by Danika Stone
Ash stared at her. Vale seemed to have everything under control, and he had no idea what she meant by “you take this side.” He cleared his throat. “I, um … I don’t mean to sound dumb, but what are we doing?”
“See the bottom of the tree? Those lower branches?” Vale pointed to a pine tree with boughs that fanned the ground. “That’s going to be our base.”
“Base for…?”
“For the shelter, Ash. I know staying overnight is not ideal, but it’s going to start snowing soon!”
Ash’s gaze flicked to the trees in the distance and the shadows of clouds that obscured the mountain peaks. The snow had started. It was already sticking to the upper branches. They needed some kind of shelter, and fast. As he realized this, the uneasy feeling tightened into a knot of fear. He looked back to find Vale waiting.
“So we’re building a lean-to with the rest of the branches?” he said.
“Exactly.” She grabbed several boughs, pressing them against the existing fan of branches. “I’ve already got the first layer done. We just need to get enough on top that it’s semiwaterproof.”
“Shouldn’t we have a fire or something to stay warm? I don’t know about you, but I’m soaked.”
“A fire would be awesome, but I didn’t bring any matches.” Her eyebrows rose. “Oh my God, Ash! Did you bring some?”
“Nope.” He swore under his breath. “But we’ve got to make a fire somehow.”
“No, we don’t.”
He shook his head. Almost every survival game he played had a scenario like this. Wood plus friction equals fire, right? “Hey! I know what to do!”
“What’s that?”
“We rub two sticks togeth—”
“It doesn’t work the way it does in the movies,” she interrupted. “Everything is wet, Ash. It’ll take too long.”
“But if we don’t have a fire—”
“Just trust me on this.”
“But—”
“Shelter’s the first priority,” she said. “Hypothermia is the real danger. If we don’t get warm—”
“But we don’t have a fire!” he snapped. “Without a fire, we won’t be able to stay warm. And if we can’t stay warm, we’re screwed!”
Vale stared at him for a long moment. She had that look on her face, the one she got so often when she was about to argue with him. Instead she nodded. “I agree about the fire,” she said. “And we will try to build one. We will, Ash. But let’s worry about fire once we’ve got a shelter done, okay?”
Ash glared into the forest. In any game, he’d know exactly what to do, but here he was out of his depth. He was angry … scared. What the heck are we doing?
“Ash, listen. I…” Vale winced. “I can’t feel my feet anymore. My hands are numb. I’ll help you with the fire. Promise! But we’ve got to get out of the rain first.”
Ash looked up. The sky was dropping fat white flakes onto them. A shudder ran through his body. We’re already wet. Add snow and we’re really gonna be in trouble. He looked back to Vale. “I don’t know what to do,” he said. “I … I’m no good at this kind of thing.”
“Shelter first. Then we figure out the rest.”
“Right. So what do I do with the branches?”
“Just weave them in,” she said, showing him. “One over the other.”
“Got it.” Ash jammed the next layer of branches above the ones Vale had woven into the existing frame, shivers running through him. “Here. Let me take some of that.” He grabbed another handful just as Vale touched his arm.
“Thanks,” she said.
Throat aching, he nodded rather than answer.
For a long time, the friends worked side by side. The sleet was a constant presence, beating down upon their heads in needles of cold. Ash’s ears burned, his body pushed to the limits. Across from him, the hood on Vale’s jacket turned white, frost blurring the edge where it met her knit cap. The flashlight’s beam barely made it past the flakes and eventually she tucked it into her pocket. Around them, the ground was covered with a thin layer of snow, more building by the minute.
Hypothermia.
The thought ignited a terrified fervor within him. Ash rushed from tree to tree, stripping the branches and piling them on top. The action pushed meager warmth into his limbs, but it wasn’t enough. Shivers rocked his body. Snow coated the branches almost as fast as he added them to the shelter, creating a dark cave under the lowest boughs. When he came back the last time, a hand darted out and caught his leg.
He yelped.
“Get in,” Vale said. “It’s pretty dry inside.”
