AN: The, erm, character, if you will, of Muzzy the cat is actually one I wrote for a longer story which currently awaits a little more plot before it makes its way home to you.
This little ditty sort of came out of that; it's one of those details that stuck with me while working out that other story.
She starts slowly, tentatively.
"I had a cat once."
He wonders what this has to do with anything at all, but merely shows the question in his eyes, unwilling to speak.
"When you...got me Jasper. You suggested that a cat is also very clean and independent. But I didn't...I-- I had a cat, once."
Jasper? That was months ago. He wonders what made her think of it now.
"Her name was Muzzy. And she WAS intelligent. She knew... She knew when I was upset. She knew I needed a friend more than Russ did, even though she was his cat. She looked out for me; didn't leave my side when I was home."
Of course. The first week of January.
"After... they... Well she made sure I got up in the morning. And that I went to bed at night. And she saw... she alerted me to the arrival of the state social workers."
Oh. Oh, no. He can see where this is leading and he doesn't like it. "Bones?"
"They wouldn't let me take her. In retrospect it seems silly I would ever think they would. They promised they would put her in a caring home but... if what they found me is anything to go by..."
His heart breaks for her then; that she was both abandoned and forced to abandon. It's no wonder she flat out refuses to have children. It's not just trust in others she's been denied all these years, it's trust in herself as well.
"Bones, I--"
He catches something flash through her eyes but he isn't sure what it is. All he knows is, line be damned, this woman needs to be held. And he grabs her, slightly forcefully, and unnecessarily so; they both know she would never fight him for this right now. And they cling together a good long time, hiding from the world and its demons in the comfort and shelter of a friend's embrace. And she knows he wants for all the world to heal her wounds and fix her problems, just as he knows she wants the same for him.