"Let's go to my apartment." I say, "We can eat and rest there and figure out a way to get you back to normal." "Ok" she says, "be careful though." I place her down for a moment while I pull my shirt back on and gather our stuff, then I start to lower my hand before hesitating, "Can I pick you up?" I ask, "it would be a lot faster if I didn't have to lower my hands each time and I'd feel a lot better snout your safety when I only have one hand to hold you with." "I guess" Ava says, wincing slightly at the idea. That was good enough for me, so I reached down and wrapped my fingers around her. As I picked her up she yipped again. As adorable as it was, I still asked her, "You ok?" "Yea maybe go a bit more slowly next time" she mumbled, "also could you not hold me so tight?" "Sorry," I responded, "but I don't want you to fall, we good now?" "Yea we can go" she replied.
I started walking towards the street, intent on taking the bus since I was getting pretty hungry, then I realized something, "Uhh, Ava. I'm going to put you in my pocket, Ok?" I asked her. "What?! No! Why?!" She yelled back, pushing against my hand. "Ava calm down, I don't want to drop you by accident. I'm going to put you in my pocket because I don't think people will react well to someone walking around holding a tiny tiger person" I explain, "I see two options, you can try to make a wish, which will probably end badly, or I can hide you somewhere safe. Of the places available, I think many pocket's the safest one. Ok?" For a second, she just sat there before sputtering "wha.. but.. no! You can't put me in your pocket!" "Do you have a better idea?" I asked, "no.. but you can't..." "Pocket it is then" I responded before putting her in my pocket quickly, before she could respond.
I hope that she's not too mad at me when she gets out... She does need to calm down though, a pocket moving on it's own isn't much better than someone holding a tiger person. "Shhhh." I say as I reach into my pocket and start stroking her, "calm down, it's going to be fine Ava." After petting her for a minute or so, she stops moving and I start walking to the bus stop.
When we get to my apartment I reach into my pocket and pull Ava out, bracing myself for an onslaught of abuse, only to find her curled up into a ball and sleeping. I decide that she's too adorable to wake up right now so I go and prepare dinner.
After my hamburger it's ready, I cut an edge off and place it on a napkin. Then I start stroking her back. After a few seconds she starts purring. Snickering to myself, I pet her for a few moments longer before calling her name softly. "Ava, Ava, wake up. I have food." At the mention of food, she rolled over and pushed my hand away. "Also, your purring" I said grinning. At that, she snapped upwards and glared at me. In response, I pushed the piece of hamburger towards her. She glared at mgr a bit more before grabbing my peace offering. "Do you forgive me?" I asked her. "Hmm, only if you give me more hamburger" she said scarfing it down. I took that as a sign that everything was fine.
After dinner, I folded up a few tissues to make Ava a makeshift sleeping bag. Then carried her over. Rather than get in, she curled up right on top of the tissues, I guess that was more comfortable for her as a bipedal tiger. I turned off the lights and went through my routine to get ready for bed, and by the time I came back Ava was already fast asleep!
I lay down and thought about all the fun I could have tomorrow.