On my 13th birthday, a gift from my grandmother contained simply a decorated card labeled “Ticket to The Clothes Hole for Dan Mitchell, unlimited use, training required.” There was a box to mark and for someone to sign that the training had been completed. And at the bottom, it had her address. I figured this was some kind of family secret I was going to be introduced to. When we were alone together for a moment I asked her about it, and she said only that it would become clear on my next visit.

The basement at my grandmother’s house had always been off limits, but when my parents took me over there a week later, we all quickly went down there.

Grandma explained, “I know this will sound confusing, but it’s been a bit confusing for all of us, more than 2 centuries of our family. My ancestor Abbie found this site and built the home around it.”

“What is it?” I asked. “And why are there so many racks of clothes? It looks like a clothing store!”

“Yes, and it’s all free for you to use now. But I need to explain. And it will help if we go over to the other side, past all the racks of clothes.”

She led the way. At the far side of the room was a pile of clothes on the floor, just piled there, not hanging or folded, and nearby, there was a circle painted on the floor under a similarly sized round curtain rod with a curtain that was open in front.

“Abbie discovered a pile of clothes just like this. Except they were clothes from the 1700s, naturally. But where this mark is on the wall is the Clothes Hole. Once in a while this opens up and an article of clothing pops out. We think they’re all lost clothes belonging to other people. The clothes are all in good condition, and there’s some other condition for them to come here that we don’t understand, since if all the good condition lost clothes in the world came here, we wouldn’t have enough space if we filled the yard with a warehouse. Our best theory is that it’s a wormhole, and the other end drifts around the world and when it encounters a suitable piece of lost clothing it pulls it through. One thing we know is that it only pulls in one article of clothing per person.”

“OK, so it’s like a free second-hand clothes store?”

“That part of it is, but now let me explain this circle. When you enter the circle, your body changes to that of the owner of an article of clothing you are wearing.”

“What!?” I exclaimed.

“That’s what happened to Abbie, who was originally Abraham Johnson. It was a cold winter day when Abraham came upon the clothes pile, and feeling the need to be warmer, grabbed a coat from the pile and put it on. It turned out to have belonged to a woman, and Abraham’s body changed into a copy of that woman’s when he stumbled through the then-unmarked circle.”

“Is the change permanent?”

“It’s permanent, except that you can visit the circle again in another person’s clothing and change to that person.”

“So why didn’t Abraham change back?”

“Oh, he did once he figured it out. But ultimately he changed back to Abbie again. Abraham was gay, and there was no tolerance for that in colonial America. By changing to Abbie, she could stay with her male lover without them being outcasts.”

“Do you know it’s really the owner of the clothes, and not just the kind of body the clothes might be designed for?”

“Yes. It’s not limited to clothes that have come through the hole. If you want to confirm it yourself, try on my hat. Well, before I offer it, I need to be sure you have some of your own clothes here and that you aren’t, for some reason, dressed in borrowed clothes, or ones bought from the thrift store in town.”

I thought for a moment, then affirmed, “Everything I am wearing belongs to me and me alone and was purchased new.”

“Great. Then take my hat and walk into the circle.”

I took the offered hat, put it on my head, and walked into the circle. Sure enough, I turned into a copy of Grandma. I was still wearing my clothes, which were a bit ill-fitting, but they did not fall off. Still standing in the circle, I took the hat off and handed it to Grandma, and I turned back into myself.

“OK. Seeing is believing; being a part of it, doubly so. Do you know how it works?”

“Some sort of magic, it seems. I wouldn’t believe in magic if I didn’t see it. But there is no rational explanation otherwise. The copy is exact down to fingerprints, but we think it provides the body as it was at the time the owner last touched the clothing. Some of this clothing has been here for decades and it produces a body at the same age it did when it first came through the hole.”

“How does it decide which body to give you if you have clothes from different people?”

