I was surprised when Thom stopped by a Pret a Manger on our way to see his artwork. The chain restaurant was as ubiquitous in London as Starbucks was everywhere else and seemed far too mundane for someone like Thom to patronize, but Thom made his coffee order with enough familiarity to make me believe this was a daily ritual. The cashier didn’t even ask his name before scrawling it on a cup. 

Thom was dressed in paint-splattered overalls and scuffed boots, and between the worn clothes and the heavy duffle slung over his shoulder that was full of what I assumed must be art supplies, he looked more like a handyman than an artist at the moment – a handyman from a porn film, honestly, between his sculpted features, mysterious smile and sexy stubble. 

“Where are we headed?” I asked as our strides fell into alignment. We were roughly the same height, but Thom’s legs were a little shorter than mine. He had no trouble keeping pace with me, however.

“It’s not far,” he said instead of answering. 

As we walked down the street in the direction of Whitechapel, Thom nodded at most of the people we passed. I couldn’t tell if he knew them or if he was being unnecessarily polite, but to my surprise the people he acknowledged usually nodded back at him. In my experience so far, the English – at least Londoners – mostly kept to themselves and considered it polite to let others do the same. Maybe they could somehow tell that Thom was a local? I found it hard to believe that they all knew him, especially since he seemed so antisocial otherwise.

“Have you lived in London long?” I asked, realizing that I’d never thought to ask this question before. While living with Thom had felt strangely easy from the beginning – perhaps because Mason had defused any feelings of awkwardness between us before they had a chance to form – we didn’t talk much. Today was the first time we’d shared any details about our lives. 

“All my life,” Thom replied and then smiled. “Well, I suppose I should say lives.”

Creatures of myth often had longer than usual lifespans, but I’d not heard of any with more than one life. “Lives? You’ve had more than one?”

“Eight, actually.” 

“How old are you, then? In total.”

Pursing his lips, he replied, “Oh, over a hundred now, I suppose.”

I frowned, doing the math. That was much less time than I had expected, barely more than ten years per life unless some of them had been even shorter than that. I wanted to ask more questions in this vein, but I had learned to be patient. Thom was not very forthcoming and I didn’t want to shut him down by being too direct. “And you’ve lived in London that whole time? That’s a long time to live in one place.”

He glanced at me, his eyes burnished gold in the sunshine. “I suppose for someone like you who never settles anywhere for long.”

“I lived in Seoul my entire life until recently,” I protested.

He tilted his head thoughtfully and studied me with fresh interest. “So you’re new to the nomadic life?”

I nodded, so distracted by his attention that I nearly tripped over a curb as we crossed the street. Thom caught me by the elbow with a firm grip and pulled me back onto the sidewalk with a little smile. I was suddenly reminded of a time I had done something similar for Yun Seo and my cheeks flushed.

“You can look all over the world for answers,” he said, his voice dropping into a soft tone more appropriate for sharing secrets – or using in the bedroom. “But they’re usually closer than you think.”

“Maybe,” I allowed, “but leaving wasn’t something I’d ever wanted to do until there was no reason to stay.”

Thom made a soft sound of acknowledgement and released my arm as he continued walking. 

The street broadened into a plaza and I was surprised when Thom crossed it toward an old white church. He led me around the crumbling cemetery to the other side of the structure and I realized that the building had been converted into a daycare, the yard on the far side of the church filled with squealing children. 

“Odd place for a daycare,” I noted, my gaze lingering on the weathered headstones nearby. 

“There isn’t a lot of cheap real estate left in the city,” Thom replied, pushing through the gate and into the playground. 

“But they can afford to hire you to paint a mural?”

He laughed, and the sound was warm and generous in a way I hadn’t found him to be up to that point. “No. This one I’m doing gratis. I happen to know the director and she asked for something to brighten up the yard.” Glancing back at me, he backed his way to the corner of the building, somehow managing to miss a pair of running children as he went. “I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to cover an old church in street art,” he added, sharp teeth peeking out between his lips as he grinned.

A pang of worry tugged at my chest as I tried to imagine what kind of sacrilege Thom might dream up for such a purpose in spite of the presence of children, but I breathed a sigh of relief when I rounded the building and got my first glimpse of the mural. An enormous tabby cat sprawled across the wall of the church, paws straining to reach the round window near the roof, the red stained glass roundel the perfect size and color to be a ball. I laughed at the design, struck by how wholesome and innocent it was compared to what I’d imagined.

“It doesn’t seem like your style,” I noted, glancing at Thom who was watching my reaction with an amused smirk.

“It isn’t,” he admitted. “But it’s good to try new things from time to time, don’t you think?”

I couldn’t argue with that.

A red ball similar to the one in the mural collided with my leg and I caught it before it could roll away. A young girl looked up at me in anticipation, her hands spread wide in readiness to catch it. I tossed the ball toward her with a strange feeling twisting in my gut. It wasn’t quite nostalgia, but it was something similar, a longing for home – a feeling of home I hadn’t experienced in a long time. 

