[[ Garfield ]]
Of course I passed out on Rachel's couch. It wouldn't be me unless I got too drunk and made an ass out of myself after all. Groaning, I shed the soft blanket that was draped over me. Funny. I'm pretty sure that wasn't there when I passed out last night. Rachel must have put it on me last night…which means she totally knows I drunkenly passed out on her couch. Great. Because that's not embarrassing at all or anything. Thankfully, my hangover was not as bad as past hangovers. Rubbing the base of my neck, I let out a quiet yawn and glanced out of the large windows facing Jump City Park. The sun was shining brightly and it seemed to be pretty warm outside going by the skimpy outfits some passing joggers were wearing.
"Sleep well?" Rachel's voice called out, snapping me out of my trance. God, she was good at sneaking up on people.
"Oh yeah…thanks for letting me crash here." I said sheepishly. Rachel snorted.
"Well, I don't exactly have the upper body strength to just throw you outside, so you got lucky." Rachel retorted. I smiled. So the demon queen does have a sense of humor after all. Good to know. I glanced at the digital clock on the T.V and my eyes widened upon reading the time. 12:05 p.m. Holy shit. Did I really pass out for that long?! She must think I'm a total loser.
"Shit it's pretty late." I said, suddenly snapped upright. Besides the fact that I'm totally overstaying my welcome at this point, if I don't leave soon I'll miss my volunteer shift at the animal shelter.
"Got somewhere better to be?" Rachel replied, sipping what I presume to be coffee from a plain black mug.
"Not that I totally don't love waking up in a virtual stranger's apartment, but I'm gonna miss my shift at the animal shelter if I don't get going soon and they're pretty understaffed as it is." I replied, pulling my shoes onto my feet. Rachel looked at me quizzically before responding.
"I can go with you if you really need help. I'm not really doing anything and we need more time to iron out our story anyway." Rachel suddenly said. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't shocked. Rachel Roth did not seem like a the type to volunteer, let alone volunteer at an animal shelter. If anything, I half expected her to vehemently hate animals.
"Well, that'd be awesome; the more the merrier, right?"
{{ Rachel }}
If there's one thing I learned from spending time with Garfield, it's that I don't completely hate animal shelters. I'm usually not a volunteer person, let alone an animal person but this animal shelter wasn't that bad. It probably helped that Garfield was doing most of the work for me. Despite that, I seemed to be getting the swing of things. I cleaned the cages that desperately needed to be cleaned, administered medicine to the animals that needed it and set out the food for the animals. Not bad for a first time volunteer.
Because we had finished most of our tasks, Garfield and I were left with a little bit of free time to go over our story.
"Right, so I guess we can just say we met here. That seems a little bit less dramatic and a lot more grounded." I said, stacking a giant bag of dog food onto a pile. Garfield nodded eagerly.
"Gonna be honest that makes about 100 times more sense than the Mephisto thing." Garfield said, laughing. I rolled my eyes, a small smirk on my face. Okay, he did have a point.
"So. Who is this Kori person anyway and why are you going out of your way to do make up this whole charade?" Garfield asked, filing some papers on the counter in front of him. I sighed.
"Kori's been my best friend since freshman year of college. She's the closest friend I have and virtually my only family left; she's kinda like a little sister to me. Anyway, our friend group is quite gossipy and I know if I show up with no one Kori's going to try and set me up with one of her 900 Tameranian cousins." I replied, rolling my eyes. Kori had good intentions but I was definitely not interested with being set up with a virtual Kori clone.
"Well I for one am SHOCKED you don't want to be set up with some random Tameranian dude." Garfield replied sarcastically. I let out a snort and shook my head.
"I know right? How completely unlike me." I retorted. Garfield chuckled and turned around to face me.
"Nah, I feel ya. We're getting to that age where everyone's starting to get married and yet…here we are." He said replied. Was I crazy or did I hear sadness in his voice?
"You're telling me you have no one in your life?" I asked, almost shocked. As much as I didn't want to admit it, Garfield was rather attractive and the fact that he was single was a little bit surprising.
"While I'm happy to hear that you're just as shocked as I am, yes, I am single and more than ready to mingle." Garfield chuckled, checking off something on his clipboard. Huh. Why did I suddenly feel weird about this?
