When It Rains, It Pours

Chapter 5
V (The Gym)

I stood in front of my mirror, just thinking. Something lurked just below the surface of my conscious thoughts, something big, something important, and most of all, something very strange. I thought maybe it was some half-remembered dream I had just woken up from, or some drunken indiscretion that was coming back to me.

I ran a hand through my hair (I had long hair back then) and desperately tried to remember what it was that gnawed at the back of my mind. Then I suddenly remembered: something horrifying had happened to me.

The night before, something very unusual had happened. Somehow, I had become younger, my body had traveled back in time. I vividly remembered it: reverting back into a little kid, looking up in fright at the growing world. I dismissed it as a dream, but simultaneously realized that such lucid memories could not be the product of any dream. As I thought about it, the experience came back to me with increased detail.

I was at her place, then I left, then she followed, then it rained...

Just to make sure, I pulled up my undershirt and checked my body. My chest was normal, with a full complement of curling hairs and well-developed pectorals. I rubbed my face, taking note of the rough hairs that bristled on all the familiar spots.

It’s strange how easily one gets over something so outlandish. Within an hour I was dressed and ready to head to the gym. I opted to skip my morning shower and instead bathe after working out. I thought that some activity was the first thing I needed.

My workout was short; I just couldn’t concentrate on my squats and presses with the previous night’s events on my mind. I retired to the locker room and got ready for a shower. While on my way to the stalls with only a towel around my waist, I noticed that the gym’s sauna was unoccupied (a rare occasion). I blessed my luck; a relaxing steam bath was just the thing I needed.

I pulled open the heavy door to the steam room and hung up my towel. I stepped inside and closed the door with a clang, and twisted the handle to the closed position. The sauna in that gym was one of the weird ones you hardly see anymore. There’s a big steel door with a massive handle that’s a real bitch to open. I guess they’re supposed to make real sure that the humidity stays in the bath. Or something, I don’t know.

After setting all the knobs and things to my preferred settings (this was one of those new kinds of saunas, it didn’t have a stove in it), I sat down on a bench and got ready to relax. As the first of the humidity trickled in, I felt a bizarre tingling sensation apart from the relative cold. I shrugged it off and waited for it to get warmer.

It heated up and became moister, but the faint prickling feeling didn’t subside, and actually escalated as more moisture was introduced into the chamber. I stopped thinking about it and instead enjoyed the comfort of the sauna. The unknown sensation felt kind of good, anyway. I relaxed and savored the cleansing steam. I dozed off for a few moments, and awoke with a twitch. I started to recognize the tingly feeling, I recognized it as something very bad.

I looked down, with some trepidation, at my body. Sure enough, it was an unfamiliar sight, one hailing from half a decade ago. My chest wasn’t nearly as defined as it was when I stepped into the bath. Without its hairs, it was smooth apart from the sheen of moisture on it. My legs looked trimmer and my arms looked skinnier. Thankfully, my penis hadn’t changed, except for maybe a missing pubic hair or two. Overall, my body looked slimmer, softer, more adolescent.

Unfortunately, my unexpected rejuvenation wasn’t stopping. I rubbed my hands around my face and felt hairs in certain locations only, and they were quickly disappearing from those. Peering down at my body again, I watched in wonder as it slowly went backward through its development. Muscles shrank and softened, hairs were abolished, and skin lost its rough texture. In confusion, I tried to figure out what was triggering this transformation.

As I looked around the room and saw the steam rise up, I realized the obvious: it was moisture. I damned my stupidity and glanced at my regressing physique. All of my body hairs were gone, except for my underarm, pubic, and leg hairs. A far cry from my normally attractive musculature, my build was approaching the beanpole shape of my early high school years. I knew I had to leave the sauna to keep my pubescence intact, but I was drawn to my dematuring form like one would be to a train wreck.

The sound of footsteps outside the door brought my attention back to where it was needed. I sprang to the door and tried to turn the handle to the door. The heavy iron mechanism was always difficult to operate, even more so when I had the body of a high school freshman. I desperately pulled on the handle with all of my skinny body’s might, but then heard a faint thunk noise. Suddenly, the slow progress I was making with the handle ceased. The handle would not budge. I wiped away the steam on the door’s window and looked outside. A janitor’s mop had somehow fell onto the door’s circular handle, threaded itself through a couple of its bars, and had jammed itself up against one of the nearby towel racks. I looked, dumbstruck, at this impossible occurrence.

