"I know you think this is silly," Stace said as he gave me a serious look, "But let's just go over it one more time. So I know we're both on the same page. Let me hear your safe-growl first."

I rolled my eyes but gave him a little growl as I bared my teeth.

My boyfriend nodded, "And the warning whine?"

That was more of a whimper than a whine, I thought. Either way I crouched and made the noise we'd agreed on.

"Good," he nodded. "And the go bark?"

I thought it was a yip but he called it a bark. Either way I did that too.

"Ok good," Stace relaxed a bit. "So it's like the basic traffic-light system, easy to understand and easy to remember. The safe-growl is like a red light, it means stop immediately. If you get uncomfortable or scared, or you want to stop for any reason at all, use your safe-growl and everything ends immediately."

"The warning whine is your amber light," he continued. "That means slow down, but doesn't necessarily mean stop. Use that if you're not sure and need some more time to decide. Or if you need time to cool down and take a breather. And the go bark is your green light. It means 'yes', or proceed. That's when you're comfortable and want to continue with what we're doing."

I rolled my eyes again and yipped at him once more.

Stace smiled, "I know you think I'm being over-cautious Megan, but the last thing I want to do is put you in a position that triggers your anxiety while you're unable to speak up for yourself."

He had a point there, but considering I was a small arctic fox I wasn't able to tell him that. Or thank him for being so thoughtful.

We were both sitting on the sofa in the living-room, my clothes were in a little pile underneath me and my small fox plushie was resting on the cushion next to my right front paw. Stacey was sitting relaxed beside me, and he had a sip of his cola before setting the can down on the coffee table.

The collar and leash were there next to where he put his drink, and I couldn't help staring at them for a few moments. They were still in the packaging, but the fact that he'd brought them out at all gave me some little flutters of emotion. I wasn't sure which emotion yet, but definitely something.

Then my tall dark and handsome foxboy boyfriend did something I hadn't expected. He picked up my little white fox plushie and put it away in the drawer under the coffee table. Without access to that I was stuck on all fours, and without hands I wasn't sure I could open the drawer and get it back out.

"Are you still ok Meg?" Stacey asked. He was watching me, and probably saw something in my body language while I was staring at the drawer my plushie disappeared into.

I took a deep breath then responded with the go-yip.

After all, I was the one who wanted to be a fox so I could avoid all my human responsibilities. And if I started to panic or anything, I could do the safe-growl. Thinking about that cut off any anxiety before it started.

"Glad to hear it cutie," my boyfriend replied.

Then he carefully picked me up for a moment, and gathered up my clothes. He set me back down on the sofa while he went into the bedroom and dumped my clothes in the hamper with the rest of the dirty laundry.

He sat down next to me again and picked up the collar, then carefully got it out of the package. He paused before reaching for me again and asked, "Are you ready Meg?"

This time I hesitated a second or so before I yipped again.

"Then hold still cutie," Stacey said as he gently picked me up and set me on his lap.

It took a bit of fussing around and some adjustments, then I heard and felt the plastic 'click' as the collar snapped closed around my neck. I felt another little flutter of something the moment it happened.

My clothes and plushie had been put away, I was stuck as a fox, and I was wearing a collar. If anyone saw me they'd assume I was just an animal. Not even a wild animal, I was Stacey's pet. I was domesticated. That little flutter happened again as I wondered what my friends or family would think if they saw me.

I was distracted from those thoughts as Stacey suddenly commented, "My gods you're cute! The pink collar was the right choice. You look like a little fluffy white princess."

That made me blush, which fortunately was invisible under my fur. My tail was wagging too, as my boyfriend picked me up and held me against his strong chest in a tight hug. One of his hands started stroking my forehead and scritching behind my ears, while the other supported me and rubbed my belly. Pretty soon I melted into a white fuzzy fox puddle, except for my tail which was flapping around happily behind me.

Stace continued holding me and petting me a while more, then suddenly got to his feet while he kept me cuddled up against his chest. "C'mon cutie, you need to see yourself in the mirror!"

