Post by ark on Jan 18, 2019 23:56:26 GMT -6
Hi all. I've been majorly inspired by the recent burst of activity on the site, so I've started writing a new story this week. I'm not sure when I'm going to have the time to work on it again, so rather than let it fester on my PC for god knows how long, I thought I'd post what I have so far.
I have a pretty good idea of where I want to take it next, but let me know if you have any thoughts on the directions I could take. Hope you enjoy!
Ark
Three Wishes
Peter basked on his sun lounger, cocktail in hand. The warm sea breeze brushing over him, with miles of endless blue sky ahead.
This was the life.
Only, it wasn’t really. Peter felt awful. He’d felt awful for months, lost and alone after his divorce papers had come through. He’d booked this holiday in the hopes that a bit of sun, a bit of drink, and some R&R would lift the cloud he’d been wading through. But he’d been here three days now and he felt as bad as ever.
At 42, he felt awkward being in a place like this on his own. There were happy couples his age everywhere he looked, and groups of young singletons making a disgrace of themselves every night, but hardly any single 40 somethings looking for a fresh start. He’d been in a happy couple not so long ago, and he’d been that pissed 21 year old climbing statues once upon a time too.
To be fair, there were a few single gents around his age, or older, drifting around like ghosts. Dead behind the eyes. He was one on them now, he’d realised. Out of place. He’d exchanged knowing nods with a few. They’d all come here to recapture something, their youth, or their zest for life, but instead they were just endlessly confronted with what they’d lost.
While Peter started off into the abyss, his eyes were drawn to a beautiful young woman emerging from the sea. Long dark brow hair swished back over her shoulder, black & white designer bikini hugging her slender figure, held together by gold rings and willpower, endless legs striding through the surf. It was like a scene straight out of a Bond film.
Pete, breathtaken, removed his sunglasses for a better look. She looked vaguely familiar, this stunning leggy beauty. She walked out of the sea and straight towards him. He inhaled sharply and sucked in his gut, but she turned to the left, giving Pete a glimpse of the greatest bottom he’d ever seen, before joining a impossibly tanned man a few loungers down.
Now this man Pete did recognise. Fabricio Hernandez, Italy’s number one striker and notorious ladies man of the Premier League. Pete had watched this man tear his local team Stoke City and the England side to shreds numerous times, and here he was literally snatching Pete’s dream woman away as well. A memory twigged, and Pete remembered that Fab had made headlines recently by marrying an English dance sensation after a whirlwind romance. Sophie Everleigh.
Pete had seen her dance a few times, she’d been one of the Pro’s on Strictly Come Dancing and was darling of the tabloids. And here she was, meters away, with her amazing ass in full view.
The fact she was making out with his nations greatest sporting enemy was a detail the content of his swim trunks seems happy to ignore.
So as subtly as possible, Pete jogged into the sea to cool himself off.
He splashed some salt water over his face and paddled about for a bit, but his eyes kept drifting back over to the Fab and Sophie. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been this attracted to a woman. Maybe his ex-wife, 20 years ago, when they were awkwardly flirting on a beach just like this. She’d been a stunner in her youth, great tits and an hourglass figure, but her looks had faded along with everything else over the years in that doomed relationship. She’d ended up matronly and bitter, and he’d gotten fat, bald, and aloof. He wondered if he’d ever have a second chance at love, and if he did, would it turn out any different?
As he was about to head back to the beach, he kicked something hard under the sand. Cursing, he reached down and pulled it up. It was a old school, incense lamp. A bit rusty here and there, but in good nick. He poured the water out of it and gave it a look. It was covered in elaborate carvings and a language he didn’t recognise, and there was no sign of a “made in china” stamp. This might be worth a few bob, he thought, as he hauled himself out of the surf.
He plonked himself down on his sun lounger, and started brushing the sand off his archaeological find. Again he glanced over at the sexy young couple, still going at it, and getting increasingly handsy. Fabricio copped a feel of Sophie’s ample, tanned breast. God, Peter could only imagine what such a boob would feel like. He wished he’d married Sophie Everligh.
