Chapter Eight
A Handful of Quiet Days

 

Jonathan blinked a few times. Standing upright took a moment to get used to after running around that much as a cat, especially considering how much lower to the ground he’d been. Simon was on the sofa, out of breath laughing, and Jonathan had to take a moment to let the vertigo go away. Not having a tail to balance things out was genuinely strange. 

“Hey, take it easy,” Simon said, noticing Jonathan’s not-moving and not-talking. “First time back takes a moment.” He swung his legs off the couch, letting Jonathan sit down again. “You alright?” 

“Yeah,” Jonathan said. “Just weird to be this high up again.”

“It gets easier,” Simon said. “Practice and you’ll be able to pop back and forth in no time. And then it gets, y’know. Fun.” The look of mischief on Simon’s face would have been scary if he didn’t look so excited. Jonathan raised an eyebrow. 

“Fun?” He was about to say more, maybe something glib. He hadn’t decided on that bit yet. But before he could get out another syllable, with an almost audible ‘poof’, Simon’s face was covered in a layer of soft fur, and a very cheeky grin. 

“Yeah,” Simon said, twitching a nose that was markedly pointier than it had been a second ago. “Fun.” With another ‘poof’, the fur went away again. “It’s not just this stuff. Tougher hide, sharper teeth --” he opened his mouth to show a set of pointy and quite vicious-looking canines, “-- whatever you want to bring over. It’s really cool.”

Jonathan looked at his hands. They looked the same they always had, that little bit of arm hair creeping up on the back of each of them that reminded him that one day he’d look like his father, like he was wearing a wool sweater under every article of clothing. Maybe that would bother him less if he brought some of the cat-features over with him? Cats were supposed to be fluffy, after all. And like, Simon looked appropriately cute. Well, not cute cute. Not to say that ferrets weren’t cute, of course…

Simon, observing Jonathan’s mental ring-around-the-rosie and not knowing what went on under the surface, gently patted him on the back. “Well, you’ll figure it out. I know you will. It’s only a few more days before we head over the school, and even if you don’t get a grasp of it before then, the teachers will definitely be able to help you achieve your potential and all that stuff.”

“Yeah,” Jonathan said, squeezing his hands into fists and relaxing them. “Stuff.”

“You alright?” Simon’s hand was still on Jonathan’s back, a fact the latter was all too aware of. “You seem a little out of it.”

“Y-yeah. Just a little- Just a little out of it,” Jonathan said, and hopped up. “I’ll be fine! Uh… thanks, man. It was fun.”

“You… too?” Simon said, a little confused. “Anyway, I gotta get to bed, before Charlie gets annoyed at us being up too late.” He got up too and dusted himself off. “Get some rest, J-Cat. You had a Big Day!”

“J-Cat?” Jonathan felt the corner of his mouth curl up. It sounded cute, at the very least, but he wasn’t sure it was him. 

“I’m trying it out,” Simon shrugged. “Jonathan is so formal, but you don’t have ‘Johnny’ energy.” Jonathan crossed his arms and looked sideways at Simon. 

“What even is Johnny energy?” he asked. “I can’t imagine it’s very different from, like, Simon energy, right? Two syllables, i’s and o’s.”

“Exactly!” Simon said as the two of them peeled out of the living room and started to head to their respective rooms up the stairs, “and you’re not cool enough for my o’s and i’s.”

“Oi!” Jonathan laughed, “I’m plenty cool! You’re just saying that because you turn into a ferret and you can’t move without bouncing.”

“You wish you were ferret,” Simon said with a cheeky grin as he got to his own door. “Have a good night, Catman John.”

“Ew. No. Anyway, g’night Ferret Boy.” Jonathan gave him a little wave, and got a mouth-click and finger guns as a response. He went into his room and closed the door behind him. He changed into his pajamas, crawled into bed, and laid in the dark for a bit. It really had been A Big Day, like Simon had put it. He really was a familiar now, whatever that was going to mean going forward. A part of that was obviously the whole cat-thing, but there was probably going to be more to it than that. 

For one, he was going to be paired up with a witch, wizard or warlock, and he didn’t even know how that was going to go. Was that person going to be nice? What if they didn’t even like each other? What if the first time they met each other they hated each other’s guts? But that was probably not going to happen right? If he understood correctly, the two of them were sort of fated to be able to work together well? There were a lot of things he didn’t understand yet, and he allowed himself not to fully know. The future was a mystery, but in a good way, for the first time in a very long time. 

As he shuffled under the covers, looking up at the ceiling, he moved around a bit, uncomfortably. It was a fact of life that sometimes, the pillow heated up just a little too fast, his pajamas were just a little too stifling in certain places, and the back of his neck was just… itchy. He had a brilliant idea. With the sound of gently displacing air, Jonathan disappeared. In his place was a small black-and-white cat, with a white nose, white socks, and a white tail-tip, lying on its back in the middle of a large bed, covers up to its eyes. 

