Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Snow tumbling down from the heavens looks like little more than static noise, scattering the low blue of the dusk sky. Every fat snowflake obscures the perfect sky a bit more. The air’s heavy. The world feels soundless, like the snow puts everyone into individual bubbled existences, so Yumeno Gentaro couldn’t feel more alone even as he’s surrounded.

It’s odd, isn’t it? He lives in one of the most crowded cities in the world, in the great age of the Internet. There’s something profoundly lonely about being surrounded and just as isolated as ever.

He despises this time of year.

Gentaro picks his way back home, unable to justify taking the metro to shorten a mere 20-minute walk. As snow continues falling he begins to regret the decision, but would it have been worse during evening rush? Would he have wasted the same amount of time, smashed between two people that feel like aliens to him? Standing up, jostling against someone he’ll never know and can’t begin to imagine the thoughts of? Maybe walking was the better decision, was the worse decision, but something feels wrong either way. Indecision makes him feel sick to his stomach.

Definitely a bad mood, and he chalks it up to the oppressive cold of winter. Tomorrow he’ll wake, at ease with his fellow humans, decisive, and optimistic about his career prospects.

Force a smile!

He’s tired. A quick stop inside a convenience store and he has all he needs to get him through the night, a half-dozen little cans of sweet sake. How far he gets through them depends entirely on how he feels in the next few hours. He’d pick something stronger but has too much work this weekend to spend tomorrow puking it back up.

When he steps back outside, the snow falls harder, melting as it hits asphalt. Something beautiful turned to dingy water. Gentaro trudges home, legs tired.

His apartment building was the cheapest he could find, a good distance from anything of interest. Shivering, and his whole body feels heavy like the snowflakes weigh him down. He passes fenced-off parking spots, twisting his keyring between anxious fingers.

Sound breaks through the snow-silence. A meow, coming somewhere from underneath the nearest parked car.

Gentaro hesitates, keys jingling. It’s a cold day to be a cat outdoors. Certainly below freezing. He hesitates and a faint curiosity holds him in place.

Another meow. Insistent, unless that’s Gentaro’s imagination.

“Hello?” Gentaro responds. His voice comes out flat at first, but he pitches it up in a coo, the only way to talk to cats. “Where are you, little friend?”

Another meow, louder still. This cat has some lungs, and Gentaro sighs. He squats, careful not to get his clothing wet, peeking through the fence to the car behind. All he can see is eyes reflecting light, bright green and oddly pink. Reflecting neon lights Gentaro can’t see.

The cat crouches under the car, watching Gentaro sagely.

“Go home,” Gentaro says. He can’t match the insistence in the cat’s meows, but tries anyway. “It’s cold. You’ll freeze out here.”

When there’s no response, he exhales, breath foggy in the cold. Time to keep moving. The cat will find its way home, and surely it has a family. A warm, busy home to go back to. Noisy and lively. Probably looking for their cat, anxious in the doorway, scanning streets and calling its name.

But there’s no one around. The cat will have to make its own way back.

“I see,” Gentaro says, as though he’s continuing a conversation. “I’ll be going now. Find your way home, alright?”

He stands, taking a step toward his apartment. Abruptly the cat darts out from underneath the car, squeezing itself through the tiniest gap between chain-link fence and the brick building.

“Oh.” Gentaro inhales sharply, cold air in his lungs. Awestruck, he kneels, eyes wide. Slowly he extends his hand, bare under the soft drifting snow, and extends a hand to the strange cat.

What if it has rabies? What if it bites?

The cat inches forward, slow and serene. Lightly its nose brushes against the pad of Gentaro’s fingertip.

“You’re massive,” Gentaro breathes.

It has to weigh over twenty pounds, big-boned and well fed, a generous layer of padding around its middle. Long fur, soft-looking in a dark grey so cool-toned, it might as well be blue in the dim lighting. Calmly it watches Gentaro, but the cat’s tail moves back and forth, so he can’t be sure if its preparing to dart back into the shadows.

Gentaro figures with so loud and insistent a meow, and such a hefty body, the cat is probably male. Gravely meow, like the cat smokes.

He looks lovely. He looks friendly, gaze keenly focused on Gentaro’s face, soft and warm-bodied. For an instant Gentaro indulges in a sweet fantasy, painted in dripping dreamlike colors, a warm spring vision. He imagines writing with a pet at his feet. He imagines burying fingers in fur, rumbling purr rippling through his whole hand.

