Swap Meeting

Many thanks to floss83 for first editing and improving this story.

Grateful thanks to the erudite Ginger_Scent, who writes stories in both English and Italian, for pointing out additional embarrassing mistakes and weak parts, suggesting better words and phrases and helping make the story better in countless ways.

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Almost everybody who knew Barnaby Grant would describe him with a single word: bastard.

They had to admit he was a shrewd businessman. When they first go to know him, some acquaintances found being around a shark was exciting. But most of the people he dealt with eventually stayed as far away from him as they could if they could help it.

His private life was almost nonexistent. He didn't care, because he paid professionals to give him everything he wanted. They despised him, but they were whores, so they came when he called.

Tonight, he was with one of them who avoided him unless she really needed the money. Though he took her to a nice restaurant, he spent the dinner telling her about Mrs. Roberts, his executive secretary, and the various ways he humiliated her in front of his staff, her husband and even her children.

"I know she hates me, and she knows she could run the business without me, but one of her kids has a lot of medical bills, so she's at my mercy."

He laughed heartily, and the hooker, whose name he always seemed to forget until he looked her up in his phone book, pretended to smile because that's what she was getting paid for.

Barnaby never took any of his call girls home. He didn't want them in his house, so he always rented a hotel room for the night. He wasn't cheap, so it was an expensive hotel. But it could have been any filthy dive once he and the pretty woman closed the door because of the disgusting things he made her do.

The ultimate sadistic pleasure for him was finding something vulnerable in even the most hardened prostitute. They knew they had to speak to him or he'd tell them to leave and they'd forfeit their pay. His conversational skill was honed razor sharp to manipulate others at work. The hookers were no match for him.

They had many stories for customers who wanted to talk before sex, but they had never encountered someone like Barnaby. He would pretend to believe them and encourage them to embellish and invent, all the while directing the conversation into channels where he could probe and discover more about what they liked and disliked.

His triumph was prying out the woman's deepest, darkest sexual secret -- the one thing she detested more than anything else. Then he would demand it -- and eventually obtain it. He enjoyed it even more if they were crying or gagging or both while he did it to them or they did it for him.

It came down to that on this night as well, and the hooker was in a rage. She was refusing, but he knew she'd come around. His game was to see how little it would cost to force her to do it, and he figured that if it cost nothing extra, he was the winner. He usually won.

"You are the most sickening excuse for a human being that walks this Earth," the woman said. "How I wish I you could feel how disgusting it is to have sex with you!"

Talk like this didn't bother Barnaby. He loved it because he knew that by the end of the evening, he would have his satisfaction and the woman would be hating herself.

"Oh yeah?" he replied. "How much do you wish that would happen? Would you pray to God or Allah or whatever you pray to for that to happen?"

"Yes I would," said the woman vehemently. "I would give anything to make you take what you've been giving. You'd be a whimpering crybaby in no time. You're nothing but a bully. You can hand it out, but you can't take it yourself."

"Oh yeah?" he said again. "Maybe you can find yourself a genie. Or why don't you go out on the balcony and wish on a star. Just don't fall off."

He began to laugh.

Dressed only in a slip, she got up and staggered to the sliding door that led to the balcony and pulled it open.

"Hey, be careful!" he yelled. "You've had a lot to drink."

She opened the door, stepped out and looked up into a clear sky full of stars.

"Why be careful?" she thought to herself. "So he doesn't have to explain my dead body to the police. Screw him! Look at all those stars. Why not make a wish? It's stupid, but I'm going to do it anyway. I wish that I could trade places with Barnaby. I'd be the rich businessman, and he'd be the whore. Yes, yes, yes. I wish. I wish. I wish. Oh! Was that a shooting star?

She began to laugh and the laugh turned into a cough.

"How did it get so cold out here?" she thought. "I'm shivering. A second ago it was a nice night. What happened? Something feels strange."

She walked back into the room and began laughing again.

"Barnaby Grant, you're through," she shouted at him as she poured herself another strong drink. She knew she was going to need it and more of them to get through this night.

