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“Daaaaaaaaad? Daddyyyyyy. Dad. Daaaad. Dad! Dad?”
Silence fell throughout the lair. All was dark and still.
“Raaaaaph?”
The curtain to Leo’s bedroom flung open. “Leo?” Raph asked through his retainer, rubbing his eyes as he wandered into the room, teddy bear tucked under his arm. “Wash ‘appening? Ish one in da mornin’…”
Leo was sitting up in bed, hands bunched up in the sheets. He was still wearing his blue and yellow basketball jersey. He hadn’t taken it off in days. Usually it was Donnie bundling up like that. “I don’t feel too good,” he said, reaching one arm over his shoulder to scratch at his shell. “I’m all…bleauagh, you know? Itchy and sore and…yukky.” He shifted irritably in place. “I should’ve told you earlier, but…”
“Don’t feel too good?” Raph interrupted. “Like, in your schtomach? I told you an’ Mikey dat pizza wasn’t no good after sittin’ out all weekend –”
“No, no it’s not that.” Leo looked down at his hands, inspecting his nails. “It’s…aha ha. It’s, uh…a personal problem?”
“A pershonal – no, wait, hang on. Shtupid fing.” Raph sighed irritably and plucked out his retainer, placing it on the nearest clean surface. “A personal –”
“Oh, dude – not on my comics!” Leo cried, disgust contorting his features.
“Shh, keep it down!”
“But you put your stinky drooly retainer on my comics, Raph!”
“Stop talking about my stink –! Look,” Raph said - taking in a deep, calming breath. “What’s goin’ on?”
Leo folded his arms with a huff. “Now I don’t want to tell you.”
“Wh – Leo! You’re gonna wake everyone up for nothing?!”
“You’re not helping –”
“I can’t help if you don’t tell me what’s up! And stop yelling, you’ll wake the others!”
“Okay! Okay. Fine.” Leo shifted in a circle so his back was facing Raph. “You asked for it.”
He pulled the jersey up over his shell.
Raph went pale. “Guuuuuuys?” he yelled.
…
“Yes, a red eared slider,” Donnie said into the phone. “No, we’re not registered with you, but I can make an account with your clinic right away.” He smirked faux-sweetly at Leo, who was sulking on his bed as Raph and Mikey fussed over the slimy green fuzz that carpeted his shell. “Anything if it’ll help my poor baby. Owner’s name? Othello von Ryan – that’s V-O-N…”
Leo grumbled some very rude words in Spanish as Mikey ran his finger over the fronds spreading across his back. “It’s kinda like fur,” Mikey mused. “Maybe you inherited it from Dad? He is part rat.”
“He wasn’t part rat when we got his DNA, Mikey,” Leo sighed. “That came after.”
“Hey! At least I’m tryna come up with solutions, Mr. Hiding-That-I’m-Sick-From-My-Family.”
“It’s a personal problem! I didn’t wanna bother you guys with…” Leo wafted a hand at his shoulders, “this whole situation. I just wanted to handle it on my –”
Suddenly, a frantic hammer of fists pounded at the entrance hatch to the lair. “Guys! Lemme in! It’s me! Leo, I’m coming, hold on – don’t go into the light!”
Leo groaned, flopping backwards on the bed before remembering that that hurt and rolling despondently onto his side.
“April!” Mikey yelled. “We’re in here!”
“You need to unlock the front door, Mikey! Splintz borrowed my key!”
“Okay! I’m coming!”
“How is Dad still asleep?” Raph bemoaned, as their big sister bounded into the bedroom – laden down with bandages, a toothbrush, hand sanitiser, aspirin, a bottle of water, a deodorant can, and a Bible. Everything in this family was chaos.
“Donnie said Leo’s dying,” April said, dumping all the stuff in a heap and rushing to his side, “and he told me to bring medical supplies, but I forgot half the list so I just grabbed stuff outta the bathroom and – oh my god, what’s on your shell?!”
