still don't know what i'm doing here @donewithhumanity - Tumblr Blog

Jun 10

The Hide-and-Hunt Social (G/t)

So I played a manhunter-type wide game at camp a little while ago, and apparently my brain's response to being chased through the woods in the dark was, "Ah. But what if it was giants?"

Anyway, that's how this story happened.

Because HOLYYYYYYYYYY MAN.

My brain has not shut up about that experience since. So naturally I turned it into a G/t story. As one does. 🎩

SYN: At a trendy cross-scale hunting event in the woods, Leanne Jones’ first time being chased by her giant husband becomes something far more raw, revealing the quiet imbalance at the heart of their relationship.

The Hide-and-Hunt Social

Bellametre

It was only when Leanne Jones saw the jagged wooden signs lining the dirt road that she began to wonder if she had made a mistake.

MIXED-SIZED COUPLES

HIDE-AND-HUNT SOCIAL

CHECK-IN THIS WAY!

She sat poised in the tiny seat behind the plexiglass walls of the SafeSeat MicroCabin Keith had bolted to the dashboard, squinting first at the signs through the windshield, then down at the crumpled brochure in her lap. Clearly, the people who had designed the two had never consulted each other. The brochure was all soft creams and looping cursive, the sort of thing that might advertise a ladies’ luncheon or a summer garden party. The signs outside, by contrast, looked as though they had been hacked together with a blunt axe and a couple broken lava lamps.

Gooseflesh prickled along her arms. She rubbed her hands over them, trying to smooth it away.

Phyllis had brought the whole thing up last month at the quilting circle, where Leanne and the other Mini wives of the neighbourhood gathered on Wednesdays to sew handkerchiefs for their husbands and exchange news. “All the rage,” Phyllis had declared, flashing her smile that was more gum than teeth. “Everybody’s doing it.”

And the brochures she passed around certainly knew how to sell themselves. Words like sensation and community-sanctioned thrill curled across the foiled headings. Leanne had been curious in spite of herself. Thinking back, it had been some time since she and Keith did anything out of the ordinary. A brisk romp through the woods and a bit of excitement sounded healthy. Modern. Just the sort of thing a good wife suggested now and then to keep life lively. She had even gone so far as to start watching the two-o’clock jazzercise program and practice her jogging form on the coffee table. Elbows up, swing in step, breath one-two, breath one-two.

But sitting there now, with the green walls of the forest encroaching on all sides as they reached the end of the road, Leanne wondered if she ought to have read the fine print.

The thought barely had time to settle before Keith started backing up. He eased the station wagon neatly between two enormous mud-caked trucks, their tire treads so deep Leanne imagined she could have lain down inside one. This time, she kept her hands folded tightly in her lap. She didn’t want to fidget.

The keys jingled as Keith switched off the engine. The steady hum of travel faded, and silence settled over them. From behind her cabin, Leanne could hear him going through the familiar routine of working out the stiffness after hours of sitting. He did it all the time at home: first removing his glasses, then pressing his shoulders back against the seat, and finally rubbing the bridge of his nose. After church. After cribbage. After evenings hunched over the dining table reviewing office reports. It was one of his little habits.

And when your husband was eighteen times your size, you came to be very well acquainted with his little habits.

“You know, hon,” he said at last in that thoughtful lilt of his, “I gotta admit, this isn’t the sort of outing I’d have pegged you for.”

No surprises there.

Leanne straightened. “I thought we might try something new,” she replied, careful to sound confident. “Phyllis said when she and Scott tried it for the first time a few weeks ago, it was like nothing they’d ever done before. And it’s in all the magazines now. Common Ground Weekly called it the number one new pastime for couples of every shape and size.”

She reached down to unfasten her seatbelt, but that was when she noticed something strange.

Her hands were shaking.

Not badly, but enough to make the buckle difficult, especially with the way it always liked to stick. Assuming it was only fatigue left over from the drive, she gritted her teeth and wedged one of her cherry-red nails beneath the latch to try and pry it loose.

“A few of the girls are planning to try it later this month,” she went on quickly, “but I thought we might as well get ahead of things. Beat the rush and all that—oh, for goodness’ sake, why won’t this thing open—”

Keith’s voice suddenly came much closer, stirring her pageboy curls through the holes in the back wall of the cabin. She caught the clean smell of his aftershave.

“Need a hand, hon?”

“No! No, I…” She attacked the buckle more ferociously, heat climbing up the back of her neck. “I’ve got it! I’m just… excited, is all.”

There was the soft rustle of fabric as he settled back into his seat again. “I’m excited too,” he said. “Heard a bit about it from the fellows at work. Sounds like it could be a real good time.”

Leanne’s nail broke just as the buckle sprang free with a triumphant click. She pushed up to her feet, smoothing her dress back into place. Then her necklace. Then her collar. She tidied one curl, then another.

Took a breath.

Then she walked out of the cabin and finally turned to face Keith. He sat behind the wheel with one arm draped over it, the other resting beside the open window. His shirt was buttoned neatly to the throat, its crisp lines climbing into the angle of his jaw. His brown hair was coiffed to the side, bringing out the dark flecks in his hazel eyes. Nine flecks in the left, eleven in the right. She had counted them many times.

He looked at her. Slid his glasses back into place.

Leanne was suddenly aware of herself. It wasn’t only that Keith was handsome—though he certainly was—but that there was something deliberate about him, as though each movement had been measured and approved before it happened. Even after seven years of marriage, there were moments when the full weight of his attention still caught her off guard.

But seven years had also been a firm and efficient instructor, and she was not about to stumble over the plain old look on the plain old face of her plain old, ordinary Keith.

“A fine day,” she said, cheery once again. She brushed the front of her dress, glad she had not gone with the heavier circle skirt, with its crinoline forever tangling around her knees. The shirtwaist offered a much freer range. “Come on. Let’s go see what this thing is all about.”

