Shift Chapter One I wake up. I am a cat. I stretch my legs and purr a bit. This is not normal. Why am I a cat? Seriously. I mean, it's awesome, of course, but also weird. I just wake up, and I'm a cat. A freaking cat. I roll off my bed, delighting in my instincts and tail that make me land right on my feet. My ears twitch as I hear every smallest sound. Padding across the room, I feel graceful, smelling everything, from the my brother's burnt toast to the roses in the park, a few blocks away from my suburban house. My door opens, probably my mom, who insists on waking me up every day, despite the fact that I'm sixteen and quite old enough to wake myself up. As I hear the door, I quickly leap beneath my bed, waiting for my mother to realize I'm awake. Probably not in my room. My mom sighs and walks to the middle of the house where she calls for me at the top of her lungs. I run into the bathroom across the hall, hoping no one will see the streak of orange. I quickly turn the shower on (no small feat for a tiny cat) and think of my options. The first, of course, is to tell someone and get medical help. This isn't really an option, seeing as I can't talk. The next thing I consider is trying to use pure will to change back into a human. That I try. I close my eyes, squinting, then focus on losing my fur, growing fingers, getting normal eyes, becoming a human. Luckily, it seems to work. As soon as I start morphing, I wish I had done this in a room without a full-length mirror. From the moment I start shifting to the second I finally become fully human, about thirty seconds, I am the most hideous thing that walked the earth. Not that I can walk. I can't move at all, which is quite a disadvantage, seeing as I can't turn away, can't close my eyes, have to keep seeing the terrible transformation. At almost the end, I see myself almost fully human, but covered in fur. Then the fur retracts, as if its a sped up video of hair growing, then played backwards. I smile a human smile, then hop into the shower. The shower is good. The almost scalding water pounds on my back and forces some sense into me. And then I start having the reaction that a normal person would have in my situation. And that is to open my eyes wide, almost scream, and say to myself "I TURNED INTO A F***ING CAT!!!!" I stumble out of the shower, towel off in a daze, and then realize I left the shower on. I quickly turn it off and race through the rest of my morning routine. I dash out into school just a minute before the bell rings and run to class, luckily only a few hundred feet away from the entrance. The whole day goes by in a blur, normal, boring classes just like normal. Impossibly long last period. Same, same. The only different thing is lunch. I'm almost silent, not my normal talkative self. My best and only friend, Enna, and I sit alone at one of the large tables, the ones that can hold sixteen people. The rest of the lunchroom is crowded, and people would rather take their food out in the hallway than eat with us. Enna chats the hour away about a guy, a book, a car, and some videos. She chats about some movies stars and some singers. She looks at me expectantly after every sentence, wanting an answer. Most of the time I get away with an absent-minded nod, or a "mh hmm." But she catches me right before we split to fourth period. "Ani, you haven't been yourself today. What's wrong with you?" Enna puts a hand on my shoulder. I shrug it off and mumble a "I'm fine." I start off towards the locker rooms and The sound of four hundred students drown out her desperate calls of "Ani!" as people briskly walk around her, making her an island in the middle of the river that dragged me to the locker rooms. I arrive home only five minutes after school ends, after running to the school exits after Calculus to avoid the mad rush of all 3400 students rushing home from the biggest high school in Minnesota. I run to my room, lock my door, then turn to face the mirror. I take a deep breath and whisper to myself. "Let's see how this works." I shift a few times until I'm more comfortable and more able to believe that I actually CAN turn into a cat- it wasn't just a weird dream. Then I try and see if I can just shift part of the way. I try, and soon I have cat eyes but am fully human. I smile, revealing the cat teeth, then hold up my hands and admire the claws that replace my fingernails. Cool. Then I can't think of anything else to do so I go back to fully human and do my homework. I go to bed at 110, relatively early, and dream... About cats.
