"I think they were just trying to get rid of us," Audrey complained, and Uma just shrugged as they all started their trek down the road.
After Anne and George found out about their enormous mishap with the milking, they had proclaimed that the girls needed a break from farm life. So, naturally, they suggested what Audrey had officially dubbed a farm activity to draw them away from their troubles. After all, it was their last official full day there, and the elderly couple wanted them to enjoy it.
All five of them were dressed down significantly in only thin tank tops and short shorts as they walked down a dirt side road in search of a supposed creek that crossed the road not too far from the house.
Needless to say, Audrey wasn't enjoying it all.
"If they were, it certainly worked," Uma remarked, scratching at her bare shoulder absent-mindedly as they looked for any signs of a stream.
"But the thing is, I don't get it. Why would they send us to a stream of all things?" Audrey questioned, and Mal just shook her head nervously.
Evie quickly noticed the smaller girl's fear, and she squeezed Mal's hand in her own tightly and comfortingly. Evie knew that Mal was terrified of any body of water. Evie was sure that she would have an extremely hard time getting Mal to get in water that reached her mid-calves, which was approximately how deep this stream was supposed to be.
"It's going to be okay," Evie assured Mal reassuringly, and Mal looked at Evie somewhat worriedly but nodded trustingly.
"Hey, y'all, there it is!" Uma called from the front of the group with Audrey. Uma pointed down the road, and the rest of the girls approached where Uma and Audrey were standing.
"It really is crossing the road," Audrey remarked in suprise, and Uma looked at her with an eyebrow raised.
"Well, did you expect any less?"
"No, but I've just never quite seen anything like it," Audrey told her defensively.
"Let's go see it!" Evie excitedly cried, and Jane nodded wholeheartedly, despite the fact that she really didn't like the revealing clothes that she was wearing.
The five of them headed down the road and they approached the creek carefully, examining it with interest. However, everyone's types of interests seemed to vary greatly from person to person. Mal's was an interest in getting away from the water, Evie's was an interest in viewing its beauty, Uma's was an interest in getting into it, Jane's was an interest to examine the little minnows dwelling within it, and Audrey's was an interest in going back to the farmhouse.
"Oh, it's so pretty! A babbling brook," Evie pointed out, enthralled by the beauty of the stream, and Mal kept silent. Audrey's eyes went wide as she realized just how muddy the water was and how undoubtedly disgusting it was.
"We're supposed to get in this?!" Audrey demanded, and Evie shrugged and nodded slightly.
"Yeah, I guess."
"Nope, nope, nope, I'm not doing it," Audrey proclaimed loudly after only a moment, and as she was turning to leave in the direction from which they had all just came, Uma grabbed her around her midsection and pulled her back so that she was standing at the edge of the water.
"Now, now, you wouldn't want to disappoint Miss Anne and Mister George, would you?" Uma asked, and Audrey shot her a dirty look for Uma's ridiculing of her formal titles for people.
"Well… who's getting in?"
"I definitely want to," Uma told them, and before anyone could say anything, the pirate kicked off her shoes and stepped right in the water, walking over to the right side of the stream where it was off of the road and slightly deeper.
"What the heck are you doing?! What if people see us out here in the water nearly naked and wet on top of that when they're driving by?!" Audrey demanded.
Uma shrugged, and started to follow the stream to the sharp bend not too far down. All of the other girls shared a glance and Evie picked up Uma's shoes as they trailed along the embankment to follow the pirate.
It soon came to their attention that the embankment was getting perpetually steeper until the girls were looking down into a ditch that was about as deep as Uma was tall. At the bottom, there was a small sandy bank and the stream. Uma was standing in the middle of it, and there was a tree that was growing directly on the edge of the embankment facing the road, which covered up any views of possible passersby on the road. It was ultimately an area of isolation.
"Now you have no excuse to not get in, Princess Pansy," Uma expressed to Audrey, performing a fake curtsy. Evie and Mal shared a glance, and Evie took Mal's hand in her own tightly as she helped the faerie down the edge of the embankment. Audrey rolled her eyes with a huff, and hesitantly started to attempt to climb down onto the sandy edges of the water with Jane just behind her.
Once they were all on the sand, Jane walked forward, taking off her shoes, and stepped into the water with Uma, a huge grin lighting up her face as she enjoyed the water running over her toes.
Mal was just staring at the stream, looking at where it led and thinking of how far it likely stretched. Evie squeezed Mal's hand as she positioned her mouth nearby the other girl's ear as she whispered.