The warmth of another beside him. A gentle focused cat, and Gentaro would never have the heavy expectations of conversation placed on him, no real demands, and no risk of rejection. He deeply craves the warmth, silent sweet companionship, because he hasn’t shared a bed with another in nearly a year now.

He pulls back his finger and the moment ends, a second of contented fantasy shattered.

“You need to go home to your family,” Gentaro says dryly. He stands up, expression as frosty as the snow that collects on them both. “You have one of those, right? A whole wonderful world for you, don’t be stubborn. Don’t--”

Whatever he wants to say chokes up in his throat, and the cat is still, watching him with unblinking eyes.

“It’s cold. Get off the streets,” he says finally, and he walks away.

It’s someone else’s cat. They’ll be looking for him, missing him, wondering when he’ll be home. If Gentaro longs to take him back to his apartment, then he’ll cause a problem for the owner.

Easier not to get invested. The cat will make it home or someone else will act, and it’s none of Gentaro’s business.

He makes it down the block before he realizes he’s being followed.

The cat follows several feet behind him, hesitant steps on cold asphalt. His paws must be freezing, but gingerly he continues. When the cat knows he has Gentaro’s attention, he meows again.

“Go home!” Gentaro hisses.

The cat doesn’t deserve his anger. It’s an awful time of year and he’s in no mood to get attached to anyone or anything, not in the slightest, and he doesn’t want to be responsible for someone’s housecat freezing to death.

Another block, and Gentaro swears the temperature drops during his walk. It’s cold and wet and he’s worried.

When he reaches the door of his apartment, he turns around his keys, thinking long and hard.

It’s unethical to leave the cat alone in the cold. Even if he’s fluffy and long-haired, he still might freeze, and Gentaro would feel responsible.

It’s unethical to take a cat from the streets, because he surely must belong to someone, this is Tokyo. So he takes the cat in for a single night and lets him go tomorrow, as soon as it’s warm. No one could be angry with him for that.

The cat stops in front of the locked apartment building doors, seemingly admiring himself in the mirrored reflection. When the cat turns to look up at Gentaro, his mind is already made up.

Gentaro kneels down, scooping up the cat. He’s as heavy as he looks but surprisingly amicable to being picked up, tucked into Gentaro’s heavy coat.

He’s cold. Cold fur, cold nose, cold paws. Gentaro’s relieved he made up his mind and didn’t leave the cat outside. Who knows if he would have lasted the night?

“My apartment doesn’t allow pets,” Gentaro murmurs, wrapping the coat tightly around them both. “So you’ll need to be quiet.”

The cat seems to understand, because he nuzzles his head to Gentaro’s neck and is silent. Gentaro slips inside, silent on the elevator, immensely grateful no one’s around.

“You’ll have to be good in my apartment,” he says under his breath. “Don’t make a mess.”

Warm breath. He supports the cat with one hand, unlocking his door with the other. It’s not until he’s inside and the door is locked that Gentaro relaxes, setting down the enormous cat.

“Do you have a name?” Gentaro asks, a one-sided conversation. He slips off his shoes and hangs his coat, taking his cans to the fridge.

The cat shakes like a dog, scattering tiny water droplets across the floor, and Gentaro is surprised. What an odd cat. The cat twists his head to the side, dragging a paw through his fur, starting some complex grooming process.

Gentaro goes to the bathroom, pulling his towel from the rack. Gently he scoops up the cat, rubbing him dry.

“Do you have a home?” Gentaro scratches at the cat’s head, fur damp and spiked. He scratches behind the cat’s ears and feels a slim collar around his neck, buried in fur.

Dark leather, smooth against Gentaro’s fingers. The front has a little beaded chain, ending with a dice in miniature and a tiny tassel.

“This is cute,” Gentaro murmurs, fingering the little chain. “So, you have an owner out there. Why didn’t you go home?”

The cat rubs his cheeks against Gentaro’s outstretched hand, seemingly content.

“Nothing to say?”

When the cat is silent, Gentaro sighs, setting him back down on the ground. He turns up the heat, stripping to his high-necked shirt and pants. He pulls the shirt from his body, crumbling it in his hamper, and he feels the cat’s eyes on his back.

He changes quickly, and washes his hands too long in water too hot. From the fridge he pulls convenience store crab from yesterday, forgotten like most of the food Gentaro buys, and he sets it on the floor beside the cat.

“You like crab, don’t you?” he asks. “Dice-cat?”

