Boys, Bears, and A Serious Pair of Hiking Boots

by Abby McDonald

  I pause, slowly taking it in. “Did you say, ‘we’?” I send a silent plea to the universe that I misheard her, that it was just a slip of the tongue, but to my horror, she nods.

  No. Freaking. Way.

  “What about my internship, and the Green Teens?” I protest, realizing too late that they won’t care.

  Dad pats my hand sympathetically. “I know you have plans, but you can do those things in the fall.”

  “I can’t, not for the internship!” I stare at them in dismay. Don’t they realize that the Green Teens have a whole summer of events planned? Thinking quickly, I try to come up with a solution. “I can stay here, with Olivia!”

  Mom shakes her head. “It’s far too long to impose on any of your friends.”

  “Dad?” I turn, imploring him, but he’s no use.

  “It’s already settled, I’m afraid. We’ve found a family to sublet the house, so it’s a done deal.” My horror must be showing, because he tries to comfort me. “Think of it as an adventure! I know it’s not ideal, but you’ll get to explore a new city and make friends. It’s only for a couple of months.”

  A couple of months? I slouch back, defeated. But as the news sinks in, I realize that something’s not right — and I don’t just mean the destruction of my summer plans. Mom’s smile is fixed too brightly, and Dad is gulping back his second glass of wine.

  And then I remember what happened before.

  “Are you . . . ?” I start, nervous, but the words stick in my throat.

  Mom looks up. “What’s that, honey?”

  I pause, all my earlier courage deserting me. Facing down Principal Turner is nothing compared to real, harsh questions like this. “Nothing,” I say quietly, and push the tofu around my plate for another five minutes while they chatter about all the wholesome activities I’ll be able to do in Orlando. Now I know what people mean when they talk about the elephant in the room. Only to me, it feels like a full circus, complete with acrobats, performing seals, and a marching band trumpeting, “Your parents are splitting up!”

  But I don’t say a word.

  I tell myself that I’m over-reacting, getting paranoid or something. I mean, Grandma has been having problems with her hip, and Dad did say something about a new client overseas. But no matter how much I try to ignore the hollow feeling in the pit of my stomach, I can’t. Because of last time.

  It was during my freshman year. Dad was gone a month — a business trip, they swore — but I caught Mom crying twice, crumpled alone in the laundry room when she thought I was upstairs. And then he came back, and she started going to the hair salon every week, and wearing those outfits, and cooking meals from scratch to serve in the perfect dining room. Nobody ever said a thing about it, and I still can’t find the words to ask.

  “Can I be excused?” I finally abandon my food, appetite gone. “Olivia’s picking me up soon.”

  “Are you going out?” Mom pauses.

  I nod, already out of my seat. “Miriam Park is having a girls’ night in,” I lie, naming a girl from my lit class who drives around in a gas-guzzling SUV and wears heels to class. Heels! Mom, of course, loves her.

  Just as I hoped, her face relaxes. “Oh, that sounds like fun.”

  “I’ll be back by eleven thirty!”

  I grab my purse and head out to the front of the house to wait, balancing back and forth along the edge of the sidewalk like I used to when I was a kid. We live at the end of a quiet cul-de-sac, with neat front lawns and new-grown trees spaced twenty feet apart, looking as thin and pathetic as they did when we first moved in. I long for grass that isn’t mowed down to an inch high, and wildlife beyond a few birds and a stray fox. Olivia’s parents were going to take us on vacation, camping out in a national park so we could actually enjoy the nature we’re working so hard to save, but I guess that’s out now.

  I sigh, kicking a pebble along the curb as I think of the summer that awaits me instead. Grandma’s development in Florida is paved in sand-colored tile, with bright fake turquoise pools sunk into the ground and lone palm trees potted at the edge of every pathway. There are panic buttons in all the pastel rooms and motorized golf carts whirring down the streets, bussing the residents to early-bird dinners and bridge at the community hall.

  I don’t think I’ve ever laid eyes on another teenager there.

  By the time Olivia’s third-hand blue Honda rattles into view, I’m past gloomy and into wallowing.

