A Double-Edged Life

"Mr. Teru?" a female voice inquired from behind the closed door, accompanied by a sharp rapping of knuckles. Meka stirred awake instantly, not having been deeply asleep to begin with, and sat up, the rusty springs of the mattress screaming beneath his weight as he reached for his shirt on the floor.

"Yeah?" He called groggily as he struggled into it. The knob turned a moment later and the door yawned open. There were no locks on them as the volunteer staff at Zeal Shelter (a classy name for what was little more than a revamped fleabox motel) tried to run a clean operation and that meant having a strict open-door policy.

"Your application recieved a response this morning." a smiling, plump middle-aged human woman with short black hair informed him as she bustled into the room uninvited and pulled up the shades. The raccoon winced as light smacked into his face and brought a hand up to shield his aquamarine eyes. "She'll be coming for her first visit with you this evening, isn't that exciting?" she continued.

"Yeah..." Meka grunted, still attempting to wake up and trying to place exactly which application she was going on about. Mrrendrenda Wallis, the woman in question, annoyed the absolute piss out of most of the men who stayed there with her inability to leave them alone, but Meka found her tolerable in small doses. In a way, it was almost comforting to have some semblance of a mother figure in a place like Zeal.

"You'll want to meet her downstairs in the cafeteria when she arrives. We'll give you two plenty of time to get to know one another and that means no going off to prowl tonight, Mr. Teru."

"I won't..." Meka muttered, rubbing his temples. Mrs. Wallis nodded once, offering him a smile before letting herself out and closing the door behind her. Once she had gone, Mekakushi fell back in a sprawl, staring at the ceiling. He'd lasted nearly three weeks in the shelter which, according to the occasional drifters, was going for some sort of record. The women at Zeal maintained forty rooms and offered boarding to whomever asked for it when they had the space to accomodate, with the exception that those staying there would abide by their rules or be ejected. Most left of their own accord, not liking the idea of being mother-henned.

Meka hadn't found the rules hard to follow. First there was the requirement that you shower daily, which had been no problem. Secondly, visitors were to be cleared with the staff before they wellowllowed in to put a damper on the drug dealing, which likewise didn't effect him as he had no one to invite. Thirdly, you were expected to send out two work applications weekly under the supervision of one of the staffers. Meka had, likewise, fulfilled this requirement and hadn't heard back from any of the employers he'd darkened the doorsteps of.

Until now, anyway...but what employer in their right mind would come to the shelter just to see him, he wondered? And then it dawned on him with a sudden jolt what she had been talking about. Last week, he'd been presented with a variety of pamphlets that had been gathered for him as a not-quite-subtle hint that it was time to move on.

Among them, there was an application for a group calling themselves UnderWing that specialized in finding homeless youths work and generally ways to make themselves useful. It was a sort of modern-day apprenticeship, he supposed, and upon submitting to a background check, supplying a recent photograph, and stopping in once for a drug test and again for a face-to-face meeting with the staff, your records were added into their database to be perused by potential "adopters".

The downside had been that the program's cut-off age was twenty-one and Meka was going on twenty-five. The upside, however, was that he hadn't cared for this rule and looked young enough to be under the bar. Even better had been when this supposedly careful and thorough organization hadn't looked twice at the age he'd put down and added him right among the same circulation as their other applicants.

He'd dismissed it from his mind after a couple of days of hearing nothing, having applied on a whim, and now they were getting back with him. Someone wanted to take him in. He supposed he should be excited, yet he found himself offput by the fact they'd said that the response to his application had been female because it left him with one of two possibilities. He was likely going to end up with a fat dictating overlord who'd sit on her couch eating bonbons and watching Days Of Our Lives as she barked orders. If not that, then he'd end up with a curvy Milf-wannabe who'd think it was cute to have a boy on-call and would drop the shoulder of her shirt and push out her breasts whenever she wanted to get a rise out of him.

