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_ ** Amazing Peter fan art by :iconBuckSaber: - thank you for your generous contribution!** _

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Hehhey, and welcome to the Hockey Hunk!

Season 4 is still well on its way, and I am glad to say that I feel very inspired, and pleased about my current plans for the short-term and the long term plotting of this tale - with all the twists and turns you can expect, of course! It is amazing to think that the story still has such a pull, 2 years after is very modest beginnings. But that's how it tends to go, anyway. The more fanfare, the...more dissonance. *chuckle* Or so it seems to me. I might be overtly pessimistic. But I am optimistic about presenting this chapter to you, and as always, I hope for your feedback!

Have a nice read!

*

Blargh.

My tail was practically sweeping the floor behind me as I took the final few shuffling steps and reached Peter's door, a beacon of hope and peace in this seemingly never-ending stormy sea of today.

I yawned and dug into my pocket for my keys, and yawned some more. It'd really taken the juices out of me today, it felt like, this combination of a Cobb attack, the overbearing presence of Alex, the cold splash of water that was Marge's mood after Bonnie appeared, and maybe with a little helping of an all too attractive Haakon giggling over big penises with his best buddy and best-something Mason.

What is a little lion to do, trapped in the middle of all that, I wonder?

Well, obviously...

...the door opened with a click...

...I was going to gossip!

"Hello!" I called out as I shuffled into the aseptic hall of Peter's apartment, closed to door shut, and proceeded towards the little table that held paw wash and disinfectant to soak myself with in order to make myself acceptable for Peter's hygiene standards.

"ROWREEH!" Peter's voice echoed from somewhere within the apartment, probably the bedroom.

I soused my paws with the bad-smelling stuff and rubbed them vigorously together to get it all over my paws and evenly onto the furs so that my skin would get a treatment as well, and then shook them a little in the hopes of making the alcohol-based stuff evaporate more quickly. That sue felt cool.

"HOW'RE YOU?" I hollered out in the hopes of making some little chit-chat before I went out to seek the cougar.

"AAAALRIGHT!"

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Well that was a bonus, I thought, satisfied with my paws for now, which meant that I would have to do my tail yet, or Peter would feel displeasure at my sloppy behaviour. I didn't want that. I just wanted a nice warm meal, a hot shower, a curl up on couch, some TV and Peter-banter, and then preferably a nice Facebook chat with Victor. The thought of that caused a few extra flutters in my belly...if only because I would probably have to tell about the incident at work today.

Goddamnit. I've no idea how he managed to pull that one off and not leave smouldering ruins of a lion behind him. Only more of a "almost shit his pants" kind of a lion, perhaps...well...yes...maybe...

"THAT'S GREAT!" I quipped back.

"DINNER READY SOON!" Peter replied from the beyond.

That made my ears perk a little. I had smelled something cooking when I entered, but the application of solvents had really made my nose full of other kind of scents that really obscured everything else away.

"YAAAY!" I purred, happy that at least some things were going well.

I finished applying the spray to my tail and shook it a little to make the tuff puff out a little. It glistened with the bad-smelling stuff, but I knew it'd be alright, soon. That shower I planned to take would take care of any residue, which was nice. I felt ready now, and wandered into the apartment, past the kitchen door arch with even nicer smells floating from there, the very neat living room, and then through the partially open door into the master bedroom.

Peter was sitting cross-legged on the bed, surrounded by items scattered all over the bedspread. He had pulled off one of the drawers from the chest of drawers by the window and placed it onto the bed, and then, it seemed, he had proceeded to unload its contents for whatever purpose he had in mind. He was currently fondling some sort of a plastic packet in his paws, turning it around and looking at it. I recognized what it was, certainly, having seen all too many over the years, one of the plastic IV bags he would hook up the terrible tube poking out of his belly, to drain murky fluid from within his abdominal cavity that would carry the toxins away from his body, his kidneys unable to sort it out the normal pee route.

