Pulling At The Red Thread Of Fate - Chapter 2 - The First Day Of The Rest Of My Life... free porn video

Pulling at the Red Thread of Fate - Chapter 2 - The First Day of the Rest of My Life... As I walked out of my room, I could see my parent's bedroom door open and caught a glimpse of one of my Dad's flannel wool shirts strewn across the bed. Feeling a little self-conscious about my blouse, I stepped into the room to grab it so that I could cover myself a little more. As I was about to step out of the room though, a framed photo on my Mom's nightstand caught my eye. It was a picture of the four of us at Disney World from over 10 years ago. My hands reached for the picture and touched the image of the little girl wearing a cute pink dress and a pair Mickey ears. There was a part of me that recognized the girl as a younger version of myself, but I knew that she wasn't me... or that I'm not her. Although the memory is quite distant, I do remember the family driving down to Florida and having a great time while I was there... but I'm definitely a bratty boy in these memories. My heart sank a little as I realized that this wasn't as simple as something happening to me or my body, that somehow my entire history had changed. I wanted to stop and explore some of our family photos to see if my entire life had been rewritten, but I heard my Dad yell, "ALLY! Are you going to school or not?". Startled out of my thoughts, I placed the photo back on the nightstand and hurried out of the bedroom, slipping on my Dad's shirt as I gingerly walked down stairs. I could see my Dad at the bottom of the stairs, at first looking at me impatiently until he noticed that I was wearing one of his shirts. It was much too big for my new smaller frame and hung off me like an oversized coat, but it made me feel more comfortable than I was moments before and as much as the girl side of me might have disagreed with my fashion choices, I needed some semblance of normality if I was going to step outside and have people potentially gawk at me. He seemed flustered when I asked, "Dad, can I borrow this?" It was a completely rhetorical question of course, because I was already rolling up the extra long sleeves. Steve, having already been woken by his screaming sister, was more non- plussed than anything else and figured this was just some teenaged girl thing and Jen gave me a quizzical look before shrugging it off herself. I turned to my Dad again, as a random stray thought crossed my mind. If the "past me" has changed... I asked him, "Dad, who's the President?" If he had recovered from the new look I was sporting, my random question threw him off again as he seemed a bit flustered when he responded, "Wha... You-you know we can't say his name in this house!" I smiled a bit as I remembered how mad my Mom had gotten during the last election and the entire family decided never to mention politics in the house again. I'd have to do a lot more research, but it seems like the big things in this world haven't changed at least. I gave him a playful punch on the arm and leave him to his confused thoughts as I grab my car keys from the bowl near the door and head outside, Jen and Steve giving each other confused looks before following behind me. I breathed a sigh of relief when I saw the same old beater in the drive way - a hand-me-down from my Dad before he bought his new truck. I felt Jen approach me and ask, "Are you sure you're okay to drive? I don't mind..." But I was already making my way to the driver's side door before I even thought to answer her, and she took it as a sign that she was going to ride shotgun today. My brother was already buried deep into his phone, watching some video or playing some game and completely ignoring me as he got into the car himself. If I seemed closer to Jen now that I was a girl, I could already feel the distance between me and my brother. I'd like to think I'd still be close to him regardless, but I assume at some point we would have just spent less time together for whatever reason. Now was definitely not the time for a sibling heart-to-heart though, so I tried to put it out of my mind as I got into behind the wheel and settled in. I looked back at my brother to make sure he had his seat belt on before pulling on my own belt. Jen was looking at me expectantly, careful not to pry, but definitely with a touch of concern. I gave her what I thought was a reassuring smile before turning to face the road in front of me and started the car. Pulling out of the driveway, I thought about talking to her more about... well, whatever the hell "this" is. The noise bleeding out of my brother's headphones made me fairly sure that he wouldn't be able to hear much of anything I would have said, and based on our short encounter in my room it seemed like we had the type of relationship where she'd drop over to see what was wrong with me. I looked at her and said the only thing I could at the moment, "Feel free to plug in your phone if you want to listen to something." As I turned back to focus on the road, I could see her out of the corner of my eye as she shuffled in her seat to pull up a playlist. It's not that we weren't close before, but that inevitable socially constructed barrier that is created between the men and women gradually built up around us as I started approaching Mike, my best friend, with some of my personal problems or to be my wingman. We were still close, but I wasn't going to ask Jen to help me with other girls. I coughed as