Thinking quickly, I dashed to the controls for the sauna and turned off all the moisture. Fearing the worst, I glanced down at my body. Whatever was doing this had taken its toll; I was undoubtedly younger, barely into puberty. My scrawny legs only had a modest spread of hair over them, and as I watched, they were made smooth as if they were sheared by a dozen invisible razors. My pubic hair was a trim, velvety patch. As I reached down to feel it, it too faded away into a spare collection, and then into little more than peach fuzz. I gingerly felt my genitals. My proud, thick member had degenerated into a comical, unrecognizable little thing. But it wasn’t over: I actually felt my testicles retract, signaling the absolute end of puberty for me. It was a bizarre feeling, let me tell you.

I noted that I must have shrunk considerably, as the sauna suddenly looked quite unfamiliar. Everything seemed to be in a higher position. I would guess that I was a foot shorter. Studying my hands, I marveled at their stubby fingers and narrow palms. I thought and decided that I couldn’t have been older than twelve at that moment. Twelve! How old were the Plympton kids? Fourteen? If they could have seen me then...

The flow of steam into the room was stanched, and my regression started to slow. I shrunk steadily to ten, losing height and whatever vague traces of maturity I had left. I tried the door again, it was still jammed. Actually, I couldn’t tell, as I could barely see out the window even on the tips of my toes, and I probably couldn’t have moved the handle in my present state anyway.

I sat down and considered my situation. I was a little boy in a locked sauna, gradually becoming younger. I worriedly wondered if I would get back to normal. I ran my little hands through my hair, trying to remember the night before. I was unable to remember anything about growing back up, just that I was normal when I woke up. I lied down on the bench and thought some more, thought about this whole messed up experience.

I must have dozed off again, because I awoke to a much larger sauna than before. I quickly looked down at myself. My skinny ten-year-old form had given way to a round six-year-old’s body. I sat up and padded over to where a puddle had formed. I looked into it. I couldn’t see much in the shallow puddle, but I saw enough of the round face and light hair to know I had regressed significantly.

I then noticed that the chamber wasn’t humid anymore, and that the persistent tingling feeling had gone. It didn’t take much to figure out that this meant that I had stopped regressing. I nervously paced around the room, hoping that someone would notice the stuck door and let me out. Then I came across another problem: how would people react to an unattended child in the sauna? They might try to take me to find my “mommy”, or put me in a similarly awkward position. Or, I wondered with horror, would someone connect the lone man who went into the sauna to the kid who emerged?

As these thoughts played through my mind, I didn’t notice that I was gradually becoming older again. When I reached up to scratch an itch on my smooth face, I found that it seemed vaguely different from before, as if the proportions of my body had changed again. A quick inspection of my body revealed that I had indeed grown a year or two. I then discovered that I was still progressing, though gradually.

I was hardly over the excitement of finding that I was again aging when I heard a voice outside the door. It was a man, saying something about the mop handle stuck on the door. Sounds that resembled what could only be that person removing the mop handle followed. I waited tensely, hoping that the person wouldn’t decide to come in and see if anyone inside was all right. Strangely, he didn’t.

I went over to the door, ready to put this whole ordeal behind me. But as I came to the door handle, I again realized how difficult it would be for my tiny body to manipulate it. Even so, I had to try. I pulled on the handle with all the strength I could muster, and managed to turn it ever so slightly. I continued, and eventually turned it open. I slowly pushed the heavy door open and went out into the relative chill of the locker room. Remembering that I was completely naked, I pulled down my towel from the rack and wrapped it around my body. I hurried off towards the toilet stalls, hoping to find some privacy. As I scurried off, I stepped in a puddle of water with a wet splash. The years I had regained in the sauna quickly disappeared from me again, and I felt the towel grow and shift around me.

I made my way to one of the restroom stalls in the locker room and climbed up on the toilet. I noticed, with a grimace, that my feet dangled off the ground. After waiting in that stall for what seemed like ages, I regrew to a semblance of my normal age. I quietly went to my locker, put my clothes back on, cancelled my subscription to the gym, and left for my home.