Sam stared at herself in the mirror like it might blink first.

  The air in the tiny bathroom felt thick, humid with the weight of her own racing thoughts. Her new reflection shimmered in the flickering fluorescent light, every curve and angle breathing a soft, undeniable truth back at her.

  She swallowed hard.

  Curiosity, inevitable and unstoppable, purred its way up her spine.

  Her hands twitched at her sides, fingers flexing with the desperate, magnetic pull to know. To understand. To feel.

  "Okay," she whispered to herself, her voice softer now, warmer around the edges like velvet wrapped around steel. "Okay, Sam. No one's here. No cameras. No judgment."

  With trembling fingers, she peeled her shirt over her head.It snagged briefly at her newly generous bust, and she had to shimmy awkwardly to free it. She couldn't help but ugh—an honest, breathless sound that filled the tiny space.

  The girl staring back at her was slim but not skinny. Her stomach had that natural, faintly defined tone that looked like she jogged for the aesthetic, not the sport. Her hips had filled out enough to suggest real softness beneath the surface, a tempting, lived-in comfort.

  Her breasts...Sam flushed darker, her cheeks blooming pink under her gsses.

  Full. Heavy. Real.Not absurd, not cartoonish—just enough to command attention without demanding it. She cupped them carefully, testing the weight in her palms like she couldn't quite believe they were attached.

  A little gasp broke from her lips.The warmth of her own touch traveled through her nerves like a spark, curling deep in her belly.

  "This is so fucked," she muttered, but she didn't stop.

  Her hands explored lower, tracing the new curve of her waist, the gentle outward swell of her hips. Even her thighs had gained just a hint of plushness, the kind that promised softness without surrender.

  Her pajama shorts—already loose—hung even more awkwardly now, slipping dangerously low on her hips.

  And without really thinking about it, driven by a heady cocktail of awe and something far more primal, Sam hooked her thumbs into the waistband and slid them down.

  The shorts puddled around her ankles.

  The world froze.

  Where once there had been something hanging—awkward, foreign, hated—there was now smoothness. Softness. Herself, reborn, reimagined... completed.

  Her legs wobbled.Her heart exploded behind her ribs.Her brain stopped making coherent words altogether.

  A shy, almost bashful wonder melted across her face. Her knees pressed together instinctively, the way she'd seen girls do without even thinking about it.

  Some part of her brain, the devious part, whispered dark and daring ideas.The old Sam—the Sam who'd joked once, half-seriously, about starting an OnlyFans just to mess with people—would have already been pnning a photoshoot.

  Her face burned hotter.

  It would be so easy, now.So dangerously easy.

  The idea tickled her mind, wrapping itself around her pride, her vanity, her hunger for validation she'd never dared chase openly before.

  She bit her lip.

  The image of herself—soft, curvy, dangerous in a way she'd only wished before—taunted her in the mirror. Her body was an unwrapped gift begging to be admired, documented, worshipped.

  Sam's fingers twitched again, hovering uncertainly.

  Maybe if she just took a couple pictures—Nothing bad, just for herself, right?No harm in appreciating what the universe had so generously dropped in her p—

  DING!

  The microwave beeped.

  Loud. Sharp. Shrill.

  Sam jumped a foot in the air, heart smming against her ribs like a trapped bird.

  Reality crashed back into her like a freight train.

  She yelped, scrambling to yank her shorts back up, nearly tripping over herself in the process. The estic caught awkwardly on her hips now, fighting the new width.

  "Shit—shitshitshit—"

  She managed to wrestle herself into a basic state of decency, heart hammering, face burning so hard it could have powered Las Vegas for a week.

  The microwave beeped again, as if impatient with her nonsense.

  Sam clutched the counter, gasping for air, staring wide-eyed at the doorway like someone was about to bust in and catch her admiring herself like a giddy teenager.

  Which, she supposed, she kind of was right now.

  A choked ugh burst from her throat, half-hysterical.

  "Okay," she panted, wiping her forehead. "New rule. No sexy existential crises in the bathroom."

  The microwave dinged again, almost smug.

  "Yeah, yeah, I hear you," she grumbled, stomping out of the bathroom with all the dignity of a freshly minted disaster.