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Early Saturday morning the phone rang. Kris scrambled to grab it before it woke his father who would no doubt have a hangover yet again. "Hello?" He whispered in a hushed tone not wanting to bring his father's wrath down upon himself by waking him.

"Hey Kris, Kerris says you're getting the highest grades in Calculus so you're nominated to be my tutor. When should I come over?" The voice on the other end of the line seemed far too cheerful and awake for this time of the morning.

"Kitt? It's like 8 am on a Saturday what are you doing calling me before I'm even out of bed?" He'd slept past his usual lap time at the local pool due to the injury he'd sustained the night before. Damn Audio and his stupid prank!

A cheerful giggle answered his surly question. "Who else would call you? Wait do you have a girlfriend I don't know about?" She barely paused for breath. "So when should I come over and bring my text book? It's the weekend so we can work on it all day if you don't have any plans." That last sounded almost like a question as well.

He looked at his closed bedroom door and considered. "Let me run it by father first, I'm sure he'll be alright with it but he had some guys over watching the game last night and he might want us to clean up some before you come over. What's your number and I'll call you when I know?" He sat up slowly and reached for a pen and paper from his desk at the foot of his bed. Quickly he jotted down the number and put her name over it so that he wouldn't forget what it was. "Okay I'll call you in a few hours and let you know what he says." Then before she could launch into anything else he quickly hung up the phone.

After about 20 minutes of heart stopping terror that the call had woken his father he finally managed to calm down enough to get out of bed. That was easier said than done, he was still sore from the nasty trick the previous night and had to put more of the cream on according to the instructions that Coach O'Brien had written out and left beside the little tub of cream. He was glad however that he'd done that before going to the bathroom, the numbing effects made it bearable to empty his bladder where if he'd have done that before using the cream he didn't think he'd have been able to keep from screaming.

Hobbling back to his room he looked for his loosest pair of boxers to put on then grabbed a t-shirt and headed for the living room to see how much cleaning he'd need to do before he could ask his father about letting Kitt come over. It was about what he'd expected. The ashtrays were overflowing and there were empty alcohol containers all over the place. With a soft sigh to himself he went to get the garbage can so he could dump things directly into it. It really didn't take that long to clean up the majority of the mess but there was no way he was getting the burn marks out of the carpet or the stench of alcohol and smoke out of the apartment.

The kitchen was pretty much a write off. There were dishes in the sink piled up till they hit the bottom of the cupboards and a smell that he could not find the source of. As slowly as he was moving this was going to take a while. He put the first load into the dishwasher and started filling the sink to do the pots and pans since they were too large to fit more than one at a time into the machine. He didn't usually mind doing a little of the cleaning, he'd been doing it since he was a kit, but lately Saturdays had been a nightmare. With the extra bodies around and no one willing to pick up after themselves half his Saturday was spent just making the apartment presentable. On the weekends when he got to see his mother, only once a month, the dishes didn't get done and things piled up even worse.

* * * * *

Edmond had been overjoyed when he asked if Kittara could come over and study for her calculus test. It had been the first time he'd seen his father smile at him in months. He'd practically handed him the phone on a silver platter and breathed down his neck while he was telling the vixen she could come over around 11 and stay for lunch. The apartment was as clean as Kris could get it in the hour and a half before his father had finally rolled out of bed. He'd made sure to make his bed and get everything put away in it's proper place, even going so far as to put his dirty underwear on the bottom of his clothes basket so there was no chance she'd see them. Now he was waiting, impatiently in the living room, pacing back and forth while he waited for her to arrive. His father was being overly cheerful, even offering to order pizza in for the three of them since he didn't think there was anything in the house suitable to feed to a girl. It was really... Nice. Kind of like how Edmond had been before he'd found Kris and Sean on the couch.

Who'd have guessed that tutoring a girl for a calculus test would make the older coon so happy?

The doorbell rang.

Kris jumped and turned to get the door only to find his father already there opening it for the diminutive vixen. "You must be Kittara. Kris said you were pretty but he didn't say you were beautiful." The older coon took Kitt's hand and brought it to his lips pressing a kiss to the back of her knuckles. He kept looking at her too, like right in her eyes as if he couldn't get enough of them.

