“Here you go, April, should all be sufficiently mended.” It was the next day, and Peak had mended my roughed up pieces of clothing and returned them to me.

I wasted no time in slipping back into my full outfit. For some reason, I felt really bare without my jacket, and I was the type who’d always wear her shoes indoors, so I was also glad to get my boots back on.

“Good work, Peak! Now I’ll actually look presentable come next week!” I commended Peak while giving a reverent nod. “Actually… come to think of it, this isn’t exactly formal wear, is it?”

“Hmm… I think you look pretty festive. You are a Seraph, after all. You don’t needa plaster your outfit with a bunch of feathers like everyone else.” Evidently, I was a race known as the Seraph on this world. Peak had mentioned it a few times before, and explained it to me awhile back. This world had four main lands. On each of those lands, there were five races, each under the denomination of a certain god or goddess; according to Peak, we were in territory under the rule of the goddess of myth, Mythos.

The Mythos races, if I recall correctly, were made up of the Sprites, Nymphs, Hollows, Oni, and of course, the winged Seraphs.

“Hmm, then what are we gonna do about you, Peak? What are you gonna wear for Talon Day, or whatever?” I pointed an accusatory finger at Peak and then morphed that point into an imploring hand gesture. It wasn’t unlike Peak to think through everything with me and neglect himself.

“W-Well, I was just kinda hoping to stay inside for the day. Preferably, I’ll be abstaining from the festivities—” Peak weaseled some more, he still was hesitant to go. I just looked at him with eyes full of shame then asked the one question I’d been wondering.

“Peak… just how long has it been since you’ve had genuine contact with, y’know, society?” He’d been so excited to see me, and yet so scared to go into the village. Peak was clearly a social being, so why was he so hesitant to visit the village? He said he had people who’d “rather not see him,” and things he’d rather not deal with? Could what he was avoiding really be so impactful that it meant distancing himself from society so completely?

“Let’s see... uh…” Peak held his hands in front of his face and started counting on his fingers. “That’d be five years!”

“FIVE YEARS?!” It was no wonder Peak was surprised to see me. If he was without any meaningful social contact for five years, no wonder he’d think he could’ve been hallucinating or something.

Even if years in this world were dictated by the passage of seasons, as dictated by the chromatic moon, and not a monthly calendar, that was still an insane amount of time. At minimum, it had to have been around a thousand days.

“Hey, it's not like I’ve been completely isolated. Busty comes by to yell at me once or twice a year.” Peak tried to appeal to my sense of reason, but it only made him appear more pitiful.

“Peak, that’s not real social interaction. Not at all!” I attempted to scold Peak...

“Ahaha, is it not?” But all he did was laugh it off, arm behind his head as usual.

“Seriously, what could you be avoiding that requires holing yourself away for half a decade?” I bent over to look Peak right in the face. While he was still sitting down, I had been standing from where I’d changed.

“W-Well, there’s just someone I don’t wanna see, okay?!” Peak shot off another worthless attempt. This one, especially, was bad!

“SOMEONE?! I thought you said people not a person. And what’s with all that crap about not being welcome?! Clearly, you’re welcome if they’re inviting you to their festivals, so explain, man! EXPLAIN!” By this point, I was violently shaking Peak around as I stated my demands, and Peak’s face had turned pale as all of his BS excuses slowly crumbled to his feet. Maybe he hadn’t been lying, but he for sure wasn’t telling the whole truth either.

“People can be singular, too, can’t it?” Peak averted his eyes. He’d been called out, and he wasn’t good with confrontation.

“Not in that context, it can’t! Not in that context!” The shaking accelerated. “And what about not being welcome? Hm? Was that another lie?! Hmmm?”

“The person I’m avoiding wouldn’t welcome me…” Peak’s words squeaked out in a choppy burst. I was now shaking him to the point where he sounded like he was sitting on a vibrating chair when he responded.

