it's only been a couple of days and i miss you (c)

In her younger days, Bubblebeam had spent as much time as possible in camp, with her siblings and her friends, enjoying the social atmosphere of the little tree-lined hollow. These days, she spent every waking hour she could manage out in the territory--and as much of that as was reasonable, she spent walking the border. Not the ThunderClan border; the scent of bracken and moss still put her on edge and made her scars itch. Not the RiverClan border; thoughts of Honeydew and the eerie sound of rushing water kept her far away. So that left the border with ShadowClan. Its damp earth beneath her paws and the tall, sheltered forest of pine trees felt far more secluded from the collective misery of camp... and besides, there was always the chance that she might run into a friend. She found it far nicer to linger in the memories of misty nights, a sharp yellow gaze, musky conifer bark, rather than the sour tang of grief when she remembered how many cats she'd lost. Instead of sitting in the den with so many empty nests, instead of nursing her aching shoulder and burying her sorrow in the stifling familiarity of camp, she would far rather sit here and look across the border and wish that a devilish smirk and its accompanying pair of green eyes would suddenly appear and set her heart alight with the strange and fluttery sensation of love. She could not care less that it was not supposed to be hers; she would take whatever she could from this world before it abandoned her, too.

It was late enough that she was the only cat out on the territory. Their numbers had dwindled so harshly that it wasn't too difficult to find an excuse to patrol on her own; no one cared enough these days to chase after her. Besides, dawn and dusk sounded far more appealing now that they carried the tantalizing hint of what they might bring with them. A friend... or even more than a friend. Of course, she might also see someone she'd never met before, or not meet anyone at all. But sitting alone at the border wasn't so bad. The heat of the warm new-leaf day cooled off, stirring her thick fur with a gentle breeze that carried with it the strange and different scents of ShadowClan territory. She'd tired of these deciduous trees... as beautiful as SkyClan's territory was, it carried only tragedy. But would she rather live in the wide and agoraphobic moors and chase rabbits, and chase her dream of keeping her family together? Would she rather take Crookedlight's antithetical suggestion and flee to the peace of Twolegplace? Or... was there a chance her fur would stick to her with cold mud, and she'd only wake at night and never see the sun again, and that the darkness could welcome her? A chance that any swallowed bubble of guilt could wash away, and the word "mine" could be anything other than a wishful thought?

Sitting alone here, it almost felt possible... dangerously so. But she pushed the thought away. Leaving at this point was a foregone conclusion. But... where would she go? Could she leave her family? Could she cling to her siblings in a new place entirely, or ruin her life by claiming what little she could for herself? Could she be so selfish? Could she even live without the ties to her siblings tearing her into shreds? Pale green eyes raised themselves to the sky in a silent plea. Birdsong.... Her distant relative, so far gone in the stars, who'd left her Clan and found peace. Found happiness. She'd wondered at first why StarClan would have such a story to tell her... but it seemed almost obvious, now. A sign maybe. Or a warning. How was she to know which was which? Where was she supposed to go? What was she supposed to do? "Stars," she sighed to herself, staring out at the reddish hues of sunset on the horizon. "How much more of this do I have to take?"

Perhaps her plea had been answered. Perhaps she was simply lucky. Perhaps the object of her thoughts simply found his mind walking in the same paths hers so often did. But whatever the reason--curse or blessing--Bubblebeam's ears pricked up at a familiar sound interrupting her despondency. Pawsteps in the mud, and then a voice. His voice. Calling out her name. Pure relief flooded her veins first, and then her bodily response followed: the relaxation of her shoulders, the widening of her eyes, the smile spreading across her face. "Silverbird..." Almost unconsciously she took a step forward, paws pressed up across the invisible line marking the border between them. As always, his mere presence was magnetic, drawing her closer without the merest hint of effort. As if she'd been perched high up in a tree and he was the ground, the irresistible force of gravity sending her plummeting downwards with the exhilarating sense of freefall lightening her heart. Did he even have to try? Did he know how impossible it was to look at anything other than him, with the faintest glimmers of starlight reflecting off of his dark fur?