Meka decided he'd play his trump card early and tell whoever this woman was that was coming to see him this evening quite bluntly that he was gay. If that fact alone didn't perturb her enough to leave, he decided he'd hold nothing back to make her. He'd stayed quiet and put on an air of passiveness for the people at Zeal, but the fact of the matter was that he was going slowly insane with little outlet.

He ate little, he slept less, and when he DID sleep, his mind was plagued by thoughts and memories of Roan. Meka turned onto his belly, burying his face in his pillow, and sighed. Most men his age were just now getting out of college and preparing to start their career and families. He was hiding in a homeless shelter, making plans to blow probably one of the only chances he'd get, and reflecting on months of nightmareish rape and humiliation.

Closing his eyes, the raccoon let it all wash over him again like a tide of poison.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

He'd been born into a normal-fare middle-to-low-cass household. His mother, Elizabeth, had been an exciteable anthro raccoon who paid rapt attention to homemaking magazines and television shows, and his father, Bakuto, was a former Japanese human businessman who had met his mother while she and some of her college friends had been vacationing in his home country. Their first child, Meka's older sister Joanne, had been unplanned but welcomed and turned out to be the incentive they'd needed to get married.

They'd man aan agreement before having any more children that Elizabeth would name the girls and Bakuto would name the boys...hense, as their only son, Meka had found it a little awkward to be included with his sisters when going anywhere. Joanne, Lina, and Mekakushi...how was one -not- supposed to feel like they were sticking out like a sore thumb? In spite of this, they'd been a relatively happy family and Meka had dearly loved them.

The downhill slope had begun when his father had suffered a heart attack and died when he was in fifth grade. It was one of those tragic things that families never quite got over, but eventually bounced back from....except for Meka's family, there'd been no bouncing back. Instead, everything had caved in on itself. His mother had become a recluse drunk and chronic overeater, Joanne had taken to rebelling heavily and noisily until finally running away one night for parts unknown, and that had left Mekakushi and his younger sister Lina.

He and his sister had been each other's port in the storm through middle and high school and focused themselves on their schoolwork, knowing full well it would be their only chance at getting out. Meka had graduated third in his class and had been offered an academic scholarship to Burrdale University which he had eagerly taken, promising Lina that once he had finished his classwork and found a steady job, he'd come back to get her and the two of them could share an apartment while she finished her schooling as well.

It was a well-intended plan that had never come to pass.

Meka had started his first semester at Burrdale the following autumn with high hopes and determination in mind. He got along well with his roommates and the courses he'd chosen to study he didn't find terribly challenging. As far as he was concerned, it was simply going to be a matter of knuckling down and getting the work in on time. He may, actually, have done very well for himself had he not chosen to eat his lunches in an off-campus cafe that another person in particular frequented as well.

Roan had waited for the right opportunity to introduce himself, waiting until he had seen Meka engrossed in a book of classic short stories for his literature class before approaching him. Meka had been attempting to analyze "The Yellow Wallpaper" which, by sheer chance, happened to be a story Roan had been familiar with and the two easily struck up a conversation.

Being a lonely college student far from home, it hadn't taken long for Meka to find himself infatuated with the anthro badger. Things that should have been warning flags to him -- the fact Roan was a good fifteen years his senior, or the fact that he was dodgy about what he did for a living -- hadn't mattered to him then. A week later, when Roan would ask officially if Meka would like to date him, he would eagerly accept. Three days following that, Roan would take his virginity as they watched a movie together while Meka's roommates were out of the dorm for the evening.

As Roan and Meka had grown closer, Meka's grades had begun to suffer. He was being kept away from his studies and sleeping through his morning classes to the point that, upon recieving his mid-semester report, he realized he was going to fail out and be unable to keep his scholarship. Roan, having been prepared for this and moreso -hoping- for it, had instantly extended the invitation to Mekakushi to come live with him.

"My apartment's more than big enough." he'd assured the young raccoon. "Find yourself a part-time job to help cover your share of the rent and food and you can stay with me as long as you like." Not wanting to go home, Meka had eagerly agreed and, by the end of the week, had moved in with Roan and put in for an academic drop from all of his classes.

