His Friends (2)

When somebody called, Kyro put Iris down on the sofa and went to the side to talk. She, in the meantime, glared at him with all her might, which he didn't even notice. Tired of this fruitless endeavor, Iris finally looked away and around herself.

The remote control was nearby, so she half crawled out of the towel to drag it close to herself. With that done, she turned on TV and located the channel she wanted. It wasn't too easy, but she managed to get to the twenty-third one, and lay down in satisfaction.

On the screen, a familiar girl was biking in a beautiful autumn scenery. Iris couldn't recall the title of the movie, but she knew she'd seen it before, and that it was a nice tale about love that perseveres against all odds. In other words, it was a sappy romance movie, and that was exactly what she was looking for at the moment.

While listening to the calm background music, she pulled and pushed the towel around until it made a nice den. It covered most of her body, which looked sickly and malnourished when the fur lay flat against it, so she only let her nose peek out.

For the purposes of revenge, she had removed all the towel from beneath herself, which left the place where she lay on the sofa as wet as she was. It was a petty move, and she embraced it with all her heart. Before crawling into her towel-made den, she had also rolled all over the sofa so Kyro wouldn't have anywhere to sit.

After some ten minutes of peaceful watching, right around the time the girl on the screen was about to follow her love interest into something dangerous from which he would need to save her, a hand descended toward the remote control. Iris screamed right away, her teeth rushing straight for the offending object.

"Hey, hey, no need to— What did you do here!"

The expression on Kyro's face was exactly what she'd been expecting. His eyes narrowed in anger, his lips parting to take a controlling breath. It was a lovely sight, and she screamed out in joy, laughing to herself. That's what he got for forcing her to take a bath, ha!

Her joy was short lived, though. He picked her up by the scruff, which was a touch uncomfortable, and pointed at the sofa. "What exactly did you do here?"

'You wanna know?' she asked, eyes gleaming. The moment he lowered her since she was just a silly pet and couldn't answer him, she proceeded to show him what she'd done.

She ran to the other side of the sofa and shook her fur. There was little water in it, but a few droplets still flew off. Then, she took a couple steps and rolled on her back, making sure to cover as much surface as possible. Next, to make sure that nothing was wasted, she dragged herself on the belly toward Kyro.

When she was by his long legs, she looked up and cooed at him, asking for praise. Her eyes were shining with mirth, and she couldn't help chuckling as his expression darkened with her every move. Since he didn't react in time, she sat down and tilted her head to the side, acting puzzled. 'Something wrong, mister?' she asked in her head in an overly sweet voice.

For a moment, Kyro just stood still, then his right hand came over to hide his face. Through the gaps between his fingers, he looked at her with a strange emotion. It wasn't anger, which somehow had already evaporated, and she couldn't really understand what he was feeling now.

'What's wrong?' she asked a bit more seriously this time.

He crouched down by the sofa and caressed her head. "I was so worried for you yesterday, you know. I thought I had caused your death." The heavy words fell like stones into Iris' heart. She suddenly felt guilty all over again.

After a moment, he added, "I'm glad you're able to enjoy yourself like this," and before she could react, he lowered his head and kissed her forehead.