back next"WE'RE MEETING THEM TODAAAAYYYY!!" Salem exclaimed as he shook Dirt awake.
"Buuuhhhghh," Dirt groaned, "What time is it??" he whined, lifting his blindfold.
"It's 10am! And Grooly just told me they're ready whenever we are!!!" Salem showed Dirt his iPod so he could see the text he'd described. Dirt squinted really hard at it for a second, trying to get his eyes to adjust, but they ultimately decided they didn't actually care what the actual text actually said.
"Dude, I've only gotten like... four hours of sleep! C'mon!" Dirt complained, lowering his sleep mask back down as he tried to get comfy again.
"No, you come on!!!" Salem whined, and shook Dirt continuously. "Sarah's already getting ready! We have to go see them now, now, now!!!" he demanded. Dirt grumbled in frustration and ripped his blindfold off.
"OKAY!!!" he yelled, pushing Salem away from him.
For a moment, Dirt thought Salem looked scared, but he quickly recovered. "Jeez, dude, somebody's a lil grumpy gus~" he teased with an uneasy smile.
"I'm sorry," Dirt sighed, "I didn't mean to yell, I'm just tired..."
"What? Ummm it's okay? Lawl..." Salem said, brushing him off. Dirt sighed again as he struggled out of bed, making old man noises on his way to stand up. Salem transformed and skittered out the bedroom door, making his way over to Sarah's room. Dirt chuckled at how excited Salem was, shaking his head with a smile. He went over to his closet and threw on an old zip-up hoodie over his dirty t-shirt and decided that was enough.
An instant later, Salem came skittering back into Dirt's room and transformed when he got to the closet so he could dig through all the clothes with his person hands. "I need to make them think I'm cool!" he exclaimed as he started throwing articles of clothing behind him, pelting Dirt with them.
"Hey!! Dude!!! Stop throwing shit!" Dirt laughed, throwing the clothes back at Salem. Salem hissed as he just kept rummaging through the closet.
"Oh, perfect!" Salem beamed as he held up a shirt with Naruto and Sasuke kissing on it.
"Hey, that's mine!" Dirt complained.
Salem looked at Dirt with an angry little pout. "Well you're not gonna wear it, are you?" he said snootily. He pulled off the tank top he was wearing and quickly changed into the oversized anime shirt. Salem smiled at Dirt with his hands on his hips. Dirt had to admit, Salem looked very fucking cute in their clothes. He'd be lying if he said he didn't want Salem to wear his stuff. It always warmed their heart, seeing him looking just so adorable in their oversized shirts and hoodies and such.
"Ooohh this is niiiiice," Salem cooed, running his hands along the fabric, "Its sooooo soft oh em gee where did you get this??"
"Uhh I dunno. Probably etsy or something? It's really old," Dirt replied.
"I'm never taking this off," Salem joked.
Sarah peeked her head in the door and sang, "I'm ready!"
"YIPEE!!!" Salem chirped, and literally jumped up and down in excitement. He slapped on a baseball cap that had a little embroidered crab on it and tucked his tail into the long black skirt he was wearing. "OKAY LET'S GO!!!" he yelled, and ran out the front door, not closing it behind him.
Dirt and Sarah followed him out, but at a normal walking pace. "HURRY UP!!!!!!!" screamed Salem as he repeatedly pulled on the door handle of Sarah's locked car.
"Don't do that!" Sarah gently scolded, "It'll mess up the lock mechanism!"
"What?? Really?" Salem asked, befuddled, as he dropped his hands away from the handle.
"Probably," said Dirt with a shrug as Sarah unlocked the doors. Salem hastily climbed in and got buckled.
"LET'S GO LET'S GO!!!" he yelled, apparently having abandoned caring about the lock thing. Dirt sat in the back next to Salem as Sarah put the address into her maps app. Salem took Dirt's hand and started shaking his arm with it.
"EEEEEEEE!!!" he screeched, bouncing up and down in his seat.