“Ah, yes, important info to know. It doesn’t consider clothing covered by other clothing, even partially. If your shirt is tucked into your pants, it won’t consider the shirt. If your shirt is untucked and covers the waistband of your pants, it won’t consider the pants. Hats, shoes, and jewelry all count, and those things sometimes come through the hole. Out of the possible items, the one which is highest on your body is the one considered. And it seems meticulous about ownership. If your borrow something, or if something was lost and not intentionally discarded, or it was stolen, then it still belongs to the person who owned it before. While we treat it as ‘finders keepers’ because we have no hope of locating the owners, the magic doesn’t. If the owner sells it, gives it away, or discards it, he no longer owns it; in the case of something discarded, whoever picks it up next owns it. If the item was owned by a business, or a person too close to death, it will ignore that item, but the hole doesn’t bring us items like that, nor does it bring items that were owned by somebody who wouldn’t be expected to wear it.”

“You’ve had a long time to figure this out, I guess.”

“Abbie documented it before the United States was a country. I still have the original records, but we work from modern copies.”

“So I can just go pick anything and change into somebody else? Other than the style and size of clothing, how would I know?”

“When something new comes through the hole, we don’t know. Once in a while, one of us comes down here and tries on all the new things. We put a small numeric tag on each item and we store the description of the person it produces in a computer database, and if you have no idea what you would want, you’re welcome to help with this effort and see some random bodies. If you want something specific, you can search for a person of a specific gender, height, weight, and basic sizes. But generally, we don’t let you take the items that came through the hole, save for the garment generating a specific body you want to try for a period of time. We keep the clothes here to make those bodies available, and if you want to leave here in another body you should bring a set of clothes to fit it.”

“I guess I could. If you’re guaranteeing I can leave in my own body, I wouldn’t mind getting to try on other bodies for a short while, and help with your effort.”

“I should caution you about the nudity. When we test the new items we generally have you strip naked behind the curtain and then put on just the one item that came through. This ensures that other clothing does not interfere, and if you turn into a body too big for your original clothes you don’t rip them. But it means you might be topless or bottomless while you are here being measured and weighed. The people here measuring and weighing you, which will be other family members, will see you partially naked, but it will be somebody else’s partially naked body, though you will be occupying it. Nobody will molest you or touch you more than is necessary to take the measurements, but you do need that accept you will be seen partially naked in these other bodies.”

“I guess I am OK with that, as long as other people take turns being the one to try on the clothes.”

“Sure, we can fully introduce you into the system. Usually we have three people, one trying on clothes, one measuring that person, and one entering the data into the computer. It looks like we have a washload of clothes that have come through the hole, so I can get those washed and dried and we can do the measuring after lunch.”

So we let her start the wash and all went back upstairs. Immediately after lunch was cleared away, Mom, Grandma, and I went back downstairs.

Grandma instructed, “OK, we’ll rotate roles, but Dan, you will be trying on clothes first because that doesn’t need any explanation. You can observe us while I measure you and your mother enters the information to see how that works.”

“OK,” I replied.

“I’ve put the clothes to be tested on this table, folded and stacked. When it’s your turn to try something on, you pick an item, and take it inside the curtain with you. There is a small gap between curtains at the back where you can access a clothes rack with hangers for you to hang up your current clothes as well as the item you are trying on. Strip completely naked like you were going to take a shower, then put on the new item. In weird cases, like it’s too small to wear properly, just put it on as best you can. Your body will change, and then you should be able to finish putting the thing on. And then open the curtain and we’ll measure you.”

“Sounds simple enough. And you said my turn to try on stuff first. I can choose anything from this table?”

“Yes, go ahead.”

I wanted to keep it simple, so I picked up a T-shirt. It was red with a car printed on the front. I went in, pulled the curtain closed, and hung the T-shirt on a hanger. I took my shoes and socks off and set them aside. I figured I could leave them off for the entire session. I took off my shirt and pants and hung them on hangers. There were also hangers with small hooks, one of which I used to hang up my briefs. There were still more hangers of these and other types, including one that had a small box hanging from it which latched shut, I suppose for jewelry.

I took the new T-shirt, determined which side was the front, and put it on over my head, then worked on getting my arms into the sleeves. And then I grabbed the bottom of the shirt and pulled it down over the boobs I suddenly had, since the shirt had apparently belonged to a woman. I looked down for a moment. Yep, I was female down below, too. I wasn’t old enough to have had sex, but I had had the lessons about sex, which came with drawings. So I knew the slit that greeted me between my legs was expected on a woman. I opened the curtain and stepped out.

