Shit! A propane tank.
I abandoned my post and sprinted to the area between the structure and the propane tank intended to fuel the house for the winter. If this blew up, the house would be the least of anyone’s worries.
Calling on my dragon, I asked him to use his breath, not his fire, to push the fire at the corner of the house away from the tank.
“The tank!” Finally, someone else noticed it. “Cut the gas!”
While they were working on this, I hid, just out of sight from the others. They didn’t know about my dragon. Our station was a mix of shifters and humans, so we often kept our animals to ourselves.
Especially me. Dragons weren’t exactly welcome in the fire station. But mine had a special gift. He could cool fires down. And I could burn things as long as there was an existing fire to borrow from. His breath was cold enough to freeze anything within reach. And while freezing this house would be a dead giveaway, I could use some cool breath to make sure the fires didn’t reach the propane tank.
My dragon turned down the temperature of the fire, not enough to be noticeable but enough to keep everyone safe.
I’d blown one last breath on the fire after hearing the gas had been turned off. We were out of danger.
“Whoa!” Darris said. He was out of breath from running over. “You…you had no water. How did you…”
I shrugged. Darris was human. I had to cover for myself. “I don’t know. The fire cooled off over here. Maybe the center was on the other side of the house. I’m just glad it didn’t reach the propane tank.”
Darris looked at the house and to me and back again. “Huh. That was some luck.”
“Yeah. Let’s go help the others.”
While I walked away, I looked over my shoulder. Darris was stumped, but the way he looked at me…I might have some questions to answer later from my friend.
Chapter Six
Brent
Cat-sitting Bunny Foo-Foo was one of my favorite things. It felt like I wasn’t alone while, at the same time, doing a favor for a friend. In the past, I’d usually watched her at Altan’s place, but the tattoo parlor added too much to my commute. Since they were taking a midweek “three-day weekend,” it was easier to have her come to my place. It made sense, with Sothea having most of his work on the weekends, that they’d try to break away when no one else did.
Most cats didn’t like being moved around. They liked their place, their sun patches, and their humans. But Altan’s fur baby was a pretty cool cat in a world where cats were the coolest of all pets. At least, to me, they were. She didn’t seem to mind coming over here, probably because I had a special pillow just for her and gave her plenty of attention. I wasn’t allowed a pet of my own, but the occasional guest didn’t get the management in an uproar.
They were technically leaving tomorrow, but Sothea suggested Altan come over tonight to give the cat time to adjust, but also to give him and me some together time. We didn’t get a lot of that anymore.
Between my job and where he was currently living and their growing family, there just wasn’t a ton of time left to go around. We made sure to squeeze some in. Our friendship was important to us. Sothea was great about making sure we had that time, but it wasn’t the same as before. I wasn’t sad about it, exactly. Relationships changed with time. It did take some adjusting, though.
Exactly on time, there was a knock on my door. When I opened it, there was Altan with my furry buddy.
“Hey, sweetie.” I took the cat carrier and brought it to my bedroom, unzipping it next to the little cat condo I’d picked up for her the last time they had me cat-sit. She jumped straight up onto it, curled into a ball, and started purring.
“There you are, sweet thing. If you need anything else, let me know.” She looked up at me. “Yes, your dry food’s in the other room, and, when it’s time for your wet food, I will be sure to get you that as well. Take a rest.”
“I swear, sometimes you talk more to that cat than you do to me.”
“That’s because she doesn’t talk back, I guess.”
“Then how do you answer her questions?”
“Har har.” He was always teasing me about my affinity with cats.
And there was some truth to me answering unspoken questions from her pretty much all the time. I always felt like I knew what she needed to hear next and went with it. They had all these specialists who are whisperers for horses and lizards and lions. Maybe I was the cat whisperer. Or maybe I was just lonely and had a good bond with this one.
“Okay, cat’s settled in.” He dragged me by the hand to the couch and pushed me down with both his hands on my shoulders. “Now, tell me everything. What’s the deal with you and Theo?”
“What do you mean, ‘deal’?”
“Come on. I know that more happened that night when you two walked away holding hands. You don’t do that.”
