The first stop Harold made was the campus store, as it was the closest and was never truly a bad idea. It might not have all the professional clothing he'd need to dress himself in while teaching or things like underwear and so on, but it would be helpful. It would at least give him some things that he could wear around the house and do various chores in when he wasn't teaching. He'd kept a fair collection of things like jeans and tee-shirts for those sorts of tasks, like cutting grass, keeping on task with what maintenance jobs he knew how to do, or simply staying comfortable.
But his old clothes didn't fit him anymore. He could get some of them on, but the pants pinched in all the wrong places and were extremely short on him now. He couldn't even button many of his shirts and the tee-shirts that he had were now incredibly tight. A part of his mind absentmindedly mused over keeping them just to wear for Virginia and show off how muscular he had become, but he put that aside for the moment. He would need new clothes that would fit him better for both work and so on. He couldn't just rely on elastic and outfits that didn't fit for the next four centuries from what he'd been told.
His walk was fairly quiet and no one bothered him, though he did get a few odd looks from students on the campus sidewalks. He likely figured they were simply thinking about how ill fitting his present clothes were. He figured he had no reason to correct them on that. The thing that surprised him the most was on how many Normals there were on campus. He figured the college was something of place where Moon Lake's weres could get their college degrees and still have the freedom to be weres and thus was open only to those in Moon Lake, not knowing that A) while most of Moon Lake's population were Weres of some kind, the town did have a fairly large Normal population that lived alongside them and that B) part of what protected Moon Lake's secret was that they kept things open so not as to attract a lot of inquisitive eyes and ears. Thus Normal students from outside Moon Lake and even outside Washington State could enroll. The only odd thing they ever reported was an odd waiver in which they agreed not to divulge anything odd they might see while in Moon Lake to any form of media, including all social media outlets. Harold would find that out eventually, though.
He ultimately found the college store in the Student Union building. It was small and half of it was devoted to selling the college's books, and the other half was devoted to clothing and various school supplies of various kinds. There were also knickknacks that included things like coffee mugs and so on. They actually looked nice, and Harold figured he'd come back at some point and buy a mug or two, but he wasn't going to use the allowance he'd gotten to upgrade his wardrobe on coffee mugs. He made his way toward the sets of clothes that they had and began observing their various sizes. The dean had given him the general sizes that would more comfortably fit a weretiger in his human form, though he did remind him that there were no clothing that would fit him in his tiger form. An over-sized robe might fit to cover him in public, but also carried the commentary that for the most part at night he would be allowed go anywhere in his fursona and be as naked as he wished, though there were a few areas even in Moon Lake that kept some of those things having some restrictions in order to keep people driving through Moon Lake from finding anything out, but for the moment, he wasn't here to worry about robes, but to get standard clothes that he would need.
His looking through things did alert a lone woman from a back desk and she came up to approach him. For a few moments he didn't notice her and it wasn't until she spoke that he did notice her presence.
"Do you need any help, sir?" he heard a feminine voice, which did alert him.
He turned and caught her scent and barely held back a growl when he caught her wereraccoon scent.
"I'm just looking into getting some new clothes that would fit me," Harold managed after a few moments, "after everything that went on yesterday."
The woman gave a heavy sigh and looked down for a moment and then looked back at him. She seemed to catch on to Harold's frustration and antagonism toward Alice Decrux without him mentioning it.
"What has my mother done?" the woman asked with a sigh.
"Your mother..." Harold said slowly.
"My name is Megan Decrux," she answered with a sigh, "Alice is my mother. And the local radio did talk about her being in a fight with a weretiger yesterday."
"She tried to turn me," Harold borderline growled.
"Given your scent it would be clear that she failed," Megan answered, "So, you may feel glad at that. I apologize for being drawn into family troubles."
"Family troubles?" Harold asked.
"Everyone knows of the things my mother has done that's been... questionable," Megan said slowly and with a heavy sigh, "think she is some kind of rogue like Yvette Smith was... and when I found out about all that it did make us grow distant... But she really isn't a rogue... at least not deliberately."
"Wanting to turn people and then milking them for child support isn't rogue?" Harold growled.
"It isn't good... but it isn't outright evil and not without its causes," Megan sighed again, "and causes that she's never really addressed."
Harold raised an eyebrow to her. Physically she looked like she was about the same age as Alice, but then he figured a were's lengthy lifespan would mean that despite being younger than her mother, both of them were in the age bracket that would allow them to look to be about the same age.