As they drove down the freeway, Salem kept yelling for Sarah to "DRIVE FASTER!!!" but she always replied with, "No! I am already going 10 over!!" but they continued to have this back-and-forth no less than ten times on the way there, even though they both knew the outcome of it. And it was more yelling. Meanwhile, Dirt was just on his phone, texting Brian, tuning the whole thing out.
It was only like a 15 minute drive, but Salem made it seem like it took over an hour. Dirt immediately felt a little yucked out when they pulled up to what was practically a mansion compared to their dinky little house. Salem had stars in his eyes as he pressed his face up against the window, looking at the building.
Before they even got out of the car, both Grooly and Tooly came running out the front door, their tails raised behind them. The house was secluded, surrounded by a scraggly forest that appeared to just be taking shape. Seeing that it was safe, Salem yanked his beanie off and fished his tail out of his skirt.
Salem burst out the door before the car was fully stopped and Sarah screamed, "HEYHEYHEYHEY!!!" but he didn't listen. He landed very ungracefully, stumbling and falling right into one of the twins. Dirt had forgotten which was which, but it was the calico one that Salem had just meet-cuted into.
"WOAH! Be careful, bro!" the tall calico catboy laughed as he caught Salem. Dirt unbuckled and awkwardly scooted over to go out the door that was already open, since the driver's side was up against some shrubbery. Sarah opened her door into said shrubbery.
"Um. I'm gonna re-park..." she said with an embarrassed laugh. Dirt chuckled and rolled his eyes as he made his way over to the catboy trio. They were all rubbing their faces against each other in greeting, and even though Dirt KNEW it was a normal thing for them, it still weirded him out a little. A very cringy thought crept into his mind: What if this is what fangirls did when they met like fuckin' Markiplier or whatever? That would be fucking hilarious.
"Oh um, this is Dirt, my boyfriend!!!" Salem cheerily introduced them.
"Nice to meet you!!" the orange twin held his hand out and Dirt went to shake it, but he pulled them in for a hug instead. "Ahahaha! Got you bro!!! You thought I was gonna give you a handshake, didn't'chya?" he laughed, squeezing all the air out of Dirt. They just made a strained wheezing sound like a fumbled accordion. "I'm Tooly, by the way," he said after releasing them.
"And I'm Grooly!" Grooly said, popping up next to his brother.
"Heh.. hi....." Dirt said shyly, stepping back from the pair a little.
Sarah suddenly ran up to the group, panting. "Sorry! I hope it's okay I parked over there," she said, catching her breath and pointing over to her car which was parked between a couple of baby trees.
"Yeah that's prolly fine," Tooly said with a shrug.
"Um, anyways, I'm Sarah!" she said, holding her hand out to the twins. They both leaned forward and sniffed her hand. "Oh!" she quietly exclaimed. "Hehe..."
"Can we go inside?" Salem asked half-politely and half-impatiently.
"Yeah of course!" Tooly exclaimed. He beckoned for everyone to follow him into the front door.
As soon as they entered, the smell of stale cat piss punched Dirt in the face. It was to be expected, considering all the kittens that would come and go through the place. And to be quite honest, it's not like it was something Dirt wasn't used to. It was almost comforting that the place wasn't a big, pristine mansion. It actually looked hella lived in!
The expensive-looking couches were all scratched up, and the edge of the rug in the middle of the room was all frayed. Stray cat toys littered the floor and furniture, and three litterboxes were sat in the corners of the room. (One in each corner. Not three in each corner. I'm not sure if that was clear or not so I just wanted to make sure. Not that it matters LITTERally (lol) at all.)
In the kitchen, a tall middle-aged woman with graying hair was stirring a huge pot of something. "Oh! Hi!" she said, a bit startled, when she noticed the guests in her home. "Sorry about the mess!" she apologized, putting a lid on the pot and moving to the sink to wash her hands. "It doesn't exactly stay clean around here, no matter how many times ya clean it!" she said with an embarrassed chuckle. After drying her hands, she walked right up to Salem, who was sort of leading Dirt and Sarah.