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He chuckled softly, and paused at the sound of his own voice again. It was high-pitched, and he still wasn’t sure why. It still didn’t bother him, though. He scooted out from under the covers and walked around on the bed like a cat for a bit. It was so strange seeing the world like this. Bigger, sure, but different in other ways too. His hearing was so much sharper. Whenever there was a noise, it was easier to hear it after a second, and he realized that that was because his ear had turned to face it. He flicked his ear experimentally, and then batted at it with a paw, making him lose his footing and fall over onto his face. After an embarrassing second, he sat upright. Well, it was a good thing nobody had been around to see that. Apparently, thinking consciously about how he was standing and sitting was a recipe for disaster. He had to let his instincts help him out, or he was going to be a terrible cat. 

But things did feel nice this way. He wasn’t sure if it was his imagination, but it was like the world was a bit slower when he was a cat. Like everything moved around in a slightly easier-to-see, easier-to-deal-with way. Was he just processing everything faster? He blinked a few times, and realized that he was also able to see very well now that it was pretty much dark, like someone had turned on a very dim night light. Well, he knew how well a cat’s eyes adjusted to the darkness, so that was no surprise. Still, it was nice. He wondered if he would get the overwhelming urge to start hunting for mice. 

With another cute, kitty-esque chuckle, he sauntered back over to his pillow and stepped on it. It was very soft, and, well, he was a cat. He put one paw on it, and then another. He took a few steps, in a little circle, to see if he could find the optimal way to lie down, and then just sort of… plopped, curling up into a ball. Maybe it was because of the fur, or maybe it was that his body regulated heat differently now, but the pillow being warm didn’t bother him as much now. And at least his pajamas didn’t itch his neck or scratch at his arms when he was like this. He put his head down on his paws and closed his eyes, and within minutes, he’d dozed off. 

He woke up seven hours and thirteen minutes later to a knock on his door. Groggily, he opened his eyes. The words in his brain were ‘Yes, hello, who is this?’ but when he opened his mouth, still sleepy and not a shape he was particularly used to, what actually came out was “Myallo?” and immediately he got himself giggling at not just his voice, but the fact that he’d practically meowed out of reflex. 

“Are you decent?” he heard Sarah ask. Jonathan looked at himself. Technically, being a cat, he wasn’t wearing any clothes. On the other hand, clothes seemed to change back and forth with him, so he wasn’t not decent. He had clothes on him somewhere. He wasn’t going to turn into a gross naked boy if he changed back, at least. 

“Myah!” he said with another little giggle. Sarah pushed the door open, scanning the room, until her bright eyes fell on him, and he was very happy with the fact that he wasn’t wearing his normal face, or he would’ve blushed. She seemed so happy to see him, something he wasn’t used to. 

“Oh my goodness, you are adorable,” Sarah squeaked as she walked into the room. “Anyway, Charlie says breakfast is ready downstairs, she’s got some things to take care of before we go back to Threewees in a couple of days.” Jonathan nodded, listening with rapt attention and not at all struggling to think of himself as cute. Like, sure, cats are cute, and he was a cat, but still, Jonathan wasn’t cute. He wasn’t really allowed. Boys weren’t allowed to be cute. Well, Simon was, but that was… well, different. “Also!” Sarah said, cutting through his thoughts with her gentle sing-song voice, “she asked me to tell you about the Heart of Primaris. Wanna do that now?” Even in her human form, she had the unbridled energy of an excited dog. Or fox, as the case might be. 

“Yeah!” Jonathan said, excited. He was happy to spend more time with her, after all. 

“Okay, normally I’m not supposed to be in the boys’ bedrooms for too long but like, you’re nice, and you’re cute, and I trust you,” she said, and hopped onto the bed, kicking her feet up. 

The way she’d told him she trusted him made Jonathan feel all kinds of great. It was that she didn’t see him as a threat, as just another guy who would try to maybe take advantage of the situation. Like, sure she probably trusted Simon that way too, but it was still flattering, in a sense. He meowed softly in response, and before he could say anything, she’d reached over and run a hand over his head. He froze. It was so nice. Why was that so nice?! She was petting him. He realized with embarrassment that he was purring again. 

“Gosh,” Sarah said, “you really are a cute cat, you know that? It fits you.”

“Mrrr,” Jonathan said, grumbling softly, but he couldn’t really make it convincing. It was really nice to have his ears be played with, the back of his neck being gently scratched, the hair on his head be slightly tousled and then flattened back. 

“Don’t grumble at me, kitty,” Sarah said with a little chuckle. “You’re enjoying this, and a lot too.” Jonathan harrumphed but didn’t actually correct her. “Anyway, there’s not a lot for me to say, really.”

Jonathan looked up at her, and nodded. “The Heart of Primaris?”

“Yeah! Essentially, it’s supposed to be this big magical artifact thing. It’s supposed to only be a legend but like, magic is real, right? So it’s a bit hard to distinguish what sounds silly and what doesn’t.”

Jonathan nodded, trying to focus while he looked at Sarah. She was so big up on the bed next to him, and he had the overwhelming urge to nudge her with his head. He looked at her arm and gave in. “Bonk,” he said. 

“Cutie,” Sarah said and scratched under his chin. He wanted to make a noise of annoyance but his purring betrayed him. “Anyway, Primaris was the person who gave the world magic hundreds of years ago, right?” 

Jonathan nodded. He’d kind of assumed magic had just sort of existed before. “So one person created magic?”

“Yeah!” Sarah said. “That’s before he became god.”

“He what?!”