I was too out of it to do anything but fall asleep last night. I think part of me had assumed I might, for some reason, feel safe enough to switch in the middle of the night, but alas, I have no such luck. I’m still a cat when I wake up in the morning, curled up at the end of Gwen’s bed. Any thoughts I had about wanting to be human again are gently pulled back from the precipice they’d been standing on as I stir, my whiskers and tail twitching as I stretch out, arching my back and digging my claws into Gwen’s comforter.
Right, I never washed it. I owe her for that.
I owe her for a lot.
The dorm beds are tiny, which is why it surprises me that Evan is still here, sleeping soundly next to Gwen. She’s spooning him, which I find adorable, but I’m awake now and I need to do things, like use the bathroom. I still can’t reach the handle to flush, so I settle for closing the lid with a paw instead. I can’t brush my teeth or do my normal morning routine when I’m like this, so I skip those and strut through the quiet and chill air that has settled into our dorm this morning. My food dish is empty, and my water dish is almost empty, so I finish it off and then walk around doing nothing in particular.
I end up in my room, pawing through a few of my things piled at the bottom of my closet.
I find a box I know contains a picture of a boy and his sister and elect to ignore it, snaking my way deeper inside and finding nothing interesting. When I exit the closet, I take note of how messy the room is. It should probably be cleaned soon.
That’s enough looking around. I exit and walk toward the sofa on the right side of the room, settling into a sunkissed spot comfortably and loafing until I hear Gwen wake up. She comes out a few minutes later and our eyes meet. She doesn’t have any visible expression on her face, doesn’t look like she’s feeling any one specific emotion at all. A corner of her lips quirks upward, and she joins me on the couch. I’m glad she doesn’t sit too close, or she would’ve disturbed the comfortable spot I found.
We sit in comfortable silence for a time, and eventually she reaches over to pet me, dragging her hand down the back of my head and following through down the rest of my body. There’s a spot near my rear, a little ways down, to the side of my tail, and she scratches it until I’m purring and… and safe.
She isn’t talking, which means she doesn’t expect communication from me. She might be upset at me, but it feels more like she’s just happy I’m back and… and safe.
I can switch back now. I can feel it.
I half-expected I would switch back involuntarily, but it seems that is not the case.
Why couldn’t I switch earlier? Was I… was I scared of Gwen’s reaction? Scared of Gwen? Did I need her to let me know everything was okay and that it was safe to switch back?
Holy shit. No.
No, no, no.
I never need to be afraid of Gwen. Never.
I feel so guilty that I find myself switching before I have time to think about anything past wanting to show Gwen that she makes me feel safe.
Poof.
I’m in a pretty funny pose when I switch, loafed up in my human body. Gwen yelps, and I feel bad for that too, but I can’t dwell on it because—hrrrk—I’m coughing up a hairball. I manage to pull my hands out from where I’d had them tucked into me and catch it in time to not wreck the couch. Gwen gags, and I get up to toss it out and wash my hands. When I’m done, I turn back towards her and find her staring at me in shock, her eyes as big as I’ve ever seen them, roving across my body.
Oh, come on, what now? Am I growing fur? A tail? I look down and my expression is soon a twin sister of Gwen’s.
I have boobs. Big boobs. Way more than what estrogen had graced me with over the past few years. And… my stomach is gone. Not literally, I just… I haven’t had healthy eating habits in a long time. After I ran away, I was happy to eat whatever I could find. It has led to some bad habits, and one of the results of those bad habits was a slight tummy.
It is still there, between my legs, but I can ignore it because I have freaking boobs finally!
I glance at Gwen and smirk, jiggling them up and down. I might have felt embarrassment over this before, but now it’s all I can do to stop myself from fondling them—not in any sexual way, just… they’re soft! They feel really nice!
Gwen, however, has allowed the shocked face she was making to slip from her face. Though maybe she didn’t allow it, seeing as how she’s now sort of staring at me in what I can only describe as mute horror. She looks afraid of something. Of me?
“Gwen?” I venture cautiously. Oh my gosh my voice is... it's right.
My speaking seems to snap her out of it—whatever it was.
“Alice, you’re—you changed again.”
“I know!” I say excitedly, not sure why she looks scared of my new chest. “Look at mah dang boobs! I actually have a use for bras now! And like, okay sure, I know bras are supposed to be evil or whatever and super uncomfortable but now I probably need them to not have saggy titties or back pain or… or whatever happens when you have boobs! I don’t know! Holy crap I’m so freaking—”
Gwen cuts me off. “No, Alice. I mean… your face. What… how many times… what did you do?”
