He's usually pretty good about staying asleep as long as we don't get too loud," Meghan said as she tiptoed back into the living room where her brother, Brad, was sitting.
The 'he' in question was Meghan's young son. The father was long gone. The only thing Meghan missed about him was the child support payments, although even those were difficult to miss since she'd never actually received any.
Meghan motioned for Brad to follow her and she led him into the kitchen. Brad leaned on the kitchen counter as Meghan pulled out two coffee cups. She brushed her long, brunette hair to one side as she pulled out a tiny bag from a top shelf and poured a little of what looked like tea leaves into each cup. She looked up at him with a mysterious smile, the corners of her eyes wrinkling slightly.
Meghan was Brad's younger sister. She'd gotten married and pregnant just out of high school, divorced soon after the birth of her son. Though Brad had secretly doubted that her marriage would last considering her youthfulness and her ex-husband's dickishness, he was never anything other than supportive of his sister. They were like best friends and there were no secrets between them.
"Ok, what's this surprise?" Brad finally asked as she prepared the tea.
"Well, you know how we talked about how you're into the...body swapping thing?"
Brad had confessed to her his kink for body swapping several months ago and she'd been very supportive. She didn't freak out and call him a weirdo or tease him. She thought about, mulled it over, and agreed with him that it didn't mean anything. It was just a kink. But why was she bringing it up now?
"Yeah?" he asked with some trepidation.
She poured water into the two mugs then put them in the microwave to heat up. She turned to Brad and chewed on her bottom lip, adorably nervous.
"I was passing the farmer's market today and this weird old lady called me over to her table," Meghan began in a rush. "Like, literally, called me, she knew my name. Then she said she knew I wanted to trade bodies with someone for a little while, just to see what it was like. Like I talked about with my brother. Those were her exact words, how did she know that?"
Brad shrugged, at a loss.
"Anyway, she promised that if we both drank this tea it would happen. It was a little expensive but..."
She trailed off and looked up at Brad as if daring him to speak. The silence spread out until the microwave beeped.
"Ok, that's weird, I admit. But you don't actually believe her, do you?" Brad finally asked. Though a part of him hoped it were true. Becoming his sister wasn't his first choice, but he wouldn't mind inhabiting her adorable body for a little while.
Meghan took out the warm cups of tea and handed one to Brad. Her cute lips curled up in a sly grin.
"One way to find out." She said, arching an eyebrow and raising her cup.
Oh, what the hell? Brad thought, and quaffed his drink. The tea was weirdly smoky and strangely thick. An exquisite dizziness went straight to his head like a shot of whiskey. Before he'd even put the cup down on the counter the room was spinning.
Brad leaned over to support himself and stared down into the dark dregs of the coffee cup. It seemed to expand downwards as he watched, becoming bottomless and sucking him down into the inky blackness. First his head then his body was pulled into the dark chasm that opened up in front of him.
