As Carol turned 30, she began to worry about looking old. So while attending a flea market, she couldn't resist buying from an old crone "cosmetics guaranteed to make you look younger." And she couldn't wait to try them out.

At home, she noticed a change in her appearance from the moment she began applying the face powder, eyeliner and mascara. Each made her look progressively younger. But by the time Carol finished with the lipstick, she decided things had gone a bit too far. He now resembled a rouged 12-year-old, right down to her youthened body.

As she was an eighth grade teacher at St. Stan's Grammar School, Carol didn't see how she could do her job now that she was younger than her students. But how to hide the obvious? She located a bra she last wore when she was 15 and stuffed the cups with socks. She put on platform shoes to boost her height. Her dress hung lower on her body, but it covered her now skinny girl's legs. Carol chuckled, "Now nobody will notice I've gotten younger!"

All but Sister Brunhilda. "Ach!" the nun said as she spotted Carol in the school hall. Grabbing her arm, she dragged Carol into a restroom where she used a washcloth she carried for such occasions to scrub all the makeup off Carol's face. While struggling to free herself, the socks popped from her teen bra and her platform shoes became undone.

"You shouldn't dress older than you are. Enjoy your girlhood. You'll get older soon enough," Sister Brunhilda lectured, ignoring Carol's pleas that she was a teacher, not a student. Condemning the rest of Carol's attire, she put Carol in the proper school uniform with knee socks and black shoes, combed her hair into a more girlish fashion, then deposited Carol in a sixth grade classroom.

Carol was initially stunned to now be a student at the school where she was a teacher. But then several of the sixth grade girls approached "the new girl," telling her, "Any enemy of Sister Brunhilda is a friend of ours." Their camaraderie made Carol feel at ease, and she was soon enjoying her new but reduced status at St. Stan's. She considered her rejuvenation a blessing. The only thing that still bothered Carol was: How come Sister Brunhilda knew to have a school uniform her exact 12-year-old size available on the very morning after she purchased those mystical cosmetics?


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