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⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀┋ P3: THE FELINE SPY ┋
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When he had finally reached the entrance to his school, he prepared to catch his breath for a moment. His breathing was labored, but his face was red, which even he couldn't explain why; most likely stress.
His breathing continued a little more agitated for a while longer as he talked to the school's doorman, who fortunately was in good spirits and allowed him to enter the university.
A few steps inside, Jhon could appreciate the huge university he was looking at in front of him: a beautiful structure of two five-story buildings with red and white walls and a giant university logo on the roof of each.
Before anything else, he sought out the nearest restrooms to wash his face several times. She needed to recover from what had happened, and get rid of all the cat hair that had stuck to her.
He shook the hair out of his uniform and drank some of the water from the spout, taking advantage of the liquid soap next to him to freshen up better and look better in front of his classmates and teacher, who would most likely tease him for his late arrival to class.
Once calmer, he made his way to his classroom, feeling uncomfortable the whole way as he didn't see any other person in the hallways; it was obvious, everyone must have already been taking notes of what the teachers were dictating. He needed to catch up fast by asking someone for the notes.
But who?
The further he advanced to his classroom, climbing the stairs to the third floor, he became nervous as he remembered that he didn't know anyone at the university. If he had to ask a classmate for notes, he would probably already have the image of someone irresponsible, so he had to do his best not to stand out so much in class and do his best not to show how nervous he really was.
Once he opened the classroom door, everyone turned to look at him; all noise ceased for a moment and the awkwardness set in.
<
He could only say that in his mind, as someone whispered to him to hurry past. With his hair standing on end, he looked around for who was speaking to him, managing to see a dark red haired girl pointing to an empty seat next to him.
Again, the same girl whispered for him to sit next to her as she motioned for him to pass quickly. No one noticed his gestures because he was the center of attention, so he trusted the girl's suggestion and walked towards her, but someone raised their voice in front of him.
"You're late... Jhon."
He was soon paralyzed with fear again, turning to see his teacher, who was looking at him in annoyance.
"If you're going to be so suddenly and late for my class, at least have the decency to introduce yourself and apologize properly!" he demanded.
Jhon nodded immediately, swallowing saliva again at having to speak in front of everyone, who didn't look away. He began to worry even if he had something wrong with his face that made him look so weird. He was sure that no one knew what had happened to him that morning, so his mind began to wander in hypotheses, until the professor called his attention again and he answered.
"I-I'm Jhon, I'm new to the class. And... also in the city. I was really late coming because I got lost in the streets. Seriously, I'm sorry, it won't happen again."
As best he could, he struggled to come up with a good excuse. He needed to clear things up somehow without revealing something that would get him branded as crazy, to which he turned his gaze back to the professor to see if he could sit down now. He nodded silently, and they all quietly turned back to the classroom, little by little.
Jhon let out a relieved sigh and looked for a seat again, however, the girl from just now had not stopped making her gestures over and over again. She was a very energetic girl, Jhon noticed.
He ended up accepting the invitation not wanting to look for another seat as well as not wanting to interrupt someone who was concentrating. He approached the girl and smiled gratefully at her for the support.
The girl smiled back as she wrote down what the professor was dictating in class.
The situation had gotten a bit complicated, but it seemed that he was not going to get into too much trouble. Although her body was calm now that everything was over, she didn't trust that during the recess she would be inundated with questions.
The most he could do was to grab his pencil and notebook to start taking notes of what the professor dictated; and, perhaps, take advantage of his first approach with the girl to ask for her notes.
<
The girl noticed his gaze and gestured him to keep quiet during class, but he whispered to her:
"I need... to borrow your notes later, please. I promise to get them back to you quickly" he asked politely, to which she thought for a moment, looked at the rest of her classmates, and then nodded.
Jhon could be calmer for a while and he calmed down once and for all.
His attention was fully returned to the class and he made sure that nothing would distract him. Nothing, absolutely nothing.
Not even the huge cat identical in face to his childhood friend who had become affectionate with this one after invading his house in the middle of the night.
Of course she couldn't help thinking about that, she claimed to herself.
With her eyes closed, she took a moment to quietly wake herself up. He grabbed his cheeks and tapped them lightly, then checked on his other companions.
