“You- you can help us?” Alexis asks, craning her neck forward in anticipatory hope. This was the first person to offer any kind of… anything. “Fix you up”… that had to be it. Right? Surely this lady had something that could make all of this go away.
“Of course! You come in. I’ll fix you right up,” the woman said with a gentle, warm smile, not any of that leering smirks the other employees had offered before.
“Might as well,” Jon said with a shrug of his shoulders, heading in without pausing for Alexis. She swallowed a lump in her throat and followed along, barely noticing that both of them were walking with a semi-quadrupedal gait.
“The section for males is that way,” the lady said to Jon, who made his way over without a word. Alexis stuck near the lady.
“I’ll help you find something that fits, my dear,” she said. “But why such a pretty monkey would wish to cover her fur in just as it’s starting to take form is beyond me.”
“I’m not a monkey!” Alexis screeched, recoiling back.
“Aren’t you, though?” The lady asked in response, and there was no venom to her tone. No mockery.
“I mean… I don’t WANT to be a monkey…” Alexis sighed. She really was turning into a monkey, wasn’t she?
“Why not? What is wrong with being a monkey?”
“I… I… because it’s not what I am! It’s not what I was.”
“That doesn’t mean it can’t still be wonderful. Did you climb a tree?”
“I… yeah,” Alexis nodded her head.
“How did it feel?”
“It felt… awesome,” Alexis’s eyes went wide. She really had enjoyed her jaunt up the tree, grabbing those bananas. It felt right and natural and freeing.
“Sit with me, little monkey,” the lady said as she sat down on a bench and patted her lap. It was only then that Alexis realized how big the woman was. She towered over Alexis easily, leading Alexis to wonder just how tall she was. Ten feet? Twenty? Wait. No.
Alexis looked around the store. Everything was big. The walls, the shirts, the fixtures… it wasn’t that they were big, it’s that Alexis was small. Small like a monkey. She stepped out of the tattered remains of her clothes and hopped up to the bench with a deft jump, and sat next to the lady.
“Do you know what clothes are to a monkey, my dear?” The lady asked.
“Ook?” Alexis asked in response, not realizing that she wasn’t speaking human words anymore.
“They’re servitude,” she answered. “Right now, your boyfriend is finding a vest and a little hat that fit him perfectly. And then he will find an organ grinder who will teach him to dance. Do you want that for you?”
Alexis shook her head “no”.
“Clever little monkey,” the lady said with a smile. “Would you like to find the jungle and be happy?”
“Jungle - ook- happy!” Alexis answered. She still had a tiny bit of humanity left, just enough to communicate on a rudimentary level.
“Good monkey,” the lady nodded her head. “For you, this place is no punishment. For you, we offer freedom.”
“Free monkey! Ooh-ah!” Alexis liked the sound of that.
“And maybe you can find a much nicer boyfriend than that utter dolt you came here with,” Alexis liked the sound of that. Jon really was a jerk.