Prompt: "prompts! Love your story and I hope this will help you to continue being an amazing writer and just all around awesome! Lets see..how about Hawke and the Arishok get a VERY fluffy cat who happens to be crazy cat aggressive but to only one of them."
The dozens of small white slips Hawke cupped in her hands could have easily been mistaken for white rose petals at a distance.
Grimacing, she pressed the garbage can pedal with her foot and dumped the wrappers of what she estimated to be about 20 band-aids into the stainless steel barrel – while the culprit watched her every move from the comfortable protection of the Arishok's lap.
"When I agreed to watch Beth's cat while she's at the conference," Hawke muttered, "I assumed I'd be getting a cat, not a monster."
Ygritte was eight pounds of white fur, satin ears, and the purest evil – and she was Hawke's responsibility for the next week. Making sure that the cat didn't die was proving to be more and more difficult with each passing hour.
"I try to play with her, she attacks me. I go to put on her collar, she attacks me. I put her food down, she attacks me." She sighed, reaching for the tube of Neosporin. "I look like something out of Hellraiser, and I've had this cat for six hours. I don't know how Beth does it."
"She does not trust you," the Arishok answered, scratching the longhaired feline behind the ears, a gesture that was met with a contented purr. "Your movements are nervous. Your fear makes her suspicious. It is a common, and often appropriate, inference to make."
Glaring, Hawke slapped a band-aid around her ring finger. "The first thing she did when she got here was lunge for me. Who wouldn't be cautious after that?"
"You are put on guard when a visibly nervous person approaches you," he reminded her. "Animals operate on the same assessments."
"If so," Hawke continued, "then it stands to reason that if I approach her calmly and confidently, she'll be put at ease, right?" Determination settled into her face, and she closed the distance between them in long strides.
"All right, cat," she declared as she stood in front of them. "I am bigger than you, I share half my DNA with your master, and I have thumbs. I am not afraid of you, and I will prove that now by petting you in a calm and confident manner."
She didn't make it within six inches before being bitten.
"Oh, that is it," she spat, despite Ygritte's petulant yowling and hissing to scoop her up and hold her at arm's length. "You have to live with me for a week while your owner learns to cure cancer sipping piña coladas at a hotel." Storming off toward the kitchen, Hawke ignored the gnawing on her left wrist. "I AM GETTING YOU TREATS AND WE ARE GOING TO BE FRIENDS GOD FUCKING DAMNIT."
Hawke's persistence eventually paid off, but not without a lot more blood, critique from the Arishok, and three foul-smelling tins of sardines.
And three weeks after Beth's return, she was still finding white hairs on everything.
"Fucking cat."
