Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“A glass of water,

Two pills to down,

4:30 in the morning,

And yet you’re still around.”

___

Catra ran a hand through his recently choppily cut short hair as he huffed out a frustrated sigh looking up at the ceiling with tired heterochromatic eyes that held frustrated tears. This isn’t anything unusual, this has been going on for the past month. He felt cold, like he always did nowadays. Catra turned his head to look at the space beside him only to see the form of someone he couldn’t forget even if he tried. Believe him, he has tried, countless times.

The figure’s eyes were glowing a soft yet vibrate baby blue, their blonde hair out of their usual ponytail and now laid surrounding them and encasing zir face. Zirs skin looked cold, their expression a sad frown. Catra snarled before kicking the blankets off and getting up from the bed. He stormed out into the even colder house, down the hall, and into the bathroom. He flicked the light on and looked at himself in the mirror, ignoring the pile of hair on the ground for the time being.

He stared at himself deeply, he had deep and dark bruises under his eyes, his body was thin, his fur had grown out and had become matted. He hasn’t been doing a good job at taking care of himself. He looked at the pile of clothes that had started to pile up in the bathroom, with no motivation to clean any of them. A familiar shiver ran down his spine again, he looked at the doorway. There ze is again, leaning against the door frame looking at him, that frown filled with worry.

“You need to take better care of yourself, darling.” Ze spoke softly, their voice having some sort of reverb and a slight distortion to it.

Catra scowled, “Don’t tell me what to do, you're not real.”

Catra opened the medicine cabinet and grabbed a prescription pill bottle before walking right through the figure, heading downstairs, steps heavy and almost rushed. They walk past the living room, sparing a glance at the male sleeping on his couch bundled in their-.. Catra’s thickest and warmest blanket. Bow had insisted he stay with Catra, saying something about it’s what a brother and friend would do. Catra’s grateful for him being around nonetheless, he thinks if Bow wasn’t, Catra would end up doing something stupid.

Catra entered the kitchen shivering,

“Why is this house so fucking cold?” He hisses out before going about making himself a glass of water. 

“The thermostat has been broken for a month, Cat.” 

Catra's ears twitched at the sound of the figure speaking, it had their voice. Catra ignores the figure again as he anxiously goes to take his sleeping meds, they also help from seeing or hearing the figure. Catra tried to ignore the chills as the figure wrapped zirs cold limbs around him, his tail lashing,

“Please promise you’ll eat, darling. I can’t stand to watch you suffer like this.”

“Yeah, well you’re the reason for my suffering.” He grumbled as he shakily threw the pills into his mouth before starting to chug his water. The cold hold on him was tight and caused him to shiver violently, his fur doing nothing to help fight off the chill and with so little meat on his body, it was almost painful. Catra let out a loud warning growl and the figure let go quickly. Catra spun around to snap at the figure, only to see ze had left. Catra was still freezing, he gripped his arms as shivers ran through him violently. He stumbled his way into the living room and curled up on the floor against the couch by bow’s feet.

He held himself tightly as he choked back stuttered sobs, trying hard to be quiet. He didn’t want to wake up his older brother, he shouldn’t have to worry about Catra or the ghost of the person he fell in love with haunting him. He could handle this alone, Bow didn’t need to worry.

Soon, the pills kicked in and he succumbed to unconsciousness.

———————

6 months ago...

Catra huffed as he looked through the papers on the table. It was probably 10 at night? Catra spared a glance towards the microwave clock to see it was not in fact 10 at night, but 2 in the morning. He let out a deep sigh before taking off his glasses to rub the sleep from his face. He probably should head upstairs and get in bed.

He looked down at the papers scattered across the table and groaned, this needed to be done by the 25th and now it was the 24th. If he pushed through and got it done now, he could have it sent out by this afternoon and-

“Cat?”

Catra glances towards the kitchen’s entryway, a fond smile of admiration at seeing his favorite person. Adora was rubbing zirs eyes sleepily and yawning. They were in red shorts, one of Catra’s larger hoodies, and their glasses they typically rarely wear. Catra felt his heart swell with love at the sight,

“What are you doing up, Princess?”

Adora snorts, “I could be asking you the same.”

Catra smiled, standing up and walking over to his partner, wrapping his arms loosely around zirs waist, “I was doing taxes and all that lovely adult stuff. I was about to head to bed.”

“About to or stay up all night to finish them?” Adora asked with a knowing smile and raised an eyebrow

Catra could only sigh fondly and shake his head, “You know me too well.”

Adora scoffs playfully, “Of course i do!” Ze raises Catra’s hand showing off the ring on his finger, “I married you.”