Keith nodded and slowly brought his hand over, laying it palm-up on the dash as always. She balanced her pumps in the familiar grooves of his skin and looped an arm around his thumb. Then he lifted her carefully and let himself out of the car.

As they made their way along the marked path, though there were plenty of pretty green things flanking them on either side, Leanne couldn’t keep her eyes off the ring on Keith’s finger. It caught the light filtering through the canopy of leaves above, shining like polished honey: a simple band of gold with one faint indent, no wider than a hair, running all the way around it.

It made her twist the ring on her own finger. When they had first gotten engaged, they had decided to follow the intersizal tradition of cutting her ring from his, a symbol of unity that had seemed so romantic at the time. But lately, for whatever reason, she couldn’t help but notice how Keith’s ring looked… incomplete. Almost defective, missing that line in the middle.

The thought soured her stomach, and she hated herself for having it at all. Beneath her, Keith’s hand kept its usual steadiness, carrying her through the trees as if nothing had changed. She swallowed and forced her gaze away.

The path was longer than it had looked from the parking lot, and Keith walked for nearly ten minutes before rounding a bend into the main clearing. The grass there was clipped short and soft, and four tents stood scattered around the middle, none higher than his knees. Streamers and bunting banners crisscrossed between them, and a drink table had been set up along one edge. Minis clustered beneath the white canvas, adjusting jackets, tugging laces, comparing ribbons. Farther out, near the treeline, the regular humans stood in loose groups. Almost all of them were men, their overlapping voices blending into a low, unhurried rumble of talk and laughter.

It looked… chipper.

Leanne asked Keith to set her down beside the largest tent. He did, as careful with his footing as ever when other Minis were nearby, and once her shoes touched the grass, he stepped away. She thought he was giving her space to handle the check-in before returning with instructions, but instead he drifted toward the men, extending a hand before disappearing easily into their circle of conversation.

Right.

“Leanne!”

The voice cut through the air. “I knew you’d make it!”

Leanne summoned a smile as she spotted Phyllis pushing through the gaggle of people beneath the tent, another woman close behind her. Phyllis’ hair sat in the same platinum perm she wore every day of her life, wrangled into a shape that allowed the powder on her face to glisten in the hot sun. But there the familiarity ended. Instead of her usual silk blouse and slim-ankle trousers, Phyllis wore a loose shirt tucked into men’s pants, with sturdy boots on her feet. Actual boots. She looked less like she had arrived at a social afternoon and more like she was preparing to enlist in the army.

“Leanne,” Phyllis said again. She was carrying two paper cups of iced tea and managed to spill only a little as she threw her arms around her. “I’m so glad you made it. The other girls said you’d chicken out, but I knew you wouldn’t be a spoilsport.”

The coarse stitching of Phyllis’ shirt dug into Leanne’s chin. When the hug ended, she stepped back and accepted the cup Phyllis held out to her. The other woman remained beside them, staring across the clearing at the giant men. She was lean and sunburned, with sleeveless, muscular arms and a thick mop of blonde hair. A nickel-brass whistle hung from her neck, and bright ribbons had been pinned up and down the straps of her overalls, sparkling like gumdrops.

“Phyllis,” Leanne said. “Yes, we made it… you look, um…” She tried to let her gaze travel discreetly over the outfit, but it came to rest with obvious disbelief at the boots.

“Adventurous?” Phyllis supplied with a sly smile. She gestured toward the other woman with her cup. “Bev here had extras I could borrow. I was wearing my workout clothes, but they’re the brand-new paisley set and Scott didn’t want the leotard getting dirty.” She looked ready to pitch into a full tirade about that when she paused, frowning slightly. “Where are your clothes?”

A blush crept into Leanne’s cheeks. Evidently, the shirtwaist wasn’t nearly as free-range as she had thought. She took a sip of iced tea, but it was grainy with sugar and painfully sweet. Desperate for rescue, she glanced toward Bev.

But Bev was still surveying the men across the field, her jaw slack. After a moment, she gave a small nod in their direction, and her voice trickled out in a loose, warm drawl.

“That sky-high drink of water your husband?”

The line of her gaze was fixed on Keith’s white shirt. Leanne nodded.

“Glory.” Bev rested her knuckles against her mouth. “You must’ve done something right.”

It wasn’t the first time Leanne had heard something like that. She just looked at the ground, tracing a finger around the rim of her cup.

“That one over there in the plaid is mine,” Bev went on, pointing toward a huge bearded man with shoulders like an ox. He was talking with one of the big volunteers carrying a stack of maps. “Hal’s chased me through courses all over the state. Last time we were down in Gravelheel Park, I had to get stitches after I cracked my head falling down a gopher hole.” She reached up and pulled back her hair to display the damage.

Leanne’s brows nearly climbed off her face. A long, ugly red line ran above Bev’s ear.

“Wow, that’s… “ She pressed a hand lightly to the side of her own face. “Goodness. I’ve never done anything like this before.”

“Oh, that’s the best way,” Bev said at once. “You get all the nerves. All the adrenaline. Second time’s still fun, but the first?” She gave a low whistle. “Unmatched.”

A subtle ache began to form beneath Leanne’s hand. From the edge of the crowd, a volunteer in a tie-dye shirt and clipboard approached. For one hopeful instant, Leanne imagined she might be asked whether she needed water, or a chair, or perhaps a place to briefly pass out. But the woman’s face opened instead into a bright, practiced smile.

“Welcome! If you’ll follow me, I’ll get you checked in.”

Phyllis gave a squeal and caught Leanne by the elbow, and before Bev had quite finished wishing them luck, she was swept beneath the tent, pulled through the crowd like a needle through cloth. Feminine chatter pressed in on every side. Nearly all the players were women—women of every sort, many bearing scrapes and fading bruises from what Leanne could only assume were earlier games. There were very few men.