The way things were going, he would most likely not understand the classes if he had his mind full of muddled thoughts. But, in his case, it was totally normal.
He just had to get something to calm him down from anxiety, and try to momentarily forget what he had seen.
But, the more time passed, the more the minutes became eternal, and Jhon began to sweat more and more from his nerves. Not only because he didn't understand any of the class, even though he was trying so hard to understand it, but also because he was beginning to recapitulate his childhood adventures with his friend, and events that never happened when he replaced the image of his friend with the six-foot feline in his house.
She clenched her hands into fists and, lucky for her, the recess bell rang. Her notes were a mess and much more than she had understood.
However, and through it all, the girl next to him had noticed it all. Her worrying, fretting and fidgeting throughout the class.
This one closed her notebook and handed it to him, handing it over with a sweet smile.
"Here, catch up. Don't worry, if you don't understand something I'll help you understand it, as long as you put in some of your effort too, okay?"
Jhon turned to see her, somewhat dumbfounded, and after receiving the notebook he watched as she got up to leave the classroom until recess was over.
And without further ado, and as a couple of minutes passed in which Jhon tried to wake up from his silly trance, the whole room became empty.
As he shook his head, his thoughts with the feline vanished, and his face burned a reddish hue. She licked her lips, noticing that even her lips had dried out. Something was most likely wrong.
He looked around once more and opened the notebook, starting to read through all the notes first to get a quick idea of the topics that went by while he was gone.
With the calm silence of the class he was fortunately able to concentrate better, and thanks to that, it didn't take him long to catch up thanks to his quick prose.
However, the class had not yet returned.
It seemed like everyone knew the place a little better than he did despite the fact that they were all new to the university. Maybe and he had even missed some previous class or event that everyone participated in and he forgot to schedule it.
If that were the case, it would explain a lot.
Jhon stretched out his arms and looked at the window, where he had a brown striped cat staring at him from the window.
He was petrified at the same moment, watching as it didn't look away from him.
Jhon shook his head, touching his hair to calm himself. He was already having a problem believing the cats had something against him. He was a cat lover, and yesterday he had given tuna to some, so it was normal that some would look at him from time to time.
So, to calm down and breathe easier, he made his way to the bathroom, leaving the classroom.
With some curiosity, and just when he came out of the door, he went a little inside to see if the brown feline was still there.
Sure enough, it had disappeared.
Jhon set his mouth like a line, doubting what it all meant, however, he continued walking.
He followed the straight path down the hallway, trying to locate any signage that would tell him where the bathroom would be. He didn't want to go back to the second floor to simply wash his face, so for the moment he ruled it out of his options.
She walked a little further, turning a corner in the corridor, looking out of the corner of the window at her side.
Where, with a leap, the same brown cat perched to see him.
Jhon stood still, and began to walk forward, watching as the cat in turn prepared to jump.
However, she took several steps back as if to retrace her steps, and watched as the cat jumped in the other direction.
She took advantage of the moment to run and look for a quick bathroom to get into, now really feeling like going to the bathroom for real.
There were signs for various things, passing two dining halls, but without a clue to a bathroom.
At each corner of the corridors there were windows, and next to these was a giant space where the air entered and served as an alcove between the walls of the corridors to illuminate the classrooms and give natural sunlight to the students.
To his luck, he managed to hear how, behind him, a couple of girls were talking about going to the bathroom.
<
However: he would look like a stalker if he followed them. So he had to follow their footsteps carefully.
"Meoooou!"
He turned to look to his side, and the cat was standing on the small wall that served as an alcove in his hallway.
He tried to walk to the side, watching as the cat's gaze kept chasing him.
"Why are you following me...?" he asked the cat, ready to bolt. However, his urge to go to the bathroom was intensifying and the girls were already leaving.
"Meoou."
No answers, clearly.
He looked from side to side for his escape options and, gritting his teeth, took the option of running away to escape the cat without involving the girls in it.
<
In front of him, the same dark red haired girl appeared, who greeted him cordially, but who was ignored as the boy ran past her to continue running from the cat that was now chasing him jumping from tree to tree with totally immense leaps due to the distance between the branches of each one.