“J-just a few m-more—”
“No. Come in.” She pulled at the pant leg of his rain-drenched jeans. “You’re soaked, Ash. You don’t even have a hat. You need to warm up.”
“I d-didn’t think I’d need a hat,” he snapped. “C-coming h-here wasn’t even my idea! I hate the outdoors! I hate hiking! I—I—” His voice broke. The dark forest, swirling with fresh snow, blurred through a veil of angry tears.
“It’s okay,” Vale said gently. “Just come inside. It’s warmer here.” She gestured for him, then backed into the shelter. “I’ve got a scarf. You can wrap it around your ears. It’s in the bottom of my pack.” She disappeared into the shadows. “I’ll find it for you. You sit down.”
He wobbled in place, exhaustion hitting him. He staggered down to his knees and crawled inside the hut. Vale had hung a small glow stick onto a branch above her head, and it cast a sickly green light.
“You brought a light stick,” he said.
She glanced up from her bag. “Uh … yeah. I brought two of them, actually. And the flashlight.” She pulled a ribbon of fabric from the opening of the pack. “Here’s the scarf.”
“Th-thanks.” Ash wrapped it over his head like his grandmother did. He knew he probably looked silly, but he didn’t care. For the first time in hours, his head was warm. “That’s better. My ears were half-frozen.”
“Sorry, I should have offered it sooner. I was just working on something.” Vale looked down in front of her, and Ash followed her gaze. She had a pile of twigs and leaves and two sticks. No fire. “I … I can’t seem to get this going,” she said.
“You want me to try?”
“Sure.”
Vale handed him the sticks, and Ash tried to get the rhythm, but his hands were numb and he kept slipping. After twenty minutes of frustration, he shoved them aside.
“Th-this is stupid!” he said through chattering teeth.
“The wood is wet, Ash.”
“B-but it should work! Wood plus friction equals fire. It always equals fire!” He made an angry sound and tossed the sticks aside. “S-so d-dumb!”
An awkward silence drew out between them. He could hear Vale’s teeth chattering, but she wasn’t arguing with him. She’d known what to do. She hadn’t panicked. She was the only reason they were alive at all. Realizing it, Ash felt terrible. Vale was right. The wood was wet. Everything was wet. He would have wasted their chances if he’d tried to start a fire rather than make a shelter. He wrapped his arms around his knees, the garbage bag crinkling. Vale had given him that too. She was the one with the supplies. Not him. He’d packed whatever was on hand this morning. Nothing had been planned. The light sticks and flashlight were hers; the shelter, her idea.
A wave of frustration rose inside Ash. He wanted to yell—keep yelling—until he felt better, but Vale was here. He couldn’t do that to her, not after everything she’d done for them. He crossed his arms on his chest and put his chin to his knees.
“Sorry,” he grumbled. “For not listening to you. I … I’ve never done anything like this before.”
Vale looked up, her face so pale he could count her freckles. “It’s fine.”
“No,” he said. “It’s not. I was upset. I should have listened. I—I—” He gave a short laugh. “I’m hangry, all right? I’m fricking starving here.”
Vale reached for her backpack. “I already ate my g
ranola bar, but I’ve got some gorp, if you want.”
“Some what?”
“Gorp: granola, oats, raisins, and peanuts. It’s an old-fashioned name for trail mix.” She laughed tiredly. “There are chocolate chips in it too, though. So … maybe it’s supposed to be gorpc?”
“Gorp, huh? You’re a real outdoors person. That’s pretty awesome.”
“Not really. I just…” Vale sighed. “I like to be prepared.”
“I tell you, Vale. This is why you’d be great to have on a D&D campaign.”
“You can stop bringing it up. I’m not joining your group, Ash.”
“You say that, but I really think you should. Look at how last night’s campaign went!”
Vale laughed and shook her head. “It was terrible! I died in my first battle.”
“So? I’ve died in like a thousand of them.”
Vale giggled.