For her part Kittara seemed nonplussed. She smiled up at the raccoon and when he finished kissing her hand she smoothly lifted it from his hand to straighten her hair. "Hello Sir, is Kris ready for me yet?" She peered around the older man looking for his son and a real smile lit her face as she spotted him standing just behind his father. "There you are! Come on we have a huge amount of work to do and I *HAVE* to pass this test!" She brushed past Edmond, grabbing Kris by the hand and heading down the hallway like she knew where she was going.

Kris looked back over his shoulder, a little startled at the way the vixen took charge of the situation and just barged into the apartment. He managed to point out which bedroom was his before she blundered into his father's room. But that's the only input he had in where they were going or how quickly. She even shut his door behind him and took over the bed before he had a chance to offer her the chair at his desk.

"Okay, I get the basic..." She launched into what she did know and from there the two of them started to work on what she would be required to know for the upcoming test. They used the one she'd failed as a study aid, Kris showing her where she went wrong on each of the questions and approving the way she answered the correct ones.

An hour after she got there, Edmond knocked on the door and opened it without waiting for an answer. "You kids have been studying too hard, what do you want on your pizza?" He handed in two glasses of coke and a bowl of chips that Kris had no idea where he'd found.

Kitt looked up from the problem she was working on to check the alarm clock on Kris' desk. "Oh, I didn't realize we'd been working so long. Thank you, Mr. Blackwood. Ummm... do you guys eat meat?" She looked from the older raccoon to the younger.

Edmond laughed, a rich throaty laugh that Kris hadn't heard in months. "We eat meat young lady. Can I assume meat lover's is acceptable?" At the vixen's nod he turned to Kris. "You want a veggie lover's as well?"

The question startled Kris, not for the content, but the tone of his father's voice. For the first time in months he'd actually sounded like he cared one way or another. "Ye-yeah please Dad." The older male smiled at the two kits and closed the door as he left the room.

Kris stared at the closed door until Kitt hit him with his pillow. "What's wrong with you? You look like you just saw a ghost."

Kris turned to face her slowly, still shocked at the change in his father's attitude. "I kinda just did." He shook his head in disbelief. "He hasn't been that... normal around me in months. Not since he found Sean and I--" He broke off suddenly not sure if he wanted to share that memory with the chatty vixen.

Kitt was not going to let it go. "You and Sean? Who is Sean?" She was on her knees in moments, leaning on the desk so she was only inches from his face. "Spill!" Her tail was up over her back wagging a mile a minute, she looked so eager, so hungry for his story.

He looked at his closed door then back at the vixen. "Promise you won't tell *anyone*?" He knew he shouldn't tell her, but he'd been keeping it inside so long now that it was bursting to come out. Sensing a juicy bit of gossip, Kitt nodded, mimed sealing her lips shut and throwing away the key. For a moment Kris just stared at her, but her being someone who had two men, two mated men as her guardians made it easier for him to open up to her.

"Well... Sean is my best friend in the whole wide world. We did everything together before..." He paused a moment, closing his eyes to better organize his thoughts. "I guess it started when I was seven and he was eight, see that is when we met. I'd just gotten my first skateboard for my birthday from Dad. I think he wanted me to do something more manly than swimming you know?" He looked at Kittara, hoping she'd understand what he was saying. Kitt just nodded and grabbed his pillow from the floor, sliding it under her chest as she got comfortable lying on her tummy with her feet up in the air.

"Well he took me to the local park. There I was with my new pads and helmet holding my new board, so scared I couldn't move, when up comes this kit not much older than me. He was awesome! I mean he was only doing basic tricks, riding low rails and jumping two or three stairs, but he was my age!

"He slid to a stop right beside me and said he loved my board. I was as shy than as I am now but Dad kind of pushed me into talking to him and before I knew it he was teaching me the basics. We flew around the park till Dad said it was time to go but by then we were best friends." He stopped talking for a moment to fumble in his desk drawer. A large photo album was extracted, opened to a well worn page and handed to the vixen. The pictures were of a young Kris and a slightly older cougar boy, both dressed as skater kids and holding up their boards to show the camera or caught in the middle of some trick or other.

