The bus was packed with commuters and by the time Nif arrived at the stop closest to home, her feet ached and she was in no mood to cook.
Sapha was on the sofa, her beautiful, lean body stretched out like she was posing for a photo shoot. Scattered around the floor in front of her were discarded salty chip packets and half-drunk soda bottles.
“What’s up?” Sapha drawled, half lidded, watching a muted black and white film.
Nif wasn’t in the mood to chat with her housemate. Normally the two of them got on well even though they were as different as any two people could be. Thanks to her grandmother’s inheritance, Sapha reviewed films for a hobby, sleeping through most of the day on the couch and then glaming up to attend opening nights of films and other events, mixing with actors and producers, and often being mistaken for one of the stars. Generally she’d attend two or three a week, but mostly Nif saw her in her silk pajamas in front of the TV.
“I’ve had a bad day. I’m ordering Thai and then locking myself in my room. Did you want me to order you anything?”
Sapha hauled herself out of her body-shaped indentation and slunk towards Nif, yawning wide to reveal teeth that were sharper than they should’ve been. She wrapped her arms around Nif’s shoulders and nuzzled her cheek with her nose.
“Curry puffs. A dozen. And don’t forget the prawn crackers.” Then she vanished into the shared bathroom and Nif could hear the shower turn on. Was that her second or third shower for the day?
After putting in the order, Nif locked herself in her room and stripped, tossing the stained blouse in her dirty hamper and digging out her fluffy, purple robe. It smelt like the home she’d grown up in. Of pine and cinnamon and wood fires. She plugged in her phone and then dialed the people she’d been wanting to talk to all day, putting them on speaker.
“Hello, sweetie. Rough day?”
“Hi Mum. Awful day. Just awful.”
“Is that Nif? Tell her I say hi and I just finished reading the book she got me for my birthday. Ask her if there’s any more in the series.”
“Tell her yourself, Jon. It’s on speaker.”
“Oh. Hi Nifty-Nif! Did you hear I read that book you gave me?”
Nif plopped onto her bed and smiled into her pillow, letting her parents’ voices wash over her in a soothing wave.
“There’s two more in the series so far. I’ll bring them next time I’m down.”
“Wonderful. Wonderful.” Her dad was a cheerful, burbling stream on a summer day. “Now what’s this about you having a crappy day?”
“I don’t even know where to start!” Nif laughed, her voice catching.
“Tell us about your date, dear. We haven’t heard from you since then, and I suspect if it had gone well, you would’ve called sooner.” Her mum was so matter of fact, her words edged by the comforting growl Nif had always associated with furry winter cuddle piles and honey sweet cakes on sick days.
“Trevor. His name was Trevor and we hadn’t even gotten to dessert before he asked what my shift form was.”
“Oh honey,” her dad said, clucking his tongue sympathetically.
“What’s worse was he started off by saying someone’s form didn’t matter. That we shouldn’t judge people by their appearance.” Nif sniffed, rubbing her palms hard into her eyes. “I don’t even know why I’m so upset. It wasn’t like he was particularly wonderful. He was cute and kind -- he volunteers with kids for crying out loud -- but it wouldn’t have worked out. I would’ve spent my time tidying up after him while he was off on adventures trying to discover himself.”
“Jerk-face,” her dad hissed.
“Dad!” Nif spluttered.
“Well he is. Shallow too. How anyone doesn’t see how wonderful you are is beyond me.”
“You’ve got to say that. You’re my parents.”
“We’ll also be the first to call you on your bullshit, sweetie,” her mum said. “So you can trust us when we say he isn’t worth an extra thought.”
“You never once wondered if there was something wrong with me?”
“Nif!” “No, sweetheart!” they spoke at once.
“I mean, everyone else shifted around puberty,” Nif continued. “If not sooner. Like Hazel from next door.”
“Poor Hazel. I wouldn’t wish her trigger moment on anyone,” her dad hummed. “She was barely three. Anyone would be scarred for life watching your mum die like that.”
“We see the fact that you haven’t shifted as a good thing. People shift because of physical or emotional trauma. Accidents. Abuse. The stress of puberty. Not shifting means you had a happy childhood. That we’ve done our jobs properly and protected and prepared you for life to the best of our abilities.”
“But…”
“No buts,” they chimed at the same time.
