((ooc: Continued from Tear gas. Yeah. That's it.))

Cafas Johnson was a known entity at the 24th Precinct. One that wasn't tolerated past the foyer unless he was paying a parking ticket.

Today he wore an all access pass on his shoulder, in the form of a little white cat with claws sunk into his uniform. Left claws for left turns, right claws for right turns, and they'd soon reached their destination: the precinct's locker room. In specific: the laundry room tucked into the corner, and the hampers set out front. The cat nose dived into a pile still warm from the driers and, with expert precision, resurfaced as a cat boy clutching a work shirt. Nyugen was printed on the front. He didn't bother to read it before tugging it on, and scrounging for a pair of probably-too-big pants.

Anyone who didn't want Officer Whiskers borrowing their clothes knew better than to leave their laundry outside of their lockers.

Calley stood and, with practiced grace, stepped over the edge of the hamper and onto the tile floor. He spent a lot more time looking at the shirt he was tucking than at the pink-haired man in front of him.

“So. Talking.” Talking was what they were going to do now, apparently. His ears were already half-flat in anticipation.

Cafas wasn't terribly comfortable with the glares he received even in spite of the black and white fluffball on his shoulder. His poor, poor shoulder. It didn't deserve to have directions given by claws. Claws were for... No no, they weren't riding that buttery train of thought. Cafas was not on board when it left the station, instead, he was standing in a locker room.

The weight and warmth leaving his shoulder made him feel uneven in a most unpleasant way. He'd been carrying that cat for hours, he'd grown used to it. Now it was gone, into a basket of laundry that Cafas was fairly certain wasn't Calley's. Judging by the sergeant stripes on the shoulders when Calley emerged, he was correct. Why hadn't he gone for pants first? Pants would have been the right way to do that. And what was their protocol now? Was he meant to avert his gaze like he hadn't seen Calley naked more times than he could count?

That'd just make it more awkward.

Once pants were equipped in the leg slot, Calley stepped out of the hamper in his long established uniform of "other people's clothes". He was tucking his shirt in, and running his word hole, but Cafas was busy being overwhelmed to see him alive, and well, and whole. The ears told him what he was going to do was a bad idea. His heart told him it didn't care.

Why change habits now?

Cafas wrapped his arms around the now clothed cat-boy and pulled him up into a tight hug, face buried in brown hair between kitty ears. "I'm so glad you're okay. God I was scared." Cafas was not letting go. Not for at least a minute. Minimum. Even as an over excited Schulman made some kind of hastily cut of squeezing sound on her way through.

Tail foofed and ears frantically twitching against the stupid too-tall jerk whose face had no place being all up in his hair like some kind of breathing safety blanket and claws sunk into a dirty uniform front and curled so tight maybe he'd never let go and shaking with pure rage

rage is definitely what this was

hot angry rage behind his eyes stupid Cafas stupid hug stupid squeeing noises from across the room

“Schulman,” Calley spoke, “if those pictures turn up anywhere, so help me.”

His voice was a little muffled by shirt, and now his mouth tasted a little like dust and smoke and river water, but he didn't need to move to see that his partner had gone for her phone camera like a true fan girl. He didn't need to move to scowl at her, either.

He didn't need to move at all. Just for a little while.

“You really are a good actor,” Calley said, his face still pressed into the X-Man's shirt. “I could almost believe you care.”

He could hear Schulman's cringe from across the room, in the form of quiet steps backwards, and a door eased shut behind her.

Claws on his chest, and he was back to avoiding trains of thought best left forever in scrap yards. Emotional support, that was fine. Hugging was safe, even if the years of dating could till be seen in the intimacy of it.

Cafas held Calley tightly, knowing better than to fall for the same denial the cat boy was feeding himself. Angry Calley would not have put up with the contact. Cafas held his shaking ex tight to his chest and tried to radiate reassurance to take the pain away.

Apparently it wasn't working.

>>“You really are a good actor, I could almost believe you care.”

