Another dull day of school.  I shuffle off the bus, down the half a block from my stop, and open the door.  After putting my backpack down and hanging my jacket, I take care of all the immediate needs that come with being the bigger sibling at home before mom gets home - feeding the pets, cleaning the litter box, and so on.  Once I’m done with those, I pull a lasagna out of the freezer, take it out of a box, peel back a corner, and pop it in the oven for the next hour or so.  Not only is lasagna one of my favorite meals, but it’s one of the easiest too.

After all that’s said and done, I make my way up the stairs, but before entering my room, I look across the hall and see a pale pink light coming from the base of the door.  I could tell that Celeste was at it again, from the sounds coming through our paper-thin walls.  I never let it on, but I’ve always been jealous of her - see, she unlike most people is a witch.  A thing that I as a male, in our family, clearly am not and would not be.  It’s not that I’ve ever wanted to be a girl or anything, but how can you not be envious of a sibling who practices spells and creates potions?   

That envy had begun to split us apart - there was always going to be a difference between us considering I’m four and a half years her elder and the opposite gender, but she was my best friend growing up.  As soon as puberty hit for me, however, it became pretty clearly apparent that I wasn’t supposed to hang out with other girls, lest they be my girlfriends.  Along with that, our interests diverged - me getting more into football and athletics in general, and her, well…doing her magic “thing”

It was disappointing, but not necessarily unexpected.  I’d developed a decent friend group of guys on the football team, so I clearly wasn’t lonely, and they always roped me into their stupid ideas, so they definitely made sure I wasn’t ever bored. 

On that note though, this was a fairly quiet night by comparison.  Most of my friends were out getting drunk - something that I was not comfortable doing for another few years, so I was stuck at home on a Friday evening with not much to do.  I tried pulling my homework out of my backpack, but found myself spacing out within a few minutes.  I went downstairs to talk to my parents, but then remembered as soon as I got there that they too were out for the night for a fancy dinner.  They trusted me enough not to require a babysitter, so it was just me and Celeste.  I wonder what she’s up to, anyways?

I worked my way back up the stairs, and knocked on her door - I knew better than to barge on my sisters room, not knowing what could be on the other side, especially considering I live with a witch.  That said, usually she shouted back at me, whether it was to go away, come in, or something in between, but this evening she was almost silent.  Putting my ear to the door, I heard a soft but confident set of what sounded like nonsense words being repeated.  Was this one of her spells she was practicing?  I tried knocking again, this time yelling for her “Celeste?  What the hell are you doing in there?”.  Again, no response, though the chanting from inside the room became louder.  I tried knocking and yelling again - again, no answer and the voice raising higher and louder.  Was she ignoring me?

Eventually, I gave up, and pulled the master key out of my back pocket, as the door was locked.  It took a bit of wriggling, but I got the door open, but before I could even say anything, I was overtaken by the end of my sister’s chanting, and a thick pink cloud of smoke.  There was no time to react, and before I knew it, I was coughing on whatever fumes this pink clouds were from.  Goddamn it, Celeste, you’re in so much trouble if I get sick from this!

Wait, what?

My coughs…they’re still there, but they sound a lot softer and higher.  Almost like my sister.  I look up at her and notice she’s standing there, not doing much of anything, except giving me a horrified look. 

Wait, look up?  To my sister?  I checked both her body and mine to see if she was stepping on something or if I was kneeling and I WOAHOAHWOAH!

Upon looking down, the sight that greets me are my normal clothes, except for whatever reason, it looks and feels like they doubled in size.  Along with that, the thick material of my jeans and shirt were starting to rub uncomfortably against my skin.  Did she use some kind of shrinking spell on me or something?

“Uh sis…” I stammer.  That voice again? “W-w-what happened?” I ask her, terrified.

Her mouth is still agape, and can’t really form any words to say.  Instead she grabs me by the wrist (since when was her grip so strong?) and leads me into her room towards the back corner, where a full sized mirror was leaning against the wall.  I look into it an-

HOLY SHIT I’M A GIRL!

The immediate shock of what I see, I feel causes my hands to come up to my face, meaning the jeans that were barely struggling to hold onto my body slipped out without any effort at all.  That said, my tee shirt now tented me so its hardly like I was naked.  At least for now, as I lift up my shirt to get a full view of my new form.  I see Celeste look away in embarrassment, but modesty be damned, I need to see this for myself.

The girl in the mirror was rather cute.  She was about the same height and age as Celeste (that is to say, just under 5 feet and just past her 13th birthday.  Her skin not only was ridiculously smooth, but free of any blemish, scar, or zit that her previous body had been riddled with.  Working her way down, my eyes get a quick view of her chest, and he immediately look away from the mirror in horror.  Slowly peeking back, I see the chest area, featuring small breasts that seemed to indicate more to come in the following years, and a distinct lack of any muscle mass.  Her dark blonde hair spilled out behind her shoulders, but outside of that, she looked near identical to her sister in every way.

Wait, her sister?  MY sister.  That’s me!

A blush immediately fills my cheeks, as a whole load of feelings come at me, all at once.  My heart is sinking from embarrasment, my body is trying to shrink into itself, and my stomach is…fluttering?

