12. Grath #2
Just grateful for what I found.
One month later, the café has a line out the door most mornings.
The viral kitten video got a second wind after the developer story broke. National news picked it up. Someone wrote an article about small-town resistance. Another person started a crowdfunding campaign for rowhouse restoration that exceeded its goal in forty-eight hours.
Maris hired two part-time staff. Expanded the menu. Started selling branded merchandise with the kitten's face on it.
The kitten, for its part, accepts celebrity with regal indifference.
I run deliveries now. Officially. "Orc-Strength Deliveries" painted on the side of a van that barely fits me. Businesses book me weeks in advance. Turns out people love the novelty of an ex-gladiator gently transporting their fragile goods.
The rowhouse is mine. Actually mine. Maris helped me furnish it. Most of the furniture is human-sized, which means I have to fold myself into ridiculous shapes. It's home.
She stays over most nights. Or I stay at hers. We haven't officially moved in together, but her toothbrush lives in my bathroom and half my clothes are in her closet.
The ceremony happened two weeks ago. Small and ridiculous, exactly as promised. Maris wore a flower crown. So did I. The kitten sat on a cushion and meowed at appropriate intervals, which someone decided counted as officiating.
We exchanged vows. Hers made me cry. Mine made her laugh. We kissed while the town cheered and someone's uncle played a jaunty tune on a fiddle.
It wasn't legal. Not in any official sense. But it was ours.
Now we're here. At the town's first human-orc pride parade. A small affair, barely a dozen floats, but meaningful. A year ago, this wouldn't have happened. Now it feels inevitable.
Maris walks beside me, waving at the crowd. The kitten rides on my shoulder, wearing a tiny rainbow bandana that it absolutely hates but tolerates for the attention.
"Smile," Maris says. "You look like you're being tortured."
"I'm smiling."
"You're grimacing."
I try harder. Someone takes a photo. The flash makes the kitten hiss.
"Almost done," she promises.
The parade ends at the café, naturally. Someone set up a small stage. There are speeches. Recognition for businesses that supported integration. A moment of silence for those still fighting for acceptance elsewhere.
When it's over, people filter inside for free coffee and pastries. Maris donated everything, despite my protests about profit margins.
"It's one day," she'd said. "And it matters."
She was right. It does matter.
I'm helping carry equipment back inside when the kitten starts acting strange. Pawing at my pocket. Meowing insistently.
"What's wrong with you?" I mutter.
It bites my finger. Lightly, but with clear intent.
Maris notices. "Everything okay?"
"The kitten's losing it."
"That's not new."
But the kitten won't stop. It digs its claws into my shirt and reaches into my pocket with one paw, emerging with something shiny.
A ring.
I look at it. Tiny. Silver. Definitely not mine.
"Where did you get that?" Maris asks.
The kitten drops it into my palm and sits back, looking extraordinarily pleased with itself.
I examine the ring. It's simple. Handmade, maybe. The band is slightly crooked, like someone hammered it into shape without quite knowing what they were doing.
"Is that," Maris says slowly, "for me?"
I look at the kitten. The kitten looks at me. Its expression clearly says, You're welcome.
"I didn't buy this," I tell Maris.
"The kitten bought you a ring."
"Apparently."
She starts laughing. That full, bright laugh that I love. "This is insane. We already had a ceremony. We don't need rings."
"We don't," I agree. But I'm looking at the ring. At her. At the future we're building one ridiculous moment at a time.
I kneel. Right there, in the café, with cleanup half-finished and people still milling about.
"Grath, what are you—"
"I know we already did this," I say. "And I know the kitten's timing is terrible. But." I hold up the ring. "I want you to have this. I want you to know that I'm here. Permanently. That I choose you every day and I'll keep choosing you."
Her eyes shine with that light I've learned to recognize, the one that means she's about to say something that will undo me completely. "You're doing this because a cat gave you a ring."
"I'm doing this because I love you," I say simply. "Because every moment with you feels like the home I never thought I'd have. Because you saw me, really saw me, and didn't look away. The ring is just proof that even the universe agrees."
She drops to her knees in front of me, heedless of the dirty floor, the scattered napkins, the half-wiped tables. Her hands find mine. "Yes."
"I haven't asked anything yet."
"Yes to whatever you're asking. Yes to all of it. Yes to today and tomorrow and every ridiculous thing that comes after. Yes forever." Her voice breaks on the last word, and my chest feels too tight to breathe.
I slip the crooked ring onto her finger, and somehow, impossibly, it fits perfectly. Like it was always meant to be there. Like some force in the world decided we'd suffered enough and threw us this one small kindness.
She kisses me, and the café erupts in applause. Gumbo whistles. Nora's filming on her phone, tears streaming down her face. The kitten meows, loud and triumphant, like it's accepting congratulations for a job well done.
When we break apart, Maris is crying and laughing at the same time, her forehead pressed against mine.
"We're a disaster," she says, her breath warm against my lips.
"The best kind of disaster," I tell her, and I mean it with everything I am.
"The kitten's in charge now. We're just along for the ride."
"I can live with that."
I look at the tiny creature, still sitting on my shoulder like it orchestrated this entire thing. Maybe it did. Maybe it saw two broken people and decided they needed fixing.
Whatever the reason, I'm grateful.
Maris leans against me. The café buzzes with life around us. Our home. Our community. Our absurd, imperfect, perfect future.
"I love you," I tell her again, because I can. Because she's mine and I'm hers and nothing will take that away.
"I love you too." She holds up her hand, admiring the ring. "Even if your taste in jewelry is questionable."
"The kitten's taste."
"Right. The kitten." She scratches behind its ears. It purrs, the sound rumbling through all three of us.
Outside, the sun sets over the town. Tomorrow there will be deliveries to make, customers to serve, a life to build together.
But tonight, we have this.
And it's everything.