Chapter 3 Toy Mice
TOY MICE
Ember
“That one looks like he likes you,” the older gentleman next to me said. His finger was shakily pointing at the giant furry orange cat in front of me. I’d noticed him already, since that was the one I was in the midst of having a stare-off with.
I’d been walking around the animal shelter for the last hour, and I’d met every available cat they had here. But this guy? I just kept coming back to him. He was lounging in the back of his crate, looking grumpy as hell. He had long orange fur with a white chest and gold eyes. He was stunning.
“Excuse me?” I asked one of the volunteers as she walked past. She stopped and smiled, so I pointed over to the orange fluff ball glaring in the back. “What’s his deal?”
Her smile slipped for a brief moment. “Oh, he was a surrender, but we don’t have any information or anything on him.
They just sort of left him, and no one has been able to get close enough to love on him, so he’s been here a while.
” She shrugged as if to say, ‘happens all the time lady, pick someone else.’
I nodded, instead of being an asshole like I sort of wished to be. “Right, well I want him.”
Her mouth formed a small ‘o’ and she forced a smile that came out more as a wince. “I’ll…um get the paperwork and all that together for you.”
“Thank you.” I turned away from her and looked back at the fluff ball.
“Well dude, you’re coming home with me. We’re going to have to stop at the store though, because I have absolutely nothing for you aside from a couch to sleep on and big windows where you can lounge in the sun.
” He just stared at me, but it wasn’t a glare like it had been before, so I was taking this as a small win.
With the paperwork filled out, and one more volunteer scratched to shit, I was the proud owner of the grumpiest cat in the building. He was perfect.
“Good luck,” the first volunteer muttered to me as she handed me the folder with all of his forms in it.
I couldn’t hide the eye roll this time. It had been a long damn day, and this girl wasn’t helping.
“We’ll be fine. He just doesn’t like you.
Clearly,” I said with a shrug as I picked up his little carrier and walked back to my jeep.
I set him on the passenger seat and then hopped in, starting it up and turning on the A.C.
for us both. The sun had definitely come out now, and we were feeling it.
“Okay, my dude. You need a name, but I guess we have time to decide. Also, you should know that I’m not normally so snarky, but I think you’re great, and she was being kinda bitchy.
I mean, you saw that right?” I looked down at him, and he blinked up at me before letting out a small meow.
“I’m glad we’re on the same page with this dude. Let’s go home.”
This morning I was in a shitty yoga class, and now I had a cat. Maybe I should apply for the damn sex app. I was clearly having a ‘be crazy’ type of day, and it could use some whipped cream.
“Okay CC, I think I should do this. Do you think they’ll even accept me? It’s an application, so it isn’t as if it’s a sure-fire thing, right?” I asked, staring at who I had quickly deemed my new best friend.
Wide gold eyes stared up at me as his fluffy tail flicked back and forth across the hardwood floors.
I’d quickly discovered that he enjoyed the game of fetch.
I wasn’t sure if that was normal for a cat, but who was I to judge?
I’d gotten him a couple of toys at the pet store, and so far, the only ones he’d taken to were the small toy mice that were catnip-infused.
I’d throw one, he’d snatch it back up and drop it at my feet.
We’d been doing this for almost an hour while I filled out the application to join this insane sex app that the girls in my yoga class talked about.
Apparently it was part of an exclusive sex club over in Sapphire Cove, called Silk and Spice.
I’d never heard of it, and I was surprised how easy it was to find, but again, the only socializing I did was in the bakery, and it wasn’t as if people came into Buns of Delight to discuss their latest flogging session.
I chuckled to myself at my own joke as I threw the mouse for CC again.
The application was pretty straightforward.
It asked for your name, age, an up-to-date physical and clean bill of health, if I was on birth control—thankfully I was—and the last time I was sexually active—basically my life’s history since the moment I started pleasuring myself with or without a partner.
I’d give it to the creators; they were thorough.
My eyes scanned over the list of likes and dislikes, each on a scale of one to five, one being absolutely not, three being maybe, and five being fuck yes.
They even had a comment section for each if you wanted to elaborate on your ‘hard limits’, as they called them.
Penetration—of course. Penetrate away.
Choking—yolo, please don’t kill me.
Degradation. I stared at the word and genuinely thought about whether I wanted to be called names and talked down to. Who knows? Maybe if he were hot enough. Solid three.