The first month had been the best. The two of them had gotten along famously, had made love near-nightly, and every night slept pressed firmly front-to-back in Roan's bed. Meka had found work at a video store that was within walking distance of the apartment and, while he didn't especially enjoy retail, was making more than enough to supplement whatever income Roan was bringing in so they could live comfortably.

As the second month got underway, however, things began to change. Roan would sometimes pinch or slap him a little too hard, apologizing and saying that being rough had always been a kink of his. He'd never found a partner who could stand it, he'd said, and so he'd made himself hold back. "I just feel so comfortable around you, Kushi, I want to enjoy you freely. Will you let me?"

Again, playing straight into Roan's hand, Meka had agreed. What had started as an occasional slap that would bring a bruise or a bite that would draw blood gradually spiraled into full-blown beatings, the breaking of his right wrist twice, handfuls of fur and hair being pulled out, and three broken teeth he would later blame on falling down the stairs and had yet to have capped.

He'd endured the physical abuse in silence. Pain, he could deal with as long as his lover was happy with him. And for awhile, Roan seemed to be exactly that. He'd always apologized after being especially rough and would gently tend to any wounds he'd afflicted, talking to him softly all the while as he showered his face in kisses and assured him he loved him as he'd loved no other. Roan had also taken to offering Meka cigarettes to calm him after a turbulent session, thereby creating another vice with which to manipulate him later.

Meka had, of course, believed him. Why shouldn't he? He'd become so cowed that he would, in his mind, compare the things Roan did to him in the heat of passion to a housewife who grudgingly allowed her husband to take her anally on special occasions. Not the most pleasant of experiences for the one on the recieving end, but as long as it kept him happy...

At the point of six months, any trace of gentleness or apology was long-since forgotten following one of Roan's outbursts. They no longer made love, it was one-sided fucking that Meka was expected to lie silently still for. Any noise, even a slight gasp, was grounds to have a fist buried in his belly or his jaw. When he wasn't being fucked, Meka was prone to whatever Roan could dream up otherwise. The anthro badger enjoyed verbal assault just as much as physical and it was often that Meka found himself on the recieving end of a violent berating just before leaving for or returning home from work.

By month seven, Meka had been ordered to quit his job because Roan didn't like the idea of having him out of his sight for eight hours a day and by month eight, he wasn't allowed to leave the apartment at all. The sex had become sparse, but in the times it was had the raccoon was bound securely by his arms and legs to the bedposts. When Roan had finished, he would untie him and order him to sleep on the floor.

When the tenth month came, Meka became accustomed to not being untied at all. Roan had taken to leaving him tied to the bed more often than not while he went out for the day, releasing him for an hour in the evenings to allow him to feed and relieve himself before returning him to his bonds. Meka had, during that time, little to focus on to keep his sanity and the nicotine jonesing at bay and passed the time more often than not counting the stripes on the wallpaper or the blisters of paint on the ceiling when he wasn't sleeping.

He had found himself in the awkward position of vaguely wishing Roan would not return on the days that he went out, but knowing that he depended on him for survival. If the badger, for whatever reason, did not come back, he had no way of freeing himself and would die alone in their apartment. The thought of it -- of lying awake and screaming himself hoarse, slowly dying of starvation and thirst -- kept him eagerly anticipating Roan's arrival home each evening.

As the eleventh month drew to a close, Meka and Roan seldom came in contact with one another. Meka was left tied to the bed or ordered to sit facing the corner with his hands on his head. The raccoon was not permitted to speak, eat, sleep, move, or even use the bathroom without permission.

The fact of the matter had been that Roan had grown tired of him....he'd used Meka for all he could think to use him for and nothing was, any longer, a surprise. He knew well the sobbing cries the raccoon made when brought to tears, the way he'd grit his teeth when enduring large amounts of pain, the way his blue eyes rolled back in his head just before reaching orgasm, among many others. He knew Mekakushi well -- inside and out. And he found him utterly boring.

