title: Blind Date aliases: [] tags: [FA] author: [Jayne] id: [48912483] date: 星期四, 八月 25日 2022, 12:50:27 凌晨 modified: 星期日, 九月 11日 2022, 10:32:41 上午

[TOC]

Blind Date

Author: Jayne Source: Blind Date

7:30 PM.

The sun was obscured by stormy clouds, and cruel winds whipped at one red fox’s undershirt, his dress shirt slung over one shoulder in his fingers, his briefcase hanging from limp fingers that also clutched a piece of paper. It looked like rain, but the report didn’t call for it. Just distant thunder. The sun would barely be up anyway.

His black dress shoes clicked on the pavement; an authoritative sound compared to the scattered rubber shuffle of the other pedestrian’s sneakers. He’d just gotten off a long day at work, and both the evening rush and dinner rush was already over. Only college-age adults, delinquent teens, and the elderly wandered the streets, with everyone else busy at home or in bars.

A lonely night, despite the muffled roar of hundreds behind doors and windows.

His destination wasn’t far now, though. His appointment for that sober Friday night was a blind dating program wedged between two restaurants. He’d been before – and been disappointed before – and knew the program. Show up on time, go to your assigned table in your assigned room, meet up with your assigned partner, try to find something similar between you two, and, if you’re lucky, get a phone number to call back.

Last time had been a disaster. They’d hooked him up with a woman, despite clearly saying he was gay, who, while extremely nice, was not his type at all. Mostly because of the woman angle. Still, it was nice to talk to her now and again, so maybe it wasn’t a total bust.

The fox stepped into the building and held up his ticket with the hand holding his briefcase, number clearly marked as he passed by the receptionist’s desk. He didn’t bother taking in a room he already knew, with all its purple-colored rim lighting and a few random plants, probably artificial. The receptionist barely lifted their head from their computer to confirm the ticket, not bothering to wave a hand in affirmation.

“Must be a busy night,” he said to himself.

The hallway to the booths was deeply quiet, like the velvety carpet and the burgundy paint could swallow sound. Behind thick black curtains was the rooms, each with their three tables and three pairs of people. The fox’s ticket said “2-3,” so he entered the first room on the right.

The first thing that struck him was how drab it was. Last time they’d at least pulled out some fake ferns, some more of that gaudy rim lighting, a little candle on each table, but this time it was three empty tables with numbers, undecorated walls, and a single overhead lamp that wasn’t bright enough for the corners, but too bright for the middle.

“Not busy,” the fox grumbled, “just lazy.”

Of course, no-one could hear him.

With a few more off-color grumbles, the salary worker put down his briefcase, rested his coat on the back of the chair he selected, and then sat into the hard wood seat of the metal chair with a long, long sigh. Alone, even here.

A few minutes passed to let the fox stew. He ran his long fingers through his short purple hair, and took in low, slow breaths.

The curtain behind him parted slightly, noticeable more by the slight shift in airflow than the sound of rustling fabric. He turned, and his supposed partner appeared, holding up a ticket with a “2-3” stamped in fading ink on the end.

“Same table,” they said, voice light, quiet.

The fox blinked once, then held out his slender right hand. Black fur, pink pads, short, well-trimmed claws.

“Hatcher, he/him,” the fox said, indicating his name with smooth confidence.

His counterpart lifted one grey-furred hand, their own claws the same color, just as well-trimmed. A mouse, not quite as well-dressed as the fox, but certainly a lot more comfortable. Well-fit polo shirt, chinos, a pair of restrained, plain sneakers. Humble looking.

“Erin, also he/him,” the mouse returned. His irises were red, but his eyes looked kind, and his short hair contrasted Hatcher’s slightly longer mane.

They shook hands. Hatcher noticed how supple the mouse’s palms were. A subtle scent of lavender followed him in, too. When their mutually silky hands parted, the fox motioned his new friend to the other side of the table.

“Please, sit.”

It was evident how much Erin had invested in first impressions. He carried himself elegantly; his long, thin tail swayed behind him, an echo of each previous step, an exaggeration of each sensual little shake of his hips on his two-second journey to sit.

Erin’s chair pulling out and pulling back in was silent on the tacky, functional carpet beneath the two’s feet.

“No candles,” Hatcher said, almost apologetically, as if he had to make up for the venue’s deficiencies himself.

The mouse leaned forward on his elbows and waved one hand dismissively, a thin smile pulling up his cheeks.

“Don’t worry. I’d have probably tipped it over and caused an accident anyway.”

The two chuckled together.

“I don’t know,” Hatcher replied, “I walked in here like a drunk monster. It probably would’ve been a disaster before you even showed up.”

Erin tilted his head, that smile not fading in the slightest.

“Rough day?”

Hatcher inhaled sharply through his nose, held it a moment, then exhaled through his mouth.

