Mind Games - Chapter 1 - A Red Fellow
Written by Ande883
Edited by Cimar
"Niiiiiiiick! C'mon! I want to do something!" came the annoyed shout from the living room. Back in their own bedroom, Nick sat at a small wooden desk trying to get some boring work done paying bills and other adult things.
Lord knows I'm the only adult in this apartment anymore… he thought jokingly to himself. Hearing the distress call from his wife made him laugh at how she'd changed since she got pregnant. The strange cravings, the inability to do anything herself. Sure, that last one wasn't entirely her fault. She needed a lot of help just to get off the couch the past few days since their incident with her sister.
He was glad that it had only been that much, though. There was one thing that he didn't think he could handle.
"Nick! I am going to kill you if you don't get your butt out here and take me somewhere!"
Nick gulped. Perhaps he had thought too soon.
"Mood swings…" he mumbled to himself. Nick arose out of the desk and walked into the living room where Judy lay on the couch, just as she had for the last couple of days. It pained him to see her like that because he knew how much she liked to work, but with her being so far along and the kits almost ready to be born, her maternity leave was in full force, not even allowing her to do desk work.
"Nick…" she said as she saw him. A couple of sniffs later and Nick was confused as ever as to what she was really feeling. "I'm so sorry for yelling at you! I don't want to upset you in any way!" she cried, the tears flowing like streams down her cheeks. Nick sat by her and pulled her face into his chest, letting her still cry as he stroked her ears. This was the best way to calm a sad bun-bun, he'd learned.
"Do you want to go to Fitwik's?" Nick asked.
"Mmm hmm," she mumbled, face still pressed into Nick's chest and nodding. Nick wasted no time in helping her up and going straight to the door.
When they arrived, Judy headed straight for the PIXAR machine and began looking for something that caught her eye. Nick just stood by her and watched, knowing that she was going to want to do whatever she wanted, and Nick really had no say in the choice.
"This one!" Judy said, pointing her finger at the scenario she'd selected. Nick leaned forward and took a look at it.
"Really? You want to do that one?"
"But… *sniff* I just thought that… *sniff* it would be… *sniff* kinda fun, you know?"
"Alright, we'll do that one."
Judy is depressed.
It was nearly two in the morning and the young rabbit had just made it to her tiny apartment in the middle of the big city. Another week of this and she was going to lose it. But that was what she told herself every week. Just keep holding on a little longer and things will get better. For months she'd been putting in the worst possible hours, long night shifts that never seemed to let up. But she still had hope that they'd get better. She always did.
Her only form of relief was coming home to a nice and quiet apartment; a drastic change from the noisy and fast-paced atmosphere of working at a rather popular diner. Judy let out a sigh of relief walking into her apartment hearing absolutely nothing but the hum of the tiny refrigerator. It almost hurt her ears it was so quiet.
Judy glanced out the small and only window in her one-room apartment. The city was still awake, cars driving by and night-mammals carousing the streets, their shouts and hollers making the rabbit wish she had just gone back home several years ago.
Most nights she didn't even bother taking off her uniform. She had enough to last seven days as long as she wore the same one at least twice. She usually slept hard enough that it never got wrinkled. Tonight she didn't even have the energy to pull the covers over herself. Judy didn't know if she even wanted to at this point. It was cold in her apartment; she turned off the heat at night to save money. She sometimes wondered if it would be better to just freeze to death in her own home. Maybe Hell was warmer.
Judy lay in her bed, unable to get herself to move. On most days she would be getting up by noon only to go back to work at two, work until two in the morning and do it all over again. It was a vicious cycle of monotony. But it was her life and she just had to deal with it. Luckily for her, she was going to have a day off from work tomorrow. Unlucky for her, she was going to be spending it at the wedding of someone she hardly knew.
One of her coworkers knew the groom and decided to invite Judy, as well as set her up with someone else she didn't know. Her friend was a great mammal and well-intentioned with the setup, but Judy didn't want that right now. She was fine living alone. In all reality, she was probably better off alone for the time being. She found herself being irritable more often than she should have been.
Even though the day was not going to be dedicated to her getting some much-needed rest, she was happy that she wasn't spending it at the diner. She hadn't had a full day off in over a month. The hours were starting to take their toll, her sanity slowly wasting away. But it was better than anything else she could get. She'd tried for something better long ago, but that ended horribly, forcing her to take the job at the diner until she could get her chance again. That chance still hadn't come.
If there was one thing that she liked about her job, it was that it made her dead tired by the end of her shift so she never had to worry about having sleeping problems. As she stared at the ceiling of her apartment, Judy felt her eyelids slowly get heavier and heavier until the world around her was completely black.
"Have a seat, Judes. Glad you could make it!" said a bubbly feminine voice. Judy sluggishly turned her head to see her bunny friend waving to her in an overly dramatic way. It was too early in the morning for all of her cheeriness for Judy's taste, but at least she didn't irritate the carrots out of her.
