Another Catgirl

by ~nekoewen

As Aaron awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found he was transformed in his bed into a teenaged catgirl. His boxer shorts felt too large, two nipples poked at the thin cotton of his T-shirt, and he had a tail. Moreover, it was already 9 o'clock; he should've been out the door an hour and a half ago.

"Aaron?" his mother's voice called. "Your boss is on the phone! Are you there?"

When he tried to talk he gagged silently instead.

"It looks like he's still asleep; I'll have him call as soon as he wakes up. I'm sure you already know how easily he gets sick. Yes."

Aaron spat out a wad of saliva and hair onto his bed sheets. "Ugh. What was that?" His voice had become much higher too. "Hello?" he said experimentally. He was hearing through the top of his head too--through two big cat ears.

"Oh my!" His mother had poked her head into the room. "I don't think we've been introduced..."

Aaron pulled the blanket up over his chest. "It's me, Aaron."

"Your name's Erin? That's so cute! Aaron and Erin! I remember him saying something about a girl; how long have you two known each other?"

"No, I mean I'm your son; I'm Aaron. I don't know what's going on, but I woke up like this." The ears twitched.

"You really expect me to believe a story like that?"

"I have cat ears!" He tugged at them, and they did indeed stay on. "And a tail!" Although he could feel it, the tail seemed to move on its own unless he concentrated on it.

"So? So did that girl in the news, Caitlin. Or Kelly. Whatever her name was."

"And guess what? She used to be a guy too."

"Fine. Tell me something only my Aaron could know."

"Um..." He tried desperately to think of something, anything. "Uh... When I was five I dressed up as a robot for Halloween, and--"

"I tell everyone that story. What else?"

"Um... Crap. I can't think of anything else off the top of my head. Maybe--"

His mother put her hands on her hips and sighed. "That's my son all right."

It was decided that he could be called "Erin" and referred to with feminine pronouns until/unless they could do something about his/her condition.

*

Erin's mother made her stand in the middle of the room to be measured with a measuring tape. "You're a skinny little thing now too, too small to borrow any of my things. I'll have to go out and buy you some new clothes and then we can take you to the doctor's office."

Before Erin could say anything she was out the door. In the two hours before her mother returned, Erin had to go to the bathroom, and she discovered she was indeed a girl all the way. When the realized that she was probably going to have periods, she hid under the bedcovers until her mother returned.

"I think I got carried away."

Her mother had brought back enough clothes for two weeks--all of it carefully chosen and a lot of it costing twice as much as anything Aaron had ever worn. There was also a copy of Catgirl by Kaylee McPherson. It was a paperback, but one of those largish paperbacks that sold for $15.

Erin got dressed with more help from her mother than she would've liked. The bra seemed needlessly complicated and its straps cut into her shoulders, and the panties seemed much too thin, but everything fit. The pants were even low-cut enough not to hinder her tail.

While waiting in the waiting room of the doctor's office she started reading the book and quickly decided she'd had it easy. Kaylee's transformation had been painful and traumatic and messy and taken months to get used to. But here was Erin, clothed and walking around as though it was somehow normal mere hours later.

The nurse called Aaron's name, and took Erin's temperature and blood pressure, then measured her height and weight. "You seem to have lost a lot of weight compared to the last time you were here and... er..."

"That's kind of why I'm here."

She'd been sitting in an examination room for a while--those rooms always seemed to contain their own kind of time--trying to keep her tail from moving when the doctor came in. Without looking up from his clipboard he said, "So, Aaron--"

"Actually it's Erin now."

"Ah. So. What seems to be the problem?"

"I'm a catgirl."

He flipped through Aaron/Erin's medical file. "Odd..."

"I thought so."

"Are you in any discomfort?"

She thought her way through her body, from her cat ears to her human toes. "Not really."

"Well. Since there haven't been many cases like this, I think we should do a physical."

Between him and the nurse, they checked her breathing and pulse, looked inside her nostrils, mouth, and ears, tapped her knees with a little rubber hammer thing, took a blood sample, and had her strip down so they could check her more intimate places.

When the ordeal was done with, the doctor gave her a clean bill of health. "If anything, you're much healthier than before. Your blood pressure was a little high, but now it's right where it should be, for example. I'm going to consult with a veterinarian I know about your ears and tail just in case, and I'd like to schedule some X-rays, but you're in great shape."

"But what about the part about being a catgirl?"

"Well, that's not really my area of expertise. I can tell you that it wasn't done surgically, but otherwise the best I can offer you are these."

He handed her a signed doctor's note explaining the situation and a pamphlet titled "So You've Become A Catgirl."

