Snickers decided to call the rat Anadil and that's what he told her during their first meeting.
The rat looks up at Snickers with wide, black eyes, sniffing. The cat had never approached her so she didn't think she had much to fear from it. In a fight, she had a feeling the cat would win, so she turned around to run.
Snickers grabbed his new friends tail and the rat came to a sharp halt. She tried to tug away but the paw and almost-claw holding onto her was tight.
Snickers said behind her: "didn't you hear me? I'm going to name you Anadil."
Pausing her fight against the brute behind her, the rat turned back toward the cat and he let her go, licking his paw, probably to show that he was no threat. The rat was wary but relaxed the smallest bit. Before her mother died, she was told not to trust cats or any other animals but her kind. She'd learned to only trust spiders because they didn't bother her and ate the bugs crawling around her living space.
The cat spoke again: "so do you talk? I said I want to name you Anadil."
"I heard," the rat replied, causing Snickers to stand up straighter in taut surprise. The voice he had heard was small and high pitched but she was able to form words like any other animal he had spoken to, not that he had spoken to many.
"So..." said the great orange cat. "I'm snickers."
The rat narrowed its beady little eyes. "I know."
They sat in silence for a moment and the rat turned away.
"Wait!" Snickers said and the rat halted. "Can I call you Anadil?" He thought it would be nice to ask permission before calling her the name he made up. He was pretty sure it was the name his humans had mentioned quite frequently though he never knew the direct source of it.
"Why would you call me Anadil? Call me Rat. Humans call me it though I'd rather you not call me anything." The rat began to scuttle away. Snickers ran to catch her but this time, Rat's tail slipped between his claws. He guessed he would have to wait her out. She'd come out sooner or later.
That would be sooner. Not long after their very short conversation, Rat came out of her hole to the outside world. She assumed Snickers wouldn't bother her again. She was wrong.
"That didn't take long." Meowed a voice behind her.
Rat jumped a centimeter off the ground in surprise and it's fur lurched into the air. Out of instinct, Snickers fur stood on end as well, only the tips of his paws touching the ground before quickly going back to the "I'm no threat" pose, licking his paw.
Rat lowered herself down as well and decided to finish their conversation from before. "Why would you call me Anadil?" The rat asked.
"Do you have any other name?" Asked Snickers, curious.
"I have Rat."
"That's not a name."
"It's what I'm called," Rat taunts.
"But it's not your name." Snickers says, matter-of-fact.
"But it is."
"But it's not."
"Why does it even matter to you?" Rat asked, exasperated by the argument. The truth is, Rat never had need for a name. Why would someone without relatives need something so trivial?
"Because." Snickers says.
"Because... why?" Rat was just about to turn around and leave, ignoring the nervous expression of the cat. There was no point in staying when there isn't even a reason for the topic of conversation and if there is, then why isn't the cat telling her? Useless.
"I want a friend." The cat says, looking down, his tail flicking at the tip, wrapped around his body.
Silence pressed on.
"What's a friend?" Rat asked slowly, afraid it means "next meal". She didn't want to be eaten by this lazy batch of orange fur.
The cat looks as if it just got caught doing something it shouldn't be.
Rat repeated the question. Snickers answered her, confused: "a friend is a... friends play games and, uh, sleep beside each other, um, share food and water... they do other stuff but I don't know what it is yet cause I've never had a friend before now. We are friends, right? Oh, and friends talk about stuff, like we're doing now."
Rat thought it would be a good idea to have a friend of her own but not another species. Why couldn't the one asking to be her friend be another rat? Then they could talk about stuff they have in common. All her and this cat could do is talk about things they don't have in common. And how would they even talk at all with each of them sharing the awkward trait?
"We could do a trial run. One day of being my friend and if you don't like it, we can go back to the lives we had before we met. Deal?"
Hesitating, but knowing it'll be the only way to get Snickers off her back, they touched tails. 🐈