Culture Shock (8 page)

He closed his hand over her shoulder. "The only thing I plan to hold against you is me."

"Oh, really?" she said, not sure if he kidded her or not.

He put his beer on the table and pulled her into an embrace. "Yes, really.”  The sexy timbre of his voice made her shiver.

Before she could speak, he kissed her.

Her eyes closed and her lips parted to allow him access. She shuddered when their tongues touched. Words of caution played in her mind, but any restraint she had melted away as his kiss deepened and stirred her embers of passion into flame. She had waited all week just to savor his kiss.

Alex stretched out alongside her and snaked a cradling arm under her head. With his free hand, he traced her body's curvature, slowly moving his hand along the side of her breast, to her waist, and along the swell of her hip. A warming sensation lingered wherever he touched.

For propriety's sake, she should push him away and get up, but every nerve in her body tingled with want for him.

When his body arched away, she opened her eyes. With lips still locked to hers, he stretched toward the end table with a reach not quite long enough to turn off the light. The lamp craned in the opposite direction, and while grappling to keep it from falling, Alex's fingers grasped the ancient fixture's frayed cord.

Amidst flickering light, shooting sparks, and the shattering of glass, Cynthia contorted. She closed her eyes as a stinging electrical current coursed through her, arcing her against Alex. The powerful discharge bound them together by pure force.

Her eyes, the only part of her body she could voluntarily move, flew open in wide amazement. Nose-to-nose with Alex, she stared helplessly at him. Moments ago
his luscious, blue eyes had been filled with desire, now they bulged in protest against the wattage. Suddenly, the room went dark. At last, the breaker had interrupted the current's flow.

***

Alex's hands and feet tingled, and it was hard to breathe. With his heart beating like a drum, and him being unable to focus in the sudden darkness, he shoved at whatever was next to him and heard a thud hit the thinly carpeted floor.

"Ouch!"

"Cynthia?" Confusion clouded his reasoning. The shrill voice coming from him wasn't his. The exclamation of pain sounded like him but he hadn't hurt himself. If he had, wouldn't he know it? Why didn't she answer him? "Cynthia?" he called out again.

He pushed himself off the couch, and felt his way across the darkened room, seeking the breaker box. He didn't feel quite right; nothing he could pinpoint. Prickles lingered from the power surge, and his feet ... He chalked the sensation up to the electrical shock.

With a jaw tense from worry about Cynthia, he groped until he found the closet, opened the door and patted the wall until he reached the spot where he expected to find the box. Nothing! With the dim moonlight reflecting through the window, his eyes quickly adjusted and he saw the metal outline. Funny, it seemed much higher than he recalled.

He stretched to open the cabinet and fiddled with the switches until he found the thrown one. After flipping it back into place, he walked over and turned on the overhead light. "There!"

He grasped his throat. The voice was clearly not his own, rather Cynthia's. But it couldn't be. "W-what the..."

The sight of himself sitting, dazed in the middle of the floor, staring up with arched brows threw him into a tizzy. How could he be there if he was here?

Alex shook his head in confusion, the shock must have been much stronger than he realized. His eyes surely were playing tricks on him. Was he having one of those out-of-body experiences, he'd heard about or had he just been shocked senseless? He looked down and gasped, seeing long, red nails and slender fingers ... on his hand. "What the hell?"

The hair he ran those fingers through wasn't his! Unlike his short waves, he found long, thick tresses. Nothing made sense. His heart racing, he dared look down again. "Oh my God! What's happened?" he screamed. "I'm you!"

Looking dazed and confused, his body still sat on the floor, but jumped at his scream.

Realization suddenly showed on his face
the face looking up at him. "Oh, my God, you just talked to me with my own voice, and ... and how can I possibly be here looking at myself over there? Oh, Alex, what's happened to us?"

Hearing his voice coming from across the room baffled his mind. He plopped down on the sofa and lowered his head into his hands. This couldn't be happening. It was a dream…a really, really bad dream and he was about to wake up.

Looking beyond his lap to the floor, he noticed petite feet wearing trendy, sling-back sandals. He willed the toes to wiggle, and the ones in the shoes did. "Holy crap! This isn't a dream, it's a nightmare!" He glanced across at what used to be his body. "Cynthia? Are you in there?"

She raised her hands and held them in front of her face, then turned them over and over, examining the massive fingers and hairy knuckles. She touched her cheek and her eyes widened. "Oh, my God, I'm growing a beard!" Tears blurred her eyes
his eyes. "This can't be happening. Lord help me! I'm in your body." She crawled up and sat in the easy chair, her gaze an empty stare of disbelief.

Both were speechless for a few minutes, but finally, Alex turned to Cynthia. "How did this happen?" he asked, in a panic-stricken female voice. "Please slap me and get me out of this hell."

Chapter Five

Cynthia held her breath and tried to let reality sink in. Yesterday, she worried about looking like the abducted women and now she looked exactly like Alex. Which was worse?

If she wasn't staring at herself on the sofa across the way and dealing with the structure of a new body, she'd swear this was all something out of a scary movie. Any minute now the credits would roll and she could leave the theatre and resume her normal life. Somehow, the panic building in her chest was far more than fear caused by acting.

She crossed, then quickly uncrossed, her legs, and put her feet squarely on the floor. "Criminy, no wonder you guys never sit like that. It's uncomfortable."

Alex stood and began to pace. He stopped and kicked off her shoes. "How in the hell do you walk in these flimsy things?"
 

"I think we have a much bigger problem here than my shoes," she snapped. "We have to fix this. Clearly something horrible and unexplainable has happened to us."

His shoulders slumped. "I know, I know! The lamp must have shorted out and been the cause. God, I thought things like this only happened in the movies."