Shaking off the feeling, I returned my attention to Thom and saw that he was already setting up to finish painting. I found a bench in the shade to sit on and finish my coffee, watching as he wielded cans of spray paint like paint brushes and brought the tip of the cat’s tail to vivid life. 

“Do you want some?”

I looked over at the boy who had crawled onto the bench beside me. He was offering me part of his string cheese. 

Shaking my head, I smiled. “No, thanks.”

“What do you think its name is?”

I followed his gaze to the giant mural. “I don’t know. What do you think?”

The boy considered this deeply as he nibbled on his cheese. “It needs a good name.”

“Of course. Maybe you and your friends should vote on what it should be.”

Nose wrinkling, the boy shook his head dramatically. “No. They’re bad at choosing names. They’d call it Stripes or Meow. Stupid names.”

Chuckling at his certainty, I returned my attention to the mural and Thom as he stretched high over his head to reach the last spot of empty wall. “Do you have a cat at home?” I asked the boy.

“No. A dog. And I am not a dog person.” The boy shook his head with a grimace, his brown hair falling forward over his eyes with the force of his movement. “It’s always giving me wet kisses.”

“What’s your dog’s name?”

“Roger. A terrible name.”

Amused, I asked, “Who named it?”

“My dad. He said it reminded him of his boss.” Finishing off his cheese, the boy sighed. “What about Tom?”

“For the cat? That’s a person’s name, just like Roger.”

“No it isn’t!” The boy retorted with a giggle. “It would be like the story!”

I tried to think of the story he meant, thinking of a few cartoon characters that fit the description. 

Before I could make a guess, the boy said, “You know. The King of Cats!”

I didn’t know, and I frowned, trying to remember a story with a character like that. 

“Oh, he’s done!” the boy exclaimed, climbing onto his feet on top of the bench and hopping up and down. 

Worried he was going to fall and hurt himself, I reached out to steady him, but he leapt off the bench and stumbled to the ground before I could stop him, rolling back to his feet and bounding across the playground with several other children to get a closer look at the mural. I stood up and walked closer as well, eyes widening when I saw Thom adding his signature to the painting, a cat’s nose and whiskers. And above that, a crown. On some level, I’d been expecting this, but the confirmation of my suspicion was still unsettling.

When he was done, Thom looked back to meet my eyes, a knowing look on his face, and I realized he had brought me here for this reason alone. He knew I would recognize the mark. Thom collected his tools and ruffled the hair of several children as he walked past, joining me without saying a word. 

“That was you on the billboard last night.”

Chuckling, Thom nudged me with an elbow. “Let’s go. We should talk somewhere else.”

He walked me to the back of the church and gestured to a bench next to the cemetery. When we were settled, Thom looked at me for a long time, his stare so intense it made me want to look away, but I sensed I was being tested so I held his gaze.

“As I said before, I’ve lived here a long time,” Thom said finally. Lips pressed into a thin line, he stretched his arm out over the back of the bench, unintentionally brushing fingers against my shoulder. His gaze was focused on the buildings across the street and seemed to be seeing through them to something else. “I’ve seen the city change even down to the roots with the construction of the Underground. New construction pushes out the old and the city gobbles up more and more greenspace until everything is concrete, metal and glass. They call it progress. I call it destruction and the loss of history. Walden Construction is tearing up the old with no respect to what came before, rerouting the streets that have been footpaths across this land for a century and leaving more and more people homeless.”

“Gentrification is a disease in many cities,” I pointed out, Thom’s passion on the topic striking me as a bit extreme. 

He gave me a look like I was missing the point, but nodded anyway. “I didn’t realize it was so widespread.” A dark chuckle escaped Thom’s lips. “Even so. This is my territory and I will defend it.”

“It seems like something that is too big to stop.”

“Perhaps. But I have some ideas.”

Smiling sadly, I looked at the headstones crumbling into the dirt and thought of all the people who had lived and died in this place while Thom continued living. What was he? There were many possibilities, long-lived creatures that were bound to certain territories, but I couldn’t help thinking of the boy’s statement about a cat who was a king. I should look up the story later.

“Would you be willing to help me?”

I winced. “I don’t do that kind of thing anymore.”

His fingertips touched my shoulder again, this time with purpose. “Not anymore? So you did before?”

“I spent years fighting someone else’s war. I won’t make that mistake again. I’m sorry.”

Nodding slowly, he traced his index finger over my back. “I understand.” Sighing, he let his arm fall back to his side and rolled to his feet. “You can’t blame me for trying to recruit you.”

“You’re not going to kill me or something now that I know your secret, are you?” 

He laughed, shouldering his duffle. “And lose my roommate? Hardly. I know where you live, remember? You can’t betray me without becoming homeless.”

I nodded. “That’s true.”

“Ready to go?” 

“I think I’m going to wander for a bit.”

His expression darkened, but he nodded again. “Okay. See you later.”