Be Not Far from Me(6)
“Bears,” Cory repeats his brother. “Shit, yes, there’s bears. That’s what got Davey Beet, right?”
“You shut the fuck up.”
There’s a lot of pissed in my voice, and I don’t know how much of it is because of Duke and Natalie, and how much of it is for Davey Beet, but I’m pointing my beer at Cory with two fingers extended, which is pretty much how you start a fight around here.
“Dude, chill,” Cory says, hands in the air. “All I said was—”
“She knew him,” Duke says. “So shut the fuck up.”
“Oh . . .” Cory looks back at me, belated understanding dawning. “Sorry.”
I don’t respond, aware only that even though Duke backed me up, the distance between us just got wider at the mention of Davey Beet. I get up without saying anything, well aware that if I’m out here much longer somebody is going to get slapped. I’ve built a pyramid of beer cans beside my chair that topples over as I leave the fire ring, what was inside them now sloshing in my belly. At some point Jason and Kavita have disappeared, something that normally would’ve amused me, but right now I’m not finding much funny.
I unzip the tent that Duke and I have taken with us on too many trips to count, sometimes forgoing the canvas to have the stars look down on us. Tonight, I’m in it alone, the unnerving cluster of high-pitched laughter following me as I slip down to the ground, head cradled in my arms.
“What’s the story there, bro?” I hear Cory ask Duke. “Was she banging him?”
“Really? You’re going to ask her boyfriend that?” Meredith says, and I know she’s staring down Natalie when she says boyfriend.
The warm rush of affection I feel is quickly replaced by cold, like someone dropped an ice cube down my throat, when Duke says, “Naw, man. Nothing like that. She just fucking idolizes him.”
And then I hear him crush his beer can.
I don’t know if I pass out or what, but there’s a fair amount of drool on the side of my face when someone crashes beside me. I wipe it away, hoping I’m not too drunk to reclaim my boyfriend’s affections when I roll over to discover it’s Stephanie sprawled out beside me.
“Wrong tent,” I tell her, but she only groans in response.
“Hey.” I give her an elbow, and she slaps at my arm. The next poke gets zero response, so I know she’s out cold and there’s no point trying to move her. Besides, all the beer that was in my stomach has migrated south, and my bladder is on the verge of bursting.
I slip out of the tent, still drunk as hell but awake enough to zip it behind me so that Stephanie doesn’t freeze. It’s spring, and away from the fire the night air has a bite to it that she won’t welcome. If she can even feel it, that is.
A light breeze blows smoke in my eyes, the fire now down to embers and gray ashes, no one crouching near it for warmth any longer. I hear voices up toward the ridge, a mix of male and female, and assume that the others must have wandered there out from under the canopy to look at the stars.
More than once in my life I’ve wished that I were a boy, and every one of those times was when I had to take a piss outdoors. There’s no graceful way to go about it when you’re a girl. And right now I’m not at my most agile, so if I don’t want to smell like urine tomorrow I’m going to have to take everything below the waist off.
I start with my shoes, which apparently I passed out wearing, then strip off my socks. Having wet socks is the absolute worst, and if they’re soaked in your own piss that makes things about a thousand times more terrible. I’ve accidentally peed on my socks enough to know, and though Dad could help me with just about everything in life, that particular problem always left him baffled.
I’m far enough from the tents that I don’t think anyone is going to be able to hear me, so I strip down to my bare ass and crouch. Sure enough, I fall right over, enough beer still in my veins instead of my bladder to make me unsteady. I push myself back up and do what I came out here for, hoping I really did go far enough away that no one can hear because damn.
I’m zipping up my jeans when I hear something that’s not natural. Or, actually it is. It’s the most natural sound in the world, one you can’t hold back no matter how tight you close your throat, the guttural growl of physical pleasure leaking out so that the whole world knows you just had a good time.
I know that noise. And I know exactly who made it because I’m used to hearing it in my own ear, Duke’s body pressed tight to mine. I’m drunk enough that at first it’s a dead kind of feeling as I come up on them. Sticks snap under my feet, and I make no attempt to be quiet, since they didn’t either.
Duke is pulling his pants up over his ass, bare-chested, and Natalie’s shorts are still around her ankles as she sits up, pulling leaves out of her hair.
“What the fuck?” I say.
It’s a dumb-ass question. Nobody needs to tell me what was going on, and there aren’t any words to take it back or fix it. So Duke and I just stare at each other for a beat, Natalie still finger-combing her hair like it’s not her problem.
And I guess it isn’t, really. She’s not the person I want to punch, not the person who promised me good things and honest words. Not the person who told me we’d get out of here together, load his truck up and just go. That wasn’t her; that was him.