Eshek had slimmed down again since her pregnancy; the only hint that she’d given birth a moon ago was a bit of lingering softness around her hips and face, making her normally sharp cheekbones look slightly cherubic — less murdery, more gentle. Nowadays, she rarely left the Mansion, let alone League territory — but the two exceptions to this were Luc and Pine; if either of them wanted her, she’d never say no. And so, she’d left her kits with Ber after ten minutes of ‘you’ll be okay?’ ‘we’ll be fine’ ‘are you sure?’ and headed for NightClan at a trot. Really, it was nice to be outside again, to be doing something other than being a doting, worrying mother, to be seeing someone who reminded her of the impulsive, fearless she-cat she’d always been. As she walked, she tilted her head back and closed her eyes against the gently falling snow, breathing in the cold, fresh air with a peaceful smile.

When at last she reached the medicine cat she absolutely wasn’t falling for (and who, unbeknownst to her, she’d loved for a long time), she sat down very queenly in front of him, feigning an uncaring, dismissive air, and stated breezily, with quirked brows, “you called?” She didn’t kiss him this time; her heart fluttered treacherously in her chest as she wondered whether he’d do it instead. Either she didn’t understand her feelings and was confused by them, because Eshek was an idiot, or she was in denial about them, because she already had feelings for her best friend — she didn’t need them for someone who probably wouldn’t even want to be with her, someone who’d done very well on his own (or, well, not so on his own) in SummerClan. Either way, she ignored them. It was too frightening.

She was totally caught off guard, letting out a startled, undignified sound as Pine barrelled her over with the force of the kiss. When she caught her breath and became aware of any of her surroundings through the whirling daze of snow and Pine’s warmth, she was underneath him, pinned against the cold ground.

“Hi,” was the first thing she could think to say, just blurting it out in a flustered, bewildered voice so much higher than her usual one. When he brushed the snowflake from her cheek, it was the closest Eshek had ever come to looking like a schoolgirl with a crush, her ears an incredibly bright red, her eyes darting with quick little movements to anywhere that wasn’t Pine’s gaze, her head pressed back against the snow like she was trying to avoid touching him despite the fact their bodies were crushed together. She let out a weird, high little sound in her throat, jaws clenched shut as she stared desperately at a tree trunk beside them and not at the tom on top of her. “You—you ever heard the one about the duck and the trampoline? I can’t remember how it goes.” She let out a high, insane burst of laughter. What the hell was she saying. Her head was still turned to not look at him, because she did not need this visual to haunt her at night. God, he smelled really good. “You smell really good,” she blurted out, and it sounded like a strangled cry. Immediately she slammed her jaws shut again, her whole face pinching in a desperate little wince.

If you thought Eshek's face was red before, now it went the colour of a fire engine - and with such white fur, it was incredibly plain to see. Her cheeks burned, her ears burned, the entire bridge of her nose was prickling with pins and needles that she assumed was the redness creeping over it - and this time, when she couldn't look at Pine, it was because her heart was beating so loudly in her ears that little spots were forming in her vision and she could barely work out which way was up or down. That was the hottest thing I've ever heard, a little voice in her head squeaked. "You-you-you-I-you-we-I-you—" She was just going to keep going on like that, so finally she took a deep breath - as deep as she could with Pine weighing her chest down, which wasn't very deep at all and still left her dizzy - and, after puffing out her cheeks to get rid of the expression that looked a bit like she'd sucked on a lemon, tried to calm down. Finally, she turned her head and managed to look up at him - but as soon as she did, she only lasted about two seconds before her eyes darted away again and she rolled her cheek back against the snow, her heart hammering even harder in her chest, which by this point should have been impossible. She sucked in a shuddering breath; just when she was getting herself back together, she had to go and look at him. Stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid.