“That bad, huh?” Erin asked, his eyebrows nearly disappearing in his well-kept bangs.

The fox leaned back and slid one hand through his own hair. At the very back of his head was the scrunchie keeping his ponytail up, and he loved to fiddle with it when he remembered it.

“Overtime to get some paperwork done, it wasn’t…”

A moment of stinging sharpness, then released weight. The band snapped in his fingers, and the back of his hair instantly fell to its usual shoulder-length mat.

“…nevermind,” Hatcher growled, looking at the ceiling, “it sucked. It always sucks.”

The wood of Erin’s chair creaked ever so slightly as he leaned further in. The fox couldn’t help but drop his eyes right back to meet the mouse’s. Green eyes to red eyes, the fox leaning back, the mouse leaning in. Exasperation to gentle curiosity.

Involuntarily, instantly, Hatcher swayed his tail back and forth. He twitched his brows as he forced himself to stop his obvious affectionate tell.

The mouse blinked once, lowered his eyes to the side, then blinked back up to Hatcher’s sight.

“Keep wagging, it’s cute.”

The fox couldn’t stop himself if he wanted to.

“You’re cute,” he rebutted, a dry throat diminishing its already low impact.

“I can also give you something you need,” Erin whispered.

A moment of hesitation, as if he didn’t understand what the mouse had said through his delicate smile. Hatcher’s tall ears flicked up once, an automatic, evolutionary response to quiet sounds, a search for more in the distance. Here, though, tens of thousands of years of civilization later, the fox would have to do something very uncivilized.

“…could you repeat yourself?”

Erin slowly tilted his head to the other side.

“I can give you something you need,” he reiterated, a little louder, a little more clearly, and with a tone of bemusement.

Hatcher took in a deep breath.

“Which is?”

Erin brought his two hands together at the fingertips. His pink pads squished together ever so slightly, the gloss on their well-lotioned skin demanding attention.

“Freedom from the grind.”

A one-sided chuckle. The mouse only smiled.

“I think, unless you make enough to support two people, two homes, and two budgets on a whim, you’re better off seeking someone else in need,” Hatcher returned.

The idea was intriguing. Flittering thoughts of throwing papers and briefcases and suits into the river, laughing as he did. Scattered nonsense of growing old with someone he met in a shitty dating program. Abortive sparks of defiance against work and responsibility for an eternal – or however long a life is – fling.

“It’s not like that,” Erin returned, parting his hands, “but I can show you before you say ‘yes’ or ‘no.’”

Hatcher let both of his arms fall to his sides, then, with a sense of electric bravado tingling between his shoulders and in his scalp, he leaned forward too.

“Okay then,” the fox whispered back, a sly grin on his face, “enlighten me.”

Erin turned his right palm up, fingers half-curled in an inviting anticipatory grasp. Hatcher exhaled through his nose, a single almost-laugh, and then placed his right palm flush with it.

“What, is this like a séance?” the fox asked, narrowing his eyes, broadening his smile.

The mouse’s smile faded a bit, so imperceptibly small it was nearly impossible to tell.

“…do you trust me?”

Both looked each other in the eyes. This was a serious moment.

“Yeah, I do,” Hatcher whispered.

The mouse’s smile returned in full, and even more. His red eyes seemed to twinkle with excitement, his round ears likewise lifting with his spirits.

“Then hold on tight. Blink and you’ll miss it.”

Of course, as if defying fate, Hatcher blinked. In the briefest portion of a second his eyes were closed, he felt a lurch like a car skipping a pothole, or an elevator falling a couple of inches. He felt his grip on Erin’s hand disappear, but that same contact warmth all around him. In the 0.4 seconds it took the fox to blink, he found himself an inch tall in the palm he had twice now squeezed.

It took more than a few seconds for Hatcher to realize his new surroundings. The velvety fur between smooth, glossy pads now came up to his ankles, the smell of lavender was overpowering despite its airiness. His knees shook.

Hatcher inhaled sharply, closed his eyes, and shouted –

“WHAT THE FUCK?!”

High above, Erin winced slightly.

“Hey, calm down,” the mouse’s smooth voice came, same tone, slightly lower tenor, but so damn loud that Hatcher himself winced a little in surprise.

“Can you turn me back?!” he shouted up, eyes wide and frantic.

“Yes! Of course I can,” the ad-hoc giant returned, and lifted his other hand up defensively.

“Well?!”

The mouse looked to the side, at nothing in particular, just long enough to have a few thoughts that Hatcher couldn’t share in. When he turned his head back, he had a slightly apologetic look on his rodent face.

“You said you’d let me show you, though,” he said in that same whisper-loud rumble.

Hatcher opened his mouth wide to protest but was cut off by his captor.

“You said you trusted me.”

