DerbyGhost

Now that the air has finally been cleared, our KT and pal can focus on the truly important issues of our time. Meal planning! But the magical transformation of the KT isn't done with Jay, not by a long shot.

The days preceding Audrey’s visit were filled with a plethora of planning. Kass and I sat down and really hashed out how we wanted to handle the introduction. Hir planning skills really were on display as zie charted out multiple worst case scenarios and how we could handle them. It turns out, if you plan you might not panic as much. Wild, and my brain is telling me that sounds fake but I dunno. I guess I can trust hir in that things are going to go well.

It’s not like Audrey is going to judge me for being, well, a kitty. If anything she’d probably think it was adorable and give me way too many headpets, not that I could necessarily get mad at her for that. Being pet felt waayyyy too good. And as long as it was someone that I trusted, it didn’t feel like a massive violation of my personal space. 

What I was worried about the most was how she would take to magic being real. I’m sure she wouldn’t believe it at first, but eventually it kind of had to be this big world breaking revelation, right? It took me a while to process it, and hell I’m living proof that it happens. I didn’t know how in depth we would need to go with explanations, or would she just accept things right away. I don’t know. What’s the worst that she can do? Call me a freak? I’d just add her to the talley of family members who said that and move on. But she was better than that. Even when we were kids Audrey was always in my corner, even if mom and dad weren’t. There was no way she could be a jerk about this. She couldn’t, right? 

Besides figuring out how to break the news of my new form, I had a whole dinner to plan. I decided to go simple for the food, just a basic shrimp scampi. It was hard to fuck shrimp up, it’s delicious- everyone loves shrimp, right? They might be the bugs of the sea, but damn they were the delicious bugs of the sea. Sea bugs, butter, pasta, little garlic, maybe some roasted veggies- boom you’ve got yourself a meal going. But I wanted to do more, I wanted to impress them. I didn’t know too much about Stace, but I wanted to make a good impression since I had been so absent from their lives up until this point. 

It's not like I was ignoring them or banishing them. Audrey and I talked every now and then, we just weren’t close like we were as kids. Both of us dealt with the brunt of our parent’s, uh, traditional values in our own ways. She realized she couldn’t hide her feelings for other women and that led to a big flare-up between my parents and her. And I tried to stick it out and be the good child, at least as long as I possibly could be. Eventually I was stuck between my loyalty to the person who showed me the most love and this false concept of familial obligation and I told my folks to shove it. Definitely later than I should have, but hey, better late than never. 

By the time I got the guts though I was deep in college life and extremely overwhelmed with keeping up with my major. Audrey understood and we both vowed to get closer later, and I guess the later is now. What better way to bond with your sibling than to destroy their view of the universe and also be a cat. Everyone loved cats, so how could she not forgive me for being such a rascal. 

Anyway, the point is I wanted the dinner to go well. So I pulled out all the stops. Kass promised that zie didn’t mind being my delivery person, and I made it up to hir by having hir taste test all of my dinner practice runs. Also I knew that Kass absolutely adored cheesecake, and I took it upon myself to try to make one homemade to be our big dessert surprise. 

And of course it was a fish dish, so I had to go out of my way to research what wines paired best with it since I knew that Audrey was still a wine gal. Somehow she hadn’t lost her taste for grown-up grape juice even though she probably threw up as much as she drank back in high school. I got pretty good at covering for her when she was hung-over though. We even shared a bottle or two behind mom and dad’s backs, a little act of rebellion to keep each other going. 

Eventually I settled on a nice chilled chardonnay that would really pop with the savory nature of our pasta. I didn’t know much about wine though, so Kass and I tried a different bottle or two every night until we found one that we really loved. Well, it might have been the wine talking but we were both convinced that it was a winner so we grabbed a couple of bottles of that and they’ve been resting in the fridge waiting.

It was really nice testing the wine out with Kass, we’d cuddle up still and throw on some dumb tik tok cringe compilation and just mellow out in each other’s company. The KT couldn’t really get drunk, but instead it felt like my body was wrapped up in even more fluff than before. A lovely haze that made me want to cuddle even closer to Kass, something that zie didn’t say no to. In hir words ‘when a cute kitty wants to curl up on your lap and giggle at something dumb, you let them.’ 