Whether he felt the same way towards her or simply responded to her unspoken need to have him there, Silverhawk approached, and pressed his nose gently into the ruff of her fur. A violent shudder passed through her from the point of impact and all the way to the tip of her fluffy tail. After the horrible month she'd had, after all the losses... that single touch sent everything else flying from her mind. Bubblebeam rested her head against his shoulder, leaning into his solid form as if he were the only real thing around, because he was. Silently she inhaled the deep musk of his scent. It was okay. Everything would be okay. With SkyClan camp far behind her and the grief in the deep recesses of her mind, it almost seemed true. A quiet purr radiated outward, rumbling from her chest. Just this moment made everything worth it.

However, reality returned eventually, as it always did. Silverhawk was kind but he was not without curiosity. Not even he could read her mind. After a little while he stepped back, and Bubblebeam did not try and cling to him any longer than he wanted. Though she would've been happy if the embrace had lasted just a little while longer. The inevitable question--even in the soft, charming cadences of her friend's voice--doused her gradually-warming heart in the chill of corporeality. "Ah... right." The gray-furred warrior flicked the tip of her tail and glanced away, searching her mind for an answer. She couldn't lie to him, she could never; it felt dishonest to even try a simple "I'm fine." He knew her better than that. But how to summarize? How to explain everything that had happened? She didn't want to dump all of this on him. When was the last time she'd helped him instead of just being a mess? He was always listening to her, always assisting with whatever issue weighed her down. It was that night at the lake all over again. How could someone be so selfless? Bubblebeam wished hopelessly that she could be more like him.

Eventually she looked at him again, pale green eyes meeting the darker green of her friend's. More than a friend. She didn't have any space in her brain to try and find a label that would fit what he was to her. Instead, she smiled--a small smile, but still a genuine one. Her pain truly seemed much lesser just in his presence. "I've just had a hard moon. I got attacked by a fox, then camp got attacked by dogs, then some family members and friends... passed away..." Even thinking about Honeydew or Graywind would send her spiraling, let alone the indecipherable mess of emotions surrounding Sunfire's disappearance, so she willed the specifics away. "Honestly, nothing that I haven't dealt with before. But that's really the problem. No matter how long I wait or how many things I try to do differently, nothing ever really changes. You know what I mean? There's always some predator or some shattering grief that follows me no matter where I go." Though she tried to sound nonchalant, she hardly managed it. Her voice felt low and cynical. She disliked it immediately. Why couldn't she sound like him? Bubblebeam shook her head, a frustrated little laugh making its way out of her throat. "Sorry. Every time we meet, it's always something like this. I wish I could just stop complaining and bear it like everyone else seems to. I don't want to be useless. I don't always want to be the one needing help. I wish I could be of help to you, like you always help me, but I can't help anyone like this."

Though the mess that swirled within her chest kept itself far more manageable than it had been when she lingered alone in SkyClan camp, it still felt hardly bearable even with the assistance of Silverbird's presence. Bubblebeam felt--not for the first time tonight--her lungs constricting with the difficulty of drawing breath steadily. The positive emotions from seeing her dear friend clashed horribly with the cocktail of anxiety and grief and confusion that laced her veins every waking moment. It buzzed in her ears, hissed in the back of her mind, crawled its way up her spine. She could never truly escape it, never truly wish it away, as much as she wanted to. She still felt like a walking catastrophe. However, despite her state, she still couldn't help but look up when she heard his voice. That voice. It smoothed her over like the stillness of a lake, like a cloudless sky. Just the way he murmured her name, so gently, as if his care for her were the most foregone conclusion in the world, quieted the irregular beating of her heart.

As always, he didn't stop just with her name. Silverbird spoke, and each word that left his mouth in that pleasantly soft tone forced the waves of irrationality back bit by bit. How did he do it? Did he know how something so easy for him was the only thing that drew her away from the precipice of fear? Bubblebeam felt herself sitting down on the grass, as if something else had inhabited her body. She felt the tension in her muscles slowly beginning to fade--the cool night air brushing against her fur--the mud beneath her paws, distantly, far away. Her entire focus fixed itself on Silverbird. A smile curled onto his face. If he'd told her anything with that smile, she would have no choice but to believe it... even if he said that she didn't need to apologize. Apologizing came so naturally to her, just like sweet-talk did to him. But... he said that he didn't mind listening. That it was good to have confidants, because it was. Stars, it was. She hardly realized how much she missed the cats in SkyClan that she'd once considered close enough to share her troubles with. Honeydew, gone. Graywind, gone. Thymelight, far more busy as SkyClan's only medicine cat. Ploverwing, Sorrelmist, busy searching for her long-gone father. Hemlockfox, vanished on the other side of the forest. No wonder then that she kept turning to the ShadowClan border for solace. Her only remaining friends who she could trust to be there for her... Hawkmist, and Silverbird. Silverbird had never let her down. Even now, he listened to her problems. She loved that he was so kind to her, that he knew just what to say... She loved him.