A long pause between them as they both looked to the other for a moment of elucidation. Hatcher bit his lip. Erin lifted his brows. After long enough, Hatcher finally spoke. His voice sounded almost defeated.

“I did.”

Erin smiled wide and brought the hand he had lifted in reassurance down to the palm Hatcher sat in, index and middle finger spread in a V on either side of the fox’s legs. Each finger, as slender as they were, were thicker around than the fox’s torso at this disparate scale.

“Fuck,” Hatcher whispered, taking a step back and shrinking his head into his shoulders.

Though they barely touched the surface of his palm, Erin’s fingers still depressed into that living surface enough to make the fox feel the dimpling effect on either side. He had to shift his step around to not lose his balance at the subtle, but resonant shift in muscle.

“I know this is a little sudden,” Erin rumbled, his smile losing its apologetic note, “but I… the moment I saw you?”

Hatcher leaned in, ears perked up despite the anticipation of such heavy words.

“…I wanted you.”

Hatcher’s heart stopped. A slight ringing in his tall ears, both from his better’s words’ volume as well as their meaning, began to pick up.

“I just… you’re so handsome, it’s obvious you work so hard, and… I think it’s really, really sexy of you to… trust me so quickly.”

Too stunned to concentrate on anything but the flattering, and maybe a little terrifying, words shaking his skull, the fox barely noticed Erin bringing his fingers closer to his shrunken form, centimeter by centimeter.

“And I… think it’s obvious you like me too. Right?”

Jaw slack. Brain buzzing. Barely able to perceive of the situation, let alone his place in it. Powerless and so, so small. The words came naturally to Hatcher’s mind, then his lips and tongue followed.

“I… really do,” he said, voice husky. He just hoped Erin could hear it.

The mouse’s eyes practically glowed. He didn’t get to meditate on them for long, though, as grey fur and pink pads and black, gleaming claws suddenly lifted from around the fox, closed together like scissors over his head, and then pressed him down firmly into that vast, trapping palm.

Even without the coat, Hatcher’s dress clothes were warm. He felt sweat drip down his loose bangs, and it only got worse with the doubling of the mouse’s body heat around him. That was only the second thought on his mind, though, given that the main was the sparks in his green eyes from a lack of air in his lungs.

“Ghaaack,” he squeaked out with his forced exhale.

“You’re so cute,” came the giant’s rumbling voice.

With what little strength he had, Hatcher pushed on the fingers pinning him down and restricting his breath. It was completely useless – his hands only barely dimpled into the mouse’s body-width digits, and they budged not even one relative inch.

“I… do you still trust me?” came a question from on high, muffled through the ringing in the fox’s ears.

The weight relented just a bit. It still held Hatcher down, but he could gasp in a desperate breath before responding. Even though his lips quivered, his eyes were as wide as he could make them, and though he squirmed like a terrified insect in the taller man’s hand, he only had one, true, response.

“Y-yeah.”

He had to say it through a cough. Erin flicked his tall, round ears, a response much like his had been just a few minutes ago. The mouse spoke slowly and lifted his hand from the fox’s chest.

“Well, I’m going to do two things, then.”

Hatcher listened and watched with rapt attention.

“I’m going to strip you naked.”

Hatcher nodded, a wave of cold heat rolling up his spine, through his scalp, and into his cheeks.

“Then I’m going to put you into my shoe, and walk home.”

Hatcher nodded, and somehow opened his eyes even wider.

“I’m going to do this,” Erin reiterated, his thunderous voice gaining a deeper rumble. His own eyes widened, an almost manic glee among the glints on his red irises.

“…go for it,” was all that Hatcher could respond with, a kinky grin peeling its way across his own quivering lips.

Instantly, the mouse’s fingers came back down. They didn’t press with the same crushing force as before, instead grabbing and pinching at Hatcher’s clothes. With barely a tug, every button on the fox’s shirt popped, the well-tailored sleeves ripped, and the front came straight off.

“Nice chest,” the mouse murmur-rumbled.

“Th-thank you,” Hatcher responded, feeling his blush so hard his cheeks throbbed.

Erin pinched and flicked his index finger and thumb, discarding half of his new friend’s former outfit. just as easily, he slid one single claw into the top of the fox’s pants – which elicited a small yelp of fear out of Hatcher, before the mouse simply pinched the buckle to crush it, then pulled away, tearing all that expensive fabric to shreds, just to toss it away with the same lack of care.

“Nice legs,” the mouse whispered, this time more to himself than anything else.

Hatcher rolled half-over in embarrassment, but couldn’t help but maintain eye contact. Green to red. Smile to smile. The fox felt like he was burning up from his own shame, even as he covered his underwear with both arms and clenched thighs.

“Thanks, uh, thank- thank you,” he muttered, smiling so wide it hurt.

The mouse closed his eyes and nodded, a silent gesture of affirmation. Affection.

