Chapter Text
One morning in the summer, the MC wakes up in the little cabin he shares with his friends for a week. Something is different, and it takes a number of moments to discern what. First, he noticed an odd sweaty warmth on his chest. When he went to scratch, it was softer and much more sensitive and, well, more of it, than he expected. Plus the scratching was a lot scratchier. Rubbing the sleep from his eyes, he stretched his legs and made a small, pleased sound.
Something about the sound made him stop and look at his hands.
His lithe, graceful hands. His fur-backed hands, fingers tipped with very sharp-looking black claws and see, with a flex they come out. Attached to pale blonde furred arms.
He thought back to the night before, and remembered shedding a few quiet tears just before falling asleep at last, wishing he could wake up as a girl who was a cat. What the fuck, the catgirl thought, and began purring anxiously.
(S)he didn't dare peek over the side to see if her friends were awake, and tried to stop purring. It was soothing though, and she didn't particularly want to stop, but she did. It was like controlling her breathing.
Listening, she found that she could pick out little sounds from the woods outside with ease. Feeling as sunk as it as going to get, she touched the top and then sides of her head, and indeed - her ears were big and soft and sensitive, and with a bit of focus she found she could turn them around. It was easy to turn them to focus on sounds and things that might make sounds, but just turning them without a focus was like trying to make her eyes look in different directions.
Unawares, she let her ears swivel like broadcasting dishes on a concealed bunker from the top of her covers. The many small sounds she could pick up was fascinating enough for her to forget herself for a while, and her predicament.
She could hear the soft, steady breathing and even the heartbeats of two of the four others she expected. The third was breathing more shallowly, and she judged he was awake. The fourth, she realized a moment later that she could pick up from outside when she turned just right. From among the whistling of birds and humming of bugs and sighing of the wind in the trees, came the words of one side of a difficult-sounding phone conversation. He sounded tired, exasperated, like he wanted to hang up, but kept talking and squeezing out excuses and deflections. He was talking to his girlfriend, who seemed unhappy with him. The MC loathed him in that moment - he really was the selfish asshole she had sometimes felt like he was.
Then she could hear footsteps approaching, and after a few moments the one who was awake seemed to hear them too. He shuffled around below her. The MC's mother come to drive them up for a late breakfast? The panic came flooding back - she desperately wished to be left alone at that moment. So she did the next best thing and tried to impersonate a pile of pillows, mindful of her ears.
At the very last moment she became aware that she had a tail which was presently curling anxiously around herself atop the covers, and held it down with both hands. It was momentarily blindingly difficult not to let go, almost like a rising cramp, but then it passed and she could relax into the quietness.
"Hello?" her mother called a few steps before reaching the door, which she pulled open without hesitation. Sounds from without flowed in with shocking clarity, and the catgirl realized that the window hadn't been open like she assumed. "Good morning," the awake one said, quite brightly MC thought. The other two grumbled and there was a lot of rolling in sheets from beyond her camoflauge. "Good morning, boys," her mother said warmly, and proceeded to instruct them on the still extant availability of breakfast and that there would be lunch in about three hours, as she bustled into the tiny cabin to pull away the curtains, open a window, gather the dirty dishes from their snack last night. Then she was gone again, and MC sighed in relief.
"Where's [deadname]?" asked one of the newly awakaned boys sleepily. The other one seemed to be trying to go back to sleep. The open window was letting a very pleasant and fragrant cool into the somewhat dank room - the catgirl found the smells to be clearer, easier to discern. With relief she noted the dissipation of the indoors odor. Not something she would normally have thought about.
"I think he went to pee," said the awake one too-casually. He knows, she thought with icy fear. She thought about her claws, and held herself rigid against the need to shudder and scratch something. "Ugh," the waking boy answered. Then he seemed to spring up onto his feet, and shuffled quickly out the door. Those two were allright, she thought generally. When they were all hanging out together, they were the ones she most looked forward to seeing.
There was some more bed-shufflings from below, and the two boys murmured a little smalltalk about going to breakfast, and the one who was fighting with his girlfriend. They were blandly supportive, and she wondered how she had never seen before how that was a transparently shallow cover for whatever they really thought of the 'experienced' boy. Then the third one came back, and asked about the MC again. He sounded very mildly concerned, and she felt a strange warmth in her chest at that. He actually cares that much that he asked?