that thought crossed my mind. As far as I knew, I was straight... but I don't know what that means now though and I'm not sure I wanted to find out. I did notice my heart flutter momentarily as I conjured up Mike in my mind, which made me immediately want to bury that thought as far down as I could. I realize that I'm trying to push these problems away, but I really want to avoid opening Pandora's box for as long as possible. It was perhaps a bit of a cosmic joke that the first sone that seemed to come up on Jen's phone was "I Kissed A Girl", causing the both of us to squirm around in our seats as the both of us just let the song play out in silence. It did give me a chance to focus on the drive and as far as I could tell everything was the same. Even "Batty" Barrow, the old lady on our street who was harmless but no one could really understand, was out walking her poodle like she always did. As we left the neighborhood and started gaining speed, I tried my best to break the ice by probing Jen about what our past, "Hey, do you remember when we went to that summer camp when we were still in junior high?" She turned down the music but remained silent. I didn't want to take my eyes off the road, but I could see that she was almost struggling to answer, although I didn't know why. She cleared her throat for a moment and tentatively answered, "That's when you almost drowned when you were trying to learn how to swim..." I remained quiet for a while as I let her memory of that event sink in. In my version of events, there was another kid who had gotten a cramp while swimming and I jumped in to help carry them to shore. It was also a bit annoying to think of myself as the victim, but I hoped that was chalked up more to me not learning to swim until later in my life than being a girl. But suddenly the memory of gasping for air, chocking on water, suddenly surfaced in my mind and I shuddered as the memory of drowning was something that was now a part of me. I definitely knew how to swim before I woke up today, and while a part of me was curious if I could still swim now, this was just another thing I hoped I didn't have to figure out. I nodded, while still looking forward, "Right, it was pretty frightening." Jen continued, "That's when Mike jumped in and pulled you out." I felt my cheeks flush a little as my heart fluttered once again. Well, I guess that explains why the girl version of me seems to have a crush on him. When I stopped at a light, she leaned in and asked, "Are you sure you're okay? We can drop Steve off a couple of blocks away and head back..." I shook my head and accelerated when the light turned green, perhaps more determined now to find out more about the new me. "I'm fine," I assured her as I let the music fill the silence. I didn't want to weird her out by asking more questions at the moment. About five minutes later, I pulled up to the school and parked my car. Everything here looked normal at first blush, with the same people in their same cliques hanging outside of the campus trying to enjoy the last few moments of freedom before the bell rang. My brother didn't bother looking up from his phone and grunted a "bye" as he jumped out of the car and headed off to presumably find his own friends. I grabbed my bags and started walking to the school, before feeling Jen grab me to loop her arm against mine and pull me close to her. I stopped myself from squirming, because I didn't want her to think something was more amiss that it already was, but it made me wonder how close we were... maybe she was simply feeling a little protective after my little "episode" this morning. We passed by everyone without much incident, except for the occasional lustful stares that I immediately recognized based on my own awkward attempts to glimpse at a girl without being noticed. If... WHEN I get back to my actual life, I'll have to remember that guys are about as smooth as sandpaper when they do that, particularly if all they do is turn away the moment they think you've caught them. The familiar trophy case was right by the entrance, but something caught my eye. Or rather, the absence of something. The State championship trophy was missing, and in its place was a District finals trophy instead. I could feel Jen squeeze my arm as I tensed up at the revelation that, in whatever this world was, our team didn't win State. Maybe I should be flattered that the universe thought I was the big reason we were able to go all the way last year, although I couldn't help but feel a little disappointed that they team couldn't pull it off a memory of Ally bawling her eyes out at our loss flashed in my mind. My locker was right where I expected it to be, and I could feel Jen tentatively release me so that I could open my lock which clicked open after I entered the same combination I've used countless times. That was about the only thing familiar with my locker though, as I noticed that Ally almost spared no effort in decorating her locker with stickers and magnets with sunny self-affirming messages like "Always try your best!" and "You go girl!". I did smile at how corny it all seemed, despite the fact that I'm sure it was all sincere. If her journal was any indication, Ally did seem like that kind of person... I caught my reflection in the mirror attached to the door and stared at myself again while Jen wrapped her arm around my tiny frame to give me a side-hug and said, "I've got to get to class, but text me if you need anything..." Before I could