Looking Through The Lens

http://www.asstr-mirror.org/files/Authors/ryansylander/www/

Chapter 5

Back Home

The next morning I was surprised to be feeling better.  Perhaps in some subconscious dream I had worked out some demons, or maybe I was just tired the night before, but when Julie came over, I was genuinely happy to see her.  She had breakfast with us, and we even had time for a short beach walk while my parents finished packing.  Lara was holed up in her room getting her stuff together, since she had not packed the night before.  The few times I looked at her, she just looked at me blankly.  I felt badly for having shut her out the night before, but there was no time to reconcile with her, for the moment.

Julie and I promised to write often, and try to see each other during the year, however difficult and unlikely.  She shed a few tears, and thanked me for the great summer with a tender kiss as we stood by the gentle waves of a low tide.  And then I left.

The ride back to our house was long and quiet.  Lara was distant, but there was nothing I could do about it with our parents in the front seats.  I thought about writing instead of talking, but I wasn’t sure if I wanted that information preserved on paper.  Besides, Lara couldn’t read in the car without feeling sick.

Returning to the mountains was bittersweet.  The majestic beauty of the Catskills served both as inspiration for life, and as a reminder that vacation, and Julie time, was ending.  That evening, after we had settled into our house again, I asked Lara to come to the stream with me.  She shrugged wordlessly, and followed me out the back door.  We walked to the stream in silence, while I tried to swallow my man pride and apologize to her.  I sat on a low boulder by the water.

“So, I’m sorry about last night,” I finally said, throwing a pebble into the creek.  The ripples were quickly distorted by the current.

“Why?”

“What do you mean?” I asked, somewhat confused by her answer.  “I blew you off when you asked about Julie.”

“So, you don’t have to tell me anything, I don’t care.”  Her tone, however, betrayed her true feelings.

There was an uncomfortable wall between us.  I sat still, wondering how to proceed.  I had a sudden flashback to innocent winters long ago, when Lara and I would throw big rocks into the creek to break the ice sheets, and watch the water flowing underneath.  Life was so easy back then. 

“Look, I wanted to tell you, but I was having a bad moment.”  For a long time Lara said nothing.  Finally I turned around to make sure she was still there.  “Last night didn’t go so well with Julie,” I added.

Lara looked at me contemplatively, and then her expression softened some.

“What happened?” she asked, tossing a pebble of her own into the pool.

“I don’t know, we found a dark spot over in the trees, and then we, you know, we did it,” I said.  Did I really want to tell her this?  And have her think her brother was weird, or bad at sex? 

“So?  That sounds OK,” said Lara cautiously. 

“It just wasn’t what I expected.”

“Why?”

“What was your first time like?” I asked.

“I told you, remember, James and I were at the tennis courts?”

“I know, but, what did you – how did you feel?  Like during, and after?”

Lara thought for a moment.  She nudged me and I moved over so she could share the boulder.  I felt some relief at her gesture of closeness.

“Well, it felt good after the first minute or two.  I don’t know, it was pretty good all in all.  Was Julie in pain?”

“No, she liked it, or so she said.”  I was being evasive, partly because I didn’t know myself what I was trying to say.

“Were you in pain?” Lara asked, with a frown.

“No, nothing like that!  I was just wondering how you felt, I don’t know, inside, I guess.  Basically, I felt rushed, and awkward, and stupid.  I don’t even know anymore, it seems really retarded now that I’m saying it out loud.”  It did.  Why couldn’t I just have been in the moment?

“What was up with her and Becky on the beach?” she asked suddenly.

“Oh, that.  I guess they had some problem with liking the same guy, and Becky was trying to get back at Julie by going for me.  I’m not sure really.”

“Stud,” said Lara.

“Pff.  Whatever.  It wasn’t cool.  At least Becky went away though.  Maybe that whole thing was part of the problem.”

“Well, what did Julie do last night after you were done?” asked Lara, after some thought.

“She said that it was great, and we lay there for a while.  I guess I was just nervous, though.  When we were at Becky’s, I felt really comfortable with everything, but last night it seemed like I was trying to put on the wrong size clothes, and backwards too.”  I threw another pebble in, out of frustration.

“Sometimes things aren’t just right, Matt,” she said.  “I don’t know, maybe you put too much pressure on yourself?”

“Maybe,” I said.  I thought about that, and it made some sense.  All of the chaos from the situation from Becky had focused our sexual tension into that one evening, and the added pressure of my morning departure had likely stressed me out by the time we got to the moment of truth.

