Bearclaw Valley And now it's hard to breathe

The news of dumb girl's promotion had hit Laurel like a brick — she hadn't seen this coming at all, for the girl had been nothing but disrespectful in her eyes and she couldn't even properly communicate. It made Laurel's blood boil and it also returned the dejected feeling she had had when she'd crumbled in front of Indra the other day. She saw little escapes from where she was at, and the puppies in her stomach felt like they were dragging her down around every corner. She considered challenging Xan for his position but it was hard in her present state, and she considered just leaving often, too. It wasn't like she mattered much to Xan; he hadn't been looking out for her, not as ridiculously much as he had for the dumb girl. He would always be off caring for her and being around her and he hadn't made an effort to really be around her other than drop off some scraps every once in a while. Indra had to support Laurel all the way when she shouldn't have to.

And now this. The situation here was becoming less favourable by the moment and all of this was coloured heavily by Laurel's realisation that she wanted to be the one who was loved by Xan. It was the realisation that the father of her children had left her before they had even gotten together that stung the most. To know that her children would grow up in a broken home... If they still had one by that time at all. Perhaps it would be better to kill them when they were born, she thought some days, so that she would be free and they would not lead such painful lives as she and Indra had. Or perhaps it would be better to cut Xan out of their lives before they were even born, so that they would simply not know better than just having a mom and an aunt.

But such thoughts were fleeting and every time it came back to wanting something impossible. With angry strides Laurel made her way towards the dumb girl's whelping den, fully expecting the ever dutiful and watchful — over her offspring and her health — @Xan to intercept her somewhere along the way.

Although Xan frequented the site of the whelping den, he was not there when Laurel began her trek. He’d been at the borders, freshening up the traces of his scent to better ensure his home was left alone by those unwelcome. It was from there that he’d been coming when he spotted the tawny woman, the way she moved spelling something out for him that he couldn’t quite make sense of; she didn’t seem happy but to what degree her anger was, if that’s what it was, he couldn’t tell. He did realise, however, the direction she was going and it unsettled him.

With long strides, he closed the space between them, slowing and calling out, “Laurel,” before reaching her. The closer he got, however, the quieter he became, leaving him in total silence by the time he’d come to a stop. Alexander was not oblivious to her pregnancy but actually seeing the change to her body was strange to him. “Where are you going?” he asked a moment later, snapping himself out of his thoughts. And, of course, he remained as oblivious as ever to her feelings.

She heard her voice coming from the subject of her ire and halted in her tracks, turning to face him. She could see on his face that he was taken aback by the way she looked now; which caused a hiss to fall from her mouth for had he really not noticed before or contemplated the option? The hiss had subsided by the time that he reached her however. Her body language remained neutral though there was something icy about the way she carried herself that mirrored how defensive and hurt she was.

Now you care where I'm going, she thought coldly to herself. What did he think? That she was going to slaughter the dumb girl? She should have done so before, but she knew she could not; she was not a monster, she tried not to be, at least, and she knew that it would not make him love her.

"To find you," she said coldly, then assessed him to silently signify that, well, she'd found him. "How could you? What is even — What even are you trying to do? Bully us away? You could just chase us out if you want us to leave. You could at least tell me if you don't give a fuck about me or your future children." She'd started out using her normal voice but somehow by the end of her heartfelt tirade Laurel's voice had risen to shouting level while a look that was a mixture of anger and sadness -- of betrayal -- painted her face a dark shade.

Whilst anger and sorrow painted her features, his own reflected only the confusion he felt. He did not understand what was going on or from where her words—her claims—came; he did not understand what was happening, nor the reason behind her outburst, and that frustrated him to no end. As of late, it seemed as if everyone knew something that he did not, that everyone could read into emotions that he failed to recognised—everyone knew the fears and pain of others, all except for him. And this he wanted to change, he wanted to understand, but each confrontation left him feeling more in the dark.

“What are you talking about?” he asked in a single breath, frustration touching his tone. “No one’s bullying you, especially not me. Why would I want you to leave? You’re my friend, Laurel.” The word was not one he used too often, the process of gaining friends something that he often avoided; that which was gained could then be lost, and he couldn’t stand the thought of losing any more than that which he already had. “And I do give a fuck—about you and them,” he added, tilting his muzzle to point towards her abdomen. “They’re family. And you’re family, too.” He didn’t view her as a sister—he couldn’t, not after having sex with her, that would be too weird—but he did consider her a member of his family, though the exact connection was unclear.

It frustrated Laurel that he just didn't see what he was doing to her and how he was tearing her apart at the seams. He didn't see that by deciding that the dumb girl was now her superior he was shoving Laurel's face in the mud once more. "How can you not see!" she screamed, but then she let him speak. Let him say that he gave a fuck about her and the pups, and that she was family, and that they were family.

