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~SUMMER~

Otters make great swimmers, and Arden was no exception. He'd been one of the top swimmers in the country ever since his freshman year at Elton High. Trouble was, he was as far from swimming or the water at that moment as he could possibly get. The hot August sun beat down on his unprotected head as the young otter huffed and panted, making his way doggedly around the school's track. His shirt was wet, hot and sticky. It clung to his torso, only adding to the discomfort of the heat and the dull pain that shot through his legs each time he took a step.

The soccer team was out on the football field that day. Arden had heard from some kids at school that the artificial turf made practice a bit easier on hot days like this. He let the stray thought drift to the back of his mind and continued his run, paying little attention to the players. He regretted this unconscious decision only a few moments later.

"Heads!" The loud cry was followed immediately by a blurred streak of white and black flying right at him. The soccer ball hit Arden square on the forehead and threw him off balance.

The young otter was too stunned to brace himself and hit the ground with full force. He lay there with his eyes closed, trying to figure out what exactly had just transpired.

"You alright?"

Arden opened his eyes slowly. Through the blur, he recognized Mark, a wolf from the soccer team, standing over him. "Huh?" He meant to say a lot more, but his thoughts were still far too scattered for any of the more complicated words.

"You took quite a hit, there." Mark slapped his own forehead and winced. "Straight on. Just lay still for a bit. Things should start to focus more."

Arden took the wolf's advice. He lay there, thankful for the cool shade that Mark's body provided. When the world stopped spinning quite so much, he judged it safe to get up. "I'm fine." He sat up and touched his forehead gingerly. "Never knew running was that dangerous."

"Ah, a sense of humor! So not all is lost." Mark's canid muzzle broke into an adorable grin.

'Adorable?' Arden shook his head. 'I must still be hallucinating.'

"I'm Mark, by the way." The wolf watched him intently.

"Oh, er... I'm Arden." He already knew the wolf's name, but some lingering doubt kept him from saying so.

"That's a nice name... Arden. Very unusual." Mark extended his paw. "Come on, let's get you off the ground."

"Thanks." Arden took the wolf's paw, feeling the soft, well-groomed fur.

They stood around for some pawful of long and uncomfortable moments until Mark spoke again. "So listen..." He looked this way and that, avoiding Arden's eyes. "Practice is over, and you look like you need to cool down a bit after your ordeal. How about a smoothie?" His bright blue eyes met Arden's green for a fleeting moment and he looked down again. "Unless of course... unless, you know, you have other things to do. I mean, I was just heading to the smoothie shop myself and I thought that maybe you'd want-"

"I'd love to." It was Arden's turn to smile. Something was happening inside him, and he was strangely disinclined to run away from the new feeling.

"Great!" Mark's muzzle broke into a grin again. "I know this awesome place right down the road from here."

"Rabbit's? Never been there myself." The world stopped spinning completely, and Arden decided to try walking.

Mark followed him. "Oh, you'll love it! They take fresh fruit and mix them with sorbet. They're good for you, too." He patted his taut stomach. "I gotta stay in shape for soccer, so junk food is a big 'no.'"

They started walking towards the exit when a voice called from behind. "Yo, Marky Mark, me and the boys was gonna go grab a slice at Ginno's. Wanna come with?" It was Andy, a very unpleasant looking weasel.

Arden sighed at having his chance to spend time with Mark ruined so easily.

To his surprise, Mark waved the weasel off. "Nah, I'm just gonna hit up Rabbit's."

Andy shrugged. "Suit yourself, man." He jogged back to the field and joined the rest of the team.

"Never was a fan of Gino's. If I'm gonna have pizza, the least I can do is make sure it isn't dripping with grease." Mark walked casually beside the otter. "Besides, it's way too hot for pizza."

"Yeah." Arden wiped some perspiration off his forehead. "What is it, like ninety out?"

"Something like that, yeah." Mark squinted up at the sun and then looked back at Arden. "Worse for you, though. Otters don't get summer fur, do they?"

