Jared was in love with a cat. He had always been a believer in love at first sight, and he knew that one day he would meet his soulmate.

And here he was.

Calix was everything: hot, badass, and a cat (not like Jared was a furry or anything, but still). Everything about Calix was amazing. He made Jared feel all sorts of things, the best things.

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"Honey, I'm home!" called Calix as he walked into the house.

Jared came running around the corner to hug his amazing husband. "How was work today?" he asked.

Calix took his coat off and put it on the rack by the door. "Okay, I guess," he answered, obviously tired from his long day of work.

Jared hugged his husband. "You don't have to lie to me, sweetie, it's okay if you aren't feeling well."

Calix smiled weakly. "It's no biggie, honey, everything is fine."

Jared quietly took off his husband's coat.

"Even if something was going on, you needn't worry about it. You are already so busy here at home, I'm surprised you haven't lost your mind."

Jared smiled lightly, knowing his husband was hiding something. "It's okay, sugar cube, you can tell me anything. It'll be okay."

Calix sighed at his honeybun's cute yet constant pestering. "You know how they are at work, sugarplum — "

Jared cut him off. "Are they harassing you at work again, sweetie?"

Calix nodded lightly.

"Well I'm going to have a stern talk with your manager, cutiepie, this is ridiculous."

Calix reached out and placed his hand on his caring husband's shoulder. "You don't have to do that, schmoopy. Everything is under control."

Jared teared up slightly at his husband's strength. They knew each other so well. "Oh Calix."

"Jared..."

They embraced tightly.

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The awkwardness that was radiating off of Jared staring at Calix was uncomfortable, to say the least.

Kei hobbled over to the gay snake and slapped him across the face sharply. "Wake up, lovebird, we gotta keep moving."

Jared shook his head and blinked at the literal slap back to reality. He opened his mouth, then closed it.

Calix was unamused. "What the moons does he think he's doing?"

Aidyn snickered at the snake's foolishness. "He's doing an ancient anguis mating call, first used by the oldest angui."

Ari perked up. "Really?"

Kei laughed at that. "No, Ari, not really. He's just joking."

"Or am I?" Aidyn retorted.

Ari looked back at him, now confused. "Are you?"

"Yeah really, are you?" Kei asked, now suspicious of Aidyn's confidence.

"Guys?" Calix spoke up, now a little concerned about the rest of the group's attention span.

Aidyn, who did not hear him, continued on. "I don't know, am I?"

"Guys..."

"Come on Aidyn, are you?"

"Guys."

"I'm not sure anymore, what were we talking abo — "

"GUYS!"

"Oh hey, what's up, Calix?" Aidyn asked nonchalantly.

"Is he okay?" Calix pointed towards a spaced-out Jared.

"Oh not again. Yeah, this happens all the time," Kei assured him, grabbing a water container from her bag. Calix watched uneasily.

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Tonight, Jared had convinced Calix to go stargazing with him. They had packed a small midnight snack and a blanket for later on.

As they looked up at the vast skyscape, Jared turned himself slightly towards Calix. "I want you to know one thing, sugarplum."

"Yes, pumpkin pie?"

"I will always love you no matter what. Whatever may or may not happen, I will always be here for you."

Calix smiled in return for his sweetie-pie's lovingness. "That's why I will always love you, Jared, you have always been loving and caring for me and everyone else. That is why I got something special to celebrate this night with you."

"Oh honey, you didn't have to get me anything. Besides, I don't have anything for you," responded Jared modestly.

Calix smiled even more and embraced his husband into a tight hug. "Why don't we go inside and look at your gift?"

They hugged a bit more before going up to the house. Calix led the clueless husband down into their basement before covering his eyes."I'm going to need you to trust me now Jared."

"Forever and always."

Calix then placed a small furball into the hands of his husband. Jared flinched from the strange feeling of softness.

"You can open your eyes now."

Jared squealed at the adorable creature in his hands.

"A CAT! I LOVE CATS!"

Calix smiled at Jared's enthusiasm and pet the cat softly.

"What's his name?"

"I thought you should be the one who named him."

"Nugget."

"Nugget?"

"He just reminds me of a nugget."

"If you're hungry Jared we can get foo — "

"I'm not hungry, Calix, just having a creative moment."

"Like it's not big deal Jared, we brought some with us — "

"HIS NAME SHALL BE KING NUGGET OF CATBERG AND HE WILL RULE HIS LAND WITH DIGNITY."

"Jared, you need to be honest with me this time. Rehab is expensive."

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Jared was very wet again.

"Was that really necessary?" a deep and heavenly voice emitted.

"Yes," cried out a chorus.

Jared slowly opened his eyes to find a very innocent looking Kei with an empty container of water and a breathtakingly handsome maxi behind her.

"Who's that hottie?" he mumbled.

"Moons, he's out of it. Kei, pour more water on him," Aidyn directed.

She nodded and continued the transfer of liquid from container to the anguis' head.

Jared slowly awakened out of his gaydream and into the real world. "Huh?"

"You know, at this point 'lovebird' isn't a strong enough phrase for you. Hurry up." Kei prodded Jared with her toe.

"Where — who — huh?"

"Yes," replied Kei.

"Yeah, we should probably get going. You can space out on the way," said Aidyn, looking up at the sky.

"But then we'd lose him," Ari said worriedly. "Kei, shush, we don't want to lose him."

Kei mimed zipping her mouth shut.

"Okay." Aidyn looked up and down the beach, and pointed to somewhere behind them. "We came from that way, right?"

Everyone thought for a few seconds.

"Did we?" Aidyn asked again.

