foreign affairs

Nick glanced at the clock, 7:00. His mom would be home soon. He went back to watching the TV and flipped the channel. Again unsatisfied, he turned on his X-Box. Flipping to Netflix, he turned on Tokyo Majin and watched for a little while. He never really understood why, but his favorite character was Aoi. It wasn't that she was better than all the others… but her name sounded nice.

The door opened and Nick's mom walked in, carrying bags of groceries.

"Nicky.. Come help me… there's more… in the… car." His mom said while hefting some dog food bags. Nick sighed and stood up, planning to help his mother with the bags. As he stepped toward the door, he knocked into a bag and a plastic bottle fell out. He picked it up and looked at the weird writing.

"Hey, mom! What's this?" he yelled. His mom turned to look at him.

"Oh! That's some new soda from Japan! It was the last bottle, thought you might like it!" she called back. Nick looked at the bottle and set it on the coffee table before walking back outside to get the remaining groceries. He brought them in and put them on the kitchen table before retrieving his soda. He opened it and took a small sip, it tasted strange, like strawberries or something. He shrugged it off and continued his night as any one would, drinking the soda before the end of the night.

Saying good night to his mom, he stepped into his room and closed the door. He was feeling strange but dismissed it as being up to late. He flipped off the light and jumped into bed, happy to be able to rest.

During the night, weird occurrences began. First, his messy reddish-brown hair darkened to a midnight black and straightened, lengthening to his shoulder. Next, his face changed, his eyes became a nice almond shape and his cheekbones became higher and lips became fuller, but his face softened, giving him a childish but very feminine look. Then his neck became smaller and more petite, leading to his waist shrinking inwards. Throughout the process body hair had been receding to the point now where it seemed there was none left. His arms became small and thin, and his hand became tinier. His legs were next. His thighs puffed up a little bit as his butt and hips ballooned, then his lower legs became thinner and his feet shrank and became dainty. There were two other changes before the last. The final change was mental rather than physical, as his memories locked themselves away.

His mother pushed open the door to his room and told him to wake up. When he didn't, his mom walked to his bed side, ready to throw him off the bed, when her breath caught in her throat. Instead of Nick was an Asian girl about his age. While her mother stared down at her, nicks eye's fluttered open sleepily. Looking up, she smiled sweetly.

"Ohayo no Haha." she said innocently, not seeing anything wrong with her language or higher pitched voice. She stared up at her mother curiously, and her mother stared back- straight into her eyes.

"Oh… my… god." Nick's mother said breathlessly, "Nicky… what happened to you!?" Nick just tilted her head, not understanding. "oh… so you don't understand English…. Anymore…"

Nick just smiled sweetly and watched her mother, even though her mom spoke weird words. Her mother sat at nicks desk, and pulled up her computer. Going to Google, she waved nick over, who stood behind her curiously and looked at the strange writing on the screen. Nick's mom typed in 'Are you nick' and it came up in Japanese. Nick read it for a minute and nodded vigorously for a second.

"Hai!" she said, hoping her mother understood at least that.

"Oh boy…" Nick's mom mumbled. "You need a new name…" Her mom typed in 'what do you want your name to be,' and 'Nani ga anata no namae ga shitaidesu ka' came up on the screen. Nick bent over and read it in silence.

"Ah.. Watashi?" nick asked, laying a hand on her chest for a second to signify 'Me'. her mother nodded hesitantly.

Nick stopped at thought for a minute before saying, "Ah… watashi no namae wa… Aoi desu." she said, after signifying herself again.

"Aoi?" her mother asked, and Aoi nodded then smiled sweetly. 'Now comes the next challenge…' her mother thought '… telling eddy he has a Japanese daughter.'