There was a little less fear in Hatcher’s heart for the brief moment before Erin knelt down. He could only clutch onto a slim finger with a tiny yelp of surprise, as the great lurch of distance and speed brought him down to waist-level.

The mouse must have already been working his shoes off under the table. Though the too-bright ceiling light barely reached under the table, and though he could barely see over the side of Erin’s palm, he still could tell that he’d worked his right shoe half-off. There was the shoe, tan canvas and black laces. There was Erin’s shapely heel, with silky grey fur over taut skin, a high arch that terminated in a pronounced ankle.

And then the unenviable sensation of falling.

Hatcher barely knew what was happening until he was already airborne. Erin simply had tilted his hand to one side, and the fox fell and spun and yapped once, loudly, in fear – thought it must’ve seemed a squeak to the mouse, ironically. The fall terminated more quickly than expected, with a simple thump of his light body into the dark cavern of Erin’s sneaker.

It was dark as night in the twin shade of the table and the foot overhead, and so the fox could barely make anything out with his unadjusted eyes. An insole that curved with the supple shape of the mouse’s foot, like pieces of a puzzle. Hatcher only had a moment to let his instincts take over and crawl to the less-impacted place where the mouse’s arch rested before the groaning shuffle of fabric and rubber overtook him – as did the sheer weight of the not-quite-a-giant’s sole.

He was truly trapped. Arms spread-eagle, gently wrinkling shifts of weight atop him, pulse pounding in his ears, and a stifling heat that buried his poor body and mind, Hatcher was trapped.

His heart thrummed and fluttered with excitement. Erin might as well have very literally owned him.

The next hour was a blur. The compression of the mouse walking was tremendous, it made his joints strain and he saw spots and stars every time the slow roll of a confident step squished him down. Still, he was unharmed. Unharmed under the weight of the slender man, unharmed by the perpetually swinging lurch of steps off the pavement and forward. Harmed only by his shame, yet enticed by it.

After an hour, or more – it was hard to tell with little stimulus besides the thunderous groans of muscle and fabric and rubber – it all stopped. Instead of creaking moans of shifting shoes and the rumbling crackles of tread gripping debris and pavement, there was the relatively light shuffle of fur against canvas, as well as a swell of blinding light from behind Hatcher’s head.

“Was that good for you?” came the new-but-familiar sound of Erin’s voice.

The fox found himself barely able to open his mouth, let alone speak, after he peeled himself off the cushy insole of his new friend’s shoe.

“…yeah,” he croaked.

“Great!”

The shoe lifted into the air, and Hatcher simply flopped face-first back into it, a soft groan leaving throat as his lungs refilled with air. He slid a little with some forward momentum, as twin plaps of the giant’s feet rung out, muffled by distance and the thick canvas all around.

“I’ve got things all set up here,” the mouse continued, probably walking around his home, or apartment, or condo, or whatever. It was too far outside to care about right now.

“So – what, are you going to keep me like a pet?” the fox returned, managing to find a bit more of his voice with every passing moment.

“Not quite. Yes, but, no.”

“What about my fucking job?”

The gentle thumps of Erin’s feet on the hardwood floor so far below them both ceased, as did all forward momentum. Hatcher managed to sit up and brace his back against the inside of the sneaker, although he had to pant for breath after doing so.

“Didn’t I tell you I could give you what you needed?” Erin asked, voice quiet. His face took up the majority of the fox’s vision of the outside world. The rest was white walls and Hatcher’s own disheveled bangs.

“I need some freedom, Erin,” the tiny fox returned, his voice quaky and slow. He didn’t know how much he meant it.

“Freedom to be a salary man?”

Hatcher’s mouth twitched. Erin continued.

“Would you rather slave away for money you have to give away, or live with someone who can take care of you? Someone who wants you, for you?”

“What about,” Hatcher asked, though he wished he’d stop himself, “my dignity?”

Erin’s quiet smile returned, eyes barely narrowed.

“Dignity to file paperwork and do overtime?”

Hatcher lifted one hand tiredly, giving the mouse that one. Still one more question burned his ears, and he managed to gasp it out all at once.

“If you keep me like this, even if you give me everything I could possibly want, won’t you get bored? Won’t you find someone else?”

There, Erin tilted his head, and his smile faded entirely. His red eyes gleamed, and his brows furrowed lightly with a look of airy concern. Then he spoke, only one word, with as much care and meaning as he could manage.

“No.”

And there, Hatcher’s heart flew.

“…then, uhm.”

The fox found his voice hard to use, his throat choked up.

“Then, let’s… You can show me the place you have for me?”

Erin smiled wide and closed his eyes, then opened them and looked away as he began to walk forward again.

“It’s a second date,” he said.

Hatcher sunk a little against the wall of the shoe he leaned against, and lifted one hand to his cheek to try to hide this ear-to-ear smile.