Seven: Invite

There was a picnic, like Tugger had known there would be. He got some more money out of the Mungojerrie & Rumpleteazer National Bank and bought two bottles of water from the nearest Somerfield store, and then he was shown into Electra's flat to borrow her shower. Everybody agreed that Tugger should take turns in breaking into other people's homes for his "grooming," like Mistoffelees called it, to avoid being seen more than once in a house where he didn't live. He slept in the TSE 1 still, wrapped in blankets that his darling fangirls brought him from their respective homes, and covered in their furry bodies to keep warm.

The picnic was a hit, mostly because Tugger had basically begged Mistoffelees to join them. The magician had not been happy with playing the loving pet, but had surrendered when Tugger threatened him in a very friendly manner.

Paige immediately fell in love with the tuxedo cat and spent most of the date rubbing his tummy, which made Mistoffelees purr like crazy and Tugger get slightly annoyed. He didn't like not being the centre of attention, and it baffled him that anyone would possibly prefer scratching Mistoffelees behind the ears than talking to him.

The trio spent a rather lovely afternoon in Kensington Gardens. It was a warm day, which was a rare thing indeed for London, and Paige's eyes shone like the sun above. Every time Tugger smiled at her she seemed to light up from within, as if she was astonished that he even bothered to look her way. A part of him cringed when he saw that. Someone, probably Paige herself, had really messed with her head. She seemed to think that he would leave at any moment, for how could he possibly be seriously interested in a pathetic little nothing like her?

Therefore, Tugger made it into a point to constantly letting her know that he found her company enjoyable. He chuckled every time she dared to come with a joke, encouraging her to relax around him. When her hand absently stroke Mistoffelees' fur, Tugger made his own hand 'accidentally' brush against hers. That caused her to blush something fierce, but at least she didn't pull back. Tugger was always nervous she'd do that.

At the end of the afternoon he walked her back to her house, and there he tried kissing her for the first time. He had to bend down of course, since he was at least a head and a half taller than she was. Paige wasn't prepared for it, and the kiss landed rather embarrassingly on her nose. Nevertheless, it made her giggle, and that was better than her backing away.

"Can I see you again tomorrow?" he murmured.

"Yeah... If you want."

She tried to sound as if she didn't care what he did. Bless. Tugger grinned.

"I'll call you."

Paige pecked him on the cheek again, just as she had done after their first time out, and then she walked up to her door. Before she went inside she turned around and gave him a shy little wave, which he returned. Then she was gone.

"Phew," sighed Tugger.

"Ah, young love," purred Mistoffelees and chuckled by his feet. "That poor girl has got it bad." He suddenly grew serious. "You're in trouble now."

They began walking back to the junkyard.

"What do you mean?" asked Tugger. "This ends the day after the dance. I'll take her there, she'll not be alone, her friends won't make fun of her, and that will be it."

"You think you're helping her, but you're only making things worse. How do you think she'll feel when it's the day after the dance and her Prince Charming never phones her again? You are not just some fling. She's falling in love with you." The magician sighed deeply. "I knew this was a bad idea from the start."

"Aw damn it..." Tugger groaned. "Why didn't you tell me this before?"

"Because I had no idea your little Paige would get so into you! I thought she would be one of your little fangirls. I thought she wouldn't care so much. But she does care. And she will be devastated when you leave her. Don't look at me like it's my fault, Tugger," he said when he saw the ex-cat glaring at him. "This was your idea."

"You helped me do it, Misto," said Tugger sulkily.

"Yes, because I know you! I know you mean to do good things, but you keep getting into trouble. You are not cruel. You never mean to break a queen's heart, it just... happens. Because you're the Rum Tum Tugger. This is what you do."

"So what are you going to do? Are you going to break the spell?"

Mistoffelees shook his head. "I cannot do that. The spell has to run its course. It will have to get weakened before I can even begin to consider breaking it. But for her sake, Tugger, I hope you get the chance to warn her before you go away. If you just saunter off like you always do, this whole thing will have been for nothing, and your Paige will be back to thinking she is ugly and that no one will ever truly care for her."

Tugger kicked at a pebble, sending it flying across the street. "I won't let that happen."