"It's so nice to meet another catperson! We weren't sure how many others there were out there!" the woman said as she enthusiastically shook Salem's hand. "Oh, I'm sorry, where are my manners? I'm Hailey, the boys' mom. Adoptive mom, of course. Well! One of their moms, heh! My wife is upstairs feeding the new kittens! Three teeny little sweeties came in just last night, the poor things. Emaciated and cold... But they're doing SO much better now, thank goodness!" Hailey rambled. "I'm just boiling some chicken here for the kittens who aren't bein' bottle-fed anymore," she said, gesturing to the kitchen.
Sarah sniffled and Dirt looked over to realize her eyes were watering, but she was smiling. "It's.. so nice to meet you," she said, stepping forward. "I'm Sarah. I kind of see myself as Salem's 'mom' even though he's only a couple years younger than me, but for the first month I didn't even know he was a catboy at all!"
Hailey laughed. "A month! Hehehe! We didn't know we had a couple of catboys on our hands for a YEAR!" she exclaimed through her laughter.
"Mooooom...." Tooly groaned impatiently.
"Oh! Sorry, I don't mean to bore ya! I could just go on and on and on about these two right here! Not to mention how many other kitten stories I have—"
"MOM!!!" Tooly nudged Hailey.
"Oh, I don't think it's boring at all!" Sarah exclaimed. "I'd love to hear ALL your stories!" Grooly and Tooly both GROANED.
"Please don't encourage her..." Grooly said, but seemed to mostly just be teasing his mom, who giggled innocently. "How many cats do you have right now?" Sarah asked, clasping her hands together invoking the image of a saint, the same way Salem did that one time. I'm sure you remember. As Hailey answered, Grooly motioned for Dirt and Salem to keep following him and his brother. They followed; Dirt was reluctant to ditch Sarah, but he shrugged it off, figuring they'd catch up later anyway.
"Am I the first other catperson you've met?!" Salem asked the two excitedly as they led them down the hall.
"YEAH!" Tooly yelled, as he opened a door. "Anyways this is my room!" Salem transformed and adorably trotted around the room, smelling everything with his mouth open, you know how cats do.
"So like.. How did you guys end up here?" Dirt asked quietly. "If you don't mind me asking," he quickly added.
"Oh you know," said Grooly, "Born in a wet cardboard box all alone." Salem transformed JUST to laugh. All three of the catboys were XD'ing in real life. "LAWL!! No, but really! I mean kind of! It's not like I remember, but Hailey loves to tell the story. She found us near death Abandoned by Disney, as little kittens. Nursed us back to health and the rest is history!" Abandoned by Disney??? God, this fucking guy, not understanding old, niche creepypasta memes.. *Rolls eyes* How the fuck do you know what that means and I don't??? Aren't you like part of me? Am I? Are you? Haha! Anyways...
"Yo, there's a little guy under here!" Salem exclaimed from where he was laying on the floor and looking under Tooly's bed for some reason. "Hey bro! Come here, man!" he beckoned. An elderly gray tabby nervously peeked its head out.
"Lucy!" Grooly exclaimed, pushing past Dirt. He knelt down and gave the cat some sweet scritches. "This is Lucifer! He's almost as old as us, like, 22 or something? He's like the brother I never had..." Grooly said, lovingly petting Lucifer, who purred happily.
"HEY! WHAT'S THAT SUPPOSED TO MEAN?" Tooly yelled, but Dirt was pretty sure it was a bit. They both laughed after that, so yeah, just a joke, then.
Dirt was still really curious about a lot of stuff concerning these guys. He almost wished he'd stayed behind with Sarah, cause Hailey almost definitely told their whole tragic and compelling backstory without him!
"Hey, do you guys wanna see the kittens?" Grooly sweetly offered as he picked Lucifer up and carried him over his shoulder.
"YEAH!!!!" Salem exclaimed, springing up to his feet, his tail flicked excitedly behind him.
"C'mon!" He led everyone back out the hallway and up the stairs. The landing alone was huge, with several cat trees placed next to the huge bay windows that overlooked the forest. Said bay window was also lined with several cat beds, all of which had built up lots of multicolored cat fur.