Judy took a seat on the opposite side of the booth from the brown bunny. She looked over her friend; there was nothing new about her, but Judy was too tired to move very quickly.
Kristie was about the exact opposite of Judy. She was happy all the time and usually showed it a bit too much for most mammal's liking. It was that positive energy that made her a hit at the diner and was probably the only reason that Judy hadn't burned the place to the ground yet. It could be mildly infectious sometimes. She had brown eyes that almost seemed to have flecks of gold in them.
"Not so loud, Kris… My head is killing me…" Judy mumbled while laying her chin on the table, her ears flopping over her eyes.
"I didn't say anything, silly!" she said with a bright smile.
"I can practically hear you smiling. Must you always be so happy?"
For perhaps the first time in weeks, Judy watched as Kristie's smile fell away, though not in sadness. She wasn't sure if that doe was capable of being sad. She looked concerned. It was a look that Judy had seen a couple of times before. It always came when she was at her worst.
Judy, despite how much she despised Kristie's bubbly and outgoing personality, appreciated how caring and considerate she was of Judy's feelings. She was the one one that she could go to for anything; a true friend.
"I don't know, maybe it was you that made me want to be so happy. Like, I love you Judy, but you're always so down on everything. It's a little bit much sometimes. I wish you tried to be happy at least once."
"What, you think I don't try to be happy? I would love for my life to change, but things just don't go my way. Things haven't gone my way ever since that incident at—"
Kristie leaned forward and grabbed hold of Judy's ears and gave them a good yank, hard enough to cause Judy to pull back and finally sit up.
"Oww! What was that for?!" What met Judy's eyes was something that she had never seen before. Kristie looked angry.
"Stop thinking about it! You do that all the time and it drives me nuts! Please, just think about anything else!" she finished with a huff.
Judy couldn't believe her sore ears. Kristie had just yelled at her, and not in a 'Hey Judy, I just saw the most hilarious video!' kind of way. She was genuinely angry. But that look didn't last long as pretty soon Kristie was a heaping mess of apologies.
"OhmyGodJudyI'msosorryaboutyellingatyouIreallydidn'tmeananyharmbyitIjustwantedtotryandgetthatideaintoyourheadthatmaybeyouneededto—"
"Hold up, Kris! Calm down. I'm fine, I probably needed that. It's been on my mind a lot recently. I know I shouldn't think about it…"
"No, I'm sorry. That wasn't very kind of me, was it?"
"Not really, but like I said, I think I needed that." Kristie smiled warmly at Judy. She'd seen the look plenty of times. Over the many years that Judy had known the lovable brown bunny, Kristie had done plenty of things to try and get Judy to be happier. It usually wasn't anything too extravagant, but recently Judy had been extra down on life. She half expected her to do something crazy.
"Well, since you say you actually try to be happy, which I highly doubt," Judy scoffed at Kristie but smiled knowing that she was just getting a hard time from her. "I know that you need to just loosen up those muscles of yours and have a fun night."
"No, I'm not coming to the wedding tonight, and I'm definitely not going with that buck you told me about."
"Oh, come on, Judy! He's fantastic! I promise you'll have a great time! I think that's what you need most. A good time and a good buck. Abra Kadabra, you've got a happier life!" Kristie exclaimed at a level that was probably too loud for the inside of a cafe early on a Saturday morning. Realizing this, Kristie knew to keep her voice on the quieter side, which was still a bit much for Judy.
"I don't need any sort of magical solution to happiness. I just want to be happy."
"And how do you plan on doing that? Sitting at home all by yourself? You've been doing that for too long Judes… how has that worked out for you?"
"I'm still not coming! I won't know anyone else there except for you!"
"Juuuudyyyy!" Kristie said with her best sad eyes. It was hard to say no to those eyes, but Judy had to remain vigilant in her efforts to stay home.
"No!"
"Plllleassseee!"
"No!"
"I thought I said no…"
Judy sat alone at one of the many tables in the reception hall. Just as she expected, she knew nobody there except for her friend and the "date" that she was supposed to be with. But he was off with some other rabbits that she didn't know. She could have seen that coming from a mile away. She hadn't spoken a word to her blind date in hours.
All she could do now was wait for the night to be over. Judy checked her phone… in three more hours.
The atmosphere reminded her too much of work. The noise, the tables that still had dirty dishes on them. She almost felt compelled to take them and bring them back to a washroom to be cleaned. That might have been a little more enjoyable than sitting by herself. It was a sad time when she would rather be at work than somewhere else.
"You don't want to be here, do you?" came a mysteriously smooth voice. Judy looked behind her, but she saw no face, only the torso of a significantly taller individual. Bringing her gaze upward, she saw an interesting red fellow. He wasn't like any of the other rabbits at the wedding. In fact...he wasn't a rabbit at all.
