The numbers don't look right to you, as there are only 3: 4, 13, 666. Not being an avid lottery player, you figure that there was be a game which would use those numbers. You flip over your fortune, and frown.
"Your number's up. You grow down," it read.
"Grow down?" you say starting to crumple the fortune. Then you chuckle and shove it into your front pocket. "Grow down - more likely the writer meant "You're going down." Not the greatest fortune, I'd better be careful crossing the street."
As you walk home from the Chinese restaurant, you start to itch. You run your fingers through your hair and painfully pluck the source of one of the irritations from your head. You thought it was a big mosquito, but in your hand you hold a tiny feather with blood on the quill - your blood. You lose your grip on the feather and wafts away on the breeze. You notice that your thumb and index finger no longer are able to meet. You also notice that your fingers are growing ridiculously long. It takes nearly five minutes for you to extract the house key from your pocket and open your door. In the end, your pants pocket is badly torn, and you had to use both hands and your mouth to position the key in the lock and turn it.
As the keys drop from your lips, so do a few teeth. You panic and run to the bathroom. It had to be something you ate at the Chinese restaurant, you think. But you never heard of any food poisoning like this - it's more like radiation sickness: hair and teeth falling out, muscle pains, and the like. You recall hearing about a guy in London being poisoned at a restaurant by a former KGB assassin using a radioactive isotope, and you wonder if you might have gotten someone else's food. You've heard that some of these small places "recycle leftovers" from patrons who didn't finish their meals, by scraping them back into the serving pots. Your mind is racing with evil thoughts.
You flip on the light and lean into the mirror for a closer look. You are horrified at the distortions already visible on your face, and the downy feathers interspersed with your hair. Tufts of hair fall from your head as the down begins to fill in the bald spot. Your five o'clock shadow feels like down as you run your fingers over your face. Suddenly, you bend over the sink and vomit out blood and teeth and most of your Chinese dinner. You make a royal mess of the bathroom, as you fill the sink and dribble on the floor trying to get to the toilet bowl. Then you fill it.
The first thing you notice when this wave of nausea subsides is that you've lost height. You can barely see into the mirror now. Hard orange ridges protrudes from the top and bottom lips. They're like giant finger nails, you think, or maybe duck bills. You freeze and stare. Your face is covered with downy feathers, only stray hairs remain on your head. You rip open your shirt to reveal a fully feathered torso. Your hands are all wrong. There appear to be just two long fingers at the end of each wrist. Your over all arm length from shoulder to finger tip is definitely longer, but your arm lengths from shoulder to elbow and elbow to wrist definitely seem shorter than normal.
You hear a van pull up out front, and peek out the window. The writing on the van's exterior identifies it as the catering van for the restaurant you dined at earlier.
Something pings in your brain. You remember the dry erase board with specials when you entered. The sign proclaimed that people should put their orders in early because in two days the Special would be Peking Duck. You stare at your reflection in the mirror and wonder. The van doors slam. You look out to see two Asian thugs walking from the van toward your house. You swallow hard. You have to go. You stop yourself after climbing on the window ledge. You may be turning into a bird, but you're not ready to fly yet.