I want to thank the beautiful Dani for creating my cover page and for all my other peeps that supported me in writing this fanfic! Thank you babes! ;)
Laura could remember the day she'd seen the little black kitten. She was six years old, no taller than her father's belt, with head full of imagination. That night in particular, it was very cold and a light rain had started to fall. Her father and she had been walking home when she heard it.
With all of the cars, people and other city bustle, it was amazing that Laura had even heard it. A small mew had caught her attention. Yellow raincoat zipped up and ready for action, Laura splashed her way in the direction the mysterious noise had come from. Her father yelled after her, but the little girl did not stop running until she spotted it.
A small black kitten, no bigger then the size of her hand sat in a planter, soaking wet and crying. Laura huffed in determination and animatedly rushed over to the kitten. "Gotcha!" she screamed in triumph, although the kitten hadn't really made an attempt to run in the first place.
By the time her father had finally caught up to her, the kitten was zipped up in Laura's jacket, purring happily at her warmth. "Made a new friend I see?" her father mused. "I saved her!" Laura puffed her small cheeks in frustration; she hated being treated like the child she was. "Well, doesn't look like there's anyone here for that little cat... How about we go home and make some hot cocoa? She can go too."
Later that night, an excited six year old girl sat in her living room floor with a cup of hot cocoa and a small bundle of black fur at her feet. Her father placed down a bowl of warm milk, but the kitten turned her nose up at it; it was almost as if she was repulsed that this human would think her so low as to drink milk! The nerve!
Instead, the little black cat hoped on Laura's lap and began lapping at the warm cocoa inside. "Hey!" Laura giggled, not minding the share. "Well that's pretty strange, but at least it looks like she likes you a lot, eh Laura?" She shook her blonde curls in agreement and snuggled the kitten close. "She's going to be my best friend."
The years passed, and the little girl Laura was no more. In her place, a young woman stood. She was beautiful, though not the most graceful. And her personality seemed to be filled with the same things that made up her diet; sweet and hyped up. Alongside her, her once starved black kitten had grown into a beautiful black cat.
"Silas! Come here!" Laura called to her cat one evening. After years of being together the black cat, she'd named her Silas, had grown accustomed to coming at Laura's every beck and call. Laura was in her room, already perched on her windowsill's couch, watching the stars with a plush yellow pillow in her lap.
Silas jumped up at the opposite end and stared at her owner with large yellow eyes. Laura smiled and stroked the cat's soft, silky ears. Silas had been there with Laura for everything; the rare but brutal fights with her worrisome father, her fears of failing classes and, probably the hardest, her breakup with her long-term girlfriend, Danny.
The two had been dating for almost two years when the couple had broken apart. For Laura, it'd made her senior year of high school a little too sullen for her taste. And now, during her senior summer, she still couldn't figure out why the two had really broken up in the first place.
She sighed as she though of her ex, but knew that nothing could really be done about it now. Danny was supposed to be going to some boarding school that Laura had never even hear of and Laura was hoping to go to her local community college that fall. I wonder if I ever will see Danny again... She wondered with a sigh, still mindlessly stroking the cat's furry head. Or at least... Someone new...
Laura stopped and turned to look up at the starry sky above her. Each star, she knew, was billions of miles away; so far that she was surprised she could see their light in the darkness. And as beautiful as they were, and as desperately as she longed to be with them, she knew that she could not reach them in all of her years. She just hoped that this same rule did not apply to the person of her dreams.
And while Laura was staring up at the glittering lights in the sky, she was unaware that Silas had been watching her all the while with keen and intelligent eyes, as though she was formulating some sort of plan in her mind.
"Laura, wake up." Laura's father shook her awake. Her eyes opened to see that a dim light now filled the room; it was daytime, but heavy rain clouds were blocking the sun. Sitting up, her back aching from sleeping against the wooden pane of her windowsill couch, Laura sat up and looked up to meet her father's happy gaze. "You fell asleep while watching the stars again!" he playfully scolded her. Yawning, she nodded to her father, but still found herself too tired to really talk.
"By the way, kiddo, have you seen Silas? She didn't come down for her breakfast as usual." Laura looked up at her father with wide eyes, as though she didn't fully understand his question. "What do you mean?" she asked him. Silas, in all her years of living in Laura's company, had never gone missing. Her father seemed to mirror her concern and rubbed the back of his head nervously. "Maybe she's somewhere in the house?"
