Where was he?

She’d watched every night for so long… where –was- he?

She paced back and forth in front of her window, occasionally ducking under her covers when she heard people walking down the hall. They couldn’t know she was up, let alone that she was waiting for someone who made her pulse lift and her cheeks flush just to –see- him, never mind when they had kissed.

After she was sure everyone was in bed she had even made her way outside to see if he was waiting for her unseen.

There was nothing… no one waiting for her, not even the black cat he had become before he vanished. Nothing at all to even say he had waited and had to leave again.

Was he hurt?...

Was he dead?

She had no idea and it was killing her, slowly and surely crumpling her up inside and she couldn’t even begin to say why.

She stood outside so long her feet felt like ice when she crept quietly up the stairs and slid under the covers. She pulled the blankets around her and tried not to imagine the worst.
But did it hurt more to think that He was hurt, or that he had just left without a word.

She never thought that it would be hard to tell such a thing but it was for what felt like an eternity. She squeezed her cat plush to her chest so hard its button eyes felt likely to bruise her as she tried not to cry. She felt more like a child than she had in years.
It was so unfair, she’d never felt so sudden, or deeply about anyone.. never wanted to kiss them like that and never let go.
She’d never –dreamed- of someone the way she did so often of him…

To think he might be gone, or taken, or hurt or… Dead.


She shook her head and made herself lay down at last. She would sleep, she would wait for him when she could not patrol, she would leave him notes when she was gone with excuses, anything that he might –might- leave a note of his own if they missed each other in the night.

She even wished she could ask her sister to look out for him, but she was afraid to, she was afraid that her parents would find out. She knew they didn’t want pets in the house, and there were reasons, good reasons she knew. They might think Caine was something she was trying to adopt… worse though, what if she TOLD her sister, and he came as a man. Oh god… she would NEVER live it down that some older man with NO shirt came rapping at her window at odd hours.

No… She’d wait… she would keep waiting and keep looking… that was all she could do for now.