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"Where are you going?" his mother asked. Washing dishes at the sink.

The squirrel froze. He couldn't tell her the truth. He didn't like to lie, but ... well, he couldn't exactly say, "Oh, I'm gonna bang a bat." It wouldn't be well-received.

"Hmm?"

"Out," said the squirrel.

"Well, you know the rules. Be home for supper."

"Supper," the squirrel (his name was Azure) whispered. His paws shook as he opened the door and slipped into the backyard. Oh, he was so afraid of getting caught. He knew what his parents would think, what would happen.

Yet the fear was, in a vicious way, addicting. And each time he went to see the bat, he grew bolder. At least ... when he was with her. He could talk to her. He couldn't talk to others. Not honestly, anyway. The boldness melted away as soon as they parted. He was clumsy, a solitary, shy squirrel. He had no friends. Didn't want them, necessarily. Just ... he was detached. Different.

He went into the woods, scurrying past thorns and brambles, his brown fur matching the autumn colors. Bushy, glorious tail bobbing behind him as he moved. Paws crushing dried leaves with a crunch, crunch, crunch, marking his paw-steps.


Azure had found the bat (her name was Mauve) a week or so ago. Bats were mysterious. Alluring. Rare. They lived in cities in the clouds, and they didn't come down. But this one had hurt a wing. Tumbled. Azure had found her in the woods, out in the edge of this wilderness. She had pleaded he not give her away.

"Don't reveal me," she had said.

"Why? You need help," he said.

"You'll help me, then. I'll stay out here until I heal."

"But ... "

"We value our privacy," she said, of bats. "I don't want my fall from grace ... " She looked between the tree branches to the heavens as she said this. "I don't want it known. It's ... just please don't reveal me," she pleaded, her soft pink eyes meeting his brown ones. "You don't know what they'll do to me."

"Who? The bats or ... "

Her eyes continued looking into his, giving no answer.

He had nodded, promised. "I won't."

He brought her food (berries, mostly) every day. He crudely patched up her wing, deciding it wasn't broken, only strained. Or something. He didn't know. But she wouldn't fly for a few weeks.

"Won't they come looking for you? The other bats?" he had asked her.

Again, she didn't answer. She just breathed in and out.


He reached her, panting. She was sitting in the middle of a small, hidden place, trees all around. Thorn bushes. You had to shimmy on your belly to get to the tiny clearing in the middle.

Her large, angular ears perked. "You're so loud," she told him. But she smiled. "You're so eager and young."

"I don't feel young," he told her. And he didn't. Not that he felt mature, but ... he always worried, was anxious. Obsessive-compulsive. He had not the personality of youth, aside from an undying naivete and romanticism that leaked out now and then. A repressed curiosity.

"I don't think you know," she told him sincerely, "How young you are."

The squirrel held his bushy, well-groomed tail in his paws. He looked to Mauve. She looked to be in her prime. Neither old or young. Did bats even age, he wondered. He assumed she was older than him, but couldn't be sure.

She patted a wing on the dying, fading grass. "Sit."

He did so.

"Do you enjoy ... being with me?"

"Of course," he whispered sincerely.

"I don't mean to question you." Pause. She nodded. She put the end of her pawed wing to his furry chest. "You have a gentle heart."

He blushed. What did one say to such a thing?

"With bats, love is ... aerial. Acrobatic. It's free-wheeling." Her eyes glinted, but only for a second. They then faded and darted back to his. "It's almost arrogant. But with you," she told him, "Love has been fluttering, beating, grounded. Somehow ... more real."


Azure pawed the dirt and leaves. He didn't even know creatures talked like this anymore. He shrugged. "Well ... "

"I don't know if you understand, but ... the passion we've had has been something vulnerable and ... tender," she finished, adding, "With us bats, it's normally frivolous."

The squirrel looked to her, lovingly. She was the first creature he'd ever loved. Ever had. She seemed to be so much more, in so many ways, than he was, or ever would be.

"I wish," he told her slowly, "I could go back with you. When you go back to the clouds."

She smiled at him. "No, you don't."

He nodded. "I do. I wish I had wings."

She shook her head. "Not if you knew ... the secrets we kept. We are full," she said, spreading her wings to the best of her injured ability, "Of secrets." She lowered her leathery, warm wings. "Thank you, though," she told him, "For taking care of me."