Grooly led them to a door and gently knocked on it. "Mamma?" he said through the wood. After a moment of silence, the door was opened by a short and stout woman with white hair. She looked tired and weary.
"Ah!" she looked surprised to see new people in her house. "Today's Saturday? Gosh, I completely lost track of time..." she sighed. "Sorry. It's nice to meet you, we just had a bit of an unexpected..." she gesticulated as she tried to think of what she was trying to say, "Uhhh.. happenstance." Should we go? Should we go? Should we go? Dirt was incredibly anxious that they were a nuisance to the busy wives.
"Sorry, I'd shake your hands but I need to wash mine! Um, I'm Amaya." Amaya did an awkward little bow in lieu of shaking hands.
"I'm Dirt," Dirt said quietly, bowing his head just as awkwardly as Amaya had.
"And this is Salem and he's just like us for real!" Grooly said, pushing Salem towards Amaya by the shoulders.
"Hi!" Salem waved, his ears twitching adorably. Amaya gave a tired smile.
"It's a pleasure to meet you, Salem," she said, again doing her little bow, but managing to make it less awkward this time.
"Yeah! :3" Salem said, his tail wagging.
"Can we see the kittens?" Grooly asked, pushing the door open wider.
"Of course," Amaya stepped aside, "Just please keep your voices down.."
"We know..." Tooly groaned as everyone filed into the room.
It was another huge room. It almost felt like an oversized vet's office. The west wall was lined with metal tables, upon which sat a long futuristic-looking tube machine. Inside, were two teeny tiny kittens wiggling around. Aside the tube thingie were medical supplies, sanitation supplies, a little scale, and a couple of clipboards hung from the wall. Underneath the tables were a mini-fridge and metal cabinet. And like also some other stuff but god I hate describing shit! You get the idea.
On the east side of the room were a bunch of cat beds and toys and blankets sprawled out inside a kitten pen. Three bigger kittens were cuddled up together in one, and four other kittens played amongst themselves. Other kittens were hidden away in the little uhhh cat bed thingies that are like little caves? You know. I'm done describing this room. Salem kneeled down next to the sleeping kittens. "Wow...." he whispered, "Can you believe I was that small once?"
"Heh.. you were still pretty small when I found you," Dirt chuckled quietly.
"But look at them!! These guys can prolly barely even walk yet can you imagine?? Ah...." Salem sighed. "Anyways! This place is huge what else you got here?" Grooly and Tooly both chuckled pretty hard at that.
As they turned to leave the room, Hailey and Sarah appeared behind them, and Sarah looked like she'd been crying. "Sarah!!! Are you okay????" Salem asked, extremely concerned.
She sniffled. "Yes... Hailey told me the story of how she and Amaya found the boys and raised them and it got to me...." she explained.
"Oh em gee... Sarah......" Salem giggled, and nuzzled his face on her shoulder. She smiled and pet his head.
All of a sudden, Dirt's phone started buzzing in his pocket. Assuming it was probably spam, he took his phone out to hang up, but, "My brother's calling me..."
"You have a brother????" Salem asked, mouth agape.
"I'm pretty sure you knew that," said Dirt. "Sorry, I should take this..." He galloped down the stairs like a graceful horse, expect I'm pretty sure horses can't go down stairs? Or is that cows? Probably both, right? Anyways he trotted down those stairs like some kind of magnificent beast that CAN go down the stairs.
He wasn't sure what to expect. Dirt's brother had barely spoken to him in the past three years since they moved out! Once they were outside, they answered. "Hello?"
"Hey bro... Uhhh... So this sucks...." Oh no oh god oh fuck. "So like... grandpa... had a heart attack in his sleep last night and passed away. Mom's dad, I mean." Oh no :(
"Oh...." was all Dirt could think to say. He tried and failed to say more: "Um... Oh...."
"Yeah.... So... His wife's planning a funeral and stuff. It'll be in like, a week or so. In case you wanna come. Mom said we don't have to, but I wanted to let you know," Dirt's brother explained.