“You’re both dorks,” Nif snorted and even though the frustrations of the day still weighed heavily on her -- the new author being stolen from her, her coffee cup getting crushed, missing her bus home --, she felt lighter for talking to her parents.
“Now what’s really bothering you,” her dad asked. He was always the more observant one, possibly because he dealt with young adults on a daily basis at the local high school.
“What do you mean?”
“He’s right. You’ve had enough bad dates and you’ve never let any of them bother you before. What else is on your mind?”
So she told them about Leon. How he’d not so much as asked but ordered her to be some author’s PA and then given a manuscript she’d invested so much time and effort into to Charlotte, who wouldn’t care and then this amazing author wouldn’t get published and…
By the time she had it all off her chest, she’d managed to work herself up into a righteous fury and then travelled down the other side to end up empty and tired.
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“What are you going to do about it?” her mum asked after a long moment. And that was just like her mum. Practical, down to earth and ready to move planets if it meant things would change for the better.
“I need to get that manuscript back from Charlotte. First thing tomorrow, I’ll ask her…”
“Don’t just ask, sweet pea. You’ve put in that effort and your boss had no right handing it over to someone else without your approval.”
Her mum made it sound easy. Nif couldn’t imagine herself demanding anything, but she could make it sound like it was in Charlotte’s best interest to return it. The woman was not known for her work ethic. No, that wasn’t right. She was highly successful and efficient, but that was only because she knew when to say no and when some things just weren’t worth her time.
“And I’ll prove to Leon I’m more than a PA during this project. Maybe the author will like me so much that they’ll insist I take the lead!”
“Who is the author again?” her dad asked. “You never said. Have I read anything they’ve written?”
“Leon never actually told me. They’ve been published through Nova so they probably write science fiction. I’ll ask him tomorrow.”
“You can get me a signed copy of their work! Think you can get them to include their favourite song lyrics when they sign it? I got Jessica Beetle to write hers and it was not what I expected from someone who writes exclusively horror.” Her dad had the strangest collection of signed books. It didn’t matter if he liked the author or not, but it did make it easy buying him gifts.
“Feel better now, sweetheart?” her mum interrupted before her dad derailed the conversation entirely.
“Thanks, Mum and Dad. You guys are pretty awesome.”
“That we are, Nifty-Nif. And you’re pretty swell yourself.”
“Seriously? Swell?” her mum mocked and there was a scuffle on the other end of the line and a strangled squark of outrage.
“Don’t forget I’m still here,” Nif called, preparing to hang up if things got heated.
“We’d never forget you, sweetheart,” Mum said. “Oi, you’re getting your feathers in my mouth!” In the background, Nif could hear the warbling call of her father’s laughter when he was in his bird form. “I don’t know how I put up with him,” her mum sighed. “Now, any plans for this week?”
“Doctor’s appointment tomorrow. I need my prescription to be refilled and Sapha will be out the next few nights so I plan to take advantage of the available TV and catch up on my shows. That’s if I’m not too busy with this new project.”
“The project does sound promising even if they’re treating you less than they should,” her dad said, shifting human enough to speak. “You let us know how it goes, okay.”
“And tell them if they don’t promote you by Winter Solstice, I’ll be coming down and having a few words with that boss of yours.”
“Mum!”
“See if I don’t!
The buzzer for the living room window went off at the same time Sapha finished her shower.
“Foods here, Nif!” she bellowed.
“Got to go, but I’ll talk with you soon,” Nif said and after a round of goodbyes, she dashed for the living room window, hauling it open to collect the bag of food left on the ledge by a winged-shifter.
Things weren’t resolved yet. She still had to figure out how to get A Lonely Star back, but what her parents had said about her not experiencing trauma being a good thing resonated with her. Did she really want to be able to shift when the trigger was meant to be so stressful?
When she was in highschool, it hadn’t looked so bad for the most part. When kids began shifting at puberty (as normal people did), Nif had patiently waited her turn. Her period had arrived earlier than most, and she’d been quietly smug thinking any day she’d shift. She dreamt of the animal she’d be. Maybe a bird like her father. They could go flying together, even avoid the school traffic by flying above it all. She could wing her way into school and change back into human, warm brown skin bare and flushed from exertion. Everyone would be so jealous. Or maybe a bear like her mother? They could curl up together in a ball of fur on cold winter mornings and doze the day away.
