I didn’t mind the purple swirl, or the dizzy, acid nose burps I got from traveling through the portal. I was on top of the world, literally, when we materialized back in Summer’s mountain. Stepping out into the portal room, I blinked at the bright, dazzling colors of the main chamber. The blue pond, the green crops. And the air, cool and fresh in comparison to the thermal blast of down below. I would have just stood there for a few moments, venting my lungs, waiting for my body temperature to lower, but…
“Hurry!” Summer darted away from me, disappearing toward the front door.
“Wh…” I started to ask.
“Hurry!” her voice echoed down the hall. “While you’re still too hot!”
Wondering what she had up her painted sleeve, I got to the exit just as she switched off the lava fall.
“Take off your armor!” she said, throwing open the doors. “You’re going to love this!”
I’d just taken off my helmet and chest plate when the freezing air hit us.
“Oh yeah,” I said, savoring the refreshing chill. “I see what you…”
But she was off again! Running across the snow, down to the frozen river!
“Oh no,” I breathed. “You can NOT be—”
“Come on!” I watched her bound down the bank, out of sight, and heard a few quick plinks of pickaxe on ice.
“What are you waiting…” Summer began, and then, after an audible splash, finished with a breathy “f-f-for!”
“Crazy girl,” I huffed, running after her. “And I gotta be crazier for following her!”
A few snow-crunching strides brought me down to the sight of Summer waist-deep in a hacked-out pond.
“Just do it!” she shouted. “Don’t think!”
Don’t think. As easy as not breathing!
But I tried not to do either, racing onto the ice and leaping into the air.
Smack!
Down to the bottom, pushing up from the mud, I came up with an explosive “Bwaaaaa!”
“Isn’t it glorious!” Summer asked as I splashed and gasped and tried to put subzero syllables into words.
“Yeeeaaayayaya…” was my grand answer.
“The first time I returned from the Nether”—Summer splashed me—“I was so hot I thought I’d snuff it. But then I remembered that some people back in our world—maybe in a country close to mine?—they pop from saunas to cold-water plunges for their health.”
“Yehehyea,” I shivered, “r-r-really h-h-healthy.”
Summer laughed. So did I. Sharing a laugh with a friend—well, I considered her a friend, at least—was glorious.
“Nothing quite like returning from the Nether,” continued Summer, “to really make you appreciate the world we live in up here.”
I’m sure I would have answered with something equally insightful. I might even have quoted that lesson about being grateful for what we have, especially if what we have is something as wonderful as the natural world. The smell of a tree, the breeze on my face, the sight of high, white clouds floating lazily. Bright sun, blue sky. Amazing what you don’t appreciate until it’s gone. I’m sure I would have said something—
But my stomach beat me to the punch.
Grrrp.
“Guess you’re hungrier than you realized,” Summer teased, climbing out of the river. “The heat down there can make you forget to eat. And throw in all that running and fighting and I’m right on the edge of starvation.”
She wasn’t exaggerating. The river wasn’t the only thing chilling me, and a whiff of my own unusually bad breath left no room for debate.
“I think a celebratory dinner is in order,” announced Summer as we headed back for the mountain.
“Totally!” I chimed in.
Bread, baked potatoes, cookies…
“Chicken!” Summer practically flew through the doors as she spoke. “Nothing hits the spot like a bit of blackened bird!”
And suddenly I wasn’t hungry anymore. Just the opposite. I felt sick, slammed with a looming confrontation I’d managed to avoid with the previous mutton breakfast.
“Well, come on then.” Summer led me down the hall, across the main chamber, and through another set of double doors. “Let’s feed them before they feed us!”
I swallowed spit, took another gulp of head-clearing air.
“The coop’s just down this way.” Summer was already in another door-lined hallway.
“Ummm…” I tried to speak, tried to think. How to get out of this. How to explain.
“What was that?” asked Summer, slowing her pace.
“Oh,” I stammered, “I just—” At that moment, my eyes fell on an open door to my right, a dark, bare chamber with recessed redstone torches above a smooth stone floor, lined with…MUSHROOMS!
“…just thought mushroom soup would be better!” I said with sudden confidence. “I mean, why go through all the trouble of killing and cooking when we can just pick—”
“Surely you jest,” Summer laughed in my face. “Gooey mushroom slop? Never touch the stuff anymore, unless it goes in a rabbit stew.” She made a little, musing “hm” at the thought. “Would you prefer that? A spot of hunting, a few hoppers in the pot with some carrots and—”
“No,” I gulped. “No thanks.”
“On then,” she said, continuing her trot, “to the cluckers.”
Outwardly, I was silent, but my brain was screaming in alarm.
She’s going to be angry! When I tell her, she’s going to be insulted and hurt! Maybe even throw me out!
“Here we are,” she said, and opened a single door at the end of the hallway.