“I guess I kind of had this vision of a perfect evening,” I continued, feeling that my thoughts were finally finding the root of the problem.  “You know, where Julie and I just had a great night.  I guess my vision was different than what actually happened.  I don’t know, I wish I had given Julie a better time.”

Lara sat silent.  “Well, I never thought I was going to do it on a tennis court the first time either.  Not exactly my dream, but so what?  And Julie did seem happy this morning, right?”

“True.”  I gave a small laugh, letting out a sigh of relief.  “Thanks, Lara.”

“For what?”

“For talking.  I feel better about it now, although I have some things to think about.”

“No problem, Matt,” she said, giving me a hug with her arm.

“So, how was your night?” I asked.

“Not telling.”

“What!?”  I turned to her and gave her a what-the-fuck? look.

“Chill, I was just kidding,” she said.  “It was good.  I mean, do you want to hear the details?”

“Um, I guess not.  Glad it was good though,” I said.  After a pause, I had to ask one thing.  “How many times did you do it?”

“Just twice.”

Just twice? 

“Did James last longer this time?”

“I thought you didn’t want to hear the details!”

“Well, I don’t know, whatever you want.”

“He did, especially the second time.”

I didn’t know what to say, so I just threw another pebble in.

“Look at us,” Lara said, with a small laugh.  “A few years ago we used to play kid games right here on these rocks.  Now we’re sitting here talking about sex.”

“Yeah, it’s weird,” was all I could answer.

“Do you miss her?” asked Lara.

“Yeah, I do.  You?”

“I miss her too.”

I looked at her distant expression for a moment.

“I meant James,” I said with a furrowed brow.

Lara looked back at me, with a small smile.

“Yeah, I know.  C’mon, let’s go eat dinner.”

The next few weeks were quiet.  I wrote to Julie every few days, and letters from her came about as often.  I apologized for being ‘tired’ on our last night, and left it at that.  I didn’t have much to say, besides that I missed her and wished I was still in Montauk.  Nice sentiments, but not enough to fill a decent letter after the first few times I wrote it.  The optimism we felt at parting was lessening as it became clear that letters were no substitute for being together.  Still, I made an effort to tell her about what was going on, which was mostly preparing for high school, playing my guitar, and hiking in the woods.  Becky and her were not on speaking terms, apparently, which suited me fine.

Lara seemed to get over being apart from James much quicker than I did.  After a few days, she seemed perfectly fine, while I stayed withdrawn.  I never saw her send or receive any letters from James, though a few from Julie came to her.  Eventually I figured that Lara and James had decided not to try and keep in touch.  To be honest, more than once after struggling for an hour to produce half a page of pathetic writing, I wished Julie and I had come to the same arrangement.  But other times, when I got a sweet letter from her, I was able to relive the feeling of being with Julie, and it was all worth it.

Lara and I started high school a few weeks after we got back from Montauk.  The workload was more than what we had gotten used to in middle school.  Lara typically breezed through school, and I got along decently, though I had to study more than she did to get the same grades, a quality which I thought was most unfair. 

As a result, my letters to Julie slipped from a few times a week, to once a week if I was lucky.  There was a similar decline in letters from her, and we both acknowledged that we were pretty busy with school.  But it actually made for better letters, as we had more to say, less often.

The one good thing about high school was seeing my friends again.  I had avoided calling them since returning from Montauk, since I was in a Julie state of mind, and wanted to be alone with my thoughts and memories of her.  Once school started though, I wished I had called them earlier. 

Mostly I hung out with four other guys.  There was Brian Smyth, a tall, athletic soccer player.  He was blond and a rugged outdoorsman, substantially outgoing, and already a ladies man.  In sixth grade, he had ‘dated’ an eighth grader briefly, which at the time was godlike to the rest of us.  Bruno De Rosa was the son of Italian immigrants, and one of the most quietly adventurous guys I’ve ever met.  He and I both had dark hair and tanned complexions, and sometimes people thought we were brothers.  Carl Trotter was an artist, and of Norwegian descent, with sharp features and a hard, lean frame.  He could be moody and sometimes difficult to understand emotionally, but fun to hang out with.  Peter Roderick was a regular looking guy with long dark hair.  He was the kind of person you wanted in the driver’s seat if you needed something difficult done perfectly and usually in a better way than you would have ever thought of.  A brilliantly creative mind.  But that was only sometimes.  Most of the time he was just one of the guys, and usually somewhat quiet.