"You still keep those around?" I asked as I stepped closer and remained standing by the bed, to watch the cougar surrounded by the collected memorabilia of his years of illness, now spread over the bedspread in a strange collection of sorts.

"Must've forgotten it, I had so many spares," Peter snuffled as he gave the wrapped item another look before he stuffed it into a black plastic that was bulging with what I presumed were the discarded portion of the items he had discovered so far to be useless.

"You did keep well stocked with fluids and stuff," I mused as I carefully sat onto the edge of the bed without risking letting any of the stuff fall, "though most of this is newer, isn't it..."

I grabbed something on a whim, the black and metal shape of the stethoscope that sat near Peter's knee on a coil. I let it dangle from my paw and observed the oddly out of place item with mild curiosity. It was one of the less weird items, all told, though. I could recognize the strange plastic bag with a mask attached, which Peter had told me how to use, in case he suddenly stopped breathing, and a very curious-looking item that I knew was used to measure the oxygen content in your blood as well as your pulse, with a little clip you attached to your ear, and then three was the sealed plastic box which I knew to contain the most outrageous item of them all, Peter's automatic defibrillator.

"Yeah," Peter commented as he watched me play with the rubbery stethoscope, and he let out a moderate snuffle. "I got most of this stuff after George and I started seeing each other. Seemed...like a good idea, you know? That I could do something to help if he started feeling unwell..."

"I remember," I smiled a little, determined not to let the mood drop, even with the mention of George. I realized that this was as much a trip down the memory lane as it was an attempt to make a bit more room into his sock drawer. This stuff had meaning to it, through its associate with George, and that had to be respected. "I kept wondering whether all this stuff was really legal..."

"I bought it all from Amazon, I presume it is," the cougar replied with a slightly crooked smile as he picked up another plastic-wrapped package, which I saw contained a massive syringe. "Hmmm...don't think I need this either..."

"That was for flushing the port, isn't it?" I recalled the sinister-looking item's use.

"Yeah," he said.

"You had masks and gloves for that," I said as I put the stethoscope carefully down back into the wooden drawer, next to plastic-wrapped packets of sterile gauze Peter probably had deemed to be worth saving. "You made me wear them if I helped."

"Staph A is a motherfucker," Peter replied simply, "and you know that I keep them in the living room, for easy access, even now."

"Right," I nodded, recalling the boxes that stood on the little table next to the TV remote. "In case of surprise visitors."

"Exactly!" Peter said as he put the now obsolete syringe into the trash bag.

"There's a lot of stuff here..."I commented again, looking at what I thought to be more useful for stocking a small clinic, "...and this, too..."

I picked up the black Velcro-covered blood pressure cuff that was connected into a small white plastic box by a tube, and gave it a look under Peter's attentive gaze. He snuffled.

"Well I use that one every day, because I have to keep an eye of my health, of course," he said, "I mark it all up every day."

"I know you do," I noted.

"That's a spare, though," he said as I carefully rolled the cuff and the tube around the plastic box, wanting to be at least a little helpful, "I've got that neat new one right here..."

He pointed at the bedside table, and I nodded.

"I recall," I said, having seen it in use plenty of times.

"George thought I was going a bit overboard with these," Peter waved his paw over the assorted resuscitation equipment, "but I thought it was just a reasonable precaution...all things considered."

My stomach fluttered again, but I kept up a steady, gentle, little smile, and nodded.

"Well it's all very useful," I said, "now, too, when you have to monitor your health and all that..."

"At least there is that," Peter replied in a low voice that I couldn't really analyse much to my liking. Sometimes he kept a lot hidden, after all...I knew enough of that, too, and knew not to push. That wouldn't do him good. He might crack, and he hated when that happened. I didn't want to bring an episode of depression up, not with an ill-placed comment. Maybe going through stuff he had bought with helping George in mind was what he needed to do now to keep it all together.

"Looks like you've been really busy, then," I noted, "getting up to cleaning the drawer and all that."

