Chapter Text
The building imposes as Kaelix gazes at it from inside his friend’s car. It doesn’t exactly tower, but the absolute magnificence of it is impossible to ignore. A giant central building, three storeyed high, and wider than anything one could comfortably call a ‘summer house’.
Rumors of the Dore summer house had always reached his ears, having lived and grown up not far from here, but it was the first time he had stood upon the property himself. As soon as he had entered the gate, he had felt the shift, as if the very air that surrounded this place was supposed to hold itself to higher standards.
He briefly debates calling but decides against it. He was here anyways.
Kaelix walks down the winding stone path to the central building that he would most accurately call a castle. There was an air of absence, though, as if the essence of the house had been collected and stored away, as if the whole place was holding its breath for a second, perhaps longer.
He knocks.
He looks to the left and then to the right, taking in the lazy summer afternoon air, as if simply standing there didn’t make him nervous. He spots a ball of black fuzz move a little at the edge of his glasses but he’s pretty sure it’s just an aberration. Maybe a rat.
No answer.
Well, then he’s going to have to call.
Freodore picks up on the first ring. “Yes?”
“It’s me, Kaelix. I’m here, at the front door”
“Oh”, Freodore replies. There’s a brief shuffling sound, before he continues, “Hold on”
Kaelix doesn’t know what he’s expecting, but a sleepy, green haired man, slightly shorter than him isn’t what he’s expecting.
“Freodore?”, he asks. .
Freo holds out a polite hand to shake. “That’s me”
Freo opens the door further. Kaelix takes in the general darkness of the place as his eyes struggle to settle. He nearly falls over at the general ball of soft that hits his feet. A shrill meow rings out.
“Be careful”, Freo says. There’s a certain sharpness to it that Kaelix definitely registers.
Kaelix knew he was there to paint cats. The advertisement he had seen while scrolling his social media said as much but the longer he stood there, the more he realized. He wasn’t just there to paint cats. He was there to paint more cats than he had ever seen in his life.
Slowly his vision cleared to reveal a fuzzy one sitting by the window, gazing outside reverently. Two others crisscrossed at his feet happily, purring. A few steps away Freodore stood, hands by his side, looking rather unsure but also like he belonged there more than anything else.
“I will”, Kaelix replies before looking down at the white one. He gives it a little pat on the head.
They stand there for a second, Freo watching Kaelix watch the cat before Kaelix straightens himself up to his full height, “So they’re the ones I’m painting?”
A slight smirk tugs at he corners of Freo’s lips., “Oh there’s more. Come on.”
They walk in silence for a few steps, Freo picking up the white short hair while Kaelix does his best to avoid tripping over the other two. As they walk, the cats multiply. Another white one under the wood table. Two play fighting in the hallway.
“There’s 42 of them”, Freo says. Kaelix doesn’t get a moment to be surprised, as they enter a room with several covered paintings and a little stool and table at the end. Freo drops the white cat that immediately leaves the room.
Freo waves a hand at the paintings. “These have some of them”
“But I need a painting with all of them in it. They should look good”, he adds, and then pauses, “like themselves, I mean.”
He moves forward and pulls off one of the covers, revealing 2 feet painting of a white Siamese sleeping with his nose on his tail, the perfect picture of peace. They both stare at it for a minute before a meow interrupts the process.
They turn heads simultaneously and Kaelix is suddenly aware of how close he’s standing. He takes a tentative step back and trains his gaze towards the sound. Sure enough, there’s another Siamese, this one with a few spots of yellow orange, strutting by and gazing upon them, tail flicking.
Kaelix looks back at Freo. “So”, he says, “How big is this painting?”
Freo hesitates. “I don’t know… like big? 6 feet?”
Kaelix takes this in. “And you want it done by when?”
“I guess there’s not really a deadline. A few…months?”
Kaelix considers this.
“Would you like some coffee?”, Freo asks.
Kaelix is a little startled at the change.
“Sure”
He’s normally not the type to have a coffee at this hour but there’s a certainty to the ask, as if he couldn’t refuse, so he agrees.
“Let’s go sit”, Freo decides. Kaelix follows him down yet another dimly lit corridor, this time into a small room that seemed warmer than the rest of the house.
A singular table with a chair stood at a corner of the room, with a closed laptop on the table and a random couch that stood just by the door, as if Freo had just dragged it in for this very purpose. And a coffee machine.
“Make yourself comfortable”, Freo says, as he gestures to it, “Even though it’s not much.”
“Oh, it’s no problem”, Kaelix finds himself saying. He sits himself into the couch that sinks farther than he expected it to and watches Freo methodically brew two cups.
“So, you’ve been living here for long?”, he asks.
“Not really”, Freo looks up, “In fact not at all. I just…need to get this done.”
Kaelix nods. Understandable.
