This past summer, my friends and I discovered a hidden creek on a path that diverts from our normal walking trail. If you trek through tall and tick-infested grass, you will find yourself on the rocky shore of a small and peaceful running creek, peeking out from underneath weeping willows. Frogs, toads, and too many birds to count called this haven their home; every few seconds one would hear the ‘ROAAAAK’ of a frog giddily about to dive. To the left of the creek was a large pond, though none of us ever braved the swim.

My best friend Blaire- quiet, tall, and intelligent -was the first to discover the place. She brought her twin sister. Then me. Then our other friend, Lucille. We considered ourselves the four musketeers, though in my mind I wanted to keep the limit to the original three. At the time, I didn’t like Lucille much. I think this was because I’d heard she was talking behind my back, but I don’t even know if this rumor was true. Despite this, a deep resentment rose in my chest whenever Lucille joined us three at the creek.

No matter what I wanted to think, she was prettier than me. Her hair was light and brown, glowing golden when the sun hit it. Her eyes were a swirling green that made my deep brown eyes cower in their presence like a tree trunk hidden beneath its lush green leaves. In the halls, Lucille held hands with her boyfriend, swinging their arms and singing a song into his lips. She was thin and nimble like a gazelle. She was smart as a dolphin and Lucille was all I wanted to be. 

I wanted ever so badly to switch bodies for just a day; I needed to know what it was like to be her. Every move she made was every move I mimicked. To be Lucille would be to be a celebrity.

Her parents, unlike mine as of recently (at the time), were happily married, situated in a house that should belong to fairies in the way that it was rustic and ethereal. It compared to the creek in that way, as the water wasn’t quite clear; although feeling the cool rush of the pond sent a bolt of energy through your veins when you planted two fingers into the bank that clung onto rocks beneath your ratty sneakers.

The four of us tried to make it our mission to visit as often as possible, though there was one day on one of the summer’s hottest afternoons that I had arrived and found only beautiful Lucille with her white toenails dipped into the creek’s bank. I thought about walking back through the itchy tall grass to leave her be, but my feet were getting hot in my tennis shoes. I sauntered through the rocks and seated myself atop a boulder before slipping off my sweaty shoes and socks, tired from walking the trail. Lucille turned her head to me as I placed my whole feet into the water, wiggling the water’s moss out of my toes. 

Her golden face seemed sullen and distracted, unlike her usually sunny disposition. Her stunning green gaze caused me worry, though I didn’t know why. Those eyes drifted away for a moment before she turned her head back to the creek, staring across the stream and to the island beyond. The way her hand rested limply, drifting along with the water’s current.

The silence pained me, the way that the only sound I could hear was the croaking of a toad and a gentle rushing of the water over the rocks. Biting my cheek, I adjusted my gray overall strap. I cleared my throat, anxious to speak but anxious to know what troubled perfection. “You ok?” I muttered, eyes wide and hands fidgeting with some dirt on the rock. The dirt lodged beneath my gold fingernail.

She hesitated. Releasing my cheek from my teeth, I followed her gaze to the island across the creek. We’d seen a family of ducks make their way through the grass on that side. Frogs hopping onto the shore. A songbird staring at its reflection. We had seen such beauty at the creek. “You can’t tell anybody this,” Lucille whispered abruptly, bringing me out of my daze.

Curiously, I leaned down slightly from the smooth boulder, gaze not leaving the island. “Tell anybody what?” 

She closed her eyes and ran two elegant fingers through the rushing water, the heat seeming to beat down on her as sweat ran down her back. “I might be pregnant. I took a test and…” 

…

I remember her telling me the whole story through a ten-minute series of quiet and desensitized mutters and sighs. I couldn’t move my body. Even today I can’t possibly picture my expression. I’d heard of girls getting pregnant at our age, but hearing this news from Lucille made the water rushing over my feet hurt like pinpricks. 

This is, I believe, when I realized that she wasn’t perfect. Beautiful Lucille was just Lucille, going through teen girl problems like me or Blaire or the next girl. Parents, looks, boyfriend, it’s complicated. Her fairy house was a front for goblins.

I don’t remember what she or I said when she was done, but I remember crouching down to bring my arms around her pale figure and closing my eyes, picturing us sinking into the secret creek that we were safe underneath. Water rushed over our aching feet as we breathed in silence, chests rising and falling in a synchronized rhythm.