Contagious Positivity

Lucy Hamilton sighed. She threw her bag onto her bed and jumped on after it with a "thump!" Burying her head in fabric, she let herself grumble, "Why's it gotta be so hard?"

A chair spun around dramatically somewhere in the room. "What's hard? Who's hard?"

Lucy sighed again. Her roommate, Casey Matichek, the most obnoxious woman--Person? Woman? She said she was a "demigirl," which Lucy had tried to research but gave up on understanding. When asked, she said, "I identify with women, enbies and certain mathematical and chemical structures, particularly semigroups," which just about broke Lucy's business major brain--to have ever lived.

She turned her head to see the blue-haired demigirl sitting there in her oversized office chair looking up ever so innocently at the blonde woman laying there in her crumpled beige pantsuit and cursed herself for not checking the perimeter before letting her guard down. It was a living hell having her as a roommate and Lucy constantly thought about asking to transfer to a new room.

The problem was that nothing Casey did was exactly *wrong*. She wasn't cruel or unkind, she gave Lucy space when she requested, she always asked before bringing boys (or anyone else) back to the room, she kept her side of the room clean and when she wanted to stay up until 3 o'clock in the morning drinking Red Bull and playing Valorant she went out into a common area.

No, it's that she was *so* helpful, *so* accommodating, *so* eager to be the best roommate, the best student, the best friend, the best person she could be that Lucy couldn't stand it. At the slightest indication Lucy was upset, Casey would jump in with a million suggestions to "cheer her up." Whenever she was bored, Casey would extend an invitation for her to join them at one of their "fraternity" events ("Don't you mean 'sorority?'" Lucy had asked, but Casey just shook her head, "It's a gender-inclusive fraternity. I know it'd be better if there was another word, but Greek isn't the most gender-inclusive language, y'know?").

It was exhausting! And Lucy had just given them the mother of all openings! Argh!

"Life," Lucy muttered, accepting defeat. She knew better than to try to convince them that she was feeling alright. Casey had jumped on her for far less.

"Oh? That can't be true." So resolutely, disgustingly positive!

"*My* life," Lucy suggested.

"Oh!" The demigirl squeezed her thighs together. "That can't be true, either! Your life is so beautiful, Lucy! You have so many things to be grateful for!"

"Like having you for a roommate?"

The sarcasm went characteristically unnoticed. "Yeah! And you're at a good school with a loving family to back you up and you're young and you have your health and, if you don't mind, I mean, you're really pretty and, I mean..." Casey jumped up and walked over to the bed. They reached their hand over to Lucy's scalp, but she automatically tensed up and they backed off. "Sorry. I just- Your hair, it's so pretty!"

Lucy blinked. She let out a little sniffle. "Yeah." She felt her lip quiver.

"Oh, I'm so sorry!" Casey sat back onto their own bed, legs dangling. "Is that what's wrong? You're upset about your hair?"

Lucy grabbed a strand. She looked sadly at the golden blonde lock of hair, watching it shimmer in the fading sunlight, following its intricate curls with her eyes. "Yeah..."

"Oh, honey!" Casey leaned forward, just barely stopping themself from reflexively grabbing her hand. "It's so beautiful, though! I know girls who've tried dozens of products trying to get your natural color and texture."

"Well, right." Lucy knew there was no point trying to point out that the girls Casey knew were either STEM major supergeniuses who got published as freshmen and could do whatever the fuck they wanted with their appearances or queer humanities majors who had no job prospects to begin with. "I just wish I wasn't judged for it, is all."

Casey cocked her head. "Oh, is that what this is about? Was someone making fun of you?"

Lucy cringed. She hated how Casey treated her like a child. Just because *they* were a child didn't mean everyone else was! "No! It's just that, well..." She returned to her bag, willing herself not to cry. She would never hear the end of it!

She heard footsteps. "It's okay, Luce! You don't have to tell me if you don't want to. I just hope you have someone you're comfortable talking to, is all."

Lucy tensed up. She took several quick breaths. "No, no," she sputtered out, raising her head, "It's alright! Quite alright! I mean, jeez, Case, it's not that big of a deal!" Lucy pulled herself up to a crosslegged position, finding Casey standing awkwardly by her bed, one hand behind their head and another gently stroking the bedpost. "I just got a question wrong in macro and I got a little bit upset about it, that's all. It's stupid, no point dwelling on it."

