Cat Out Of The Bag
The walk back through the empty corridors of the school brought back a tenseness she remembered from the day Qelhatat traversed the portal. There was a mean feeling in the air, and the main difference was that now she had much more hair that could stand on end now.
She made her way to the lab’s door without a hitch, only to find after a pointless rattling of the handle that it was under lock and key. Damn.
“Looking for this, Marcus?” A voice on her left made her jump in surprise - it seemed having waited an hour had done nothing as the vice-principal had simply stayed prowling around the door all this time, holding Anna’s school bag hostage.
It was the name used that made her jump the most however. Her heart beating wildly, she took a step back, feeling panic take hold. She wanted to say something, anything to get out of this mess... which with her female voice would’ve been a terrible idea, consequently leading her to feel strangely grateful for hyperventilating right now.
“You are Marcus, right?” The lady continued at the absence of a reaction from the student, dropping her arm holding the bag back down. “Is that where you’ve been? Hiding in professor Robert’s cupboard while your parents rummaged heaven and Earth to get you back?”
“I… I can’t…” She muttered despite herself with a raspy voice, her emotions too raw to stop from flooding out. “I can’t go back…”
The older woman sighed. “I know that with puberty you teens tend to have wild reactions, but running away from home because of a disagreement?”
“Is that- Is that what they’ve been calling it? A disagreement?” Anna replied indignantly, her shaky voice growing unmistakably feminine as her volume augmented. “An entire life of being constantly dismissed and blamed for everything, a disagreement?”
The vice-principal only paused for a moment before reaching for Anna’s hood, who swiftly dodged before grabbing her bag out of the woman’s hands and running off. “Now will you please stop running for a moment!?” She shouted before giving chase for the second time this afternoon. “I’ve called your parents, young man! They’re en route as we speak!”
The threat of her parents made her heart skip a beat, the accumulating revulsion having grown to something so terrible she lurched forward, wishing herself to be anywhere but there... But it made sense. Of course they would call her parents. Of course they would still call her young man. Of course they would still think she’s Marcus. It was all because of this charade of keeping things secret, wasn’t it? At least that’s what her mind told her just now. Her emotions were on overdrive, she was scared, afraid, panicking, and so were her thoughts.
She pulled off her hood and ripped away her mask to the gasp of the vice-principal, sending her a glare full of the contempt she was afraid she had in her. “This is what you wanted to check, wasn’t it?”
“What in the blazes…” Like a reflex, the older woman pulled out her phone and started punching in a number, while Anna hightailed it, her instincts giving her the simple command of searching somewhere safe.
She ran through the corridors of the school, climbing on all fours the stairs to the main classes block, galloping up to the third floor where she knew her class was in session. A slight voice at the back of her mind, grasping for control, told her to stop before she sowed even more chaos, but Kitten required safety, and it was behind that door.
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So the door was flung open, and the catgirl leaped across the room, landing on a very startled Sam’s desk, a nearby Jules seeming as flabbergasted, and the faces of the classmates and teacher sporting similar expressions.
Details got blurry.
There was joy and safety, but safety was waning.
The sensation of being carried, a bell ringing far away.
A scent that was similar to safety.
A low, continuous roar all around her, moving forward without running.
Safety regained, held onto tight.
Drowsiness.
When Anna came to, she rubbed her eyes and found dried tears, accompanied by a mild but persistent headache near her right temple. She realised her head was gently resting on Sam’s shoulder, and she quickly processed her whereabouts as the backseat of a moving car, a young woman, about late twenties, in the driver’s seat that sported hair of a similar color as Sam’s, only cut short and spiked up with gel.
Sam apparently noticed her shifting and turned their head. “Are you back with us, Anna?”
Her thoughts were a bit of a jumble. She stayed immobile, enjoying the feeling of contact against her partner’s shoulder. “I’d went somewhere…?” She remembered her mental exercise from last night. Visualise the sea of thoughts, look for the epicenter… Grab tightly, and no letting go. The headache receded, her eyes blinking away the fatigue. “I’m sorry, what’s happening?”
Sam shifted their arm, wrapping it around Anna. “Depending on perspective, you’ve either been knocked out for thirty minutes or an hour.”
“What…?”
“Do you remember anything?” They asked, a concerned look on their face.
Anna dragged a hand to her forehead, focusing for a moment. She could recall sensations, feelings, blurry images… Nothing concrete. She shook her head to the negative.
Sam sighed, then took a breath, expediting the hard part out of their mouth as quickly as possible. “You went full cat and revealed yourself to our entire class.”
The moment she knew what she was looking at, the images in her thoughts became clearer. She clearly remembered the feel of sitting atop a desk, her tail swaying side to side, while she looked Sam dead in the eyes with affection. Of hearing the disbelief of classmates. “A real tail?” “Is that the new girl?” “Holy sh-” Sam standing up from their chair and in a swift motion carrying her away before anyone could stop them. Grabbing their phone out of their pocket and calling their sister for an “early exit” while she was busy nuzzling her head against their neck and purring.
The recollection of all this made the headache come back stronger than before. A groan escaped her lips as the grip of her hand on her head tightened ever so slightly.
“Woah woah,” exclaimed Sam, pulling her into a hug. “Easy there. I think that happened because you’re completely mentally exhausted. No more shouldering everything by yourself, okay? I’m here.”
“I messed up so badly… Now an entire class knows, the vice principal knows…” She sighed. “Heck the entire school must know by now, there’s no way the government people aren’t gonna come dig for info…”
“I know. We can worry about that later. For now, evening at my house, alright?” Their hand went to caress Anna’s back in soothing circles. “Calm, relaxing evening, tomorrow your birthday party, then we’re gonna worry about what the world’s gonna throw at us next.”
She shifted around, throwing her head backwards into Sam’s lap. “Couldn’t even keep the secret up for two whole days...”
“It’s okay, love.” They soothingly muttered in her ear, softly caressing its fluffy inside with two fingers. “I was a ticking time bomb myself. Neither of us wanted to stay cooped up at home, if it was really that much of a problem Mr. Robert would’ve stopped us earlier. The mere fact he went along with our crazy idea is enough to tell me we can handle the trouble.”
Anna looked up to Sam’s face, then timidly nodded, prompting a smile from them.
“I hear your girlfriend’s awake?” The lady at the wheel asked. “Name’s Monica. My lil’ sib told me a lot about you, Anna.” As the car stopped to a red light, she turned her head backwards, taking an appraising glance at the catgirl. “And if you ask me...?” The big sister paused, an angry look on her face that made Anna pull her knees up to her torso. “You are frickin’ a-do-ra-ble!” She shrieked with a wink and a smirk, before turning her attention back to the road and roaring the motor to full strength as the light went to green.