Notice: I'm reorganizing a little. Whiskers!verse falls under my standard Drabble Disclaimer: it's quickly written, barely edited, and not particularly stringent about canon or characterization. In other words these are minor works, not to be taken too seriously.

Bella gets a cat, cat doesn't like Jacob, Jacob is jealous of cat. / Missing scene somewhere in New moon, before Jake turns into a wolf, back when they were best friends (like doing homework or something).

[mid-New Moon, pre-FURSPLODE!sion. Romance/Humor. Rated G.]

Charlie and Renee speak on the phone more during the five months following the Cullens' departure than they did when they were dating. This would frustrate Charlie if he wasn't just so damn worried ("Sometimes she sits I can't tell if she's awake or asleep, Renee, did you ever do this when you were her age?", except of course she didn't, not over him) but right now there's no room for frustration, or for regrets, or for wishing. The only thing he has room for is terror that his girl has lost her mind (and fury with the pale little nancy brat who did this to her, he should've just shot the kid immediately after they returned from Phoenix, "Not to worry Chief Swan, I'll take good care of her", what had he been thinking) and uncertainty of what to do next. (Though now she's hanging out with Billy's boy sometimes, and Charlie swears he's seeing a tint of life come back to her cheeks, though not enough to stop the endless, screaming nightmares.)

He finally feels a new emotion the day Renee says "Phil thinks Bella should get a kitten." (Charlie can hear Renee flicking her fingernail absentmindedly against the countertop. She did that all the time when she would make calls to the electric company when their heater would short out that first winter in the house. Apparently he now ranks at the same level as a repairman.) "He says no one can be unhappy with a kitten around."

Charlie almost says, "Well, Phil's practically Bella's age, so I guess he'd know," but he doesn't. He just grunts noncommittally. But he's desperate, so that very afternoon, he drives Bella over to the animal shelter, steers her into a room full of mental cages that smells so strongly of antiseptic that his nose wrinkles. (In a flash Charlie pictures Bella inside of one of the cages, smelling of cleaning solution, and he swears on the spot that no matter what happens he won't let anyone send her away to an institution, he'll quit his job and take care of her for the rest of his life instead, he'll even learn to cook.) Cats and kittens mewl from behind bars. And Bella's eyes light up.

When his daughter pokes her fingers into a cage and giggles when a kitten rubs against her hand, Charlie Swan is, more than anything else in the entire world, annoyed. Fucking Phil.

Whiskers likes the girl who takes him home a lot. The girl scratches behind his ears, gives him tuna fish, lets him sleep in the crook of her neck at night (though sometimes she turns over and Whiskers has to dig his claws into her shoulder to hold on). Whiskers loves the girl. The girl is his girl. (Whiskers likes the man, too, even though the man tossed him off the kitchen table when Whiskers tried to play with the round little metal things. But he'll get some later. He is a Very Stealthy Hunter and he can be very patient for the round little metal things. Just watch.) She goes away in the morning which gives Whiskers time to explore and hunt bugs and take long snoozes in the laundry pile, but she comes back in the afternoon and scoops him up and they sit on the couch and the girl pets Whiskers until his eyes glaze over. This is good. This is the way things should be.

Until a few days later, when the boy comes over. The boy who smells like dog.

"I don't think your cat likes me."

"What? Why would you say that?"

"He's glaring at me."

"He's a cat, Jake. They just naturally look like they're glaring."

"No, seriously, look at him. He hates me."

"Don't be silly. No one could hate you."

The girl and the boy settle down onto the couch and pull books out of their bags and start chattering away to each other. The girl nibbles on her pencil eraser as she stares at a page covered in writing, and the boy stares at her. Whiskers does. Not. Approve.

"Ow!"

"What?"

"Your cat! He bit my hair!"

Laughter. "Well, it does kind of look like a cat toy."

"...does not."

"Hey, I like your hair, but if I was a kitten, I'd be playing with it all the time."

"Well, you can play with it anyway, if you want."

"I'm not a kitten."

"Thank God for that."

The boy has not responded to Whiskers' clear message of possession and domination. The boy is even daring to slide closer to the girl on the couch. He is either profoundly stupid, or a genuine threat. A threat which must be neutralized at once.

"Aww!"

"Ow! He scratched me!"

"Oh, don't be such a wuss. He just wants to snuggle. Don't you, Whiskers? Who's a good kitty?"

"He wedged himself between us and now he's glaring at me again. Bells, this cat has it out for me, he seriously does."

"Oh, and he's some great threat to you? He's the size of a coffee mug."

"...well, he gets to put his paw on your chest."

"Huh?"

"Nothing."

The boy scoots back to the other side of the couch, and Whiskers purrs. Threat neutralized. Though he'll have to keep an eye out for this dog-person. He will be trouble.

"...so, why a white cat?"

"I don't know. He's cute. Aren't you, Whiskers?"

"He has yellow eyes."

"And?"

"I'm just saying. Does he remind you of someone?"

"No, why?"

"...never mind."