Cathal, Doctor Watson and OPEN
Between himself and Doctor Watson, it was Cathal who jumped first, and his poor kitty who looked alarmed second, enough so that his head snapped up and he looked about with wide eyes that settled on the cause of Cathal's sudden madness with an expression that could only be described as disinterested when he saw it was only a human. "Hi, Ellie!" was his first word to her as he gave a grin, a little bit embarrassed for being scared, but loud noises weren't usually the order of the day for him. At least they didn't scare Watson. "I'm... I wasn't scared at all!" he declared, nodding as though it would make his words that much more believable. "If it'll make my name easier to remember, you can always go with Cat? I know Cathal's hard to pronounce!" he said. And anyway, he always approved of shortening people's names. He'd only found out about that one when he'd come to school and had insisted on being called Cat here ever since by the people he called his friends.
He positively beamed when she asked after Watson. "He won't hate you, but you're going to have to tell him you're a friend and say you'd like to pet him before you do it, or he might get a little startled! He's the best kitty, but he can't hear, so we use signs to talk to him! And he's a clever boy, so he does them right back. If he doesn't wanna be pet, he'll tell you! You just need to give him a little wave and if you pat your hand, the back, he'll let you know!"