“Oh, very nice,” Grandma said upon seeing me.

I posed for them, trying to ignore the fact that my now-female private parts were on full display. At least they had promised I’d see them similarly half-naked.

Mom spoke next. “OK, I’ve got the record for this one started. Gender female. Description: A red T-shirt with a picture of a car on the front. Do you have the size?”

Grandma stepped behind me and looked at the tag behind my neck, and called out, “Medium.”

Mom continued, “Size medium. This body is young, I’d say around 18. White, with blonde hair and can you tell me the eyes?”

“Blue.”

Grandma directed me, “Now stand over there in front of the height chart, with the backs of your feet together and flush against the wall.”

She pointed where there was a tape stuck to the wall with measurements every inch, and I went there and stood as directed.

“Five foot five inches tall.”

Next, Grandma directed me to a scale.

“One hundred forty one pounds.”

Next, Grandma pulled out a measuring tape.

“I’m going to show you how to measure a woman. I’m going to take several measurements around your body and a couple vertical ones. The first is the bust. Hold your arms out slightly so I can run the tape under them.”

And she wrapped the tape around my body, directly over my boobs, bringing it together between them, and read off, “38 inches.”

“Next, we measure your band size. This is for bras, and I know you’re not wearing one, but it’s an important measurement of a woman’s size.”

She lowered the tape, this time directly below my boobs, pressing up against the bottoms of them where they met the flat part of my chest. “35 inches. That makes you a 36C bra size. The C means your bust is three inches larger than your band, and the 36 is because bras come in even-numbered sizes.”

“Next, your waist. Where I’m going to measure is higher than you might think of as your waist, because you’re used to thinking as a boy. For women, the smallest area above the hips is the waist.”

And she did just that.

“31 inches,” she called out.

Grandma continued with the next instruction, “Next is the hips. Stand with your legs straight and pressed together.”

She ran the tape around my butt - my naked butt - and just missed my private parts in front.

“This measurement goes around the widest part of your hips when you stand this way. 39 and a half inches.”

“Now hold this here.”

She put one end of the measuring tape at my neck on one side, and I held it in place with the hand from the opposite side as she ran the tape along my shoulder and all the way down my arm, holding it at my wrist where she read off “31 and a half inches.”

“The next measurement is a little delicate. Spread your legs somewhat, and I want you to hold one end of the tape against the top of your leg where it meets your crotch. No, directly in the middle so it would be trapped between your legs if you put them together. Yes, like that.”

I appreciated that she had avoided touching me there, since it was impossible to hold the tape there without touching my private parts slightly. I was touching a girl’s private parts for the first time, though I was the girl! She ran the tape directly down the inside of my leg and read off where the top of my foot began. “29 inches.”

Next, she had me sit in a chair and she got out one of those foot-measuring devices I’d seen in some shoe stores, and used it to measure one foot, then the other. “Size 8 and a half.”

Grandma stepped away for a moment, and came back with a camera which was mounted on a tripod.

“Hey, you didn’t say pictures were involved!”

“Sorry. But it’s only a picture of the owner’s body, and we’re only going to take a picture of the face.”

She had me stay seated in the shoe-sizing chair and took the picture, showing me afterward it was just of the face.

“OK, that’s it. Measuring a man, or a girl whose breasts have not started growing, is mostly the same, but with these differences: Instead of the bust and band measurements, there is a single chest measurement, which is around the widest part just like the bust measurement. The waist measurement is at the place where the top of typical pants would go, a couple inches below your navel, and between where a woman’s waist and hip measurements would be. There’s no hip measurement, and the shoe sizer has a separate men’s scale.”

Still with no pants on, I went over to where Mom was sitting at the computer, and she showed me how all the data they’d just collected was entered on a form that looked vaguely like a human body. There was also a space with today’s date, and a blank one labeled Tag Number. “I need the number,” she said.

Grandma took a round tag from a small box and called out, “Thirty-nine two seventy-one.”

