On a wonderful fall morning Andrea woke up in her dorm room, itching everywhere. She had a strange feeling – when she walked up to the mirror, for some mysterious reason, she wasn’t tall enough to look into it, unlike on the previous day. She jumped onto the windowsill, and she saw her reflection in the windowpane, and sure enough, she had turned into a slim, black cat overnight.
‘Typical Monday morning’, she grunted to herself. The only silver lining was that she didn’t have to wash her hair – her greasy hair from earlier had turned into clean, shiny fur. First, she cleaned herself up a little, sipped a few sips from her roommate’s milk coffee, then left for the university.
She had to return a book to the BMSC Library – she managed to pull her bag on the ground the whole way – she almost suffered a setback, because the doorman thought that she escaped from the basement. Andrea, however, self-consciously drew herself up, then she dug out her Student’s ID card from the bag. The security guards discreetly told her that she should probably get a new ID photo.
Since the guards weren’t going to let her in the library, she left the book outside the front door. Then she went over to Szentkirályi Street, where she had to attend a lecture. Even though the professor was using a laser pointer, Andrea, being the well-educated cat she was (she majored in biophysics, after all), knew well how laser light works. She curled up and took a nice little nap on the desk, while everybody around her was scribbling diligently.
Nevertheless, her most unpleasant experience was the practical lesson at the Clinic. She couldn’t reach the patient, no matter if she was sitting, or standing next to the dental engine – in the end, she decided to set the chair in a completely horizontal position, so she could treat the patient sitting down on their chest, but she just encountered more and more problems.
She had to grab all instruments with two paws, therefore, she couldn’t use the mirror, and that made her very clumsy, since she couldn’t keep the patients’ teeth away from their lips. Moreover, as she couldn’t see colors the same way as before, she couldn’t determine whether the gums were inflamed or not. In addition, one of the patients was allergic to cat fur, so she couldn’t treat her, because she kept on sneezing – so Andrea added that to her medical history.
Her second biggest issue were the latex gloves – somehow she always managed to puncture them with her claws. After the third or fourth pierced pair the assistants were not even smiling at her anymore, let alone wanted to pet her. And when she knocked off a few things from the instrument tray – they were on the edge of the tray, she had to do it – she was kicked out of the room.
Andrea didn’t mind this at all, she got extremely tired that day. Walking home, nobody was catcalling her, then again, all the dogs were barking at her, and people were constantly stepping on her tail on the subway replacement bus. At night, right before she fell asleep, she wished that when she woke up the next day, she’d either be a housecat or a dental student, because being both at the same time is quite uncomfortable.
