This was a prompt I solicited from my friend Soso on Tumblr because her half-birthday was yesterday and I was too drunk to post it right after I finished it. So here you all are, some fluffy RoseMary.
Something was wrong—Rose could tell immediately. Jaspers wasn't bounding around the house like he normally did, and sure, he was getting rather old, but just a few days ago, he'd still been a furry streak on the loose. Now, he only seemed to want to curl up and mewl pathetically, and Rose was immediately worried.
"I guess I'm taking you to see Doctor Crocker, huh?" Rose murmured, rubbing his back. She didn't know if the doctor would be able to help, but if it was something bad, she wanted to know right away.
She located the paw-print-shaped magnet on her refrigerator and dialed Doctor Crocker's number. Unfortunately, after five rings, the call went to a voice mail service. "Hello, you've reached the office of Doctor Jane Crocker. I'm unfortunately on vacation now until June twenty-first and will be unavailable for appointments in the meantime. If your pet or loved animal needs to be seen, you may take them to see Doctor Maryam at (619) 555-2575. Again, that number is (619) 555-2575. Have a good day."
"Crap," Rose muttered. The last thing she wanted to do was take Jaspers to see a complete stranger, but what choice did she have? Reluctantly, she dialed Doctor Maryam's office. This time, an actual person answered.
"Hello! This is Doctor Maryam's Animal Clinic! I'm Nepeta, how can I help you?"
Well. This girl sounded unusually cheerful. "Hi, I'm Rose Lalonde and my cat is usually a patient of Doctor Crocker, but she—"
"Right, she's out of town for another month. Does your kitty need to be seen?"
"Yes, he does. I think he's sick."
"Aw, poor baby. What's his name? I'll have his medical record printed off and you can come right in if you want."
"Yeah, that sounds great," Rose said, her mood brightening slightly. "His name is Jaspers. Jaspers Lalonde."
"Alright, Rose, just bring him in and we'll get him all taken care of. Do you know where the office is?"
"No, I don't."
Once she'd scribbled down the address, she hung up and looked down at Jaspers, who had curled up at her feet. He looked up at her and, though she knew cat expressions were not the same as human expressions, she imagined he looked sad. "It's okay, baby," Rose said, crouching down and rubbing his head. "Doctor Maryam will be able to help. Let's go get your carrier."
She knew something was wrong when he willingly went into the carrier. He let out a sharp meow of complaint as she carried him to her car, but it was far less resistance than he'd ever shown before. During the ride over, the carrier shook slightly, but aside from some small whines, he remained quiet. He could probably tell Rose was taking him somewhere to (hopefully) get better.
The office of K. Maryam, DVM, wasn't too far away. Like Doctor Crocker's clinic, it was set in a small strip of suites primarily used by other sorts of doctors—there was an orthodontist and a chiropractor and an office of cardiac physicians. Rose was able to find it easily enough, and she headed inside and went right to the front desk.
A blond woman maybe a year or two older than Rose with a blue hat resembling a cat jammed over her hair was sitting behind the front desk. She looked up as Rose approached and smiled brightly. "Hi! Rose Lalonde?"
"Yes," she said, recognizing this woman's voice. "You must be Nepeta, then."
"Yep! Just sign in right here—" she pushed a clipboard and pen towards Rose—"and I'll let Doctor Maryam know you're here. She's with another patient right now, but she should be finished soon. I got Jaspers's medical record all ready to go," she added with another smile.
"Thank you." Rose quickly scribbled down her name, Jaspers's name, the problem, and the time she'd arrived in the appropriate boxes, pushed the clipboard back to Nepeta, and headed to a chair not far from the door. Once she sat down and set the carrier on the floor, she opened it up and took Jaspers into her arms. He meowed in presumed gratitude at being let out and snuggled into her. She stroked his fur for a few moments before getting the distinct feeling she was being watched. Sure enough, when she looked up, Nepeta was smiling and gazing at Jaspers with clear adoration in her eyes. Rose half-expected to see heart bubbles popping out of her. She's definitely a cat person, Rose decided.
About ten minutes later, the door to the back room opened up and a strikingly handsome man with a bulldog, spiky red-and-black hair, and a ring through his septum appeared. The dog let out a deep bark when it noticed Jaspers and started forward, but the man gave a sharp tug on its leash. "Heel, Tink," he ordered, and the dog obediently sat down. "Thanks, Doctor M!" he said, waving to some unseen person behind the door. Then he looked at Nepeta, waved at her too, and added, "See you around, doll. If your friend's brother needs help with that horse, just let me know."
"Get lost, loser," Nepeta giggled, throwing what looked to be a dog treat at him. The bulldog, Tink, caught the treat and began eating it.
"Come on, Tink. Let's go pester Tav." The man waved casually to Rose and strolled out, Tink following behind him.
"Who's next?" a quiet voice asked from behind the receptionist's desk.
"Rose Lalonde with Jaspers the cat," Nepeta said. "They're waiting right outside."
"Do we have the medical record?"
Nepeta shuffled some things around on her desk. "Yep! Right here!" She handed a thick file to whoever it was (Doctor Maryam, Rose presumed) and said, "You set for them?"
"Yes."
Nepeta half-rose out of her chair. "Rose, Doctor Maryam will see you now. Just head on back!"
"Come on, baby," Rose said softly. She stood up, still cradling Jaspers, and picked up the carrier in her free hand. The door to the back was still half-open, so she shouldered it the rest of the way open and stepped through.
"Hello, Rose, I'm Doctor Maryam."
