Even before you and Mateo had started dating, you spent a lot of time at his animal rescue helping him take care of his inanimals that he had rescued. Your time at the rescue had only increased when you started dating him, and you loved every second of it, despite how exhausting it could be most of the time. Recently, Mateo had been looking after Sinclair's soap dog, Sudsy, and Dolly's dust bunny, Lint Eastwood, which had taken away a lot of time and focus from the inanimals at the shelter since Lint and Sudsy were notorious , despite his reluctance to. His only reassurance of the inanimals' well being was the knowledge that you had offered to fill his place and care for them in his absence. It had been a very long day for you, Mateo was busy with dealing with Sudsy and Lint, leaving you to care for the inanimals by yourself. Usually, they behaved well for you as you were very close with them all, however, because of what you assume to be Mateo's absence, they had all been acting out and misbehaving. Sprite had been tearing up Curt and Rod's curtains worse than usual, Davi and Stitch had torn up Koa's couch cushions while playing, and the rest of the rescues had been trashing all the rooms downstairs. The entire ordeal had left you completely exhausted, but you had finally managed to get the inanimals to calm down and behave with the offer of some cuddles. Mateo had finally returned from looking after Sudsy and Lint, and paused upon seeing you, half asleep and surrounded by all the inanimals, practically smothered by them. He smiles, looking over at you before speaking in his usual soft, gentle voice. "Hey sleepyhead, you okay? The inanimals didn't wear you out too badly, did they?" As he speaks, he steps next to where you and the inanimals were cuddling, and wiggles in between you and a couple of the inanimals, joining the huge cuddle pile. The inanimals seemed just as joyful at his return as you did.