by Jenn Bennett
Zorie and Lennon.
We are so good at this.
And before I know it, we’re rolling around, a tangle of arms and legs, half on the nylon rainfly, half in the night grass. Like we used to do, back during the Great Experiment. My glasses are somewhere, and his hand is up my shirt, and he’s saying all these insanely shocking and intimate things he wants to do to me, which should be making my ears turn pink, but right now it all sounds like poetry. And my fingers are headed for his belt buckle, and—
A scream.
Not me. And not Lennon. It’s in the woods.
It sounds like a woman. In trouble.
22
* * *
Another scream follows. It’s from a different location. An answering scream.
Not a human scream. An animal?
“What the shit is that?” I whisper, hand stilling on the hard muscles of his bare stomach. Someone’s lifted up his shirt in a completely indecent manner. Oh, that was me.
“It’s fine. Just a little mountain lion. No danger,” Lennon whispers, guiding my hand lower.
Oh.
Wow.
He’s definitely excited about the mountain lion.
This makes me extra excited in return.
Wait. Mountain lion?
“Mountain lion?” I whisper hotly.
“Caterwauling. Probably trying to find a mate,” Lennon confirms in a drugged voice. “God, your hand feels good.”
“Are we about to get attacked?” My voice sounds drugged too. I know I should move my hand away from his jeans, but I’m having trouble relaying the message to my fingers, which really want to linger and continue with exploration. My body is saying: Ahoy! I sailed on a deserted sea for months and have finally spotted land. Fertile land. Land better than I remembered. No way am I turning this ship around now.
“What?” he whispers.
“Did I say that out loud?”
“Is this some dirty pirate routine? Because I’ve really got a thing for Anne Bonny.”
Another scream rips through the night air.
“Jesus!” I say, heart racing, and not in the good way. “That sounds like a human being.”
“It also sounds really, really close,” he says, voice sobering up. “As much as I would like you to never, ever, ever, ever stop . . . I think we should—”
More screaming. Okay, talk about a bucket of ice water. I’m genuinely scared now, imagining something jumping out of the darkness and clawing my face to shreds. Nature is a horror movie. And we’re out here in the middle of a field, being stalked by killer animals.
I panic, unable to find my glasses or my headlamp, but Lennon spots them. We can’t gather up our stuff fast enough. Then we’re jogging back up the hill as the horny wildcats scream behind our backs.
By the time we get up to the camp, several other campers are standing around in long underwear, warily listening to the caterwauling. All eyes turn to us, and—terrific—I’m flushing like a guilty person. Well, technically, I am guilty, but now I’m also the camp hussy, so yay?
Lennon, on the other hand, acts calm and collected, breezily talking to the other campers as he lugs the rainfly around, reporting that, yes, it’s probably two mountain lions down in the tree line at the bottom of the hill, but no, they likely won’t come up here. Someone else, a middle-aged man with a Jamaican accent who introduces himself as Gordon, says he’s encountered several mountain lions in this park over the years, and agrees with Lennon. He’s telling other campers to make sure their kids aren’t wandering around alone, and to be cautious.
Since the camp ranger has left for the night, several people, including Lennon, volunteer to keep an eye out for a little while. And after we get our stuff put away, he digs out an extra camp light from his pack—another one of those palm-size ones—and puts that on our picnic table.
For a while, the camp is buzzing with murmured conversations, and a few campsites are lighting fires in their pits. We eat some of Lennon’s M&M stash in a late-night anxiety binge, and when I’m on my second handful, his eyes go big.
“Oh, shit.”
“What?” I say, frantically looking around for a wildcat.
“No, no,” he says, turning me back around. “Hives.”
I look down where he’s gently tugging down the collar of my T-shirt. Pink welts all over my neck and chest. I pull up my shirt. They’re on my stomach and arms, too.
My first thought is: I’m somehow now allergic to Lennon. And of course the universe would punish me for all that rolling around in the proverbial hay with him. Camp hussy, after all. I’m cursed. But Lennon’s analysis is slightly less paranoid.
