Chapter Text
“Meow!”
Naoya was carefully standing in the entrance to his small apartment, keeping distance. His eyes were fixed on his rather unwilling house guest. The kitten was tiny, white with darker gray stripes, and absolutely terrified. “Hey, little one. I’m terribly sorry to disturb you,” he said softly, only to hear an echo seconds after:
“Sorry for the intrusion.”
Kou had taken off her shoes and followed him inside. Her posture stooped, gaze betraying both her nervousness and curiosity as it flew across Nao’s apartment. Then she saw the cat. “Hello, kitty,” she whispered, which, really, wasn’t a big step down from her normal volume.
She hesitantly stepped forward and crouched down, averting the small cat’s gaze. “It’s alright, I won’t hurt you,” she murmured. While Nao watched in amazement, the kitten took a small step towards Kou’s outstretched hand to sniff it. And then, slowly, its fur flattened and it rubbed its head on Kou's hand.
He sighed in relief. After rescuing the small cat from the street and being unable to locate its owner, Nao had decided to find a good home for it. First, he had wanted to keep it himself - but whenever he tried to approach it, it would hiss and run away. That’s why he had brought Kou with him – while their friends Ken and Yo had made fun of him for rescuing a stray that seemingly hated him, Kou had shyly asked if she could meet it.
Nao had been a little anxious – what would have happened if the cat had also rejected his friend?
The kitten allowed Kou to scratch its head, and a very rare and open smile showed up on her face. It was only after particularly challenging games that she looked this relaxed, and Nao was even happier now to have given her a new opportunity to smile.
“So… are you okay with adopting a kitten?”, he asked after it was clear that Kou was not going to have any problems with the cat. Nao felt just slightly jealous as he stroked the bandage on his hand where the cat had bit him earlier. It didn’t hurt too bad; it was mostly his pride that had been wounded just a little.
Kou looked up a little sheepishly; her mouth turned into a shaky line, as if she was trying not to smile. “If it doesn’t bother you…”, she said.
“Awesome!”, Nao grinned widely. He knew for sure that Kou would give the cat a good home – and maybe, just maybe, it would be a perfect excuse to come visit her sometime? He had never really known how to ask for that without being invited first, but now…
“I will call my dad to ask, please excuse me.”
While Kou pulled out her phone, Nao carefully sidestepped around the kitten which eyed him suspiciously. He went into the kitchen to start putting the cat food he had bought into a bag. They would need to go to a vet first; he had already found the nearest clinic and made an appointment.
When he brought the new transport box and the supplies back into the hallway, he managed to startle both Kou and the cat, who looked up at him almost in sync. Nao couldn’t help but smile at that. Since Kou was still waiting for her call to go through, he quietly lifted up the bags and then set them down on his end of the hallway.
After that, he busied himself with picking up some scattered clothes – he hadn’t anticipated inviting Kou today and didn’t want her to think he lived in such a mess. Cleaning just hadn’t been on his mind since he had brought home the cat.
When Kou’s small voice suddenly stopped, he looked up. Only a faint tapping betrayed her movements before she appeared in the doorway to his room. Her face looked upset and – were those tears in her eyes?
“What’s wrong?”, Nao asked. He vividly remembered the last time he had seen her cry - he had made her cry, which was even worse. He had resolved to never let that happen again, and now he didn't know what to do at all!
Kou had to take a deep breath before she said: “My dad won’t allow us to take in a cat. He has an allergy and… we can’t.”
Nao had seen Kou upset a number of times, the worst time was the one when he had just found out that she was a girl and she had run away from him crying. It had broken his heart then and it broke it now. To make matters worse, the cat appeared next to Kou’s legs and meowed softly, clearly not wanting to be separated.
Think, Nao!, he told himself but the need to make Kou look less miserable was taking up all his thinking capacities.
“Don’t worry, we will find a solution!”, he finally said and debated whether or not it would be invading her personal space if he went over to hug her. But then again, he didn’t want to spook either her or the cat, so he stayed where he was.
“Look, we haven’t gone over all the options yet. Maybe we can find out if the cat was chipped and it can return to its previous owner!”, he suggested.
Kou bit her lip and nodded, going back into the hallway to get the transport box. The kitten followed her immediately.
Nao sighed at the sight of that. It would be cruel to separate those two now that the cat had finally found someone to trust. But what could he do?