“Hiiiiii, April,” Leo said, attempting a camp little wave. “And it’s nothing, you can go home.”
“Nuh-uh.” April threw herself onto the bed and wetting her hands with sanitiser. “Not until I know what that stuff is.”
“I still think it’s fur,” Mikey said, rubbing his whole hand along Leo’s back. Raph slapped it away.
“Knock it off! Y’might catch something.”
“Can you guys keep it down,” Donnie spat, covering the phone with his hand, “so I can hear the veterinarian?”
April’s mouth hung open. “Your brother is dying and you called a vet?!”
“What else was I meant to do? I don’t suppose it’s a common Yokai affliction to grow vegetation out of one’s back!”
“I’m not dying,” Leo sighed, exasperated. “I just got…some stuff going on. And anyway, you won’t catch something,” he continued, kicking his brother in his orange-spotted thigh, “if you all just leave me alone.”
Raph growled in frustration, fists balled as his sides. “You,” he yelled, prodding Leo in the chest, “yelled for me!”
“Yeah, ‘coz Dad didn’t answer! And I you just totally embarassed me and got everyone involved and didn't, you know, help? I’ve been dealing with it for weeks on my own, and –”
“Weeks?!”
Every head in the room snapped towards Leo, who swallowed guiltily. Ah heh heh,” he laughed awkwardly, spreading his hands out in supplication. “Did I say that out loud?”
No one moved. April’s face was a mask of disappointed judgement. Mikey looked quietly panicked. Raph was just furious. “H’okay, doc,” Donnie said into the phone as he stormed from the room, “scrap that ‘overnight’ thing, I’ve just been informed…”
“I am so mad at you, Leo,” April tutted, moving away from him to sit next to Mikey, whose breath was becoming rapid and shallow. "Worryin' everybody like this."
"Worrying?! Hey - I'm the one turning into a grassy knoll, here!"
“You kept this to yourself for weeks?” Raph’s anger was brewing deep inside his chest. It was that same indignant, frustrated anger that boiled to the surface during the Pizza Puffs debacle. Why couldn’t his brothers just act in their own best interests – even once?! “Why, Leo? What if it is contagious? We don’t even know what’s going on with you!”
“This!” Leo jabbed an arm in Raph’s direction. “This, Raph. This is why. Because I knew you’d freak out and start yelling and blow it all outta proportion, it’s just a little growth –”
“Little growth?! Your shell is furry, Leo!” Raph kicked a set of weights Leo had been using, the anger in his system smothering the pain that shot up his foot. “Why’m I always putting out you guys’ fires, huh? Why can’t you come to me before it gets bad? Why am I always the last resort?”
Mikey shuffled a little closer to April, who looped an arm around his shoulders. “Guys,” she said firmly, “come on.”
But Raph had had enough. He stormed out, wishing not for the first time that Leo had a real door on his room that he could slam. Once he was out of sight, he slumped down onto the floor, claws raking over his scalp. For a while, all he could hear was the sound of his own heartbeat, and the pounding in his head. But then;
“…talk about it?”
He opened his mouth to tell April that no, he didn’t wanna talk about it, when he realised she was still in Leo’s room.
“What I mean is,” the disembodied voice of April said - to Leo, “spill. Now.”
Raph heard Leo sigh. But it wasn’t an exasperated, frustrated kind of sigh. No; he just sounded…sad. And scared. “You know why.”
“I really don’t. Raph just wants to look out for you –”
“And that’s why! He looks out for all of us. Including Dad. Including the whole freakin’ city! You think I wanna put something else on those broad shoulders just because I’m a little sick? I just thought I’d…”
A long whoosh of breath.
“I just thought I’d ride it out. Like I know he would.”
