crushing

The moment the sound of paws reached his ears Pyrrhic scrabbled to try to fix his appearance. He'd already made a fool of himself. He couldn't allow himself to appear even weaker in front of a mortal stranger. Fear of being seen in a sorry state was enough to keep the tears in his eyes from spilling over and a quick, aggressive swipe of his paw rid his lips of pink hued spittle. He felt barely presentable but the woman was standing over him in an instant and there was no time to do better.

He forcefully cleared his throat to rid it of the tightness that would give away the extent of his predicament and then submitted to her generous and unnecessary attempt to make sure he was okay. "Oh, um, no I'm okay. Really, it was nothing." She offered her shoulder and he dutifully took it, feeling embarrassed all the while. "Yes thank you."

Pyrrhic tone was lackluster but honestly he tried his best to be light-hearted when he said, "Damn roots jumping out in front of me." It was a lame justification for what had happened and an even worse attempt at humor but he was at a loss for words and simply wished to retreat into the shadows.