"See even than he was a good looking guy, more photogenic than I was."

Kitt giggled a little, privately thinking that Kris was the better looking of the two but she could sense a bit of hero worship going on and didn't say so out loud.

Kris picked up his narrative. "Everything was fine until about a year ago. Sean had just turned fourteen I was still thirteen. We were at his place having a sleepover, but he was acting kind of strange. After his parents made us turn the lights out I found out why. Sean told me he'd been having strange things happen to him at night, like waking up all sticky and wet down there. Neither of us knew what was wrong but we were both too scared to ask anyone."

Kris stopped again, reached for one of the glasses of coke and took a sip. Kitt pulled the bowl of chips onto the bottom corner of Kris' bed and started munching quietly on them while she waited for him to go on with his story.

"He started hanging out with some older boys. Started smoking and acting like he didn't know me. It was a really tough time for me cause he was like the only friend I really had. Then I started to wake up with the same problems that he was having." Here he paused and looked away from the vixen his ears folding back in his hair in embarrassment. "Mom said it's just a normal part of growing up and that all boys go through it. And no I didn't ask her, she found the evidence on my sheets and in my laundry basket." He nibbled on a chip idly as he worked on getting his composure back. "Anyway I went to talk to Sean after school one day and told him what Mom said. Well he laughed and said he already knew and I was being stupid for worrying about it. After that we started hanging out together again for a while but he wanted me to smoke with him and... well you have to have healthy lungs to swim like I want to so we sort of drifted along neither of us really willing to give up on our friendship but not sure where it was going.

"Then the night of my fourteenth birthday he challenged me to shoot the bowl." At Kittara's blank look he grinned. "Not a skater huh? The bowl is that big semi spherical concrete feature that you see in the big skate parks. Not to be confused with the pipe, which is the half circle bit that you see skaters sliding up and down the sides of." Understanding dawned in her eyes and she nodded slowly so he continued.

"Okay so he dared me to shoot the bowl, which is just another way of saying ride my board up and over in a full 360 flip. I knew he could do it cause I'd seen him a few times but I'd never tried before I was always too timid. Sean said if I didn't at least try it he wouldn't speak to me again so of course I *had* to do it." He took another swallow of his coke and sighed softly. "I made it on the first try. Which was really scary let me tell you. I could have fallen and broken all kinds of bones in the process but I didn't, I ended up right side up on my board heading right back down the pipe toward Sean. He was jumping and cheering and acting like a total fool, we both were. I grabbed him and spun him around and before I knew what was happening I was kissing him." Here he paused and looked at Kitt to see if she understood the implications of what he'd just said.

Kitt's head came up and her eyes widened. "You kissed him? Oh my goodness. Was it a good kiss? Did you like it? Did *he* like it?" She grabbed the other coke and drained half the glass to stop herself from asking more personal questions.

Kris blushed furiously, reaching up to scratch behind his ear as he stared at the glass in his hand. "I ah... yeah I liked it. When I pulled back I started to apologize to him and he stopped me by kissing me back. So I guess he liked it too." The vixen tittered a little laugh and covered her mouth with her hand motioning for him to go on.

Clearing his throat he tried to sound as calm as possible about what happened next. "For a while it was all we could do to keep our hands off each other. not like you know groping each other in public or anything gross like that but he was always shoving my shoulder or punching it and I kept pushing him and bumping against him in the halls and stuff. Every chance we got to be alone we were kissing again, trying new things; like did you know that Spiderman kiss where he's upside down and she kisses him, that's actually possible and gives you the most amazing head rush!" He paused for a moment with a silly grin on his face which made Kittara giggle and reach over to put her hand on his knee, then he swallowed and frowned a little.

