[Fel]

Originally Posted by Lonestar23

Dulled green eyes glanced up at the sound of pawsteps coming from the apprentices den. Most other apprentices were sleeping (if they were lazy) or training - the clearing was filled with warriors at the moment, so who could this be? Aspenpaw’s gaze became a little more hopeful at the sight of Tawnypaw… but what was she doing here? Where had she been? ”Tawnypaw?” His voice was low, quiet, almost like he didn’t want her to hear him - but he did. He really wanted to talk to her, except he was afraid to. He knew she had been close to Moonpaw - he had often heard her speak of the other apprentice. Aspenpaw hadn’t been as close as Tawnypaw had to the other she cat, but he could see why she was spoken so highly of - she was a wonderful cat. [Or… she had been a wonderful cat. Aspenpaw hated death so much. He’d never thought that a cat he cared about so much would die so soon. She’d been way too young to die. Clearly StarClan hadn’t felt the same way, because they had taken her from the Clan. And, the fact that Tawnypaw was avoiding him now - or appeared to be trying to avoid him - wasn’t helping much. So Aspenpaw stayed where he was, unsure of whether or not he should approach the she cat. He didn’t know what to say to her to help, and he was afraid to so much as touch her - she clearly didn’t want him to. Maybe she was ashamed to look at him? It was doubtful - as far as Aspenpaw knew, he hadn’t done anything to make her upset. Grief was a funny emotion… it ripped you apart from the inside. Everyone had different ways of dealing with it. The tom wanted company, but he wasn’t as willing to work for it anymore - and Tawnypaw? She seemed to want nothing more than to be left alone.

Their eyes had both dulled, hadn't they? Perhaps a symbol of how much Moonpaw's death had affected the clan. She'd been Tawnypaw's closest friend, and her passing away had surely not opened that spot to anyone else- it had turned her to close herself off from the rest of the clan, to give up on the idea of ever finding somebody else she'd think about in the same way. She could never replace Moonpaw, and perhaps never even feel so strongly about a single cat, ever again. Sniffling to a few seconds as her tail flicked back-and forth in dread, her ears suddenly perked at the sound of a familiar voice, a familiar whisper. Slowly raising her head in order to meet the fellow apprentice's gaze, she couldn't help but feel a pang of sadness, of guilt run through her heart, because Aspenpaw had known her, too. "...Aspenpaw." She murmured, paws pushing into the ground awkwardly as the she-cat attempted to keep her voice from cracking, from expressing the grief she'd been feeling for quite so long. It was harder to keep herself 'emotionless' when there was a living reminder of Moonpaw right there, after all- perhaps now she understood why some other cats couldn't handle the children of those who had wronged them, even their friends. It hurt so much more than she'd expected. "...I haven't seen you around here in a long while." She whispered, shaking her head with a small, shaky sigh.