My cat, Frisbee, is dying.
He's been losing weight for a while now. At first it was a good thing, we thought- he was a big chonker of a tubby boy, and we figured switching him from unregulated kibble whenever he felt like it to set meal times of wet food, plus running up and down the stairs of his new house after he moved to Toronto with me, was making a difference. Certainly it did, but he continued to lose weight beyond his goal of 12 pounds, and began vomiting copious amounts of bile every couple of nights.
We took him in to the vet and confirmed he was a little underweight at 10.3 pounds, and with his list of symptoms the vet was hopeful that it was either feline diabetes or hyperthyroidism, both of which are treatable. Unfortunately, his white blood cell count came back outrageously high such that he almost certainly has gastrointestinal lymphoma. Which is apparently not uncommon in middle-aged cats (he's nearly ten).
They could confirm it with an exploratory surgery, but his health is obviously suffering already and there's no guarantee he'd survive the very expensive surgery. Much less the subsequent very expensive chemotherapy which would only buy him another six months to two years, on average.
Even if I had the money for the drastic options, I don't think I'd go for it- just putting the poor guy through all that when he can't understand why we're doing it. But I don't have the money anyway, so it makes it a little easier to accept that the best thing I can do for him now is make him comfortable and happy for as long as I can.
He's got, probably, a few weeks to a few months. Possibly a little more if he responds well to anti-inflammatories and can digest a bit more of his food a bit better. That much we can do for him.
I'm going to spoil him rotten for whatever time we have left. I already spoiled him with constant cuddles and affection and treats, but now instead of an overlarge handful of treats once a day, he's getting it two or three times a day. And mealtimes are off; he meows and runs to his bowl, he gets food. Why not- it will make him happy and it might make him a little stronger. His weight certainly isn't an issue.
He's been a dear friend these past nearly ten years, there for me with his head bonks and trilling purrs and grooming my beard for me like I was a fellow cat in good times and bad. He's the best cat I've ever had, and nothing can ever replace him. But there's nothing left for me to do but to make him as happy and comfortable as I can for as long as I can, until it becomes clear that he's suffering, at which point I can grant him a painless passing with me at his side.
I'm. Not doing well, emotionally, but that's to be expected. I love this little guy more than is remotely reasonable and I'm going to miss him like a vital organ when he's gone. But until then, yeah. He gets spoiled. He deserves it.
Pictured here in better health, a floofy chonker nonpareil.
45 notes
·
View notes
writing about going to the gym instead of actually going still counts…right? 2k 18+, MDNI
eddie munson x fem!reader (implied plus-size)
The gym at Eddie’s new apartment complex wasn’t so bad.
It had just undergone a big renovation by the time he moved in, so it still smelled faintly of paint and some of the machines had that protective plastic film over the monitors. It was on the small side, but had enough room for a row of treadmills and ellipticals that faced a big window, looking out on the grassy knoll of the courtyard behind the leasing office.
Eddie never went on them, though. He was mostly there for the weights, following the regime Steve had put him on a couple months prior. It wasn’t as rigorous as the one his friend followed, but it was demanding enough that Eddie needed an occasional break, elbows resting on his knees as he tried to catch his breath and pushed sweaty tendrils of hair from his face.
His shirt was old and ratty with the cutoff sleeves and drooping armholes stretched far beyond their natural elasticity. Truthfully, it did make him look a little douchey. But he also kind of liked the way it showed off his arms, the edges of the tattoos on his ribcage, the tops of his obliques.
Especially now that he actually has obliques.
He’s not yet worked his way up to the full-blown gym-bro attire Steve wears when he’s posting his little thirst traps all over Instagram. The videos are the worst—him planking shirtless or flexing his biceps as he curls a weight or swinging weird giant ropes with his arms.
Eddie’s only filmed himself lifting a few times now. Partly because Steve keeps demanding he send him videos so he can “check his form” but also because…he just looks good, okay?
He never dreamed he’d be the type. Aside from a (very) brief skateboarding phase, his main source of exercise when he was growing up was running from local law enforcement.
Now here he was lifting three days a week, considering adding a fourth.
He was still slacking on cardio—the smoker’s lung capacity really hindered him there. But Steve had suggested they try boxing, and a free pass to hit Harrington certainly held some appeal…
Eddie found he actually kind of liked the gym now. It was quiet and peaceful. It gave him an hour or so to turn his brain off and focus on nothing but counting sets or reps. He felt good when he walked back to his place a little sweaty and sore, feeling like he’d done something.
And he liked it especially when you showed up.
He’d seen you a few times around already, mostly walking with your dog. Or dogs, rather. By his count there were a couple different ones.
There was a Corgi who would stomp his stubby little legs like he was mad at the concrete; and a border collie you liked to take to the dog park and toss a frisbee for him to catch; and an elderly chihuahua he often saw you lift into your arms and carry for the end of his walk when he grew tired and looked up at you sadly with those big, pleading eyes. You were powerless.
Spotting you out and about whenever Eddie was going to get his mail, or taking a walk to stretch his legs after sitting at his computer too long, catching a glimpse of you from his balcony when he sat out there in the morning or evening, had started to become the highlight of his day.
He still had yet to, you know, talk to you.
If he ever had the fortune of walking past while you were out, his words immediately failed. And he couldn’t even count now the number of times he’d walked past the dog park while you were there and wished desperately he had a dog just so he had an excuse to go in and talk to you.
