So, last night, I started to watch an anime called "Your Name"... it was one of those teenage "body swap" stories. I didn't watch long, because it was clearly so unrealistic. I mean, you wake up in someone else's body, in THEIR bedroom, and next to you is a mobile phone.... SURELY one of the first things you would do is to try calling your own phone number? No, they never think of that, do they? (ok, so if they did, I guess the story would be VERY different, but ....). Then I tried one called "Switched"... similar idea. They were both clearly aimed at a teen audience, so I watched very little of either.

Later on, I was thinking back on some of the stories I had written, and remembered that I'd done a couple of stories that involved male-female body-swaps (and braces, of course). That lead me to look online for body-swap stories, and see what was there.

And then I idly thought that maybe I could write another body-swap story, but it could end up pretty much the same as my previous ones, where the two people DO call each other.... so why bother, unless.......

[In case you are wondering, Asian Braces will continue, I need some time to think about the storyline and then write it. This will be a SHORT story, and by that I mean maybe only 5 chapters.... I already know the ending, and the whole story takes place over only a few days]

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Alternative history

One of those "what if..." sort of stories....


Chapter 1


This morning I woke up before the alarm on my phone went off, which was nice, as I wouldn't have to get out of bed almost immediately, and get my self ready for college.

So I lay there, eyes closed, not moving, and just thought about 'life' for a few moments. Well, today was my 18th birthday for a start: at long last I was an adult. Officially! Mum and dad have actually been pretty good the last year or so, they have been treating me more and more like a grown up, and less and less like a child.

Then my mind went back to last night, after dinner. My younger brother, Mike, had gone to a friend's after school, and having tea with them, something that often happened... so tonight it was just mum, dad and me. After dinner we cleared up the dishes, putting them into the dishwasher, then went and sat in the lounge. I picked up the TV remote, and was just about to turn the TV on, when I happened to look at mum: I could see a small tear starting to come from her eye.

"Hey mum, what is it?" I asked.

"I was just thinking about what it would be like if......." she replied, pausing.

"If...? I asked

She too a deep breath. All too often she would reply with something like 'oh, it's ok, it doesn't really matter', but tonight she seemed a little different. "I was thinking what it would be like if your twin sister had actually survived..." she said.

Wow, this was the first time in... well YEARS, since either mum or dad had even mentioned my twin sister. All I knew was that when I was born, I had a twin sister - obviously not an identical twin, because I'm a boy - and that she had died very soon after being born. But it was one thing that never got talked about, and I suspect very few people were even aware.

I looked at my mum, she now had another tear, coming from her other eye.

"You've never really said anything about her...." I replied.

Dad put his hand on mum's, to try and comfort her. "I don't know why, but I think we both felt that it would be too painful to actually remember her... but you're eighteen tomorrow, so maybe it's time you know a bit more about her" dad explained. "When mum was pregnant with you, the doctors noticed that one of you two - you - was quite big, and the other one of you - your sister, Olivia - was a lot smaller. They said that, in such cases, it was quite common for the smaller baby to not survive, so we were sort-of prepared for her to not survive... but it's still a shock when it happens!"

"She looked so tiny, so perfect...". Mum got up, and walked out the room. "don't worry, I'll be back in a second....". She returned a few moments later, with an envelope in her hands. She sat down, and opened the envelope, removing what were clearly some pictures. She passed one over to me. "This was you.... minutes after you were born. You were a little over 6 pounds, and very healthy....". I had seen this picture before: there was a copy of it in my 'baby book'.

".. and this was your little sister, Olivia. She was so pretty...". Mum passed a second picture over to me. It was of a small baby, in an incubator, with tubes and wires attached to her, and yes, she was rather cute. OMG.... I suddenly realised that this was the first time I'd actually seen my twin sister! "She was just under 3 pounds, and whilst she looks ok on the outside, it seems her insides just weren't ready for her to live...." I could see tears welling in mum's eyes, as she was remembering back eighteen years.