He blushed again.

She sighed, looking skyward, then asked, "How did you get your name?"

He fiddled with his paws as she listened, disrobing him while he talked.

"I was born early," he said, "By two months. I was tiny, naked, and ... blue. Azure."

"Poor thing," she whispered into his ear. "You pulled through, though," she declared, sitting back on her haunches, already disrobed herself. "That counts for a lot, you know?"

He nodded quietly. "Do you mind if I ask," he said, "What it's like up there, in the clouds?"

Her eyes glazed over. "Not the dream you're thinking of." Her eyes regained their focus. "Oh, it's beautiful, but ... you can't grow roots in a cloud. You know?" she said again.

He didn't.

"That's okay," she assured him, moving to a sit. She reached over to nab some of the fruit he's brought to her the afternoon before. Her stomach aching for food, for sustenance. She brought a strawberry to her lips. Licked it.

"We don't have these," she told him, as a falling, orange leaf drifted past her head and to the forest floor. "Up there. I've never tasted anything to refreshingly sweet. Not sickly sweet or a sour-sweet. A cool, gentle sweet." Her teeth bit in. She chewed, and the pale-pink juice ran down her pink chin.

Azure swallowed, throat dry. "Strawberries are my favorite ... fruit," he said.

"You shouldn't be so timid," she told him. "I mean it. You're such a beautiful squirrel," she said, her voiced aching. "I wish things had been different."

"What do you mean?"

"I don't know." She smiled sadly. "Fate." She shrugged. She took another strawberry.

He watched her eat. Devastatingly hungry for the fruit, and for her. Her fur was a soft, champagne-pink, her eyes bubbly. She sat upright, legs open, three-toed, clawed foot-paws wriggling ever so subtly. Her form was stout, but had a certain elegance. The wings gave it that. Those wings. Natural givers of flight. Her supple breasts and belly, her snout and nose, those sharp teeth. Her angled ears.

He whimpered.

She laid back, slowly sprawling, half-eaten strawberry between her teeth.

Azure crawled to her on all fours, own teeth moving to her mouth, biting gently on the berry, taking it from her mouth. Chewing. Sweet juice dripped to her lips, running down her chin. Gulping down the berry, Azure lapped the juice, lapping her lips.

She kneaded his groin and sheath with her knee.

He moaned, panting, pulling away. But her wings went round to his back, keeping him in place. "Why can't you relax?" she asked him. Eyes peering into him.

"I'm afraid."

"Of what?"

"Of getting caught."

"And why does it matter? Why do you care," she asked, "What others think?"

He blushed. "I don't know," he whispered, not wishing to discuss it. "I can't ... keep secrets," he said, "Like you can."

"Do think it's easy? Keeping secrets?" she asked, wings having pulled him down. So that he now lay on top of her. They were nose to nose. "Do you think I like it?"

"I don't know," he said again, eyes darting away from hers, and then back again.

The falling drizzle left the bat's pink fur glistening. Like tinsel on a Christmas tree, or something sparkling. And droplets caught on the squirrel's whiskers.

"If only we could get away," she said. "If only we could hide ourselves somewhere."

"Why?" he asked.

"Would you object?"

He opened his mouth to say something.

"Would you leave it all behind?"

He thought a second. Nodded.

"If wishes were horses," she said, and she giggled a bit, leaning her head back, staring straight up through the branches. In the growing cool, her breath showed when she exhaled. She shivered slightly. Azure breathed onto her neck, on top of her. Sharing his body heat. "If wishes were horses," she said again, and thought a moment. "I don't remember the rest of the saying." Her eyes went blank for a moment. "I should remember." She sighed. And smiled at the squirrel.

He squeaked into her ear. "Why," he asked her, "Are you so nice to me?"

"You've been nice to me," she told him.

"No, but ... " He shook his head. "I don't understand."

"What? What don't you understand?"

His furry chest heaved. He had no answer.

"If you don't have a clue about life," she told him. Shrugging. "Well ... neither do I."

Somehow, oddly, that was ... reassuring.

The pink-furred bat stopped the squirrel from saying or thinking anything more. Kissing him. Their breaths flared out through their noses, turning to vapor. Both of them wet with drizzle. When the kiss was broken, Azure sat atop her stomach, straddling her. Running his paws along her wings. Ever so softly.