At the main table, she received a safety lecture she scarcely heard and seven waivers she scarcely read, ticking boxes beside phrases about “gentle handling” being subjective and organizers assuming no liability for catastrophic injury or risk of death, before signing each page with a hand that hardly felt like her own.

Then came the bins of spare clothing behind the tents, where Phyllis helped her wrestle leather trousers of uncertain history beneath her dress and find galoshes only two sizes too large to replace her surrendered pumps. Leanne already felt perfectly ridiculous, and the feeling only worsened when volunteers began threading through the crowd with plastic whistles and big coloured sashes, each couple marked in matching colours so hunters would pursue only their designated partners. Hers was bright purple striped with mustard yellow, wound twice about her waist with the tails hanging behind, while the whistle was hung round her neck.

“Perfect,” gushed Phyllis, cinching the cord until Leanne could barely swallow. Phyllis herself wore a starchy pastel pink sash. “Now all you need is war paint.”

“War…?” Leanne’s eyes were pulled across the field.

The men had drifted closer to the tents, standing in clusters, stretching, laughing softly among themselves. Their voices rolled through the air like distant thunder, and Leanne rubbed at the ache that had begun to build behind her left eye.

“Hon?” a loud, low voice cut in suddenly.

Leanne nearly jumped out of her skin. She whipped her head up, heart racing, and found herself looking into the familiar dark flecks of Keith’s brown eyes. He was kneeling in the grass just to her right, a little way down the slope.

She scolded herself. It was Keith.

Only Keith.

From the corner of her eye, she caught sight of Phyllis with her head tipped back, one hand pressed over her mouth. Her cheeks were flushed and her eyes shone with barely contained delight. Leanne curled her hand into a fist, seized by a sudden and very strong desire to sock her squarely in the arm. Instead, she adjusted her absurd sash with as much dignity as she could and lifted her eyes to her husband.

“Don’t suppose you’re here to whisk me away early?”

Keith smiled. It was a pleasant smile, certainly, but it arrived a second too late, like he had been caught in a private thought and only just remembered to put it on. He lifted a map and let it unfold in his hand.

“The head start they’re giving you should be enough to get you to the creek in the middle here,” he said, tapping a blue line. “Good cover there. Deadfall, low sightlines.” His finger dragged across the page, circling another patch of trees. “And if you panic, you’ll likely cut east.”

Leanne stared.

“Obviously, there’s the strategy of hiding near the starting line and waiting out the hunters while they run deeper into the forest, but it’s not much of a strategy if I already know about it.”

Her heart sank. She could see the changes in him now: no glasses, collar unbuttoned, a purple-and-yellow ribbon tied around his wrist. His sleeves were rolled to the elbow, the white cuffs slightly strained in a way that made it difficult not to notice the strength in his forearms. There was colour in his face she had not seen all morning.

He folded the map, his thumbnail scoring the crease with a slow, dry hiss, then he reached down with his free hand. With the very tip of his index finger, he delicately placed it beneath her chin and tilted her head up. The pad of his skin was rough and warm.

“Don’t go thinking I don’t know how smart you are,” he said with a small smirk. “I’ll be hunting you the whole way.”

It was practice alone that kept her expression composed. Only her eyes moved of their own accord, straying helplessly to the ring on his finger. It shone in the sunlight, incomplete as ever.

A horn sounded, gathering the clearing to attention. Conversations tapered off and the volunteers clapped, smiling.

“Welcome, everyone!” cried a voice through the speaker, crackling at the edges. “Thank you for joining us today. As we approach kickoff, we ask that all guests who have completed registration please proceed now to the designated starting lines. Move with intent, for players who fail to report promptly will be collected at their hunter’s convenience.”

Laughter rippled through the crowd.

“It’s time,” Phyllis whispered beside her.

The men began moving toward the far side of the clearing, putting distance between themselves and the Minis with an ease that made the difference in scale feel suddenly very real. Keith pulled back and slipped the map into his back pocket, then brushed the grass from his knees as he rose to his full, towering height. For an instant he stood still, head turned toward the trees in unreadable concentration. Then he looked down at Leanne again and smiled.

“See you in a bit,” he said with a wink.

He strode away to join the others, his loafers thudding heavily against the earth.

Leanne felt numb as Phyllis guided her with the rest of the women toward the trailhead. With every step, she only wanted more to turn around and return to the safety of the tents, rather than march closer to the wall of trees that now seemed far more threatening than they had only minutes before. She tried to imagine what it would feel like to walk beneath such titans, but the only sensations that seemed to reach her were the leather trousers pinching behind her knees and the hollow clonk of her bare feet inside the galoshes.

As they walked, the announcer’s voice continued overhead. “As always, this is a trust-based event. Hiders will enter the woods first, followed by a ten-minute grace period before pursuit begins. They are advised to remain off the mulched hunting paths to avoid serious risk of injury.”

They reached the starting line, a length of rope in the dirt.

“Emergency equipment and communicators are stationed throughout the playing zone. Should you or another player require medical attention, please locate the nearest communicator and notify our team immediately.”

They arranged themselves side by side.

“When a hider is caught by their pursuing partner, they are out of the game. The only other official methods of withdrawal are sustaining a critical injury or blowing the whistle with which they have been equipped. At that point, the pursuer must immediately cease play and escort them back to the tents. Laughing, yelling, screaming, pleading, crying, and vomiting do not constitute valid withdrawal and will be treated as part of the game.”

A volunteer moved down the line, straightening sashes and tightening whistles.

“The first human to catch their partner wins the Hunter’s Ribbon, while the Minivariate who lasts longest wins the Hider’s Ribbon. Play with integrity and enthusiasm. Remember: this is cooperative, consensual, and meant to be fun. Thank you, and enjoy the game.”

Several women whooped. Others bounced on their toes. Leanne felt sick.

Just ahead of her, the trees rose like the spires of some colossal gothic fortress, so tall she wondered how their tops did not carve grooves in the blue of the sky.

