Pumpkin Patch | TO BE REWRITTEN

chapter one

A/N: Updates coming soon! (In the form of a rewrite, lol. Whoops!)

It's official: Hedgehogs are evil. 

Hedgehogs are evil, little girls are malevolent, and I'm really wishing I could call Dexter Madan the worst boss in the history of entitled-teenage-boy bosses, ever.

The frost-covered October ground is hard, and cold from it is leaking into my bones. My costume — I think it was supposed to look like the Grim Reaper? — is too thin, a little torn in some places, and completely inadequate when it comes to keeping out autumnal chills.

Also, it keeps getting snagged on this infernal bush.

"How's it going down there, Calvin?" Dexter asks. He isn't under a bush. He also has the privilege of wearing a jacket, nice and plush, and is likely doing a good job at protecting him from the ravaging cold. 

"So great," I tell him, running my hands over the frigid earth. "I love children. Your sister is an absolute dream. Why does she even—dammit."

I jump shed-your-skin hard. There's that hedgehog, soft spikes grazing my fingers lightly. At least, I hope it's the hedgehog. I've either found Dexter's little sister's beloved pet, or some kind of bristled turd.

My hands cup its small body, and I awkwardly scooch backwards on my knees to extract it from the bramble. "I can't see, but I think this is it?" I'm greeted by a cellular flashlight shone right in my face. I grimace, turning my head away. Compared to the unforgiving blackness of this particular Iowa night, the slight shaft of light is far too harsh.

"Yep," says Dexter, finally turning that damnable light off. "Let's scoot."

Who even says that kind of thing? Let's scoot. Woot woot. I love to loot. I've never had fruit. I might go take a bath in soot, just to boot. Does he think it's cute? (Sorry: coot?) Does he pick up his debate boys with cheesy phrases like that?

Dexter walks off without me, nearly indistinguishable from behind, what with his black-as-oil hair, and his stupidly dark jacket. The hedgehog is small and curled up in my palms as I catch up to him, wondering if I can wear a jacket like that to work.

"I'm so glad that this is over," I tell him. It gushes out, a river, a sigh. I hate how Dexter is always so silent. He's too quiet, too reserved, for my tastes. (Which is a shame, because, otherwise, that boy is quite my taste.)

He hesitates before responding. Finally, he relinquishes his silence. "Me too." His breath puffs out in front of him in clouds of moonlit silver. "My sister and her 'emotional support' hedgehog. . . ."

I laugh, and he does, too. 

"She's named it Wimbledon," Dexter continues. I've never noticed how his face moves when he talks. We just never . . . talk, I guess. His eyebrows are flying all over the place, his eyes widening with every word.

It's quite cute.

Our steps are crunching beneath us as we walk over fallen leaves, rotting about the frozen ground. "It's crazy," Dexter says, slowing down and running a hand through his thick hair. We come to a stop. "Calvin, how long have we known each other?"

Forever, is what I want to say. We practically have. I go with the real time, though. "Twelve years, I think." Dexter and I learnt MMA together. He was my first sparring partner, first grappling buddy. 

We were absolutely vicious together.

I sprained my ankle in a sparring round against him; he refused to tap out when we went through our consecutive jiu-jitsu phases, and I ended up knocking him out. We only quit freshman year, him just before me.