"I just wished on a shooting star, and you're finished. You hear me?"

"I hear you," he said with a laugh. "Before I'm all washed up, though, come over here. It's getting late and that little thing we talked about might take some time, because I want you to do it very slowly, so that you really enjoy it."

"Ugh," she said and shuddered. Suddenly she was just as chilly in the room as she had been outside. And she felt strange inside, too. It was probably the booze or the fear of what she was going to do with Barnaby. She poured herself another drink and walked over to Barnaby. She might as well get this over with.

************

A couple of hours later he was fast asleep, and she was curled up in a corner of the bed weeping. In her four years on the job, this was the most humiliating and degenerate night of them all. Even being stinking drunk and delirious hadn't helped. She was too worn out to get dressed. She cried herself to sleep in a drunken haze, repeating softly, "I wish, I wish, I wish, I wish..."

*******************

It didn't take Barnaby long to realize something was wrong. He slept completely naked, and when he woke up he saw right away that he had two breasts, a vagina and no penis. He rolled over on his stomach and put his head on the pillow, waiting to wake up from his dream.

After a few minutes of feeling no different, he decided to get up and see where the dream might take him. He found himself in the hotel room from last night, and everything looked the same except himself.

There was a piece of paper on the coffee table. He picked it up and read the note scribbled on it.

"I don't understand what happened, but I have to get out of here before I go crazy. I'll be back."

It wasn't signed.

He walked into the bathroom and looked at himself in the full-length mirror and saw that he had the body and face of last night's call girl, whose name he had already forgotten. It was a nice body, he thought. The breasts were big but not the enormous ones he preferred. At least they weren't fake. The ass was small and round, just like he liked them, because the small ones caused more pain when he penetrated them. She was in good shape, and her face was pretty, too. That's why she was expensive.

He wasn't in a bad mood, just a little impatient. This was quite a dream, but for some reason he felt like he needed to wake up and get to work. There was a knock on the door. He looked around for some clothes, but his were missing. Hers were all over the bedroom floor. He put a towel around his waist and looked in the mirror and saw his breasts. He found the white hotel bathrobe, put it on and went to the door.

He pushed in right past him. He was him. Barnaby looked at the man who looked like him. When he started talking, he sounded like him. Weirder and weirder, he thought.

"Look," said the other Barnaby. "I am as puzzled and scared as you are. You are Barnaby, aren't you?"

Barnaby nodded.

"When I woke up early this morning, I was in your body, and I saw myself, you, lying on the bed next to me. I thought I was dreaming, but everything else was real. I started to put on my clothes and then realized that I looked like a transvestite, so I put on your clothes. I went back to my apartment and tried to figure out what to do. I still haven't come up with anything. I don't believe in magic, but this is something that's not natural. We've got to find a way to get our bodies back."

Barnaby listened. Some dream, he thought, but dream or not, he was Barnaby.

"What are you talking about, bitch?" he said. "What's the idea of taking my clothes? Did you take my wallet, too?"

He looked around.

"Where's my stuff?"

"I didn't know what to do. I wanted to be sure you didn't disappear. I have all your and my identification at my apartment. We'll go there later and work on this."

"I'm going nowhere," he said. "I'm staying right here until this dream is over."

"You don't understand," the other Barnaby said. "We've got to get out of here before anyone finds out. At least I do. I think you're making a mistake, but if you want to stay I don't care. I'm leaving."

"You're going nowhere, bitch," Barnaby said and jumped at the hooker in his body. When she easily pushed him away, he found out that he didn't just have the hooker's body, but also her woman's strength. The other Barnaby had his well-exercised body.

"Sorry, but I've got to go home now and think in peace," said the other Barnaby. "I'm stumped, but I've got to think of something. You can't leave until I do."

The man walked over and swept the hooker's clothes up from the floor into his arms, then rushed out the door.

A few hours later, the phone rang, and Barnaby picked it up. The voice was his.

"I told the hotel we're staying for a couple more days and my woman friend would be ordering room service," the voice said. "I'll see you tomorrow."

