coyotes in space

“Is it weird I don’t know if this kind of snowfall or the blizzard are prettier?”

Brandon turned as the key clicked in the lock, looking down to Cody. “Hmm?”

“Like, it’s pretty. At least at night like this. Was prettier where we parked, without the street lights, just dim moon,” the coyote added, tugging lightly at the bare rubber tee.

Brandon chuckled as he swung the door inward. “Get inside first, it’s damn cold, n’ we can kill the lights and leave the blinds open,” he said as he nudged the coyote with a thick paw squeaking against the coyote’s shirt and earning a quick ‘yip’ from him.

“Okay, okay,” Cody said as he slipped on in, the wolf following him to close the door, closing the sliding latch at the top. The coyote looked around, sniffing briefly, before padding to the closer side of the king-sized bed to plop his backpack down, reaching into it to fetch his phone charger while the wolf followed through in opening the blinds, and dropping his own duffel on the table in the motel room.

“There we are. Ain’t gotta sleep yet but..” the wolf slipped out of his own over and under shirts, dropping them on the chair back. “C’mere,” he added, patting the top of the bed on the coyote’s side.

Cody couldn’t help a soft smile, taking a seat first, and then leaning back into the wolf’s middle as Brandon situated himself to be a stable cushion for the coyote, and draped an arm around him.

The wolf chuckled at the soft squeak from the coyote’s shirt against his own rubbery hide. “Comfy? Good view?”

Cody nodded, and leaned back slightly further. The wolf hadn’t been kidding; he felt even softer, nearly like an underinflated balloon he could sink into, making it much easier to cushion him. “Yeah… ‘put up with’ was definitely not the right phrasing earlier,” he replied with a soft snrk.

Brandon chuckled, and tightened the arm around the coyote. “Figured it wasn’t. But good view?” he asked again, reaching with his free paw to click the switch beside the bed, turning off the lamps. The only light came through the window, framing the soft falling flakes, dense, but without the insistent rush of the blizzard the night before.

Cody quietly nodded, wrapping an arm around the wolf’s in kind, to hug to himself, before finding the wolf’s tail to hug up alongside himself in his lap, quietly content to the soft squeaks of his outfit and the wolf’s form as he watched the frigid display.

“Not weird at all,” Brandon whispered in Cody’s ear after a long moment of silence. “Not a bit.”

Cody nodded faintly, and tightened his grip around Brandon’s tail with a few more squeaks.

“Did he call you weird?” Brandon asked after another brief pause.

Cody twitched slightly. “Mm?”

Brandon’s nose brushed the back of the coyote’s head softly, between his ears. “Or they? She? Figured ‘he’ though.”

Cody kept looking at the window, pausing, muzzle audibly opening and closing two times before he simply nodded softly. “He.” It was quiet, a little strained. Cody knew he was bad at hiding that. The wolf’s nose brushed gently from one ear to the other, and the coyote inhaled deeply through his nose, though with a quicker involuntary sniff at the end, followed by a slightly shaky exhale. It and the rubbery scent were...comforting, somehow. Only now did Cody realize that the wolf’s latexy hide smelled slightly differently from his tee. Warmer.

“Shh…s’alright. I’m not gonna get upset atcha fer cryin’,” Brandon murmured in the coyote’s ear.

“How’d…?”

Brandon shifted slightly onto his hip to balance as he wrapped his other arm around Cody’s front, to hold to himself. “Because I felt it drip on my tail.”

“Oh.”

“Hey, is alright. I promise. And promise y’ain’t weird. Not fer likin’ the snow, not fer liking wearin’ what yer wearin’, not fer skippin’ the fake butter on yer waffles, and certainly not fer liking bein’ with me,” the wolf spoke softly, giving each of the coyote’s ears a quick peck at the base.

Cody turned away from the window to bury his face into Brandon’s chest, even nuzzling in for the material to stretch around his muzzle slightly in an effort to be even closer. “He got mad at me for wanting to wear it even when his friends weren’t over. And that I’d pull on something else or take it off when he wanted to smoke. He didn’t even hate it, he liked me wearing it but just...not...outside of the bedroom,” he mumbled, head tilted to the side slightly to be heard.

The wolf’s grip tightened. “Well it ain’t dumb or weird. Despite bein’ me, it normally ain’t like, a thing, but… it’s pretty cute on you. It looks good. But most importantly, it ain’t weird or dumb,” he spoke, more firmly by the end.

“Even not wanting to smoke with his friends?”

Brandon snorted. “Well, passin’ on free weed’s a little weird, but-”

“He wanted me to pay for more than I would’ve used.”