Taking care of herself in order to take care of others... a sensible thought, yet one that seemed foreign. If she couldn't help, then why did she deserve help of her own? Why, when others meant so much more to her than herself? Yet, Bubblebeam could not argue with the logic of it. Acknowledgement felt heavy in her chest. In her attempts to be of help to others, she had only become more of a burden. She couldn't help others if she wasn't even capable of helping herself. But no sooner had she begun to feel the weight of the accusation she had begun to levy at herself than it was swept away from her. Silverbird stepped closer, his deep green eyes fixed on her, his face so near that she could feel his breath stirring her fur.

”So let me take care of you. What’s the point of calling you mine if I can’t do that much?”

Mine.

And before the force of that line had finished wreaking havoc on her composure, before its red-hot warmth had completed its paces through her entire body, Silverbird stepped forward and embraced her again. "Silverbird..." Without so much as a thought, Bubblebeam responded in kind, instinctively seeking out the comfort and sense-heightening pleasure that accompanied his touch. She buried her face in the plush ruff of fur around his neck, twining herself as close to him as she could get. Paw to paw, chest to chest. The spine-tingling intensity fizzed through her mind like so many pine needles cushioning the ground beneath them. At the same time, her ears kept trained to the sound of his voice. Some quiet prickling at the back of her mind said something about the border, but it couldn't help but be drowned out in Silverbird's whisper. Words of consolation, commiseration, empathy. His own father, too... She pressed only closer at the thought, hoping she could give him some fraction of the peace he always afforded her. This moon's difficulties hadn't been locked within SkyClan's borders. Of course, they hadn't; she wasn't the only one with problems. But... it was so much easier with someone else. So much more bearable when she could actually give voice to the pain that lay dormant instead of pretending it did not exist.

He shifted, not moving further away but simply into a different position, and she found herself confronted by those eyes again. Those eyes, so very close to hers, and their accompanying shower of compliments that settled under her skin. Strong, capable... could she believe something like that of herself? In this moment, with Silverbird right there, it sounded like he could only speak the truth. But in the dark of night, or in front of a fox, or facing her family, it felt very different. Yet she had no time to doubt him, not with the trail of fire left by his touch moving once more, and now he stood at her side and their tails twisted around each other. The blue-furred warrior's fluffy, unkempt tail entwined against his. Pale gray-green eyes met Silverbird's gaze, drinking in every moment of his presence, noting the glimmer of hope that shone from his expression. Very briefly, something akin to guilt or shame attempted to possess her at his observation about SkyClan, but it flickered and died immediately with the brush of his side against hers. She had not been treated terribly, on purpose... but the fact remained that she was unhappy, miserable even, in her current state. And Silverbird already managed to reach the conclusion that she hadn't yet shared with him. Had she considered leaving? If she had any breath left in her lungs, she would laugh; the idea of leaving had been one of the only things driving her paws forward through the monotony of everyday life. At first, she'd thought to leave with her brother. She'd convinced herself that Hemlockfox would come any day now to sweep her and her sisters away. But as the moons passed, that idea slowly faded, and in its place a new, more rebellious thought stole into her heart. Marshes crept into her daydreams... and a pair of pelts, one black and silver, one pale as the moon....

