“You, Lee Riseul, are pathetic, you know that?” Minra paced in front of my couch, where I was currently glaring at her with my arms and legs crossed. “You go to work at god knows when in the morning, come home at god knows when at night and you have no friends.”

“I have you, but I don’t think that counts.”

She waved her hand dismissively. “Irrelevant.” She stopped in front of me and crossed her own arms. “You need a life and I’m going to get you a pet.”

The two statements were so seemingly unrelated that I just stared at her. “Are you high?”

“No!” Minra flapped her arms excitedly and pointed into the corner, where a human-cat hybrid was currently stalking his own fluffy gray tail. “Look how cute they are! You have to get one. Once you have one, you’ll have to take him for walks, and go out and buy food instead of ordering takeout, don’t think I didn’t look in your garbage because I did, and you’ll actually have to interact with people. I mean, look at Bean!” The hybrid looked up at his name and Minra grinned fondly at him. “You cannot resist the cute, dude.”

Bean smiled shyly at me then jumped as his tail twitched. I gave a reluctant smile back because he really was adorable. He had perky grey ears and a fluffy matching tail, and two deep dimples when he smiled. No wonder Minra was obsessed with him, and she’d only had him a few months.

The new human-cat hybrids were all the rage at the moment, and the pet stores couldn’t keep enough of them stocked for clamoring customers. They were exclusively male, with the appearance of a boy in his early teens. When walking they walked upright and usually came up to about shoulder height, but they crawled on all fours as well and curled up on the floor to sleep with their tails wrapped around their legs for comfort. Their most feline characteristic was their eyes, which had a cat’s vertical pupil and were usually human colored. They were basically child-like and never reached full human intelligence, but they could talk and had personality for the most part.

When Minra introduced me to Bean, I knew why she liked him: the dimple for one thing, his cute ears and matching tail for another. His eyes crinkled when he smiled and he was sort of shy when around new people, but he was used to me by now. His given name was Hongbin, but Minra had poo pooed that almost immediately and said she preferred Bean. She said he liked it too because he jumped up and down the first time she called him that.

Yeah, I call BS on that. She just liked the name.

“I don’t want a Cat-Boy,” I tried to protest. “They’re just a fad, and seriously, why would you want a hybrid pet? Just get a stupid cat.”

“Cats can’t talk.”

Honestly she had a point.

Minra beckoned to Bean, who trotted up to her and took her hand. She fluffed his hair behind his ears and he closed his eyes, enjoying the sensation. “I’ll be back tomorrow with your very own Cat-Boy. No changing your address before I get back.”

Damn. She always could read my mind.

I opened the door and walked her outside. Minra turned Bean around. “Say bye, Bean.”

Bean lifted a small hand and gave a tiny wave. “Bye-bye,” he said and then ducked his head shyly as he did whenever he talked to someone besides Minra.

I couldn’t help but smile. They were kind of endearing.