"Everybody Change Places!" by M. J. Amft, Part 2

Number of entries received for the 2007 InnermoonLit Award for Best Short-Short Story to date: 105

Click here to read "Everybody Change Places" Part 1

I had once known a real Ronnie, a very handsome, very wealthy Ivy Leaguer who broke a tiny bone in his wrist. That bone would not heal. For nine months casts were removed only to be replaced immediately, He was a boy who had everything, including a swimming pool, a tennis court, his own baseball diamond, and a glamorous girlfriend. But he also had that damned cast. He seemed like a good character for a Seventeen story.

So while he was off in New York having surgery on the wrist, I dreamed up the candy striper. As soon as the real Ronnie met the make-believe Gay, the story flowed as fast as I could write. But that ending…

I uncapped my all-powerful pen. With it I yanked Gay out of that red and white uniform. I made her much more beautiful, very rich, and slightly spoiled. And I broke her wrist. I pulled Ronnie out of bed, healed his bone, took away all his money and rich friends, and made him a lowly part-time City College student and lab technician. I pulled Gay’s drab visitor out of the past, stuck him in the present, changed him into a girl who liked Ronnie, gave him a nurse’s aide uniform, and christened him Jenny. I could do it. They were my characters.

When beautiful Gay left that hospital, Ronnie didn’t wait, hoping for a call. He called her. When she wasn’t home, he called again, and when she was busy he asked her when she would not be busy. And he got the message, loud and clear, got it in a way that no girl ever would; because he was a boy, with that masculine inner core of toughness, he could appreciate a final twist of irony that I added.

I re-typed the battle-scarred manuscript and sold it.

To be continued...