"Prove me wrong then. Don't let this one down like you did the others. Make sure she knows you won't be around forever. You could call her right now and tell her."

Tugger stopped walking and looked at the magician. Of course he could phone Paige and say it. That he was going to leave and be gone as if he never existed. It would be the right thing to do, to keep her from hoping.

But he couldn't. He had never been good at things like that. And what would be the use? He would only ruin things as they were. He still hadn't had the chance to get himself invited to the dance as Paige's partner, and that dance was the main event of this entire charade. If he couldn't make that one night a happy occasion for his weird little human, then he might as well return to the junkyard, sit in the TSE 1 and wait for the spell to wear off and turn him back into a cat.

"I will tell her," he lied. "But not yet."

"Before the dance," said Mistoffelees. "Just so that she knows what she's getting herself into."

Mistoffelees knew he was lying. Mistoffelees always knew when anyone was lying. But he didn't say anything, and the pair went back to the junkyard without saying another word to each other.

Tugger and Paige saw a lot of each other the following week. He went with her to the movie theatre, which was the first time he ever saw a film. It was some romantic story that he got sick of fairly quickly, and the popcorn that Paige had bought weren't really his kind of thing either. But he put his arm around her, and though she tensed at first she soon leaned against him with a content sigh, so he thought afterwards that perhaps the evening hadn't been a complete waste after all.

They had two more picnics, but those were both cut short due to rain, so the couple snuck into the café where Tugger had had his first cup of coffee to spend time with each other. Tugger quickly learned to ask for tea instead. Granted, the beverage did taste more like water than anything else, but it was still better than coffee.

The former Jellicle thought that he was doing a rather good job at impersonating a human. There was only one time, outside the ice-cream shop, that he came against something that might have revealed his true identity. He knew of course that his disguise fooled humans easily, but he had never thought about what would happen if a simpler creature, one that would not only count in its sight to decide what was in front of it, saw him. He got his answer when the small white terrier that stood tied to a lamppost caught sight of him.

Tugger could see the confusion in its eyes. It saw something that was human, that had to be human, but smelled like a cat. The contradiction made the dog's tiny brain malfunction, and for a moment it could do nothing but stare. Then something clicked into place, and it started barking. With the fury that only very small dogs that think they are very big dogs can summon, the terrier pulled at its leash, trying to get as close to the abomination as possible, to bite, to warn, to make it go away.

Tugger took a step back and bared his teeth before he could stop himself. It was an automatic reaction to a canine threat, even if the canine in question was ridiculously small. For a split second, it felt like the dog grew until it was his own size, a growling, murderous beast that wanted him dead. Tugger felt every tiny hair at the back of his neck stand up, and he wanted to claw at the dog to show it he wasn't afraid, but before he got into a serious fight he remember his place. He remembered Paige. She stood next to him, looking at him oddly.

"Tom?" she mumbled. "What are you doing?"

Tugger took a few calming breaths. Before his eyes, the terrier seemed to shrink to the size it really was, and he was aware that he could easily kick it across the street if it should get loose and charge at him. It kept on barking and trying to get at him, but he managed to repress his urge to fight back or run away. Instead he smiled soothingly at Paige.

"Nothing. Sorry, love. I just... I don't like dogs a lot. I'm more of a cat-person, as you know."

Then she smiled back at him, and they crossed the street so that he wouldn't have to pass the still barking dog.

After having bought ice-cream somewhere else, the couple sat on a bench in the park. Paige sat comfortably in her seat while Tugger had lain down on his back with his head almost in her lap. Paige's fingers were playing lazily with his hair, and if Tugger had still been able to purr, he would have sounded like a sawmill. He was feeling completely content with the world right now. The ice-cream was sweet and cool, and the first really tasty thing he had eaten since his transformation. The sun was nice and warm, and there was a girl that petted him as if he was still a cat present. All things considered, it was a lovely day.

"Tom?" said Paige suddenly.

He opened one eye and squinted at her. She had finished her ice-cream and was throwing the cone crumbs to the gathering pigeons. "Hm?"

"Can I ask you something?"

"You can ask me anything, love."