Jhon began to cross glances with several people, and with all his strength, he stopped after holding on to the corner of a wall, avoiding falling.
He looked out the window beside him and the cat was there.
This was already driving him crazy.
"Your first day of school and you're already making a giant commotion!"
The voice of a girl behind him startled him, who squeezed his shoulder while holding a smile.
It was the same girl from before. Just the same one.
"W-What...? How come... you're here?"
"You turned the whole floor upside down."
"What?"
Jhon looked at the neighboring halls of where he stood, realizing that from what she was telling him he was right.
"My name is Emi. It's a pleasure." However, despite her tender and welcoming smile, her hands clenched tightly in the boy's palm, who tried to pull his hand away in vain. "Next time you see me... greet me cordially, yes?"
"Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes!" he commented repeatedly, until she finally let go of his hand.
Jhon caught his breath and rubbed his hands together, blowing on them and looking around to see if the cat was still spying on him.
"Your name is Jhon, right? The professor pronounced it recently in class."
"Ah, yes... my name is Jhon." he commented himself, looking everywhere for where the feline might have been hiding.
Because, no matter where he looked, it was gone.
"What kept you going from place to place? You looked like you were running away from someone. Were you being chased by some bullying?" his soft and gentle attitude soon returned, feeling a shock of feelings for Emi at that moment.
Despite this, Jhon quickly shook his head.
"No, no... It's just... I just want to find the bathroom urgently." he confessed to her, largely telling her the truth.
"And why didn't you ask me? I know the school inside out."
Holding up his thumb and jerking it back, he gestured for her to follow him. Emi waved to a few classmates walking past her, while Jhon tried to do the same, somewhat awkwardly.
"How do you know the...-?"
"Let's not talk about it, go on, hurry up!"
Socializing was not his forte... in fact, he had just realized he had almost zero experience with it.
Paranoid, he kept looking everywhere for the brown cat, but there was no sign of it.
They walked up to the second floor and turned a couple of times, until they pointed to the bathroom, now in front of him.
"See?"
Jhon looked up in better spirits and thanked Emi with much enthusiasm, who told him that if he liked he would wait for him outside and take guard.
"No... That's not necessary. I know how to get back to the classroom."
"You sure?"
Jhon headed for one of the bathrooms quickly. He went in and shortly after came out, washing his face with a large splash of water.
However, and just in case, he soaked ten more times.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa, what's wrong?"
When he looked up, Jhon could see Emi more than confused, terrified.
"... I have a... fever" she excused herself.
The girl was silent, her mouth half open.
"I'll go... fast forward. I'll see you in the classroom."
"I left your notes in my folder, thank you so much for the help."
"You already wrote them so fast!"
After that, he didn't hear her voice again for quite a while.
To her luck, there was no one in the bathrooms, so she took her time to rest.
And just as he rested, he also overthought.
He was sure that what had happened to him was no hallucination. He had even heard the feline's meow and everything.
After catching his breath he set off again to the classroom, if not before hearing the meow behind him again.
"Meoou!"
There was a window in the bathroom, next to a tree with a branch extending far enough for this one to pass through.
The cat's voice made him turn sharply, finding the feline right on the windowsill. Jhon stared at it, puzzled by its constant presence.
"W...What are you doing here?" he muttered, waiting for an answer from the cat, who simply stared at him, as if he understood every word.
He decided to put aside the strangeness for a moment and hurry back towards the classroom. He moved quickly through the halls, trying to ignore the presence of the cat that seemed to be following him.
As he entered the classroom, he noticed that the next class had already begun. A few classmates glanced sideways at him as they took notes and the professor continued with his explanation. Jhon tried to go unnoticed as he made his way to his seat, but the professor's gaze found him immediately.
"Late again, Jhon?" the teacher said with a raised eyebrow, still writing on the board without wasting time.
Jhon nodded without looking up, chagrined, feeling the stares of his classmates fall on him. He felt as if everyone was judging him for being late twice in one day. The pressure was overwhelming him.
The class went slowly, with Jhon trying to concentrate on the notes Emi had lent him. He was trying to keep up with the pace of the class, but his thoughts wandered between the professor's explanations and the strange appearance of the cat.
