A little accident.

We fixed ourselves as best we could, pulled up our pants and made sure no one had seen us. Well, no one was standing around, at least. It’s weird, but somehow I didn’t care if anyone had seen us. We’d already done the deed, no use feeling regret afterwards. Besides, it felt good. Still, I felt like teasing Diana a bit.

“Hey, you’re the real adult here. You should be the one preventing us from doing risky stuff like this.”

Diana sighed and shook her head. “You all always give me too much credit. I’m only 26, Oliver. I need to remember to ask you if you feel like an adult when you’re 26. I still have some years of recklessness left in me.”

“Really? Is that how it is?”

“Yes. Although… No, it’s nothing.”

“Aw, come on. You already started.”

“...” Diana smiled wryly at me. “It’s not like I’m trying to bring the mood down, but… When my dad passed away I felt like I was **** to grow up all of a sudden.”

“...I see. I’m sorry.”

She shook her head. “I said I’m not trying to bring the mood down. It’s just… Things are different when you have to fully look after yourself, when you no longer have your family to back you up. Maybe you’ll understand some of it when you move out of your house, hopefully without losing family.” She knocked on the tree right after saying that. So did I.

We made our way back to the others right the way we came. When we reached the small waterfall, however, we saw the girls all kneeling close to Noelle, who was sitting on a rock with tears falling down her cheeks. Alice was gently stroking her back and holding her hand.

My chest froze and, with what we had just talked about with Diana, I assumed the worst. We ran to the group and immediately asked what happened.

“H-Hey, what’s wrong!?”

Sarah smiled wryly at me. I noticed she was massaging Noelle’s ankle. “Noelle tripped on a rock and twisted her ankle. It’s nothing serious, but it hurts her to step on it.”

Bad as that was, Diana and I both sighed in relief.

“What’s with that?” Mila asked, frowning.

“Sorry. We… thought it was something worse,” Diana said.

I kneeled next to Noelle and she gave me a heartbroken look. “Does it hurt that much?”

She shook her head. “No,” she said, sobbing. “It’s just… It’s just…”

“She can’t walk like this,” Sarah said. “We still have more than three hours left. If she forces it, it really will turn into something serious.”

“We were waiting for you so we could call the resort and ask them to come pick us up,” Grace said, grimacing with arms crossed below her chest.

“I… I…” Tears kept falling down Noelle’s cheeks, the corners of her mouth punting down. “I wanted… I wanted to…”

I was at the very edge of crying, too, and just from seeing my sweet Noelle cry. She was by far the most excited about this little hike. She pushed for it, prepared for it and looked forward to spending this time with us. That out of all of us she’d be the one to have an accident…

“I’m sorry… I… I ruined it…!” Seeing her cry was absolutely heart wrenching.

I kissed her cheek and carefully wiped a tear from the other. “You didn’t ruin anything. We’ll continue this way,” I told her.

“Oliver, Sarah said it’s not serious but she really shouldn’t walk like this,” Alice repeated.

“I know. She won’t walk.” I turned around, dropped my backpack and crouched with my back to Noelle. “Hop on.”

“W-What? Oliver, I… I can’t…”

“You weigh like, what 55kg?” I smirked at her. “Trust me.”

“Oliver, I know you can bench press over 120 kilos, but this is different. You won’t be able to carry her all the way there,” Sarah said. “20 or 30 minutes, sure, but…”

“I can and I will,” I told Sarah. “I’m not making empty promises. I can, I will and it’ll be easy. You’ve grown used to it, but you’re forgetting that I’m not normal, Sarah.”

“O-Oliver, no, it’s fine.” Noelle stopped crying, but I could tell the guilt she felt hadn’t gone away. “I don’t want to burden you. Let’s just call the resort and…”

I turned around again and faced her. I pecked her lips, cupped her cheek and smiled at her. “This is probably one of the easiest things you could ever ask of me. Let’s give it a shot, alright? If I get tired we can call the resort then, but we can at least go a little further. What do you say?”

“...” Noelle sobbed one last time and wiped her own tears. “If you’re tired and don’t admit it, I’ll get really mad, okay? You have to stop if I'm a burden.”

“Okay, okay. I promise. But in return you have to rub your chest against my back every so often.”

That got a nice giggle out of her. Seeing her smile was a relief to us all. “Okay. Deal.”

“Yes!” I fist-pumped, which got louder laughter out of her and the other girls. I leaned in again and kissed Noelle on the forehead. “I’m serious, okay? You didn’t ruin anything. We’ll go as far as we can and stop if it turns out I’m well over my head.”

Noelle nodded. “I’m sorr… Um… Thank you.”

“That’s better. Now hop on.”

Noelle climbed on my back and I held her in place with my hand beyond her thighs. She was SERIOUSLY light, or at least she felt extremely light to me. I even jumped twice with her on my back, making her let out a little yelp.

She laughed. “D-Don’t do that! I thought I was gonna fall!”

“I’ll die before I let you fall,” I told her.

We were still on the main road, so many others walked past us and saw our little scene. A young couple around Diana’s age walked past us, too. When they saw me with Noelle on my back, the girl elbowed her boyfriend on the ribs.

“See? Why can’t you be more like that?”

“What? It’s all for show! The guy will give up after 10 minutes!” the boyfriend argued.

Sorry my guy. If ten minutes was all I was capable of, I wouldn’t be worthy of being these girls’ boyfriends. I was carrying Noelle all the way to the resort even if I lost my legs in the process.

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