"Right... Uh... Okay. Shit. I'm kind of like... in the middle of something right now and I have no idea how to react to this at all so. Um. Keep me updated I guess. On the funeral front."
"Yeah. And hey, us two haven't talked in a while! We should really catch up, bro!"
Dirt chuckled dryly. "Yeah. We'll catch up soon, dude. Guess we needed an old alcoholic's death to finally talk to each other again after all this time, huh?" Dirt's brother laughed. "But yeah, we really do need to catch up. I've missed you, man."
"Okay."
"Alright. Uh. Talk to you later. I love you."
"I love you too, man. Bye."
Dirt hung up.
He walked back into the house, his feet suddenly feeling heavy. He felt like he was made of drying cement, like he was some giant, lumbering behemoth, coated in a fast-hardening substance that was making it harder and harder for him to move. Or feel. How was he supposed to feel? Some part of him wanted to cry, but another part felt like that man didn't deserve his tears. He wondered how his mom was handling it.
Salem was standing at the door, apparently having been waiting for him there the whole time. "Are you okay?" he asked immediately. God, I hate that he can smell my emotions or whatever...
"Yeah. Kind of. I don't want to talk about it right now. Let's go back inside." Salem frowned and tilted his head.
"Okay....." Salem reluctantly conceded, and they made their way back upstairs where everyone else was.
Sarah, Hailey, Amaya, Grooly, and Tooly were all in the kitten room playing with the kittens, baby talking and cooing as they wiggled little fake mice and birds in front of their itty bitty paws. Dirt leaned against the doorframe as Salem went to go join them. He watched, in a trance-like state, as they laughed and giggled amongst themselves. The sloppy, uncoordinated movements of the weeks-old kittens had him hypnotized, as they struggled to grab hold of the little mice and such. They wobbled with every step, just barely in control of their movements yet.
"So... Okay now I'm super curious what the story with these boys is!" Salem said suddenly, pulling Dirt out of his weird stupor. He was super curious as well...
"Oh!" Hailey exclaimed, clapping her hands together excitedly. "Well, I just told Sarah here that story, but I don't mind repeating myself!" she said, smiling. "First of all, for background, Amaya and I have been fostering kittens for a long long time! Before we even got married! And well before I was even a woman! Hah!!!" Salem and Sarah both chuckled, and Sarah was listening with the same fascination as if it were the first time she was hearing this story, even though she'd literally just heard it not ten minutes ago.
"We were college sweethearts, and moved in together as soon as we graduated. Our very first kittens happened upon us by total accident! One of Amaya's friends found a newborn litter in the street, and knew that she loved cats, so they brought 'em here! Back then, it was a whole lot harder to get resources.. We couldn't just google 'how to take care of baby kittens'!! So we did our very best. We got a lot of help from our vet, who was happy to help and provide us with information and such! It was a lot of hard work, but we really loved those little beasties...
"We loved takin' care of 'em so much in fact, that we started looking into fostering more kittens for the local shelter, which always had overflow, with new kittens bein' born every day! So that's what we did for a long time! We even made our own little website documentin' all our little sweeties, and finding people who'd adopt 'em when they were ready, and givin' tips to other folks who might wanna foster kittens as well!
"One day—this was a few years after we'd married—a fellow fosterer friend of ours came to our door with two tiny little baby kittens. Said they weren't gaining any weight and they didn't know what to do anymore! They seemed perfectly healthy otherwise, weren't sick or anything like that, just weren't growin at all! So we took up the challenge! We tried all sorts of different formulas and medications and such to get 'em to grow, but no matter what we did, it seemed like they were staying teeny tiny forever!
"A few weeks in, they were still so tiny, as if they were still only a few days old! But they were still doing fine in all other ways. It was such a mystery to us! Our vet was just as confused as we were! But we were determined! We were NOT going to give up on these sweet little things!