"What's it like? Flying?" He caressed her wings.

She laid back, eyes half-open. "It's like ... controlled falling. In every direction," she whispered. She strained for his tail, dragging it down to her chest, tugging at it. Stroking the fur. Then she wrapped her wings around him again, pulling him back down. Locking his muzzle in a kiss, a wet, heated one. They both shivered slightly, but the shivering soon stopped ... the faster their blood coursed.

By this time, the squirrel's member had slipped out, was firm. He closed his eyes and worked his way into her, her spread legs. She was warm, tight. She was strong. Nearly every day for the past two weeks, he'd come out here. They had done this. Started by talking, always descending into this. The first time ... the first time, Azure had been startled. He had fought it, so very nervous. She had cooed into his ear, stroked his chest, calmed him with her voice. She had assured him, and heart pounding, he had let it happen. As he was letting it happen now. Never mind he didn't truly know her, or that they weren't even the same species ... why should it matter? He didn't see anything wrong. It didn't feel wrong.

He slid slowly and gently in and out of her, bucking hips. She grasped his shoulders.

"Open your eyes," she panted. "Open them."

He did so. They were vulnerable eyes. Not used to making contact, and certainly not for extended periods of time. Eyes were the windows to the soul. Eyes were terribly intimate.

"Look into mine," she whispered, tongue hanging out.

Squeaking, he nodded, swallowing. His throat dry. As he moved tenderly into her, deep in, sliding back, deep in, his eyes met hers. Locked. Staring. For nearly thirty seconds before either of them blinked. The drizzle causing them to blink. And they both allowed their eyes to close, noses nuzzling, still together. Nothing wild, nothing showy. Just simple and soft, the bat chittering and running her wings over him. The squirrel squeaking and shuddering as he reached his climax, settling his head to her breasts. She stroked his ears, clutching them weakly as she climaxed herself. Chittering.

Wet from the drizzling rain, they sat, shivering slightly. She leaned her head on his shoulders. Breathing in and out. "Listen," she said.

His ears swivelled.

"To the forest. The rain, the birds ... "

He nodded. And sighed. Breathing in deep.

It was getting dark.

"You should get going," she whispered into his ear.

"I can't leave you here tonight. It's ... it's raining."

"I've endured worse."

He shook his head. "No, you should ... "

"If they come for me," she told him, taking his head into her paws, touching nose to nose. Looking into his eyes again. Despite his instinctual urge to dart his eyes and break the contact, he did not. He kept with her. "If they come for me, and they will," she said, nodding. "They will. When they do, I don't want you to be near. I can't risk it."

"But what's wrong?" he whimpered. Worried. Confused. "Why won't you tell me? Why?"

She shushed him, whispering into his ear. "Because I can't," she stressed.

"Why?" he asked again.

"Just don't worry, huh?" she said sadly, nuzzling his cheek. "I'll find a way, some way," she said, "Some place," she added, "We can go. And no one will find us. We can live our lives there."

Azure didn't ask where, didn't ask why. Though he was swimming with questions. They were silenced by her lips.


The next day, she was gone. The woods were empty, leaves all fallen. Soggy. They squished under paw, in the mud. Forlorn, he had sunk against a tree trunk, sliding to the ground. He had sobbed.


Eight months later, the next summer, he thought he heard a rap-rap-rapping on his window in the middle of the night. The moon was full and bright, milky. And the night bugs were singing at the creek. He had turned and curled into a ball beneath the sheets, bushy tail hanging off the side of the bed. Arms clutching a plush mouse to his chest. And he'd phased back into sleep. Only to hear the sound again. He sat up in bed, blinking. Blinking. Looking around. And he settled back down, unable to close his eyes. Until he slipped into sleep again.

The third time he opened his eyes, she was there. Sitting on him, straddling his chest. His plush in her wings, cradled to her breasts. Her pink fur a deeper shade in the dimness. She leaned down to kiss his nose. And then took his paw, nodding to the window.

"Let's go," she whispered.

He didn't question where. He didn't question anything. Not where she had been, and not the scar that ran down one of her cheeks, and how her ear looked like a sliver had been bit out of it. He just followed her. And they went far away, to the land of might-have-been. Where their hearts waltzed and performed duets day and night.