Catra pecked Adora’s lips with a hum of acknowledgment, his eyes half lid as he mutters, “I’ll never get tired of you saying that.”

"I'll never get tired of reminding you." They mumbled against his lips before kissing him again.

Adora soon pulled back and glanced towards the table and huffed through zirs nose, before moving from their partner's embrace and towards the paper covered table, "Alright, let's kick these bills and payments in the ass so I can have my heater back."

Catra stood back and watched as Adora shifted through papers, pushing their glasses up. Catra couldn't help watching zir for a bit, his heart fluttering with warmth before he joined his spouse.

——————

Catra stared at the food in front of him. It didn’t look bad, the pancakes looked aesthetically pleasing and smelled wonderful, however, the magicat wasn’t hungry. Bow was staring at him again, Catra slouched in his chair,

“How did you sleep?” 

Catra scoffed inwardly, they both know he didn’t sleep well by the fact he was curled up at the end of the couch shivering so hard his teeth were chattering. Catra shrugged as he pokes at his pancakes,

“Fine.”

“You didn’t have any nightmares?”

“No.” He grumbles,

"I like your hair."

Catra scoffs "It's a mess"

"Yeah, but I like it. It suits you."

Catra huffed through his nose, running a hand through his hair, 

"....It was too matted to take care of it. This is better." He mutters,

Bow nods taking a bite of his food backing off...at least that’s what Catra assumed,

“Lance and George are wondering when you’re going to come pay them visit”

Catra rolls his eyes before roughly cutting into his pancakes and shoving a piece into his mouth, 

“Tell them I’m too busy.”

Bow raised an eyebrow, “Cat, I’ve been living here for 2 months, what could you possibly be so busy with that would warrant not visiting our dad’s?”

”Bills? Mourning? I don’t know, make something up.”

“Catra you can’t keep avoiding them, they’re worried.”

“Well then tell them not to be.”

“Catra…i understand that it’s been rough since…A-”

Catra sets his fork down harshly and snarls at Bow. However, he was unphased and only gave Catra a sad look, not of pity but of understanding. They both held eye contact for a long moment before Catra scowled and pushed his chair harshly out from under the table and stood up, 

“I’m going out.”

Bow sighed and leaned back, “Okay, Cat. Remember, we’re going out to dinner with Glimmer tonight. Be home before 9, please?”

Catra ignores Bow as he grabs his coat and leaves the house, slamming the door in the process. Catra doesn’t mean to snap at Bow like that, He knows that he was just trying to help Catra, and he knows it isn't healthy to keep snapping at Bow or avoiding their dad's, or anyone for that matter. Everything was just...too fresh still. Adora, as selfish as it sounds to say, wasn't just his best friend or his partner.

Adora was his soulmate, his everything, his heart. Adora was his will to keep going.

 But Adora is dead.

Adora died.

Catra doesn’t really notice he's running until his lungs are burning and black spots start to dance across his eyes. He forces himself to stop and gasp for air. Taking in his surroundings, he's in front of The FrightZone.

Adora never liked it when he went there, so he stopped.

He watches himself go into the bar.

He shouldn't be here, he knows he shouldn't, but he isn't really there is he? He is just a passenger now.

He sits down at the bar anyways.

"You're sober, don't do this" he hears them plead, "You promised."

But it's a lost cause. That 3 year chip, the one they had worked so hard and failed many times before to get, felt hot in his pocket. He doesn't order anything, the bartender doesn't offer him anything. Catra’s ears flicker once and awhile as he takes in the sharp smells of cigarette smoke and the musty smell of the guy next to him.

When he gets a whiff of the alcohol in the air, and his chip is burning his leg, he dashes outside. Stumbling behind the place to vomit.

He's shaking and he's back in control. He hears the footsteps before he feels the cold presence of Adora. Ze crouches in front of him. Catra closes his eyes tightly,

"Go away, Go away, Go away. You're not real, please stop." Catra pleads, 

Adora doesn't move any closer, "Cat, even if I could, I would never leave your side."

Catra takes a shaky breath as he moves back and leans against the wall of the bar, gripping his hair as he stares straight ahead, the translucent figure of Adora in his peripheral.

Adora doesn’t take long to move in front of Catra with a pleading look, "You have to believe me Cat, I'm really here. I can't tell you how or why this is happening or even if you can fix this but I'm right here."

Catra could feel another wave of Sadness and Anger grow as he stares at supposedly, his very much ghost spouse. Catra wants to believe them, wants to look at this figure and ask why ze left him here alone or why ze is doing this to him, he wants to understand so badly why he wasn't the one to get killed.

Sadly, He doesn't believe in ghosts and he'll be damned if he starts now.

