A Case of Mistaken Identity {Drew}

[Melisande Theroux]

Melisande walked slowly up her apartment stairs, phone glued to her ear. On the other end, Wesley was trying to explain to her how he'd had problems chewing through his furniture in his first house when he'd just gotten out of the military. They'd been talking a lot lately, just as she suspected they would have, but she couldn't really say she was sorry. He wasn't actually as much of an asshole as she'd initially thought, and even though it was primarily his fault that she was a lion in the first place, she felt like she was beginning to get the hang of it.

She turned the locks over to her apartment and pushed the door open. "Alright, Wes. Bye," she said, a large smile on her face. She couldn't imagine chewing through her reclining chair's fabric. She looked at it fondly, and nearly jumped back in surprise when Drew stood up from it.

"Jesus!" she cried. "You scared me! I thought you went to go see that movie with Josh already," she said, hand to her heart. She knew she smelled him, but he'd been at her apartment so much it was useless to try and identify if he was currently there or if it was just residue - she never cared enough to, but he'd surprised her.

When met with a stare, she held her hands up. "What?" she said, voice slightly annoyed still from having the shit scared out of her. "...Drew?"

[Drew Richardson]

He hadn't meant to scare her, really.  Honestly, he hadn't!  He'd let himself in and settled into a chair because he was still ever so slightly paranoid about hanging around outside the door, given what had happened with that crazy lady, and he hadn't thought she'd mind, at least initially.  He had something to talk to her about, so that might change in the next few minutes.

"Josh canceled, somethang goin' on with Aimee.  Movie prolly woulda sucked, anyway," he told her, trying to figure out how to breach the subject on his mind.  It wasn't going to be easy, no matter how he did it.  "Uh, Melisande?  Can I ask what's goin' on with you an' Wes since I...got back?  I mean, I ain't gonna freak out or anythang an' I don' blame you if you don' really like me so much after that mess, but if you like him..."

He trailed off, not really sure how to go on with that.  Pretty much, he just wanted to know.  If she was into Wes, he was going to be pissed at Wes for awhile, but he'd get over it.  That was her choice, but he wasn't blind.  He'd noticed how much time they were spending together, he'd heard her say goodbye to him as she pushed the door open, and he'd seen the fond look on her face.  He wasn't a total idiot, despite the impression some people got.

[Melisande Theroux]

Mel's smile as he said that his plans got canceled faded just as quickly as it'd come. She had opened her mouth to suggest something naughty, like strip-poker, but then Drew'd plowed right on, dumping words out in front of her so quickly that, after a moment to process what he'd said, she realized that he might not have gotten them out at all if he hadn't have sped through his little speech right then. She wondered how long he'd been working them over in his head, and she narrowed her eyes a little at him, folding her arms.

"Andrew Richardson, have you lost your mind?" she demanded, stomping her foot like a child. It was hard to take Melisande seriously when her cherubic cheeks with their little dimples were still present as her lips twisted into an angry frown. Her size wasn't at all intimidating, and neither was her voice - especially when she pulled a stern mom-move like that, but stomped her foot like an impudent child. No, none of that seemed to help her any - but the fact that in the last few weeks, something about her, something nobody could put their finger on, had changed, made the volume in her words that much more present, and that much more serious.

She leveled her gaze at him, still unable to believe what she'd heard. "First off, why would I leave you after all of that happened? And secondly, heh," she said, a surprised, dry laugh edging out in between her words, "Wesley? Really? I mean... really?" she asked, throwing her hands up in the air, her voice shrill.

"If I didn't want to be with you anymore, I'd have taken my key back and told you to GTFO, not sneaked around behind your back with your friend. Get real," she snapped. "And I'm honestly hurt that you'd think that. I mean, I work at a strip club, I expected to eventually hear something about thatl, but this is a little far-fetched," she said, giving him the raised eyebrow expression, like an annoyed Disney princess.

[Drew Richardson]

It didn't take a rocket scientist to know that he was in trouble when she pulled out his full name like that, and all he could do about that one was be glad that she didn't know his middle name, or she'd have probably done the full 'mom' thing and pitched the whole thing out there.  Even his own mother didn't do that anymore, though he hadn't exactly done anything stupid enough to warrant it in a hell of a long time.  She'd yelled at him after she was done being relieved that he hadn't died in the Middle East, but that was about it for his whole adult life.

