The furry formula

I've always enjoyed working at the Wildlife rehab center. The animals just seem to take to me. Especially the raccoons. I admit I fell in love with them the first day I got to work with them. Even so much that I took a few home with me to care for overnight. I wouldn't have, if I knew what kind of trouble it would cause, but it seemed like a very humane gesture at the time.

Davey, my 10 year old son, was really excited to see the raccoon babies. He always did like raccoons, and he was very good with them. Late that evening they were flocking all over us, trying to get at the two bottles of formula I had. Even so, we got them all fed in pretty short order. That was enough to get them heading towards sleep, and so we snuck out of the room. "Here Davey, put the leftovers in the fridge for their breakfast." Davey was looking at the formula curiously.
"Earth to Davey...Davey come in..." I joked, waving my hand in front of his face.
"Yeah, I'm coming. Can I try it, dad?"
"Try what?"
"Y'know...the formula. The kits sure like it."
He raised it to his lips. I grabbed it before he tried it. "Davey, it's for animals! Wild one's at that. I don't even know if it's safe!"
"Awww dad! It's just formula. Powdered milk, y'know?"
"It's not safe! Go get ready for bed. I'm gonna need help with them in the morning, too"
This got him flat out sulking. He went upstairs and changed. He came down and made a point of the fact that he had his raccoon pajamas on. I guess he thought that qualified him for a taste of the formula. "No bedtime milk for you, my little raccoon. Get to sleep!" He stormed off, quite mad. I made it a point to watch the fridge for a while, just in case he tried to get some later. He'd done it before. After a good hour and a half, I was convinced he was in bed, and so I got ready for myself. I drifted off quickly, pleased to be helping the raccoons.

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I couldn't believe my dad wouldn't let me try the formula...it's not like it could hurt me or anything. I decided to prove it. After he was in bed and asleep I snuck back down to the fridge and found a bottle of formula. Getting used to the nipple took a little while and I didn't get much out. Once I figure out the trick, though, I got a nice mouthful.

I was right. It tasted like powdered milk. A little sweeter then I was used to, but quite tasty. Having succeeded in my quest to prove Dad wrong I went back to bed, finally able to sleep.

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I was brought back to unhappy wakefulness by someone shaking me.
"Dad! Dad! Help!"
I looked at him, bleary eyed in the dark room. The shadows were making some odd patterns across his face. "Huh?"
"Dad, I have a tail!"
He turned around a displayed it to me. It looked like a raccoons tail, growing over the top of his pajama shorts.
"Clever trick, Davey. Couldn't it have waited till morning?"
"It's not a trick, Dad! Feel it!"
He let it fall to the bed, and it felt too heavy to be a fake. I reached out and felt it, and it felt warm, and just like a tail I would feel at the rehab center. I jerked my hand away. "Davey? What's going on?" He looked truly scared. "I don't know. I rolled over and felt this tail a couple minutes ago!" I rolled out of bed and flipped on the light. As soon as I did, I realized we had a really big problem. The tail was only the beginning. Davey couldn't see it, but he had the beginnings of a classical raccoon mask. “Davey, I don’t know what’s going on here at all, but I think you’re turning into a raccoon.”
”A racc…but...how?”
I couldn’t blame him for being scared. I think I would have been just as bewildered if it had been happening to me. “Shhhhh…I don’t know Davey. Just come sit down, and we’ll try and figure this out.” I patted a spot next to me on the bed, and he slowly sat down, carefully avoiding sitting on his new tail. I found myself stroking his head as if he were a raccoon I was trying to comfort at the rehab center. His hair was slowly getting softer to the touch. I didn’t want to worry him more buy telling him. The hair was going from dark brown to grey, too. I wish, looking back, I could have gotten a picture of him like that. He had a full mask and stripes over the eyes, and his ears were starting to perk up into triangles. His tail was twitching just a little bit. It was an almost disgustingly cute moment. He seemed to have calmed down, to some extent, and he curled up on my bed soon after. He even wrapped his tail up to his slightly black nose…just like a raccoon. I wasn’t sure what to do. I didn’t want to wake him up again, or disturb him at all, he was in for a tough time as it was, it seemed. So I just sat there and kept stroking him. I seemed to keep him calm, and I didn’t know what else I could do. But even as I petted him, he was getting more like a raccoon. His face was jutting out into a muzzle, and most of his body had grey fur on it. His hands were, well, paws…the thumb was almost gone, and I could see the beginnings of some claws sticking out. The poor kid…I wished I knew what had started all this. We spent the night in the lonely vigil…waiting, watching, and him sleeping. As dawn broke, ever so slowly, he was curled up on top of his pajamas. It didn’t look as though he’d ever been human. I slowly slipped out of the room, exhausted, hungry, and honestly scared to be in the room if he woke up. How would Davey react? Or worse, what if he didn’t react at all? What if he really was a raccoon? I stumbled into the kitchen, and saw the fridge door ajar. I reached in and felt the formula. Still cold enough to…well, should I? Could I feed Davey like an animal? Just because he looked like one…but he did need to eat, and it was probably the best thing I had, in the house, for him to eat. I padded back upstairs and into my room. Davey was just beginning to stir. I sat down and scratched his head, hoping…praying that he was still in there somewhere. He opened his eyes and looked at me. Then he looked over his body, as if confirming what he had been dreaming about. Then he looked back up at me, and let out a quiet chitter. I couldn’t think of anything to do but offer him the bottle, so I did. He seemed wary of it, even clumsily swatting it away with his paws. In the end though, I think his hunger got the better of him. He latched on and sucked it until only a mouthful or two remained. He refused to take that, though. He kept nosing it up towards me, almost as if… “That’s it, isn’t it, Davey? You drank this, and it made you a raccoon!” An excited chitter from him.
“And you want me to…”

