#I also hope it's okay I borrowed Nova--Hibiscus's awesome cat!

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Curiosity’s Cat

Alright! Merry belated Christmas to this year’s lovely Wordgirl Secret Santa, @hibiscusangel15! The prompt was “Tobecky”, and I hope it’s as sweet a peppermint romance as all can be! 

Proofread and edited by a very tired brother who wouldn’t get out of bed this morning and was thus subjected to listening to the live reading of all my fanfiction. Enjoy, and happy holidays!

Soft piano music played from the radio perched on the McCallister coffee table, a well-worn book with pages held by a bookmark emblazoned with a gear design and embellished with ribbon beside it. Claire hummed softly in the kitchen, stirring cinnamon and nutmeg into steaming hot cocoa. In the living room, perched precariously on several dictionaries and a chair on wheels, a young boy stretched on his toes to place the gleaming star on top of the tree....just a few inches, now.....

“Tobey, love, do be careful!” Claire scolded softly, bringing in the silver tea tray to rest on the table. Reluctantly, he brought the star to his side again, only to note the tray’s impedimenta with bafflement.

“Mother, last I checked, there were merely the two of us, yet you’ve prepared three mugs of cocoa here. Who, may I ask, is the third for?” he asked, though the confusion did not inhibit his immediate claim of one of the black-and-white biscuits from the tea tray. 

“Sirius, a bit of reason never hurts. Last I checked, Mr. Starsoldier doesn’t quite share your predilection for cocoa, does he?”

The blonde’s face flushed cherry-blossom pink as he quickly pushed his plushie robut companion behind one of the throw pillows with his geometry-socked foot and sipped his steaming cocoa with as much refined dignity as a fourteen-year-old possibly could have, burning his tongue and dotting his nose with butterscotch syrup and whipped cream all within about fifteen seconds of each other. She shouldn’t have, but Claire couldn’t help but giggle. 

“His name is Mr. Starslayer, and he--I mean, it!--couldn’t possibly, because his internal circuits aren’t coated, his joints aren’t hydraulic, and hot fluid stains aren’t machine-washable. So, no.” 

“Hmmmm...” she said playfully, tapping the candy cane hooked the rim of her mug against it in thought, “Then perhaps it could be for Nova?”

The mechanical cat purred from the hearth and arced her paws towards the warmth from the tray--a clever trick, to be sure, but one that had been programmed in the long wait after midterms before the rest of the class period was over. Nimbly, she lept to the davenport and settled on Claire’s lap in response to the name recognition, settling happily into sleep mode once his mother laid a hand on her back.

“She’s a cat, mother, she’s far too fussy. Now, pray tell, who is arriving so suddenly?”

There was a tap at the window behind the boy as a familiar countenance appeared with a grin.

“Hello, common folk!” chirped none other than Becky Botsford. 

###########################################################

The boy’s heart froze in his chest, the dictionaries he was sitting on unfortunately taking that very moment to fall off-kilter, toppling the chair, the volumes, and the lanky but still hopelessly inept Tobey McCallister III.

“I couldn’t resist!” Tobey’s beloathed classmate giggled, giving a thankful curtsy as Mrs. McCallister took her coat, “Thank you so much for having me over--is, is Tobey okay?”

“Peaches and cream, my dear.” grumbled the coffee table, a bruised arm appearing just far enough to retrieve the steampunk mug of cocoa as Becky laughed and stepped over on light feet to the tea tray. 

“Ah, make yourself comfortable, love--there are marshmallows in the sugar bowl, cream, and, ah, you can’t have seen Chez McCallister until you have one of these biscuits--Tobey and I made just about all of these, he absolutely insisted only perfection.” the woman said, beaming with a perfect knowledge of how much the comment would embarrass her son.

“Thank you! And these are positively ambrosial....why, Tobey, I’d save some for you, but I’m afraid these rose spritz ice cream cookies are going to melt...” she retorted playfully as the boy genius finally sighed and sat up opposite her on the rug. 

“Well, then, Miss Becky Botsford, to what do I owe the pleasure?” he said, nabbing one of the aforementioned sweets.

“Tobey,” his mother cut in with a soft glare, “Your friend here has found herself with an excess of activity and few places to carry out such.”

“But your brother made the cut, I presume?”

“He’s at his friend’s house.” she said, smile unfaultering, “My parents needed time to wrap and hide Christmas presents for our treasure hunt tomorrow, and we usually go to the Heaslip’s together, but the most coincidental thing is, as soon as Violet found out that you were mostly by yourself for Christmas Eve too, she caught a cold! A really super-contagious one! That Johnson, thankfully, hasn’t caught yet and isn’t transferable to either the homemade cookies or fluffy unicorn mittens she gave me. That’s funny, huh?”

“As ignominious it is that your mate has clearly thrown you for a foxglove, I suppose I could appreciate the company.” he said softly. 

“Perfect!” she said, resting her cocoa on the table, “It took me a little while--an “absolutely last minute” sort of little while, but I brought some ideas for games that I think everyone here will enjoy and are entirely compatible with the unconventional three players, and of course I’d always listen to any of your ideas!”

