Chapter 7 The Domestic Upgrade
Zoey didn’t answer Cole’s last comment.
The question about her ass still hung in the air, unanswered and dangerous.
She turned away from the mirror like it had burned her and started walking again, bare feet silent on the new hallway runner.
The strange noise was louder now—soft, rhythmic, almost like a low mechanical hum mixed with something wetter.
It was coming from the room that used to be hers.
The door was slightly ajar.
She reached it in three quick steps, shoved it open hard enough that it bumped the stopper, and walked straight in.
The teenage bedroom was gone.
No more unmade twin bed. No more half-dead plants, no more posters of esports teams, no more pile of hoodies on the floor.
In its place was a clean, expensive home office.
Soft gray walls. Two large desks facing each other.
A pair of ergonomic chairs. An ultrawide monitor on one side and the faint glowing outline of a sleek silver iMac on the other.
A low bookshelf held design books and a small potted plant that looked like it had always lived there.
The air smelled faintly of new electronics and some expensive candle she couldn’t name.
“What the fuck? What happened to my room!?” Zoey’s new voice cracked high as she stood frozen in the doorway.
Behind her, Cole finally tore himself away from the hallway mirror.
The awkward heat of looking at his own adult face (and at hers) still sat under his skin.
He crossed the distance fast, longer legs eating the hallway, and stepped into the doorway just as Zoey moved deeper into the room.
By the time he crossed the threshold she was already on the far side, standing in front of the glowing iMac like she belonged there.
“Yoooo what the fuck…?” Cole’s deeper voice came out stunned. “Your room’s like an office now.”
The iMac screen flickered. Emmi’s face filled it—same pink racing chair, same soft studio lighting, same delighted little smile. Chat scrolled rapidly on the side of the stream overlay.
“Well, it’s about time you two show up,” she said, voice bright and teasing through the computer speakers. “Jeez, making chat wait for your lame butts.”
Zoey’s hands curled into fists at her sides. The diamond-studded band that had just appeared on her left ring finger caught the desk lamp and threw tiny rainbows across the keyboard, but she hadn’t noticed it yet.
“Change us back, you crazy bitch!” she yelled at the screen. “What did you do to my mom?!”
Emmi only giggled, the sound light and merciless. “All in due time, dear. Now, don’t you two like your fancy office? Zoey, you’re a fantastic graphic designer who’s been a barista on the side… and your hubby Cole is a smarty-pants computer engineer.”
The knowledge hit them both at the same second.
It wasn’t gradual. It was a flood.
Cole staggered half a step as entire libraries of information slammed into place behind his eyes—system architecture, low-level programming, network security, the exact way heat sinks and power delivery systems interacted, the feel of soldering a board, the quiet satisfaction of optimizing code until it ran clean.
His slightly-above-average teenage understanding of computers expanded into something professional, instinctive, adult.
He suddenly knew how every device in the room worked.
He suddenly knew he had built half of them.
Zoey made a soft, broken sound.
Creativity poured in like hot water. Color theory, composition, the exact pressure of a stylus on a tablet, the way light wrapped around a 3-D model, the smell of espresso and steamed milk, the muscle memory of pulling a perfect shot, the way oat milk microfoam should look when it was done right.
She could feel the weight of a portafilter in her hand even though she was standing empty-handed.
She could see half-finished client projects that had never existed until this moment.
“Stop calling me that!” she shouted, voice shaking. “My name is Zoey!”
The name locked into place the second it left her mouth.
She felt it settle behind her teeth like a collar.
Only then did she look down and see the diamond-studded wedding band gleaming on her left ring finger.
The metal was warm, like it had always been there.
The stones caught the light every time her hand trembled.
“Wait… what?!”
Cole saw his own ring appear in real time.
A black band with a single bright blue line running around the center simply…
materialized on his left ring finger while he stood beside her, staring at the ultrawide monitor on the second desk.
The metal was cool at first, then adjusted to his skin temperature like it belonged.
He turned his hand over, watching the blue line catch the light, and felt something heavy and permanent settle in his chest.
Zoey’s voice rose into a raw, panicked scream.
“Why can I only say ‘Zoey’? That’s not my name! God damn it! You sick twisted fuck! Why is this happening to us?”
On the screen Emmi only smiled wider, chin resting on one hand, and let the question hang in the air between them while chat exploded with laughing emotes.