b y y o u r s i d e

chapter.

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it was a warm summer evening.  Alex and Simon, as usual, were on a trip together, or an "adventure", as they liked to call it. they had spotted this hill near to  a river for the night. it didn't look quite reassuring: the plants and the dirt were humid if not completely wet, the river was muddy and all  animals that were present were strange and probably dangerous insects.

though, this place wasn't scary neither was it uncomfortable,

as long as Alex is with me, Simon thought.

since they had just arrived, they had to get  their stuff ready so that they could rest as soon as possible. lighting a fire was their first priority in order to survive the cold night that was about to come. "hey Alex, do you still have some wood in reserve ?" asked Simon, who was now a human boy. Alex his anxiety was easily noticeable on his face as reaction to Simon's question.

"ehh...lemme check", he grabbed his bag, already knowing what he would find in it, which was nothing but bottles of water and other provision, but no wood.  the place was too wet to have any kind of flammable plants around or anything dry enough to light a fire. "we're fucked." Alex thought. "did you find anything ?"

"take off your shirt" said Alex to Simon. not as in order, he actually said it in a very soft yet confident way, which didn't make Simon any less surprised, well disturbed. he had decided to ignore the weird thoughts that were getting louder in his head after Alex his comment, and just say "what ?". "your shirt bud, I need ya to take it off" Alex his response didn't make his intentions any clearer, and Simon was now getting anxious, but he decided to do it anyway.

as he was handing it to Alex, he asked "uhm...w-why do you need it ?". Alex giggled, a bit surprised that Simon hadn't understood his idea yet. "for the fire of course!!", since there was a town pretty close on their way, Alex would buy a new shirt for Simon once they'd get there, probably the next day. he couldn't use his precious leather jacket for the fire, and either way if Simon was too cold, he could give it to him for the night. but Simon didn't seem to understand all of that.

"HUH?? but Alex! I'm gonna freeze to death!!" the small guy was so worried for his life that he hadn't realized the situation, but eventually after a couple of seconds complaining, he started paying intention to his shirtless chest, exposed to Alex his sight. his face, for the first time in his back-to-human existence, turned red and his heartbeat went faster. he thought he was just really affraid of dying and that would be why his body behaved this way, but he was obviously flustered. Alex had noticed...

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