He wants me to drink it. The thought hit me like a thunderbolt. There he was, my poor body, stuck in a raccoon’s shape. He wanted his daddy. And, I realized, I wanted him too. I would rather give everything up to be with him. Everything. I slowly unscrewed the lid and took a mouthful of formula. It really did taste good, like sweet milk. I lay down and Davey curled up next to me, waiting. I guess…like him…I never felt it start. I was just lying there, and suddenly my jeans got really tight and a big floofy tail was sticking out behind me. I got them off…though not without a noticeable amount of pain, and lay there in just my briefs and t-shirt. I never felt any of it happen really. I just noticed, rather in a daze that I had ears, and fur, and paws, and a mask, and then, hours later, I was a raccoon no bigger then Davey if not smaller. I cuddled up to him, curled next to him and we slept, two raccoon kits, safe and happy close to each other. Some point during the night I woke up, thinking about my wife. How she’d react to finding her husband and son gone. Or to finding two raccoons running about the house, as she’d never shared Davey and my love of the animals. She would tolerate them, but avoid them, if she could. There had to be some way to convince her to keep us…or make her one of us. Slowly a grin spread across my raccoonish features. Raccoons are often lauded for their especially adroit paws. I found out now, since I was one, exactly why that was. I had tried to write a note to my wife, but the pencil was too awkward. I had been able to type out a note, if slowly and with some errors here and there, on our computer. Davey and I hid behind a counter when she arrived. We’d shepperded the other kits into the basement, so it was just her and us. She read the note carefully and then opened the fridge. Everything was working just as it was supposed to. She made herself a cup of tea, and poured the “special” milk into it. If I could have, I would have given Davey a high five right then. The deed was done for better or worse, and now we just had to wait. She lay down, either trying to work off the effects of her trip or the laced tea. As she slipped into dreamland, Davey and I snuck up to watch. The effect was subtle, I had to admit, but it was strangely beautiful, watching rusty brown fur creep over my wife’s, now more like my mother’s, features. Soon after, she curled up on top of her clothes, and Davey and I curled up next to her. Whatever my wife’s feelings about ‘coons were, I knew she wouldn’t be able to help herself once she saw the two of us waiting for her, and her milk.

I’ll never forget the moment she opened her eyes and saw us kits for the first time. If the sunrise could be caught in a single moment, or a single place, her eyes were it. Every worry in me relaxed as I saw that and I snuggled up against her, knowing I was safe, whatever lay ahead.