"Nope." Arden ran a paw through his thick coat of fur. "It's not too bad indoors or in the water. I don't go out much when it's this hot out."

"Speaking of," Mark tilted his muzzle quizzically, "what brings you out to the track? I don't think I've ever seen an otter jogging. You guys aren't really built for it. No offense."

"Oh, it's this whole fitness test thing in gym." Arden blushed, feeling incredibly self-conscious of his running ability. "You need to run a nine-minute mile... and I can barely run a mile, let alone do it in nine minutes."

Mark rolled his eyes. "See, that's just stupid. You're an otter. Why in the world would they expect you to run well?"

"Oh, I agree!" Arden perked up instantly. "Man, I'm so happy at least somebody understands!" Although this made him wonder again why he'd decided to go out running in the first place. "We just got a letter saying that anything under nine minutes would mean extra gym time this year."

Mark raised his eyebrows. "Really? Wow, that's rough." He smiled. "Well, if it's any consolation, you were looking pretty good out there."

"Thanks." Arden folded his ears, embarrassed at the compliment. His inner voice piped up again. 'Why are you even embarrassed? He's just complimenting you. And why are you still staring at his adorable smile? No, no. Not adorable... just a smile.'

"Ah, here we are!"

Mark's voice jarred him back to reality.

"Rabbit's Smoothies and Healthy Eats."

"Cool." Arden nodded absentmindedly and followed the wolf inside. He was greeted by a cool blast of air from the A/C. The young otter stood still for a while, letting the cold air leach all the heat out of his fur. He opened his eyes and took a look around. The place was small but very neat. Beautiful paw-painted murals graced the walls depicting nature scenes from around the world. The rest of the décor was picked to match - green tables and chairs, a green menu board over a green counter where a weasel stood dressed in a green smock with the Rabbit's logo stitched on it in white.

Mark walked straight to the counter. "Hey, Jenny!" He reached over the counter and gave the weasel a quick hug. "This is Arden. Now, Arden has never had a Rabbit's smoothie before, so make his extra special, okay?"

Jenny giggled. "Will do, Mark." She peeked around the wolf. "Hi, Arden, what would you like?"

Arden was too busy looking over the menu to reply at first. All of the names were fancy, and none of them actually betrayed the contents of the smoothie. He shrugged. "I have no clue; there's so many to choose from. I'll just have whatever Mark's having."

"Two Laguna Blasts, then." Mark slipped Jenny a twenty. "My treat."

Arden opened his muzzle to protest, but those eyes... and that smile. He nodded obtusely. "O-okay."

"Good," Mark winked and put his wallet away. "I'm glad you didn't put up a fight. I'm extremely stubborn, so it would not have worked. Here, let's sit down." He motioned to a nearby table. "Usually, I like to sit outside, but not today."

"Yeah, definitely not." Arden took a seat in one of the flimsy plastic patio chairs.

Mark sat across from him. "So..." He propped his elbows on the table and rested his head in his paws. "What do you do besides run, eh?"

"I'm a swimmer." The gift of speech was returning again.

"Oh yeah, that's right!" Mark's ears instantly perked up. "You placed, what, third in nationals last year? You were in the papers!"

Arden could feel a familiar hot flush creeping up the back of his neck. "Yeah, that was me." He hated all the attention, but beg as he might, the article still got printed in several of the city papers.

"Well, now I don't see why they're making you run at all." Mark harrumphed. "Bureaucrats."

The embarrassment quickly faded, and Arden smiled. It was nice to have someone who understood and commiserated with him. "Yeah. Everyone else on the team just sorta took the whole thing in stride. I mean, I understand why, of course. Arguing with Coach about letting us slide is a losing battle. The last person who tried it got booted from the team." Still, he hated talking about himself and quickly changed the subject. "So, how about you, Mark. What do you do?"