Cafas tensed, a cringe running across his face. He let his breath go in a sigh, deflating perceptibly, but not letting go. Schulman retreated, because she was wiser than Cafas had ever been. She knew exactly how much he'd hurt Calley. Cafas just knew Calley needed the hug desperately.

"Yeah. I uh... I earned that." Tears dripped from eyes still clamped shut into brown locks that still smelled like home. The rest of the pain was forced back down to buy some time to talk. There would be time to cry later. There had been time to cry for months. An opportunity to actually talk... He didn't know how many he'd get, especially given how close he'd come to never getting any at all.

"We could probably both do with talking about... About everything, I guess. Mybe with some coffee. You've gotta be tired, and you'll need your energy up to yell at me properly." Cafas gave a single chuckle, squeezed Calley, and let go, trying to step back out of the claws. "So... What do you say? Coffee for you, just desserts for me?" He was aware he looked kind of pathetic, a very sorry and pleading expression creasing his face.

Not sorry enough to avoid that pun.

June 17th, 2015

He really wasn't sure what to make of his new partner. On the one hand, she was as strict and glowering as a senior officer was supposed to be. On the other, whenever he broke out the cat ears, he could see the thinly veiled fan girl hiding behind those eyes. He had it on good report that those hastily removed paper bits left taped to the inside of her locker were magazine cut outs. He'd seen what kind of magazines Schulman read.

They were the kind that loved candid shoots of pink-haired movie stars getting ice cream with cat boys in uniforms.

“Com'on, Shuls. Please? Pretty please? Five minutes. Ten, tops.”

“Do not call me 'Shuls,' Whiskers.”

“It's not even far from our patrol route. Just one teeny-tiny detour. Just picture him, sitting all alone. The last message he received a disheartening text about overtime and I can't make it. Despondent at a bar, surrounded by women—-and men—-ready to take advantage of his vulnerable position-—” He could see her visualizing as she griped the steering wheel, and it was disturbing. If this had been an anime, she'd have a nosebleed. “I'll get you an autograph.”

“You owe me more than your boyfriend's autograph, Swartz.” And yet, she put the car in gear.

“First off: not my boyfriend. Second: should I get him to kiss a picture for you? I'm sure some fine young woman would be willing to lend her lipstick—”

Schulman made a point of short-braking at every stop light. He grinned through the whiplash. If she was this easy to tease, they were going to get along famously.

Guess whose partner is a die-hard fan? Calley texted, making zero attempts to hide his screen. Headed your way in fifteen.

They arrived at the bar. Calley double-checked the address as Schulman stared through the windshield.

“Everyone's laughing,” she diagnosed. “And nothing on dispatch. So… yeah. Any reply from Cafas?” She used his significant-not-other's first name a lot more comfortably than she'd ever used his.

Calley stared at the walls of… bubbles? Foam? Bubbly foam? Flowing out into the street, and checked his phone again. Nothing.

Here. Did you get attacked by a soapmancer?

They drove, very slowly, past the giggling revelers outside. Calley eyed his still-silent phone. While he may or may not have taken a cat-appropriate stance to text messages, Cafas was usually good at replying quickly. “We should… get out and investigate?”

The management was cool with the bubbles. Apparently they'd been instigated by a young woman with a breezy dance style and her celebrity arm decoration. Heh.

Glad you hooked up with Ghosty, say hi to her for me. See you tonight.

He-—and an autographless Schulman—-wished the manager the best of luck, advised him that city hall probably had some kind of permit he should look up if he wanted to make this a regular thing, and got back in the car. Three hours of patrol left. Cafas would probably be asleep by then. They really didn't get much of a chance to talk anymore, but there were few things finer than dive-bombing a bed that an X-trained Aussie was trying to sleep in.

Alone on the street, twenty feet back, a cell phone vibrated against the concrete.

3 missed messages

---

“I'm really not sure what there is to say.” The cat boy said, making a point of looking anywhere but at the man who'd just made his ears soggy. “But if you want to try the NYPD's finest coffee, be my guest.”

He stalked towards the break room, leaving a far-too-inconspicuous Schulman trying to hide behind the opened locker room door.