The voice hung up and Barnaby slammed the phone down. He was getting tired of this dream. He spent the rest of the day eating, watching TV and drinking booze. He thought of playing with his body, but decided that would be too spooky. He fell asleep in a drunken haze.

When he awoke the next morning, he was a little upset for the first time. This weird dream seemed to be going on for a long time.

He ordered breakfast from room service and then took a shower. He put on the white robe. He thought about what he could do and what he should do, but he couldn't think of anything. He spent the day watching TV, eating, drinking and not thinking.

When there was a knock on the door around eight, he knew immediately who it was and was even a little glad because it meant some variation from his boredom.

The other Barnaby went right to the closet. He was carrying some clothes. He hung up a couple of pieces and put the rest on the dresser. Then he cleared the meals that had accumulated on the round table and carried them out into the hall. He came back in and sat down at the table and said, "Sit down!"

Barnaby grumbled but joined him.

"I spent the day with Mrs. Roberts," the man said.

"You did what? Why you little --"

"I was desperate. I couldn't keep going back to my apartment looking like you. I didn't know what to do, and I remembered you talking about her. I don't have much time because I'm going back to your office and working with her some more tonight. Thank goodness it's Friday. She agreed to work all weekend, but then she's used to that, isn't she?

"If you want to hear everything I have to tell you, you need to shut up. If you start interrupting me, I'll just get up and leave. Is that understood? When I'm done, I'll answer your questions."

Barnaby looked at the man and noticed he was wearing different clothes from the ones he had worn two days ago. They were his clothes. The man must have broken into his house. He began to get angry and started to say something but decided to be quiet for now.

"I went very slowly with Mrs. Roberts. At first, I pretended to be you. Boy is she frightened of you! She told me about the appointments you missed yesterday and had a list of people to call and your appointments for today. When I told her I didn't want to hear about any of that, she got really frightened. She thought I was playing one of your sadistic games with her.

"The more we talked, the more I thought to myself that I could trust her. Finally, I told her the story. Of course, she didn't believe me. She was trying to think of what trick you were pulling on her, so I told her she had my permission not to believe the story as long as she followed instructions.

"I remembered that you said she could easily run your business without you, and I told her that until I gave her other orders, that's what I expected her to do. She is telling everybody that I had to leave suddenly on business and won't be back for a couple of weeks. Meanwhile, she will spend her time showing me what to do and teaching me how to be you. I had your address from your driver's license, and she told me how to get in your house without tripping the alarm."

"Why that --," Barnaby started to say and then he looked at the other Barnaby frowning at him and stopped.

"I went to your house and showered and put on some fresh clothes. You've got some place. It got me thinking about the future. Up to now, I've focused on surviving in your hateful body. But I made myself a cup of coffee and sat at your kitchen table and thought hard for a couple of hours. I started writing things down. I'll read some of them to you now."

The other Barnaby looked at the pad he had placed in front of himself.

"I decided my number one priority for now was you. No, I don't feel sorry for you, you sick prick, but you're in my body, and I have no idea how long this swap is going to last. I don't normally believe in the supernatural, but I began to think, what if something or someone was teaching you a lesson and tomorrow or next week or next month, we would be swapped back? I couldn't have you wrecking my body before I got it back. So I'm going to take good care of you.

"That's why I brought you some of my clothes to wear. So you can get out of here."

There was a knock, and the man went to the door and opened it. A voluptuous woman wearing clothes too tight for her and heavy makeup walked in.

"Barnaby, this is Tessy," said the man. "She's going to stay here with you for now.

"If you're like I am now, you're not going to change much. I feel like one of those men who say they are a woman trapped in a man's body. I'm still myself, and I'm not attracted to women. I did experiment already with your plumbing and found that I could make myself come with my hand -- even as confused as I am."

Barnaby now had his mouth open. He was absorbed in what the man was saying.

