once masked by a light shade of make-up became more prominent as her make-up faded to nothing. Her extremely feminine face gained a slight amount of pudge as her cheeks puffed out. It's oval shape also contracted to a more round face. Her up-turned nose grew tiny even as her eyes widened somewhat. None of this was as surprising as what happened to the clothes she was wearing. The black skirt dropped to just past her knees and developed a split that went all the way up to her crotch. Before she could even register those changes, though, the skirt tightened around each individual leg. She felt the fabric of the skirt coarsen somewhat as the cotton transformed into denim. The scoop neck blouse grew sleeves and lightened from pearl to just plain white. The phrase 'Daddy's Girl' appeared across the front in cute script. Suddenly, Tristan realized that the transformation was in its final throes. She watched her breasts, which were now massively too large for her now tiny body, deflate. Now, staring back at Tristan in the mirror was a girl who couldn't be more than 12 or 13 years old. As Tristan stared at the reflection of the girl, who was wearing black denim capris and matching flip flops, smiled back at her sweetly. She looked back at the knob at the side of the mirror and saw that a number above it now read 13. There were a whole series of similar looking knobs on either side of the mirror. One read 'Caucasian'. Another 'Blonde'. Yet another showed figure measurements. Tristan guessed that if the knob she had accidentally turned had made her younger then each of these knobs must control other facets of her appearance. "Not just appearance," a voice from behind Tristan said. Tristan jumped and turned to find Danya standing in the door of the dressing room, just beyond the view of the mirror. The witch was smiling warmly down at Tristan. "What do you mean?" Tristan asked as she stepped toward the woman. "Well, you can also alter your behavior. It won't stop you from being you. It's just that, when I decided to give men a chance to shop like women, I thought it would be interesting for them to see what it felt like to think and act as women for a while as well. The knobs on the mirror let them try on various bodies in much the same way that they would try on clothes. The same goes with personalities, though I'm afraid they don't go much beyond generalities and stereotypes. The amount of magic it would require to let a man tailor his own female personality would be next to impossible to maintain along with the rest of the enchantments running in this store." "So, how does it work exactly?" "Well, pretty much the same as the rest of the store. However, there are some added benefits to this particular enchantment, though. The knob on the bottom left controls the duration of the enchantment to alter appearance. Basically, the knob defaults to the setting that allows you to transform back into your normal form immediately after you leave the store. However, if you turn it, you can extend the length of your transformation by increments of one hour. There is, however, a charge of five dollars per hour associated with this benefit, though." Tristan turned to look back at the mirror and whistled. "This is amazing!" "I told you you'd love the dressing rooms here, Tristan! I've got to get back out to the floor, but feel free to call if you need anything." With that Danya left and the door to the dressing room closed behind her. Tristan turned back to the mirror and slowly reached out to the age knob. This time she turned it to the right. She stopped when the number above it read 16 again. Within seconds her appearance returned to what it had been before she turned the knob. Curious, Tristan continued turning the knob. She stopped when the readout said 30. Again the tingling feeling returned and in a matter of seconds she had transformed again. Now the skirt she wore was a pair of black cotton slacks. Her flip-flops had transformed into a pair of high-heeled sandals. The blouse was essentially the same, only with a much lower cut scoop, and now a feminine cut sport coat was covering her bare arms. The changes in her appearance were much more drastic, though. Tristan's face was now leaner and a few faint lines that would one day be full- fledged wrinkles pulled at the edges of her mouth. Her legs were longer and leaner than she had ever seen them, though without the heels she knew she wasn't much taller than the 16-year-old version of herself. Her breasts were also larger and her cleavage was displayed even more prominently than it had been in the tank top she had been wearing when she came into the dressing room. Her hair was fuller and looked to have had light red highlights added to it to accentuate the slight brown of her natural honey-blonde color. Her make-up was as slight as it had been before, only now it had a more professional tone to it, as if she were a businesswoman of some sort. Basically a woman who wanted to look attractive without calling a lot of attention to herself. Her features were highlighted, but in a muted sort of way. Tristan smiled at the gorgeous adult woman staring back at her. She had never imagined that she could look so amazing before. This shopping trip might have started out dull but now she had to admit she was having the time of her life. She spent a few minutes playing with dials. She found one