11. Chapter 11
Mal
H enrik strides down the hall before I have a chance to register the cold he left behind. My cock is painfully hard in my jeans, and my pulse is still strumming away in anticipation, but I have no choice other than to let him go.
“What is it?” he snaps. A moment later, he sighs loudly and says, “I’m sorry, dove. It’s not your fault.” And then he closes the door, leaving the rest of his conversation cut off from my unintentionally prying ears.
Dove? Who’s dove?
My cock deflates, but I remind myself I have no reason to be jealous over Henrik’s use of an endearment toward someone else. As he so vehemently expressed to me, our exclusivity goes both ways. And I trust, at the very least, he’s not lying to me about that.
So whoever this dove is, it’s not a current lover.
That thought appeases my irrational disquiet somewhat, but I’m still left feeling off-kilter. Whatever that phone call was about, it burst the intimate little bubble Henrik and I had been in all morning.
I mean, for cripes’ sake, the man made pancakes after we had a moment .
I don’t talk about my life with anyone. Not my friends, my coworkers.
I barely even scratched the surface with my psychiatrist before I couldn’t afford our sessions any longer.
And yet, somehow, Henrik, after having known me for only a couple days, made me feel safe enough to at least share a little.
And now he’s gone. I’m hesitant to eat without him, but after waiting for a few minutes, I make myself a plate and sit alone at the big pine table.
Admittedly, the pancakes and fresh fruit are delicious.
But they would have been better with some company.
I remind myself that I’m here for Henrik, not the other way around, so there’s no reason to be upset.
It’s not his job to keep me entertained. I’m not here to play househusband.
I’m here for sex, simple as that.
Half an hour later, Henrik still hasn’t come out of his office.
With a reluctant sigh, I open the contacts app on my phone, finger hovering over the number for my psychiatrist. Henrik was right about one thing.
I should set up an appointment now that I have the funds to do so.
I can get back on my meds, stock up on fast-acting benzos for when the panic attacks are bad, and hopefully get back to some semblance of balance.
It’s just that the idea of spending money on myself when I have so much debt to pay off doesn’t sit well.
There are more urgent matters I should take care of first. With a flick of my thumb, I switch over to my banking app to check my current balance.
And that’s when I see something that has my eyes bugging out of my head. Five somethings, to be more precise.
“What the…”
I fling myself off my chair, almost sending it to the floor in my haste.
Hurrying past Henrik’s closed office door, I round the corner into the guest room, making a beeline for the small desk in the corner of the room.
The contract Benji prepared for me only a few days prior is still sitting on top, and I swipe it off the surface, flipping to page two. My mouth hangs open.
Under the section titled “Advance,” it clearly states I’m to be given a week’s worth of pay upfront in order to take care of any necessary immediate costs.
That’s five digits’ worth of cash that’s available in my checking account right this instant.
I plunk to the floor, my shaky legs unable to keep me upright.
I’ve never, never had that kind of money. And the only explanation I can come up with as to how I missed this in the first place is because I was too busy ogling Henrik to read the fine print.
I knew I’d be making a boatload of cash with this job. It’s the reason I accepted it. Or, at least, the main reason. But somehow, I wasn’t prepared for what that would actually look like.
And what it looks like is over $10,000.
I rub my mouth, realizing I could, right now, pay off one or two of my many credit cards if I wanted to. This could put my life back on track. This is what I wanted. Something miraculous to help me claw out of my hole.
This is a good thing. A great thing. I should be relieved. I should be thrilled.
But I’m freaking out.
Scrambling up on jelly legs, I grab my things, order a rideshare, and hoof it back down the hall. Henrik’s door is still closed, and for a moment, I debate knocking to let him know I’m leaving. But in the end, I don’t want to disturb him, so I pass by without a word.
Maybe I’m being a coward.
Right before I enter the elevator, I remember the mess in the kitchen, so I swing that way, quickly putting away the leftover food and loading the dishes into the washer.