His solution to the matter, of course, had been to get rid of him. Freeing him would only put him in danger of Meka telling the wrong sort of people about the things that had gone on behind closed doors, as it was already apparant the boy was not a good judge of character. He'd ended up with Roan, after all. The only way to assure he would rest well at night, Roan had decided, would be when Meka was dead.

He had spent the night before the planned execution doing his best to make amends with the battered raccoon boy in an attempt to win his trust back. He had allowed Meka out of the bedroom to have a hot bath without being watched and to enjoy a meal and cigarette at the table with him. He apologized for the past few months and explained that some headache medication he'd been prescribed had been giving him horrid mood swings.

Roan had attempted, that night, to initiate sex with Meka, but it had been unsuccessful. Meka had been too weary from his neglect to give much of a reaction, the lack of which made it impossible for the badger to excite himself. Instead, they had settled for simply sleeping beside one another as they had the first month they had lived together. That night, Meka could almost have believed in God again.

In the morning, Meka was roused early and it was explained to him that he and Roan would be going away together for the weekend. "I want you to know how sorry I am for all of this. I never wanted to hurt you this way, Kushi. I want to take you away for a couple of days, just you and me, so I can prove it to you. So you'll learn to trust me again." Those words would haunt him for years afterward, seared into his brain like garrish scars.

They had gone to a motel on the edge of town and, upon checking into their room, Meka had been promptly blindfolded and ushered onto a chair as his wrists and ankles were tied together. The raccoon had stood obediently still, accustomed to this sort of treatment and knowing it was all prelude to, no doubt, a new game Roan had thought up to play with him, willing or not.

It hadn't been until the rope had slipped over his neck that the first twinges of fright had begun to settle over him, and by then it had been too late. Meka had no sooner begun to panic than the chair had been kicked out from beneath him and, for one horrible instance, he had been suspended in mid-air by his throat, choking and twitching as his eyes bulged from their sockets.

And then, with a crash and a showering of plaster, he'd fallen to the floor. The light fixture Roan had chosen to affix his noose to had not been sturdy enough to support the raccoon's weight. Terrified beyond comprehension, Meka had begun to scream, his voice raspy and his throat burning from the near-hanging. Roan, alarmed that someone had surely heard the noise, had fled.

Mekakushi had cried for help for nearly an hour before a passerby saw fit to summon the police. He had been cut free and, still in the throes of hysteria, they had attempted to question him and find out who had done such a thing. Meka had never given them Roan's name..not even after they had administered a mild sedative to calm him down.

The year's worth of devotion had done its job and, even after all that had happened, the raccoon's first impulse had been to protect Roan and keep their secrets. The second, more personal, impulse was to not tell them what he'd been through out of fear of what they'd think of him. He'd, essentially, been nothing but a sperm receptacle for the past year...and he couldn't bring himself to tell them or -anyone- about that.

Eventually, with nothing to go on, the police had let him go and sent him home to his family. He'd spent the next three years as a stranger in their house, coming and going as he saw fit and speaking to his mother and Lina as little as he could. His mother had given up easily enough on him, but Lina had persisted, wanting to know what had happened to her big brother since he'd gone away.

As a result of his sister's prying, he'd started trying to find excuses to stay away from home and likewise get on with his life. His distractions ranged anywhere from attending free self-help seminars to attempting to get picked up in various dives within reasonable walking distance of the house.

He'd given up on the latter after several unsuccessful attempts. It wasn't that he hadn't been able to turn heads...in fact, he caught attention just fine. It was just that when it had finally come down to Meka and someone else alone in the back seat of a car or in one of the back rooms, he found himself prone to panicking. It had struck, without fail, at the point of penetration no matter whether he was the giver or the reciever...a wave of shivering cold nausea, followed by his chest tightening and a bout of uncontrollable crying.

