Jacob had been hanging out with Aiyana now for a few weeks after bumping into her at random one day. She hadn't exactly given him the choice about this, hanging out in his dormitory while he wasn't there and following him around. It was like he had an extra shadow -- albeit one that could shapeshift at will.
At first her presence had been unnerving for him. He'd felt for a while that he was being watched and pursued by some malignant entity and things would often be moved around his dorm that shouldn't have been. He'd felt unsafe, until the day she outed herself to him. Aiyana had been pretty safe in revealing her secrets, after all, who would believe somebody claiming to have met a shape-shifter? Such things were in the realm of Bigfoot and Jewish space lasers. Even if somebody did believe, they'd never be able to catch her.
It was the weekend, and Jacob and Aiyana had nothing to do. She didn't really have a home to go back to since she didn't particularly need one, so she stayed with him. Crickets chirped from the bushes and gardens below like some alarm, softened to background noise by the distance. It was unbearably humid. Three fans blew on maximum to make up for the lack of air conditioning in the dorms while the dirty window only opened halfway. The building was in a dire need of an upgrade, but all the money spent on tuition and rent would never make its way to being put to bettering the campus when there were investors to enrich.
"Jacob." She began, laying on the bed in a loose-fitting crop top and tight leggings. She held a book above her face, a rather heavy tome labelled 'Shock Doctrine' that he'd been given by one of his professors. With a clap she closed it. "Let's do something."
He swung about in his computer chair, neglecting the paper he was writing about tectonic energies. "What do you have in mind?" He knew she wouldn't pick a restaurant since she no longer required food, but he wondered what she could be thinking.
"I don't know -- something." She muttered indistinctly. "I'm so booooored." As she said this, she flopped her arms down across the side of the bed and let her body ooze and drip as a display of just how very bored she was. He paused as he ran through things in his mind, before deciding to list them off for her to choose from.
"Mmm... a walk around campus?"
"No."
"How about a movie?"
"Nah."
"The beach? It might be nice to get into the water to cool off."
She thought about that one, before dismissing it. "Nope."
"... video games?"
She didn't even justify that one with a reply, but with a glowering stare.
"Well, I don't know... farmer's market? The zoo?"
That suggestion caused her to raise an eyebrow. "You know you have a zoo right here." He didn't quite follow. Seeing his puzzled look, she rolled her eyes and dropped her form into a puddle of pinkish flesh, her clothes dissipating with her. The surface of her flesh bubbled and ruptured into a small, oval shape until peaks and troughs formed as she took shape once more. The pink tinge dimmed to a pure white in areas and darkened to a black in others, forming a crisp line as they solidified their shades until the very image of a penguin stood atop his bed.
She quacked at him and ruffled her feathers before hopping off the bed. Instead of landing, her body splashed to the ground into another puddle and a corona of goo that reassembled itself into the form of a meercat. "Is this any better?" She asked, her voice high and squeaky.
Jacob looked on at this incredible display and clapped his hands. He'd seen her change into all manner of things but it never ceased to impress him. He didn't think he could ever get bored of seeing her change from one thing to another.
She stood up on her back feet and her body stretched out, swelling bigger and bigger like a balloon until she practically engulfed the whole space of the bedroom. A large ruff of fur appeared at her neck and her mouth expanded into a huge maw. Her two massive front paws landed as she snapped into the shape of a lion, giving off a powerful roar that shook the coffee cup on his desk.
"Shh -- quiet! I'll get reported if you're too loud." He protested, motioning with his hands for her to chill. She gave a low, rumbling giggle and turned back to the bed, changing her shape back to her preferred form half-way and remaining as half human, half lioness. It was an odd sight to see in real life.
Jacob still watched on as she adopted a comfortable position. "Huh. So you can do that too. You should go to a furry convention like that. They'd love you." She tittered and gave a big, toothy smile that showed off her long-pointed fangs.
"You know, I meant to ask." He started asking but paused, unsure of if the question would be considered rude or not.
"Ask what?" Her tail flicked lazily in the air.
"Eh... you don't have to answer it if you don't want to, I don't know..." Jacob mumbled.
"Go ahead."
"It's just... I know you can take on any form. That bit's cool. But I was wondering what your real form is. I want to see the real you."
"... Oh." She mumbled. The eye contact she held with him was lost as her gaze drifted off to the side. The toothy grin gave way to a muted despondence. "Well..." she sighed.
"No, it's ok. You don't have to answer that." He quickly interjected, trying to avoid hurting her.
"It's not that -- it's... more that I don't really know." She stared back into his eyes. He could see in her expression something different now, something deeper than what they'd shared so far. It was as if there was a barricade that she'd opened for him, just for him, that he might understand more.
There was a brief silence between them as they shared unspoken sympathies. "Have you always been able to do this? Change form, I mean. Did you ever have a form of your own? You must have, right?" He wanted to ask so much but held himself back from being too pushy on topics that could be sensitive.
She flopped back onto the bed. The tail and ears receded back into her and the fur gave way to pink skin. She was small, taking on the appearance of a child with sleek black hair similar in form to her preferred shape. There were a few minor differences, skin blemishes had been removed in her usual form and her face wasn't quite as round, it was as though the form she normally chose was a 'perfected' adult version of this child self that she'd once known.
"This is what I used to look like." She replied, sitting up on the bed. "I memorised it from a photo from when I was a kid, I think I was ten or so -- my parents separated. My dad worked in a lab as a materials scientist, trying to make piezoelectric polymers... Of course I didn't know that at the time. My mother was working in the same lab as a biochemist. There was an incident that left her brain dead..." Her voice became quiet and shaky as she recanted what she remembered. "He couldn't deal with caring for the both of us, so he left her family to look after her and he took me. We went to visit her on weekends, but it wasn't her anymore."
Jacob felt like he'd pressed the wrong button. He wanted to go back and stop himself from opening this old wound back up, but she still went on sharing. All he could do was look on and listen. Her being in the form of her childhood self made it all the harder to hear, knowing that she would have been that small and innocent when it was all happening to her.