Shaking it off, I walked over to the kitten cages and glanced at each of the tiny, mewling creatures. I looked at all kinds of kittens, from solid grey cats to speckled calico types until my eyes landed on the second most beautiful cat I had ever seen. The cat was a sleek black color and had rather short fur. Its ears were large and alert and despite the fact that it was missing an eyeball, it had the most engaging eyes I had ever seen on a cat. Suddenly, I felt myself remembering my childhood.
Growing up, I had a pet cat named Odin. I was a pretty antisocial kid so of course, Odin was my only friend growing up. In fact, save for my mother, Odin was the only other thing I loved. I dreaded going to school because that meant being apart from my precious cat and when I finally got home I would spend all day playing with him. He was, for all intents and purposes, my best friend. Unfortunately, my father did not feel the same way about Odin, so when he and my mother briefly reconciled when I was ten, he made me give Odin away. Ever since that day, I'd sworn off ever having another pet. But I think that changes today.
"Awwww, he likes you." Garfield cooed as the black cat stretched its paws toward me. Aside from its missing eye, the cat seemed perfectly healthy to me.
"What's its name?" I asked as I unlocked his cage. Garfield glanced at his chart for a second before responding.
"Castor…y'know, he's up for adoption if you wanna take him home with you." Garfield offered, a huge smile on his face. I bit my lip. Although I would never admit to anyone, the penthouse did get lonely from time to time…and the little thing did need a home.
"Yes…I'd like that."
[[ Garfield ]]
Today was surprisingly pretty awesome. Rachel was a pretty competent volunteer and worked well with the animals. We'd also managed to go over some of our story and I even learned some new things about her. For example, she apparently has a soft spot for one eyed black cats. After discussing our story and finishing up our shifts, we'd headed our separate ways and for some strange reason, I was feeling pretty bummed about it. Weird. Shrugging, I unlocked the door to my apartment, expecting to find an empty living room.
Instead, I was greeted by the presence of Karen and Victor canoodling on the couch. Fucking gross.
"Blegh, get a room guys!" I said, sticking out my tongue.
"One, pay more rent and we'll get a room and two, where the hell have you been all day?" Victor asked, a large smile on his face. I set down my keys and headed to the kitchen for a snack.
"I've been out."
"No, really? I couldn't tell. For real man, where've you been, Karen's been worried sick about you." Victor said as Karen giggled. I rolled my eyes and smiled.
"I'm touched that you care so much about me, Karen and if you must know, I was with Rachel." I replied, settling on an apple to eat. Karen perked up at the mention of Rachel's name.
"Rachel Roth?" she asked, suddenly serious.
"Yeah, how do you know her?" I asked.
"First of all, I read the paper-you should try it some time- and secondly we have mutual friends! What were you doing together?" Karen asked, curious. Oh man my time to shine! Thank god we went over our storyline.
"We volunteer at the same animal shelter." I responded cooly. It was truly amazing how smooth that came out. This is gonna be great practice for the real deal.
"Interesting, I didn't know she volunteered…anyway we should all get together sometime." Karen said, smiling. I grinned. This was going pretty damn well if you asked me.
"Yeah, sounds cool, I'll ask her next time I see her." I replied, heading toward my room. I flipped the lights on and sighed as I settled into my bed. It's been a long 24 hours but damn if it wasn't fun.I looked over at my desk and groaned, not wanting to deal with the more adult aspects of my life. My pay wasn't bad for the amount of time I'd been working but it also wasn't enough to pay my loans off at the rate I'd like. At this rate, I'll be swimming in debt until my forties. Also on my desk was a letter from Tara I hadn't bothered to open. I'm sure at some point I'll be emotionally ready to open it, but now isn't that moment. Annoyed at the mere thought of my ex, I decided to shoot Rachel a text message.
Since I know u probably miss me soooo much how about you + me + karen beecher + my totally (not) awesome flatmate all get dinner tomorrow. if u need a more tempting reason, it'll be great practice for koris lunch thingy.
I hit send and smiled, happy to finally have plans other than being sad about Tara.
{{ Rachel }}
I'd met Karen only a few times before but was thoroughly impressed each time I met her. Not only was she well educated, but she was also friendly and ambitious, something I really appreciated in a person. So this dinner tonight was more than a little nerve wracking for me. Sighing, I smoothed out my skirt and crossed my arms, ready for Garfield to hurry up already. According to him, the restaurant was rather upscale and required fancier dress than just jeans and a tee shirt. Suddenly, Garfield emerged from his apartment wearing a well fitting button down shirt and tailored pants. His usually unruly hair was gelled back and he seemed to be relatively clean shaven. To say I was taken aback is a bit of an understatement.
