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It takes six months for Bogo to take her half as seriously as she’d like him to – around then, she gets into the system, cracks a robbery, and decides she loves her neighbors, but is starting to grow out of her odd little box. Clawhauser is thrilled.
“You can live with me,” he says, and nearly falls over the edge of his desk. “I live so close. Jude. Judy-Jude.”
She avoids a wave of sprinkles and napkins and raises her paws in surrender. “Okay, okay. I’ll check it out tonight after my shift, sound good?”
“Sounds amazing,” he says, and hands her a bear claw.
Clawhauser is a little disappointed that she doesn’t really have much. Except photos. Judy has a lot of photos. Ever since she figured out that she could get them printed at the Pawgreens for chump change, basically, she’s been printing photos of her family and friends non-stop. So that’s really the first things that go up – strings running across the walls with photo after photo clipped to them, her smiling parents looking down at her, her siblings frozen in mid-wave.
“Okay, I take it back. That’s amazing.” Clawhauser peers at her collection. “You’re dedicated, Judester.” The endless swath of nicknames should be frustrated – they’re cloying, afterall, and only make sense half the time. But he’s so earnest, and he’s basically her only friend. “Do you have a Polaroar?”
“A…what?”
“Oh jeeze, Jude.” He goes into the hall closet and tugs out a little box and hands it to her. “Here. I never use it, it’s a present from an ex. A nice one, but you know.” He shrugs.
Judy turns the box over in her hands. “Oh!” She hops on one foot. “One of my uncles had one these when I was a kid.”
“They’re pretty great. You keep it.”
“Oh, Clawhauser—”
“Ben,” he says. “It’s Ben. We’re roomies now.”
“Ben. This is a really nice gift, but it’s yours—”
“No. It’s yours now.” He presses it closer to her. “Enjoy it, okay? Someone should.”
Moving that much closer to the station does a lot for Judy’s commute. So much so that the first morning after she’s finally all settled, she wakes up and showers and dresses and eats and is standing in front of the precinct – and realizes her shift doesn’t start for another hour. No way Bogo’s going to let her start that early, even if she’s itching for it.
ben: y r u gone already???????
judy: not used to the five minute commute lazy bones
ben: [coffee cup emoji]
judy: i made some silly
ben: no u need to go to java jag, across the street
Judy sighs and looks up, spotting the little patterned sign down the street.
judy: sure thing
He sends her his order, something that looks atrociously sweet, but so very Ben, and she shoulders open the door. It’s crowded, people crammed into little tables with cups of coffee and computers, headphones in their ears, a few businessmen having some impromptu meeting and arguing about app development. Judy queues up, looking over the menu. She just likes coffee, a little sweet, with a spot of cream.
When she finally gets up to the counter, she’s memorized Ben’s order, sorted her own, and looks up to find –
Teeth. Red. Bored expression, not typical, but could be threatening, could be something, could be –
Fox.
“Welcome to Java Jag,” he says. “What can we brew for you?”
“Um.”
He peers down at her, the muscle in his jaw twitching ever so slightly. “Ah, the esteemed ZPD,” he says. “We don’t do parallel ordering with the shop next door, I’ve told your cheetah friend a hundred times.”
“Oh.” Judy’s head finally clears. “No, I’m just here for coffee. For me. And my friend. Um.” Calm, stay calm, you’re okay, you’re the one who said—
“What’ll it be, bunny?”
“What?”
“I said, what’ll it be, bunny?”
Something about that rubs her the wrong way, but she presses on. “Okay. I need a venti caramel pop mocha latte cream, extra whip, with chocolate drizzle in the cup.”
The fox gags.
“This is for that cheetah, isn’t it?” He looks her up and down. “You don’t really seem his type.”
“I’m his roommate.”
The fox sighs and shrugs. “Okay, Clawhauser’s usual, and for you?”
“Small coffee. Sweetened. Bit of cream.”
“Wow. Opposites do attract.” He rings her up. “Nine-eighty-eight.”
“Nine-eighty-eight?”