In lieu of a name tag, he has to make something up, and the little chain from his collar seemed like a good place to start.

Dice-cat waits while Gentaro shreds crab with his fingers, picking it into appropriately-sized bites. While he eats, Gentaro opens the first of his cans of sake, letting himself slip into a comfortable state of wallowing.

When he starts his second, he’s bundled up in a mess of blankets and Dice-cat nests on top, warm and purring like a motorboat on Gentaro’s lap. His fingers weave through fur, and the cat smells faintly of garbage, but Gentaro is tipsy and can’t mind.

“I despise this time of year,” Gentaro says, running fingernails down the cat’s back. “I have deadlines but I’m exhausted, entirely spent. I have nothing to write and nothing to say.”

Dice-cat’s eyes close slowly, and he keeps purring. Gently he nudges against the can Gentaro grips, as if he wants to try it.

“Alcohol is bad for cats,” Gentaro protests. Gently he pushes away the curious cat’s muzzle, giving him scratches to make up for it. His tail flicks back and forth and Gentaro is comforted, but not nearly enough to sleep.

He makes it through the third can and the fourth and half of the fifth before he’s drunk enough to relax. Before he’s drunk enough to cry, even if he can barely manage tears, one hand thrown over his face.

Dice-cat lays beside him, his head resting against Gentaro’s shoulder. Eventually his purring stops and he sleeps, silent and blissfully warm. Almost like sleeping beside another human, and Gentaro chokes.

“I’m sorry,” Gentaro murmurs. “It’s been a long day.”

It’s been a long year and a long life before that. Gentaro finishes the fifth can and turns off the lights, slipping under the covers. He wraps his arms around the cat beside him and slips into a drunken dreamless sleep.

~

Gentaro wakes up, his arms empty, and Dice-cat nowhere to be found. He reaches for his phone, closing out a handful of notifications, before he wakes up enough to question where the cat might be.

Was it a dream? He rubs his eyes, disoriented and sick to his stomach. He hears water running through the pipes, like he left the sink running.

Dice-cat walks into the hall, shaking before his gaze fixes on Gentaro. He just woke up, he’s too disoriented for this.

“Did you… Use the toilet?” Gentaro asks, one hand to his head.

Can cats be toilet-trained? He recalls reading something about it online, but if that’s the case, the cat surely has attentive owners.

Dice-cat meows loudly and Gentaro groans, collapsing back down. He’s so--cute, and Gentaro aches. Deeply he craves a pet of his own, and a polite one that can use the bathroom? Ideal.

But the cat belongs to someone else. Gentaro doesn’t mean to be selfish, but he’s growing fond of this cat, and it’ll be hard to send him on his way.

Another meow, softer, nearly concerned. Dice-cat jumps up on the bed, heavy enough to shake it, and he stands over Gentaro’s still form.

“Are you hungry? You should go out and find your owner, I’m sure they have food for you. I’m sure they’re waiting,” Gentaro murmurs. “It’s selfish of me to keep you here.”

The cat rests his little head down on Gentaro, eyes unblinking. The odd color was no trick of the light, and his fur is too cool-toned, he looks strange. Like a dyed cat. Uncommon. Gentaro pets him, softly groaning.

What kind of cat owner leaves so sweet a boy outside in freezing weather? What cat owner doesn’t bathe their cat, so he smells of garbage and rotten fish? Maybe it would be good for Gentaro to take the cat in, but his apartment doesn’t allow pets, and he’s caught up in indecision.

“Did you use the toilet?” he repeats, and Dice-cat purrs happily on top of him.

When Gentaro rises, his windows are fogged over, humid inside and freezing outside. He gathers up the remnants of last night’s breakdown, tossing the cans in his recycling.

All six of them. Gentaro hesitates, counting twice. He feels like shit, so he knows he drank, but he definitely remembers leaving the sixth in the fridge.

Incredulously, he turns to the cat, innocently perched on his bed. “Did you drink one of these?”

Dice-cat’s eyes are half-closed and he swishes his tail. Smug little bastard. Gentaro’s losing it. He must have been too far gone to remember drinking the sixth, but it’s gone, and his door is securely locked. He groans, tossing the can with the rest.

“It’s still cold outside,” Gentaro says, filling a little bowl with water. “So I suppose you can stay another night. But if you go to the door I’ll let you out, and you can go home.”

Dice-cat meows, a wide-mouthed lazy sound. Gentaro likes to pretend he understands, because it eases his guilt.

