Feliformia Ch. 01

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Prologue

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"So? Why are you here, then?" she asked.

Well ... This was a darn good question. How did it come to this? Only a year ago, I was sitting in front of my TV all day when not at work and barely had any friends that I cared for. Living alone made it easy for a person to forget about those friendly relationships as it was not the missing part of life. That was me, my routine. Monday to Friday, I was going to work to fill up the bank account, then returned home and did easy things to keep boredom at bay.

My sexual life consisted of watching porn and masturbating; no wonder why I was not happy. It was too easy, and it pulled me down into despair and loneliness until, finally, a voice in my head interjected to my lack of momentum with a classy 'what the fuck are you doing???'. Of course, that didn't change anything at first. The voice had to repeat itself hundreds of times before I could finally understand what it meant. The message was, 'Go out and get yourself a real human girl.' Yeah, my fundamental needs had to tell me what to do with my life, it was rather embarrassing.

One would think that this cute woman sitting in front of me, sipping her beer and waiting for my answer to her simple question, was a potential date. She was not. Or maybe she was. I didn't know just yet. No wonder that with an ambiguous statement like this, she was confused about me. I was confused as well.

"So what? You are not going to tell me?" she insisted.

I took another sip of beer before giving her something to work with.

"Hey, no, it's nothing like that. It's just that I don't know what to start with."

Her name was Erika, and she was now looking at me with a puzzled look before acting reassuringly and providing me with a pair of crutches to palliate my non-ability to communicate correctly.

"Look, if you want to fuck me tonight or if you just want to talk and have fun, just tell me. We are all different, and that is fine. I just need to know so we can move on and enjoy ourselves. I'm not saying that I will let you fuck me right away, but if it ends up that way, I'm good with it, you know. I'm a grown adult."

At least she was super easy-going. I should be grateful to her for breaking the ice like this. But as appreciated as it was, it didn't help me very much at the moment.

"Well, Erika, I am not sure yet about what I want. I'm currently in a strange situation at home, and I'm not sure how to handle it exactly."

She scoffed at me.

"AH! That's what it was. The cat gets out of the bag. Let me guess. You are married, and now you are doing things behind her back! That seems to be the trend these days. And no, I'm not interested. I have no issues with people sleeping around with multiple sex partners, but when you are seriously engaged with someone, and you put her trust at risk, then I want no part of it. If she is okay with it and you are fishing for a threesome, I don't think I want this either ... Mind you, I've never been offered one before ... let's label that as a 'to be considered.'"

I let an audible groan out.

"No, I'm not married! However, there is someone in my life already ... but wait ... before you ask any more questions or come up with new theories, let's order two more beers, and I'll explain everything to you. I'm pretty sure you are not expecting what I'm about to tell you. Once I'm done, then you can judge me all you want. Deal?"

She leaned back in her lounge chair in the corner of the pub, and a smile appeared on her face.

"Oooh ... I get the feeling this is going to be an interesting one ... Well, you know what? I like beer. So I'm in. Try to make it entertaining," she said.

"Oh ... it will be ... it will be ...," I said.

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Chapter 1 - The naming of the cat

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It was about a year ago.

"Hi, my name is Mark, what's yours?"

"My name is ... Theresa ... but ... I don't like it ... I don't know what my parents were thinking ... It makes me feel like I was born in the 60s."

The little librarian was embarrassed by her name. I had to admit, she looked like 25 years old, and Theresa seemed a very odd choice for that age, it didn't match her look either. She was short, about 5'2", she had some Asian genes, tan skin and relatively long black hair mounted in a simple ponytail. Her glasses contributed to her librarian look, an image that made sense since she was working in a bookstore.

I usually didn't do that, but for some odd reason, when I walked past her, my heart skipped a beat. I didn't know if it was pheromones or something, but we both stopped and looked at each other, knowing very well what was happening at that moment.

"Hey, Theresa is fine. A name does not define who you are, I suppose. Look ... I don't want to be inappropriate; I know you are at work ... but ... could we ..."

Before I could finish my sentence, she interrupted me.

"Yes!"

We could only stare at each other past this point. It took a moment to resume the awkward non-conversation. I pulled out my phone from my jeans pocket, created a new contact, and punched in the letter T in the first name field before handing it over to her.