"And this is the ONLY picture we have of the two of you together..." and she passed another picture to me: it was a picture of one larger healthy baby - me - and a tiny baby - my sister - together in an incubator.

"Your sister died shortly after I took that picture" explain dad.

"So how long DID she survive then?" I asked them.

"Two days. Two very long days....." he replied.

"Yeah, I can sorta imagine...." I replied. Mum passed the other pictures, except one, over to me: they were more of my little sister, in her incubator. Then she passed the last one to me. It showed the same rather cute tiny baby, with the tubes and wires all removed, in a blanket, and looking very much more peaceful. My tiny twin sister, who never made it.....

Yeah, I wonder what life would have been like with a sister. Would I even have my younger brother, Mike? Or would mum and dad have stopped after having us two?

Olivia... that's a nice name, and it's the first time mum and dad had ever mentioned it.

I went over to the settee and sat next to mum, putting my arm around her. Yeah, I'd admit that by now I had a couple of tears in my eyes too. "Thanks for sharing, mum... dad.... Hey, would you mind if I took pictures of these photos? I'd love to be able to remember her too...."

Chapter 3

I assumed that my daily routine would be almost identical, and that seemed to be the case. I went into the bathroom, and had a shower, which was familiar, yet a bit different! One difference was the fact that I needed to keep my long hair dry. The other was than my body had extra bits, and was missing other bits! After my shower, I took the opportunity to look in the bathroom mirror at my silver smile again.... yeah, nice... and was about to brush my teeth when I realised it would be a bit of a waste of time, as I'd soon be eating breakfast.

I dried myself off, then knocked on my brother Mike's door, to tell him that the bathroom was free.

Back in my room, I grabbed my dirty socks and pants (actually, I guess that should actually be 'panties'... they are definitely smaller than a guy's underpants!) and put them in the linen hamper, and got some clean ones from my drawer. My bra was on my chair, so that was easy. Then I had a slight issue: what sort of clothes did I wear, as Andi? There was a pair of jeans on the chair, so I picked them up, to see what might be underneath... there was a used top, and that was it. Well, that helped a bit, I was wondering if there might be a skirt or tights underneath. I went to my dresser, and found a clean top - a pink one of course, and some socks, which I put on, followed by the jeans. I put my trainers on my feet: ah, no change there then!

Ok, but what about makeup? I'm a girl, and we girls wear makeup! I had inspiration: back on my phone, I looked at the pictures: BINGO! Selfies! I looked carefully. Oh, good, the clothes I had put on looked fairly typical, and I can see I wear a bit of makeup, but not a lot: OK, I can do this!

It's strange, but I picked up the eye-shadow without even thinking about it, and seemed to be able to apply it quite well without thinking. Same for the mascara and lip gloss. Then I had to brush my long hair: as a guy, with short hair, that had never been an issue for me, but it did take a bit longer to do than I was used to. Hmm, it feels strange having long hair, but it DOES look good on me! Maybe I'll be able to cope as a girl after all!

Ok, need to pack up the books I need for today.... I looked on my phone for my timetable: ah, good, I was still studying Maths, Extra Maths and Law, so my timetable was unchanged.

As Andy, I tended to have cereals and juice for breakfast, and when I got downstairs, mum had put out a dish and a glass for me: it seemed that Andi had the same breakfast as I did. Next to the dish was a small pile of envelopes: birthday cards! There was one from mum and dad. Two from my two lots of grandparents, and another from my auntie. I opened them between mouthfuls of cereals: they were all fairly 'normal' 18th cards

"Happy 18th Birthday, Andi!" said dad, who came over and gave me a nice hug, and a kiss on my cheek. Whilst I was looking at my cards now, we had agreed that we would do presents tonight, then we would all go to the pub, so I can have a LEGAL drink!!

"Thanks, dad!"

"Hey, sis, happy 18th!" said Mike as he walked in to the kitchen a few minutes later, giving me a card.

