My parents straight-up abandoned me.
Left me on the side of the road of a town I'd never heard of before. Hardly a glance back as they sped out of town and back down the mountain. The odd part was, I wasn't even that mad; In fact, I was fucking amused, if anything. It takes a lot of guts for parents to just abandon their child like that, and for that I commend them.
That was a month ago, and I've not heard from them since.
The fact that I was not only dropped off in front of the local Boarding House but that the feline that ran the joint had been ready and waiting for me was pretty telling. He'd claimed to have seen the whole affair happen from the second-story window he'd conveniently perched himself off on at that specific point in time.
When he walked me inside, what I had at first taken for an apartment building turned out to be more like an old-timey rustic farmhouse, complete with an old floor-based television. It reminded me of my grandmother's house, just dustier. I'd later learn the TV set was just for decor and didn't even have any guts inside.
The owner of the joint's name was Toh, and he claimed to not only own this boarding house but also the local coffee shop as well.
"Coffee tastes like shit water," I replied without thinking. It took him by surprise; I didn't care.
We had an extensive conversation about my life, what I had been doing since I turned eighteen, and how my life at home was(which I, quite frankly, found to be quite pleasant as long as my family stayed out of my room). The discussion eventually, inevitably, turned to my current predicament.
"So, ah, I see you've got some luggage there. Since you were, how should I say this," He paused, his voice sounding a lot like Scott Bakula to me. Godfuckshit, how I wanted to watch some Star Trek right about then, "Are you going to need a place to stay, or do you have some relatives in town?"
There was no way he hadn't known this was coming. I'm almost positive my parents had been in talks with him over the last couple of months, but now, almost an entire month out since my arrival, I've not come any closer to having any sort of clarification.
Toh and I had come to an agreement that, since I didn't have any money on me right then and there(That he knew of), I could stay my first month for free but would need to be able to scrounge up a job at some point before the end of June. We shook on it, and then I just mellowed out in the basement room he supplied me with, complete with the internet, regular meals, and no expectations other than cleanliness and (eventually) rent.
Despite my parent's best efforts, I found myself in a similar, albeit slightly more tedious, situation.
Fast-forward to today. May something or the other. It's late in the month. Toh has been making it a point to mention rent every other chance he could get. He was a good guy, at least as far as the beasts I've met here in Brickhedge go, but I had my limits, and the cat was reaching them. Did we agree on certain things? Sure. Did I have the motivation actually to get out there and make good on the agreement?
Fuck no!
I'd been slothing about town for a few hours now, taking in the sights from a new perspective—one of the residents. I'd been hastily disapproving of the city as my family drove through that fateful day, being a city-dweller all my life. The unassuming exteriors, old ones(and not the cool ones) sitting on benches, the simple signage above businesses. It was easy to think that the place was largely unknown for good reasons.
But over the past month, as I ventured out from my burrow to see what the town actually had to offer, I'd started discovering things that felt like treasures. I'm talking about used video game stores, pawn shops, and thrift shops holding junk that I'd never thought I would see in person. I mean, a used copy of the original black-label Final Fantasy VII for five dollars? Absolutely unheard of. Most places would have marked that up five times that easily.
I'd even come across some old, worn-out bibs and a video cassette recorder at the thrift store. Now I'm no fucking hipster or alternative dresser or anything like that, but a damn good worn-in pair of bibs was a find, regardless of the state they were in.
Plus, finding clothes that an adult mole could wear comfortably in itself was a chore, evidently. My mother always did the shopping, so the whole damn thing was new to me.
Then there was the food! I'll be forthcoming: I am a fatass. I know that I'm fat, and that is every bit part of me as the wiggling tentacles on my nose that give my species their namesake. I will and have done so on many occasions, sat down, and devoured an entire pizza all on my own. That said, the down-home country cooking found here in Brickhedge is absolutely fuckin' incredible! They slather gravy on everything: Vegetables, fish, grubs, you name it, they'll put gravy on it.
It's locally made, too, even sold at a grocer down the street.
My favorite place to eat thus far as been at Grubbin'Go on Corn Avenue. Prices are fair and really undersell the quality of the food. They'd been part of the community for nearly four decades from what I was told by the head chef who, I forgot to mention, was too a vole.
Shit, I didn't actually mention WHY it has been my favorite place.
Voles! The business was founded by a family of voles back in the 80s. The head honcho is still there, greeting diners every day as they enter and leave. He didn't really tend to much of the work around the shop nowadays as he was nearing 95, but his presence was evidently every bit a staple of the town as that stupid water tower. Oh, I forgot to mention their--
If I had been a prey animal like my kind was back during the Primal days, I'd been a goner right then and there.
In my reverie, I ran smack dab into the side of a lion that had just emerged from the building to my right. She yelped, and I swore as I went down flat on my ass. "'ey, watch where you're going, bitch!" I yelled, agitation bleeding out of every last syllable.
The way the beasts walking the streets right then looked at me told me that none were used to hearing shouting like that.
My eyes watered up from the impact on my snout. Those tentacles were lined with shallow nerves which I'm sure served a purpose a long time ago, but now only served as an additional area to experience the 'kicked in the nuts' sensation.
"Oh, sweetie, I'm sorry," she said. She had a pleasant voice, at the very least. "Here, let me give you a hand."
I rubbed the pain away as fast as I could, but you just didn't rapidly recover from damage like that, ya know? The tentacles are covered in sensitive nerve endings, so getting hit there is like getting hit in the nuts.
When the tears finally cleared away, I was greeted with a birds-eye view of the canyon between two of what were probably the largest breasts I've ever seen on a beast that wasn't in some anime or comic book.
Now, I've zero interest in sex, the female body, or anything else like that, but I'll admit the sight of such a well-developed female body was a sight to behold from an intellectual perspective.