She looked quickly along the line, hoping to find another doubtful face, some companion in alarm. But there was none. Every woman wore the same tightened expression of purpose, hair pinned back and bodies coiled like springs. Some had even streaked mud or paint across their cheeks.

Leanne could feel her grip on herself beginning to slip. Each breath was barely enough to keep the black at the edges of her vision at bay. Images of being trampled the moment the horn sounded kept flashing through her mind until every joint and muscle felt as though it were turning to liquid.

Then there was pressure.

On her hand. Warmth. A squeeze. Leanne felt the black recede a little and she looked over, surprised to find pink-nailed fingers interlaced with her own.

Phyllis gave her hand another squeeze. It was like a pulse, guiding her own heart back into rhythm. Leanne looked up and caught Phyllis’ eye, full of sympathy. She was smiling too, but not with the gummy, manic grin from before. Something softer. Quieter.

“Humbling, isn't it?”

Leanne had never heard anything like that come out of Phyllis Whitaker’s mouth before. But even so, she could not deny that something in her pounding chest settled at the words. Phyllis squeezed her hand one more time before letting go and turning back to the forest, bending her knees and curling her fists.

Leanne bent her knees. Curled her fists.

The loudspeaker buzzed.

“Hiders, are you ready?!”

Absolutely not.

“On your marks… get set—”

The entire line of players surged forward like greyhounds released from a gate. A woman beside Leanne nearly bowled her over as the airhorn blasted across the field. One instant they were there, sashes flashing at their waists like beads on baited hooks; the next, they were gone. Leanne stumbled after them, lifting her dress as she followed. She barely had time to draw one last breath of warm, ordinary summer air before she was swallowed by the waiting dark.

Immediately, she felt the shift in temperature. The hair along her neck and arms lifted as she crashed through the dense green of the forest floor. Other players darted through the brush around her, the colours of their belts flickering through the leaves, their laughter and voices dancing on the wind. She tried to keep her eyes on them, but even Phyllis disappeared quickly, and within only a few minutes the only sounds of forest escapade she could hear were her own.

Snap. Rustle. Crack.

It was so loud. And yet she had no idea how else she was supposed to move. It was difficult even to recall the last time she had been properly outdoors. Life for her had a way of becoming mostly interiors. The suburban house. Her tiny kitchen atop the counter of the bigger kitchen. Often the extent of her time in nature was the few potted plants that Keith kept on the windowsill where she could reach them.

She tried to remember the jazzercise rhythm she had learned, and the buoyant, theatrical voice of the curvy instructor popped into her mind:

Swing in step. Breath one-two. Breath one-two.

She kept plowing headlong in a straight line, long grass and low-hanging leaves smacking her in the face. Her imagination kept trying to conjure images of whatever might be waiting just beyond the next step, but she forced herself to stay calm. There was no need to worry. The orientation had specified that all animals larger or more dangerous than goldfinches had been culled in this part of the forest for the game. There was, strictly speaking, no risk of any creature more alarming than that.

Well.

Perhaps except one.

Breathe. One-two. Swing in step.

Despite her chest already beginning to burn, she pushed herself onward until she eventually came across one of the mulched hunting trails. It cut a winding swath through the trees, wide enough for two dozen Minis to walk abreast, smelling sweet and loamy. The moment Leanne spotted it, she turned on her heel to change course, but stopped. There were Minis running along it. She couldn’t see them clearly from this distance, but the licking colours of their sashes were unmistakable.

Equal pangs of contempt and jealousy simmered inside Leanne. She scrutinized those vivid colours as they raced along the trail, taking advantage of the clear ground to get ahead while they could, even though it was taking a risk.

And knowing she would not do the same.

She swallowed down the emotion in her throat and turned back toward the bushes. At the same time, like a hammer striking metal, the second horn reverberated through the trees.

Leanne tripped into a spiderweb and nearly went down over a mushroom, catching herself at the last instant before stumbling into a blackberry thicket. Big thorns snagged her arms, leaving behind thin, stinging lines and pulling painfully at her curls.

Calm down.

She was fine. She was playing the game and was, in fact, making perfectly reasonable progress.

She simply could not seem to say any of it out loud.

Instead, she clung to the rhythm she had found, the only steady thing left to her.

“Swing in step,” she whispered. “Breath one-two. Breath one-two.”

Slowly, the forest began to change. Leanne became aware of a new ache in the fronts of her thighs as the ground sloped downward. She tried to keep her attention on her footing, but it grew steadily more difficult as the vegetation thickened, forcing her again and again to slow to a walk just to push through some stubborn creeper or another. It was getting colder, too, the saplings giving way to denser trees that crowded the light into narrower and narrower slits until the brightness above felt very distant indeed.

Eventually, she came upon a wide gulley. It cut across her path from left to right as far as she could see, and so she stopped. In truth, the pause was welcome. She had time to draw her breath, to wipe the sweat from her eyes.

The gulley appeared to be the creek from the map, nearly dry, with only a thin trickle of water weaving between the cracks of the large, unforgiving rocks. She looked along the edges in both directions for a fallen log, any kind of bridge, but there was nothing. Only the drop.

There was no useful direction except forward, so she began to descend, lowering herself from rock to rock in a manner she very much hoped no one was watching. It was not an elegant process, nor was it kind to her clothing. She tried not to think about what would need mending once this whole ordeal was over.

She had not made it even halfway down when she heard something that halted her mid-scoot.

A whistle.

Shrill and thin, like a trapped animal, and close. It was somewhere farther down the creek bed, perhaps a hundred steps away.

Leanne sat very still.

Some logical part of her mind told her she ought not to go toward it. But a primal, less articulate part had already decided otherwise. Against her better judgement, she picked her way through weeds and tall grass forcing themselves up between the rocks. The air seemed heavier here, the space tighter and more enclosed.

When she finally broke through into a shallow, ankle-deep pool, her breath caught in her throat.

It was Bev.