So instead, Catra scoffs disbelieving and stands up, 

"I'm going crazy." He mutters as he shoves his hands in his coat pockets and begins his walk down the street, the 'ghost' of his dead partner following close behind. 

Ze always does.

——————

Catra doesn’t know how he lost track of time, or how he could leave his phone in his bedroom. But here he is, the sun no longer lighting the sky and him rushing to get home. He can't believe he's going to be showing up late to dinner at his own house. He scowls lightly as he takes as many shortcuts as he could think of as he tries to make his way home. 

Yes, he doesn't want to go to this dumb dinner with Bow and Glimmer. 

Yes, he would normally not care about how late he was or simply not show up.

And Yes, he knows they're just going to be awkward or understanding and talk about anything going on with their friends hoping Catra would chime in with a question or interest or just anything other than silently eating his food.

This isn't the first check up dinner they've organized.

Catra thinks it's not just for him, knows it's not just for him. Bow and Glimmer have gone from seeing each other every waking moment to seeing each other whenever Bow isn't babysitting Catra to make sure he doesn't decide to do something stupid. Which is fair, he had a tendency to do that when he was younger and on the cusp of having a breakdown.

Catra always feels on the cusp of a breakdown now. It was worse when he heard the news but 2 months isn't enough time to get rid of that feeling apparently …maybe no amount of time is really.

Catra stops and looks around, realizing he has no clue where he is, he's in a part of town he's never been before. He scowls, kicking the ground as he mutters curses. 

Of course, he would get lost. This is just fucking perfect. He covers his face with his hands, taking a shaky frustrated breath as he feels himself start to get overwhelmed with all the emotions he's feeling. He feels like he's about to spiral and he can't stop it, and he feels like he can't breathe. He's going to disappoint Bow by not being there and he's going to be upset. Glimmer's going to think he missed it on purpose again. 

He can't breathe, it's all too much.

The feeling of cold limbs hugging him tightly causes him to gasp for air at the sudden sensation. He coughs as he collects as much air as he can, he didn't realize he wasn't actually breathing or that he had started crying. He was now in a crouching position, the cold presence of Adora pressed up close against him, murmurs of sweet nothings being whispered to him. He's so tired he fully falls back into a sitting position, he scrubs his eyes roughly as he tries to pull himself together.

The arms don't loosen until Catra is breathing normally and starts to shiver. Catra takes another deep breath as he processes slowly that he had a panic attack.

Adora moves to be in front of him, somehow Catra knows that if ze had pupils they'd be filled with concern. Catra stared at the being who had clearly gotten them out of their panic attack, in a similar fashion that his Adora would,

"Say…" Catra swallowed the lump that was starting to form in his throat, "Say i believe you…that you are who you say you are. How do I know you're real and not a figment of my imagination?"

Adora seemed to perk up at the idea of Catra believing zir, quick to grin and excitedly answer, "I was thinking about that when we–er you went on your walk and i was going to say something only i would know that you have never told anyone else, but then i thought 'well if i say something you know then it wouldn't prove anything.' So, I was thinking, and I remembered there's things I, Adora, would know that you, Catra, would not!"

Catra looked at the ghost bewildered by how proud ze looks, that was definitely an Adora mindset when it came to explaining things. Catra nods slowly, not worried about anyone seeing him talk to what Catra assumes to be no one in everyone else's eyes. Catra waited for the ghost to continue, which didn't take very long,

"So, if I know my dear spouse well enough, I know you need proof and evidence to believe anything, so here's something I think you'll find interesting or at least enough to believe me"

Catra watched the ghost lean in close, "I have a journal I've been writing in since like 5th grade and it's in my office, bottom shelf, hidden inside a false book about calculus" Ze whispered, as if someone other than Catra would hear them speak.

Catra can’t help snicker, "You don't even like calculus."

Adora seemed to roll zir eyes, though Catra could only tell by the way their eyebrows moved and the slight roll of zirs head,

"Thus, why I picked it as the book to hide my journal." Ze spoke like it was obvious, "No one likes calculus enough to pick up a book and read about it."

"....Touché."

They both sat in silence for a while, Catra still trying to logically explain what's happening to him and that apparently ghosts maybe do exist? It's at moments like this that he wishes he wasn't sober. 

Catra soon stands up, Adora quickly scrambles up as well,

"Alright, I don't have the energy to process this so, back trying to find my way home and not think about how you might actually be my dead partner."

After a few dead ends and running from a stray dog that chased him for a couple of blocks that Adora found hilarious, he found his way home. He didn't even get into the doorway before Bow and Glimmer were hugging him tightly, Bow openly sobbing while Glimmer scolded him,

"What the hell, Catra!? You can't just disappear like that!"