"We-well only 'cuz it's cold," she told him, aiming for disinterestedly stern and ending up somewhere closer to shaking girl's voice. Oh my God, Eshek did not stutter. She squeezed her eyes shut for a moment before opening them again, pupils dilating as she did so. "But you- you stay on the other side of the nest, because this kissing thing has gone totally too far and I-I'm a mother now." It was such a flimsy, laughable, unrelated excuse, made all the more ridiculous by how serious she tried to sound when she said it. "And then - when we're on opposite sides of a nest - you can tell me what you wanted to talk about. Okay? So-" She patted his chest, the movements tiny from how her paws were trapped between her and Pine's hot body - hot because he was hot, because of the body heat, the heat of his body, not because he was hot, not-not because this feeling was all she was ever going to want for the rest of her life, morning and afternoon and night, breakfast and lunch and dinner. "Up, boy." She was giving herself a neck ache from how desperately she was trying to appear disinterested and not look at him. Inexplicably, she started to hum to herself - like she was trying to appear so casual and calm. Except even the humming was off-key and shaking and just generally manic-sounding because she didn't actually have a song to hum, she was just making sounds and hoping Pine didn't pick up on it. Because she was so completely unaffected by this.

Eshek snatched her paw away. "Look at the one-eyed meddy boy tryna wink," she shot back hotly, but it did nothing to help the redness of her ears and cheeks. After a moment, though, the savage look melted into a goofy, slightly sheepish little grin and Eshek looked down at her paws, dusting one of them back and forth against the snow. The thing was, neither of the toms she'd been mates with - or close to mates with - had ever properly flirted with her: Funk's form of affection with her had been insults, and Ber's was... insults. Huh. She thought Luc occasionally flirted with her, but at the moment they were such a floundering, teenage mess of babbling, falling over each other, does he mean that like a friend or?? feelings that it was hard to tell. She'd never been called goddess before, never had someone who just openly and unashamedly showed her romantic affection, never been so outwardly... complimented. Jeez, this was getting sad.

"C'mon, idiot," she mumbled in an uncharacteristically bashful, shy voice, still smiling stupidly and looking down at her paws as she nudged him roughly. "Find somewhere cozy. And don't look at my butt."

She watched him go for a moment, looking ridiculously smitten and poorly put together, her ears drooping backwards and even her fur and whiskers looking mussed all out of place by the icy breeze. Then, shaking herself out, she raced after him. "I hope you ain't gonna lose your touch when I break your stupid legs again," she shouted at him against the wind whipping her face, taking only a few heartbeats to catch up to him and run alongside him. Suddenly, a grin hooked across her face. "Hey, wanna reenact something?" she asked devilishly - and then, before he could answer, stuck her foreleg out to trip him in a perfect reenactment of him tripping Aspenstar in front of the dog. "No, yeah, no, I totally see how that might have been an accident," she teased with a purr, slowing and trotting back to him with that same sharp, wicked grin on her face, her mouth half-open from joyful panting. God, it felt good to be out in the wild again, with her blood pumping and the snow searing against her adrenaline-hot pelt. Her eyes felt sharper, clearer; she felt so much more alive, so much more herself.

"Oh my God!" Eshek burst into embarrassed, disbelieving nervous laughter, sitting back on her forelegs to cover her mouth with both forepaws. Except because they were both sadists, the laughter, while genuinely apologetic, was also just uncontrollably, joyfully amused. "I'm so sorry." Her voice was muffled by her paws, eyes managing both to be squinted by her embarrassment and wide with disbelief. It was also totally going to be a visual that kept her up at night, Pine just casually pushing himself up and popping his shoulder back in its socket with a lazy, tired grin, but we aren't going to talk about that. "You are the most fragile thing on the face of the planet," she scolded with a smitten laugh, like it was a fond point in their relationship that he was so stupidly delicate while also being insatiably foolhardy. Walking around, Eshek nudged him to his paws with her nose, quietly dropping her eyes when their muzzles brushed past each other and lingered for a moment. "Can you walk?" she asked into the warmth of their breaths mingling between them, finally raising her eyes - and then threw in for good measure, "dumbass?"