We had all become friends, at first, mostly by geography: we lived within moderate walking distance of each other, and somewhat far away from anyone else.  Such is mountain living.  But we all loved camping and hanging out outdoors, swimming in the lakes, and fishing, so we would have been friends anyway.  Throughout middle school we were pretty much inseparable. 

Four of us had formed a band at the start of the summer.  Carl played drums, Peter played the guitar, and Bruno played bass and sang.  I played guitar.  Brian didn’t play any instruments, and when we asked him if he wanted to sing, he declined.  He was the only one of us who played sports at school, so that was his hobby.  But he would hang out and listen sometimes. 

Mostly we had just gotten together a few times before I left for Montauk, and we realized that it was going to take work to actually be a band.  We all had parts of different songs that we had learned, or sort of learned.  There wasn’t much overlap, and the few songs we all sort of knew were pretty rough.  But it was a start, and it was fun to play music with someone other than my tape player. 

The first day of school, Lara was sick, so I walked out to the end of the drive and got on the bus.  High school started earlier than middle school, much to my dismay.  When I got on the bus, nothing had really changed though.  Same few kids from our area, including Carl, Brian and Peter in the last two rows.  Bruno usually rode to school with his dad who worked in town.

“Matt!  What’s up?  Where the fuck have you been, man?” said Carl.  They had saved me my seat, and I dropped my bag down and settled back against the side of the bus after some handshakes.  The four of us looked around and grinned, each perched over our seats like hawks.

“Just busy, you know,” I said nonchalantly.

“I called you a bunch of times, your Mom said she’d tell you,” said Carl.

“Yeah, I know, I was just busy with shit.”

“Like what?” asked Carl.

“Hey, give the man a break!” said Peter.  “How was Montauk?”

I gave them a brief rundown of my trip, including some vague mentions of hanging out with a girl called Julie.

“So did you hook up with her?” asked Brian.

“Yeah, actually.”

“Hohhhh!  Nice!” exclaimed Carl.  “Bri hooked up with Carmen while you were gone.”

“Cool.  How did that happen?” I asked.

Brian started to speak, but Peter shushed him.

“Speaking of…” said Peter, with a nod towards the front of the bus.

Carmen got on the bus and came to the back.

“Hi Brian!  Can I sit here?” she asked Brian, pointing to his seat.

“No,” said Brian.

“Why are you such an ass?” she said to him.

“That’s just the way he was born,” said Pete.

“Shut up, Pete,” said Brian.  “Fine, sit.”

“Oh, thanks a lot,” she said sarcastically.

She put down her bag and leaned back against the seat

“Hi, Matt,” she said, with a little wave.

“Hey Carmen.”

Carl looked at her for a moment.

“What’s wrong with me and Pete?”

“I just saw you guys yesterday.”

Carl laughed and shook his head incredulously.  “Okay, then.  Fuck you too.”

“What!?”  Carmen said, “Matt was on vacation.  We’ve been hanging out all month.”

Carmen was a little funny that way.  She was cute, but somewhat self absorbed.

“How was your trip, Matt?” she asked.

“Matt hooked up with a girl,” said Carl.

I rolled my eyes.  “My trip was good, hit the beach a lot, took it easy.  And yes, I hung out a lot with a girl.”

“That’s cool, how’s Lara?”

I noticed Peter perk up.

“She’s sick today, but otherwise fine.”  I paused, and then added, “She hooked up with someone too.”  Peter visibly slumped down a little.  I grinned to myself.  Peter had a big crush on my sister.  She really didn’t know, since he was pretty shy when it came to his own affairs of the heart.

“Ooh, I’ll have to ask her about that!” gushed Carmen.  In my attempt to tease Peter, I had forgotten that Carmen liked to gossip.  Ten dollars said that everyone would know about Lara and my summer relationships by the end of the day.  I made a note to apologize to Lara in advance.

As part of a clean slate promise I had made to myself at the beginning of high school, I had vowed not to drink, except maybe one or two beers at a party, and to focus on school, music, and writing to Julie. 

High school went pretty typically at first; I went to class diligently, took notes, and did my homework.  After a while, the greater responsibility that came with high school somehow translated into greater freedoms taken by my friends and me.  The trailheads not a quarter mile from the school were tempting, and sometimes they beat out staying in study hall for the last hour of the day. 

