smiling critters

chapter 28 - rumors

ever since Neil changing got leaked, rumors had begun to spread like wildfire. Neil would hear stuff like ‘i heard his parents don't feed him,’ or ‘my friend told me he does heroin.’ ‘he’s homeless,’ ‘he's an orphan,’ etcetera etcetera. Neil was starting to go back to chronic suicidal thoughts and that self harm withdrawal was really starting to kick in hardcore. back when he was living with godfrey, this would be his 13th reason. Like deadass, this would be what broke him. The rumors got worse and worse as his mental state spiraled with it. He started secluding himself more, not just from strangers, but his friends too. But Thursday, when his second period class went to the bathrooms for a break, dylan pulled him aside.

“Ok, what’s going on?! You’ve been ignoring us all week!” he asked, gripping his shoulders. Neil stayed silent and looked at the floor as he ran his fingers through his hair.

“Is it about the rumors? Look, we can help you deal with them in any way we can.”
Neil just hugged him as tight as he could as Dylan hugged back. They stayed like that for a few minutes until Neil separated to talk.

“Sorry, the rumors are just really dampering my mood. I’m starting to think about cutting again. Can I come to your house?” he signed.

“Uhh, I dunno. My uncle is in the city for business and will be at my house when i get home today and tomorrow, then my mom has the day off saturday and she wants me to spend the day with them. but he has to do stuff sunday and my mom will be at work, so are you doing anything sunday?”

Neil thought for a moment before shaking his head.

“Great!” he smiled and wagged his tail before looking at the main area to see the class going back to the classroom.

“Ok that’s our cue, c’mon!” He continued as he scooped the american shorthair up, being mindful of his tail, and started jogging to join the others. Neil, although quite flustered and in pain due to his back injury from monday, just latched onto dylan’s neck as he ran and carefully trotted down the stairs to catch up to the rest of the class. But as dylan ran, neil noticed a girl giving them a dirty look. He looked to his right, not wanting to maintain eye contact with her, only for him to now be making eye contact with dylan’s chest. Sure, they were dating, but there was a time and place for everything, and school was not the time or place to be ogling your boyfriend’s chest fur. He darted his gaze to the end of his tail, which was now in his lap since he didn’t want it to get trampled. That only happened once, and due to its deformity, only made it hurt more and ended up putting him out of commission for like a week and a half. Godfrey was upset about it to say the least, and had locked him out of his room because of that. When georgia was giving him a physical, godfrey had confirmed his abnormally long tail and scoliosis were genetic deformities on their dad’s side. Neil was ripped from his thoughts when dylan suddenly plopped him on the ground.

“We’ve reached our destination, your majesty~” he flirted as he bowed. Neil snickered as he gave him a hug and walked into the classroom. He would’ve given him a better reward for carrying him all the way back to class, like a kiss, but place and time, and the school wasn’t too fond of any PDA that went past a hug.

dylan POV-

Dylan sat at his seat, happy that he was able to make neil feel better, even if it was for a second, because he looked just that much more energized since their interaction. His deskmate, a girl in hollie’s soccer team, sat beside him and leaned in to whisper something.

“Dude, why were you hanging out with neil? I heard he does hard drugs,” she sneered. Dylan turned up his muzzle at the comment as he noticed neil shrink again.

“What do you mean? I’ve known him since we were 9, he’s never done anything like that!” he whispered back, a little annoyed.

“Well that’s what a lot of people are saying, have you checked on him?”

“Yea, i have. He’s not on anything.”

“Hmm, well my friend-”

“Was lying to you. Look, i know most of the stuff people are saying about him and none of it’s true, ok?”

“Oh, i just tend to believe what everyone else is saying.”
Dylan rolled his eyes as he got back to his work until the bell rang. He walked neil to his next period and tried to stay with him as much as he could, and when school had gotten out, he told neil to text him whenever he was feeling particularly low. When he got home, he saw his mom’s half brother, a cocker spaniel-german shepherd mix, sitting on the couch on his computer typing away. He shut the door and sat beside him and struck a conversation. His uncle was a big contractor and was in Myrtle Beach for a few meetings and decided he’d pop in to see his little sister and her pup. They spent the day together, and if dylan was being honest, it was nice having another person in the house for those two days. Neil stayed over whenever he could, either that or he brought dylan over to his house, but that wasn’t always the case and when he had to come home to an empty house, he felt this sense of hollowness, so having uncle in the house was a nice change of pace. When their day was over and dylan got to go to his room for the night, he didn’t have any notifications other than a lengthy text from Neil detailing what happened in the locker room followed by another text that read, ‘sorry, that was longer than i expected,’ and a missed call from the group chat, which was usually bryson calling to help everyone with their homework. He opened neil’s message and when he was finally done, he was left disgusted with kai’s friend. Saturday, uncle, mom, and dylan went to breakfast and the beach before going home so uncle could get to his meeting before going out for dinner. The day was good overall, other than dylan missing what bryson called ‘a prime catch-up opportunity,’ and getting harped on a little for it.

Kai POV-

On sunday, kai was in the car with his parents going to church. They had another fight the night before and were now patched up. he was tired from being out all night last night, but he at least was going to remember to tell Simon he didn't want to be friends anymore. he got out of the car and went inside with his parents before texting Bobby, who was busy spamming pictures of starburst, who was either sleeping or doing fucking nothing, and freaking out over him before he glanced up and saw Simon and his parents walk in and sit at the pew just across from him, and the rage he’d built up over the past few months, both with him and his parents, had boiled over and in a flash he was tackling Simon and punching him as hard as he could. he didn't even feel in control of himself, he was just angry.

“Kai! Kai, stop it!” He heard a woman's voice as he was pulled off Simon. he calmed down enough to see straight. It was mom. she was hugging his wings to his sides as tight as she could as dad made sure Simon was ok.

“Kai, what is wrong with you?!” she snarled at him. He didn't say anything, just glared at the floor as he broke out of her constrictive grasp.

“answer me. why did you do that?”

“because.”

“that isn't an answer.”

“he recorded my friend changing.”

“no I didn't! he’s lying ms. Hawthorne!” simon shouted.

“Kai, be honest. Why did you think you had any reason to get violent with Simon?”

“I am being honest! He recorded my friend changing last friday!”

“don't lie to me.”

“I'm not!”
after a lot of pushing and shoving, Kai telling his parents that Simon filmed Neil and Simon insisting that he didn't, and the pastor getting involved, the adults made Simon call Neil after the sermon to get his side of the story. after two rings, he didn't pick up.

“if he's not going to answer, then just say you're wrong. There's no shame in admitting you acted incorrectly or on impulse,” the pastor told him.

“no no, I'm sure he's with my other friend. I’ll see if he answers,” Kai insisted as he went to Dylan's contact and pressed call. it rang before going to voicemail. He called again.

“c’mon dyl, don't make me look stupid here,” Kai mumbled as his phone rang.

1517 words