When I wake up, I am—thankfully—not a cat. I am human. I have opposable thumbs and the world is the right size. I walk on two feet and I can actually cry.

The time is also close to 11 and I basically missed half a day of school but I guess that’s what Xanax does to cats. I’ll try to remember that next time. Assuming there is a next time, which I really, really, hope not. I mean, everything points to this transformation being almost completely unconscious. I didn’t choose to become a cat, okay? Not me. Sure, if I hadn’t done it that Earl guy would probably not have let me go, but that doesn’t make everything that followed much better.

But now I’m okay, and a third of a cat-eaten sandwich isn’t all that bad for a breakfast, and…

…Something here is wrong. There’s something here that shouldn’t be. Some cat-part that isn’t gone.

I look behind me.

A sleek, furless tail stretches out from just above my ass. All of a sudden, I feel like crying again. You know what this is? An excellent excuse to not go to school. I’m already late as is, so what would even be the point? Going to school at this point is basically begging for someone to notice the tail, and… I dunno, call the cops? Okay, gee, I don’t know what would happen. If I saw a classmate with a cat tail, what would I do?

…Call the cops? No, wait, that isn’t… Yeah, no, I’d probably bring them to the principal, have them call their parents, schedule an expensive visit to a doctor…

Yup. Can’t have that.

But skipping school completely looks even worse than just skipping the first few periods. I’ll have to sit on the bleachers during P.E, but that’s hardly news.

I glance back at the tail again. It’s not especially mobile, less like a monkey’s and more like a, well, cat’s. About as flexible as you’d expect an extension of a spine to be. I don’t think I’ll be able to pull off any karate moves anytime soon. Hm? What’s that? I should cut off this limb that I grew overnight? Why, that’s a great idea! That obviously won’t be 1, painful, 2, possibly cause bleeding and kill me, and 3, eventually require a doctor’s visit.

Not to even mention points 4, 5, and 6: painful.

Grumbling to myself, I pull on a pair of pants, only to find that it won’t exactly thread over the tail sticking out of my ass. Great. How do you hide a tail? Stick it down the side of my pants? Too obvious, and most of my jeans are at least slightly skinny along the thigh. Press it flat against my back? I tried it a little and, yeah, no, that’s called ‘breaking your own spine.’ Not viable. In that case…

I wrap it around my midsection. Yeah, that works.

Apparently, it’s more flexible when going side-to-side as opposed to up-and-down. Good to know.

The clock is ticking, time is running out, and I have no time to brush my teeth, so I just throw on a hoodie and book it out of the apartment, making sure to lock it behind me. Down in the entrance, Flyby stops me and I instinctively feel a bout of fear. He still feels huge compared to me. His eyes affix me to the spot. I look away. “You haven’t happened to notice a lil’ cat, ‘ave ya?”

I gulp. “A… cat?”

He makes a gesture with his hands as though pressing a sandwich together. “‘Bout jay big. Black. Pink nose, yellow eyes?”

“We… aren’t allowed to keep pets,” I mumble as though that means anything.

“I know,” he says gruffly. “It’s just that… Well, a lil’ feller snuck in, an’ he might be sick. Just give a yell if you see ‘im, alright?”

I nod at him, and that seems to be enough for him, because he turns around and starts checking beneath the stairs, making ‘kssksskss’ sounds as he does. I kind of want to tell him not to worry, or that I’m keeping the ‘kitty’ safe, or any other such white lie, but I can’t risk him learning something he shouldn’t. Or, worse, getting mad at me for keeping a cat. Hypocrite.

I step out of the apartment complex. Normally, even if I was several hours late, I would just walk the way there since it is pretty far, but I’m a vampire now! I can run like the wind.

N-, not to the point of becoming a cat, though. Geez, is that something I’ll need to worry about from now on? At least sleeping seems to cure it, otherwise, I’d have a real problem on my paws. Hands. Hands!

I shake my head and start running. This time, I take the route through the alleyway, even though my instincts are screaming at me not to. My hair, still long from last night, keeps flapping in my face and I eventually decide to just pull up my hood in the faint attempt to keep it out of my eyes.

Once I get to school, it seems that lunch only just ended, but as a vampire, human food is of no consequence to me. Sure, I haven’t gotten a hold of any human blood bags just yet, but that’s only a matter of time, okay? So far my vampiring has been a bit lacklustre, but tonight will be different. Tonight, I will suck blood!

“What’re you cackling about, Gurb?” a familiar voice asks and I whirl around just in time to see Jake approaching, a relaxed smile on his face. “And what’s up with the hoodie again? You got somethin’ hidden under there or what?”

I tug at my hood, pulling it down further, hoping it might hide my locks. “...No.”

