Hump Day
You buy a huge, ancient looking mirror to place in your hallway. You are pleased with the purchase but you start to run into other problems, like... when did your wardrobe become so ill-fit?
(M POV tf Camel)
You look at the mirror you got at the auction at the pawn shop with a nod. It is a really old mirror and really huge. Not many people bid on it in the first place because it is too large to fit into most apartments. You have placed it at the end of the hall leading from the bedroom and bathroom to the kitchen and dining room area. It is so large it takes up the entire end of the hall and mirrors the entire hall to the kitchen, making it look like it is a 4-way crossing. If you had not already been living here for some time you'd actually be worried of mistakenly trying to walk into the reflection thinking it was another hall.
You were lucky to be able to get this too- the auction was on Wednesday so you would normally be at work, but it was a holiday this year, cutting the week in half, and you got this mirror and a rug for your bedroom- which is what you originally went there to find. There are what appears to be hieroglyphs around the frame of the mirror as well... you should look those up some time and figure out what it says. Wouldn't it be hilarious if your mirror was etched with swearwords? Just some Egyptian messing with Americans, knowing they won't be able to read it.
You look into the mirror. Another Wednesday- you got this mirror a full week ago now. Last week went a lot faster than this one is going. You groan and hold your back as you lean back as far as you can, feeling your vertebrae pop back into a better position. Have you been slouching when you work? You never really pay attention to stuff like that, but your back feels stiff as heck and maybe even a bit swollen toward the top? Plus your tail bone sticking out further than most other people is annoying against the back of your pants. You do not remember ever having that problem before, which makes it weird you do now. You have swapped your pants out several times but they all seem to do that now. No one else has a tailbone that sticks out as far as yours- it is an obvious abnormality so it isn't like you can just go shop for pants that accommodate your birth defect.
Another Wednesday to drag your ass through. You sort of wish you had the day off. Go to work on Saturday, and get Sunday and Wednesday off- break the week up so you don't get so wrecked during the weekdays and don't get forced into wasting your entire weekend trying to recover some life. Your back is still stiff too. Is it the office chairs? You try to sit up straight but it is hard- you have to consciously do it, so the moment you start doing anything else your body just wants to slouch again. You let your tiny tail out of your pants, so it flicks around over the back and it seems to work well like this- so it no longer feels strangled under your clothing. It works fine- no one minds it being out, not like there is anything lewd about a proto-tail.
You were not sure the etiquette on the mini tail since, well... no one else has one. There is no point of reference. You asked Frank about it and he said it should be fine- he also mentioned off-handedly about your neck being abnormally long to. You know... you never thought about it, but looking at your reflection now- he is right. It isn't super noticeable but your neck is longer than normal. Huh. That actually might be affecting your posture too.
Oh shoot- the hieroglyphs! You keep forgetting to look up what they mean. Ugh, always too busy. Probably doesn't say anything that important anyway- it is just a mirror. Might just be the signature of the person who made it or the place it was made in.
You groan as you look at your reflection in the mirror this Wednesday. Your clothes do not fit right, forcing you to wear your more flexible clothing to compensate for the time being. Surely you cannot be growing still at this age? Don't people start SHRINKING when they are past maturity? Maybe your clothes are what shrank... but then how did every outfit you have all shrink? Surely you'd notice the clothes getting smaller before you managed to shrink your entire wardrobe.
The sun has been bleaching your hair; turning it more golden than brown. Odd- you haven't been spending that much time outdoors. It also feels softer than normal... did you change shampoo? You don't generally pay that much attention to that sort of stuff, but whatever you are using now must be the good stuff. The tassel on your long ropy tail feels more like your hair used to though. You wash it the same as the hair on your head though, so why does the hair on your head only feel softer? Hrm.
It is surprising you never noticed your longer neck before- it is quite obvious now as you pay attention to it directly in your reflection. No one else has mentioned it, so you suppose the deformity tends to go under everyone's radar.
You look at your reflection and turn your head to examine your face in profile. Yea- your nose is rather wide. But not big really- the bridge does not stick out as far as most people, and is instead double-wide. The cleft in your upper lip is also deeper than others. No one thinks your weird, but you cannot help but note the differences because you are the only person like this that you have ever seen. The giant mirror certainly helps call attention to your appearance too.
