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<p>Thus sated, she darted around the gathering, the thirty or so people who had showed up from both within the clade and without. She hugged everyone who wanted a hug, chased Warmth in multiples, the two little skunks leapfrogging each other and leaving their fur and clothes stained green with with grass. She drank a few margaritas, allowing through only a modicum of the drunkenness so that she remained cognizant and present through the tipsiness, awake and alert through the haze.</p>
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<p>And then, as she had several times over the last week, she latched herself onto Dry Grass. As they had over the last week, they revelled in the closeness and affection, the joy in allowing themselves to be around each other despite meaningless admonitions. As they had, they spoke mostly of small things, of interesting things they had seen or nice foods that they had eaten or simple stories made up on the spot. </p>
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<p>It was important to her that she be around this person she considered a member of her family. One of the close ones, not one of the distant ones, not one that had cut her off. It was important that they spend quality time together, that by that time she live her gratefulness for Dry Grass’s presence.</p>
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<p>And then, when they all piled into the movie-theater-<em>cum</em>-cuddlepit
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((Talk with Dry Grass))</p>
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<p>And then, when they all piled into the movie-theater-<em>cum</em>-cuddlepit, Dry Grass slouched into a beanbag and dragged the skunk into her lap. They sat silent through the movie, watching off and on, dozing now and then. The movie was not important. It was good, she was sure, but that was not the point.</p>
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<p>An hour or so later, Dry Grass set up a cone of silence over the beanbag and nudged Motes to sit beside her rather than on her and said, “Hey, kiddo. I would like to apologize for everything that happened this month.”</p>
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<p>Motes scrubbed her paws over her face to wake up more fully. “How do you mean?”</p>
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<p>“All of that wretched business with my down-tree.”</p>
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<p>“That was not your fault, though. She is just a bit– she is just a b-word.”</p>
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<p>Dry Grass smiled faintly. “I will let that slide. She is <em>definitely</em> a bitch, yes.” A pause, and then she continued, “But it rather was my fault, my dear. I mentioned that I had been visiting after that evening with the salad and maccy chee. I made her mad, then told her to go fuck herself.”</p>
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<p>Motes sat for a moment in silent, watching the movie, half-listening at the muffled audio that made its way through the silence. “I had guessed, yeah.”</p>
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<p>Her cocladist frowned. “That is why I am sorry. So much happened, and I started it without really thinking of how it would impact everyone.”</p>
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<p>She shrugged. “But then, maybe I started by whining at you about it. It is nobody’s fault but Hammered Silver’s.” She giggled sleepily, adding, “She made herself mad, even. I do not believe you that you say you did.”</p>
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<p>Dry Grass’s expression softened and she brushed some of her mane out of her face. “I suppose there is that,” she said quietly. “We could go back and forth placing blame as much as we would like–”</p>
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<p>“And she would always be the wrong one,” Motes interrupted. “Frick her. She is the one holding grudges, we are the ones doing what we want. She is the one hurting people, we are the ones just playing and having fun and not hurting anyone.”</p>
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<p>There was another moment of silence, of Dry Grass furrowing her brow and thinking, and then at last she lay back on the beanbag and tugged Motes back up to lay on her front. “Yes,” she murmured as the skunk got comfortable. “Yes, I guess both of those are true.”</p>
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<p>They stayed like that for the rest of the film, Dry Grass petting Motes and Motes telling Dry Grass stories about the day, little nothings that showed that fun, that lack of pain.</p>
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<p>And then, when the movie was over and many of those in the community center had started to doze on their beanbags and couches, when Dry Grass fell asleep one too many times and begged off to go back home — not without yet another tight hug from Motes and a promise to be back — when Motes herself started to get sleepy, she disentangled herself from the rest of that dozy comfort and slipped out into the cool of the night.</p>
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<p>Rather than turning left off toward home, she turned right to the other arm of the ‘U’ that made up the neighborhood and started wandering through the grass until she hit the sidewalk. There, vines in chalk blossomed lazily behind her footsteps, and in the night, in the light of the stars and the moon and the streetlamps, they seemed to glow in pale oranges and whites and blues. She played with them by taking wobbling, drunken steps, crossing one leg in front of the other, pirouetting clumsily to make them tie themselves into knots.</p>
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<p>Even so, she continued down around the slow curve of the neighborhood’s main street, not bothering to venture into any of the cul-de-sacs. The chalk lines were fun, a little trail describing where the little skunk had wandered, but she <em>was</em> tired. It had been a long first day back as Little Motes, and she had successfully packed it to the brim with all that she had wanted to do, and that success gave to her a sense of rightness.</p>
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@ -44,11 +44,11 @@
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<li class="done2"> <a href="006.html">D’: Flashback to the past</a> — The origins of Motes told; some anecdotes (including Slow Hours’s prophecy).</li>
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<li class="done1"> <a href="007.html">C’: A Finger Pointing and Hammered Silver</a> — A Finger Pointing gets a letter, too; discussing what to do about it; risk assessment with Waking World and Sasha; message to Hammered Silver.</li>
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<li class="done2"> <a href="008.html">B’: Hunting for a new way forward</a> — Big Motes for a bit; not going to stop playing or stop being Little Motes, just wants to know how to deal with the pain; talking with Sarah.</li>
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<li class="done0"> <a href="009.html">A’: Outro</a> — About the future of Motes.</li>
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<li class="done2"> <a href="009.html">A’: Outro</a> — About the future of Motes.</li>
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</ul>
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</article>
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<footer>
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<p>Page generated on 2024-01-13</p>
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<p>Page generated on 2024-01-14</p>
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</footer>
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