Past

Some days it was still hard for Darren to remember who he once was. It was over five years ago now, back when he was still in high school. He had been on the football team; it was an away game. With the score tied and seconds left to play, he suddenly found himself on the sidelines. But he wasn’t just off the field, he was also out of his body and now stuck inside the body of one of the cheerleaders on the opposing team. It turned out all his teammates were as well. Everyone was freaking out, but the swapping seemed limited to just the field. Explaining the swap to the outside world was tough. Darren’s mom and dad were quick to accept they now had a daughter instead of a son. And Darren didn’t change much. Sure, he wasn’t able to play ball anymore, but he still walked around in a flannel and oversized coat. He lost track of the woman in his body after about a year. And stopped talking with many of his swapped friends once he went to college. In fact, no one at college thought of him as anything other than a normal woman. It was only sometimes when he went back to his home town when anyone might mention anything, and even then it was often just in passing. His old self seemed like a past life and a very distant memory.