Rose very nearly dropped Jaspers in surprise. It wasn't that the woman necessarily startled her, but she hadn't expected Maryam to be so... gorgeous. It was probably her eyes, Rose decided. She had dark skin and smooth black hair cut into a bob and dark-red, nearly black lipstick, but the most striking thing about her was her eyes, jade-green and vivid. The rest of her was admittedly gorgeous, but it was her eyes that completed the whole picture.
It took her a minute to realize that she should probably say something. Doctor Maryam was giving her an expectant look and next to them, unseen by the vet, Nepeta had both her hands over her mouth as she heaved with silent giggles. "It's nice to meet you," Rose said once she found her voice. "This is Jaspers."
"Hello, Jaspers. A pleasure to make your acquaintance," Doctor Maryam said, bending down a little and running her hand over his head. She had her nails manicured and painted black, Rose noted.
Jaspers purred softly and closed his eyes while Doctor Maryam petted him, which was a bit of an improvement over the first time he'd met Doctor Crocker. He'd bitten her hard enough to draw blood, although she was obviously used to being bitten and hadn't complained.
"The examining room is right back here," Doctor Maryam said. She turned and led the way into the back. "So Jaspers is ill, you said?" she added, holding open a door to the left for Rose.
"Yes. He seems tired and he didn't eat much today, and he also threw up yesterday. I didn't think much of him throwing up, but with everything else, I thought it was better to get him checked out, just in case." She set Jaspers on the examining table when Doctor Maryam indicated and set down the carrier on the floor.
"Hmm. Does he seem to be in any kind of pain?" Doctor Maryam asked, stroking him with both hands.
"No. He just seems tired."
"Hmm." She began taking Jaspers's vitals using a cat-sized thermometer and a stethoscope. "His heart rate is a little slower than I would expect and he seems to have a fever. It's probably a kitty cold."
"Excuse me?"
Doctor Maryam cleared her throat, giving her an embarrassed sort of smile. It was quite pretty, actually. "Sorry. That's what Nepeta calls them. A fairly accurate assessment, actually. A period of minor illness characterized by fatigue, lack of appetite, and an elevated body temperature. Nothing life-threatening, of course. He's only ten, after all, not incredibly old, so I wouldn't worry too much about it. If he was fifteen or older, I would be concerned. But I've seen a surprising number of cats come through her recently with the same symptoms, so there's clearly something going around." She ran her fingers through Jasper's fur. "However, I believe it might be prudent to prescribe him some medication, if that's alright with you?"
"Well, you're the doctor," Rose said, shrugging. "If it'll help him get better faster, then it's fine."
"Alright," Doctor Maryam said, smiling slightly at something Rose couldn't quite figure out. She wrote something down in Jaspers's medical record and then went to a cupboard and withdrew a small box. "There's four doses in here, which should be sufficient. Give him one in the morning and one at night, and if he's not feeling better in about three days, we'll make him another appointment."
"Sounds good. Is that it?"
"Keep him well-supplied with water. Good for humans and good for pets. Aside from that, it's fairly straightforward."
Rose nodded, looking cautiously at her while she petted Jaspers. He'd laid down on the table of his own accord and remained quiet the whole time, but he seemed just as enamored with Doctor Maryam as she was. "How do you know Doctor Crocker?" she asked abruptly.
"Jane? We went to school together. High school, actually. We went to different universities, but when we met again at our five-year high school reunion, we discovered we were both studying to become veterinarians, so we bonded over that. After that, we remained in contact and allied ourselves, so to speak. So now, whenever one of us goes on vacation—like now—we send our patients to the other. It's worked out well so far."
"That's really cool."
Doctor Maryam smiled. "Very much so. I actually used to have a small crush on her, but it wore off and now we're just friends."
There was a faint ringing in Rose's head. Lesbian, a voice said, making her very happy. She'd been hoping it was the case, but she wasn't sure until just now. She had a soft spot for wildly attractive, intelligent women. "Then you have a crush on someone else?" Rose half-joked. She knew she was being deliberately leading, deliberately flirty, but she couldn't help herself.
To her surprise, Doctor Maryam seemed to blush slightly even as she smiled. "Perhaps," she said after a moment, meeting Rose's eyes.
Bingo. Apparently the attraction wasn't just one-sided. Now that Rose knew Jaspers would be okay, she could focus on the beautiful veterinarian in front of her. "I know the feeling," she replied, smiling at Doctor Maryam.
The other woman's blush deepened. "I..." She cleared her throat. "Perhaps, once Jaspers is feeling better, you'd like to have dinner with me sometime?"
Rose grinned. "Of course. I'd like that a lot."
"Wonderful. Um... If you don't mind, I'll give you my number now since Nepeta has a tendency to get a bit overexcited over things like this."
"Like what?"
"Dates, not that I have many. Which is why she gets so excited," Doctor Maryam said, pulling out a business card and a pen from her lab coat. She wrote something on the back of the card. "She is very much a matchmaker, and it can be tiresome at times, but she has a good heart. She's gotten a little better at the, um, 'shipping' thing since she began seeing her girlfriend, though." She put the pen back in her pocket and handed Rose the card. On the back was her phone number (her cell phone number, Rose presumed) and the name Kanaya.
"Is Kanaya your first name?"
"Yes. It seems a bit foolish for you to call me Doctor Maryam after we've made a date."
"I agree," Rose laughed. She scooped Jaspers back into her arms, picked up the carrier, and followed Kanaya back to the front.
So much fluff, but not even a bit of kissing... I hope it's okay, Soso!