Musically, we started making progress as a band, working up mostly classic rock covers and having a good time.  It definitely cut into studying time, but I managed to keep up with schoolwork enough to get a decent first report card.

Letters went to and from Julie about once a week, with an occasional short phone call.  With school in session, there was more to talk about.  There were still promises of trying to see each other over break, but as fall progressed, they became less, well, promising.

I suppose I should have foreseen what came next, but I didn’t.  Sometime in November Julie stopped writing me.  It started with a three week lull in October, at the end of which I got a short letter saying she was sorry she hadn’t written, a few excuses about school and being really busy, and a promise to try and write more.  Then that was it.  A phone message got no answer, and I wrote several times more, asking if everything was alright.  Then I stopped writing her, wondering if I had done something wrong.  I asked Lara about it; she hadn’t heard anything from her in a while, and told me that Julie was probably just busy.  I figured that if something terrible had happened to her, my aunt would have let us know, so I didn’t think she had been hurt or anything.  But then that meant that she had probably lost interest in me.  So I waited, unsure and somewhat uneasy.

The skiing season started in November, which somewhat offset my qualms about Julie.  My friends and I were avid skiers, and once the slopes opened, we usually went every weekend.  Skiing, like fishing, is one of my favorite activities, and the winter was always a great time of year for me.

Somewhere around mid-November my clean slate promise had pretty much disappeared, with regards to drinking.  The winter was when both my parents worked, and increasingly I was hanging out with my friends, whether skiing or playing music.  As the initial discomfort of being freshmen dissipated, we began to get into the high school party scene.  Drinking was the focus, since what else was there to do?

Going out at night was easy for Lara and I.  Ever since I could remember, our mothers let us, even encouraged us to sleep over at friends’ houses a few times a month.  They meanwhile would have their friends over for dinner and movies.  Sometimes we would have sleep-outs in our cabin with a few close friends.  It was there that Lara and I had first started drinking, when Brian brought some liquor over.  After that he had struck an agreement with his older brother, and drinking became an occasional, but regular, part of our lives.

Partying in high school took on a whole different tenor.  In middle school, when we drank, it was a kids’ sleepover, just with some booze mixed in.  In high school, it seemed more serious.  My first high school party was a dive into the deep end.  Brian had somehow convinced his older brother Craig to bring us to a party in the woods one weekend.  Friday after school, I went to Brian’s, where I was going to stay over for the night.  Carl was there, as was Carmen.  I was surprised to see her, since she and Brian had been having a rough time lately.  Brian had said he was fed up with her selfish attitude.  From watching them, though, I thought Brian was rather harsh to her.  But I didn’t butt in.

 After dinner, Brian, Carl, Carmen and I jumped into his brother’s pickup bed, and we drove a couple of miles to some friend of Craig’s, where we parked.  Craig handed us guys each two six-packs of beer, and then shouldered a backpack and grabbed a few more six-packs himself.

“Remember, three of those six are mine, guys,” he said.  I looked at Brian questioningly, but he made no answer.  Presumably Brian had secured us a six-pack each.

“How far is this place?” asked Brian as we started into the woods.

“Not far.  There’s a bunch of hangouts in the woods, this one’s called the Ledges.”

“How do you stand the cold?” I asked.  Despite the walking, the chill in the air was penetrating my thick coat already.

“Drink,” he said.  “Usually we hang out at someone’s house if we can.  But sometimes the only place to party is the woods.”

After walking about 10 minutes, we started hearing voices up ahead, and soon we came into a little clearing where the bedrock was arranged like long, large steps.  A three quarter moon lit up the grey stone with a faint glow, and here and there, people were standing or sitting on the ledges in loose groups, most of them holding beer cans.  I couldn’t recognize anyone in the low light, and felt somewhat out of place.  Craig apparently saw who he was looking for, and headed for a group of people near the edge of the clearing.  They were happy to see the beer.  Craig put his beers down on the rock and started passing them around to a few people who didn’t have any.  Brian put down one of his six-packs, and motioned for us to do the same.  I still wasn’t sure what the beer situation was, but I put down one of my packs and held on to the other one.

A girl in a knit ski hat leaned in and peered at my face. 

“Who are you?” she asked.

“Matt,” I said.

“I don’t think I know you.  Are you a sophomore?”

“Nah, freshman.”

“Oh.  That’s probably why.  Who are you here with?”  she asked.  Her tone wasn’t cold, merely inquisitive.