“All the long grass on the hill. Whatever kind it is, your hives don’t like it.” He inspects my body and asks me if I’m having trouble breathing. I’m not. No loss of vision. No throat swelling up. None of the urgent 911 symptoms.
“You have an EpiPen?” he asks.
“Yeah, but I don’t think it’s that bad. This has happened before, remember?”
“That day we were hunting for metal out by the abandoned warehouse,” he murmurs.
We were fourteen, and someone had given his dad a used metal detector, which he’d passed along to Lennon. We were so positive we were going to get rich, finding hidden pirate gold. Our booty ended up being one vintage metal name tag that looked like it belonged to a waitress, an old quarter with a hole drilled in the middle, and a bent-up veterinarian syringe. All worthless. Lennon kept the name tag—the engraved name on it was “Dorothy”—and I kept the quarter.
Oh yeah, and I developed a superfast case of hives from overgrown dandelions.
“What about Benadryl?” he asks.
I nod. “Got plenty of that.”
“Why don’t you take the maximum dose,” he suggests. “Like, now.”
I do that, taking a couple extra pills just to be safe. The hives look ugly. I just had one of the best make-out sessions of my life, and now I’m a monster.
Screw you, universe. Screw you.
My sleeping bag is still rolled up, so I use it as a pillow, lying down on the floor of the tent. I try to concentrate on calming down, because stress will only make this worse. I’m vaguely cognizant of the “may cause drowsiness” effect of the antihistamines, which turns into “you bet your sweet ass these will cause drowsiness” when I double up on them, but the next thing I know, Lennon’s waking me up, and I have a horrible neck cramp.
“Izzt morning?” I slur, utterly groggy.
“No, it’s just past midnight. You’ve been snoring for about an hour.”
“Good God.”
He chuckles. “It was super cute. Not a loud snore. Your mouth was open.”
I groan and stretch out my neck. “Stupid antihistamines.”
Lennon lifts the hem of my shirt. “They’re working, though. Hives are going down. Tired?”
“So tired,” I whisper.
“The mountain lions are gone. Let’s crash.”
One step ahead of you, buddy.
But he doesn’t let me fall back down on the tent floor. He gently urges me into the chilly night air, which makes me grumpy, until I see the magic he’s working. He’s managed to zip our sleeping bags together into one massive bag. They aren’t quite the same size, so it’s slightly askew and mismatched, but he rolls out his foam mat and arranges the merged super bag on top. He also makes a long pillow out of some of our clothes, covering them up with our now-dry camp towels.
He’s a freaking camping genius.
And if I were more conscious and less addled, I’d like to show him how much I appreciate his skills by continuing where we left off before all the cougar screaming. But I can barely keep my eyes open. While he stows our packs in his tent, I climb into the double sleeping bag, shimmying out of my jeans once inside. And then he’s slipping inside with me, warm and solid. We gravitate toward each other, and as I curl up against him, head on his chest, his arms around me, random thoughts pass through my head.
Second: I don’t want it to end.
And the last thought, I say aloud. “The only way my dad will ever let me see you is if I confront him about his affair.”
Lennon’s response rumbles through my cheek after a long sigh. “I know.”
“It’s going to break up my parents.”
“I would never wish that. Not in a million years. If my parents split up, I’m not sure I could handle it.”
“What do we do, then?”
He runs his hand down my arm. “We’ll figure something out. I promise. Stop worrying.”
And I don’t. I’m too tired. But somewhere in the back of my head, I know our time together is dwindling, and that once we get home, there’s a chance everything will fall apart. I’ll need to come up with a solid plan of action. Create some sort of mental safety bunker in case my world is destroyed.
All this time, I’ve thought my life would be easier if Lennon wasn’t in it. I was half right. Now that he’s back, things are a million times harder. I never realized “us” would be so complicated.
* * *
The next morning, we leave the camp sooner than expected.
I wake up to a cold sleeping bag and manage to track down Lennon outside, finding him dressed. He’s also a ball of nervous energy. At first I fear that we still have a mountain lion problem, but he assures me they are long gone. There’s something new to worry about.
