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Wile stands at the kitchen counter—surrounded by smooth black tiles, red-stained wooden cabinets, and glass cupboard doors—his eyes rounding into saucers as a pigeon flutters past the paneled glass window. Suddenly, the quiet street outside is the perfect backdrop for his hunt.
"Sylvester! Sylvester!" Wile yells, spinning on his heels as he rushes out the carved wooden door and down the long hallway, past the single staircase.
"What-t-t is it-t?" Sylvester asks, patting the last pillow before throwing it haphazardly onto the long, rose-red couch beneath the towering golden bird cage, scrambling to the front door past the rustic standing lamp to grab Wile by the arms.
"It's a bird! It's a bird! There's a bird!" Wile screams, his head shaking so hard it nearly unscrews itself.
Sylvester, the corner of his eye twitching before his face falls from dreaded concern to disappointed fury. "It's-s-s-s a what-t-t?" Sylvester questions, each word dragging far too long, seeming to catch in his throat before he finally gets it out.
"I—" Wile begins, his gaze dropping to their feet, right where the desert sand runner meets the entrance.
"My moth-ther is-s-s coming t-t-today, and now you want to do this?!" Sylvester questions, shaking Wile's arms. "Did you even make the coffee?" Sylvester questions, throwing his head back as his arms slowly slide to Wile's wrists.
Wile E. opens his mouth, blinking for a moment, his gaze shifting back down the hallway to the kitchen where he hadn't even finished washing the pot in the deep metal sink.
"Of course you didn't," Sylvester concedes, throwing his hands over his face. "My mother thinks I'm a failure for being jobless."
"That's not my fault," Wile complains, his face slipping into a bored exasperation.
He had honestly only known the woman for a few minutes when Sylvester had said the word boyfriend. She had fainted backwards, woken up, taken one look at him before clutching her chest and screaming, "MURDERER!" He had honestly thought they were past the mommy's approval phase after she failed to give it.
"You killed her grandkids!" Sylvester screams, his hands outstretched in indignation beneath the heavy stained-glass chandelier.
"No, I didn't," Wile complains, folding his arms.
"Well, you killed the potential for her to have biological grandchildren!" Sylvester complains, turning away toward the dark wood of the drawing room.
"I didn't do that either. Tell her to come over in a few months, we can start working on the kids now. You can carry them," Wile suggests, striding over behind Sylvester, his boots stepping over the red carpet printed with the despairing, caged Tweety.
Sylvester turns around, glowering down at him, his eyes flickering under the shadow of the giant golden cage spanning overhead.
Wile E. halts in his tracks, turning to walk the other way around the deep chestnut coffee table. "I don't see why I have to suffer for your mother's nonsense. Your brother doesn't even have a husband to buy him a house. In comparison to him, you're the First Lady," Wile rumbles, striding back down the desert-sand carpeted hall toward the kitchen.
Wile, trying to look over his shoulder, his lips twitching at the corners, slumped into a suggestive shrug just to give Sylvester one last chance.
Sylvester's glare had only deepened, growing more ferocious by the second beside the unlit fireplace rotisserie, before finally slamming one of his hands from his hips to aim sharply at the kitchen door.
Wile turned, his face falling as he shook his head. That old woman always seemed to want something, and now she was sucking the joy out of his marriage just by existing. She had better grant the apartment to the other kid, her ashes aren't stepping into this house, he grumbled to himself.
"What-t-t?!" Sylvester called, his teeth dragging on the 'T'.
Without turning around, Wile could see it: the sharp glare, the folded arms, the posture of indignation that was entirely unearned against the backdrop of dark wood and snow-globe-lined counters.
Wile slumped back into the kitchen, leaning over the deep metal sink, his eyes catching on the cloud of sky as he waited for the next feathered thing to pass by—the vacuum hot, the insufficient preparation for a woman that simply would never be pleased.