"Well I was looking for some spare batteries I thought I might have here, and I found that this whole drawer was a mess and I didn't have anything better to do..." he rumbled.

"Sounds like a good way to pass the time," I said, "useful, too..."

I felt a bit lame, but maybe it was enough to say. Maybe he'd agree. I wasn't sure.

"Yeah," the cougar muttered. "Lots of old junk here I no longer need."

I still wasn't sure what all this meant.

"Well, at your day wasn't as exciting as mine was," I huffed, letting my ears do some talking, too.

"Oh?" Peter stated.

I gave him a rambling account of everything that happened today - Haakon, COBB, Bonnie, the nagging that ensued, even mentioned the sudden appearance of Alex...while Peter listened attentively, gave me the occasional nod, and the odd chuckle, before I finally finished, feeling flustered and...a bit relieved, too, now that it was all out there. Peter surely had gotten an earful...Victor might get another, of course, but now I was feeling a bit better about the squirming in my stomach that hadn't subsided ever since things started going mad.

"Well, well, then," Peter mused, scratching his perpetually itchy arm, "sounds like Mister Holden has proven himself again to be a pawful..."

"It was awful," I grunted, "Both Victor and I had told him not to come, because we told him I might feel strange about it, but there he was..."

"Maybe that's exactly what he wanted to do," Peter proposed.

"Make me feel weird?" I asked him.

"He seems to like testing you for some reason," the cougar stated, "maybe this was another test."

I puffed out my cheeks and let out a deep, hissing breath.

"I thought Victor had made quite clear to him that he can take care of himself and doesn't need his brother's help when it comes to those he associates with," I stated, using pretty much the same words Victor himself had while giving him that talk. Peter had heard a part of it, too, considering that he had joined the Holdens and me for some refreshments at Victor's place after our infamous rendezvous at the park. He'd had...interesting time, Peter had told me afterwards.

"Maybe he doesn't take it seriously, then," Peter suggested, "maybe he somehow doesn't understand how uncomfortable he makes you sometimes. Or maybe he just enjoys making you uncomfortable..."

"I think that Jacob Holden is a lot of things but I can't think of him being....uhm..." I rubbed my chin, thoughtfully, as the image of a goofily smiling Cobb Holden wearing an apron and ONLY an apron floated past my frame of mind, "...mean...eh...obnoxious, sure, but...a bully..."

"He doesn't seem the type, no," Peter nodded, "At least from what I can tell."

"I know!" I huffed, probably sounding miserable. "He seems nice, in his own way, but then he ends up doing something he definitely shouldn't have done, and he probably knows he did the wrong thing but..."

"I suppose he could have forgotten that he was banned from the store..."

"I find that a bit improbable," I grunted.

Peter swiped my side with his tail and snerked.

"Or maybe he's getting back to his brother through you, somehow," he said, "I think he enjoys getting his brother all riled up over small things...this Victor of yours has a temper."

Well, Peter was right there.

"He sure does," I replied, my ears dropping as I thought about all the examples I had seen over the past couple of months, including our mega argument.

"But it's of the hot and passionate kind," Peter winked, "It comes up hot and hard, and sizzled out eventually..."

"And he knows how to use it," I replied.

Peter elbowed me.

"Sounds kinky," he said.

"No," I snuffled, though not without a smile, "I meant, he knows how to argue. He knows how to vent things out eventually. He knows how to deal with it. He's not like...not like Graham."

Definitely not like Graham. The leopard could only do as much as make a few faces, shrug, and rumble placating words to me that were meant to make me feel better, and that also seemingly made his misbehaviour more acceptable, by pointing out the foibles of my own behaviour, and telling me that it was alright...as if I was the one who needed to apologize, not him...he who wanted to give me all the freedom in the world.

Fuck. Immature lions with immature leopards make for immature relationships. No wonder it crashed and burned.

"I can tell as much," Peter took me out of the reverie with his words.