Catra grunts, pulling out of the hug, opting to hug himself, "I didn't mean to be gone for so long, I forgot my phone here and got lost, it isn't a big deal. What time is it anyways?"

Glimmer huffed, crossing her arms, "11 am at this point."

"I thought you..you weren't answering and you left your phone and.." Bow blubbered, Catra's heart breaking at seeing his brother so upset, knowing full well what he thought happened. 

He pulled Bow back into a hug tightly, feeling guilt consume him, letting Bow cry. Glimmer looked at Catra with relief despite her scoldings, she placed a hand on Catra's Shoulder, "We know it's been hard and we know you would never do that, but we're worried about you Cat. You don't eat, you don't sleep, you leave anytime we bring up the accident or…Adora."

Catra's whole body winced at hearing zirs name out loud for the first time by someone living in weeks. Bow has calmed down at this point, but continues to hold Catra in a tight embrace. Glimmer's eyes are filled with a sad understanding as she continues, "We love you, and we miss zir too."

Catra can’t help the anger and frustration that roars in his chest at the statement. He knows they miss Adora but they aren't the ones who are still mourning the death. They haven't had trouble sleeping, or eating, or even just living. They are able to continue living and moving forward while Catra feels his whole world has stopped and nothing is worth it anymore. Hell, he's talking to a fucking ghost for fuck sakes. How are they allowed to miss zir when they haven’t lost the love of their life.

Catra knows that's wrong and selfish of him to even think but it's hard not to, he will never be able to live life the same way again now that the love of his life is dead. Instead of saying any of these hurtful things that could hurt his friends, he put up his walls, "...i'm going to bed."

Catra pulled out of the hug and began to walk past the two of them, feeling their worried eyes on his back as he left up the stairs, neither of them trying to make Catra stay. 

Good.

Catra’s almost to his room when he stops in front of a closed door. The conversation he had early came to his mind. He shakily reaches out for the door handle before gripping it firmly and opening the door to a room he has refused to go into until this moment.

The office was Adora's favorite place to be, whenever they had a free moment that wasn't going to work or spending time with Catra, ze would be up in here either reading or working on zirs hobby at the time. 

Catra remembers when they discussed getting a house instead of renewing the lease on their apartment, how nervous Adora got when pitching to have an office, seen as ze never had enough space to truly indulge in the things they liked or had hyperfixations on.

Catra was obviously okay with that, knowing how bummed Adora would get when they would run out of space in their tiny apartment and Adora would stress out over the idea of getting rid of anything. 

Those were always rough days.

When Adora saw this room, zirs eyes practically were glowing with excitement, whispering to Catra how this was the house. Catra knew then too that this house was the one, already planning to give Adora the world like ze had for him.

The room looks frozen in time now, the only light being the ones from downstairs reaching barely enough in the room to see everything.

Catra didn’t bother with the light switch, opting for the lamp on the table, as Adora usually had it. Once the lights were on, Catra felt his eyes well up again as they saw how dust had gathered on everything in here. Even zirs last big project they were working on, a lego world of their own, a kingdom called bright moon and a forest called the Whispering woods. Ze had a story for it all too. Catra always asked about it, but ze would only tell him that it was a surprise.

Catra misses zir.

Catra ignores the table of legos, looking at the bookshelf that stood behind the desk. He crouches down and grabs the thick calculus book, which wasn’t heavy at all. He gently sets it down and stares at it.

He doesn't move to open it or go near it. Catra doesn't know why he's so nervous to open the book, he just is.

Maybe it's because if he opens its and there's nothing, that's admitting that everything that has happened today is just proof that he's going crazy, and if there is what the figure said is in here, Catra’s whole perception of the world is a lie and that means admitting ghost are real and Adora has been following Catra for a month willingly.

That's more daunting than it being nothing oddly enough. Catra realizes at this moment that there isn't that looming cold that's usually always on one side or over his whole body. As if the figure chose to not be here when Catra was finding what they said.

'Or maybe you really are going insane.'

Catra scowls for the thousandth time today and rips the bandaid off. Grabbing the book again, Catra opened the book.

There it was.

Right in a hole cut into the pages, sets a thick journal, with faded stickers and worn pages.

Adora has been here this whole time.

Catra quickly closes the book and rushes to put it away, his hands shaking as he quickly fumbles with the lamp's light switch, stumbling out of the room hurriedly and closing the door. Leaning against it with wide eyes. His brain is working so fast, desperately wanting to find a logical reason for why this is happening.

He knows one thing though, He can't look at zir tonight again, or maybe not for a while. Catra has a feeling he won't have to worry about that, but he isn't taking any chances.

