Underneath It All

The sphinx cat stared at me with wrinkly, alien eyes. I stared back, my soul basically leaving my body.

"That's Cornflake," said Chloe, the girl I'd been trying to impress since September. She worked weekends at Paws & Claws, where I'd just scored my first actual job. "She looks intense, but she's a total softie."

Cornflake blinked. I swallowed. "Cool. Very ... distinctive."

Chloe's cat hat—literally a beanie with ears—slipped as she leaned into the enclosure. She pushed it back with that effortless casual move that made everything look easy. Being fifteen shouldn't feel this complicated, yet here we were.

The shelter had regular animals too. A golden retriever named Max kept flopping onto my feet whenever I walked past, because apparently my designated role was emotional support human. A tabby cat named Mittens judged everyone from atop the scratching post. But Cornflake? Cornflake existed in her own dimension.

"People pass her up constantly," Chloe said, scratching behind the sphinx's enormous ears. Cornflake melted like butter. "They see her and go, 'nope, too weird.' But she's literally the sweetest cat here. They don't even give her a chance."

Something about that hit different.

"Yeah," I said quietly. "That sucks."

I thought about my own life—how I coded between classes because I didn't want people to know. How I straightened my curls three times a week. How I laughed at jokes I didn't find funny just to fit the room's vibe.

Chloe looked at me, really looked at me. "You want to hold her?"

"What? No, I might—"

"Here." Before I could chicken out, she gently placed Cornflake in my arms. The sphinx cat was warm, impossibly soft, completely unselfconscious about being exactly what she was. She purred like a tiny engine.

"See?" Chloe smiled, and it was genuine. "Underneath it all, she's perfect."

I looked at this weird, wonderful, completely authentic creature. Then at Chloe, who wasn't wearing makeup today, whose hair was kind of messy, who somehow made being real look like a superpower.

"Yeah," I said. "I feel that."

The golden retriever nudged my ankle. Cornflake kneaded my sleeve. For the first time in forever, something inside me settled.

Maybe I didn't have to perform. Maybe weird was its own kind of perfect.

"So," Chloe said, "same time next week?"

"Absolutely."