Everyone thought some more.

"Kei, you have the map," Ari reminded her.

"Well we came from the woods," Kei mused. "So... back into the woods?"

No one seemed to have a problem with this.

Anyway, they lost Jared.

The details of how this happened were very unclear for everyone, but that is completely and 100% besides the point.

He first tried calling for someone.

"Guys!"

This then devolved to "Guys! Where are you?"

Which then became "Guys! Where are you? I found some cool sticks on the ground and thought we could make a stick hut for this cool rock I also found."

As much as Jared wanted to construct a stick home, there was no Calix to be seen. And no Calix, was no good. Jared needed his Calix. He didn't care what it would take to find his true love. One day they would be together forever, whether that cat man liked it or not.

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To make a long story short, Jared did not find Calix. He did, however, find what looked like a small stone mildly deformed horse.

His first thought was magic gnomes. His second thought was a rare undiscovered species of tiny stone horses.

Then he realized there were a lot of other weird stone things scattered around. Jared took a second to think about this. The magic gnomes theory seemed more likely now, or perhaps it was a species of stone people, not just horses.

"Jared! There you are!" Ari came running towards him, Calix the Hot Maxi and the other two following close behind. "See, Kei, I told you we'd lose him!"

Kei points at Aidyn. "Hey, Aidyn was the one who gave him permission to get lost."

Jared looked at the people he called his friends, glancing at their expressions. Aidyn and Ari were relieved, Kei was being her usual Kei self, and Calix — Calix looked concerned. Calix had been worried about Jared.

CALIX HAD BEEN WORRIED ABOUT JARED. So did that mean... Calix cared about him?

There had been many times in his life that Jared had wished that he could fly. However, this very realization was the first time Jared felt that it was truly possible. For right now, he wanted to fly with Calix.

Unfortunately, he doubted anyone in the group would let him try.

"I found a horse!" said Jared suddenly, fixing Calix with what he hoped was a brave and heroic gaze. "It's right there." He pointed helpfully towards the ground.

"Jared, do you know what a horse is?" Kei asked.

"It's a small horse. A small stone horse."

"Where?" Ari asked, glancing around.

Jared pointed helpfully towards the ground again like he was accomplishing something.

Kei knelt down and picked up another stone thing. "Whatever this is, it is not a horse."

Aidyn frowned at it. "Looks kind of familiar. Is that all there is?"

Kei looked around, reaching forward and picking another small stone thing from the ground. "Nope."

Ari picked up another one. "Look, I found one too. Doesn't look like a horse, though."

Kei squinted at it. "It looks like a pointy blob. Hey, I have a taller pointy blob!"

For once, Jared was the one concerned for his friends. "What do you mean that's not a horse? It looks exactly like a horse." He knew because a friend from his village had drawn a picture once, and the two looked very similar. His friend was very talented for not being real.

Aidyn held up what looked like a round rectangle. "Jared, what part of this looks like a horse?"

Jared wasn't about to be fooled by Aidyn's trick questions. "All of it, silly."

Aidyn muttered something Jared didn't quite catch and seemed to give up.

"Wait wait wait, I think they've got pairs." Kei set two identical horses next to each other, both colored an off-white. "Look, pointy blob and pointy blob. Pointy blob with hat and pointy blob with hat."

Jared took this time to look at Calix, who was watching all of this with a nearly unreadable expression. Not because there was no emotion there — there were several emotions there, most of which seemed to be some form of disappointment. Calix was complex.

Jared liked that. He almost fell into daydreaming about his future with Calix again, but was cut off by someone saying "THERE'S SO MANY BLOBS WHAT?!"

"Hey wait a second." Aidyn knelt beside Kei, staring at the rows of weird-looking horses she'd lined up. "Isn't this a game? I'm pretty sure this is a game."

"What kind of game could you play with those things?" Calix asked, still standing a few feet away from the rest of them. Jared could think of several games you could play: you could throw them in the air and headbutt them, or play guessing games...

Maybe he should take some on the road. Calix seemed like a game kind of person.

Or maybe he didn't. He was very mysterious.

Games or not, he was still hot.

That rhymed. Maybe Jared could become a poet and write love poems to Calix.

Aidyn handed Kei the last horse-thing, and she set it in the line next to its very tall horsey counterparts before standing up to proudly admire her work.

And then she stopped standing up very well, and Jared watched her sway a bit. Half of him was concerned, but the other half was more focused on figurative language to describe Kei's very graceful swaying. (He managed to come up with "like a small flower in the wind," which wasn't bad on such short notice.)

Ari steadied Kei. "Whoa, are you okay?"

"I'm wonderful. Never been better. Motor coordination is overrated anyways," Kei replied, continuing to sway. "Good night, dear friends." Her eyelids fluttered shut.

And like a flower in the wind, Kei proceeded to gracefully faceplant into the ground. 

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....Aaaaaand we're back! And gayer than ever!

We hope you liked this chapter! It was written by the impeccable Charles (mushroom-boi), so thank you sir for your lovely humor. We appreciate it.

What do you think of Calix so far? Or — drumroll please — Jalix? (Cool ship name. Cyill got the short end of the stick.) And do you have any predictions on what's going to happen? Or even remember what has recently happened? So many questions, Almonds. *evil writer laugh* *oh my MOONS I sound like Shannon Messenger this is terrible I regret everything*

Anywho, we hope you enjoyed! Have a good Easter if you celebrate, and have a good end-of-Passover also if you celebrate! And if not, just like. Vibe!

With virtual hugs, purple Google features, and 1950s Jalix AUs,

Gay (Fedora-Clad)

(G.F.C.)