Seeing her staring at the pamphlet he said, "I've always said they send us pamphlets for everything. Apparently I was right." He chuckled at is own joke. "We'll be calling you to schedule a follow-up appointment."

Erin's mother had been reading the Catgirl book in the waiting room. When Erin showed her the note she said, "Well, that'll definitely come in handy."

She called in catgirl to work on her cell phone, and promised to show up the next day, on time like usual. Her mother treated her to lunch at a cheap Italian place.

"You know mom, you seem really calm about this."

"Well, I always wanted a daughter, but your father insisted we couldn't afford another child."

"What's wrong with having a son?"

"Nothing! I was hoping for one of each actually."

"Only now I don't look anything like either of you. And I have cat ears."

"That's true... I hope you won't shed too much; your father's allergic to cats after all."

"I'll try to take care of it... It's just strange how accepting everyone has been. The doctor didn't even blink."

Her mother shrugged. "People can get used to anything if you give them enough time. Haven't you been reading the newspaper? More and more people are getting transformed all the time. A few months ago Mrs. Wong--she's from my book club--her daughter became a six inch tall pixie overnight. And let's not even talk about poor Mrs. Samsa's son."

Erin poked at her tangled spaghetti. "Yeah, I forgot about that. I guess it could always be worse, huh?"

"You're still a lot like your father, you know that?"

*

When Erin got home, she went about calling people Aaron knew. His sort-of-girlfriend broke up with him/her.

"But why?"

"Because I don't swing that way."

"But on the inside I'm still the same old Aaron!"

"So? On the outside you're a catgirl, which means you're a girl, which means you're not properly equipped. You're a good... person and all, but I mean, how would we even do it?"

"I... I could ask my cousin how..." Erin offered feebly.

"It sounds too complicated already. I'm going to find a new boyfriend--one with actual boy parts."

Aaron's friends were more understanding. Only one asked if he could see Erin naked, and he was (mostly) joking. Donovan and Christie both offered to take her shopping for clothes, and Christie upped the ante by recommending a hair salon. Aaron's grandparents were a little hard of hearing, and Erin finally gave up trying to explain. As for Aaron's college professors, she sent emails.

*

The next day was odd. In the downstairs bathroom the green anti-dandruff shampoo and generic white soap were replaced by fruity-smelling shampoo, conditioner, and body wash. She smelled nice afterwards, but it was still odd.

She was out the door and halfway to the bus stop when she realized she couldn't listen to her mp3 player because her earphones wouldn't work with cat ears. The sides of her head were totally earless, and any normal earphones would be small enough to get lost inside her cat ears. On the bus people stared, and she wished more than ever for musical accompaniment to help her ignore them. An unpleasant, foul-smelling man sat right next to her and leered at her chest. Aaron had never done anything like that.

Aaron's work was at a small electronics store, located directly next to a pet supply store. Before she was even in the store someone's big dogs started barking at her from the back of a pickup truck.

The company had few female employees, so the smallest polo shirt they had on hand was still too large. The customers, Erin realized, were being much nicer to her. Except for the ones that avoided her completely.

Bob, the full-time sales associate, looked at Erin and shook his head. "I can't believe it's you in there," he muttered.

"You're telling me," she replied.

For some reason the manager was spending an inordinate amount of time cleaning up the bathroom, and brushed off any offers to help out.

The day was mostly uneventful, except for a couple times when a customer brought children along and they tried to pull Erin's tail. Suddenly she understood perfectly why cats always freak out when you do stuff with their tails.

And then Jack Fanella came to the store. Of all the regular customers he wasn't quite the wealthiest, but he was definitely the angriest. Erin and Bob were putting merchandise away when he stormed into the store and slammed his cell phone--the new, top of the line, super-expensive model of course--down on the counter.

Erin and Bob stared at each other, hoping the manager would take care of it. When Fanella yelled "Someone better get out here!" Bob nodded to her. "It was your sale."

As she walked over to the counter, her tail stood up on end by itself. "Can I... help you?"

"You're new here, aren't you?"

Erin looked to the back room, where the manager was doing something at his desk, and mouthed Help Me. He shrugged. She turned back to Fanella and took a deep breath. "Sort of."

He leaned across the counter--she could smell the nicotine and aftershave and body spray on him--took off his sunglasses, and smiled so warmly she began to think he'd been abducted by pod people. "I'm Jack. What's your name?" Happy, smiley, slimy pod people.

"E--Erin," she managed. Was he flirting? She tried to remember the birth date written on his driver's license from the time he'd written a $900 check and gotten mad at Bob for following company policy and verifying it with the bank. He was 35 or so. She had the body of a 17-year-old.

