I remember it like it was yesterday.
I was substitute teaching for the twelfth-grade English teacher. It was the last hour of the day on a Wednesday, about fifteen minutes before the bell. No one was really feeling the lesson that day, and I couldn't blame them; I wasn't exactly interested in Ragtime, myself.
As a vice principal, I spent a lot of time among the students. And I had to admit, many of the girls walking the halls were excruciatingly gorgeous. I had trained myself to ignore their charms, since there were a number of issues that stood between me and ever actually letting anything happen with a student. Especially since most of them were still legally minors.
Rumors could spread like wildfire in a high school. The last thing my career needed was a reputation as some kind of pervert. So I made it a point to not even look.
I mean, more than a little. I still noticed, I wasn't made of stone.
But as I led the rather unenthusiastic discussion of the latest chapters in the book, I felt the change fall upon the world, as sure as a sunrise. The discussion halted a moment, and then continued as though nothing had happened. But something had happened.
I looked around the room and immediately noticed Nikki Johnson had changed. I had once considered her to be a lovely young woman, a pretty blonde with a petite cheerleader's body. But when I looked at her then, there was no recognition that what I was looking at was or ever had been an actual person.
It was like someone had left some kind of hot, animated sex doll in the class room. The girl sitting next to her, whose name I believed was Jenny, blushed and giggled a little, nudging her friend, who joined her in soft comments and snickering.
It occurred to me that only Nikki had changed. All the other girls were still very real people, with hopes and dreams and histories. Nikki was the sole thing occupying a desk.
Her presence was starting to cause a bit of a commotion, as more and more students took notice of her... condition. Meanwhile, Nikki just sat there, a stunned expression on her face, painfully aware on the unwanted attention.
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