“But you should get a bath.”

Another meow, and Gentaro swears it sounds like he’s complaining. It’s been that long since he’s talked with humans, and now he’s pretending to have a conversation with a cat. Ugh.

Gentaro scoops Dice-cat off the bed, ripping him from the warm spot he was sitting in, lugging the heavy cat to the bathtub. Gently he sets him down inside, and Dice-cat meows, loud and irritated.

He takes off his collar first, weighing it in one hand. It’s nice, kind of punkish. Clean enough that he can replace it when the cat is dry.

“You smell like garbage. Don’t you want to stay here another night?” Gentaro teases, happy to pretend the cat is his for a few more hours. Happy to pretend, to play at conversation and feel as though someone’s listening to him.

Dice-cat yowls through the bath, until Gentaro shushes him. Warm water drips from his head, fur flattened, and he looks deeply upset. Upset even as Gentaro massages shampoo through his fur, smelling of lime and freshly cut wood, hands careful not to get shampoo in his face. The cat is still and irritable, but doesn’t scratch, accepting his fate.

“See, isn’t this better?” Gentaro asks, faintly smiling. He rinses shampoo out, and Dice-cat is sullen. His back arches when Gentaro scratches, like he’s enjoying the touch but is too stubborn to admit it.

Gentaro didn’t think cats had this much personality. It’s amusing. Almost like having another person with him, and he barely feels lonely.

When Dice-cat is rinsed off, Gentaro scoops him up in a towel, rubbing him dry. He still shakes like a dog after, grumpy and darting off, but he predictably only makes it as far as the fridge.

I’m miserable, he seems to say. Wet and sad. The only thing that can heal my wounds is more crab.

“I don’t have any more,” Gentaro tells him. “You can have dried fish.”

The cat settles for that, munching in the crunchy silver fish while Gentaro gets ready for the day. He’s fascinating to watch and Gentaro turns from his computer desk, documents open and ignored.

Dice-cat licks himself clean, paws dragging forward from behind his ears, so his hair sticks up. He eats another few dried fish, loudly crunching so Gentaro knows it’s not as good as sushi. Gentaro watches as he explores the apartment, peeking in the closet and in the bathroom again, paw swiping under the fridge.

He hops up on the counter and pretends not to hear Gentaro’s scolding, squeezing himself behind the faucet. He jumps down with a heavy thud and Gentaro prays his neighbors don’t hear. Silently he watches Dice-cat paw at the extra pair of house slippers, ones Gentaro always kept for a guest he’d never have.

“I think they’re a bit big for your feet,” he says dryly. “But you’re welcome to them.”

The cat has already moved on. He wiggles himself under the bed and Gentaro groans, getting up to shoo him away.

He has to pull the cat out, too curious about the clear plastic tub of personal items Gentaro stashed under the bed. Sighing, he sets the cat atop the bed, draping a blanket over his body.

“Don’t judge me.” Gentaro frowns. “You’re a cat. You’re probably fixed, anyway, what would you know about sex?”

Dice-cat meows, insistent and demanding.

“Well. Dildos are for people, not cats,” he mutters. “If you were human, maybe. Otherwise, mind your own cat business.”

A single bop to Dice-cat’s nose, and Gentaro returns to his writing. It goes a little faster when the cat settles at his feet, underneath the desk. He focuses easier, warm and content, and his hands flutter over the keyboard.

Lucky charm cat.

When Gentaro takes a break he slips Dice-cat’s collar back on, sipping water and eating just enough to calm his stomach. Back to writing, and the cat is happy to nap beside him.

In a day he goes more done than he has all month, even if the quality isn’t quite where he wants it to be. A chapter is finished and he’ll go back to edit, but he’s satisfied for the time being.

Gentaro leaves the cat to run to the convenience store, buying them both a feast of raw fish and instant noodles. He picks up a can of cat food, weighing it in his hand. And although he planned to spend as much of December intoxicated as possible, he forgets to get alcohol and doesn’t feel like going back.

A sober Saturday night with his cat. God, Gentaro’s never felt like more of a writer.

Dice-cat at home eats noodles, pinched between Gentaro’s fingers. Fish he tears up, that the cat takes between his teeth and shakes like he could kill prey already packaged.

“Big tough cat.” Gentaro snorts, dangling a noodle just out of reach. “Acting like you’re a hunter.”

The cat sulks, but unblinkingly watches the noodle. He has to look only a bit defeated before Gentaro gives in, and he shakes the noodle like prey too.

