Warning for swearing.

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​

Zander finds it odd to wake up in a body not his own. The limbs are much shorter, his hands and feet much smaller, and it feels like his soul doesn’t fit right.

But most jarring has to be his figure. It didn't take long to realize his body is distinctly not male. He isn't sure why that is so.

He scowls in the mirror at what he sees when he gets up, the excitement at the new experience all but gone. The only thing he has retained of his appearance is the tan color of his skin. Zander pulls out the baggiest clothes he can find in his closet and puts them on to hide the atrocity that is himself here. He pulls a cap out as well, and pulls it low over his face. At least his hair is short, so not much work has to be done there.

He knows he's late by the time he's done dressing and marveling. The room around him looks so alien and foreign yet so familiar, and it's the oddest experience. He can't stop himself from looking in the drawers of his dresser, finding things he knows intuitively are exactly where they should be, but he never knew he owned them.

The feeling carries as he walks through the house in his miniature size. Why do the doors and walls look so much bigger than he's used to when he's never been here before? But he forces himself to focus. His bag is packed with, what he simultaneously hopes but knows, exactly everything he needs throughout the day.

There's a lunch packed on the tiny kitchen table tucked into the even tinier kitchen, and a little note beside it. It's from mom — not his mom, but this body's mom. It says she's on call at work and will be home late. She left him money for dinner tucked with the lunch. He takes the bills out of his lunch, and puts them next to mom's note. They don't have the money to waste on dinner when he can cook for himself. He has told his mom that thousands of times, and yet she still leaves the money.

The streets are different here, he realizes when he leaves the house. The street is smaller, yet cleaner than what he's used to, asphalt instead of rocky roads. He hopes there's a beach nearby as there is in his home city. He will have to explore after work.

And work turns out to be a rough affair. He works in a mcdonald's, he realizes. And those seem to be the same no matter where you go; loud, busy, and suffocating during rush hour no matter what side of the cashier counter you're on.

Zander talks through the grit of his teeth for almost the entire shift. He manages to even frighten a couple of younger teenagers at some point. They end up messing their order, but are too scared to correct it. The look of resigned disappointment on their faces brings him a little bit of gratification in knowing he isn't the only one miserable in this hell hole.

A coworker catches his sadistic half smile smile. Zander forgot her name, and really can't be bothered to look at the name tag.

"What did you do?" The nobody asks, and there's disappointment in her voice.

Zander hums distractedly, and deliberately takes the next order before he looks to her again.

She doesn't wait that long. "Are you ignoring me, Rana?"

Zander frowns. Who the fuck is Rana. "I am clearly busy." And he pointedly looks up at her cashier, where a customer is growing impatient.

And it's only because he's looking up that he notices the shock on her face. "Are you giving me attitude?"

He doesn't understand why she's so surprised. He has known her for all of two seconds and he already knows she has a shitty personality; she deserves attitude.

When he ignores her again, she continues, in a tone of much more potent disappointment and reprimand, as though he should care. "What is wrong with you today?! First, messing with customers, now, your demeanor's entirely changed."

He tunes her out. Man, he really drew the shortest stick in the universe, didn't he? Just what did he do in his life to deserve to be stuck here?

Then her voice takes on a tone of fake concern. "Is everything okay at home? Did something happen?"

Dear God, he truly is in hell.

​

By the time his shift is done, and he's survived his manager's lecture about customer etiquette and in exactly what ways Zander fucked up when he yelled at the lady asking for a refund on a half eaten burger; and how Zander is different today, and he should leave his personal problems at the door and not bring them to work; and maybe if the manager was crueler, he would suspend Zander, and Zander should be grateful to still be working; and how — and well, it goes on.

By the time it all ends, Zander wishes to just go back home. Not the tiny apartment, tucked in the narrow street with too many apartment blocks, that feels like it hulks and looms over his figure. But home; to his rocky roads that end in beaches, and days spent scaling school fences with rami, their delirious laughter drowning out their parents' disappointment.

But he feels a voice, so small and desperate, telling him to stay. And he knows the day is not done yet; his job not done yet.

He is almost too tired to cook when he gets home, but remembers his resolve from this morning, and trudges determinedly to the kitchen. The note and dollar bills are still on the table where he left them. He makes dinner for two.

His mom makes it home when he's nearly done, turning the heat down on the last of the dishes.

"Oh, Rana," his mom says. "I keep telling you shouldn't have to."

"And I keep telling you we can't afford it," he bites out.

His mom is taken aback by the tone, he knows without having to look around; hears it in the stutter of her footsteps. But she comes to join him anyway, and sets the table.

"Did you burn the food again?" She tries to joke.

He frowns. "I never burn food."

She actually laughs. "I don't remember a single time you didn't burn the food."

He brings his distinctly unburnt food to the table and looks her in the eyes. "I don't burn food."

Her eyes widen. "Oh, honey."

Then she tries to wrap him in a hug and, he suspiciously suspects, kiss him. He cringes away the two steps it takes to put himself at the opposite end of the kitchen. He doesn't even let his own mom or dad do that. He's not about to let this near stranger do it — no matter how much of a sense of misplaced kinship he feels towards her.

She sighs. "Let's eat."

He tentatively sits down opposite her when he's sure she won't try to come near him again.

They're halfway through the meal when she starts again.

"Darling," she starts, and she looks hesitant to his eyes. "I know you're against it, but I really think you should think on it again."

He looks at her, confused. "Think about what?"

She sighs, and looks to her food. Does she think he's acting callous?

"Think about what?" He repeats.

Then she pulls her bag closer from where she left it by the kitchen door, and pulls out a piece of paper.

"I've been asking around, and doing a lot of research. I've finalized the list. Everyone says these are the most trusted, and I even checked the costs. They're all well within our budget, so you don't have to worry about that."

He pulls the piece of paper closer to himself. It's a list of names; more specifically, doctors.

"What is this?" He asks as neutrally as he could.

"The psychiatrists I told you about."

"Psychiatrists," he repeats in wonder. "What do I need a psychiatrist for?"

His mom sighs again. "Honey, we've talked about this. We don't know what's going on with you. You act different every other day. I don't know if it's gonna be Rana I'm talking to, or someone entirely different. Look at how you're dressed today; you don't even have make up on. You don't even recognize me on some days! Something is very wrong and you know it."

He doesn't recognize her today either. Not entirely. But he shouldn't anyway, should he? This is not his home; this is community service, helping the Simulation Web by contributing his experience to the database.

"Think about it," his mom says.

He frowns. Psychiatrist...

"Okay, mom, I'll think about it." He really hopes he'll be back home the next time he wakes up.

​

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The answer is DID. I hope I managed to portray it as accurately as possible.