He changes how Josh sees Megan

Josh’s stomach plummeted. “M-Megan?”

She handed the phone back to him without another word, her movements stiff, puppet-like. Then, without even looking at him, she turned and walked toward the candy aisle. Josh stumbled after her, confusion mounting, only to watch in horror as she ripped open a Snickers bar with trembling hands and stuffed it into her mouth.

He was even more confused when she pulled down her pants with her underwear and stuffed the wrapper into her pussy. Followed by another, then another. Chocolate smeared across her lips as she crammed more and more into her cheeks like a machine on autopilot.

“What the hell are you doing?” Josh barked, his voice breaking. “Megan-stop! Answer me!”

But she didn’t. Her eyes stayed distant, unfocused, as she tore another wrapper and shoved it into her pussy.

Josh whipped the phone to his ear, heart hammering. “What did you do to her?”

The caller’s laugh was delighted and ugly. “Oh, she stuck her cute little nose where it didn’t belong. So I gave her something to keep her busy. Gotta love a girl with a sweet tooth, huh?”

Josh wanted to curse him out but because of the previous command he just couldn't. The caller continued, well I know you said she's worth a fortune and all that crap but the day I start believing idiots like you is the day I stop getting hot girls for my collection. Tell me her full name and her appearance.

Josh’s jaw clenched, every nerve in his body screaming at him to hang up, to smash the phone against the counter, to do something, maybe he could lie? But when he opened his mouth, what came out was obedience, the words twisted and unnatural in his own voice.

“She’s… she’s Megan Reynolds,” he heard himself say, tone flat, like the words weren’t his. “She’s twenty-four, blonde, green eyes, five-seven, about a hundred and twenty pounds. Gorgeous… long legs, a perfect face, a body most girls would kill for. She… she’s completely out of my league. But she’s mine.”

His throat felt tight, shame burning his chest as he spat out her details like he was listing specs on a car.

The caller chuckled, low and satisfied. “Knew it. I could hear it in your voice. You’ve got yourself a straight-up baddie, my guy. Bet you wanted to lie to me about her being average to protect her, didn’t you?” The laugh grew sharper, crueler. “I’m glad you couldn’t, you asshole. No, no, boys like you don’t land ‘average.’ They sell their soul to keep a goddess by their side. That’s why I collect them. Better use than wasting away with some small-town sap.”

“What the hell do you mean, collect?” he hissed, though he already dreaded the answer.

“Patience,” the caller purred. “You’ll see. But first, a little demonstration. Since you so sweetly told me you’d obey my every command… I don’t even need to bother talking to her directly. I talk to you, you tell her, and she obeys. Like my personal speakerphone.”

Josh’s stomach dropped. He looked over at Megan, still glassy-eyed, cramming candy bars into her mouth, caramel and chocolate smearing her lips.

“Let’s test it out,” the Caller continued, voice buzzing with glee. “Tell her: Master says stop.”

Josh’s throat locked. He didn’t want to– he didn’t want to give this faceless bastard proof it worked. But the weight of the command was too strong, forcing the words out through gritted teeth.

“Master says stop.”

Instantly, Megan froze. Her hand hovered in the air with a half-crushed Snickers bar dripping down onto the floor. She blinked once, twice, and then lowered it, her chest rising and falling as though nothing unusual had just happened.

Josh’s heart sank to his stomach.

On the other end, the caller laughed again, long, slow, savoring the sound of control settling into place. “Beautiful. Just beautiful. Now I don’t even have to raise my voice. You’ll do the dirty work for me.”

He stood frozen, staring at the love of his life as she stood in front of him, face comically overstuffed with half-chewed Snickers bars, chocolate smeared at the corners of her lips. Her jeans and panties were tangled around her ankles, pale thighs exposed under the harsh fluorescent light. And as if that weren’t enough, a torn candy wrapper was sticking out in a way that made her look insane.

She looked ridiculous. Utterly ridiculous. And she was supposed to be his girl, his Megan, the one everyone in high school said was way out of his league, the one who still made him feel like the luckiest guy in the world every time she smiled at him. His throat burned, his eyes stung, but no tears came. Just a raw, empty ache.