He makes his way to the bathroom, grabbing his sleeping pills and taking them dry. 

As soon as his head hit the pillow, he was out. Already exhausted from the events of today.

Chapter Text

Adora isn't there when he wakes up in the morning.

Nor when he goes to bed that night.

And yet again, not there when he wakes up the next morning.

He's starting to think that maybe, just maybe, him finding that book was a coincidence and that the ghost was just him going crazy from mourning.

It would make things simpler to explain if that's the case. 

He's startled from his light sleep by a familiar cold covering his entire back and almost nestled in the crock of his neck. He feels the tight grip of the hold and can't help his chattering teeth, he doesn't even turn around, the faint glow from zir arm and zir face from his peripheral is enough evidence for him to know.

He shivers violently, seemingly enough to have the ghost move quickly away. Catra turns around, Adora has moved to stand on their side of the bed, holding zir arms and a pained and sad look on their face.

Catra shifts so that he's sitting up as he stares at his dead spouse,

"...Hey Adora." He whispers, as if even his own voice was too loud to even speak at a normal volume, slightly shocked by how relieved he sounds,

Ze looks away, "I'm sorry….i just….i wanted to see if i could hold you…i didn't mean to make you cold."

Catra stares at Adora quietly, studying them. Adora’s clothes are the same as when the accident happened. Ze's hair is down all the time though. Does it bother zir like it did when ze was alive? Catra loved when they would wear it down. Only when Adora looks back at him, which takes a good minute or two, does he speak again,

"...I was starting to think you were a figment of my imagination…Why were you gone for so long?"

Adora winces, holding zirself even tighter, "Well at first it was because I wanted to give you space. I….i don't really remember much of what happened after i left. Usually, i can just watch you from afar or between dimensions i think?? I'm not really sure."

Catra nods slowly, before slowly getting up and shuffling to his closet. He knows he won't be sleeping again, hell, he was in and out of sleep tonight from nightmares anyways. Looking through what clothes he had left to wear, his whole body winces when his fingers brush the fabric of Adora's favorite red bomber jacket.

"...you should wear it."

Catra glances at the ghost before looking back at the jacket,

"I can't…" he mutters, pain evident in his voice, "it was yours."

"Well…i always liked seeing you in my clothes." Catra hears Adora move to stand next to him, "Besides, most of your clothes are dirty."

Catra stares at the jacket, before closing the closet and heading to the bathroom, searching through the clothes pile for any clothes that seemed decent enough to wear,

"Catra that's so unhygienic"

"I'm not wearing your clothes." He grumbles as he finds a sweater and some shorts that didn't smell. He grabs his testosterone and a needle before walking back into his room and grabbing a clean pair of boxers, he needs to do laundry he knows, he'll do it later.

He sets his things on the dresser and begins to change, trying his best not to look at his disheveled fur, he knows Adora is watching him, he can feel zir watching him. He always knows when Adora is looking at him. He sighs, keeping his shirt off as he begins to open the needle,

"You uh…you need to wipe the area first."

Catra huffs quickly to walk back to grab the bag filled with the other things needed. He grabs the electric hair clippers as well, before heading back to the room, going about the steps he's been doing for a year now.

He shaves the patch of fur he shaved last month on his stomach so he has a smooth and easy area he can inject himself, then he goes about preparing the area and the injection. After checking for air bubbles, he takes a moment to take a deep and slightly shaky breath.

He's never done this alone. Adora did it for him before zir's death, and Bow helped out last month because he's probably the only other person he trusted to inject him. They know Catra doesn’t like needles.

There are other forms. He's aware of that, but he didn't at the time and he liked that Adora was a part of the process. Half the time, Catra would be lost admiring Zir before he even realized they'd be done. Catra didn’t mind it if it meant he got to spend even more time with his spouse.

He minds it now.

He knows he could just wake Bow up and ask him for help. He wouldn't even question why Catra is up and he won't be upset but he's already doing so much by being away from his own wife to watch over him. Bow does so much, cooking, cleaning, even just encouraging and coaxing Catra out of bed on especially rough days.

Catra absolutely loves Bow, loves him to death, but he knows that Bow is getting…

Tired?

Worn-out?

Impatient.

Maybe he can try and convince him to leave again and go back home to Glimmer.

"Cat?"

Catra blinks their eyes open again. 

Oh. Right, the shot.

Catra takes another quick breath before he grabs ahold of the syringe, and grabs the spot on his stomach he was going to inject himself with. He tries to steady his hand, inching closer, He feels his fur begin to raise and his ears fold back as he stares at the needle.