that would allow her to remain in the same outfit no matter what she did to her body and turned it from off to on. Then she started making changes. After a bit she was a red haired woman with C-cup breasts that were surprisingly perky. Her facial features showed a faint Asian heritage and she had trimmed her body down to a more petite size. The magic of the dressing room was amazing. No matter what changes she made, her body always adjusted so everything looked just right. Her breasts were large and might have looked enormous on her now petite frame, but somehow nothing seemed out of place. Tristan was admiring her features and toying with the idea of using the personality knob when she heard a knock on the door. Before Tristan could say anything the door flew open and there, staring at her from the doorway with a scowl of anger, was her mother. "Are you going to spend all day in here Tristan? I thought you were going to show me what you liked best." "I'm sorry, Mom. I kinda lost track of time in here," Tristan said. "Mom? Girl, what on earth is wrong with you? I'm supposed to be helping you pick out clothes for your job interview on Thursday and all you can do is space out and call me old." Tristan blanked for a second then shook her head as if clearing it. "Uh, sorry Nadine," she said hesitantly, feeling weird calling her mother by her fist name. "Like I said, I just lost track of time. You caught me by surprise is all." Tristan's mother merely nodded. "I like what you've picked out, but don't you think you're showing the goods a little too much," she said. Tristan looked down at her overly exposed cleavage and smiled. "I guess you're right," she said. She turned back to the mirror to get one last look at this form. She knew she'd likely never see it again, though it was kind of exciting to wear. Still, there was no telling what kind of guy clothes his current body's outfit would transform into once she left the store and became Eric again. As she stared at the reflection, her mother moved beside her to look as well. She raised her hand to primp her hair but paused. "Hey, these little knobs on the side of the mirror have writing over them." She reached out to touch one. "Mo- I mean Nadine, I wouldn't touch that if I were you," Tristan said as she tried to stop her mother from turning the knob. As she did she accidentally brushed another knob. For just a second, Tristan felt a little fuzzy headed. It was the feeling she got when she was coming out of a particularly good daydream. As it faded, Tristan knew she wasn't herself. She couldn't explain it, but she felt like a brand new girl. She glanced back at the mirror and immediately saw what had been changed. The personality knob had been shifted. When Danya had come in and explained it all to her, it had read 'Default'. Now, above it was written 'Tease'. Tristan took in her reflection again. As she stared at her sultry curves she felt a hint of the excitement she knew she'd experience if she went out and let every man in the mall ogle her. It was the most empowering feeling she could ever remember feeling. With a smile she looked over at Nadine. She smiled as she realized she could no longer think of the woman next to her as her mother. That was when she noticed the way Nadine was also staring at herself in the mirror. "Like, wow!" Nadine cooed. "I haven't felt like this in years. I wish I had a body as hot as yours, Tris. I feel so old all of a sudden." Tristan felt sorry for her friend. She wanted to help her out so, even though she knew she wasn't exactly in her normal frame of mind, she decided to use the power of the mirror. It never even occurred to her that it might not work on Nadine. The thought that it was affecting both of them at that very moment never occurred to her either. Instead, without hesitation, she turned the age knob back down to 16. Suddenly, she felt a shifting in her own body. She turned back to the mirror and watched as both her's and Nadine's bodies were remolded. After a few seconds Tristan's transformation was complete. However, Nadine's continued on. It seemed to Tristan as if all of the changes that she had programmed into her own body were now activating along with the transformation of her body. When it was all finished, Nadine bore a striking resemblance to Tristan. The two were different enough that no one would ever mistake them for each other, but the similarities were overwhelming. As she came down from the high of the transformation, Nadine blinked at herself in the mirror. At first Tristan was afraid that she wouldn't like the change in her body. Then Nadine spoke and Tristan realized she never had anything to fear in the first place. "Wow, sis! This outfit is totally hot!" Nadine said. "Come on, let's buy these outfits and wear them out of the store. I bet we can make every guy in this place drool!" "Sis?" was all Tristan could say. "Yeah, Tris. I know you don't like me saying it too loudly, but we are sisters. Twins and all that, and if you emphasize the fraternal part again I'll kick you in the shin." Tristan looked down and saw the chunky platform sandals Nadine was now wearing to go with her low-rise jeans and halter-top. A kick from those would be sure to hurt. "No, it just struck me as odd that you'd admit it out loud," Tristan said. "Whatever. Come on!" Nadine walked to the door of the dressing room. Tristan followed