"It's okay, M. It's not going to sweep you away. It only reaches your calves," Evie reassuringly told the girl, and Mal nodded, swallowing hard as she mustered as much courage as she could gather. Evie took off her shoes carefully nearby Jane's and Mal followed along at Evie's calm but insistent gaze.
Evie then stepped back from her, still holding Mal's hand tightly in her own as she gently pulled Mal toward the creek. Evie stepped backwards into it, and Mal watched her carefully as she attempted to push through her fear and follow the slightly older girl.
Mal soon found herself in the water as well, and she stood still, letting it wash around her as she held onto Evie tightly. Evie let her hold on as tightly and as long as she wanted, willing to do anything that would make Mal comfortable with the water.
Uma just grinned at the sight of everyone in her natural element before realizing that Audrey was the only one not in there with them.
Audrey was standing on the edge of the stream, her arms crossed over her chest as she stubbornly and adamantly refused to get in.
"Oh, come on. Can't you have any fun?" Uma asked, and Audrey just turned her nose up at the stream. Uma rolled her eyes, and she reached down, cupping a considerable amount of water in her hands. She then pushed forward, splashing the pink princess.
Audrey spluttered, her tank top and shorts successfully somewhat damp, and she glared at Uma.
"What is wrong with you?! I could get the leg-losing disease!" Audrey screeched, and Uma raised an eyebrow at her, completely unimpressed.
"What's that?"
"You know! That disease! The one that you get when in streams or outside, unchlorinated water and it gets in your nose, in your ears, or in your mouth!"
"How does it work exactly?"
"The germs and stuff from the unclean water crawl into your body parts and eat at you from the inside out. Before you know it, the doctors are chopping off your limbs and you're a legless, armless blob rolling around!" Audrey hysterically explained, and Evie raised an eyebrow at Audrey's assessment, knowing there were a million more elegant ways to put it that weren't quite so crazy.
"Like a turd in the wind?" Uma questioned curiously, and Mal snorted, which prompted Evie to smile due to the fact that it signified Mal's growing comfort in the situation.
"Exactly!" Audrey cried, and Uma pretended to think about this for a moment. Uma pursed her lips before shrugging at Audrey.
"Huh. I think we oughtta take our chances on that one," Uma told her before surging out of the water and grabbing the girl's arms tightly in her grasp.
Audrey immediately started screeching, trying to yank her wrists from Uma's hold. But Uma was too strong for the princess as she backed up into the water. Uma slowly turned around, before yanking Audrey so that she was the one backing into the water.
Audrey fought against her with everything she had, and Uma pushed as hard as she could against the force of the princess. Uma finally managed to get Audrey into the water where Uma was fighting to keep Audrey there.
"Well, well, well, what's goin' on here?" a strange voice rang out suddenly and Uma let go of Audrey. However, Audrey was still pushing against Uma and she flew forward into the water face-first. Uma instinctively got into a defensive sort of stance, her eyes hardening slightly as she looked in the direction that the voice came from.
To her complete and utter surprise, there were four boys standing on top of the high banks of the stream in rolled up jeans and nothing else. They had no shirts on and no shoes, for that matter, and every one of them had huge grins on their faces.
"Uma!" Audrey cried suddenly, interrupting Uma from her staring at the boys. Uma looked down at the princess, dripping wet from where she had fell into the water and her clothes clinging to her skin tightly.
Uma grabbed Audrey's arm and hoisted her up with a slight smirk, letting her guard down as she realized that there was a perfect opportunity to embarrass the princess beyond all belief.
Audrey grabbed onto Uma's upper-arm tightly, turning to face what Uma seemed to be looking at so intently. Her eyes went wide and her jaw went slack as she gaped at the group of boys standing there staring at the group of girls.
Uma grinned widely, expecting this reaction. However, she definitely didn't expect it when Audrey backed up right into her in the midst of what Uma assumed was almost pure panic.
"Hi," Evie was the first to speak, and Mal looked at her best friend. Mal almost groaned at the look that Evie had on her face. Her eyes were lit up with a sparkle, and her face had that flirtatious grin that she always had when she saw some boy that she felt attraction toward. Mal sighed deeply at the bluenette, really dreading what was to come next.
"Well, hi to you, too," replied a dark-haired boy with a cute crooked smile and a very much affected accent. Mal just raised an eyebrow, having to admit that Evie did have good reason to be smitten. But that was just how the boy looked. Mal had no idea what these four creeps were doing out here while the three girls were swimming.
"What, um… What are y'all up to?" a sandy-haired one questioned somewhat shyly, his eyes mostly on Uma as he spoke. Mal almost wanted to laugh, knowing that boy was certainly barking up the wrong tree.