"Hum ... okay then ... here ... Enter your phone number, and I'll text you, so you get mine."

She eagerly entered her number in the contact, and before I knew it, she sent a text message to herself. Bold, but that worked too. She handed me my phone back and looked at me with a beet-red face. I didn't know what took over me at that time, but her burning face was so cute. I extended my arm and patted her head.

"Okay... then ... I'll talk to you later, Theresa."

I walked away, leaving her paralyzed behind me. I came here for a book, but I was going out with a date instead. It was not a bad deal.

Just before exiting the store, I heard a random voice far behind me, probably a nosy co-worker that rushed to Theresa to inquire about me. All I overheard was, "Who was that weirdo that touched your head?", which was enough for me to lower mine and leave this place in a hurry. Maybe I shouldn't have done that.

I drove back to my small townhouse. It had a garage at the ground level, the kitchen and living room were one floor above, and the three bedrooms were on the second floor. Still thinking about what just happened at the bookstore, I let myself fall on the couch and pulled out my phone.

"Is it too soon to text her?"

I went into the messaging app and looked at my sent texts. I clicked on T and read what she sent to herself.

"Meow!"

Meow? That was hilarious. She texted herself, "meow." I mean, that worked, it was just to get my number. But still ... Was she a crazy cat lady or something? It was a good thing not to be allergic to cats in case we started dating. It felt pointless to wait any further. I used my thumbs to send her a real message this time with a touch of humor.

"Hey kitty, it's Mark. Are you free after work? Wanna do something?"

Bzzz! It took only a few seconds before I got an answer back. "Yes!"

"Great. Like a restaurant or coffee, would that work?"

Bzzz! "Food. Your place."

Food? At my place? Geez, she was fearless. Or maybe it was me that was a coward. So I texted her back an emergency exit, just in case.

"I'm okay with that, but are you sure you are? Remember, we never spoke before."

Bzzz! "Yes."

Bzzz! "6 pm"

Bzzz! "Sleepover?"

WOAH! Wait, wait, wait ... What? Did she skip like ten steps just now? We didn't even know each other. We spent a total of one minute together in a bookstore. What should I say to that? It was an instant crush, I thought, but ... still. I was not that confident of a person. I felt intimidated, but I didn't want to close the door either. My thumbs went back to work on the cold screen.

"Dinner at 6 pm, my place. We will go from there, okay?"

Bzzz! "Yes."

Good, she didn't seem offended or anything like that. However, she was only using one or two words at a time; it was pretty hard to interpret any emotions out of that. I texted her back my address and scrambled to clean up my place. Fortunately, I already had enough ingredients to make a decent meal so I could avoid a trip to the grocery store. It was just a matter of making the place look decent. Because of her terrifying 'sleepover' bomb, I made sure to change the bedsheets and picked up the dirty socks populating the floor.

I spent a chunk of the afternoon preparing everything. Good thing it was Saturday, I would never have managed to do all that after a workday. Then around 4:45 pm, my phone buzzed again.

Bzzz! "5 pm"

What now? Was she an hour early? Instinctively, I looked outside my kitchen window. The small Theresa, carrying a backpack that made her look even smaller, was standing out there, in the driveway, eyes fixed on her phone. She didn't seem to have a car. I texted her back.

"You know I can see you, right?"

Bzzz! "No."

"Well ... I can ... Come on in. The door is unlocked, once inside, just go up the stairs."

Bzzz! "Yes."

Theresa moved to the door and got inside. I heard her taking off her shoes and climbing up the steps. She was still the cutest thing in the world. I tried to welcome her in a way that made her feel at ease.

"Welcome to my palace! Hopefully, you didn't have trouble finding the place. Here, let me take your stuff. I'll put it in the living room over there."

With a smile on her face, she handed me over her heavy backpack. I wondered what she was carrying. The real-life girl was much more eloquent than the text version of her.

"Sorry I'm early. I finished work at 4:30, but I thought I was supposed to finish at 5:30. So I decided to come here directly. I hope you don't mind."

"Not at all, I was just cleaning ... or trying to. My plans for the day were quite different. I'm glad they changed, but it was a race to preserve my honor. I didn't want you to see my usual dump. Come, sit down! Do you want something to drink? I have a white already open."

"Sure," she said, "Don't give me too much, though ... I tend to get drunk easily."

