A Fluffy Tale (2 page)

He ran around the end of a display, and
nearly collided with someone. “Oh, sorry—” He stared at the man he’d nearly
knocked over. “You!”

“Excuse me,” Zachary Ledbetter said as he
made to move past Julian, his cold expression unchanged from the morning. The
big kem sat on his shoulders again, his tail flicking lazily as if he was
utterly bored by Julian’s presence.

“No…wait! Please…um… Look, this morning…I'm
really sorry about your trousers…”

“I don’t wish to talk about my clothing,
thank you. Will you excuse me?”

“Yes…no, wait!”

Ledbetter’s eyes narrowed. “Are you always
this impertinent?”

“Are you always this damn rude?” All the
resentment he’d bottled up over the day came spilling out. “What the hell did
you mean by that crack this morning?”

“I have no idea—”

“That, that…‘
I
do’ crap. About Pyon. What did you
mean?”

Ledbetter’s upper lip curled in a sneer and
he started to walk away. Without thinking, Julian grabbed his arm, and the man,
probably startled by a mere assistant grabbing a solicitor in this manner,
actually stopped.

“Why won’t you tell me? Pyon’s a bloody
nuisance—if you know how to make him behave…”

Julian stopped as Ledbetter drew himself up
to his considerable height, and his kem’s fur started to bristle. “
Make
your kem behave?
Make
him do anything? You have one of
the most beautiful gifts known to mankind and you call him a ‘bloody nuisance’?
You make me sick—you’re the nuisance. It’s you who doesn’t know how to behave.
I pity your poor little fellow, having to put up with you. I wish there was
some way of taking him away from you, but since there isn’t…” He sneered again,
his green eyes narrowed icily. “You complain of his discipline? Look at you.
You’re dirty, rumpled, dashing about like a lunatic, paying no attention to
him—you don’t know where he is, do you?”

“He’s with the shop—”

“He’s behind you, terrified. And your kem
is sick. Sick because you’ve made him sick.”

Julian whirled—and yes, there was Pyon,
sitting on a display of cans, head tilted and looking rather wary. At least he
wasn’t causing a problem. “He’s not sick.”

“Yes he is.” Julian felt Pyon dive inside
him again, and Ledbetter pointed at his chest. “And there’s the proof. How many
times a day does he do that?”

“I don’t know, maybe fifty—“

“
Fifty
?
And do you know
why
?”

Julian frowned. “It’s what kems do. They
need nourishment or something.”

“Or something, yes. Your kem is starving,
and you’re feeding him junk.” Ledbetter grabbed Julian’s shopping basket off
him. “Look at this rubbish. Biscuits, processed cheese, white bread…and you
have dark circles under your eyes so you don’t sleep sufficiently, your skin is
spotty and your physique flabby. When did you last eat a piece of fruit or take
any exercise? This month? This year? Dreadful. Your kem can only be as healthy
as you are. Pyon has to keep topping up because you give him so little to
nourish him. His fur is poor, and his behaviour results from both bad diet and
your disgusting attitude. I’ve seen you twice for less than five minutes at a
time and most of that you’ve spent shouting at the poor creature. Do you have
any idea how much that hurts them?”

He shoved the basket back at Julian. His
beautiful kem gave his host’s face a lick and Ledbetter reached up and stroked
the kem’s tail with reverent gentleness. “You, sir, are unworthy of the honour
of hosting a kem. If you had a spit of decency, you’d pull yourself together
and give Pyon a long and happy life. Instead you’ll indulge yourself until you
drop dead at forty of a heart attack, and take him with you. Now good—“

Pyon chose that moment to rematerialise—and
leap across to Ledbetter’s arm. He scrambled up until he suddenly saw Ledbetter’s
kem—he scrambled
down
in panic.
Julian had never seen him react like that to another kem before—was he afraid?
He reached out to pick Pyon up, but then stopped because
Ledbetter
beat him to it.

“Hey, Pyon,” the man said in a low, gentle
voice as he cupped Pyon’s bottom. “You’re safe, little fellow. Linis won’t hurt you, you know that.
Yes, that’s right. Let me have a look at you. May I?”

