We returned to the campground, dust ground into our clothes and the pores of our skin, our legs and feet achy and tired. Grandpa cooked chicken on the grill. I salivated like a dog at the first whiff of barbecue sauce.
“How’d you do?” he asked.
“Great,” I said, leaning over the grill and inhaling the tangy scent. “How’d you do?”
“I don’t know how to explain it, but even with all the damage, there’s still a feeling of life around there.”
“I know, I felt it too. You think we can fix up the cabin?”
“I do. It’ll be quite a job though, and we’ll have to talk to your parents about it.”
I nodded. I didn’t know when my parents were coming back, but surely they wouldn’t object to Grandpa and me working on the cabin.
“Maybe we could come back this summer,” I said.
“I’d be up for that,” he said.
“Is the new cairn still standing?” I asked.
“Sure is. It sounds strange to say it, but standing near those stones, you almost feel like they’re alive. The way they balance and hold together, they’re not just stones anymore.”
“There’s an energy there.”
“An energy, yes, something like that.”
Grandpa let out a great big breath and wrapped an arm around my shoulder, giving me a tight squeeze. He released me and said, “One more day here in the mountains, then we head to the ocean. What would you like to do tomorrow?”
“Just climb some more,” I said.
“Are you sure? Nowhere else you want to go, or anyone else you want to see?”
“Everyone I want to see is right here.”
He smiled and squeezed my shoulder once more. “Go tell Grandma the chicken is almost done, okay?”
In honor of Uncle Max, I cooked his special-recipe baked beans, sweet and smoky. Grandma sautéed the baby morels in butter. We played cards until the darkness surrounded us, then Grandma and Grandpa went to bed in the RV. Moths spun around our lantern; the fire risk was too high for a campfire. Kaitlyn’s face glowed with warmth. She hadn’t worn any makeup all day.
“So, what does it mean really, to be goth?” I asked them.
Nick recited: “Goth unashamedly celebrates the dark recesses of the human psyche.”
“I don’t get it.”
“Life is dark, but we’re trying to find the beauty in that, you know?”
“I don’t know. I like light and nature and climbing. That’s all about living.”
Kaitlyn smiled at me. We didn’t need words. We understood.
“I’m hungry,” Nick said. “Any leftovers?”
“Leftovers? You had two pieces of chicken, those fancy mushrooms, and three helpings of the special beans,” Kaitlyn said.
“Good thing he has a tent all to himself,” I said.
“I’ll be right back,” Nick said. He grabbed a flashlight and left the circle of lantern light.
I gazed up at the nighttime sky, the shadows of the forest like questions in the dark. Would daylight reveal the answers? The brightness of the stars took my breath away.
When Nick returned, he kept to the edge of the lantern light. “So you never saw anyone light a fart on fire, huh?”
The next thing I knew, the lighter flared, and a fireball pfooofed through the air.
Kaitlyn and I shrieked, and Nick collapsed on the ground in hysterics.
“Oh my god, did he just—?”
Kaitlyn groaned with disgust. “You did not just do that!”
“You are sick!”
“That’s so gross!”
One of Uncle Max’s jokes popped into my head. “You want some mustard with that?” I squeaked out the words before doubling over.
Kaitlyn groaned. And I was pretty sure I heard a chuckle coming from inside the RV.
Kaitlyn and I climbed in our sleeping bags after midnight. Through the mesh roof of our tent, the stars and moon gave us a celestial show.
“I’m going to be so sore tomorrow,” Kaitlyn grumbled, squirming around in her sleeping bag.
“Yeah, maybe. You should have stretched before bed.”
“Now you tell me.”
“We’ll stretch in the morning.”
“You okay?” Kaitlyn asked.
“Yep, you?”
“I saw your big box of books and stuff in the RV. Are you really thinking of staying here?”
“I don’t know. I thought maybe I could stay with my parents’ friend Susan. Her daughter is away at college now. But it wouldn’t be the same as being home at the cabin with my parents.”
The sky looked so vibrant and alive compared to the low haze in Detroit. Everything was clearer out here. I hadn’t worked out all the pieces yet, but I could feel the unraveling going on inside me.”
“Do you want to talk about it?”
“Nah. It just feels good to be here. Especially having you here with me.”
“Anytime.” She rolled onto her shoulder and kissed my cheek. “Goodnight, Carabou. Indiana She-Jones.”
I smiled in the dark and kissed the air. “Night night.”
A minute later, she whispered, “I can’t believe I like him.”
“So he’s not gay, huh?”
“Oh no.”
“Did you tell him about Eric?”
She nodded. “I told him. He took my hand, that hand, and kissed me. And he didn’t let go.”
Tears flooded my eyes.
“Don’t you start crying now,” she half-laughed, half-cried.
“I can’t help it.”
“It’s probably a good thing we did all that hiking. It helped him blow off some steam. If I’d told him at home, he might have done something stupid, like drive up to East Lansing.”
“Yeah, he blew off some steam, all right,” I said.
“Oh disgusting, please, don’t remind me.”
“It’s just guys. My dad and Uncle Max used to make songs out of armpit farts.”
“My brother taught me how to do that!”
After a pause, Kaitlyn said, “I’m not sure I know how to be Nick’s girlfriend. To be anyone’s girlfriend.”
“I think you’re doing pretty good already.”
Kaitlyn propped her head in her palm. The moonlight shone on her hair, turning it silvery purple.
A sly smile spread across her face. “Do you miss Tom?”
“I’ve been trying not to think about him. But I can’t help it.”
“You’re in love!” she whispered and flopped back on her pillow.
“No, you are!” I whispered back.
Kaitlyn curled up on her opposite side to sleep, but I stayed on my back looking up at the night sky, the twinkling stars. I sent my love and wishes out into the vast universe. Que sueñes con los angelitos.