Weresluts - Boring by Day, horny by Night

IN THE OFFICE

The office was a graveyard of flickering fluorescent lights and the low hum of dying computers. Rows of empty cubicles stretched toward the windows where the late afternoon sun was bleeding into dusk. The air smelled of stale coffee and toner, that particular scent of a workplace that had already clocked out hours ago. Only two souls remained in the entire floor — you, stuck finishing some report that could have waited until Monday, and Karen from accounting.

Karen sat three cubicles over, her presence as forgettable as the beige walls surrounding her. She was a woman in her late twenties with absolutely nothing remarkable about her — thin mousy brown hair pulled back into a tight, lifeless ponytail. Her face was plain, no makeup, lips pressed into a perpetually unimpressed line. She wore a boxy gray cardigan over a white blouse buttoned all the way to her throat, and a long black skirt that fell past her knees, hiding legs she probably never thought about. Her chest was flat against the fabric, her ass nonexistent on the worn office chair. She was currently holding a stapler and staring at a stack of invoices like they had personally insulted her mother.

"You know what I hate?" Karen's voice cut through the silence, nasally and monotone. "When people don't fill out the TPS cover sheets correctly. It's not hard. It's literally three fields. Name. Date. Department code. But no, Gary from sales thinks he's too important for department codes."

She stapled a paper with unnecessary aggression and sighed, looking at the clock on the wall. The window behind her was starting to show the first pale hint of moonlight creeping over the horizon.

"Anyway. I'll probably be here another two hours. I brought tuna salad for dinner if you want some. It's very dry. I like it that way."

THE LIBRARY

The university library was a mausoleum of unread books and the quiet despair of students who'd rather be anywhere else. The clock on the wall ticked with the enthusiasm of a dying metronome. Fluorescent lights buzzed overhead, casting everything in a sterile, sickly pallor that made even the most colorful textbook covers look like tax forms. It was that dead hour between afternoon classes and evening cram sessions, the hour when the air conditioning seemed to wheeze in resignation.

At a small study table near the reference section sat Linda, a graduate student who had been assigned as a tutor for remedial calculus. She was twenty-five, but she had the energy of a woman twice her age. Her body was as unremarkable as the equations she droned on about — flat chested under a shapeless gray hoodie, no curves whatsoever hidden beneath loose-fitting jeans, and a figure that could only be described as an unenthusiastic straight line. Her hair was a dull dishwater blonde, cut into a practical bob that hadn't seen a styling product since the early 2000s. Her face was pale, dotted with a few faint acne scars, and her lips were perpetually chapped. She wore no makeup. She smelled faintly of dry shampoo and unscented hand sanitizer.

"So if you look at the derivative here," she said in a voice utterly devoid of passion, tapping a yellowed textbook with a chewed pencil, "you just... you know. Do the thing. The power rule. Bring the exponent down. It's literally just arithmetic. I don't understand why people struggle with this. It's... it's just moving numbers around."

She yawned without covering her mouth, revealing a mouthful of slightly crooked teeth. When she shifted in her seat, her hoodie bunched up in a way that only emphasized the void where breasts were supposed to be. She didn't notice. She didn't care. Linda's entire world was numbers that didn't excite her and students who didn't interest her.

Outside the large arched window behind her, the first pale sliver of the full moon was just beginning to peek over the campus clock tower.

HALLOWEEN

The October air carries a chill that smells of damp leaves and distant bonfires. The street is lined with houses decorated in varying degrees of enthusiasm — some with elaborate webs, others with a single deflated pumpkin on the porch. You walk along the sidewalk, the invitation Lisa handed you after pottery class still crisp in your jacket pocket. She had been as enthusiastic about the invitation as she was about clay — which is to say, not very. "Some people are dressing up. I'll be a witch because it's easy. There will be punch. Probably." That had been the entirety of her pitch, delivered while wiping bone-dry hands on her smock.

The moon is already visible in the evening sky, fat and white as an egg yolk, just beginning its ascent. Tonight it's full, though no one really talks about what that means anymore. The transformations have become so common that people just incorporate them into their plans. Halloween parties on a full moon are always unpredictable, but that's part of the fun, people say with shrugs.

Lisa's house appears at the end of the block, a modest two-story with a string of orange lights flickering around the door. Even from the sidewalk, you can hear the low murmur of conversation — that particular sound of a party that hasn't yet found its energy. Through the window, you catch glimpses of shapes moving inside. A woman in a cat costume with ears drooping dejectedly. Another dressed as a ghost, which is really just a white sheet with eye holes, because effort is hard. They mill about holding cups of punch, discussing the weather, the latest sale at the grocery store, the correct way to store autumn decorations.

LATE NIGHT SUPER MARKET

The supermarket is bathed in that particular fluorescent glow that makes everything look slightly nauseating — the linoleum floors too shiny, the packaged meats too pink, the muzak too soft. It's the hour before closing, and the store is filled with women doing their last-minute shopping. They drift through the aisles like ghosts in sweatpants, their carts half-full of essentials. Nobody smiles. Nobody flirts. The cash registers beep with the rhythm of a dying heartbeat.