“Uh, Craig, I guess.  I’m his brother’s friend.”

“That’s cool.  My name is Julie.”

I felt a pang in my heart at that name.

“Nice to meet you.”

Just then, a rather large arm locked around my neck.

“Why are you hitting on my girlfriend again?” roared a voice.

“Brad, stop!” said Julie, slapping his arm.

“I wasn’t, man, just talking,” I let out.  He didn’t have a real tight hold on me, but suddenly I was panicked.  My heart was beating inside my head.

The arm let go as quickly as it had appeared.  A large guy came into my view, giving Julie a tight squeeze.  He was one of those seniors that could give freshmen nightmares.

“Just shitting you, Joey, chill…  Oh, shit, I thought you were someone else!” he exclaimed when he saw me.

“You’re a retard, Brad!” said Julie.

“I thought it was Joey,” he said, laughing hard.  “You look just like him.  From the back.”

“It’s cool, don’t worry about it,” I said, trying to keep my voice steadier than I felt. 

“I’m not worried,” he said.

“Alright.”  I ventured a hand out.  “I’m Matt.”

“Brad,” he said, with a death grip on my hand.  I was pretty sure he was on the football team.  “You’re not drinking,” he added, as he took a long chug of his beer, and threw the can away.

“Um, I just got here.”

“Well, get to it, man!”

“Brad, give him a break,” said Julie.  “He’s a freshman.”

“Oh, really?”  Brad looked at me with a devilish grin.  Before he had a chance to do anything, I pulled a beer out, and offered it to him. 

“Need a beer?”  I asked.  He seemed surprised for a second, and then took it.

“I like this guy already,” he said with a laugh.

I pulled another out and opened it for myself.  My heart had finally stopped beating a thousand times a second.  I took a long drink, trying to impress the seniors.  The beer was ice cold, and went down easier than usual.  I felt some warmth, not only from the beer, but from the small smile Julie gave me when I looked at her.

An hour later I was fairly buzzed, as were Brian and Carl.  Carmen was clearly drunk.

“You know, Craig was right, I’m really not that cold,” I said.  Was I slurring my words?  It was hard to tell if I was talking weird or hearing weird.  Both?

“Me neither,” said Carl. 

“Well, I’m freezing,” said Carmen.  Brian had reluctantly given her his coat, and he was obviously a bit cold. 

“I’m not giving you my sweater,” he said.

“I have to pee,” she whined.  “I hate peeing in the woods.”

“Better than peeing in your pants,” said Brian, which Carl and I thought was pretty funny.  He didn’t score any points with Carmen though, as she stomped off into the woods.

We stood silently for a moment.  We didn’t really know anyone else there; it seemed to be all juniors and seniors.  I still had a beer left, which I opened for lack of anything else to do.

“So what’s up with your woman?” asked Carl.

Brian didn’t say anything.  Then I realized Carl had asked me that question.

“What?” I said.

“I said, ‘So what’s up with your woman?’” he repeated slowly and deliberately.

“Oh, I thought you were talking to Bri.  Um, nothing right now.  I haven’t heard from her in a few weeks.”

“She pissed off at you?” said Carl.

“I don’t know.  Probably just busy.”

“That’s a bad sign, I think,” said Carl simply.

“I don’t know how you do it, man,” said Brian.

“Do what?” I said.

“That long-distance thing.  If you can’t see her for a year, what’s the use?”

“Well, I don’t know, I really like her,” I said.

“There’s a lot of cute girls around, though.”

“True,” said Carl.

“Yeah, but… I mean, they don’t always want to go out,” I said.

“True,” said Carl again.

“No, but if you’re not going to see Julie for a year, then you’re not going out with anyone, for sure,” said Brian.  “At least if you try to hook up here, you have a chance.”

“So you’re saying I should just stay local?” I said.  “Like the song, ‘Love the one you’re with?’”

“Well, I’m just saying, is she worth it?  Waiting a whole year to see her again?  And then what?  She might be changed, or not want to wait for you.”

“I guess I see it different, man.  I think she’s worth it.  We had a connection this summer.”

“Maybe,” said Brian.  “I’m not knocking you, just amazed that you can hang on to that.  I hope she writes you soon.”

“Until I hear otherwise, I’m gonna stick with her,” I said.  I took a long chug of beer, but suddenly I felt cold.

Carmen came back from her pee break, walking unsteadily.