Well, she shouldn't give away that kind of information for free as it could get her in trouble with other guys. I poured her a good glass nonetheless and handed it over to her along with a patronizing but not serious comment referring to what she had just mentioned.

"There you go, let me know if you don't like it. Don't drink it too quickly, okay?"

Theresa just stared at me. She didn't say anything, and I couldn't read her mind at all. Was my joke that bad? Then she just gulped down the entire glass of wine to my instant stupefaction.

"I'm sorry, you said something?" she said.

She extended her arm, presenting her glass for more.

"Okay, okay! I see. Forget what I said and drink at your own pace."

I filled her glass again, but this time I didn't make any bad jokes. The last thing I wanted was a drunk girl on my hands before our date even started. But what now? She was still staring at me in silence. Was she going to ... yes ... She was going to do it again. She gulped down the second glass. Now, it was making me feel a bit uncomfortable.

She had been here for less than 5 minutes, and she drank two full glasses of wine already. Einstein could have calculated that. Theresa would be wasted within the next 15 minutes at that pace.

I pushed the cork back inside the bottleneck and put the bottle on the floor next to my seat, out of her reach.

"Okay, Theresa, why don't we slow down on the drinking for now? So, tell me a bit about yourself. Do you work full time at the bookstore?"

She still had a cute smile on her face, was she really here, at my house?

"Yes, I mean, I only started two months ago, I only do it to pay my rent. It is not as if I read books or something. I barely learned how to read and write."

Ah, that would explain the lack of words in her text messages.

"I see. So, you went to a bad school? I know the feeling. My school wasn't good, either."

She objected.

"No, no! My school was great. It is just that I didn't have an interest. I ... I didn't get a secondary school diploma ... I know ... It's bad. A social worker told me to try this job at the bookstore, so I did. It turns out I am pretty good at filling up shelves and following the alphabetical order. I can do that much."

Well, she was honest about it, at least. She wouldn't be the first one that didn't have an academic interest and got crushed by the expectations of our performance society.

"Hey, it's all good. You can do whatever you want with your life, and there is no shame in that. As long as you have enough to sustain yourself and are happy, those are the only things that matter."

She lowered her head and adopted a tired look.

"Well, even that ... Sustaining myself ... It's hard, you know. I wish things were simpler."

Okay, noted, work was not a good topic in this case. It was time to shift the mood a bit before it got too dark.

"Hey, talking about sustaining, let me show you what I'm going to cook for you tonight. Let me grab my cookbook."

"Sure! I'm not picky ... I'm sure it's going to be fine. I like simple things."

I put my almost full glass of wine on the coffee table and stood up.

"It is simple enough, one sec, I'll show you. We can tweak it to your liking too."

I headed to the kitchen to grab my book and got back to Theresa with it, flipping the pages and trying to find the recipe I had in mind. I sat back down in my chair, put the book on the coffee table, and turned it around to show her the picture of the delicious looking pork and apple burger. I looked up to see her reaction, but she was just staring at me again with a flushed face.

"Uh? ... What? ... What's wrong? You don't like pork?"

I noticed that she was swallowing something. That was when I realized my glass was empty. I didn't dream about this ... It was full a second ago. Did she down all my wine while I went to the kitchen? I was only away for ten seconds. That was now three good-size glasses of wine that ended up inside such a small body. There was no way she was not feeling it, and it was going to get worse in a few minutes too, the more it would enter her bloodstream. I had to ask an uncomfortable question.

"Theresa? ... Do ... Do you have a drinking problem? I mean ... If you do, that's fine; I don't mind putting all the alcohol away. But, just tell me."

"No ... I ... I don't."

"Well, you just drank more than half a bottle of wine within ten minutes, not even tasting it."

"Sorry," she added in an apologetic tone.

"There is nothing to be sorry about ... It's just ... This is a date I was looking forward to. I don't want it to end badly. That's all."

She shook her head.

"I'm fine ... I usually never drink. I thought it would give me some ... courage. Sorry."

Ah ... If it was true and Theresa was not used to drinking, that might explain why she didn't know how to drink. That was a plausible scenario in my head.

"Hey ... No worries ... You don't need courage, okay? Here is what we are going to do. We are going to put the alcohol away, and you just relax and let your body process it. Today, you only have two things to do; to be yourself and only do what you want to do. Don't put pressure on yourself like that else it won't be fun for you."

