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Nicholas Wilde was nothing if not self-preserving, even at the best of times.
A lifetime of hardships and regularly being on the receiving end of casual cruelty from total strangers will do that to a guy. Not that he ever gave anyone the emotional upper paw, though.
‘Never let ‘em know that they get to you’ was his tried-and-true motto, after all.
Really could buy a printer and some card stock, slap on a font, come up with a rhyme, pass it off as a platitude and make some quick cash in the inspirational card industry, he mused as he popped off the lid of a soda bottle, taking a long swig. All the geriatric millennials would eat it rightttt up.
He promptly shook his head at himself with half-humored disbelief. Even now, two years into trading his old life for his new one as a cop, he still couldn’t shake the hustling mentality one hundred percent of the time.
Which brought him back to his original thoughts on self-preservation…
“Whatcha thinking about?” Judy’s voice broke through the silence, and he turned from where he stood to face her. She was lounging in her gray sweats and a snug-fitting white tank, resting on her belly on his bed in the corner of the room, arms propped up on elbows, chin in her paws, and legs swinging to and fro carefreely up in the air. After an imperceptible pause, he gave her his usual easy grin, the one he’d spent years perfecting, and shrugged. “Wasn’t thinking about much of anything. So what are we watching tonight?”
“I’m glad you asked,” she grinned back, eyes sparkling, all excited. “I’m giving you a choice, you get to choose. You’ve got two options tonight: CSI, or Law & Order. Whichever one you choose, we’re binge-watching it till it’s time for me to go home.”
He put down his soda on the counter next to him. “I’ve never seen either one.”
“I know.”
He thought for a moment. “Eh, let’s go with Law & Order. But if I hate it three episodes in, we’re changing it.”
“Deal!” Judy sat up on her knees. “When’s the takeout arriving?”
“Should be here any minute.” He glanced at the clock on the wall of his kitchenette, opposite of the bed. Judy had helped him make his studio apartment as homey as possible when he’d first moved in, and she’d gifted him the clock, among other things. The hands on it were carrots. He’d jokingly complained about it then, but secretly he hadn’t minded.
Right on cue, there was a rap on the door. Nick went to answer it, uncaring about his appearance; he was also in gray sweats and a form-fitting white tank (“Now we can maaaatch!” Judy had waved her shopping bags in his face with a gleeful little shoulder-wiggling dance months ago, and he’d enjoyed the cheek-splitting grin on her face too much to protest beyond throwing her a smile, an eye roll, and an “Oh boy”) .
“Panda Express for Nick Wilde?” A teenage beaver offered.
“Yep, thanks.” Nick pulled out a twenty from his pocket and exchanged goods with the kid.
He shut and locked his door, walked back over to his low-to-the-floor bed, and with one paw pulled out his laptop from underneath it while handing over the food bag to Judy with his other paw. “Bon appetit.”
She opened the contents of the bag as he situated himself next to her on the bed, both of their backs coming to rest on pillows propped up against the wall. He opened up his laptop on his own lap and reached for the smaller carton on Judy’s lap.
Her dinner was lo mein and vegetables, his was sushi.
“Ugh, so good,” she mumbled with a mouthful of noodles. “Thanks, Nick.”
“Don’t mention it,” he chuckled, popping a piece of the sushi roll into his own mouth. Chewing, he got them to the screen of Nutflix, ignoring that his battery percentage was low (He could easily grab the adapter later, he reasoned to himself. Besides, he’d just gotten comfortable), and scrolled down for a few seconds until he found their show of the evening. He turned on episode 1 of season 1.
The two of them settled into companionable silence after that, the only points of contact being that he reached into her lap every so often for food, and she leaned slightly into his side to watch the show on his lap, with her shoulder and his arm lightly pressing into each other most of the time.
Nick did his best to focus on the cop drama unfolding before him, trying to ignore their constant, mild physical contact. Operative word being ‘trying’.
He didn’t know when exactly he’d started crushing on the bunny. All he knew was that it had been gradual, taking months and years for him to even realize it at all, let alone be consciously aware of it in everyday situations. But it probably had something to do with the amount of times he’d saved her tail during dangerous missions; the fear that made his fur stand on end over the fact that he could lose her, it was a real possibility, she could die on the clock and he’d be left without a partner, and more importantly, a best friend in this world, for the rest of his life. The thought was terrifying and way too realistic for comfort. At first he’d spent a great deal of effort attempting to convince himself that he just cared for her as a close friend - given that she was his only real one - nothing more, but then whenever he tried to do that she’d turn her wide violet eyes on him and beam brighter than the sun and all his efforts would evaporate like mist.
He took stock of his current situation. They not only had PTO over the next two days, but it was also Friday night, which the coinciding time of rarely, if ever, happened to them. Chief Buffalo Butt had threatened the two of them with a month’s worth of parking duty in the new year if Judy continued to refuse to take her PTO, because evidently somebody in Internal Affairs had started sniffing around Judy’s, and by association Nick’s, nearly constantly clocked-in timetables, which didn’t reflect well on the buffalo. Judy had griped and groaned about being cornered over her schedule, but Nick was just along for the ride on matters of work and time off, seeing as his entire social life now existed solely at the precinct. Mammals he’d used to know didn’t tend to get too chummy with him anymore on account of the fact that he was now a cop. But he didn’t really mind either way, since he had Judy, both on and off working hours.
He’d silently wondered if she would use her two and a half days off to visit her family in Bunny Burrow, which would have left him alone with nothing to do (not that he told her that), but blessedly, Judy had gotten herself excited about the opportunity to spend all weekend long introducing Nick to her favorite police shows. She had a list of six shows, which she was dividing into options of two, and he’d get to choose one out of two options each day, and they’d devote one of each day to each of his top picks.
“Y’know, you really should charge your laptop before it dies on us,” Judy murmured, finishing off the last of her lo mein. Nick nodded, paused the episode, and wordlessly lifted the laptop off of himself to reach down below the bed.
All of a sudden, two shrill alarms sounded from both of their phones, and they both straightened to look down at their screens.
Zootopia Emergency Alert: This is a city-wide shutdown. Remain in your homes. Sahara Square, Rainforest District, and Downtown biome weather simulators are down. Tundratown temperatures are below freezing, with its inclement weather traveling west, south, and southwest. Repeat: This is a city-wide shutdown. Remain in your homes. ZPD is on the ground to escort you back into your homes. Contact ZPD for assistance.
“What…?” Nick frowned at his phone, then looked out the only window between the head of his bed and the kitchenette.
Oddly enough, it was sleeting outside from his view from his apartment on Lionheart Ave.
“This never happens,” he marveled, both in amazement and concern.
Judy, for her part, had immediately spurred herself into action. She cleared off the bed and was dialing someone on her phone, foot tapping hard on the floor. The other end of the line also immediately picked up.
“Bogo,” she said into the phone. “I’ve gotta be out there helping mammals get back into their homes.”
“Hopps,” Nick heard the buffalo’s tired voice from where he sat. “There’s no need for that. I’ve already called in reinforcements and every position is accounted for-”
“Nick and I are the only members of the force not out there right now!” She bulldozed on, stubborn as ever. “Chief, we can take our PTO another week, any week, after this is handled. Think of Little Rodentia! Their apartment buildings aren’t built from concrete on the ground; they can easily tip over in the wind, and we’re the only mammals small enough to evacuate them to somewhere safer from the snow, and”-
“Little Rodentia was already completely taken care of five minutes ago.” His voice was getting a little louder, a little firmer. “Now if you don’t shut it right this very second, you and Wilde will be assigned on parking duty for THREE months, Hopps. But what you’re not going to be doing right now is working.”
“But-” Judy’s eyes locked with Nick’s. “I’m, ah, not at home currently.”
“Well, where are you?”
“Nick’s apartment.”
“Then I suggest you two get comfortable,” The chief spoke slowly and deliberately, “because I don’t want either of you out on the streets, unless you both want to get fired. Am I understood?”
Judy sighed and rolled her eyes at Nick, who made a face at her in a show of solidarity. “Yes, Chief,” she said reluctantly.
Bogo clicked off the call, and she scoffed, tossing her phone back onto the bed with a little more gusto than necessary. “As if he’d ever fire us. We’re way too much of an asset to the ZPD! Besides, I know he loves us.”
“Which is exactly why he’s not letting us work, Carrots, you know that.” Nick shrugged. “We’ve more than earned a little time off.”
“Yeah, yeah,” she grumbled, rising on her hind toes to peer out the window. “Gosh, the weather’s going crazy out there.”
“I know.” Nick hoisted himself off the bed to throw the remains of their takeout into the trash. “I mean, it is winter, which of course makes it worse.”
“Yeah.” Judy continued to stare out the window.
Nick, on his part, stared at the back of her head for a moment (her ears were droopy), then said, “Hey, silver lining: I guess we can binge-watch more than just a few episodes tonight, since you’re staying the night.”
“Speaking of which, I can sleep on the floor,” she offered, gesturing to one of his larger pillows. “That’ll work perfectly fine as a mattress for me.”
“What? No. That’s not happening. You’re not sleeping on the floor.” Nick shook his head, training his expression to be neutral. “You’re a lady, and I’m a gentlemammal. I’ll take the floor, you take the bed.”
“Since when are you a gentlemammal?” she teased. He quirked the corners of his lips up, eyes half-lidded, full-on pretending this conversation wasn’t making him nervous.
“Since now. End of discussion.” He sat back down on the bed, waving his laptop at her. “C’mon, we’re only on episode 2, and I haven’t decided whether I like it yet.”
“Oh, you’re gonna like it, trust me,” Judy smiled back at him and visibly relaxed, all notions of returning to work out the proverbial and literal window. “Hang on, lemme get some popcorn started.” She made a move toward his pantry, when suddenly, all the lights in the apartment turned off, including the digital time on the microwave. Instantly, everything went dark.
They both groaned.
“You’ve gotta be kidding me,” Nick turned his phone’s flashlight on, illuminating the dim room. “Is the heater off too?”
Judy glanced at the thermostat on the wall and grimaced. “Yeppp,” she drew out the word, emphasizing the ‘p’. “We’re gonna freeze.”