Damn. 

"I'm askin' 'cause I don' know!  I ain't tryin' ta accuse you of anythang, but y'all been talkin' a lot lately an' I don' get it!  Somethang's been goin' on, and nobody wants ta tell me!  If it ain't 'cause you don' like me, then what's goin' on?" he asked, his volume going up only because he really HADN'T meant to piss her off, was feeling defensive, and really WAS frustrated as hell that NOBODY would tell him what the big deal was.  Something had definitely changed, and he was out of the loop.  He didn't like being out of the loop, especially when it involved everyone acting funny.  As far as he could tell, it looked like the other four had paired off and left him to wonder what the hell was happening.

In a way, he was right, but so very, very wrong otherwise.  They'd 'paired off' only so far as infecting each other with the shifter virus, and he didn't know it, but that really wasn't something he wanted.  He didn't want to be left in the dark, though. 

He just didn't know WHAT to think.

[Melisande Theroux]

Melisande had been about to start into him again, but Drew raising his voice at her was enough to make her visibly flinch and take a step back, eyes wide. Her mouth actually fell open a little at the notion he'd just done it, and for a second, it looked almost like she was about to cry. Her lips pressed together and her eyes narrowed, nostrils flaring as she exhaled heavily through her nose.

She didn't say anything, just reached over and locked whatever locks hadn't already been secured on her door, and then looked at Drew. Without warning, she reached out, planting a hand flat on his chest and shoved him back into the chair (good thing it rotated). "Sit," she commanded. The fact that she was able to push him down with what seemed to be very little effort, she hoped, would be enough to earn his silence for a precious few seconds while she spoke.

"I'm going to show you something, and it's not going to explain everything, but it's going to be a start. Now, from you, I want no running, yelling, screaming, or in general any very sudden movements. Promise," she said. When he opened his mouth to protest, she held up an index finger, shaking her head, falls of light brown hair brushing her shoulders.

"Promise," she said again.

[Drew Richardson]

He honestly hadn't meant to raise his voice at her, but he'd come from a large family, so he couldn't quite shake the habit of getting loud when something happened.  You weren't heard in a family like his unless you got loud, and he did it whether it was something good or bad that he was animated about.  This, what with how it upset and frustrated him, was certain to get him to raise his voice some, and he really wasn't angry, especially with her.  He would never do anything to scare or make Melisande cry on purpose.

Josh and Wes, yes.  Melisande, no.

He stopped at her expression and flinch, realizing that he'd messed that up and gotten loud, but it wasn't like he could take that back.  He didn't feel like withdrawing his questions and defensive remarks, since he'd meant those, but the volume he would have.  His bad.  Of course, having her shove him one handed into the chair definitely got him back for the volume.

It also shut him up for sure.  He positively stared up at her, aware that he wasn't THAT easy to shove around, and she hadn't even looked like she put any effort into it.  He'd have believed that of Wes, because the guy was built like a Mack truck, but this was Melisande.  What the hell?

"Promise?  What if I wanna run, scream or yell?  I might do it on accident!  What's goin' on?" he asked again, the tables turned and him staring at her wide-eyed now.  She seemed dead-set on this promise, though.  Fine, he'd do what he could.  "I promise ta try not ta yell or freak out.  Melisande, what's goin' on?"

He'd have been lying if he said that he wasn't getting paranoid at this point.  What was she going to do?

[Melisande Theroux]

"Well, try," she said finally. She shifted her position for a moment, and then clasped her hands in front of her as she spoke. "Okay, Drew. A lot has been going on since... well, it all sort of started.... Okay, thing the thing is..." She tried to explain several times before sighing, and wringing the sleeves of her terrycloth zip-up hoodie so much that she might've permanently damaged them.

"The reason Wes and I have been hanging out so much is that... well.. He's a shapeshifter. So is Aimee. And actually, Aimee made Josh one, too. And Wes made me one - but Josh didn't know about any of this until it happened. All Hallows has tons of them, it's why the people there are so pretty. Vampires, too. I know it sounds crazy, but it's all real, and I really can't sugarcoat it any for you, because that's the long and short of it. We think you were attacked by a vampire, and that's why you got beat up so badly by a woman who's evidently my size."

