Lady watched Marcy leave the house for her date, then settled down to think.
She'd been a dog for weeks, and it simply wasn't working out the way that she'd wanted. Animals, especially pets, spent a lot of their time alone, or at least without direct attention. She did have a lot of fun at times, of course. It was odd playing catch with her father, for example, but fun.
The next morning, she talked to Marcy about it. "I know I dumped on you last night. Do you mind if I think about this a little longer?"
Marcy smiled at her and rubbed her ears, "Of course. Look, you made a kinda impulsive choice, and I was impulsive to take advantage of it. I'm still willing to make you almost anything, except for me."
Lady spent the next couple of weeks examining her life, trying to figure out what would make it better. Even if she was miserable right now, this was such an unobtainable dream that she wanted to make it work. Slowly, she started to consider changes, to herself or her family, that would make this life more bearable.
Marcy, in the meantime, was living her life well and had no regrets. She was still dating Calvin, who seemed almost made for her. Lady questioned Marcy at one point, but she'd only laughed, "Strangly enough, I haven't used my power in weeks. I'm really trying to see what happens here."
Finally, one night while Marcy was reading for class, Lady lept up onto the bed, "Okay, Marcy, I'm ready to make my choice, if you don't mind."
Marcy pet her a bit, "Okay, what do you want to do?"
Lady panted, a little worried, "It's not one thing, really. Do you mind if ask you to make a bunch of smaller changes?"
She thought for a second, "No promises, but lets see what you want."
"Okay, I think I need more animal instinct. You gave me just enough to fit into this body and move naturally, but it's not enough to live like this. I need to be able to eat dogfood and like it, I need to have the urge to bark at passing cars, I need..." she trailed off, embrarresed, "I need to be able to crap in the backyard without feeling like a pervert."
Marcy nodded, "That's doable. What if I go too far?"
The dog chuffed, "Something tells me that it won't be a problem. If you go too far, I probebly won't care, will I?"
Marcy smiled, "What else?"
"Get my... your parents to buy me better food. This stuff tastes awful."
"Easy enough," she answered, "What else?"
Lady paused, "I need a companion, another dog. Someone to play with, interact with... mate with."
It was clear that Lady thought Marcy would balk at this, but she took it in stride. Even if she didn't have a lot of instinct, she did have some. "Okay, you have someone specific in mind?" she asked.
Lady shook her head, "That's not what I meant! I don't want you to make a victim of someone, I want you to find me a male dog. Just a dog."
Marcy smiled, "If we find a person, a willing person, you'd have someone you could actually talk with. If we can't find someone willing, we'll just find a dog at the pound."
The dog finally nodded. It was clear that Marcy had something in mind, and she couldn't stop her even if she wanted. "So what do we do now?"