“THAT’S DIFFERENT!!!” Finally fed up with our conversation, the back of Peak’s chair broke off and he fell backwards onto the ground.

When we were both a bit calmed down, we stood up on the patio, looking over the river as we talked.

“Sigh. Don’t worry, I’m going. I did say I’d bring you there eventually…” Peak scratched his beard and looked at me with reassuring but distant eyes.

“That you did. But you also said all that other stuff.” I jabbed at his lies.

“Look, I already apologized for that, didn’t I?” Peak cast his gaze in guilt.

“Actually, you didn’t, but it's whatever. I wasn’t exactly looking for apologies, anyways. Just tell me why you hid the truth in the first place.” Peak wasn’t a liar, at least, I didn’t consider him one. So, when speaking to him, I made sure to beat around the word lie.

“Truth is, I figured that if I said that I messed up and sealed myself away out here to avoid someone, you’d think I was being trivial.” Peak, as he grew more anxious, switched his scratching from his beard to his hair.

“Duh! It is trivial! If you’re the one who screwed up, just own it and move on.” I honestly never understood that sentiment. No matter how many times someone could fall down. No matter how many mistakes someone could make. To me, there was never anything worth running from.

Running from mistakes… doing that only had a tendency to make matters worse.

“See! That’s why I didn’t wanna tell you! I knew you’d say that!” Peak jumped to life as he reversed the blame onto me.

“Look, buddy, I just say it how it is. Now that I’m in this new world, I wanna reinvent myself. Never run away from my problems or what I wanna do.” I started on what seemed like a tangent. In reality, it was a lure. I was gonna bring Peak in and trap him.

“I suppose, that’s rather admirable. Good on you, April! Ahaha! That’s really cool!” Peak grabbed my head and brought me in for a one armed hug, or a noogie, or something. But against his expectations, I pushed back.

“I’m glad you think so!” After he’d defused so many of my attempts to be sly, I was glad I’d finally pulled one over on him. It turned out, whenever Peak was in a bit of a down mood, that was when I could catch him off guard with one of my schemes. “Because right now, what I wanna do is help you out, Peak!”

“Help me out?!” At the sudden change in my demeanor from open and sensitive to devilishly plotting, Peak leaped away from me in a weirded out shock.

“All the quests of April Fallow have been completed. Well, except for that whole blank dream thing, but that was a dud! So, now we’re moving forward!” I struck a pose and pointed at Peak.

“Actually, we didn’t really get anything done… You lost your weapons, the blank dream was a flunk, and because of that, we can’t register you with a Crystal Tree—”

“Lalala! Don’t care! You’ve helped me out, so now it'smy turn to repay the favor. And in classic Peak style, it’ll be against your will.” Even though I was speaking in the most declarative voice I could muster, my arms were somehow saying even more as they went place to place.

“Ahaha… What’s that supposed to mean, lass?” Peak had no idea how to react, so he’d responded with a mixture of his anxiousness from earlier today and his usual energy.

“This whole time, you’ve been helping me under your own will. Elklin Peakswill! But no longer! Now it’s time for you to be under my discretion.” I continued my proclamation.

“Your discretion… with what?!” Peak was finally starting to catch hold of what the words I was throwing around meant, and when he did, I could hear his blood pressure spike through his voice alone.

“Out with Peakswill! It’s now time for you to Fallow my lead! After all, I was pretty darn popular in high school. When it comes to social stuff, I’m pretty much a deity—a second feathered deity to bless this beautiful mountaintop. That is, if I’m right and the deity, y’all worship for Talon Day is feathered…” Realizing partway through my frenzy that I had my wings manipulatable, too, I started to implement them into my nonverbal talking. Then, as I neared the end of my statement, I waited for an affirming nod from Peak before continuing. My guess was right, Talon Day probably worshipped some feathered deity. Thank god for context clues. Without them, I would’ve ended up ruining my whole mojo and looking stupid.