reply, I saw the most beautiful girl in school approach me in the mirror and I instantly snapped around, spinning on my heels to face her. Violet Everdale. The Queen Bee, the head cheerleader, the girl who was at the top of the school and knew it. Her long fiery red hair framing her beautiful face that were punctuated by her startling deep, blue eyes and those soft, luscious lips with a body that could only be described as almost impossibly sexy. Every guy wanted her, myself included, but she never paid anyone any attention - not even the State winning quarterback. She had her gaggle of retainers trailing behind her, ready to affirm anything that came out of her mouth so that they could stay on her good side. Ally's feelings for Violet bordered on idolatry, as I started to feel both immense adoration for her and also jealousy at the other girls who got to spend so much time with her. As the girls surrounded me and backed me into my locker, I noticed that Jen had already slipped away. Maybe she was worried about being late to class? My concern for her quickly waned as I turned back to face Violet though, with what I assumed was a dumb star-struck look on my face. She grabbed my chin with her perfectly manicured hands, her red nails brushing against my cheek, as she examined me closely before releasing me. "Listen, new girl. I don't care they you joined the team late as a replacement." She paused as she closed the distance between us, and I could feel her sweet, sweet breath against my face as she continued intensely, "If you can't keep up with us, I won't hesitate to ask the coach to cut you." Despite lusting after her, I had to admit I didn't know much about her. We knew each other by virtue of her being a cheerleader and me being on the football team, but I had no idea she was so intense about her role. I'm not sure how Ally would have handled the pressure, but I personally thrived under it and responded by reassuring her in what I felt was a confident voice, "I won't let you down!" It came out more like a squeak, because despite my own confidence I could feel the nerves working their way through my body as I tried to cope with the sudden attention I was receiving. I wanted to tell myself to calm down, and could feel the thumping in my chest slowly steady itself to a more normal beat. She leaned in closer to me and whispered into my ear, "You better not. I'll break you if you do." I nodded furiously in agreement as she patted my shoulder and turned away from me and started walking to whatever class she had next. Her gaggle of girls threw in their own meek attempts at intimidation, but everyone knew that the only words that mattered were Violet's. I'm sure they wouldn't mind if I flopped and got dropped from the team, lest I somehow enter their little bubble and they have to compete with someone new for her attention. The girls were more than happy to change the subject away from me though and I could hear them fawn over her as she led them away from me, and the only thing I could think at that moment was that I wouldn't give Violet or her entourage the satisfaction. I turned back to the mirror and tried my best to look stern and put on my "game face", but all I could see was a cute girl scrunching up her face into a pout. I guess I'll have to work on that... The bell rang and I was snapped out of my thoughts and shoved my gym bag into the locker before slamming the door shut and sauntering off to class. I wasn't sure why I cared so much about showing Violet I deserved to be on the team but seeing this side of her set me off. Girl or not, I still had my pride and I wasn't going to let someone intimidate me so easily. First class - I'm still not using the "p" word - was pretty uneventful despite some of the slight differences I noticed. I still sat in the same place, in between two guys that I had been friendly with if not necessarily friends with, but it almost felt like having a girl in between them killed any vibe the three of us previously had. The two of them mostly spoke around me about things that presumably Ally wasn't interested in previously, or at least was afraid to show interest in publicly, going deep into the how the latest Call of Duty patch totally unbalanced some gun. Not wanting to draw any attention to myself, I just smiled politely at their animated conversation and focused on my own problems. The first thing I did, as if it was habitual, was pull out a compact from my bag to check my makeup. I didn't even notice I was doing it until someone bumped into my desk on their way to their own seat and startled me out of my self-examination. It's not that I was losing control of my body, but there were these things that I did that are simply habitual based on a lifetime of experiences that I simply don't remember having. As I closed the compact, I realized that even the way I walked... and the way I sat at my desk at this moment, with my legs crossed, were just a part of how my body worked. As a bit of a test, I uncrossed my legs and tried to spread them out, but I found my knees clanging together as if they were magnetic. Now that I had some time to myself, I pulled out my phone hoping to find some clues. As I stared at the lock screen and it asked me for my password, I hesitated. The password I used had no special meaning to me, but it was a combination of my jersey number and date I won my first game which I assumed wouldn't work here. I took a deep breath and brought my finger up to the screen, hoping my