Claire McCallister rested her empty mug on the coffee table and stood up wearily, buttoning her jacket and snagging her briefcase from the door. 

“Ah, these shall have to be two-players, I’m afraid.” she said, ruffling her son’s hair and stepping to the door, “It’s rather last-minute, but some people really can’t keep themselves out of trouble on Christmas Eve, and the office called. Absolutely no stealing snogs while I’m gone, you both hear?”

The scarlet mess of what had once been Tobey McCallister stuttered as the door fell shut and his classmate merely looked over the book’s description from the coffee table.

“Awww, hey, is this The Wild Robot? I think TJ was reading that a little while ago...”

“And what of it, Botsford?” he said, sipping his cocoa.

She looked up with soft sparkling brown eyes and giggled. Not that Tobey cared, that is. “Hey, no need to be embarrassed! It’s always the story that really matters, anyhow. Speaking of which.....” she said, shaking her bookbag.

“Ah, yes, the games!” he said with a poorly disguised lilt of enthusiasm, “What is it, now, Ticket to Ride? Scrabble? Mouse Trap? It’s only sporting to warn you, though, ‘tis an honor fine to lose to a McCallister!”

She cuffed him on the shoulder playfully, laying out game sets on the table one by one, none of which were recognizable, or, for that matter, branded. 

“Prepare to eat crow, my good sir, for ‘tis an honor perhaps finer to lose to a Botsford!” she retorted in perfect Elizabethan English and with a loose imitation of her friend’s accent to boot. “This one, I thought would be a fun one to start with--I mean, if you’d like? I made it ages ago, but I’ve never had a proper opponent. It’s called Curiosity’s Cat, and it goes like this....”

*****************************************************************************************

The game should not have been nearly as fun as it was, the two had to admit, once the puzzles were solved, the cards shuffled, the case finished, and, of course, the laurels of candy wreaths and good cheer bestowed. 

“Now, I have to wonder,” Tobey mused, his wreath perched rather like a flower crown, “Did you make these yourself as well, Miss Botsford? They are absolutely resplendent.” His delighted gentle grin could warm even Rhyme’s frozen heart--not that our now-speechless heroine noticed or cared in the slightest of course.

After a flustered few seconds (”What’s the matter?”, Tobey teased, “Curiosity’s Cat got your tongue?”), Becky’s nerves defrosted enough to respond, “Yes, but satisfaction brought it back.”

“Ah, shame, I was hoping I’d finally found the compliment to silence a rather loquacious blatherskite.” 

“That simply wouldn’t do, Mr. McCallister, you’d have to talk only half as much as usual to fill the room with two people’s worth of conversation. To answer your question, yes, actually, I did!”

“In a last-minute’s sort of little while, I presume?” he hummed, turning it over, “Ooh, are these candied hibiscus really edible? I haven’t had the sort of thing since Bristol!”

“You’ve never been to Bristol.” she said flatly.

“Exactly.” he said, pulling one of them off the tightly-woven bands and letting the light saccharine taste dissolve on his tongue, “So it only serves I’d miss them all the more. And I must say, my dear, these are absolutely ambrosial--that is to say, heavenly, scrumptious, and practically perfect in every way.” 

He laughed softly, tapping her on the shoulder and leading her to the kitchens, “So it’s only fair that deserves at least a cup of tea, wouldn’t you say? Best vanilla-jasmine blend you’ll find here or anywhere, a la McCallister.”

“Tea? I call a perfidy.” she responded, starting a round of a silly and longer-running game of wits between the two as the kettle began to heat and the boy started to look through a variety of spices and blends in the cabinet.

“You speak with intellectuali-tea, though it’s surely with a malady.”

“That’s with respectibili-tea, though only in a rhapso-tea.”

“Well, that, love, is a tragi-tea, for our anfractuosi-tea.”

“To that we have a reme-tea.”

“And so ends”, he said, pressing a hot cup of fragrant tea into her hands, “Our proso-tea.”

At last, the door opened and the very exasperated Mrs. McCallister hung up her coat. “Hello again, my darlings--ah, that tea is for me, I presume?” she said, playfully giving an attempt at lifting Becky’s teacup to which the girl giggled and gently tugged hers back.

“Mother, Becky doesn’t have to go so soon, does she?” the boy protested, noting the extra car outside as she poured herself a cup with cream and sugar. 

“Ah, I don’t suppose you accidentally enjoyed yourself, did you? Don’t worry, your friend will be over again soon enough.” 

The girl curtsied as she packed her bags again and set her teacup in the sink. “Thank you for having me--I accidentally had fun, too. Merry Christmas!”

“Merry Christmas to you as well, Becky Botsford.” he said as he walked her to the door, stopping short just a few centimeters from the step as she tapped his shoulder and looked up to the top of the doorframe.

“Technically, your mother is here now...” she whispered at a pitch a mouse would need to be quiet to hear. 

“I’m sorry, what was that?”

And, bouncing lightly to the tip of her toes, she silenced him with a kiss on the cheek.