"Peaches, wait! I can jump in myself!"
"Nope! We all know you'll chicken out if I let you go, Louis!" Peaches yells, holding me by her trunk and racing toward the pond. She's right, of course. I'm not the best swimmer, nor am I very interested in practicing. Peaches stops right before the pond and says, "Okay, you've got one chance to get in the water before I toss you in myself."
"Um," I respond, "I'm uh… I'm gunna climb down before I…"
"Come on, Wiener! Just jump in already!" Crash interrupts. The three possums are all floating side-by-side.
"Fine." I concede.
Just as I'm actually about to jump in, Peaches dives into the pond with me still in her trunk. We go quite a bit deeper than I'd have gone alone because she's much bigger than me, so I'm kind of freaking out. I panic and let all of the air out of my lungs, which makes me panic more. I start scratching toward the surface, but I don't think I'll be able to make it that far without passing out. Though my leg's feeling a lot better, I can still barely kick with it.
I'm about to give up when Peaches' trunk grabs me and pulls me up.
"Woops," She says, hugging me with her trunk, "I forgot that you're not very good at that whole 'not drowning' thing. Are you all right?"
I cough up some water, smile adoringly and say, "Yeah. I'd say I'm… relatively adequate."
Peaches nuzzles me against her trunk, then moves me away and gasps, "I know how you can swim! Well, more or less…"
"Huh?" I ask. She starts to lower me down toward the water. I apprehensively grab onto the end of her trunk and partially curl into a ball.
She sets me carefully on the surface of the water, spines first. Am I floating? I try to turn over, but can't. I'm floating! What the heck!? I almost want to laugh at how awkward this feels, half curled up into a ball with water literally everywhere around me but by face. I'd laugh, but it's somewhat embarrassing to be in such an uncooperative and vulnerable position with everyone looking at me.
I hear Crash and Eddie chuckling and James giggling behind me. I'm never going to hear the end of this… On the spur of the moment, I look up at Peaches, my face downcast and questioning. I don't get it, why'd she put me like this? I can't move, I can barely keep from rolling over, I don't even know what's going on. She's staring at me ponderingly. I have to admit, she looks awfully pretty with her hair up in a mess and the sun sparkling off her fur, but I don't want her to see me feeling so lousy.
"Awe…" She says tenderly, "Louis, you kind of look adorable."
"Thanks," I say modestly, "but… could I have some help getting out of the water now? This is not, what you unabashed mammals may refer to as, comfy." I reach my claws up and grab onto Peaches' trunk; she pulls me up and holds me. Crash starts to move around disconcertedly.
"Uh, Eddie?" Crash asks.
Eddie swims slightly away from us, chuckles embarrassedly and says, "Yes?"
"Why is the water warm?"
"What do you mean? It doesn't feel any warmer to me…" Eddie answers reluctantly.
"Gosh dang it, Eddie! Did you pee!?"
Everyone bolts away from Eddie as quickly as possible, leaving him staring at the water ashamedly.
"Ugh, that's disgusting!" James says.
"You said it!" Peaches agrees. A tremor runs through Eddie and he looks up at everyone while not really looking at anyone. Then he walks to the shore and takes off running.
"Eddie, wait!" Peaches and Crash shout at the same time.
I jump into the conversation, "Guys, I'll get him." Peaches puts me on the ground at the shore. My leg doesn't hurt very badly, but I'm not sure it's a good idea to try running on it, so I dig into the dirt and off toward Eddie.
I must trip him when I pass because I hear him fall over. I poke my head out of the ground. Eddie stands up. Brushing himself off, he says, "Leave me alone." He starts walking again. I climb out of my hole and more or less hop-run over to him, my leg stinging slightly when I balance myself with it.
I reach him, put my arm on his shoulder, spin him around, and say, "Come back, I can't follow you for much longer with my leg."
"Good." He says, and keeps walking. I sigh, not really wanting to follow him, but I continue to hop along.
I say, "Manny told us we were only allowed to go out if we all stayed together. He's going to freak if he finds out you left."
Eddie stops, but then he starts again at a quicker pace and says, "See if I care."
"Well, obviously you care a whole heck of a lot more than you're letting on. Otherwise you wouldn't have left in the first place." I say, trying to keep up with him.
He turns around and stares at me heatedly, clenching his fists. "Shut up!" He orders, "I don't need you psycho-analysis-isizing me."
"First of all, it's pronounced 'psychoanalyzing.'" I say. He just about punches me, but I continue anyway, "And secondly, since when do you care what anyone thinks about you? I've known you for long enough to know that something like this shouldn't be bothering you as much as it is."
"Well then obviously you haven't…" He retorts callously.
I take a deep breath, trying to not give up on the conversation. "Listen," I assert, "literally. No. One. Cares. About. What. You. Did."
"You heard James! …and peaches. They said I was disgusting!" He yells almost miserably.
"Okay, okay… wait a second." I say, "They were disgusted because you peed in the water that they were in… It's not like they really cared all that much… I'm sure dozens of animals have peed in that pond." I cringe a bit after I say that.
"You're not helping, you know." I can tell he's a little cheered up though, at least his voice doesn't sound so sad. I still need to get him back to the group though. The pond may be relatively close to where most of the animals congregate, but Manny will still smash us if we're not with Peaches when he shows up. I really hope I'm exaggerating...
"I had a feeling you'd say that." I respond. "But, listen, just come back and sit near the pond and watch everyone or something. You don't have to talk to anyone if you don't want, but we should probably get back there before Manny comes to check on us." Eddie nods his head slightly, looking down at his feet. Seriously though, what's gotten him so worked up? I've never seen him experiencing any other emotion besides comically happy for more than a second, and I've never once seen him embarrassed about anything. I was beginning to think he didn't even know what embarrassment was.
…
Sitting next to Eddie while watching Peaches having fun- without the droning of my peers nearby to keep me from being myself- is kind of boring, mostly because Eddie doesn't appear to want to talk to anyone about anything.
I wait another few minutes, sitting there awkwardly, hoping he'll say something. Eventually, he finally tries to start up a conversation.
"Um, Wiener…" He clears his throat, "I mean Louis…"
"Yeah?"
"I'm sorry I was such a jerk back there. I shouldn't have made you walk with your leg… and I shouldn't have yelled at you... You were just trying to help."
"Calm down, Eddie." I say reassuringly, "It's fine. You were embarrassed, I get it…"
"No. I'm not sure you do." He says hesitantly.
"Then what is it?" Eddie looks down at Crash and James who are taking turns jumping off of Peaches' trunk into the water.
"I'm only telling you this because I know you don't have anyone else to share it with."- FINALLY SOMEONE GETS IT- "So, and I can't stress this enough, don't tell anyone." Great… just great… another secret. Apparently I am about to become the keeper of every secret in the herd, which is a terrible idea. It's like I'm the king of secrets! Which is weird because I've always thought I was the king of stuttering… or shyness… or being abhorrently bad at keeping secrets…
"Fine. What's one more secret gunna do?" I say, demonstrating my former point…
"What?"
"Never mind… Just, uh… ignore me and go on."
"Okay…" He takes a deep breath and closes his eyes tight, "I think I might be… gay… And, and… I, maybe… just a little bit… like James…"
Sorry this took so long. (You can thank finals for that...) This chapter's song is "Dance, Dance" by Fall Out Boy.