Then the one who woke up last said something very different, and the three chuckled uncertainly. The catgirl lay still and repressed tears. Why, she asked the powers that be and not for the first time, why are these the people I'm stuck with.
After a few minutes, they all left. Then the phone conversation seemed to end as well. The catgirl lay still, trembling, in her top bunk. She hoped that nobody would ever find her and that they would all leave and she could stay there forever and pretend not to exist. At the same time, she wished with the power of an exploding atom bomb that anybody would come and hold her and let her cry forever.
Only a few minutes later, did someone come. She thought at first it was her mother and again felt the spike of fear, but then the steps hesitated and she heard a shuddering, quiet inhale before the door swung open. It was Dage, who had been awake. Does he know? Her mind shifted into a glassy calm. She flexed her fingers and her feet and her black claws came out.
Of course, he did know. Ten minutes before the catgirl woke up, Dage had heard an odd sound from above. He carefully lifted his head above the edge and saw the impossible sight of her transformed face and ears and one arm and tail. In quick and very, very quiet snorts, she had snored. Only his natural skittishness, and her extreme cuteness, gave him the control to lower himself back down quietly and still his heartbeat.
"[Deadname]," he asked worriedly into the quiet room, without crossing the threshhold. "Is that you in there?"
She didn't move, but something had relaxed when she realized who it was. If he had kept the secret so far, maybe he was safe? She desperately wanted to not be alone; it was the only thing she wanted more than to be alone. So even though she instantly regretted it, she made the smallest, most pitiful and needy mrrp any cat ever made, and her tail pulled free from her slack grip to lift in weak interrogative above the edge of the bunk. Something about the relief of it made her ears flutter, making a small sheety sound against the covers.
Dage went so quiet and still she might have thought he was never there. She had lost her nerve though, and her tail was curled tight against the back of her leg, out of sight.
Then he took a step forward, inside, and said her old name again. It felt alien to her, as alien as it always had but somehow even less descriptive now. Even though she hadn't consciously thought about it, some part of her knew with absolute rock solid certainty that she had been given some rare and delightful gift that she would never, ever, ever regret, no matter how much hardship it might bring her. Even though she was terrified of how others would see her, she felt like herself, like she could see the world through her own eyes for the very first time. Other parts of her fantasy about transformation were still unexplored.
But there was a wavering determination in his voice when he said it, like he knew that it might not be right, and that there might be danger, but was resolved to find her anyway. He is willing to brave a weird furry alien just to see if I want breakfast, her mind provided and she felt another thing like the warmth in her chest. It melted some of the ice that had locked her in place since Jakey said the thing she didn't care to think about right now. Maybe he doesn't agree with him.
She didn't dare speak, but made another sound, falling morousely rather than rising in question. If she was doing this she was doing this, she supposed, and pushed her head up til she felt a coolness at the top. With a little flicking, her ears were free. She forced her tail out and let it sweep anxiously over the covers on her legs instead of curling behind them.
Dage stopped instantly and his breathing turned ragged. But he didn't run or scream which she chalked up as a win. Very slowly, she pulled the cover down to uncover her face.
There was more of it than she expected and she felt a little awkward for a moment before she got free. Then her eyes met his and she saw them go wide.
They just stared at each other. "You-you-you-" he stammered and she glanced at the open door. Distantly, she became aware that she really did need to pee. "You're a cat," Dage finally managed, shaking, "and a," and then suddenly he blushed and it was both a million times better and worse than the shocked fear of the instant before. It was enough to momentarily shock her out of her various existential crises, and her face soured.
She sort of half-sat so her small but round and firm breasts came into view. Like the rest of her body, they were covered in very short, very fine, very soft blonde-darkening-to-reddish-brown fur, except the areolas. Areolas she was keenly aware were firm and sensitive at the moment but for some reason she felt defiant rather than embarassed about that detail. "A girl?" she challenged, and was surprised at how her voice was simultaneously high like a few years ago and scratchy and husky in an altogether new way as well. She suddenly felt quite good about herself, as she watched the power she held over this boy color his skin and avert his eyes shyly. He didn't at all seem like he was about to bolt now, and she liked that.
