Something was wrong but she couldn’t quite put her paw on it. It had been a few days since she’d last seen her lover. This wasn’t like her to just up and take off without at least shouting at Rivet that she was angry at her for something or another. Rivet was quite upset with this seemingly random turn of events, especially since she didn’t know what, exactly, it was that she’d done this time to apparently piss off her lover. The first night Turquoise didn’t come home, Rivet slept only lightly. But when the second and third nights came with still no sign of her lover, the ebon female didn’t sleep at all.

Having not slept for a couple of nights, Rivet felt like a walking zombie or something, and it was making her a little cranky. She had searched every inch of the pack territory during the last two days but had found neither hide nor hair of her Turquoise. Unable to locate her within the pack territory, Rivet finally decided to begin her search outside the territory.

Leaving the pack territory, she searched the areas nearest surrounding the Forest. By midday, she was exhausted. Spotting the Lake, Rivet moved to the edge and leaned her head down to drink from it. After drinking what she wanted, she moved under a tree and flopped down, dropping her head on her paws. She was upset and tired. What the hell had happened to her girlfriend?!

She was tired, beyond tired, and distressed that she couldn’t seem to locate her missing lover. It was clearly taking a toll on the darkly colored female. All she could think of was that she’d managed to end up doing or saying something wrong and that Turquoise had finally left her for good. But she’d thought things had been going fairly alright. They hadn’t really fought in a few days since they’d joined the pack, but apparently Rivet had been wrong or something. How could she not think like that? Turquoise had left her once, after all. What was to keep her from doing it again?

If it weren’t for the fact that she was as distraught as she was, Rivet very well might have fallen asleep right where she was. But her emotions were running far too strong for sleep to overtake her. This was probably for the best, though, considering that she wasn’t within the pack borders. She was considering getting up to resume her searching when the sound of her name came to her. The first thing she took notice of was that it was her full first name and not one of the pet names Turquoise usually used. Something was clearly wrong.

Lifting her head from her paws, she turned her head toward her lover with her own ears flattened against her head. Before she could say anything, though, Turquoise continued speaking. If Rivet’s ears weren’t already pinned against her head, they sure would be now. The more Turquoise spoke, the sicker to her stomach the dark female was feeling. But it was when her lover spoke of having liked flirting with some other female that Rivet lost it. She didn’t throw up, even though that’s what she felt like doing, nor did she get angry. Instead, tears began to roll down her cheeks.

She was speechless. Rivet couldn’t find a single word to say. Turning her head away, she just laid there, letting the tears roll down her cheeks, dripping onto her ebon paws.

She was hurt and feeling quite confused. It hadn’t been all that long ago that Turquoise had said she loved her (Rivet). So why was this happening now? Rivet actually flinched, slightly, at hearing those three words right then but it could easily have looked like a soft sob had flittered through her body. It was like her whole world was suddenly crashing down around her. This was even worse than when Turquoise had shouted at her that she needed space and had left her for those several days that they’d basically been broken up. This feeling that she was feeling… there were no words to even come close to how she was feeling. It hurt. So much it hurt.

It was Turquoise’s last sentence that caused her to finally turn her head, turn her gaze toward the woman she loved so much. “Is that what you want…?” she asked. Her voice was no louder than a mere whisper, afraid to speak any louder because she knew that her voice would break. “You say you love me and then suggest we should break up?” Rivet’s heart was breaking into many little pieces and it was not a good feeling at all. Her whole world revolved around the other female. The thought of even trying to be without Turquoise made her want to curl up and die. “Do you know…” Her voice cracked. “Do you know that I love you more than life itself? That without you, I am nothing… have nothing…” Did Turquoise really want them to break up?

“There is a difference between talking to other girls and flirting with other girls,” was the first thing that rolled out of her mouth because she had fallen completely silent until Turquoise had finished speaking. “I don’t care, and never have cared, that you talk to other girls. But flirting with them… that’s crossing a line that shouldn’t be crossed. Doesn’t matter if anything happened or not.” Her heart was aching at the mere thought of even remotely sharing her girlfriend with someone else, especially because Rivet, herself, didn’t want anyone else in any type of way.

Mismatched eyes shifted away from the woman she was so very much in love with as her tears continued to drip down her cheeks. “Am I not enough for you?” she asked, her voice barely above a whisper. If Turquoise really did want to break up with her, Rivet wasn’t sure that she could convince her otherwise. In that moment, Rivet actually found herself wishing that she was back home with her family in Firefly Forest. And yet, on the other hand, meeting and falling in love with Turquoise had been the greatest moment in her young life. “I don’t want to lose you…” she whimpered.

Her entire world was suddenly being ripped right out from under her. She felt like she couldn’t breathe and, quite honestly, just wanted to die in that moment. She couldn’t help but feel like everything had been all a lie to this point. “Shut it…” she heard herself hiss between grit teeth when Turquoise spoke of loving her, yet it didn’t sound like her to herself. “You selfish bitch… you have always been a selfish bitch, and always will be. You don’t know what love is, so don’t you dare claim to love me. If you loved me, you wouldn’t be doing this shit.”