  “Go to Disneyworld, learn to play bocci, and completely lose my mind,” I tell her, wrenching open the door. I collapse into the passenger seat.

  “What?” She stalls, then lurches back into gear as we make a messy three-point turn. Well, five-point.

  “Things I can do in Orlando.” I sigh. “My mom is dragging me down with her. For the whole summer.”

  “Orlando!” Her dismay is gratifying. “But —”

  “I know.”

  “And —”

  “Yup.” We fall silent in joint horror as I rummage in the glove compartment for a new CD. The Polaroid Kids: they know about loneliness and pain.

  “What am I going to do without you?” she wails, making an illegal left turn. “We were going to picket the Chamber of Commerce about fair trade! And hang out by my pool! And sneak into all the graduation parties!”

  “I guess you’ll have to do all that with Cash now.” I slump lower.

  “We’ve been dating like, three weeks,” she protests, but I catch her blush all the same.

  “You really liiiike him.” I use a singsong voice, happy to change the subject. “You wanna kiiisss him. You’re gonna do it with him.”

  “Jenna!”

  Cash (as in the late great country singer, not the capitalist tool of ownership) is the handsome dreadlocked boy who came to her rescue last month. We were handing out leaflets at the mall when this burly middle-aged man started arguing with Livvy — towering over her and ranting about natural progress and human achievement through landfill sites and pollution. Just when things were getting kind of scary, Cash stepped in, making the man back off and Livvy practically swoon at his feet. He’s a senior at a school across town and the founding member of their Earth Activism group. In other words, he’s perfect.

  “Come on, you’re lucky,” I say, with only a (completely reasonable) hint of jealousy. “The most eligible guy down in Orlando is probably, like, fifty.”

  “I don’t know,” she pretends to muse. “I can see you with a silver fox.”

  “Ewww!” Now it’s my turn to blush. “Livvy!”

  She laughs, reaching over with one hand to grab her purse and rummage for the bag of jelly beans she always carries. “No, but seriously, we’ll find someone for you tonight. I bet Cash has tons of cute friends, ready to quote Thoreau at you and gaze dreamily into your eyes —”

  “Right before I leave the state.” I take a handful of candies and divide them up by color on my palm.

  “Hey, this way you can have a crazy, reckless fling!” Livvy is still flushed by thoughts of Cash.

  “I’ll settle for a normal, boring date,” I tell her wryly. She makes a face as we stop at a traffic light.

  “That only works if you actually let them ask you out. Or, you know, say yes!”

  I eat another jelly bean and change the subject. It’s not that simple — as any teenage girl would agree. Finding a guy who’s cute, smart, and actually likes me is hard enough, even without the basic requirement that he be into environmentalism, too. I mean, the last guy to ask me out was Jaz Simpson, and he spends all weekend at monster-truck rallies!

  By the time we pull up outside Cash’s house, on the edge of town, our list of ways I can avoid the summer in Florida is still empty, but I refuse to wallow anymore. “Let’s face it: I’m doomed,” I declare brightly, climbing out of the car and surveying the tangle of teenagers milling around in the front yard. Groups are sprawled on blankets on the ground, and some kind of punk music blasts out from the house every time the door opens. “So let’s j
ust have as much fun as possible before I go, OK?”

  “Deal!” Olivia agrees.

  The party turns out to be pretty fun. Even when Olivia abandons me to go hang out with Cash, I don’t mind. That’s what’s so great about the Green Teen project and eco stuff in general: even though I don’t know any of the kids here, we’ve got some common ground to talk about, so I don’t feel like an outsider. Just like guys on the football team can talk about plays and practice all the time, and the indie kids always have music as their fallback topic, I have environmentalism. Soon I’m relaxing with a group in the living room, chatting about our favorite books, and — sure enough — Thoreau.

  Suddenly, Olivia comes tearing into the room. “Jenna!” She grabs my arm, bouncing up and down with delight. “I’ve got it!”

  “What? Wait, calm down.” I laugh. She’s so excited, you’d think her parents just bought her a hybrid.