I wonder if my tongue is scratchy too, she thought idly, and let her eyes wander over her friend. Her tail was turning in the air absently and only one ear was perked towards him - the other was skipping randomly between noises from the outside, surveilling for footfalls.
Dage was considered the little one among them, but he had gotten taller in the last few years. Pale and pasty, with a reserved air and a sharp smile that came out only sometimes. Sometimes, she wondered what it was that made him not smile so often, but she had never thought to ask before. He was never cruel or mean. She liked that.
He glanced at her, looking a little calculating. Is he going to ask about my dick?
Remembering that she had a crotch was like someone paying back a debt she had forgotten. Because, no, she didn't have a dick. Her crotch felt vague and half-formed like other parts of her had before she got a good look at them, but there was a definite pleasant airyness.
Underneath the cover but poorly hidden with her chest and most of her midriff revealed, she traced a hand downwards. Above her breathless anticipation, her face burned but she didn't notice. This was more important than anything had ever been.
The fur on her stomach was very soft, like all the way up her chest and neck and face. It was a little longer, though. As she came to the curve downwards beyond the navel, the skin became sensitive. It was like there was a big tingly ball pushed up into the front bottom of her stomach that politely suggested pressure and friction.
The hairs shortened and roughened a little and then thinned to nothing. There was no flabby (or insistently stiff) shaft there, but a slit. The skin around it was hot. With the sound her rushing blood, she remembered she wasn't alone and she became aware of her blush and her curling tail and flusteredly flicking ear. But she couldn't stop herself. Without taking a breath of looking at anything, she slipped the tip of her index finger inside.
It was warm, and a little moist. There was a nub near the top of it. Her face broke into a wide, content smile, and she relaxed. It had only taken a few seconds, and Dage had miraculously been looking out the open door at the pivotal moment. She looked at him, feeling practically religious - making the discovery without being observed meant something to her, and all was as it should be with the world.
When he glanced up at her, she was still smiling mildly. He looked frightened again and looked away, but this time it made her chuckle instead of hate him. "It's still me, Dage," she said on the tail of the grin. That made him turn to her properly, and meet her eyes. He smile a little and shrugged helplessly. "How," he asked and something about it told her he didn't expect an answer. She shrugged helplessly back and they just looked wordlessly at each other for a moment. Then she asked him to throw up a t-shirt for her, and the moment had passed. But the MC felt a little bit more like a person again.
"Are you gonna.. come down, or?"
She peered down at him through one slit pupil. Then she sighed and threw herself back into her bunched up duvet. The change had made her smaller, and if it wasn't for the tail hanging over the side she might have disappeared completely. Dage was sitting on a chair by the small table, turned towards the bunk bed. "Fuck, I guess... It's just like, well," and she bat her tail aggressively against the bedframe. It hurt a little, and she huffed in annoyance.
"What am I going to do," she finished weakly and Dage could only nod, forehead wrinkled in thought and bent forward. When he didn't say anything she perked up towards him, agitated. "What?"
He looked at her funny and then tried to hide a smile. She blushed but asked, "what?" again more insistently. She made a low growling snarling sound from the frustration and he looked even more amused. She caught her tail batting against the bedframe rythmically in one hand and willed it to be still.
"You're just like my cat," he admitted sheepishly and then laughed loudly. The catgirl fumed, and then almost laughed, but then she fumed again. "I'm still human," she muttered but then she doubted it and bit her lip. It stung a little, and she realized that some of her teeth were really pointy now. A little upwelling of terror threatened to tip over into her mind but she distracted herself with a big stretch of her legs and back and flexing her claws. It felt good, and with a shakeout of her ears she felt ready to try something.
After the stretch her body felt amazing, like she could do anything, and she rolled up into a bounce off of the bed down onto the mattress on the floor below. She would have landed gracefully, if it wasn't for the mattress sliding off to the side as she put her weight on it. Instead, she tumbled sideways and crashed onto the naked panel floor in a heap. Dazed, she peered up at a stunned Dage, and blinked and shook her head and pawed her ears.
Then Dage laughed again, even harder and louder and longer. He sombered and apologized when he saw her expression, and it made her want to stop being mad at him. But today was going to be an emotionally taxing day, and she felt like the world owed her a little bit of something in return even if it was being mad at maybe the only person in the world she so far trusted to not try to have her murdered or turned into a science experiment on sight.