“Well, cheetah’s order is, like, seven bucks. Leaving the rest of it to you.”
Judy groans, forks over a ten, and drops the change in the tip jar.
“Your twelve cents is appreciated, ma’am.” The fox pulls away from the register and goes back to flipping through his phone.
“This is amazing, Jude, thanks.”
“It’s so heavy,” she groans barely managing to get it up on his desk. “What’s in this?”
“Tiny bits of heaven,” he says wistfully. “Oh! Did you meet the fox?”
“Yeah, he knows you.”
“He’s a cutie and a half, am I right?”
Judy frowns. “I’m a rabbit, Ben. I’m not exactly primed to be attracted to foxes.”
“Well, whatever. Objectively, he’s handsome. Total bad boy, too. We used to have him in here all the time. I guess he cleaned up or something. Pretty well, too. Oooh, Millie made this, she’s the best one there, love that hippo.”
Judy sighs, waving over her shoulder and heading to her desk. “See you tonight, Ben.”
She shuffles into the elevator, glancing down at her cup, frowning.
There, on the side, is a little marker drawing of what must be her.
“Bunny,” it says, a few little arrows pointing toward her ears.
“Dumb fox,” she mutters, and angles the little sketch away.
“You’re back!”
“I am.” Judy shuffles closer to the counter.
“Hold on, I’ve got something for you.”
“What—” The fox comes around and puts a little stool in front of her.
“There.”
Judy scowls and kicks it out of the way. “I don’t need that.”
The fox shrugs. “Only trying to help. What’s the name on the small coffee?”
“Huh?”
“Your name. Didn’t need it last time. You had the cheetah’s order. Everyone knows it.”
“Oh.” She clears her throat. “It’s Judy.”
“Right.” He scribbles some letters on the cup.
“That’s not how you spell it.”
“It’s fine. Millie, here.” He turns back to her. “Two-eighty-eight. I’m Nick, by the way. But I know you just keep calling me “that fox” in your head.”
“I do not,” she says hotly.
“Oh, you totally do.” The fox – she cringes to herself – Nick leans forward and grins. “So, I hear you’re the first bunny on the force.”
“Rabbit. I am the first rabbit on the force.”
“Bunny, rabbit.” He shrugs.
“Judy? Judy, your small coffee, sweetened, just a bit of cream?”
Nick snaps his fingers. “Carrots. That’s what we’ll go with. Millie, thoughts?”
“Whatever Nicky.”
“Amazing,” he says. “Absolutely amazing.”
Judy rolls her eyes. “Goodbye.”
“Smell ya later, Carrots. Tell cheetah I said howdy.”
He keeps doodling on the side of her cup. Clawhauser thinks she should save them.
“I think he’s flirting with you.”
“Again. Rabbit—” She points to herself, then the cup. “Fox.”
He shrugs. “I guess I just don’t see the big deal, Jude. He’s cute, he obviously likes you—”
“He teases! All the time!”
“That’s, like, a thing, isn’t it?”
“It shouldn’t be,” she says hotly. “When we support the idea that males show their appreciation using aggressive tactics, we naturally contribute to a more violent culture at large.” She folds her arms over her chest. “I refuse to believe that a fox is…is…is hitting on me.”
“A fox is hitting on Judy?” McHorn comes into the staff lounge, tossing his coffee cup onto the counter and rummaging in the cabinet for filters. “That’s cute.”
Josie meanders in after him, trumpeting her agreement. “Well, you know what they say…what do they say?”
“Opposites attract.” Clawhauser sighs. “You’re like a character in a play. It’s so romantic.”
“I’m going back to my desk,” she says loudly, hopping down from the chair and bounding out of the room.
Ridiculous! Absolutely ridiculous! There’s no way, in any time or universe, that some sarcastic, eye-rolling, phone tapping fox has any sort of feelings or opinions whatsoever on her. That’s preposterous, and not at all what she needs right now. Her parents would freak! They’d flip the stand over racing into the city to drag her back by her ears. Absolutely not. She does not need, in any way shape or form –
Text me: 450-318-9924
“Oh, for the love of all that is green and good,” she mutters. A quick hand and a flick of the wrist is all it will take to toss the cup into the trash as she makes her way back to her desk. Really – that’s all she’d need.