There was a pop.
Sophie appeared on the sun lounger next to Pete, and he had his hand on her thigh. They looked at each, for half a second and then screamed.
“What the fuck!” Sophie snatched her hand away and scrambled to her feet. “Who are you? What the hell just happened!”
“I don’t know!” he pulled his hands back in held them up innocently. “Honestly!”
“Where is Fabrico?” she looked around, but the footballer was no where to be seen. “And what….what the hell has happened to me?”
It had taken a few seconds for Pete to notice, but while it was definitely Sophie Everleigh who’d just magically appeared next to him, she looked very different. For a start, she was about 30 pounds heavier, her hips and thighs in particular looking much more buxom then they had moments before. Her tan was gone, and she instead had a pasty white complexion similar to Pete’s own. Her stomach was still pretty flat, but her abs were no longer visible. And the designer bikini had been replaced with something less glam, but more industrial to hoist here heavier looking chest. Her face looked a bit tired, with bags under her eyes and slightly softer cheeks.
Sophie probed her new fold and bulges, she looked over her shoulder and grabbed her ass, which mere moments before had been a natural wonder of the world, and now found it pale and sagging a bit, with a soggy look.
“What did you do to m…” suddenly both Peter and Sophie grabbed their heads, blinding headaches hitting them both simultaneously.
Sophies mind was suddenly rushed with thousands of images, memories, of a life she hadn’t lived. She’d been born in 1980 rather than 95. Despite the 15 year back leap, her childhood had been mostly the same, happy and active, taking up dancing age 6. The first major diversions happened when she turned 21. A dance audition for her first broadway show, her big break, she’d slipped and ruptured the cruciate ligaments in her right knee, the memory of the pain racked through her as if it was new. And alongside the pain, the fear of what the injury could mean. The surgeons had been optimistic, but they’d been wrong. Months of painful physio got her back on her feet, but it quickly became apparent she’d never dance professionally again. This had always been Sophie’s worst nightmare, and here she was living it through some imposter memories. She’d been forced to get a desk job to pay the bills, a marketing job for big city company. Hours of daily dance practice replaced by hours sat hunched at a desk. It hadn’t taken long for her ass to lose a bit of it’s shape, and her abs to lose their fight with the office biscuit tin. It was in the office she’d met Peter, a sweet guy from accounts. He’d charmed her over a few coffee breaks, before awkwardly asking her out. They started dating, and he made her feel special (almost as special as when she’d been dancing) and worshiped her body even with a few extra biscuits tagged on. They’d gotten married when she was 25, he 29, and honeymooned in the Bahamas. The years had rolled by, house moves and job changes shifted by in her mind. She remembered turning 30, and trying not to let on how upset she’d been about it. She recalled her horror at finding her first grey hair a week later, and her metabolism shifting down a gear a year later. She remembered failing the pencil test for the first time, as her boobs began to droop. She saw the holiday photos from Majorca that had revealed how bad her cellulite had gotten, and membered sobbing about it for days. She remembered spending hundreds of pounds on anti-aging creams and moisturisers for fight the lines and wrinkles that had started to take root across her once smooth face. She remembered being 38, feeling bloated and past it, on holiday with her husband.
Meanwhile Peter battled a migraine and an alternate timeline of his own, remarkably similar to the life he’d know, except instead of the office romance that had led to him marrying his ex-wife, he remembered an office romance with the beautiful Sophie, and their ensuing 13 years of marriage up to this very point.
Sophie sat back down, head spinning with the two simultaneous realities that rattled around inside. She was simultaneously a 23 year old dancer and a 38 year old marketing exec. She rubbed her hand across the scars on her right knee, cupped the unfamiliar fold of her softer stomach (an unwelcome sight even for the half of her mind that had seen it develop over years rather than seconds). She looked across at a man who was equal parts stranger and her husband of 13 years.
“What the hell is happening?” she asked, more confused and scared than she’d been in two lifetimes.