Cafas sighed as he followed the lying cat. He had plenty to say. Calley was never lost for words when it came to Cafas. At the very least he'd have some snarky fall back insult to make. With the whole cheating thing, Cafas was pretty sure a well rehearsed rant was bouncing around inside the cat-boy's head. "Later Schulman." Cafas waved over his shoulder without looking at the officer behind the door.

"You're not sure what there is to say in the same way you're not sure why my windowsills still have black and white fur on them. I will have some of the coffee that I must be single handedly paying for." Cafas waved to a passing officer to break the tension of the glare. If anything it just made him glare more. Cafas didn't even break stride, it was the 24th precinct, he expected glares.

Actually several precincts...

They entered the break room after several turns that Cafas would have no hope of recalling. He'd been focusing too much on Calley to remember the path. Faces turned to see who had just walked in, before chairs scraped on the floor in near unison and everyone made for the doors. None of them had seen Cafas and Calley together off duty since the incident. They all simultaneously decided they didn't want to. Too much risk of being collateral damage to a tiger.

"Come on, just... Please. Please Calley." Part of the group that had just vacated saw the exasperation and regret on Cafas' face through the security feed. Schulman brought them fresh popcorn and looked both scared and hopeful. "I know you're hurt. I know you have abandonment issues and I know that was pretty much the worst thing I could have done to you outside of the whole relationship being one big practical joke. I want to talk to you about it, so at the very least you can have some closure, and an explanation."

Why do you open that word hole?

They were not going to talk about cat hair on window sills, just like they were not going to talk about said window sills still being left a crack open as if cats were still welcome. Welcome, when day by day and week by week the room had changed, and a new pillow had moved in next to Cafas', and the dresser he'd emptied out one day while Cafas was out had home knit cat-print socks peeking out of a half-closed drawer.

There were not going there. At all. There wasn't anything left to visit.

Calley ignored his fleeing fellow officers. He sat in a plastic chair that made a disconcerting shiiiiik as his weight pushed it across the tiles. He didn't bother with the pretense of coffee, though he gestured magnanimously to their row of vintage 80's one-pot brewers and the gleaming steel new machine that only Davidson knew how to work.

“Help yourself. It's what you do.”

He'd said that out loud, hadn't he?

Yep.

Calley crossed his arms, and perked up his ears too attentively, and let his tail dust bagel crumbs and dust in an arc behind him.

“Let me stop you right there,” the cat cop said. “I don't have abandonment issues. Abandonment issues are when the shrink helps you realize that everyone around you is actually full of loving support. What I have is people who abandon me. So. Explain away.”

He'd have made popcorn for this, but someone had taken the last bag.

Cafas rolled his eyes as he made an attempt to decipher the fancy looking coffee machine. An almost imperceptible shake of his head as he gave up and moved on to one of the more user friendly models. A pair of mugs were procured from the bench, and checked for cleanliness. Aside from the fact they had clearly been left out for a week, it was fine.

“Let me stop you right there, I don't have abandonment issues. Abandonment issues are when the shrink helps you realize that everyone around you is actually full of loving support. What I have is people who abandon me. So. Explain away.”

Why on earth was there no alcohol in the break room? His coffee, freshly poured and already lukewarm, could seriously use some ethanol. Less dust, too. He probably should have rinsed the mugs. Oh well. Cafas sipped his coffee and sat down opposite Calley. "Abandonment issues." He sipped again and set down both coffees. "Fine, explanation." The still full mug found itself pushed in front of Calley. Cafas took in, and released, a deep breath.

"I f****d up. I was lonely, I was drinking, and Maya... She made me smile for the first time that year, and it was June." Cafas could feel the tears in the corners of his eyes. Those weren't going to help the situation. He kind of wished he had the tear duct control to suck them back in. "It's not like we were really in a healthy relationship anyway. I can't even remember the last time we'd seen each other. It would have been months between anything passing for a conversation. Which doesn't make it okay that I kissed her. I know it now, and I knew it then."

