Extra Fluff

Chapter 2: Kintsugi

It was 11:37 am, and the floor of the basketball court was spotless, as Kai began to leave and clock out. When he heard footsteps coming from the entryway to the basketball court. The doors swung open, and out came a golden retriever, he was tall and moderately muscular, wearing a basketball uniform for the local college football team with the number 52 on his chest, and beneath that, the name "Buck". Kai seemed to recognize this stranger from somewhere, but couldn't quite tell from where. But this strange dog stared back at him with shock as he approached Kai slowly. "Kai, is that you?" the golden retriever muttered. "Wait..." Kai muttered out loud in disbelief. "You know me?" questioned Kai.

"I mean, you look somewhat familiar to me ..."

"Look, I knew you since our junior year at Aries Highschool-"

"And this may sound abrupt... but... from afar... I had feelings for you"

Kai was flustered, he had gotten out of the worst relationship he had had to date, and now he meets what feels like a snow white story. It felt too good to be a reality.

"Oh! How rude of me to not tell you my name. I'm Buckley Thomas. You can call me Buck!"

Thomas was confused and defensive. On one hand someone had a secret crush on him, and only was made aware of it on a whim?! Kai didn't know how to feel. Buck could see some form of distress on Kai's face. "Is everything okay?" Buck asked with concern. Buck reached out to comfort Kai by resting his hand on Kai's back. Kai saw Buck about to comfort him physically, and flinched away in discomfort, his face in a state of primal fear, frantically breathing, sweating, feeling an icy hot sensation in his legs. Dolion looked a lot like Buck, and was treating him with true love and affection. It all felt so... Surreal. "Who hurt you?!" Buck asked with great worry. "Here, take this." Buck said as he handed Kai a slip of paper, gently placing it into the palm of Kai's hand. "Anyways... I have a little league basketball game I'll have to monitor." Before Buck left he turned around and said one last thing to Kai, "Let's talk online if you need me." before turning to enter the basketball court. Kai clutched the sticky note in his paws tightly, and walked out. "What just happened?!" Kai thought to himself, completely baffled on what just occurred. As Kai walked upstairs to the break room to clock out, he felt strangely happy, but unable to let his guard down. As Kai clocked out, he couldn't stop thinking about what exactly happened, and how it felt so good that there had to be a catch to it. Kai climbed onto the bus and began to look at the sheet of paper with a blank stare, the whole way to his home. As he opened the door to his apartment, he sat down on the couch and pulled out his phone, and added the number to his contacts, assuming this was Buck's phone number. Kai opened his text messages and began to type. "Hey its Kai, I am genuinely so sorry for what happened back at the rec center, a lot of things have changed since high school. For better or for worse..." and hesitantly pressed the send button. And for what seemed like an eternity of waiting a notification came back on his phone from Buck "There is no need to apologize for anything, we can talk about that more if you'd feel comfortable to do so." Kai looked down at his phone, the bright screen projecting onto his face, and began to type away. "I had an ex who only wanted me for my body, who I broke up with not too long ago." Kai Wrote "You just looked so much like him, when I ran into you that my fight, flight, or freeze kicked in." when Kai pressed send, it felt as if a heavy boulder was hoisted off his chest. "Did I just open up to a complete stranger?!" he thought to himself with disintent, before long he saw Buck begin to type. "Oh. My. Goodness. I feel so sorry for you... Are You okay now?!" Kai sat in silence and disbelief, someone who genuinely cared for him that wasn't family? Kai didn't know how to feel. Joy, yes, but also shock, and a warm cozy feeling that felt euphoric. Just as he looked back at his phone Buck had sent him a new text message, this time of a lone red heart, this one emoji made Kai begin to tear up, and begin to sob. "HOW COULD SOMEONE LOVE A FOX AS BROKEN AS ME?!" Kai wailed as he rushed to his bed and bundled up in his quilt, laying in a fetal position, his eyes pouring with tears of emotional pain, his pillow sopping up the salty brine and leaving a dark, wet patch, on the pillowcase. Just then Kai felt the phone in his pocket vibrate, another text from buck had come through. "Just know I can be the metaphorical pillow you can cry your feelings into. <3" Kai looked at the screen and softly smiled, as he laid down onto his back gazing at the ceiling of the bedroom, as his eyes slowly began to shut, and fell into a deep slumber, knowing at the very least he'd be off work tomorrow. And as the night slowly but surely shifted to day, Kai awoke from his bed and grabbed his phone, to find a text from Buck: "Good morning! I hope you slept well, I was very worried about you." Kai wanted to say so many things, but all he could muster up to type was a simple "Thanks" as he hit send before swiftly closing the app, scared of how Buck would respond. Kai walked into the kitchen and looked at the time, 9:23 am. Kai opened the refrigerator and grabbed a hard boiled egg from a plastic tub, and bit the egg like an apple, finishing the egg in two whole bites, washing it down with lukewarm water from the faucet. Somewhat ready to start the day. Kai walked over to his desk, to some art on his drawing tablet, but... what to draw? Just then Kai's phone began to ring, looking at the contact, Kai saw it was Buckley. Nervously Kai answered the phone, butterflies in his stomach. "HHAaAAaaaaahhh..." was all that escaped Kai's maw in an attempt to say "hi" before covering his mouth with his paw embarrassment. "Is everything... ok?" Buck asked. Kai completely in an embarrassed panic blurted out "Oh my god I am so, so sorry, I'm fresh out of bed and I-" "No, there isn't a need to apologize, Kai!" Buck interrupted, "We all have done some embarrassing things, wanna hear something I did yesterday that embarrassed me? If it makes you feel any better." Kai felt strangely comforted hearing that. Enticed, Kai responded "S-sure..."

