Crosby 11 and Mondo 10

"Mondo, keep up!" Crosby yelled, his voice cracking with the newness of puberty. "f you don't stay close, we're never going to make it to the peak before the sun goes down." Crosby's legs, thin and too long for his body, pumped hard as he hurtled up the hill, dust spinning up with his footsteps and sticking to his sweat slicked skin. The sun, still warm above them, inched shyly across the sky as if longing to give the two running boys the last bits of summer heat they needed.

"I'm coming," Mondo panted, his too short arms pumping feircly as he tried to catch up to the older boy already so far ahead of him. The hill they were climbing, not quite aged or rugged enough to be called a mountain, yet the title of trail stretched long before them. Mondo stumbled over a rock in his path, and slowed much more than was necessary. "Can we take a break, Crosby? Please," he added the last word as a wheeze, as though his whole existence depended on the word before tumbling hard into the packed dirt. The boy lay in the dirt for a long moment before rolling gingerly onto his side. He reached into the sweat soaked shirt he wore, pulling an iridescent stone, crystal like in its appearance, from inside his shirt. The stone hung from a frayed cord around his neck, and Mondo buried it in his pale small fist, his only concern was for its safety.

The sound of thundering feet as Crosby tripped down the hill to him fell onto Mondo's ears. He closed his eyes, gratefully and tried to slow his ragged breaths.

"Mondo!" Crosby, said kneeling beside him. "Are you okay?"

Mondo swallowed, a globule of phlegm and salty spit in his throat stopped him from speaking immediately. He turned his head and spat until his throat felt raw and he could taste the dust and pollen as he breathed.

Crosby turned his head to the left, to the right, and to the left again. The hill was fading into shadow steadily as the sun gave up on their pursuit. Crosby, once filled with the single-minded determinedness to just see the world from the top of the hill, now only feared the two would not return home before darkness rendered their journey impossible. "Mondo, I'm going to help you up now, alright," Crosby said, already lifting the younger boy up and throwing his arm over his shoulder so Mondo could use him as a crutch. Mondo flopped uselessly against him, threatening to drag the both of them back to the ground. Crosby huffed, his annoyance which had been initially stifled with concern for his friend crept into his voice unbidden. "Help me out here, Mondo," he said wiping a dribble of spit of the other boy's chin with the back of his sleeve on his free arm. "We have to get home now." Finally, Mondo complied, and the two began a slow stumble down the hill with sun winking her last goodbyes behind them.