Grumbling, she found a pair of her shapeless jeans and pulled them on over her boxers. It was all terribly ill fitting now, and she wondered. "Hey, um, Dage," she asked, not looking at him. He answered, "what" a little breathlessly. This was the first time she had tried to ask something since, well-
Her tail coiled chaotically in the air as she paced from side to side, making to sit or strike a casual pose at each turning point. She went back and forth a few times as he waited patiently. Finally, she stopped and turned to him with challenge.
"There's no mirror in here," and she flicked an ear and looked embarassed. "You want me to take a photo of you?"
The words came out disbelieving, and maybe a little mocking, and she scoffed and looked sour. But her ears and tail wilted miserably. He instantly felt terrible, and scrambled to pull out his phone. She looked suddenly apprehensive, and her tail curled inwards. "Um," she said and glanced towards her bed. Behaving as he would with his cat, he stilled politely and waited for her to express herself. She looked down, to the side, bit her lip, and then back to the bed. "Can you use my phone?"
Right. "Uh, sure, yeah that makes sense, yeah," he flustered. She'd be grasping at any strand of control she can get at right now, and pictures in a phone was obviously a huge deal - they'd both seen movies and were nerdy kids with access to the internet, they know that that's something you should be careful about. She looked at him as if asking for permission, and he found himself nodding slightly.
The catgirl reached up a hand and rummaged for a moment, and then pulled out the silver little flipphone she'd had for several years. Dage's phone undoubtedly had a better camera, but for now she just wanted an image of herself at all.
It felt oddly intimate to give him her phone.
She stood before him and scrathed one elbow with the other hand awkwardly. One ear was trained on the camera, the other still on approach scanning duty. She stared warily into the little lens of the camera, as the phone made soundbyte shutter noises a few times. Breathlessly, he beckoned her closer and took a couple of portraits of her face as well.
When Dage looked from the phone screen to her and back and to her again, he smiled a different smile. This one was softer and his eyes were in it more than usual. She stared at the expression for a moment, mouth hanging open. It made him embarassed.
The catgirl felt very awkward all of a sudden. She didn't want to have to worry about whatever this was - the other parts of her fantasy felt very distant and unappealing now. She was hungry and she needed to pee, she didn't want to think about stupid emotions or the future or anything at all, really. Maybe try to see how sharp her claws were, and get something to eat and a cup of coffee.
Shifting from awkward to sullen, she grabbed her phone back and didn't look at Dage as she stepped outside. "I'm going to pee," she muttered at him. Her ears were drooping and her tail curled inwards- Dage felt his heart dropping at the sight, and internally screamed at himself. He wasn't really sure what he'd done wrong but he was sure it was something. He, he thought before correcting himself, she has just had her life shattered by being turned into a catgirl, she doesn't need her friends being weird too.
Her friends. He thought about Jakey "joking" that it'd be nice if [deadname] would stay gone, and himself laughing, and wondered what the fuck was wrong with them all. Sure, Dage had wanted to invite [deadname] to the D&D sessions, but he hadn't. He had never said anything when Jakey or Mathias went off. The least he could do, now that he was apparently the only one who she trusted with her predicament, was to be a good and supportive friend in any way she needed and wanted. He resolved in that moment to not push her or leave her, and only offer his time and attention.
Feeling a little better about himself, he got up from the chair he had sat himself back down on and stepped out into the bright, warm day to wait for the catgirl.
Meanwhile, said catgirl was panicking about what to do after pissing. With a dick, she knew that she was expected to shake it off and not worry about it, but now the protocol was opaque to her.
The impasse felt insurmountable, and all of the ways she had been cast into precarity piled up on top it, threatening to overtop and crush her into the mother of all anxiety spikes.
With a sharp movement, she pulled her boxers and her jeans back up, and then leaned her forehead against the tree she had crouched down behind. She had to clear her head a little, she told herself as she breathed.
What am I going to do, she asked herself and she was as clueless as Dage had been.
But she didn't feel like collapsing into a heap just yet, so she flicked out the claws on her right hand and carelessly carved into the pine in front of her. She growled low, and pushed the threatening tears down behind the rumbling sound. If she's angry she can't be sad and helpless, right?