Together, the pair searched the entire two floors of their house, top to bottom, but Silas could not be found. Laura couldn't help herself and found her emotions pile up into tears in her eyes. "Dad... Where could she have gone?" Since that fateful day, twelve years ago, Laura had never been without her little black cat. "I'm still dumbfounded as to how she even got out of the house..." her dad mumbled angrily to himself; he never liked seeing his only daughter upset and he also had to admit that he'd grown fond of their only pet.
Somehow, without crying as much as she wanted to, Laura managed to get dressed and help her father make up flyers to post around their neighborhood. "She can't have gotten far if she was in your room last night." Her father had said, but Laura wasn't so sure. The two of them had hurried around the neighborhood, Laura calling Silas's name all the while, putting up flyers and asking neighbors if they'd seen the black cat.
But with no luck found and rain starting to pour heavily, Laura and her father retreated home with heavy hearts. Laura cried harder that night she could ever remember; not even her breakup with Danny could have topped the pain of loosing her childhood friend, the creature who'd always been there for her. Her father had tried to assure that she'd come back and had even double-checked the house to see if she'd been hiding or at least how she'd gotten out.
"Like a vampire, just up and leaves her tomb..." he sighed in disappointment, unsettled that he could not find the small black cat. He noted, however, the moment of silence that hung in the air; Laura had stopped crying. When he went to check on her, creaking the door open just gently enough so that she could not hear, he saw her lying with her face in her pillow, sniffling sadly. Surely, he knew, she was asleep. It was at this realization that he knew his only daughter had cried herself to sleep.
The next morning, there was a knock at the door. "Laura! You might want to come down here!" The disgruntled eighteen-year-old grumbled to herself in agitation and exhaustion, but at her father's second calling she walked down stairs in a half-awake state. "What is it?" she asked.
"How about you open your eyes and see?" her father chuckled. She could hear her father leave the room as she opened her brown eyes opened and widened at the sight before her. A girl with long dark curls and deep dark eyes stood before her holding the one and only Silas in her hands. "Silas!" Laura cried and rushed towards them. The girl smiled and held out the cat to her, Laura gently taking the feline and holding her close in an embrace. "I was so worried!" She could feel tears pool in her eyes again, but didn't dare let them spill in front of the beautiful stranger before her.
Laura found herself taken aback as she stared at the stranger's face once again. Woah... She could only manage one thought to sum up the girl's appearance; she was absolutely astounding in Laura's eyes. "Might wanna be careful next time there, creampuff." The girl said with a smirk. "T-thank you! We don't even know how she got out, she just... Did!"
Laura was now fully aware of her appearance; hair a mess, pajamas still in full swing, red eyes and dried drool on the side of her mouth, she was certain that she was nowhere near ready to meet with such a beautiful young woman. But nonetheless, the other girl did not seem to be offended, although she did smirk a lot. "Where did you find her anyways?"
"It was raining last night and I was on my way home from..." the girl trailed off mysteriously. "Visiting with my mother." She concluded with a rueful glare at the floor. "But anyways... I was walking through the city when I heard a cat cry. I found this one sitting in a planter so I took her home with me. I saw your flyer on my way out this morning and decided I should just get this over with."
Though the girl was slightly rude, Laura found that she strangely didn't mind it so much in her dazed state. "A planter... In the rain?" she asked, recalling the day she'd first found Silas. "Yeah, why is that weird or something?" asked the girl in a bored tone. "N-no... Never mind... Anyways, might I ask for your name?" Laura, despite her wild appearance, tried to show her usual, perky self and extended her hand towards the mysterious woman. "Carmilla." The lady smirked with a gleam in her eye and accepted Laura's hand.
Laura felt something, in that moment; had Silas left her to find the person she often thought about while looking up at the lonesome stars? Shaking her head of silly notions, she placed her black cat down on the floor and looked back up at Carmilla. "Please, stay for breakfast! We'd love to have you." She smiled. "As long as you have hot cocoa." Laughing, Laura smiled and took the girl's hand, leading her into the kitchen. She found that it didn't matter how she'd met Carmilla; Silas or no Silas, she was happy to have met her.