"Eyes up here, baby." She said again, this time drawing my unamused attention away from her public display of the female mammary glands. I looked her dead ass in her yellow eyes and said,
"I'm not looking at your tits, lady." That one got a gasp from a woman across the street. "You need to watch where you're going."
She rolled her eyes and shook her head, her thick, wavy green hair swaying as it hung down past her shoulders. "Likewise to you, you little shit." I could feel an argument coming on over this. It was not something I was exactly wanting to have right now, even if the tentacles on my nose were wiggling with excitement despite the payload of pain they had just been dealt.
When she straightened up, placing both hands on her hips. I swear her eyes had been focused on my tentacles. I could literally see the tension bleed out of her body as she looked at me. Okay, well, not literally see, but you get the fucking picture.
"Sorry, it..." She paused, almost as if what she was going to say next was--
"It was my fault; I was in a hurry."
A lie.
She kept staring at me, not even offering a hand as I climbed back to my paws. The sun was beginning to really warm things up out here, and I wanted to get inside someplace soon. "Listen, lady, I accept your apology. Now get the f--"
"Do they move on their own, or do you like to control them like a tail?" She cut me off, pointing at my nose. More precisely, the tentacles. She had a look of equal parts wonder and curiosity on her feline face. "Your nose-thingies, I mean," Her accent spoke of a different part of the country. Maybe the midwest.
"My what? Oh, they're prehensile." I replied, wiggling a single tentacle in a waving gesture. I creased my brow in irritation as this interaction had gone on for far too long for my personal liking.
"That's like... very interesting," She purred, the deep primal rumble coating her every word. "Like seriously. What are you, if you don't mind my asking?"
I was really beginning to get pissy at this point. I exhaled loudly and replied, "I'm a star-nosed mole. Now, if you'd please--" I looked to my left and right, trying to find a reason to get away.
She crossed her arms, which smushed her breasts together and further accentuated her cleavage. She was looking at me now with a look of a predator toying with its prey. "My name's Callista Reigns, but my friends just call me Callie. I'm actually the local GP here in town, and--"
"For fuck's sake, woman, I. Got. To. Go! I'm--" To my right, on the door of the building from which she had emerged, was a Help Wanted sign. "I am late for a job interview!" I said harshly, brushing past her as I headed for the door. The whole situation had gotten too personal for my liking.
Inside the cooled building, I quickly walked up to the counter where a beast of unknown species currently tended to something on the counter beheind them. Sensing the lion's eyes still on me from outside, I said loudly, "I'd like to interview for the job, please."
Imagine my fucking surprise when Toh, my landlord, turned around with a massive smile on his face.
* * *
[ CALLISTA ]
"That's like... very interesting," I could feel myself purring now. The sight of those little wriggling pink tentacles on this beast's face had unearthed something within me that I didn't know was there. I had to know more. "Like seriously. What are you, if you don't mind my asking?"
The little mole with the star-nosed face. Six, no, eight! Eight little wriggling, veiny appendages... They were prehensile, too, Able to move in any manner he wanted. Fuck me, I thought; I was not getting turned on by the thought of what could be done with those things, was I?
(Hell, yes, I was.)
He was clearly getting agitated by this point. I can't blame the little chubby guy, though. But then, he did run into me, and if fate is a thing, then clearly, this was meant to be.
Think, Callista, think! Gotta set the hook before he rushes off. You've already soothed the tension-somewhat-so now do something to direct his attention elsewhere!
I did the only thing I could think of, given the lack of preparation, and crossed my arms, making sure my biceps pushed my boobs inwards. I wasn't sure how much he could see from down there, so I hoped it was enough. I awkwardly found myself standing 'cutely', with one leg forward and crossed and my two hands held together at the front near my groin.
(C'mon girl, you are fucking this up worse than the final exam of year six at medical school!)
"My name's Callista Reigns, but my friends call me Callie. I'm actually the local GP here in town, and--" He pushed passed me in a rush.
"For fuck's sake, woman. I. Got. To. Go! I'm--"
He was trying to get away from me. Like, legit trying to flee. I saw the glances to his left and right earlier, and I definitely caught the one just now as he read the Help Wanted sign on the door of the coffee shop.
"I'm late for a job interview!" If a mole could bark, that was probably what it'd sound like like a raspy mixture of a dog and a smartphone in a smoothie machine.
Letting the pressure up on the girls, I stood there in a loose stance, kind of numbed at the events that had transpired. I mean, getting the brush off wasn't anything new; Plenty of gay and married men out there that I've come on to dropped me as soon as they realized what was happening. Couldn't blame THEM, but this little starry-faced mole? Hell no, ain't no way he was mildly interested, given how long he looked down my shirt.
I looked myself over in the reflection in the coffee shop's glass front: What stood before me was a robust and independent mountain lion with an overactive libido and a head of thick, flowing sea-green hair with deeper waves of green throughout. Sure, I stood over six feet tall, which was easily a good two feet taller than that cutey of a mole, and I was a lion, so maybe that intimidated him? Prey and predator.
Beasts don't like to acknowledge that relation in the modern day, but it's very much a real thing on a subconscious level. It was something I'd learned about early on in medical school that there would be cases where, as a doctor of a predatory species, there may be instances where patients become overly agitated or experience more fear than they otherwise would have with, say, another prey beast doctor.
Realizing that I'd been staring inside the coffee shop for the last few minutes, no doubt making the beasts inside feel more than a bit awkward. Plus, my little mole buddy had stepped behind the counter with Mr. Toh.
"Huh, maybe he was telling the truth after all," I shrugged as I started down the street, headed for home,. A busy day of tending to the residents of Brickhedge awaited me tomorrow.
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