Angry Cat's Arc

Chapter 6 of 8

He stood in the clearing with the toy mouse in his paws. The fabric felt rough against his pads. He turned it over once, then set it back in the grass where he had found it. When he looked up, Harriet was standing at the edge of the trees. She had followed him. The realization made his fur bristle. She held something in her paws—the bright purple and yellow catnip mouse from the clearing. The one he had just put down. No. A different one. This one was newer, the colors sharp, the tail intact. She must have picked it up after he walked away from the chair. His claws flexed. She had no right to touch it. No right to follow him here. The anger surged hot and familiar, but beneath it something else stirred. A question he did not want to ask. He walked toward her, past the tree wrapped with the orange ribbon someone had tied years ago. The cobblestone path leading back down the hill started just beyond where she stood. She did not move. She just watched him with the toy mouse in her paws. When he reached her, he stopped. The anger was there, ready to lash out, but he forced himself to speak instead. "Why did you follow me?" His voice came out rough. She looked down at the toy, then back at him. "Because you've been carrying this alone long enough," she said. "And I wanted you to know you don't have to." The anger did not leave. But it shifted. He looked at the toy in her paws, then at her face. She had grown up watching him break things. Watching him hiss at nothing. She could have stayed away. She chose not to. He took the toy from her paws and turned it over. It smelled like catnip and something older underneath. He set it on the ground between them. "I still don't know why I'm like this," he said. Harriet nodded. "I know," she said. "But maybe you don't have to figure it out by yourself." He did not agree. He did not refuse either. He just stood there with her in the clearing, and for the first time, he did not walk away alone.