“Dangit, dangit, dangit!” my sister starts “I messed up this damn spell and now Matthew is a girl!  Ugh!”

‘Matthew is a girl’.  Huh.  Why is that not the weirdest thing I’ve heard during all of this?

Celeste rolls her eyes as she pulls a long tapered piece of wood out from her dress sleeve, nonchalantly muttering to herself “Well, at least the reversal spell aught to work to fix the issue”

Reversal - she was going to turn me back to a boy?  I weirdly felt a panic rising in my chest.

“Oh well.  eaque pedum solvere et revertetur in scopum original ad…”

“STOP!” A shrill voice shouted.  It took me a few seconds to realize it’d been my own.  Celeste meanwhile looked on, dumbfounded.  Had her brother just said no to becoming a boy again?

“Matthew…are you okay?”

“Yes…no…maybe, I…I’m rea-…rea-“

And before I knew it, the dam had been burst and warm tears began streaming down my face.   Why am I crying?  Why did I stop her?  What’s wrong with me?

My sister, god bless her, immediately came in to scoop me up and hug me.  I didn’t think about the fact that we were now equal in size, and that I was still naked; I just dug my head into her shoulder and cried until the tears stopped coming out.  After which, I finally recovered myself enough to look her in the eye.  She handed me a pink robe, and invited me to sit on her bed. 

“So um…sis…” Holy shit she called me her sister!  Why does that feel so good? “You stopped me from using that reversal spell on you.  Is there something you wanted to tell me?”

I tried to open my mouth to talk, but words betrayed me, and I just looked away from my sister’s glare, down at the floor below me.  “I can’t…”

“What do you mean, you can’t?”

“I mean I can’t, okay?  I’m not…” I choked again “I’m not supposed to like this…”

“Like what?”

Again, I wanted to tell her what I was feeling, but the words didn’t really come out right again.  I made another flaccid attempt at talking, but my sister interrupted, clearly putting some sort of pieces together - at least better than I could right now.

“Wait…you mean you like being a girl?”

I try hiding my emotions from her, but a loud sob gives away my feelings.  As much as I know it’s wrong, even being told that much is making my stomach do backflips, like it finally got the food it’d been hungering for for years. 

“There, there, it’s okay” my sister tries to comfort me

“No!…no it’s not…I’m messed up and wrong and…and…”

Celeste grabbed my shoulders and kindly but forcefully made me look her in the eyes.

“Matthew…if you like being a girl, there’s nothing wrong with that.  I’m not gonna think any different about you, and I’m pretty sure mom isn’t going to either.”

Oh my god, was I really going to do this? 

“You mean I can just…be a girl?”

“Uh huh”

“And it’s not weird?”

“Nope, not at all”

“And I can like girl stuff and be cute and-“

“Yes, yes you can.  Listen, sis, I messed up my spell, but if it helped unlock something about you in the process, all the better!”

A pregnant pause followed that.  I eventually after a minute or so mustered up enough gusto to say what my soul had been screaming this entire time “I…I think I wanna be a girl…”

“What’d you say?” My sister said, a mischievous grin appearing on her face.

“I said, I wanna be a girl, okay?!  Being smaller and softer and being called your sister feels really good and I’ve never felt so good about myself and….please don’t hate me?” I whisper

My sister looked at me, with eyes of sympathy, before giving me another large bear hug.  I could feel our small breasts squishing against one another, and unlike what I’d have thought, I didn’t mind the feeling at all.  If anything it made me feel one with my sister again.

“Oh Matthew…I wouldn’t ever hate you.  And besides, now I’ve got a kickass twin sister to play with!”

I can be her sister?

I immediately glomp hug her back onto the bed.  Is this what self confidence feels like?  A light and fluttery feeling has expanded past my tummy and has overtaken my body.  There’s still a niggling voice in my head telling me to stop this charade, but I tell it to shut up. 

A few minutes later, I’m dressed in a remarkably similar outfit to my sisters - a dress featuring long sleeves, divided into two sections - the top acting like a long sleeved scoop neck tee, and the bottom acting like a swishy skirt.  God, why was going spinny in this thing so much fun?

Most of all, I’m just happy that me and my sister are close again, and that I can finally say I look confident about how I feel, as foreign as that sounds.

My giddiness is short lived though, as I hear a loud door knocking. Mom.

“Shit…what do I do, Celeste?”

“I…I don’t know Madeline!”

I then hear steps going up up the stairs to Celeste’s room.  Mt breathing is getting heavier, and before I know it…everything is huge?  I’m distracted by my mom’s GIANT leather boot, that I choose to hide behind.

“Hey honey…you seen Matthew?  Was meaning to talk to him about something”

“Nope, haven’t seen him, nothing to report!”

My mom just gave a pursed frown, as she made her way out of the room, and shut the door behind her.  As soon as the door closed, I felt my body expand rapidly, to the point where I was back to being my (relatively) normal self.

“Did…did you just shrink?” Celeste asks me, skeptically.

That can’t be it, can it?  But now that I’m a girl, particularly one so similar to my sister…wait…it can’t be.

“Oh my god Celeste, I’m a witch too!”