Breaking Free (15 page)

When I reached for the material, he grabbed my hand.  Pulling it up to his mouth, he kissed my fingers one at a time.  “We can’t,” he repeated.

“Why?” I
asked breathlessly, trying to reach his boxers with my other hand.

“I don’t want
you kicked out and I don’t have any condoms.”

“I’m on the pill,” I said
, slipping my hand under the elastic band.

He
took a deep breath and then groaned.  “You’re killing me, Mal.”

I lean
ed forward and planted my lips on his again while I allowed my body to drop onto his lap.  His hands slid down to my ass and pulled me closer.  We both moaned as our bodies reacted to the movement.

“You’re coming around, I see.”
  I tried to lift his shirt over his head.

“Damn.  No.”  He
stopped my progress.  “We can’t do this.  I’m sorry.”  He picked me up and sat me down next to him.

“I need to tell you something,” he said.

“You really are gay?”

He leaned over and passionately explored my mouth with his own.  When he came up for air, he said, “No.”

“You’re a tease.”

“Not usually, no.  There are
other things to think about here.”

“Like what?”

“Like I don’t want to be responsible for you spending your senior year in military school.”

“It might be worth it.”

Even in the darkness, I could see his smirk.  I ran my fingers along his knee and under the fabric of his shorts.

“You’re distracting me,” h
e said, closing his eyes.

“Good.”

“I really need to tell you something.”

I grabbed his hand and put
it high on my thigh.  “Go ahead.”

“I—I
…”  His fingers kneaded my muscles.

“Yes
?”

“God, I’ve never wanted someone this much.”

“I’m all yours.”

He
lay down on the rock and pulled me on top of him.  Our bodies immediately molded together like they were meant to be.

“We need to remove some clothes first,” I said,
sliding my hands beneath me to reach his pants again.

He allowed me to fumble for a few moments before he flipped us over so I was on the roc
k and he was hovering above me.

“This is easier,” I said, reaching for the waistband of his shorts.
  This time, I got them over his hips before he stopped me.

“What?” I groaned.

“I really need to tell you something.”

“What?”
  Since I was getting nowhere with his pants, I moved over to mine and unzipped them.

“I—I’m going to miss you.”

I paused.  That wasn’t what I was expecting.  “We’ll keep in touch, right?”

“
Of course.”

My pants were halfway down my ass and he was looking at my face, not my panties. 
“This isn’t going to happen is it?”

“No.”

I sighed and closed my eyes, willing my mind and body to accept that.  After a few moments, my heart no longer beat out of my chest and my breathing became regular again.  We both zipped up our shorts and then he held me in his lap for the next couple hours as the storm clouds Chris warned us about started rolling in.  I saw a headlamp approach us a few times but it never got too close.  That made me think Chris was keeping an eye on us.  It probably was a good thing nothing more happened between me and JC or I would have received a one-way ticket to military school.

There wasn’t much talking while we sat there holding each other
.  I’m not sure either of us knew what to say.  The next day was going to suck.  There was no way around it.

Eventually, Chris
came all the way to the rocky ledge and told us we had ten minutes until lights out.  JC walked me to my tent and then gave me another kiss.  “Goodnight, Mal.”

Chris watched, but didn’t say anything as I entered my tent and JC went to Neeky’s.

Chapter 24
:  August 25

“
you said
you didn’t
have those sorts of feelings for him,” Marta says, back to knitting.  I had given her the high-level review of what happened rather than the play-by-play.

“
That was the only time something like that happened.  I think it was the result of me cutting him.  I was never drawn to him in that way before then.”

“Your feelings were a result of cutting him?”

I nod.

“But I thought you said
you didn’t feel the normal rush while cutting.  It wasn’t until he held your hand that you felt something.”

“
It was weird,” I admit.

She shakes her head and her lips curl into the faintest smile. 
“Do you want to know what I think?”

“Not if you’re going to tell me I’m a terrible person for hurting him.”

“Of course not, cariño.  He asked you to do it.”  She drops her knitting needles and takes my hand in both of hers.  “I think what you felt had nothing to do with cutting.”

I
tilt my head and stare at her, not quite sure what she’s trying to say.

“I think, in that moment
and the rest of the night, you felt something more than friendship for him.  I think you loved him.”

I roll my eyes and snicker at her comment.

“You can laugh, but hear me out on this.  Before any of this started, let’s say a year ago, would you have sat perfectly still while someone cut your arm?”

