Summer of Secrets

Guardian Angel

Jaelyn

After swimming and meeting up with Isabell for lunch, Isabell persuades me into changing my clothes for the hike. She thinks that skinny jeans are inacceptable for climbing up mountains. 

Once fashioned in a pair of white shorts, and still wearing my purple tank, I have Isabell braid my hair into one long braid. She does a fishtail, and I can feel it, heavy against the middle of my back.

When the bell rings we head to the field armed with filled water bottles and the pack of gummy bears that I had bought the previous day at the gas station. I am kind of excited for the hike because those that make it to the top will get to have a sunset dinner. I see Eric carrying a gigantic basket, which I can assume must have the food. I wonder how he will carry it up the mountain, and as I'm thinking this he catches my eye, but instead of waving or coming over he blushes, and looks away. 

"It looks like he still hasn't gotten over the the dick revealing escapade." Isabell says with a giggle. 

"Well at least he wont bother us for a while." I say.

"You mean bother you." she says with a smile. "You're all he sees, sweety."

"Stop it!" I say, booty bumping her, but unable to contain some laughter as I think about that whole pantsing fiasco.

She just giggles, and everyone waiting for the hike looks at the both of us laughing, probably wishing that they could know what might be so funny, and it makes us laugh even harder.

Once in the forest I feel like we are in a whole new world. Like we have left civilization and are now in Wonderland. When will the rabbit jump out to tell me he's late? We can hear birds chirping in the trees above us. And sometimes the glimpse of a deer running into the abyss. The farther the climb the steeper the incline, and the harder the hike becomes. Isabell is chatting away unaffected by the hike, probably having to do with the fact that she grew up in this state, and doing outdoor things like this are a regular.

Wanting to get my mind off the burning of my legs, the hot severity of the sun overhead, and the sweat trickling down my back, I ask Isabell if we can sing. 

"Yah!" she says excitedly, whipping out her Ipod.

"Okay so let me find something that we both know...hmmm, do you listen to Panic at the Disco?" she asks.

"Um, no." I say.

"Okay how about My Chemical Romance?"

"Nope."

"Fall out Boy?" she asks, now looking perturbed.

I shake my head no, "How about Rihanna?" I say.

She smiles, "I don't have it on here..." she says shaking her Ipod.

"...but I know enough of the lyrics to that one about the only girl in the world from my little sister playing it all the time!"

"Okay." I say looking at her with a mischievous grin as I start to sing...loudly. 

"I want you to love me, like I'm a hot ride. Hold me like a pillow..."

The kids around us slow down and stare once we start. But soon we get most of them to join in. And when that songs done, we change to another, and then another. 

I notice Nikolai at the front of the group near Eric. He has earphones on, and earlier when he passed me when we first started hiking I could hear him listening to the loud screaming voices of some heavy metal rock band. Seeing him now reminds me of his sudden appearance last night in the water. For some reason he always is around when I'm falling apart, or might need help. I wonder if we'll ever have a normal conversation.

Finally after hours of hiking, and singing till our voices are hoarse, we reach the top of the Mountain. Its not exactly the tippy-top, but its the farthest that hikers are allowed to go. People around me start dropping like flies onto the mountains rocky exterior, in complete exhaustion.

Isabell who finally started showing fatigue at around our third hour of hiking lays sprawled out on the ground, her hands covering her face. I don't sit down to rest like everyone else because I have a dilemma. 

"Isabell?" I say.

"Yah?"

"Remember when I said I had to use the bathroom a couple hours ago...but I wouldn't stop because I didn't want to make the whole group wait for me as I peed?" 

"Umm-hmmm.", she says nodding her head.

"Well if I don't go to the bathroom in the next 2.4 seconds I'm going to piss my pants!" I frantically whisper down to her.

She laughs like its the most hysterical thing ever, but I think that it might just be symptoms of to much sun exposure. She points towards the woods below,

"Your going to have to go in there and find a bush." She say through hiccups of laughter.

"Come with me?" I ask.

"I'm sorry love, but I cannot move, let alone make it down there.", she says stiffling a yawn.

I sigh, setting my pack and water bottle down onto her stomach. For a second I think that I should probably let Eric or Ryan know where I am going but then I see that they are preoccupied with setting up the picnic, and I know that if I tried walking all the way to them and back I would definitely have an accident. 

Quickly, but carefully, I start making my decent down the rocky hill towards the forest. Once under the shade and hidden from view from the campers above, I hurriedly look around for some type of peeing appropriate area. The floor is swampy so I have to be careful as I make my way towards a small bushel-like tree. As speedily as I can, I unbutton my shorts squatting, finally able to release all the built up pressure that had been burdening my bladder. When I am emptied, and beginning to put my shorts back on I start to notice the hoards of blood thirsty mosquito's flying around me. I then notice that I have already been bitten multiple times.

Itchy, and bothered, I start making my way out of the forest. But as I am swatting away some bugs, I lose track of my footing, getting my right foot submerged in a pit of quicksand-like mud.

"Oh my God!" I whisper.

My shoe is completely engulfed, and as I try to pull my foot out nothing happens; the shoe doesn't move an inch. Freaking out now, while still being eaten alive,  I try sliding my foot out from the immobilized shoe. I am successful at doing so, but then I have no place to put my sock covered foot on this mucky mud covered forest floor. I notice a patch of grass a little ways away so I begin to hop on one foot towards it. But then as I am doing this, my left foot suddenly slides out from under me on a patch of muddy water, and I go flailing onto the nasty wet ground. I am now almost close to tears. My legs are covered in mud, my favorite white shorts are totally ruined, and mud is on my hands, in my nails, and splattered on my face. I feel to humiliated to start crawling out to the others like this, so instead I sit with my head in my hands hoping that Isabell will soon come to the rescue when she notices my absence.

Time passes, and from my watch I can tell that its been almost an hour. The sky overhead is slowly getting darker, and if I listen intently I can hear the laughing, and chattering voices of the other campers. Alone and bedraggled I can't stop the tears that start dripping from my eyes. I try wiping my nose with my arm, but its covered in dry crusted mud...and the tears come harder. Why did I ever have to come to this fucking camp?  I think. I hope my parents feel remorseful when they are told that there daughter was found dead in a Vermont forest, after being sucked dry by mosquitoes.

Exhausted, and still bawling I just lay down, not caring for my hair or the rest of my body.

And then I hear it...a deep chuckle.

My eyes fly open as I look up seeing a persons face looming above me. But even through the blurriness of tears, I can tell from the build, and manly aroma; a mix of sweat and cologne, that its Nikolai. 

"What the hell do you think you are doing?" he says.

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