The small girl was starting to feel the effects of alcohol. I could see it in her rolling eyes. That was not ideal, but I could accompany her through this, and she would be fine in an hour or two. It was not how I wanted my date to go, but hey, a bit of compassion never hurt. She stood up on her wobbly legs.

"I ... want to be myself ... Yes ... Sorry ... Can ... Where are the washrooms? Please."

She grabbed her backpack and headed aimlessly to the powder room. I tried to guide her as best as I could.

"Yeah, that is it! You are almost there ... that's the door, yes ... If you turn the handle, it will open."

Few! She looked as if she never drank before. If she were smashed like this after only three glasses, it was because she never built a tolerance for alcohol. While she was doing whatever she was doing, I went back to the kitchen and started preparing some snacks. Food would help her to regain her senses. Some cheese and rosette de Lyon could just be what she needed. Plus, it was delicious, I thought while stuffing my face with some of it.

Time passed, 10 to 15 minutes so far, and she was still in the washrooms. What was taking so long? Plus, I was hearing all kinds of strange noises coming from there. Not natural sounds like what you'd expect from a person doing business in a washroom, but more like ... unidentifiable struggling noises. I knocked on the door.

"Hey, Theresa? Is everything alright? Do you need anything?"

No answer ... Then suddenly.

Bzzz. "No"

Did she ... just texted me? What in the world was going on here? I spoke through the door again.

"Hey, Theresa ... Why are you texting me? Are you okay?"

Bzzz. "Yes. 2 min. Okay."

Bzzz. "Zip me. meow."

Woaaah! ... What was going on inside her head? Her texts made zero sense. Zip me? She couldn't be wasted to the point where she couldn't zip up her pants anymore. What was she talking about? And the meow was back again. I knocked at the door once more.

"Okay, look, I give you five more minutes, if you are not out by then, I'll force my way in, alright?"

Bzzz. "Wait."

Wait wait ... That was all I did so far. What a strange girl. Not what I expected tonight. I brought the snacks to the living room and ate a couple more. The wrestling noises stopped at least, but now it was all quiet in the washrooms.

After the deadline expired, I headed toward the door with a tool that would allow me to unlock it from the outside.

"Okay, you come out now, Theresa or I open the door myself. I'm getting worried."

Silence ... Then the door handle started to shake. It was still locked.

"You have to unlock it first, you know."

For the next few seconds, the handle was rattling, as if unlocking it was the most complicated task in the world, but finally ... clunk! ... It fully turned, and the door slightly cracked open, barely, just to say that it was not closed anymore. Then nothing ... She didn't push it open more than that. I couldn't see the girl still hiding; only her shadow beneath the door betrayed her presence.

"Don't... don't judge me ... okay?" Theresa said with some hesitation. Or was it fear in her voice?

"Judge you for what? Come on, Theresa, I already told you, if you are drunk, it is not a big deal, we will just wait it out."

I said that exactly when she pushed the door open slowly. My jaw instantly dropped, and my eyes became as round as dishes. THAT ... was the LAST thing I expected today. It was Theresa, alright, but she was wearing a full black latex catsuit. It had attached feet, hands, and head. There was also a long rubber tail dangling from her lower back. I couldn't help but notice that there were two large cat ears on top of her head, and her hands were actual paws; she had no fingers. That was what we could call a true catsuit in every sense of the word. Oddly enough, it seemed a bit loose on her, though, around her waist, chest, and neck area.

"... Theresa? ..."

She brought her hands, or should I say paws, up to her chest. I noticed that she had pink paw pads, the same color as the inside of her big ears, to compliment the suit better. She tried to express some words, but she had difficulties letting them out of her mouth.

"I ... This is ... What ... What do you think?"

There was no way I could lie to myself about this. Even though this was super odd and unexpected, I was so turned on right now. She was so hot. But, could I say that brutally like this? Was it what she wanted to hear?

"Theresa ... You ... You look gorgeous!"

I'm not sure if she was reassured because I didn't freak out like she was probably expecting me to, but she made a step forward, one that a girl full of alcohol would do. She lost her balance a bit and tried to take another one, but walked on her other foot and started falling forward. I rushed to catch her, and she ended up face-first into my chest.