Just when we were starting to become friends! Had our first adventure together. Shared our first victory! Now this!
I followed her into a short, narrow chamber, nothing but some torches, another door in front, and a double chest cut into a side recess. “I usually feed them once a week,” she said, opening the chest to remove two clumps of bright green wheat seeds. “Unless I’m really hungry.”
If I just don’t tell her…I thought, turning on my own guilt. Just go along with it, just one more time.
“There you go.” Summer handed me a clump of stacked seeds, then backed up a few blocks from the next door. “Careful,” she said, and drew an iron axe from her belt. “Sometimes they run out.”
Don’t risk upsetting her. Don’t ruin everything!
The door slid open to a cacophony of clucks and an overwhelming smell of feathers.
When I’d raised chickens, it’d been outdoors. I never knew that enough of them in a small room carried a concentrated scent. It wasn’t bad. Kind of like a pillow. I guess under normal circumstances, I might not have minded it, but in the state I was in now, with my spinning head and churning stomach…well, I don’t want to imagine what I would’ve felt like if this world allowed them to poop.
There were about a dozen of them, pecking on the room’s dirt floor or splashing in a central pond that even held a small island with a tree. “They do love their swim,” said Summer, walking over to a wall lever, “and some fresh air.”
Ch-ck!
Cold air rushed in from a pair of iron-grated holes in the wall. The crisp sensation seemed to perk me up, give me strength.
I can do this. Just go along with it. Swallow my feelings for a while.
Holding out the seeds, letting the birds peck their food from my hand.
It’s better than losing Summer, right? Better to keep the peace and keep the friend.
Their eyes. Trusting little dots. Just like on my island. Just like the moment before I…
“That should do it,” announced Summer as a quartet of little squawking chicks appeared. “Enough to replace the ones we harvest.”
Just look away, pretend it’s not happening.
The axe in her hand.
Why can’t I be allowed to cover my ears?
The blade, passing to me?!
“You do the honors.” Her voice, matter-of-fact, like she was plucking wheat.
Just a few swipes, quick. Then it’ll all be over.
Stepping over to the first bird.
You can…
Looking up at me.
You…
The eyes…
“I can’t!”
Spinning to Summer, dropping the axe.
“Pardon?”
Dry throat, beating heart, sweat dripping into my eyes.
“I can’t! I’m sorry! I can’t kill them! I can’t kill anything for food! I used to. On my island. I raised chickens too. All tame and friendly and expecting me to take care of them and…I killed them, almost all of them. I let a few go, but I killed so many…and I couldn’t live with it. I felt so guilty! And yeah, I know, it’s kinda hypocritical ’cause I still need their feathers for arrows and I know I’ll have to make a choice when those run out, and yeah, I ate the rabbit but it died by accident and the sheep was killed by a wolf, and yeah, if I was starving and if it was me or them, like when I had to catch those fish down in the mine, but as long as I’m not starving and I don’t have to, then I just can’t kill another living thing for food. I can’t! I won’t!”
Silence.
Then…
“Okay.”
“Okay?”
Summer shrugged.
“If you don’t want to eat meat, then don’t eat meat.”
“Oh.”
“As long as you don’t mind if I do.”
“No”—I shook my head vigorously—“no, that’s fine…as long as I don’t have to watch you kill them.”
“Of course not.” Summer gestured to the door. “Wait outside, or even in the kitchen so you don’t hear anything.”
“Oh.” Another beat of silence, my heart still clanging in my chest. “You’re sure that’s okay?”
“Why wouldn’t it be?” asked Summer, calmly retrieving her axe. “As long as you respect my life choices, why wouldn’t I respect yours?”
So simple. So obvious! Friends respect each other’s life choices.
I turned for the door.
“And, Guy…”
Turning back.
“Next time, if you need to tell me something, why not just tell me instead of telling yourself a story in your head.”
“Noted,” I said, and shut the door.
Walking down the hall, I digested yet another fresson: Friends communicate. I’d imagined an entire conflict, trying to control the future instead of just risking it by being honest. And as I chewed more on that wisdom, I realized it was really just a side dish to the main course: Friends shouldn’t be afraid to be honest with their friends. What kind of friendship is built on lies and secrets? How can someone really be your friend if they don’t know who you are?
The notion was a feast for my brain. So much so that I recounted it all to Summer over dinner.
“And that’s why friends shouldn’t be afraid to be honest with their friends.”
“You and your lessons,” Summer laughed after her last bite of chicken.
“I never get tired of learning.” I shrugged, reaching for another cookie. “And there’s so much to learn now. Life in this mountain, life in the Nether, life with you.”
“You’ll get the hang of it.” Summer made a subtle, pleasant noise that, in a world of facial expressions, probably would have translated to a smile. “You’ll be an expert in no time.”