Rivet shoved herself to her paws, completely avoiding any eye contact with her former girlfriend. “Don’t bother trying to crawl back to me again because I won’t be there. I won’t be anywhere…” Not sticking around to give Turquoise a chance to ask what she meant by that, Rivet pushed off, letting her legs carry her as far away from the woman her entire life revolved around. She didn’t look back, wouldn’t look back. Tears streamed down her face as she ran, blurring her vision, but she didn’t care. She didn’t stop, wasn’t going to stop, uncaring of where she went or even if she died at that point…

Having never unleashed her fury at Turquoise before, it truly felt wrong to Rivet to be doing so now, but she was hurting. She was hurting so much more than she ever had before and when she was hurting, the only thing she could think to do was lash out at the one hurting her. In this case, it just happened to be the female that Rivet’s entirely world revolved around. Now that she’d lashed out at Turquoise with hateful and hurtful words, the smaller female wanted nothing more than to just get away… away from the pack territory and away from Turquoise. She didn’t care where she ended up, to be honest. She just wanted… needed… to just get as far away as possible.

But she didn’t get to get very far before she was suddenly in jaws of the female she was trying to run away from. The suddenness of her scruff being grabbed caused a nasty snarl to rip from the smaller of the two. Although she wanted to struggle, to rip herself away, she knew it was futile since she was very much the smaller of the two. “If you’re so hell bent on letting me go, then why the fuck are you stopping me?” she spat out through grit teeth.

As her fury raged through her, the smaller female’s body quivered, though only part of that was because of her raging fury. Tears continued to roll down her cheeks. “You give me no choice in this, saying you’re letting me go but yet stop me when I’m trying to go? Why? Why bother stopping me?” Is it maybe because of the current frame of mind Rivet is in? Is it maybe because she doesn’t care in that moment if she lives or dies?

Emitting a frustrated growl, she jerked herself forward, yanking her scruff from Turquoise, but instead of running again, she wheeled around to glare at the larger female. Fury and hurt burned in her watery eyes. “What does it matter what I want, Turquoise? You’ve clearly already made up your mind. It’s always only ever been about what you want. You wanted to join the pack and I went along with it. Every time you want something, I go along with it whether I want to or not. Do you know why? Because I actually do love you. More than you obviously realize.”

Although it sounded like a rhetorical question, it actually wasn’t. Rivet really did want to know why Turquoise was stopping her from just going. Much to Rivet’s dismay, Turquoise was able to, yet again, make it seem like it was all about her. The lamely added sentence didn’t make it any better, either. She was so hurt, so furious, and just wanted to go away, get away from all of this. Rivet didn’t care if she lived or died at that point in time because she really didn’t want to live without Turquoise.

Though her body quivered with a raging fury, a sigh actually escaped from her. “What do you think I’ve done all this time, Turquoise?” Letting her mismatched gaze directly met Turquoise’s, the smaller female stood her ground. “I have been taking you as you are all these months; your temper, your selfishness, and everything else. Even when you screamed at me that you needed your space and left me standing alone, I readily took you back, accepted that you have your temper tantrums. That is part of loving someone,” she informed the other female. Her voice sounded a whole lot calmer than she actually felt.

“I mean it when I say I don’t want to live without you, Turquoise,” she began, slowly lowering her gaze toward the ground at her own paws. “I just… really don’t. You’re all I’ve got. You’re all I want.” It took some doing, but the smaller female managed to force herself to lift her gaze to meet Turquoise’s once more. “Have your flings, if you must. Flirt to your heart’s content. But come home to me at night. Just… don’t tell me about them because I don’t want to know…” Would that be compromise enough to satisfy Turquoise? Would it be enough to not be pushed away?

If being able to keep Turquoise in her life meant having to share her with others of Turquoise’s choosing, then so be it. As long as Rivet was the one she came home to at night, and didn’t share any of the details (or even make mention of it), then this was how Rivet opted to go about her life. She would rather die than be without the female in front of her, even if it meant sinking to a new level that she’d never sank to before. Only time would be able to tell if she’d just made the biggest mistake of her life or not.

A gentle nod of her head was given when her lover spoke. “It is,” she responded, taking a hesitant step forward, bringing her a little closer to Turquoise. “You’re all I want, Turquoise. You’re all I’ve ever wanted. As long it’s me that you come home to at night, then do as you will. I love you. With every beat of my heart, I love you.” And she would adjust to the fact of knowing she was, from hence forth, sharing her lover with others. Rivet just really hoped that it would be enough to be able to keep Turquoise from setting her free.

Rivet already found herself hoping that she’d not just made a huge mistake, but she didn’t allow herself to dwell on that thought for very long, opting to shove it away as far as she could. A gentle nod was given to answer the silent question being asked of her. Rivet would do whatever she could in order to be able to stay with Turquoise, even if it was something that made her gut feel like twisting inside of her. She did wonder, though, what her family would think if they knew what she’d just done.

A small smile touched her muzzle at the vague promise being made to her by the woman she loved so very much. “Just love me, Turquoise…” she murmured, leaning into the gentle caress from her lover. “And never stop.” Because that was one of her absolute biggest fears at this point. Rivet fell into step beside her lover, wanting to go home with her and wanting even more to curl up with Turquoise’s larger frame wrapped around her. Having not slept in a couple of nights, Rivet was beyond exhausted.