"There are some vampires who are really bad; they run a place where you can buy people like slaves and really bad stuff happens there. They can just snatch people right off the street, well, humans anyways. There's a law saying that shapeshifters, like me, are 'freeblood', which means we can't just be grabbed and thrown in without one of our own kind selling us. So, basically, to prevent that from happening, Wes infected me. Aimee infected Josh, and, well, I said I'd infect you, but I don't like keeping things from you. I've been trying to figure out how to tell you, but I know you don't believe me, so I figured I'd just show you...."

Melisande's form seemed to fade away, leaving the large form of a female lion in her place. The animal was regal and beautiful, sitting on her haunches with golden eyes staring directly at Drew. She moved forward, low-crawling to show him she meant no harm, to attempt to nuzzle his leg with her head.

[Drew Richardson]

Drew watched Melisande with a suitably concerned expression when she told him to try, then had trouble even beginning to explain, since that just didn't sound good.  It was when she jumped right into it that he reacted.

By staring at her like she'd just made a really, painfully bad joke at his expense.  Shapeshifters, and vampires, weren't real, and everyone knew it.  She had to come up with some ridiculous story about her, Wes, Aimee and Josh being shapeshifters?  What was Wes, a refrigerator?  And why would she even bring up his attack, only to blame it on a vampire?  That was low. 

Yeah, she was right that he didn't believe her, and that was plain on his face.  Skepticism was really the only way he could even consider approaching this subject, which made him think that she really hadn't taken anything about his personality into consideration when she asked him to promise not to freak out.  Why would he freak out that she told him she was seeing his friend because they were, what, shapeshifters?  Besides the fact that it sounded like total bull.

Then, she showed him.

And he just stared.

He couldn't move for the first few moments, because it was just that insane.  He must have lost it, right then and there.  Something in his brain must have just popped, because guys didn't see their girlfriends just turn into great big lions.  It didn't happen.  He didn't move until she crawled forward and actually touched him.  It was as though that physical contact was what broke him out of his stunned paralysis.

"OH, HOLY SHIT!" he howled, his promise to try not to do so forgotten in the insanity of the situation.  He jumped back from the MASSIVE cat so fast that he essentially ended up crab-walking up the back of the chair, and flipped it backwards so that he could land in an entirely ungraceful pile just past the chair itself.  Fortunately, he also landed on his head, and you may wonder why this writer actually thinks that's a good thing, but really, it was.  It meant that he stopped spazzing and had to deal with the injury as his immediate concern.  That included grabbing the area that was soon going to be a nice goose-egg, and wincing while staying put. 

That was one way to get him to chill for a moment, and by the time he was done recovering, he stared at the cat again.  "This ain't happenin'.  No way," he murmured.  He definitely wasn't dreaming, though.  That crack on the head had hurt.

[Melisande Theroux]

The lioness actually sighed, a strange thing to see, watching her boyfriend flip the chair over. The noise startled her, but she only sat up for an instant before realizing he'd banged his head pretty hard - hard enough to calm himself down, which means it had probably hurt. She crept alongside of him, lowering her head to him to nudge him a little. She could hear him saying that it wasn't happening, but obviously her presence suggested otherwise.

She nudged his hand specifically, like an animal who wanted attention, specifically, to be petted. A soft rumbling sound was coming from her chest and throat - Melisande was purring. It was probably beneficial to her that she'd worked at All Hallows for as long as she had, because she'd picked up being a lion quite well, if you ignored the fact that her size was still a little bit of an issue. Her tail flicked behind her, and she'd found that if she moved through her living room without much care, she'd knock things on her table over with it.

She nudged him again, trying to show him that she was okay, and that she wasn't going to hurt him. She even managed a playful sort of "purrrow?", though from a lion it wasn't quite as soprano as a common housecat.