"I play soccer!" Mark swelled proudly at the fact. "I just got captaincy this year. I'm pretty stoked. Also... I, um..." He folded his ears and rested his tail in his lap. "I like to read."

"Do you really?" Arden couldn't help but giggle at the wolf's shyness.

"Yeah." Mark glanced abashedly over at him. "I'm- I'm kind of a nerd." He sighed.

"A brave nerd at that." Arden wondered how far he should go before he would be outnerding the wolf. "I love to read, but I wasn't gonna mention it. Thought you'd think I'm weird."

Mark brightened up again. "That's awesome! What do you usually read?"

"Oh, you know, fantasy..." Any minute now, the wolf would start laughing and call him a geek; Arden knew it. But some inner instinct urged him on. "Ever heard of the Redwall series?"

"Of course!" Mark narrowed his eyes. "Veil: good or bad?"

"I think he was good." Arden smiled with relief. "Although you never know... maybe his motives were selfish."

They discussed their favorite Redwall books for almost an hour, interrupted only once by Jenny bringing them smoothies.

Arden took a sip of his smoothie. "Wow! This is really good!"

"Told you." Mark drank his slowly, savoring the taste with his eyes closed and a blissful smile across his muzzle. "Don't drink too fast, though. On a day like this, you're virtually guaranteed a brainfreeze."

He spoke too late. A numbing cold spread up through Arden's skull, followed by a pounding pain. It combined with the bruise and made the otter cry out. "Oww!" He held his head in both paws and shut his eyes.

"Oh, I'm so sorry!" Mark stood up and took him by the paw. "Come on, let's get outside. The heat'll help."

They walked outside into the sweltering sunlight.

To Arden's surprise, the headache receded as quickly as it had come. He sighed with relief. "Oh, that feels much better, thank you."

"Oh, don't thank me." Mark looked completely downcast again. "I just keep hurting you."

"Hey, don't worry about it." Arden threw his arm around him. "I guess it's just an injury-prone day for me. Besides, you have no idea how many times I've hit the side of the pool doing backstroke. I've had way worse bruises than this."

Mark's eyes stayed sad, but he smiled wanly. "I guess. I still feel bad. So anyway, where do you live?"

"Gordon street. I think we used to take the same bus back in middle school." Arden remembered the fact quite well but felt embarrassed to admit it.

"Oh yeah, I remember now!" Mark's deep blue eyes met Arden's green and lingered for a little while longer this time. Arden closed his eyes and sighed. Realizing his inappropriate reaction made him extremely nervous again. Mark didn't seem to notice, however, so Arden relaxed.

The boys walked down the street together in the direction of their neighborhood. It wasn't a long walk, and it was only made shorter by the animate conversation they made along the way.

Arden knew the neighborhood well. It was the epitome of suburbia. The front lawns of each house were trimmed to perfection and through the use of strategically placed sprinklers, were a bright, lush green. The houses were neat and tidy. They were almost completely identical, too, as if every single one was built from the same blueprints. There was a sense of peace and order -- not a thing out of place. Some called it boring, but Arden enjoyed the feeling of security it provided. His life was crazy enough as it was - high school, swimming, this damn fitness test.

They reached Arden's house first. It was just about as typical as every other house on the street - white siding, two floors, two-car garage. The only thing that was sort of out of place was a large pink flamingo sticking out of the lawn. Mikey, Arden's brother, had given it to their dad for Christmas back when he was six, and it hadn't moved since.

"Ah, right!" Mark stopped by the mailbox and looked over the house. "This is your place. I remember now. I guess I just sorta forgot since eighth grade."

"Yeah, it's been a while since we rode the bus to Tomston, huh?" Arden remembered those days quite clearly. He'd have to get up before six each morning, bolt down his breakfast and run to the bus stop only to spend another forty minutes bumping around in the back of a noisy school bus. Fortunately, Elton Macenfield High was only a fifteen minute walk away.

Mark spoke again after a few heartbeats of silence passed between them. "So, um... when do you plan to go running again?"