body's muscle memory would take over given how much it seemed to act on its own already. Thankfully it did, as my finger tapped in a number and the phone unlocked - 102019. I made sure to remember it just in case, but the thought occurred to me that I'd have this problem for pretty much everything she used... I hoped other passwords would come to me just as easily, or I'd literally be back in the stone age. The first thing I did was open my social media accounts to get an idea of her who Ally knew and to see if there were any other changes I could immediately see. She had a lot of friends... or maybe she was the type of person who accepted any friend request, but her network was massive and on every platform she'd get at least a few dozen reactions to her posts and pictures. Most of them were from other girls, so at least she seemed popular, but I noticed quite a few from guys I knew... know... and well, I'm pretty sure their motives were less than pure. I looked up from my phone briefly, feeling a little self-conscious and glad I had put my Dad's shirt. She also took hundreds... maybe thousands of photos. It's not that I was afraid of the camera, but I definitely didn't take as many selfies as her. But it provided a great record of her life at least. She was clearly close with Jen, as she appeared in practically every other photo, and there were girls I recognized from the JV cheerleading squad. I shuddered a little as I remembered cheerleading practice today, but from the photos here it seemed like Ally was quite talented and at this point I would have no choice but to count on her body knowing what to do if I didn't want to bomb out on my first day. I knew they practiced as hard as any other team, if not harder, and if I was determined not to make Ally look like a fool, I'd have to take this seriously. I just wish the uniform skirts weren't so damn short... I put cheerleading out of my mind for the moment and scrolled to a date from last year where I knew I had taken a trip with Mike to the next town over to try to scout out a team before we had to play them. It shouldn't have been a surprise when I found pictures of Ally hanging out at the mall with a group of girls from the JV team. It's not that I expected to find a picture of Ally hanging out with Mike with tagged #scoutingtheenemy or something like that, but the fact that my memories didn't match up was yet another reminder that this... dream? Nightmare? Whatever this is, is much more real than it has any right being. As a bit of an experiment, I typed in my name - my old name? - into the phone to see if anything came up. Not that "Allen McCarthy" was an uncommon name, but the results that did come back where definitely not me. In fact, the top hit I found was for some ancient 30-something in California who worked as an accountant on that job site. Of course it wouldn't be that simple... I locked my phone again and put it away, needing to take a quick break from finding out more about the life I found myself in and to process everything I had just learned. Everything was close enough to what I knew that it was familiar, and I couldn't say that there was anything bad about Ally's life. Hell, in my mind at least - if not to Ally's chagrin - I was lucky she didn't have a boyfriend because I have no idea how the hell I would have dealt with that fucking surprise. I made a face of disgust as I went through the guys in my life and I'm not sure I'd find any of them appealing. I mean, if I swung that way of course! Although Mike wouldn't be too bad... he was always such a nice guy and all that, and when he'd come over to my place, and we'd sit in my room together, and he'd wrap his arms around me and brush a stray strand of hair out of my eyes before leaning in to - WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?! I almost fell out of my seat as I realized how quickly my thoughts drifted into Ally's own fantasies. I mean, they ARE Ally's fantasies, because what else could they be? I shoved that thought deep into the recesses of my brain because - holy shit - do I not want to even go there right now and reached into my bag to look for my notebook and a pen. I was pleasantly surprised when I found that everything organized the way I expected, except with much more colorful highlighting and legible handwriting. At least that's one thing that I didn't mind sharing with Ally anyway. I turned to an empty page at the end and experimented by writing out the big question on my mind: "What the fuck is happening to me?" It came out in the cute cursive as I half expected it to, but I couldn't help but look at the very elegant looking "fuck". I looked up as Mr. Hesham walked in and the class began to settle. I actually tried to focus on class for a while, and noticed that he picked up right where he had left off yesterday. Figures that I'd be stuck learning math no matter what body I happened to be in. But after a while, I gave up and returned to the end of my notebook again to try to start collecting my thoughts. I decided my question above would make as good a heading as any and underlined it, before starting perhaps the most list anyone has ever written down, grasping at any straws that came to mind. 1) This is still a dream! 2) I'm in a coma. 3) I'm in an alternate dimension. 4) Freaky Friday'ed. 5) I'm trapped in some kind of computer simulation. 6) I'm dead and now I'm in heaven (or maybe hell...). 7) An angel is teaching me a lesson like that Christmas movie. 