"From what I know..." Megan began to explain, "is that when she was young... she had one boy that she really loved, and I'm not talking about simply looking for a good time and then milking for money. I'm talking about marriage, white picket fence, and the works."
"What happened?" Harold asked with curiosity.
"He eventually ran off with some other woman on her," Megan answered, "and that REALLY hurt her and she never really forgave him for it. Sort of holding an opinion not to be loyal to anyone if they're not going to be loyal to you."
"But there is more to life than just one guy," Harold pointed out.
"I tried that," Megan sighed, "but she was so hung up on this guy that she really didn't have any faith in that. It's something that she's clung to as part of her own sense of punishment on all men. Since they can't be loyal... she'll put them in a situation where they have to take responsibility for someone other than themselves. Unfortunately, she's never understood that the guy that hurt her wasn't a true sample of every man..."
"So all that she's done is nothing more than getting even for the actions of one jerk?" Harold asked.
"Pretty much," Megan answered, "It doesn't justify what she's done or mean that she could be easily forgiven... or even relate to what happened to you yesterday... but it'd be best that you understood WHY she's acted the way she's acted."
"Well... I thank you," Harold said slowly, "but for the moment... I'm more interested in getting some clothing that will fit the new me."
Megan Decrux nodded, "Well... we have a few tee shirts with the college logo or the initials, a few pairs of socks with the college initials, and some golf polos with the logo or initials and all of them are in the school colors. Students wear them to college sports events, even if their only within the college... for the reasons that are obvious. Some professors may wear them during the day... and so on."
Harold nodded as Megan continued.
"If you're looking for more than just Moon Lake College apparel you may need to go to the K-Mart here in town," Megan continued, "though, they'd probably only be good for day to day wear... the quality of what they'd have for professional wear is going to be limited."
"Does Moon Lake have any place that would work for more professional wear?" Harold asked.
"Outside of Awareness, none," Megan answered, "but because Awareness sells so that smaller weres can have clothes they can transform in... while they may produce clothing that will fit your human form, they will be pricey and you'd still need to disrobe before transforming. There is a Big and Tall store in Seattle, however, and they should have plenty of more professional clothes and shoes and so on."
Harold sighed and then nodded, "Well... thank you... for everything."
"No problem," Megan answered, "the cashier there at the front desk will handle things when your ready."
Harold nodded. He watched as Megan walked off. As he began picking out a few pieces of clothing that would work well and would fit him, he thought over what she'd told him. She was apparently one of the children that Alice Decrux had carried and raised through her various schemes and events. Unlike her mother she seemed calm and perhaps even frustrated/disappointed in the things her mother had done but that family love remained, which made sense to him. It would be pretty hard for the parental bond to children and a child's bond to its parent to break to the point of open hatred. He figured Megan told him to make sure that he understood some of her mother's motivations, even if they didn't justify her actions. Alice might not be some evil mastermind with no humanity, but that didn't mean she could or should be doing what she had been doing. For the moment though, Harold still had his clothes shopping to do.
He handled his shopping at the college and soon moved on to the other various shopping trips he needed to make sure he had clothing that would fit the new him well. It did well with every he could get in Moon Lake. The K-Mart wasn't too bad and they did have some socks he could use for dress socks if need be, though he didn't buy too many of those as while his old socks didn't quite fit perfectly, they actually came the closest to actually fitting him. It worked out fairly well and didn't cut into the five hundred dollar allowance that he had to upgrade his wardrobe. The biggest thing that he noticed was that when many of the weres that met him learned that he was newly transformed, they congratulated him and welcomed him to were society almost as if they were old friends. When he tried to explain the circumstances he met some of the same concerns that both Virginia and Dean Myers had given him relating to Moon Lake's Statute 1A, but they did state that they hoped things worked out well for him.
From there, he went on, driving into Seattle and handling the last of his clothing shopping needs. This included getting more professional clothes, both short sleeved and longs sleeved, khakis, navy blue and black colored professional pants and even some shoes that fit him a bit more comfortably, as in his transformation even his feet had gotten a bit larger though not necessarily too much bigger. The trip ate through nearly all of the five hundred dollars that the college had for him to use and ultimately took some time given the drive to Seattle and finding the stores suggested to him, but things were ultimately worth it in that Harold had clothing that would fit him.
When he finished he then moved on to head home and hoped that Melissa had had a good day and followed his instructions on his note. Trevor had seemed like a nice boy and had been quite helpful in terms of getting furniture and other things put in place, but that didn't mean that Harold wasn't going to stop being a protective dad and making sure that his baby girl didn't get herself into any trouble.