Honestly, though, this huge white snowy bastard was the hugest riddle that I had ever been faced with. It wasn’t like he was his own story—it felt like this jerk had his own saga, man, like his own series or some shit piled in the back of the library, a classic that them there young’uns forgot about and was left to sit there, gathering dust, being something epic all by itself. A story worth reading, if the librarian was kind enough to recommend it (or at least not that much of a bitch to hide it).

He cried some more when I touched him, which skewed something within me, scaring me, thinking I had done something even worse (which wouldn’t have surprised me). But then he…he smiled at me. I mean, sure it was ice-covered and frozen like the rest of him, stiff in a way that only despair could cause—but still. It was a smile. Like maybe he could tell what I was trying (and failing) to do, and he was cool with it, or at least humoring the idea behind it.

And…well, maybe the tears he was crying now were an improvement? (WOW that sounds awful.) No, wait, listen. His other tears had just been there, falling from what seemed like nowhere, and he had just let them because fuck it what else could he do? But THESE tears weren’t just falling; they were bubbling and fresh, an active thing, like they emanated from something internal, a gut-wrenching pain that you couldn’t stitch up so you just had to bear through it until it passed. This…still sounds awful, actually, but shut up I’m getting to the point! The point is that he was probably still in pain—but at least, now he was feeling. Some numbness had broken when I touched him, and I guess there had been a spark between my muzzle and his shoulder, but the fact was that you’re in trouble when you can’t feel anything but Teeny was feeling.

Did…was that me? Did I do that?

He followed behind me, letting me guide him who-knows-where, somewhere warmer, south, trusting me to take him somewhere safe. An awful choice, really, to trust me to do anything right—but I had done something for him, I guess, with the concern I felt for him that I didn’t truly understand myself. I was painfully aware of him behind me; his height and size, the thrum of the air that broke when his big white ass traveled through it, his wet, ice-laden scent and the ragged breathing that misted around his muzzle as he breathed. He whispered something—to me, to himself, I’m not sure which—and I stewed on what he said as we walked, keeping silent and to myself but trying to figure out:

Lee-os? Ley-os? Lih-os?

What the fuck?

Was that…his name?

I mean, it was still far from the time to be asking confirmation on his name—the bro just got reintroduced to his pain, and I wasn’t gonna break the precarious thing I that I had kinda-sorta-maybe helped him accomplished. But Leos (Liy-os? Leyh-ohs? Fuck me.) seemed like something a walking saga would be named, something that rolled off the tongue in a unique, majestic way (that I couldn’t replicate to save my life, goddamn). So I led this dude to warmer places that maybe could thaw out the rest of him—and in my head, I had found a better name for him than Teeny.

Leos.








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