the girl that had been her mother out of the dressing room. She looked up and smiled as she saw Danya approaching them. "There you two are. I was beginning to think that you weren't going to come out of there. Have you made up your mind on what you're going to buy?" Danya winked at Tristan as she led Nadine over to the counter. Suddenly, Tristan realized it would be fun to go out into the mall and play with the boys for a while. She knew that this was simply the magically induced personality controlling her, but there was something else telling her to go for it as well. She realized she was curious what it would be like to hit on boys. Without her magically enhanced personality she would never even think of trying to pick a guy up, even if she had a female body. Now she had all the instincts of someone who did just that on a regular basis. With a smile she told her sister that she'd be right back and ran back to the dressing room. There she found the knob for the duration of the transformation. She turned the knob so that it changed from 'Default' to 'One Hour'. Then a wicked grin spread across her face. She turned the knob one more click over to the two- hour mark. Back at the counter she found Nadine pulling out a credit card to pay for their purchases. She looked over at Tristan as she walked up. "Don't worry about being scanned, Tris. Danya said that she knew exactly what you were wearing," she said with a smile. "Guess today's shopping is on Daddy!" Tristan giggled at her sister's remark. "But of course," she said and smiled at Danya. Danya acted as if she hadn't heard as she scanned the card and handed the signature sheet that printed over to Nadine. Nadine scrawled a name on the form that Tristan assumed was their father's name in this new reality then handed the sheet back to Danya, who took it with a sly grin. "Don't worry," Danya said. "Everything will revert back to normal in two hours." Tristan just nodded and headed for the store entrance with her sister. "What did Danya mean by that?" Nadine asked as they walked out. "Nothing," Tristan said. "She was trying to be funny, I think." As the two of the walked out into the mall, Tristan felt suddenly energized. For the first time since transforming back into a sixteen year old body, she took stock of what she was wearing. Where Nadine was wearing jeans, a halter-top, and platform sandals, though, she had apparently taken a different track to look sexy. She was wearing a plain cotton tank top with a deep scoop in front that showed almost as much cleavage as when she'd been in an adult body, a tight black leather mini-skirt, and a pair of 3-1/2 inch stiletto heels. Somehow she was even walking in them as if she had been born wearing them. Everywhere she and Nadine walked guys turned their heads to look. For two hours Tristan and Nadine behaved as if they were the fantasy of every guy in the mall. When a likely candidate showed a little too much interest, they zeroed in for the kill. First Tristan would lick her lips and arch her right eyebrow suggestively. Then Nadine would sit down, cross her legs, and caress her thigh. If the guy took the bait and came over the two would work him over till he was about to burst in his pants right then and there. At that point they would walk off and find another suspect. They managed to do this a total of four times. It was as they were setting up for their fifth try that, for lack of a better description, reality shifted. Tristan licked her lips as the gorgeous older man across the food court watched her with obvious lust. She turned to watch Nadine sit down on the nearby bench. Nadine crossed her legs and then went to caress her leg. Then there was a sudden jump, like when a dual-layered DVD switches layers. Suddenly Nadine was massaging her foot. Tristan blinked and realized that Nadine wasn't herself anymore. She was old, like in her late thirties. It didn't make any sense. Tristan was about to ask her sister what was going on when she remembered. She looked down at herself and saw her boy's body and clothes staring back up at her. She looked over at the window at of a nearby store and saw the face of a handsome teenage boy staring back at her. As she looked at his strangely familiar place, another jump took place, this one in her mind. In an instant Eric was himself again. He remembered everything he'd done as Tristan and smiled. He had expected to be ashamed of his behavior, especially the things he'd done once his personality had been altered. He was surprised to find, though, that he didn't. Instead, he felt calmer and more comfortable with himself than he'd felt in years. "Boy, Eric," his mother said from her perch on the bench. "You sure wore me out shopping today. From the way you were acting before I figured today was pretty much a wash, but I had a really good time." Eric looked over at his mom and smiled. "I did too," he said. "Good, but my feet are killing me. Grab those bags and lets get out of here. I'm sure your father's wondering where in the world we are now. It's nearly 6 PM. I don't think I've lost track of this much time shopping since I was a teenager!" Eric just shook his head as he picked up the bags labeled "The Guy's Place". "I'll bet, Mom," he said and followed her to the mall exit. As they walked past he took another look at the man he and his mom had been trying to entice before the spell wore