He’s softer now that he’s dry, sweet-smelling. Gentaro scratches his nails down the cat’s back, picking through tangles and finding a few mats he’ll have to cut out later. The motor-boat purring starts up again and he smiles.

Why would a well cared-for housecat have mats in his fur? Gentaro entertains the idea that he found a stray, that the cat was wandering hungry and alone until he found him. It’s a sweet fantasy, it really is, a predestined meeting of man and beast. He could be blissfully caught up in it, but the truth hits him.

He can’t keep pets in his apartment. Be it a few weeks or a cat’s lifespan, Gentaro will have to say goodbye. And the loss hurts too much to risk, so attachment will be the death of him. Dice-cat leaves tomorrow morning, before he gets any more fond of the purring feline beside him.

“You’re leaving tomorrow,” Gentaro says. “First thing in the morning. Someone’s surely looking for you, so I can’t keep you another night.”

If cats could show emotion, Gentaro is sure Dice-cat would be visibly sad. His purring stutters, eyes open and fixed on Gentaro’s face.

He’s tired. Tired and wanting to get off, but he can’t do that with Dice-cat’s gaze on him. It’s creepy. What’s the point, anyway? He’s sick of masturbating and it hasn’t felt great in a long time.

Gentaro turns off the lights, and sleeps with Dice-cat against the small of his back. Comforting, but it’s a temporary comfort, and Gentaro can’t fully settle.

Chapter Text

He dreams of arms around him. Pale wrists, with fine green veins beneath, wrapped tight and hands held in his own.

Breath in his hair, hot on his ear. He feels safe, taken up in a human cocoon, lovely and as permanent as anything can be. Hands against his stomach, bare, fingers faintly trembling, and Gentaro trembles too. They swim in green-tinted warm light, tinted through curtains and through snow outside.

“I love you,” the voice whispers, a little too coarse, soft and faint. Gentaro covers his face and the smile he bites back, and a hand dips lower. Warm on his lower stomach, fingers grazing hip bones.

“I love you, too.”

Even when I’m gone? Even when I’m buried and you’re in all black, weeping over something rotting six-feet-under? Will you love me when I’ve been a ghost for nearly a year, in air and ash, drifting alongside your weary body?

Yes, he thinks. And in response, will you love me even if I don’t follow? Even if I do follow, once the world’s exhausted me and I yearn for your arms, in life or death or blissful empty afterlife?

Of course.

Gentaro is satisfied, and his eyes close. A good dream is a welcome relief, but waking up is inevitable. Nightmares leave him fearful, but the gentle dreams leave him longing, and he finds the latter far worse.

Skeletal hands wrap tightly around him, and he can’t escape the grip. Tight and dry and dessicated, bones around his throat, bones around his stomach. Gentaro chokes.

You’ll love me forever, even after I’m gone, and anything else is a betrayal.

~

He comes to slowly, sunlight coming in from the edges of his blinds. It stripes the bed and the bodies beneath covers, and the room is cozy. Fingers outstretch, arms shift, and something heavy is draped over his torso.

Warm flesh. Gentaro’s fingertips brush against human skin and fine hairs. Lower to a wrist, veins underneath skin, a living pulse he can feel. Lower still and their fingers lace, Gentaro’s slim fingers weaving with another’s. Wide and soft, and he squeezes lightly.

He itches for more contact. To feel skin against his again, as close as any two people can get. A warm shiver, a gentle pink electricity, runs along his entire body.

Breath hot against him. Gentaro’s eyes flutter open, adjusting slowly, and his mind wakes up faster. He takes the arm tossed around him and pushes it off, rolling over.

“Who are you?”

The man beside him opens one eye, lazily but in a startlingly smooth motion. He yawns, arms stretched over his head, back arching. He’s nude, and Gentaro panics.

Dark hair falls over his shoulder, tangled and navy-colored. He has wide-set features, sharp teeth and long incisors, visible when his mouth opens. When his eyes open his pupils contract to slits, gaze keenly fixed on Gentaro.

“Morning.”

Gentaro sits up, scrambling for his phone. He holds it like a weapon, like a call to the police would be fast enough to help him. “Answer me.”

The man stretches, clearly in no hurry. When his back arches Gentaro watches his bare chest move, the little silver glint of piercings and the strange array of scratch-like scars across brown skin.

