Zoe
At 7:00 a.m. the next Saturday morning, I’m waiting outside my building, my backpack at my feet and a bag of breakfast goodies in one hand, purchased from the same Starbucks where I dished out early-morning abuse as a snippy, work-obsessed caffeine hound. I’m still getting the side-eye from the regular morning barista, a college kid I now know is named Joseph, but ever since I showed up a few days ago, waited patiently in line, and apologized for giving everyone so much hell, it seems like a thaw is in the offing. I don’t even worry that someone’s spitting in my espresso as vengeance.
Now if only I could stop worrying about what I’m waiting out here for. I’ve dressed in what I have determined is camp-appropriate clothing, though I imagine that somewhere in my combination of hiking boots, jeans, and long-sleeved knit top, I’ve managed to get something wrong. No doubt the first of many things I’ll screw up on this initial outing, but judging by Aiden’s brief email—Go ahead and be yourself. Let’s not make this harder—he wouldn’t expectanything else.
My phone pings with a text from Greer, sent to both Kit and me, part of a long strand of a group text we keep constantly going to check in with each other.Are you nervous?she asks.I think about sending a bunch of those emoji faces with the clenched teeth, because Iamnervous, but good thing I don’t, because Kit’s reply comes before mine, all caps:YOU SHOULD CALL THIS OFF. When I’d finally worked up the courage to tell them about this, the Sunday after I’d gone to see Aiden, Kit had nearly exploded with shock. “You can’t go out into the wilderness with some guy who basicallyhatesyou,”she’d said, her voice rising with each word. “This is a ridiculous idea! This isn’t adventure, Zoe. It’s self-immolation.”
“Kit,”I’d said, calmly, trying to keep the volume down. “You are really ratchetingup the drama.”
“I think she means,” Greer had said, “that we thought you might do something a little more—of yourown choosing?”
“I do a lot of things of my own choosing,” I’d said. “Maybe that’s the problem.”
I hadn’t told my friends about my late-night guilt jar making, hadn’t told them that my lottery-night wish for adventure wasn’t really my heart’s desire. But everyone knows you can’t buy forgiveness. Everyone knows you have to work for it, and this thing I’m doing with Aiden? This isworking for it.
All this week, I’ve been preparing. I got a camping wardrobe, sure, but I’d mostly been mentally preparing. Aiden may have told me to be myself, but I think the trick is I need to be a better version of myself. Friendlier. More flexible. Warm and polite. I almost tailed Greer to her classes to see how she manages it, but I figured that’d be crossing a line. The bag o’ breakfast stuff is a good start, a peace offering for Aiden, but I also need to remember to smile more, to lay off the snark. Also it would be good if I stay upright this time around.
I close my eyes, thinking again of that awful attempted apology, the moment I’d fainted, and the unfamiliar, shuddery feeling I got when he looked right at me. I think of him walking to my car, after we’d settled the details, the way he’d watched every step I took, and the way he’d scanned my face before I drove off. He made me feel like I was transparent, like he could see straight through every one of my finely polished pretenses. At least this first weekend is a short one, Saturday morning to Sunday noon; after this we’ll be heading to Stanton Valley on Fridays.
My phone pings again, Kit a second time.Why aren’t you answering?!I smile down at the phone, appreciating her concern, however neurotic.I’m fine,I type out.Remember, he checked out. You have all the contact numbers.Once I’d gotten Aiden’s number, and the numbers associated with the camp, I’d given them all to both Greer and Kit. And it was true that Aiden had checked out, though that was probably an understatement—my investigator turned up a squeaky clean record, but he’d also been two grades ahead of Aiden in school, and knew him and the family, had said everyone knew Aiden O’Leary as a stand-up guy, one of the best. There’d only been a few short pages to the report, showing that Aiden had been a licensed paramedic for eight years, that he had one speeding ticket, that he’d lived in Wisconsin, and then Colorado, before moving back here a little oversix months ago.
I take a deep breath, send another text.I’ll be okay. Not nervous.I add a thumbs-up emoji, which is probably suspicious; I don’t think I’ve ever used a thumbs-up emoji, but oh well.
Right then, an older-model, dark green SUV pulls up alongside the curb. I tuck my phone into my back pocket and reach down for my bag, hearing a door slam.Here goes,I think, and arrange what I hope is a smile on my face when I look up at him. He is…not returning the gesture, instead wearing that same forbidding, stern expression he had before. “Why don’t you let me take that,” he says, gesturing to my bag, not really a question, and I’ve got to remind myself:Try to get along. Six weekends will be six thousand times worse if this guy quietly hates youthe whole time.
“Sure, thanks,” I say, handing it over.
Once we’re both strapped in, pulling away from the curb, it becomes painfully clear that we’ve not managed to say any additional words to each other. Aiden is staring straight ahead, way too much focus given the fact that there are very few cars out and about, and as for me—well, I’m pressed so far against the passenger door that I sort of feel like I should offer to buy it dinner. I inhale quietly, gathering courage, and shift so that I’m less awkwardly arranged, then reach down to where I put the white paper bag.
“I brought a couple of donuts,” I say, my voice sounding unnaturally loud in the quiet car. “But I didn’t know if you’d like those, so I brought a muffin, too. And a bagel.”
“I already ate.”
Warm and polite,I think, like a mantra. “Well, maybe you’ll want some later,” I say. “Take it from me, right? You don’t want to get woozy on the road.”
No response.
I set the bag down by my feet, ridiculously disappointed. Both because I wanted that to work, and also I sort of wanted a donut. My stomach, traitorously, growls.
“You caneat,” he says.
“Maybe in a bit.”
I think he might—I don’t know what. Grunt? This drive is going to takeforever.
“So,” I venture again, “your email mentioned that I should—you know. Be myself?” I hate the way I’ve done that, the way I’ve hitched my voice up into a question. I used to counsel first years at my firm about that—Be declarative.It projects confidence.I clear my throat, make another attempt. “But it may be easier if myself—well, if myself knows yourself a little better. For the purposes of this thing we’re doing.”
If myself knows yourself?Less a projection of confidence than of complete idiocy.
“You had your background checkdone?” he asks.
“Yes, but—”
“Then you know the basics.”
Well!
“But if this is going to be convincing, we should know some things that couples know. Favorite foods, TV shows, thatkind of thing.”
