"You're useless, all you ever do is make things worse."
"This is why nobody wants to be your friend."
"Why do you always carry around that sketchbook anyway when you can't even draw? Ha ha!"
...
She pretended she didn't believe them, she thought she didn't care, and she promised to ignore them.
She didn't even know she was going to cry over this.
At least not until she ended up sitting on a bench aside a trail in the woods during her walk home from school, planning to hide until she could somehow stop the flood of words that were breaking her down.
"After I tried so hard to have a friend, that's all you can say to me?"
She sobbed only for about a minute, followed with two minutes of deep breathing, aimlessly looking at the area around her while trying to calm down.
That was when the tranquil, isolate ambience of the forest began to overtake her. The sun was starting to set, and it was facing Haku, shining many delicate golden rays through gaps in the cluster of trees.
It put her in a peaceful trance, it made her want to stay here a long time.
The quiet girl now wished to take out her sketchbook, but she just couldn't even bear to look at it; not after what they said to her.
She instead pulled out a blank piece of loose paper and her notebook, and tried sketching the forest scene. It was simply too much of a sight to ignore.
"I'm completely unskilled at drawing a background..." she thought, as she whipped out her pencil.
Minutes later, her drawing was progressing, and she was starting to watch it turn rather ugly.
The trees were thin and lopsided, the leaves were messily scribbled, she thought. The depth was barely visible.
It didn't look remotely good.
Haku sighed a long, stingy sigh, feeling a rush of fresh tears wetting her eyes again. Her attempt of comfort just backfired.
But that was until...
"Meooow."
She heard a curious sound from an animal.
"Meow." it came again, sounding welcoming and rather close.
Haku quickly wiped her eyes with her sleeve. She decided to look around for the kitten, but when she looked right in front of her again, there it was, rolled up on the ground, meek with a tender physique.
"Meeeooow."
It was a small gray baby cat, it seemed. Its solid-blue eyes had an energetic spark, and its small fuzzy mouth opened ever so gently as it mowed.
Haku leaned forward, wonderingly gazing at it.
The cat inched a few steps closer to the bench before sprawling down on the flat ground.
This sight made Haku smile. She flipped over the paper with the forest sketch and tried drawing the friendly cat's portrait.
"Please don't move. It'll take a second." she gently spoke to the cat, feeling a certain bond form between them.
She sketched out a vaguely-drawn head shape. For now, it lacked in definition, but still resembled the cat.
She then tried drawing the arch of its body and the position of it licking its paws, etching lightly on the edges to give it a fuzzy look.
For a while, she was so wrapped up in the quietness that she forgot all other things for a while.
Eventually, Haku was able to successfully complete her work in several peaceful minutes.
She smiled brightly and showed it to the kitten.
"I'm finished sketching you."
The cat, who hadn't moved since, now rolled over playfully and emitted a soft purr.
Haku slowly stood up, crouched down and patted its belly. The friendly cat loved it. It even began to rub its head against her pant legs.
Even thought it was just an animal, Haku thought, this was a warm gesture, just what she needed.
It felt kind and true, just the way friendship should be.
Haku, now in much higher spirits than a half-hour ago, started walking off with a content smile. The surroundings were quickly becoming a richer color of twilight, signaling Haku that she had to be getting to her house soon. She forced a goodbye to the sweet kitten and made her way down the trail. When she was a few feet away, the kitten have a noisy meow.
Haku turned around and saw the small, gray figure in the beginning sunset gazing at her with large, lonely eyes.
Haku's expression grew the same.
"I'm sorry... I can't keep you." Haku sighed sadly.
"My mother doesn't want any pets, and you seem domesticated, so you should be going back to your own family."
She gave the cat one more affectionate pat on its head and walked off, pretending not to hear the last tiny meow that came behind her from the forest.
"Haku, you said you were going to start coming straight home right away. And why are your eyes all red?"
Haku decided to tell a small lie; she didn't want to tell her mother that she let her classmates drive her to tears again.
"I think... it must be the pollen in the air." she said, with the most natural tone she could manage to pull off.
"Oh, and I was... walking along the path, and I saw this kitten... I knew I shouldn't keep it, but I managed to sketch a picture of it."
Haku bashfully pulled the flimsy sheet of paper out of her bag and showed her mom, who just barely looked at it.
"It's very nice." she said.
Haku's smile faded a bit. Her mom said that for everything. She would probably say the same thing even if Haku were to draw a ugly, vomiting caricature of her teacher as a pig.
