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It was early afternoon when Mack got back home from running errands. Which he was an adult and he could totally do his errands by himself. No matter what anyone said. And no one needed to know that he had missed Will the entire time.
Will who was sitting hunched over on the sidewalk in front of their house.
“Hey, everything alright?” Mack asked softly, coming over to Will, resting a hand on his hunched shoulder.
“They just left her,” Will said.
“What?” Mack was confused.
Will straighten up so that Mack could see the fluffy, black cat Will was holding in his lap. Mack wouldn’t have called it a cat yet but it certainly wasn’t a kitten either. At the shift of Will’s body the cat let out a pained sounding meow. Staring up at them with huge golden eyes. “I came out to bring the garbage and there was a car, and it was going too fast and it didn’t even stop Mack. I don’t know what to do.”
“I’ll be right back,” Mack said, going into crisis mode. The little black cat was obviously hurt but Mack was hopeful the they could help it. He rushed inside grabbing a blanket off the back of the couch and an empty box. Googling the nearest vet he rushed back out and dropped to his knees next to Will.
“Hey, it’s okay. We’re going to everything we can to save her.” Mack arranged the blanket in the box. “How long ago did this happen?”
“I don’t know, ten twenty minutes?” Will looked reluctant to let go of the little cat.
“There’s a vet not far from here,” Mack said, showing him his phone.
Will nodded and they carefully moved the cat from his lap into the box. She protested a bit but settled again against the soft blanket.
“Come on, I’ll drive,” Mack carefully picked up the box and help Will to his feet. Once he was in the passenger seat, Mack passed the box back over to him along with his phone. “Call the vet tell them what you know.”
Will nodded, seeming more out of it than Mack liked.
“Hey,” Mack reached out, curling his hand around, the back of Will neck. “It’s going to be okay. We’re going to do everything we can.”
“Yeah, okay,” Will nodded.
Mack hurried around the truck and carefully headed in the direction of the vets office as Will talked to them. It didn’t take long for them to get there and they were soon enough inside, handing the box over to the vet.
As she was taken to the back, the woman at the desk began to ask them some questions.
Will was able to answer most of them but then, “Does she have a name?”
Mack blinked. “Ummm she not…”
“Mascara,” Will answered.
The absurdity of it startled a laugh out of Mack. “What?”
“My aunt had a cat. Looked just like her. And she called it Mascara.” Will shrugged.
“Mascara it is,” Mack knew that it probably wasn’t smart to name something that they weren’t sure would make it but he wasn’t going to deny Will anything.
“And which last name shall I add to her file?”
“Ummm,” Will started.
“Both.” Mack cut in. “Celebrini-Smith.”
The receptionist nodded and continued to fill out the file while Will gave him a small smile.
“This may take a little while. You’re welcome to wait or we can give you a call when we know anything.” The receptionist said.
“We’ll wait,” Mack said, tugging Will over to the chairs. They were the only ones in the waiting room at the moment and after a minute Will, leaned his head on Mack’s shoulder.
“Thank you,” Will said.
It took about an hour for the vet to come back out. Will sitting abruptly up as soon as he saw him, gripping Mack’s hand almost too tightly.
“She going to be fine.” The vet said. “We had to do surgery, but I’m confident she’ll make a full recovery. I want to keep her here at least over night. She doesn’t seem to have any identification but she also doesn’t seem to be feral. Are you going to keep her?”
“Yes,” both of them said at the same time.
“Okay, I’ll get a list of what you’re going to need to help her with her recovery.” The vet said.
Will had relaxed his hand at the news and soon they were going over the list with the vet and heading out of the building.
“Thank you, Mack,” Will said again. “You stayed so calm and just thank you. I’m kind of jealous though.”
Mack laughed, as they got into the truck. “Of my calmness?”
“No,” Will shook his head, and Mack looked over to find Will beginning to blush. “That Mascara gets to share our names before I do.”