A/N: Hi guys! I'm participating in Dovewing week on a social media site, and the contest is fanfics. So I thought, Why not? Haven't really written for Dove yet. I immediately had a few ideas run through my head, but decided to go with this one. I'm not a DoveXBumble fan (TigerXDove was what I preferred) but I don't hate Bumblestripe. So here's a little piece about them I guess.

To my other readers; yes, I am going to update Far From Home as soon as I can. Also, the next chapter of Sacrifice is in progress (I also got the chapter arc a little more firmly planned out. I'm hoping Ascent won't be as sloppy as Desolation :/ ).

NOTE: Some facts may be a little messed up due to me not having read the fourth series in FOREVER. Also, I'm going with Tigerheart's original description: green eyes and bracken-colored fur (in the third series he comments on his fur being similar colored to Lionblaze's, since he believed they were kin).

EDIT: Well this ran away from me :\

DISCLAIMER: All characters and main Warriors ideas are owned by the collective entity known as Erin Hunter. I merely elaborated on some themes with my own eloquence. Be warned.


Distance

It had been hard when Dovewing had stopped seeing Tigerheart. A distance had spread between them like a river, the other side of the clan boundaries' like far banks, the scent lines an impossible stretch of water to cross. They could, of course, but what was the point? There were no more forbidden night adventures for them to partake in, no more them to think of. Loneliness swamped her like a mist, and pain shot through her every time she turned away from the border of pines.

It wouldn't have been so hard if she and Ivypool hadn't drifted so far apart. Dovewing and her sister had been close when they were born, and even at first they were close during their apprenticeship. But something had changed suddenly, like a newleaf storm rolling in. Sunshine and peace, then suddenly tension and thunder that hadn't been there before. A negative charge had sprung up between them, lashing out like lightning any time she 'stepped on Ivypool's tail'. Lionblaze told her it would pass. Jayfeather was silent then, almost sorry that he had to bring up the prophecy and its importance.

After a while, things got a little better. Bumblestripe became a friend of sorts, always eager to lift her spirits. Blossomfall too was friendly, although it was more to keep an eye on her brother than anything. But then she found out that Bumblestripe was interested in her.

And she tried to love him, she really did. He was her friend, and a great cat. Caring, sweet, and funny. But every time he looked lovingly at her, she broke a little inside, because she did care for him, but not that way. Not the way she cared for a lithe, darker colored tom with eyes as dark as pine needles. It broke her heart the more she realized that she didn't – couldn't – love Bumblestripe the way she had loved Tigerheart. The way she still loved Tigerheart.

(And she felt guilty, and oh, so sorry, because she knew it would break his heart, and sympathy filled her because she knew how that felt.

But she couldn't stay with him; with the lie she carried because of her own guilt at loving a Shadowclan cat. She cared too much to make him live with a lie.

It's just too bad that she can't love him enough to keep his heart from breaking.)

END