As the moon hit the stars in the night, darkness crowded the forest and it was colder than all of us ever had been at Glory Bell. All of the blankets and few pillows we packed for our trip were now laid out for each of us to sleep on for the time being, Walter and Dina were in charge of keeping guard at night and sat together near the entrance of the gap in the tree while later on Nicolas and Lucas would switch them after a few hours.
Yuugo and me were allowed to sleep for the entire night as I was the most vulnerable and Yuugo had put up with me for the whole day.
Everyone huddled together in the corner to keep each other warm while all the older kids stayed at a more secluded place away from the rest of them.
"Why am I sleeping in the middle?" I narrowed my eyes looking at my blanket on the ground and singular pillow just for me. On each side stood Lucas's and Yuugo's blankets.
In the past, I didn't mind that all of the older kids shared a room but the only difference is that we had our own beds to sleep on. We were all aware that we no longer had beds for the time being but the way our sleeping position was set up, none of us had ever been used to it before.
The younger kids seemed fine snuggling up with one other, the same could not be said for the older children.
My legs stretched out against the blanket as Lucas helped me with my pillow, "Because," He said as he grasped the pillow gently lifting my injured leg and placed the soft material under it to give me some comfort. We all decided to give our younger siblings the rest of the pillows.
"Because...?" I tried to continue him on as I watched him tower over me and pull me closer to the middle of the blankets laid out for the three of us, "Oh."
Lucas hummed, "Huh? Did I do something?" He looked at my face not aware of how close he had gotten to me.
"No," I answered. A smile small formed on his lips before reaching over beside me and grabbing another blanket to cover me.
"You do have to keep in mind that you're the most vulnerable one here right now [Name]," He said as he began to cover me up and pushing me down onto the ground to lay flat.
"Plus, it's colder now and we don't have a house to protect us from the wind."
I nodded looking up at him from the ground as he began to go under his blanket right next to me.
"I get that, but..." I trailed off looking to the other side of me and noticed that Yuugo had already made himself comfortable but had his back faced me. I couldn't tell if he was already asleep.
"But what?" Lucas asked making direct eye contact with me now about to lie down flat on the ground.
"We're so, close."
He blinked a couple of times before scanning our positions. Me, him, and Yuugo were barely even inches away from each other, if I were to just slightly I would have touched both of them.
"Yeah, so?" He raised a brow not fazed at all as heat started to rush to my face.
"What do you mean and?! You're not fazed by this?!" I quietly yelled at him. His eyes travelled across the room while slowly laying back down on the ground, completely ignoring my complaint.
"Hey don't ignore me!" I threatened him making him chuckle. Once he was finally on the ground his body faced me as I turned my head to look at him.
"Like I said, it's colder out here. It'd be best if we used our body heat to keep warm," He smiled. I tried to open my mouth to say something but no comebacks appeared in my head. Lucas was right and he knew that too.
Looking away, my head faced the ceiling, "Right."
His hand suddenly brushed through my hair making me look at him once again, "Get some sleep OK?" I nodded at his request feeling something in my stomach curl up.
"Goodnight [Name]," He said to me before removing his hand and grabbing one of my hands without breaking eye contact with me.
"Goodnight, Lucas," I said breathlessly as I stared into his hazel eyes.
I didn't know what this feeling in my body was. And I also didn't how Yuugo's eyes opened after hearing me and Lucas's conversation come to an end.
—
For the entire night, Lucas had stayed as close to me as he possibly could to keep me warm. I ended up falling into a slumber for quite some time until the sudden feeling was gone when I woke up in the middle of the night.
By now, the fire had gone out and the very few lamps that were set out were soon fading away. Darkness shadowed the room and my eyes had trouble trying to look around. I couldn't get up as I would disturb someone from their sleep.
Sounds of muffled snoring were heard from the other side of the room, indicating the slumber of the younger ones. I had felt Lucas's presence go away, meaning that he and Nicolas were now up for night duty.
'It's cold,' I thought in my head as I stared up at the ceiling of the tree.
Since Nicolas was originally sleeping with the younger ones to act as more protection, he has switched with Dina making her take his place for the rest of the night.
Beside me was the body of Walter, his back facing me and Yuugo's, whose back was also facing me. Warmth was no longer covering me. Walter's heavy snores were heard from the side of my ear, trying to drown those noises out, I began to flip over my body to the other side.
"Shit..." I whispered hissing. Because my calve was still in pain, I had accidentally twisted my muscle, nearly wanting to make me scream out profanities.