8) I've always been a girl. That last one was hard to write, but I had to consider the possibility that I am going crazy because of the items on the list, it was the only thing that was actually reasonable. As I scanned over the list again, a stray thought crossed my mind and I reached into my bag to pull out my physics textbook. I quickly to the contents and found what I had been looking for - Quantum Mechanics. I tried to scan through the short blurb - there was that story about the cat, but everything else was basically German to me, until I got to the phrase that had stuck out in my mind: Many Worlds Interpretation. Sure, the textbook didn't actually tell me anything about it, not that I would have understood it anyway, but that phrase was enough to evoke possibilities... and at least a possible scientific explanation for what may have happened to me. Maybe I could ask Ms. Chang about it in Physics at the end of the day. My thoughts were quickly interrupted though when I noticed the text book slam close in front of me. I looked up and saw Mr. Hesham towering over me. "I'd appreciate it if you paid attention to my class instead of worrying about others, Ms. McCarthy." I could hear some tittering as the other students reacted to me being admonished before I smiled sweetly at him in response and said, "I'm sorry! I'm focused like a laser!" Apparently that wasn't something I said here because that just made the class giggle in response and made him even more annoyed with me. He simply shook his head and started walking back to the front of the classroom before continuing to go on and go about calculating slopes or something else equally uninteresting. I quickly turned my notebook back to the page I had set up for today's lecture and did my best to pay attention, knowing that there was nothing else that I could do at the moment. History class was a little more fruitful in that I at least had an excuse to flip through the textbook during class. As far as I could tell, everything that I had remembered about reality was still true. I'd almost wish there was something dramatically different, like Canada had taken over the United States, or Julius Caesar was actually Julia Caesar, so that I could chalk this up to an alternate reality... but no such luck. It did give me another idea though. When I was leaving class for lunch, I could see Jen already waiting for me in the hallway - maybe she had a free per... I rolled my eyes as I stopped my own thoughts. Oh fuck it. Period. Given that I've already lived out half the day, I'd say the idea of this being a dream was getting more and more farfetched and I was going to have to start dealing with some of these realities. Regardless, it was nice to see a friendly face in front of me and I smiled at her when she approached me and grabbed my arm, much like she did this morning. "Are you feeling better?" she asked me as she started to lead me down the hall. "Honestly, I'm not sure," I responded, before stopping and turning to her. "Actually, I just wanted to head to the library for a bit, so if you want to go ahead..." I felt her squeeze my arm tighter as my words started to trail off and she shook her head at me before sharply replying, "No!" She relaxed a little bit, as if surprised by her own reaction and continued in a softer tone, "No... I'll come with you." I shrugged a little and gave a slightly confused, "Sure," before leading us to the library. If anyone thought it was strange that two girls would be walking through the halls arm in arm, no one said a word. I stifled a chuckle at the thought of me as a boy walking down the halls on Mike's arm. Not that I would have cared too much, but I know he would have been mortified at people's reactions. Reaching the library, I noticed that the librarian had already left for lunch and that the girl who volunteered to sit behind the desk today was busy eating her lunch. I didn't mind of course, since I knew exactly what I was looking for. Jen released my arm, but continued to follow close behind as I made my way to the corner of the stacks where I remembered the yearbooks were kept. I pulled the two most recent yearbooks from the shelf, but as I noticed that they went almost all the way back to the founding of the school. I handed Jen the books I had grabbed and then picked out a few from the 90s - I wasn't sure when my Dad was a student here, but I figured I was close, and motioned for Jen to head over to one of the tables down the aisle. As we sat down across from each other, Jen whispered, "What are you going to do with these?" I grabbed last year's yearbook from her and began to flip through it, looking for "my" picture as I answered her, "I'm just trying to find few things out..." My voice trails off as I get to the Junior "M's" and see "me" there. There I was, with a big smile on my face as I posed for the photo. I took a deep breath and continued to flip through the pages, finding the group picture of the football team. I smiled as I noticed that in my absence, Mike made quarterback... although I wasn't sure if I was happy for him as his former friend or as my current "crush". I flipped through the pages and everything else seemed the same - my brother was still in the computer club, for one - and stopped when I reached the cheerleader page and saw to my surprise that Ally had been the captain of the JV team last year. Poor girl must have worked her ass off to make Varsity this year and then had to deal with starting at the bottom run of the