“I—I don’t know.  Maybe if
it was Jenna.  Someone I trusted.”

“
Yes.  Trust.  He was showing you that he had complete and utter trust in you.”

“Maybe he just wanted to see if it felt good.”

“Or try to better understand you.”

“What’s any of this have to do with love?”

“How many times in your life has someone showed complete and utter trust in you and cared enough about you to want to understand what you were thinking and feeling?”

I open my mouth, ready to give her a quick answer, but no sound comes out.  We both know the answer
so there’s no need to speak.

“He wanted to see you.  The whole you.  The good, the bad, and the ugly, and let you know that he accepted you.  Every last bit of you.”

My mind tries to process her words.  He didn’t act any different towards me after I cut him. He really did accept me.  The real me.

“Of course,
that’s just my humble opinion,” Marta says.

“Omi
god,” I whisper slowly.  Could my nanny be right?  Could she see something that I was blind to?  Something that I’ve never experienced before.

I cover my mouth with
my hand, too stunned to speak.

“What are you thinking?” Marta asks
after a few moments.

I shake my head as the
words form in my mouth.  She might be right.  “I might love him.  Loved him,” I whisper.  I’m staring straight ahead at the fireplace.  I can’t believe I didn’t see that before.

“
We need to find this boy so you can tell him how you feel.”

“W—we can’t,” I mumble,
cradling my head in my hands.

“Why not?”

“He’s dead.”  I killed everyone I loved.  First Jenna and then JC.

“Dead?!” she exclaims with concern.  “Where’d you hear that?”

“Sheila …”  I try to remember exactly what happened, but it’s a bit of a blur.  The storm had subsided, but even without the thunder and wind it was loud and chaotic.  People yelling, the helicopter arriving, EMTs preparing.  Sheila tried pushing me into the car, but I resisted.  I had to see what happened.  She never gave me that chance.

“What did she say?” Marta asks, her brow furrowing in concern.

“She …” I pause because her words are what broke me.  They’re what sent me to the padded room for a week.  As much as I want to feel something while I’m on these drugs, remembering that night could be pushing my luck.

“Go on
.”

With a big gulp, I mumble
, “She told me they found his body in the river.”

Marta sighs and shakes her head.  “Dios mio. 
Tell me exactly what happened.”

Chapter 25
:  August 2 (Day 15)

After JC kissed me
goodnight, I had a hard time falling asleep.  It was probably a combination of the kiss and the sadness around his impending departure.  Well after midnight, I finally started to drift off, only to be immediately reawakened by a clap of thunder.  Within seconds, I heard the pitter patter of raindrops.

It was the first time it had
rained during our trip and I became anxious, wondering if my tent would leak.  I sat up and turned on the headlamp lying next to me.

“You okay, Mal?”  I hear
d JC’s whisper from the next tent over.

“Yes.  Just making sure I won’t get wet.”
  I crawled on my knees around the perimeter and once I was satisfied it wasn’t leaking, I climbed back into my sleeping bag and turned off the light.

“Goodnight.”

“Goodnight.”

I smiled and figured
he had been lying awake all night like me.  Just as I was thinking about inviting him over to finish what we had started earlier, lightning flashed through the sky and was immediately followed by a rush of rolling thunder.  The rain picked up and wind whipped through the trees, howling in the night.

I pulled my sleeping bag over my head and hummed, trying to drown out
the noise.

It was no use, though.  A
fter another two sparks of light and thunderous roars, the rain itself became deafening and unrelenting as it beat the top and sides of my tent.  So much for a small storm.  Chris really needed to find a better weatherman.

I continued humming, hoping that would calm
me down, but I was distracted when the hair on my entire body stood on end.  I unzipped my sleeping bag to turn on the light, but was hit by a chemical smell.  Then it happened.  Blinding light and a sudden crash that made me scream.  It was followed by the slow, creaking sound of wood splitting.  I sat up and hugged my arms around my chest as the creaking grew louder.

With one final crack and a whoosh of air, I felt something fall outside.  The ground rumbled when it hit, shaking my bones and nerves. 
At almost the exact same time, I heard a shriek.

I scurried to my door,
unzipped it, and stuck my head out, trying to see what happened, but it was pitch black.  Another scream.

A few feet away, a light turned
on and quickly approached me.

“Are you okay?” JC
yelled above the clamor of the rain.