“Do you know all of their names?”, Kaelix asks next. An orange short hair makes its way into the room, sniffing Kaelix curiously.
“I try”, Freo replies. There’s a moment where the machine hums and Kaelix marvels at the way the orange one seems to lean into his touch.
“Are you from around here?”, Freo asks, handing him a cup.
“Well yeah. I don’t live here anymore but I did grow up here”
“Do you like it?”
Kaelix pauses at that. He didn’t not like it. It was his home. But he can’t help but think of the times the town felt too small for him and he hesitates.
“It’s alright”, is what he settles for.
“I’ve seen your work”
Kaelix feels a sudden rush of something at that. He often paints his things and lets them go out into the world, and he’s still surprised when people see it and hence, see him.
“Do you like it?”
“It’s pretty good”
“Just pretty good? Not excellent? You wound me”, Kaelix jokes, bringing a hand up to his chest for added drama.
That gets a small laugh out of Freo. “I like the forest paintings more. They’re very environmental”
It had been some time since Kaelix had done sceneries. Which meant that not only had Freodore checked him out, he had thoroughly checked him out.
It did make sense. Freodore seemed like a methodical man, Kaelix concludes, and yet something about being thoroughly studied by the man made him want to hide.
Recently, he had pivoted more to painting pets, specifically dogs, on the suggestion of his friend, and honestly, it had worked out. Pet owners were pretty open with their pockets when it came to getting a quality original.
“Thank you”, he replies.
“So, why do you own 42 cats?”
The question had been pressing on his tongue since the moment he had walked in.
Freo lowers his mug so the rim rests against his knee. He would’ve sighed but he seems to reign it in. “Honestly? I have the same question”
Kaelix giggles a little at that, but the list of questions in his mind just multiplies.
“They’re my aunt’s”, Freo elaborates. A black Siamese inspects his knee interestedly. He extends his free hand before giving the cat some scratches. “The last time I saw her, there were six. I didn’t know it had got so bad”
Kaelix hums. Forty-two cats to paint. His eyes focus on the way Freo pets the Siamese, the way it basks in his presence. It feels like he’s stepped into a different world.
“I’d love to do it”
Freo’s eyes snap up to his, and for a second Kaelix sees the pure surprise through them. “You would?”, he asks.
“Yeah, it’ll be great. I…I’m going to have to observe them, isn’t it?”
Freo nods seriously. “Yeah, I’ll get everything set up. And you can tell me how long it’ll take and everything”
They discuss the details of the commission as the sun dips below the horizon. Three months. Kaelix would observe the cats for three months before beginning his painting and then he estimates it’d take him a year for the final piece.
He’d live at the summer house for the three months. And then he’d send updates through the year.
“Alright, I’ll send you the email”, Freo confirms, once again shaking his hand.
“Alright, yeah”
“And a question-“
Kaelix turns in curiosity.
“Do you know any good place that delivers dinner out here?”
“How was I supposed to know that?”, Freo groans, “I assumed there must be at least one place”
Seible laughs on the other end of the line. He’s walking through the city, swinging his phone back and forth and Freo is avoiding looking at the screen lest he throw up.
“It’s a summer house Furi-chan”, he says, “And in Kikiri too, it’s literally in the middle of nowhere!”
Freo sighs. “I have no idea how auntie lived here.”
“Hang in there Furi-chan”, Seible chirps, “Two more days and I’ll be there. You got this”
“What if I perish after eating another peanut butter sandwich?”, Freo asks.
Seible is nearly doubling over once again. “No! Furi-chan! Have you not been grocery shopping? It’s been like two weeks! How are you surviving?”
Freo shifts his position slightly to rest the phone against the bedsheet. He’s absentmindedly lying in bed on his side, fully feeling the misery of his situation.
“it’s…strange”, he opts to say, “Everyone knows I’m not from here. Everyone also knows why I’m here”
Seible looks at his phone then, really looks, and Freo avoids the screen for an entirely different reason.
“You can’t do this to yourself, though”, Seible says. His voice sounds serious. Freo begins calculating if it’s worth pretending he’s having connectivity issues.
Seible ends up crossing the street then, and thankfully he drops it. “But anyways, tell me more about the painter”
Now Freodore really wonders if he should feign connectivity issues.
“There is no more to tell”, he groans, “He’s nice and he seems like he’ll do a good job”
“So just nice huh? You wouldn’t tell me about how he looked at the cats with love in his sky blue eyes for 20 minutes if he was just nice”, Seible wiggles his eyebrows very visibly though the screen.
“Goodnight Seible”
It was going to be a long two days.
Seible arrives two days later with a bag of clothes and Freodore’s favorite pastry that he had packed very carefully.
“You didn’t have to”, Freo says.
“It’s going to rejuvenate your pastry-deprived cells Furi-chan, eat up”, Seible says patting him on the shoulder.