"Standing in the water. What're y'all up to?" Uma sent back his question sassily, and the boy just laughed in response to her, looking enamored by her and very awkward at the same time.
"I don't think I've seen y'all around here," one in the back with pretty blue eyes addressed them as he leaned against the tree, gazing at Audrey. Uma reeled a bit as Audrey slammed into her again, and Uma immediately knew that Audrey was scared to death of these boys for some reason.
Honestly, Uma wasn't scared of them in the least. They were a bunch of silly teenage boys that had spied up five girls dressed down in hardly anything. That was all that there was to it.
"Well, we just came here," Evie told them with one of those much too big, much too toothy grins that she was so infamous for. That first boy with the dark hair seemed to really have his eyes on her, and he effortlessly hopped down so that he was down there with them. The other three boys wasted no time in following him.
One of them approached Mal, a boy with brown eyes that somehow reminded Mal of Evie's. They weren't as trusting, though, or as soft, and they had much more mischief in them.
"Where'd y'all come from? Heaven?" the boy completely unsubtly asked Mal, and Mal just scoffed at him, looking him right in those cocky eyes as she gazed at him brazenly.
"How long did it take you to come up with that one?" Mal questioned, keeping her fingers firmly laced with Evie's, and the boy chuckled at her with a giant smile.
"Hank, don't you got no manners?" the blue-eyed one that had picked out Audrey demanded.
"We all know you ain't got none, Beau," Hank pointed out, and Mal knew from her gaze that he was easily referencing the fact that Beau hadn't taken his eyes off Audrey since he first looked at her.
The original dark-haired boy looked at the exchange before quickly turning back his attentions to Evie with a huge smile.
"So, what's your name?" Evie's dark-haired admirer asked, and Mal could feel Evie leaning hard against her as she melted into a puddle of giggly goo.
"Mal- no! No, she's Mal!" Evie pointed at Mal as she practically lost all good sense in her brain. It was truly a shame, Mal thought, that Evie would lose her mind finally because of some random boy from the sticks.
"I'm Evie. What's your name?" Evie questioned with a bat of her eyelashes as she giggled breathlessly.
"Aw, mine ain't near as purdy as yours. I'm Bobby Ray," he introduced himself sweetly and Mal almost rolled her eyes as she tried to keep a close eye on Evie's situation and simultaneously watch her own admirer that was getting a little too close for comfort.
Mal narrowed her eyes at him, and purposefully exhibited her wedding band in a gesture in front of her face as she scratched her forehead gently. Hank obviously caught on fast and he backed away from her, instead deciding that he'd go and admire Jane.
"That's cute," Evie complimented as she looked at the boy, and Mal almost wanted to gag. Bobby Ray's name was anything but cute. It was the corniest name Mal had ever heard in her whole life.
Bored, Uma stood there between Beau and Audrey as she unintentionally blocked Audrey from having to look or get near him.
The sandy-haired boy that had his eye on Uma the entire time was starting to draw a bit too close for Uma's comfort, though, so Uma turned and looked at him, accidentally exposing Audrey to Beau.
"Whatchu doing, boy?" Uma questioned him, and he backed up quickly, his eyes wide as he admired her in all of her somewhat intimidating glory.
"I'm Junior, Lester Junior. But everybody 'round here calls me Junior," Junior introduced himself, stuttering as he gaped at Uma. Uma just raised an eyebrow at him, enjoying his speechlessness and absently noting that she had heard the name Lester somewhere before.
"What's, what's your name?" he questioned, and Uma shortly replied her name, and he looked even more starstruck. Uma rolled her eyes, but turned her attention to the scene that was unfolding beside her with Audrey and blue-eyed Beau.
"Hey beautiful, you're mighty purdy. Anybody ever told you that?" Beau asked, those handsome eyes looking at her from underneath his serious-set brows. Audrey immediately wished that those were Jay's eyes, because they never looked at her like they held the desire to just devour her whole on the spot. Well, they didn't not ever, but when they did, it was usually a reciprocated desire and it was much more comfortable because she knew him and wanted him to look at her that way.
"It's Audrey, and yeah. My boyfriend. Who's really bad and who'd beat you up if he saw you flirting with me!"
"Where is he now?" Beau questioned, and Audrey swallowed, coming up with a lie on the spot in an attempt to get the boy to leave her alone.
"He's back at the road in his truck. He drove us here, and he's waiting for us to come back in a little while," Audrey informed him confidently, and Uma raised an eyebrow at her, impressed with Audrey's ability to lie so convincingly.
"That's funny. We came from over that way, and we didn't see no truck," Beau pointed out the fault in Audrey's yarn, and Audrey gaped for a moment before quickly thinking of another way to support what she was saying.
