He was still too young to really understand with his mom when she had died. Sure he lasted a year, but he watched as she declined more and more. Now he saw his father do it too and he wondered when he would be joining her. Perhaps it was better that way, after all his father was her ‘imprint’ and loved her more than anything. Still Barrett really didn’t ‘get it’ but he could read the patterns well enough to understand that soon his father wasn’t going to be with them either. He missed his mom, and every time they came out to the grave at the start he thought it was just keeping her company and seeing her. Nowadays it was something else, even more so seeing as their father even was getting too weak to join them regularly. Today his thoughts laid on what he would do when his father would be buried next to her, grim thoughts, ones that had been in his head more and more as he laid up in the trees his eyes dull as they looked at the leaves move across the ground with the spring breeze.

He didn’t want to stay here anymore.

Not in death, but the moment his father died, Barrett knew he would have to leave this place. It hurt enough going back to the den without their mom not to mention Inyan who went on some grand adventure already. What started as a big bustling family was quickly starting to scatter due to the whims of fate, leaving the den as empty as he felt. Sure, his Aunt Tuari tried to pull them together and take up the role as ‘mom’ best she could and he of course appreciated her efforts, but she wasn’t his mom. Mohegan even started staying at home and taking up duties their dad did seeing as he was the only one home a lot with Kajika out on his own adventures a lot. However, Barrett could see his irritation and sometimes desperation in knowing this was going to be his life.

Barrett didn’t want to trap him like that. He didn’t want to keep no one like that.

He felt frustrated, like a storm was brewing in his chest just waiting to explode out, but his face didn’t show any of it. Fate was cruel to them it seemed. It was then he heard the higher pitched yells of his fiery colored brother. Pax was deaf after all, Rett long since had gotten used to his brother’s tones and they far from angered or upset him. If anything his brother, and siblings in general, were the few things anymore that brought a genuine smile to the sides of the predominantly black boys golden muzzle. He would have replied, but instead he basically rolled off the branch he was on dropping out of the tree and then rolled across the ground a ways. Perhaps it was because he was so inwardly numb he didn't care about the ‘thud’ and the rush of slight pain that hit him upon the impact. It wasn’t anything bad, maybe some bruises later, but he got up as if nothing happened. He wasn’t too high up after all, but his small form on the branches probably made him fairly hard to see against a shadowed background.

His darker form slid across the larger, lighter colored form of his brother, looking at the large pretty flower. It was, admittedly, probably the prettiest one his brother had collected to date. He waited to make sure his brother was looking at him in the face before he said, ”So you want to go still?” Part of Barrett didn’t want to go. It just dredged up the dark thoughts of their father being in a fresh grave next to their mother when her own grave was still mostly a dirt patch now. He knew the answer, but still he wanted to hear it he guessed.