He'd left each of his would-be partners confused, upset, and sometimes even enraged at the denial. As for himself, he was more than enraged. He was absolutely livid that, because of Roan, a part of him had been destroyed and he was now being cheated out of any attempts at intimacy. The seminars had preached that moving on from trauma took time and was difficult, but for Mekakushi it seemed impossible.

Once easygoing and gentle, he had become hostile and irritable, wanting nothing to do with anyone. Everything had come to a head nearly a month ago when he had returned home from an evening of wandering to find Lina sitting on the edge of his bed and rifling through his dresser, attempting to find something, anything, to tell her what had happened to Meka in the time he'd been missing.

He remembered meeting her eyes, he remembered her shrinking away, and the next thing new,new, he had been straddling her on the edge of the mattress as she sobbed, clutching a bloodied nose as his fist descended on her again and again. Behind him, their mother screamed and cursed incoherantly as she attempted to haul him off of Lina.

When, at last, he'd been tumbled to the floor, his mother had informed him, glaring at him through her glassy red-rimmed eyes, that she wanted him out of her house. It had not been a matter of "get a job, find an apartment, and leave", it had been an instantaneous ousting and had resulted in his week-long stint of homelessness that had brought him to Zeal in the first place.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Meka opened his eyes again as the string of memory completed itself, leaving him as it usually did -- feeling sick and angry. He felt terrible about how he'd treated his sister, and he'd promised himself endlessly that if he'd had those few moments to do over again, he'd never have hit her. But...that and five bucks would buy him a bus ticket to the next town over, he thought sourly. He couldn't change what he'd done, so there was no point dwelling on it.

He stared fixatedly at the ceiling, his mind shifting gears with an almost audible click as he thought of Roan next, wondering what that son of a bitch had been doing with himself. Probably had a new toy by now...maybe had already had several of them. And he bet the bastard had fed them the same lines -he- had so eagerly lapped up.

"Kushi..." he said aloud to no one, narrowing his eyes in utter hatred. He hadn't cared for the pet name since Roan had adopted it for him. He'd always been Meka to his friends, but had only ever been Kushi to Roan. Hearing it, even off of his own tongue, made anger throb in his temples and his fists clench.

"Mr. Teru?" Mrs. Wallis's voice called through his door as a sharp knock accompanied it. "She called to say she'll be by in half an hour, I hope you're decent."

Meka's eyes instantly shot to the bedside table where the alarm clock boasted 4:31 PM on its digits. Now how in the hell had that happened? He must have fallen asleep while he'd been thinking, he reasoned as he sat up and dragged a hand through his charcoal-colored hair. He debated a shower for a moment and then pushed it out of hand...his aim wasn't precisely to impress whoever this was he was supposed to be meeting with, after all.

"Mr. Teru?" the voice held a stern edge to it now as the knock repeated. "Are you awake?"

"I'm awake." Meka yawned around the words as he stretched and swung his legs over the side of the bed. "I'll be down in a minute." There was a pause and then the sound of retreating footsteps. He spared a quick look at himself in the small mirror that hung on the wall, acknowledging his hair standing out in random corkscrews caused by his sleeping with passive disinterest. He supposed the clothes he wore smelt faintly musky by now as well as he arched his back to pop it and then sauntered toward the door to let himself into the hallway.

If nothing else, it was going to be an interesting first meeting.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"So..." the silence of nearly thirty seconds was broken as Meka glared muleishly across the table at his visitor. He'd not liked the yellow anthro tree frog that had introduced herself as Karma as soon as he'd seen her and the fact that neither his appearance, nor his sour countenance had put her off annoyed him.

"What?" he sniffed, leaning back in his chair to glower at her from where he sat with her at one of the rickety fold-out tables in the conference room-turned-cafeteria. She reached up to tuck her mane of brown hair back behind her shoulders as she eyed him levelly.

"You afraid of cats?" she inquired, cocking her head slightly as her orange-hued eyes regarded him with interest. Meka blinked, offput by the query.

"No."

"What about snakes?"

"No..." he narrowed his eyes a little, getting annoyed with the out-of-left-field questioning as he fumbled into his pocket to fish out a crushed pack of cigarettes, in which only two remained, and a book of matches.

