The four of us are slowly making our way to my burrow, me sitting on top of Peaches while Diego and Shira walk beside us. The rain has faded to a light fog that only reaches up a little above my head. It curls like smoke around us as we trudge through it. I look over at Diego; he's looking back at me through the fog. I swear I see him wink at me before kissing Shira on the cheek. Shira chuckles and looks up at me with a face that reads 'that's your cue.' I blush, partly because I'm always embarrassed around others but also because I'm surprised that they care enough to try to get me to tell her.
Shira tries to warm up Peaches for me by asking, "So, Peaches. How long have you two known each other?" I keep forgetting that Shira's only been here a few weeks. She still doesn't know a lot about us. Of course, the 'us' is merely wishful thinking. I don't know my status in the herd, let alone if I'm even really in it.
Peaches says innocently, "Oh... Ever since we were little."
"How did you meet?" Shira asks.
"Um..." Peaches says, trying to remember. "We had to be like five, or something. I was out exploring with Crash and Eddie, and we found this little hole in the ground. I couldn't see inside it. Crash told me that monsters lived in holes, so I was scared to look. But Eddie dared me to reach in, and I was not about to be shown up by my uncles. I stuck my trunk in ever so slowly; Crash yelled, 'Boo!' and I screamed, but I kept reaching in. I was curious. At first I felt something sharp and thought it was a monster, but it was small. So, I pulled it out. Then there was this little prickly ball in my trunk."
I feel kind of weird listening to Peaches tell the story of how she met me, but it's a good weird.
"Suddenly, the ball opened. And there he was, shivering from being brought out into the cold. He said, 'Hi, my name's Louis. What's yours?' with that cute, shy voice he has, and I told him, 'My name's Peaches.' right before his parents came rushing out of the burrow looking for him."
"And how about you, Louis?" Shira asks, feigning curiosity though I've already figured out that she's meddling. "What were you thinking when you met Peaches?"
"What? Uh... I was kinda cold." I look down at Shira pleadingly. I can't just tell her that she was the only thing I thought about for weeks after that.
"Yeah... I guess that makes sense," Shira says, "but what did you think of Peaches?"
"Oh..." I say, blushing. "I thought she was... pretty."
"Come on, Louis." Diego jumps in. He was the one who had found Peaches out exploring on that day that changed the rest of my life.
"What?" I ask.
"I saw the way you stared at her, with that look of wonder and emphatuation you still get every time you look at her." He smirks, and I hear Peaches chuckle. What does that mean? This is more disorienting than digging straight into a rock. Why'd she chuckle? Is it a good thing? Does she think that's cute? Or just childish?
*Thwak*
At that moment, a tree branch snaps back into position after Peaches had moved it to pass. It rakes across my face. I lose my balance and role backwards off Peaches' back. Falling's always been a terrible thing to me; I'm petrified of heights. I land, or rather collapse, on my sore spines. Needless to say, that wasn't a very enjoyable experience, but, at least this time, Peaches is right there.
"Louis! Oh gosh, are you okay!?" She scoops me up. "I'm so sorry. I am so sorry, I forgot you were back there."
"Yeah, yeah. I'm fine." Peaches is looking at me, tears welling in her eyes. "I'm okay, Peaches. Don't worry." I rub my nose, and feel warm, sticky blood on my hand. My nose is bleeding slightly, but I'm more concerned about my eye, which I can feel swelling and darkening.
"Well that could've gone better." I say to no one in particular.
"Ooh," Diego says, "That's one heck of a black eye."
"Guys, I don't care about my eye right now. It doesn't hurt that much; now can we please high tail it to my burrow?" Truthfully, it does kind of hurt a lot, but I want to get Peaches her necklace and get back to the cave as quickly as we can.
"Yeah." Shira confirms.
"Well then," Peaches continues, "Let's head out."
Maybe I merely have a concussion, but there's something dazzling, head-spinning, about this whole thing. I still don't know if Peaches l-loves me back, but she's holding me so caringly and benevolently. She's holding me the way I'd hold her if we switched places and I was a mammoth and she a molehog. Like I'm something loveable, she doesn't want to let go of me, but she doesn't want to hold on too tight either. She's enwrapping me as if she feels guilty for accidentally lashing me with that stick, but I don't want her to feel guilty. She's fantastic, outright blindingly fantastic.
I hold onto Peaches as we walk. Not hard, but just enough that I hope she gets it. I sit still in Peaches' trunk and just exist, not caring about anything. Of course, it's more like a shaky, staccato of caring too much about everything and also not caring about anything in particular all at once. But it's hard to distinguish between pure empathy and just plain apathy, not that I'm at either of those extremes.
I'm just happy. Happy to be in Peaches' embrace. Happy to have friends who care enough about me to push me to say what I need to. Happy because otherwise I'd be miserable, and happy that it doesn't crush me to recognize that.
This chapter's song is "Say" by John Mayer.