My face? Oh gosh, I hope I don’t have a muzzle or something.
I run to the bathroom and stare at the girl in the mirror.
My face is definitely different, that’s for sure.
Softer, smaller, a little rounder, a little more femme but still close enough to my old face that I’m sure people would still be able to recognize me as me, especially with my wavy orange hair. But that’s not what had Gwen looking at me like I’d just murdered a family of five. No, that would be my eyes.
My irises now fill the entire visible surface of my eyes. They’re the same emerald green as before, but there’s not a single hint of white sclera anywhere to be seen now. It’s just gone, and my pupils are vertical black slits.
The girl in the mirror blinks.
“This looks sooo weird,” I mumble to myself, starting as Gwen enters the bathroom and flicks on the lights.
I quell a hiss before it can even start climbing up my throat.
She’s on me in an instant, pulling me into a crushing hug that I eagerly return. She smells a bit like Evan and sweat, and the lingering aroma of her body wash, lemon and vanilla, is soothing to inhale. She pulls away from the hug when she hears me sniffing her and looks straight at me.
Wait.
She looks straight at me.
Not up at me.
Just at me.
My eyes are level with hers.
How much did I change?
“Are you… okay?” Gwen asks.
I stare at her. Am I?
I shrug, suddenly not feeling all that talkative anymore.
“Did you—how many times did you change, Alice? Like, that’s what’s causing this, right? Or maybe the longer you spend as a cat?” she hedges, though it’s not directed at me. She shakes her head, dismissing the unwanted train of thought. Being analytical helps her deal with shit. She doesn’t avoid it like I do. She’s Healthy. “Shit, I dunno, just… fuck! Say something, please! Please, Alice!”
“I’m okay,” I whisper. “It doesn’t hurt. Can we just… can you hold me?”
Evan’s still asleep, and we end up cuddling in my bed after she makes me put a shirt on because I somehow forgot I was naked.
And then she holds me.
And she assures me she will always be here.
We end up talking some more. It’s mostly me apologizing to her for being an ass yesterday and turning into a cat to avoid talking to her, though I still don’t answer the question she asked. The one that left me unsure of how to reconcile my enjoyment of being a cat against my desire to help people, probably mostly kids and teens, who might be going through something similar to what I went through, or who might have gone through it already. Who might need help. I would be even more of a mess than I already am if I didn’t talk to my therapist.
While Gwen and I are talking, I learn that, last night, when I spied her and Evan through the window, she hadn’t been worried about me at all until she saw me jumping at the window. She was upset I hadn’t taken my phone with me, and that I didn’t let her know I was going out, but the crux of her outpouring of emotions was her being afraid and talking to the only other person she could about everything that was going on. I wish she would have asked me about it first and am a little suspicious of how quickly they got to the “talk deep” part of whatever’s going on between them, but I’m not pressed.
Ultimately, she was scared she was going to lose her best friend, and she felt like she already had, at least a little bit.
I don’t see how someone can spot personality differences between two very different forms, but she says I’m different when I’m a cat.
Not in a bad way, but not in an entirely Alice way, either.
I don’t really understand her. She says I’m more playful as a cat, more aloof and perky and less sad, but I feel like I’m all of those things when I’m human as well, minus the sad part. Human Alice is extremely fucking depressed.
Gwen keeps trying to get me to understand, and I continue to not understand… until she asks me if I was consciously thinking about it when I hissed and jumped away from her yesterday morning.
To my mild confusion (and maybe slight horror), I realize I don’t have a memory of doing those things. I know they happened, I remember hissing and leaping on top of my bed, but I don’t remember consciously choosing to do those things. It feels similar to how someone reacts if they touch something too hot—I don’t really think about needing to get my hand off a hot stove, I just know I need to, and so I do.
What that all “apparently” means, according to the Word of Gwen, is that I have new instincts. Now, those aren’t what make up a person’s personality, but she says it’s the closest analogy she can draw.
Like duh, I already knew I had new instincts, but recognizing that I’ve developed a prey instinct and responded to being startled with it is… interesting, to say the least. Or, maybe it isn’t. Some people have those instincts already when they’re around psychopaths (allegedly), or even when they meet a dude at a bar and are just about to go home with him when they realize something is off and suddenly find their brain screaming at them to get out of that situation.
Gwen seemed upset when I realized this and explained it to her. Fair.
I soothed her when I added that people scare other people by accident every day, and sometimes they shout or flinch or jump away. My reaction was just a bit more…
What’s the word…?