Mom showed me how she entered that number. The camera was set up to automatically upload to a folder on this computer, apparently, and Mom showed me the folder and how she attached the picture to the record. Then she clicked Submit to save the record in their system.

Next, Mom showed me how to create a new record, something she must have already done when she started the last one. The first step was to select boy, girl, man, or woman. “This gender choice brings up different templates of measurements, and then you get to the screen we were on before, or one similar to it. We use ‘woman’ for anyone with measurable breast growth, and ‘men’ for roughly a year beyond puberty, when the genitals have started to expand. You go change and then come here to enter the next one.”

I went back behind the curtain, took off the shirt, and put my other clothes back on, restoring my usual body. Then I handed the woman’s shirt to Grandma, who attached the tag and laid it on the back side of the table with the other clothes.

“Put your shoes over beyond the scale so they are out of the way until we are done here,” Grandma suggested as she took her own shoes off in that area.

Grandma modeled next, while Mom took up the measuring role. She chose a button-up shirt which turned out to be a man’s shirt. The tail of the shirt hung down but didn’t quite cover her dick and balls during the measuring process. As weird as it was to think about seeing Grandma naked, it was weirder to see her as a man.

I entered the description of the shirt as a long-sleeve medium-blue button-up shirt with tails, the description of the man as about 30, Hispanic, dark brown hair and brown eyes. And I entered the measurements as Mom read them.

Once Grandma got changed back, it was her turn to enter the measurements, my turn to measure, and Mom’s turn to model. She picked a red mini-skirt from the pile. It was near the top, but I had been too embarrassed to pick that one the first time. Now that I’d been a girl already, I figured I’d be able to pick something that was obviously girl’s clothing, and I was thinking about my choices from what was left.

Mom came out with the most unbelievably huge boobs just hanging there, and even Grandma was laughing. And then I realized I had to measure her. She came out 5 foot 6, 187 pounds. Mom took a moment to explain something before we went on.

“Normally, when a woman’s bust is measured, she has on a bra or clothing that is going to hold the breasts in place. I don’t, so I am going to hold them up a little the way a bra would, and you run that tape measure right over the nipples and press them down as much as you reasonably can.”

Eventually I got the tape measure wrapped around her to her satisfaction and called out, “44 inches.”

The band size, with Mom holding up her breasts more fully so that the space directly under them was accessible, was 38 inches.

“Woo hoo! A 38F,” Grandma called out. “Going to be demand for this one even though the bras will be hard to find.”

Her waist was 36 inches, and her hips 46. Sleeve length was 34.

Next was the inseam. Mom held the top end of the tape measure in place, and while I trusted her to do it right, I looked up for a moment from my position kneeling by her feet, and her private parts were clearly visible under the short skirt. They looked very different from the ones on the girl body I had before; that one was closed up and just a slit, but these were open and I could see all the parts the health class diagrams had said were inside, all exposed. I quickly turned my head toward her feet where I got the measurement at 31 inches.

The shoe size was 9.5 in womens. And then it was my turn to take a picture.

“You’d better take a picture only of this face,” Mom said. “If you have my boobs in the picture I’ll delete it.”

I took the picture to her and Grandma’s satisfaction. And once she got changed back to her more normal sized woman body, it was my turn.

I took the rather see-through blue garment, I wasn’t sure what it was called, but it was like a woman’s one-piece bathing suit except clearly exposed too much for any beach that wasn’t a nude one.

“Woo hoo! Danny in lingerie!” Grandma shouted.

“Hush! We want to make this easy on him,” Mom scolded.

Then, to me, Mom said, “Let me take a look at that first.”

She examined the garment and then told me, “Some of these open up at the bottom. Those you can pull on like shirts and then fasten the two straps between your legs. This one doesn’t, so you will have to pull it on like pants. Then you pull up each shoulder strap with the opposite hand and put the arm through it, and adjust the cups comfortably over your boobs.”

