Chapter Text
On days where his composure was worse, and he was less aware of surroundings and far less abrasive, the day when being with him felt the most peaceful and almost pleasant, you found yourself enjoying his presence. He was more passive on those days, and it almost felt like he was a house-cat, a passive accompanying member of a household rather than the thing that destroyed your life. It would often be when you slept over, when he hadn't woken up to whatever intrusive internal torments you imagined haunted him to tell you to get the fuck out of his apartment because he never wants to see your hideous face again, when he woke up on a side of the bed that left him unfamiliar to you.
There was times when he would almost paw at you for your attention, keeping himself below eye level, or entertain himself with random nick-knacks he would pick up, like your keys, just jingling them in front of himself, his eyes darting to follow the shifting of the brass. His childishness was endearing, and although his eyes never gleamed, the way he fiddled with his food or lifted his arms high over his head to stretch his back, arching with a certain unexpected grace from his stocky frame made you see the smallest bits of light in him.
He often curled up on the sofa, just scrolling through things on his phone mindlessly, and had even used your lap as a pillow on more than one occasion. It had been three months since he started to ruin you, and the strange domesticity of your relationship was one of the only comforts you really had, and you were incapable of ignoring what allure the cat did carry, the innocent way he looked at you when something you did caught his attention, his occasional enthusiastic way of expressing his love for his interests. It was so rare to see him show proper emotion that you couldn't help but cave into the desire to want to let him curl up on top of you while he ranted about the way YouTube channels dedicated to marksmanship didn't describe the feel of the gun in their hands vividly enough to his satisfaction.
"It's not even worth watching if they don't bother describing when the weight of the recoil hits you. They'll show you an engraved pistol but won't go into detail about the texture of the metal. It's all a waste of time, none of them know what they're talking about,"
He was cute when he was fussy, his scrunched nose almost bringing emotion to his dark eyes.
"I don't even know why I'm talking to you about this, it's not like you'd understand either. No one gets it unless they truly know their way around a gun, I-"
"You've told me many times about how much you enjoy the cold metal of a gun barrel when you stroke it," you can't hold back a chuckle in that instant, his strangely flustered face endearing enough to have been worth the risk of your statement.
"Shut up." He promptly responded, grouchily, and you almost wondered if you liked him.
He held you from behind, his hand on yours, your weight supported by his body.
"You're not doing it right. If your hands are shaking this much, you'll never hit the target right," he muttered, trying to keep you as steady as he could. A date at the shooting range. Or, at least, it was the closest thing to a date you had experienced since you had lost your previous partner because of his actions, and the fact that he offered this himself with such insistence was out of left field enough that you wondered if you were going to end up driven into the woods and buried six feet underground. In defense of your train of thought, hearing "I'm going to take you out to practice shooting," sounded like a fair guarantee that you were going to end up in pieces in a dumpster.
You didn't say no to him. You never really did, or at least not when you saw him start to look at you in a way that meant no wasn't an option.
To your surprise, it wasn't unpleasant. As much as he was a harsh critic, the excitement he had when you managed to finally hold the rifle in the way he had desperately been trying to maneuver you into doing was actually visible on his empty face, and you felt a bit of pride well up in your chest. You couldn't help but enjoy the way he handled you as he helped you focus on the target.
When you finally shot, and he kept you balanced from the recoil for the first time, you ignored how the tent in his pants pressed against you.
On the drive home, you kept your hands in your lap, him having returned to his usual quietness.
"I'm guessing you're happy that I finally have a hands on experience with gun feel," you say, intentionally avoiding looking at him. As pleasant as the rest of the experience was, something told you that you didn't want to look too closely at the cat's eyes.
"You're worse than the most inexperienced novices, talking to you will always be like talking to a wall."
"At least I'm a more informed wall now," you say, looking at your knees.
"Next time, we'll go at an hour when there's less people," he said, his eyes on the road, the words coming from low in his diaphragm.
There was a lump in your throat.