One hand goes up, raking his hair forward, flattening one of his navy-furred ears. An absent grooming practice. Beads fall back, and Gentaro’s gaze fixes on the dice at the end. The collar around his neck.

“Oh, God.” Gentaro’s hand darts forward, weaving through the man’s hair, soft and fluffy. He feels the base of his ears atop his head, warm and fleshy, and he’s dumbstruck.

“Nyah,” the man says, dry and half-sarcastic. He moves forward in the bed, head resting in Gentaro’s lap.

“You’re the cat.” A statement, barely forced through Gentaro’s teeth.

The man shrugs. “Yeah. I figured you would kick me out today, unless I told you I don’t have a home to go back to. So there you go, and I can stay here.”

“No, no, wait. You’re--”

“Dice,” the man offers. “And I’m still sleepy, lay back down.”

Gentaro is speechless. When no response comes, even after a moment of scrambling for anything, he lays back down.

Dice is warm, a low rumble from his chest sounding almost like a purr. When Gentaro hesitates, Dice wraps an arm around his body, drawing him close. Bare skin warm.

“What are you?” Gentaro asks. “You--were a cat.”

“Yeah.” Dice pouts, his ears flattening. “And it was so cold outside! Brr. But I got invited into a nice warm apartment with a sexy guy who feeds me, and I figured this could be my home too. You’re lonely, huh?”

“I’m not.” Gentaro’s expression twists. “You’re--some kind of hybrid?”

Dice blinks, long and slow. “A werecat. I’m human whenever I want--well, if I focus. Sometimes I slip back and forth.”

The perilous middle. Neither man nor cat. Dice forges some new uncommon existence, taking the best of both.

“I see,” Gentaro says. “Why don’t you get a job and your own place?”

Dice pouts, the center of his upper lip arching higher. Like a cat’s mouth.

“I have a job! I make tons of money, seriously. I just, ah--can’t exactly always control when I slip back and forth, so I drop my wallet, and then I have nowhere to stay!” he says. “Come on, we can help each other out.”

Gentaro’s brows go together. “You want--a part-time pet owner?”

“Yeah!” Dice smiles, loose and easy. “I can pay rent. Lonely writer, you want a pet, right? Someone to kiss and hold in the night? I like being fed, you like companionship.”

He frowns, arms crossed. “It’s a small apartment.”

“I’m small!” Dice protests, eyes wide.

“You drank my sake.”

Dice waves this thought aside. “It looked tasty and I was curious! You’re such a bully. Share with a cat sometime, huh?”

Gentaro hesitates. It feels like an imposition, but not an uncomfortable one. He’s used to being cold with people, so they give up and leave him be. His short tone goes over Dice’s head, and he’s oddly persistent.

And he rejects any semblance to intimacy with humans, but Dice is barely human.

Lazy, half-closed eyes. Dice smiles, and his easy going energy is nearly contagious. Gentaro feels oddly at ease.

“Oh, come on. I can make it worth your while,” Dice purrs, his hands going to Gentaro’s waist.

Gentaro’s face flushes red. What? What? Is he offering sex? More surprisingly, was Gentaro considering it for a second there?

“No!” he stiffens. “Excuse me?”

Dice’s arms pull back and Gentaro feels cold. His grin doesn’t falter in the slightest, ears twitching. He rolls over, and Gentaro’s gaze follows down the curve of his spine, faint dimpled small of his back, and the dark-furred tail lower down. The curve of his ass, skin looking soft, brushed with dark hair.

Gentaro half-regrets refusing. If Dice offered again he’d probably agree, but the space between them feels sweet and warm. His skin itches but he forces himself up from the comfort of his bed, shaking out his hands.

“Wanna make breakfast?” Dice purrs. “I’m hungry!”

“Useless cat,” Gentaro mutters. But he goes to the kitchen, keenly aware that he’s wearing nothing besides boxers and an oversized shirt. Dice watches through one eye, arms wrapped tightly around Gentaro’s pillow, while Gentaro scrambles eggs for him.

Gentaro feels strangely at ease. When he feels eyes on his back, he doesn’t feel threatened, as if he’s alone. Dice takes up little space.

Dice takes the bowl Gentaro offers, waking up once there’s food offered. He pauses for breath when half the bowl is gone.

“Aren’t you gonna eat too?” he asks, eyes wide and unblinking.

“I’m fine.” Gentaro smiles faintly. Before he says anything else, anything he regrets, he turns to get his clothes to change in the bathroom.

Cold water on his face. He meets his gaze in the mirror, blinking fast.

