Tom thinks about what's happening

Tom stood frozen, pulse pounding in his ears.

The scattered garments on the floor might as well have been a crime scene. His hands still tingled from the feel of the nylon, and a phantom trace of the scent lingered in his nose, mingling with an unsettling familiarity.

The memories didn’t come in a neat timeline — they bled together, raw and jagged.

A dim hallway at night. A sliver of bathroom light under the door. The faint sound of a hair dryer and the outline of a body moving behind frosted glass. That shape was her — not Sarah as his wife, but Sarah as his mother.

The very idea felt like an iron weight pressing into his gut, yet the rush in his blood told a different story — one that this new body seemed to know all too well.

He stumbled backward and sat heavily on the bed, his legs jittery with pent-up energy.

Jesus Christ… this isn’t me. This is… him. The kid I’ve become.

It was becoming disturbingly clear that the transformation wasn’t just physical. His head wasn’t only filled with his own forty years of marriage, mortgage payments, and quiet nights watching Netflix. Lurking just underneath was the other life — this eighteen-year-old’s thoughts, habits, and urges. And those urges… they weren’t hypothetical. They were lived-in. Rehearsed.

He squeezed his eyes shut, trying to isolate his own memories, but instead, her image bloomed unbidden: Sarah in her kitchen robe, pouring coffee. The robe never fully closed, showing the delicate slope of her collarbone, the soft sway beneath. He could remember — no, feel — what it was like to steal a glance while pretending to be disinterested.

He dug his nails into his palms, the sensation grounding him just enough to think.

If my wish rewrote the world, then everyone else believes I’m her son. She believes it. And if I… if this kid’s mind is in here with mine, then I’ve been living with these feelings for years — in this reality.

A sudden thought made his stomach turn.

Did she ever notice? Did she ever catch me staring?

His eyes drifted to the door, down the short hallway that led to the rest of the house. His mother — wife — would be just beyond that, living her morning as if nothing had changed.

And for the first time since the he started using the coin, Tom wasn’t sure about anything...