“Hear me now, Peak! I, April Fallow, will reintroduce you into society, and solve your problems! I’ll remedy your relationship with that avoidable someone, and repay my nonexistent debt to you!” And with one, final pose, I did a take two of my introduction, stood up on the recently repaired patio guard rail, and intentionally leapt off into the sky… falling right down into the stream.

My reason was convoluted in procedure, but simple in concept. If I did this, I could strip Peak of all ability to argue back or protest my help. After all, it’s impossible to argue with someone half-drowning in a flowing stream.

Peak—abundantly energetic, dangerously altruistic, socially exiled, and confrontationally anxious. When it came to dealing with other people’s problems, he was as adept as they came. When it came to dealing with his own, he only had two routes he could go. He could laugh it off like he did with Fi’s anger, or run away like he did from Shelter.

“Ahaha! Fine then!” I was yanked out of the water that I was still unable to properly navigate through, despite my movable wings, and when I’d resurfaced I was met with the embrace of a gleeful, teary eyed, Peak constraining my ability to retrieve oxygen. “If you’re so adamant about it, I can’t refuse it.”

“So, you’ll let me help you…?” My heart fluttered as Peak’s face morphed into a familiar smile. He then wiped his tears from his eyes and conceded.

“I’ve realized for awhile that I couldn’t run away forever. It’d been eating away at me for so long, yet I’ve done nothing. So, thank you, April... I’ll embrace your help with open arms!” It’d turned out, he was crying because he was moved. For a guy as altruistic as Peak, it probably felt pretty nice—having someone who wanted to help him.

“Yeah, that’s great. But can you do me a favor before I help you…” Through the last remnants of my breath, I pleaded to Peak for one last favor. “Can you actually embrace it with open arms. You’re starting to choke me.”

“Dang it! I always do this! There you go!” I was immediately released and dropped to the ground, only to find Peak’s hand right in my face. “We can look after each other, okay? You’ve got my back, and I’ll have yours.”

I was once more getting deja vu. It was like these past two days had happened before. I’d retraced my steps since day one.

Encountering that waterfall filled with mist, then exiting that mist and meeting someone new, and now being hauled out of a stream with Peak’s hand spread in front of me.

It’d happened before, yet this time it felt completely different. I’d grown and experienced so much, more than I ever had back on Earth. I had battles that fulfilled my sense of wonder—my need for adventure. I met people who would inspire me to do cool things with my life. And most importantly, I was about to form a real partnership.

Not one where one of us was exclusively helping the other. No, we’d look after each other, even if it was only until I went to the dungeon. Helping one another when we could, and making up for the other’s weaknesses. That was what a partnership was.

I’d thought this once before, but now I was certain—now it felt sure. Peak and I... We were officially partners.

I was, and would likely always be, selfish and self absorbed—I’d repeatedly taken from Peak without offering anything in return. I was overly prideful and rushed into things without thinking about the ramifications towards myself or others—my Rapiter stunt, in reality, had almost certainly stressed Peak out more than myself. But if it was for Peak, I could fix those flaws and throw all that aside.

I’d realized I was delaying my adventure, but in a way, I was going forth into an adventure of my own. One different from the typical hack and slash fiesta of kill monsters and profit. My adventure would start by helping out a middle-aged oaf become less socially recluded. A unique start, for sure, but it was gonna be mine.

I saw a lot of myself in Peak, despite our differences in culture, age, sex, and origin. That must’ve been why I wanted to help him. It was like… like I was helping myself by helping him.

So, I took Peak’s hand.

“Yup, I agree! We have to have each other’s backs from now on—” My hopeful declaration of friendship was cut short. My bandages had all but washed away in the stream, and as I reached for Peak, my wounds reopened.

“—And we’ll start by patching you up!” Peak, unphased by my leaking, concluded my sentence for me.

“And we’ll start with patching me up!” I copied his conclusion and then, as he offered me a shoulder to lean on, we headed back to his treehouse to reapply my bandages.