I stayed still for a couple of seconds in that uncomfortable position biting my bottom lip and tightly shutting my eyes to bear the pain.
"...Yer' stupid for tryin' to move..."
My eyes shot open and looked at the boy with black hair. His back was still faced me as he spoke, "If you were cold, ya' could've just said so."
I swallowed thickly looking at Yuugo as he began to flip his position, his face now being in front of mine whilst we both lay down. My eyes remained open as I looked at his face. His eyes were shut and his breathing was shallow.
My mouth gapped looking at his calm expression before he wrapped his arm over my body and roughly shoved my face into his chest.
"Wh--?!" I almost yelled out but came to a stop once my words muffled due to the impact. My body tensed almost feeling unsure if this was illegal or not. The sound of his slow heartbeat clouded my senses, to the point where it was the only thing I could hear.
As my body calmed down, I began to grow comfortable in his arms, and then suddenly the words escaped from his mouth.
"G'night, [Nickname]."
Slowly dragging my arm to his chest I placed it on his body, feeling his warmth take me.
"Goodnight, Yuugo."
--
"Jeez! It's freezing cold this morning!" Damion yelled out loud clutching his arms together as we walked through the forest.
Though it was extremely sunny outside, the same couldn't be said about the wind that brushed past us.
"Got that right, Daimmey..." Nicolas shivered as he carried me on his back, this time Lucas and Walter were at the front of the group whilst Dina and Yuugo stayed at the back.
"Just another day to go guys!" Walter shouted holding onto the pen, in the morning we all decided to use the sharpened sticks as a walking tool to keep ourselves sturdy on the ground.
My wound had been changed once again, though there was very little improvement from the last couple of days, it began to slowly heal itself, dead skin peeling off every now and then and hell did it sting.
Dina laughed at Nicolas's behaviour, even though he was our age, sometimes he acted like a child.
"Well, at least the trees are slowly clearin' up now..." Yuugo added, using the stick in his hand to help himself get up.
"Nicolas, carry me instead pleeeasee!" Mike suddenly ran up to me and the blonde-haired boy carrying me startling the both of us.
His tiny hands clutched onto the clothing of Nicolas making him snicker, "No way little Mikey boy!" His body crouched to his height teasingly, "I don't see no injury on your leg!"
Mike cried animatedly making us and the others around us laugh out loud.
From the night before, Yuugo couldn't really figure out why he had made that gesture. His eyes lingered on where I was, speaking to all of the kids around me as Nicolas carried me.
He remained oddly silent since this morning, replaying the scenario in his head before he suddenly missed his step making him nearly trip, "Shit!" He yelled out to where Dina could only hear.
The girl slightly panicked and caught him, "Are you alright?" She asked concerned, "You seem on edge today, not to mention your face is..." She trailed off sweat dropping at him making him snap.
"W-what is it?!" He yelled making her laugh at him stupidly as the two began to walk again.
"I'm just saying, you were awfully close to [Name] this morning. Why's tha-"
"PffsHHSH-?!" Yuugo suddenly choked on his saliva making her laugh even more until he swiftly pulled her aside and stared her dead in the eye.
"Do not ever tell anyone you saw that," He said with a panicked voice before letting her go.
"You're so random Yuugo, it's OK to admit you finally like [Name]," She smiled but that only made him go in circles.
"I-I do not!" He shouted at her making her raise a brow.
"Huh?" She questioned before raising a hand in the air and fanning Yuugo, "I didn't mean it like that..."
His breathing hitched, shutting himself up immediately, he brought his hand to his hand and tugged at it frustrated, "Ahh, what the hell is happening to me..." He mumbled to himself.
His eyes travelled to where I was once again, he never noticed how differently I smiled, the way my eyes would squint at a stupid comment while laughing. He couldn't understand why he was just now noticing these things about me.
He looked away defeatedly, not wanting to even look in the direction where everyone else was. But maybe that was one of the very movements that he noticed was the most important decision of his life.
In front of him stood something so atrocious to the human eye, the slimy breath, thousands of eyes scattered onto its head, and it was bigger than any animal he had seen before.
His breathing became rapid as he ran over to Dina and grabbed her by the arm, dashing to the rest of us with a hurry in his voice.
"RUN!" A yelling was heard from the back of the group. Nicolas swung himself around confused what Yuugo said, until he felt the thumps of a threat.
"DEMON-- THERE'S A DEMON!" Yuugo finished his sentence as all of our eyes went wide, landing upon Demon as big as a ship as it let out a horrendous screech.
"GO!" He yelled as all of us began to pick up our feet.