The more he looks, the shakier his hands get. He can't, He can't, He can't, He–

"Catra…look at me."

Catra doesn’t. He tries to force his hands to move but they shake more, he thinks his whole body is, a whimper sounding out.

"Catra? Catra, breathe!"

Catra lets out a breath he did realize he was holding and sets the syringe down. He hugs himself as he slowly backs away. Adora moves to be in his line of sight, brows furrowed in concern and worry,

"You okay?"

Catra takes a moment to calm down, embarrassed that Adora had to see that, and embarrassed he couldn't take one little shot. He snarls angry, his tail lashing. 

Adora reaches out to touch him, he walks right through zir quickly.

God, he's so pathetic, isn't he?

_________

5 months ago…

Adora has been very…quiet today.

That's not totally unusual for the blonde, when ze is tired or having a rough day, zir takes a few hours to zirself in the office. However, Adora has been quiet since they got back from visiting zirs sister, Mara, which is unusual. Catra’s currently finishing up in the shower, luckily it won't take too long to dry off like it normally does seeing as Adora helped a few days ago to trim his coat so he isn't so furry.

Once he's somewhat dry, he walks into their room, towel wrapped around his neck and in just his boxers,

"Hey Dor', I think I wanna skip brushing my fur tonight."

Adora, who's in bed looking at their phone, only humming in acknowledgment.

Catra huffs, crawls on their bed so he's hovering over zir, taking Adora's phone and setting it on the nightstand before he starts to smother the blonde in kisses all over zirs face. Ze laughs and pushes him, not really trying to stop him, "Catra! Stop!"

"What? I'm not doing anything." He mutters against zirs cheek with a smirk, before he dives down and blows into zirs neck, ze laughs harder now trying to stop the feline as he starts to tickle the blonde.

It doesn't take Adora long to finally flip Catra over so that ze is straddling him, still laughing and snorting. Catra loves his partner so much, he's sure if he looked in a mirror, he'd have a dopey grin and his eyes would be blown wide, he can hear himself purring already. He waits for Adora to calm down, his tail not being able to stay still with how happy he is right now.

Adora lets out a sigh, before finally opening zir eyes to look at him. They crinkle with mirth, as ze smiles down at him, "What was that for?"

"You weren't giving me enough attention, besides you've been quiet all day. Heck usually you give me at least a look when I say I don't wanna brush my fur out and make me do it anyways" 

Adora scoffs, "I don't do that."

"You really do, you pout at me and go,'Catra, my handsome and sexy partner! You have to brush your fur or it'll get matted!" Catra mimics, only to get whacked with a pillow, "ACK!"

"I don't sound like that!"

Catra raises his hands in defeat before he frowns slightly, "What's going on in that big brain of yours."

Catra wishes he didn't bring it back up, because zirs eyes stop sparkling and they pout slightly. They sigh, going to move, Catra’s hands quick to hold zir hips so ze doesn't move. Ze raises an eyebrow, a small knowing smile appearing on zir lips, "Really, Cat?"

Catra has the decency to look sheepish as he squeezes zir hips gently, "You can move if you want."

Adora snorts, leaning down to give Catra a quick kiss, quick enough to have Catra chase zir for more, resting zirs forehead against his. The moment passes as Adora pouts again, Catra waiting patiently for zir to speak.

"I'm not upset or anything.. i've just been thinking about something. Something Mara said and…something else that we haven't really..i guess talked about and i– Well–"

Adora goes quiet again, hands fidgeting with his fur as ze tries to gain the courage to say what ze wants.

It takes a bit, but after inhaling deeply, ze blurts it out,

"Doyouwannahaveakid?"

Catra blinks rapidly processing exactly what his spouse has just asked him, once it clicks his ears perk and his eyes widen as he looks at his spouse whose face is red, either from embarrassment or holding their breath, or maybe even both. They look at Catra with wide anxious eyes, seemingly also shocked they said that out loud.

"A…a kid?"

"Ye..yeah! I mean I know we've only been married for a year, but we've been together since senior year of highschool and have been in each other's life since we were kids! And i know we don't have the space and–"

"Adora."

Adora snaps zir mouth shut effectively stopping their anxious ramble,

"A kid."

Adora doesn’t look away or speak, just nervously nods. Catra swallows harshly, his mind and chest buzzing. Adora wants to have a kid with him. Adora wants a kid and wants to be parents with Catra. Adora has been thinking about a family….with him.

It kinda makes sense. Not the having kids with Catra thing, he's currently still shocked Adora wants a kid with him. Adora over thinks a lot of things, especially conversations they've never really talked too much about. Of course kids were brought up, but at the time they were young, freshly out of high school and only 5 months into their relationship.