Distantly--she felt very far away from herself, right now, very far from the unending warmth that consumed her frame--Bubblebeam realized she had not spoken in several minutes, save murmuring his name. But he'd asked her a question that required her a response. With some difficulty, she loosened the muscles of her throat which had only managed a few uneven gasps and shuddering exhales from the tantalizing closeness they now shared. "I... I have considered it," she said, her voice hardly a breath in the night. She didn't have to speak loudly; a single motion would cause their noses to touch. "More than considered it. I've been... counting on it. I know I can't stay in SkyClan, I just... haven't had the courage to do it by myself." And this even after he'd lavished her with such praises--as if she could ever be anything other than afraid. She shook her head slightly, though the motion caused her whiskers to brush against his. "I thought I would go with my siblings to WindClan, but my brother hasn't come back in moons, and my sisters spend so much time searching for my father that I have had no chance to bring the idea to them. It seems less likely. So, I... I've been thinking about where to go... instead." Her voice hushed even more, if it were possible. Had the night been cold? She couldn't tell; her face felt as if it had been lit aflame by the very surface of the sun. "I've never been apart from my siblings. I--you know, you saw me, when my sister went missing. But I had... never had my friends die like this, either. It's never been so bad. So, if I'm... doing things that I could never do, in the first place..." Birdsong's advice flew featherlike through her thoughts once again. To go, to leave, to find happiness beyond the bounds of her birth. Something that several cats within her Clan would likely kill her for if they knew the depth of the desire that stirred within her at the idea. The vow she'd reluctantly taken as a warrior--she would dismiss it in an instant. She would turn traitor, villain, and risk the hatred of those for whom she'd lived. But... it didn't seem so impossible, when she sat like this with him.

Bubblebeam's face moved slightly, looking at Silverbird. She could hardly believe the thrill that ran through her every time she realized just how closely they sat together, nor the trembling that passed through her whenever she recalled the word "mine." Could that word ever be meant with full honesty? She dared to speak again. "I... know I'm going to leave. And, if I'm being honest with myself, there is somewhere that I would much... rather... go." The last few words fell--traitorous, honest--from her mouth with a sense of finality. She could hardly breathe. Had she meant them? Yes, every syllable. But to sit here in this silence felt as if she'd stepped foot into the den of a fox and now waited to see whether it would reward her bravery, or devour her whole. What if she'd misinterpreted what he had been saying? What if he simply asked out of curiosity, and she had imagined the hope in his gaze as a reflection of her own? Surely not. But she waited on tenterhooks, unable to breathe or move or even think, twining her tail with Silverbird's as if it were the only lifeline keeping her from hurtling off the edge of a cliff.

”Come to ShadowClan.”

The rush of pleasure that flooded through Bubblebeam at the words he spoke, at the press of his body against hers, felt illegal. Was she allowed to be this happy? Was she allowed to be this terribly, traitorously selfish? But she couldn't deny the way she felt, as if gravity lost its hold on her, as if she were falling upwards into the sky. The darkness of the night melted away into haloes of sunlight, all radiating from his deep purr that rumbled all the way through her chest and into her heart. It all sounded, all felt, too good to be true. Someone who loved her this much... was he even real? Was she just dreaming? But he spoke as persuasively as ever. Even if he'd kept on stuttering, nothing could have sounded more eloquent than his voice. He didn't have to work hard to convince her to do something that she wanted to do. She'd never, ever, wanted something this much. She'd never wanted someone this much. Silverbird had spoken to his mother about her; he'd promised to speak to Leopardstar; he would vouch for her. She didn't deserve him... but he wanted her, anyway. If it weren't for his frame holding her up, she might have melted onto the ground like snow in greenleaf.

”We wouldn’t have to play these games anymore, Bubblebeam. The border wouldn’t be an issue anymore. You could really, truly be mine.”

The idea felt so attractive as it flashed into her mind and flew around her like a fluttering bird finally set free. No more nights waiting anxiously at the border for a few stolen moments of time. They could spend every evening together, curled around each other like this. When they'd first made contact, the heat of a blazing fire had spread its warmth through her slowly, and she now felt entirely consumed by that desire. She wanted it. In comparison to the loneliness, to the darkness, to the misery... could she even stand such a stark difference? But oh, to be his, truly and completely. She didn't need anything else in her life. Water, food, even breath itself paled in comparison. All she needed to subsist was this interaction alone. "I... I want that so much," Bubblebeam exhaled, her voice little more than a whisper above the beating of her heart. "I know it'll be hard to go. But... stars. I want nothing more than to be on the same side of the border as you, all the time." If it were possible, she pressed her face even deeper into his fur. The scent of him made her dizzy. Words failed; she had no way to properly enunciate her feelings. Hopefully the embrace they shared, the purr that rose from both of them to become a united entity, would prove that she meant what she said. "I'll go with you. Not tonight, but... soon. I-I want to really be yours, Silverbird." She nuzzled his face. "I want to."