As if fate timed everything sadistically perfectly for it all to get even worse, the laptop screen chose that moment to go black.
“Damn it,” Nick muttered.
Judy marched across the small square footage from the kitchenette back to Nick’s bed to swipe up her phone. “My phone battery’s at 28 percent. You?”
Nick checked. “17 percent.” He also noticed that the time was 8:45pm.
“We’ve gotta conserve our batteries as much as possible. Turn the flashlight off,” she ordered, and he complied.
Now the room was bathed in complete darkness.
Judy looked out the window again. “All the lights on this street have shut off.”
“Wouldn’t wanna be outside right now,” Nick pointed out, and thanks to his night vision, he could see Judy nodding in defeat. “I guess so,” she said glumly.
They both listened as the winds began to pick up outside and the sleet, now turning into thicker snow, fell harder.
“Now what?” she said into the dark and quiet room.
Nick took a deep breath, then motioned for her to join him on the bed, momentarily forgetting that she couldn’t see him. “C’mere, Carrots. We’ll make a staycation out of this weekend yet.”
Judy found her way back onto the mattress, this time seating herself against the headboard of the bed, while Nick continued to stay firmly in place all the way by the foot of the bed, his back to the wall. He watched as she settled her bunny butt on his main head pillow - and he forced himself not to think about that too hard - pulling her knees to her chest and resting her chin between them. “We could… swap childhood stories,” she mused. “Or play truth or dare. Or twenty questions…” Her voice trailed off, letting him stew on those options.
He instantly knew what he did and didn’t want to do most, and strangely enough, the second option she’d suggested happened to be both.
“I’ll… pass on the childhood stories for now,” was all he said.
She didn’t try to hide the disappointment on her face, which was cute to him. Has she forgotten that I have night vision? He wondered. Out loud, she said, in a chipper voice, “Okay. Truth or dare it is.”
“Hit me with your best shot,” he challenged her casually.
“Oh, you’re gonna regret saying that,” she teased, and he found himself smiling alongside her.
“Doubt it.” He shot back. What’s the worst she can come up with?
“Okay. Truth or dare?” She lowered her knees all the way down and leaned forward a touch.
He thought for a moment. “Mmm, truth.”
“Have you ever had a girlfriend?”
His confidence screeched to a halt. Okay, evidently she wants to get right to the nitty gritty.
“We need to have some type of veto power in these games,” he decided aloud. “Some topics should be allowed to be off the table.”
“Aw, but that’s no fun!” Judy protested, leaning back against the headboard again. “What’s the point of having a sleepover in the dark if we can’t be honest with each other about these kinds of things?”
“It’s not being not honest, it’s evading some of the truth, which is different,” Nick insisted. He was starting to feel nervous again. “Y’know what, Carrots, you were right; I regret this. Can we play a different game?”
She crossed her arms and pouted for a moment, before softening her features and her voice. “Nick… I’ve known you for over two and a half years now… We’ve been a team since before you were even a police officer. You know you can share anything with me. Right now we’re getting snowed in, we can’t use any technology, and we don’t have anything to entertain us. I promise you can trust me. I would never, ever use any information from tonight as blackmail on you, if that’s what you’re worried about. You’re safe with me, you know that. Besides…” Her voice took on a perky lilt. “Confession can be good for the soul.”
Nick pinched the bridge of his nose, thinking. In all their time of being friends, they’d never crossed this territory before. He’d gladly thrown himself into work, case files, and undercover missions with her, as a welcome distraction from these very types of conversations. Conversations that could get too deep, too personal, too raw were always expertly deflected, changed the subject from, and she had mercifully always let him get away with doing that… until now. Clearly all those times were catching up to him, and she was dying to know more about him at this point, and she didn’t seem to want to let it go anymore.
He supposed he could lie and make up some stories about his life… That would be far more preferable to telling the truth…
As if reading his mind, Judy added, “And please don’t make anything up. That’s no fun either, plus I’d be genuinely bothered if I ever found out you were lying to me.”
He sighed. “Give me time to decide whether I wanna play.”
After a small stretch of silence passed between them, he noticed that Judy was shifting, pulling up the edge of the blanket over her legs. She was strong, and her tugging had made him move slightly too, a little to the left.
“It’s starting to get a little cold,” she said.
“Yeah, it is.” He lifted his butt off the bed for a moment, pulling away his side of the blanket from the wall, out from underneath his legs, before settling back down in place with the cover now over his body.
He let the silence between them go on for a few more seconds as they both got themselves comfortable, before finally relenting. “Alright Carrots, I’ll play. But any question you ask me, I have the right to ask you back.”
“And I swear on my life that I am capable of answering any question I ask you,” Judy nodded eagerly.
Nick swallowed. Guess we’re doing this. “Oh-kay, I’m going first. Truth or dare?”
Judy smiled in his direction in the darkness. “Truth.”
He appreciated that she was giving him the upper paw. “Have you ever had a boyfriend?”
“Nope,” she shook her head. “I’ve been on one first date before, and I’ve had a couple… encounters. But nothing serious. I was way too focused on getting into the ZPA, and that scared off anyone potentially interested in me.”
Encounters? Nick’s eyes widened as he took in the full meaning of her words. She’s experienced, he realized, newly intimidated. Of course she was… she was a bunny, for crying out loud. He should have been mollified by the fact that she’d never been in an actual relationship, but the word ‘encounters’ had just been branded into his brain, and now that’s all he could think about. And visualize.
“Huh,” he said, voice cool, calm, and collected, a world away from his thoughts. “Your turn.”
“Truth or dare?” she asked, covering herself all the way up to her shoulders with the blanket now. This forced him to move another inch to the left.
“Truth.”
She waited for a beat, before curiosity got the best of her. “Have you ever had a girlfriend, Nick?”
“Nope,” he replied simply, just as she initially had. He didn’t offer any more information, though.
“That surprises me,” she said slowly, nonjudgmentally. “Were you just not interested in anyone ever?”
“It’s your turn now, Carrots,” he reminded her, a detection of humor in his voice, which she thankfully caught.
She giggled. “Okay, okay, go for it.”
“Truth or dare?”
“Truth.”
“If you had to choose between saving my life, or saving a random Zootopian citizen’s life, in a life-or-death situation, what would your instinct be?”
Judy seemed to ponder this. “Well, you already know what police protocol is…”
“I know, I know. But what’s your instinct.”
“Saving you,” she said in a heartbeat, and Nick’s own heart dropped into his stomach.
He’d already suspected that, given some actual near-death experiences they’d been through together, but boy, did it feel good to hear it said out loud.
She plowed on through his silence. “Truth or dare?”
“Truth.”
“What would your instinct be?”
“Saving you,” he supplied instantly, feeling somewhat exposed, even though he’d asked the question first and she’d already given him the answer he’d hoped for.
As if to reward him, she beamed, her eyes all soft and sweet and mushy in the darkness. “I love you,” she said easily, and his heart dropped even further into the pool of his belly.
“Love you too, Carrots.” Nick could feel the skin under the fur on his face warming, while the rest of his body began to shiver. “Truth or dare?”
“Truth.”
He thought for a moment. “Would you ever betray Mr. Big for the sake of your job?”
“Heck no,” Judy shook her head firmly. “I may typically be loyal to being a cop, but I’m not stupid when it comes to Mr. Big.”
Nick was impressed. “What if you knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that you could get away with it? That you could make it out alive?”
“Still no,” Judy responded, voice resolute. “For the sake of Fru Fru and my goddaughter, no.”
“Good,” he said, not only approvingly but also out of relief. “You’re a smart bunny, I’ll give you that.”
She smiled smugly in the dark, which amused him. “I know.”
“Your turn,” he reminded her.
“Oh yeah… Truth or dare.”
“Truth.”
“How’d you even cross paths with Mr. Big, anyway?”
“Oh boy, that’s a long story.” Nick thought back to all the convoluted details of the memory. “To condense it for you, I was an acquaintance of an acquaintance of an acquaintance who was an interior designer for some relative in Mr. Big’s family, I think a second or third cousin or something like that. One day, acquaintance number 3 asked for a favor from acquaintance number 2, about needing a velvet green armchair; this relative was very particular about armchairs”-
“Wait.” Judy interrupted him. “A bigger mammal-sized armchair? Or a rodent-sized armchair?”
“Well now, that’s opening up another whole can of worms about the Big family’s inordinately extravagant wealth and tastes, but yes, it was a bigger mammal-sized armchair. Acquaintance number 2 had already known that I knew somebody else who had just put a velvet green armchair up for sale. It was a garage sale, and the chair was in lightly used condition - not that anyone else knows that - but he still asked me to retrieve it for him. And thus started my connection with Mr. Big.”
“That’s just the condensed story?” Judy asked.
“Believe it or not, it very much is,” Nick said, amused.
“Huh.” She seemed to ruminate on this for a moment, then continued the game. “It’s your turn.”
“Truth or dare,” he said, beginning to relax into their back-and-forth.
“Truth,” she said back.
“Hmm… what's your favorite thing about being a cop?”
Judy's eyes glittered in the darkness as she started to smile. He knew this was her favorite thing to talk about, her passion in life. “When I first started out, my favorite thing about the job was that I romanticized it a lot in my head. My - our - first real closed case was exhilarating for me. It was like a drug, a rush. I actually made a difference in many other mammals’ lives; I made the world a better place. That was a dream come true. And that’s still my reason for doing it, at the end of the day. Now, though, my favorite thing about it is probably getting to go work every day with my best friend.”
Nick’s heart warmed at her words. “Aw, now that’s sweet, Hopps.”
“I know,” she said again, and laughed. “I do have my moments.”
“You’re always having those kinds of moments,” he reminded her.
“True. And you love it,” Judy said, tone both confident and affectionate. “Truth or dare.”
“Truth,” he smiled.
“Hmmm…” She was quiet for a long while, then, finally, spoke up again. “What kinds of things get you going?”
Nick just about choked on his spit. “Pardon?”
“Y’know.” Her voice was incredibly casual. “Sexually. What turns you on?”
