Phoenix Maplewood string in my hands tethered to faceless friends

forward-dated about a week. maybe @Mahler? :eyes:

isolation feels like a crime, somehow. it feels unfair — undeserved, even, as if he ought to force himself into the company of his packmates in some sort of cruel, self-imposed punishment. but it isn't like he chose this — the constant sickness, the feeling of the earth spinning beneath his paws with each slight movement, the cravings for foods that aren't even really foods and leave him feeling sicker than before more often than not.

through all of it, he knows something is wrong. he has a sneaking suspicion that he knows exactly what it is that's wrong — but denial is second nature, and ignorance is easier.

at least, until the cause starts to show — visibly, not just in his ever-present state of sickness. it seems to happen overnight, though he knows that can't be the case. one day he simply... notices. and it disgusts him. the swell of his belly, the prominence of the little protrusions he'd never noticed until now. he vaguely remembers them from his mothers. the memory only upsets him further.

so he sequesters himself even further from the pack, determined to keep his secret for as long as he possibly can. he doesn't want to see wintersbane, or any of the others who are likely bearing his children (at least, that's the wraith's assumption, given that he is unaware of the presence of any other men early enough in the pack's history to have sired them). he doesn't want to deal with the consequences of his carelessness, his couplings with strangers, his lack of parental desire or instinct. it's all too much. he just wants to be alone.