"We soon realized that they WERE growing, just a WHOLE LOT slower than normal kittens! In fact, their growth rate was more in line with human babies! Hehe!! And one day, just after their first birthday, Amaya walked into the kitten room and SCREAMED!!! There were two HUMAN BABIES just sittin' there! With cat ears and tails to boot! We just didn't know WHAT to do, then! We'd decided before that we weren't gonna have kids, and that the kittens would be our whole life, but here these two babies were! As if delivered by the stork!
"After lots and lots of emotional conversations, we decided we'd raise them. After all, it was like destiny! Just like the very first kittens that were brought to us! That's what I always said, anyways, hehe! But we had a huge challenge ahead of us, raisin' a pair of twins along with fostering all these kittens! We decided to only take a few kittens at a time for a while, to focus on our babies until they were old enough that they wouldn't need our near-constant attention.
"As they got older, it was pretty clear that they weren't exactly like human kids, either, though! By the time they were four, they already had a pretty good handle on their basic needs. 'Cept for bein' fed and all, since we made all their food and such. But anyway, we also realized that they were going to need an education! And we were so afraid of what might happen to them if we sent 'em off to school to be discovered as part cat! So we homeschooled 'em ourselves! And heck, I think we did a pretty good job raisin' these two..." Hailey began to get choked up towards the end of her monologue. Oh, but she wasn't done yet, sorry.
"Hehe... And then Grooly, here.. When he was 10 years old he told us that he didn't wanna be a girl anymore! At this point, Amaya and I barely even knew about bein' trans, so we were so lost! We all went on that journey together. At first, it was simple. He hadn't hit puberty yet, so just changin' the pronouns was all we had to do! He even kept the name we gave him since it's kind of just a silly made-up word and not gendered at all, haha!
"But at around 12, he started going into heat and—gosh what a nightmare!" Hailey laughed, "We had no idea what to do, then! But luckily by then the internet was a bit more sophisticated, and we started doin' more research about bein' transgender and such, and through it all, I realized, gosh! I started realizing things about MYSELF that I'd never given much thought before! So really," Hailey wiped a tear from her eye, "Grooly and I were truly in it together, now. Both figuring ourselves out. Figuring out where to go from here!
"At some point, poor baby's dysphoria was gettin' so bad we just said SCREW IT and went and saw a doctor. We were lucky to find someone willin' to be discrete. Only a couple doctors and nurses ever knew that Grooly wasn't fully human while they helped us with his medical transition..." Now Salem's eyes were watering too. Dirt straight up had tears cascading down his cheeks, but it was hard to tell exactly why. Their emotions were all over the place.
"See, now you know why I was crying!!" Sarah exclaimed indignantly.
"Oh wow...." Salem cried, "What a beautiful story.... Mother and son.. together as one..." he sobbed. Sarah and Salem hugged each other, crying together.
Dirt couldn't take it anymore. His emotions were building up like a disturbed bottle of kombucha and he didn't know how much longer he could go without losing it and just straight up screaming, so he quickly excused himself (left without saying anything) and ran back outside.
Seeing everyone cry like that was contagious or something. Dirt was almost relieved that he had something to cry over that wasn't a dead abusive guy. Sat up against a tree, they finally let themself absolutely WAIL.
The aforementioned bottle of kombucha finally exploded, shards of glass embedding in his skin, the fizzy fermented liquid stinging the wounds, adding insult to injury..... Metaphorically, in case that wasn't clear. Maybe I don't need to tip my hand, but I don't want anyone to get confused like, 'Wait, he actually had a bottle of kombucha?' No. He didn't. He was both the kombucha himself, and also had the kombucha explode in his face, injuring him greatly. But like, not actually. It's a fucking figure of speech.
Fucking anyways. Not only had Dirt metaphorically exploded like a bottle of kombucha, he also felt like the kombucha itself; a sick concoction of different emotions, bottled up and fermented and confusing. Normally a story like that wouldn't elicit this kind of reaction from him. He'd find it heartwarming and maybe get a little choked up, but his testosterone-ridden endocrine system most certainly wouldn't let him cry like this.
