Page 165 of Bride of Choice

With a grunt, he prowled the room, sniffing the air noisily.

“What the hell are you doing? Is this some kind of psycho wiener, delusions induced…” I couldn’t even think of a word for this craziness. “What the hell are you doing?”

Rek continued to sniff things, picking up items to hold them directly under his nose.

Grabbing up the cloths I used for tea towels, kitchen towels, whatever you wanted to call them, I blotted tea off of my chest, glaring at him all the while.

Rek paused to study what I was doing, before moving on.

He had that same sleep-deprived look in his eyes as before. He was definitely slimmer than he used to be, I noted.

“Are you sick?” I murmured, walking over to my bed to sit down, watching him.

“What?” Rek continued to sniff around the place like a crazy person. “What mean, sick?”

“I mean, sick. Are you sick-sick?” I elaborated.

“You sick-sick. Gives males stupid names. Gogo-ed-boobs, Rektal… Kook-deed, call bad male Bum-bum. Silly female. Not good.”

“I don’t hear Gopher bitching when I call him Gogo boots, fur for brains, Bum-bum’s name sounds like a bunch of growling sounds and he doesn’t prefer to be called anything, I’m just repeating the song sounds others make when he stomps around intimidating everyone, and what’s that shit about Kooky? What the hell else am I supposed to call him, dummy? It’s his name!”

Rek stopped snuffling at everything, giving me a long, measuring look.

“What?” My eyes narrowed as I studied him carefully.

He paused for the longest moment but then grunted and glanced away. As if whatever he’d been looking for wasn’t to be found, he finished his investigation, coming up with zilch. With a grunt, he picked up my tea mug and nabbed a towel to start mopping up the mess.

“Late. Why my Jojo go meet males in small hidey hole cubby space?” He just tossed it out there. “Thems haves mates. All thems,” he grunted out stubbornly.

Good lord… save me from crazy males.

“If you must know… I’d had a movie night planned with Gopher and Boog.” Hesitant to tell him the rest, I stood and busied myself with my bedding, getting it turned down for bed. “It sort of turned into a…” My hand lifted, making a lazy circle as I searched for a word. “A support group, of sorts.”

“Supports for what? They haves mates. No need supports from Joanie,” he growled out softly as he stomped closer.

As if he wasn’t there, I turned off all the lights but for the small candle lantern by my bed. “Sometimes… some people need someone to give them a little knock upside the head, a sort of Oi, don’t be doing that, numbskull.”

Climbing into bed, I went on as if he wasn’t there. Rek climbed right in along with, reaching over to turn off my light, like this was all perfectly fine and normal.

“Hey! What the hell do you think you’re-”

“Rek cold,” he grumbled, feeling anything but as he slid in next to me. “No hog all bed furs.” Grumbling and fussing, he cozied right up to me, curling himself around me until there wasn’t an inch of me that wasn’t pressing into him. “Why need Jojomine tell them they stupid? They stupid.”

I had to snort at his audacity. He had some nerve coming up in here acting like this, but I had to admire the balls on this fool.

“Some people wouldn’t know they were being a crazy person even if you wrote it backwards on their forehead in permanent marker to remind them every time they looked into a mirror, You’re a total nutjob!”

“Why backfurds?” he softly grumbled, sounding all comfy cozy and sleepy.

Glancing over my shoulder at him in the dark, I gave the thick arm snuggling around me a pinch. “Because the mirror flips the image.”

“No need mirror know they stupid. No need Jojomine…” A loud, jaw cracking yawn left him. It was cut short as his hands brushed the dampness on my shirt from my tea spill and he grunted in surprise. I’d almost forgotten all about it.

With a soft, chuffing, Ew, sound, he began carefully undoing the buttons on my sleep shirt.

“Excuse me,” I spluttered.

“No ‘scuse. Shirt wet. Rek help,” he muttered, deftly dodging my hands, much as I slapped at him, and soon had the entire front of my shirt undone before I could redo a single button.

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