She sat in the water clutching her ankle with one hand. Her pant leg had been rolled up and her boot lay beside her on a rock. Mud streaked her clothes and bare arms, and her hair had come loose, hanging around her face in a wild, damp tangle. She waved her sash above her head with her other arm, her whistle clenched between her teeth.

“Bev—” Leanne exhaled.

Bev dropped her arm and snapped around to face her. The instant she saw Leanne, her eyes widened and she shook her head violently, waving her away in frantic, jerking motions. Go. Go.

But her ankle was badly swollen. The skin around it looked tight, hot, and shiny. There was no possibility of running on something like that.

Leanne stumbled closer. “Oh—oh, my goodness. You’re hurt.”

Bev’s hands flew up again, more desperate now, shooing her back as though trying to drive off a stray animal. She jabbed a finger past Leanne toward the trees behind her, her mouth shaping a word soundlessly. Run.

“I’m not—I can’t leave you,” Leanne said hurriedly, dropping beside her in the water. “Just—just wait a second. Perhaps I can—”

She swallowed. What was one meant to do for a twisted ankle? Ice? Elevation? Neither was especially available under the present circumstances.

“Can you stand?” she asked, already slipping an uncertain arm beneath Bev’s. “If we go slow, we can—”

Bev made a strangled sound somewhere between pain and frustration, seizing the sleeve of Leanne’s dress. For a second, Leanne thought she meant to use her for leverage.

But then she saw her face.

Bev was smiling.

It was the most terrifying smile Leanne had ever witnessed. Bright, trembling, and reminding her very much of a lit fuse. Bev looked on the verge of bursting into laughter or tears or perhaps both. Yet beneath it ran something steadier than either: resolve. And woven through that resolve, unmistakably, was eagerness.

“He’s coming,” Bev whispered.

The words sent a cold spike down Leanne’s spine.

“Go,” Bev said, louder now, urgency sharpening her voice. Her smile remained. If anything it grew almost girlish with excitement. “You have to go. Don’t let him see you.”

Somewhere in the trees there was movement. Something large. Something moving fast.

Leanne reached out and gripped Bev’s arm. “Oh, Bev, we must move. What if it’s not Hal? What if he doesn’t realize it’s you?”

“It is, and he does. Don’t worry, he knows the sound of my whistle.” She gave it a flick and it pinged against her nail. “But he doesn’t know you’re here. If he sees you, he’ll go and find your man. It’s how he plays. Now go, get out of here.”

Leanne couldn’t stop the whimper of desperation that escaped her lips. “Bev, please,” she begged. “He’s going to catch you if you stay here. He’ll make his move when you’re vulnerable like this—”

“I know!” Bev shouted. She shoved Leanne in the chest, still smiling that awful smile. “For God’s sake, what aren’t you getting? This is the best part! Let me be!”

Another crash, closer now. More branches breaking. The water around them began to quiver, but Bev’s eyes were fixed beyond, shining as though she were waiting for the main attraction at a fair.

Leanne went rigid.

“You’re crazy,” she sputtered. “Crazy.”

Without another thought, she turned and ran.

She scrambled up the far side of the bank, bashing her knee against a rock, and burst into the brush beyond, branches clawing at her while her breath tore raggedly through her chest. She did not look back. She could not. Behind her, the forest broke open with the sound of heavy footfalls, undergrowth being trampled, something immense advancing with terrible ease, and then—

A shriek split the air.

Leanne ground her teeth against the sound. It echoed around her, then behind, lingering in the creek bed long after she had put distance between it. But she only ran harder, driving her legs forward even as they trembled. She ran and ran and ran. Heaven knew whether she had ever moved so far or so fast in all her life.

At last—after direction and time had become equally unreliable, after the forest had blurred into mould-dark greens and browns—she collapsed onto a rise of roots at the foot of a cedar, dragging air into her lungs.

She had no idea how long she had been running. Ten minutes. An hour. A year, perhaps. But she could go no farther just then. The backs of her heels were raw from the boots, and the headache she had carried since the tents now beat steadily against her skull. She leaned back on her hands and tipped her head upward. Blood trickled in a warm line down her shin.

These women made no sense.

What was the point of such a ridiculous game if the Minis had no chance of winning? To be subjected to something so demeaning, so openly humiliating, and be expected to call it recreation? It was madness.

She pulled the clip from her hair and tried to run her fingers through her curls. Impossible. There were leaves, grass, and something sticky in them. She threw the clip to the ground and brought her galosh down on it, crushing it into pieces.

If everyone else wished to throw themselves gleefully beneath stampeding feet, they were welcome to it. She, for one, intended to use sense. No more making an exhibition of herself.

She was going to hide.

Leanne rose, wiped the sweat from her upper lip, and set off to try and take stock of her surroundings. As she moved, the forest grew greener and wetter, the earth softening underfoot. Huge gnats orbited her head. Once her galosh sank ankle-deep in black mud and came free with an indecorous squelch, but she went stubbornly on.

She finally spotted an especially tall tree with a fork splitting the trunk some distance above the ground. She stopped where she was and looked up. It was high enough that no hunter would think to inspect it closely, and certainly not reach into it. She might sit there in perfect safety until the horn sounded. She might even dry a little in the breeze.

She grabbed the lowest branch and did her best to climb. The first two went tolerably. The third less so. By the fourth she was panting. By the fifth her arms had begun to burn.

At home, heights were different. At home there were ladders built to scale, little bridges from shelf to shelf, handles and railings. These branches were rough, too wide to grip properly, and set just far enough apart that she had to hoist nearly her entire weight with her arms alone.

Still, she persisted.

At last she dragged herself onto a branch wide enough to stand on sideways and clung to a splintered edge of trunk, chest heaving. She was perhaps level with Keith’s hip, hardly the triumphant height she had imagined. She glanced up at the fork above; it remained several hard pulls away.

Suddenly, voices drifted through the trees, and Leanne froze.

“...but Ronnie insisted on doing it. Bought herself boots and everything.”