He looked her way incredulously. She was just sitting there, her pupils looking beady in the dark, blinking seemingly innocently every few seconds. It blew his mind how she’d veered into this kind of territory at all, much less this many minutes into the game. “Uh, I plead the fifth.”
“Nuh-uh, can’t do that,” she said in a singsong voice. “You said you never had a girlfriend, but I know you must’ve done stuff with someone in a friends-with-benefits sort of way.” She waggled her eyebrows in his direction, and now he realized that she did remember he could see her in the dark.
“No, seriously, Carrots, I plead the fifth.” Nick laughed breathlessly, but his tone was getting urgent. “That’s way too much blackmail fodder for you.”
“I already told you Nick, there’s no blackmail happening,” she reminded him patiently. “Okay, just tell me one thing. One thing that turns you on. Remember, you can ask any question back.”
Nick chewed on his lip thoughtfully, reasoning to himself that she didn’t have to know that he hadn’t actually ever been with anyone in order to answer this question. “I..” He considered what he could say briefly, then decided to just answer honestly. “I really like it when a girl’s noisy in bed.”
“Hmm,” was all Judy said lightly, which made him obscenely nervous. “...Your turn.”
He gathered his wits about him, feeling like he’d just escaped a maze. “...Truth or dare.”
“Mmm… dare.” Her voice took on a competitive edge.
Nick, not expecting that, looked around the room, seeking inspiration. If he dared her to do anything that required her to get out from underneath the blanket, she could later on dare him out of his blanket cocoon just as well, and he was not interested in that. The coldness was really starting to set in, and even with both of their thicker winter fur coats grown in over the past month, he was hoping she’d spare him tonight.
Finally, after thoughtful consideration of every possible thing, including the motivation to stay on par with her last question and keep things equal between them, he decided on something that was just as daring for him to hear from her as it was for her to say. His voice sounded unexpectedly deep as the words tumbled out, even to his own ears. “I dare you to describe to me the encounters you’ve had in the past.”
Judy’s ears perked all the way up, and he saw her eyes widen, and he faintly picked up on a new scent emanating from her, a whiff of something sweet that was impossible to ignore.
Millenia ago, if he’d happened upon her somewhere, in the dark, and her ears had perked up, and her eyes had widened, and that scent had come off of her into the wind, and he’d sensed it and seen her like this, it would have started a frantic chase between them, led by him. Even now, he felt oddly frantic, like he was inviting her to run away from him.
With apparent nerves of steel, Judy burrowed deeper into his blanket, all the way up to her chin and cheeks, before accepting the dare.
“I was… sixteen the first time.” She closed her eyes, and he felt a flash of jealousy as he witnessed her remembering whatever this was. “He initiated. He was a buck from my biology class; I had a crush on him. He knew I had a crush on him. He smooth-talked me for a couple weeks over texts, and notes passed in class, until finally we had a moment alone under the bleachers in the school gym. He kissed me, I kissed back, there was tongue. He felt my back and stomach and chest underneath my shirt, and he grabbed my butt.” She paused, and he took the moment to let her words sink in. Then she continued. “He turned out to be a jerk who didn’t believe females in general should be cops, let alone female bunnies, which was obviously insane to me, so he never got to get a second kiss from me. The second guy I kissed was another buck. I was seventeen. He was a guy I tutored in math; his grades were dropping. I thought he was cute. This time, I initiated. We were in his bedroom. I kinda jumped him. We made out in his bed. I took his shirt off, so he took my shirt off. Then I took his pants and underwear off.” Judy opened her eyes and looked for him blindly in the darkness, but Nick knew she couldn’t really see him that well. Maybe his silhouette, but not the morbidly curious expression on his face. She smiled in his direction, looking embarrassed. “I… gave him a blowjob.”
Nick slowly nodded, accepting this, feeling all kinds of personal with her now. “Oh yeah?” He encouraged her to continue, trying to keep his tone as even and indistinguishable as possible, but failing miserably at it. His voice was too husky, too deep to his own ears, and he knew from the way her ears perked up again that she caught that. (Her scent was coming off stronger now too, he noticed.)
She nodded slowly as well. “Yeah. Then right after that… he returned the favor.”
She went quiet after this, and silence engulfed the space between them for a hair too long, before he forced himself to say lightly, “Wow. Any other guys?”
“No,” she said in a softer tone, and he found himself exhaling silently. “I wanted to date the math guy, but he wasn’t interested in me after finding out that my lifelong goal was to join the police academy. He was my first and only real heartbreak. That sucked for a while.”
“Yeah, well, he didn’t deserve you anyway.” Nick assured her, uncharacteristically serious. “And look at you now. A big city girl who achieved her dreams.”
“Thanks, Nick,” she said even more softly, all serious too, and that didn’t accomplish anything to diffuse the tension in the air between them now. “Truth or dare.”
A million ideas raced through his mind of what she could do or say next, after he gave her his answer, and those ranged from her asking him the same question back, which he prayed she wouldn’t do, all the way to his wildest, headiest, most certainly impossible hope of her daring him to play out those acts she’d just described, with her. His heart was pounding in his head. “Dare.”
Her next sentence was instantaneous. “I dare you to explain to me, in great detail, why you’ve never had a girlfriend.”
Nick barked out a laugh in surprise. “You sure don’t know when to quit, huh.”
“Never have, never will,” she smirked, looking equal parts sly and adorable. “Fess up.”
He inhaled a long breath, then let it out. “Alright, alright.” He looked down at his own lap, covered by the textured blanket, and he let his eyes focus on the texture as he gathered his thoughts and started talking slowly. “I had a crush on a vixen in the ninth grade.” He paused and looked over at Judy, who was sitting completely still. He looked back down at his lap. “There were a lot of foxes in my classes, since I went to the inner-city public school at the heart of Downtown. She was the most popular girl in class.” He furrowed his brows as he started to remember the pain attached to these normally buried memories. “Valentine’s Day was coming up, and I’d heard our English teacher praise her for apparently writing a really good poem for an assignment, so I got it in my head that she’d appreciate it if a guy who was interested in her wrote her a poem. I spent every night for two weeks in my bedroom, trying to write the nicest poem I could think of. Looking back on it, it was definitely overly cheesy and stupid, but it still came from the heart, y’know? I was hopeful that I’d have better luck in the romance department than I did in the friendship department at school. Looking back now, I know I was an idiot for being so optimistic, and I definitely tried way too hard. I never should have gone all out for her the way I did. But I didn’t expect her to read it and laugh, and then share it with all the other girls in our class, and for them to all gang up on me and laugh at me.” His ears flattened to the back of his head as he recalled that awful feeling. “It was humiliating. Those girls spent the rest of the semester looking at me and whispering to each other whenever I walked past them in the hallways. I dropped out of high school after that summer and never looked back. Haven’t tried to pursue any girls ever since.”
He looked up from his heavy focus on the pattern of his blanket towards Judy, and was surprised to see that she was now mere inches away from him, shivering violently, eyes filling up with tears, paw reaching out for his arm. Man, she was fast. “Oh, Nick,” she said forlornly, and he sighed, both out of not wanting her pity and also not wanting her to be cold.
“You’re going to freeze your tail off, Fluff. Get in here.” He readjusted the blanket off his own body, lifting his arm up to invite her to join him - and was hit by an unwanted wave of icy cold air - before Judy clung to his side, teeth chattering, and together they wrapped themselves back up in his blanket cocoon.
“So… freaking… cold…” she whispered, and he instinctively encompassed her with his arms, rubbing her small frame with his giant paws, and she inched closer and closer to him until she was on his lap, facing him. In a swift, fluid motion, her legs spread apart to surround his hips, igniting a fresh round of fierce butterflies in the pit of Nick’s stomach, and she buried her paws into his armpits. He rested his chin on the top of her head and covered the backs of her drooping ears with his blanket. She was now completely engulfed by him and the blanket, and he was internally thanking his past self for propping up such a huge pillow for his back; all the times he’d moved slightly to the left hadn’t required him to readjust his back support. Judy had been a genius to convince him to buy pillows that were meant for much larger-sized animals than himself.
They were silent for quite some time. Nick continued to rub her back in very short up-and-down motions, incredibly mindful of not going too far down her small waist. She sniffled into his neck, untucking her paws from his armpits and moving them slightly lower to wrap around his sides and clutch at his back. He closed his eyes, relishing the feeling of her holding him so tightly and for so long - they’d never hugged this long before, and definitely never this close. Without even thinking about it, his tail wrapped around her body too, and he couldn’t find it in himself to be embarrassed, because now she was nuzzling his neck with her nose and oh, it felt so good. As a show of appreciation for it, he gave her body a tight squeeze, and she squeezed him in return, long and slow. He could feel every inch of her stomach and chest pressed to his, and he could also feel both of their heartbeats hammering away against each other. Her scent was intoxicatingly all around him now, and completely overwhelming. All of his insides had turned into mush. He wanted to kiss her really badly right now, but she was still tucked under his chin, and an unignorable, cynical voice of reason in the back of his mind warned him not to go there, and it also helpfully reminded him that bunnies were highly emotional creatures in general, let alone when something provoked their emotions, and he was just a friend to her, and she was clearly just trying to comfort him right now after he’d shared such a pitiful story, and the fact that they were being forced to share body heat right now was only because the inside of his apartment had dropped to dangerously low temps.
Nick cursed the logical, self-defensive, forcefully protective side of his brain - he really was nothing if not self-preserving, even at the best of times - because he knew it was right; he knew she didn’t like him that way. She had never given him any indication that she was attracted to mammals outside of her species, and he was even less inclined to believe that that could be true after hearing her stories tonight. She was a rabbit who was clearly into other rabbits.
He sighed, and promptly made up his mind to enjoy their surprise cuddle fest as much as he possibly could, knowing that once the shutdown was over, or the heat came back on, whichever came first, that this experience between them would most likely never happen again. His heart twisted at the knowledge, and so he wrapped his arms and tail even tighter around her body, willing it to stay this cold for the rest of the night.