My eyes widened slightly, but other than that I remained a very happy comfy melty fox in his strong arms. I didn't mind being carried, at least not by him. And a moment later I turned and froze as I saw myself as a fox for the first time.

I really was tiny. I'd guess from the tip of my nose to the base of my tail was only about forty or forty-five centimetres. My tail was about thirty or thirty-five centimetres long. Not quite as long as the rest of my body, but close. I was a little white floof-ball, with a floofy tail sticking out the back and fuzzy ears sticking out the top. A little black nose and two amber eyes at the front were the only part of me that wasn't snow-white and floofy.

The only other colour on me was the collar, and that band of pink stood out against my white fur so nobody would ever miss it. In fact I was pretty sure some folks might not even know I was a fox. They'd see the collar and my general shape and probably assume I was some fancy little breed of dog.

My eyes finally shifted from myself to my boyfriend. Tall, fit, strong, dark, handsome, he looked amazing. He also looked like a giant compared to me now. I was this tiny soft delicate floof in his big strong arms. I was the domesticated pet, while he was the man with the wild hair and the dark eyes. He was also wearing dark clothes, and my white fur gleamed against the black t-shirt he had on.

We continued to stand in front of the mirror until I finally took my eyes off our reflections. Then Stacey turned and left the washroom. He gently set me down on the sofa again, and reached for the leash.

My eyes widened as I watched him open that package. Then he smiled and held it up as he asked, "Ready for walkies?"

This time I hesitated for a few seconds. I glanced from him to the leash, then to our apartment door. And finally I looked back at Stace and did the warning whine. I wasn't quite ready to go out in public like this.

My boyfriend lowered the leash and asked, "You need some time hon?"

I nodded, then stepped onto his lap. I let myself sort of flop down, with my body laying on his thighs, my tail hanging down in front of his shins, and my chin on his belly while I stared up at his handsome face.

He stared back down at me, and after a few seconds a wide smile appeared on his face. "Ok, you just want to hang out at home with me for now."

This time my nodd was almost imperceptible, but I knew he saw it.

"Whatever you like cutie," he replied as he dropped the leash onto the cushion next to him.

He picked up his drink and had another sip of soda, while his other hand started petting me and rubbing my forehead and behind my ears. It wasn't long before I started purring, and my eyes drifted closed as I let myself completely relax. I was happy, I felt safe, and I was Stacey's cute little pet fox.

I actually drifted into a light sleep at one point, curled up on my boyfriend's lap while he petted and stroked my fur and relaxed with his drink. I might have spent the rest of the afternoon like that, but at one point I was woken up by my phone.

Lifting my head slightly I opened my eyes as my ears twitched. The phone was in our bedroom, but I could hear it loud and clear. So could Stace, he had one ear angled towards it same as me.

"What do you think cutie?" he asked. "Might be something important?"

My answer was clear as could be. I closed my eyes and lowered my head back down, then for good measure I wrapped my tail around so it rested over my nose and hid my face. Phones were human things but I was a smol cute fuzzball. The only things I needed to be concerned about were fox things.

Stace chuckled softly as he gently stroked my fur and scritched my ears some more. Meanwhile my phone soon stopped making noise. A minute or two later it pinged with a few texts, but I ignored that too. Texts were also human things, not fox things.

It wasn't long before I managed to doze off again, and this time I wasn't disturbed until my boyfriend needed to get up to visit the washroom. He gently picked me up from his lap then set me down on the sofa cushion, but it was more than enough to wake me from my light sleep.

When he returned he stood in front of the sofa looking down at me and asked, "How are you doing? Do you need walkies yet?"

A moment later he frowned, "Actually do you need anything? Water, food? I didn't think about that before but if you get hungry or thirsty like that you're kind of stuck. Do we have to put out a bowl of water? And some fox food? Do they even make fox food? Or a bowl of dog kibble?"