"Where does it put us that you favour her? That you put her above us? You know I deserve to be the Alpha female. You knew that it would hurt me to make her so. How could it not? My pups deserve a father. A real father!" She looked at him, still frowning angrily, her hackles bristling with the indignity of it all. "I should have everything she has. It's not fair, Xan. How could you..." She trailed off there, feeling very much lost for words and like the world was piling up on her. Her legs felt shaky and she looked at him pleadingly, wishing he would just see what she meant.

When she screamed, his body went rigid, whilst his brow furrowed. See what? he wanted to ask, yet the words didn’t quite make it out of his mouth. He was entirely oblivious to her feelings, aside from the anger that she presently displayed—he was blind at times, but not so much so that he couldn’t see that. Yet, it confused him, knowing not from where her anger originated.

Then she continued to speak, and he thought—maybe—he’d figured it out.

“She has to lead beside me,” he said, body relaxing, though his confusion remained. “When my parents lived here, they led together. When I was in… another pack, their leaders were also mates. That’s how it’s supposed to be.” …right? his eyes almost seemed to ask. There was either a single leader that was without a partner, or two leaders that were married. That was how it had always seemed to be, that was what he’d grown used to seeing; he knew no better, having nothing aside from his past observations to base his decisions on. “I didn’t mean to hurt you, Laurel,” he continued, daringly taking a step towards her. “You never seemed interested, I didn’t expect you to care.” Indra he might have expected to be bothered by it, but not Laurel. From where he stood, she’d seemed content with where she was. How was he to know any different? He couldn’t read minds, he could barely read emotions.

Slowly, confusion morphed into concern as he stared at her, disbelief evident in his gaze. “Do you think I won’t be a father to them? I’m gonna be.”—he glanced towards her abdomen, then back at her face—“I want to be there for them and you. I don’t want what happened to me and my siblings to happen to them.” He didn’t know how deep her anger ran, he couldn’t see that far, but he wanted to believe that she wouldn’t be like his own mother. “What do you want? What will make you not angry at me?” Truly, Alexander wanted to fix what he could and eliminate the tension from his makeshift family.

All he said were excuses in Laurel's ears. 'She has to', 'my parents did the same'. Didn't he see that it wasn't just her position in the ranks that fucked everything up? She knew there was no use to ask him if and why he didn't see any of it because he was just a dumb man, like they all were.

He said that he didn't think she was interested and she frowned, then hissed with a tone of disbelief: "You didn't think I was interested when I was between your hips?" Okay, truth to be told, she hadn't entirely been interested, not until later when she realised that it was more than the dumb girl having him that bothered her. But still. He should've known. He should've asked. He should've at least realised that there might be something there, something more than 'oh, you're one of my pack mates carrying my children'. "You bring her everything she needs and I get nothing!" she said, her voice raising again as she felt the anger in her chest rise, too.

She huffed when he proclaimed to being a father to them. "How? How will you even explain to them what they are? How will you explain to them why you're never there? You're not even there for me now, so how can I expect it to be different when they're here?"

When he asked what she wanted Laurel narrowed her eyes. Wasn't it clear yet? Didn't he see? "I want what I deserve, Xan. I deserve a place by your side -- you should be mine, not hers. You know it but you are blinded by some foolish puppy love for someone who cannot even say the words back." Laurel frowned darkly and then, out of the blue, she closed the gap between them and pressed her head against his neck. It felt so good to be there, but she knew that it would never be. She said, voice low and filled with sadness because she knew that it would probably not happen the way she wanted it: "My children deserve to be princes and princesses and I will make it so." One way or another. The weight of the threat made her lips tremble but she was not joking. Laurel stared intently at Xan. Had she not been pregnant she would have challenged him here and now, claim not only his wife's throne but his own too if he would not choose for her.

As she hissed, his ears fell back; it wasn’t something he’d ever stopped, or even thought to, consider. That she had any interest in him beyond their friendship, he’d been oblivious, as was the usual with him. “You were in heat… I thought…” he struggled to find his words, a frown tugging down at the corners of his lips. “I thought that was the only reason. And because we’re friends you—you didn’t mind it…” He was entirely uncertain now, even more so than before. His brows knitted together he cast his eyes downwards, staring hard at the ground as if it might offer to him all of the answers that he was searching for—but such things required a voice in order to be shared, and the earth around them just wasn’t capable of providing anything of the sort. Seconds later and he was looking up again, gaze snapping back to meet hers as he spoke once more: “You have your sister—Indra’s there for you, she always is, you don’t need my help.” Did that make him feel any less guilty for not paying closer attention to her? Absolutely not.

