Those Worse Off Than You

I just sat there and listened, knowing Ace's tendancy to expance suspenseful, parcially disturbing stories and conversations with pauses.

"I... almost drowned once- when I was little," he started. "My mom was getting sick- she had to stay home all the time. I went outside to play and she told me to stay away from the ice. No one was watching me and there was so much snow I couldn't tell where the ice was. I was playing on what I didn't know was ice... and I fell through.

I was small- but I remember it as if it were a nightmare. It was cold- like a bath of ice cubes filling my lungs. I needed to cough- but I couldn't; my airways were filled with water. It felt like being cut all over- that's how cold it was. I couldn't breath.

I was down there for a lot longer than I remember. I should have died. If not from drowning; from the cold. But someone pulled me out and brought me home where my mom called an ambulance. I wasn't breathing... but I came back. Now I really wished I hadn't. I ended up lucky- got away with pneumonia."

All i could say was, "Wow. I... I didn't know."

"Yea... So when Angel pushed me under water- I kind of freaked out."

"Ace- we wouldn't have made you go swimming. We were just kidding around."

"I know- it just... doesn't seem like a reasonable excuse to run off on you guys, now that I look back at it."

"It wasn't," I scowled before lightening up my face a bit. "But you don't need to beat yourself up about it."