Chapter 15

A/N: If you're enjoying the book please comment and vote

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Alfred stopped in front of a small apartment complex was located on the outskirts of the Bronx. It wasn't one of the best places to live, but it was affordable for Heather and the apartment itself was rather nice.

She didn't miss the way Alfred looked at the place as she stepped out of the car, he certainly didn't think that it qualified as a decent living space if the expression on his face was anything to go off of.

"Thank you again so much for the ride and the small talk." She said as she waved him off before turning around to head up to her apartment that was on the fourth floor. Alfred gave her a simple nodded of his head before he drove off. A few people where watching and staring as they tried to understand why such a nice looking care had dropped off someone in there area. Being relatively new to the complex meant that Heather didn't yet know much of anyone who would be nosy enough to ask her about it.

The apartment that she lived in like many of the others in the area was made of red bricks on the outside and dull white colored walls on the inside. There was a total of eight floors in the complex with sixteen rooms on each floor. The facility and reception counter was man by either a kindly old man who a less than friendly younger woman who always seemed preoccupied with something when Heather walked past her. What it was she didn't know but she wasn't one to ask either seeing how she was one to scowl more often than smile.

There was one small elevator that was used to take tenants between the floors, but at odd intervals it would shake or creak in such a way or even lag at times when it came to having the door open that Heather didn't trust it enough to take it even though she lived on the fourth floor. Getting stuck in an elevator wasn't one her bucket list of things that she still wanted to do in life.

Instead she took the stairs which were covered by a dark colored carpet and fairly well stained. From what exactly was hard to tell due to the dark color of the fabric, all the stains appeared to be a lighter or darker shade of red. None of the owners of the apartment seemed to care enough either to get it cleaned or change the carpeting to make it look more appealing.

The steps were rather creaky as well and would groan whenever more than one person stepped on them at the same time. One step in particular on the third floor half way up would squeak in such a terrible way whenever anyone stepped on it. Heather made sure to avoid this one because at the back of her mind she couldn't get rid of the feeling that it sounded too much like a living creature whenever this happened.

She was fortunate enough to get a apartment that was located next to the fire escape at least in the event that the place caught on fire or some other type of emergency took place. Nothing had happened yet, but the way the building was taken care of, it gave off the feeling of it being only a matter of time before something was going to happen.

The only uncooperative thing about the apartment that she lived in was her door. She had to tilt the handle just the right way so that she could get the key to fit into the hole otherwise it would jam and take her an extra fifteen minutes trying to get it unstuck and hope that the doorknob didn't break. It had happened once before and the staff had been rather putout to have to come up and fix it for her.

Opening the door, she leaned down to pick up the mail that she knew was going to be laying there in wait for her. There was never anything interesting or important among the things she received. Most of it just being junk mail or offers for things that she wasn't interested in. She knew threw it away without looking through it however because she was never certain when she would end up missing something important.

Today was not one of those days however and she ended up tossing all of it to be recycled before heading into the kitchen to get something to drink. Her throat was a little dry after swapping from being some place so cold to one that was of a more comfortable temperature.

She looked down when she felt something bump against her leg to find her only companion having come out from where he was hiding to come and greet her.

"Hell pretty boy, did you have an interesting day too?" She cooed as she leaned down to pet the cat looking creature. The black and gray mottled creatures let of a soft huff a meow in return before rubbing against her hand.

On first appearance anyone would think that it was a typical house cat even though it was slightly bigger than one and at least reached up past Heather's shin and halfway to her knee. It even acted and behaved like a house cat and enjoyed staying inside while she was gone.

Truth was though, it was believed to be a western version of the nekomata othr, but classified as a failed experiment to force it to cross with another creature or cat some years ago. The exact story was never very clear but the result was her companion who was quite happy as a house cat even though it couldn't communicate beyond normal cat noises and the two tails it had ended up being disformed so that one was long and elegant and the other was a short stub that could only twitch occasionally.

"Marshmallow, Do you want to come and join me in my study as I get to work on some stuff?" She asked looking down at the cat creature who had attempted to wrap itself around her legs as a plea for more attention. He perked up when she said this and trotted ahead of her in the direction of the office. He perhaps loved the space more than she did because there was a little window shelf that he could lie on while she worked away on her computer.

While she was gone the door always stayed closed as she didn't want to risk him ruining any of the papers, books, and other things that she collected while she was away. So for him this was quite a treat whenever she came home and he got the chance to sit in the window and suck up the sunlight.