Judy’s sniffling had slowed down quite a bit, and so had her heart rate. She moved her paws from his back to his chest, keeping them there and staying absolutely still for a moment, before making an effort to pull her face away from his throat and resting it against his shoulder. She craned her neck up to look at him in the dark. “I’m so, so sorry that happened to you, Nick,” she spoke softly, all sad and tender-hearted. “You were not stupid or idiotic for what you did. She was mean. She didn’t deserve you, either.”
Buried too deep by the fuzzy warmth that was radiating off her body onto his, he was unable to bring himself to feel anything but touched by her kindness, her care, and her words. “Thanks, Carrots,” he said simply, lifting one of his paws up to gently hold the back of her head. She leaned into the crook of his neck at his touch, and the desire to plant a kiss on her powerfully returned to the forefront of his mind. He resisted, scared. All he could think right now was Don’t ruin the moment, Wilde, don’t even think about ruining the moment-
“We should sleep,” she murmured into his neck. “But not right here. Over there.” She didn’t point in any direction, but he knew what she meant. “Don’t you dare sleep on the floor. It’s way too cold. We need each other’s body heat.”
“Affirmative,” he replied as casually as he could, and she whipped her head around to look at the head of the bed, over the blanket surrounding her up to her ears. “Why’d you buy such a gargantuan bed?” she moaned. “The headboard is so far away.”
“Are you kidding me? That was your idea,” Nick reminded her.
“I know, I know,” she grumbled. “You shouldn’t always listen to me, you know. I make mistakes.”
He cracked a smile at her dramatics. “No, that wasn’t a mistake. You were right.” He made his voice light, donning the air of a furniture salesman. “The size of the bed, matches the size of the kitchen. Everything is perfectly proportioned.”
“Then why’d you rent an apartment meant for an animal that’s bigger than you?” she whined. “I just warmed up and now I’m gonna have to get cold again.”
“We’ll be fast,” he assured her. “The faster we get under there the quicker we can warm back up.”
“Okay.” Judy pulled away from him slightly, and he winced as the cold air of the room returned between them. “On the count of three.”
He nodded, letting go of her.
“One. Two. Three!”
The fox and the bunny released the blanket at the same time and scrambled toward the main head pillow at the front of the bed. The air was absolutely frigid for all of three seconds before their heads hit the pillow and they dove underneath the blanket again. They both shivered against the coolness of the pillow and the chill of the mattress, arms reaching out for each other, and Nick pulled Judy firmly into his chest first, his right paw cupping the back of her head and his left paw curling around her back, with his tail coming around to wrap around her own tail and legs. They both took deep breaths, steadying themselves, and Judy started to nuzzle his neck again, this time more desperately - trying to warm her nose, he figured - as her own paws clung to his back tightly. He hurriedly tucked them both in on all sides before returning his paw to the top of her head. After a moment of hesitation, he started to caress her soft, pushed back ears. Luckily, she seemed to be okay with this, seeing as she returned the action, running her fingers up and down his spine. The butterflies in his belly were back and stronger than ever. He closed his eyes, committing the feeling to memory.
“Hey, Nick?” Judy’s voice was very soft now, her breath hot against his neck.
He stopped his caressing but kept his paws on her. “Yeah, Carrots?”
“This is nice.” She gave him a quick squeeze. “We should do this more often.”
His heart sang as her words sunk in. “We can do that,” he said quickly, aware that he sounded awfully eager, but at the same time he was way too enraptured to care. She liked this, she wanted to do this with him more often, even without the excuse of a dead heater. They were going to do this again. His heart was pounding in his chest, and he knew that with her sensitive hearing, she could tell, but he couldn’t bring himself to feel ashamed about this; his confidence grew and grew as he replayed her gentle admission in his head over and over. He squeezed her in return, long and slow and tight.
“Good night, Nick,” she whispered, snuggling deeper into him.
He settled into place, getting as comfy as possible and pressing his paws into her back one last time, before releasing his hold and letting his arms rest around her body. “Good night, Judy.”
She fell asleep rather quickly, but he stayed awake for as long as he could, soaking up the feeling of having Judy in his bed, in his arms. He listened to the steady sounds of her breathing and her heartbeat, paid attention to the rising and falling of her chest flush against his, inhaled her sweet scent that seemed to be everywhere, and thought back on their evening and their round of truth or dare, silently admitting to himself that swapping secrets with her hadn’t turned out to be so bad after all. In fact, it had been intriguing, exciting, and comforting, and she’d seemed to enjoy doing it as much as he had. Maybe if the power was still out tomorrow, they could play another round. He let his mind wander to her confession of her experiences with other bunnies, and he wondered if she’d particularly enjoyed sharing that sort of thing with him. He also wondered if the tension he’d felt during that conversation had been felt by her too, or if it was all one-sided and he’d just been imagining things. He wondered if he’d be given the chance to push the unspoken limits between them even further tomorrow, and if he could find out even more intriguing details about her. He sure hoped so… he’d like that…
And with those last thoughts on his mind, he drifted off to sleep.
—
Nick drowsily awoke to feeling itchy on his face, having vision in only one eye, with something equally itchy draped over his neck. He was vaguely aware that there was moisture dripping down his shoulder, and one of his paws was gripping something plump and round and soft, with a tuft of fluff between his fingers.
He lay completely still and analyzed and re-analyzed his position, trying to wake up.
It took all of twenty seconds for it to dawn on him that the moisture on his shoulder was not his drool, but Judy’s, the thing covering his eye was one of her ears, the thing around his neck was her other ear, and the soft, round thing in his paw-
His eyes grew three sizes in panic as he realized that he was holding Judy’s butt and tail, and not sparing a second, he lifted up one finger up in the air, then his second, then his third, then his thumb, then his wrist, until his whole paw and arm were hovering a short inch above her in the air, and then he smoothly moved his arm to the right and dropped it back down by his side on the mattress.
Relieved that he hadn’t been caught, and only slightly mourning that he hadn’t fully taken in how it felt to be doing something like that, Nick used his other paw to lift her ears off of his face and neck, then lowered his chin to peer down at Sleeping Beauty herself.
Her mouth was open, and there was indeed drool coming out of it, dripping onto his neck fur and down his shoulder, and her limbs were all spread apart like a starfish on top of him underneath the rumpled blanket. He couldn’t help but breathe out a quiet laugh at the sight of her, but apparently it wasn’t quiet enough, because she started to stir.
She opened her eyes slowly and looked right at him, pupils dilating as she focused on his face.
“Rise and shine, sleepy,” he gave her an easy smile, voice uncontrollably low and honeyed. “How’d you sleep?”
A slow smile spread across her features too, making her look strikingly pretty, and she stretched every which way on top of him. “I slept good. You?”
“Best sleep of my life,” the words were out of his mouth before he could stop himself (he really needed to pull himself together), and he winced internally for a fraction of a second before noticing that her smile had grown deeper and her eyes looked even warmer now. “Is that so?” she beamed widely at him, seemingly delighted by this information.
“Yeah,” he admitted. “I’ve never cuddled anyone to sleep before, at least not for as long as I can remember.”
“You would have loved being a bunny in another life, then,” she sighed, drawing in her paw to grab a fistful of his white tank and resting her balled up fist on his chest. “Every night, growing up, until I became a teenager, I shared my bed with my litter of siblings. It was cuddle central, all night, every night, my entire childhood.”
Growing bold, Nick moved his arms around her frame to hug her to himself, and laid his head back on the pillow to stare at the ceiling. “Oh wow. I can’t even imagine.”
He felt Judy lifting her neck to look up at him. “Were you an only child?”
“Sure was. How many siblings do you have?”
“275.”
Nick whistled. “Wowee.”
“Yeah,” Judy giggled, tracing circles on his chest with her finger, sending sparks to every inch of his body. “We bunnies… we’re good at multiplying.”
“You’ve mentioned that before, yeah.”
She giggled some more, and Nick shook his head, smiling, eyes still trained to the ceiling. “Rabbits are quirky creatures,” he decided to say.
“Oh, yeah?”
“Yeah.” He glanced back down at her. “You’re cute, but you don’t wanna be called cute, which requires an immense amount of self-control from the rest of us, but you don’t practice any of that yourself, ‘cuz you’re an absolutely insanely horny species”-
“Hey!” Judy laughed, punching him in the stomach, which garnered an “Ow!” from Nick. “And what would you know about that?”
“I don’t begin to pretend to know, Carrots, that’s beyond my level of comprehension,” he pulled her closer to himself, and she continued giggling into his neck, unable to refute any of his points.
Again, he felt struck by the desire to kiss her, and that feeling was incredibly strong, but a much bigger growing need presented itself to him in the form of a dull pain right below his navel: he really needed to use the bathroom.
He sighed, not wanting their pillow talk to be over, but ultimately knew he needed to give in to nature calling. “I don’t wanna get up,” he said out loud, “But I gotta use the little fox’s room.”
Judy pushed herself off his chest and sat up on her knees, and he maneuvered around her and got off the bed, hissing at the cold as his feet touched the vinyl floor. It was freezing out here, outside of the warm oasis his blanket and their body heat had provided in his bed. He opened the only other door in his apartment on the side wall, between the kitchenette and the front door, tried on the light switch, saw that it didn’t work, and resigned himself to doing his business in the dark.
—
He emerged from the bathroom shivering, and walked over to the window on the back wall, looking out. Several feet of bright white snow covered the street below, as well as the rooftops of the building across the street, and more than halfway up the bodies of the cars that were parked and lined up in rows up and down the street. The sky was overcast and gloomy. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Judy grabbing her phone, then sighing and putting it down (it must be dead, he figured), and then heard her entering his bathroom and closing the door behind him. He took the opportunity to find his own phone and sit down at the edge of his bed.
His phone was dead too, which didn’t surprise him. He looked up at the analog clock on his kitchen wall. The carrot hands pointed to 9:20am. They must have had a good eleven or so hours of sleep… Maybe. He wasn’t sure if they’d only stayed up for an hour or more after he’d last checked the time last night.
Five minutes later, Judy reentered his main living space and walked past him into the kitchen.
