pairing: rika/reader
notes: for day 3 of rika week – volounteering/animals.
No dog, Rika says. That’s the one concrete limitation she has here. She’s been feeling that ache of something missing for a while now, but she can’t deal with the heartbreak of another dog. Not again. Not after Sally.
It doesn’t stop her from bending down to coo at the dogs in the shelter when she volunteers, and asking about the regulars, but. She won’t be swayed on this.
Not that you have any intention of doing that, anyway. Pretty bad basis for getting a pet together, especially for the first time – and even more so considering Sally.
But, aside from dogs, everything else is, at least, up for consideration.
You toss ideas at her in the weeks after she confesses that she feels ready to let something new into her heart and house.
It’s not that you’re trying to take the role of a passive observer in this process – it’ll be in your house too, of course, so you’d better be on neutral terms with the idea, at the very least – but it means something to Rika that’s… not quite there for you.
So – a cat? A fish? A bird? A ferret?
Fish are fine, she says, but not what she’s looking for. Birds aren’t quite her thing, as ferrets… bother her for some reason she can’t quite place. Cats – well, she’s already given up the most beautiful cat in the world to someone else, so it’s a little late on that count.
She laughs at the more ridiculous suggestions, and takes more of them seriously than you might have thought.
There’s no point in trying to rush her. She’ll know when she knows. But, weeks later, and there’s still no leads.
Until she gets the phone call from the volunteer worker.
You were already planning on going out that day – nothing fancy, just walking around the city some, a chance to spend some time together – so when Rika slips her phone into her pocket with an odd look on her face and says that someone from the shelter asked her to meet at her house as soon as possible, it’s not too much trouble to make your way there first.
Honestly, it’s a little bit ridiculous that the girl even had Rika’s number, but then, Rika herself has volunteered there long enough that she must have some information on record.
When you get to the address she texted, her face is familiar in a vague sort of way, but you cannot remember her name for the life of you. Of course, what’s much more eye catching is the snake she winds gently through the fingers of her left hand.
It’s a delicate little thing, small enough to fit through her parted fingers but long enough to curl around her wrist and down, and patterned in alternating buttery yellows. Occasionally it pauses and flicks out its tongue and then continues meandering along, seeming contentedly curious.
“Sorry to call you up so suddenly,” says the girl, absentmindedly holding her other hand up to the snake to let it expand its playground. “I wasn’t sure who else to go to.”
Rika elbows you when you mutter that literally anyone who gets paid for this sort of thing would have worked.
The girl rattles off the details of the story that Rika told you on the way there – corn snake, probably not too old, maybe a year, near as she can figure, but that’s mostly guesswork. Owner was a casual acquaintance of hers who took advantage of the fact that she volunteered at a shelter to drop off a snake they no longer cared to deal with on her, without checking whether the shelter was equipped to deal with it.
“I don’t even have a real tank for her, just…” And the girl gives a weak shrug, motioning to a sad little tupperware bowl, empty now but, you presume, meant to act as a makeshift home for the snake.
“So… what are you gonna do?” you ask. You’re watching Rika, rather than the girl, but turn back when the girl starts to shake her head, looking nervous. “I can’t – I can’t leave her here, my parents would freak out.”
“May I?” Rika holds out her hands.
It’s almost comical how quickly the girl presents the snake to Rika, letting it test her fingers curiously and then begin to wind through them. The girl’s face shows stark relief, as if you’ve solved her problem all at once.
“She… knows there’s no reason that we would have to take the snake, right?” you murmur.
“Oh, hush,” whispers Rika, voice light even as she scolds you. Louder, she says, “well, she definitely needs a more permanent home, and something more… fitting than that.” She nods to the bowl.
She lifts her hand to examine the snake closer. It gently nudges against Rika’s nose before looking for another place to explore.
“She is a pretty little thing, isn’t she?” Rika asks, seeming faraway. “Does she have a name?”
“The snake? Probably did, but I don’t know it.”
And oh, you think, watching the softness of Rika’s eyes, this is it.
“Well…” says Rika. She half-turns to you, and the snake takes that motion as a cue to start trying to climb up the side of her face. “What do you think, dear? How do you feel about harboring her at home, for now? Give her somewhere a bit more suitable to stay until we find her a more permanent home?”
You stifle a laugh as the snake begins winding around Rika’s hair and Rika absentmindedly strokes its head. “Yeah,” you say, “for now. I think that sounds best.”