“I have no idea.” Pete massaged his temples, trying to deal with the disconnect of knowing this woman intimately and also her being a total stranger. He remembered the lamp, and picked it back up, looking at it with new awe. “I think I wished for this.”
“What?”
“I found this lamp in the sea, and was cleaning it off when I looked over at you…” Pete remembered the flawless tanned physique of the Sophie of 2 minutes ago, and her amazing breast being squeezed. That same breast looked noticeably less perky now…”and you looked so… and I wished that…I wished that I’d been the one who married you instead of him”.
Sophie was agog. “You wished we were married? But you didn’t even know me! You stole me from my husband, and trapped me in this crippled, middle aged body?!” her face flushed with fury. “You bastard!” she slapped him. “How could you do this! All because you what, thought I looked hot! And now look at me, I’m all old and fat, and never made it as a dancer! Never met Fabio! I had this amazing life and you….you snatched it away! You sad old man. This is so typical of you….” She stopped as she realised that she knew Peter very well. She had nearly two decades of memories of him, deeply entangled in her own life.
“I didn’t mean to! It was only an idle thought, I didn’t know it was a bloody magic lamp! And besides, I never wished for you to be injured or….” He barely stopped himself
“Old!” she threw a fistful of sand at him. “So this wouldn’t be a problem at all if I was still a 23 year old sexpot with dancers legs!” her stomach churned at the accuracy of that statement. She was no longer a 23 year old sexpot, and her legs hadn’t danced for years and had the cellulite to prove it.
“Don’t get mad honey,” Peter frowned at the overly familiar language, it was hard to keep track of what was real and what was implanted by his wish. “We’ll sort this out.”
Sophie clutched her face. “I need to get out of here.” She stood up to head towards the hotel. Her lower back gave a twinge and she stumbled slightly. Pete moved to help but she shooed him away. “I’m fine, just stiff.” She blushed embarrassed about the quirks of her older body that she only half remembered. A stiff lower back due to bad posture at work, a completely alien sensation that she somehow knew all about. This body felt alien, while totally familiar. Her young body felt like a distant memory, but this older body felt like a distant fear now made flesh.
She marched off to the hotel, while Pete massaged his temples and tried to make sense of a world turned upside down.
I have a pretty good idea of where I want to take it next, but let me know if you have any thoughts on the directions I could take. Hope you enjoy!
Ark
Three Wishes
Peter basked on his sun lounger, cocktail in hand. The warm sea breeze brushing over him, with miles of endless blue sky ahead.
This was the life.
Only, it wasn’t really. Peter felt awful. He’d felt awful for months, lost and alone after his divorce papers had come through. He’d booked this holiday in the hopes that a bit of sun, a bit of drink, and some R&R would lift the cloud he’d been wading through. But he’d been here three days now and he felt as bad as ever.
At 42, he felt awkward being in a place like this on his own. There were happy couples his age everywhere he looked, and groups of young singletons making a disgrace of themselves every night, but hardly any single 40 somethings looking for a fresh start. He’d been in a happy couple not so long ago, and he’d been that pissed 21 year old climbing statues once upon a time too.
To be fair, there were a few single gents around his age, or older, drifting around like ghosts. Dead behind the eyes. He was one on them now, he’d realised. Out of place. He’d exchanged knowing nods with a few. They’d all come here to recapture something, their youth, or their zest for life, but instead they were just endlessly confronted with what they’d lost.
While Peter started off into the abyss, his eyes were drawn to a beautiful young woman emerging from the sea. Long dark brow hair swished back over her shoulder, black & white designer bikini hugging her slender figure, held together by gold rings and willpower, endless legs striding through the surf. It was like a scene straight out of a Bond film.
Pete, breathtaken, removed his sunglasses for a better look. She looked vaguely familiar, this stunning leggy beauty. She walked out of the sea and straight towards him. He inhaled sharply and sucked in his gut, but she turned to the left, giving Pete a glimpse of the greatest bottom he’d ever seen, before joining a impossibly tanned man a few loungers down.