“I don’t know what you want,” he countered, at a loss on what to do. “I’ll be there for them. And why would I need to explain to them what the are…? They’re our children, won’t that be easy enough for them to understand?” He didn’t understand what she meant, not in the slightest. They would be their children, members of the second generation to be born into Bearclaw Valley—what else was there for them to know? What else would need to be explained?

Alexander was momentarily taken aback by her words, and then found his body growing rigid when the distance between them was lost; he was taken by surprise, though it took no longer than a few seconds for him to realise what was going on. He relaxed and lowered his head just enough to rest it on her own as he asked his next question: “What do you want, Laurel? Me or her title? Both?” What was her end goal, what did she want the most? “Do you really want to be with me, or are you just saying that?” Curiosity, perhaps, but primarily just the need to fully understand her; he wanted to know what was going on inside her head, he wanted to be able to do whatever he could to keep her content and there with him, though it was not only for the children. She had become someone he considered a friend somehow, without him even noticing initially, and he wasn’t ready to lose that.

Pulling his head back for a moment, he stared down at her, merely watching her expression. Should she allow it, he’d touch his nose to her forehead before resting his chin atop her crown and leaning into her, shaking his head slowly. “They already are princes and princesses,” he noted with an exhale. “They aren’t even here yet, but their crowns are already there. You don’t have to worry.” If ever the day came for him to pass along the throne, it would not be to any one child in particular that it would go—each of his would have a fair chance, each of his would have as much of a right to the valley as the others, and that would never change.

I thought... "You didn't think at all," she countered coldly. Not with anything other than his loins, anyway. What a ridiculous thought that she would do such a thing with him only because they were friends. The truth was, Laurel didn't entirely understand why she had done it or what she wanted of him -- but she wasn't about to tell him that. He said she didn't need his help because she had Indra, but it wasn't like that. It was different, what In and she had. Xan, she wanted for a whole different reason.

Xan didn't understand. He didn't get how it would be different for them, for their pups, different than the pups of the Alpha female, the Alpha pair. Laurel felt she deserved to be there, not Xan's dumb mate, and she felt utterly betrayed by not getting what she deserved. She should be Alpha, Indra her Beta, and Laurel would make it so, with or without Xan's approval. That she had vowed, not for herself, but for her children. She would give them what they needed, no matter the cost.

She didn't respond to his questions about their children but when he asked about the title or him, or both, and if she really wanted to be with him, she frowned, some of her anger molded into sadness. "Of course I want to be with you..." She trailed off, the words painful and the knowledge that nothing would come of it even moreso. There was a twinge of anger in her heart that he would make her speak the words. Though some of it was a façade, for she wasn't as certain as she said but she was used to playing this game and hold hearts in her paws, Laurel still felt her heart thrum in her chest when she spoke the words, and if she dug deeper into her feelings she would find that she was really hoping, really rooting for him to say me too, I made the wrong choice. For him to fix it, to choose to be with her instead, or at least take a first step along this path. But she would unlikely ever admit those feelings to anyone else, because she knew that reality would prove her hope futile.

The accusation that he hadn’t thought wasn’t argued against—his beliefs were his own, he could not make her experience the moment through his mind. He could speak the thoughts that ran through his head, he could vocalise them and make them known to all, but he could not ensure they would all be understood, as that was not the reason for why they existed. Thus, for a long moment, he was silent—silent and thinking, considering what he should next say, how he could comfort her, but the time to do so had long since passed.

And then she frowned, and out came her answer—an answer that forced him to maintain his silence, brain working to go over what it was that she’d said.

She wanted to be with him.

“Why?” he couldn’t keep the question from flying out his mouth. “Why me? I haven’t done anything for you, I haven’t been there for you—why do you want to be with me?” He couldn’t wrap his head around it, not at all. Even now, after experiencing so many and in such great quantities, Alexander did not understand emotions—not how they worked, not what was the driving force behind them, nothing.

“Why don’t you hate me?”

Why? The truth of the matter was that a big part of that why was answered in that she wanted what she could not have. He was taken and his mate had the position she so coveted. This had all started as nothing but a dumb game -- one she had played often, but never with pups to show for the outcome -- but now that she had lost the game Laurel could not just accept that. She dug for answers herself but it was difficult to place all of the feelings she had going on. Why? Well, she didn't know.

His question provided answers. "I do hate you. You drive me crazy and make me angry and say hurtful bullshit and don't seem to give two shits about me and hang 'round with her all day but —" after a short breath Laurel continued, words rushing out real fast and some possibly incomprehensible then, "— I also love you and want to be with you all the time and I don't even know or understand why so how could I ever explain it to you?"

Then, after a few seconds pause, Laurel decided that she might rather not want to hear his answers to all of that. It'd probably just be something hurtful. "I gotta go," Laurel said abruptly and she shouldered her way past Xan with a dark and angry frown on her face.