The Liar's Guide to the Night Sky

by Brianna R. Shrum

  “Come on,” says Jolie. “Up this way.”

  I say, “Okay,” and follow them into the growing dark.

  The stars aren’t out yet or anything; it’s not nighttime. It’s just evening in the mountains, which feels like nighttime anywhere else. The clouds are spitting out these occasional fat flakes—one every few seconds so it’s like they’re being worked on individually, meticulously.

  A few cousins are laughing up ahead as we walk the trail back to debauchery mountain.

  The snow crunches beneath our feet and my big, puffy (warm as heck) coat swishes every time I move my arms.

  But beyond that?

  It’s just . . . silent.

  Nothing but the woods—the specific, cool dark of the light gray clouds in the sky and the sun looking for a place to truly retreat. The crisp smell of pine and snow (because evergreens and aspens are all that can make it in Colorado, altitude and cold and lack of oxygen considered). The sounds of absolute emptiness.

  I want to stop right here, let them all move ahead and melt in it.

  I don’t, obviously. This is the mountains. I don’t want to like . . . get attacked by a roaming pack of wolves or something.

  But the silence in these woods. It’s so different than the woods back east. There, no matter where you go, you’re surrounded by life. By sound. If it’s not squirrels rattling the branches, it’s birds singing. It’s cicadas screaming. It’s bugs under your feet and life burrowing into the trees.

  Here, it’s truly, truly quiet. Here, you can just . . . be away. Even from the bugs and birds.

  What a revelation.

  We crunch along, further and further into the woods, some of us lugging bags and some of us lugging logs and who knows what else, until we get to the place that Tzipporah loudly declares is The Spot.

  The Spot is a really great clearing in the middle of the trees, whose boughs have largely protected it from snowfall. Not completely, there’s still patches, and it’s not like the snow is inches deep or something anyway, not here, not on this side of the mountain.

  But there’s a few rocks piled up in the memory of a campfire, and I wonder if they’ve made one here before (probably) or if it’s been others who have used this as their spot and Tzipporah and Sam just discovered it and we’re taking it as our own (also likely).

  “Alright,” says Tzipporah. “Men. Assemble the campfire. It is not warm out here.”

  “Aye, aye,” says Jaxon, saluting. He flings the bag off his back and dumps the logs in the pit in a way that Jonah apparently finds dissatisfying, so he goes to take over and Jaxon pretends to be offended for like four seconds before he happily gives up and goes to sit on one of the big logs that’s been set up around it. Oliver, Lydia’s BFF and honestly a year too young to have fairly made the age cutoff for this outing (he’s in the eighth grade), stands there looking awkward until Jonah finishes up.

  I set my bag on the ground and make my way to one of the unoccupied logs, glancing up at the sky. It’s still not nighttime, still this gray on the precipice of going black.

  We’ve been hiking for like an hour, so yeah, it’s gotten later.

  I shiver, and it’s definitely the cold; it’s not because I’m nervous. Everyone knows their way around here. Everyone knows how to mountain.

  I say, all cool, definitely cool, “So how do we, like, find our way back?”

  Jonah says, still focusing on the log formation, “Bread crumbs.” I groan and he glances back over his shoulder at me, mouth curling. “Landmarks,” he says. “And little pieces of yellow ribbon marking the path.”

  “Ah.”

  “As though Tzipporah would let us just hike back here without marking trees and shit; come on. I’m surprised she didn’t video the whole hike step by step.”

  I laugh. “Yeah, okay, fair.”

  Tzipporah, from somewhere just inside the trees, says, “I heard that.”

  I laugh harder. “Who was in charge of that?”

  “Who do you think?” says Jonah. “The Eagle Scout.”

  “You’re—an Eagle Scout?”

  “Mm,” he says. “That surprise you?”

  “Well.” I shift on the log. “Seems a little goody two-shoes for you.”

  He laughs, throaty and smoky, and glances at me with those dark brown eyes again, and I can feel it in the pit of my stomach. “Yeah,” he says.

  “So you’re the guy who gets us back out of here?”