But god, that old fuck doesn't deserve my tears. It's good that he died. Can we just agree that I'm crying over a beautiful story about a transgender family, please? Sorry, Dirt. I think it's pretty obvious to everyone that while seeing everyone cry like that definitely oiled the wheels that are his tear ducts, he was pretty shaken up about his grandpa dying as well. Shit... It's not like he was ALL bad. No one is, really.
A bastard alcoholic former cop who abused his kids wasn't all bad? Sure, when you put it like that he sure sounds like the worst guy ever! And I know the readers, and also I, would LOVE to absolutely flame this guy! But the fact of the matter is, he loved his family. He loved Dirt and his brother, he loved Dirt's mom and her siblings, he loved his wife, his other grandchildren, his dogs. He loved throwing barbeque parties with his whole family every summer with that special steak marinade that tasted like heaven.
For all his flaws, Dirt couldn't deny that he looked forward to those parties as a kid. Yeah, cause I liked his dogs. And because his grandpa was in general a sweet guy when he wasn't drunk, and Dirt never saw his cop days, anyway! And he DID give the best birthday presents, AKA cold hard cash. He.. did send me a check for 200 bucks for my birthday just last year, with a sweet letter wishing me well in life. I never got the chance to write him back.
It was a lot. Dirt wanted to be angry with him for how that man treated his mom, his aunts and uncles, his grandmother. He wanted to feel no sorrow for the death of a former cop who surely drank on the job. Why should someone like that deserve any sympathy? And yet here Dirt was, sobbing their fucking eyes out over him in the middle of some very sparse woods, outside the mini-mansion of two catboy skateboard youtubers, which is definitely a string of words that no one has ever typed or said or even thought of before. Hah... It was messy. Dirt's whole life was messy, and it was only getting weirder and messier. Maybe it was okay. To take a minute, and cry over someone that, despite their many flaws, meant something to them.
Yeah, okay. But I'm not explaining this bullshit to Salem or Sarah. This is my own inner struggle and I'm keeping it to myself. Okay, kombucha boy. What? Dirt knew that bottling up his emotions like that wasn't healthy. Yeah, I know. But I'm gonna do it anyway, cuz I don't feel like unpacking this shit out in the open where everyone can see it. That's fair, I guess. Maybe someday Dirt would write a novel and have one of his character's grandpas die under the same circumstances, and maybe that character could be open and honest to their friends about their emotions, to get some kind of cathartic release, even though the novel probably wouldn't have anything to do with that in the first place and that bit would kind of be shoe-horned in to create more intrigue even though it was already getting really long, way longer than he'd anticipated, but he'd add this whole abusive grandpa dying arc in anyway, just so he could talk about his feelings for a minute.
Why the fuck would I do that? That's stupid as hell. Yeah, probably not. I don't really know where I was going with this. Anyways, now Dirt was going to have to deal with his family. And he knew that Salem was probably going to get himself involved whether they asked him to or not. Fuck. Fuck, indeed.
For now, though, Dirt was still in the forest, and Salem and Sarah were still in the mini-mansion, and unbeknownst to him, something juicy was going down in there. For real? Yeah, bro. Don't worry, he would find out about it soon.
After his unexpected breakdown/introspection session, Dirt gave himself a few minutes before going back inside the house, hoping it wasn't TOO obvious how much he'd just been crying. He sheepishly opened the front door, hoping not to alert anyone to his reentry, but everyone was sitting in the entrance room, and they all stared at him as he opened the door.
"Welcome back!" Hailey greeted. Dirt did a White Person Smile and nodded awkwardly in her direction.
"Y'okay?" Sarah asked, looking a bit concerned. Dirt nodded silently, not wanting to fucking trauma-dump on these nice people he'd just met.
He stood awkwardly in the entryway, not knowing what to do. "Come, have a seat!" Hailey invited him once she realized he was being an idiot. Dirt shuffled over to the couch Salem was in and sat down next to him. Salem leaned up against them and purred softly. Dirt let out a sigh of relief at feeling the touch of his boyfriend.