A summer storm is coming. A big one. It’s been brewing from the remnants of a tropical Pacific front off the coast of Southern California, and now it’s gathered strength and is headed north.
If we’re going to get to the star party, we need to make it through Queen’s Gap today—a narrow canyon passageway between two mountains. A river runs the length of it, and that river floods during storms. As in, floods the entire canyon.
“I talked to the ranger. He warned me that we can’t get trapped in there,” Lennon explains. “So we either need to hike through it before evening, or we need to stay here for another night. But there’s a chance if we do that, it could be another day before the canyon is cleared for hiking.”
“Are you sure we can get through it?”
“If the storm follows the track it’s on, we should have no problem. But we need to leave soon. In the hour.”
“Oh, wow.”
“How are your hives?” He inspects my arms, pulling up my sleeves. “Not as scary, but still there.”
“At least they’re not itching all that bad at the moment.” All I can do is keep an eye on them, manage them. Keep my stress level low and be proactive about medicating. I’m still groggy from the Benadryl, but I’ll take a nondrowsy prescription antihistamine with breakfast. And there is breakfast, I see, because Lennon already has everything laid out, including the all-important coffee.
“I’m going to need that caffeine as soon as I get back from the restroom,” I tell him. “As much as you can spare.”
“I’ll make it extra strong. It’ll taste like burned sludge. Milkshake thick.”
“I forgot how much I like you.”
One side of his mouth twists up. “You’ll like me better if I can get you to the star party without us being drowned in a storm, so hurry it up.”
“Hurrying!”
We have to rush to eat and get our camp packed, which involves lining our backpacks with garbage bags in case of rain. Once we’re ready, we head out of the campground with a few other wretched souls who are also up at the crack. It’s not long before those hikers leave us for the Silver Trail. Our western path is much smaller. Smaller means no fellow hikers—good—but it also means that we’re returning to the backcountry.
No posted signs, no bathrooms, no cell service.
We’re on our own.
The morning fog wears off as we head toward a small chain of mountains covered in Ponderosa pines. And after a brisk uphill hike, the forest levels off and opens up to a river that snakes through a long canyon: Queen’s Gap.
The canyon is fairly narrow and lush with ferns and moss. A slowly inclining trail on the right bank of the river is barely wide enough for two people to walk comfortably, and occasionally I fall behind to avoid running into overgrown brush. But it’s worth all the hassle—the rough path, spiderwebs, and occasional low-hanging tree branches that nearly poke my eye out—because it’s really spectacularly gorgeous here. The canyon river is babbling, creating a light mist where it dips down small hills of polished river rock, and unworldly ferns that cover the canyon floor seem to be growing larger and more luxuriant the farther we walk. It’s an embarrassment of ferns. As if nature said, here, you deserve an extra helping.
We’re making great time, and I’m glad to be away from guitar-playing campers and all their tempting grilled meats. I’m also glad to be alone with my thoughts. For once, instead of worrying about my parents or cataloging my plans for the day, I spend my hiking time in the canyon watching Lennon. Thinking about Lennon. In my head, I revisit our make-out session from the night before and throw some additional fantasies into the mix that are 50 percent dirtier.
But by midday, my energy wanes. Not even filthy thoughts can sustain me. I’m sore and tired, and I just want to drop on the ground and sleep. “I need to stop,” I tell Lennon.
He glances at me, brows knitting together. “You all right?”
“Just tired.”
“Me too, actually. Come here,” he says, gesturing for me to come closer. “I want to check on your hives.”
“You just want to gawk at my deformity,” I tell him as he lifts the hem of my shirt to reveal a sliver of my stomach. The skin there is speckled with raised, pink bumps, but the bigger wheals are breaking up. “So sexy, right?”
“The sexiest,” Lennon agrees, running the backs of his fingers over the puffy welts. “Itchy?”
“I’m not sure. It’s hard to concentrate on feeling bad when you’re feeling me up.”
