In-Genie-Us!

"No. I called in sick after I saw those pics on Matt's instagram page. That moron better go into protective custody or something, because when Brad wakes up or sobers up, he's going to find a bunch of texts on his phone, including one from me, and God is he going to be pissed off. Jesus." She gave a weak chuckle, but it was better than nothing. "Can you imagine ruining your brother's wedding that way?

"But I couldn't handle facing everyone at the office today. Not after that. Chase and Bannon are pretty good guys, for lawyers, and so is Miss Graves. But they'd all be so nice and sympathetic and I'm pretty sure I would have lost it and started crying again.

"So if we're not going to screw, and we're not going to go and toss all of Brad's stuff out of his apartment and into the street-"

"We're not?" she interrupted.

"-what are we going to do all day?" Allie finished, ignoring her. She wiggled her bottom against Shanaya's groin. "Because I can feel what you're packing in those jeans, Ray. And I admit you've got me kind of curious. And for the last few years, fucking's always been my favorite way to pass the time."

"You," she said quietly, "are not helping a bit."

"I know," Allie said cheerfully.

"Why do I let you get away with it?"

"Because I'm hella hot."

"Happily, true." She closed her eyes, trying to ignore the delicious armful of woman she was holding. "How about we go for a walk?"

"A walk?"

"Sure. It's a nice day. What sounds better? Staying here and dealing with Brad when he realizes he's face-down in a great big pile of crap, or getting out into the fresh air and having a really good long talk?" She wrinkled her nose. "I've been stuck inside musty, dusty classrooms since last August. I'm pretty sure I've still got chalkdust in my hair. And this is probably my last summer in Mayfield. Mom and Dad have made a life here, but I don't think I'll be coming back after college. So I might as well say goodbye."

"It's two months before you have to go back," Allison pointed out, though, to her vast relief, she slid off her lap. "Aren't you jumping the gun a bit?"

"Maybe. Maybe not." She opened the door. "I'll wait downstairs while you dress, and tell your mom what we're up to."

Allison batted her eyes winsomely. "Are you sure you don't want to see me with my clothes off?" She lifted the hem of her shirt, showing a heart-stopping stripe of golden skin. "I can be very persuasive."

"No," she answered. "I'm not sure. But I don't trust me around you."

"Funny," Allison answered as she closed the door. "I've always trusted you." She fixed her with one bright blue eye. "Why don't you start trusting yourself?"

You have to be the stupidest person in Kentucky, Shanaya snarled at herself as they walked down the sidewalk, Allison's mother watching worriedly from the front steps. The woman practically begs you to take her to bed, and you turn her down? What the hell is wrong with you?

Oh, shut up, she told her libido. You know it was the right thing to do. Allison might have been ready to go, but being on the receiving end of a revenge-fuck is no way to start a relationship.

Yeah? But what about staying male? Or have you forgotten that we're working with a time limit here? Sometime soon the universe is going to look at you and realize your fucking around with it, and you'll get snapped back into your old body. And I don't know if Gene has the mojo to try this twice. So stop dicking around!

"You're quiet, Ray," Allison said, when they had walked a couple of blocks. "What are you thinking about?"

"That I'm an idiot." She took a deep breath. "That I should have told you how I felt years ago. That maybe we would have found out we're not right for each other, but at least then we'd know."

"Or maybe we would have found out we're perfect for each other," the shorter woman replied quietly. "Wouldn't that be cool? To be married to your best friend? The way your parents are?"

"My parents?" she replied dumbly.

"Well, of course your parents," Allie said. "Anyone who looks at them can see it. They're so cute together." She smiled up, her eyes twinkling. "You can look at some couples and see them twenty or thirty years from now. Older, sure. But still in love. And some couples, you wonder how they're not going to kill each other in the parking lot." She sighed. "Me and Brad probably would have been one of those."

"Nah," she replied. "You're too sweet to kill Brad. And he's too much of a chickenshit to lay a hand on you. I think you'd probably send him a very nice little note, written in pink pen, with little hearts over the 'I's, telling him that you were very sorry, but it was either a divorce or shoving him into a wood-chipper."

Allison snorted. "The wood-chipper is sounding pretty good right now." She took a deep breath. "Screw him. I'm sick of talking about him, and I'm definitely sick of thinking about him. Let's just enjoy ourselves, all right?"