“Look, in a campaign you just have to learn to go with what happens,” he said. “You roll the die and you take your chances.” He shrugged. “But there’s strategy too. And you’re always prepared, Vale. You keep your wits about you when things go down.” He paused, hoping that his next suggestion sounded more casual than he meant it. “I, uh … I know you said you weren’t going to game anymore, but I’d take you back anytime if you wanted to.”
Vale groaned. “I’m just not into video games.”
“You used to love them!”
“Used to.” She sighed. “That was like … three years ago.”
“Two. And it was awesome!”
“Hardly, I—”
“We were a great team! The two of us used to take on everyone.”
Vale frowned. “Yeah, but … we weren’t the only ones playing.”
A long uncomfortable silence followed her words. Ash knew Vale was remembering the harassment that had started among the other squads and had spread to the entire gaming community where they played. Many of those gamers were now gone, but Vale had never returned.
“No,” Ash said quietly. “But it was still nice when we were playing together. Just me and you.”
Vale smiled sadly. “Yeah, it was.”
“Last night you stayed with me when everyone else left. We faced the orcs together.”
“And we died.” She smiled again. “But thanks. I … I get what you’re saying.” She reached into her pack and pulled out a bag full of trail mix. “Here. You have it. I already ate my granola bar, so I’m good. You need something to eat too.”
Ash took the plastic baggie. He wanted to shovel it with his hands, dump fistfuls into his mouth, and fill the pit in his stomach in seconds. Instead, he said: “Are you sure, Vale? I mean, this is your food. Your supplies.”
“It’s fine, Ash. Just eat.”
Tears filled his eyes, and he blinked them away. “Thanks,” he said. “I … I appreciate it.”
He grabbed a handful and shoved it into his mouth. It wasn’t enough, but it was something, and for that Ash was grateful.
CHAPTER FOUR
“I can’t lie to you about your chances, but … you have my sympathies.”
ASH, ALIEN
IT TOOK ASH a good half hour before he stopped shivering. Strangely, it was the arrival of the snow that caused the change. Outside the open entrance to the shelter, a blanket of white covered the landscape, transforming it into shades of blue and gray. He felt as if they’d been transported into a different realm. Another level in the game. Autumn was abruptly gone, winter in its place. The weight of snow filled the gaps in the interwoven branches, sealing out the rain and pressing down on the boughs above their heads. Minute by minute, the entrance grew smaller. What had started as a large half C—big enough for a teen to crawl through—narrowed into a sloppy circle the size of a dog door, then a half-moon the size of a football. The temperature inside the crude hut slowly rose.
Still, the snow fell.
The iciness of the air under the pine boughs faded. The clouds from Ash’s breath disappeared, and his limbs relaxed. He wasn’t warm exactly, but he wasn’t freezing any longer. The hollow where he and Vale huddled under the tree reminded him of the doghouse his aunt and uncle had built for their huskies. As a little boy, Ash had been obsessed with his iPad, but on one weekend visit, he’d forgotten to bring the charger. When the iPad had finally lost power, young Ash had gone outside to play while his mother had coffee with her sister. Bored with building snowmen, Ash had crawled inside the wooden structure next to the porch to play with the dogs. Eventually, he’d cozied up to one of the huskies and fallen fast asleep. Despite the icy winter conditions, the interior of the doghouse was snug and warm. Ash had been woken hours later by the shouts of his panicked mother, and he’d crawled out, completely fine after several hours outside in subzero conditions.
The lean-to smells a lot better than the doghouse did, Ash thought with a smirk. Everything under the tree branches was pine scented, like Christmas trees or winter sledding. Under that sharp smell was a faint odor, something flowery and soft. Vale’s shampoo. He glanced over at her. In the watery green light, she could have been a statue. Her head was tucked down to her knees, her whole body curled in on itself as she waited out the storm. It made his heart twist to see her.
He and Vale had been friends forever (or at least as far back into forever as kindergarten felt). In the high school social strata, theirs was an unexpected companionship. Ash was everyone’s friend while Vale was almost no one’s. At lunch, they sat together, and after school occasionally studied together. The rest of Vale’s friends were online, though even those were limited. It hadn’t always been that way. In middle school, Ash and Vale had both been gamers, but that had ended with a months-long bout of harassment. It wasn’t just online. At school, the bullying had only grown worse.