"Are you ready?" Garfield said. I merely nodded. I was still shocked his sudden appearance change that I couldn't even find the words to reply to him.
"Unfortunately, I don't have a fancy car to escort you in but the restaurant's not that far away so our feet should work just fine." he added, extending his arm for me to grab. Hesitating for a moment, I glanced at his face before linking arms. This felt…nice.
"What's with the linked arms?" I asked after a moment of silence.
"Well, considering we're creating an elaborate relationship heist, I figured we'd look the part, don't you agree?" Garfield replied, a clever smile on his face.
"You have a point there."
"I do tend to do that from time to time." he countered. After several minutes of generic chit chat we finally made our way to the restaurant where Karen and his roommate were waiting for us at a table. Thankfully, the restaurant was fairly empty which meant we'd have at least some privacy. Garfield waved at his roommate and we quickly made our way over to our table.
"Rachel, nice to meet you, I've heard some great things about." Victor said, offering his hand for me to shake. Wow. Like Garfield, Victor was friendly and warm and suddenly I felt not as worried about the dinner.
"Nice to meet you Victor. Nice to see you again, Karen." I replied, smiling. Karen smiled back at me as I took a seat at the table.
"How's my girl Kori doing?" Karen asked as I glanced at the menu in front of me. So far, things seemed to be doing okay. I can totally do this.
"She's doing very well. I think she's a little busy, what with the wedding date moved up and all, but good nonetheless." I replied diplomatically.
"Ah, perfect. So I'll be seeing you there, yes?" Karen added. I smiled and nodded.
"Can't miss me; I'm the maid of honor." I replied. Victor laughed and Garfield gave me an encouraging smile.
"Can't wait! I imagine the wedding will be beautiful." Karen sighed happily. She wasn't wrong. Since we last talked, Kori said that Dick had spared no expense in giving her everything she wanted. Knowing Kori, that meant that the wedding would be a lavish, princess like affair.
After an hour of near non-stop conversation and surprisingly delicious food, Karen, Victor Garfield and I left the restaurant. After exchanging numbers and promises to keep in touch, Karen and Victor headed off to her apartment for the night, leaving me and Garfield to walk back.
"My apartment's not that far from here." I said, not wanting to impose myself on Garfield.
"Are you kidding? It's like midnight there's no way I'm letting you walk home by yourself." he insisted as I headed in the general direction of my apartment. Shrugging, I decided not to fight him on this; he was right, Jump City was dangerous at night, I of all people should know. So together we made our way to my apartment.
"I'd say this night went pretty well, wouldn't you?" Garfield suddenly said after a few moments of silence. I nodded. He did amazing, better than I ever would have expected a random guy I forced to be my wedding date would.
"You were great, very in character." I said, giving him a small smile.
"Well, y'know, I did act in high school."
"Did you really?"
"Hahahaha, nah I was in stage crew. But I did lie a lot as a kid, so I guess…close enough?" Garfield replied, chuckling. I laughed along with him, surprised by how at ease I felt. I guess it had been a while since I'd made a friend since Kori and the feeling of easiness with a new person was…strange.
"I was in stage crew too, actually." I said.
"Get out of here! Were you really?!" Garfield replied, incredulous.
"No, but I was a pretty decent liar as a kid." I replied with laughter. Garfield smiled and shook his head.
"Dammit, I've been bamboozled. And by the least likely person too! Who knew there was a sense of humor in there?" he laughed. We carried on in carefree conversation for what felt like hours before finally, we reached the entrance of my apartment.
"Oh. We're here." I said, suddenly a little disappointed. How strange.
"Right…well…goodnight." Garfield said, the same hint of disappointment in his voice. I stared at him, really looking into his eyes for the first time. And suddenly, he leaned in an kissed me. The kiss was nice; nothing like what I experienced with Mal. It was gentle and calm and most of all, I actually enjoyed it. We kissed for what felt like an eternity before I finally pulled away and stared at my feet.
"Goodnight." I said quickly, disappearing into the doorway of my apartment.