"I know I can be a thorn in your side, but you didn't have to wait so long before checking in on me."
The lioness was reclining under the sparse shade of a tree, her light eyes squinting a bit from the brightness of the sun hanging overhead. The crook in her tail made it hard to flip her tail around, as she had always done before that rainy, blasted night. The bones had healed, but not straight. Her tail ached when the weather shifted, and she knew better than to really try to groom it.
Perhaps one day it wouldn't ache so much, but the wounds were still sensitive.
"Lucky for you I'm not vain," Umutsuz said with a toss of her head, a wry smirk crossing her face at the same time she crossed her left paw on top of her right one. She was always full of piss and vinegar, and her injury had only appeared to make her more sour than she used to be.
The Inselelo approached the dark sandy coated lioness carefully. He did start to consider her a friend, but that didn't mean she was the easiest to deal with.
She was fiery, and even with her less-that-perfect eyesight, she was always watching everything like a hawk. If he wanted some bits of gossip, Umutsuz more than likely already knew ten times the amount of details he could only dream of. And yet, she had very few friends, and a complicated family to connect herself with.
"Good, because your tail looks like s**t," Giruvegan laughed. Umutsuz was probably the only lioness beyond his sister that he felt like he could completely relax around. She had zero interest in him as a sire to her cubs, and rather enjoyed yanking his tail about his role here in the pride. He found her to be a breath of fresh air, and a shelter to hide under when some of the pusher lionesses got the better of him. "But seriously, it is ok? Not that I think you want to go running around without a tail, but...." He had been doing what he could to help injured lionesses and cubs, once he had recovered from his own concussion.
"It hurts like hell," the lioness snarled. "And I think it'll hurt like hell until I die. But at least...I didn't break a different limb. I can probably still hunt, still help, and still chew your a** out."
"Okay, okay. Good to see that a traumatic event like that didn't change you at all." The male sat down next to the lioness, listening to the wind rustle through the grasses. Life seemed ok, though it was hard to really accept that a tragedy had happened, and keep pressing on day by day. Especially the lost little cub that had died. How would one really get over that? He had seen loss in his life, but not quite to one so young.
"I think you're doing worse than me, and your position in this pride is the more precarious of us all. Why do you care so much?" Umutsuz had seen just enough shifting Inselelo to develop her own taste of outsides males. Most of them were useless, vain creatures. They didn't carry a chip on their shoulder like Giruvegan seemed to.
"Because life is fragile," he replied after a while, watching a butterfly flutter past them. The breeze seemed to knock it around a bit, but it carried on in the direction it wanted to go. "And I think at times, being in the same home for so long, it is hard to see just how fragile that is. I know your injury to your tail wasn't too severe, but what if it had festered? An infection easily could have killed you, fever overtaking you until you closed your eyes for the last time." He sighed again, his shoulders sagging a bit. "I know, I care too much about many that probably don't think much about me, as an Inselelo."
"Ugh," Umutsuz said with a look on her face. "You do care too much, and you really need to stop. It's just going to hurt you in the end." No one really knew when an Inselelo would be challenged out...most of them left, and she couldn't recall a time where one died from the challenge. Was that something he would do? It was hard to tell, but the male took his position very, very seriously. It was a bit surprising that he didn't seem to have any offspring on the way yet...with how some of the lionesses eyed him. Well, if they weren't migrating for now, some of them would certainly get bored, and a hell of a lot more demanding.
She wouldn't really want to openly admit it, but she would miss him once he was gone. A play toy, to a point, but he really did put up with her bullshit.
"I know," he replied. "I think I will start to let the grip of pressure release me sometime soon. Life isn't forever, even if at times it feels like it."
They allowed the silence to grow between them, merely enjoying each other's company when the world was slowly passing by in front of them. Umutsuz wondered what the next Inselelo would be like.
"You're far too sentimental and soft," she replied quietly. "But it can feel like a breath of fresh air, with how some males in the past acted within our pride. Keep your chin up and your heart shielded, idiot."
Giruvegan laughed, his chest ringing out clear and bright laughter into the sky. "All right, all knowing crooked tailed wise one." He was expecting a slash across the face for bringing her busted up tail, but at least she only shot him a look that could kill, rather than the sharp string of her claws across his face.
"Hey! I'm not that old! And leave my tail out of it, bird brain." Umutsuz shot him a dirty look before huffing to herself, intent to ignore him until he wandered back off onto his never-ending patrol. Soft-hearted fool.
(1,024 words)