{$title} tw: drowning, mentions of near-death
When they had been given the chance to leave camp, Foamkit had thought the river was only a puddle deep. He had felt so secure being clutched and supported, and it had been a balm to his apprehension. The camp had fallen silent in the long yawn of midnight.
The water was so pretty.
In the faint, twinkling light, he had seen it full and well. He had swallowed the glittery stars, the colorless river. The water was so pretty. Foamkit wondered if his lungs looked like constellations now.
Beginnings of leaf-fall twirled like ribbons around him, his faint heart still beating even though he was the water now. Dead leaves pirouetted into the stream, then like a billowing dress, not yet brittle, they were sent swirling into the current. He was tiny enough to be them, and just as much a promise of cold.
He wasn't stupid — well, maybe. He had heard cautionary tales of cats drowning, even adults so towering and big that they seemed to make rivers look like rivulets of rain in their crossings. But like any tale, a shroud of fiction cloaked his discernment. Stories only told so many details. They couldn't even breathe in reality's same air.
If they could, he would know exactly what dad looked like, who he was.
A long line of dark bubbles escaped his mouth, his chest working through the torrent, a last squeeze of air. The bubbles were in the shape of an apology. He was so sorry, and his mama and his siblings would never know. Over it all – he sobbed because of this inconvenience. The grief and the funeral herbs that would be spent on him. How tongues once combing soothingly over his fur would pretty his hair for the grave. Foamkit did not know where his tears and the river began.
His consciousness finally stumbled.
@Galepaw
The water was so pretty.
In the faint, twinkling light, he had seen it full and well. He had swallowed the glittery stars, the colorless river. The water was so pretty. Foamkit wondered if his lungs looked like constellations now.
Beginnings of leaf-fall twirled like ribbons around him, his faint heart still beating even though he was the water now. Dead leaves pirouetted into the stream, then like a billowing dress, not yet brittle, they were sent swirling into the current. He was tiny enough to be them, and just as much a promise of cold.
He wasn't stupid — well, maybe. He had heard cautionary tales of cats drowning, even adults so towering and big that they seemed to make rivers look like rivulets of rain in their crossings. But like any tale, a shroud of fiction cloaked his discernment. Stories only told so many details. They couldn't even breathe in reality's same air.
If they could, he would know exactly what dad looked like, who he was.
A long line of dark bubbles escaped his mouth, his chest working through the torrent, a last squeeze of air. The bubbles were in the shape of an apology. He was so sorry, and his mama and his siblings would never know. Over it all – he sobbed because of this inconvenience. The grief and the funeral herbs that would be spent on him. How tongues once combing soothingly over his fur would pretty his hair for the grave. Foamkit did not know where his tears and the river began.
His consciousness finally stumbled.
@Galepaw