So she let herself be angry instead, angry at Jakey for his cruelty, at Mathias for his selfishness, at her dad for his distance and her mom for her overbearing, at the world for staggering ever closer to everything bad she had been taught as a child were things of the past.
The quiet rage, while thawing, didn't last. She was startled out of it by approaching footsteps, and quickly hid herself behind a boulder. Ears trained, she was a little shocked to find just how well she could make out the sound, and how easy it was to focus on it's details. It was her mom, she knew before she spoke. She asked Dage about her, and he just said that she'd gone to pee. He sounded admirably casual as he said it. For the third time she asked, what am I going to do?
The catgirl waited for a while - it felt like it must have been a quarter of an hour at least, but she knew it was likely less than five minutes. Her heart was slowing down and she didn't feel totally paralyzed anymore. The smells and sounds of the sun-warmed woods were soothing, and she thought that maybe she'd just wander off and not think about anything. Then she heard her mom feign brisk indifference and go away back towards the main house.
It was a relief, a disappointment and a heartwarming reassurance all at once: the sentiments thank god she's going away, I can't believe she's not worried enough to come and find me and hold me and she's trying to respect my boundaries coexisted within her, and it was quite confusing. She tried to let the forest envelop her, and not think.
It must have worked at least a little, because when Dage approached she didn't notice until he was close by. "[Deadname]?" He asked the trees waveringly from just a couple of meters away, and she made another of the small wordless sounds. They were proving to be quite useful. A look of pure relief passed over his face when he turned to see her.
"Hey," she said weakly. "Thought I'd run off?" He laughed, short and a little wild. The encounter with her mother had left him not a little rattled, and his mind was filling up with armed men with unmarked black helicopters. "I mean, I wouldn't blame you," he said and pulled his fingers through his stripey hair. "Christ," he added and then crouched down where he stood. She sidled up to him, and her thoughts followed his.
"That's fair," she murmured. They looked at the scenery together for a moment.
Apparently resolved to not think about that for the moment either, Dage set down on his ass instead and rubbed his face. Then he asked something she had not expected him to, but found she quite appreciated being asked.
"I was thinking that, um, maybe you don't want to be called," and he glanced up at her apologetically, "the same thing anymore. You know, considering," he finished and vaguely indicated her feminine attributes.
She raised an eyebrow at him, but he was absolutely right. "You know, I never really felt like a [deadname] anyway."
He snorted, but furrowed his brow and didn't say anything. She had to say it, she knew. She said the name she had been thinking of and Dage looked up in surprise.
"Yes I know that was the name of one of our classmates, I thought it was pretty, okay," she asserted hotly. Dage raised his hands in protestation, and hid a consternate smirk.
"Allright, allright, it's a fine name," he said. Then more pensively he added, "you've been thinking about this for a long time, huh."
Only the sounds of the woods filled the air between them.
"Yeah," she breathed and felt closer to tears than she had all morning. Then when she tried to squeeze her eyes closed they slipped out, and when she tried to breathe, a strangled sound came out and she had to press her palms against her closed eyes.
"Hey," Dage said and stood awkwardly. "Hey, hey, it's allright," he tried to say and lifted a hand but hesitated. It's over she thought and it made her want to sing. She'd somehow survived and come out the other end. The dark tunnel she had been staring into had lit up suddenly and while flashing in some weird colors, it didn't seem to be a train. As much as she was crying for the years lost since puberty destroyed her fragile sense of self, and for the doubtlessly coming hardships yet too amorphous and unknown to be tangible, she was crying in gratitude for the weird reprieve she had been granted from her undesired body.
Something about the triumph in it made her confident enough to fall into Dage with a tight hug, and to hide her face in his shoulder and weep. He was maybe a little surprised and awkward about it but she didn't blame him. He held her and stroked her hair and gently, hesitantly, pet one of her ears, as he murmured empty reassurances. After a little while she started purring against him. With a forceful effort, he held back against the delighted laugh that inspired.
She must have noticed something though, because she sucked snot wetly and wiped at her nose with the back of her hand. Voice still thick and wavering, but smiling, she told him, "I don't even really know how I'm doing that."
She noted she couldn't purr and speak at the same time.