“How long is she gonna last, you think?”

“Would’ve been five minutes, but I’m going easy on her. That way, when this is all over, maybe I’ll only hear about it for a week instead of two.”

Leanne’s throat constricted. She tried to flatten herself against the trunk, but there was very little of her to flatten and nothing at all to hide behind. So she was forced to watch, completely exposed, as the giant men came into view between the trees. They were enormous, loose-limbed, muddy at the cuffs, ribbons tied at their wrists. One fair-haired, one dark.

Neither Keith.

“You should see her when she gets mad,” the fair one was saying, “when you’re the size of, like, a cig and a half, there’s only so much you can do.”

“That’s why I usually scare Jess out of it before it starts,” the dark one replied. “Trust me, when I catch her, I’m gonna make sure she never wants to play this game again.”

The fair one kicked a rock. “If only that worked with Ronnie. I’m pretty sure she’d stop seeing me if I pulled something like that. I—oh, dude, look!”

Both their gazes locked on Leanne, and she felt as though she had been nailed to the tree. For one suspended instant, no one moved.

Then the fair one’s mouth slowly curved into a smile. He clicked his tongue. “Keith’s girl, isn’t she?”

Leanne’s heart gave a sharp, panicked jolt. She folded an arm across her waist, trying to hide her sash. “Oh,” she managed, her voice barely holding together. “Oh, please—”

But something eager had already lit their expressions. Without another word, both of them turned and broke into a run.

“Wait!” Leanne blurted. She let go of the trunk to cup her hands around her mouth. “Wait! I—”

The bark gave way beneath her feet.

The fall wasn’t far, but it was enough to turn her stomach over itself on the way down. She struck the ground on her back, the air punched from her lungs. Mud splashed over her chest and across her face, and she slid a few inches into the stagnant water pooled at the base of the tree.

She laid back, unmoving. The world rang hollow and distant around her. Then the pain came rushing in. Her shoulder, her hip, the sting of wounds she hadn’t even felt before. Her chest heaved uselessly as she tried to breathe, her body refusing to cooperate. The ground sucked faintly at her elbows where they’d sunk into the mud. When she tried to push herself up, they buckled almost immediately, dropping her back down with a soft, pathetic splash.

“I can’t—” she choked. “I can’t do this.”

Everything around her was so stupidly large. The trees, the rocks, the grass, even the pauses in the noise. Her own breathing felt excessive, like it was carrying for miles.

It was just like—

Just like—

No. She squeezed her eyes shut.

But her mind would not let her alone. Images forced their way in, crowding upon one another: the morning Keith had to open the jam jar after she insisted she could manage it; the evening he poured cold water over her when she burned herself trying to push his coffee cup closer; the times she had miscounted the ladder rungs and made him steady her with a finger; the afternoons she had strained her voice calling up to him from the floor; the days she left messes on the counter because some were too large to clean by herself; the nights she was so exhausted from traversing the house that she could hardly speak to him when he came home from work. Seven long years of it, settling layer upon layer like dust.

Leanne sat up, wiping the wet strands of hair from her face, and was mortified to discover she was crying. Tears streamed from her eyes, leaving warm tracks through the mud on her cheeks. A sob slipped out, and she clapped a hand over her mouth.

Who did she think she was? This wasn’t a game. Not for her, climbing trees and crawling through mud. She belonged in her quilting circle, teaching the other wives how to embroider daylilies and geraniums. In the kitchen, positioning fruit on a Jell-O salad or untangling cords in the junk drawer. At the table, polishing Keith’s favourite cuff links.

Here, she was just…

She glanced down into the muddy puddle beside her and saw a strange creature staring back. Its face was streaked with brown, scratches cut across its cheeks, and pine needles jutted from its matted hair like horns.

…Small.

The whistle hung against her chest, its cord damp and twisted.

She raised a hand and ran her fingernail along the hatch marks in the plastic. All she had to do was blow it. One sharp breath, and the nightmare would be over.

No one would blame her, and certainly not Keith. Of all people, he would stop immediately, even if the rules had not required it. He was always good like that. And he would not question her, either. He would gather her up and find somewhere she could wash off and put her hair back into a presentable state, then carry her to the car and take her out for dinner wherever she pleased. He would not make comments or little jokes about the why of it. He would let her sit in the crook of his neck the entire drive home if she wanted.

And yet there were so many things he could not be telling her.

Her hand went limp, falling into her lap, and a glint of gold caught her eye. Her ring, somehow still there despite everything. It was dulled by mud, sweat, and blood, and as she looked at it, the old emptiness began to stir again inside her. Her stupid ring, made from gold cut from Keith’s own band.

Through a blur of tears, she yanked the ring from her finger, glad that the slippery grime was useful for at least something. She held it in her palm, her hand shaking with the electric urge to throw it away.

It’s so small he probably won’t even notice it’s missing, she thought.

“Okay, but that’s only because you didn’t give me a chance to get my glasses first.”

Leanne gasped under her breath. She looked up, and there he was, standing right in front of her—but not as himself. Instead of seventy-five inches tall, he was only five. Her eyes widened, and a bright smile broke across her face.

At the sight of it, he stepped back, his brows drawing together in nervous indignation. He crossed his arms. “You told me you weren’t going to do this anymore.”

Her memory stirred. She knew this scene. It resembled a conversation she had once had with the real Keith only a year or so earlier, beside their bed, when she had sat on the nightstand explaining a dream she’d had in the night… something she thought about far too often. But now that memory seemed to be trespassing into the fantasy itself, the lines between them blurring.

Mini-Keith turned away and began pacing back and forth. Leanne tried not to notice the soft ache of having him so close, small enough that she could see all of him at once.

“Do you like me better this way?” Keith asked curtly.

Leanne nibbled her lip. “Do you?”

He stopped. “You didn’t answer my question.” He shot her a look, his eyes darker than she had ever seen them. “Is this easier for you?”

