MADDY

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Disclaimer: Read all tags carefully and thoroughly. Several of my fics deal with heavy topics such as graphic depictions of violence and major character death. Individual fics are tagged and rated accordingly.

BTS

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The Fall Guy (2024)

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Ola was a tornado of motion as she entered her condo. She leaned her weight into the door as it swung open, her work bag knocking against her side noisily. It was just past six o’clock on a Thursday evening, she was starving, her feet ached, and her cheeks were sore from another ten hour shift spent fake smiling at customers looking to buy overpriced furniture and appliances. She huffed and kicked off her narrow kitten heels, hung her bag up by the door, and turned to face the interior of the entryway. 

Two yellow eyes peered at her from the darkness. A curious little yowl cut through the air. She flipped on the light switch. 

“Hi, Mimi!” Ola cooed, immediately planting her bottom on the ground and making grabby hands at the tortoiseshell cat now illuminated by the light. 

Mimi deftly leapt off the arm of the couch and made a beeline for her, pushing his head into her hands. She made baby talk as she pet him, scritching behind his ears and down the length of his sides. His purs vibrated through her fingers and he closed his eyes in bliss when she scratched under his chin and around his collar. The collar was a new addition, a present after five months of him living with her. She’d put it in a nice box with a stick-on ribbon and everything, not that he understood the sentiment. He was still just a cat, but he had quickly become something she looked forward to coming home to every night. The collar was a firetruck red with a gold charm dangling from the center. The name MIMI was engraved in blocky letters.

When he flipped onto his back for belly rubs, she carefully stretched out his left hind leg to examine it. The soft fur along the side of his leg was almost fully grown in, slightly obscuring the scar there. “This looks good,” she announced, and she dropped his leg. Mimi made a chuffing sound in response and curled around the leg in question to examine it for himself. 

She’d found him after work one night in the condo complex’s parking lot, crying and limping around the dumpsters with a trail of blood behind him. He was way bigger than the average housecat, standing at nearly her knee when he was on all fours with paws almost the size of her palm. But when she’d rushed him to the twenty-four hour pet hospital, way more teary-eyed than she had any right to be over a stray cat, the vet tech hadn’t been able to identify his breed. He wasn’t chipped either, she came to find out. She’d sat in the waiting room while they stitched up the wound, and when he’d come up from the anesthesia she had been right there waiting, rubbing the pad of her forefinger up his nosebridge to soothe him. 

Of course, with an injury to recover from and no chip to identify an owner, there had been only two options for him: send him to the shelter or take him home. The choice really wasn’t a choice at all, in her opinion. Now, five months down the line, they were here — just a girl and her pet cat. It was the simple things in life. 

“You want some dinner, baby?” she asked, standing to make her way into the kitchen. Mimi followed close on her heels, movements totally silent if not for the jingling of his collar. 

She smiled down at him as she prepared his food at the counter; a homemade blend of ground turkey and sweet potato that she made in bulk weekly and stored in the fridge. For a stray, he was the pickiest of eaters. He downright refused to eat any of the dry packaged stuff from the grocery store. It was only after she’d put down his bowl on his feeding mat that she started to prepare her own dinner. As a single woman cooking for one most nights, her meals were lackluster. She opened her fridge and stared dead-eyed at the shelves. It looked like tonight would be leftover Chinese takeout from yesterday. 

She popped the container into the microwave then went to switch on the TV in the adjoining living room while it heated up. “What do you feel like watching, hm?” she called. Expectedly, Mimi did not respond. She settled on a channel playing Hollywood classics in black and white just as the microwave beeped. 

Mimi was sitting patiently by his food bowl when she reentered the kitchen. He tracked her with his eyes as she blew on the steaming beef and broccoli, then fished a fork from the drawer next to the stove. Only after she’d taken her first bite did Mimi begin to eat. He was a gentleman that way. The thought made her giggle. She sat on the couch to eat, tucking her legs up on the cushion beside her. On the TV screen a woman in dramatic lighting recounted to a detective the last time she’d seen her missing husband. 

The film had already started by the time she switched it on, but that didn’t matter to her. Part of the fun was trying to piece together the details of what she missed. She often made up character names and entire relationships from out of context conversations and old-timey action sequences. From the kitchen came the sound of clinking metal as Mimi licked his food bowl clean, and moments later he leapt onto the couch next to her. With a huff of breath he curled up in the triangle of space between the back of the couch and the bend of her knees. 