Now this man Pete did recognise. Fabricio Hernandez, Italy’s number one striker and notorious ladies man of the Premier League. Pete had watched this man tear his local team Stoke City and the England side to shreds numerous times, and here he was literally snatching Pete’s dream woman away as well. A memory twigged, and Pete remembered that Fab had made headlines recently by marrying an English dance sensation after a whirlwind romance. Sophie Everleigh.
Pete had seen her dance a few times, she’d been one of the Pro’s on Strictly Come Dancing and was darling of the tabloids. And here she was, meters away, with her amazing ass in full view.
The fact she was making out with his nations greatest sporting enemy was a detail the content of his swim trunks seems happy to ignore.
So as subtly as possible, Pete jogged into the sea to cool himself off.
He splashed some salt water over his face and paddled about for a bit, but his eyes kept drifting back over to the Fab and Sophie. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been this attracted to a woman. Maybe his ex-wife, 20 years ago, when they were awkwardly flirting on a beach just like this. She’d been a stunner in her youth, great tits and an hourglass figure, but her looks had faded along with everything else over the years in that doomed relationship. She’d ended up matronly and bitter, and he’d gotten fat, bald, and aloof. He wondered if he’d ever have a second chance at love, and if he did, would it turn out any different?
As he was about to head back to the beach, he kicked something hard under the sand. Cursing, he reached down and pulled it up. It was a old school, incense lamp. A bit rusty here and there, but in good nick. He poured the water out of it and gave it a look. It was covered in elaborate carvings and a language he didn’t recognise, and there was no sign of a “made in china” stamp. This might be worth a few bob, he thought, as he hauled himself out of the surf.
He plonked himself down on his sun lounger, and started brushing the sand off his archaeological find. Again he glanced over at the sexy young couple, still going at it, and getting increasingly handsy. Fabricio copped a feel of Sophie’s ample, tanned breast. God, Peter could only imagine what such a boob would feel like. He wished he’d married Sophie Everligh.
There was a pop.
Sophie appeared on the sun lounger next to Pete, and he had his hand on her thigh. They looked at each, for half a second and then screamed.
“What the fuck!” Sophie snatched her hand away and scrambled to her feet. “Who are you? What the hell just happened!”
“I don’t know!” he pulled his hands back in held them up innocently. “Honestly!”
“Where is Fabrico?” she looked around, but the footballer was no where to be seen. “And what….what the hell has happened to me?”
It had taken a few seconds for Pete to notice, but while it was definitely Sophie Everleigh who’d just magically appeared next to him, she looked very different. For a start, she was about 30 pounds heavier, her hips and thighs in particular looking much more buxom then they had moments before. Her tan was gone, and she instead had a pasty white complexion similar to Pete’s own. Her stomach was still pretty flat, but her abs were no longer visible. And the designer bikini had been replaced with something less glam, but more industrial to hoist here heavier looking chest. Her face looked a bit tired, with bags under her eyes and slightly softer cheeks.
Sophie probed her new fold and bulges, she looked over her shoulder and grabbed her ass, which mere moments before had been a natural wonder of the world, and now found it pale and sagging a bit, with a soggy look.
“What did you do to m…” suddenly both Peter and Sophie grabbed their heads, blinding headaches hitting them both simultaneously.
