1
Sam
Everyone claims that cacti are impossible to kill. Yet there I was, staring at the shriveled remains of my third attempt this year, just as my phone chimed with a calendar reminder: “Presentation Monday: Reimagining Urban Green Spaces.”
I rubbed a hand over my face, sighing. “Oh, Sam,” I sighed at my reflection in the window, “you’ve designed three award-winning eco-developments, but you’ve still managed to unalive a cactus.”
The irony wasn’t lost on me.
A glance at the time sent a fresh wave of irritation through me. I should be getting ready for that presentation. Instead, I was standing in my apartment, debating whether I had packed enough essentials for what was surely about to be the most unnecessary road trip of my life. All thanks to Callie.
Somehow, my BFF had managed to rope herself into a cult.
Okay, technically, she called it a spiritual retreat, but I wasn’t buying it. Ever since she quit her marketing job last year, she’d been bouncing from one New Age community to the next—wellness retreats, sound baths, experimental mushroom therapy. She was a chronic dabbler. But something about this latest endeavor felt different.
For starters, she wasn’t answering her phone.
And then there was her last text:
CALLIE: Babe. The spring equinox will be life-changing. You have to come. Stay a few days. Just…be open.
That’s the thing. I wasn’t “open.” I was too busy designing green spaces to traipse off andfrolicin them.
But Callie was Callie, and despite her questionable life choices, she was still my best friend. I owed her. Even if it meant trekking into the middle of nowhere to stage a well-timed intervention.
We’d met years ago through her brother—my evil ex, the one I never spoke about—but we stayed friends long after I kicked him to the curb. It wasn’t her fault that he was a self-absorbed disaster, just like it wasn’t my fault I was too naive to see his manipulation for what it was.
Callie was the only good thing to come out of that relationship. We understood each other in a way that had nothing to do with him. She’d seen me through the breakup, through career wins and failures, through every crisis of self-doubt.
Now,sheneeded me…even if she didn’t know it yet.
I picked up the sad, brittle remains of my once-thriving cactus and turned it over in my hand. A thing meant to survive anywhere, somehow failing under my care. It crumbled between my fingers as I tossed it into the trash. “Sorry, Kevin,” I sighed. Who knows why I even bothered to name them? Maybe Callie was right. Maybe I was missing something.
Fine. A weekend. I could do a weekend. Get in, drag Callie back to civilization, and get out.
Three hours into the drive, my perfectly paved highway turned into winding, tree-choked backroads, and my phone’s GPS decided to start downloading an update, leaving the dot that represented my car frozen at the last intersection.
I double-checked Callie’s directions.Turn left at the old fire road, keep going until you see the crooked tree. If you think you’re lost, you’re almost there.
Super helpful.
The trees pressed in as I rounded another curve, and the shadows knit together overhead. The road narrowed, more weeds than asphalt now, and my cell signal blinked down to one bar.
A flicker in the rearview mirror—just a deer. Better there than in front of me, but still. Who on earth found all this nature relaxing?
I was just about ready to give up and call in a rescue drone when I spotted it: a tree bent nearly in half with a wooden sign nailed to it. The Morning Wood – Growth Begins Now.
I squinted. Did they…did theyhearthemselves?
No doubt Callie thought it was hilarious. I shook my head and kept driving.
Hopefully, the only thing standing at attention out here was the forest. It looked…normal. Rustic, sure, but not the kind of place that required an emergency extraction.
I pulled into a clearing where a handful of dusty Subarus and Jeeps were parked. A cluster of wooden cabins sat at the tree line, and a winding path led deeper into the woods, disappearing beneath a canopy of budding spring leaves.
And standing in the middle of it all, waiting for me like a smug golden retriever, was my best friend.
“Sam!”