She mimicked the motions while holding the garment in front of her, then handed it back to me. And I took it and headed into the booth. Mom’s instructions worked. As soon as I had my feet through the holes, I changed. I got the thing on, and when I adjusted it over my boobs (which fortunately were normal sized), I saw there were lace flowers that I assumed were supposed to go right over my nipples. When I adjusted it that way it seemed somewhat comfortable, so I assumed I had it on right. You could see right through the garment all around the edge of each breast. There was also a lace bit between my legs that covered my private parts. In back, the garment covered most of my butt, but without any lace - I was sure anybody would be able to see my whole butt practically like I was naked. But so equipped, I opened the curtain and stepped out.

“Marvelous,” Grandma called out. “You make a great girl.”

Mom said, “You’re a nice-looking girl, not a porn star like my last body.”

I blushed a little, thinking about where I’d put my hands on the body Mom just called a porn star.

They decided I looked 22, and did all the measuring and the picture.

We went on like this, at first doing all the main garments like shirts, pants, skirts, and dresses. Then the underwear and bras.

“Isn’t it creepy putting on someone else’s underwear?” I asked.

Mom replied, “By the time you get them on, they will be on the body they belong to. But yes, if it wasn’t for providing access to a body, we’d just throw them away.”

At the end, there were a few garments that would not cover much: a sock, a glove, an earring, and a hat. I guess it wasn’t surprising we had all left these for last since it meant whoever wore them would for all practical purposes be completely naked in front of the others. When it came to my turn among these, I picked the glove, which turned out to be a man’s glove. Mom put on the sock, which turned out to belong to a girl of about 10 years. Grandma, who had pierced ears, put on the earring, which was for a somewhat attractive but obviously older woman, though younger than Grandma. And I was left with the hat, obviously a woman’s hat, and I ended up in one of those porn star bodies like Mom had had, though a bit smaller. When that last was done I put on my proper clothes again including my socks and shoes.

Grandma read out a summary, “37 garments, representing 21 women, 13 men, 2 girls, and 1 boy. A typical mix and the usual assortment of sizes. Three porn star bodies that we should only allow renting. Four that are too old and ugly and not worth keeping. The rest can go into the usual catalog.”

“What are you talking about, renting and catalog?”

Mom explained, “For most of the time members of our family have been here, we only used the bodies to refresh our own family. When each person got old, they’d pick a young body from here and live a new life. I’m really your mother and Grandma is really my mother, but we lived other lives before these. For a long time, there wasn’t tracking of a person from birth to death, and it was easy to just make up new identities. Even after Social Security numbers were created, nobody needed to apply for those until they started working, and we’d look for a body that was the appropriate age and simply apply for one when we were ready. And we mixed in across the area, returning here when we wanted a refresh. And there were way more clothes than we could keep, so we kept only the ones that gave roughly 15 to 25-year-old bodies, donating the others to thrift shops or selling the occasional really nice items. In those days, there were just two rows of racks down here, male and female.”

Grandma now added, “Those were sorted by when they arrived, and when either row was full, we would throw out the rack of oldest clothes as not wanted. When somebody took a body, they took the article of clothing with them, and could optionally come back and refresh the body as long as the garment was still wearable, even if it had holes and whatnot. It was rare that people did that, though. Usually they were ready for a change and took something new.”

Mom continued, “Although SSNs were not required for children, the way that children were listed as dependents on tax returns created a virtual tracking system for children. Family members started reporting fake children as dependents 18 to 22 years before they planned a refresh, and within the town we made complete fake records for these children. We stayed ahead of the system. When the supposed parent was ready to refresh, they’d find a body that was believably the right age and gender and swap into it. Often, they selected these bodies and held onto the clothes to generate them years in advance. We also saw the need to sometimes produce these children when people got audited, so we started keeping clothing for children of all ages, and added more racks. We could have a town employee become a child of any age, gender, and race when needed. Of course, some people had real children in addition to the fake ones, so we had real schools and teachers and whatnot, but each teacher had one or two real classes a day and other classes full of fake students who never actually attended school, but our records said they did.”

“I see where this is going,” I said.

“In 1986, the IRS started requiring SSNs for all dependents 5 years and up, and we simply generated SSNs for every fake child we were tracking. Again, we were ahead of the system. Now it’s just a town function; anybody really or fictionally born here can apply to be reborn at any time, and we’ll set up all the paperwork, and when they really want to be young again, they can. But eternal life isn’t for everybody, and though there have been a few thousand descendants since Abbie’s days, we only have about seven hundred people today regenerating themselves typically once every forty years.”