“Just in time,” she told him. The woman on screen was graciously accepting the detective’s handkerchief. “I think this white lady killed her husband and is hamming it up for the detective. That’s always how it goes in these things.” 

Ola never did find out who the killer was, because she nodded off just minutes after finishing her food. She only woke when Mimi stretched and pushed his paws into the meat of her thigh. “Huh?” she mumbled sleepily, slow blinking at the end credits playing on screen. “Damn. Was I right, did the wife do it?” Mimi only blinked at her, entirely unhelpful. She shrugged, getting up to stretch with a groan and series of popping joints. 

Showering up didn’t take long. Mimi was already laid out on a pillow on the left side of the bed, waiting for her when she stepped into the bedroom. She tucked her hair into a wrap and then sunk into the mattress with an unflattering moan. Luckily, her single audience member didn’t judge. She checked that her alarm clock was set to wake her at seven the next morning, then switched off the bedside lamp and lied back. 

“G’night, Mimi. Love you,” she said into the darkness, words slurring as sleep took her under its wing. 

Ola awoke with a snort of breath. There was no sunlight peaking through the gaps in the curtains, only a soft orange glow from streetlamps. Her skin was warm from being snuggled up in her  blankets, but she didn’t feel refreshed from a full night of sleep. She squinted at the red numbers on the clock at her bedside — 3:27. 

“Whathefuuhh…” she mumbled, frowning at the time. She swiped a hand along the bed next to her. It was cold, Mimi long gone. 

There was a loud thump from outside the bedroom, then a pregnant pause. Afterwards some shuffling, this time much quieter. Ola’s heart kicked in her chest. There was someone in her home. She sat up, eyes adjusting to the darkness as she searched for a mass of black and tan fur skulking along the walls. But Mimi was nowhere in sight. Her bedroom door was slightly ajar; she could’ve sworn she’d shut it before going to sleep. The sounds outside her room could totally be her cat getting into things he shouldn’t be, but something felt distinctly off about the whole thing. 

A smart person would shut and lock the door, call the cops and wait. She really considered it, too, taking a long look at the landline on her other bedside table. But the odds of the cops actually showing up and doing any good were slim to none, and Mimi was out there alone with a potential intruder. What if he got spooked and they hurt him? Her mind made up, Ola crept out of bed and over to her tiny walk in closet. She wrapped her fingers around the wooden bat propped behind her shoe rack, then peaked out through the crack in her door. The coast was clear.

The rustling sounds were coming from the kitchen and became more pronounced as she tiptoed down the hall. What did they want in there? The most expensive thing she had in the living area was her TV, and even that bulky thing was secondhand. None of the lights had been switched on, but her eyes had mostly adjusted by the time she reached the bend where the carpet seamlessly transitioned into cool tile. Her pulse raced in her throat, and she breathed shallowly through her mouth as she raised the bat. There was a man standing in front of the fridge, the white light from inside it illuminating deep brown skin and a head of wild curls. The man was faced away from her, a blessing in itself because it became quickly clear that he was also naked.

In her shock she almost gave herself away as a gasp rose in her chest, because there was a naked man rifling through her fridge at three in the morning, and she was frozen solid with a bat poised to strike. Just as her muscles caught up to her mind, the man turned around with a Ziploc bag of deli meat in his hand. Upon seeing her, he also froze. His eyes blew wide, his grip on the deli meat went lax. It fell to the floor with a smack against the tile. Ola intentionally kept her eyeline above the waist, but she couldn’t help her gaze darting down to the jewelry around the man’s throat. It was snug like a choker around his Adam’s apple, a single gold charm hanging from it. 

The band of the choker was firetruck red. The charm was engraved with a single word — or rather, a name. MIMI. 

Ola couldn’t help it. She screamed. 

“Ola, wait, I’m not gonna hurt y—!” The man ducked out of the way as she swung the bat wide, and as her momentum threatened to send her tipping over she didn’t even clock that he knew her name. 

