Us Against The World

"Right, where have you put it?"

Looking up from the laptop screen, I was met with the rather amusing sight of Cyrus standing there, hair even more unruly than usual and chest heaving from exhaustion. If it weren't for the fact that his face was covered in scabbed pox spots, I may actually have admitted that he looked kind of hot all wild-looking and het up. That was, if I actually thought that, but seeing as I totally didn't, it was irrelevant. Besides, I was rather distracted by the piece of English coursework which some stupid teacher thought that it would be good idea to email me to do. "What?"

"Don't play smart with me!" Now he wasn't so much as hot as angry - which was even weirder. It was the first time that he'd seemed even moderately so; not even Ceri had been able to light the furious spark which currently shone in his eyes. It hadn't even happened when I had gotten extremely bored a few days earlier and covered the downstairs toilet with cling film. He had simply appeared in my bedroom a few hours later with wet trousers, a scowl and said 'You're cleaning it up.' before disappearing to go and change. I refused to, and because it was actually his pee, Stephen made him clean the floor with a scrubbing brush when he got home from work and found out what had happened. Stephen then gave me a high-five and a wink of congratulations before leaving to tell Mel that she may need to buy some more bleach.

With a raised eyebrow, I only bothered to look at him for a few seconds longer, before turning back to my work. "Whatever I'm supposed to be apologising for, I'm sorry, but I really have no idea what you're on about."

"I want to know where the hell you've put it! This isn't funny!" His voice cracked towards the end of his sentence, making him lower his volume somewhat.

And then I may have gotten a bit pissed off at him, which really was never a good thing. And so, I angrily stood up, moving forwards to look him in those eyes which didn't freak me out much anymore. Only, I found that I was craning my head back to do so. Since when had he been that tall? I barely came up to his chin, which was a fairly strange thing. Something about him previously had made him seem so much smaller, but now with a furious expression, he seemed to much more… Intimidating? Only no, that wasn't the correct word because I was on the eyelevel of a baked bean stain which ran down the front of his shirt, which to be honest, made the situation a while lot more comical.

Anyhow, I was still narked about being accused of something which I hadn't done, although I did somewhat wish I was guilty of, and poked him in the chest, purposefully missing the stain which didn't quite look dry yet. "Do not talk to me like that!"

"Then do not move my things!" He stamped his foot, much in the manner of a spoilt and very moody child.

"I haven't touched your stuff! You can't just accuse me of that!"

"Who else would have taken it? One minute, it's lying there on the kitchen countertop, I leave the room for moment, come back and it's disappeared! You're the only other person in the house, and unless it's miraculously come to life, you're the one that's taken it!"

"You probably just put it somewhere else and forgot! I've been in here writing crap about whether Macbeth is evil or not for the past hour, not messing around with whatever you've lost."

"I haven't lost it! I never let that thing out of my sight for barely a minute – I wouldn't have just put it somewhere and forgotten where."

"What is it? I bet you fifty quid that it's on the table or something!" With a final jab (I quite liked doing that), I turned and stormed through to the kitchen, with him following, all whilst kicking up a fuss.

"My wallet, and don't you think that I've checked? I've practically turned the entire house upside-down looking for the damn thing."

He collided into my back, as I stopped in the doorway, slightly stunned. "… Cy, why is there a cat in the sink?"

Stopping short of what was predictably going to be a snappy comment, he too seemed to be at a loss at the ginger tom sitting there, tail flicking back and forth and a stern expression upon its squashed face. It gave a territorial growl as he spoke. "I haven't a clue, although I'm more concerned about what it has under its paw."

Looking towards where he has mentioned, I noted the square of leather which it seemed to be extremely possessive of - his wallet. "Then go and get it."

"Are you kidding me?" Mouth agape, he looked horrified, as if I just said that we should go and eat Bambi's mother for lunch. "I'm not going anywhere near that… that thing."

"It's a cat."

"I'm allergic to them."

Judging from his terrified expression, he was most certainly not. With a sly smile, I raised an eyebrow at him. "No, you're not."

He looked a little sheepish, raising a hand to self-consciously rub the back of his neck as the tops of his ears flushed a crimson red. "Okay, no, but they all hate me. It'll eat me if I go anywhere near it."

"You're scared of a little, innocent cat?"

"It's a bloody demon incarnated! You see the way it's looking at me – it wants to kill me and then feed me to its hoard of demon children!" As if on cue, it gave a loud and somewhat discontent growl in the back of its throat, to which he gave a small squeak, taking a small step back and pushing me forwards slightly towards it. That's right – just use me as a shield and feed me to the lion fist.

"You are such an unbelievable pansy."

"Please can you get it for me?" He practically begged, moving back to only poke his head around the doorframe. "I promise not to give you any more homework whilst we're off! I'll even order for more to be given to Ceri for you!"

"You drive a hard bargain, but I'm not quite feeling it."

"And I'll also tell you what you write for your English work. You know what I'm like when it comes to Shakespeare."

After being made to watch the film adaptation of Macbeth with him, I knew very well what he was like when it came to Shakespeare – a complete and utter nerd, so I was more than content with his second offer. "Deal." The cat, surprisingly, seemed to be much friendlier that expected, for when I crept my way over to it, holding out a hand and murmuring soft words, it stood with its paws both out of the sink, a happy purr rumbling in its throat as it allowed me scratch it behind its ear. "Hey Cy, it's nice. Come and stroke it."