"Oh, well, he probably went to the, uh… Convenience store around the corner."
"There ain't no convenience store around the corner," he pointed out with a bit of amusement.
"Well, you just haven't been to the right corner," Audrey told him, crossing her arms over her chest uncomfortably. She didn't like how the boy was looking at her, and she was desperate to escape this situation.
"Good answer," Uma remarked under her breath, and Audrey shot her a look before nervously returning her gaze to the boy before her.
"Where did y'all really come from, though?" Billy Ray asked, and Evie immediately grinned widely as she straightened a bit, unconsciously leaning just a bit closer to the boy. Mal pulled on Evie's hand, trying to keep the girl from answering him. The last thing Mal wanted the boy to know was where they lived.
"We live at the Auradon castle," Evie told him, and looked back at Mal questioningly as Mal yanked on Evie's arm, trying to make her shut her mouth.
"That must be why you're so beautiful. You're a princess."
"Oh, I don't know if I'd go that far," Evie giggled wildly, enjoying the praise, and Mal watched as Evie's ego inflated ridiculously. Of course, it wasn't as if it wasn't always there, but it was usually less there until somebody puffed it up. Mal made sure to keep it inflated every once in a while. After all, Evie needed it like she needed air since she was so unbelievably self-conscious sometimes.
Mal tried to get a scope on Hank wherever he had disappeared to, and she quickly spotted him nearby a nervous and wide-eyed Jane that looked to be completely uncomfortable in the midst of his advances toward her.
"So what's your name, purdy?" Hank asked, and Jane was almost clammed up completely, but she managed to squeak out a "Jane."
"That's real nice. I've got an aunt named Jane," Hank informed her, easing his way nearer to her as Jane looked like she might pass out on the spot.
Mal immediately wanted to go and interfere but going all the way over there would leave Evie there to embarrass herself and get herself way in over her head.
Mal shared a glance with Uma, trying desperately to convey to her to go and defend Jane. Uma looked at her curiously, but quickly realized precisely what the faerie was getting at. Uma grabbed Jane's wrist in her hand firmly and pulled the girl over behind the pirate. Uma then subtly tapped at Audrey's hand and Audrey started to back up. However, when Beau tried to follow, Uma stepped in the way firmly.
"So what are y'all up to really? We never got a straight answer on that one," Uma returned to business, and the boys all shared a big grin.
"Oh, we was out here gigging some frogs and catchin' some crawdads for Pappy to cook up this evening," Bobby Ray answered her as if it were the most normal thing in the world. Audrey wrinkled her nose impulsively and Jane frowned slightly. Uma raised an eyebrow, somewhat interested. Of course, that was likely due to the fact that she was willing to try anything that came out of the water.
Out of her peripheral vision, Mal quickly spotted Evie deflating and shrinking back at the words that her admirer was uttering. Evie backed up so that she was at least even with Mal, if not a bit further back.
"Well… That's certainly… interesting," Evie commented, and Mal could hear the evident disgust in her voice. There wasn't a single bit of flirtatiousness left in the girl, and Mal knew at that point that Evie was most definitely over this boy.
Mal was almost ready to laugh. She could practically hear the thoughts running through Evie's head right then, and almost all of them were definitely surrounding the fact that these boys were some sort of untamed, wild animals.
"Aw, don't knock 'em 'till you try 'em. They good! Real good!" Hank assured her, and Jane squeaked as he offered her a wink. Mal felt Evie's grip on her hand tighten as she gazed upon the four boys.
"Hey, I-I got an idea!" Junior stammered a bit, still staring at Uma. Uma looked at him curiously, and the rest of the girls were honestly quite afraid of what his idea was.
"What if y'all came over this evenin' and try out Pappy's frog legs and crawfish chowder? We live just across from old man George's house," Junior suggested nervously, and all of the other boys nodded eagerly. Mal absently wondered if it had crossed the boys' minds that the girls could not know where that was if they weren't staying there.
However, what Uma had gathered from that statement was that she immediately knew how Lester was familiar. He was the man that owned the runaway donkey that tried to attack Uma.
"Well, we're actually busy this evening," Evie informed them with an apologetic tone of voice, and Audrey immediately jumped at the opportunity.
"Yes, yes! Extremely busy! So unbelievably busy," Audrey informed them, and Evie nodded emphatically, agreeing wholeheartedly with the pink princess.
"Yeah, we're busy… But what do those frog legs taste like?" Uma questioned, and all of the other girls glared at her as they mentally slapped her.
"Aw, they's the best thing y'all will ever put in y'all's mouths!" Beau proudly proclaimed to them, and Junior, Hank, and Bobby Ray expressed varying forms of concordance with this statement.