“Damn, it’s cold,” she said.  Brian just shook his head and huffed.

The clearing was suddenly quiet, and then there was a hushed murmur among the others around.  We looked over in the direction of the road.  A couple of flashlights were bobbing up and down, getting nearer.

Muffled shouts of “Cops! Cops!” echoed through the clearing, as people scrambled to grab beers.  Craig came up to us and thrust two six-packs at Brian and me.  I grabbed one in the confusion, wondering why he was giving it to me.  “Meet back at the truck,” was all he said.  When we just stood there dumbly, he pushed his brother forward in front of him.  “Run, man!”

All hell broke loose.  Brian ran into the woods, and Carl, Carmen and I followed.  Then there was a shout of “Wait!  Stop!” behind, but no one stopped, so I kept running.  I could hear other people around us trampling through the underbrush.  Twigs scratched our faces as we dashed madly through the trees.  I looked back and saw a flashlight following us.  In a panic, I tossed away my six pack of beer into a bush.  Better than getting caught with it, I thought.  I turned off to my right.  Someone followed, but not the flashlight.

After a few frantic minutes of running, we were alone.  I stopped to catch my breath.  I was surprised to see Carmen stopped next to me.

“Damn, what the fuck was that?” I said.

“Looks like the cops busted it,” said Carmen.

“Where’s Bri and Carl?”

“I don’t know, I thought you were Brian,” she said.  “Where are we?”

We looked around.  We were in the middle of the woods, with only some faint moonlight filtering through the canopy.  The clearing and any sign of the others were absent.  I stood for a minute more, still breathing hard.  I had a vague idea which way we had run from, but how far, and where we had turned off were not very clear. 

The sudden possibility of getting lost descended on me.  These woods went on for miles; wandering in a single direction did not guarantee exit to a road.  Being lost at night in the woods in November was bad.  Very bad.

“Where’s Pete when we need him?” I said.

It was true.  This was where Pete would do something like use the moon and stars to pinpoint our direction back.  Then he’d probably even build a flashlight out of a beer can to boot.  But he wasn’t here with us.

“Should we call out?” asked Carmen.  I could tell by the way she was looking around that she was frightened.

“Bri!  Carl!” I yelled, but not too loud.  Silence.  I yelled again, louder.  There was no answer.  They could still be running, for all I knew.

 “Alright, let’s just try and go back the way we came,” I said.  “Maybe we can find the clearing again.  Craig said to meet at his car, so let’s go.”

“What about the cops?” asked Carmen, fear touching her voice now.

“We’ll just have to chance it,” I said.  “I don’t really know anything else we can do.  I’d rather get arrested than lost out here in this cold.”

I faced towards where I thought we had come from.  I looked up; the moon was up high and over my left shoulder.  We started out, trying to keep a steady direction.  Carmen fell behind pretty soon.  I stopped and waited for her to catch up. 

“Are you alright?” I asked.

“I don’t know, I feel weird.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’m cold, and shaky.”

Suddenly she knelt down and threw up onto the ground.  I moved away and narrowly avoided having it splash all over my shoes.  I knelt down next to her, and steadied her. 

“Shit, are you alright?”

She didn’t answer.  Her breathing was uneven.  The night was suddenly much more serious than I had imagined it would be when we first set out from Brian’s house earlier that evening.

Panic rose up in me as I watched Carmen kneeling in the pine needles.  I forced myself to think.  Cold, shaky… I took off my coat and wrapped it around her shoulders.  The chill of the night air rushed under my shirt.  Every time I moved, a frozen part of the shirt touched a different area of my flesh like a hot knife.

“Carmen.  Carmen!”  I shook her gently.  She stood up, and fell towards me.  I braced myself and held her upright.

“Oh my God, I feel so shitty!” she said, with a sudden laugh.  I didn’t see anything funny about the situation.

“Can you walk if I hold you?” I asked urgently.  We took a dozen tentative steps.

“I just want to lay down,” she said, letting her body slide down mine.  She lay awkwardly on the floor at my feet.

“Carmen, get up!  You can’t sleep here.”  Carmen just groaned.

I stood for a full minute, unable to move.  Part of me wanted to run away, but Carmen would certainly freeze to death.  I had no idea what to do.  The pounding in my heart was threatening to overwhelm me.  Everything was going into overdrive in my mind.  My breathing was uneven too.  I was still feeling the beer, and lucid thought was eluding me.  I yelled for Brian and Carl again, but there was no answer.  The cold was making me ache.