I nodded, wiping my soaked bangs out of my face.

JC ran past me towards the next tent.  When I turned in that direction, I finally saw what happened in the glow of his headlamp.  A massive tree was lying on its side, covering Chris’ tent, which was in a heap on the ground.

I rushed after him and we squatted
near the tree.

“Chris?!” JC yelled, squinting to keep the rain out of his eyes.
  I patted the tent, trying to feel her beneath the fabric.

“Chris!”
  He climbed on top of the tent and started trying to find her, too.

“Help
…”  Her voice was weak, but there.

“We’re here!” I yelled
, moving in the right direction, but slipping on the wet material.  My knee slammed into something hard.

“Chris?”

“Help …”

“JC, she’s right here,” I said, pulling the fabric up and tr
ying to tear it with my hands.

“You won’t be able to rip that.  We need to cut it.  Do you have a knife?”

I ran my hands through my dripping wet hair, trying to get it out of my face. “Are you trying to be funny?!”

“
See if the others have one!  Or try to get the hatchet out of the supply container!”

I stood up and started rushing back towards my tent, but ran into Neeky and Mia.  Neither of them had a knife so I picked up my he
adlamp and headed towards Bling since I knew the supply container would be locked.  When I unzipped his door, I found him inside, sitting in the corner.

“Do you have a knife?”
I asked, dripping water on the floor of his tent.

“Why?”

“Chris is stuck.  She’s hurt.” I started eyeing the contents of his tent.  His backpack, fully packed, was in the corner and his sleeping bag was rolled up and in the stuff sack.  It’s like he was getting ready to leave hours before he was supposed to.

“So?”

“We need to help her!”

“
Ain’t my biz.”  He leaned back on his elbows like he didn’t have a care in the world.

“
Do you have a knife or not?!”

“Maybe.”

“Give it to me!”

Just then, Neeky joined us, adding another puddle of water.
  “What’s going on?”

“He won’t give me his knife.”

“Give us the knife, man.  She’s hurt bad.”

“Like I
says, ain’t my biz.”

Neeky rushed in and tackled him.  I couldn’t believe it. 
He never seemed like the aggressive type.

“Where is it?”
he asked, sitting on his chest.

I crawled in next to them and reached my hands up Bling’s pants, feeling along his ankle. 
He tried to kick me, but I stayed far enough away to avoid the brunt of it.  The first leg was a bust, but I got lucky on the second one.  I moved closer so I could roll up his pant leg and he landed his foot right in my shoulder.

“Don’t be a dick!” I yelled,
reaching for his leg again.  I followed Neeky’s lead and sat on it so he couldn’t kick me anymore.  Once I did, I was able to roll up his pants and pull the knife from its holster.

I ran back to JC and handed
it to him. He sliced it through the fabric and we got our first glimpse of Chris.  Her face was pale and contorted in pain.

“What hurts?” I asked, as JC continued removing the
material from around her.

“Leg,” she whispered, closing her eyes against the rain pelting down on us.  I ran back to my tent and grabbed
a poncho to hold over her face.  By the time I returned, JC had the tent removed as much as possible and I saw the problem.  Chris’ right leg was stuck under the tree.  Probably crushed.  There was also a pool of blood collecting on the floor beneath her, growing a lighter and lighter pink as it mixed with rain.

“We need help,” I said.

“Where’s the phone?” JC asked, searching through Chris’ belongings.

“Tent pocket.  Other side,” she whispered.

JC climbed over the tree, but returned within seconds.  “Anything under there is destroyed.”

He
stood there, soaking wet, looking between me and Chris who was even paler than she had been a few minutes ago.  “You need to go to the Lodge and get help,” he finally said as Mia and Neeky joined us.  Not surprisingly, Bling was absent.

“
The new counselor will be here in the morning,” Mia said, spitting water out with every word.

We all looked at Chris.  With shallow breathing and blood still draining from her leg, morning would be too late.

“You want me to go?” I asked.

“You and Mia. 
You two are the best with directions.  Plus me, Neeky, and Bling need to try and move the tree.”

“You can’t be alone
with Bling,” I said, kneeling down and splashing mud onto the tent.

“He’s not g
oing to try anything in the middle of the storm with Chris hurt.  How far are we from the Lodge?” he asked her.

“Six
miles.”

He pulled a map and pen out of Chris’ bag and then huddled next to me and Chris under the poncho.  “Where are we?” he asked, holding the map next to her face.