The X-man wrapped his hands around his mug on the table, thumbs fidgeting at each other. The fallout was going to be messy, he already knew that. He should probably finish, because he wasn't sure he'd be able to once Calley got going. "We were awful together even before then too, Calley. We tried, I know we did. I loved you too much not to, and while you're going to deny it, you loved me too. It just didn't work. We should have called it off before then. I don't regret a minute of my time with you Calley, and god knows I haven't stopped loving you, but what we had was borderline abusive at best. So... Yeah."

The silence he left was very expectant.

Cafas set a coffee mug in front of him. I <3 NY. He couldn't tell if it was ironic; the gesture, or the mug.

He wrapped his hands around it while his ex-… this ex-something talked. The line about kissing Ghost, like a kiss was all this was about, like they couldn't have laughed off a kiss together, all three of them, sitting around some table at a coffee shop with the latest tabloid in hand—the kiss earned a hiccup. A hiccup was definitely all it was. Calley kept his eyes on the steam rising up in—well, in ghostly little puffs. What was this, English 101 with a hackneyed adjunct poet-prof? She rose through the air, between them even here.

“Cafas. Stop psycho-analyzing this. You stayed with her because you like her better. She is better. I get it: I like her better than me, too. That was the best I had to give. Probably the best I'll ever be. If it wasn't enough, it wasn't enough.”

Good talk. They should stop it. Right here.

“I'm curious. Cat, you know?” He flicked the ears. Like Cafas could forget. “How long did it take for like to be love? I mean, it couldn't have been a first sight thing. We're all a bit past that point with each other. What was it—a week? A month? How long until you loved her more than me?”

Calley's side of this didn't matter. It didn't change anything. Yeah, things had been rough in their relationship--but they'd been getting better. He'd been getting better. It was just a little at a time, but Cafas had been patient with him. And sure, they hadn't been seeing each other much, but that was Cafas' weeks off filming movies as much as it was Calley's long hours. It wasn't like Cafas was some stay-at-home cop wife: when he was in town, he was an X-Man. His hours were as crazy as Calley's.

He didn't know when he'd used the last of that patience up.

I <3 NY steamed quietly between white knuckles.

No no, that was not how all of this was meant to go with Calley. It was Calley. Where was the yelling, and the snark, and the hurtful comments? Those were normally everywhere with him. Instead they were just sitting at a table, speaking like sad adults, over dusty coffee. Cafas didn't know what to make of any of it. Had he... Had he hurt Calley that badly? So badly he couldn't just pretend to laugh it off while harbouring it forever? Enough to get past the cat, to the human inside? It was all kind of depressing, really.

The ear wiggle was cute though. He'd missed those silly ears.

"You were enough." He breathed the words more than said them, tears finally welling over onto his cheeks. He sniffled once and wiped them away, streaking ash and dust across his face. "I don't know that we did our best though. We did our best, while still living our own lives, that's true. Really though? I should have quit the X-men, and the forge. I should have been with you when I was in town, not running around playing catch up on every stupid responsibility I'd given myself." Cafas lifted his coffee to his mouth and finished it, because it was going cold, not at all to drown the tears.

"Until I loved her? Maybe a couple of months. More than you... I'll keep you updated." He was working on keeping those silly brown eyed emotions all down inside. He couldn't say who he loved more. He felt like he loved them equally.

Which is more painful than it has any right to be.

"There's really no helping me, is there? I mean, how do you even reconcile loving two people?" Cafas laughed, but his heart wasn't in it. His heart was somewhere, being torn in half by Calley and Maya's hearts.

>> "Until I loved her? Maybe a couple of months. More than you... I'll keep you updated."

He'd been traded in for a shiny new Ghost-Cadillac. The old Honda still ran fine and the seats were comfy, but the new car had better suspension and a friendlier dealership.

Seriously. Did Cafas even listen to the things he said? Calley's claws flexed around the sides of his mug, just a little, just enough to feel the start of that dull ache behind each nail that told him he'd break before the other guy if he pushed the point.

He let his hands relax. And he didn't even snort at the idea that Cafas could currently—right this moment—love him more than the women he'd left him for.

That was just--

That was what Cafas had said. No prompting; his own words.