"Tomorrow, I guess." He didn't plan to run tomorrow, but something about the wolf made Arden want to see him again as soon as possible. "I have to get into as good a running shape as I can."

"Great!" Mark's tail seemed to acquire a life of its own. It wagged back and forth excitedly, doing nothing to hide the wolf's happy reaction at Arden's reply. "We could... maybe... maybe get some smoothies again or something."

Arden spoke before Mark had time to feel uncomfortable again. "Sounds wonderful! My treat this time, though."

Mark shrugged. "Fair enough."

They shook paws and parted.

Arden walked down the short cobblestone path and opened the front door. The blaring sound of videogames led him straight to the living room.

Mikey was sitting on the couch, clutching a PS3 controller. "Hey! How was your run?" He glanced up at Arden briefly and went back to his game.

"Not too bad." Arden dropped his backpack by the door and plopped down next to his brother. "I think I might actually have a chance to make the nine minutes."

"Nice!" Mikey's attention was still devoted squarely to the TV. "I'm glad I don't have to worry about that for another few years. In four years, who knows, maybe I won't have to do it at all."

"Oh yeah, yeah, rub it in!" Arden shoved his brother playfully.

Mikey squealed and windmilled his arms to maintain balance. "Heeey! Do you know how long I had to play to get to this spot? There isn't another checkpoint for miles!"

"Saw-ree!" Arden put on a mock expression of penance and tried not to laugh.

Mikey loved to play videogames. His attention in life was evenly split between that and sports. He never liked swimming because of all the rules and the chlorine in the water, but he took to lacrosse very well and played it all throughout elementary and middle school. Like most otters, he wasn't a good runner, but he made a great goalie. He was tall for his age, too - more than a head taller than Arden. In fact, aside from sharing their mother's emerald green eyes and their father's short ears, the two brothers looked nothing alike.

"Arden!" Came a shout from the kitchen. "You better not be getting your sweat all over the new couch!"

"I'm not, Mom!" He got up quickly and padded over to the kitchen. "What's for lunch, anyway?"

"Salmon." His mother stood by the stove, already starting on dinner. "It's in the microwave, dear."

"Thanks, Mom." He headed over to the microwave and hit 'fish' on the speed settings.

"How was the run, dear?" Mrs. Halinen turned around briefly to give him a peck on the cheek.

"Oh, pretty good, I guess." He remembered his incident with the soccer ball. "I got hit in the head with a soccer ball... It was an accident, Mom!" He added knowing his mom would immediately go looking for the mean boy who threw the ball at him.

"Hmm... there's still a bit of a bump." She wiped her paws on a towel and examined Arden's forehead more carefully. "Grab some ice from the refrigerator. I hope whoever hit you apologized, even if it was just an accident."

"He did, Ma." Arden took an icepack out of the freezer and placed it on the bruise. Although, come to think of it, he was so absorbed in his conversation with Mark that the pain only now came back. "We actually went out for smoothies afterward." He didn't know why he was so reluctant to mention it; his mother loved it when he made friends.

"That's wonderful, dear!" Mrs. Halinen smiled and patted him on the shoulder. "What's his name?"

"Mark." He couldn't help but smile at the mention of the wolf's name. "He's the captain of the soccer team."

"Oh, very nice!" Mrs. Halinen smiled and turned back to the halibut she was preparing. "You know, you could be captain of your swim team if only you'd push Barken more."

Barken was a tough-as-nails, ex-marine otter, who coached the team with an iron paw. The thought of pushing him (both physically and verbally) seemed ludicrous to Arden. "It's okay, Mom." He repeated the same thing he said every time the argument came up. "I'm just happy being a decent swimmer. Being captain is too much of a headache, anyway."

Mrs. Halinen seemed to understand that this is as far as she was going to press the issue at this point, so she changed the subject.

"You should invite Mark to dinner sometime. You know how much I love meeting your friends."

"I will, Ma." He sighed happily at the thought "I will..."