His lips curl at the corners. “Are you saying I’ve got magic hands, like Jesus?”
“Are you saying I’m a leper?”
He tugs the edge of my shirt back into place. “Totally. That’s exactly what I’m saying. Please stay away from me and definitely don’t kiss me.”
“Got it.”
“That was supposed to be reverse psychology.”
“I know. I was just realizing something.”
“Oh? What, pray tell?”
“You’re the only person besides Joy who isn’t afraid to touch my hives.”
“They aren’t contagious. And if you think a few splotches on your skin are going to stop me from touching you with my magic healing hands after what we did last night, think again.”
“Good. I mean, uh . . .”
“It was pretty good, wasn’t it?” he says.
Am I blushing? My ears feel hot. And a few other parts of my body.
We never did a lot of flirting last fall. It wasn’t like this. We were friends in the daytime, make-out partners by night, and we managed both the secrecy of our relationship and this strange new world we were exploring together by keeping things separate.
Now there’s a different energy. A thrilling kind of tension.
I know I’m not the only one feeling this new energy between us. I’ve caught him sneaking glances at me out of the corner of his eyes, as if he’s trying to measure me. Study me. It’s exciting and maddening, and I feel as if I might have a heart attack if something doesn’t give soon.
There’s that smile again. “Anyhoo, your hives look a shit-ton better than last night, but you don’t need to overtax your body.”
“Is that your scientific opinion, Dr. Mackenzie?” Okay, maybe I have a little more energy for filthy thoughts. Definitely willing to overtax my body if he’s going to help.
“Gordon told me they had to airlift a guy out of here with hives last summer.”
“Gordon?” It takes my brain a second to crawl out of the gutter and realize it’s the Jamaican man from th
e camp last night.
“We chatted this morning.”
“Look at you, being all non-antisocial.”
Lennon rolls his eyes humorously and continues. “Gordon said that apparently this hiker, he’d never even had hives before, or not in a big way. But he was mildly allergic to peanuts, and even though he could have them in small quantities from time to time, he ate a bunch of candy with nuts while climbing. And that, combined with exhaustion . . . His throat swelled up so much, he lost consciousness.”
Angioedema. That’s when your face swells up like a balloon. A lot of people with chronic hives have it. Luckily, I’ve managed to avoid it.
And I hear what Lennon’s saying, but I’m more concerned about the source of the airlift story. “You told Gordon about my hives?”
“He camps here a lot, and I was just trying to find out if he knew what kind of grass was on that hill. It’s velvet grass and oxeye daisies, by the way.”
“Ooh, yeah. That oxeye daisy weed is on my no-fly list. High-risk allergen.”
He gives me a look that says there you go.
“And I’m sorry about that idiot hiker who decided to gorge on Snickers bars while climbing, but I’m not allergic to nuts,” I say. “I mean, God. Can you imagine a world without peanuts?”
Lennon’s mouth twists humorously. “The horror. You may not be allergic to peanuts, but look at all the other stuff that sets you off.” He ticks off a list on his fingers. “Stress, daisies, shrimp that Sunny cooks—”
“Bad shrimp,” I murmur cheerfully.
“Bad shrimp,” he repeats in Sunny’s voice. “Oh, and there was mean old Mr. McCrory’s dog. Remember? He licked your hand and five minutes later . . .”
“That was just bizarre. I’m not allergic to Andromeda’s kisses. How was I supposed to know his hellhound’s saliva was poison?”
“Maybe it had been chomping on daisies.”
“Or shrimp.”
“You’re an anomaly, Zorie Everhart.”
“I am nothing if not an original.”
“Well, OG, let’s feed your hive-ridden body some lunch, so we can get through this canyon before the storm hits.”
After finding a good place to sit, we eat a quick meal out of our bear canisters, and when we hit the trail again, my body isn’t hurting like it was earlier. Either the break helped, or the extra meds, or maybe I’m just getting used to hiking. Whatever the case, I’m able to get into a comfortable groove. Just one foot in front of the next, watching my surroundings, and breathing.