It’s a beyond strange occurance. Shouldn’t he be more disturbed? Shouldn’t he reject all that’s odd and uncommon, focusing his all on his writing?

But perhaps he was bored and out of touch, and Dice brings in sharp inspiration, the wild and the fascinating. Gentaro feels a little more alive, a little breathless. A little more raw, when he’s been numb for the past year.

When he returns, Dice is sleeping again, empty bowl beside him. Gentaro takes it, nudging him awake.

“If you’re going to be a human, you’ll need to get dressed,” Gentaro says coolly. “You can’t sleep nude in my bed.”

“Aw, why not?” Dice whines. He sits up anyway, gaze sticking to Gentaro. “If you even have pants that fit me.”

His tail flicks up from the covers, soft and fluffy. Gentaro refuses to fall for whatever Dice is trying to push him into.

“Underwear,” he relents. “And you can borrow a yukata.”

Dice pouts but tugs on the clean boxers Gentaro offers him. He stands still while Gentaro ties the yukata, his face close to Dice’s stomach.

His skin is warm. Gentaro’s eyes drift to the trail of hair going to his navel, waistband of the boxers low on his hips. The scars across his upper body, like Dice was ripped into by some beast. The little silver nipple piercings, and Gentaro has to physically turn away.

“See anything you like?” Dice asks, voice lightly teasing.

Gentaro jabs at his stomach, standing up. “Here’s where the flabby cat stomach went, I see.”

Dice’s ears go flat and he scowls. “You seemed to like my stomach just fine yesterday.”

When he pouts, the little divide in the center of his upper lip gets more pronounced. Gentaro can’t help but smile, the expression faint.

“Maybe so. But a lazy kitty is one thing, and a lazy grown man? Quite different.”

“Then I’ll be a cat again. Problem solved!” Dice grins, falling back on the bed. Now that he’s dressed, Gentaro doesn’t mind.

“You say that, but I don’t believe you can control it.” Gentaro quietly calls his bluff. “I don’t think you’d be here if you had even amateur control over your form.”

Dice seems far from offended. “Maybe!”

Gentaro sits at his desk, opening his laptop. When he thinks of it, he rises to turn on the water boiler and set out two mugs for tea.

“You’re interesting,” he murmurs. “Truly different. I suppose I’m just curious enough to let you stay for a bit, but if you start to become a nuisance--in either form--you’ll be put out.”

“How cruel.” Dice lays back, closing his eyes. “In this cold weather I’ll freeze.”

“Then you’d better behave.” The sharpness in his tone surprises them both, and Dice visibly shivers.

“How scary!”

Gentaro sets a mug of tea for Dice on his nightstand, and returns to the desk. He opens up his novel-in-progress, and lets Dice sleep while he works.

Words flow a bit faster. Gentaro feels more focused and the phrases bubble to the front of his mind, fitting together more smoothly than the day before. Rough compared to what he can do, but something is better than nothing, and it’s far from awful. Clean it up. Craft each sentence a little stronger, fitting together like bricks, polished until they glow.

He’s a gifted writer, and somewhere he always knows that. But each step of writing is rough and ugly in itself, a building of structure, every stage of refinement. When confusion feels heavy on his shoulders he’s useless, and his words are blown down as easily as sticks. When he’s focused his job is easier and his hands are quick at the keyboard.

It’s a good day for writing. Two good days in a row, and he’s pleased.

“How goes it, sexy writer?” Dice asks, his hand to Gentaro’s shoulder. He reads the screen and the last line Gentaro typed.

“It goes as well as I can expect. You’ve been sleeping for hours.”

“Well--” Dice yawns. “Cats sleep more than fifteen hours a day, you know.”

Gentaro frowns. “I’m not sure you need that much sleep in this body.”

He wants to ask how it works. How it works, and where Dice came from, and what exactly he is. He wants to know everything and pick apart Dice to see exactly how he functions. He wants a life story, written down for him to read, for him to consume, because he’s fascinated. He wants to know everything but the mystery and the magic of it all makes him feel alive.

“Well, now I’m awake. And hungry again, so I’d be really fucking grateful if you got food.” Dice grins, leaning against Gentaro’s chair.

“Oh?” Gentaro’s voice is dry. “How grateful, exactly?”

Dice’s arms wrap around him from behind, head resting on top of Gentaro’s. His beaded chain falls down, resting against Gentaro’s cheek.

