Not to mention she must be hurting from the scrapes on her legs and the purple bruise on her upper thigh.
“Have you been drinking enough water?” Trey chimes in. “When’s the last time you ate?”
“Um,” she says. “Yesterday, I think? Maybe at lunch?”
Zoe hasn’t eaten sinceyesterday? No wonder she seems checked out.
“Here,” Trey says, offering his canteen. “Drink this.”
She takes a tentative sip.
“You need some food, too,” I say, “as long as you’re not nauseated. Are you nauseated?”
Zoe shakes her head and takes another sip from the canteen. Silas offers her some berries he foraged today—thimbleberries, non-poisonous—and Parker manages to get her to eat a protein bar. She perks up considerably after that.
An hour later, once the guys have moved Zoe’s tent right next to mine so I can keep an eye on her overnight and give a fresh dose of ibuprofen if she needs it, my thoughts shift back to Thorn.
Has he made it to Matteo and Joshua yet? For the first time, it occurs to me how hard it must have been for him to head out today. Not just because he was afraid to leave us alone—but because he and Matteo weren’t on good termsbeforeall the drama that went down.
Matteo is lucky to have a friend like Thorn…iffriendis even still the right word.
I really hope Thorn is okay.
Zoe shifts in her tent, turning to face me. The guys positioned us so we could leave our doors unzipped and see straight into each other’s tents; she’s lying on her side, tucked into her sleeping bag, one arm curled up underneath her like a pillow.
“You’re so good at this,” she says sleepily.
My eyebrows raise. “Good…at what?”
Sitting in a tent, writing in my journal until she falls asleep? Being a silent neighbor so I don’t disturb her?
“This,” she says. “Camping. Hiking. Knowing what to do to help people. All of it.”
I’m so stunned I can’t quite process her words.
Not even Abby would say I’m good at camping and hiking with a straight face, and she knows me better than anyone else on the planet—though it occurs to me that Abby hasn’t lived this experience with me like Zoe has.
Still, my instinct is to deflect.
“I don’t know about that,” I say. “I’ve never done this before—and I’ve missed my bed and the air conditioning and, like,somany other things, from the moment we left.”
“Really?” she says. “I never would have guessed you hadn’t done this before.”
I’m speechless.
My clothes are all wrong. My shoes are all wrong. I had a panic attack on the side of a cliff.
But I guess I must have done something right if she had no idea how uncomfortable and out of my element I’ve felt at so many points along the way.
“Yeah, no,” I say. “I got broken up with for being ‘too high-maintenance’?”—I exaggerate my air quotes—“so I signed up for this to prove a point. My ex told me to my face that he thought I’ddie. That I should vlog about it for ‘great entertainment’ because it’s such a joke that someone like me would sign up for something like this.” I glance down at my hands, at my mismatched nails that remind me of Thorn. “I thought if I just did a lot of research, I’d be good to go, but it’s beensomuch harder than I thought.”
“You never complain, though,” she says.
I consider it. “Not out loud, maybe?”
She laughs, but then her smile fades. “Sorry about your ex, Sadie. Sounds like you’re better off without him.”
“Thanks,” I say. “I definitely am—but sometimes his words still get under my skin.” I swallow. “He made it sound like some sort of personality flaw for me to be…the way I am. Overprepared, particular. All of that.”