After all of our strenuous research, we were ready. Everything was planned out. Everything was absolutely perfect. Nothing could throw a wrench in our plans. And then I grew again. 

~~~

I woke up on Thursday, the day before our dinner with Audrey and Stace and realized that I had a little less space to curl up on the couch than I thought I had. I was still all curled up, but rather than being a decorative throw pillow, I was more draped across the couch like a blanket. I hadn’t just grown, I had expanded!

Jumping out of the bed I was overwhelmed by how much bigger I was. Hell, I must have been like, twice the size of my previous self. Dang, I’m glad that happened while both Kass and I were asleep, that must have been freaky to see. A growth process accelerated over the course of one night. It must have meant that I was on the right track though. There wasn’t that much time left in the month and Kass had said that the time someone needed to spend in the KT really depended on the individual anyway.

One of the first things I noticed besides my height was that I no longer had my formless paws at the ends of my arms. Instead they were replaced with delicate little hands at the end of slender arms. They were in proportion to my body, but I was just shocked at how small they were compared to my old self. Maybe, if I stretched really hard, I could wrap both of my hands around one of my old arms. Maybe. They used to be so stocky and thick, and I couldn’t help but laugh in joy as I saw my new appendages. My legs had also slimmed out with very basic feet, giving me a nice leggy look. This was cool as hell. I loved these transformations. 

Feeling stiff  I stretched to flex out my sweet new limbs, throwing my arms behind myself and pushing my torso out and immediately realized that the top part of my chest was oddly tender. That wasn’t all, the area around my hips also was quite touchy. I made a note not to smack myself there by mistake but it all made sense. 

Sudden pain in the hip and chest area. Voice cracking to be higher than it used to be. My limbs were longer and more slender than they had been before I went to sleep. It was obvious and I don’t know how I overlooked it before.

These must have been those growing pains that Kass was talking about during my last change. Of course these areas would be hurt. The magic had taken a rolling pin to my body, stretching me out to be twice as long. Of course there was going to be some soreness to go with it. God I could be so oblivious sometimes, I couldn’t see what was right in front of my face. Kass was going to so laugh when I told hir about this later. 

~~~

Kass had, as predicted, absolutely loved my changes. After thinking it over I decided not to tell hir about the soreness that I was experiencing. It felt kind of personal, and zie was already helping me so much with preparations for dinner. It kind of felt like dropping one more thing on Kass’s plate when zie really didn’t need that. But obviously it was hard to hide the fact that I had doubled in size overnight. 

It kind of ruled actually, being so tall again. At least comparatively. It’s not like I was adult height anymore, but at least I wasn’t a massive shrimp! As much as I enjoyed being small, now I didn’t have to leap up everywhere. There was a part of me that would miss that. But it was just nice to be able to stand up and see over the stove, or into the sink when I was cleaning things. It just really underscored how much I had adapted to be able to survive, and now I could relax and do things normally again. Which would be very good since there were a lot of moving parts that I had to think about for dinner. 

“Hey Jay,” Kass was wrapping up hir breakfast of oatmeal and the last of the bourbon bacon. “Have you thought about dressing up a little bit since your sister’s coming over?”

Looking down at my “Kiss the Cat” apron that Kass had found from some thrift store I shrugged and turned back to cleaning the stove. “Nah, didn’t really cross my mind. I just thought I’d wear what I’m wearing now. It’s been good all week and it’s not like I’m dirtying it.”

“Hmm,” zie said. “Well haven’t you gotten kind of bored of what you’re wearing? You’ve been in it every single day. Repeating the outfit is fine for a cartoon character or an actual doll, but since you’re a human wouldn’t you like to switch things up a little. Try something new even? You’ve got this chance and now you can definitely fit into the very very small size of adult fashion, well actually probably teen stuff. But even then it’s not like you’re going to be wearing little kids clothes.” 

I stopped scrubbing for a moment and thought. It would be kind of nice to give it a try. And what would be the harm in experimenting? If I didn’t like anything or if they looked way too baggy on me I could always just send it back and get a refund. And it would be kind of nice to dress up for my sis. I never really cared too much about clothes. They were just kind of utilitarian. You wear this thing so that you don’t get arrested for being naked out in public. But my body now was kind of cute and it would be nice to dress it to impress. Alright I just sold myself on it. . .

“Okay Kass, let’s do it. I think you’re right. I, uh, kind of really like this KT body. The new additions have been cool,” I patted my ears as they twitched. “And I think I’d like to show it off a little bit.”

Zie smiled, lighting up the room. “Alright Jay! Do you have any ideas about what you’d like to wear? Any no-gos?”

“Why don’t you go kind of crazy, no restrictions. I want to see what you can find that you think would be good on me! Maybe a few casual things to wear around the house as well? It would be nice, I think.” I put the last of the dishes on the drying rack and gave hir a thumb’s up. Thumbs, I’ve missed you so much. Having the ability to give someone a thumb’s up is one of those things that you don’t really realize you’d miss until you couldn’t do it anymore. How tragic, how sad. 

“Give me one sec, I’ll be right back.” Kass pushed back hir chair and walked off to hir room. About a minute later zie was back holding what looked like ruler-by-the-foot. “I don’t really want to have to go to the mall multiple times if things don’t fit, it’s just super crowded in there. So I thought I’d take your measurements? Just so we’d know what works, save some time all around. Is that okay?” 