“What’s taking them so long to fix the weather simulators?” He wondered aloud as Judy opened up his pantry cabinet.
“I know, right?” she frowned, opening a bag of a loaf of bread and taking a bite out of a slice. “I wish you had more than just this and snacks and microwaveable meals in here,” she complained between chews.
“I know, I’m sorry.” Nick stood up and walked over to her, grabbing the bag from her paws and pulling out another slice, taking a bite himself. “But we can’t open the fridge,” he said with a full mouth, “Or the food’ll go bad.”
“I know, I know.” They both stood on the cold tile floor for a few more seconds as they ate, then Judy closed up the bag and put it back into the cabinet. “We’ve gotta ration this,” she explained, and Nick sighed and nodded in agreement, before they wordlessly both headed back to bed, crawled under the covers, and into each other’s arms.
—
Nick was grateful that it was below freezing outside - it meant that he and Judy were forced to cast aside all pretenses and formalities, and they could just hold each other close.
Truth be told, now that he knew what it was like to snuggle her for extended periods of time, he seriously couldn’t imagine going back to their former life of minimal physical contact and a usual two or three feet of space apart from each other at all times. He was beyond excited about two of the last three sentences she’d said to him last night before falling asleep: ‘This is nice. We should do this more often.’
So few words, but they packed unbelievably good potential for his future.
Judy angled her chin down and looked up at him through her lashes, and he suddenly felt like his heart was caught in his throat. “I had fun last night,” she said sweetly to him, and he wondered if she was deliberately amping up her cuteness levels on purpose, or if she didn’t even know she was doing it.
Well, you DID call her cute to her face like ten minutes ago, wise guy.
“So did I,” he smiled back, eyes half-lidded and voice smooth as silk. “I guess I’m glad the power went out last night.”
She awarded him with one of her megawatt smiles. “Huh…” Her tone was light. “I guess I am too.”
It feels like I’m flirting with her, Nick’s internal monologue picked up with panic. Am I flirting with her? Is this happening? Are we flirting with each other?
Out loud, he continued, “Thanks for convincing me to play truth or dare.”
“Anytime,” she beamed at him, raising her paws to rest on his chest, and then lowering them slightly to feel his abdomen. He felt his own taut muscles flexing underneath her touch, and he brought his paws to her back, gently pulling her closer.
They were almost nose to nose now, just a few mere centimeters of space apart. Her scent was freshly overpowering all over again, flooding his senses.
He begged her silently with his eyes to close the gap between them, because if he did it and it turned out he had been dead wrong about signals and she only thought of him as a friend, the rest of their quarantined time together would be unbearably awkward and also incredibly painful, and he wasn’t sure if he’d ever be able to live it down, or worse, if their friendship could ever recover.
If kissing was on her mind right now, she didn’t betray that on her face; she stayed put where she was, and now suddenly broke eye contact, looking down at his chest, absentmindedly scritching up and down his abs with her paws.
He was too chicken to ask her what was on her mind - that was usually something she asked him when it got too quiet, and he didn’t feel brave enough to pursue with that question, especially because she wasn’t asking it either.
When she did speak again, it felt like she was throwing out a lifeline for him.
“Wanna play some more?”
“Sure,” he said it half-heartedly, but deep down he was thrilled.
Her voice took on a teasing lilt. “Oh yeah, you do? Have I converted the former con-mammal Nick Wilde to a life of full transparency?”
“Ugh, of course not, don’t even joke,” Nick furrowed his eyebrows at her, smiling all the while. “At least, not most of the time.”
“How often can I get you to be vulnerable, then?” Her paws were toying with his shirt.
“About 10 percent of any average day,” he quipped back.
“When’s that 10 percent of time?” she quirked her eyebrow at him, smiling back.
He fell serious. “Whenever we’re in bed together,” he said, immediately feeling afterwards like that was the riskiest possible reply he could have given, but thankfully, she didn’t seem to mind at all.
“New motivation unlocked,” she said simply, a note of interest in her voice.
His heart was picking up its pace again. “So, who’s going first?”
She snuggled in closer, and he lowered his muzzle slightly so he could continue to make eye contact with her. “I can go first.”
He brought his paws to the small of her waist, rubbing his thumbs at her sides in circles, reveling in the feeling. “Truth or dare.”
She, in turn, brought her own paws to his waist, and mirrored him, rubbing her thumbs on his sides as well. Their twin movements felt dangerously good to Nick. “Truth.”
“You mentioned last night that you’ve been on one first date in your life,” he said, doing his damndest to keep his face expressionless. “What was that like?”
She cringed dramatically. “Oh sweet cheese and crackers, It was a nightmare.”
He raised an eyebrow, not expecting that response. “Oh yeah?”
“Yeah. Don’t even get me started.” She shook her head at whatever memories had surfaced, went still, then, after a brief pause, apparently reconsidered, and promptly launched into a rant. “Actually, you know what, I will get started. This dude was insane, Nick. Insane with a capital I. First off, he asked me out a week before I was supposed to join the academy, and the only reason I agreed to go on the date was because my parents guilted me into it, because apparently his dad and my dad were friends in high school. Anyway, I show up to the date, and he’s got a bouquet of flowers for me. Which is, y’know, supposed to be nice, and normal, if he’s trying to make a good impression, but the bouquet was just peonies, Nick. Peonies. And baby’s breath. I couldn’t believe it. I”-
“Whoa, whoa, whoa, hang on, hang on, hang on.” Nick raised his paws up and shook them back and forth in the air between the two of them. “Please translate the significance of the flowers for those of us in the room who didn’t grow up horticulture-savvy.”
Judy slowed her roll. “If a rabbit is giving another rabbit peonies and baby’s breath on any given day, he’s signifying that he’s interested in marriage. On any given day, that’s serious. But on a first date, he’s a lunatic.”
Noted, Nick thought, filing that tidbit of information away.
She carried on. “Anyway. So he hands me the flowers. I take them, not wanting to be rude. We sit down at our table at the restaurant. He doesn’t ask me a single question about myself, the. Entire. Date.” Her usually big eyes were now enormous. “Instead, I’m asking all the questions, carrying the whole conversation, and I got tired of that pretty quickly. So I pointed out that he hadn’t asked me anything about myself yet, and we’d already been there for an hour. So he goes,” Her voice got louder and more animated, “How many kids do you plan on having after you get married? ’ Nick, I was dumbfounded. I laughed it off and explained that that wasn’t even on my radar, since I was about to join the Zootopia Police Academy, right, and he goes, he goes…” She made a funny face and brought her paw to her chin, speaking in a country drawl: 'ABOUT THAT, I was hoping I could talk you out of that, Judy.’ And I was like, ‘How did you even know about that in the first place?’ And he was like, ‘Well, word travels fast in Bunny Burrow,’ but I smelled something fishy, obviously, so I started giving him the third degree, and he cracked under pressure almost immediately, and as it turned out, my parents paid him to go on this date with me in a last-ditch effort to try to get me to drop out of police school.”
“So, what, he didn’t even like you, it was all just a set-up?” Nick asked, thoroughly amused.
“That’s the crazy part. He did actually like me! He wanted to marry me, and he even said so to my dad! He would have gone on the date with me regardless. But he still didn’t turn my parents’ offer of cash down when they decided to meddle!”
Nick gave a short exhale through his nose, a smirk on his face. “Yeesh. Your parents are nuts.”
“Tell me about it,” she sighed, a fond smile returning to her lips. “Don’t get me wrong, I love them, like, to death, buuuut yeah they’re pretty nuts. And that guy? He was a lunatic. A lunatic.”
“Yeeeeah,” he shook his head, finding her hysteria over the situation almost funnier than the story. “That he was.”
He slowly brought his paws back to rest on her waist, and she grabbed the crooks of his forearms as he did so, traveling her paws up the muscles of his upper arms and then moving them inward onto his chest, then down his chest, before finally resting them back on his sides.
His voice came out lower than intended after she’d made herself thoroughly comfortable with touching him all over. “Your turn, Carrots.”
She buried part of her face into their shared pillow, so that he could only see one of her eyes looking at him. Cuuuuuute.
“Truth or dare,” she whispered.
“Truth.”
Her paws gripped his sides just a little bit tighter. “So… tell me all about… all of your encounters.”
Crap. She was asking him this in the morning, in broad daylight, and he wasn’t being afforded the same comfort and cover of darkness that she’d had last night. (He ignored the annoying voice in his brain that reminded him that he’d seen every expression on her face last night in the dark anyway.)
Outwardly, he just shrugged, accepting defeat. “I actually haven’t… had any encounters of my own...” He watched as her eyebrows shot up as she absorbed this information. “...Like, at all.” She turned her face fully back towards him now, so he could see both of her wide eyes.
“I’m really, really surprised,” she slowly admitted after a beat. “You don’t give off that vibe at all, you know.”
Game entirely forgotten, Nick was too curious to let this comment go. “Yeah? What vibe do I give off?”
She looked like she was reflecting for a moment. “You just kinda seem like… you’ve been to some questionable places and seen and done a lot of things. Like you’re not innocent.”
“Well, I’ll give you that,” Nick chuckled dryly. “No, I’m not innocent.”
“But then why haven’t you ever… experimented?” Judy cocked her head to the side, eyes huge and curious, and it struck him, all over again, just how beautiful she was.
Nick sighed. “Getting laughed at by that girl in the ninth grade traumatized me in more ways than one, Carrots.”
“You’ve been… scared? To explore that stuff?”
Nick stiffened. “Not scared, just… I don’t know. I haven’t gotten far enough with any female, I guess. But I’ve done plenty of exploring online, just so you know.”
Judy leaned forward, her paws instantly on his shoulders, expression placating. “You don’t need to get defensive, Nick, I’m not judging you at all, I promise you that.”
Nick was no longer enjoying this conversation. “I don’t need your pity, Carrots,” he muttered, making a move to remove his paws from her waist.
She shook him forcefully by the shoulders, surprising him. “I’m not pitying you!” She sighed heavily and stopped. “You have nothing to be ashamed of! So what if you haven’t been with anyone in that way? I’ve never even had a boyfriend.”
