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Under_The_Whispering_Door_by_TJ_Klune

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Nelson shrugged. “We have no secrets here.”

“We should,” Hugo muttered, pulling a tray of scones out of one of the

ovens. They were thick and fluffy, bits of chocolate oozing. Wallace might

have noticed them more if he hadn’t been thoroughly distracted by the fact

that he could change clothes at a whim.

“How does it work?” he asked.

Nelson scrunched up his face. “You have to want it hard enough.”

Wallace wanted it more than anything. Almost anything. “Done. What

else?”

“That’s it.”

“Are you messing with me?”

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” Nelson assured him. “Think about what you’d

like to wear, how it feels against your skin, how it looks upon your frame.

Close your eyes.”

Wallace did, feeling a little awkward. The last time Nelson told him to do

something, he’d been jumping in circles. The song ended and another started,

this one apparently with even more screams.

“Now, picture an outfit in your head. Start with something simple. A pair

of slacks and a shirt. You don’t want to try layers, at least not yet. You’ll get

there.”

“Okay,” Wallace whispered. “Slacks and a shirt. Slacks and a shirt. Got

it.”

“Can you see yourself?”

He could. He stood in his apartment bedroom in front of the mirror

hanging on the back of the door. His closet was open. In the streets below,

horns honked, men and women in construction hats shouting and laughing. A

busker played a cello on the street corner. “Yes. I can see it.”

“Now, make it happen.”

Wallace opened one eye balefully. “I think I’m going to need a little more

than that.”

He yelped when he got a cane upside his shins. “You’re not focusing.”

He closed his eyes again and took a breath, letting it out slow. “Right.

Focusing. Slacks and a button-up shirt. Slacks and a button-up shirt.”

The strangest thing happened.

He felt his skin tingling as if a low electric current began to run through

him. It started at his toes and worked its way up his legs and into his chest.

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