Praise—call me a good girl, daddy.
I started giggling to myself, wondering if they’d regret letting me this far into this test run when they saw these comments.
Anonymous sex? Perfection. Yes.
The only question I came to that I took a moment to answer was ‘Why are you interested in trying out our app?’ I thought about lying, making up some shit about how I just wanted to try new things, this seemed like such fun, whatever bullshit the other girls were putting to gain an approval email.
But after a few minutes of staring off into space and realizing I wasn’t even that serious about this, I decided to be honest. I reread my answer for the third time, ‘I’m sick of my mother’s bitching about how I’ll always be alone.
This seemed like a solid way to find new nonsense to tell her, so she’ll get off my back’. Yup. That was what I was going with.
Next question.
I finished the rest of the survey in no time and closed my laptop before I could start getting in my head about why this even mattered. It didn’t. I didn’t even want to be on this app.
“Okay, CC, dinner time!” I said as he trotted over, a small purple mouse stuffed in his mouth. “Tuna or salmon tonight?” He cocked his head at me, as if to say, ‘you tell me human female.’
“I can’t believe I’m full-on talking to a cat. I have a cat. This is just. Wow. Okay, dinner.” I let out a breath and dished CC out some fancy salmon kitty food in his dish before I made myself dinner as well.
“You know, CC, I never wanted kids or anything, but I also didn’t see certified cat mom in my future,” I mumbled mostly to myself. Thankfully, he didn’t acknowledge me for even a moment as his face was buried in his food bowl, and we ate in a comfortable silence.
It was an hour later, in the middle of me making the specials’ schedule for the bakery this week, that my phone dinged with a new email. I looked over and felt my stomach drop as I saw the message that’d come in.
“Oh fuck me,” I muttered to myself.
I’d been accepted into the Silk and Spice dating app, insane comments and all.
“Why doesn’t Mom like me the way she does my brothers?” I asked Grandpa. My voice was more of a whisper as he sat next to me on the bench at our breakfast table.
Mom had been leaving me here with Grandpa a lot lately.
She’d just drop me and take my brothers out to do something, and it didn’t make any sense.
I was a big girl now—I’d just turned ten, and they were only eight.
They never listened when we went out, and I always did.
So why was I here, and they were out playing and having fun with our parents?
I knew they saw Dad while they were out too.
Evan had told me the last time she’d picked me up and brought me home.
Grandpa looked down at me. He had the same brown eyes I did, but his face was covered in wrinkles, and he had almost no hair left on his head. He said that happened when you got old.
“What makes you ask that, Doll?” he said as he cut another piece of his pancake.
“Well, she always drops me off here with you, and her and my brothers go out and do fun stuff. Why don’t I get to come along with them? Like family?”
“That’s quite a bit of questions you’ve got there. What’s bringing this up?” He didn’t sound angry with my questions like Mom sometimes did; he just sounded concerned.
“A boy in my class, Kenneth, told me that his parents take him and his brothers to the zoo every year, and Mom took the boys to the fair a few weeks ago and Dad met them there, but they didn’t take me. Kenneth said it’s because I’m a girl and they don’t like me.”
He stared out the window for a few minutes, and I wanted to press the question, but I wouldn’t. I didn’t want to sound ungrateful; I just didn’t understand why they treated us differently, and I hated not understanding something.
I stuck another bite of pancake in my mouth. Grandpa and I added a ton of chocolate chips and blueberries to mine. Maybe if I just kept eating, I wouldn’t ask stupid questions anymore.
“Did you ever think maybe I just wanted you to hang out with me and not your rotten little brothers?” Grandpa asked, interrupting the silence as I chewed. “And Kenneth sounds like a little shit. I wouldn’t listen to him anymore.”
I arched a brow and stared up at him. “You don’t want to hang out with my brothers?” I asked.
“Oh sure I do, I just want to hang out with you more. But don’t tell them, okay? No sense in getting them all riled up that you’re my favorite.” He playfully nudged me with his shoulder and winked.
I smiled back. I couldn’t help it. I’d always known I was Grandpa’s favorite, but hearing it just cemented the fact that I was more fun than my brothers, and that made me happy.
We ate the rest of our pancakes in silence, listening to some old record my Grandma used to like when she was still alive. It was good, my time here with Grandpa. Who needed to see my dad when I had Grandpa to make pancakes with?