“You’ve at least been to third base,” Nick pointed out, his voice getting slightly louder.
“Yeah, and then rejected right afterward by the guy that got me there,” Judy matched his volume, her paws again going to his shoulders, this time gripping him. She was staring him down like a rabid animal. “I’ve never known what it’s like to have passionate sex with a guy who’s crazy in love with me. I’ve never known what it’s like to hold paws with someone who cares about me and wants the best for me. I’ve never even attracted a guy who’s okay with me being a cop!”
Nick’s mind quickly supplied the thought, I can be that guy. I can check those boxes.
Out loud, he said, “True… thanks for pointing that out.” He slowly wrapped his arms around her again, coming to rest his paws on her back.
“Of course,” Judy’s doe eyes looked at him in concern, care, and clear relief. “We’re both technically virgins here, and neither of us are losers, Nick.”
He gave her a sudden warning look with his eyes. “If anyone at Precinct One finds out-”
“I would never do that,” Judy shook her head fiercely. “You know that. You know me.”
He relaxed. “I know. I do know you.” He pulled her close, and she melted into his embrace. “Boy, I feel lighter than I have in a long time, Carrots. Guess confession is good for the soul.”
“When you’re with the right mammal? Yes, yes it is,” Judy wrapped her arms around his neck, burying her nose into his throat. Nick’s arms wound tighter around her frame.
“Whose turn is it?” He asked lazily, getting comfortable.
“Huh?” She kept clinging to him, her voice muffled. “Oh, I dunno. Do we need to keep playing the game, or can we just ask each other anything now?”
“We can ask each other anything now,” he decided, moving one of his paws up to rest against the back of her head.
She stroked the nape of his neck with her paws, quiet for a moment. Then said: “What kinds of things have you explored online?”
A laugh punched its way out of Nick’s throat. “No question seems to be off-limits for you, huh.”
“We’re way past that point now, aren’t we?” Judy also sounded good-humored. As if to emphasize her point, she gave his neck a squeeze.
“I guess you’re right,” he started to caress the backs of her ears again - hoping he could do it for longer today than he had last night - then began to answer her question, glad that he couldn’t look into her eyes right now. “Nothing too crazy. Just normal fox porn, a few other species’ porn. Just basic stuff.”
“Which other species?”
Nick thought back for a moment. “Okay, mayyybe more than a few. Fennec foxes, wolves, any canines, really. Cheetahs… cougars… tigers… leopards”-
“Got a thing for cats?”
“No, not at all,” Nick said honestly. “I was just curious about them for a spell. Weasels were especially kinky on the sites that I looked up, so I watched some of those videos. And…” He hesitated, weighing the words in his mind, internally debating for a couple intense seconds, before biting the bullet. “...Bunnies. I’ve seen some bunnies.”
“Oh?” Judy pressed her chest deeper against his, which he did not fail to notice. “Why bunnies?”
She still hadn’t loosened her grip around his neck, so, encouraged, he continued caressing her head and back. He felt the insides of his ears redden at her knowledge of his admission. “Ever heard the term, ‘fucking like bunnies’?”
“Are you genuinely asking me that, or are you just being sarcastic?”
“Sarcastic.”
“I figured.” His nostrils were suddenly filled with the completely overpowering sweetness of her scent again. “Everyone’s heard that term, especially me.”
“Yeah, well, I heard it, too.” Nick carefully, quietly inhaled her scent. She smelled so good. “I needed to see for myself what all that talk was about.”
“And… What did you think?” Judy’s tone was indecipherable, mysterious.
He swallowed, which he was instantly aware that she not only heard, but also felt, against her face. “I thought it was pretty hot.” His ears and face were burning now. “What about you? Have you watched any porn?”
“No, not really,” Judy shook her head against his neck. “Well, a little. I looked up some bunny porn during the dry spell after my heartbreak, but it kinda reminded me of him, which triggered me, so I stopped.”
Nick nodded thoughtfully, still caressing her ears. “I’m really sorry you went through that,” he said sincerely.
“Thanks.” She unwound her arms from around his neck and lowered them to right below his armpits, wrapping around his sides and meeting again at his back. “I’m over it now, though. Throwing myself into the world of the police force got me out of that rut.”
“Hey, I get that.” Nick squeezed her to himself. “The ZPA’ll whip anyone into shape, physically and mentally.”
“It was a lifesaver for me,” Judy agreed.
“Same here.” Nick lowered his paw to the small space between her neck and her fallen ears, then pressed down on her neck, before traveling down to meet his other paw at the small of her back.
A pregnant silence fell between the two of them.
It only lasted a minute, before Judy pulled away, enough to look him in the eyes. The look on her face was mischievous. “You mentioned you watched weasels because they’re kinky.” She said it as a statement, not a question, and Nick couldn’t help the embarrassed smile that grew on his face as her eyes danced with his. He couldn’t believe it, she was actually causing him to feel shy. “...Yeah.”
“What kind of kinks were you looking up, Officer?”
He laughed. Hard. “Wouldn’t you like to know?” He teased, his claws gently scratching at her sides for a brief second.
“Oh, I would,” she insisted. “All in the spirit of transparency, of course.”
Okay, this is unmistakably flirting, His brain was screaming at him. We are definitely flirting with each other now.
“Will anything I say be held against me, Officer?” He couldn’t help leaning in, eyes half-lidded, growing confident by the sight of her smiling at him like that.
“Depends,” was all she said, and he wanted her to elaborate, wanted to know what she was implying, when all of a sudden, the overhead ceiling light flooded the apartment, air started whirring again from the vents, and a beep sounded from his kitchen, and they both backed away from each other, straightened, and looked around the room.
The power was back on.
“Oh, thank goodness!” Judy hopped off the bed quickly, and Nick instantly mourned their sudden distance and change in mood. “We need to charge our phones,” she said to him, all business now, and he nodded, clambering out of bed as well.
As he went to work on plugging in his phone, she opened the microwave door and placed in a two-minute meal of Spaghettios.
“I’m starving,” she said. “Thank heavens this finally works.”
His phone screen soon came alight, and one by one, three more emergency alert notifications popped up on the display, the most recent one on top reading: Zootopia Emergency Update: Rainforest District and Sahara Square’s biome weather simulators are up and running again. Downtown’s biome weather simulator is still down, and our scientists are hard at work on fixing it. It is advised for you to continue to remain in your homes. Essential workers are allowed outside to shovel snow, put down salt on sidewalks and roads, and deliver food. No restaurants are open to the public inside of their buildings, only drive-through is permitted at this time. Tundratown’s biome weather simulator has been temporarily forcefully shut down. We apologize for any inconvenience. Please contact ZPD for assistance.
“Hey, Carrots,” Nick slowly tore his eyes away from his phone to look up at the bunny. He held out his phone. “Look at this.”
Judy walked over to where he knelt by the charging port, and she leaned in to read the latest alert.
“Oh gosh, the poor mammals of Tundratown must hate being there right now,” Judy murmured.
“Yeah, well, now they’re getting a taste of what every other mammal in Zootopia felt for the past fifteen hours.” Nick put his phone back down on the foot of the bed. “No animal likes to be outside of their natural climate for too long.”
“I do feel especially bad for the locals of Sahara Square,” she mused, then turned back toward the kitchen and the microwave.
Nick rose up from his crouch and watched as she stood on her tiptoes on the top of his step ladder by the counter, opened the microwave door, and pulled out her Spaghettios can.
“Uh, careful, there’s fish meatballs in there,” he pointed out.
Judy hopped down from the step ladder, dipped a finger into the soupy can, and brought her fingertip to her lips to taste the sauce. “I know. You can eat those.” She used her foot to prop open his pantry cabinet door, and it swung out. “You better heat up some food quickly, just in case the power goes back out.”
“Doubt it will again,” Nick said, but he obeyed anyway, walking over to his pantry and looking inside for anything substantial to eat.
A couple minutes later, he also pulled out a warmed up can of Spaghettios out of the microwave, and he joined Judy at his little table for two against the side kitchen wall that connected at the corner to the wall of the bathroom door.
They ate in silence, with Judy passing on her meatballs to him, one by one.
Once they were finished, Nick took both of their empty cans and threw them in the trash, and Judy walked over to a floor vent, standing a little bit over it.
“Ooh, that feels good on my feet,” she said to him, and he came up behind her, arms reaching around her body, the insides of his paws facing down toward the vent to feel the hot air. “That does feel good,” he concurred.
Not as good as cuddling you, though.
The thought washed over him like a wave, and he knew he didn’t want to completely lose the level of contact they’d had all night and this morning. His paws faltered in mid-air for a moment, and then, hesitantly, he stepped all the way forward so her back was against his front, and he bent down slightly, lowered his arms, and met his paws around the front of her chest, hugging her from behind.
Judy wordlessly raised her arms and placed her own paws overtop of his, hugging his arms as he hugged her body, and he leaned his muzzle down over her head, so that both of them could feel the hot air from the vent blow on their faces.
“So…” Judy said softly a few moments later, not letting go of his paws. “Do you want to pick back up where we left off on Law & Order? Or…” Her voice trailed off.
Nick chose in that moment to be brave. “I don’t want to go back to Law & Order, no,” he spoke in a calm voice, almost ninety-nine percent certain she’d be okay with what he was about to say next. “I wanna hold you in bed some more.”
She stood still for a second, then moved to turn all the way around in his arms, her paws reaching up and looping around his neck. She was on her tiptoes, and he was still bending down a little. They held each other, face to face. “We can do that,” she echoed his words from last night, smiling, and a warm smile grew on his face in return.
Without another word, he lifted her up and carried her back into his bed.
—
Judy’s paws were everywhere on him all at once. Running up his abdomen and chest, looping around his neck, traveling back down his torso, wrapping around his sides, meeting at his back, scratching up and down his spine, scrabbling back up for purchase on his arms and shoulders.
Nick’s paws were slowly braving the small of her back, the curves of her waist, squeezing and feeling her, over and over, and when he experimentally lightly dug his claws into her sides, he elicited a gasp from her that didn’t sound pained at all. He really, really didn’t know what he was doing, but he knew he could figure it all out as he went along, and he also knew he tremendously liked everything that was happening to him.
