Page 27 of Conflict Conclusion

Finally, when James was about ready to ask Leon for his phone so he could jot down notes about navigating the housing market, Leon squeezed his hand.

“Where do you think you’re going to look for a happy place to live? Noah and Aspen seem to really like their new place. It’s…a bit far from my place, but you might like it, and I’m sure we could make it work.”

James felt a little like how he’d felt on that road earlier. Leon was slamming on the brakes, and James’ heart was at risk of flying out the front window.

He had known Leon might not be ready or interested in living with him. Now he came with a large orange furball. There were so many things to consider, for both Leon and Yarmen. Of course he wasn’t going to agree to live together in the waiting room of an emergency vet⁠—

Except that wasn’t quite right. James hadn’t explicitly asked him if he could move in, with his new feline companion in tow.

If he wanted this, to start a life with Leon in a shared home with their two fur babies, he had to fight for it.

James turned in his seat, but right as he opened his mouth, a nurse called, “Leon and…Cat.”

Leon huffed out a soft breath, tightening his grip on James’ hand as he stood up and helped James to his feet. “You’re going to have to think of a name for him.”

“I’m not very creative with names,” James muttered, allowing himself to be led down the hall to an exam room. “When I was a kid, all my stuffed animals were just called what they were. Bear, dragon, sloth, millipede.”

That eyebrow piercing shot up. “You had a Millipede stuffed animal?”

The vet tech let out a sharp laugh she immediately tried to hide behind her hand. “I guess Cat wasn’t too far off, huh?” she said.

James ignored them both, still reeling from having somehow messed up his first attempt at the moving conversation. He focused on gently setting the cat down on the exam table and smoothing the edges of his probably ruined shirt.

Leon wrapped an arm around James’ waist, and when the vet tech turned to do something on her computer, he leaned in and whispered, “I think James is an amazing name.”

Warmth and that giddy anticipation he’d felt at his mom’s house flooded through him.

He loved this man, with every fiber of his being. He wanted them to name the cat together and bring him home to what he was still desperately hoping could be their apartment. He wanted to curl up in their bed and listen to their two cats playing in the other room. He wanted, more than anything else, to be there by Leon’s side as he tackled PTSD and healed from what had been a tough year for them both.

Maybe, if they tackled it together, it could be just a bit easier moving forward.

Chapter Eight

LEON

“Ginger?”

“Too on the nose,” James said, shooting down Leon’s fifth good idea in a row.

“Garfield?”

“I never really liked that cartoon,” James said, shifting from foot to foot at the side of the exam table.

The vet tech had scanned the cat for a chip and, finding none, told them that after the waiting period, the cat would officially be theirs.

Or James’. The cat would be James’, possibly across the city if he chose to move into Aspen and Noah’s new apartment building.

Leon really had no fucking idea why he’d suggested that. James had just looked so stressed and anxious, and after his weird sort-of meltdown in Leon’s bathroom, Leon wanted to do anything in his power to make him feel better. Even if that meant suggesting he move across town with his new pet.

“Alright, we’re a little backed up today, so I sent the vet a message, and he put in an order for an X-ray. I’ll take him over for the scan, and the vet will be back to read the results and go over next steps,” the tech said.

She motioned for James to take a step back, and Leon used that as an excuse to wrap James up in his arms.

The tech wheeled the exam table out of the room, and the door quietly clicked shut behind her.

“Cheeto,” Leon said, and James shook his head.

“Nacho.”