Lost Change

Chapter 49

Okay. That may have been a mistake.

The next day was nothing but misery.

To kick the day off, a storm moved in sometime during the night. I woke up to greet the sun... and saw nothing but dark clouds and heavy rain through the window. Instead of the rejuvenating excitement of the Morning Song, I was left feeling grumpy and cheated, like a kid who had woken up to find snow all around but was told they still had to go to school.

To add insult to injury, my decision to approach and sit on her shoulder had apparently triggered a decision for Minna. Up until that point she had been following Trenil's instructions and working with me, but she always gave me the impression it was an obligation for her, and that she didn't truly expect it to work. She didn't seem like she would be too put out if I returned to the forest once I was better; sometimes it even felt like that was what she ultimately wanted me to do. She wanted me to get better, but hadn't really been particular on what might happen after that.

But now...

Now she had a determination about her. She wanted me to stay. And she seemed to believe that she could get me to, if she tried hard enough. It wasn't enough for me to heal up and then go, it wasn't enough to make a token effort to satisfy the Elder's request, or to soothe her own guilt. It wasn't enough to make an offer to stay that she expected me to reject.

Now she was actually putting her heart into it.

It started with breakfast. It wasn't good enough for me to just sit on her leg to eat anymore. Now that she knew I could tolerate sitting on her shoulder, she simply refused to hand over the pineapple ring until I was perched there. We fought for a good half of an hour over the piece of fruit before I finally gave in to hunger and perched on the extreme edge of her shoulder. Her shirt seemed to have more padding than I had expected, and I was able to vent some of my growing frustration by digging my claws into the fabric.

But then, because that wasn't humiliating enough, she decided to pet me through the meal, too.

I had thought that we were finally done with that now that she was able to get away with touching me at other times, but apparently Minna had gotten other ideas. So before I could enjoy my reward for sitting on her shoulder, her hand reached up and started stroking over my back. It was hard enough to eat with the nervousness that came from being right there on her shoulder, and the random pressure and nudges from her hand on top of that made it impossible to enjoy the food.

I tried carrying the food away from her to eat, but that was now a huge no-no, and she snatched the pineapple back from me the second I hopped off her shoulder. No amount of squawking or angry hops could convince her to give it back.

It was well over an hour after we had actually started breakfast that I managed to sink my teeth into actual food. The only consolation I had was that at least she hadn't gotten to eat yet, either.

When I had finished the pineapple I was given a raspberry, then a slice of apple. By that point her petting was simply too much, and I hissed to make her stop... but apparently that was against the rules, too. The petting continued, albeit at a more gentle and slow pace, but no new piece of fruit was offered.

Hissing louder and jumping frantically about had no impact on the lack of food being offered, either.

It was only when I stopped hissing that another slice of food appeared... and Minna's strokes along my back returned to their normal pace along with it.

I made it through a few more bites before it got to be too much, and we fell into a pattern as the process repeated itself. Her petting slowed when I grew frustrated and hissed at her, but it never stopped, and the meal wouldn't continue until I had relaxed enough to stop hissing.