…intense.
That doesn’t make everything suddenly okay, as I somehow doubt anyone else hisses at whatever startles them, but it helps me chill out a bit and not focus or think about other things, like my eyes, which I don’t actually think I’m that upset over. I think they look cool, even normal, the same as they do when I’m a cat. If I get any looks about ‘em, well, it’s October. Spooky season.
It didn’t even cross my mind to hide them until Gwen brought it up. This story is hosted at g.com.
Annnd there goes not thinking about my eyes.
“So, sunglasses? Contacts?”
I shake my head. “No. I’ve hidden myself my whole life,” I say, more than a little venom in my voice, but it isn’t directed at her and she knows that. “I won’t hide this.”
“You’re… they’re pretty far from normal. You’ll get lots of stares, especially when it isn’t October.” Oh, good, she had the same thought as me.
“Look—I’m so sick of caring about what other people think when they see me. Am I ‘femme enough’, are my shoulders ‘too broad’, do I display all the ‘signs’ of a male upbringing? It’s so fucking exhausting. Let the government come for me, let people stare, let whatever bullshit that’s gonna happen because I choose to be myself happen. Fuck, people stare at me enough already.”
I can hear Gwen’s grin in her voice. “Mmk, mmk, but—I think people might be staring at you for different reasons now,” she says, and I blush, still cuddled up against her. We haven’t done this in so long—the cuddling and talking. It’s nice.
“At least I still look like me? Somehow?”
I try not to think about the fact that people will be staring at me for new reasons now. At least they won’t be rubbernecking or asking me if I’m a boy or a girl or any of the other bullshit I’ve managed to tolerate.
“Dude, you got huge tits, your eyes are completely fucking green, and you’re my height now, which means you lost six inches. No one’s gonna think it’s you.”
“I hope I lose another six inches,” I reply coyly.
“Like you even have that much to lose,” she fires back, and I laugh, because making fun of my genitals is one of the best ways to pass the time and have a laugh until I remember I have them and go quiet.
“Yeah, yeah. Question for you now, though.”
“Shoot.”
“Why’s Evan still here?”
Gwen hesitates for a moment, choosing her next words carefully.
“I…” she starts. “I think I really like him? And I needed someone to talk to about… well, you. He’s really smart and had a lot to say, but I’d like to go over it with him present, if that’s okay with you?”
I shrug. “Sure, why not? Also… you literally just got out of a relationship. Fuck Cody, by the way.”
“Fuck Cody,” she agrees.
“But yeah. That just ended, and you’re going right back in? Does Evan know? He seems nice and… and he absolutely does not deserve you fucking him up.”
“Relaaax. He knows about the breakup and he knows I’m into him now. And he’s interested in me as well, but we’re keeping things casual for now.”
“I thought you were finally going to go for a girlfriend,” I say, not without some sadness. Gwen is like a magnet for cool lesbians and I miss the revolving door of them she’d had going last year.
“Look, fuck, I was, but then we started talking and I thought you were gonna be at Octavia’s all night and I really wanted someone to do something with. Not my fault he ended up being decent.”
“Just decent?” a voice, Evan, calls back from somewhere in the living area.
“Oh, great, that’s my cue to get up,” Gwen says, taking her cue to get up and wandering out to say good morning to Evan and grill him on whether or not he was listening to us—he wasn’t, and I believe him. I don’t think I’m supposed to hear them, so I tune the rest of the conversation out.
I quickly get dressed and pile all my clothes in one corner. It’s not doing much, but it makes me feel like I’m doing something.
“Ayyy, there she is,” Gwen says with a shit-eating grin as I exit my room.
“Holy shit, your eyes—”
“Please don’t make a big deal out of it,” I ask Evan, walking over to the fridge to get some milk.
“You got it,” he replies easily. Damn, okay.
I take the milk and pour it in a mug. I put it in the microwave and put the milk carton away.
“So!” Gwen says, clapping her hands together as we all subconsciously crowd around the kitchen island. She leans over it, cradling her chin in her hands and looking at Evan, then me, then Evan, and then me again. “It’s Sunday. We’ll do pizza for lunch and can go out for breakfast. But first.” Her eyes focus on me a little more intensely. “Alice… just curious, you’re not in trouble—why were you locked out last night, and what were you doing behind the dumpsters?”
Oh, you know, just trying to enjoy myself and nearly getting killed in the process.
"Milk first. Cozy Sunday," I say as the microwave beeps.