[Drew Richardson]

He sat up, at least, but he didn't go any further than that.  He made no attempt at standing or fixing the situation with the chair, and had his head clutched as he stared at the chair as though it had offended him.  Better to focus on that than the ca--

Oh, she was touching him.  Touching him!  A lion!  In Melisande's apartment!  And the best part, it was supposed to be Melisande!  He was insane!  He had to be!  He wondered if he tried to run, if the lion that he thought his girlfriend was would eat him.  Maybe.  He wanted to call Josh and tell him to come over, though.  He needed his friend to tell him that he was being crazy and wasn't seeing this.  Maybe that would snap him out of it.

He didn't want to get eaten for it, though.  That wasn't worth it, even if his brain only THOUGHT he was getting eaten.  He imagined it'd still suck.

"Um.  Okay.  My girlfriend's a lion.  That's great.  I need ta call Josh, so he can come tell me I'm crazy," he told the cat, feeling even stupider for talking to a LION, but she nudged his hand and it occurred to him that not petting her or whatever she wanted and yelling might result in him getting eaten.  Not being eaten was his big goal.  "I'll be.....righ' back.  Don', uh, yeah, be back in a sec."

He got up slowly, watching her like she might take a swat at his ass (which would have scared the HELL out of him), and he edged towards the kitchen for a foot or so before bolting inside and whipping his phone out, dialing Josh, and hoping that he wasn't going to be ignored for anything going on with Aimee. 

Finally, he got an answer.  "JOSH.  I'm at Melisande's, an' I thank I lost my mind, but I gotta HUGE cat in the livin' room, an' you need ta get over here so I can prove ta myself that I'm crazy," he explained fast, pretty much all in one breath.  Josh better not argue, because he wasn't going to deal with it.  This was him freaking out as quietly as he could because there was a LION in the other room who really didn't need an excuse to eat him.  He'd promised her he wouldn't yell.

[Melisande Theroux]

Melisande watched him, a little disappointed that he wouldn't pet her, but she couldn't really expect him to just accept her with open arms. That would have been too easy, really. At least the hard part was over. As he dashed into the kitchen to phone Josh, who no doubt would simply try to calm him down as opposed to accelerate the situation any (she hoped), she changed back into her human form, and walked in after him.

"Drew," she said, tone more than a little pleading. "Josh already knows. I told you, he's a leopard. He reacted pretty much the same way you did, if it makes you feel any better," she offered. She reached out to touch him, but her hand fell short as she pulled it back. She realized he might not want her to touch him right then, and it hurt her feelings to imagine it.

On the phone, Josh did pretty much exactly what Melisande had said: A lot of "I know's" along with the confirmation that he was also a cat. Josh encouraged Drew to talk to Melisande about it, saying that he was in the middle of something at work, and he'd call him back when he had a chance.

Melisande looked at him expectantly, eyes still that pretty liquid golden hue from her feline form. She attempted to smile, but it didn't quite meet those amber eyes, and she just shrugged. "Are you mad at me?" she asked softly.

[Drew Richardson]

No!  No, no no no! 

Josh wasn't supposed to say 'I know' and say that he was a cat!  He was supposed to tell him that he was being ridiculous and that he was suffering Post Traumatic Stress Disorder or something!  Imagine that, he got shot off in the Middle East and thought he was going to die without having those problems, but now he got kidnapped and hung on a wall for a few days and couldn't keep it together.  That was brilliant.  He was getting stupid in his old age.

Finally, he couldn't listen to it anymore, and hung the phone up.  Talking to Josh wasn't helping. 

He turned back to Melisande, leaving the phone on the counter where he'd dropped it in frustration, and he actually managed to miss the gold eyes for a moment.  He felt better talking now that he didn't think she was a lion anymore, though.

"This is crazy, Melisande, totally cuckoo.  I didn' jus' see you turn inta a big cat, right?"  He looked at her finally, made eye contact, and his heart sank.  Her eyes had never been that color before.  How could this be true?  How could he have possibly missed this?! 

"Fuck.  I gotta sit down," he said suddenly, not even worrying about her responding to that question.  This looked way too true, and he didn't know how the hell to deal with it, but what choice did he have?  He could have told himself that he'd been crazy and thought the lion thing up, but her eyes were gold.  That wasn't right.  He waited until he had a chance to sit down at her dinner table, set his head down for a second just to concentrate, and finally just groaned.  "No, I ain't mad.  Jus'....Christ, this ain't right, none of it."