"Well, until now, so did I. But evidently we were wrong." She held her hand to a headache building in her forehead. Ideas jumbled in her brain. "So, to fix this, all we have to do is shock ourselves again?"

Alex stared at her. "Yeah, right! All we have to do is determine just how much we can take before we electrocute ourselves. I don't know about you, but as badly as this may seem, I'd rather not kill myself ... or you, since I seem to be borrowing your body for the moment." He sagged onto the sofa, leaned his head back and stared at the ceiling.

"I'm not so sure I agree. This is horrible, and at this point I might be willing to take the risk. But, since you aren't, what do you propose we do?"

God, it sounded so strange to hear her own voice asking herself what she proposed to do.

Alex lifted his head. "This is so weird. I'm talking to you and looking at myself." He dipped his chin and stared at the floor. "I don't have any idea. This isn't exactly something that happens to me on a regular basis."

"Well, we can't stay like this! For heaven's sake, my brother is coming to visit. How am I supposed to explain this to him? For that matter, how am I supposed to show up at work on Monday? Did you think about that?" Welling panic caused an inflection in her voice.

"I find it frustrating that you insist I fix the problem," he snarled. "I'm just as upset as you are, and for some strange reason I want to slap you, but I'm afraid I'll bruise my own face."

The tension lifted for a moment as the sound of Cynthia's booming laughter shattered the silence. "I'm sorry. This isn't funny, but I just pictured you slapping me. Then I'd have to punch you and hurt myself."

Despite the stress, they collapsed into hysterical laughter until a moment of sanity prevailed and Alex sobered. "Well, that was good, but nothing's changed. What the hell are we going to do? I can't go to work like this."

***

After bantering back and forth for hours, Cynthia's nerves were completely frayed. She stood and held up a surrendering hand. "Look, we aren't getting anywhere and I'm exhausted. I need to sleep. Maybe we can think better after a good night's rest."

Alex nodded. "You're right, but how do we decide who sleeps where? You have my body and I have yours. Do you go to my apartment or do I? Do I sleep in your bed or in my own?"

Cynthia furrowed her brow. "I hadn't thought of that." She glanced down at the body that had become hers. "I guess I won't exactly fit into my night gown."

"Oh,
noooo," he interjected. "Don't think I'm wearing one. I may be stuck in this body but I refuse to play the part. It's bad enough that I have on this foo-foo blouse...and I've already sampled your shoes. That's enough for me."

Cynthia put her hands on her hips. "Oh, yeah? Well, you didn't seem to mind when I had them on, and...don't look now, but you're wearing a thong."

Alex grabbed his rear end with both hands. "Oh, Christ, what next?"

"How about if we both sleep here tonight? One of us can have the bed and the other the sofa. That way we don't have to make any rash decisions right away."

"Sounds good to me. I'll take the couch." Despite the mass confusion, he still acted the gentleman.

"No, you take the bed. I'm used to it...or you're used to it. Oh, hell, the body is used to it. I'll just sleep on the sofa. No more discussion."

"Okay. You win." Alex acquiesced and walked into the bedroom. "But I'm sleeping in my clothes…your clothes…anything but your nightgown."

Cynthia followed him and rummaged in the closet for blankets. Alex settled between the clean sheets and snuggled down.

"Sure, you get the bed and I have to sleep on the stinky couch," she mumbled.

"I heard that!" He raised his head. "It was your idea, not mine."

She didn't respond, but returned to the living room and snapped the blankets a little too vigorously as she spread them out on the sofa. This wasn't his fault, but she didn't have anywhere else to aim her anger. The scream rising in her throat threatened to choke off her breath.

***

Alex felt a tad guilty, but curled on his side, scrunched the pillow into a comfortable ball, and closed his eyes. He was dozing off when he heard Cynthia tiptoeing toward the bathroom. He rolled over. "Where are you going?"

"You don't have to be a Rhode's scholar to figure it out. The only other room attached to the bedroom is the bathroom." Her voice showed her annoyance. "I'm going to brush my teeth. I always do before I go to bed."

"Well, should I go with you and bring your teeth?" he snapped back.

"I would appreciate a little less sarcasm if you don't mind. And, since you mentioned it, you might want to brush before you go to sleep, too."

He should have kept quiet.

Alex rolled back over and faced the wall. "I'll pass. I don't like sharing toothbrushes." He chuckled. "Hell, I don't know why not. We're sharing everything else at the moment." His attempt at humor to ease her distress fell far short of the mark. He turned back to face the wall and listened as the sofa creaked beneath her weight
or rather his weight.

With the blanket beneath his chin, the aroma of her perfume lingered on the linen. Under different circumstances he might have been aroused.

He tossed and turned. Ever since Cynthia had mentioned the word, "thong", Alex had an incredible urge to pick at his behind. He fought against exploring and kept his hands in check as long as he could. Finally, he couldn't stand it anymore and plucked at the flimsy undergarment strung between his cheeks. His mind questioned the need for butt floss. He'd always found skimpy undergarments a turn-on, but he didn't expect to be the one wearing them. The thought didn't bring a chuckle as he hoped. Nothing about this nightmare held any semblance of humor, and he shuddered at the thought his situation might just be a permanent one.

***

The Sunday morning sun, filtering through a hole in the bedroom curtain, caught Alex square in the face. He struggled to open his eyes, but the blinding ray was extraordinarily bright. He rolled away from the glare.

Memories of last night flooded back. He froze, afraid to move…to get up. Please, God, he bargained with the Lord, tell me it was just a bad dream. Make it a bad dream, and I'll do whatever you ask of me.

He hesitated a moment before exploring his chest. His fingers rested on a mound, and then moved to a second one. Clearly it wasn't a dream. He had tits.