A cold, crisp breeze blew through the air as I walked down a path in the rainforest. I really shouldn't be alone out here by myself; I'm pretty sure I went too deep in the woods. Despite me walking continuously through the foliage, I couldn't familiarize myself with my surroundings. I came to the conclusion I was, indeed, lost in the woods. Yet I debated whether or not I should continue going further or retrace my steps.
I decided to stop walking for a bit to let my legs rest up. I wasn't sure how long I was walking to cause my legs to cramp up and fall asleep. I sat down by a nearby wax palm, stretching my legs and cracking my bones to wake them up. I tried to wrack my brain and remember which direction I came from in the first place. But I couldn't keep my thoughts narrow-minded because of the chilly wind that seemed to get colder the longer I stayed out here.
Rustling of the trees and bushes continued to grow closer, as eerie feelings came from the pit of my stomach. The bits of sunlight were beginning to hide behind heavy dark clouds. It seemed as if a snowstorm would be brewing soon. I had to make it back to Casita before I would be stuck in the storm. I decided to stand up and begin walking in one direction in hopes I could make it back in time.
Continuously walking through the woods, I thought I could hear a faint sound of footsteps walking behind me. Yet every time I turned around to see if I was being followed, there was nothing behind me besides the scenery of the rainforest. I had a feeling, an unsettling feeling, that I was being followed. My stomach persistently flipped in circles, and my ear kept involuntarily twitching.
"Is somebody there?" I said, loud enough that my voice bounced off the trees. I received nothing back in return. Nothing except for another blast of cold wind blowing through the woods. I shivered as the air made contact with my skin; even my coat of fur wasn't enough to keep me warm. I was never really keen on cold weather. Goes without saying, unless it's coming from Pepa, snow is not my favorite form of precipitation, ultimately making winter my least favorite season.
After some time, I heard the same sound of footsteps walking. The only difference this time was that the impressions making contact with the dirt started rapidly getting closer. I stopped walking and turned my head back around, but I saw nothing. Just trees, and dirt and patches of grass. If this is some sort of sick joke, then I don't like it. I hate the thought of being followed by something when I don't know what or who it is.
"Oye, who's there?!" I shouted, obviously fed up. Rustling continued to increase as something grew closer towards me. My breathing began to increase in fright, unaware of what I should do. I just decided to stand still and wait for thing that seemed to be following me, come into view.
The bushes next to me rustled; something was in there. Obviously scared, I stared at the bush, waiting for something to jump out of it. Surely enough, something did jump out. And it was just a tapir. "Wow. I was scared for nothing." I said, breathing a sigh of relief. "It's just a danta (tapir)." The wild animal then looked at something behind me, widened its eyes, and ran away like a bat out of... uh... the Underworld... while I laughed at myself for getting scared over nothing.
Not even after a minute into walking on the dirt path, someone grabbed me from behind. Whoever it was, they had a tough grasp around my waist as I struggled to get free. I began to hyperventilate, trying to kick my way out of their grasp.
"Stop fighting me!" The voice replied, sounding like a man. This man's voice didn't sound like someone I knew. It didn't have a soothing tone like Camilo's, or the playful type like Cinco... It was gravelly. Besides, how does this guy know who I am, much less how he knew I was here?
I continued to fight off the hold this stranger had on me, Out of the corner of my eye, I saw something creeping up from behind. The animal placed it over my nose and mouth, causing me to suffocate into it. "Sleep now, son. Sleep." He said. Son? Oh no... I knew exactly who this guy was! How did he come back to life?! He fell over the edge of a cliff next to a waterfall! A near forty-foot drop!
I tried to remove the paw from my face, but he immobilized my arms from extracting it away from my face. Every time I breathed, I started to get lightheaded. My eyes began to get heavy as my panic subsided. I remember falling to the ground, almost completely unconscious.
"Oscar! Despierta!"
Within a few moments of Mirabel's calling, Oscar's eyes snapped open and he jumped, screaming loudly as though someone was hurting him. And it wasn't one scream; Oscar kept screaming, not fully realizing he was awake yet.
"Whoa, Oscar! It's okay!" Mirabel shouted while gently grabbing onto the speedster's shoulders and giving him a controlled shake. "It's okay! It's just us!"
Oscar blinked the last of his sleep away from his eyes before his screams finally stopped. Mirabel let go of him and stepped back a bit to allow the cat to see his surroundings. His older primos stood before him, each with a worried expression on their face. There was no hiding the nightmare, or the tears that had been trickling down his face throughout his terrifying dream state. With nothing more to hide, Oscar opened up his floodgates and launched himself into Isabela's arms, wailing loudly. His face burned with shame as Isabela wrapped her arms around him and began to rub circles on his back as soothingly as possible.
"Shhhh," Isabela whispered. "It's okay. We're here; we're right here. You're safe now."
Camilo came closer and started stroking Oscar's head as comfortingly while Mirabel took to to Oscar's shoulders, gently gripping and massaging them as the youngest of the group wailed into his oldest cousin's shoulder, desperate to work out some of the tension that had built up. None of them could remember the last time the fuzzy goof ball had cried so hard, and it seemed like eons before his sobs finally subsided. The youngest slowly dared to look up at his cousins.
"Do you want to talk about it?"
"I... I don't know," Oscar stuttered. "It was... just a dream... But it felt so real..."
Isabela and Mirabel looked at each other before Camilo spoke. "Talking to us will make it better. Trust me. We can help you through this, nuestra vida. You're not alone."
Sniffling a bit, Oscar glanced at his cousins. Each one was looking at him with the most comforting and gentle expressions. Oscar sighed and suddenly found the floor more interesting.