I rolled my eyes then hopped down off the sofa and pawed at the coffee table drawer where our plushies were kept. And despite all the stuff Stace was concerned about a moment earlier he still pretended not to know what I wanted.

"What are you doing cutie?" he asked with a smile. He tried to force a straight face but couldn't quite manage it as he added, "Careful Meg, you'll scratch the furniture. When I'm picking up the food and water bowls I'd better grab a trimmer for those claws too."

This time I gave him a look and a growl. It wasn't our 'safe growl' though, just a general warning and unhappy sound. And since he obviously wasn't going to help I tilted my head sideways and grabbed hold of the drawer pull with my teeth, then carefully pulled my head back.

Sure enough the drawer slid open. I hopped up on the coffee table with the drawer still open and placed a paw on my plushie then thought 'Kon!' as loud as I could. At the last moment I suddenly remembered there was a collar around my neck, and I had just enough time to panic about strangling myself when I heard and felt something go Snap!

I looked down in time to see my pink collar fall to the floor, then realized I was back in my foxgirl form. I was kneeling naked on our coffee table, while Stace stood nearby.

"Did I break it?" I asked as he crouched down and picked up the collar.

He shook his head as he straightened up again, "It's a safety collar. The clasp undoes if there's any serious force on it, so your pet won't get hung up on a fence or bushes or something."

"Good," I said as I stood up. Then I admitted, "I forgot I was wearing it until the last moment, then I thought it might choke me when I changed back."

Stace frowned, "Shit I never thought of that. I assumed it would magically come off, the way our clothes do? I thought you'd end up sitting ontop of it."

I frowned as well, "Actually that makes more sense? I wonder why that didn't happen."

It only took my boyfriend a second or two to come up with a plausible explanation, "My guess is whoever created the magic didn't think of it? Like they assumed going from human to fox there'd be clothes in the way, so they made sure there was a safe way for the clothes to come off. But going from fox to human, it never occurred to them that we'd be wearing anything fox-sized, so there's no allowance for removing things like collars."

"Assuming your users will act logically is a pretty common mistake a lot of devs make," he added.

"It's a magic plushie, not buggy software Stace!" I teased. "Are you going to submit a bug report to Kid Chaos?"

He laughed, "Maybe? If it's a safety risk then they should be notified. Maybe they can issue a remote patch. Otherwise we'll have to learn how to update the firmware on those things ourselves."

I rolled my eyes as I headed to the kitchen to get myself a glass of water. While I was in there I added, "Anyways, before I forget, I'm not drinking out of a dog bowl. And I'm absolutely not going to eat dog food!"

"What will you do if you get thirsty?" he asked. "I don't want to be an irresponsible pet owner here, I have to worry about your health and wellbeing."

After a few gulps of water I replied, "We can add a couple more signals to our safety list. We'll have one for 'human time' so you know I want to turn back. And one for if I'm thirsty, or hungry. And if I am, you can pour me a glass of water and put it somewhere I can reach."

He actually looked a little surprised at my response, "You're taking this pretty seriously Meg. Just how much time do you plan on spending as a fox?"

"Not too much," I mumbled. I went to find my phone so he wouldn't see the way I was blushing. I commented on my way to the bedroom, "It's just really nice ok? Especially with you, I feel safe and comfortable with you."

Stace chuckled, "Ok cutie. But if you're spending too much time as a fox we're definitely going to do some leash training. I'll get you out for a walk in the park sooner or later."

My blush got brighter at that thought. When I found my phone I had a look at the texts, and suddenly I forgot all about walkies and leashes and collars. I was looking at a couple texts from my mom, and they didn't sound happy.

"That was my mom who called earlier," I sighed as I emerged from the bedroom. "She wants me to call her back ASAP. And she wants us to go over there for dinner with her and dad tonight."

PurpleCatGirl

If you're enjoying our work and you'd like to support us, please consider joining our patreon & get early access to bonus chapters, new chapters, and new stories!
https://www.patreon.com/purplecatgirl