"So unlike Graham," I repeated with conviction.

"Indeed," Peter mused.

We were quiet for a brief moment before Peter picked up the black trashcan and smacked my side with it. I let out a startled rumble, and Peter snuffled.

"Come on," he said, "the food must be ready by now. I don't want that chicken to go all crusty."

"Can I help with laying the table?" I asked.

"If you want to," Peter said.

*

Well, the food was delicious. Peter had cooked the chicken breast with some cheese, and definitely made a great filling for my hungry tummy. Peter ate his usual small portion, with plenty of little sips of water, and had mostly salad on his plate. We only talked this and that...such as the sheer embarrassment of Cobb buying that muscle boat magazine and loudly announcing how his gay brother would probably like seeing the pictures of buff, shirtless boatsmen in it. That got a good chuckle out of Peter, even if he was playing with his salad with his fork, while I had already devoured almost all of the food on my plate.

"No appetite?" I asked once that had gone on for some time. "Is it the drugs?"

Peter's fiddling came to a grinding halt.

"No, it's not the drugs," he replied.

I didn't really want to voice the next thought that came to mind, the next most obvious cause for his lack of enjoyment from his meal. Maybe the sadness had a stronger hold of him today. Perhaps the browsing through the stuff had meant more than I had quite realized yet.

"Alright," I said, to give the initiative over to him.

Peter put his fork down onto a neatly folder paper napkin on the table, folded his paws together, and pursed his lips.

"I think you should move out, Rory."

I couldn't do anything but look at him, across the table. Peter kept his gaze steady on me, and his lips barely moved when he spoke. I could see the tension all over his body. I was tensing, too.

"Peter..."

He let out a grunt.

"For both our sake," his paws clenched together hard.

"Peter..."

"Don't Peter me," he shook his head briefly.

My tail smacked against the floor, my body tense and annoyed, as much as my mind was puzzled over this sudden remark...so matter of fact.

"What's wrong?" I asked. "Did I..."

"You're good now," he said," you're well now. You can take care of yourself, and you should. I have done all I can now. You should go home."

I just stared at him. His voice was kinda thin, and it certainly sounded like it wasn't easy for him to say any of this, and...who knows how long he'd been thinking about this, letting the idea grow and making it....making him feel all kinds of terrible in the process, I suspected.

"Peter..."

"I fixed you up," he said quietly, "I've done all I can for you now, and you have to go back to your normal life."

"This is my normal life," I gasped.

"No it's not," Peter snapped. "It's not normal me either."

"If I'm a burden..." I said.

"No," Peter said. "I am."

I yelped.

"But you're not! You never were!"

"I always am," he said, his arms now moving so that he was practically hugging himself while he looked at me, tense and offish, "and...and I can't let myself fall into a trap..."

"A trap?" I made a face.

"I've only barely begun to hold myself together again," Peter said, "I can't let myself pretend that you're here every time I fall apart again...I have t do it myself."

"But I am here!"

"You can't be."

"I AM here!" I repeated.

"I know!" his voice became louder.

"So why don't let me help?"

"I don't need help!" Peter hissed.

"So why don't you want me to be here?"

"Because this isn't your life," his ears flattened, "your life is out there."

"You are part of my life, Peter!" I reached for his arm, but he stifled me with a tense snarl. I withdrew my paw.

"I think you should move out by next Monday," Peter spoke quickly in a very quiet voice, "I'm not throwing you out, I just...I just need a date...I just...I just..."

"Peter..."

The chair legs squeaked against the bare floor as he pushed it back and then stood up.

"I just can't let you hold me together..." he muttered under his breath as he hurried out of the room, leaving me sitting there, alone and feeling sick in my stomach.

*

Thank you for reading my story!

I hope you enjoyed the read, and hopefully you'll lavish me with comments, votes and faves - and watches, if you only just stumbled upon me - all feedback will help others to find these stories to enjoy as well!

See you on Monday!

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