Hybrid

Turnabout

"Oh, hey mom," I said awkwardly, not turning around to face her.

Isaac was able to pull his shift back quickly enough to avoid suspicion on his part, turning around to greet my mother.

"We're just being dumb," Isaac said, trying to cover for me.

"Dumb how?" My mother asked.

"Just guy stuff," Isaac said.

I fought desperately to calm myself down to pull the shift back, but having my mother right behind me was stressing me out and making the shift worse. I figured I had no other choice but to come out to her eventually, so I turned around, smiling teeth and all.

My mother gasped, which was expected. Putting her hands to her face, she looked me over.

"Hey mom." My voice sounded like an animal's, and I felt like I was going through puberty all over again.

"When did this happen?" She asked.

"Today?"

I could hear her heartbeat speed up slightly, and I knew she was getting nervous. I probably looked fairly scary, but she didn't know I was as harmless as a fly despite my appearance.

"We're going to get this under control as quickly as possible, don't worry," Isaac tried to comfort my mother.

"Is it not under control?" She took a step back.

I wanted to get closer to show her I wouldn't hurt her, but I also didn't want to scare her even worse, so I stayed in place and lifted my hands to show I meant no harm.

"He's just new at this," Isaac said.

I felt the shift going down and it made me so excited that it came back.

"I'm really not allowed to have emotions any more am I?" I groaned.

"Don't be such a loser and figure it out." Isaac rolled his eyes.

"I don't like the tough love." I frowned.

"But when you're focused on something else, you calm down. Look at your hands." Isaac pointed at me.

My shift had gone away and my claws were gone. I felt a lot better knowing I wasn't stuck like that forever. I had a right to be over dramatic at the moment, I was a human hours ago. 

"Should I hide all the fragile things in the house?" My mother asked.

"Yeah, I already accidentally broke a container," I admitted.

"How?" My mother waved her hands, "Never mind, I don't want to know."

She walked inside, grabbing pictures and other glass items first. She was being surprisingly more understanding than I had expected, but at the same time this change felt like it was going to happen eventually, it just came sooner than most of us had planned.

I made my way inside, trying to convince myself that I wouldn't shatter everything I touched. By the end of the night, I was doing a lot better. The only setback was when I was playing video games with Isaac, my reactions were so fast that I couldn't lose, but it was intense and my shift came out, nearly breaking the controller.

We went to school the next day and Isaac was prepared to take me down at any moment. They were right about the building being overwhelming, and I resisted the urge to cover my ears every two seconds. For the most part, I was able to get through the first half of the day without any problems.

Maria was accompanied by her bodyguard. She would glance at me every few minutes when she could get away with it without Joe noticing. I hated how grabby he was with her, and I felt myself having to take deep breaths each time he even looked at her. Eventually, he pushed it too far, and Isaac needed to pull me out of the room.