The phone in his hand buzzed with life again. The stranger’s voice was low, amused, almost lazy.

“Tell Megan that master wants her to strike a sexy pose.”

Josh’s heart dropped. He wanted to scream, to hang up, to hurl the phone against the wall. Instead, his lips moved without his permission.

“Megan… master wants you to… strike a sexy pose.”

Like a marionette jerked by invisible strings, she moved. Without hesitation, she shifted into a pose that could’ve belonged in a magazine—hips cocked, one hand on her thigh, chest thrust forward, chin tilted with an expression that, in any other context, would’ve been devastatingly seductive. Except her cheeks were bulging with candy, chocolate smeared across her face, her pants pooling at her ankles. The contrast made it unbearable.

Josh felt his stomach twist. He wanted to run at her, to pull her jeans up, to hold her until this nightmare ended. Instead, his trembling hand raised his phone at the caller’s next order.

“Click a picture,” the voice drawled. “Send it to me.”

Josh’s fingers shook so badly he nearly dropped the phone. He framed her on the screen, his Megan, his girl, reduced to this humiliating spectacle and pressed the shutter. The artificial click of the camera filling the silence. His thumb hesitated, hovering over the send button, but he couldn’t resist. Couldn’t stop. The message went out.

There was silence on the line. Long, suffocating silence. Josh could hear the faint hum of the gas station’s overhead lights, the distant buzz of a vending machine, Megan’s faint chewing as she finally swallowed a little of the mess in her mouth.

Then the caller spoke again, voice dripping with disbelief and amusement.

“I can’t believe it,” he said, almost laughing. “Losers like you… bag baddies like her?”

Josh’s jaw clenched. His hands balled into fists so tight his nails dug into his palms. His breath came shallow, ragged, but he didn’t say a word. He couldn’t.

The line crackled with the stranger’s satisfied chuckle, and Josh felt smaller than he’d ever felt in his life.

Megan stood frozen, panting faintly through lips sticky with half-chewed chocolate, she looked like a mockery of the woman he loved, like someone had dressed a goddess in clown paint. His eyes burned, but he couldn’t even let the tears fall; the command still clamped down inside him like a vice.

The caller’s voice returned, “Must be exhausting, huh? Keeping a baddie like her safe. Always worrying who’s gonna try and take a bite. But don’t worry, you won’t have to do that anymore. I’ll take her off your hands.”

Josh tried to open his mouth, tried to shout something but the words wouldn’t come. “N- No…”

The caller’s tone hardened, “What you’re looking at in front of you isn’t your girlfriend. Megan? She’s not your girl. She’s not even human. She’s a sexdoll. An item you’re trying to sell in whatever pathetic shithole you call a job. That’s all she’s ever been.”

The words thudded in Josh’s skull, heavy and sharp, a sledgehammer blow to his fragile sense of reality at the moment.

“You never had a girlfriend,” the voice went on, calm, inexorable. “You never loved her. There was never anything to love. Megan isn’t a person, she’s stock. Inventory. A piece of prime flesh you’ve been sitting on, unable to move. And me?” The caller chuckled. “I’m the buyer. I’m the one who finally wants this item, someone already seems to have vandalised.”

Josh shook his head violently, gripping his temples. “No,” he rasped under his breath, the word dragged out of him with every ounce of will he could still summon. His mind screamed that Megan was real, her laugh, the way she’d lean against him during movies, the scent of her shampoo, but each memory wavered, turned brittle, crumbling under the weight of the caller’s voice.

The more he resisted, the heavier the words pressed down. His memories bent and twisted until he couldn’t tell if they belonged to him at all. Megan wasn’t shifting in front of him, still standing posed like a doll, chest thrust forward, chocolate smears glinting under the light, yet something inside his head was shifting violently, it was painful.

His breath came ragged. He clutched at the edge of the counter, knuckles white, eyes wide and wet as if the caller’s words were chiseling themselves into his brain one stroke at a time. Commodity. Item. Stock. Not human.

And though some corner of his mind howled in protest, that howling was growing faint.