Arden lay in bed that night with his arms folded behind his head, thinking. He certainly had a lot to think about. He was never as oversexed as some of his friends, but he'd always considered himself to be straight. Although, thinking more about it, he realized that his only 'girlfriends' happened in elementary school because his parents thought it was adorable and in middle school because it was expected of him. He never seemed to be as entranced with them as most of his friends were. Could it be because he liked boys all along? Could it be that he never noticed it because he'd grown up on the swim team, and seeing his friends naked in the locker room was so routine? And then there was the matter of Mark. Arden imagined the wolf - his gray fur mingling beautifully with the white fur on his underbelly and throat. He thought of the wolf's strong legs formed from all those years of playing soccer...

Arden felt a stirring in his sheath. But this time... this time, it didn't feel wrong or strange. It felt good. He was gay. Any thoughts of denial vanished whenever he imagined Mark.

"I'm gay." He said the words first in his head and then out loud.

It felt good after all these years of confusion to finally realize who he was. A weight was lifted off his chest and he was only too happy to let it happen.

But what about his parents? His friends? Would they be as accepting of him as he was? Arden, the gay otter, was the exact same person as Arden, the straight otter... but would that be enough for them? Mostly, he was afraid of his parents. Engvard and Tarja Halinen were by no means homophobic, conservative, religious nuts; but the thing is, the subject just never came up. Arden realized that he had no idea how they would react to his newly-discovered sexuality.

'So, don't tell them.' His inner voice spoke up for the first time since his run that morning. 'It's not like you have any reason to. You don't even have a boyfriend.'

"Yes, I..." Arden stopped himself. He hardly knew Mark; now that he looked at things from a more logical perspective, he couldn't see a single reason to even think that Mark would ever consider being his boyfriend. Besides, Arden had heard quite a bit about the wolf's private life through the grapevine. Being captain of the soccer team made him a hot commodity for the females of the school. When they weren't flocking around him, they were standing in groups gossiping about him.

In fact, Arden was fairly sure that Mark had had a steady girlfriend for the past few years.

Oh, how he envied her. She got to hold him, look into his blue eyes and kiss that sweet gray muzzle... to touch that well-built body...

Thinking all that caused another stirring in his sheath.

"Ah, what the hell." He slipped his boxers off. "Might as well celebrate my new-found gayness."

With that, he began tenderly stroking his growing maleness.

He never considered himself to be much into masturbation, but making Mark the subject made everything different.

Each stoke sent waves of electricity though his body making him shiver and moan softly. He wanted to make it last -- he wanted the sensation to keep building forever -- but his logical mind was no longer in control.

His paw stroked faster and faster up and down his shaft. The tip was already leaking fluid, lubricating everything nicely. He imagined Mark's paw there instead of his, the wolf's muzzle lovingly licking Arden's chest and then finding its way further down. Whenever he thought the sensation couldn't get any stronger, it did. Finally, after a few glorious minutes of stroking and panting, it happened. His back arched, his muscles tightened, and the lightning storm inside his body escalated beyond anything he could imagine. With a throaty moan, Arden released himself all over his paw and stomach.

For several minutes, he just lay there panting and enjoying the warm after-effects of the orgasm. Yeah, he was gay. Any doubts he may have had lingering in the back of his mind were released with the rest of the warmth that now covered the beige fur on his stomach.

As the orgasm faded and his member began to retract back into his sheath, Arden decided that he should probably clean up before falling asleep. He padded quietly across the hall to the bathroom and took a quick shower. It wasn't one of his usual long showers because he was far too scared of getting caught showering in the middle of the night.

Rather than using the dryer in the bathroom, Arden opted for the drying mat in his room. As he lay there, the mat slowly leaching water out of his fur, he began thinking about the future. Should he even bother saying anything to Mark? If he decided to tell his parents, would he find himself homeless?

These questions and many others spun around in his mind as he slowly drifted off to sleep.