James grinned madly and eagerly went along with Teddy's push. "It's not the actually fresh air as such that counts," he explained as he happily strode along the path. "It's the idea of fresh air, of being outside. It means that you're not stuckin a musty old castle, feeling claustrophobic. Does that make sense at all?"
He shrugged, not caring much even if he was just spouting nonsense. Teddy had known him since birth. He was used to it by now, surely. He kept up a fairly steady stream of chatter as the two young men walked along towards the nearby village. "I think the age thing has a lot to do with it," he commented at one point, several minutes later. "Neither one of my parents really wants to know the first thing about me or the sibs. I understand that, I guess. But they're not very tactful in how they deal with us. I'd like to think it's just because they don't know how to relate to us, being only a year or two younger than them, yet their children at the same time. Otherwise, I'd just have to assume that both of them are very rude, which I'd rather not assume." He paused and then, genuinely curious, asked, "How is your Gran, by the way?"
Suddenly, James got an uncomfortable feeling in the pit of his stomach. He stopped walking, looking around. It felt like they were being watched. He cocked his head to the side and narrowed his eyes at Teddy. "Do you...?" he trailed off, not really knowing what to ask. "I could be imagining this, but do you get the feeling that... I dunno, like we're not alone?"