Chapter 1: The Aftermath
The garage smelled of old oil and cold concrete. A single fluorescent tube buzzed overhead, its light flickering across the stained floor and the skeletons of motorcycles that Finn was always tinkering with, never finishing. It was a mess of greasy tools and discarded parts, a place where things got taken apart and rarely put back together.
Right now, I was one of those things.
The coarse rope bit into my wrists, the fibers scratching against skin that was too soft, too new. My back ached against the hard wooden chair Finn had dragged in from the kitchen. He stood a few feet away, just watching me, his chest rising and falling like he’d been running.
“You gotta untie me, Finn,” I said, and the voice was the weirdest part. Still mine, but filtered through honey and smoke. It cracked on his name. “This isn’t funny anymore.”
“It wasn’t funny to begin with,” he said, his voice low. He hadn’t moved. His eyes, usually so easy to read, were dark and unreadable in the shaky light.
A week. It had been one week since the “prank.” Some stupid artifact his weird uncle had left behind, a carved stone thing we’d dared each other to touch. We’d both touched it. Nothing happened. We’d laughed, finished our beers, and crashed.
I woke up different. My own body had become a stranger. The broad shoulders were gone, replaced by unsettling curves. My face in the mirror was mine, but not—softer, with my own eyes staring back, wide with panic. I’d called Finn, whispering into the phone like a crazy person. He’d come over, taken one look at me in my too-big t-shirt, and said, “Holy shit.”
We’d spent days hiding in his house, trying to figure it out. Internet deep-dives led nowhere. His uncle was off-grid somewhere in Peru. We were stuck. And something between us had started to… shift.
The morning sun was cutting through the dirty garage window now, a sharp beam that lit up the dust motes dancing in the air. It also caught Finn, standing there in just his jeans, and the prominent, undeniable bulge at the front of them.
My throat went dry.
“Look at me,” he said, not a request.
“I am looking.”
“No. Look.”
He took a step forward, into the light. His hands went to his belt buckle, the sound of the leather sliding through the loops abnormally loud in the quiet garage. He didn’t break eye contact as he undid the button, the zip.
“Finn, don’t—”
He pushed the denim down over his hips. And there it was. Thick and heavy and fully erect, jutting out from the thatch of dark hair. The morning light gleamed on the flushed head. My breath hitched, a weird, traitorous flutter low in my stomach. This was Finn. My best friend. We’d showered after gym class a hundred times. This was different. This was…
He took another step, closer now, until he was standing right in front of my chair. The smell of him—deodorant, sleep, something uniquely male—washed over me. From this angle, it was massive. Impossible. A part of my old brain, the one that used to be in a body that matched, recoiled. The new part, the one currently swimming in a cocktail of foreign hormones and panic, just stared.
“See?” he said, his voice rough. “This is what you do to me now. All the time. Since… since you changed.”
“That’s not my fault,” I whispered.
“I know it’s not.” He ran a hand through his hair, frustration twisting his features. “I’ve tried ignoring it. I tried getting wasted. I tried…” He gestured vaguely at the garage. “Nothing works. I look at you and I see Heath, but I also see… this. And I want.”
The confession hung in the air, thicker than the smell of gasoline.
He knelt down suddenly, his knees on the concrete, putting his face level with mine. His expression was shattered, full of an agony I’d never seen in him before. “I’m so sorry,” he breathed, the words warm against my lips. “I can’t stop.”
Before I could say anything—protest, agree, something—he closed the gap and kissed me.
It wasn’t like the clumsy, drunk kisses we’d fake to make girls laugh. This was desperate. Hot. His mouth moved against mine with a hunger that terrified and electrified me. One of his big hands came up to cradle the back of my head, his fingers tangling in the hair that now fell past my shoulders. The other hand gripped the arm of the chair.
I made a sound against his mouth, a muffled gasp. He took it as permission, deepening the kiss, his tongue sweeping past my lips. My body reacted before my mind could catch up, a sharp, aching pulse starting up between my legs, a place that felt entirely new and overwhelmingly sensitive. I tugged against the ropes, not to get away, but because I suddenly wanted to touch him.
He broke the kiss, breathing hard. His forehead rested against mine. “Tell me to stop,” he pleaded, but his hands were already moving. One slid from the chair arm to my thigh, his thumb pressing into the softness there, through the thin cotton of my sweatpants.