Or a stick figure.
"She didn't say I improved or anything..." Haku walked off to her room, wishing for her mom to at least understand her interest in art.
That evening, a downpour of rain unexpectedly thundered down, creating thin puddles on every bit of ground outside.
At one point the drops were like beads, the way they noisily knocked against every surface they landed on,
Haku went out to the far end of her backyard to take inside the gardening supplies, when she heard a familiar meow...
She paused for a while. The meow came again, this time sounding loud and urgent.
Haku quickly took the supplies in the house, and went back out in the rainy backyard, thoughts pelting her mind much like the storm.
The meows became even more piercing near the fence.
Haku peered to the side and saw a cat, laying on the side of the street, bleeding.
Her mouth fell wide open. With her heart pounding, she went outside the fence in order to tend to it.
It panged her even more when she saw that the cat was the exact same kitten from earlier. Memories flashed through her mind. Though barely any, it felt like more.
Haku looked around her, seeing she was the only person around.
She decided to bend down and scoop the limp ragdoll creature in her cradling arms. It cat felt so flimsy and weak in her grasp. She stroked it softly on the head, trying to comfort it.
Even while she was sure her mother would be upset, she wanted to be determined, even risking getting the kitten's blood over her white school uniform.
Haku set the cat in the middle of a small patch of clovers. It was clearly suffering, dull eyes half-open, and the wound on its side spilling blood.
Haku pulled an extra towel from the outdoor laundry rack and used it to patch the wound up.
She didn't know how to place the towel, and it seemed to not help much. The cat seemed to only grow weaker.
Panting, she felt her eyes pool up with tears, which she couldn't tell apart from the heavy rain that dripped off her face.
"I'm such... I'm such a failure... The cat's going to die... all because I can't do anything."
She took one look at the cat's barely-conscious face and burst into tears.
"I want to save this kitty... and I have to do it myself, because if mom finds out, she'd punish me and tell me to leave it to die... she'd tell me the cat doesn't matter..."
Haku tried desperately to keep down her sobs.
This very cat was once rolling around, delightful and brimming with life. Haku couldn't stand to see a friend so broken down.
...a friend?
"But, the cat does matter!" it came straight to Haku.
"She cheered me up when I felt sad. She let me draw her portrait. She gave me kindness and affection... and we're friends!"
Friends.
Haku remembered her mom telling her to always offer help for any friends.
"Friends are always there for one another. A true friend is one that supports you through troubles, plays with you, and enjoys being with you. These are the kinds of friends you should always help."
Something went off in Haku's head right then and there. Whatever it was, it felt like a feeling that destined to stay for life.
"A true friend... even if she is a cat... she's everything my mom said made a true friend. And I bet she'll understand when I tell her."
Haku shakily opened her back door and called her mother, despite the condition she looked like she was in.
"Mom... I need to help a friend... in need."
"Haku? What happened?" her mom looked panicked.
"You're soaked... why are you crying?"
Haku silently led her mom out to where the cat was resting.
Her mother felt enough sympathy just by seeing the kitten's struggling state.
"Mom, I know you don't like cats..." Haku said.
"But... this is the same cat I did the drawing of. She... she also made me happy when I felt upset. Now she's hurt and we have to help her. We have to take her to the vet..."
Several days later, the kitten was nursed back to health. The cat was restored to its bouncy and sweet self slowly and steadily, and it was quite heartwarming to see.
On the day they went to visit the kitten, Haku's mom told her that she could adopt the cat as a pet.
"Really?! Oh, thank you so much..."
Haku hugged her mother, unable to express her true gratitude.
"Well, the cat is your friend, right? You helped each other out." she did say.
"That is right!"
"Lavender! Come here, Lavender." Haku called to the fuzzy grey cat.
"Meow!" the cat mowed happily and rushed towards kneeling Haku, rubbing her small face against her just like before. Haku scratched at her neck, and Lavender began to purr softly.
It was a moment that just filled everyone with warmth.
It felt kind and true, just the way friendship should be.
...
ENDNOTE: Bleahh I feel like I'm going to vomit honey and cupcakes. How cheesy was that? XP. I wrote this last summer. Yep, not exactly recently. Edited some of my writing since my style has improved since then (believe it or not). But to tell the truth I actually kind of like this thing I wrote. It sorta has meaning, to me...
And one more thing. Happy Birthday Yowane Haku! (November 21). I kind of did this as a part of celebrating it lol yep