"That's a cute name."

He was flirting. And he wasn't very good at it. She wanted to suggest that it might be a good name if his wife gave birth to a daughter, but instead:

"Thanks. So, what's up with the cell phone?"

She was leery of putting the conversation back on the topic of his complaint, but it was better than being flirted with.

"This thing?" He held it p as though just remembering he had it. "This thing won't get any reception anywhere in Fremont."

"Not even in Roaming Mode?"

"Roaming?"

She took the phone from his unresisting hands, pushed some buttons, and handed it back. "It's a dual-mode phone, so it can access other cellular networks. When roaming is enabled it'll use them if there's no normal signal. It costs more--about 40 cents a minute--but you should be able to make and receive calls normally even in Fremont that way until they finish building digital towers there." She smiled. It was the fakest smile she ever smiled.

To her surprise he grinned, politely thanked her, and left, promising to be back some time soon. Usually he threatened to never come back again, as though they'd have considered it a bad thing.

The manager came out with something behind his back. "Hey Aaron... I mean... Erin. You know what I mean. I've got something for you."

He had, it turned out, made earphones for her, by carving triangular pieces of gray packing foam so that they could serve as holders for earphone speakers.

"It's too bad there aren't more catgirls around or we could sell these. Anyway, try them on!"

They had to be trimmed a little to fit properly, but they worked great.

"Thanks! I was wondering what I could do about that..."

"No problem. It's the least I could do when sales are up 20% today."

"What?" Usually the store's sub-par sales never spiked by more than 10% unless there was some really phenomenal promotion going on. "Why's that?"

He scratched the back of his head. "I guess you didn't notice, but your per-ticket sales are up by about 40%. People just seem to be buying more stuff when you're around."

Bob grinned. "Usually you kind of have the opposite effect."

*

On the way home Erin stopped off for dinner. She got a small pack of sushi and some bottled water, and sat down on a bench at the park. The sun was getting ready to set and the air was just the right temperature. And probably because she was a catgirl the sushi--especially the tuna--was more delicious than it had any right to be.

When all was said and done, being a catgirl wasn't too bad. It was mostly just a matter of making some adjustments. Whatever had done it to her was much better at it than the "sorceress" that had changed Kaylee. And more importantly, now there were enough weirdoes around that no one seemed to care anymore. She started thinking about writing a letter to Kaylee. "You went through a lot of bad stuff, but because you did I was able to live with the whole catgirl thing okay, so thank you." Maybe she'd ask about meeting in person, even though Kaylee had supposedly become a hermit or something. (A catgirl hermit? Talk about a statistically unlikely phrase...).

While Erin was throwing away the sushi container, she saw someone coming towards her and was startled to realize it was a catgirl--in a pink nurse uniform no less.

"Hi," Erin ventured. "Who're you?"

The catgirl nurse stopped just close enough for the shadow of her ears to brush against Erin's shoes. "My name is Kotomi. I've come to take you to your new home."

"Ooookay. You're gonna' have to clarify that a little for me."

"There's a place called Nekomimi Land, where we catgirls can live together in harmony."

Erin took a step back. "So far I'm actually doing okay here. I appreciate the offer, but I think I'll pass."

Kotomi frowned. She looked tired.

"Why don't you ask Kaylee? She's been a catgirl a lot longer than me--so she's more experienced at it--and... and..."

Kotomi's arms were stiff at her sides, her hands clenched into fists.

"Did I touch a nerve or something? Because..."

"I'm not asking." Kotomi shook her head, and moved closer. "This is for your own good." Kotomi's left hand reached for Erin's shoulder, while her right went to her pocket.

Erin grabbed the wrist of the hand that reached for her shoulder. Real fighting was never like in anime. Real fighting stole your breath until you drowned in it. She did the very first thing that she could think of; she bit into the arm as hard as she could. It was soft and yielding and hard and moist and Kotomi's scream seemed to come slowly from somewhere far away. Erin's elbow struck her in the temple and threw her to the ground.

Kotomi stared up at her. She was crying. It was reassuring to know she was capable of crying. The blood in Erin's mouth, on her teeth, tasted like acid. The syringe of violet fluid lay on the ground; Erin brought her shoe down on it, shattering the glass.

Kotomi looked down at her arm, and then at Erin. "How could you do this? You're one of us! You're a catgirl!"

Erin shook her head, trying to steal back her breath. "It's not that simple. Nothing ever is.”

She started picking herself up. "There's something wrong with this world."

"Then go away."

When it was over, when Kotomi was gone, all the strength seemed leech out of Erin's body. Her knees bent until she was sitting on the ground. She wrapped her arms around herself and shivered, alone.