A Paw Behind You

Mundane Weekends

"Sky, you're suppose to be here at four!"

"Sorry, Aiden. I overslept."

"Well, let's just quickly get on our walking pace. Wouldn't want the others to wait!"

The greyed cloudy sky loomed over the town as it had drenched the desolate landscape since yesterday, and ending probably during my over-timed afternoon nap.  The atmosphere felt dense with water vapor and smelt of earthiness. The fox however was probably even getting wet from my admittedly tardiness. (But not purposely!)

And now, as we were exiting the school entrance, a confounded me followed the lead of the fox, while the fox himself was humming joyfully with a relaxed strolling motion, completely brushing off what had happened.

I would kill for that skill, you know? And how does he do it, I will never know.

And I don't even know where I was going!

No matter how much I questioned, he just kept saying 'secret', 'secret', and 'secret', almost as if that was his only vocabulary at the moment. It was irritating, and after a bunch of failed sways, I just decided to give up and keep quiet, while focusing on avoiding the wet puddles.

Seconds turned to minutes, one minute turned to two... 

Straight to right, and right to left, left to more lefts... I was extremely confused of where we were now. Even more so, when all the buildings were practically the same: wrecked, abandoned, shut-closed with rusting metal shutters and glass windows shattered

"How long will it be till we get there?" I asked.

"Hm... I think... one... two.... three..." He counted, looked at the grey sky, and answers a number I was totally not expecting, "Should be 20 minutes away if we walk this slow, 5 minutes if we run."

20 fuc... calm down, myself, calm the hell down...

"Why can't we call like... Noah or someone to bring us there? I'm sure he has a car!" I suggested. But this, was weirdly earning me a blank look from the fox when I advanced further front, his warm rust-brown eyes now giving me the chills, almost as if, his positivity had a switch that flipped from my words alone.

"I don't trust those... cars, especially from that family," this lasted in silence for a while until as if the 'switch' in his head flipped again, "Anyway, a walk is good for the body! A run would be better though..."

"Oh hey! There's a bike there in that alley on our right!" I pointed out, desperate to find any vehicle medium for us to skip a tiring run (and also to switch the intensity of the conversation). Luckily, this one seemed.. oh wait, NO!

When Aiden had excitedly ran for the secluded bike, the moment it was brought out onto the light, the clear rust and ruined form it was in immediately made me regret the very choice I made...

What the heck, Sky!

"Hey look, a good find, Sky! We can still ride this too. Look!" He scarily wiggled the seat and wheels. The plastic seat was in tatters, the metals creaked alarmingly whenever he turned. And them metal back passenger seat...

"Aiden... I don't think I can sit with you..."

The metal was not only rusted, practically the entire back end of the fence-like seat was rotting away like a decomposing corpse. And seeing algae beginning to grow on it, this was not something I would kill to sit.

"Oh, it's just a bit of grass, no biggie. Here let me just..." He quite literally teared and threw the moist algae away, "There, all better now!"

"Um..." I was now skeptical and extremely suspicious with this bike. Was it safe? Was it even able to steer? Would I actually be going to a death trap?