Julian blinked at Ledbetter being so polite
and formal with his kem, but the man ignored him, carefully lifting Pyon up.
“Aren’t you handsome,” Ledbetter crooned, still keeping his voice very quiet,
while Pyon gazed back adoringly. Ledbetter’s entire demeanour, his expression,
had softened and became solicitous, kind—almost like a completely new person.
He scratched behind Pyon’s ears and stroked the kem down his black-furred back
and tail with one long sweep of his big hand. Pyon began to trill as he hardly
ever did with Julian—and here he was, cuddling a complete stranger.

“Thank you, he’s mine,” Julian snapped, unaccountably
jealous. “Pyon!”

Pyon jumped, startled, and dematerialised
instantly. Julian’s hand tightened around the basket handle as he glared at
Ledbetter. “Okay, you’ve said your piece.”

He didn’t trust himself to say another
word, so he turned on his heel and walked off. He paid for the food and managed
to scrape up enough politeness to nod at the shopkeeper, but then he stomped
out, furious and even more humiliated than he’d felt that morning. He’d come
that
close to punching that man and he
hadn’t felt like that since school! Unworthy of Pyon?
Who the hell did he think he was!

The bus came almost at once and five
minutes later he was letting himself in through his front door. As he tossed
the food into the fridge, too angry to be hungry, Pyon appeared and sat on the
countertop, looking expectant.

“See what you’ve done?” Julian snarled.

Pyon meeped and ran off—probably to make a
little nest on the bed or with Julian’s clothes. Julian didn’t care. He flung
himself onto his sofa and glared into space, his arms wrapped around himself.
That pompous, supercilious, privileged prick! Pyon wasn’t ill, and neither was
he!

He turned on the TV but it held no interest
for him. He couldn't think of anything but those hurtful, vicious words and the
completely false accusation of…

…cruelty.

Was he cruel? Everyone knew you couldn’t
hurt a kem—they just dematerialised if they felt threatened. You didn’t have to
feed them, they kind of absorbed what they needed from inside the host.
Actually, no one knew much about them at all. Except Mr
Perfect Hair And Trousers apparently.

He heard a quiet chirp and turned. Pyon sat
on the end of the sofa, again looking wary.

“Oh come here, stupid, as if I’d hurt you.”
Pyon squeaked and leapt into Julian’s arms, and Julian, for a few moments, just
gave himself over to the pure pleasure of letting Pyon cuddle and lick him.
He’d
never
do anything to hurt
him—how could that bastard say that?

But when he sat up a little and Pyon curled
up on his lap while Julian stroked him, he had to admit there was a huge
difference between Pyon and Ledbetter’s kem—Linis, that
was his name. Pyon and Linis. Pyon was small and scruffy and hyperactive. Linis
was huge and sleek and apparently perpetually calm, even when his host was
upset.

Kems were all different with different
personalities. Everyone knew that. But Pyon’s fur did look rather…limp. And
thin. Julian didn’t usually pay any attention to that because his kem was
usually rushing around like a mad thing. But Julian wasn’t sick, so why was his
kem?

Pyon made an enquiring little chirp and
then dematerialised without the slightest warning. Was he hungry? Was Ledbetter
right and Pyon needed more food—better food? But they didn’t
eat
.

He stood up and went to the fridge. That
remark about the fruit had really stung because it was true—he didn’t like
fruit or vegetables much, and tended not to buy it because it went off. His
parents—his Mum, particularly—had always insisted on vegetables at supper and
there was always fruit in their house. Julian just didn’t bother when it was him alone.

But maybe he needed to. He looked at his
watch—yes, he had time if he used the tiny corner shop at the other end of the
block.

Half an hour later, he looked at the wildly
expensive packed salad and the even more expensive piece of steak he’d managed
to get from the deli he’d never used, a few doors down. “You better appreciate
this, Pyon,” he said, grimacing as he picked up a bit of green stuff. Yuck.

He didn’t have time for anything but his
usual coffee and Danish before work, but he’d gone to bed early and slept a
full nine hours. Pyon looked just the same but maybe he was a tiny bit less
hysterical. He came back to Julian’s desk sooner than usual at least. It was
hard to concentrate on him completely because Edward was slinking back and
forth at intervals, and Julian kept tensing for another remark. He also
wondered if Ledbetter would say something to the managers about Julian’s
rudeness in the supermarket—he’d stepped over the line, he knew that and if
Ledbetter complained, he’d have every right to.

