Later that evening, Tony found a radio in his drawer that he hadn't realized would be there. It was nice to have at least one human pastime while he was still human enough to enjoy it. He plugged it in and quickly found himself singing along to the gangster rap stars he idolized.
"Yo, yo, Costa Caballo! Don't touch that dial, you lisnin' to XLTF, 120.2: Da Hood!" pumped the announcer.
"Shit, I always dreamed of endin' up on this station," Tony thought to himself in his room. "Hmph, I guess it's officially not gonna happen now!" he thought. It would have to be okay, he decided. He was here because he'd already given up that dream in the first place, among others.
Suddenly there was a loud knock on the wall that made Tony's movable but still-human ears perk up. An angry male voice followed, "Turn that crap down! Some of us are tryin' to sleep, ya hear?"
Tony was surprised because he didn't actually think it was that loud, in fact he was surprised someone would be able to hear it from next door. Maybe the neighbor's hearing had changed to be more sensitive than his own? Tony kind of wanted to yell back some smart remark but settled on just putting in the provided pair of headphones for a while.
After dinner, which came in a dog bowl but was some kind of multigrain turkey wrap, Tony heard a knock on his door and went to answer it. Tony opened his door and saw Megan standing there waiting to be let in. The first things he noticed were her ears: they were very tall, very wide and very deep, and they even had some of her increasingly short brown and black hair sprouting up from them. She also now had a third pair of nipples.
"Uh, wow, Megan, what can I say? Nice ears! Must be pretty wild to go around detecting everything a dog does," he said in amazement.
"Speak for yourself, wet-nose," she said with a sly grin, inspiring him to look in the mirror. He did a double-take and than immediately leaned in closer to the mirror, poking and prodding and examining. He even opened his mouth to see if he'd missed any changes, and that's when he discovered his wide and flat but still human-length tongue. No wonder he'd bit his tongue a few times while chatting with David!
Tony tried to play it cool and invited Megan to sit down on the bed with him, ready to talk with her about his day.
"So did you meet your new trainer today?" he asked in a chill voice.
"Yeah," she said, "her name's Daisy. Honestly I think it sounds more like a dog's name than mine. I guess it went okay, though. She worked me pretty hard, but she seemed nice enough."
"My man David is a total homie. I cannot believe I lucked out with him! He even said we're going on an adventure tomorrow. I can't wait to see what he has in mind."
"That rocks, Tony, but, um, do you mind if we chat a little quieter? I am still gettin' used to these things after all," Megan asked gently, flexing her huge shepherd ears so he'd get the hint.
"Oh, sure, um, no problem," Tony answered almost at a whisper. "So how was it? Did you get to try out that awesome playground out behind that first building we went in?"
"Yeah, Daisy took me out there in the afternoon. That Bedlow woman from the intake office was out there. She knew we were friends and said she'd seen you out there with your trainer this morning. She said you seemed to be having a good time."
Tony had not actually thought of anyone actually seeing him out there, since he had spent most of the time basically alone with David, but it stood to reason that he could be seen from office windows while he was in the outdoor part. He suddenly found himself hoping that nobody had a certain kind of mess David had to clean up for him out there. He quickly changed the subject. "So," he asked, "who else is with us in here? So far you're the only one I've met."
Megan laughed. "I'm not surprised," she explained, "There really aren't that many, only two that I know of. There's some asshole that's next door to you, I guess. He's turning into a bomb sniffing labrador, got here before we did and is too high and mighty to talk to the rest of us. Then there's my next door neighbor, some old biddy who's turning into a shepherd like us but cries like a baby every night over every little change." Megan started mocking the old woman in a whiny mimicking voice: "Oh no! A tail! Oh no! My breasts! Oh no! I'm growing fur! What have I done to myself? Fifty years of marriage and now I'm not even a woman! Aaah! Somebody make it stop! Make it stop!!!"
Megan finished her impression with a pretend faint. Tony and Megan both burst out laughing hysterically. Megan choked out, "I didn't even dog ears to hear that snowflake melting!" Tony tried to catch his breath and nodded.
"Haha yeah I can see why not," he said, wiping a tear of humor from his eye. "Anyway, it's nice to have confirmation that it isn't just us. At least it, um, explains, um, I guess some certain things I smelled out in the training yard, I guess," he stammered awkwardly. Megan blushed and bit her lip as though she thought Tony might have find out something embarrassing about her. Instead of mentioning it, she just stayed on topic.
"Yeah," she said, "I think we're just the only two who happen to be here now that actually get along."
Tony smiled at that. He WANTED to get along with Megan. He liked that she seemed to wanna talk to him. He liked that she smelled really good somehow to his sensitive wet nose. And most of all, he liked that she was turning into a dog just like he was, and that they could sort of enjoy the experience together along the way.