Raph pressed at the corners of his eyes, letting the colours and the pressure swirl there for a moment. Everyone always said Leo and Donnie were the most alike. And they were both pretty annoying, in that attention-seeking way. But all the same, Leo had him there. Had Raph ever gone to his brothers when he was sick? Even when they were tots? No; he’d masked up and kept going. Putting everyone else before himself until he collapsed, finally, into bed each night. Both he and Leo were prideful and desperate for control; never wanting anyone else’s help, swearing blind that everything was fine. Maybe he had no right to be angry, if that was the example he was setting for his younger brothers.
He really was bad at this leader thing.
He needed to go make things right – but just as he went to sit up, a foot painted with chipped, purple nail polish nudged him in the hip. “Come on,” Donnie said, phone still cradled under his chin, “I’ve got a diagnosis.”
Donnie gathered them all on the mattress together; though no-one seemed too keen to touch Leo. Donnie sat at the head of the bed, legs crossed.
“To paraphrase the words of the great Doctor Delicate Touch…”
Donnie cleared his throat, then leaned right into Leo’s space. Then, terrifyingly, he grinned.
“You got mould!”
“Eeeewwwwwwwwwwwww!” Everyone leapt backwards off the bed, colliding with the floor in unison.
“Mould?!” Leo cried. “The vet said I’m…like, an old piece of cheese or something?”
“Or something is right.” Donnie pulled up a website on his phone and showed it to his brother. “If a young red slider turtle – such as yourself – does not have adequately clean surroundings and, ahem, a basic hygiene routine, they can grow algae on the surface of their shells.” He stood up, smirking. “The veterinarian said warm baths and scrubbing should solve the problem, but if the algae has permeated your shell you may have to go in for antibiotics.” He looked Leo up and down. “Though I don’t know where I’ll find a pet carrier large enough.”
Mikey flung his arms around Leo. “Yay!” he cried, squishing his cheek against his brother’s shoulder. “You’re not gonna die. Today.”
Leo folded his arms and scowled at Donnie. “I resemble you saying I don’t bathe.”
“Resent.”
“I know you are but what am I?”
“You're the one who refuses to shower after we go around the Lazy River, Nardo! We live in a sewer, it’s inherently dirty! And Mind Raph told me about that time you licked chocolate off your own foot, you reprobate –”
“Enough,” Raph said, rising to his feet. “The real issue is; how do we solve it?”
…
“A little higher…no, to the left. A scooch down and – ahhh, yeah, that’s the spot.” Leo beamed over his shoulder at Raph. “We’ll have this algae off in no time, bro.”
The toothbrush looked so small in Raph’s huge paw. And it felt like Leo had been sitting in this kiddie pool for hours. It was a last resort, since Donnie had immediately got the ick about Mikey nuzzling up to Leo and had called dibs on the shower for an hour and a half – split three ways, so they could all be decontaminated. But it was worth it for some brotherly quality time.
“Uh…hey, Leo,” Raph said, aiming for casual as he rinsed his brother’s back with filtered water, “I was just thinking. Uh…I might be, uh, coming down with something.”
“Hm?” Leo spun around in the pool, splashing Raph’s knees. “You think you’ve got the mould too, big guy?”
“No! No no no. But uh…” Raph placed his hands over his stomach. “But I gotta confess…I ate some’ve that old pizza, and now my tummy’s goin’ crazy.”
His stomach was fine. Even Raph couldn’t be tempted by that dry, greasy mess on the counter. “I think I got food poisoned, man.”
“I knew it!” Leo crowed. “I knew you had that pizza on your mind.”
“Ah ha ha…yeah. So, uh, once we’re finished scrubbin’ all this gunk off your shell, I might, you know…” Raph scratched thoughtfully at a stubborn green spot on Leo’s back. “I might gotta go to bed, you know? Sick leave. An’ I was wondering…could you bring me some tea or somethin’? The lemon stuff, with the honey? When I get sick. Which I think I will.”
Leo paused. Then, he turned around, and let Raph resume his scrubbing.
“Sure, buddy. I’ll look after you.”