"Fish?"

"What the hell does this have to do with anything?" he snapped as he placed one of the cigs in his mouth and struck up a match to light it. The frog blinked twice, and then grinned. It wasn't a malicious grin, so much as one of amusement.

"I have a lot of animals to take care of. That's the reason I enrolled as a caregiver in Underwing, because I could use the extra help around the house now that I'm getting ready to move and I need to start relocating them all." she explained with a shrug.

"I don't like pets." Meka replied after taking a drag, his tail lashing behind him out the back of the chair.

"Mm...well, they're a little hard to love at first, but afterward they're pretty likeable. Anyway, so....I guess we could tell each other a little about ourselves...?" she tried.

"What is this? A goddamned tea party?" The raccoon snorted, shifting his position in the chair. "I don't have to tell you shit, lady."

"No, you don't." Karma shrugged. "I was just suggesting, that's all. And, really...'lady'? I'm only twenty-three." Twenty-fucking-three. She was younger than he was and here she was wanting to adopt him, Meka scoffed. He would be better off on the streets. The frog drew a sigh that only held a twinge of exasperation. "You must have been through a lot to end up here."

"That's my business." he answered defensively.

"Never said it wasn't. I don't want you to get the wrong idea, Meeka, I'm not going to twist your arm to get you to come with me if you really don't want to, I just--"

"Meka." the raccoon snapped, exhaling a vent of gray smoke through his nostrils. "Meh-kuh. You wanna take me in so bad, you could have at least learned my goddamned name."

"Actually, the ladies I talked to called you Meeka too." she grinned again, unperturbed. "So at least I'm not the only one. I could always just call you Coonjab if you really want."

"Not if you like your face's geography as it is..." At this, Karma burst out into good-natured laughter that was infuriating.

"Oh god, I think I like you already." she snickered. Meka felt his stomach clench, deciding this would be the perfect opportunity to pull out the big guns.

"That's too bad. I'm gay." he said smugly, gratified as the frog's eyes flew wide.

"Wait, what...?" she asked in disbelief.

"I said I'm queer. I suck cocks." he pressed as he flicked the ash off the end of the cigarette onto the floor, pleased that he'd gotten her off-balance and now trying to keep her there. "You have a problem with that?"

"Actually, no. Not unless you think you're going to redecorate my bathroom or anything. I just---" she cleared her throat. "---sorry for saying so, but you don't look it."

"Really." the raccoon said tersely. "And what exactly should I look like? Would it help the illusion any if I put on something slinky and walked across the room for you?"

"Would you??" the frog asked eagerly, making his brain fishtail momentarily for a retort. At length, he simply fell into agitated silence, his eyes narrowed to slits and his arms crossed over his chest. "Well, anyway, getting on with what I came here about, I'm still going to extend the offer to you, if you want it. My place isn't the Ritz, but its a hell of a lot nicer than a shelter and I'm going to be moving into a nicer one with a friend of mine soon. I wouldn't need you to do much...help me feed the animals about mid-day and then help me get them rounded up for bed in the evenings. They have their own enclosures to keep them from fighting so you can see how it gets a little hectic trying to catch them all and--"

"No." Meka said firmly. "I don't want to. I've had a hard enough time and I'll be damned if someone younger than I am shoves me around and tells me what to do."

"I see..." Karma nodded, folding her hands and resting her chin upon them. "Well then, I guess I really have nothing else to talk to you about."

"Guess not." Meka grunted as he snuffed the cigarette on the end of the table, moving to get up.

"Except..." the frog cut in sharply. "...the fact you just said you were older than me." She leaned in slightly and lowered her voice to a loud whisper. "I don't claim to be the best at reading over paperwork, but they make it pretty clear the cut off age is twenty-one."

"Fuck you, you can't pin anything on me." the raccoon growled, his ears flattening as his heartrate quickened. He'd been caught, he thought to himself angrily, and worst of all he had no one but himself to blame for it. Karma's brows shot up in an innocent expression.

