Lina's eyes widened as she recognized that a human face was emerging out from the fuzzy muzzle. As his ears slimmed down to a better proportioned size, he sighed in relief. He used his new human hands to examine his fur-less body.
"Oh man, does that feel good," he said. Then he noticed Lina. "Sorry about stealing your ring, but...well, I stole it first." A foolish smile spread over his face.
Lina was, at the moment, not as furious as she probably should have been. After all, he had just screwed her over by preventing her own return to the human race. But instead, she was eying his short black hair and slightly muscled build. He wasn't going to make the football team, but he certainly had an attractive enough body for Lina's moderate tastes. His body was grimy with dirt that had accumulated after months, or even years of being a rat, and his hair was tousled and filthy. "Um...," she squeaked out a response. "I'm Lina."
"I'm Ian," he replied. He held out his hand, but realized the pointlessness and withdrew it. "I have to thank you for helping me get back to normal."
"And I have to thank you for making me stay a rat for the rest of my life!" Lina shouted, suddenly recovering her senses and realizing what this meant for her. In her fury, she leaped off the shelf and onto his shoulder, biting and nipping at his neck and scurrying out of the way of his flailing limbs as he attempted to catch her.
"Stop it! Stop it!" he shouted, backing into another shelf and toppling boxes of necklaces and collars to the floor. He finally managed to brush her off, then quickly set about reorganizing the fallen items out of fear another transformation would befall him.
Lina shook off her dizziness from the fall and was about to jump on him again, but saw the fearful look in his eyes as he worked rapidly to return each item to its proper box.
"Just how long were you a rat?" Lina asked.
"I don't really know," he said as he put the final collars away. "It's been a long time, though. I was fifteen when I stole that ring. Thought it would look good on my girlfriend and I didn't have a lot of cash."
Lina told him the exact date to help him realize the passage of time.
"Then I just missed my nineteenth birthday," he sighed. "I wonder if my family's forgotten all about me?"
"I'm sure they wouldn't forget about their own son," she said in a genuinely consoling way. She might be angry at her own fate, but she had begun to understand how he had already suffered for so long.
"No, I mean I wonder if the curse that turned me into a rat erased me from history. You know, to keep anyone from snooping around trying to find out where I had gone."
"Oh," she realized.
"I tried to return the ring the day after it turned me into a rat," he explained. "But as I was searching for the right aisle the old man found me and took the ring back himself. I had to wait until someone else took it before I could make my move. And now, here you are."
"I guess fate has a funny way of turning things around," Lina pondered.
"I was afraid fate had me pegged a rat for life when you first came," Ian continued. "I saw you take it, but I couldn't get close enough to you without either you or that friend of yours spotting me. But, thank God, you came back." He smiled. "And I promise I will try and help you change back as well."
"What if I just pick up the ring again and then put it back?"
"That would count as stealing it twice, and only returning it once," he said. "So you'd still be cursed.
Ian and Lina fell quiet, trying to think of a method that didn't involve waiting around for three years for someone else to take the ring. Lina finally spoke up, but about something entirely different. "You...um...should probably get some clothes."
Ian let out an embarrassed "Oh!" and his face turned red. He covered his crotch with his hands. "I'm so used to being naked, it didn't even occur to me..." He wandered out of the aisle. "I'll be right back!"