Reflex, is what she’ll call it later – the thing that makes her tuck the cup closer to her chest, just under her arm, protecting it from herself.
Well, she thinks. It couldn’t hurt to think on it.
“You haven’t texted me.” Nick leans over the counter, pen stuck lazily behind his ear, paw reaching for her usual size cup.
“I’ve taken the notion under consideration.”
“She’s taken it under consideration, Millie.”
“Whatever Nicky.”
He jerks his head toward the hippo. “She’s invested. Small coffee? Sweetened? Bit of cream?”
“…Yes.”
“Perfect.” He scrawls her order on the side of the cup and slides it down the bar. “So. How’s it feel, being the tiniest animal in uniform?”
“It’s…” Not what I thought it was going to be. Sometimes a disappointment. Sometimes the worse. “Good.”
“Good.”
“Yeah. It’s good—”
“Carrots, small coffee, sweetened, bit of cream.”
“Did you seriously write carrots on my cup?”
Nick beams. “I seriously did.”
“Ugh.” She snatches up the cup and heads out the door.
“Text me!” he shouts after her.
Judy trudges in the precinct and to her desk. She has a mountain of paperwork to get through, foxes or not. McHorn walks by, peering at the cup.
“Fox left you his number.”
“Again?” Josie asks. “He’s into you, Jude.”
“Not interested.”
McHorn snorts. “What, because you’re a bunny?”
“No,” she says quickly. “I just…he’s not my…my type. Or something.”
“Cut her some slack,” Josie says. “I’m sure back home there’s not many foxes, am I right, Jude?”
“Yeah, just a few.”
Josie nods. “I went to school with a nice bun. His folks sent him into class with that fox repellent.” Judy’s hand gravitates to her side without thought. “Well, maybe it’ll take time. He’s a little rough around the edges.” She smiles. “You’re all fluff.”
She is alone in the house, and Ben is out on a date.
So.
She leaps.
judy: so this is me. texting you.
nick: this is excellent news. i’ve got my roommate’s van for the night let’s go out.
judy: it’s after eleven.
nick: and yet, here we are.
And yet.
He has his roommate’s van, and it’s…atrocious. Judy almost turns around and goes back inside – she was only going to text him, she wasn’t going to go out with him, what on this green earth would her mother think, what would her father say, what—
“Hey. Stop thinking about all the bad stuff and get in, if you feel like. No pressure.”
“You were the one who drove here in the van.”
“Yeah, but you said you wanted to go out.”
Judy sighs. She did, and she does.
He’s cute, right?
And she—
Well. She’s all fluff.
She kisses that fox, right there in the front seat of the ugliest van she’s ever seen. She kisses him and it’s two in the morning and she has to be at work in five hours, but it’s a good kiss and a nice kiss and all she can think is sly fox, nice fox, jeez I really like this fox.
“Is it too soon for a couple’s costume?”
“I haven’t considered it,” she says, not looking up from her book. He squeezes her feet before shifting on the couch, glancing over at her. “Are you considering it, Nicholas?”
“I’m always considering Halloween,” he says. “It’s my favorite day of the year. After my birthday. And after your birthday now, I guess.”
“You can like Halloween more than my birthday, Nick.”
“I knew there was a reason I liked you. How about Little Red Riding Bun and the big bad wolf?”
“Ugh.” She looks up at him. “Seriously? You want to go that direction?”
“What, it’s cute.”
She kicks his hand away. “I’ll think about it,” she says, three months before she dons the red hood and forces his ears under a moth-eaten wolf’s hat that droops over his eyes.
“Cute,” he says, and she kisses his nose.
The thing about dating a former criminal is that, sometimes, weird things happen. Weird things like he’s knocking on your door at three in the morning and your roommate is shouting from the other side of the house and you’re scrambling to unlock the door and in he falls, right on top of your feet, looking up at you like you hold the world in your hands.