"There was one day that I'll always remember. Sean was at our place, Mom was in the kitchen making dinner I think and Dad wasn't home yet. We were working on our homework when Sean leaned over and kissed me. One of the good kisses, where his hand ended up behind my neck and I slid my hands up on his shoulders. I knew Mom wouldn't mind but what I didn't know is that just than Dad walked in home from work." A single tear slid from the corner of his eye and rolled down his cheek slowly being absorbed into his fur. "Dad, he didn't take it so well. He freaked out! Started screaming that Sean was a reprobate and a little bastard. He grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and pulled him off me. I tried to explain, to calm him down some but he just hit me so hard I fell back into the couch and shoved Sean toward the front door. Mom came running to see what was going on but he pushed her out of the way as well and threw Sean out!

His voice grew hushed and he looked at the door to make sure that his father wasn't standing there. "He forbade me to ever see Sean again. Told Mom that he didn't want to see that little pervert around anymore and that was an end to it." He wiped at his cheek brushing away the second tear that threatened to fall from his lashes. "Mom took my side, she said we were kids and we were just experimenting and it couldn't do any real harm. Then Dad started screaming at her." He turned haunted eyes to the vixen and managed a sad looking smile. "You know how most kids, when their parents divorce, think it's their fault but the parents say it isn't... I know it's my fault. Dad screamed it at Mom when he told her to get out and never come back." He sniffled a little and reached for a tissue to blow his nose.

Kitt, who by this time was sitting up, leaned in and hugged him hard around the shoulders. "Good god Kris! Just cause you kissed a boy and liked it? But why are you living with your father and not your mother?" It was hard to remember sometimes that Kris was two years younger than she was but right now the age difference was really clear to her. He was just a kid and he'd had such a horrible experience all she could think to do was to keep hugging him.

He sniffled again and went on in a slightly muffled voice. "Its something to do with Mom's job. She does something that makes a lot of money but it means she's hardly ever home and travels around the world at lot. Dad said that he wanted to move here and give me a more stable home life away from the 'insidious influences', his words, of Sean, only he called Sean the little reprobate again. Anyway Mom's lawyer said that Dad had a case and could win custody so she was better off letting him have me and just taking the one weekend a month that he'd let me see her. She still pays for everything, including our rent here and I can talk to her on the phone whenever I want. But it's hard not getting to see her that often, especially when Dad's so weird around me. Do you know he gave me girly magazines? It was scary, he made me sit down and look through them too, said he was trying to teach me what a real man was interested in." He pointed to his closet where he'd hidden the magazines, lube and condoms behind a box of old swimming trophies.

He was babbling now and he knew it but he just couldn't seem to stop himself. Kitt leaned in and kissed him on the cheek hugging him tighter to her chest, it had been so long since anyone besides his mother had hugged him that he automatically wrapped his arms around her and held on tightly. For a few minutes they just stayed that way, holding onto each other, the raccoon crying into the vixen's shoulder while her hand stroked the back of his hair. She murmured soft things to him but wasn't sure he heard or understood what she was saying.

They both jumped apart when the bedroom door opened again and Edmond's cheerful voice said "Pizza's here!" Kris had his back to the door so his father didn't see the tears on his face just that the two kits had jumped away from each other. "I thought you two were studying..." There was a pleased glint in his eyes as he left the door open this time when he walked back down the hall.

Neither of them said a word, the just sat there looking at each other for a few moments before Kitt broke the silence. "If you don't tell him I won't. Let him think whatever he wants, maybe he'll stop being so hard on you if he thinks you have a girlfriend." She managed a half smile and raised an eyebrow in a silent challenge.

For a moment Kris didn't understand just what it was she was suggesting, but then it dawned on him and his eyes widened in shock. "Wait, you'd do that? Why?"

Kittara just shrugged standing up and straightening her short skirt. "I like you, you're a really good swimmer, and I know from Kerris' parents how hard it can be growing up gay when your parents want you to be straight. They still don't talk to him and I've seen him cry on Uncle Mythic's shoulder whenever he tries to call them on special occasions like birthdays and anniversaries." She shrugged and smiled brightly. "Besides what grownups think they know and what they really know are sometimes worlds apart. It'd be kind of fun to pretend you were my boyfriend."