Casey did an exaggerated frowny face. "Our emotions are never stupid, Luce. They're how we learn about ourselves. I've actually been helping a friend of mine with a neuropsych project. There's some really interesting things our brains do when we feel emotions! And our bodies, too!" Lucy thought she saw a smirk.

She got down from the bed. "No, it really is stupid, Case. I've been, like"--her face twisted into a grimace as she became conscious of her use of that particular filler word--"ruminating, or something, on what a classmate said. It's not emotionally healthy."

Casey seemed to brighten up in a strange way. It made Lucy shiver. "What did they say?" Casey asked, swaying from side to side slightly as they spoke.

Lucy stared down at the floor, focusing on the ugly green carpeting to distract herself from the painful memory. "The professor asked me a question. I didn't realize he was speaking to me at first. There was already somewhat of a reaction to that. Then, I, um, said what I thought the answer was and the professor just- He just shook his head and asked for anyone else to speak up and fucking *Brad*, the brainless jock who is only here because 'Daddy is a senator,' who is going to have to switch to communications next semester, he just says the opposite of what I said and the professor goes, 'Well done, Bradley,' like he's a fucking Rhodes scholar now because he can figure out *not-A* is right if *A* is wrong, and the fucker turns back to me once the prof starts babbling again to say, 'Hey, tough luck, Bambi,' and I just freeze and have to pop a Nicorette to keep from exploding and-"

"Hey, hey, hey..." Casey was rubbing the side of Lucy's bed, stroking the soft fabric. The rustling sound seemed to soothe Lucy a little. Returning to full awareness, she noticed how her leg was shaking.

"I'm sorry." Lucy collapsed into herself.

"But what does that have to do with your hair?"

Lucy blinked. Her intense sadness turned to rage, which she worked quickly to quell (she wasn't going to be the one who was the problem). She just raised a lock of hair to the light again. "Blonde. I'm blonde. I'm blonde and a woman and..." She looked down at her body, knowing there were shapely breasts, a toned stomach and a tight waist obscured by her shapeless attire. "...Conventionally attractive, so people think I'm dumb. It doesn't matter what I wear, how bland and professional I present myself, they just can't help but see me as some stupid bimbo. One little mistake and they jump on me... It's awful."

"Oh, poor girl..." Casey kept stroking the bed. "I'm sorry those mean boys made you feel bad about your beautiful hair..."

Lucy winced. She felt like she was going to explode. Were the math and chemistry departments really such feminist utopias that she had no idea what she was going through? Jesus fucking Christ, she acted like a goddamn schoolgirl! If anyone was going to be discriminated against... But that was a horrible thing to even think. Lucy tried to shake it from her head. She started taking even breaths. "It's *not* about my *hair*," she said, as calmly and evenly as she could, "It's about the *disrespect* I face on a daily basis from those *fucking pigs*. Argh!" She fell back onto her bag.

Casey nodded. "I'm sure it's hard, feeling like you have to constantly fight against stereotypes. It must be a lot of pressure you put on yourself, to have to defy this image other people put on you."

Lucy kept breathing deeply. "Right, yeah..."

"It must take a lot of energy, just fighting and fighting... You have to project this counterimage, just to feel like you have a chance. It must be a lot of stress. It must be pretty tiring. I'm sure you're exhausted..."

The business major felt her eyelids fluttering. Come to think of it, she did feel pretty tired...

The polymath's hand inched closer to her on the bed. "Don't you wish sometimes you could just... *Stop* fighting? Stop projecting this uberprofessional 'girlboss' counterimage? Just... *Accept* some of the things that other people tell you about yourself?"

Lucy's eyes fluttered open. "What? Fuck no, what are you talking about?"

Casey pulled her arms back in surprise. Holding them behind her, she started swaying slightly. "Oh, okay, I was just wondering if you might want a... *Break* from some of the pressure?"

Lucy sighed. As much as she hated to admit it, she *was* pretty drained. It had been a tough week. This was just the cherry on top. "Maybe... It depends on what you had in mind."

A smile came over Casey's face. "Yay!" She clapped her hands together, opening them up to reveal a small, pink pill bottle that looked like it came straight from one of Lisa Frank's nightmares, being adorned with rainbows and unicorns and little skull hearts and so on.

Lucy shrunk away in horror. "What is that, some fucked up LSD for middle schoolers?"

Casey giggled. "Oh, nothing so simple. Remember I mentioned I was helping my friend with her neuropsych project? Well, she's been trying to counterengineer one of that TERF bitch Erika's concoctions to make a temporary version and we think we've got it juuuuuuuust right."

