Chapter Text
Mcgucket first knows his home.
It's barely habitable, more a collection of things thrown together and precariously balanced. Something tells him it's designed badly, and he decides to try and fix it.
There are leaks and holes all over- he remembers shivering and being kept awake- but it's stronger than it looks and he even has a sort of door. When it rains hard he curls in the propped trunk of a car front.
When he adds things he is aware that they are going into his house. Frankly it's a little exciting. Though there's a lesson that food shouldn't go into the house because it goes bad.
He knows he eats, but he isn't sure what, and he makes himself sick a lot until he narrows down some things, like animals. Sometimes trash is good too, it has plant food in it sometimes, which is new and good.
People are frightening, is another thing Mcgucket finds out. They get noisy and angry and move too much, and it makes Mcgucket feel excited and nervous. Sometimes they hurt him, or they ignore him. Once in a while they are nice.
There's a man he follows around sometimes, except he isn't a man, he's a boy. He has a building next to the lake and he sells things inside for money. The man doesn't hate Mcgucket, he's sure for some reason, though sometimes he squirts him or yells. He doesn't want Mcgucket near, which is a shame since a lot of his stuff says Mcgucket on it.
He's always interested in the Mcgucket boyman, always wants to see him when he can think more than normal and his thoughts aren't static or sparks wires crossed corruption system error. He likes all those words to describe, but he doesn't really understand them good.
Sometimes he feels like he's flying and the zaps in his head are flowing and going nuts, and he laughs and runs and dances and can't see the world around him because his brain is at 299 792 458 m / s. Light. That is light and he can't see except flashes, so it makes sense. And he always wakes up later in different ways, and usually they aren't fun ways like the light and he doesn't feel good. Not at all. And so sometimes he hides for days because the world stings and fries his ears.
Mcgucket likes children, but they don't seem to like him, so he doesn't always go near them. Older people follow them around too, and most of them are right mean. Mcgucket likes metal and whatchamacallits even though they don't taste good. It makes him happy to collect them, even if people hate that he takes them.
One day he knows loneliness. It's a feeling he's experienced a lot, but now he sees what it is and why it's there. He goes to the Mcgucket boyman, and he tries not to act up too much because he hates that. Mcgucket gets ignored instead of sprayed, and he thinks this might be fine, up until he begins to wander and touch and look for his name, and the Mcgucket boyman yells extra loud and throws something at him.
Mcgucket doesn't go back for a long time, because people who hate him throw things, so he must have been wrong about that person not hating him. Maybe seeing his name is a mistake too, and he can't really understand words good, so he's probably wrong. Maybe he isn't Mcgucket.
He is in a standoff with a raccoon when they kiss accidentally, and Mcgucket remembers kissing, so maybe this raccoon likes him. He gives her the meat they'd been fighting over, and some other gifts. She ignores some of them but some she inspects with her little hands, teeth, and eyes, and Mcgucket gets excited because he does that too. When she sticks around, it makes him so happy it's almost sad for some reason, and some of that loneliness and hurt abates.
He tries to give presents to other people, including that Stan man, because it might make them like him. Most of them see it as a misfortune though and toss it with disgust. Which is funny, for some reason. But also not so much. The Stan man stares at his gift perplexed, then rolls his eyes and tosses it in a box to shove away, and it's familiar but not, so Mcgucket spends the day feeling weird.
When he sees the boyman again, keeping away so he doesn't throw again, the boyman looks at him for a long time. Mcgucket doesn't move. He waits for the other shoe to drop.
The boyman turns and walks inside his building without shutting the door, and Mcgucket is curious enough to creep closer. He wonders if maybe he can go inside. Open doors are invitations, right? But people are mean and chase him, so maybe not.
Footsteps startle him to scramble back, but not all the way into the trees, and the boyman reappears holding something. It smells good.
Quietly, boyman moves a bit closer, and Mcgucket lets him with only a bit of tensing. The other could throw what they were holding at any moment, but they didn't seem to be yet.
Boyman stops, then sets the stuff down. It might be good. Mcgucket inches close, then reaches out with his eyes mostly on the other, for the smelly stuff in the bowl. Bowl? That's a bowl…?
The boyman does nothing when he takes some, or when he inspects it before nibbling. Very good stuff, food. Food like he's smelled here a lot, only sharper and tastier. The boyman lets him eat all of it, so Mcgucket hesitantly gives him a smile.
Words. Words that stick.
Mcgucket smells rain, so he turns and runs on all fours back to the trees, then through to the strong smell of home. He wonders if the boyman stayed where he left him, or if he went back inside with the bowl. The words he said replay in Mcgucket’s head until he knows what they mean.
“I'm sorry, Dad.” The boyman had whispered. Mcgucket wonders what for.
Tonight he's dry and warm with a full stomach and something else maybe.