Choose Your Own Adventure (Yaoi style!)

[Btw I was away and skipped updating a couple times, but I'm back now and should be updating weekly again- until this finishes up soon! :)]

I groaned as the bell rang again. “I better get it. They sound persistent.” Begrudgingly, I unrolled myself from Cole and walked to the door. For the thousandth time I reminded myself to get on my landlord’s ass about installing a peephole so I wouldn’t have to open the door to heaven only knew who.

“Morning!”

I swallowed. “Morning…Mom.”

Behind me, I heard a rustle as Cole no doubt sat up from where he’d been lounging.

“Oh, sweetheart,” my mother said, her thin arms wrapping around me. “I’ve been so worried!” Her long, dark hair fell over my shoulder and I patted her back.

“Uh, not that it’s not nice to see you, but why were you worried?”

Pulling back, she shook her head at me as if I was daft, and walked into the apartment, shutting the door behind her. The only time she showed such assertiveness was with her kits. It was both endearing and annoying as hell.

“Honey, didn’t you hear the reports lately? There’s something nasty snatching up furries! Nekos, werewolves; there’s been three disappearances in the last month!”

No, I hadn’t heard, but I was pretty disconnected. I didn’t own a TV and even if I had, I wouldn’t have watched the news.

“Mom, it’s a city, things happen. People leave.”

“You haven’t been here that long. You don’t know how it is!” Oh boy, here we go again! There was a reason I grew up in the tiniest and tiny towns. Namely my mother’s paranoia. I was used to it, but I really wished Cole didn’t have to witness it first hand.

“Mom, really, I’m fine. I’m alert. Nothing is going to happen to me.”

“Hah! Did you even notice the suspicious man lurking outside the building? Probably not!”

“What are you talking about?”

“The imposing, huge blond fellow hanging about out there.

“Big, blond…?” I rushed past her and flung open the door, which faced the parking lot. I looked out over the open walkway in time to see Eric’s retreating back. What. The. Hell?

By the time I stepped back inside, I’d convinced myself I had it wrong. It couldn’t have been him. Why would he be there so early? And why would he be, well, here? He couldn’t possibly know my address.

My mind spun and for a moment I forgot my mother was there, until heard her satisfied, “I told you so.”

I opened my mouth to say…something, but she cut me off. “And are you going to introduce me to your…friend.”

Oh lord. The way she said that. Now, my mom is very small-town and doesn’t like anything to ‘different’, as she puts it, but she’d dealt pretty well with my coming out. At least, after she had time to get used to it and I was able to convince her I wasn’t going to be molested by every gay man who was larger than me. Yeesh. But once she fully accepted it, she switched to matchmaker mode. She wanted me settled. And with another neko.

She was currently grinning at Cole in a way that made him squirm, and I didn’t blame him.

“Uh, Mom, this is Cole. Cole, this is my mother.” I looked my mom in the eye after they shook hands, saying with force. “Cole is a friend.”

“And a neko,” she said cheerfully, choosing to completely ignore me. “How nice. I hope I’m not interrupting?”

“No, no! Not at all,” Cole said quickly, shaking his hands. It was a little too emphatic, and my mother’s grin widened.

“Well, I just wanted to visit and see that you were alright,” she said, turning back to me. “Your sister, Selina, and I will be staying at the local inn for the weekend. Let us know when you’re free.”

‘Local inn’? I tried not to roll my eyes. She meant the Holiday Inn, but I let it pass.

“Bye Mom. Love you,” I said as she embraced me again and, blissfully, left.

A whistle came from behind me as the door shut.

“Don’t say it,” I warned Cole. His grin was way too satisfied.

“You’re mom’s a bit…intense. I thought she wasn’t around a lot?”

I snorted and flopped back down on the sofa. I shrugged. “She raised all of us by herself, so she had to be gone a lot for work and stuff. I think she’s trying to made up for it now by worrying and fretting more than most.”

He chuckled and I scowled. “Can we just go back to the snuggles?”

“I don’t know,” Cole said, smirking. “Do you have designs on me? Your mother certainly hopes so.”

I buried my face in a cushion. “Shut up!”

--> If you decide Ferd should throw a cushion in Cole’s face, go to Ch7A; if you decide her should kiss the jerk, go to 7B