But Edward kept his mouth shut, and
Ledbetter didn’t appear. Pyon got up to no more than his usual nonsense and
didn’t make anyone spill or ruin anything, so there were no frustrated
telephone calls about his kem. In fact, it was an almost peaceful morning,
though Julian was glad when one o’clock came around and he could get some
lunch. He’d planned to go out and find something healthy, but it was raining
and he lost the impetus. At least he didn’t expect to run into anyone difficult
at the work canteen.

But once again he was out of luck because
he spotted Ledbetter eating on his own—which was rather odd, since he was so
senior in the office—in the corner of the canteen. Julian had three
choices—head out for lunch, or eat in and ignore the man. Or he could do what
he actually did, to his own surprise, which was to take his tray and head
straight over to Ledbetter’s table. At least he got the small satisfaction of
taking the man completely by surprise.

“I want to talk to you.”

“I'm eating my lunch.” Linis stared up at
Julian with huge golden eyes that seemed to read his soul. Linis’s host was
already busy looking back down at his meal, Julian dismissed from his attention
and his thoughts.

Julian sat down and won a dark scowl. “Yes,
I can see that.”

Pyon appeared just then and once again,
Ledbetter’s stern expression softened. “Hello, Pyon.”

He reached out and petted him as Pyon
skirted warily around Linis, almost on tiptoe with nervousness. The bigger kem
didn’t move or react, just regarding Pyon with those big eyes and thinking his own kemmish thoughts.

Ledbetter glared at Julian. “I don’t want
company.”

“Too bad. You like my kem,
I come with him. I need to talk to you.”

Ledbetter ignored him and concentrated on
his chicken salad, still petting and stroking Pyon who adored the attention.
Julian could feel Ledbetter’s hostility, and yet he received these vague
sensations of pleasure from the constant physical stimulation given to Pyon. It
was confusing and irritating in the extreme, and didn’t make him any more
diplomatic in his approach.

“I want your help,” he said.

The man didn’t look at him as he answered.
“Whatever it is, I'm not interested.”

“It’s about Pyon.”

Ledbetter looked up, his eyes unfriendly.
“If you’re about to utter more nonsense about making him behave, I swear, I'm
going to put a complaint in about you.”

“I'm not! I want your help to…to help him.
About what you said. My diet and stuff. I…I want to do
the right thing. I ate a salad last night.” Then he flushed hot. He sounded so
childish.

Even Ledbetter was mildly amused. “And yet
you lived. How brave.”

“But I don’t know what’s the right thing
for him. And how do you know this stuff?”

“I pay attention to Linis and all kems,
which most people don’t bother about. If you listen, you learn. I doubt you
have much experience at the technique.”

“God, you’re such a…such a…” Julian growled
in frustration and Pyon squeaked in alarm. He hastily stroked his kem’s tail.
“It’s not you, dummy.”

“Don’t call him that!”

Pyon squeaked again and ran up Julian’s
arm. Julian shushed him gently and then glared at Lebetter. “Now who’s shouting
and frightening him? It’s just an affectionate nickname.”

“So you like being called a dummy, do you?
Is that your name? Mr Dummy?”

“It’s Julian and no, but a kem doesn’t
understand the words.”

Ledbetter made a disgusted ‘tch’. “You have
no idea how much more they understand—and more than that, they know your
heart.”

“Then he knows I don’t mean anything by it.
You’re not helping him by abusing me. I just want to know what I should be
eating.” He shoved his tray across the table towards the man. “How does this
look?”

Ledbetter glanced at it. “Sugar, sugar,
fat, salt, flour, oh and look, more sugar and salt.” He poked with his fork at
the chicken bun on the plate. “There might be some decent protein in there but
I doubt it. If you want to die young, by all means, keep eating that.”

“Will you stop with the dying young thing?
Why do you care anyway?”

“I don’t. I care about Pyon. All you care
about is your massive and badly nourished ego. You want to know how to eat
correctly? Look it up, I'm not an encyclopaedia.”

He went to stand and Julian’s cheeks burned
in humiliation again. “You’re a hypocrite, though. If you cared for Pyon, you’d
help. You’re the one with the massive ego. You just want to put me down and
swan off, so sure you’re perfect in every way. Pyon and I can get stuffed so
far as you’re concerned.”

Ledbetter’s long jaw worked and then he sat
down again, glaring at Julian. “Are you serious or are you just trying to prove
a point?”