"Thanks, Mike!". I opened his card and smiled: it said '-18- You can now legally do everything you've been doing since you were 15'. "I like it!" I added.

I ate my breakfast, which took a little longer than it used to because of my braces, then of course I had to go brush my teeth: it seemed that I was lucky because, as well as my electric toothbrush, it seemed I had a waterpic, so cleaning my teeth and braces wasn't as hard as I thought it might be, and didn't take very long.

"Bye mum, dad, see you later" I said as I came downstairs again, ready to leave. Mike was also about to leave, although he walked to school.

I grabbed my coat, and went out to catch the bus to college - all of that was easy, as it's what I normally did: I checked the time... good, I was a couple of minutes early for a change! Interestingly, I met the same people on the bus that I did as Andy, and interacted with them in a very similar way. In fact, it was the same at college, although I seemed to interact with the guys and other girls in a slightly different way to when I was Andy, if only because I'm now a girl. Pleasantly, noone seemed at all worried about my braces or the fact that I lisped.

For lunch, I joined several friends in the college cafeteria: it was pretty cheap, and the food was ok too. Of course, I had to leave everyone a few minutes early, so I could go brush my teeth... or rather my braces. This took a bit longer than at breakfast, as I don't carry a water-pic around with me! Before leaving the loo, I checked myself in the mirror: whilst my teeth and braces looked clean, I could see that I needed to touch up my lip-gloss.Oh, the problems that girls seem to have that we guys don't have. As I thought that, I thought something else too: what if I never change back to being me? I mean Andy, the guy. Could I actually cope living as a girl?

My last class ended just before 4, and I met up with a few of my friends, and we all walked into town. We had agreed ages ago not to give each other birthday cards, because all of us were turning 18 this year sometime, so that would be a lot of cards to have to buy! Had we all been 18, we could have gone to the pub, but it was still early in the year, and only a few of us were legal so far, and most pubs were strict on doing age-checks. So we went into a coffee place, where we got coffees, and then sat together around a table.

"Hey, Andi, Happy Birthday!" said Jenny, a girl in the same year as me who studied music. In her hand she had a cupcake, with a candle on it. She gave me a birthday kiss, then gave me the cupcake.

"Thanks, Jenny!". As Andy, I quite fancied Jenny.... but strangely, as Andi, I was getting very similar feelings when I looked at her, feelings that I wasn't getting when I looked at the guys in the group. Interesting.

Several selfies later, it was time to go home, where I had dinner (including a proper, full-sized, birthday cake) with my family, and then I opened my presents. Mum and dad had bought me a very nice new phone (which I needed, my phone was getting a bit old!), plus a rather nice gold bracelet with my name inscribed on it, which I put on. Mike had bought me a pair of wireless earbuds - he had clearly seen me using my tatty wired earbuds too many times!

I was going to have a party at the weekend, with friends and family coming along, so I would no doubt get more presents then, so I was very happy with what I'd been given.

After that, we all went to the pub. Mike is 16, so there was no problem with him joining us, although clearly he wouldn't be able to drink any booze. Whilst I have drunk beer on many occasions (some legal - in England I'm allowed to drink beer or wine with a meal when I'm with my family.... and some not so legal), and I've occasionally had a glass of liqueur at family occasions, I'd never really tried any of the main spirits (like whisky, gin, vodka etc). Dad bought me a double whisky: wow, it had a kick to it! He then bought me a rather more sedate pint of lager.

Back home some time later, it was time to go to bed. I was sitting at my dressing table, having just removed my makeup, ready to go to bed, and thought I'd have a look in the drawers, to see what Andi kept there. I noticed a diary, so I took it out, and opened it. It felt a bit odd, opening someone else's diary, but then I realised that, for as long as I was Andi, it was actually MY diary. It was full of her thoughts and comments.

Two things stood out for me: first, Andi seemed to worry about her sexuality - it was very clear that she had a massive crush on Jenny, but she wasn't really sure if Jenny felt the same way. The way people had interacted with me today, either everyone KNEW that Andi liked girls, and it really wasn't a big deal, or it was a massive secret, and no-one else knew. To be honest, I don't think it mattered that much.