And then I’m out the door and on the sidewalk in front of this ridiculously swanky building, wearing my bright orange Converse and a worn tee, shivering slightly as my ride pulls to a stop in front of me.
Without conscious thought, I give the driver the address of the one place guaranteed to help me relax.
Keith looks up in surprise when I step through the doors of the cat shelter twenty minutes later. “Mal. I wasn’t expecting you today.”
“Hey, Keith,” I reply a little shakily. It’s only ten in the morning, but I already feel like I’ve been through the wringer.
I’m drained from my panic attack yesterday, yet I’m jittering out of my skin, flight mode kicking in hard as I try to make sense of the new circumstances I find myself in. “I hope you don’t mind me stopping by.”
“Of course not! More the merrier, you know that,” the older man says, coming out from behind the front desk and appraising me in that fatherly way he has about him. “You look tired.”
I huff. “Thanks.”
“Well, get on back there. That’s what you’re here for, right?”
I nod, grateful Keith is giving me an easy out. I give his shoulder a pat on my way past, and when I step into the cat room and a chorus of soft mews greets my ears, my body deflates like a balloon.
“Hey, everyone,” I say quietly as I sink cross-legged onto the ground.
All at once, I’m swarmed in the most wonderful attack.
Four cats climb onto my lap and over my legs, another two attempt to claw up my arms, and several others stand nearby, affecting aloofness while they wait their turn.
I let out a deep breath, passing my hands over the different textures of fur in front of me, feeling the resounding purrs in my palms and deep within my soul.
“It’s been a week,” I tell my avid listeners, flinching when one unintentionally snags me with a nail.
I pick it out of my jeans and give the cat a scratch.
“A couple days ago, I had less than a hundred dollars to my name. And now…” I blow out another breath.
“Now, I have so much I barely know what to do with it.”
Well, that’s not entirely true. I know exactly where it will go. Toward my debts, to pay off my mother’s next care bill, maybe a little for my mental health. In a handful of weeks, I could have everything paid off. I could be even. I could get ahead. I could…
I shut down that line of thinking fast because there’s every chance I won’t make it that far. It’s not a given. Henrik could end my employment any time he sees fit, which means I need to be smart. I can’t blow the entire wad of cash at once on the assumption I’ll be getting more.
My gut sinks, and I realize my behavior today isn’t likely to endear me to my host. Henrik said I wasn’t a prisoner, and I know he meant that, but I can already sense his need for order. And I get that. I understand needing things to be a certain way.
Because feeling out of control is frightening.
And that means I should have given him the courtesy of a goodbye. I shouldn’t have left without a word after he so kindly helped take care of me last night and this morning.
“Crap,” I mutter, grabbing my phone from my pocket, incidentally disrupting a couple cats in the process. Henrik answers on the second ring.
“Mal?”
“Uh, hey.”
“Why are you calling?” he asks. I can hear the sound of a door in the background, like maybe he’s only now emerging from his office to find me gone.
“I wanted to let you know I left for a little while, but I’ll be back soon.”
There’s a pause, and I wait to hear whether or not he’ll be upset with me. But he doesn’t sound upset. “I see. Is everything all right?”
“Of course,” I say out of habit. “Be home soon.”
I cringe. Not my home.
“Mal,” he says.
“Yeah?”
“Thank you for letting me know.”
I exhale. “Sure. Yeah. Okay, bye.”
I hang up before I can make more of a fool of myself and pet the cat trying to weasel onto my shoulder.
I feel marginally better knowing Henrik isn’t displeased with me, but it doesn’t stop the lowkey buzz at the back of my mind.
The worried thoughts circling like vultures, wings buffeting me to remind me of their constant presence.
I shake off the feeling as best as I can, focusing on the sweet creatures in front of me.
“It’ll be okay,” I say to no one in particular.
I try to believe it.
After another twenty minutes or so of cat snuggles, I extract myself from my pile of purring admirers and start cleaning up.