“Grateful enough for anything.” Dice’s throat rumbles, low like a purr. “Aren’t you tired of using your impressive collection alone?”

Gentaro bites his lip. It’s not as though it means anything, right? A quick fuck, a way to meet his needs and Dice’s too. It doesn’t mean anything because attraction is just that, and he’s in absolutely no position to get attached.

What kind of man would he be if he didn’t fuck the werecat in his apartment?

He stands up, sighing. “I’ll get you food. We can surely find a way for you to make it up to me.”

Dice smirks like the cat that caught the canary. “That’s all I want.”

Gentaro pulls on his coat, keys in one hand. He’s still as Dice leans close, pulling his scarf down from the hook by his desk. Dice wraps it around his neck slowly, movements graceful and even, gaze unbroken.

“Stay warm out there,” Dice offers. “And if you return with any more of that sake--or anything stronger--I’ll give you something even better.”

Gentaro snorts. “Sure.”

It’s simple. Easy. A shared hedonism, perhaps an avoidance of something deeper. Gentaro knows what he’s avoiding; his intimacy is mixed up with fear and grief and a foggy depression that clings to his every action. He can’t begin to guess what Dice is avoiding, but it doesn’t matter when they barely know each other. They don’t need to know anything to meet carnal needs, and the attraction is surely there.

Dice grips the scarf, taut in his hands. When he leans close Gentaro can smell his own shampoo, an odd warm animal smell mixed in. Something faint like incense. Pupils shaped like a little sliver watch him, a cat’s unblinking gaze on him.

Dice leans forward and kisses Gentaro, slow and gentle and hesitant at first. Lips warmer than a human’s, moving fluidly against Gentaro’s own. And Gentaro sighs, it’s been ages--ages since he’s been this close with someone, ages since he’s been kissed. Ages since he’s traced his tongue along someone’s upper lip, dipping inside, hot and wet and unfamiliar. Slick saliva and a strange sort of desperation the other matches, unexpected but welcome.

Gentaro’s hands cup Dice’s cheeks, thumbs over sparse stubble. His tongue brushes against the little notch in Dice’s upper lip and Dice exhales, heavy sigh between them. Rough tongue, scratchy against him. When Dice bites his lower lip, Gentaro gasps, soft and muted. The chemistry between them is nearly palpable on both their tongues, dancing between their bodies like an electric current.

Dice releases Gentaro’s scarf, stepping back. Saliva clings to his lips and he smiles, satisfied.

Gentaro’s hand goes to his mouth, brushing against his sleeve. “I’ll be back in a few. Stay here, and don’t cause any trouble.”

“I won’t.” Dice’s voice is sweetly grating. “Pick me up a pack too, will you?”

“Sure, sure.” Gentaro hesitates by the door. “And Dice? Don’t you dare touch yourself until I return.”

“Wouldn’t dare.”

He goes out into the cold, the sky dark and cloudy but snowless. The further from the apartment he gets, the brighter the lights are. Busy and cold, but Gentaro’s mind is elsewhere, so he can’t bring himself to feel uncomfortable.

Dice. Man and cat, something odd in-between. His fingers brush against his lower lip, swollen and raw.

He’s a good distraction. He doesn’t have to be anything else.

Gentaro carries back food, and stops by a convenience store to get a pack of cigarettes for Dice and a bottle of wine. He can’t stomach anything stronger and it won’t feel as good if he’s drunk. If he’s drunk he’ll feel guilty and sad, but tipsy seems like the perfect balance.

Back to his apartment. He works himself up for later, his thoughts repetitive and heavy like a matra. Just a one-night stand. Not a betrayal, not something to feel guilty for. Quick and easy and hedonistic.

Gentaro unlocks the door, stepping out of his shoes. He sets down his bags, turning toward his bed.

Dice-cat is still on the bed, legs tucked beneath him. He looks sorry, eyes wide and unblinking. His tail flicks, twitchy, like he’s not sure if Gentaro will be angry.

Gentaro sits beside him on the bed, scratching his head. Warm fur, soft fur, and he sighs.

“Couldn’t control it?” he asks, and Dice-cat meows loudly. They’re silent for a long moment, windows cold and apartment warm. Silent like it’s snowing in the room, absorbing words they can’t speak.

Gentaro still has the can of cat food. He’ll offer that instead, and save the human food for another time. An adjustment strange and an attachment stranger, he doesn’t mind.

A soft kiss to the top of Dice-cat’s head.

“Next time.”