I knelt down and shook Carmen.

“I don’t want to get up, Mom.” 

“I’m not your Mom.  You’re laying in the woods and it’s freezing.  Get up!”

Suddenly she raised her head up and laughed out loud.  Then she threw up again.  I grabbed her head right before she laid it down in her puke.  Disgust filled me.  This was Brian’s girlfriend, why was I doing this?

I pushed her over onto her back, and then stood up again.  The reality of being lost was seeping into my thoughts, as my memory of the run receded.  Carmen was shaking on the floor.  If I didn’t start moving soon, I was going to freeze too.

I bent down and lifted Carmen into my arms.  She wasn’t as heavy as I thought she would be.  Luckily she was a petite girl.  I started walking again, trying to keep from banging her head into any branches.  My path meandered through the larger gaps in the trees.  I hoped I was staying straight.  Carmen was no help; she was completely limp. 

After a minute, I thought maybe I had come about as far as where I had veered off.  Was it left or right though?  Everything about the run was hazy now.  I remembered ghostly black trunks flying by like grisly slalom gates, and then throwing the beer off to my left, and… and turning away from it.  Yes, it was to the right.  So I should turn left.  But how much?

I looked up.  The moon looked like it was on my right now.  Was I turned around?  I turned to my left some.  The moon still looked like it was on my right.  I realized it was almost straight overhead.  The one thing I thought would help was now useless.

My arms were burning from holding Carmen.  I put her down, and decided to scout ahead, and then come back and get her.  As soon as I started off, I realized that this was a bad idea, since I probably would never find her again.  I walked back to her, and picked her up again.  At this point I wasn’t even sure which direction to go.  Had I already turned enough?  I committed to going a bit left of the direction I was last going, and started off again.

The progress was slow.  I had to stop a few times to put Carmen down and rest for a few minutes, as my arms threatened to dislodge from my shoulders.  But then the sweat started freezing and I felt tight, so it was up and forward again.  After what seemed like an hour, the ground started sloping up to my left.  This was promising, as we had started by running downhill some.  I turned to walk up the slope.

Suddenly I barely heard a muffled voice laughing ahead.  I stopped and listened.  I wasn’t sure if I had hallucinated hearing it, but then I heard it again.  I didn’t know why someone would be laughing in the woods right now, but I didn’t care.  Hope surged through me as I increased my pace up the hill.  A root caught my foot, and I stumbled to the ground, somehow managing not to completely drop Carmen.  She let out a cry as we hit the floor.  The pine needles were deep, and it wasn’t a bad fall, but enough to shake her out of her stupor.

“What’s happening?” asked Carmen, stirring awake.

“Sorry, I tripped.”

“What?  Matt?  What’s going on?”  Carmen propped herself up on one arm, looking around groggily.

“We’re in the woods?  Remember?  The cops came?”

“Oh, my head is spinning.”

“Can you stand?  I think the clearing is up ahead.”

“I don’t know.”

“Try.”  I stood up, and pulled her up a bit roughly.  She leaned against me.

“Whoa, shit, I don’t know.”

“C’mon, try and walk,” I urged.  “I don’t think I can carry you any farther.”

“Carry me?  What are you talking about?”

“C’mon,” I said, ignoring her question.  I draped her arm over my shoulder, and we started up the hill again.  I was determined to get to the people ahead before they moved.

“What happened?  I remember running,” she said.  I was glad she sounded a little more coherent.  “I was following Brian, and then, oh, gross, did I throw up?”

“Yeah, a couple of times,” I said, shivering off the memory.

“No wonder my mouth tastes like crap.”

I tried to put the taste out of my head.  I forged on, almost dragging Carmen’s feet sometimes.  A huge wave of relief washed over me, as up ahead I saw the Ledges.  Oddly, there were people standing around just like when we had gotten there the first time that evening.

“OK, stop for a sec,” said Carmen, breathing hard.

“Alright, but the clearing is right up there, see?”

“Are those cops?” she asked, looking hard at the people.

“I don’t know.  It looks like a party again.  Come on,” I said, pulling her forward again.

We walked slowly, and entered the clearing.  It was surreal.  It was as if nothing had happened.  People were standing around, drinking beers and talking.  Had we been dreaming?  Was it a prank the seniors had pulled on us freshmen?  Carmen needed to sit on a ledge, so I went up to a group of guys. 

