Growing Pains

Chapter 1

Samuel Rivera is my best friend, he has been since I was eight years old. Sam and Eli, that's us. People say our names like that now, as if they're hyphenated and never meant to be separated. Like gin and tonic, or Ant and Dec.

Everyone who meets Sam, loves Sam. I've never been able to work out exactly what it is that draws people in, but it's definitely real because I've seen it happen. It happened to me. He is charismatic and clumsy and horribly spontaneous. If there is one thing though, that everyone knows about Sam, it is that he has the lowest threshold for pain in the world; and is subsequently terrified of hurting himself.

You would think that someone who is inherently clumsy and afraid of injuring themselves would avoid situations that could cause them harm. Sam does not follow the same logic I follow, however, which is why I am reluctantly sat at ice hockey try-outs with him.

"You think we made the team, Eli?" Sam asks hesitantly, lifting a bag of ice to my throbbing knuckles.

I take the bag from him, noting the discomfort it causes him to simply hold the ice and shrug indifferently. God, I hope we didn't.

"Maybe, although why you decided ice hockey was a good hobby to take up, I will never know." I mutter, watching Sam grin at my grumbles.

"You didn't have to try-out with me." Sam states, although we both know that he wouldn't have escaped today unscathed if I hadn't. We do everything together, whether I like it or not, but it's not entirely out of fondness.

When we were kids, Sam had fallen off the top of a slide and had broken his arm right in front of me. It was just him and I, me and my best friend. He had screamed, sobbing at the pain and had begged me to make it stop. I still remember it so vividly. Seeing my only friend at the time in such despair had been so overwhelmingly distressing to me. I swore to myself and to him that if I could, I would take the pain from him in a heartbeat. And I did.

Sam had stopped crying, whimpering only at the fact that his arm was bent awkwardly whilst my own arm seared in pain. I had clenched my jaw, my fists, anything to stop me from crying out, and I had helped my best friend get home. Sam didn't complain once as he had his arm re-broken and set and the doctors had marvelled at how brave he was. I didn't understand at the time, that I had felt every pain that Sam should have felt. My parents thought I was putting it on, trying to sympathise or get attention. I never spoke to them about it again after that.

Every day since then, I have felt the pain that Sam should feel, taken the full force of every injury so that Sam doesn't have to. I have no idea why it happens or how to stop it, not that I want to. I would do it all over again in an instant.

Since that day, we were inseparable; but not purely because he's my best friend. Being by his side is easier; if I can prevent him from getting hurt in the first place, it's less pain for the both of us. I have no idea if Sam has ever wondered why his injuries never hurt as much as they should, or if he even remembers that day he fell from the slide.

"You really shouldn't have jumped in, he was going to tackle me. I would have been fine." Sam says idly, his eyes watching my knuckles intently. I shrug again and grin at him.

"Maybe I like the action." I say confidently and Sam rolls his eyes.

"Yeah, right. You're way too overprotective." He muses darkly and I chuckle at his frown.

"Would you rather I wasn't?" I ask, my tone is light-hearted but I am genuinely curious to hear his answer. He ponders it thoughtfully before his mouth turns up into a blissful smile.

"No," He says definitively, "But it is a pain in the neck sometimes. Look what you did to yourself!" He continues, remarking on the condition of my right hand. I flex my fingers and laugh at his mother-hen mode.