"Ok here is what happened," Buck began to talk,

"Yesterday at the little league I was teaching the pups about proper form when throwing a basketball, and this one kid was running to the water fountain to refill his flask. I was then going to demonstrate how to properly throw a ball, I grabbed the ball, jumped, and tossed the ball. HOWEVER... my trajectory was slightly off, and once I realized that, I told the pup to move, and all he did was stop and wave at me, before the ball clocked him on the noggin."

Kai let out a snicker, and giggled a little. "Yeah, sure it was crazy." Buck replied "thankfully the pup's parents were fairly understanding.". So, what are you up to, Kai? "Eh, just brainstorming on what to draw on my tablet.". "Do you have a Drawr?" Buck asked. "Yeah I do, but I don't feeL comfortable sharing it yet..." Kai said. "That's perfectly fine," Buck said back. "I respect your privacy." Just then a loud "THUD" echoed in the call on Buck's end. Buck hastily spoke "Anyways, I need to go, talk to you later, bye!" And with that Buck hung up. As Kai sat in his chair he began to scratch at his fur, back to thinking on what to draw. He floated his mouse over the drawing software's favicon, and clicked twice, as the software opened, inspiration struck. Kai scrolled to the bottom of the gallery, 2020, 2019, 2017 and then he hit the bottom of the page, and there he saw his first drawing: it was a flatly colored, labrador retriever merman. The proportions were all over the place, the abs looked like a pack of bread rolls, and the pecs were so sharply square that they could be used as throwing stars, and the paws were so comically large it was embarrassing. "What if I redid this" Kai thought as he saved the image to his downloads, and opened a new canvas. Kai overlaid the old art onto a new layer, and lowered the opacity so that it was only somewhat visible. From there Kai began to google pose references of "Canines perched on rock shirtless" and hit enter, after the page finished loading Kai headed straight for the images and near instantly endless photos of big chested dogs covered the search tab, Kai felt hypnotized gazing at the images of these extremely attractive dogs, the defined muscles posing so sensually that Kai couldn't remember what he was looking for. Kai was then brought back to his senses by a loud thud and a shatter outside his apartment. Curiously, Kai was enticed by what made the noise, climbing out of his chair. Kai walked to the door and peeked through the peephole, and saw his next door neighbors were moving. Opening the door he walked out to see a porcelain doll of a rabbit, its ears had broken off, and its glaze had chipped off revealing the coarse ceramic beneath as it stared dead at the wall. His neighbor, an elderly hyena named Dolores. She looked at the broken doll and fell to her knees and curled up, and began to sob. "That was my daughter's favorite doll!!!" she wailed. Kai stepped over the shards of broken ceramic, and knelt down to Dolores' level. Kai spoke in an assuring tone "I have some ceramic glue, in the-" "NO!!!" cried Dolores, "It's Ruined..." just then the two of them heard footsteps around the corner of the elevator. The dog slowly walked to the two of them, and asked: "What happened?" in a familiar voice. Kai looked behind him to see Buck, in a Great Dane Movers uniform. "Ma'am is everything-" just as Buck nearly finished he saw the broken porcelain doll, broken and strewn out like a crime scene. Buck began to talk. "Ma'am we can offer a warranty to fix any broken or damaged goods, would you like that?" Dolores stared blankly at the broken doll "It's just that... Bella loved this doll so much..." Dolores went on. "Before I lost her to Brain Cancer, she used to play with that doll for hours on end. She would have tea parties with the doll who she named Leslie. She would brush her hair, play princess, and even have tea parties, the two were inseparable. Even when battling Cancer, Leslie was always by her side. And before Bella passed, she asked for me to keep Leslie safe... But I failed her..." Dolores Whimpered. As Buck began comforting Delores, Kai pulled out his phone and began to search online. Kai heard of this technique from Japan, where gold was used to repair ceramics, called "Kintsugi" according to Looksi. "Hey, hey, take a look at this" Kai spoke reverently, as he handed Dolores his phone. Dolores wiped away her tears, put on her glasses and looked at Kai's phone. Kai explained: "Kintsugi is used to repair broken ceramics with gold, repairing the piece, but also making its flaws more prevalent and beautiful." "I could probably do that for you with some epoxy and gold leaf." Dolores looked at Kai with a joyfully sad look, and spoke. "How much would you charge?" Delores asked. Buck stepped in "I can cover it for the two of you." Delores looked at Kai and Buck with tearful joy, and hugged the two tightly, and sobbed, "Thank you, thank you, thank you..." Dolores walked into her apartment. When she returned, in her hand was a plastic tub. As the three of them picked up the shards of glaze and ceramic dusk began to fall, the golden light illuminating them as they worked. Kai brought the tub to his art desk as Delores waved goodbye. Kai placed the broken doll on his desk, gently and sat down. He gazed at the damage and worriedly gazed at the broken doll. Although Kai knew he could easily repair it, the pressure seemed daunting, with a backstory like that, Kai was worried he would royally screw up. Just then his phone vibrated, it was a message from Buck. "Hey, Kai. I know you probably didn't recognize me from today, but would you like to go to the hardware store tomorrow to get the supplies together?" Kai looked back at his phone, and began to type. "I knew it was you, I just didn't want to make things all about us because Miss Dolores was very distraught." as Kai sent the message he laid down on his bed and stared up at the ceiling, completely exhausted mentaly. Kai was very introverted, and this day felt exhausting to him, and before long Kai was fast asleep.