  “What?” He messes with those logs, looks up at me again from his crouch. His voice is low when he says, “Don’t trust me, Jacob?”

  “DOWN,” says Jaxon.

  Jonah stands and steps away from the campfire. “Hmm?”

  “Down, boy. Stop hitting on Hallie. Jesus.”

  “Ah, come on,” he says.

  My face flames, even in the cold.

  “No,” he says. He points a long, slender finger at Jonah and basically wags it. “Get your charming ass away from her. Hallie, stay strong. The soulful brown eyes are a trap.”

  “Aw, you think I’m soulful?” He grins. “How about you?” he says to me. “You think I’m soulful?”

  His eyes are sparkling in the dim light, and I can’t really breathe with the full force of his attention turned on me.

  “That’s a trick question, Hallie; don’t answer it. Jonah, stay away from the high schooler and sit by me.”

  Jonah just raises an eyebrow at me and I say, “I don’t know if soulful’s the word for it.”

  “Nah?” he says.

  “No.”

  “What’s the word for it?”

  “Trying too hard.”

  He spits out a laugh and says, “Christ,” just as Jaxon starts clapping.

  Jonah plops down by him, and they start talking about who knows what and my pulse is ripping through my veins, even though Jaxon is right: this is how Jonah talks to everyone.

  Thankfully, Sam comes to sit beside me and starts asking me about Massachusetts and laughs when I call a water fountain a “bubblah” in an exaggerated-for-her-benefit-I’m-not-from-Boston! accent. Night closes in a little deeper, and someone cracks open a beer, and then everyone is cracking open beers, and Rules-Following Tzipporah is surprisingly cool with everyone drinking underage.

  I’ve never seen her like this, I guess.

  But Old Snowy Ridge feels like a different world.

  It’s Jaxon who pulls out the weed—surprise, surprise. Every dude takes a hit, even fourteen-year-old Oliver who definitely should not and totally chokes on it, and on the girls’ side, the only two who pass are Sam (kind of a surprise) and Lydia (definitely not a surprise) and so I take one, too.

  I’ve smoked before. Once.

  I cough a little and catch Jonah’s eyes across the bonfire haze. He’s smiling at me, just a little. Infuriatingly cocky. Infuriating or . . . well.

  Something else that gets me a little hot.

  The cousins and the friends they brought are laughing in these little groups that I want so badly to be a part of.

  You serious? Uncle Bernie? Uncle BERNIE was fucking nuts in college, man. He got thrown in the can for like twelve different fights.

  Absolutely not. That’s bullshit.

  Ask him!

  Oh, I’m sure he TOLD you that, dumbass, but he’s been in like three, tops.

  No dude, you’re wrong. I’ve seen his arrest record.

  Bullshiiiiiittttt.

  It’s all fights and communism and protests all day long.

  An eye-rolly jack-off motion.

  Or across the aisle: Game Of Thrones, oh how fucking original to love Game of Thrones.

  I like the Lannisters!

  You just have a thing for blondes.

  Yes. Yes I do.

  Or right next to me:

  Mmmm, never have I ever made out with a friend’s ex.

  Never have I ever gone with two dates to a dance.

  Never have I ever started a mutiny in class.

  Never have I ever started my pe
riod in the middle of gym, panicked, and told the coach I’d done the splits and ripped my VAGINA OPEN because somehow that seemed more logical and less embarrassing than “It’s my regular, normal menstrual period and it’s still irregular, whoops, I bled through my underwear.”

  OH MY G-D I TRUSTED YOU. I WAS ELEVEN.

  Jaxon is lying back on the pine-needled ground behind the log now, looking up at the stars that have come out, and I just watch him. He looks so peaceful. Stoned, but he’s not stoned. That’s just how he is: at ease.

  I’m not out of it either; of course I’m not. One hit of this weed isn’t enough to get me high as much as it is to relax me just a little.

  Just enough to enjoy this whole night without anxiety eating me alive.

  I glance at the log again, sparks from the fire dancing, crackles and pops making the nighttime come alive.

  And we just get to live in it.