All she could think in the rush of adrenaline and panic was that there was a naked man in her home, and he was wearing the collar of her currently missing cat. She planted her feet and swung the bat the other way. This time the man was ready, and with an uncanny reflex he caught the thick part of the bat and plucked it right out of her hands. He held it aloft out of her reach and exclaimed, “Please, stop for a second!” 

Scratch that. There was a naked man in her home, wearing the collar of her currently missing cat, and now he had a weapon. 

She booked it down the hall, ignoring the urgent calls of “wait!” and “it’s me!” She turned into the first room she came across, slammed the door shut and locked it behind her. She pressed her back against the wood, eyes darting around for something to defend herself with. There was frighteningly little to choose from. It was the second bedroom of the condo, which she currently used for storage. The space was mostly bare save for an empty bookshelf and some plastic bins labeled in thick sharpie: WINTER, DONATE, and HOLIDAY DECOR. 

She bit her tongue to suppress a shout when a round of hesitant knocks came from the other side of the door. 

“Ola?” the man called. 

She tried to keep the tremor out of her voice when she shouted back, “You better just leave, y’hear me? I’ve already called the cops!” 

“No you didn’t. There’s no landline in that room.” His voice was soft, but she could hear the strain in it. 

So he had been in her home long enough to inspect all the rooms and learn which ones did and didn’t have a phone. Oh, God, had he been in her bedroom watching her sleep? The possibility made her shudder. Surely the neighbors must have heard the commotion by now, and would have called for help. Except no, there weren’t any neighbors to hear. Because Mr. Jones was getting older and had moved across town to live with his daughter, and his place had been vacant for a month. So she had no phone, there was no one around to get help for her…

“How do you know my name? And what did you do to my cat!” she demanded. She didn’t ask why he wasn't trying to break down the door in case he hadn’t yet considered that option.

“I know this is scary, alright? This is gonna sound nuts, but I swear to you that it’s me.” His voice was muffled through the door, becoming harder to make out as his voice dipped on the last word. 

She didn’t respond to him as she raced over to the window on the opposite wall and pushed back the curtains. If she kicked out the screen she could make a jump for it, but she was on the third floor of the complex. At best she would get surface injuries and could limp away to safety, but at worst? She stomped her feet petulantly, trying not to whine as her chances of escape dwindled with every second that passed. 

“Please, let me explain. It’s me.” 

Why did he keep saying that?

“I don’t know what you’re talking about! Just take what you want and leave!” Maybe she could ambush him by throwing a bunch of coats at his face and then book it out the front door. Yeah, that would do. 

She was unclasping the plastic bin labeled WINTER when the man raised his voice and said, “No, you’re not listening. It’s Mimi!” 

What? She dropped the lid. 

“What the hell did you just say?”

“I’m trying to tell you I am Mimi. I am your cat.”

A short, hysterical laugh bubbled past her lips. This was not happening. So now there was a delusional, naked, bat-wielding man outside the door. 

“No you’re fucking not,” she said. “I might have experimented with acid at my auntie’s New Years Eve party last year, but I did not take any last night.”

“That’s—what— I know you’re not on drugs! But it’s true. It’s…magic?” 

“Magic.” She couldn’t quite manage to keep the dubious tone out of her voice. 

There was a thunk against the door, as if the man had just dropped his head against it. 

“I don’t know what to do to convince you. You weren’t supposed to find out like this.” 

Now, Ola was a very smart woman. She had been raised with a good head on her shoulders, and she lived her life with logic and reason. But she was about to do something really, really stupid right then. She moved over to the bin labeled HOLIDAY DECOR and pulled out a small container of glass ornaments. If this went south she could smash them over his head. 

Without warning, she unlocked and yanked open the door. The man had indeed been leaning against the door, and now tipped forwards with a yelp as the surface was ripped from under him. He caught himself on his forearms just before face planting. At some point, he’d gotten the forest-green throw blanket off the back of the couch and wrapped it around his waist to preserve some of his dignity. The blanket was large, meant to stretch across a loveseat, and now it reached past his calves. Ola took a big stride over the man’s prone form and grabbed his left ankle, shoving aside the blanket fringe. All the breath left her lungs at what she found.

A long, raised scar stretched from just above his ankle to the outer side of his left calf. Right where Mimi got his stitches the first night she found him. With a gasp Ola dropped the man’s leg like it’d burned her. She backed up several feet until she hit the opposite wall of the hallway. 