Catra had said then, that he couldn't imagine caring for a smaller human being and Adora had laughed and agreed that it was weird to think about. Ultimately, they forget about the conversation in favor of apartment and job hunting while they take online classes.

It's mind boggling that they've danced around the topic for so long, but here it is, 7 years later.

Adora wants to start a family.

He feels his chest let out a deep rumble of a purr, Adora finally letting out a breath as ze leans back a tad and cups Catra’s cheeks,

"Why are you crying, love." Ze whispers, 

Catra hadn't even realized he had started to cry. He takes a shaky breath, closing his eyes and leaning into Adora’s hands, more tears falling,

"I'm just happy." He says, with a wet chuckle, he opens one of his eyes to look at Adora’s face, "You want a family with me?"

Adora seems to shake zir head exasperated with a smile filled with love, "And you call me an idiot. I've always wanted a family with you, Cat."

Catra cries more, pulling Adora gently into a loving kiss, filled with all the love he's feeling right now, Adora kissing with just as much love and it feels healing. They still have a lot to discuss before they actually adopt a kid, but for now they cherish the mutual desire to love and have a kid. He knows Adora loves and wants him, he knows, but he can't lie that he has those bad days he thinks otherwise. 

He believes zir fully now.

Adora loves him.

Adora loves him.

Adora loves him.

And Catra loves zir.

_____

Catra huffs through his nose as he reads through yet another reddit post about ghosts that doesn't exactly explain anything. Most of the ghost stories are obviously fake or just have nothing that could help with what's happening with him.

He's been scrolling through the internet to try and find out if anyone has had an experience that is similar to actually talking and being able to see a ghost. So far, the internet has proved to not be useful in his search. Which, quite frankly, is infuriating.

His tail lashes frustrated as he clicks on another link, ignoring a certain ghost trying to pick up a vase with their tongue sticking out of zir mouth.

That's another thing that's frustrating him. He can't figure out why Adora seems so chill and not freaked out by this. Ze is a literal ghost haunting their widowed partner. Is this a magic thing? Did Adora and Mara make some kind of magic pact so that they can't ever truly be gone? Granted Catra has no clue if that's how magic works being a non magical being despite him being a magicat. 

That's fine, Catra didn’t like magic anyway. 

However, just like how sometimes he wishes he wasn't sober, he wishes he had some basic understanding of how magic worked so maybe he could cross it off or even use it as an explanation for this fucked up situation.

"Are you…reading ghost stories?"

Catra startles quickly turning his phone off and turning around to face his brother, who is looking at him with a raised eyebrow. Adora looks over with a smirk,"You're reading ghost stories? Really?"

Catra’s face flushes slightly, "Pft! No!"

Bow nods but smiles like he already knows Catra is lying, "Okay, well I'm about to head to the studio. Do you wanna join me?"

Catra notices then that Bow is dressed in a cropped and sleeveless shirt and some sweatpants, 

"Mmm no. I'm not in the mood to work out and sweat."

"Alright, well call me if you need anything. Enjoy your Ghost stories!"

Bow quickly dodges as a pillow is thrown at him, laughing as he quickly leaves the house. Catra huffs, grumbling as he continues his research. Adora is still smirking at him,

"So…Ghost stories."

"Shut up."

"I never that I'd see the day that Catra-"

"Stop it."

"Alexandria Greyson would willingly-"

"I'm gonna call a priest to banish you."

"Read ghost stories!"

Catra growls loudly, turning off his phone, "I'm only doing this because i want to figure out WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK is going on!"

He takes a deep breath before standing up, tail lashing even more as he storms into the kitchen to grab a glass of water. He needs to calm down, take a break and think.

Adora died.

Catra grieved.

Adora came back as a ghost.

Catra doesn’t know how that's possible.

The internet is at this point ruled out. It takes too much time and nothing on there is helpful. He can't just ask someone about it, or hire fucking ghost hunters or something. He feels like no matter where he turns he's running into a wall.

It would be so much easier if he just let Adora be, Catra doesn’t mind being cold anymore, and maybe he can learn to actually stomach the fact he's talking to his dead spouse. Alas, he needs proof and if Adora really is dead, he'd want zir to go to whatever form of afterlife there is…..is being a ghost an afterlife? Question for another time. There's still one thing, he has been avoiding trying.

He chugs his cup of water before walking back into the living room and taking a seat, Adora tries to apologize but Catra raises his hand, 

"Don't, I'm the one who should apologize. I'm sorry I yelled, I was frustrated."

Adora fidgets, "You asked me to stop and I didn't, I'm sorry."

"It's fine." Catra sighs, running a hand through his hair, "Let's just, try something else."