Her heart gave a sharp pang. “Don’t say things like that.”

“I’m not the one wishing it were different.”

Emotion welled up inside her again. She looked down at the ring still cupped in her palm, then back at him. There was a Mini-sized ring on his finger. Seamless. Whole.

“I just…” she said at last, her voice breaking. “I wish we matched.”

He looked at her for a long moment. Then the hard line of his mouth eased.

He uncrossed his arms and came over, lowering himself into the mud in front of her. When he reached her, he tipped her chin up so she had no choice but to meet his eyes.

“We already do, hon,” he said quietly. “But not like this.”

She scoffed, but it came out thin and broken, more of a breath than laughter. “How can I know that for sure?”

A faint smile touched his mouth. “Start running and I’ll show you.”

And just like that, he was gone.

Leanne blinked. She was back in the mud, back in her aching body with all its scrapes and bruises, still holding the little circle of gold in her hand. She looked down at it, ran a finger around the band—once, twice, three times—clearing away the grime.

She took a halting, broken breath of the acrid forest air, the taste of it bitter on her tongue.

Then she carefully slid the ring back onto her finger.

She gathered her legs beneath her, wincing at the pain, and pushed herself to her feet. Wobbly, but standing. She scraped the dirt from her face and wiped her hands on her dress without looking at the streaks she left behind, then tore a strip from the damaged hem and tied back her hair in a messy knot, debris and all. She loosened the whistle where it hung at her throat. She tightened her sash.

“Breath one-two,” she murmured, wiping the last of her tears away.

And then she took a step. It stung her heel, and so did the next. But she coaxed herself forward all the same.

She watched where her feet landed, choosing what looked like the least treacherous patches of ground. Her pace was slow, but eventually she worked herself up to something between a brisk walk and a jog, keeping her elbows pumping at her sides. She lifted her galoshes clear of roots and furrows, parted branches with one hand and kept the other near her dress so it would not catch. When the ground dipped she hurried; when it rose she ducked and moved through whatever cover was available, barely pausing before pushing on again.

It surprised her how quickly the forest changed once she stopped fighting it. What had seemed a chaotic green mess began to separate into something usable. Logs became barriers to slip past rather than climb. Nettles became warnings. Even puddles seemed to announce themselves just in time to avoid.

The silence split into kinds too. There was the ordinary quiet where nothing was near , and there was the strained, pregnant silence that came just before something disturbed it.

Once, hearing footsteps far off, she slid beneath the roots of an overturned log and lay there with her cheek against the damp earth, scarcely daring to breathe, while someone thundered past on one of the hunting trails. She waited until the tremors were gone. When she crawled out, her dress was completely beyond recognition, yet she found herself still moving forward.

She had begun to feel a curious little pride in herself. Not vanity exactly, but something more authentic. She was doing it. Not gracefully, nor in any manner that could be called athletic, but doing it.

She crossed into a stand of younger firs where the trunks grew close together, neat as umbrella handles set in a rack. The floor there was springy with old needles. Light slipped down in pale narrow shafts. It was almost pretty enough to be a place for a picnic.

Then she heard it.

Not the careless crashing and blundering of the others, with whole sections of the forest being bulldozed in their wake, but the quick, measured thump-thump-thump of a stride where each foot consulted the next before coming down.

Keith.

Her body answered before thought had time to present itself. She darted left, bent beneath a low branch, crossed a scatter of stones, then veered right beneath a spray of teaberry leaves that brushed her on all sides. Behind her came another series of footsteps. He had found her trail.

She let out an involuntary burst of laughter and clapped a hand over her mouth.

“Mercy,” she breathed, and ran harder.

There was no terror in it now, only a bright and dreadful exhilaration that sharpened every sense. The green was greener. The air colder in her throat. Her heart pounded against her ribs.

She heard him alter course when she altered hers. She heard him vault a fallen trunk she had run through. She heard, once, very close, the swish of branches against his sleeve.

He was gaining.

Leanne sprang over a rivulet, landed badly, recovered herself, and sped on. Her breath came quick and hot. Her cheeks burned. A laugh kept trying to break out of her again. She would not permit it. This was serious business.

She was at a full-force run when, ahead of her, lying across the path of needles, she spotted a stick. Clean, dry, taut-looking, no thicker than two of her fingers.

She knew at once.

Without pausing, without letting herself think twice about it, she planted her heel squarely upon it.

CRACK!

The sound rang out like a pistol shot.

Behind her, his pursuit changed instantly. Straight toward her now. No more searching left in it. No guesswork.

Leanne gave a little cry and ran on. She felt absurdly light. The trees flew by. Her sash tails whipped at her legs. Somewhere behind her he laughed—a breathless, astonished sound she hadn’t heard from him in a long time.

“Leanne!”

She looked back. That was a mistake. She saw him bolting between the trees, shirtsleeves rolled, hair fallen loose at his forehead, eyes fixed upon her with such warm and hungry determination that the sight of it turned her knees to water.

She faced forward again, but too late. A root caught her galosh, and she stumbled with a gasp.

In the same instant the world rose.

No—it was she who rose.

A great hand swept cleanly round her leg, lifting her up and out of the run as easily as one might gather a dropped napkin from the floor. Her free foot kicked into empty air as the forest wheeled, and then she was upside down, held fast by one leg in broad fingers.

Keith stood bent over, breathing hard enough that each breath moved her with it. His hair was mussed, his collar open, his face flushed with exertion and delight.

Leanne was breathless too. She could not have said whether it was from running or from being there in his hands, but did it matter? One thing she did know was that she was very glad she had worn the trousers. Her dress hung down by her hair, which had come loose again. Filthy curls fell into her eyes. She was smiling so much it hurt.

For a moment neither of them spoke. They only looked at one another with the strange, bright foolishness of people who have been altogether too earnest in their play.

Then Keith’s thumb adjusted gently at her leg, securing his hold.

“Got you,” he said.