"Pin anything on you? What, you mean go running to the staff whining about how you tried to cheat the system unless you give me my way? No thanks, I'm not in high school anymore. But c'mon...level with me. You wouldn't have tried to weasel into the Underwing program unless you wanted out of here."

"I didn't weasel into anything." he said defensively, sitting down again. "They brought me the application, I just filled it out."

"You make a habit of filling out angningning things that you haven't read?" the frog inquired. "That's really not very healthy of you. You can't bullshit a bullshitter, Meka. You and I both know you saw the cut-off age and that you filled it out anyway in hopes someone would come bail you out of here." She motioned at herself and smirked. "Looks like I'm that someone."

"My ass you are..." he grumbled under his breath.

"And anyway," she continued, ignoring his remark. "You're a big boy, obviously, and if it turns out that throwing kibble and a few mice at some animals for a couple of weeks is too much for you, nobody's forcing you to stay. I'll give you a little severance pay and you can hitch a bus back here or whatever you're planning on doing."

"Or we could just cut to that part right now." he suggested acidly. Karma sighed, slapping the tabletop in exasperation as she stood.

"All right, fine." she nodded. "I'm not going to sit and argue with you about it all day. If you change your mind, though..." she added, reaching into her jacket pocket and producing a slightly-rumpled piece of paper with her phone number written on it, apparently having been planning on giving it to him anyway. Meka regarded the piece of paper as though he was being asked to eat a dead fly and when he didn't take it after a moment more, she let it flutter to the tabletop in front of him.

"I've got things that need doing." she informed him. "I'm sure you have the same so...give me a call if you've decided to reconsider. I'll be home all evening." The frog extended a hand, offering a final smile. "Nice meeting you, Meka."

Meka didn't take the offered hand and eyed her with suspicion and silence as she withdrew after a moment and shook her head faintly, sauntering out of the room. He waited a moment until he was sure that she had actually gone before getting out of his chair and heaving a sigh, his eyes falling to the scrap of paper on the tabletop. After a moment, he reached out and took it, eyeing the phone number written in pen across it.

"Fuck it." he muttered, reaching into his pocket for the book of matches again, tearing one off and striking it. It popped alight and he held the tongue of orange flame beneath the piece of paper for a moment, debating with himself. At length, he sighed and shook the match out, choosing to pocket Karma's phone number instead. Even though he'd clearly established the fact that he didn't care for her in the least, he'd learned as much as to not burn bridges he may need later.

"So! How did it go?" Mekakushi whirled on his heels to face Mrs. Wallis as she stood in the doorway of the commons area, eyeing him expectantly.

"We didn't....she wasn't interested in me." he muttered grudgingly.

"Wasn't she, now? According to -her-, you sat here pouting and swearing her entire visit." Meka inwardly flinched at the accusatory tone in her voice and stuffed his hands in the pockets of his jeans.

"I didn't like her, all right? I can't live with someone like that." the raccoon muttered, laying his ears back.

"Oh yes, and you're a just an absolute joy to live with, aren't you, Mr. Teru?" she huffed. "You never leave your room, the only time you come downstairs is to change out your bedsheets or to go out, and otherwise we never see you unless we come looking for you. The other people who stay here may be a little less to look at, but at -least- they tell us hello now and then."

"Sorry." he muttered, not feeling such in the least.

"We're NOT a flophouse, contrary to what you may think."

"I know."

"In that case, I suppose it won't come as a surprise to you when I ask that you find someplace else to stay by the end of the week. We'd like to keep our rooms open to those who -do- want help instead of turning it away." Meka jolted visibly as though she'd slapped him and blinked, his bewildered expression quickly reverting to its etched sourness.

"Fine." the raccoon replied flatly. When it rained, Meka thought angrily to himself, it poured, apparently. As Mrs. Wallis went on her way, his fingers found and ran over the piece of paper in his pocket. Maybe, he thought sickly, it WAS time to look into treading on new bridges.