He laughed a little. He didn't smell very nice, too much like boy and unwashed clothes, but she didn't really mind right now. She was being held and petted as she cried and that was the only thing other than solitude she had asked the world for so far today - and it was a helluvalot better than solitude.
A hand cupped the back of her head, carefully. Reflexively, she nuzzled into the crook of his neck and rubbed her cheek and jaw against it. His laughed slipped out, surprised and delighted. This time she was embarrassed and pulled away. "What," she demanded.
He stared at her and bit his lip, debating wether to tell. Then he shrugged minutely and asked, "did you just scent mark me?"
God dammit, she did do that didn't she? She purred angrily and turned away, tail sweeping in agitation. "Yeah well, don't be nice if you don't want someone to be nice to you," she grumbled. It was a spur of the moment thing, she hadn't thought about it. She's new to this, how would she know? It seemed like a nice thing, so that's what she'd said. She crossed her arms.
Dage sighed softly. "It's fine, it's just kinda, umm," he trailed off.
"Kinda what," she said and turned to glare. He was blushing and looking down. "Kinda really cute," he mumbled. And flattering and weird, he added silently.
The catgirl flexed her claws and growled at him. His paled somewhat, and although a little wary his expression was still wild-eyedly amused. She wasn't sure exactly why it pissed her off to be called cute by this boy, but it did. "You know, I think I could probably kill and eat a roe deer if I wanted," she hissed at him.
He seemed to decide something, and his face relaxed into a quite uncharacteristic cocky grin. He'd have gotten this expression sometimes when they were younger, when he still liked to play pranks together with Davy (who hadn't been able to come this time).
"You're even cute when you're angry," he said and looked pointedly at her tail. It stood straight and frizzed up behind her. She hissed at him harshly and bared her fangs - that at least got him to flinch. Then she hurriedly smoothed her tail back down down with her hands, face burning.
"Fuck you Dage, if you're just gonna make fun of me go hang out with Jakey instead." The spite in her voice didn't cover the tears threatening to spill over again completely. Shit, he thought.
"I'm sorry," he said more seriously, and said her new name. That made her ears and her tail perk up instantly, even though she maintained her scowl. One fang was poking out over her lower lip. It was very cute.
He debated wether to try to hug her again, but his cat-keeping instincts told him to remain passive. After a moment she groaned and stomped a few aimless steps. Turned away from him, she mumbled something.
"Hm?" he sounded in response, and she turned half way towards hin and repeated, "I'm hungry." She didn't have to explain the issues with resolving that. "Your mom's gonna start worrying, you know," he said carefully. He didn't want to push her, had even resolved not to, but he couldn't help it. That confrontation was coming sooner or later, and he was anxious to have it over and done with. She only grunted in acknowledgement.
"I can go see if I can sneak you a sandwich," he said uncertainly but she scoffed. "They're just gonna ask you about me." "Well, unless you think you're gonna go back to normal all of a sudden..."
She turned to him with a look of abject horror. Noted. He trailed off, and then made a vague gesture towards the world at large.
"Do you have a better idea," he asked more self-assured than he felt. He too, was now listening for footsteps.
"Maybe I'll just hunt that roe," she said darkly and didn't look at him. He felt as if standing on a precipice. "I thought you said you're still human," he tried to quip but it fell beyond flat. She turned towards him, hackles raised and lips curled back. She was hunching over and her tail was frizzed up high, her hands were half raised and splayed with the claws out. Her ears were flattened backwards. Her slit pupils were contracted into narrow black lines.
She growled low and took a very meanacing step towards him. He was frozen, not able to move or consciously change his expression. He was very much like a roe in headlights.
"Maybe I'm gonna decide I'm not." Then she snarled wordlessly and crouched even lower as if about to pounce.
He forced himself to turn away and make a poor impression of nonchalance. Maybe he was about to have his face clawed off and his heart chomped up like an apple, he wasn't sure- and the only avenue his rattled brain provided to avoid that was to pretend that nothing was wrong. If he acts like she's his friend and they're both regular people and nothing is wrong, maybe she will too? He could only hope.
"Did you look at the pictures," he squeaked and was pleasantly surprised that he didn't stutter. It took her by surprise, and she felt the sudden flow of rage ebb as quick as it had come on. She hadn't looked at the pictures but now she wanted to very badly.