He does a dramatic survey of the place. “So, this is the place that makes you a millionaire huh?”
Seible settles in quickly, which isn’t surprising considering his personality. There’s very little that phased him. Freodore discovered this very quickly when their first shared apartment had a water leak at 3am and Seible simply grabbed his things and moved to the couch. The next one had a neighbour that insisted on banging on their doors at 6am and accusing them of playing the drums late at night. Seible had simply smiled and told them to take it up with the landlord and shut the door in her face. So, it made sense that he got there and simply fit in.
Taking care of forty-two cats isn’t easy. There had been a caretaker, but he had left, and Freodore doesn’t feel particularly inclined to chase him down, especially since he didn’t know a lot about his aunt or any of the people that lived there.
Seible helped. Together they put things into a manageable system. It still was hard work and Seible is currently lying on the wood floor claiming his back hurt with ‘all this manual labour’.
“Did you figure out why it’s you?”, he asks.
Freo feels his heart pick up. He doesn’t know. Part of him is too scared to find out. He hadn’t been particularly close to his aunt and there had been cousins, several actually, some of whom would’ve definitely been closer to her than heh had ever been. Why then, had she left him everything, and then added the strange clauses?
He remembers it like yesterday. He got the phone call from his mother. He had to stop and recollect who Aunt Olivia was before he made the connection. And then there had been the news. All of her property, her house, the money, whatever she had, had been left to him. And the forty-two cats.
With two clauses. One, he would get a painting of the cats. Large enough to fit in the summer house’s main hallway. Two, he would never give away any of the cats.
Freo hadn’t known what to think. Half of him had been inclined to turn the whole thing down, but one glance at the creaky refrigerator and the crack in the wall that always leaked cold air made him reconsider. He had to try.
So, he had attended the funeral with his mother, avoided the sharp gazes of all the relatives who undoubtedly had things to whisper about him, and had used the excuse of having an exam the next day to rush away as soon as possible.
That had been a month ago. Then the summer break had started, and he had found himself travelling to Kikiri Town, with not much of a plan.
It had been overwhelming. Freo just wanted to do what was necessary and get back to his daily life. It seemed unreal.
He had posted the advertisement for an art commission the same day he had got there, roughly two weeks ago, making up a flashy poster as quickly as he could with the intermittent internet. Then, he made a poster to find a caretaker. Most who called heard the number forty-two and ran.
And now here he was, still unsure of what was happening, still, apparently, a millionaire.
“I don’t know”, he replies. He’s sitting on the chair cross legged, looking at Seible upside down.
“Don’t worry so much. You’ll figure it out.”
The grocery store is too bright.
Freo had promised to go there at five, but he had fallen asleep. After trying to call his name for the fifteenth time, Seible had decided to simply let him catch up on sleep.
The cat food however, was running low. So Seible now stood in the cat food aisle at the extremely brightly lit grocery store. Would five bags be enough? Would it be too little? Does cat food go off? He stands there deciding to ask the internet, but the reception makes him question if he should’ve come at all.
After struggling with the two bars of reception for a good five minutes, Seible decides to run down to the toothpaste aisle when he runs right into a white haired, blue haired, man, who had decided to round the corner with just as much speed.
“Ow”, the man enunciates and then apologises profusely.
“Oh, I’m sorry, my fault”, Seible responds sheepishly, now flattening himself into the aisle to allow the other to pass through.
The internet in the toothpaste aisle is especially powered, and Seible rounds the corner with the conclusion of needing forty kilograms of a combination of wet and dry food. He doesn’t decide to learn from his mistakes.
“Ow! Oh!”, the rather pained white-haired face says. The pain soon warps into a look of disbelief. “You really should look where you’re going”, he laughs.
Normally Seible would be embarrassed or on guard, but the guy doesn’t seem like he was about to throw a punch, so he smiles, “Sorry, yeah I really should.”
He piles a random assortment of wet and dry food high into his arms as the white-haired man watches, a little incredulously.
“Do you need help with that?”
“Uh…no I got it”
“No, you haven’t”, he decides, as he grabs some of the bags. Seible simply follows him to the counter.
The old man at the counter eyes him questioningly and jokes with white hair about forgetting his roots since he moved to the big city as he simply laughs it off.
He even helps carry it to the car.
“Thanks a lot”, Seible says as he packs the last of the bags in his trunk, “And sorry for the bruises.”
Kaelix simply waves his apology away. He wants to ask. He almost knows. Where else would someone pack 10 bags of cat food and go?
And yet something curls in his throat, holding him back. Maybe he shouldn’t ask. Maybe he shouldn’t know. Maybe he doesn’t want to know who the second smartly dressed city-boy is to the first one he had met just a few days ago.
Seible drives off into the evening.