True Beauty

It was at that point that Sonnie noticed her penis.

“What the fu-” she started to say, but then stopped – because the voice that had come out of her mouth was not the refined, endearing tones of a darling English movie star, but rather the profound rumbling bass of Mufasa trying to repel hyenas. She spun towards the mirror – only to find herself staring at a gigantic black man with a dong the size of a Costco salami, who stared in horror back at her.

“What the fuck!” Sonnie shrieked, or rather thundered, because again, her voice could’ve been put to the ground to test earthquake sensors. She stumbled out of the chamber in semi-delirium, steadying herself against the walls with hands the size of a Texan ribeye, then lurched forward, buck‑ass nude, towards the front counter.

“What the fuck is this!” she demanded, and the overweight speckly guy behind the counter winced as her words physically impacted his face.

“What’s what, why, what’s wrong?” he stammered, nervously pushing his glasses back up his nose.

Sonnie was incredulous. “What’s wrong!” she howled, likely causing every dog within a two-mile radius considerable panic, “What’s wrong! Are you blind? This isn’t what I ordered!”

The BodEz clerk wilted. “No it’s-it’s-it’s fine, that’s what you-” He reached down with trembling hands and brought up the clipboard with her paperwork on it. “See?”

Sonnie didn’t even look. “This is not Keira Knightley!” she roared, and she slammed her meat‑hammer fists into the counter so hard it caused her ridiculously oversized penis to jump.

There was a moment’s silence. The clerk blinked and swallowed nervously.

“Keiran,” he said, cowering slightly. He held up the clipboard. “You, um. You selected Keiran Knightley. Male, um, African-American male adult, um, film star. K-k-keiran. Keiran Knightley.”

For a moment Sonnie just stood there panting, her eyes bulging at the clerk like he’d just slapped her grandma across the face. Then slowly she forced her gaze down to the signed form on the counter. It was indeed hers – her name was there, along with her details and her signature. And then, just like he’d said, in the ‘Selected BodEz’ box, there it was, plain as day – Keiran Knightley.

Sonnie made a quick note to kill herself as soon as she got home.

“Change it back,” she hissed, a sound that could’ve seduced an anaconda. She leaned towards the trembling clerk, her massive bulk blotting out the fluorescent light. “Put. Me. Back.”

“I, I can’t,” he whimpered, looking for all intents and purposes like he was about to cry, “The-the mental st-stabalisers, it’s not safe, you, you can’t ch-ch-change m-more than once a week.”

Sonnie suddenly felt weak. “I can’t be like this for a week!”

“I’m sorry.”

The world was spinning. “No,” she gasped, gulping in huge lungfuls of air, “I can’t be like this for a week!” Her knees shook and she had to hold onto the counter with her canned-ham arms.

For a few moments the clinic was deadly quiet save for her ragged breathing.

“Would you like some clothes?” cringed the clerk.

***

Two hours later, a six-foot-five, two-hundred and fifty-pound black man sat in a teenage girl’s bedroom and sobbed hysterically into her Hello Kitty bedspread.

“It’s all ruined!” she wailed, tears leaking out from behind hands the size of dinner plates, “I can’t- hic- oh God look at me! I can’t go to prom like this!”

Sonnie’s boyfriend Kevin, now occupying the body of Orlando Bloom, tried to keep the despair from his rugged face. “It’s okay,” he lied, not particularly convincingly, “It’ll… it’ll be fine.”

“Fine?” howled Sonnie, “How will it be fine Kevin? Are you fucking kidding me, how will this be fine!”

“We’ll just say it was on purpose!” he shouted, throwing up his beautifully sculpted arms, “We’re doing a thing, like making a statement, like, gay pride!”

“I don’t want fucking gay pride Kevin!” Sonnie cried, “I want us! I wanted it be perfect! Just one perfect night!” She moaned and curled up on the bed, clutching the pink comforter to her chest in a hug that probably could have asphyxiated an antelope. “Ohhh, I was supposed to be beautiful. It was supposed to be our first time!”

“It still can be!” Kevin replied, although with definite unenthusiasm. Sonnie let out a wet scoff.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” She let go of the comforter and sat up, glaring swords. “Look at me. Look at me! I have a bigger penis than you!”