ladder. Maybe that was behind Violet's threat this morning, because in her mind an "also ran" making the team in senior year was probably a burden to her. I resolved that for Ally's sake... for my sake... hell, for someone's sake that, if nothing else, I'd try my damn best to make sure I excelled on the team. Hell, as far as I knew, maybe there was a girl who woke up as a quarterback somewhere trying to get back to her own life! As improbable as that sounds, if there was a girl living in my body, I would hope that she'd try her best to keep my life going. Maybe she was dealing with the same weird feelings I think I had for Violet than I was currently having for Mike. I scoffed to myself, because I'm not sure if that last thought was comforting or horrifying though... The previous year's yearbook was mostly the same, but my current body hadn't... well, filled out as well as it had now. Jen didn't say a word, but I could feel her staring intently at me. I'm sure to her I'm acting extremely strange. Certainly, I don't think a teenager would have a random bout of nostalgia and would want to look through an old yearbook to relive their former school years. I honestly didn't know what I'd tell Jen even if I wanted to explain I switched over to one of the books from the late 90s and quickly flipped through it, stopping when I found an almost unrecognizable picture of my Dad. I let out an involuntary giggle - his hair is so wild! - before placing my hand over my mouth and looking around apologetically. Thankfully no one else had come into the library since we got here. I continued flipping and saw a photo of the band my Dad was in, holding the guitar the Fender that I had found in the basement a few years ago. I pulled out my phone to take a picture of my Dad to show him later. I let out a quieter laugh this time, thinking about how mortified he'd be seeing a picture of his previous pop punk youth. But funny picture of Dad aside, nothing seemed amiss about him or his life - he was even on the football team and I could only surmise that he would be as obsessed with football here as he was when I knew him as a boy. In fact, I was surprised that he didn't push Steve into football. Not that Dad was ever pushy about it, but I knew he encouraged it at least. My heart sank a little as I wondered if he was disappointed he had a daughter whose only role on a football field was to cheer the boys on. I hoped he didn't feel that way at least. As I closed the yearbook, Jen gathered the books into a pile and reached for my hands with hers. I tried not to flinch, but I was definitely not used to this much physical contact with her and it just seemed off to me. She did have a genuine look of concern on her face when she asked me, "Did you find what you were looking for?" I smiled in return before replying with, "I don't really know. But it's okay." She responded by squeezing my hand, which if I was honest with myself, did feel comforting. Maybe that's just the relationship that I had with her here, and as strange as it is to have her be so hands-on with me, it was nice to have someone who cared. I slowly pulled my hands away from hers and picked up the yearbooks to place them back on the shelves. "Give me a second and we can go grab lunch," I told her as I stood up and put the books away. She didn't quite drop her concerned line of questioning however, and as we walked through the halls to the cafeteria, she got close to me and whispered, "Is this about what happened in the morning?" I hesitated for a moment before confirming her suspicions, "Yes. I can't-" I was interrupted by a group of boys who bumped into me, making me cognizant of the fact that this really wasn't the place to have a conversation that any reasonable person who consider insane. I continued, "Let's talk about this later?" "Sure, but promise me you'll tell me everything?" I couldn't promise that, because the last thing I needed was for someone to think I was completely crazy, so I quietly nodded in response. A lie by omission isn't as bad, right? We absentmindedly picked out our lunch in the now fairly thin lineup, but when I turned back to face the lunch tables I struck by the fact that I didn't really know where to sit. Jen and I would occasionally sit together from time to time, but most of my time was spent with the team. I peered over and saw Mike and the guys raucously talking about something that was surely mundane but that I also desperately wanted to be a part of. I noticed the other senior cheerleaders sitting nearby, close enough to the boys to be able to be a part of their group, but still separated by the virtue of having different things to talk about. I saw an empty newly empty table in front of us and motioned to Jen that we should take sit there. Better to play it safe for the time being rather than awkwardly navigate the school's social circles. I continued to probe Jen about our shared past together, although I tried to couch it all in reminiscences - "Do you remember when we went to that concert?" "Do you remember that time we stole your Dad's car?" and so on. Most of the memories were variations of the ones I had, like the summer camp memory where I had almost apparently drowned, where the general events were the same but the details were slightly modified to account for the fact that I was a girl. Of course, there must have been things that Ally... I... whatever! - had to deal with that would have been distinct from my memories. The shit I got up to with