"... I've kinda been dreaming this for a while," the youngest admitted. "I was in the woods late in the day, by myself. And I thought someone was following me. Albeit known, someone was..I don't even know..." The tears were beginning to resurface once more, but he tried to hold them back. "Whoever it was...he placed a paw over my face, causing me to pass out." Oscar began hiccuping a little more. "And I'm left alone! And... and... and..."
Oscar dissolved quickly into sobs again, prompting Mirabel to take a seat on Oscar's other side. "Hey bud," she said gently. "You know that would never happen, right?"
"We'd never leave you like that," Camilo said.
"I keep having these... night terrors. The incident happened a couple months ago and I'm still having nightmares about it. We all deserve a full night's rest for once, don't we?" Oscar said, his ears drooping. He turned to grip his tail, squeezing and slightly twisting it. If he had longer fur around his neck, he'd be stroking his fur much like how his tía Pepa would when she was stressed (i.e. that engagement dinner gone wrong).
He didn't need to look behind him to see Camilo and Isabela's concerned gaze as they watched their family cat attempt to reign in his emotions. He gently rubbed his back, trying to lessen the hyperventilation.
Oscar was ready to give up hope on taming himself when he remembered something that always had him smiling uncontrollably when he was a kitten. His nose twitched as he considered it, before he jumped at the sound of a cricket. Yeah, this was getting out of hand.
They looked at him in confusion as he slipped off his ruana, not wanting it to get damaged in the inevitable crossfire. He then slipped onto Isabela's lap, gently depositing one of her hands onto his belly. She looked down at him, gaze questioning. He fidgeted shyly. "I'll admit it, I was really ticklish as a kitten... I figured it's worth a shot."
He saw his oldest prima realize what he meant, before a smile made its way onto her face. He tensed up as he felt her hand start to move, burying his face into her shoulder as he bit his lip.
He soon stopped biting his lips, giggling quietly into Isabela's shoulder as she gently tickled his tummy. One of her arms was holding him like you'd cradle a baby, and she had her head leaning on his own. As her tickles grew heavier, and his giggles grew harder and louder, so he knew this tactic was working. Mirabel decided suddenly that her oldest sister couldn't have all the fun in this.
"Well, I know you're really ticklish here," Mirabel used a hand to start tickling around Oscar's jawline. Said feline squealed louder and scrunched his head up in an attempt to dull the tickling sensation. Although it was all out of reflex, Oscar was actually enjoying being tortured like this. He was ecstatic that they weren't making fun of him for it, either.
"Or here?" Camilo reached down, deciding to get into the mix, and gently poked a finger inside Oscar's ear. It twitched as a result.
"Is everything okay in here?" Their tío Bruno asked, quietly entering the room. "I heard screaming—oh."
He took in the sight before him, the family cat in his oldest niece's lap, ruana abandoned on the table, all of them looking at him like a deer caught in headlights. Oscar quickly turned his attention away from his uncle and pulled Isabela's hand back with a demanding meow. Wordlessly, she started again, and Bruno understood.
"Well," He smiled, heading over to the two of them. Oscar was giggling loudly at this point, trying not to hold back because it was definitely making his life easier. "Who initiated this?"
Isabela smiled up at her uncle as she cuddled the kitty in her arms. "He did. He thought it would help, and he was right." She couldn't resist bending down to rub her nose against Oscar's. The speedster whined, before squealing as she squeezed at his sides. He couldn't help but accidentally kick, nailing Bruno in the nose.
"Ack!" Bruno heard his nieces and nephew laugh as he got a cat foot to the face, echoed by Oscar's suddenly amped up laughter as she took the tickling up a notch. "Oscar! You kicked your tío! Rude!"
"I'm sorreeheehee!" He squealed, both of Isabela's hands tickling his midriff as he squirmed in her arms. "IsaHAHAHA!"
Her face was lit up in a mischievous grin, tickling fingers working all over her cat's torso. She managed to work her way into where his armpits would be and he shrieked, another powerful kick propelling forward as he desperately tried to squirm away.
"TÍO BRUNO!" He begged, grin so wide it could split his face as he burst out into another fit of giggles. "HEHEHEHELP!"
"Hmm..." Bruno couldn't help but grin. "Do you kids want some help?"
"NOHOHOHOOO!"
"Si! It would be a shame to let those feet go untickled!" Mirabel grinned up at her tío. She caught Oscar as he tried to escape Isabela's lap, laughing as he whined. "Nope! No escaping, now!"
The cat was now face down, face buried into Mirabel's leg now. Two hands wormed their way into where his underarms would be, causing bubbly belly laughter to tear out of his slim frame. He shrieked when he felt his uncle's hands on his feet though, wriggling like a worm.
He flopped back over onto his back, trying to scramble away before falling back into desperate laughter as his belly was attacked again. "PLEHEHEHEASE!" He begged, eyes starting to water from laughter. He heard his family laughing behind him, but the tickles did stop, with Bruno gently rubbing his feet while Camilo smoothed Oscar's hair back.
Mirabel pulled him to sit upright in her lap, his smile still blindingly bright as he let out giggles. He leaned his head on her shoulder again, and she wiped the tear tracks off his face. He could see Pepa open her mouth, ready to spe-
"HIC!"
He slapped a paw to his mouth, cheeks burning a fierce red (at least they would be if it wasn't for his fur) as he realized what had just happened.
"Hic! Hic!"
Mirabel's delighted laughter, echoed by her sister, cousin, and tío merely moments after, echoed throughout the Casita.