"Tessy is going to take care of me/you and make sure nothing happens to my body. She works for my friend, Tammy, who's a madam. Tammy believes in magic, and she totally got into my story. You can't stay here forever, and I can't trust you in my apartment. Tammy said she'd take you in if I paid your room and board. Mrs. Roberts showed me how to get access to your accounts, so that's not a problem.

"I see you're getting angry, but at this point that's the best I can come up with. I told Tammy to keep you happy until I could come up with something better. Some other girls are coming over tomorrow to take you over to Tammy's house.

"I'm not going to be seeing you for a while. I have to work on what I'm going to do with my apartment and bank accounts so they are safe when I need them again. And I have to learn your business. But I'll be checking on you. I've got to go now. Any questions?"

A million things were racing through Barnaby's mind, but he couldn't put any of them in the form of a question. When nothing was forthcoming, the man got up and said, "Take good care of me, Tessy," and then rushed out. Barnaby looked up and saw the hooker was smiling at him.

*****************

If Tammy had any doubts, Barnaby's behavior soon convinced her that this wasn't her friend anymore. He tyrannized Tammy's girls. They went crying to the boss, but she told them they still had to take care of Barnaby.

He spent a lot of time exploring sex with her employees. The girls were surprised to find he was a virgin and didn't want to change that status. He made them use their mouths on him and enjoyed humiliating and degrading them.

Six months went by, and one day Tammy called him to her office. She had a big smile on her face. With her was the other Barnaby.

"I see they've been taking good care of you," he said. "Tammy was telling me what you've been doing to her girls. You may have my body, but your mind is just as sick and cruel at it ever was.

"Mrs. Roberts isn't afraid of you anymore. I invented a story almost as strange as the truth. I told her I was seeing a therapist for headaches, and I made up the story about switching bodies because I was ashamed to admit it. I told her my therapist said I needed to change my life or I'd die of a heart attack.

"I said that I went into shock when I heard that and found out later that it caused some temporary memory loss. I needed her help to relearn what I used to do and then change my approach to life and business before it killed me. I told her the therapist also said I wouldn't get better until I asked her and the some employess to forgive me.

"They were still suspicious at first, but as I've been giving them raises and treating them well, they slowly began to trust me and tell me what kind of monster you used to be. They made it easy for me to decide what to do.

"So here's what I came to tell you. I'm in the process of liquidating all your companies and assets. Everyone's on board because they are all getting large bonuses. I told them I needed to get away from it all and contemplate my life.

"I'm also creating a new identity for myself. I haven't decided yet whether to do any plastic surgery, but even if I don't, you are going to disappear forever. I'm going to destroy every paper and digital record of you, including all photographs. I'll keep government records, like tax returns, Social Security, passports and driver's licenses just in case I overlook something.

"I'm paying lot of money to people who help spies and government witnesses disappear in protection programs. All my new offshore accounts will be joint, with my new name and the one I had before you took my body. That won't help you track me down, because I won't be in this country, and no one, not even Tammy, will know where I went.

"The reason I'm keeping both names on the accounts is just in case there is a reversal some day. I don't think that's going to happen, but if it does, I'll just take all the money out in my name, create a new woman's identity and destroy the paperwork with your name.

"If you do get your body back, you'll need to find Mrs. Roberts to convince her to help you re-establish your identity, because you'll no longer have any power over her. As I said, I don't think that's going to happen. I'm pretty sure we're stuck in our bodies.

"Since I'm destroying the Barnaby identity and taking mine with me, you will be undocumented. That means you won't even be able to open a bank account.

"I've decided to give some of your money to you in cash. It's fifty thousand dollars, more than double my own savings. Tammy has it. You can get ten thousand from her immediately and the rest in ten years. That way you won't have enough money to pay for a new identity or to try to find me until the trail is cold.

"Tammy says you can stay here and work for her, or she will have some of the girls take you out of town to wherever you want that's at least a thousand miles from here. She'll use your ten thousand for travel expenses and to rent you an apartment for as long as you want since you are undocumented and can't do it yourself. Whatever is left will be given to you in cash, and you'll be on your own.