She barely glanced at it before pointing to a spot along a trail.  “Take the trail southeast for a mile and a half.  You’ll intersect a trail with yellow blazes.  Follow that east for three miles then switch over to the blue blazes, north.  It’s right there,” she said, pointing to an area on the map.

I marked the spot with an X and then
scribbled her directions on the edge of the map, not quite believing that Mia and I were going to do this on our own in the middle of the night during a storm.  That plan had disaster written all over it.

“You need a radio,”
Neeky said.  He tugged on Chris’ belt until a keychain fell off and then ran to the storage container.  After unlocking it, he flipped the lid open and rummaged through the contents, finally coming up victorious.

While he did that, I
watched Mia.  She looked even more scared than I felt but agreed we had to give it a try.  None of us wanted Chris to die.

After organizing Chris’ daypack with energy bars, water, a compass,
some rope, extra flashlights and some dry clothes, Mia and I donned our ponchos and headlamps.  She hugged Neeky and JC kissed me on the top of my head.  We both hugged Chris the best we could with her lying on the ground and then took off on a fast pace.  We were silent.  It was no use talking—we couldn’t hear each other over the rain and wind, anyway.

I kept the radio in my pocket and checked in with the guys periodically.  By the time we reached the next trail, they had
freed Chris from the tree, but it sounded like things didn’t go as smoothly as they wanted.  Something about the tree not moving and her leg getting even more messed up as they pulled her free.  At least she was still alive.

After another hour of hiking, the rain and wind started to let up a little.  It was still a downpour, bu
t it was coming straight down instead of hitting us from the side.  Mia sped up to walk beside me.

“You doing okay?” she asked.

“Yes, why?”

She shrugged.  “You don’t seem
to handle silence very well.”

She was right.  I did terrible
with silence.  I must have been so preoccupied with what we were doing that I didn’t even allow my mind to wander to my own problems.  “I’m good.”

“Do
you want to contact them again?”

I pulled the radio from my pocket and called them.  “JC?  Neeky?”

We were met by silence, so I tried once more, but had the same result.

“That’s weird,” Mia said.  “I hope everything’s okay.”

“I’ll try again in a couple minutes.”

It ended up being longer than a couple minutes because we reached a creek that had flooded.  With the strong current, it was going to be treacherous
to cross.  I stepped in first, but was shocked by how deep it was.  Right at the bank, the water was up to my chest, which meant the middle would probably be way over our heads and we’d end up drifting downstream, helpless against the current.  I had done that before and didn’t want to repeat it.

I climbed back
out and we decided to explore other areas of the creek, farther from the trail.  We knew we were wasting time, but we’d be no help to anyone if we got hurt.  After about twenty minutes, we finally found a narrower area where large boulders jutted out of the water, making a sort of hopscotch game for us.  I went first and waited for Mia to join me on each boulder.  It took over ten minutes, but we made it safely to the other side.

As soon as we were back on the trail, I tried the radio again.
“JC?  Neeky?”

There was static and then Neeky’s voice, but it kept breaking up.  “We
… hike … Bling.”

“What?” I asked.

There was more static, then, “Accident …”

Mia grabbed the radio from my hands.
“What happened?!  Are you okay?”

“Bling
… JC …”

My
heart stopped.  I knew we shouldn’t have left them alone.  Would Bling really try something during such an awful situation?  Or maybe JC started it.  He hated Bling and wanted to hurt him earlier in the day.  Maybe he had his chance once Chris was out of the picture.

“What happened?” Mia
repeated.

“Help
… oh, God … JC!”

That was the last we heard from
them.  Mia banged the radio against her hand, pushed the buttons, and turned it on and off, but nothing stopped the constant static.

“I’m sure he’s fine,”
she said wrapping her arm around my waist.

I nodded and we started walking again, Mia practically holding me up.
  I began imagining what could have happened.  I pictured Bling stabbing JC.  Or throwing the hatchet into his back.

“
So, Prince Jalen.  He’s pretty badass for a little kid, right?” Mia asked, trying to distract me.

Despite my fear, I smiled at her comment.  “
You could say that.”

“Tell me one of his stories.”

The rest of the way, Mia and I took turns making up Prince Jalen stories, each more outrageous than the previous.  Like always, the stories kept me from thinking about a more dangerous topic, but this time, that topic revolved around JC, not Jenna.