She was snuggling up close to him now, and his paws instinctively moved separately to curl around her back and hold the top of her head. She squeezed him, he squeezed her back. There were fireworks going off all over the place in his body.
She began to caress his back with both paws, more firmly now, and he leapt at the opportunity to be able to return the favor, caressing her fallen-back ears and the small of her waist again like he’d been able to do so briefly last night and earlier this morning (he was quickly finding that this was his favorite activity, his favorite pastime, his favorite purpose in life, et cetera).
What started as gentle rubs on each other’s backs very quickly became a full-blown mutual massage, and Nick faintly noticed that her heartbeat against his chest was incredibly fast now, even for a bunny. They were both caressing each other in a way that didn’t feel platonic in the slightest anymore, and he silently wondered what all of this meant to her, his mind swimming with questions. Did she just simply enjoy the physical contact, because bunnies are naturally physical creatures? If so, did this mean that they could have been doing this at any point in their friendship up until now, and he’d missed out on a lot of opportunities? Or was this too intimate to be casual, even for her? Or was this both intimate and casual simultaneously for her? Did she have feelings for him, or were they becoming friends with benefits now? How much could he get away with doing to her right now? Would she stop him if he tried anything else, anything risky? Was anything he wanted to do worth the regret that would probably come later? Would it ruin their friendship? Would it break his heart?
As if she’d been deliberating on thoughts of her own, Judy suddenly lifted one of her legs and wrapped it around his hip, while wedging her other leg between both of his, straddling him. Nick froze, and his eyes opened wide, and he stared into his apartment, unable to look at her given that she was tucked under his chin. She was straddling his leg. She continued fervently massaging his back as if nothing had just happened, and below the waist nothing really was happening, except for the fact that his thigh was surrounded by her thighs… and her core.
He silently resumed massaging her back, her shoulders, her waist. Given that she had a tiny body, and his large paws alone dwarfed her by comparison, he’d been extremely careful up until this point to not move too far down to the danger zone of her tail and her butt. But now, he hesitated for a moment, before gingerly resting his fingers against the lowest possible part of her hips, testing the waters of Judy’s mood.
She immediately lowered her paws too, to right above his butt. Mirroring him, she laid her fingers flat against him, not moving to rub the spot, seemingly waiting for him.
Nick swallowed thickly. What does she want? He internally freaked out. Does she want what I think she wants? Or am I wrong?
Nervously, painstakingly slowly, he began to caress the lower side of her hips.
Judy rewarded him by moving her paws south one more inch, unmistakably gripping his butt, and, to his infinite shock, rolling her hips tightly against his thigh.
Everything that happened after that happened very fast.
He couldn’t resist the low, instinctive, primitive growl that emerged from his throat, and he was embarrassed about it, but he didn’t have time to focus on being embarrassed, because she gasped loudly and gyrated her hips against him harder, and then she actually moaned, which finally emboldened him to move both of his paws to cup her butt, and she moaned again and continued bucking against him, and so he squeezed her, again and again, and he marveled at the feeling, having never, ever, done this before, and suddenly she was kissing his neck, and Nick, shuddering, took that as his permission, at long last, to raise a paw to her head, back up just a smidge in order for him to lower his muzzle, angle their faces, and finally, finally, crash his lips onto hers.
As it turned out, she kissed him the way she did everything else in her life: passionately. Determined to keep up with her pace, Nick kissed her back heatedly, lips pulling readily apart as she pushed her tongue into his mouth, lapping at his own tongue and exploring him. Her scent was unequivocally and literally everywhere; there was no escaping it, and Nick was drowning in it, but he didn’t care in the slightest, because he wanted more of her, needed more of her - scratch that, he needed every part of her. His paws were roaming freely on her body now, cupping and squeezing her butt, traveling up to feel the forbidden fur underneath her tank top, and running his thumbs over the nubs of her chest, eliciting moan after moan after moan from her. Delighted and undone by her ardent sounds, he wrapped one arm firmly around the small of her waist, holding her in place, while traveling his other paw down to her inner thighs, squeezing each one for a few very enjoyable seconds, reveling in the panting he was creating in Judy, before shoving his paw between her thighs and beginning to rub at her core over her sweatpants in a desperate ‘come hither’ motion that he’d seen done online so many times. Thankfully, it worked; she was trembling and sighing and crying out in his arms, and as she threw back her head and moaned again, he dove down to plant needy kisses all over her neck and throat, not once stopping the work of his paw between her legs.
Nick devoted what felt like a euphoric eternity to this work, not once slowing down, with his entire world narrowing down to the quivering bunny in his paws and the movements and noises he was coaxing out of her.
The sounds coming from her mouth were downright filthy, and he had never been so turned on in his life.
“Oh Nick, oh Nick,” she groaned, and he flicked his fingers against her faster, feeling her shaking and watching her face in awe as her eyes rolled back and her jaw hung open.
“Yeah, Judy, just like that,” he encouraged her with a deep, heady voice. “Keep going, just like that.”
She clung to the back of his neck and the fur on the top of his head, eyes locking wildly with his. “Don’t stop, don’t stop,” she panted.
“I wouldn’t dare, sweetheart,” he assured her, and she bucked her hips desperately against his paw. “Keep going, beautiful, just like that, just like that. Ugh, Judy, you’re so fucking hot.”
That was what did it for her, apparently, as she was suddenly writhing and convulsing from head to toe and throwing her head back and screaming in pleasure.
He watched and listened in amazement, his paw working overtime and incessantly against her core, as she climaxed over what felt like another, albeit much shorter, eternity in his arms. As she slowly rode down from her high, she gasped over and over, and locked eyes with him again, and he stared back at her, hypnotized, as she drew closer toward him, panting breathily on his face, looking equal parts grateful and tired, until she finally collapsed her lips onto his again.
She kissed him incessantly, unremittingly, unrelentingly.
As she continued to do this, she also started rising up on her paws and knees, and he backed down against the pillow, inundated by bunny kisses and powerless to stop whatever she was doing, with both of his paws moving upward to clutch at her sides like she was his anchor in a storm.
Now she was on top of him, and she continued to kiss him like this for another few minutes, during which time Nick’s head was spinning; he was dizzy; he was completely drunk on her lips and tongue, when all of a sudden, she started moving down, kissing his chin, and his neck, and his collarbone, and his chest, and his abs, and lower, lower, lower, lower, lower…
…And by the time it finally dawned on him what she was setting out to do, she was already yanking his gray sweats and white boxers down to his ankles.
Nick gasped, propping his upper body up on his elbows, watching in disbelief as she planted herself between his legs, placed her paws down on each of his thighs, and then promptly went to work with her mouth, gently kissing all around the V-shaped area right up above his thighs, then moving more and more inward, slowly, slowly, slowly, until she was right at his hardened center.
Nick gasped again, this time much more sharply, as she began to kiss down the length of his shaft. His length quivered against her lips as she agonizingly slowly trailed kisses all the way down to the end of him, until finally, mercifully, she opened her mouth, closed her lips around his tip, and sunk her head down, taking him in.
Nick fell back onto his pillow and groaned loudly, then frantically lifted his head back up and pushed his chin down so that he was able to see her as she continued, with her head bobbing up and down, ears pushed all the way back, and eyes closed, as she sucked on him.
She was using one of her paws on his thigh to balance herself, and now, she moved another paw to the bottom of his length and grasped his hardness, and with one fluid motion, stroked all the way up and back down. He moaned as he watched, and her eyes fluttered open, and she looked up at him, and a small smile briefly crossed her face - sending a flight of butterflies right to his midsection - as she lowered her head again, mouth taking him whole as deeply as she could.
Nick couldn’t help himself - he rolled his hips upward, and he groaned deeply again as she sunk even deeper down, swallowing him. As she rose her head up again, her deft tongue made sucking and slurping sounds, before reaching up to his tip again and wagging it around him in a filthy circular motion that he knew he would never be able to forget the sight of. Then she repeated the tantalizing process, sinking her mouth back down around him while stroking what was left of him.
Nick was putty in her capable paws, and the moans and groans and sighs and cries he was readily giving up to her were nothing compared to the lewd sounds she was making with her tongue, mouth, and throat. She worked her magic on him for a few more overwhelmingly good minutes before momentarily popping her mouth off of his tip again, panting, and looking up at him.
“Hold my head, Nick,” she commanded him, and he was all too eager to obey.
His paws rushed to the top of her head, and, satisfied that he did as she asked, Judy returned to her enticing actions on his shaft. Now, with her head in his paws, he was completely powerless to stop himself from gyrating his hips repeatedly into her mouth, and so he did, with fervor and passion and raw heat and desperation, moaning all the while.
“Oh, Judy,” he suddenly realized aloud, voice hoarse, still bucking himself uncontrollably down her throat. “I’m- I’m about to come…”
“Mhm, mhm, mhm,” Judy nodded rapidly and encouragingly to him, with her gorgeous eyes focused on his face, and that was all it took for him for his walls to come crashing down all around him. With her head still firmly in his paws, Nick pushed his own head back against the pillow, lifted his chin up, squeezed his eyes shut, and cried out in a loud voice, once, twice, three times, four times, and a fifth time, as he spent himself into her mouth. Nothing had ever felt so good in his life, and he rode the waves of his pleasure to completion, not wanting to ever come down.
Eventually, he slowed to a stop.
Panting wildly and opening his eyes, he loosened his grip on her head, and she immediately crawled upwards over top of his body until she reached him, wrapping her arms around his neck, burying her face into the side of his throat, and hugging him fiercely.
Nick threw his arms around her immediately and held her back, as tightly as he could. He gave her body a long, appreciative, heartfelt squeeze, and they both released equally long, contented, tired sighs at the same time, chests expanding and relaxing.
“I love you so much,” she whispered into his neck, and he felt like he could die from relief.
“I love you too, Judy,” he said softly back, amazed at how easy it was for them to say old common words to each other in this new, unfamiliar, wonderful way, after all had been said and done between the two of them. “So, so much.”
