Kevin waited long enough to make certain everyone in the house had gone to sleep. His brother slept like a log, so he wasn't really afraid of sneaking into Jared's room. His fear was that his parents would hear him creeping down the hall to his brother's room.
Every creak on the old floorboards sounded exceptionally loud in Kevin's ears, and the door to Jared's room grated as he pulled it open. Once inside, he noticed his heart racing and he had almost forgotten to breathe.
Jared had turned onto his back, the back of his skull pressed into his pillow. A small stream of saliva had formed from the corner of his mouth. "Eew," Kevin squealed as he pulled the covers back with his gloved hands and carefully rested the amulet against his brother's chest. Even as he watched, Jared's sparse chest hairs began to increase in number.
Without waiting for the transformation to fully take effect, Jared's brother stole out of the room. If he had stayed, he would have witnessed the changes speed to their ultimate conclusion as a pelt of heavy fur covered Jared's body before his other features, including the shape of his face, began to change. He groaned slightly in his sleep and rolled onto his side.
The next morning, Jared struggled to turn off the alarm clock, which emitted a painful, piercing shriek. He slapped at the clock twice with his hand before he knocked it from the nightstand to fall with a clatter to the floor. He groaned and tried to catch a few more minutes of sleep before he knew his mom would tap on his door or send Kevin with the message to get out of bed.
Finally, it wasn't a mother's nagging that drove him out of bed. A pressure on his bladder convinced him to leave the bed, but when he tumbled to the floor while trying to stand, biting his own tongue in the process and letting out a pained yelp, he knew that Kevin had been in his room.
"Little twerp!" He meant to exclaim, but his comment came out as a low growl.
"Great," he thought. "I'm a dog again."
He trotted into his bathroom, where a full-length mirror on the back of the door offered him a complete view in black-and-white of his new body. He could barely see his reflection for the fur that fell across his eyes.