You straighten your back easily enough here, but you have a bit of a hump on your upper back so of course you slouch at work! The back of the chair shoves into your hump and forces you to slouch in order to fit into the chair properly! You wonder if you can maybe get HR on that? That seems like a health issue, you should have access to a chair that doesn't hurt your posture. When you stand up straight though- you also notice how tall you are. Wasn't the mirror bigger before? Your much too small clothing doesn't help with your size perception. You should have gotten new clothes by now, but you are not exactly swimming in money and you are busy with work a lot of the time.
You pull the collar of your shirt down and lean forward to see the mat of soft golden hair on your chest- the same golden hair as on your head. It is starting to spread recently. You hear some men become increasingly hairier as they age. It almost looks like it is encroaching on your neck in the front though... that seems weird, right? No one has a hairy neck. At least not at the bottom.
Your clothing barely fits at all, but no one seems to care. You also have a very unique body shape so problems with normal clothing is expected. You had to get HR to buy you a backless chair because your hump is too big- you'd need to be folded in half forward to be able to sit in a normal chair. People have taken to calling you stretch because of how long and bendy your neck is. After unintentionally calling attention to it, you're now known for it. Your neck is at least three times the length of any other person so it is understandable. Not like it looks bad, so you kind of just own it. Your hairline advances unusually far in the back too- you suppose it is stretched out because of the longer neck.
Your teeth are a bit odd too, but it is hard to notice normally because your cleft upper lip overhangs a bit further and looser to compensate. All your front teeth are sloped outward rather steeply, and since they all still meet in the middle- that also means they are twice as long as normal.
You flex your hands in the mirror, looking them over and wondering why they feel so stiff lately. The cleft between your middle and ring finger is unusually deep, and your thumb seems smaller than it should be. Your stiff hands have affected your typing speed at work, but the boss doesn't seem bothered by his performance so far.
Your barely functioning outfit is getting to be a real hassle. Your testicles are a lot bigger now- which is normal for mating season but... your clothes were already too tight. Now you have to be real careful how you move or you'll crush your nuts by accident.
Another week half-over. At least the boss does not expect your work output to be anywhere near the other workers. How could it? Your hands are twice as long! And your tiny, underdeveloped thumbs are so far away from your fingers you cannot hold anything like other people do. Your ring and pinky are fused at the base like your index and middle fingers, so you cannot move them all individually- just in pairs. It is the same thing with your feet- that is why you only wear socks instead of shoes- your sole is twice as long as it should be so there is no shoe that fits you. Except maybe a horseshoe, haha.
You smile at yourself with your long slate-like teeth in the mirror. The end of your nose is level with your upper lip- the cleft of your upper lip connects to it. You are glad you got this mirror- if it were any smaller you would not fit in it. The top of your head in the reflection touches the frame. You scratch the fur on your neck a bit- it has been growing a bit thicker recently and it makes you itch. It connects the longer fur on your head to the fur on your chest.
Your outfit is annoying- it looks comically small on your body. You look at the socks in particular- even though the nails on your two giant toes are not at all sharp- they have still worn a hole in the socks, and they get dirty looking so fast because you cannot wear shoes. Why even bother with them? You do not have normal feet anyway. What should be a sole on a human is instead a cannon bone on you- it forks at the bottom into your two giant toes. Your hands are the same way- making typing a bit difficult since you only have two digits on either hand. You are the only half-camel on staff, so everyone is understanding that your work performance obviously isn't going to be the same as everyone else.
When you bend over to take your socks off, your shirt groans in pain and ruptures completely in half across the back as your massive hump emerges! Oh, well, there that goes. Eh, who cares. Just ditch the clothes entirely. No one expects a camel to wear anything and you are half camel- they should respect your heritage! You pinch the fabric between your two huge fingers and yank the scraps off, then thrust forward with a grin as your package ruptures the already skin-tight pants off. Your balls are so big they fill you underwear entirely on their own, so your dick is uncovered without your pants.
Unlike a normal human- your dick emerges backwards and then straightens out as it erects- so when you pee, you have your rump to the toilet. Camel's pee backwards, same as something like a rhino. Also unlike a normal human- the glans are sort-of backwards. Human glans project further out and have their corona at the bottom- yours is at the top. Sort of like a horse, but, with more of a blunted end, and less transition from shaft to corona. It is also not nearly as enlarged as a horse or a humans- the head of your penis is not that big compared to the overall penis so it still has a tapered form overall. It is not like you have anything to hide from people behind clothing though. You don't exactly have girth but your dick is far longer than a normal human- almost two feet of shlong when fully erected, so nothing to be embarrassed about.