She let out a happy, breathless laugh into his neck fur, her grip around him tightening. “Took you long enough.”
“Hey, I’ll have you know,” Nick was grinning at the ceiling now, “I’ve only been holding back this whole time because I’m a gentlemammal.”
“Oh, again with the gentlemammal thing,” she teased.
“Oh yeah, again with that,” he parroted her affectionately, starting to caress her back again. “You know I’m right about that.”
“Do I know that?...” There was a pause. “Yes, yes I do,” she conceded, and he lowered his muzzle to plant a kiss between her ears.
“So, now what?” Judy snuggled in closer to him.
Nick’s smile never faltered. “Now, I think this is the part where I ask you to be my girlfriend.”
Judy giggled, delighted by his words, which delighted him in return. “Wasting no time, huh?”
“Not anymore, no,” Nick laughed too. They’d already wasted quite a bit of time. Over two and a half years of it, to be exact.
“And… are you gonna do that?”
“Depends.” Nick’s tone was as casual as could be, but on the inside, his heart was throwing a party. “Are you gonna say yes?”
“Of course,” Judy lifted her head up to beam at him, and he practically melted.
“Well, I think that takes care of that, then,” was all he said, before she leaned forward, closed the short gap between them again, and began peppering his lips with what could only be internally described by him as victory kisses.
—
When Nick woke up, it was much later, and it took him a while to think back and remember when and how they’d even fallen asleep. Kisses had turned to fuzzy warm cuddles, and cuddles had led to a long midday nap, and now - he glanced over at the kitchen clock - it was evening, approximately 5:15pm.
It took him another long while to remember that it was still only Saturday, and that they also had Sunday ahead of them before their next shift started back up again on Monday morning. Nick felt overjoyed at this revelation.
“Hey, Carrots,” he whispered, gently prodding her sleeping form next to him. “Carrots… wake up.”
She refused to stir, face buried into his pillow, and he stared at her fondly for a moment, before realizing now was as good a time as any to use the bathroom.
—
When he returned to Judy’s side, this time, he was more insistent on waking her up.
“Carrots,” he said in a singsong voice, softly shaking her shoulder. “Time to return to the land of the living… Carrots…”
She slowly rolled from her stomach onto her back, furrowing her eyebrows and opening her eyes to look up at him.
“What time is it?” she asked groggily.
“About 5:20pm,” he answered. “It’s still Saturday.”
She used her knuckles to rub at her eyes for a moment, then sat up. “I gotta pee.”
Before getting up off the bed, she paused, then leaned forward and gave his cheek a quick kiss, resulting in soft smiles from both of them.
She walked over to the bathroom door and he watched her from behind, until she closed the door.
He looked down at the floor and his smile grew deeper in the silence of the room.
They were together now.
Judy Hopps was his now. He couldn’t believe it.
He internally thanked whatever benevolent cosmic beings existed out there for the snowstorm, the shutdown, Bogo’s strict orders, and the power going out. Who knows how much longer their long-suffering game of chicken would have lasted had this not all been forced upon them.
Completely, blissfully content, feeling for the first time (in what was as long a time as he could ever remember) that all was right within his world, he walked over to the charging port by the foot of the bed to pick up his phone.
There were four notifications stacked on top of each other on his lockscreen, none of which were messages from anyone, but instead two were Zootopia Emergency Alerts, one was from his gym membership app, and one was a routine unnecessary one from his bank, and he swiped to get rid of them, briefly skimming each one before fully removing them.
He heard the toilet flush and Judy washing her paws, before she emerged from the bathroom and walked right up to him, hugging him around his middle.
He tossed his phone down to his side on the bed and hugged her back.
“The shutdown’s basically over,” he informed her, and she dug her chin into the center of his chest and smiled up at him. “Not for us, it’s not,” she said in a low whisper, and he bent down to peck her hard on the lips. “No, not for us, it’s not,” he agreed indulgently, and she kissed him hard again, before burying her face into his chest and hugging him tighter.
Nick’s stomach chose that moment to growl, and they both burst into chuckles and giggles.
“Time for takeout?” Judy looked back up at him, beaming.
Nick smiled back down at her, bending slightly to the left to reach back for his phone with one paw, his other paw still holding onto her. “Time for takeout,” he confirmed.
—
Their third attempt at watching Law & Order was much more successful than attempts number one and two, and they remained snuggled into each other’s sides, with his arm around her shoulder and with their eyes glued to Nick’s laptop, until around 3:00 in the morning.
—
“So, when did you know?” Judy’s voice was hushed, enthralled, as her fingers drew circles on the red fur poking out of his exposed chest right above his white tank.
It was the next day, in the late afternoon, with sunshine making a rare winter appearance, pouring warmly into Nick’s apartment, and the two of them were engaging in what was quickly becoming Nick’s newest favorite thing to do with Judy (well, one of a few new things)... pillow talk.
“I’m not sure,” he replied honestly. “To be perfectly honest with you, it was gradual. Well…” He trailed off, reconsidering. “...Do you remember those back-to-back practically open and shut cases we had in the Rainforest District?”
“The ones about seven months ago, yeah.”
“Yeah. We were sure right away who the perps were, and they were also onto us, sniffing us out.”
“Those guys were all connected to each other, which we didn’t find out till we handled the last of those series of cases,” Judy remembered, wincing. “That was fun.”
“Right. You almost died three times in a row those couple of weeks.”
“Don’t remind me,” she shivered, but not from any sort of cold. “I should have been more careful.”
“Yeah, you should have,” Nick chided her again, thinking back on the memory of them, of him giving her grief for over an hour in the safety of their police car after hours about how she could have been killed and how she needed to stop being so reckless. “Do you remember how frantic I was?”
“I do,” Judy nodded thoughtfully.
“Well…” he gave her a squeeze. “I’m just taking a guess here, but maybe that’s when I really started to know, for sure. But I also know now the crush had definitely already existed before I realized it.”
Judy seemed to muse on this for a moment, solemn. “I’m sorry I scared you so much.”
“Nothing like the fear of death to make a guy come to terms with his feelings,” Nick smiled ruefully.
She moved to kiss him on the side of his muzzle. “I’ve been more careful ever since, and I promise I’ll stay that way.”
“Good.” He took her soft cheeks into his paws and held her face, staring into her eyes seriously. “I can’t lose you.”
Her expression melted into the sweetest, sappiest look he’d ever seen her give him.
“I promise you won’t,” she whispered, and a hint of tears collected at the edges of her eyes.
He smiled fondly at her - Oh, you sweet bunny. Always so emotional. - and pulled her face in for a long, slow kiss.
When they pulled apart, Judy was sniffling ever so slightly. “I love you,” she said freely.
“I love you, too.” Nick moved his paws down to her shoulders and made a move to throw himself back against the pillow, pulling her down with him. “Now, what about you? When did you know?”
“Ahah,” Judy sounded embarrassed, wiping her nose with her paw. “About that…”
He glanced down at her, curious, and slowly linked his right paw with her left paw, interlocking their fingers. “What?”
She looked up at him bashfully. “Remember when I came back to Zootopia to find you? And you were under the bridge? During the Night-Howler case?”
“Yeah?” Nick held her gaze for a moment, before the meaning behind her words dawned on him. “Oh my word… you’re kidding.”
“Yeah,” she breathed out with a laugh. “I’ve known since you held up that carrot pen and told me to come in for a hug. It was a really tiny crush back then, nothing huge, and I never in a million years expected you to like me back, so it was just always simmering at the back of my mind, until…”
“Until this weekend.” Nick smiled knowingly at her.
“Yeah.” She returned his smile warmly, squeezing his paw with her own. “Until truth or dare, specifically.”
He laughed in disbelief. “Why did it take us this long?”
“I know,” she shook her head, leaning into his shoulder. “We’re a couple of dummies.”
“By the way,” Nick said thoughtfully. “Are we going to let everyone know about us at work?”
“We’re not going to need to; they’ll all be able to smell it on us first thing tomorrow morning,” Judy waggled her eyebrows at him, and he dove down to give her a quick kiss on the forehead.
“Did you mark your scent on me?” he asked, tone conspiratorial, eyes dancing with hers.
“Mmm... no. I didn’t. But we can change that right now if you’d like.”
Nick moved his paws down to the small of her waist, curling at her sides. “I would like that very much,” he admitted openly, and the air between them noticeably shifted as she smiled, then wordlessly crawled upwards to grab both sides of his muzzle and lower it down, looking into his eyes.
He got an incredibly strong whiff of the return of her sweet scent, with notes of honeysuckle and… something else nice (he’d figure out what it was eventually) … and then she sealed the deal, running her chin along his fur, starting from the tip of his nose and rubbing all the way up to the space right between his eyes.
His hold on her sides tightened, and he, just as wordlessly, propped himself up on his elbow to then lean down and rub his left cheek against her right cheek, and then, his right cheek against her left.
Initially satisfied with his marking, he pulled away to admire the look on her face, and then, as it dawned on him what they’d actually both just done, exhilarated that he’d finally done it for the first time in his life, and to Judy of all animals, he pulled her in for a crushing hug, and she embraced him just as intensely.
“I love you,” he said now, it not being lost on him that this was the first time in his life he was initiating saying those three important words to Judy.
“I love you, I love you, I love you,” she replied into his chest, and he felt like his heart would burst.
—
They didn’t do much else but cuddle for the rest of their Sunday, and while Nick keenly wanted to explore more unknown territory with her - including, but not limited to: swapping childhood stories, going back over their history and learning more intriguing details about the crush that had been simmering inside Judy’s head over the course of their friendship, actually starting and finishing all of her favorite police dramas, and, not least of all, finding out exactly what it meant to go physically all the way with the one he loved the most, who just so happened to be a bunny - he also knew there was no rush; this was just the start, the blossoming, of their upgraded relationship, and he could explore all of these things with her in due time; he just needed to remind her to take her PTO from now on.
A sneaking suspicion, call it a hunch, told him that she’d be far more motivated to take it from now on, and the thought made Nick indescribably, unbelievably excited for the future.
—
FIN