As a young cat, my love had been rambunctious, for lack of a better word. I wish I’d met him back when he was like that, but now all I’ve got are stories, mere whispers of his youth. I miss the cat I’ve never met, sometimes. By the time he brought me back to his Clan, we were already both the same: holding tight to our secrets, giving them only to each other.
Even so, there is no shortage of stories, especially now.
“When he was Mistpaw’s age, Cedarstep talked about this big structure, made of a solid material that reflected his eyes like water from a pond. There were herbs and plants inside, but he never told anyone how to get there; I can never know where he went. My son keeps his secret to the stars.”
I watch his mother step gradually down from the High Rock, aided by his brothers and sisters, her voice and body both trembling. His daughter Mistpaw shuts her hollow eyes, never looking at anyone or anything.
It’s hard to hear anyone speaking, so I focus on his mother’s last words. I know that place, of course I know that place.
His siblings rise and fall from the High Rock, giving him their final goodbyes and sending after him their best stories, all from the time before I knew him. Even Mistpaw goes, telling of how Cedarstep begged Sparrowstar to let him, the deputy, mentor her, to no avail. “Something about bias, I guess,” she finishes abruptly, and the Clan lowers their heads in humorless laughter.
“Flicker,” I hear his mother call to me tenderly, unwilling to respond. “Would you like to go last?” I glance up and back down. “I don’t know about that. I’m sorry.”
“Mom,” Mistpaw nudges me. “You should go.”
The camp is breathless as I mount the High Rock and sit down, staring down at the body of my love, covered in herbs and flowers, too, as I had asked. After I tear my eyes away, I am careful to never break my eyes from looking at Cedarstep’s mother.
“When Cedarstep brought me here, it had been a long time since I’d known family. I had only just begun to trust him, but he was gentle with me. When he asked me to abandon life as a rogue, to come and learn his ways and live with his Clan, I couldn’t refuse. I have yet to ever regret that decision, even at my worst times. Even at this time.
“I met Cedarstep at that place, that large structure with the water-like walls. I had known of it before and returned to see the flowers once more. On that day, Cedarstep discovered that place, and we discovered one another.”
My words echo, and while I’m still taking in breath and crafting what next to say, his mother steps forward. “Will you take me?” She demands. I blink. “To the…”
“To that place you speak of. I need to go and see.” The crowd murmurs assent. Only his daughter Mistpaw glances around knowingly, her eyes narrowed. “How far is this place? If my mom knew of it as a rogue, it could be very far.”
“Why, my son went as well! It can’t be that far, can it, Flicker?” Her voice remains strong and determined, even as I try to nod along with Mistpaw’s ill-fated aid. “It is still a long time. I don’t know if it would be good for you to make such a journey,” I tell her, placating, but she shakes her head. “Anything for my son.”
Mistpaw’s eyes, hopping from one subject to the next like honeybees, finally land on me. She affirms with her gaze: There’s no other choice.
And so the next day I take Cedarstep’s mother, and his brother, and his sister, and Mistpaw, all to the greenhouse. I haven’t told them what it is or what it’s called, and I don’t have the bandwidth to feel remorse about it.
Mine, mine, mine, my heart says. In my mind, it echoes, this was supposed to be our secret. Why did I tell them about it? Why couldn’t I have kept it? It was ours, and now it’s theirs.
They think it’s theirs, at least.
“Here,” I announce as we arrive. “Just over the ridge.” I had been hanging my head, lagging behind so much the rest of my party were practically leading themselves, turning only at my command. What I hear first is the stunned gasp of Cedarstep’s mother. “Beautiful, yes?” I say to the ground below, meaning it fully but unable to force any enthusiasm.
“Oh, look!” I hear Cedarstep’s sister, her voice drooping in disappointment. “What a shame,” her brother replies. Mistpaw stops where she stands.
I lift my eyes and see them— the ruins.
Cedarstep’s mother turns her gaze away, and her children rush to comfort her: “it’s okay, Mama,” and “he knows you came to visit,” and “we did our best.” Mistpaw goes to them, ushering them back to camp. When I see it, the greenhouse knocked to pieces, small shards of the reflecting walls strewn through the grass, I nearly smile. When I see it emptied of plants, surrounded by twolegs clearing it out and shouting to each other, I barely manage to keep a solemn silence.
It simply feels as though Cedarstep was here, keeping our secret. The greenhouse in its glory is ours to keep, locked in memory. “Thank you, my love,” I murmur to him, squinting against the glint of the sun on the shining surfaces. “I’m sorry I made you do all this to keep the secret from them.” I drop down, sitting, watching the greenhouse disappear before my eyes. I have hardly made myself comfortable on the grass when I hear Cedarstep’s mother call, “are you coming back with us, Flicker?”
They’d already walked back into the forest, far from me. Mistpaw was still sticking close to me, though she continued to wave them on back home. “No, I’ll go with Mistpaw.”
My daughter comes to sit with me, leaning against my side. “Dad’s here,” she tells me, the perfect words, and I close my eyes in peace, even amongst the shouts and the loud bangs from the twoleg’s work. That was Cedarstep, always the calmness in the chaos. “Yes,” I reply to her, breathing deeply.
“If Dad is with us, then…” I open my eyes and glance down at Mistpaw, who’s deadly serious. “If we left, for good I mean, he’d go with us then, too.”
I heave a sigh, returning my eyes to the greenhouse. “Knowing your father, he just might. But then if he goes with us, the rest of his family will be left to live without him.”
“So we have to stay- for them?”
“We shouldn’t stretch your father too thin. If we left, he’d want to come back and visit his family from time to time, but he wouldn’t like to leave us either, even if only for a little bit. We have to stay for him.”
“Huh,” Mistpaw huffs out, but I can tell she’s conceding. “What’s so wrong with them anyways?” I ask her, somehow knowing the answer as I do.
“They don’t know him like us. They wouldn’t have wanted to come here if they did.”
“One would think his mother knew him best.”
“Not at all. Dad wouldn’t have wanted to tell her anything, it would be thirty moons of small talk. And why should he have told her about himself? She can’t keep a secret.”
I hum. Cedarstep told me once that if somebody guessed one of his secrets by chance, I ought to lead them off track in order to keep it. But this had been before Mistpaw, our beautiful daughter. There was hardly a need to keep secrets anymore, now that this greenhouse, the oldest one, was gone.
“Yes. I guess you’re right about that.”
this writing piece by siv definitely tugged at my heartstrings. i could feel the heartache that flicker felt at her mate's passing, how important the greenhouse where they first met was to her, and how possessive she feels over letting anyone else from the clan see it. i was hooked from the first paragraph, and i really adore the bond between flicker and mistpaw!
you should go check out the original post and show the author some appreciation!