They reached the bottle out to Lucy, who accepted it cautiously. She examined the sparkly exterior. Rattling it, she heard what sounded like small capsules.

"Xan and Dex have already tried it. Their brains were pretty fucked to begin with and they seemed to go back to something like normal after a day or so! But just to be safe... You don't have anything this weekend, right?"

Lucy shook her head. A voice in the back of her head told her she should be worried that Casey seemed to know her schedule, but she was tired and sad and, if she was being honest, lonely... And the bottle was very sparkly.

"Great! You can comfortably be back to your normal uptight self by Saturday, Sunday at the latest! You've got all your homework done?"

Lucy wasn't entirely sure and, in the moment, she didn't really care. She blinked herself awake again. Didn't she care? How much more of a bimbo would they think she was if she forgot her homework (again)! And Brad! That chauvinist pig might think he'd actually gotten through to her with his dumb insults! She couldn't have him thinking that!

Frowning slightly, Lucy stared back down at the strange bottle with a clearer head. "What... What do these pills even do, anyway?" she asked, straining to tear her eyes away from them and look over at Casey, who seemed to be suppressing a giggle.

"Oh, nothing much. They just let you release some tension is all. Let go of your stress. Let go of your worries. Let go of your cares." They couldn't hold it in any more, releasing a little titter that Lucy had to admit was quite adorable. "Let go of your *thoughts*."

"My *thoughts*?" Lucy looked back at the bottle.

"Well yeah! If you can't think, you can't worry. If you can't think, you can't make plans and get upset when they don't follow through. If you can't think, you can't have goals and beat up on yourself for not meeting them. If you can't think, you won't stress out over other people's expectations, the hopes and dreams they impress onto you, because you simply won't comprehend them. If you can't think, you won't be self-aware enough to be distressed by the incongruity of having a stereotype imposed upon you!" They kept crossing and uncrossing their legs suspiciously during their monologue.

This was obviously bullshit. There was no such thing as- "Are you trying to give me *bimbo pills*?!" Lucy screeched.

Casey reflexively fell to the ground in a fit of laughter, carefully pulling their skirt down to obscure their crotch. Lucy could guess the reason why and it just made her fume even more. To think that this dyke bitch would mock her like this, act all cute and innocent for *months* and then when the time came throw this little stunt, this disgusting display of internalized misogyny being played out on her, the pervert would actually get *turned on* by it?! What kind of twisted degenerate would get wet just by thinking about-

Lucy blushed as she returned to her body, recognizing her own slickness. She began to shake slightly. "What the fuck-"

Casey pulled herself up. "Oh, fuck," she muttered, still giggling slightly, before looking over at Lucy.

The blonde curled up into herself, which only served to make the damp patch on her sheets even more visible. "Oh my gosh. I can't believe- I'm so sorry, I really didn't mean to-"

"Aww!" The blue-haired demigirl climbed up onto the bed. They cocked their head to one side and tried to smile reassuringly. "I think it's cute. You getting so worked up like that. You must be pretty frustrated, right?"

"I- I-" Lucy held herself. It had been awhile, hadn't it? Jason, right? The self-proclaimed anarchopunk-turned-white nationalist? Or was it Chris, the gold digging stoner with a heart of gold? God, she sure knew how to pick 'em. And how long since she had masturbated? She shuddered. "Maybe- Maybe I *do* need some release. But not from-"

Lucy looked down at the bottle. She saw her own face reflected in a sparkly star-shaped sticker. Her eyes were a little puffy, sure, but she had to admit there was something cute about her blushing red cheeks. And her hair, though unkempt and matted from all the rolling around she had been doing, was still beautiful in a wild kind of way. Fuck, she was pretty. And more importantly it made her happy, how pretty she was. How had she let a few comments from some dumb boys make her forget that?

A smile came over her face. She looked over at Casey. "What do I have to lose?"

They beamed.

Before they could do anything else, Lucy unscrewed the cap and plopped a bright pink pill onto her open palm, popping it into her mouth. She swallowed it with an exaggerated "Ahh!" She smiled. She giggled.

Casey clapped their hands together and cheered. "Oh my gosh, girl! I'm so proud of you!"

Lucy beamed back. She cocked her head. "So, when does it, like, take effect?"