A cat that was still keeping watch now back in the branches of the tree at the beginning, behind the window.
When the bell rang signaling the end of class, Jhon breathed a sigh of relief. He stood up quickly, put away his notes and headed for the door, looking for a moment of peace.
"Jhon!"
Shortly after crossing the door, he turned to see a voice stopped him in his tracks. It was Emi, who was waiting for him outside the classroom.
"Y...Yes?" he replied, trying to hide his nervousness.
This one gave a thumbs up as before, pointing to the cafeteria on his classroom floor.
"Let's go get a drink, my treat."
The dread quickly left his body, and he nodded with a big smile, blessing the girl's kindness to his heart.
Emi and Jhon headed towards the cafeteria, walking down the halls as they chatted about simple things, trying to lighten the tension of the day. Jhon felt more relaxed in Emi's company, her friendly personality and laid back attitude were comforting.
Once in the cafeteria, they were met with a bustle of students chatting and laughing. Emi instructed Jhon to order whatever he wanted while she looked for a table. Jhon walked up to the counter and ordered a coffee and a slice of chocolate cake, his favorite.
When he got to the table, he saw that Emi had already found a spot near the window. She sat down and took a sip of her coffee, feeling the warm liquid comfort her exhausted body.
Emi smiled and began to tell some amusing anecdotes of her college experiences so far. Jhon got caught up in her enthusiasm and soon found himself laughing and sharing his own stories as well.
"I must admit, your encounter with the cat in the bathroom was quite peculiar," Emi joked.
Jhon froze again.
"You saw it too!"
"For a few brief moments... Do you have a phobia of it?"
About to answer something, Jhon noticed the cat, now from outside the window, staring at him.
"Yeah... Let's just say yes. That cat was literally everywhere today...", Jhon replied laughing nervously, trying not to worry or confuse Emi, "It seems it doesn't want to let me out of its sight."
"Really?" asked Emi, to which Jhon pointed at the cat, who for a few moments Emi managed to see before it bolted from its 'hiding place'.
Emi turned back to the window and let out a soft laugh. "It looks like this cat really has an interest in you, John. But... He's very shy. Just like you, maybe."
Jhon smiled with amusement. "I'm not shy. I'm just... nervous about the whole thing. It's...complicated. Besides... it looks like that cat is trying to tell me something... though I have no idea what it could be."
As they continued their animated chat, the cat remained outside, watching them with a cold stare.
"We should give this cat a name if it's going to keep showing up," Emi suggested.
"Oh, you're right... How about... 'Coffee'?" proposed Jhon, looking at the cat, who arched his body angrily, avoiding looking at him again.
"I love it! 'Coffee' is perfect," agreed Emi enthusiastically.
Laughing and joking, Jhon and Emi enjoyed their time together in the coffee shop, momentarily ignoring the mysteries surrounding the mysterious cat named Shadow.
Thanks to the hospitality of his new friend, Jhon was able to relieve himself for the rest of the class.
By the end of the class, they said their goodbyes and Emi took a bus home, while Jhon decided to take a cab home, mostly so he wouldn't run into the brown cat on the way home.
After paying the cab fare, he looked up at the sky, catching a glimpse of a beautiful sunset. Jhon closed his eyes tightly, knowing what he would see next as he entered his house....
After paying the cab fare, he looked up at the sky, catching a glimpse of a beautiful sunset. Jhon closed his eyes tightly, knowing what he would see next as he entered his house....
But he was calmer now. Emi had helped him calm his worries a bit even though they hadn't talked about it at all, so whatever it was that was still inside his house, he would stand up to it and chase it out.
He walked over to the doorknob and turned it.
"Meou!"
Jhon turned his head back, seeing the brown cat beside him.
Without noticing, the door to his house ended up opening on its own, leaving in view, after turning his head back, an image he would never forget.
The giant black feline, who was still in his house, was tucked into a tight box, with a green collar on.
"...Meowww..."
"Meou."
Their reaction was the same as the brown cat's as soon as they saw her, and between the three of them, they stood in silence, letting the brown cat pass through out of inertia, then closing the door and throwing her backpack aside.
"What... What's going on?"
"Meooowww..." meowed the feline, chagrined.