Shanaya nodded, slowing her pace in order to allow for Allison's shorter stride. Which was strange when she thought about it, because she had always been the smaller one before the change. But it was a gorgeous day, the kind of day that seemed to belong to a made-for-television movie, the sort where nothing bad really happened and everyone lived happily ever after. The sky was a deep, cobalt blue, the temperature warm without being too hot, and even the usual southern humidity had taken a vacation, leaving them with soft breezes that made walking a pleasure, not a chore. They wandered aimlessly around the neighborhood, taking turns at random, passing memories of their childhoods on every corner. The brick bulk of Lincoln Elementary, named in honor of Kentucky's most famous son, loomed up on their left, and they took a moment to watch a gang of kids playing soccer in the grassy playground.

Another few blocks took them to Huggin's Creek, and they leaned against the bridge, looking down into the muddy, slow-moving water.

"Remember that time we stole your dad's fishing poles and went fishing here?" she asked, pointing at a spot a few dozen yards upstream. "And we didn't have any bait, so we grubbed around on the bank for worms and bugs and stuff? I thought your mom was going to have a heart attack when we got back. You had mud in places that hadn't even been invented." She snickered. "Your ears. How did you get mud in your ears?"

"It was hot and they itched," Allison replied, with commendable dignity. "And we didn't steal Dad's fishing gear. We borrowed it. We brought it back, didn't we? And besides, it was all your idea."

"Oh, yeah. I remember the way you threw me under the bus when we got back home," she scowled. "The way you talked, I was about one step up from being a kidnapper. And if we're talking about terrible ideas," she pivoted, attacking on well-rehearsed ground. "It wasn't my idea to play show and tell when we were seven. Good thing that was over at my place. If your mom had caught us naked and comparing our naughty bits, instead of my mom, she probably would have called the National Guard and had my entire family shipped off to Gitmo."

"Yeah. Mom would have flipped right the hell out. Your mom is way more sensible about stuff like that." Allison made a face. "Though the lecture was a little bit over the top, I thought."

"Right," Shanaya drawled. "Look. Your mom is great. But if she had caught us doing something like that, you would still be grounded. And gods above, can you picture the fire and brimstone speech we would have gotten? Your folks might have called in a preacher man to do an exorcism over us, or whatever it is you crazy Christians do."

"Catholics do exorcisms," Allison replied frostily. "Not Baptists."

"Yeah," she replied, faking disinterest. "Whatever. You guys all look the same to me."

"Really?" Allison gave her an arch look. "That's not what I think. Or would you have gotten a boner if Brad sat in your lap?"

"Um, that would be a hard no."

"Instead of a hard-on?" Allison snickered, and Shanaya smiled back, happy that her friend had regained enough of her poise to make bad jokes. "How come you never told me what you were packing, Ray?"

She raised her nose in the air. "Some people," she intoned, though she was tempted to break down into giggles, and did men giggle? Or was that only women? "Some people," she repeated, "don't feel the need to announce the gifts the gods gave them to the entire world. Some people have standards. We don't wear skin-tight jeans or brag about our bodies."

"Well, maybe." Allison's brow furrowed. "But you would think that one of your girlfriends would have mentioned it." Her frown deepened. "I don't know why I never heard anything," she muttered.

A wave of dizziness swept over Shanaya, and her stomach felt strangely queasy, as if she were flying in a plane that had hit turbulence. The world seemed to waver in front of her eyes, and she felt suddenly, horribly exposed, as if a vast, unfathomable intelligence was suddenly concentrating on her.

"Maybe I asked them to keep quiet," she blurted out. "A man has to have some secrets, doesn't he?"

"Maybe." Allison seemed unconvinced, but the queasy feeling slowly receded. "Most guys I know would be posting their dick-size on Tinder if they could." Her voice grew mocking. "Single white male, five-foot eleven, one seventy-five, seeking single white female for good time. Has nine-inch willy. No freaks or fat chicks."

"I'm pretty sure I'm not that big. But I'm not most guys," she replied. With a sense of having dodged a bullet, she felt the attention fade away, leaving her limp with relief.

She turned back up the sidewalk, Allison falling into step beside her. "I know," the blond woman said quietly. "It's why I love you."

Shanaya stopped dead in her tracks. "What?"