“Well fuck him then. Fuck that. But based on whatcha said so far, I wouldn’t blame yuh fer not wantin’ to with him at all, much less his friends,” the wolf added. “Nor it puttin’ ya off it entirely, fer that matter.”

Cody tightened his own embrace to sink further into that pillowy warm wolf-rubber. “Thank you.”

Brandon smiled softly, resting his snout between the coyote’s ears. “I’m just tellin’ the truth.”

The coyote shook his head, though he giggled briefly from the squeaking of rubber on rubber the movement caused. “No, not just that. You saved a moody coyote from being stuck, dumped at a truck stop, and you’re asking me about...me. It means a lot more than you realize.”

The wolf was quiet for a moment, before he spoke up. “My last relationship was a few years ago. He liked that I was a big guy n’ strong. But the moment I ended up like this, he was embarrassed to be around me in public. It wasn’t ‘as fun’ to him as when I was heavier. We split not long after,” he rumbled, whilst brushing a paw slowly down the coyote’s nape and back, finding a smoother path with a little more polish that reduced the amount of squeaking.

“Conditional,” the coyote mumbled softly.

Brandon nodded. “Basically. Didn’t invite his friends over, n’ didn’t wanna go anywhere public when I was home b’tween truckloads,” he confirmed, as he nudged the coyote’s forehead. “Tellin’ yuh t’ help...empathize? That I know what it’s like t’ feel excluded fer bein’ ‘weird’. And y’ain’t that a bit.”

Cody nodded against Brandon’s chest, and then rolled against his hip to lean back into the wolf and watch the window again. “Camping.”

“Hmm?”

“Can we go camping somewhere?” Cody asked.

Brandon paused, then chuckled warmly. “You wanna go camping while it’s snowin’?”

Cody nodded, smiling to himself softly. “I miss doing it. He hated the cold, period, only went camping once.”

Brandon’s arm tightened around the coyote again. “Then we’ll find somewhere t’ camp,” he replied.

Cody’s tail flopped lightly. “Can...I sleep on you, when we do?”

The wolf laughed, and settled onto his side alongside the coyote, to cuddle him up in a squeaky spooning. “Was I really that comfy?”

Cody giggled. “Yeah. I’ll find a blanket big enough for both of us if you get big enough to-”

“-use my entire tum as an air mattress?” Brandon asked, ruffling a paw over the coyote’s middle, eliciting squeaks from the shirt contact and squirmy giggles from the tickled coyote.

“Ehehe stop! Yeah, hehe, that,” the coyote replied, his footpaws scrabbling at the top quilt under them.

The wolf grinned, and nosed in to plant a quick kiss atop Cody’s head, more audible than the briefer pecks from before. “I’d absolutely love for ya to do that, pup.”

“Not tonight?” the coyote asked.

“If you want any hope of gettin’ up t’ pee at 4 AM here, then I shouldn’t get much bigger. I’ll get carried away otherwise… also don’t uh, wanna break anythin’ in here,” Brandon replied sheepishly.

Cody laughed with the protest, and wiggled to cozy up further with the wolf. “I’ll letcha off the hook this time, then,” he replied playfully, smiling as he watched the falling flakes rustle from a brief gust.

The wolf chuckled as well, tightening his arms around Cody, and shifting with multiple loud rubbery groans as he brought the coyote into a sitting position within his own lap. “First thought you were gonna smell like my rubber fer weeks, but I’m rubbin’ off on ya with my accent already? Sheesh,” he teased.

Cody leaned back further, letting out a slow, shaky sigh of relaxation. “Doesn’t sound too bad,” he said, eyes closed slightly. “Pretty good, really.”

The passing minutes built a small white leanto against the window of icy flakes, glistening.

“Cody?”

“Mmmh?”, the coyote grunted softly, stirring. “Was I snoring?”

Brandon shook his head, and leaned forward, letting his rubbery chest deform and stretch around Cody’s shoulders, to rest his head atop the coyote’s. “Nah. Or I didn’t hear it if yuh were.”

Cody chuckled with a worn-out groan. “Mmh...guess I should get to sleeping properly.”

Brandon nodded softly, rocking his muzzle atop the coyote’s ears. “Yeah,” he murmurred after a pause, and helped Cody lift the latex t-shirt off, setting it to the side before scooting on under the covers alongside him after kicking off his own jeans to follow the coyote.

As Cody found himself nestling up to the rubber wolf, his eyes closed again, and he let out a soft, content whine from the sense of comfort, cuddled up on the bed. He thought he heard “thank you” from the wolf, but hadn’t even a moment to ponder it before dreams took him.