Orlando-Kevin’s face flushed. “There’s nothing wrong with my penis now!” he cried, and began unzipping his trousers to pull out Legolas’s dong, “Look!”

“Oh stop, put it away!” Sonnie cried, and sunk once more to sob uncontrollably into Hello Kitty’s midriff. Halfway exposed, Kevin reluctantly re-zipped himself, then stood around uncomfortably while his now-black now-boyfriend continued to weep.

“There’s other ways to fix it,” he said, uncomfortable, averting his gaze, “You don’t even have to go, what if you stay here and motion-capture a hologram instead?”

“A hologram.” Sonnie paused her crying to look up at him with an expression of venomous disgust. “So not only will the whole school know I’m ugly, but they’ll think I’m poor too?!”

“Holograms aren’t just for poor people!” he tried, but the argument was half-hearted. Sonnie leant her giant black head back and released a loud anguished moan.

“Fat Sonnie Chu,” she wailed, “Ugly and lazy and stupid and poor! Oh God I can hear them now, they’re all going to laugh at me, fucking Jessica Johnson and her fucking skanks, oh God why is this happening to me, why is this happening!”

“Because you chose the wrong name from a drop-down box?” Kevin snapped. Sonnie glared at him.

Downstairs, the doorbell rang.

“Oh God,” moaned Sonnie, burying her head in her hands. Orlando-Kevin rolled his eyes and strode out of the bedroom. The thud of his feet descending the stairs was followed by the sound of the front door swinging open and sudden squeals of excitement, then the distant tones of conversation. Sonnie listened glumly as several sets of footsteps traipsed back up the stairs towards her.

“Oh my God, honey,” lamented Julie the moment she entered. The skinny brunette swooped down over Sonnie’s bed and placed a small hand on each of her enormous shoulders. “Oh my God, I’m so sorry, this is awful!” She leant in, trying and failing to wrap her arms around Sonnie’s enormous chest. “What happened? Is there anything we can do?” Behind her, Jake, Noni and Orlando-Kevin trailed into the room, the first two looking appropriately sombre.

“No,” Sonnie grumbled, “I’m stuck like this. The fucking BodEz guy screwed up.”

“Oh God, that’s the worst!” She pulled back from the hug and stared at Sonnie, her mouth set in pity. “I can’t believe they’d do this to you! And two days before prom!”

She wasn’t stuttering at all, Sonnie noticed.

“You guys all went okay then?” she asked glumly. She didn’t really need to ask for Noni – her skin looked as clean and clear as porcelain, the micro-hologram emitters sitting as studs in her earlobes hiding any visible trace of acne. The three newcomers nodded.

“You’ve still got a bit of a limp though,” she said to Jake. The short dark-haired boy nodded, turning slightly red as he leant on the doorframe.

“I only got the Disco Package uploaded,” he informed her, “It won’t kick in until I start dancing.”

“Yeah but then you’ll show everyone,” enthused Orlando-Kevin, and the pair of them exchanged grins. “Want to see my dick?”

“I’m fine,” cooed Julie, her words flawlessly enunciated. Sonnie could just make out the small wireless device implanted behind her temple, but if you weren’t looking for it you’d never notice the implant, or that her words were actually being spoken by a voice coach in the Philippines. “And honey, you’re going to fine too, there has to be a way, we can fix this.”

“How?” said Sonnie, choking up once more with tears, “How can we fix this? Look at me Julie. Fucking look at me.” Her lips trembled. “I’d already altered my dress.”

Julie and Noni both moved beside her and together managed to give Sonnie’s enormous frame a unified hug as she descended into a fresh round of sobs. Over in the corner, Kevin and Jake were chortling, Kevin’s pants around his ankles.

“Hey Sonnie,” said Jake, looking up from Orlando-Kevin’s proud new dong, “I hear you’ve got a huge dick.”

“Shut up Jake,” snapped Julie, as Sonnie’s howling intensified, “Don’t be an asshole. Don’t listen to him sweetie,” she reassured her, patting Sonnie on her enormous back, “You’ve got nothing to be ashamed of. It doesn’t matter what you look like, okay? It’s what’s on the inside that counts.”

The five of them exchanged glances.

“Yeah,” hiccupped Sonnie, “Totally.”