Mike, for example, likely didn't happen here unless I had a very strange relationship with him. It made me wonder if the things I knew about Mike still held true here, like his odd habit of tapping his right leg with his knuckles whenever he was nervous. I'm sure Ally would her own unique memories as well, with the cheerleading team if nothing else, although as I much as I tried I couldn't quite pull any of those memories from Ally's mind. I knew they were there, but everything just seemed out of reach at the moment. Speaking of a relationship unique to Ally, a cute spritely girl suddenly sat down next to me and gave me a quick hug. Britney was the JV cheer captain and always quite supportive and bubbly from what I remembered of her, and she was no different here. "Hey Ally! Hi Jen!" she said with an almost infectious sincerity. I could tell Jen was feeling a bit awkward and turned away to poke at her food while doing her best to ignore Britney. I knew she didn't quite fit in with the other girls at school, or at least the girls I had hung out with by virtue of being on the football team, but I didn't notice how she'd retreat into her shell. Maybe that was why she disappeared when Violet approached me earlier. I filed that away as something to talk to her about later as I turned to face Britney, recalling the nickname that she went by and smiled at her before responding in kind, "Hi Bea." She did a bit of a double take when she noticed what I was wearing, looking quizzically at the shirt I had on and couldn't help but ask, "What's with the 'Dad' shirt?" I gave an apologetic laugh and shrugged my shoulders. "I just felt like trying something new today." She tugged at the rolled-up sleeves incredulously. "I think you might want to rethink this new look, although..." She paused as reached for the tails of the shirt and wrapped her arms around me to tuck them behind my back. "Now you don't look like my little sister when she's playing construction worker with my Dad." She giggled and immediately changed gears, leaning in to me and said quietly, "I heard about this morning with Vi - she can be mean sometimes." "I know, but she's probably under a lot of pressure as the captain too." At least, I assumed the burden of leadership was something that everyone had to deal with regardless of their gender or what team they were on. She put on a thoughtful face, considering my words carefully. "Yeah, I guess. But you were always so kind and helpful with us, you know? And you kept it fun so that everyone liked coming to practice." Another similarity between me and Ally then. I knew when to put on my game face, but I had always kept it light when trying to get the team to work. Sometimes to coach's chagrin, particularly when we weren't running drills the way he wanted us to. Maybe Violet also saw me as a bit of a threat? It would have been so easy for Ally to stay on the JV team and lead them, even if she couldn't compete myself, and become more of a junior coach. I appreciated that Ally had her own ambitions though and made her own path forward, taking the riskier path fraught with the perils of self-doubt, regret, and fear of failure. I turned to face Britney and held her arms to reassure her, "Don't you worry about me - I'll be fine Bea. And you'll be a great captain too. Just lead the way you feel comfortable with, and the girls will back you up." She seemed surprised by my solemn tone and giggled. "Wow, so deep!" Not really, but to a sophomore maybe it did sound quite profound. She smiled and continued, "I'll do my best. And if anything happens... well, we'd love to have you back!" I'm sure she meant those as kind words, and maybe Ally would have interpreted them as such, but I knew I wasn't going to put Ally in a position to have to even think about failure. I simply nodded in response and told her, "Me too. We'll both kick ass this year!" She seemed taken aback by my choice of words but simply laughed it off again before giving me another quick hug and walking away muttering to herself, "Kick ass? Haha!" When Britney was gone, Jen slid back over in her seat to face me and continued talking to me as if we were never interrupted. If this was a movie, I suppose this is where I'd ask Jen to join the cheerleading team to break out of her shell and triumphantly enter the world. But even I knew there were so many problematic things with that way of thinking. And the Jen I knew had her own life anyway, so I knew dragging her more into Ally's orbit probably wasn't what she needed. I spent the rest of the day trying to get acclimated to Ally's life, if not the situation I found myself in. There was yet another traumatic trip to the bathroom, where this time I could overhear a couple of girls complaining about their period pains - I really need to figure out this female biology because it's fucking frightening - but nothing really jumped out at me as all that different. Like this morning's episode sitting between a couple of boys talking about a video game, anything different was subtle, as if this world was calibrated to the fact that I had always been female. By the end of the day, I was impatiently waiting for Physics to finally end so I could ask Ms. Chang about that strange Many Worlds thing I saw in the text book. That's exactly what I did when the final bell of the day rang and most of the class was already shuffling out of the room. I saw there were a few people lurking in the class, chatting or maybe still working on the final problem