#fnfriday

Picking him up in my pickup truck ensued his same lame joke: “Just hope you have a dropoff truck to drop me off”, which we would both laugh at despite the repetition and lameness of it. I just loved how his soft beautiful lips would move as they delivered the exact same line every time.

As snack rules dictate we did almost go through half the snacks brought on the car ride, for that sole reason I bought extra food that needed preparation which wouldn’t happen in car. The moment I had made that observation and brought up my own food, he acted shocked with his hand to his chest, deep gasp and everything. “Is my cooking not good enough for you, my dear Geoffrey?”, he said aghast. (my name is not Geoffrey). 

I then had to calm him down by the same token, “Geoffrey, my dear. I would never think such a thing. Darling I just know how you love making food out in the wilderness too”, I calmly explained in the most old-loving-couple voice I could, while stroking his cheek sensually, trying to stifle my laugh as well as trying to keep my eyes on the road as we neared the ‘parking space’ we were using.

Getting our packs together and getting into the forest was a breeze. Even though no one had supposedly walked here previously it was as if either there was a perfect road to travel or the woods were opening up for us as we went in, the bushes just letting us walk by and the tall trees peering down at us while letting in sunlight from above. We kept up the whole old-couple-charade until the sun began going down and we looked at each other and though, ’fuck, we forgot fires need to be built’, and went into a mad frenzy to try and find wood, sticks and dry grass.

This mad frenzy at sunset proved to not be beneficial as we were only able to find vaguely dry sticks. Looking at each other we simultaniously pulled on our backpacks’ straps and said, “well fuck, huh?”, and then chuckled shortly with worryful smiles.

The sun sunk below the horizon, at least as far as we know from it getting dark since we couldn’t see the horizon for trees. As we took out flashlight a calming sound reached our ears, the cracks and sizzles of a good fire. We looked about but couldn’t see any light anywhere. Instead we prompted to walk in the direction of the sound as best we could. I grabbed his hand to make sure neither of us got lost, to keep him close and to calm myself down a little from the worry of being this unprepared in the woods that we don’t know too well.

Following the sounds of fire we found a lady around our age sitting by a firepit with a fire that seemed to have gone out, she held out her hand towards us and our flashlights that we immediately turned away and said, “sorry”, at the same time. We shared a look at our synchronization before walking closer to her and her little firepit.

As we did so, it was as if we walked past a screen, which let us see that it was very much not a dead fire but a live one which provided both heat and light. We turned of our flashlights and I asked, “do you mind if we borrow use of your fire for cooking food?”, as I took off my backpack.

“Oh sure, if I can steal a bite, I’m starving a bit myself actually”, she rose to meet us as we were sitting down to take delight in the warm fire. We of course let her get some of our food as long as she was fine with canned soup.

We told her why we were there, searching for the old, evil, dangerous, malevolent witch of the wood and whatever extra addjectives we could come up with to describe her. Lara, the lady we met, said she was doing pretty much the same thing, so we thought, why the hell not join forces in this quest for ancient hags?

Both me and my friend had brought tents, so we let her get my small one as well as one of our blanket. Us boys would just cuddle in his slightly bigger one. That’s how we chose to split up for the night. The boys cuddling for warmth and the lady getting a thick blanket.

Did this put me and my best friend in a position where we almost needed help to get untangled the day after? Perhaps, but at least we had Lara to help with that.

With sunlight shimmering through the tree tops and breakfast in our collective stomachs we ventured onwards, casually chatting, trying to start a conversation with this stranger, Lara, proved quite easy.

She knew about most anything we thought to talk about, which was nice. Me and my best friend could easily not talk for hours or talk for hours but not with most other people, Lara, however seemed to almost promote our weird conversation delving into the intricate plotlines of Minecraft despite it having no plotline. Did we end up finding the point of Minecraft’s story? No, but we ended up all holding hands as we walked, which was nice.

As we took a lunch break, I asked the two others if they would be fine with me taking a short nap, which of course they were, the perfect nice people that they are. I simply laid down on the log we were sitting on, my head right beside my best friends thighs and my feet curled up besides Lara’s.

Even with it being a short nap, I dreamt of being a boat having been lost at sea for an extremely long time despite always having a lighthouse, because I never actually followed that light. The dream ended when I finally chose to follow that light.