“So you need about 18 people’s clothes every year.”

“Yes. But you saw that more than 30 usable people’s clothes came through the hole this session. Nine of them were in the age range people might reincarnate themselves into. That was a week’s clothes. We get more than 20 times the suitable identities that we need. So, by word of mouth only, so it didn’t get to be too big a deal, we started letting other people pay to change bodies. Sometimes, if the change isn’t too great, they keep their identity. But we also have twelve other small towns now where we control the infrastructure, and though many of the residents of these towns know nothing about what we are doing, we are making the same complete fake child records there as we do for people here. We charge people ten thousand for a new body, another ten thousand for the new identity, and they have to pay for the travel to set things up.”

“Seems cheap,” I said. “Twenty grand to reincarnate as a high school graduate with all the documents needed to start a new life?”

“If we wanted to charge a market price, it would be in the millions and only the super-rich could afford it, and so much money coming through our small town would look suspicious. As it is, it can fly under the radar as tax revenue. We basically eliminated real estate taxes for family in the town; there are tax bills, but money coming from outsiders pays those taxes, not our family members. Some of the money also goes to the other towns, paying for the security systems we put in place that hide our activities, taxes on the homes of family members maintaining our positions there, and to bribe people outside the family to keep our secrets. And it continues to be free for family members.”

“So what you are saying is, maybe 25 years from now I can have you set up a fake identity of a newborn, and 18 years later I can change into an 18-year-old looking body, assume that identity, and fake my old identity’s death.”

“Yep. And you get to keep doing it as long as you care to live.”

“Just be careful not to die,” Grandma added. “While it might be possible for us to give someone else your body, and we’ll certainly recycle any fake child identity you started so that someone else can use it, we can’t bring you back.”

“You said something about renting some of the bodies?”

Mom said, “Some are too valuable to sell. There’d be a war over them. Mostly they are bodies so sexy that people want them for porn videos. We didn’t show you any porn when we had the talk, but we described it and you can probably figure it out.”

I nodded.

“So we let people use these bodies but we put a GPS tracker on them like prisoners under house arrest. If they try to leave the town, or if they go beyond their rental period, which is usually 24 hours, then it knocks them out and gives us a signal and we go pick them up.”

“You personally go pick them up? And put them back in their original clothes and bodies?”

“Well, local police pick them up to bring them back here, but the police are family members. Remember that the whole town is. And then we bill that client extra for violating the terms. Though hardly anybody ever does this; they want to stay on good terms with us.”

“All right. Guess that isn’t really something I have to worry about. But if I wanted to try one on for a day, could I do that?”

“Sure,” Mom said, “Family members are allowed to exchange whenever. But until you turn 18, only with my approval of the body you are taking, and not on a school day, unless you are just doing it for the evening.”

“Also,” Grandma commented, “You will need some other clothes to wear, unless the body happens to be close enough to your size to wear what you have now. But we can let you try on various bodies, and when you find one you like, print out the sizes. You can go down to the thrift store, which actually has a lot of good clothes, even though they are cheap, because it has the things that came out of here that belonged to bodies that were unsuitable, or they were not taken after too long a time. Just remember, though, that if you buy something from there with one of our tags on it, it still belongs to its original owner forever, even though you paid money for it. You won’t be able to use it to get back to your original body, nor the one you take from here.”

“Well, I think I’d like to explore more bodies next weekend. Not that I don’t like this one, but just to test out options. Actually, I’ve got one other thought.”

“What’s that?” Mom asked.

“If these are not your and Grandma’s original bodies, why did your clothes change you back to them instead of your original bodies?”

“Good question,” Grandma replied. “It has to do with the length of time you spend in the body. After you stick with a body for about a month, any new clothes you buy while wearing the body belong to that body rather than your original, and you will need clothes from before that time if you want to get back to your old body.”

“Interesting. So the body becomes yours after a while.”

“Yes.”

Grandma signed my card indicating training was complete and we left.