Continued from Chapter 91
Nick sneered at his damp, leaky apartment as he got home for the day. Looking around in scorn at this reminder from his days of self-loathing and apathy, he sighed to himself. Coming home to this dump was a big step down from being in Judy's company all day.
The fox was one of Zootopia's finest. Ironically, he lived in perhaps one of the worst apartments Zootopia had to offer.
He had enough. It was about time to move. On stable pay and having cut off the "guilt payments" he was occasionally making to his mother to appease his own sense of justice, he knew he could afford a nicer, bigger apartment much closer to work than his digs in the Rainforest District.
Nick had just about settled on a two bedroom apartment in Savannah Central. A bit big for him, yes, but he wouldn't be utterly embarrassed at Judy's insistence that they hang out more. Nick got invited over to Judy's every once in awhile but space there was... tight. There was little to do. Despite that, Nick's apartment, while a bit larger, was arguably even worse.
So, he was going to move. Sooner, rather than later. He had already packed basically all of his belongings and he was just waiting to finalize things. Waiting on what, though? The fox groaned to himself. He knew why.
Nick wanted to know if Judy would want to move into the other bedroom. How forward it would be to ask, though. He took himself through the conversation so many times, and so many times it seemed like he'd reached an amicable conclusion with an imaginary Judy. He just couldn't bring himself to actually ask the real Judy about it. There was never a right time and he feared that if he did ask he'd be playing his hand.
Nick lifted up his phone and navigated to Judy's contact information. He had a new contact picture for her; always picked from the most special of his growing collection of pictures of the gray bunny. His current picture was particularly rare; he had caught her sleeping with her head on her arms at her desk after a late night/early morning work situation. Nick had insisted she have some coffee and she proudly refused. Well, he saw where that got her: onto his album of Judy Hopps pictures in his favorite one yet. He had, naturally, woken her up before she got into trouble, but he made a point to let her know what spoils he had gained from her little nap.
Delete that picture, Judy kept saying, her voice mixed between irritated and desperate. C'mon, that can't be the best picture you have of me...
It sure is! Nick challenged. That's your pic until I get a better one.
He'd refused all of the winsome, no, cute faces she'd made in the interim to try to goad Nick into changing the picture. He did appreciate the effort, though.
Nick's thumb was just over the call button. Maybe calling her would make it easier to approach the awkward subject. Or at least, make it more plausible to lie that he was drunk at the time. Nick took a deep breath, but then touched a different button to move back into his contact list and called someone else.
"Hello, Nick?" The feminine voice asked. "A bit early for your semiweekly call, hm?"
"Mom," Nick greeted in a blank voice. "I'm in love."
There was a terse gasp over the line. "Honey! That's great news! Who's the lucky vixen?"
"It's not a vixen, mom," Nick said.
A small pause followed. "Ah. Well I had sometimes wondered if you were more of a tod fox. As long as you're happy, Nicky!"
"Can I hold you to that one?" Nick muttered. "And it's not a tod, either." Nick grunted, taking a breath in and holding it for a second before letting it out in a rush. "I'm... I'm in love with Carrots."
"...Nicholas, are you drunk again?" Mrs. Wilde asked sternly.
"Huh?" Nick's brow raised in confusion, then he shook his head of the thoughts. "No no, mom. I mean... I'm in love with my partner, Judy Hopps."
There was a longer pause. "...Oh."
"Yeah, figured that would be your reaction," Nick muttered.
"Did you expect anything different?" The vixen's voice was slightly snippy. "Every time you come on the phone to talk about that bunny it's something different, and usually something radical."
"I've been her partner on the force for a few months and known her for over a year and a half," Nick said. "I'd like to think I could make a decision like this logically."
"What's logical about you wanting to be with that bunny?" Mrs. Wilde snapped. "Nicky, I... I don't want you to get hurt."
"Hurt?" Nick chuckled. "Well, she's never turned those bunny feet on me before-"
"That's not what I mean, and you know it," Mrs. Wilde continued. "Nicky, you... you've been hurt by prey before. She's hurt you before. I remember your call to me that evening; you were just destroyed, Nicky. Why would you ever think getting closer to her was a good idea? You can't say she's incapable of hurting you, or that it might not happen again."
Nick groaned, rubbing his arm with his free hand. "Everyone makes mistakes, mom."
"Yes, but usually those mistakes don't end up with the persecution of Zootopia's predators," Mrs. Wilde said acidly.
"Do you think I forgot that? I was there," Nick replied. "She hurt me most of all. But what I didn't know is I hurt her then, too. I inadvertently mimicked a scene from her childhood where she was bullied by a fox."
"How convenient," Mrs. Wilde said. Nick was pretty sure he could hear her rolling her eyes. "She tell you that to try to excuse herself?"
