Eva walked with Kurt and Blaine through the swinging double doors of the shelter. Eva clung to Blaine's hand. She wore large, black, noise canceling headphones to block out the noise of dogs barking and cage doors crashing together. Eva pressed her body as close to Blaine's leg as she could, until he almost couldn't walk comfortably. He looked down at her head of dark curls and smiled. He raised his eyes to see Kurt raising his eyes as well, giving Blaine a sympathetic look.

Blaine ran a hand through Eva's dark hair. She looked up at him with a weak half-smile, a little weary of being in this large building with the many cages and the fidgeting, fussing animals.

Eva had just started school and the first week seemed to go by just fine. But then she seemed to withdraw. She still talked to Blaine, but took to talking with him secretly, staying close to his side and whispering in his ear. Hunter suggested that she might not be dealing with the change very well – new environment, new schedule, new people, new sounds, new smells. She hadn't developed any new triggers, but she had become quiet and easily frustrated, sometimes to the point of tears. In a way, the new silent Eva was a bit more off-putting than full-out tantrum Eva, whom thankfully they really only saw once in a blue moon.

Hunter had suggested getting her a cat. A cat would offer her companionship, something that could help soothe and comfort her through the rough patches in her day.

Hunter had called ahead to the shelter, talking with an administrator who dealt with therapy animals. He told her that Kurt and Blaine would be coming, and bringing Eva to find a new friend.

An older woman with slightly graying hair and a genuine smile approached. Blaine felt Eva tighten around his leg, and Blaine reacted, putting up a hand to keep the woman from coming too close.

“If you don't mind,” Blaine said, smiling warmly. The woman's confused eyes flicked down at the girl hiding between Blaine's legs, wearing large headphones and squeezing her eyes shut, and she understood.

“Mr. Anderson,” the woman said. She turned to Kurt and nodded. “Mr. Hummel. Welcome. My name is Lydia. We have a room all set up for you in the therapy wing.”

She led the way through another set of double doors, and a hallway that was much more quiet, much more peaceful. She told them about their program, and the animals they screen and deem eligible for adoption specifically as therapy animals. Blaine absorbed every word, talking excitedly about the program, while simultaneously limping along with little Eva still firmly attached. Kurt pulled up the rear, feeling almost forgotten, but smiling as he watched the interaction.

She led them to a conference room at the far end of the hallway, away from the sounds of people, animals, and metal cages. The rough carpet beneath their feet absorbed the sound of their footsteps as they walked across it. Kurt wondered how they would pick the perfect cat for Eva exactly. Would they need to fill out a personality profile, or take some sort of test?

The process, to Kurt's surprise, was much simpler than that. Cat after cat was brought into the room – one at a time with a minute or two in between so that Eva could become comfortable with the influx of animals. After the last cat was brought in, fifteen cats total milled about the open space, and the three adults watched to see how Eva would react. For a while, Eva sat in the far corner of the room, not anxiously, but curiously. A few cats approached her, and she would eye them with a mixture of concern and interest, but then they would turn and go on their merry way.

After a while, the cats stopped finding Eva interesting, and she didnt seem all too interested in the cats, either. At one point, Lydia put out a small arrangement of toys for Eva to use to try and entice the cats to play, but Eva just looked at them, and then looked away.

Kurt leaned against Blaine and sighed. He didn't want to give up hope, but it didn't seem like a cat was the answer to their prayers.

“I don't understand,” Lydia said, watching the scene play out, mouth agape. “Not one of them seems to be attuned to her mood, and she's giving off some pretty blaring signs.”

Kurt wasn't exactly sure how this ‘cat magic' was supposed to work, so he simply nodded sadly in agreement.

Kurt squeezed Blaine's hand as he watched the mob of cats ignoring his little girl, and Eva, still with her headset on, staring at the ceiling.

The woman who helped bring the cats in walked through the double doors, burdened with one more cat.

“I'm sorry, Lydia,” she said, walking straight to the older woman, cat in tow. “He got out again.”

Lydia looked at the striped cat and sighed.

“What are we going to do with you?” she cooed to the cat, who struggled to be free. He twisted impossibly from his handler's grasp, and plopped to the floor, scurrying away to join the throng.

Kurt turned to Lydia.

“I think maybe we should take Eva and…”

Blaine squeezed Kurt's hand and pointed to the far corner of the room, where the new cat stalked little Eva curiously. Eva turned her head and looked once…then she looked twice…then she looked around to see who the cat might be walking up to. She stepped back a little ways when she realized the cat was coming up to her, but then the tiny beast wrapped itself around her ankles, walking through her legs and over her feet, rubbing its smooth body against her. Kurt and Blaine, and maybe even Lydia, held their collective breaths and waited. Eva touched the cat experimentally on the top of the head, between his ears. He closed his green eyes and purred. Eva giggled. She sat on the floor and placed the cat in her lap. She hugged the animal to her and sighed. The cat didn't struggle, made no move to leave, and the collective breath held in the room by all relaxed into a happy sigh. Kurt and Blaine gave Eva a moment with the cat, just to make sure this wasn't a fluke, before approaching little Eva and her friend.

Blaine sat beside Eva and took off her headset, the small girl's face beaming from ear to ear.

“Eva's cat,” she said, hugging the cat and burying her nose into its fur. Kurt cringed for a moment, thinking the cat might bolt or try to scratch, but he was content to sit in her arms and be molested.

“I think maybe he is,” Blaine said, putting a comforting hand on her knee. “Now you have someone else you can tell all your secrets to.”

Eva nodded proudly, cuddling the cat close.

“That's a beautiful cat,” Kurt said calmly, eying the marbled brown cat in Eva's arms. “What do you think his name is?”

Eva leaned close to the cat's ear, whispering to it quietly. Then she turned her head and put her ear up to the cat's mouth, as if listening to the answer.

“Brian,” Eva said, addressing Kurt out loud for the first time in days. “He says his name is Brian.”