“You’re…” she couldn’t finish the sentence, because if she did that would make this real. 

The man shifted onto his back with slow, telegraphed movements, as if he was afraid she might freak out and jump him. It was a wise decision, because she still had the Christmas ornaments. 

“Yeah,” he said. He gripped the blanket around his waist with one hand and held out the other placatingly. “I think we should talk.” 

It was well past four in the morning. 

The single light above the dining table cast a yellow glow inside the kitchen. Ola sat in a chair at the table, a bowl of soggy Cheerios in front of her. As soon as she’d poured the milk she’d lost her appetite, but across from her the man — Mimi, apparently — tucked into his second helping. After the initial panic had settled, a floaty kind of shock had taken over her body. She’d gone to her bedroom in a sort of trance to recover something decent for him to wear. All she’d been able to find was a pair of baggy, dark blue sweat shorts. Luckily, the guy was on the skinny side. 

She watched him eat in stunned silence, one hand covering her mouth with her fingers digging hard into her jaw. The green throw blanket hung over his shoulders to cover his bare chest, the fringe splayed around the base of his neck. 

Eventually Ola found her voice. “Gimme,” she said, holding out her hand. 

The man looked up at her in confusion. She stared pointedly at the collar around his throat. 

“Oh, right.” He unclasped it and gingerly dropped it into her waiting palm, and she immediately shoved it into the pocket of her sleep shorts. “I usually leave it on when I shift…it’s just easier.”  

Usually? Did he do this often? This being living as a cat under her roof only to shift back into a man to raid her kitchen in the middle of the night. She added that to her long mental list of questions to ask during this interrogation. 

But first, “What’s your name?”

“Huh?” He asked around his spoon. 

“Your name. I’m not gonna keep callin’ you Mimi.”

Was that disappointment downturning his lips? He chewed quickly and swallowed around a mouthful of cereal before he finally answered, “Michael.”

“Michael.” She drew out the name on her tongue. “Kay. So, Michael. You’re a cat.” 

He ducked his head, swirling his spoon through the dredges of milk in his cereal bowl. “Werecat,” he muttered. 

“A what?” 

“I’m a werecat. It’s like…a shapeshifter thing. I don’t change on the full moon or have blood lust or anything like a werewolf.” 

“Are werewolves real?” 

Amusement flickered across his face at the question. “Uh, not as far as I know.” 

Well that was a relief. 

“Show me.” When he once again just looked at her like she was speaking in tongues, she rolled her eyes. “Show me how you change. I’m only believing you because the alternative is you killed my beloved pet and hid his body, so I’m gonna need a little more proof.”

Michael pushed away his empty bowl, tucking his hands into his lap. She waited expectantly, and he glanced up at her from under his lashes when he said, “I can’t really do it when people are watching.” 

Now that was just awfully convenient. She leaned into his space, her voice carefully controlled. “You’re telling me that you’ve been posing as a housecat for half a year and you can’t prove to me what you are…because you’re shapeshift shy?” 

“I don’t decide how it works!” He scooted the chair back a few inches to put some distance between them. “I’ve been like this as long as I can remember, but I’m still figuring it all out. What I do know is I can’t control the shift when I’m stressed or severely injured. I’m sorry.”

The worst part was he seemed completely sincere. He looked so pitiful, his shoulders low and arms held close to himself, almost like he wanted to curl up. But he wasn’t small enough to do that right now. Ola’s flare of irritation deflated. 

“Fine, we'll come back to it. Tell me how old you are.” 

“I’m twenty-four I think. I haven’t really kept track of time in a while.” 

She pointed at him. “More about that.” 

Michael massaged his forehead with one hand, clutching the blanket tighter around himself with the other. “I’ve been on the streets for a long time. When I’m in my other form I’m still me, but things aren’t as clear. They're more sensations than full thoughts. Time runs together.”

“Do you remember how you got injured?” 

If she could look into his head she swore she’d see gears turning as he thought about her question. “I was attacked by another animal while looking for food. Maybe I was on its territory or something, or I looked like an easy target. But I remember getting in a fight and losing, and walking a really long time afterwards.”