Dirt stared into the middle distance, his mind all fuzzy and mixed up, as everyone else in the room conversed jovially. He couldn't focus on anyone's words at all. He just sat there looking like a straight up dead person for hours until things started to wind down.
Suddenly, Salem was nudging him to attention and telling him they were leaving. "Oh," was all he said, as he got up and followed everyone outside. Everyone said their goodbyes as Dirt just stood there and silently waved as Grooly, Tooly, and their moms went back inside. Dirt was simply going through the motions as he got in the car and buckled up, not really perceiving his surroundings, nor hearing the conversation that Sarah and Salem were having. It was all just a bunch of fuzzy noise and blurry images until Salem nudged him again.
"Hey. What's'a matter with you?" he asked bluntly.
"Um. Sorry. Yeah.... uh......" Dirt sighed heavily. "My brother called earlier because.. our grandpa just died." Sarah and Salem both gasped.
"Oh no! I'm so sorry!" said Sarah, glancing at Dirt in the rearview mirror.
Dirt shrugged. "Eh. He was kind of an asshole. And a cop."
"Oh. Then um.. Y-yay???" she corrected, uneasily. Dirt laughed.
"Yeah," he said.
"You smell miserable... Are you sure it's yay?" Salem asked, leaning against Dirt's side.
"Uuuggggh I just... It's just that I'm gonna have to go to his funeral, and like.. deal with my family and shit. I'm not looking forward to it."
"Oh... Where does your family live?" Salem asked.
"Up in northern Cali," he replied, "I mean.. Technically, my mom said my brother and I don't have to go to his funeral, but... I don't know. I feel like I'll regret it if I don't go."
"Why?" Salem asked, kind of snootily?
Dirt sighed. "I really don't wanna get into this right now," he said tersely.
"Ok...."
"So guess what," Salem prefaced excitedly. They had finally just gotten back, and Dirt was mentally and also physically exhausted. "While you were outside, Grooly pulled my aside and told me that...." a giggle sputtered out of Salem, "He follows my OnlyFans!" He paused and stared at Dirt, with his little hands up like 'ta-da!'
"Hah.. Cool," was the only response Dirt could dignify him with.
"Yeah, like. He's BEEN following me apparently. Like before I even knew about him el oh el!! Can you believe that?? He was a fan of ME before I was a fan of HIM and like, HE'S the famous one oh em gee..." he giggled some more. Even though the info was certifiably juicy, and Salem was clearly very giddy about it, Dirt didn't... really.. care? At most he thought it was a funny coincidence, but wasn't all that shocked or anything.
Seriously?? Man, I've been holding this secret in my back pocket ever since I THOUGHT of these twins!!! It was supposed to be like, a big fun exciting thing? And Dirt was too depressed to even care. Fine whatever he could keep being sad about his stupid grandpa and shit. Dude, you were literally the one who said it was okay that I was sad about that. The fuck is *this* shit, now?? Lol! It's the mental illness, luv :P Okay well fuck off. I can't stop thinking about what's gonna happen when I see my mom again. She still thinks I'm straight, for fuck's sake!
"Heeeeeyyyyy!!!!!" Salem whined, shaking Dirt by the shoulders. "Hello???? Have you been listening to ANYTHING I've been saying???"
"Huh? Yeah you said that Grooly's following your OnlyFans, I heard you, dude!" Dirt assured, cluelessly.
"Ummm and THEN I said that he was one of the FIRST people to buy a custom from me! Did you hear THAT part??" Salem asked, both a bit peeved that his excitement was going ignored but also concerned about his boyfriend.
"Oh! Sorry... I'm spacin'..." Dirt shook his head, "That's wild, bro! What did he get? Do I wanna know?" he chuckled.
Salem smirked, relief evidently washing over him as his shoulders relaxed and his ears perked forward. He proceeded to answer Dirt's question, an answer that made Dirt blush and was lewder than I will allow to be written here! Use your imagination ♥
"Woah..." Dirt blushed, and Salem giggled gayly.