Sophies mind was suddenly rushed with thousands of images, memories, of a life she hadn’t lived. She’d been born in 1980 rather than 95. Despite the 15 year back leap, her childhood had been mostly the same, happy and active, taking up dancing age 6. The first major diversions happened when she turned 21. A dance audition for her first broadway show, her big break, she’d slipped and ruptured the cruciate ligaments in her right knee, the memory of the pain racked through her as if it was new. And alongside the pain, the fear of what the injury could mean. The surgeons had been optimistic, but they’d been wrong. Months of painful physio got her back on her feet, but it quickly became apparent she’d never dance professionally again. This had always been Sophie’s worst nightmare, and here she was living it through some imposter memories. She’d been forced to get a desk job to pay the bills, a marketing job for big city company. Hours of daily dance practice replaced by hours sat hunched at a desk. It hadn’t taken long for her ass to lose a bit of it’s shape, and her abs to lose their fight with the office biscuit tin. It was in the office she’d met Peter, a sweet guy from accounts. He’d charmed her over a few coffee breaks, before awkwardly asking her out. They started dating, and he made her feel special (almost as special as when she’d been dancing) and worshiped her body even with a few extra biscuits tagged on. They’d gotten married when she was 25, he 29, and honeymooned in the Bahamas. The years had rolled by, house moves and job changes shifted by in her mind. She remembered turning 30, and trying not to let on how upset she’d been about it. She recalled her horror at finding her first grey hair a week later, and her metabolism shifting down a gear a year later. She remembered failing the pencil test for the first time, as her boobs began to droop. She saw the holiday photos from Majorca that had revealed how bad her cellulite had gotten, and membered sobbing about it for days. She remembered spending hundreds of pounds on anti-aging creams and moisturisers for fight the lines and wrinkles that had started to take root across her once smooth face. She remembered being 38, feeling bloated and past it, on holiday with her husband.
Meanwhile Peter battled a migraine and an alternate timeline of his own, remarkably similar to the life he’d know, except instead of the office romance that had led to him marrying his ex-wife, he remembered an office romance with the beautiful Sophie, and their ensuing 13 years of marriage up to this very point.
Sophie sat back down, head spinning with the two simultaneous realities that rattled around inside. She was simultaneously a 23 year old dancer and a 38 year old marketing exec. She rubbed her hand across the scars on her right knee, cupped the unfamiliar fold of her softer stomach (an unwelcome sight even for the half of her mind that had seen it develop over years rather than seconds). She looked across at a man who was equal parts stranger and her husband of 13 years.
“What the hell is happening?” she asked, more confused and scared than she’d been in two lifetimes.
“I have no idea.” Pete massaged his temples, trying to deal with the disconnect of knowing this woman intimately and also her being a total stranger. He remembered the lamp, and picked it back up, looking at it with new awe. “I think I wished for this.”
“What?”
“I found this lamp in the sea, and was cleaning it off when I looked over at you…” Pete remembered the flawless tanned physique of the Sophie of 2 minutes ago, and her amazing breast being squeezed. That same breast looked noticeably less perky now…”and you looked so… and I wished that…I wished that I’d been the one who married you instead of him”.
Sophie was agog. “You wished we were married? But you didn’t even know me! You stole me from my husband, and trapped me in this crippled, middle aged body?!” her face flushed with fury. “You bastard!” she slapped him. “How could you do this! All because you what, thought I looked hot! And now look at me, I’m all old and fat, and never made it as a dancer! Never met Fabio! I had this amazing life and you….you snatched it away! You sad old man. This is so typical of you….” She stopped as she realised that she knew Peter very well. She had nearly two decades of memories of him, deeply entangled in her own life.
“I didn’t mean to! It was only an idle thought, I didn’t know it was a bloody magic lamp! And besides, I never wished for you to be injured or….” He barely stopped himself
“Old!” she threw a fistful of sand at him. “So this wouldn’t be a problem at all if I was still a 23 year old sexpot with dancers legs!” her stomach churned at the accuracy of that statement. She was no longer a 23 year old sexpot, and her legs hadn’t danced for years and had the cellulite to prove it.
“Don’t get mad honey,” Peter frowned at the overly familiar language, it was hard to keep track of what was real and what was implanted by his wish. “We’ll sort this out.”
Sophie clutched her face. “I need to get out of here.” She stood up to head towards the hotel. Her lower back gave a twinge and she stumbled slightly. Pete moved to help but she shooed him away. “I’m fine, just stiff.” She blushed embarrassed about the quirks of her older body that she only half remembered. A stiff lower back due to bad posture at work, a completely alien sensation that she somehow knew all about. This body felt alien, while totally familiar. Her young body felt like a distant memory, but this older body felt like a distant fear now made flesh.
She marched off to the hotel, while Pete massaged his temples and tried to make sense of a world turned upside down.