Mimi had been so skinny that first night. She remembered feeling the bumps of his spine when she’d carried him to her car, hushing his terrified whines all the while.

“And that’s when I found you.” 

Michael nodded. The silence drew on and neither of them jumped to fill it. She thought back to when she’d brought him home after his surgery.“Welcome to Casa Ola, kitty,” she’d said, watching him limp around with a freshly bandaged leg.

She’d grown up with dogs, but she knew a little bit about taking care of cats from her high school days spent pet sitting for extra cash. Mimi had picked up on housetraining so fast, he was never destructive, and she’d considered herself extremely lucky for it. Now, though, she knew better.

Bile rose in her throat as several realizations came to her at once. “Oh my God.”

“What is it?” When she just shook her head, Michael urged, “Ola, what?” 

Every time he’d refused to eat cat food. Every time he squirmed and scratched at the vet during a checkup when the tech had asked about getting him chipped in her name. There was a reason for all of it, and it was because he was a grown man. “I bathed you,” Ola gasped. “I’ve blown raspberries into your belly and you— you’ve slept in my bed…” She abruptly stood from the table, clutching her turning stomach. “I’ve brought men home while you’ve been here. I’ve had hook ups while you watched!” 

An expression of pure horror painted Michael’s face. He threw his hands out in front of him. “No! No, actually I always gave you your privacy whenever you had guys over.” 

Ola did recall Mimi scampering out of the bedroom whenever clothes started coming off, and her stomach settled somewhat. She always thought the cat was just afraid of men from a traumatic past.

“You say you can’t control the shift when you’re injured, but your leg has been healed for weeks. Why haven’t you revealed yourself in all that time?”

At Michael’s hapless shrug, she knew he’d hoped she wouldn’t ask that. 

“It’s true that I was stuck like that while I recovered. The first time I was able to shift back on command was about a month ago while you were at work. I didn’t tell you because I’ve never told anyone about me. It’s just not something you do.”

She didn’t interrupt him even when he paused to gauge her reaction. She collected their cereal bowls and began rinsing them in the sink, glancing back at him to signal that he should continue. 

“Once I was fully healed I was planning on just disappearing, to be honest. But then you came home every night and you were so happy to see Mimi— or…” he cleared his throat. “I felt safe with you, and I could see how happy having a cat made you. I don’t remember everything, obviously, like I said it all sort of blends. But I remember you going on and on about your tough days at work, talking to me like I was your friend.” 

That was true. It made her a little sad to admit, but she didn’t have a whole lot of close friends on whom to unload everything on her mind. It had been really nice these past several months to come home, cuddle with her cat, and rant without any reservations. She’d told him everything. All about her cliquey coworkers, and the irritatingly indecisive or downright rude customers. She’d done shopping hauls for him, showing off the groceries she’d bought or new pairs of jeans and shoes like he cared to know. 

Michael sounded near tears when he said, “You’ve been so good to me. I didn’t want to hurt you by running away.”

She kept her back to him as she gathered her thoughts. If she felt like arguing further she could whirl on him and say something along the lines of ‘oh so it’s my fault, then?’ But she knew he wasn’t trying to pin blame. He was right, if she were to come home after a long day at work to find Mimi gone, it would tear her apart. She would never forgive herself, constantly wondering if she somehow left the door open. But now Mimi was gone, in a manner of speaking. There was no going back to the way they once were now that she knew the truth.

Was she supposed to kick him out? Did this mean she had a roommate? She’d purchased this condo almost two years ago, so at least she didn’t have to factor in splitting rent. It was too late, or perhaps too early, to be making any big decisions about this. This was a problem for when the sun was out. She was absolutely calling in sick in the morning. For now, Ola turned tail and headed into her bedroom. 

“What are you doing?” Michael called after her. 

“I’m getting you a pillow,” she said. 

She gathered the pillow from Mimi’s side of the bed (and nope, not thinking about the implications of that right now) and another blanket from her closet before heading back into the living area. Michael stood nervously in the doorway between the kitchen and the living room. She dumped the pillow and blanket onto the couch. He looked between it and her several times. 

“I have a lot to think about and I am running on less than four hours of sleep.” She said, and fluffed the pillow enticingly. “C’mon, you’re taking the couch.”  

~