"Is it that obvious?" Judy chided. The red fellow pulled a chair in front of her and sat down in a reversed position, resting his chin on the top of the backrest. A big, poofy tail swung happily back and forth behind him. Sharp fangs blinked even in the dim light and two half-lidded emerald spheres stared back into her soul.
"Quite. I've been watching you all night." Judy nearly got up and left, but that gaze was impossible to separate from. She couldn't get herself to move.
"That's a little creepy considering you're a fox at a primarily rabbit wedding. What brings you here?"
"Work," he said simply. "Watching people is my profession. Getting in their heads is part of job description."
"And you're in my head?"
"Well, you asked what brought me here, and I know it certainly wasn't a friend who thinks she's doing a good thing by setting you up with a bunny that doesn't even know you. I actually want to be here, unlike someone else I know." Judy nearly froze in place completely. He'd hit the nail so hard it went through the floorboards.
"You don't know me."
"Right, fluff. I definitely didn't just sum up your night perfectly, correct?"
She paused, eyebrow arching. "Who are you?"
A clawed paw was presented before her. "Nick Wilde, Master of the Mammalian Mind," he said. Judy barely stopped herself from laughing upon hearing his title. She shook his paw with the slightest of smiles.
"Is that your real title?" she responded with a smile.
"No," Nick admitted cooly. "It's actually Nick Wilde, Therapist, for short, but the former has a better ring to it, I'd say." The fox finished his statement with a smirk. It displayed his fangs much more profoundly than before and they glimmered in the dim light of the room even more impressively than before. Judy felt a shudder travel up her spine upon seeing them, but she wasn't afraid of them; she even felt compelled to get a closer look, or even touch them.
He sure didn't look like a therapist. He looked almost like a bum from the streets and definitely didn't belong at this wedding. He wore a partially unbuttoned green tropical shirt with a purple and blue striped tie that hung loosely around his neck. To her, he looked like someone that couldn't be trusted. Despite those thoughts, Judy couldn't get herself to leave. His gaze kept drawing her back to him.
"Well, Nick Wilde, Therapist… why are you so keen on bothering me of all people right now?"
"Not bothering. Inquiring. As I mentioned before, watching people is my job. I study movements, body language, anything that hints at what your mind is trying to tell you, but not outright showing. I make them feel better. I can make you feel better."
"I don't need help," she said, knowing that she most definitely needed help.
"You adjusted your seating position as you said that. You just lied to me, did you not?" the fox quipped.
Judy crossed her arms and frowned at Nick. "No thanks. Perhaps I wasn't clear enough: I don't need another mammal telling me how to feel." Upon finishing her statement, Judy stood up and turned away, but she was stopped by a paw grabbing her shoulder. She should have done everything that she could have to get away from this creep, but she once again couldn't move, just like when he was staring so deeply into her eyes. It startled her, but she didn't want to run. His touch was gentle; consoling.
"Not quite, Ms. Hopps," the fox said. Judy turned around sharply.
"How did you know my name? Is this you getting in my head? Can you read my thoughts?" she chided.
"I'm flattered, but I'm a therapist, not a magician. Your name card is right there on the table. I just assumed you were sitting at your assigned spot."
Judy hmphed, almost getting the chance to storm off again, but he placed his paw on her shoulder again. It felt so unlike anything she'd felt before; she almost rested her cheek on it.
"I don't tell people how to feel. I show them how they want to feel and help them get there. Now, I've done this for a long time. I know when someone needs help." Judy watched as his other paw reached into his pocket and pulled out a small business card, placing it in her paw and closing it around the card, then he walked away. "The first visit is free. Think about it, Judy. You can't do this on your own." Nick took a few more steps before he stopped and turned back to her one last time.
"Look at how far that's gotten you."
His final words felt like knives being pressed through her lungs. It almost sounded like he spoke them in spite.
Judy was left by herself once again. The entire room danced with light and color while her whole world stood completely still. She blinked a few times, suddenly finding herself searching the room for that fox. He was nowhere to be seen; like he had disappeared.
Judy's foot tapped in anger. "That conniving little… Ahh! Who does he think he is acting like he knows everything I'm going through?" she said to herself. And yet the more she thought about his final words, the more they seemed undeniably true. For the last few years, all she'd done for herself was coast by and let life happen. It wasn't making her happy, and that much was obvious enough for anyone to see.
She knew that her life was terrible, but she didn't think it was so bad that she needed help. She didn't think a fox could be a therapist, let alone help her find joy in life.
Judy looked at the business card in her paw. It was nearly blank; all that was printed on it was a street address and a phone number. No name, no cheesy business slogan. It was everything she would need to find him again. Her mind went back to earlier in the day. Kristie had basically told her that she didn't actually want to be happy. Letting life happen while she sat on the sidelines was a sure-fire way to stay where she was.
Her ticket to a better life sat in her paws right now.
A/N: Hope you all enjoyed this first chapter! Huge thanks to Cimar for letting me be a part of this project!
-Ande