Glancing at Dage dubiously, she pulled her phone from her jeans pocket and flipped it open. With a few quick clicks, she had opened the gallery and there she was.
She tilted her head as she peered at the little screen.
The shape of her face was immediately recognizable to her. Her jaw wasn't quite as wide, and her nose was a little smaller than it had grown since her body had started to change. But her eyebrows and her lips, her cheekbones and her wide forehead, were all the same. The color was about the same. Her long wavy hair was the same, except maybe a little thicker and more voluminous- that could just be the bed head though.
Her shoulders, and her chest, were visibly narrower. She had the urge to compare them to older photos from before, but she had none in the cellphone. She wanted to know for sure, and to luxuriate in that knowledge, because the sight of it made her heart explode with a singing feeling.
"Hey," Dage said, and she glanced up at him to see an odd expression. It was a mix of trepidation and confusion and concern. He had a hand raised halfway towards her, as if to nudge her but he'd lost his nerve. Her nose felt thick and she realized she had tears in her eyes. She wiped them away with the back of her hand. Her tail had wrapped itself around her waist, and it was more comforting than she might have expected. She chuckled wetly.
"I'm okay, it's just.. a lot," and tried for a smile. He seemed to relax a little, and let his hand fall back down. "Like I didn't think I could ever have this, I didn't even really realize how badly I wanted it, and now I apparently have it? It's... "
She trailed off as the many things contained in that "it" stacked up in her. Some part of her, only let up to the surface far away from anyone's view, had known for years that she didn't want the body she had been given or the life laid out before her. It was more than the penis and the hairs and the bones and the voice, it was the shitty friends and the emotional repression, it was the entire inhospitable society she was growing up in, becoming aware of the crumbling of. She felt locked in, trapped on all sides. But now, seeing the beautiful, wonderous being in those crappy little pictures and knowing that it was her, and that it was finally her and not the boy everyone including herself had always seen... Now the possibilities felt vast and endless.
"It's a lot," she finished lamely. He hummed like he understood and maybe, he did, in some partial and limited way.
For a moment, Dage looked conflicted but then he asked, "you mean the cat thing or the girl thing?" She had to laugh at that.
"I mean, mostly the girl thing to be honest," and then she examined her claws. "But this is pretty cool, not gonna lie." She looked up at him and grinned. Dage laughed nervously.
She'd always admired cats, for their nonchalance and general ableness, and their grace and natural dignity. A cat, in her mind, never hesitated to assert themself and never lacked the means to, and looked good while doing so every time.
A cat would never pretend that someone like Jakey was her friend.
The thought of the mean boy, reminds her as it always does of another time- It was in the winter, some years before. She had embarassed herself by talking about something she didn't know anything about. He had looked at her with surprise, and then slowly explained what the words meant. He had been wearing a newgrounds t-shirt. She had been like, eleven or something dammit! Eleven-year-olds don't know things! Argh but she had known she didn't know what she was talking about why couldn't she just have shut up and his little dismissive scoff-...
Dage had taken a step back. The catgirl had gone quiet and looked away at nothing, lost in thought. Then, her face darkened and she growled low and rising, teeth bared. Her tail began batting dangerously and her ears stroked back. Her claws came out. It only lasted a moment before she caught herself, but what had once been a momentary dark glance in the corner and a little huff maybe was now a terrifying display of deadly potential. Something about this bristling was different from the others, parhaps it was that he didn't know what brought it on. But he couldn't not think the thought: what if she's not human? What if she flips?
She must have seen it on his face, because she stiffened and shied back as if burnt when she saw it. If the moment before she had been a predatory alien, she was now a frightened cat. It took a moment before she even looked at his face again.
He was still looking drawn and pale, pulling himself inwards and instinctively away. As if she was a thing to fear, not a person to be cared for and reasoned with. The tenous strand by which she had connected herself to the world strained and maybe, it snapped. It hurt.
Gotta get away was all she could think. With a fearsome snarl, entirely inhuman and suffused with scorn, she turned and ran crying away between the trees. Only then did Dage snap out of his indecisive stupor. He called after her but it was too little, too late. The birds settled back down in the trees with some squawking and cooing and the catgirl was gone.