The second thing I picked up on was her love-hate relationship with her braces. It seemed that she had got her braces a year ago, just before her 17th birthday. I read of her frustrations of having had to wait so long to get the braces in the first place. It was clear that initially she had felt very frustrated at having the bite plane, or more specifically the lisp it gave her, but more recently she seemed to have accepted it. And the frustrations at having to brush her teeth all the time. What I did notice though was how she actually LIKED the silver smile that her all-metal brackets gave her.

I decided to write an entry in the diary for today:


"Hi Andi! Happy 18th Birthday! It has been really strange, yet very pleasant being you today. You are a very lucky girl, your family and friends love you a lot. You're good looking too, and I do like your braces: I wish I had braces like yours! Last night, mum showed me the pictures of you and me for the first time: you looked so tiny, but so cute.. I guess, from your perspective, mum showed you the pictures and I was the tiny frail one? I really wish I had actually got to meet you, I'm sure it would have been fun to have a twin sister!"


I wasn't sure what else to add, so I just signed off: "Lots of love from Andy, your brother (or maybe you think of me as Oliver?) xxxx". I gave the book a kiss, then closed it, and put it back into my drawer.

As I closed my eyes, I did wonder who I would wake up as in the morning: would I still be Andi, or would I be Andy once more?

Chapter 5

It was still quite dark when I woke up. Something felt very strange, as if someone else was in bed with me. I leaned to my left and turned on my light. Hey, did I just say 'Left'? As I did so, another light, on the other side of the bed, also came on. Which is odd, as I only have one bedside lamp! I turned and looked to my right: at the same time, whoever was in the other half of my bed turned and looked at me.

Her face was VERY familiar!

"Andi?"

"Andy?"

"Oh my god, what's happening?" we both said quietly, but at exactly the same time. "Is this a dream?" we added. I reached out, and touched her... she certainly felt real. Ok, I'll pinch myself... yes, I felt that.

We both put our arms out, and hugged each other, something which I think we had both wanted to do all our lives, but never realised we neded to. Neither of us needed to say a thing, as we both knew exactly how the other felt, and what they WOULD say if they had said it. We fell asleep once more, in each other's arms.


I was woken by my alarm, just like I normally was. I opened my eyes, to see a room that I'd not seen for a couple of days. I was lying on the left hand side of my bed, and a quick feel of my body confirmed I was Andy once more. I turned on the bedside light, and opened the drawer in the bedside unit: I was 100% certain that there would be an A5 notebook in there, with a second entry in it: I was not disappointed.


'Hi again, Andy! Thank you so much for your message, it was so lovely to read it... it seems that we're actually very much alike. Maybe I shouldn't be so surprised, we both have the same loving mum & dad, and I guess we were brought up very similarly.

So, it's our birthday party at the weekend: who am I going to be at that party, Andi or Andy. To be honest, I don't think I'll mind WHO I am. In fact, I think I'd be ok if I stayed being Andy, and I'm betting you're feeling the same about being Andi.

The BIG question I've been thinking about this evening is WHERE are you? And where am I for that matter. The best thing I can think of is alternate universes, or multiverses, like in The Flash. But how did I get here, and you get there? And will we ever get back to being ourselves?

Whatever the answers are, it has been absolutely amazing being you, and finding out a little bit more about the twin brother I never had.

Look after yourself, Andy, and have a great life.

Lots of love, Andi / Olivia. xxxxxx'


Life felt SOOOO good today! I now know the answer to mum's question, the one she never actually asked: how would my sister, Olivia, have turned out, if she had survived? Well, mum, I know I can't ever tell you, because you'd NEVER believe me, but I can say that she turned out just fine!


THE END

This is really good. Body swaps can be tricky to pull off, but you handled it really well.

brilliant read, well done!
Genuinely a bit sad it isn't longer )

Interesting idea! Thanks for sharing