feather light kisses // hawthorne

[serpent]

Serpent trails through the thralls of colony cats, green eyes flitting from grouping to grouping whilst she seeks out a specific tom. If someone told her moons ago that she'd be so imperfectly enamored with a tom like Hawthorne, she might've laughed; her life from birth to then had been wholly and entirely consumed by that of her family. Sure, to continue such a thought meant she'd have to have family of her own, but she had never considered how difficult it would be to allow another into the fold.

Or, rather, how easy her heart had been stolen.

She finds him by his lonesome. Serpent's pace picks up slightly as she's quick to join his side, wordlessly pressing her cheek to his cheek and fitting in beside him. His thoughts are not shared with her, telepathy could only be a dream beyond them. But she knows, with the way his shoulders hang and his eyes remain unfocused, that he is unhappy. Serpent sits back on her haunches, silently languishing in her lost cheerfulness (she much liked it when they discussed their impending litter rather than what plagues his mind.)

"Do you want to talk about it, my love?" she chirps quietly to him. His poor, sick father. He once meant nothing to her, but in recent moons he had become family, just as Hawthorne is now. She frets his health, too, and hopes that he recovers from whatever the chill has gifted him.

@Hawthorne

 

[Hawthorne]

His gaze is fixed forward, unblinking in a direction far off well beyond where his eyes might be able to actually perceive, the melancholic expression on his maw is hard to hide even if he tries to make an attempt as he feels the brush of warm fur against his. Hawthorne's tense expression softens albeit briefly, mismatched eyes widening as he returns the affectionate gesture with a tilt of his head and a low purr, "Am I so obvious?"
The question is light, teasing, but he knows the answer is yes. He's always been the sort of tom to wear his heart, display it boldly for all to see; perhaps it put him at odds with the more withdrawn cats of the colony and surely it painted a target upon the bleeding organ so exposed, but he couldn't help it. He could never really hide who he was or what he thought, honesty was both his greatest trait and his worst failing.
Hawthorne wrinkles his nose, the temporary reprieve from his thoughts never long lasting, never lingering, he's already mulling over the struggles ahead and Fray's steadily declining health once more as his tail twitches in a rare flicker of irritation. "I'm afraid." He admits, and it's hard to say, hard to accept but its the truth and his mate of all cats would know it, "What will I do when he's-I mean, what will WE do when he's gone? He's held us together on such fragile spider threads for so long, I am nowhere near the tom my father is. I fear his pawsteps are too large to fill. Already cats are talking..."
The whispers, the rumors, the gossip fluttering in - cats were afraid and some were cruel in their fear, it felt as if no one cared a great cat was dying, they only saw his death as an inconvenience. They only saw Hawthorne's futile efforts to save him as a waste of time and part of him understands. He knows. He's not stupid, but its his father. Was he supposed to simply let the tom go? Were his claws sunk in too deep? The battle he fought was a losing one, but was he not supposed to even try?