>> "There's really no helping me, is there? I mean, how do you even reconcile loving two people?"

“First you accept that you hurt one of them, and stop acting like this conversation was about closure for them instead of you. Then you stop caring, and you move on. Sorry, did I get those steps backwards?”

He finally took a sip of coffee. It was cold and gross and he didn't want to think about it anymore, so he put it down.

Cafas laughed, which was not the correct reaction. It was a reaction even his own brain was having some trouble understanding. It kicked into overdrive just trying to work out why on earth laughter was coming out of his voice hole. Meanwhile, there was a conversation that was meant to be happening. That was fine, his brain was rarely involved in those.

"Yeah well!," He started, strong and argumentative. Then he stopped laughing, and his voice lost all power. Side effects of realising he was actually just in the wrong and there was nothing else to it. "...Yeah. Sorry. It was meant to kind of be about both, but I have no idea how to do that for you." What else was new? Cafas and emotionally incompetence went together like Calley and... Emotional incompetence. Cafas looked up from the scratch in the table that had been occupying his attention for some time, trying to find those silly baby blues that were always begging for a slap around the face and a long hug.

Sometimes a bit more...

"Calley, I'm sorry. I betrayed you. I won't hold it against you if you hate me. I don't expect forgiveness. I just..." Who'd invited those stupid tears back. Didn't they have homes to go to? "I wanted you to know that it wasn't your fault. That I still love you. And that if you need anything, you can always come to me. I'm a screw up, and I did give up on our relationship, and I did get the order on break up, and make out with other person backwards, but I'm still me. But I think you know that already. And I don't think you hate me. That cat wasn't on my shoulder all day for the luxuriously smooth ride."

Why was there not more coffee? Coffee to distract him from the fact that his brain was catching up with the words that had come out of his mouth. It was not pleased with them.

“I don't do closure. And honestly, I'd appreciate it if you'd stop rubbing your closure all over me. Are we just about done here? I'd like to catch a nap before the next bridge explodes.”

Closure was letting go. Letting go was forgetting. Forgetting was getting hurt the next time, whenhe should have seen it coming.

Cafas' laughter twisted that knife just a littler further home. Calley's nails skidded against hard ceramic.

>> “That cat wasn't on my shoulder all day for the luxuriously smooth ride."

The cop flushed. That—that wasn't even fair. Major terrorist attacks didn't count. Life threatening situations where one or both of them could have seriously, finally, permanently, Doc-Prof-can't-scrape-enough-of-you-together-for-the-funeral died did not count.

In the sudden silence, the door creaked open. A certain officer slowly, cringingly dropped an empty popcorn bag into the trash can just inside before quietly easing herself back out. The latch clicked.

“There is one thing you can do for me,” Calley said. “I want your permission to talk to Ghost again. I've been avoiding her since the start of this, which isn't fair to her. I miss my friend.”

Both of his friends, if the X-Men must know. But it was Cafas' talent to love two people, not his. Calley's special snowflake of an ability was to hate someone as much as he loved them.

Cafas shrugged at Calley, puzzlement mixing with exasperation on his face. "You don't need my permission to speak to Maya, Cale." The X-man stood, mug in hand, and walked over to deposit it in the sink. "You only need hers." Which she would give, because it was Maya. She spoke to Isabel, she'd speak to Calley. Hell, he couldn't think what it would take to make her stop speaking to him.

"Take care Calley. This world would be a worse place if it lost you." Cafas made for the door. He was pretty sure Calley would be having none of any hugs offered. Actually they'd probably make it worse. He paused, half way out. Schulman tried hard to look busy, like she hadn't just had her ear to the door. "Snarky response or not, my offer stands. Any time, my window's open." He kept walking, and closed the door. Schulman waved awkwardly.

"You keep him safe Schulman. He may hate me, but I still love him." There, that would probably do more good that telling Calley to take care of himself ever would.

A quick trip past the phones to call Maya, and Cafas was off to Jaager Worldwide. He suspected there would be some form of celebration, but that wasn't why he was going. He had to beat the hell out some metal.