I nodded. That was smart, I didn’t even think about that. And it was respectful of hir time, so that worked too. I had never had my measurements taken before, so I was kind of flying blind here. Kass led me to the living room where we had the best light and zie proceeded to get to work. 

It turned out I was exactly four and a half feet tall, how I got that big, I didn’t even know. All of the other measurements went by as a blur as Kass wrapped the tape around me in different spots. It was kind of fun being fussed over like this, like this was a grand experiment that would end in me getting some nifty clothes. 

“Okay Jay, last one. I’m going to measure across your chest just to make sure that nothing is too baggy there, k?” I nodded and lifted my arms like zie instructed as zie wrapped the tape measure around my back and tightened it over my chest. My world was hit with instant pain in so many places from the pressure that I jumped back, stung by the evil evil tape and the thoughtless Kass. How dare zie! Well, zie didn’t know, but still holy shit why did that hurt so much?

“Woah Jay what’s wrong?”

“Hurts…” I mumbled, embarrassed by my strong reaction.

“What, the tape measure drawn across your chest hurt it?”

“Yeah it stung super bad. It was rude as hell.”

“Hmm.” Zie stopped, lost in thought. “I’m sorry Jay! I’ll be careful around there. You were also wincing a bit when I measured your hips, are you okay.”

“Growing pains,” I mumbled again. God this is why I didn’t want hir to know. Zie’d start worrying about me and it would get all weird when I’m really fine. It’s not like I’m sick like last time. I’m perfectly normal, just experiencing the regular side-effects of growing suuuuper tall. Well, super tall by my perspective. “I’d rather not talk about it. I don’t feel all weak and stuff, so I’m probably fine. I feel good in fact, super rad.”

And God bless Kass, all zie did was nod and not bring it up again. We talked for a little bit about colors that I liked and patterns to avoid. This was the most that I had thought about clothes in forever. Like, fuck. I’m excited. It’s exciting to think about what Kass was going to pick out for me! There was still some cleaning that I wanted to do to get ready for Audrey, but I would have been too wired to do anything, and the sun was in this just right spot where it lingered on the couch for a while so I figured a nap would be the best way to pass my time. 

~~~

The waking world returned to me, and I was immediately frustrated by the fact that Kass hadn’t come home yet with clothes. No worries, no biggy. Instead I happily dealt with some of the preparations for dinner. I pulled up my phone and looked up some videos on table settings because why not. It was something for my hands to do with my nervous energy, and it took a little bit of concentration but it wasn’t tiring. Since I had fingers now, it allowed me to be a little more delicate with how I handled things, which added a level of sophistication to my actions that I didn’t realize I was missing. 

Unfortunately, it didn’t keep my mind from wandering that much. What was taking Kass so long? Didn’t zie know that I was dying in suspense over here? And why did I care so much? The last time I tried to expand my fashion sense was trying out some nail polish for fun in Freshman year and my parents made me take that off as soon as I stepped foot in our house. After that I just stopped trying. And that was fine, it’s not like fun fashion was really meant for me anyway. But now if I had a heart it would be pounding and I couldn’t stop thinking about what was in store for me.

But… I had a hard time thinking about what I actually was going to wear. I tried imagining my current body in a suit and all I was met with in my brain was blank space. Would the tail pop out of the back of my pants. Actually what was I going to do with my tail? God things just got really complicated huh. Saving me from my musings, Kass chose this moment to come home, multiple bags from various department stores and boutique shops in hir hands. 

I rushed up, tail swooshing with excitement as I tried to peak into the bags. “Kass! Kass yay! You were gone for sooooo long! What did you get! I want to see, I want to see. Did you get something really cute I want to see what you’ve gotten and if it fits me please show me nowwwww you were gone forever I want to see the cloooothes.”

“Hahaha Jay, calm down you eager kitty. You’ll see in a second. And besides, I was only gone for like, an hour and some change so cool your jets. I had to make sure I had a ton of options for you.” Zie gave me a quick glance, “well you seem obviously super excited so how about we have a fashion show? I’d love to see how some of these look on you.”

“Yeah!” I could feel my energy building up, it was just too much. Dropping to all fours I rushed over to the living room, bounced onto the couch, did a quick one eighty and rushed back to Kass and proceeded to hop on my heels to keep from climbing on top of hir. “Fashion show living room let’s go go go go go!”

“You are awfully hyper for someone who has claimed in the past not to care about clothes.” Zie rolled hir eyes and followed me into the main space where I was doing cartwheels in front of the couch. I didn’t care, I was happy. New clothes! It was a mystery. It was like Christmas morning. I couldn’t wait to try them on. 

“Alright eager kitten, how about we try this one first,” Kass dropped the bags beside hir on the couch and passed me the first bundle of clothes. The fashion show had begun!

DerbyGhost

I am a cruel and evil girl, but we will have to wait til Friday to see how our kitty fares with their own personal fashion show. Plus! Family dinner!