"No, she told me that when she was drunk," Nick grumbled. "She's a very... truthful drunk. 'Hey, feel this!' she said, making me touch her cheek. She had scars there. A fox's doing."
"She's manipulative, Nick," Mrs. Wilde challenged. "Every time she's met you she's wanted something from you."
"Mother!" Nick burst. "She was desperate in the first case, and- what, are you talking about the bridge?"
"She was physically manipulative at first, then emotionally," Mrs. Wilde sounded disgusted. "She tried everything to get you back on her side."
"No, mom, no," Nick was getting angry. "I'm not going to have you twist one of my fondest memories into something that makes Judy a self-serving-"
"Well how else can I see it?" Mrs. Wilde was sounding exasperated. "You told me yourself that she only came to you, not to seek your forgiveness, but because she needed your help-"
"Saving Zootopia!" Nick enunciated. "She only trusted me, mother! Out of everyone in the city!"
"If you get with her, she is going to break your heart again," Mrs. Wilde said firmly. "It's inevitable. Is she even interested in you? Do you know that?"
"Yeah," Nick groaned, holding his hand over his eyes. "I'm ninety-nine percent sure. Sometimes she really smells like it. Only, I don't think she's even convinced herself yet."
"Mm, emotionally out of touch, a nice trait," Nick's mother said sarcastically. "I suppose she can't smell your interest. Can she hear it?"
"Mom..." Nick mumbled.
"So, why are you even telling me this?" Mrs. Wilde continued, feeling like she was getting Nick in a corner. "You know how I feel about that rabbit, and you've told me you've given up on changing my mind."
"I just..." Nick started pacing around his room. "I don't know. I'm nearing the end of my rope. Sooner or later I'm going to screw up and how I feel is going to come out. It'll be inexcusable. I just- I wish I could ask you for advice. How to approach her. What she'd like."
"So you're finally tiring of hiding your feelings and actions behind half-truths and misdirection," Mrs. Wilde replied coldly.
This gave Nick pause. His mother's words were like sniper shots. "I... I deserved that." Nick felt his breath catch a bit. "I just think you're forgetting who inspired me to change my life course. Mom- no, forget it. Of course you wouldn't care about what makes me happy."
"I... do care about your happiness, Nicholas," Mrs. Wilde sighed. "I just think you're making a mistake with that bunny... I feel like a call filled with you weeping about her wronging you again will be the next one I get..."
"You know the happiest I've ever felt, mom?" Nick snapped. "When Judy was pinning that badge on me at my graduation. The look of pride and joy on her face... I'll never forget that." His mother started to talk, but he quickly interrupted. "And when you walked up after the graduation and warned her that she better be more careful what she said about predators? I felt embarrassed for her. Can't you let it go, like most of the other predators of Zootopia have? She's tried her best to absolve her sins!" Nick was almost panting. He tried to stop pacing.
His mother was silent for a minute. "Are you done preaching at me?"
"Mom, please.. just- please give Judy a chance," Nick said quietly. "You don't know her like I do. You don't know her vivaciousness, her lust for life, her drive, her spark, her tenderness... I..."
"Do I get to say 'I told you so' if your next call about her is with you in tears again?" Mrs. Wilde replied.
"Yes," Nick said. "Yes, ram it right down my throat for the good it'll do."
"I'll think about it," the vixen's voice was non-committal.
"I'm just about done with denying myself of acting on my feelings for Judy, mom," Nick said solidly. "I've wallowed in self-pity for far too long. Now I have a job that I can be proud of and... and I could have the most amazing girlfriend I could ask for, if I'd just... do something about it."
"Well you know she's supposed to ask you, right?" Mrs. Wilde almost sounded bemused.
"She's not a fox, mom," Nick grumbled.
"I suppose she isn't," Mrs. Wilde said. "Also, I'm guessing her nose isn't good enough to pick out how humiliatingly desperate you must smell around her, so I guess you'll just have to fill those blanks in for her, hm?"
Nick felt like that was as good as he was going to get from her.
"I... gotta go, mom," Nick said glumly. "I love you."
Nick heard a long sigh. "I love you too, Nicholas. ...Tell me how it goes."
Nick hung up, unclothed, and slunk into bed.
Well, now that the easy part was out of the way, he just had to come up with a plan to reveal his feelings for Judy, Nick thought to himself sardonically.
Nick clutched his pillow to his chest. He allowed himself a wild thought that in the pillow's place might one day might be Judy. Feeling her soft fur against him, hearing her measured breaths, sharing her warmth, smelling that lovely lapine scent.
He opened his eye and looked around his apartment.
Not in this place, though.
Nick fell asleep with something like a worried conviction in his heart.