Thankfully, Jake doesn’t seem to be with his goonies or he would probably have been even worse. He looks at me with blank eyes and I wonder in terror if he’s going to try pulling off yesterday’s stunt. But, in the end, he just shrugs and asks, “Hey, haven’t you got, like, P.E now? Shouldn’t you hurry and get changed?”

I turn to stare at the large clock on the school walls and realise with annoyance that he’s right. I’ve got about four minutes to get changed. Shoot. Knowing Jake, he’s sure to bother me for the entire duration of those fou-,

“Alright, uh, see ya around, Gurb!” Jake says hastily before almost running off, leaving me blinking at the dust cloud he left. That was… new. What’s gotten into him?

Well, as they say, don’t burn a gift horse’s treasure, or something. As soon as I recover from Jake’s departure, I hurry to the P.E building with the pre-decided excuse playing on repeat in my head, ‘Sorry, I fell down my bike, sorry, I fell down my bike, sorry, I fell down my bike…” When they ask for where I feel the pain, I’ll say that my knee doesn’t look any weird but it feels bad. Or something.

Or that I forgot my clothes, which I actually did, now that I think about it. Guess that works, too.

“Luis Freighthold, I swear to Christ, if you miss one more lesson I am sending you to the principal’s office,” Mrs Katatonia says for what I think might be the fourth time this semester. “I had expected you sick, but even that isn’t a good excuse anymore.”

Just as all of the last times, I just bow my head down and look remorseful.

She sighs and puts one hand on my shoulder. I try not to flinch too much; this is a big part in our bi-monthly ‘don’t do this again’ play, after all. “I know you have a hard time keeping up with your ‘friends’(citation marks added by me), but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t at least try. There are sports out there I’m sure you could be great at if you only gave it a try.”

‘Then why don’t we ever play those?’ is what I would say if I wanted to fail this class. Instead, I just look even more remorseful, as impossible as it may sound. She sighs again, and after much consideration, allows me to just go take a seat on the bleachers. Jackpot. I try not to show my happiness too much as I slink over to the seats at the side. As always, I pick the lowest seat on the left (less stairs to climb, closer to the middle of the hall) and sit down.

Then I stand up again because it feels like I just broke my own tail.

“Was there something else, Luis?” Katatonia asks me.

I shake my head frantically because I know if I opened my mouth I’d probably scream. She stares at me for a second, so to prove that there was nothing else, I sit down again, trying to angle my tail so that I’m not sitting right on top of it. Apparently, as long as I don’t use the backrest, I can actually sit on chairs. But only if I sit straight and with a slight forward incline, of course.

The rest of the day goes alright. Against all odds, Jake actually seems to avoid me somewhat, keeping his distance. His goonies follow his lead too, meaning that I was able to survive the entire afternoon without having anyone pull down my pants and subsequently find out I have a tail. When I spell it out like that, it sounds pretty surreal, actually.

But before I’m able to actually leave the building, a hand falls on my shoulder and I go straight into the freeze reaction. The hand jerks away from my shoulder and I follow it to find Mr… Henry on the other side. The new English teacher.

“Sorry,” he says in a bit of a mumble. “I didn’t mean to startle you, Luis.”

“It’s alright,” I mumble right back at him, my speech just a bit more incoherent, proving my dominance once and for all.

A small, almost unnoticeable smile tugs at his cheek. “You do have a pendant for saying that, don’t you?” Since that’s not the kind of thing you can really respond to, I say nothing. The shadow of a smile leaves him. There aren’t too many people around us, so it’s pretty quiet. The time is 15:52 and I really want to go find Vernon. He should be there soon, if not already. “I can’t help but feel that our last conversation was cut a bit short. Would you mind stepping into my office with me?”

I glance at the entrance. “Um, I kind of have somewhere…”

He pulls up his hands in mock surrender. For some reason, it makes me think of a lunging werewolf. “It won’t take five minutes. And, of course, if you’d like, you can leave at any time.”

“I really need to go,” I say again. Something tickles against my stomach and I realise, eyes wide, that the tip of my tail is wagging back and forth in annoyance. Is-, is that something cat tails do? Either way, it makes it look as though an alien is about to burst from my stomach, so with rising panic, I press my hands into my stomach to quell it.

He nods solemnly. Oh, god, I feel guilty. He’s said like three things so far and I already feel like a piece of shit for saying no. I don’t even know where he’s coming from with this! If it’s about yesterday, I actually kind of don’t want to hear it. I mean, listen. Do I hate Jake and his guys for what they do and have done to me? Yes. Has talking to teachers helped? Not really. Might this be different? Sure.

But I’m a vampire now, and vampires don’t need help from puny mortals. It’s kind of their thing.

Besides, if they give Jake detention (or worse, expelled), my revenge on him might be a bit over-the-top since he’s already gotten his due punishment. Or it might make it harder to jump him after school.