on Momentum that she had assigned, and hurried over to the front to get to Ms. Chang as she was wiping the blackboard. "Ms. Chang? I just had a question..." She turned, and was a bit surprised to see me. I wonder what kind of reputation I had as a student here? I wasn't a genius or anything, but I'd like to think I was doing okay in my classes at least. And from what I remember of the cheerleaders, they weren't any academic slouches on that team either. "Ally? Sure, what can I do for you?" She grabbed a handkerchief she kept by her desk to wipe the chalk dust from her hands as she looked at me expectantly. I awkwardly pulled out my textbook and placed it on her desk, flipping to the page on Quantum Mechanics that I had found this morning. I flipped the book around and pointed at the section. "I'm just wondering about this Quantum theory stuff... like, this is saying there can be many universes or something?" I knew I wasn't articulating myself very well, but it's hard to ask someone if they think there are really many universes because I might have crossed over from another universe. She scrunched her face a little, trying to hide the fact that this was a bit beyond her domain, but she tried to answer as best as she could. "Well, this is something we touch on a little at the end of the year... but so, Quantum Mechanics is about probabilities, right?" I nodded, pretending to understand what she was talking about and let her continue. "That's where you get Schrodinger's cat from the book - in a Quantum state, you can't tell where a something will be until you measure it, you can only say where it's likely to be. That's why they say the cat can be alive and dead at the same time - there's a vial of poison that's being kept intact by the inaction of a particle, but we would only know what happens to the particle when we open the box. Until we do, we can only say where the particle could be - not where it is. That's called the Copenhagen interpretation." Despite the rather scattered explanation, I could tell she was really trying her best to give an impromptu lecture on a subject that she definitely wasn't prepared to speak about. I appreciated the effort, but at the moment, I didn't actually care about the Physics and to move the conversation along I nudged her by asking, "But what about this Many Worlds thing?" She was starting to feel comfortable and smiled before grabbing a piece of chalk and turning to the board. "Well, there was this scientist named Everett from a while ago who thought of another way to explain this phenomenon. Instead of everything being everywhere until you measure it, he said that everything actually happens at once and the universe is constantly splitting when you measure a Quantum event." She started drawing a branching tree. "So if we go back to the cat, in this interpretation, it becomes 'and' not 'or.' Or in other words, there's a universe where the cat is alive, AND then another universe where the cat is dead." I perked up. "So that means that there are all these universes out there where different things can happen?" "No, well... I don't actually know." She shook her head. "This is all theoretical and what professional physicists think about all day." I could feel my heart starting beat faster as I at least seemed to have found a reasonable explanation, or at least the hints of one. I gave her what must have been an intense look because she took a few steps back as I asked, "Can... can someone travel between these universes?" She braced herself against the blackboard and quickly shook her head. "No, I mean... I don't know, but I don't think that's even theoretically possible." I was practically on top of her now as I stared directly into her eyes, giving her the impression that this was a life or death situation - which it kind of was - and she quickly blurted out, "You'd need to speak to someone who specializes in advanced Quantum Theory to be sure." I wrapped my arms around her and gave her a bear hug, almost lifting her up in the air. She let out a yelp that drew the attention of the few people left in the classroom, and I'm sure this little episode would be flowing through the various group DM chains in no time, but I didn't care. It was a lead at least, and that was more than I had this morning. Now someone might think that crossing into another universe is absurd, but I'd just have to point them to the fact that I woke up to a world that accepted that I had always been a girl and really, at that point everything is crazy isn't it? I glad I had enough sense to limit myself to a hug though, as I released her and grabbed my bag before giving her a sincere and heartfelt, "Thanks Ms. Chang!". I didn't wait for her to react though, as I started practically skipping out of the classroom and to my locker. I still dreaded cheerleader practice, but at least I knew it wouldn't be forever... I just need to find someone who knows more about this Quantum stuff and I'll be able to go home with a strange story to tell everyone. First of all, apologies in advance to any Physicists who may be reading... Second, thanks for the feedback on the first chapter. Hopefully I'll have the posting kinks worked out now! This chapter is a bit of a slow burn, but things will start to pick up in as in the next chapter as Ally begins to experience some new feelings and furthers her investigation. Hope you'll continue to follow along! And please continue to leave feedback here or via email at [email protected]. Thanks!