I’ve been coming to Catty Commotions for nearly four years, ever since I moved to Las Vegas from my temporary home in Salt Lake City and started working at Elite 8 Studios.
Usually, I volunteer on Wednesdays, but every once in a while, when my anxiety is high, I’ll stop by for an extra visit.
It always helps, coming here. I’d adopt a cat or twelve of my own if I could. If I had a stable place to live.
But until then, this’ll do.
Keith pops in as I’m finishing up the litter pans.
He crosses his arms and gives me a patient stare.
I’ve always felt like Keith knows more about me than he lets on.
For instance, I’m fairly certain he knows I work in porn, but he’s never said so directly, I’m guessing out of courtesy more than anything else.
And I think he understands why I come here. That the cats help me more than I could ever help them. But he’s never once made me feel insecure about it.
He’s the closest thing I’ve ever had to a father figure, if I’m being honest. But I’ve never told him that, either.
“Making sure I stay on task?” I ask, popping my head out of a cat enclosure.
Keith snorts. “Not worried about that.”
“Worried about me, then?” I ask, only half joking.
He shrugs. “I know you do all right. But if you’re here on the weekend, there’s a reason for it.”
Yep, perceptive.
I wipe my hands on my jeans, watching as one of the younger cats, barely a year old, swipes at a hanging ball inside the cat tower she’s lounging in.
She keeps herself entertained, as cats so often do, and I idly wonder what it’d be like to have such a simple outlook on life.
To play and eat and sleep. To not be bogged down by everything we humans get caught up in.
“I like it here,” I say, to which Keith nods.
“Don’t suppose you’d wanna talk about it?” he asks.
I shake my head.
“All right. Well, we’ve got a new batch of kittens next door that need feeding in”—he checks his watch—“five minutes.”
“I can handle that,” I say quickly.
Keith chuckles. “Knew you would.”
Keith heads back to the front of the building as I finish up in the cat room, making sure to give Stella, one of the older and more crotchety residents here at the shelter, a few extra pats before I go.
I wash my hands once I leave the adult cats, and then I head into the kitten room down the hall.
My chest squeezes as dozens of tiny whimpering mewls ring out like an uncoordinated choir.
“Oh,” I breathe out, dropping to my knees to look inside one of the penned-in enclosures.
Six tiny kittens lie inside this one, spread out on soft blankets.
Their sparsely furred bodies wobble as they move about, barely old enough to do anything other than accept food and leave a mess on the blankets in return.
Their eyes are still an indistinguishable blueish-gray, squinted against the lights like they haven’t acclimated to a world outside their mother’s belly, and small color-coded collars hang around their necks as a way to tell the little similarly colored bundles apart.
I find the tub of liquid meal Keith already made up in the fridge and grab a handful of open-tip syringes.
Instructions are taped to the side of the enclosure, per usual, and I make sure to read them twice before drawing up the correct amounts.
Picking up a kitten at random, the one with the pink collar, I smile, holding it in my palm as I bring the food to its mouth.
The kitten instinctively tries to draw liquid from the tip, and I press a little out through the syringe.
It never ceases to amaze me the level of trust that occurs in such a rudimentary interaction.
The kitten has no choice but to rely on me or whoever comes in here to provide care in its mother’s stead, and I don’t take that job of caretaker lightly.
It means a lot to me, being able to do something as simple as feed another creature.
For me, it’s almost no effort. But for this kitten, it’s a literal lifesaving event.
If we weren’t here to take care of it, where would it end up?
There’s so much in life that’s uncontrollable. So much that comes our way that we can’t predict. Maybe that we can’t even overcome. But this…this is something I can do to make an impact. However small it may seem, to this one kitten, it’s more.
Maybe I’m just sentimental when it comes to my furry friends. Or maybe I wish we all had that: someone to look out for us. Someone to help us survive. Help us thrive .
Someone who cared enough to try.
“But that’s not how life works, is it?” I ask the little pink-collared kitten. “Knights in shining armor don’t really exist.”