She paused before speaking again. "Who are you?"

Both of Tugger's eyes shot open, and every ounce of the wonderfully lazy feeling disappeared. "What do you mean?"

"I mean..." She was still stroking his hair, and it felt absolutely wonderful, but he couldn't relax anymore. "I don't know anything about you. I only know your name. I don't know what you do, where you come from. So... Who are you?"

This would be the perfect opportunity to tell her the truth, or at least as much of it as he could tell. Letting her know that he was actually her pet cat was out of the question, of course, but he should really say...

"I'm... Tom Tugger," he said slowly. "I am... 21 years old." Mungojerrie had helped him with the math. It was strange. Paige had always been the older one, and now he was. "I... come from London. I have two brothers." Tugger chose his words carefully. He could only say things that wouldn't sound strange.

"What are their names?"

"Munkustrap and Alonzo."

Paige frowned. "What strange names. I mean..." She coloured a little. "Compared to 'Tom,' they are."

Tugger shrugged. "Our parents were into weird names." He paused. "The naming of... of us is a difficult matter, it isn't just one of your holiday games."

Paige looked at him. "That sounded like a poem."

"It is. A very old one. Never mind." Tugger closed his eyes again.

Paige was quiet for a moment, and then her curiosity won over her usual way of being quiet. "What are your parents like?"

Tugger quirked a smile. "Aren't we being nosy today?"

"Sorry," she said hurriedly, afraid to upset him.

"It's okay. I can say." He thought his answer over for a short while before he said it. "My... my mother is dead. She died a long time ago."

"I'm sorry." Paige's voice suddenly sounded small and afraid.

Tugger shrugged. He still had his eyes closed. "It didn't matter to me much, to be honest. She's..."

How was he going to explain the Heaviside Layer to her? Was he even allowed by feline law to do that? Maybe he would never be allowed back into the junkyard if he told her about how the star-dusty paw had descended from a darkened sky to bring his mother up to salvation and forgiveness. How blissful her face had seemed as years of pain was washed away, and how her eyes had shone when she gazed upon the faraway shores of the Heaviside.

How he had been glad to watch her go, just to be rid of her.

"She's in a better place," Tugger sighed and allowed the pigeons to have the rest of his ice-cream as well.

"What about your father?" asked Paige. "Is he..."

"Alive? Yes. I don't think he'll ever die. He's larger than life." Tugger chuckled. "It's possible that he'll survive the lot of us."

He looked up at Paige. She was smiling slightly. She looked... satisfied.

"Anything else you want to know, love?" he wondered.

She shook her head at first, and then she paused. "Maybe..."

He waited.

"No," said Paige and smiled a little embarrassingly. "No, you won't be interested. It's stupid. Forget it."

A gnawing suspicion started to grow in the back of Tugger's mind.

"My fair Paige Talbot," he purred. "There is nothing you can't ask me."

"It's just..." She took a deep breath. "There's going to be a dance at my school. It's a stupid thing really, but..."

"Is it important to you?"

Paige exhaled deeply and nodded. Her voice was barely audible when she whispered: "Yes."

Tugger sat up. He blinked a few times to make the sunspots in front of his eyes disappear, and then he turned around to look at her. Paige's cheeks had turned their usual shade of red. He could nearly hear her heart pounding. This was the moment. This was where it would either continue or fall apart.

"Then I'll go with you. If it's important to you, I'll go with you. I'll be your date. If you want me to."

For a second it looked like she was going to cry. Then slowly, her entire face lit up, and her eyes sparkled like diamonds. She looked... happy. It hit him that he had never seen her look like that before, not ever. Before he knew it, she was in his arms, pressing her cheek against his chest. Her embrace was not as tight as it usually was when he had been a cat to hug in comfort, and it was altogether more pleasant.

"Thank you," she whispered.

He couldn't tell her now. Not when she was so happy. He could not shatter the dream of the perfect night. Damn it, he was going to make it perfect! Mistoffelees was really going to hate this.

Delicately Tugger put his hand underneath Paige's chin and raised her head so that she was looking directly at him.

"You're welcome."

Then he bent down and kissed her gingerly on the lips.