  The freedom is . . . kind of intoxicating.

  Jonah is looking at me again, corner of his mouth tipping up. He’s tapping his finger on his knee, looking up at the sky for a second, looking back at me.

  I mouth, What? And I’m smiling. I’m smiling like an idiot. I know exactly what he’s trying to do and it’s exactly what he’s done with a million other girls, I’m sure, and he’s not going to get to me. He’s absolutely not.

  He shrugs, mouths, What? back at me.

  I mouth, You.

  He furrows his brow and presses his hand to his chest. Like he’s so offended.

  I narrow my eyes even though my mouth is smiling, even though I can feel his attention buzzing over my skin. I try to say soundlessly, You know what you’re doing.

  But he just shakes his head and points to his ear. Can’t hear you, he mouths.

  I exaggeratedly roll my eyes and try to say it slower.

  He cuts me off in the middle of the sentence by cocking his head toward the tree line.

  I bite my lip.

  I shouldn’t.

  I just . . . definitely, absolutely should not.

  I curl my fingers around my Coke bottle and he cocks an eyebrow like a question.

  I glance over at Jaxon, like I need his permission or something.

  I’m not going with Jonah.

  I’m not stupid.

  I’m not going with Jonah.

  I’m not.

  Jonah’s mouth tips and there’s mischief and fake innocence and sex written in the wry line.

  I’m going with him.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  IF ANYONE NOTICES ME disappearing into the woods with Jonah Ramirez, I don’t notice them noticing. I’m too busy thinking about how stupid, how thrilling it is that I’m doing this, to worry about anyone blood related to me and what they might think about it.

  The stars are out now, and it gets darker the further we get from the fire, so they’re smeared across the sky like glitter. But we don’t go that far. Not like the Colorado woods are super private anyway; the place isn’t exactly known for conditions that favor life. The woods aren’t dense. They’re a little sparse—nothing but bushes and aspens that tower over them, skinny and pale. Every one of them would be dwarfed by the trees back home.

  Anyway, the point is: we’re not completely cut off from society or the bonfire when we decide we’ve gone far enough. The point is that I can still kind of hear everyone laughing, but the sounds all bleed together like paint in water. The point is that it’s dark but not rainforest-tree-covered dark. There’s enough space for the moon to shine in and illuminate the planes on his gold-brown face, the shadows at his jawline. His eyes are really, really dark, I notice, and he’s got that dimple when he smirks. Just the one, I realize, standing this close to him. Paying attention.

  He’s always looking for trouble, I think, so that dimple is always there.

  “So,” he says, “tell me why we’ve never talked.”

  I shrug. “We’ve talked.”

  “Not like this.”

  “Well, I never go to the woods.”

  He smiles. “We should have hung out.”

  “Yeah?” I say.

  He says, “Yeah. You’re Jaxon’s favorite, you know.”

  I can’t hide the smile at that. “Bullshit.”

  He’s chewing on another one of those honey straws and I can’t stop looking at his mouth. “Nah,” he says. “Not bullshit. He loves you.”

  I lean against the aspen at my back and fold my arms across my chest. A knot digs into my spine, just the slightest bit. Not enough to be super uncomfortable, but enough to make me highly aware of my own skin. Not that my skin, my body, aren’t things I’m already pretty freaking aware of right now.

  “Well,” I say, “maybe you should have made more of an effort. If I’m such a delight.”

  He says, “I mean, your parents would have had me put under house arrest, but sure, maybe.”

  “You afraid of my parents?” I say, and I look directly at him. Just right the frick into his eyes. What is getting into me that’s making me downright bold? Downright forward? I’ve seen Jonah a million times over the years, but it’s not like I know him. It’s not like we’re familiar.

  It doesn’t matter. It’s just this kind of wild night in the woods that everyone’s going to get in trouble for tomorrow so none of us are going to think about that.

  We both know what we want.

  I mean, I certainly know what I want, and if I know anything about Jonah Ramirez, it’s that he wants what I currently want, like, all the time.

  He probably gets what I currently want all the time.