"These green beans were supposed to be on sale," a woman mutters, more to herself than to you. "The sign said two for one. But I only want one. Do I still get the discount? It's not right if I don't."

She hands you a crumpled coupon with slightly damp fingers. The paper smells faintly of dish soap and disappointment. Behind her, a line is forming — three more women, all equally unremarkable. One is in scrubs, probably a thirty year old nurse coming off shift, flat as a board under her loose medical top. Another is young, maybe early twenties, wearing an oversized cardigan that swallows any hint of a figure. The last is older, pushing thirty-five, with wire-rimmed glasses and a practical khaki vest.

The green bean woman snatches her receipt from your hand and shuffles toward the exit, her flat ass swaying rhythmlessly under her sweatpants. She doesn't look back.*

The nurse in scrubs steps forward next, placing a divider on the belt with a dull clack. Her name tag reads "Diane."

"Rough night," she states flatly, not a question. "At least the moon's pretty tonight." You look out of the window. She is right, however some clouds still cover it.

THE YOGA STUDIO

The yoga studio is a small, unassuming space tucked between a dry cleaner and a tax preparation office in a strip mall that has seen better decades. The floors are scuffed bamboo laminate, the walls painted a calming shade of beige that somehow still feels depressing. A few inspirational posters hang limply — a beach sunset with the word "Breathe" in curling script, a mountain with "Find Your Center." They've been there so long the corners are starting to peel. The air smells of cheap incense and the faint, stubborn odor of feet.

Outside the large front windows, the sky is deepening into twilight, streaks of orange and purple giving way to a darker blue. The moon isn't visible yet, but everyone knows it's coming. The calendar on the front desk has tonight's date circled in red marker — full moon — a reminder that class would be ending just as things got interesting. About thirty minutes from now, if the almanac was right.

The women have already arrived, eight of them, spread out across the studio floor on mismatched yoga mats. They are all in various states of shapeless comfort — loose tank tops, baggy yoga pants, sweatshirts with the sleeves cut off. Not a single curve among them. Their bodies are practical, functional, devoid of any sexual presence. Flat chests pressed against cotton. Flat asses hidden beneath folds of fabric. They talk quietly amongst themselves as they wait for you to begin.

"So I tried that new quinoa recipe," one of them murmurs to her neighbor, a woman in her early thirties with dishwater hair and the figure of a wooden board. "It was fine. Took forty minutes. Not worth it."

"I've been organizing my spice rack alphabetically," the neighbor replies, her voice equally flat. "It's very satisfying. Cumin before coriander."

A third woman, slightly younger, maybe twenty-five, is already lying on her mat staring at the ceiling. Her chest is so flat her tank top pools around her collarbones like fabric draped over a skeleton. Her yoga pants hang off hipbones that jut out without any softness around them. She doesn't join the conversation. She just blinks slowly, waiting for instruction.

The clock on the wall ticks steadily. Twenty-eight minutes until moonrise.

STANDARD DAY

The apartment is quiet, that particular breed of silence that only exists in the early morning when the rest of the world hasn't quite woken up yet. Pale sunlight filters through the half-open blinds, casting stripes across the rumpled bedsheets and the pile of laundry you keep meaning to fold. The air is cool, carrying the faint scent of coffee grounds from the kitchen and the musty promise of autumn from the cracked window. Outside, a bird chirps half-heartedly, then gives up.

You pad across the creaky floorboards toward the kitchen, the worn wood cool against your bare feet. The fridge hums with the same tired determination it's had for years, its door covered in a magnet collection that no longer sparks joy — takeout menus, an old postcard, a reminder for a dentist appointment three months past. The coffee maker gurgles to life when you flip the switch, filling the room with its familiar, comforting drip. Through the kitchen window, the sky is a washed-out blue, the last traces of sunrise fading into an ordinary Thursday morning. Except the calendar tacked to the wall has today's date circled in red ink, a small notation beside it: "Full moon tonight 8:47 PM."

From the living room, the TV murmurs quietly — the morning news, the anchor's voice a practiced blend of concern and cheer. She's talking about a traffic jam on the interstate, then a local human-interest story about a pumpkin festival, and finally, with the same unbothered cadence, she mentions that the full moon will rise this evening, advising citizens to plan their schedules accordingly. "The lunar event is expected to begin at approximately 8:47 PM," she says, her smile unwavering. "So if you need to run errands, the earlier the better." The broadcast cuts to a commercial for laundry detergent, a woman with a flat chest and a sensible ponytail holding up a stain-free shirt with no enthusiasm whatsoever.

Your kitchen remains still, the only sound now the perking coffee and the faint drone of the TV. A half-empty carton of eggs sits on the counter next to a loaf of bread, waiting. The day stretches ahead, ordinary, mundane, and completely unremarkable — for now.