The demigirl squeezed their legs together. "Not *that* quickly, hehe, it's probably just the placebo effect, but I like the spirit!" They jumped off the bed. "Now, c'mon, let's show the hidden space in your closet some love!"

Lucy blinked. "What do you mean?" She looked down at what she was wearing. God, it was ugly. Why had she covered her beautiful body with this fucking bag?

Casey laughed. They leaned forward to pat Lucy on the back, but stopped themself. "I should really ask, before you get *too* fucked up, what are your limits for tonight?"

She blinked again, jaw slackening. "Like, what do you mean?"

"Oh, you're just so cute! I mean, before you become any *more* of a drooling idiot, I should ask you about me touching you, calling you names, things like that." She stepped back. "What do you want me to do to you tonight, pretty girl?"

Lucy was pretty sure that she was already enough of a drooling idiot that anything Casey did to her would technically be rape, but she just giggled and leaned back and said the corniest line she could think of which was, "You've already done so much to help me release some tension, I can only, like, do what I can to pay you back and stuff."

"Gosh! That's awful nice of you, but your smile is repayment enough!" Still, they rubbed Lucy's shoulder, causing her to start purring, briefly shocking her into a simulacrum of awareness before she just accepted the strangeness of the situation, that her obnoxious roommate was petting her and she was fucking purring like a scared little alleycat and loving it.

"Now, c'mon!" They scampered over to Lucy's tiny dorm room closet (which she knew she was lucky to have at all). The increasingly bimbofied girl followed dutifully.

She looked up and down her own closet door, transfixed, as if it were some magic portal. "What do you, like, mean? What's inside there?"

"Do you really not remember, pretty girl? Gosh, I really didn't think the pills would have this much of an effect on you, not having had any prior hypnosis experience or anything." Casey pulled the door open, sending a shiver through Lucy. "Here we are!" They reached in and pulled out a black dry cleaning bag.

"Oh." Lucy looked at the ground, embarrassed, saw something drip down, realized it was her own saliva, giggled, and promptly forgot what she was embarrassed about. "My prom dress! I, like, totally forgot Mom insisted I bring it with me to school!"

Casey gave her a smirk. "I was wondering why a serious young woman like you would have something so pink and girly, hehe!"

Lucy blushed and crossed her legs and felt herself dripping somewhere else which made her blush even more and giggle and, gosh, it was sure getting hard to think when the prospect of getting to wear something so pretty was being literally dangled in front of her! Plus, the pill was having some effect maybe, who could say? She giggled again.

The demigirl smiled, then frowned. They tensed up slightly.

Lucy stared up at them. "What's wrong?" She looked longingly over at the tantalizing black bag then over at their gently tapping leg and back again. The newly minted bimbo turned away slightly.

"Oh, it's okay, pretty girl." Casey started rubbing her back.

"What's wrong then? Did I do something wrong?"

Casey sighed. "No, baby, you didn't do anything wrong, it's just that..." They hesitated, struggling to find the right words, words she would understand. "I don't want to rape you."

Lucy nodded. She didn't understand much, but she knew this was a serious thing that she didn't understand. "But... I want you to do things to me..."

"Yes, you do, right now. But... You're not in any right state of mind to make a decision like this. Hell, I pressured you into this state of mind to begin with, but, well... I couldn't just let you suffer, could I? But I can't excuse myself like that... It's not my place to save anyone. Fuck." They looked down at the floor. It was maybe the first time Lucy had seen Casey sad and that made her *so* sad!

She wrapped her arms around them. "Don't cry," she muttered. "Please, don't cry."

Casey sniffled. "I'm not crying..."

Lucy giggled. "Okay." She backed away and did a little twirl.

Casey looked up as the bimbo started to pull her jacket off and, blushing, turned away demurely.

They unzipped the bag, revealing a bright pink party dress. "I'll just leave this here," they said, hanging it up on the hook outside of Lucy's closet. "Tell me if you need any help, but otherwise I'll give you your privacy, whether you want it or not, okay, pretty girl?"

"Mhm!" Lucy squeaked as she tossed her top to the ground.

Casey continued to blush and smile as she enjoyed the sounds of the oblivious bimbo struggling with her clothes, wincing when she heard a rip.

After a good couple minutes of fumbling, there came the sound of a footstomp and the pained whine of, "Caaaaaaaaaaaaaaaase! Can you help me, please?!"

They turned around to see Lucy standing there, back turned, in the sparkling pink minidress, grabbing wildly for the zipper.