DARLING, chris chambers

twelve

Jackie Favelle

We all stopped to look at the view of a grassy hill and even more trees.

"God, the tracks go way out of the way." Teddy says after Chris.

"If we cut across this field right here, we'll be there in an hour." We stared in peace at the hilly scenery. "I think we should stick to the tracks." 

"I say we go across the field." I turn my gaze to everyone. "Gordie?" 

"Yeah, let's go." Gordie answers and everyone bolts off.

I stop my sprinting to wait for Vern. "Hey, you guys. Wait up for me!" Vern starts off on a good sprint then face-plants into the ground. I chortle at the chubby boy spitting grass and dirt from his mouth. 

"Poor boy, are you alright?" I ask through tears of laughter. 

After awhile, the trail started to become muddy and wet. My sneakers were being weighed down by dried up clumps of mud and grass. Everyone is exhausted because it feels like walking with bricks as shoes.

"I hate this shortcut." Vern whined. "I hate this shortcut." Teddy mocks him. I shake my head at the boys in front of me. Vern then swings a fake punch towards Teddy's face and Teddy flinches. "You flinched! Two for flinching." 

Teddy decks Vern twice in the arm and Vern stops screeching. "But you flinched." 

"I know. Two for flinching." Vern has a face full of hurt and disbelief.

Now, we had to face a swamp and I was so done with hiking. "How are we supposed to get across this?" 

"We use you as a raft." Teddy teased Vern. "Very funny."

I search around and break a branch from a tree not too far away. I walk to the front of the group as they wait impatiently. "What's that, love?" Chris put his hand on my shoulder. "Yeah, love." Gordie joked and Chris jabbed Gordie's side with his elbow.

"A branch." I rolled my eyes. Then stuck the stick into the murky liquid. Chris took hold of the stick and poked around even more. "Hey, you know, it's not that deep. We can walk across." 

Chris held my hand and we took a few steps into the water. The water had suddenly swallowed all five of us. I dropped Chris' hand and stood up, so did everyone else. "Hey, you know, it's not that deep." I mocked what Chris had said earlier. Chris yanked me closer to him and messed up my hair.

"I told you we should have stuck to the tracks." Vern cried.

"Is it me, or are you the world's biggest pussy?" Teddy says to Vern. "I suppose this is fun for you." Vern replies. "No, but this is." Teddy dunks Vern's head into the water. 

"Come on, Teddy, act your age."

Teddy stops, "This is my age! I'm in the prime of my youth, and I'll only be young once." 

"Yeah, but you're going to be stupid for the rest of you life." Chris smirks. Teddy removes his glasses. "Rank-out!" I laugh, letting go of Chris. "Oh, that's it, Chambers. You just signed your own death warrant." 

"You die, Chambers!"

They all fought and I backed away with Gordie. "Hey, where do you think you're going, Lachance and Favelle?" 

"Pile on!" 

We try to exit the water faster than before, only to be trampled by three boys. "Sleeper hold! Sleeper hold! No one gets out of the sleeper hold."

Chris lays on my back and plays with my hair. "Chris, please." I groan and give up.

"Vern, there's something on your neck." I look up at Chris and Teddy. "Yes, you guys too."

"Yeah, right, I'm not falling for that one, you sore losers." Vern disagrees.

"No, Vern, there is something on your neck." Chris stops messing with my hair. The attention is drawn to the black glob on Vern's neck. "It's a leech. Leeches!"

We all scramble out of the water and the boys strip out of their clothing. While I stand back hoping this wave of nausea goes away. I shake my head in disgust seeing all the leeches and my stomach empties itself. I drop to my knees and the vomiting doesn't stop, why isn't it fucking stopping?

"Chris, help her!" Vern cries.

"She's still covered in leeches." Teddy shouts. I feel Chris by my side and he guides me to privacy behind a tree. Almost instantly, I strip from my wet clothes and rip the leeches off one by one. I couldn't get the leeches from my back. "Chris, quick, get the leeches from my back."

His fingers rapidly rip about six leeches from my back and finally he stops. "There. Oh-uh Jackie." Chris turns around and shields his eyes from my exposed body. "It's fine, Chris. I-" I begin to gag again. There's something stuck in my throat, it felt as if it was closing up.

I couldn't breathe and I'm wide-eyed scratching at my neck. I run to Chris in fear. "Jackie?" Chris rubs my back. 

"Guys, help, she's choking!" Chris yells and the boys run fast. I cough and at this point I think my throat is non-existent. A horrible head ache makes it's way through my skull. The boys are all yelling things, but I can not hear a thing.

Someone squeezes me from behind and everything becomes loud. Then, I see a fat leech lurch out of my mouth and I gasp for air. I squeeze my eyes to make sure I'm awake and everything seems normal. The boys have panic all over their faces. 

I place a hand on my forehead and the pain goes away. "Holy shit, Jackie, are you okay?" Chris pulls me into his chest. "Yeah, oh my god. Ugh that's so gross." I whine, not even stealing a glance at the leech on the ground.

"God, Jackie, you scared me." Teddy says. "Yeah. Sincerely." I look around for Gordie because he's the only voice I hadn't heard during the commotion.

Gordie stands about ten feet away and he look as pale as a ghost. He slowly shakes his head. "Oh, Chris." Gordie's voice is hoarse and the expression on his face is distraught.

I look at Gordie and he's almost crying. "Oh, shit, Chris." Gordie slowly sticks his hands in his underwear and I look away from him. Gordie carefully removes his hand from his shorts and a leech appears. 

Gordie's hand is covered in blood and we all have the same facial expression. It's quiet, until Gordie's eyes start to roll back into his head and plunge to the ground. "Oh, shit, Gordie." I run over to him dropping to the ground beside him.

I look at my friend in fear and shake him by the arms. "Can you hear me?" 

"Gordie, are you there?"

"Maybe he's dead." 

"He's not dead. He's still breathing, you idiot." 

"Well, I don't know."

"Guys, chill out. He just fainted." I look at Teddy and Vern. We all hovered over our passed out friend. "Gordie?" Chris shakes him. Gordie crunches his eyes open. We still stared intently at Gordie. "God, I never met someone who fainted before." Vern speaks.

"Maybe he made a bad mistake and looked at your face."

"Shut up, Teddy." Chris discloses.

Gordie finally gets up from the ground. I quickly scurry to where I had stripped from my clothes after checking on Gordie.

"Stop it!" I hear Gordie yell from a distant and I quickly put the rest of my clothes on. Gordie walked past me angrily just as I had my shirt above my shoulders. I yelped and dragged my shirt over my waist. He knew I was there but just kept walking. The others trailed behind and Chris stopped for me. "Here." Chris held his hand out and I grabbed it. 

The five of us continued our adventure hoping that we'll be there soon.