Another Wednesday. People have been complaining a LOT about the heat but you do not notice it at all. People look like they are dying outside and then scurry inside where the AC is blasting everything into the ice age- honestly you are fine with either temperature, you do not notice that big of a difference between the two, like everyone else does. In the desert that is perfectly normal. During the day it is hot enough to boil your blood, and then at night it turns to freezing temperatures the moment the sun is absent. The sand is pale; pale colors heat up fast but also cool down quickly- white doesn't hold heat.
Besides that- they have bare skin under their clothing! You are almost entirely covered in fur- it just tapers off around your midriff, your face, and around your elbows and knees. Everywhere else you have fur, on top of the fact you used to wear clothing on top of that as well! They are being babies- the temperature is fine.
You turn to see your profile in the mirror, looking especially at the giant hump on your back, sagging a bit lower toward the middle of your back instead of the top. Hmm, you should drink a lot more though. That hump should be even bigger! It never hurts to be prepared. The hump is entirely filled with fat reserves; which can be broken down into both water and food. You wonder what it would be like to walk on all fours like an actual camel. It is difficult sometimes to walk on two legs like you do, since your torso is unusually long. Your neck is over six times as long as a normal human on top of that. If you were to completely straighten your back and neck- your head would no longer be in the reflection of the mirror. I mean... you also physically cannot do it because your head would hit the roof before that- but if you DID do it, you'd be substantially taller than the mirror. And it is a really big mirror.
You rub your jaw a bit, feeling it has been stiff for a bit now. Like your jaw hinge isn't sitting right. You wonder if maybe it is because you are a quarter human? You are the only three-quarters camel that you know of, so assessing aches and pains can be difficult because you do not know which species' biology is creating the problem. Sometimes you wish you were entirely a camel- then it would be easy.
Middle of the work time again. What do they call this day? Wedding day... wetness day... eh. Human languages can be really stupid sometimes. Some call it hump day- you like that name better. You are walking on all fours this week and honestly you cannot believe you never tried it sooner. It is SO much easier than trying to walk on two! Plus, with your barrel-shaped chest and low-set forward shoulder blades your front limbs would just be awkwardly hanging out in front of you if you even managed to stand up.
The cramping feeling in your jaw seems to have gone away this week too! Still no idea what that was about, but it is gone now so who cares. Your jaw is almost twice as long as a normal human too- so there is a lot of jaw there to hurt. Your face is pushed out so long you can see the front of your own face in your field of vision.
Why did you wear clothes before? You are entirely covered in sand-gold fur from head to toe. You look back at all the inconveniences you have experienced over the past while and just shake your head. Why did you try to be more like a human? What was the point, you have the mind of a human but you are a camel. Your hump is gigantic- you are proud of it. You are prepared for the worst. The bigger the hump the better your chances of survival. Strong camels have lots of resources gathered- which fattens the hump.
Even on all fours you feel a bit cramped in this hallway, how did you even fit on two legs before? You have to bow your head on the end of your long neck to be able to see in the mirror at all. Did your limbs get longer? They look a bit knobby now, but that is normal for camel. Your neck fur is especially shaggy, and slightly darker than the rest of it, like a shade of pale brown. Your long rounded ears flick at even the thought of having human hair. Too long- it would brush and blow against the backs of your ears all the time and be very irritating. How do horses tolerate it?
'How did look at face before?' You cross your eyes trying to synthesize what you seen the last time you looked in the mirror. Your face is a full muzzle- which pushes your eyes more to the side of your head, so the end of the muzzle isn't directly in either cone of vision... so then why do you remember it being like that last week? Your nostrils are wide horizontally but very narrow vertically, so they can clap shut to keep sand out when you're not inhaling. The way your upper lips droop in the front makes it look like you always have a coy smirk on your face- your lips always curving up toward the back naturally, even when you actually just have a neutral expression.
'Work to do? What do?' You ponder if you had something to do that you do not recall. You feel as though there is somewhere for you to go, but not what that may be. You are not a human, so it is not like you have a 9 to 5 job to trot off to. So then what do you do? What did you do before? You cannot recall.
'Mirror in sand? Dumb place for mirror.' You tilt your head at the sight of your reflection in the cursed mirror, half buried in the desert sand, before your master tugs on the reins to get you back on track. Just another hump day.