Adora tilts zir head,"Like what?"

Catra sighs, "Like actually talking to you."

He turns on his phone and opens the notes app, "I'm going to ask you questions, you just tell me everything you know, then we can work a hypothesis on what's going on and how this is possible, and from there go on to experiments, more research, and hopefully an answer or solution."

Adora stares at Catra bemused, jaw dropped and everything. Catra only raises an eyebrow in response,

"So what do you remember?"

"Wow, just jumping right in huh?"

Adora rubs zir neck, mulling the question over. Catra watches zirs eyebrows pinch, taking time to process he can only assume.

"Well…" Ze starts slowly, "I remember you..bow and glimmer… people are easy to remember. Memories with certain people are easier to remember than others but I'm assuming that's just because of how close I was to them before I died."

"Anything that's hard to remember?"

Adora’s again quiet, seemingly reluctant to answer, Catra furrowed his eyebrows, "Adora?"

Ze fidgets for a few minutes before taking a deep breath,

"Catra...How did I die?"

Catra inhales sharply, body tensing up. Eyes welling up and grip on his phone tight. 

Adora’s death…

"Hello?"

"Is this the spouse of Mx.Greyson?"

Catra had known then that something bad had happened. He was in their room working on a commission for a client.

"You….you don't remember?" He chokes out,

Adora frowns and shakes zir head, "I don't remember anything about my death. I thought maybe I would by sticking around you but Cat…i can't even remember what happened that day."

Adora’s voice sounds so painful, clearly this has been worrying zir for a while,

"Why didn't you say anything?"

Adora scoffs,"1. You didn't believe it was really me-"

"Still don't if we're being honest."

"2. you get defensive and weird when anyone brings up me dying."

Catra stares at the ghost before looking down at his phone and typing out a response, "Did you have any unfinished business?"

Catra hears zir sigh defeated, "No, Catra. I didn't have any…"

Catra looks back up when Adora trails off, their brows are furrowed, "What?"

"I….i do have some unfinished business."

Catra perks up, "Great! Okay so that's probably why you haven't gone on to some kind of afterlife."

Catra’s excitement is quickly killed when Adora seems apprehensive and even more reluctant than revealing ze couldn't remember zir death. Catra felt a bubble of dred rising in his stomach, "Why do I feel it's something I'm not going to like?"

"It…might be a She-ra thing." Ze spoke slowly and reluctantly,

Catra scowled, "No."

"Catra."

"No, Adora. You chose to not become the next Shera. You said you didn't want that if it meant not doing what you loved." 

Adora sighed, "I know, and I still don't want to be She-ra, but Mara did say that it runs in our genes. If me not fulfilling my role and accepting my role as She-Ra is why I'm still here, then maybe I'm just going to have to suck it up."

Catra's tail lashes more, he crosses his arms and leans back, "Let me think…"

Well…it makes a lot more sense now that he knows for sure that this is a magic thing and not just a 'my spouse is stuck to the living realm because of me' idea that was starting to form. However, this just makes things 10x harder to solve. Adora never trained to be She-ra or even really used the magical abilities ze had when they first started showing up.

Magic works in weird ways, you either have it or you don't. Most who have magical abilities either gain them as an early teen or a child, it's rare for babies to show magical abilities so early and it's down right impossible for non magical beings to gain powers after they turn 18. From what Catra and Adora were able to find out through Mara, Adora was one of those rare babies and was a an hour away from being 18 before zir powers showed up in full.

Catra nods to himself before getting up and heading to the front door, sitting down to put his shoes on. Adora looked at him puzzled, "Where are you going?"

"If we need you to become She-ra in order to be able to rest, then we need to understand more about what's going on. Our hypothesis is obvious," he grunts as he stands back up and grabs his coat, "if we make you She-ra, then you will be able to pass on."

Adora walks over to Catra, "How are we going to do that? I'm dead."

Catra scoffs, "Well, that's why we have to do more research about our predicament dumbass. We're going to the library."

Before Adora could argue, Catra is already out the door. Catra jumps a little when Adora sticks zir body through the door, "Or we could just ask Mara for help?"

"Ah yes, go to my sister in law for help, smart. Hey Mara! Guess what? I'm talking to your dead sibling." Catra gives a fake and sarcastic grin,

Adora rolls zir eyes, "Mara is more understanding than most."

"Look, we can go ask Mara for help after we do more research and our own experiments, Deal?"

"...I still don't like this idea." Adora sighs,

"Well good thing you have no choice in my actions, if you don't wanna come with me stay home or disappear or something."

Adora kept quiet as Catra walked with determination and purpose to the public library, a fire restored in his eyes.