  “Your summer!” she squeals. “I totally have the answer.” Without even pausing for breath, she launches into a complicated story. “. . . and Cash was talking about his plans for next year, because you know how he’s taking time off before college, and he said that his friend Kris said that his cousin was doing, like, a volunteer road trip across the country working at farms and co-ops and stuff, and that he — Cash, not Kris’s cousin — might do the same, either here or up in Canada. Canada! You see?” She beams at me expectantly. “I really am a genius.”

  “Ummm . . .” I don’t see. At all.

  “Canada!” she exclaims again, this time with more of a “Duh!” expression. “Didn’t you say your godmother Susie moved up there?”

  I gasp. “Susie!”

  “Uh-huh!”

  Susie, aka my mom’s wild roommate from college, who’s spent the last twenty-odd years dealing blackjack in Vegas/dancing burlesque in Atlantic City/traversing the world with nothing but a clutch purse and three packages of Oreos. Until six months ago, when she met a hunky woodsman up in British Columbia and decided to get married and settle down to live in domestic wilderness harmony.

  I stare at Olivia, wide-eyed, as a light appears on the horizon, a choir of angels sound, and the grim specter of becoming Hunter Creek Retirement Community’s reigning bridge champion melts blissfully away.

  In other words, I’m saved.

  “And the mountains are a kind of purple-gray. There’s still snow at the top of some.” I press my forehead against the cool glass, gazing in awe at the towering scenery. It’s only two weeks later, and I’m squished at the back of a Greyhound bus winding its way through the Rocky Mountains. My parents meant business when it came to our summer plans: just two days after school let out, Mom packed her car full of suitcases and hit the road to Florida, while Dad took a cab to the airport — both of them swearing that this was nothing but a summer change. I still don’t know if I believe them, but when the flight reached cruising altitude and I settled in with my pretzels and seat-back movie, I made myself a promise. This time, I’m not going to dwell on all the scary possibilities I can’t control. Thoughts of my parents, and the dreaded D-word, banished to the very back of my mind — and they’re going to stay there for the rest of summer.

  “Man, you’re so lucky.” At the other end of the crackling phone line, I hear Olivia give a wistful sigh. “How are you feeling?”

  “Kind of tired,” I admit. “The flight was six hours, and then I got straight on this bus. . . .”

  “The wilderness isn’t exactly convenient,” Olivia agrees.

  “But I’m excited, too,” I add, blinking at the vast landscape of rock and forest, individual landmarks lost in a blur of peaks and ridges. It feels surreal to hear her voice all the way out here, as if I’m suspended in this weird place between our familiar banter and the foreign surroundings, clouded and misty. I snuggle deeper into the folds of my sweatshirt. “I still can’t believe we pulled this off. I’m going to owe you forever.”

  “Uh, yeah, you are.” Olivia laughs. “But couldn’t you have packed me in that massive suitcase of yours? I nearly died from smog inhalation getting into the city for my interview today.”

  “Wait, what interview?”

  “OK, so I didn’t want to say anything, in case it didn’t come through,” she confides gleefully, “but Cash has found the most amazing thing. There’s this collective in upstate New York, where they run, like, seminars on sustainability and earth issues and all kinds of things, and it turns out they hire camp counselors and staff workers! If it works out, we’ll spend the whole summer, and go to all the sessions and things — for free.”

  “That’s awesome!” I have to admit, I’ve felt kind of bad, abandoning her to summer in Fairview alone. “But, wait.” I pause, then drop my voice so the other passengers can’t hear. “Does that mean you’ll be up there with Cash? Like, living together?”

  She laughs, “Jenna! Not like that. We’d be staying in the staff dorms, single-sex. Do you think my parents would ever agree otherwise?”

  “Maybe not.” For all their Bohemian stories, Livvy’s parents are overprotective when it comes to boys. “Anyway, that’s so great! We’re both going to have the best time this summer.”

  “I know!”

  Four hours later, I’m still not bored by the amazing scenery slipping past outside; but I am seriously over this bus ride. My legs ache, my butt’s gone numb, and Henri (the French backpacker beside me), is fast asleep, a thin ribbon of drool stretching to his shoulder. Every few minutes he mumbles and snorts, slumping closer toward me.

  I break and call Olivia again. My parents upgraded me to an international plan before I left, and while this may not be an emergency, as such . . . “So tell me more about this camp place.”