"I love you, Ray." Allison took her large hands in her own small ones. "How do you not know that?"

For once in her life, she was totally at a loss for words. She fumbled, her mouth opening and closing without anything coherent coming out. "As a friend?" she finally managed. "Or..." The words as a lover stuck in her throat.

"As a friend," Allison said firmly. "Although," she smiled, as her heart hammered in her chest. "There's friends. And then there's friends. Friends that can be more.

"I'm done with Brad," she stated, her voice implacable. "He could crawl from Cabo back to Kentucky on his fucking hands and knees, and it still wouldn't be enough. I told him. I told him before he left. That night we had dinner with you and that friend of yours, I said, 'Brad, I'm not telling you not to have fun. But if I find out that the fun you're having involves your pecker and other women, we're through.' And guess what he did?"

She imagined Brad's likely responses. "He kissed your cheek and said, 'No problem, babe.'"

"His exact words. So we're through. Over. Done. He's done it before. He'll do it again if I'm dumb enough to forgive him and take him back, the way I did at Christmas and again back in September. He won't change." Her voice grew thoughtful. "Maybe he can't change. But that's not my problem anymore.

"My problem is what I'm going to do with the rest of my life."

"Yes. You're obviously an old maid. You better find a man pretty soon, Allie. Or no one will even look at you. You'll end up in the attic, scaring the kids."

"Jerkwad." She took a deep breath. "You graduate next May, right?"

She nodded.

"Well, that means we have almost a year."

Her heart pounded, terrified, exhilarated. "A year to what?" she whispered.

"A year," Allison said, "to find out if we're right for each other."

And then she lifted her hands to her cheeks, pulled her head down, and kissed her on the mouth.

When Shanaya had imagined this moment, it had involved any number of romantic settings. On the beach in the moonlight. At her house, reclining on fur rugs, with a fireplace warming their naked bodies. At the city park on Independence Day, fireworks overhead mimicking the explosions in their bodies.

At no time had she ever imagined it being on a warmish June day, with her back pressed up against the trunk of a poplar tree, just a few dozen yards down from the metal girders of the Morgan Street Bridge. But she threw that out of her mind entirely, running her hands down Allison's back until she could cradle the curves of her buttocks in her hands, pulling her closer. By all the gods, this chance might never happen again, and she would be damned if she wasn't going to feel every luscious inch of her friend's body pressing against her.

Allie gave a faint, disappointed sound, and ran her tongue over her closed lips. It took a second before her stunned brain could translate the signal, but when she did, she opened her mouth eagerly, welcoming Allie's tongue like a friend who had finally decided to pay a visit to her home. It was shyly adventurous, licking her lips and tangling briefly with her tongue in a short, brief battle that had no loser, only mutual winners.

She felt something sliding up her outer thigh, and realized Allie had raised up and was rubbing her jean-covered leg against her. She gripped her rear tighter, pulling her close, moaning into her best friend's mouth unashamedly as she ground her erection against her. She wanted Allison to feel how much she wanted her, to prove her desire in the simplest way possible.

No more. No more hiding, no more shy, longing glances, no more oblique hints that might be misinterpreted or ignored. I want her. She let a hand leave the delectable curve of Allison's ass and stroked upward until the outer swell of her breast was resting against her hand, all the while kissing her sweet mouth, the taste of her like wine on her tongue.

"Jesus!" With a panting wrench, Allison tore her mouth away, though she made no move to pull away from their passionate embrace. "Good God almighty, Ray. Who the hell taught you to kiss like that?"

A dozen glib answers sprang to mind, but she put them all aside and gave the blunt, honest truth. "You did, Allie. In my dreams."

Her friend's eyes sprang wide, locking with hers. And for once in her life, Shanaya didn't look away, didn't deflect the attention. She met Allison's gaze honestly, holding nothing back.

"I've dreamed about this so many times, Allie." Her belly was shaking in fear and joy, but she managed to keep her voice steady. "Ever since I was old enough to know what I wanted in a woman, I knew I wanted you."

Allison didn't say a word, but with a breathy little moan closed the distance between them again. Her kiss was warm and loving and deep, exploring the new-found intimacy between them. When they parted again, her eyes were wide, the pupils dilated by desire.