He wondered, regretfully, if you could tell he was a cat guy just seeing the smattering of light hairs all his black clothes attracted like a magnet.
But now you were here. Physically present in the same room as him. Close enough for him to reach out and wrap his hands around you. Looking so fucking delectable in your workout clothes.
Your shape was mostly concealed by a baggy hoodie that just barely covered the roundness of your ass and skimmed the tops of your thick thighs—both of which were only accentuated by the tightness of your black Lycra shorts.
He might have dredged up the nerve to finally say something—even a meekly muttered “hi” would have been an improvement on the nothing he’d been slinging. But your headphones were resting snugly over your ears and he generally took that as a firm sign not to bother people.
They were nice ones, he noted. Not a pair of the obscenely expensive Apple ones Steve liked to wax poetically about, but you’d probably sunk a decent amount into them for the sound quality.
Or maybe they were a gift from your boyfriend, Eddie thought bitterly.
You smiled at him as you passed, giving a little wave that almost made him drop the weight in his hand. Honestly, a broken toe would have been worth it. He tries not to ogle you, honest he does. But he can see you in the mirror as you step up onto the treadmill directly behind him, despite every single one of them being free. All he has to do is tip his head slightly to the side and his view is pristine. He won’t stare, though.
He won’t, he won’t, he won’t.
At least not anymore…
He did his best to concentrate on his workout as you got yourself situated. Absently, he wondered if you were here because you thought you needed to be, and he really hoped that wasn’t the case. Because from where he was sitting, there wasn’t a goddamn thing on your body that needed any improvement.
You don’t seem to be taking it too seriously, though. Starting out at a slow walk, flicking through your phone to choose your music as you amble along. Eventually you must settle on something and set it down before you start to hike up the incline on your machine.
He figures out pretty quickly you're doing one of those “strut” workouts he’s seen floating around, where you increase your speed with the switch of each song.
Except you’re doing more than strutting—you’re performing.
It’s subtle at first. You start out simply walking at a steady pace, but then he catches a couple motions of your arms, a few flips of your head that send your hair flying. In the reflection of your face on the window he can see you’re lip syncing along to the song, your closed fist becoming a microphone for what looks like a long belt.
He bites back his own smile as he watches you, his eyes drawn to your shape in the mirror over and over. It makes him forget what rep he’s on every time, his workout little more than a charade at this point.
As your pace increases, your breathing gets harder and sweat starts to slicken your brow. You pause just long enough to pull off your sweatshirt and drape it over the guard rail. It drags up the bottom of your shirt, revealing a flash of your bare back that sends Eddie reeling.
He can’t help but imagine himself flush behind you, kissing down the delicate curve of your spine, gripping desperately at the meat of your hips and ass, molding them with his hands as he thrusts with abandon and the fronts of his thighs slap wet against the backs of yours. He would beg you to let him go down on you just like this—breathing in the smell of your musk and sweat, tugging down those shorts to bury his face between your thighs until they were trembling like his did on leg day, brushing off your complaints about being too gross or dirty.
He’d show you what dirty really was.
Eddie jolts as the dumbbell he’s holding slips from his clammy palm and he just barely moves his foot in time. It hits the ground with a dull thud, but if you notice you don’t give any indication.
Ears buzzing now, shame radiating at the back of his neck, he set the weight back on the rack and dropped to the floor, twisting into something resembling a yoga pose he saw Nancy post once. The temptation to get on the treadmill next to you is so strong, but he’s afraid it might make you too self-conscious to keep going with your little show.
Plus, he’d probably end up tripping over his own feet and face planting on the machine. Kinda tough to put the moves on a girl when you’ve got a smashed face that’s bleeding like a faucet.
Instead, he drags out his stretching, hoping he can time it right so it won’t seem too weird if he leaves the same time you do. He’s already stayed longer than he normally does, but the promise of finally getting to talk to you is too enticing.
If he was a smarter man, he might have tried thinking of something to actually say if he got the chance, but that’s a whole other issue.
At last, the machine you’re on started to whirr as you lowered the incline to normal and slowed the speed of the belt until it stops completely. Eddie’s chest heaves as he watches, his pulse racing so fast it’s probably going to trigger the smartwatch on his wrist. You catch his eye in the mirror as you wipe down your machine with a disinfectant wipe and his head snaps forward.
Best of all, when you’re done, you tug down your headphones so they rest around your neck.
This is it, he thinks, his heart pounding harder than it ever had during a workout. Now or fucking never.
“So, uhh, how many dogs do you actually have?”
As pick-up lines go, it’s…not great. But it gets you to stop next to him on your way to the door, tilting your head and smiling as you do.
Fuck, you’re pretty.
“What was that?” you ask.
Eddie scrambled. He ran his hand across the nape of his neck, resisting the urge to smack himself in the back of his head. All of a sudden, his body is unbearably hot and he’s never been so embarrassed of his douchey shirt now that your eyes were scanning him up and down.
Wait…were you checking him out?
“I just…I’ve seen you walking them,” he chuckled. “I was wondering how many you have.”
“Oh, none,” you laughed. “It’s kind of a side gig. I walk them for some other people who live here.”
“None of them are yours then?”
“Nah,” you said, sheepishly looking down at the floor and then flicking your gaze back up to meet his, a smile curling across your lips. “I’ve got a cat, though.”
next
985 notes
·
View notes