And for him, maybe you do.
“Nick—”
“I, uh. Need to crash here. For the night.” Judy nods, stepping back and letting him stand, brushing his clothes. “If that’s alright.”
“It’ll have to be,” she says, and pulls him into her room. “You okay?”
“Huh? Me? Yeah. Finn got into some trouble, I had to bail.”
“Is he okay?”
“He’s solid. But I’ve…spent a lot of time cleaning myself up. Finn’s on the straight and narrow for the most part, but he gets into a bad spot now and then.”
Judy stiffens, hand frozen over the blanket. “Should I worry?”
“No.” He kisses the top of her head. “You shouldn’t.”
It’s meant to mollify, and to calm, but Judy goes to bed anxious and she doesn’t sleep well.
In the morning, she calls out of work, makes coffee and breakfast, and brings it to him in her bed.
“I think you and I should move in together,” she says softly, brushing her fingers over the tuft of fur between his eyes.
“So you can police me?”
“Don’t turn this into something it’s not, Nick. I’m trying to help.” She kisses his ear. “You came to me last night, remember?”
“Yeah,” he says. “I know. Is that oatmeal?” She nods, and he sits up and takes the bowl. “I don’t want to make my problems into your problems, Carrots. This isn’t something I deal with a lot.” She stares. “Alright, so it happens…frequently.”
“Nick.”
“It happens all the time,” he snaps. “You think it’s easy to take yourself out of that world? You live so long one way, thinking things might get better, and then you get the chance and you take it. But you’re still tied down, doesn’t matter how hard you fight it.”
She shifts closer to him. “You know I know that feeling.”
Nick freezes over his oats, setting the spoon down and nearly knocking the entire tray off the bed as he kisses her.
“I do,” he says. “I really do.”
Ben is absolutely crying as he sets the only box he could manage to carry through the tears on the floor of Judy’s new apartment.
“I’ll miss you,” he says.
“I live down the street,” she soothes, and lets him wrap her in a bone-crushing hug. “And I’ve got an in on the coffee.”
“Coffee that you’ll be paying for,” Nick mutters, dropping the last box into the living room. “Thanks for your help, cheetah.”
“Oh, any time, you just call.”
“Yeah.” Nick stretches, wincing as something cracks. “I’ll be sure to do that.”
Ben sniffs. “Goodbye, Judy.”
“I’ll see you Monday, Ben.”
“I know, I can’t believe we’re going to go back to just being work friends.” He blows his nose into an enormous handkerchief. “It’s terrible.”
They stand together and watch him from their spots on the window seat. Jude wipes the sill. “Needs dusting.”
“Can’t you just beat it down with your ears?”
“I can’t, actually. It’s like you don’t even know me.” He chuckles, yanking her forward and into his lap. “So, Mr. Wilde. What now?”
“Well. We have a grand total of eleven boxes between us.” He shrugs. “Sooner we unpack—” He tickles her sides, and she howls with laughter. “Right.” He reaches for one of her boxes, dragging it over with his foot. “Let’s see what secrets you have here.” Nick digs through the box while Judy lazes on his shoulder, not really paying attention. “Is this…a Polaroar?”
“Oh!” She sits up. “Clawhauser gave this to me. I completely forgot.”
“Ugh, he was feeding your photo addiction?”
“Yes.” She stands, lifting the camera. “Hey, Nick.”
He looks up, and she snaps a photo.
“Hey!” He makes a grab for it. “I wasn’t ready!”
“Too slow, fox!”
He growls and she runs down the hall, camera in hand.
“You asked for it, bunny.” With a laugh, he takes off, and it’s alright that he catches her, pinning her down on the bedroom floor and pressing his nose to hers. The roll over, hold the camera high, and take their first picture together in their brand new place.
It feels…momentous, in its own sort of way.
“You know,” Judy says. “You should probably meet my folks.”
“Baby steps, Carrots.” Nick sits up, takes another photo, and grins. “Baby steps.”