  His eyebrow arches just for a second, and that’s how I know I’ve surprised him. A spike of warmth thrills in my veins when he takes that honey straw out of his mouth and says, “Nope.”

  “You sure? My dad’s an ex-Marine.”

  He sputters. “No shit?”

  “Nah,” I say. “He’s an actuary.”

  Jonah laughs and it doesn’t feel like one of those false, trying to get into your pants kind of laughs. It feels genuine. I find myself smiling. Find myself relaxing into the tree trunk at my back.

  “What the hell is an actuary?”

  “I’m not totally clear on it; it’s a math thing. And like a business money thing.”

  “Well then, in that case, no. I’m not afraid of your parents.”

  “What if I’d been telling the truth?” I say.

  “I’d take my chances, I guess.”

  “With what?” The words about stick in my throat. But look at me, all made of willpower. I am smooth.

  Jonah leans against a tree, a perfect mirror of me. Except he melts into the position. It takes clear, intentional effort for me to be like this, to appear relaxed, like I know what I’m doing, like I’m totally gunning for it and expecting to get it, not like I’m a string of concern, a wash of anxiety and Type A-ness all over the place in my brain. He looks like he belongs in these woods. He looks like he owns them.

  He looks like he owns every room (or non-room, apparently) he enters.

  He says, “Talking. With their daughter in the woods.”

  “Mm,” I say.

  “This is verboten, right? I’m going to corrupt you if you come within thirty yards?”

  “I’m pretty sure that’s how it works, yeah.”

  “Then I’ll just stay over here,” he says.

  I try my best to look prim. “I think that’s for the best. Get any closer and I’ll be swearing and smoking weed within the night.”

  “I saw you smoking earlier,” he says.

  “You did? Well, fuck.”

  He laughs again. Smoky and hazy and wanting something.

  My mouth turns up. This is never me. I’m never this confident, this just absolutely balls-out about things. Maybe it’s the weed. Maybe it’s the woods. Maybe it’s just . . . the total, immense relief at finally having a good time for five minutes after the shitstorm that the last couple months have been.

  A breeze makes its way through the trees, rattling t
he leaves in the aspens and the needles on the evergreens. I shudder, despite the big coat, because cool wind has a way of slipping under your clothes.

  Jonah says, “You cold?”

  I say, “Eh.”

  And he kicks off the tree. He approaches me—this tall, devastatingly hot silhouette—and when he comes close, I am treated to that view of his dark freckles, the spray over his nose. Jonah’s Afro-Latino, and his skin is already pretty dark, but those little freckles are three shades off of black, and the contrast is incredible.

  He leans over me, heels of his hand brushing my coat. Thumb just crossing over the strands of my hair. “You want my coat?” he says.

  His voice is low. Like he’s telling me a secret.

  I do not. Want his coat.

  “I’m already wearing a coat,” I say.

  I try to say that boldly, like I did earlier. Like I do this kind of thing all the time. Like I’m used to sneaking off with boys I’m forbidden from talking to into the woods, looking to make out or who knows what else.

  That’s not how it comes out.

  I am hoarse. I can’t just feel my voice shaking in my throat; I can hear it.

  There’s no way he doesn’t.

  His lips tick up for a half second, but he has the grace not to comment on it.

  “I think you’re cold,” he says.

  His hand shifts, so I can feel it when he pulls several more strands of my hair into the crook of his thumb, brushes his fingers against them.

  I’m shaking just a little bit, but it’s mostly the adrenaline, I think.

  I say, “Freezing.”

  His tongue darts out over his lips and his gaze skips from my eyes to my mouth and back up. “I don’t know how you guys fix that shit up in Massachusetts. But here—”

  I don’t know.

  I don’t know how they do it here.

  Because he’s cut off by the most haunting groaning from the woods, like the mountains themselves are being drawn and slowly quartered.

  There’s the sound of trees cracking. A rush of noise. And an absolute chaos rises up from the camp.

  Jonah looks up, and I push away from the tree and oh my god.

  Holy shit.

  The mountain is coming apart.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  “WHAT THE FUCK?”