Or maybe I just want it to come as a surprise. Who knows, really?

“I see you have a lot on your mind. I’m sorry to have taken up your time as is, I was simply worried about your morning absence. Although it is not my place to do so, I marked you as sick in our systems. In all honesty, I hadn’t expected you to return the very day after what happened yesterday.” He shakes his head. “But, as I said, I won’t be taking up any more of your time. I hope to see you again, Luis.”

“You marked me as…?” I blink up at him, only now actually looking at his face. There isn’t a trace of dishonesty on there. My mouth feels dry and I look away again. I actually have no idea what to say. What is there to say?

He reaches towards me but quickly reconsiders, instead folding his hands across his midsection. “See you tomorrow.”

Before I have time to say the obligatory ‘you too,’ he turns around and walks away, leaving me feeling a bit empty. I mean, really, what did I actually do here? Henry was nice, apparently did me a favour, even worried about me… And all I did was snub him off. That, uh, might not have been very nice of me? It’s not like I meant to do it, but it still feels bad.

Shoot, that totally threw me off.

I… I should find Vernon. This is all so weird.

I leave the building in a haste, trying not to think too closely about anything. As I’m walking, I try to remind myself that I can’t trust Vernon, but it’s really hard. So far, he’s just been a nice guy. Super sketchy, but I don’t think he’s lied to me so far. It would be different if I hadn’t seen a vampire (and if I wasn’t one myself). If he just approached me out of the blue I would’ve called the cops. Maybe. Or I’d sock ‘im. Depends on how aggressively he tries to make me believe in the vamp-spiracy, I guess.

The alleyway looms ahead of me. I don’t like the look of it, but I still head inside it, even though it makes my skin crawl.

In the alleyway, I find a whole lotta nothing. Yup, no one here. Just me, myself, and a dead rat. Or is it two? Actually, scratch that, I don’t want to know how many dead rats there are here. I’m pretty sure it’s a lot more than two. It smells bad, but it probably smelled worse a few days ago. Because, you know…

Aaaaand I’m cancelling that thought. No good to have.

You know what? I’m just going to wait for him. If he doesn’t show up in like, two hours, I will skedaddle. Until then, it’s about time I got started on my fourth re-read of the Larten Crepsley tetralogy. For some reason, getting started on a book is always much more difficult than continuing it. Personally, I think it’s the commitment. It’s not like you can start a re-read and then drop it after the second book, that’d be weak.

Pulling off my backpack, I rummage around until I finally grab the right book (of three, the other two being, uh, not in dispute) and pull it out. The cover looks so stupid but I kind of love it. It’s probably an unpopular opinion, but I think my favourite book is the second one, where Larten is experienced enough not to be a wuss but still not quite super-badass. Of course, any one of these is superior to the Darren Shan books. I actually only read those because I heard Larten was in them. Nobody told me those books sucked. Total kiddie books in comparison. The last book was horribly incomprehensible.

You couldn’t make me re-read them with a gun to my head. Hm. I wonder if I’m immune to bullets?

I poke my side and wince. Yeah, no, probably not.

Glancing around the dirty, stinking alley, I try to find a place where someone might sit down without dirtying their trousers, but there is no such place. The pavement is slick with grease and sludge. The top of the dumpster is covered in a sheen of unidentifiable slime. Maybe if I could sit on the wall…

“What’s that you got there?”

Oh Jesu-,

Stumbling back, I fall on my ass in surprise, yelping as my pain gets squished, almost dropping the book from my hands, my hands flailing out in an impromptu juggle as it bounces between them without ever gaining grip.

Casually, Vernon bends down and plucks the book out of the air. “Now, let’s see here…” His eyes, shielded by his yellow glasses, cross over the title. “Birth of a Killer?” He smirks down at me. “Sounds pretty morbid for a kid’s book.”

“It’s not,” I huff and pull myself back to my feet, “a kids' book.”

He lightly tosses it back to me and I only barely catch it. His smile effortlessly changes into a teasing grin. “What’s it supposed to be then? Non-fiction? You didn’t strike me as the scholarly type. Who’s it about; Dahmer? Bundy?”

“None of them!” I say, puffing up my chest. “What do you take me for, some wannabe killer? It’s just a…” -story about a boy who turns into a vampire and is pretty happy about it. I gulp. “A… a book. YA. You know.”

He steps off a little, mercifully. “Whatever you say. As long as you remember that those types of books don’t exactly represent the real situation, we’re good to go.” He winks, curiously. “Don’t try to replicate the stuff you read, either. Unlike that Larten guy, you’re far from immortal.”

My tail twitches. I pound my fist into my stomach. “Um. Yeah. I won’t.” I press the book closer to me. He read that synopsis fast. I didn’t even see it happen.

He takes a step closer. “Well, what do you say we get started?”

I nod at him. Right.