And Leanne, still panting, only laughed as she hid her face behind her hands.

A cool breeze blew through the forest, and as they set off at an easier pace, Keith gently gathered her back into a dignified position. Leanne sat secure in the cradle of his palm, one hand wrapped around the base of his thumb, the other toying with the ring on her finger. They continued to say nothing. They only breathed. His came deep and slow, still a little ragged from the run, while hers were quicker, trying gradually to imitate his and become normal again. Now and then his thumb moved, almost absentmindedly, to settle her more comfortably where she leaned against him.

The forest seemed a different place on the way back. What had been so frightening at first now looked cool and serene. The trees were no longer endless black towers but firs and pines and cedars. Puddles reflected strips of purpling sky. Lightning bugs started to flicker to life.

Keith glanced down at her once, then again, as though unable to help himself. “I still can’t believe you ran like that,” he said at last. “You near took ten years off me.”

Leanne gave a little laugh and tucked a loose curl behind her ear. “Did I?”

“You surely did. I thought I’d have you in two minutes flat.” He shook his head. “Then there you were darting under logs and cutting across stones like some kind of little rogue.”

She made a modest sound, half chuckle, half dismissal, though a warm glow stole through her at the words. After a few more steps she said, quite seriously, “We should do it again sometime.”

Keith stopped so abruptly that she had to grip his thumb to keep from being tipped forward.

He looked down at her.

Leanne, feeling suddenly shy, inspected the cuticle of his nail as if it were of great interest.

“You mean that?” he asked.

“I do.” She raised her eyes. “Though next time I think I should like to wear something proper from the start.”

He gave a small smirk, one corner of his mouth lifting so that she could see the dimple in his cheek, and her heart quietly fluttered.

“I agree,” he said, bringing his hand up to his chin in that thoughtful way he had when analyzing something. “In my professional opinion, I think the pants introduced an entirely unnecessary layer of resistance.”

By the time they reached the clearing the afternoon sun had softened to amber. The tents glowed white at the edges and the streamers moved lazily in the breeze. There were fewer people now, clusters of couples standing about with drinks, mud, ribbons, and flushed faces.

As Keith approached, several heads turned. A whisper went round, then a little cheer. People started clapping. Leanne blinked.

Near the main tent sat Phyllis and Bev. Bev’s ankle had been thickly swaddled and lifted onto a folding chair, but she was smiling as though it didn’t bother her at all. Kneeling behind her in the lawn was the mountain of her husband, Hal, his face pinched in concentration while his huge fingers worked, with surprising delicateness, at her shoulders.

When Bev saw her, she raised her paper cup in salute. “There she is!” she called.

Leanne was about to look over her shoulder before remembering where she was. Keith lowered his hand to the ground and let her step onto the grass. She straightened automatically, aware that everyone was looking at her. A volunteer came forward holding a ribbon on a velvet tray. It was blue with gold edges, stamped HIDER’S RIBBON.

Leanne stared at it. “I’m sorry,” she said. “There must be some mistake.”

“No mistake at all,” said the volunteer, beaming. “Last hider to be caught is the winner.”

The clearing broke into applause again. Bev whistled through her fingers. Hal pounded one great hand against his thigh.

Leanne turned slowly to Keith. He was already lowering himself, easing down until he sat upon the ground.

“You mean…” she began.

He had taken out his glasses, and now polished them with the handkerchief from his back pocket. It was the new one, the one she had spent months embroidering with oakleaf hydrangeas. He only ever brought it out when he meant to show her off.

“You won, hon,” he said mildly.

The ribbon was pinned to the front of her dress. It sat there absurdly splendid against the mud. The prize for the best prey.

But… somehow that didn’t feel so bad.

And then, in that moment, for reasons she couldn’t explain, she felt her eyes wander over to Bev. She still sat with her ankle on the chair, one of its metal legs dented from being handled perhaps a little too roughly, and she was smiling. But there was also a particular twinkle in her eye, one that made Leanne roam her eyes over her disheveled hair, the scrapes on her arms, the mud on her clothes and ribbons. She reached up and touched her own hair, her own skin.

Her own ribbon.

From behind, Phyllis sauntered up, looping her arms around Leanne’s and resting her chin on her shoulder. “A little better than Jell-O salad, ain’t it?”

Leanne lowered her hand. She looked around again at the social as things were starting to wind down. The volunteers were already getting ready for the next game, sweeping the wooden platforms where the registration tables sat, collecting the whistles, and throwing all of the coloured sashes into soapy water bins so they could be washed and hung for tomorrow. One of the Mini moving vans had been started up, and the smell of exhaust mixed with warm pollen.

Then Leanne felt the arms around her slip away as Keith’s hand moved into her field of view, approaching her from the side. It stopped in front of her, palm up, and she didn’t need to look back to know Phyllis had likely turned away again, hiding her smile. She kept her gaze forward, though, eyes resting on the familiar expanse of skin she knew so well.

“You did so good, hon,” Keith murmured. “I’ll take it from here.”

She hesitated. Somewhere deep inside was the smallest prodding that she needed to be back on guard. Her dress needed mending and her nails needed filing and her muddy, muddy hair needed fixing. She almost reached up to wipe away something smeared across her face.

But instead she unwound her sash, kicked off her boots and slid the trousers off her legs, tossing them to the side. She stepped barefoot into Keith’s waiting hand, and he held obediently still as she allowed herself to collapse to her knees, then her stomach in the soft grooves of his palm. She felt the air grow warmer as he wrapped his fingers around her whole body, then the swoop in her stomach as he got to his feet, and then there were no more thoughts after that.

__________________

You can also find this story on my Wattpad under the same username, in my G/t oneshots collection Offset. Constructive comments and feedback are always welcome.

Thanks for reading! 💕

#friends art!!!!!!!#oughgghhhh this is so well done #ive been waiting on this one for a while n the drafts were sooooo good already but the finished result is AMAZING #love it so much 10/10

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