[Melisande Theroux]

Melisande's expression fell more when he went through the small motions of trying to rationalize something that she'd already shown him. At least he said he wasn't mad at her, but she didn't really believe him. People said a lot of things when they were confused or frightened, so Mel was still somewhat worried about the now-precarious balance of their relationship. She sighed, again, and moved in his direction, wincing as he thumped his head down on her kitchen table. She drew her fingers at his shoulders, rubbing them gently, trying to comfort him.

"Yes, Drew. I'm sorry I shocked you, but really, it's not that bad. I kind of like it, actually," she said softly. "It wasn't precisely what I wanted, but I'm happy I got it - not like you," she said with a smile. She leaned down to kiss him lightly on the cheek, and she couldn't help herself, rubbing her own cheek lightly against his to nuzzle him, mark him. Hers. Hers. "You're just what I wanted, so please don't get scared or angry at me, okay? I can't change what I am, now."

She motioned for him to sit back, and sat down on his lap lightly, wrapping her arm around his neck and leaning against him. She could smell him now like she'd never been able to before - warm, soft, like gunpowder and aftershave. It made her smile, and she became a little worried that he was going to leave her because of all of this, which took the smile right off her face.

"Please promise you won't leave over this?" she asked again, her eyes still somewhat amber, though they'd begun to fade back to their normal blue. She faced him fully, tone very soft, but serious. She needed to know if she could trust him in that respect, because if not, she probably would just ask him to leave right then, and... then she'd go cry to Aimee.

[Drew Richardson]

No, he really wasn't mad at her.  He wasn't lying about that, and he actually wasn't at all mad now.  Just confused and dreading the fact that he knew he wasn't crazy, and that this was real.  It just didn't seem possible.  He'd seen other things over the past few years that didn't seem possible, however, so who was he to judge?

He flinched slightly when she first touched him, but it was Melisande, so he relaxed after that instant, but her 'not like you' had him thinking that she was going to tell him something else he didn't want to hear.  He wasn't sure what, but he definitely wasn't expecting to hear her say that he was just what she wanted.  That was when he turned to look up at her, right after the kiss on the cheek, and he didn't object in the least to her making herself comfortable in his lap.  That didn't mean he was okay with all this mess, but he really wasn't mad at her.  Why would he treat her like he was?

"Whoa, wait.  Who said anythang 'bout leavin'?  You turn inta a cat an' scare the hell outta me, and alla sudden I'm leavin'?  Darlin, I been shot at, chased by rabid dogs an' had some crazy shootin' jars of piss outta mid-air ta keep us out, which is nasty.  Takes more'n this ta chase me off," he informed her, though he didn't punctuate it with a smile like he might have otherwise.  He was still dealing with the information she'd given him.

Shapeshifters and vampires.  Josh, Wes, Aimee and Melisande were all shifters.  All lions, or were there other kinds?  And vampires?  That lady who'd grabbed him was one?  Was that why that situation had been so weird?  Oh, hell, this was going to make him wonder how much else he'd been missing all this time.

"Now, you tell me Santa Claus an' the Easter Bunny ain't real when all those are, an' we're gonna have trouble."  There.  He tried for a joke.

[Melisande Theroux]

Melisande's smile grew times one thousand, and she kissed him aggressively, but quickly on the lips. "If Santa Claus isn't real, than I must've been stocking up on festive lingerie for someone to see..." she said, voice trailing off as she teased him. She was glad he wasn't freaking out as much anymore, but she was more glad that he wasn't leaving her over this. It'd have broken her heart, and then someone eventually would have broken Drew's face.

"The other thing is.... I kind of told the others that I'd dose you up with something, so that the lady who grabbed you couldn't do it again - not without serious repercussions, anyways." She glanced away, and then back to him, face less hopeful than it had been before. "I wanted to make you a lion like I am, but we're sort of stocked on male lions, and I didn't think you'd like being a leopard much, since they're kind of small, and besides, Josh is already one of those... " she trailed off again.

"I was going to offer up tiger, since there aren't many that I know of, and, well, your hair," she explained. "I know it's dumb, but... it's why I thought of it."

Annnd here was where she waited for him to flip out again.