"Can't be. Shark's the best thing in the world to eat," Uma told them, and the boys shook their heads with wild, wolfish grins as they looked at Uma.
"Naw, naw, this stuff's great!" Hank told her.
"It's like chicken a-and fish all mixed into one!" Junior told her.
"And so, so good!" Bobby Ray expressed, and Uma raised her eyebrows, impressed at the praise that these boys were giving these frog legs. She was actually starting to feel an immense hankering for this food, too, and their talking wasn't helping her in the least.
"Those sound nice and everything, but we've got to-"
"Those do sound nice. I think we might would come on over for a taste," Uma informed them, and before Mal could even attempt to get the rest of them out of the invitation, the boys all got too excited to pay any attention to her protests.
"Honest?! Alright! Alright, then!" Hank grinned widely, punching Junior in the shoulder fondly.
"We'll be seeing y'all tonight, then!" Beau pronounced.
"Yeah, we better be on our way to go gig some frogs for tonight," Junior told them somewhat timidly and they all nodded eagerly.
"Yep, better be bringin' in more than the usual haul!" Hank yelled as he, Junior, and Beau climbed up the embankment to go look for more frogs.
"Come on, Bobby Ray!" Beau called, and Bobby Ray looked at Evie with a big grin that reminded Mal a little of Ben's stupid smiles that were so cute on him.
"Until tonight, Evie," he wished her. He even dared to take Evie's hand that was nearest to him, and he brought it up to his lips, kissing it gently as he attempted to look infinitely more suave than he actually was.
For her part, Evie just winced, but tried to cover it up with a smile as she felt her stomach get a little sick at the thought of this boy's attraction to her, despite the fact that she had encouraged it originally. He released her and turned to go and join the others.
Once the girls were sure that the boys were out of earshot, Audrey smacked Uma's arm and glared at her, the princess's nostrils flaring in pure irritation.
"Have you lost your mind?!" Audrey almost screeched, and Uma withdrew from Audrey defensively as she headed toward the sand bank where her shoes were resting.
"No. We're getting some good eating tonight," Uma told her, licking her lips just barely at the thought of the frog legs. Audrey did a full-body shiver in pure disgust as she followed Uma out of the water.
"Yeah, but at what cost?! Possibly our lives!"
"Those boys were harmless," Uma told her nonchalantly.
"I've watched movies about this, and I know for a fact that they do horrible things to you before killing you finally and hiding you so far in stump-jumper's paradise that you'll never be found again!" Audrey explained.
"Do you believe everything you watch on TV?" Uma questioned, and Audrey huffed in frustration as she hopped on one foot, pulling on her shoe.
"It's called historical fiction, Uma! It's like fiction, but it's really based on history!" Audrey proclaimed, and Uma just rolled her eyes.
"Personally, I'm with Audrey," Evie expressed somewhat quietly, and Mal just raised an eyebrow as she pulled on her shoe.
"You weren't a minute ago," Mal neutrally stated, not meaning it rudely or nicely. Evie immediately picked up on her irritation, and Mal felt Evie's hand on her arm.
"How was I supposed to know he was a savage frog-killer?" Evie questioned innocently, and Mal huffed as she finished putting on her shoes.
"I kept tugging on your arm to make you shut up," Mal told her, allowing a bit of her frustration at Uma and the entire situation to seep into her voice.
"Mal… You know I don't take non-verbal commands well," Evie weakly defended and Mal sighed just sighed deeply as they started back toward the road.
"Are you mad at me?" Evie asked in such a sweet and small voice that Mal couldn't help but bring her big sister closer to her in a side embrace as she rested her head on Evie's shoulder.
"No, sweetie. I'm mad at Uma," Mal pointed out, and Uma spun around toward her, walking backwards.
"What did I do?" Mal just glared at her and Evie looked at her somewhat disappointedly, successfully communicating volumes without a single word uttered. Uma just offered a guilty grin before averting her gaze with a small sigh.
They continued on in silence for a few more moments before Uma spoke up again.
"Well, we could all just focus on what's really important," Uma told them, and the other four looked at her curiously as they stepped onto the road.
"And what would that be?" Jane asked innocently.
"We'll be able to leave here saying we roughed it and had to eat frogs to survive."
Unfortunately, nobody could deny her logic there.
But everyone also couldn't deny how badly they didn't want to go that evening.
A/N: Sorry it took me so long to update this. :) I've been a little distracted because of some other fanfics I've been working on with Adventures in Babysitting and some Descendants oneshots, too. But here it is now! I hope you all enjoyed it, and please let me know what you thought!