“Mmmhh’orning”, I said groggily as I woke up still unaware of my surroundings from the nap. Opening my eyes I looked straight into my best friend’s own dashing pair of eyes. I was lying with my head on his thighs and my legs on Lara’s.

Instead of lifting me of his lap, my best friend just booped my nose instead, “morning sleepybedhead”, He ruffled my hair with his booping hand. Lara just gave me a nod and lifted my legs off of her own.

“It is sleep brain talking, but you look dashing right now man”, I lifted my self off of his thighs and checked my watch for the time, “you let me sleep for an hour and a half? We need to get going”, I urged them on.

“You looked comfy”, Lara said as she looked to my friend and gave him an urging nod.

“And you felt comfy my guy, wouldn’t want to wake you like that.”, he grabbed my shoulder and gave it a soft shake as he spoke, “Witches ain’t nothin’ but tricks ‘n’ hoes compared to my budbudbuddy”, he let his beautiful grin loose and I roled my eyes.

At this point I was beginning to think that perhaps we wouldn’t find the witch or any hut or anything. I asked out loud, “Are we there yet?”, in an exasperated tone looking up at the sky.

Lara just responded by grabbing her phone looking at something as I felt the same hand on my shoulder again. “Now now, Geoffrey, we’ll get there when we do, won’t we?”, he let his hand slip down my shoulder and arm to my hand, interlocking his and my hand.

I looked to him in the eyes, “I knooow, Geoffrey, but I’d love to get there sooner rather than later, spending more time there with you”, I squeezed his hand and began swinging our hands.

“Well great news you two, we’re here”, she put down her phone and we saw what looked like a giant tree trunk, that had been turned into a house but that house then later had been renovated and gotten insulation and wifi. It looked like a modern day witches hut. “Where I live, want to come in and get a muffin? They should be getting out the oven right now”, she didn’t bother waiting for our answer as she strolled into the house leaving us two frozen a bit in place.

We looked each other in the eye again, eyes much more dilated this time, “Before we get fatten-”, we started in unison, “I love you man”, we both said and gained a weird smile at the simultaneous confession that was unexpected to be given and recieved on both of our parts.

“C’mon broskidledi and broskidledum I made love muffins”, Lara had opened a window and was holding what looked like a muffin filled with some very pink jam. “Though any muffin is a love muffin in your hands, jayzeus”, she laughed at us.

Obviously Lara was the witch, we had figured that out by now. “Well yea, but I’m not the evil-cetera witch you described, that would be great-great-grannie, not very accepting that one”, she shook her head. “Now you two should consider yourselves lucky, you’re like the first people to see the place in like some odd hundred years I think, though getting you two to confess out there was worth it”.

I asked her, “you showed us your house to get us to confess?”, but my best friend or whatever we were now asked at the same time, “How’d you know we were going to?”.

Even through the cacophony, Lara was able to hear and respond, “yeap”, making the p pop, “and I mean you’ve been obvious ever since you drove into the woods, I mean mister and mister Geoffrey, please I do have eyes, also I looked at your cuddling dreams, adorable by the way, and I showed you”, she pointed at me, “divination like dreams of your love life - You can probably guess who the... Light? Puzzle piece? or whatever it was, who that resembled”.

We both looked at her and each other stunned, “will you excuse us a moment?”, I asked and she didn’t even dally for a second before leaving with a smile only grabbing some cup off a counter on her way. “You meant it right? Because I did but you don’t have to, I just want to, well do this kind of thing again like holy shit we found a witch, how cool is that am I right? up top!”, I rambled a bit holding up my hand.

He did not go for the highfive, instead just the handhug, “Yes to all of it, on one condition, or two rather, cuddle ‘n’ kiss?”, I laughed a bit and nodded before kissing and just hugging him tight.

As we had lent her what was basically our spare bedroom while in the forest, she too let us use her guest bedroom to sleep over in, despite it being monday and work tomorrow. “With this-”, I looked at my phone’s wifi, “probably legitmately magic wifi, we’ll just send an email and just not show up tomorrow”.

As we finally had to leave on that monday, Lara told us both if we ever wanted to hang or just have a place to chill, we should just stroll into the forest, she’d find us. We accepted that offer, and gave her a two-man hug from both sides. “Just as long as you two stay as cool as you’ve been this whole time, then you will undoubtedly stay cool with each other, however that might end up and with me and my house” she waved at us as we left.