off. He had a vague look of confusion on his face as he looked up and met Eric's eyes. Then he suddenly turned all his attention back to the salad sitting before him. Eric just laughed. It was almost two weeks before Eric got another chance to return to the mall. There was a part of him that was afraid that the store wouldn't be there anymore. Since his experience he'd discovered a whole new series of sites on the internet that told fictional versions of what he'd just experienced. One of the more popular types of stories told of a store that bounced from mall to mall and was never in the same place twice. Eric was just sure that was what would happen when he went looking for the store again. He was pleasantly surprised to find that "The Guy's Place" was exactly where he'd left it two weeks earlier. Even more surprising was the 'Help Wanted' sign hanging from one of the windows near the open storefront. Eric walked into the store and felt the sudden chill as a breeze blew against his now skirted legs. He smiled as he headed up to the counter and found Danya there waiting on him. "It took you less time to come back than most," she said. "Most are too afraid of the side of themselves they've opened up by coming here in the first place." "I'm not afraid," Tristan said as she surveyed the almost empty store. "I would have come back sooner, but my mom wouldn't let me use the car until finals week was over at school." "I know. You'd have come back the next day if you could have. I read that in you almost the minute you walked in. Everybody needs to explore this side of themselves sooner or later. Most are horrified at what they think it means about them when they do start exploring it. Others, a very select few, embrace it and realize that there's nothing different about them. They understand that this is the only way that they will ever be truly whole." Tristan nodded along, but smiled coyly. "You can drop the philosophical act. I saw the sign. I know you're about to offer me the job." Danya laughed. "How'd you know?" "Come on! Nobody talks like that except shrinks." Danya laughed again and nodded. "Well, that means it's time to get down to business, then. I'm getting ready to open up a new store in the mall over in Westbrook. That means I'm going to have devote a lot of my time over there and that someone else will have to run this location for me when I'm not here. I already know you didn't get the job you were in here buying interview clothes for before, so don't tell me you don't need the job." "Why on earth would I tell you that? Besides, I can think of a lot worse places to work and even fewer that would be even half as interesting as here," Tristan said. "Good. Then, can you start tomorrow?" Tristan made a point of looking in the planner she carried in the purse her wallet became when she came into the store. "Oh, sure. I can start tomorrow." "Perfect! Then I can start teaching you how to access the magical energy necessary to control the enchantments here in the store." "Wait, you mean I get to learn magic?" Tristan asked, trying to hide her surprise. "But of course. I'm the focal point of all the enchantments here. If I leave the vicinity of the store, the magic will slowly go with me and all the enchantments in the store will slowly dissipate. So, if I'm going to be gone for large chunks of time someone else who can control magic needs to be here working the store." Tristan took all this in and smiled. She'd had a funny feeling that she might get offered a job if she came back and found the store again. In the stories she'd read on the internet that was what almost always happened when a new universe was being set up. For a second she wondered if that was what was happening here, if some strange man was writing her fate even as she stood there talking with Danya. Then she smiled as she realized she didn't care. If it was true, all she could really hope was that all of the stories that featured her would be fun and exciting. With that she refocused on her excitement at the prospect of learning magic and started listening more closely to what Danya was telling her. Author's Note: When I started writing this story, I didn't originally intend for it to become the opening of a new universe. The story just kind of lent itself to the prospect the more I kept writing. I don't have any specific rules ironed out just yet, but they might come along at some point. If you do feel inclined to write stories in this universe I only ask two things of you for the time being. The first is that you give me proper credit for the creation of the storyline. The second is that you keep in mind that Danya would never use her powers or the magic in "The Guy's Place" for spite, revenge, or any other mean-spirited motive. That doesn't mean that other characters wouldn't do so, but Danya, unlike, say, the wizard in Spells 'R' Us, doesn't use trickery of any kind. She is always upfront about how the store and all its magic works. That being said, there are facets of the store I haven't explored yet, but I do have ideas. Feel free to add your own twists to the story, though, within reason of course. There, now that I've lectured for a bit, I hope you enjoyed reading my little story and I hope that at some point I come back and it would be the ultimate compliment to come back and find a "Guy's Place" story written by someone other than me!