  “It’s amazing,” she replies immediately, as if we never hung up. “I’ve only seen brochures so far, but it’s set up like a retreat, with yoga in the mornings and —”

  “Wait — I think they’re calling my stop,” I interrupt, hearing a yell from the front of the bus.

  “Stillwater!” the driver calls again.

  “That’s me!” I cry. “Livvy, I’ll call you back when I’m settled, OK?”

  “Say hi to Susie for me!”

  Clutching my backpack, iPod, and magazines, I maneuver over Henri — still drooling happily — and trip down the steps. My overstuffed suitcase is already sitting on the ground in front of me, bulging as if the seams will give way any second now, but before I can ask a single thing, the doors hiss closed and the bus moves slowly back toward the highway, leaving me on the edge of a dusty asphalt road.

  Alone.

  I look around, confused. The road is empty, with nothing but a simple signpost marking the stop. Thick trees stretch up in every direction, edged at the top of the valley by rock, but there’s no building or bus station to be seen. And definitely no Susie.

  I try to call, but she isn’t picking up her cell. I shiver for a moment, feeling very small in the midst of this huge vista. Back home, there’s always a man-made horizon: billboards or high-rise condos or a plane soaring overhead. I’ve always found it annoying, but now, I half-wish there was at least a gas station to make me feel less alone. This hard strip of highway is the only hint of human life in the whole valley.

  Then I take a deep breath of mountain air — crisp and cool as if it’s been through a dozen purifiers — and remind myself that alone is a good thing. It’s just me and nature, the way I’ve always wanted. I’m Thoreau, out by Walden Pond; I’m Eustace Conway, traversing the Appalachian Mountains. I’m . . .

  Hungry. And in need of a bathroom.

  I look around, hoping a vehicle will materialize on the dusty road, but the asphalt is empty. It curves gently back to the highway in one direction, disappearing into dense trees the other way. Wait. I blink at the thick wall of foliage blocking my view. What if I’m being completely stupid, and Stillwater is really just around the bend?

  My bladder likes this line of thought; it likes it a lot. Besides, what’s my alternative: standing
here, waiting for dark? I gulp, imagining the things that could be lurking in the forest, just waiting for night to fall.

  Hoisting my backpack onto my shoulders, I set off along the road.

  Sadly, Stillwater is not hidden just around the next bend. Or the next one. And by the time a cold drizzle begins to fall, it’s clear that my wheeled suitcase really wasn’t designed as an all-terrain vehicle. Finally, after bouncing bravely over rocks and cracks and stray tree branches, it gives up. Sending a wheel spinning into the undergrowth, it flips over to die right there on the side of the road. I let out a damp whimper. I’m wet and tired, and right now all I want is a hot shower, a large meal and — oh, Lord — a restroom.

  Finally, I hear the sound of an engine in the distance, like a choir of polluting angels. Struggling to take off my backpack, I turn just in time to see a mud-splattered white pickup truck speeding toward me from the highway, heading into town. My heart leaps. I know that hitchhiking is way up there on the list of Risky Behaviors That Will Get a Teenage Girl Killed (or Worse), but I think wandering the forest alone trumps it. I step out into the road so they’re sure to see me, wave my arms, and practically jump up and down to catch the driver’s attention.

  The truck speeds past.

  As I’m left in its muddy wake, I realize that the media has been lying to me all these years: small towns aren’t full of welcoming, down-home folks brimming over with family values and kindness; they’re all selfish, heartless people who’ll leave a young girl stranded by the edge of the road to die with —

  Another truck!

  This one is coming from town and makes an awkward U-turn in the road before spluttering to a stop next to me. The window rolls down, revealing a blast of angry emo music and the sullen face of a teenage girl. She’s maybe my age, with pale skin almost hidden behind a sheet of lank black hair — the kind dyed with cheap drugstore stuff so that it sucks all light and joy into its vortex of blackness. (I know these things. Livvy has a history of bad DIY dye jobs, and many a night I’ve had to run over with peroxide and plastic gloves to undo whatever “interesting” color combinations she whimsically decided to try.)