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I picked my way through the forest, a steady calm settling inside me, with quiet precision hanging in the air of my footsteps. In my hand, I held a compass, and my eyes flickered back and forth between it and my surroundings. I stopped at the edge of a trickling stream to check my bearings. I am not a nature kind of guy, so it was no surprise when I almost entered the creek headfirst. The reflection showed hair poking out haphazardly with twigs. Mud had somehow cemented itself into patches in my hair. The bright blondeness of my hair stuck out like a sore thumb among all the foliage.
I pulled on my water boots from my backpack and placed them on my feet. Barely making any sound, I entered the shallow water. I touched the slick, dirty orange mud that layered the side in neat rivulets. I was scraping some of it into a container when a loud shout made itself known, “FUCKING HELL! SHIT.”
I grabbed my knife and stood up, making myself known. A figure with black hair and ghostly white skin stood with their arm propped against a tree and the other one cautiously touching their side. The already pale skin was fading further rapidly. The figure turned their head and dazedly said, “Will?” and then they collapsed.
I basically sprinted over to Nico. The second I got there; I checked his side that he had been so expressive about. The wound was deep and the blood loss at a scary level, but I had seen worse with him and while it scared me, it didn’t scare me as badly as it usually did.
“Fuck.” I realized that the wound was a lot deeper than I thought it was. I closed my eyes and started my hymn. I had no medical supplies because, a. I was alone and b. I could literally heal myself. Hours may have passed, but they were nothing compared to the intense scrutiny that I held on Nico’s wound. I was reaching my breaking point and about to join Nico in the unconscious state when I finished.
I sat back on my heels hard and opened my eyes, surveying the sky’s light, waiting for Nico to come around. His eyes flickered open and his hand jerked out, hitting me in the side. I winced and rubbed at it while he tried to stand up. When he looked at me, he did something very unexpected for Nico. He ran and hugged me.
“Whoa, do you have an alternate personality right now?”
“I thought you were going to die. They told me you were going to die.” I heard a couple of sniffles. Nico was crying. I rubbed circles on his back, trying to calm him down.
“I am here, safe with you.”
We stood there for a second and then Nico pulled back, wiping his eyes with the back of his hand.
“This never happened, okay?”
“This happened, and it is okay that it happened, so I am not going to forget it. But if you don’t want me to bring it up, that I can do.” I gave a light smile. He not-so-lightly punched me.
“Dude, we need to work on that,” I complained, rubbing again at another bruise I was going to get from this endeavor.
He gave a quick little laugh before turning a little more morose. “What are you doing out here?” he asked as I headed back to the stream, confident that he would follow.
“Well, for your birthday in a couple of months, I want to make you something, so I have spent the last little bit working on my pottery skills.”
“And why is no one out here with you?”
“Well, because this is your gift, and I didn’t want anyone else to see it. And because I wanted to do this on my own so I could tell you that I did this on my own. Also, because I am sure anyone that did pottery would laugh at my weird insistence to go find the clay and feel it out first. I don’t think that is how you use this clay, and this probably isn’t even the right clay.” I looked quietly at my clay in the container with a smile on my lips. He gave a little “oh.”
I turned and was finishing what I started earlier that day. “This is going to take a second.” Nico sat on the bank while I felt along the ridge for some of the stuff around what I wanted.
A little while later, I stood up and wiped my brow, smearing clay. All of a sudden, Nico said, “Boo.” As mentioned before, I am not a nature type of guy and had gotten too used to the quiet, so I jumped backwards, tripped, and fell in the water. The ice-cold water enveloped me. I stood up, shaking from the cold, and the preparation I had gone through to make sure I stayed dry was ruined. Nico was rolling around laughing. I gave him a dark look before mopping myself off as best I could and then packed my stuff away, taking Nico’s “boo” as him reaching his limit in boredom.
I started my way back before I heard footsteps catching up to me. He grabbed my hand and then shadows started gathering around me and him. I turned back to him, starting to warn him off, knowing what he was doing, but it was too late.
We popped back at camp, people barely giving us a second glance. He sidestepped my glare and brought me to his cabin. When we entered, he removed my backpack and grabbed a pile of my clothes that he had folded—since when did he fold—and sent me to the showers. Before he sent me away, he gave me a quick kiss. “I am really glad you’re not dead.” We held each other’s gaze, knowing that if either one of us didn’t make it out of adolescence, it would almost certainly crush the other one. Then Nico ducked out of my gaze. “Go take a shower. I can’t hug you like this.”