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“I had a weird dream last night,” said Pepper.
The other three Them, sitting and sprawling about the quarry gnawing on apples, turned eagerly towards her. A weird dream was always a promising beginning to a conversation, and often good for sparking new game ideas as well. The Them would know, having plenty of experience in the arena of weird dreaming.
Now, though, Pepper’s face was unusually somber, brows drawn together in a pensive expression that was different from the typical seriousness with which the Them approached all manner of creative topics. She didn’t go on.
That was odd, Pepper not typically being one to hold back words. The other three were not sure what to do with this novel situation. Instinctively, Brian and Wensleydale both looked to Adam for leadership.
Adam bit his lip, and didn’t say anything.
“What was the dream about?” Wensleydale asked after a minute, when it was clear that Pepper was not going to elaborate without prompting.
“I don’t know,” Pepper said, and that sort of statement was stranger still. She looked at Adam as well, lifting a free hand to point an almost-accusatory finger at him. “I was… I was following you! Adam. In the woods. All of us were.” She glanced over at their four-legged fifth, currently napping near Adam’s milk crate, legs twitching in a presumed dream of his own. “Dog was there, too.”
“That’s all? Just us following Adam somewhere?” Brian was unimpressed. “That’s not weird.”
“Yeah,” Wensley agreed. “It’s just normal, actually. We follow Adam to places all the time.”
“I know we do,” Pepper snapped. “Of course we do.” She bit moodily into the core of her apple, chewed, and spit out the seeds. When her mouth was eventually available for other usage again, she said slowly, uneasily, “But… but in the dream, we didn’t want to.”
Silence reigned in the quarry. It was deafening enough that Dog woke up. Adam leaned over quietly to scratch his ears.
“Why,” said Wensley at last, voice oddly shaky for a discussion that was only, after all, about a weird dream, “why were we doing it, then?”
“Yeah,” said Brian. “Why?”
Pepper shook her head. There was a haunted look in her eyes, momentarily mirrored in the others’ troubled faces.
For his part, Adam still wasn’t quite meeting any of their gazes.
Then she blinked, and most of the hauntedness faded away with a shrug. “Dunno. It was just a weird dream. Like I said.”
“Just a dream,” Brian echoed.
“Weird dream,” Wensleydale added conscientiously.
Dog shook himself. The Them followed his example.
“Okay,” said Pepper eventually. “That’s enough about dreams. I’m done with my apple. Adam, what should we do today?”
Adam looked at her, and around at the others, all of them looking back at him with easy, comfortable expectation. The ease of familiar roles. The expectation that came of knowing without doubt that Adam would always lead, and they would always — willingly, yet inevitably — follow.
Adam hesitated. He patted Dog.
“What do you want to do?” he asked finally. “Doesn’t seem fair I should always decide, does it?”
The Them stared at him.
“What?” said Wensleydale.
“I was jus’ thinkin’,” Adam explained, with uncharacteristic diffidence. “I mean, I jus’ thought, it’s only sens’ble. There are four of us, we should take turns to decide.” He shifted uncertainly on his crate. “Doesn’t seem fair for me to get all the turns, is all. An’… so… if one of you wants to be leader this time…” He trailed off.
The Them continued to stare in bafflement, trying to figure out what to make of their ringleader’s transformation.
This time, Adam met their eyes in return.
Dog licked his hand.
Pepper, as usual, rallied first. “Sure,” she said. “Um. What about…” She struggled for a moment. “What about pirates?”
“Pirates?” said Adam. They all leaned forward, interested.
“My mum told me about one called Grace O’Mellon. My mum said…”
Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad, Adam decided, as Pepper continued with an impromptu women’s history lesson and the others chimed in with their own game ideas, to find out what it was like to follow someone else taking the lead for once.