"If you think that I'm going to touch that thing, you've got another thing coming. Get away from it – it's probably got rabies."

"It's fine. I'm not surprised that cats don't like you when you think so lowly of them – they're meant to be good judges of character."

"No, they're just evil little swines who think it's funny to scratch people. Will you please just get my wallet for me and then put the damn thing outside?"

With a roll of my eyes, I obliged, dragging his precious wallet out from the cat who was currently rubbing its head against my wrist. Being every the nosy one, I opened it, to find out quite why Cyrus was so het up about it – maybe he was a secret millionaire. I was very much disheartened to find that it was completely void of cash, which only let to me being more intrigued as to why it was so important to him and was about to search further when it was torn out of my hands. Seemingly, me looking through it had been a good enough reason for him to come within in a few inches of the cat, which coincidently hissed at him, and also happened made him annoyed again. "Hasn't anyone ever told you not to look through other people's personal belongings?" And with that, he stormed off up the annex stairs to his room.

I, being a mixture of confused, entertained and again pissed all in one, could only yell after him "Hasn't anyone every told you that you're a moody, self-conceited arsehole?"

"And you're a complete and utter selfish, annoying and nosy bitch who can never keep her nose out of other peoples' business!" He said in return, albeit extremely under his breath, as he slammed the door shut behind him. I still heard it though.

Ouch. For once, I wasn't being sarcastic about that. So that was what it's like to have an older brother. How peculiar. The cat just gave me a knowing look, making me turn my attentions back to it. Now fully out of the sink and standing on the counter-top, I truly remarked upon how big it was – the thing was practically a mini-tiger. "So how did you get in, hm?" Looking over its head, I noted the wide-open window above the sink, looking out over the driveway and onto the street beyond. Cyrus had obviously opened it – probably to let the smoke out from one of his increasingly frequent culinary experiments gone wrong - and accidently let the cat in. Although, the relation of burning and that baked bean stain was far beyond any reasoning which I had.

Anyhow, it gazed at me for a moment with large, amber eyes, before jumping down onto the tiled floor and running over to the Cyrus' staircase, beginning to jump up them two at a time. Stopping half-way up, it looked at me through the oak banister poles, and then carried on again. I got that message – follow it. I did so, creeping up the as quietly as possible until I came to the closed wooden door, directly at the top. The cat was sitting curled up on the top stair and pawed at the door as I reached it, indicating for me to open it. Oh, the clever little thing – what a pure and evil genius. We were very much alike.

The door handle thankfully turned without too much of a rattle with the door itself silently opening enough for the cat to slip in. I waited with bated breath for a few quiet moments, which was soon shattered by a high-pitched shriek, the door suddenly being yanked open. Before I could fully comprehend what had happened, the large and extremely panicked figure had collided with me, and we were both tumbling down the very long and very hard flight of stairs.

There was a rather loud and sickening sounding thump as both of us hit the bottom, quickly followed by an 'oomph' as I just may have landed on something squishy, that being compared to the surrounding hard tiles. There were a few moments just filled with groaning before I managed to mutter out a slightly more legible "Ouch."

"Ouch?" His voice, layered with a great deal of pain, sounded incredulous. "You have the sheer audacity to say ouch? I'm the one that cushioned your fall! Think about what pain I must be in!"

"Obviously not a lot, judging by your level of speech."

"Just shut up and get off of me, you fat lump."

I remained where I was. I was in far too much pain to even consider moving. "That's not very nice."

"Yeah, and right now you're very close to crushing my balls, which isn't too nice either-"

That did the trick to make me roll off. I most certainly did not want to be in such close proximity of his family jewels. "Ew."

"Indeed." There was a sound as he attempted to sit up, followed by a guttural groan. "I think I've done my back in."

"You're such an old man."

"It's your fault."

"Oh sure, as always, everything is my fault."

"Because it usually is." I was sternly told. "You set that damn cat on me! Actually, where it is?"

"The cat?" I attempted to raise my head for the first time, spotting it on a step, only a few up from where he was back to laying spread-eagle out. "I can't see it." As if on cue, it began to creep down to the unknowing Cyrus, finally placing one paw onto his chest and crawling on top of him. Instead of freaking out once more as I predicted, he simply cringed, groaned once more, laying still once more and not even bothering to move. "I think it likes you now."

"I would say it feels guilty for practically pushing me down the stairs, but everyone knows that cats do not have consciences." He gingerly raised a hand to stroke its head, eliciting a surprising rumbling purr from it, causing a lop-sided smile to appear upon his mouth.

"Either way, it's a freak cat. It has a conscience, or it's apparently the only cat in the world which seems to like you."

"Or it's just plotting its next attack and is cruelly pretending to be friends."

"So, again, is a freak cat."

As if time with his new friend's purrs, he gave a small chuckle, growing in strength to becoming a fully-fledged gale of laughter - something which I had never heard pass by his lips before. The change in his face was something truly remarkable - the stiffness completely left, a deep crinkle either side of his eyes appeared and for one very minute moment, he seemed to be happy. "I just think that life seems to be changing a great deal."