Vale wasn’t unattractive, but she didn’t preen the way other students did. She didn’t have a boyfriend or girlfriend, just one close friend: Ash. Her lack of a clique made her a target for bullies. So did the fact that she stood up to them.
The same guilt that had risen inside Ash while they were walking in the woods returned. In PE class, Vale was an easy target. Whenever Ash saw the bullying happening, he joked and diverted the attention, but he never actually spoke up for her. If he did, Ash knew he’d be on the outside too.
Another thought flickered to life: Does that make me as bad as the rest of them?
Ash’s gaze returned to his friend. Vale had her hands tucked under her armpits and her nose pressed down into the collar of her coat. An uneasy feeling prickled Ash’s conscience. We would have frozen out here if it wasn’t for her. The thought carried a tendril of shame. Vale had seemed completely in control when she’d taken over making a camp—giving directions like she was a teacher or something. She reminded Ash of his cousin Salma. She was in a medical program these days, “kicking ass and taking names,” as she put it.
That was the kind of girl Vale Shumway was: in charge.
While Ash had been raging about the snow, she’d seen what needed to be done … and she’d done it. His gaze dropped down to the small pile of kindling scattered between them. I would’ve died trying to get that stupid fire going. There’s no way I would’ve made the night. I’d be outside, in the snow, freezing my butt off. But Vale knew. She KNEW.
The guilt strangled him.
Ash cleared his throat. “Hey, Vale?”
Vale glanced up. “Uh-huh?”
“You look cold.”
She closed her eyes again. “Th-that’s because I am c-cold.”
He opened his mouth to make a joke, then closed it again. She DOES look cold! “So … if you’re cold, move over here. We can huddle together.”
Vale didn’t answer.
“Vale…?”
One eye opened. “What?”
Ash sighed. “C’mon and sit over here. It’ll be warmer.”
“T-too t-tired,” she mumbled. “D-don’t want to move.” She turned her face to the side, avoiding his gaze. “J-just want t-to
sleep.”
“All right,” he said. “Have it your way.”
Ash waited, but she didn’t look up. He wanted to help her, but didn’t know how. He owed her one. Vale was obviously colder than he was. She gave me her scarf, and her food, he thought guiltily. And she reminded me to pack last night, but I never did. After a long moment, he pushed the kindling out of his way and slid over so he was next to her.
Vale glanced up again. “Wh-what’re you doing?”
“You look cold,” Ash said. “And I … I think we should sit together.” She didn’t move, so Ash slid closer. “I … I’m going to put my arm over your shoulders, okay?” He laughed nervously. “Nothing weird. I’m just—” He coughed. “Seriously. I’m not trying anything. I just—You look cold. All right? It’s gonna be a long night. It’ll be better if you’re not freezing the whole time.”
When Vale didn’t respond, he moved in until they sat side by side. It was as close as Ash sat when he was at the movies with a girl, ready to slide his arm over the back of the seat so he could make a move. This wasn’t how friends sat. (Not even best friends.) At that thought, his face began to burn, but he forced his embarrassment aside. She’s just cold—way colder than I am—and she’ll get colder still if I don’t help. Ash slid his arm cautiously around Vale’s back, setting it across her shoulders, softly at first, then more solidly. He let out a slow breath.
Two minutes in and it felt like he’d defused a bomb.
With them touching, he could tell how cold she was. Shivers ran through her, passing from her body to his in small tremors. He leaned in closer so that they were pressed together from hip to shoulder. He rubbed her back. The shivering continued. The sound of Vale’s teeth chattering put him on edge. It struck him that she hadn’t stopped shivering since the rain had begun.
“Give me your hands,” Ash said.
When Vale didn’t respond, he squeezed her shoulder. “Hey. You hear me, Vale? I want to check your hands.”
She looked up, confused. “Wha…?” She sounded like she’d been sleeping and he’d just woken her.
“You’re still cold,” he said. “Give me your hands. I’ll warm them up.”