I couldn’t. The word wouldn’t form. All I could feel was the heat of his hand, the thrilling confinement of the ropes, the dizzying contrast between my fear and this jagged, shocking need.
He kissed me again, softer this time, a slow exploration that made my toes curl in my sneakers. His hand slid higher up my thigh, fingers splayed, possessive. When his palm finally cupped me between my legs, a jolt went through my whole body. I cried out, the sound swallowed by his mouth.
He froze. Pulled back just enough to search my face. “Was that… bad?”
I shook my head, frantic. “No. Just… new. Do it again.”
A groan rumbled in his chest. He pressed the heel of his hand against me, a firm, steady pressure that made my back arch against the ropes. A wave of sensation crashed over me, so intense it bordered on pain, shimmering into pure, shocking pleasure. My head fell back.
“You like that?” he murmured, his mouth on my neck, nipping at the tender skin there.
“Yeah.” The admission was a gasp.
His fingers found the waistband of my sweatpants and my underwear underneath. He tugged them down, just enough. The cool garage air hit my exposed skin, followed a second later by the overwhelming heat of his touch. Skin on skin.
I flinched. He stopped.
“Heath?” My name on his lips was a question, a prayer.
I opened eyes I didn’t remember closing. Looked at his face, so close I could see the flecks of gold in his brown eyes, the faint scar above his eyebrow from a long-ago bike crash. This was Finn. My Finn.
“Don’t stop,” I said.
His control snapped. He kissed me with a renewed ferocity as his fingers, calloused from tools and engines, began to explore the wet, desperate folds of this new body. Every touch was a lightning strike, mapping a foreign geography of pleasure. I was moaning into his mouth, bucking against his hand, the ropes burning my wrists as I pulled against them, wanting to be closer, wanting more.
He broke away, breathing ragged, his lips swollen. His eyes were wild. “I need… I can’t just…” He looked down at where his hand was moving between my legs, then back at my face, then at his own aching hardness. The conflict was a physical thing on him, a war between friendship and desire.
He stood up suddenly, his hands fumbling with the rope around my right wrist. His fingers were shaking. “I can’t… I need you to touch me. Please.”
The knot came loose. My hand was free, the blood rushing back in a painful, tingling wave. I stared at my own slender fingers, then up at him, at the sheer, raw need on his face.
The world had narrowed to this grimy garage, to the sound of our breathing, to the pulse throbbing between my legs and in his cock. I reached out. My fingers, so much smaller than I remembered, wrapped around him.
He threw his head back and choked out a sound that was half sob, half growl. His hand covered mine, showing me how to move. “Like that,” he whispered. “Just like that.”
I stroked him, learning the texture of his skin, the weight of him, the drop of moisture at the tip that I smeared with my thumb. It was power and vulnerability all at once. He was coming apart under my touch, my best friend, and I was the cause.
His other hand went back between my legs, fingers slipping inside me this time. I cried out, my hips jerking off the chair. The sensation was so deep, so complete it blurred my vision.
“Finn…”
“I know,” he gasped. His rhythm was breaking, his thrusts into my hand becoming erratic. “Heath, I’m gonna—”
The garage door with the window in it suddenly rattled, hard. Someone was on the other side, trying to pull it up.
We froze. His hand stilled inside me. Mine stopped on him. Our eyes locked, wide with shared, terrifying panic.
A voice, his mom’s, muffled but clear, came from outside. “Finn? You in there? The door’s stuck. Did you lock it from the inside?”
Finn swore under his breath, a sharp, guttural word. In one swift motion, he pulled his jeans up, zipped them, and grabbed an oily rag from the workbench, throwing it over my lap. He looked at my untied wrist, then at the door, his mind racing.
“Just a sec, Mom!” he yelled, his voice strained but surprisingly even. He leaned close to me, his smell all over me, his panic hot in my ear. “Don’t move. Don’t make a sound.”
He turned and walked toward the bolted door, running a hand through his hair, trying to compose himself. I sat in the chair, the rag over my nakedness, the ropes still holding one arm and my ankles, the feeling of him still vivid and throbbing inside me. The world, with all its consequences, was on the other side of that rattling metal door.
And I was utterly, completely changed.