“Hey, anyone seen Craig?” I asked.

“Yeah, he left a while ago,” one of the guys said.

“Left?”

“Yeah, he and his brother, and I think maybe another kid, they left.  They were looking for his brother’s girlfriend.  Did you run?  Is that her?” he said, pointing to Carmen.

“Yeah.  What the fuck happened?  I thought the cops showed up.”

“It was just Jack and Roman with flashlights.  Fucking idiots.”

“What!?  Someone said it was the cops!”

“False alarm.  Why did you run?”

“I don’t know, people were yelling run, and cops and shit.”  I let out a sigh of frustration.

“Are you a freshman?” he asked with a chuckle.

“Yeah.”

He nodded knowingly.

“Did Craig say if he was coming back?” I asked.

“I don’t know.”

“Alright, thanks.”  I turned away.

“Yo, you look like you need a beer,” he said, holding out a can.

I looked at it.  He had no idea what I had just been through.

“Thanks, but no.”

I walked back to where Carmen was sitting, holding her head.  I sat down next to her.

“Seems like they left us.”

“Oh crap.  What time is it?” she asked.

“Almost 11:30.”

“I need to get home.”

“Well, I have no idea what to do.  I guess we can go back to the truck and see if they are there.”

Carmen let out a moan.

“I’ll help you walk.  C’mon, I’m freezing,” I said, offering her a hand. 

“Where’s your coat?” she asked.  I looked at her for a moment.

“I guess I lost it in the woods,” I said. 

We started off down the path, her leaning on me for support.  It was at least a little warmer if we pressed against each other.

When we got to the house, the truck was there and idling.  I could see Craig, Brian and Carl sitting in the cab, drinking beer.  I felt a wave of resentment.

As we approached, Carl and Brian got out.

“Shit, where’ve you been?” they asked.

“Where have you been?  I’ve been freezing my ass off in the woods for an hour!”

“I’m freezing,” said Carmen, despite the fact that she was wearing most of our coats.  Brian took Carmen and put her in the cab to warm up.  The three of us jumped into the pickup bed, as Craig pulled out.

“We said to meet back at the truck,” said Brian. 

“I know that, dumb ass, the problem was finding my way back after we stopped running,” I said hotly.

“How far did you run!?” asked Carl.  “It was just some dudes with flashlights.” 

I gave him an evil stare, which he unfortunately missed in the darkness.

“Not that far,” I said, defensively.  “I would have been fine, if your girlfriend didn’t pass out on me, Bri.”

“Carmen passed out?!”  Brian let out a laugh.

“Dude, it’s not funny.  I had to carry her ass through the woods.  If my arms weren’t so sore I’d beat the crap out of you right now.”

“I’m sorry, but it’s a little funny.”

“Fuck you, dickhead.”

“Alright, I’m sorry, but what do you want me to do?” he asked.  “Wander the woods looking for you?  I thought you were with us, and when we stopped, you were gone.  So we walked back, and you weren’t in the clearing, so we figured you’d gone to the truck already.”

“Whatever.  Gimme your coat,” I said to Carl.  Luckily he didn’t protest.  I was about ready to throw them both off the side of the truck.  It wasn’t really their fault, but seeing them drinking beers in the warm cab while I had been dodging puke was not favorable to my disposition, regardless of where blame lay.

We dropped Carmen off at her house first.  She said nothing to me, or anyone else, as she went inside.  I got in the cab, since the wind in the back of the pickup was threatening to turn me into ice.  I didn’t give Carl his coat back.  Carmen had left mine and Brian’s coats on the seat of the cab.  I felt some sense of malicious satisfaction at having all three of our coats with me in the warmth of the cab while Carl and Brian sat in the open pickup bed in just their shirts.

Craig seemed sorry to have made us run.  He had yelled out for us to stop, but we just kept running.  As a rule, flashlights weren’t allowed when approaching the Ledges, for that reason.  But Jack and Roman were idiots, he explained.  Craig said he had panicked because he already had been caught by the police with beer this year, and he didn’t want to find out what happened if he got caught again.

When we got to Brian’s, I wordlessly set out my sleeping bag on his couch and went to sleep.  As I lay there that night, I had time to warm up, and collect my thoughts.  All that, I thought, just to drink a few stupid beers!  I wondered why we went to the lengths we did to make something difficult work out.  Was it worth it?  Or at the end of the day, were you just left out in the cold?

Forward to Chapter 6

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