Except Nif kept waiting.
Her friends changed, one by one. Trish was a terrier, which surprised no one. Jon shifted into a sparrow after being slammed into the ground during a particularly violent football game, which wasn’t expected at all. Tina’s shift was especially delightful when she ended up being a panda. One by one, her friends shifted and Nif watched as the friendships they’d maintained since early primary school strained and fractured. There were no rules about being friends with those of a similar kind, but the saying ‘birds of a feather flock together’ proved particularly apt. As the only kid at school that had yet to shift by sixteen, Nif found herself naturally on the outskirts. She told herself she didn’t mind.
Her mum was a late shifter. Her parents met when her mother rescued her father from being robbed when they were both on different dates. Her mother’s shift didn’t actually occur until two weeks later, a month after her twenty-second birthday, during peak hour traffic on a 44 degree day. Not all shifts were triggered by moments of extreme stress or emotion it seemed. Nif wouldn’t have minded one of those.
Her father was a little more typical. He shifted to a heron when he was fifteen, matching his long limbed human form and never ending patience. It made for an odd pairing, her mother and father. Her mother was a grizzly bear shifter and took being a mother bear to a whole new level. Her human form was petite though, a quarter of the size of her shifted form, but she had an easy going nature that was quick to turn heated if someone she loved was threatened.
Nif wished for the content, warm affection her parents had for each other despite their differences. Surely being unable to shift would be no less difficult than overcoming a cat shifter falling in love with a dog shifter? There were enough rom-coms about odd couple relationships that it wouldn’t be completely beyond the scope of comprehension.
“Don’t eat my curry puffs!” Sapha growled, dashing from the bathroom, skin still glistening and flush from the shower.
“You know the rules! Clothes on in the share spaces!”
Sapha rolled her eyes and grabbed her silk robe from the back of the couch. Nif refused to hand over the bag of curry puffs until she’d tied the robe shut.
They settled on the couch, using the chopsticks that came with the order and eating straight from the boxes. Sapha pressed play on the film she was watching and Nif decided maybe she didn’t mind the company.
“Your birthday is coming up soon, right?” Sapha asked after most of the food was gone. She was licking her finger tips, delicate little swipes, leaving clean skin behind, and Nif just hoped she’d remember not to keep licking. Sapha had shifted when she was six years old when the ferry she was riding with her parents capsized. They almost didn’t see the tiny kitten amongst the tossing waves. She hated baths or pools, but she’d live under the stream of a shower for days if their hot water bill could survive it.
“Next month. A Wednesday I think.”
“Big three-oh.” Sapha had never revealed her age, though Nif was fairly certain she was between twenty-eight and thirty-two.
“Yeah. No need to remind me. I’m going to be an overworked junior editor with no boyfriend and a social life that consists of a cat who rarely leaves the couch, a dormouse who plays D&D on her weekends and my parents, who I still call three times a week.”
“Don’t knock your parents. They’re amazing.”
“Oh, I know they are. I love them to bits. But I’m an almost thirty-year-old woman who may as well be still living in her parents’ metaphorical basement.”
“That doesn’t make sense.”
“Shut up and pass me the prawn chips.”
“You know, turning thirty doesn’t mean you need to have your shit together. It’s not some magical line you have to cross and you need to have ticked off a certain number of things -- career, partner, house, kids -- to be accepted as an adult in society. Hell, I’ve only one of the four if we’re judging.”
“And how you made watching films into a career is beyond me.” Nif shook the last of the crumbs into her mouth and almost choked when Sapha reached over and poked her in the stomach.
“You read books for a living. You can’t point fingers.”
Nif couldn’t figure out how to answer that without descending into a pity party so instead she chewed on her chopsticks and tried to figure out who the main lead was in the film they were not quite watching.
“It’ll be okay, you know,” Sapha said, just as Nif was entering that strange dreamy stage between a food coma and sleep. “Your life won’t end at thirty. It’ll be just another day. You’re the only one running in your race, so just do better than your yesterday self.”
Warmth pooled over her lap and she felt soft fur against her arms as Sapha shifted and cuddled close. Nif knew she should go to bed, but she just couldn’t bring herself to move.