"Wow. And I've been missing this for all these years?" She laughed shakily. "Ray, if I had known..." She shook her head and seemed to come to a decision. "Well. I'm not going to cry over it, though it makes me so mad I want to spit. But I'm not going to waste any more time, either." She took his hand, tugging. "Come on."

She kept her feet rooted to the ground. "Come on where?"

"Well, back to your house, silly." She looked at her as if she were a dunce. "Mom is a lot of things, but she isn't stupid. And if we went up to my room to fuck, she probably wouldn't say anything, but she would give us that look that told me how disappointed she was. No one is home at your place, right?"

"Right," she replied automatically. "But what about-"

Allison's voice was steely. "If you say 'what about Brad,' Ray, I will scream, I swear to God. Fuck Brad. He has nothing to do with this. And nothing to do with us.

"I don't know why I never noticed how gorgeous you were until the last few days. Maybe I always saw you the way you were when you were four or eight or thirteen. And I don't know why you never told me the way you felt.

"But we're here. And it's now. Do you want to waste the rest of our lives the way we've wasted the last five or six years?"

"Six years?" Despite the terror in her belly, she let her lips curve in a grin. "Do you think we should have been screwing when we were fifteen? Your folks would have hit the roof."

"I was seventeen when I lost my virginity," Allison said, her lips soft and plump and incredibly kissable. Shanaya surrendered to temptation, holding the lovely woman close. "I could have done it with you instead of Zach Thatcher and not have been scared." She swallowed, and Shanaya was reminded that this was new for her, too. "So what's it going to be, Ray? A dream? Or real life?"

She smiled tremulously. "I'd offer to race you there, but I don't want to have a heart attack on the way.

"Let's go home."

Chapter 7: Once Upon a Star

The walk back home seemed to last forever. Shanaya was convinced that before they got there, Brad would pull up and proceed to kick the crap out of her for daring to touch Allison. Or that Gene's spell would wear off and she would be suddenly returned to her old body. Or that Allison's parents would show up and forbid them from seeing each other, lest she sully Allison's pure Caucasian bloodline with her inferior ancestry. Or that when they arrived home, her entire family would be there, stiff disapproval on their faces.

Or, or, or...

Or they could open the door, step into the air-conditioned sanctuary of her home, and see that everything was perfectly normal. She heaved a sigh of relief and locked the door, something she hardly ever did, and seriously considered pushing some heavy furniture in front of it to keep everyone else out.

"Are you all right, Ray?"

She nodded stiffly. "Just...give me a second." She smiled, though the expression felt false and nervous. "This isn't how I dreamed it would be, you know. I was hoping for something more..."

"Romantic?"

She nodded.

Allison put her arms around her. "Don't worry about it, love. Do you think that every time is perfect? There's going to be a lot more days like this." She put her hands on her chest, looking up. "Long, lazy days in bed, where the only things that are special are you and me and how much we love each other.

"Take me to bed, Ray. Love me."

Shanaya never remembered how they got to her room. All she remembered, afterward, was the joy that bubbled through her heart. Allison came to her, nestling into her arms as if the two of them had been created only for each other. They kissed, and as they did, their desire rose, each of them feeding off each other in a loop that had them fumbling at each other's clothes. Mouths were no longer enough when they both needed desperately to feel skin on skin.

"Oooh, that's nice." Allison's eyes widened happily as she tugged Shanaya's shirt out of her jeans and exposed her stomach. Her fingertips danced across her belly, making her skin prickle. "And not all gross and hairy, either. Some guys, it's like you shaved a bear." She pushed the shirt higher, nearly up to her shoulders, and leaned in so she could lick her nipples. "God, these are so cute. Like little chocolate kisses." She looked up, startled, as Shanaya's breath hissed between her teeth. "What's the matter, lover?" she purred. "Never had a girl do that for you before? Men are different than girls, but not completely." She circled her nipple with her tongue, teeth scraping over her skin in tiny little nibbles as Shanaya lifted the shirt completely away, pulling it over her head and dropping it to the floor.

"You've got great skin, Ray." Her fingers ran up and down her back. "Not like a lot of guys." Her nose wrinkled. "All white and pale and pasty. It's like they think they'll die if they go outside." She snickered. "Remember when my sister asked you if Indian people got sunburn? God, I thought Mom was going to die, she was so embarrassed."